You're a US police officer, what are you thinking about going back to the East for?

Chapter 227 Preparing to Turn Raytheon's Security Chief Against Him (8k)

Seattle, server maintenance room in an old FBI data center.

At two o'clock in the morning, the exhaust fan emitted a monotonous and hypnotic hum.

Justin crumpled the empty can of Sugar-Free Monster in his hand and casually tossed it into the trash can at his feet.

He pushed up his thick-rimmed black glasses, his bloodshot eyes fixed on the three vertical screens in front of him.

As a senior operations engineer of Chinese descent employed by the FBI's Seattle field office's outsourced IT company, Justin's daily work involves patching up this federal low-level database, which is older than his grandfather.

Just two minutes earlier, in the World of Warcraft US client that was running on his right secondary screen, a seemingly insignificant guild recruitment message suddenly popped up in the private chat channel.

It was a string of gibberish mixed with special symbols and abbreviations for equipment attributes. To the average player, it just looked like a script studio was privately messaging GG to sell gold.

But after being translated using Justin's specific key, this message became an instruction from across the ocean.

The instructions were brief: Before dawn, find out the background of Victor, the former FBI agent and current security chief at Raytheon.

Justin didn't think about who wanted the information, nor did he ask why; these were not matters for an outside intelligence agent like him.

He rubbed his face and placed his fingers on the mechanical keyboard.

Of course, hacking the FBI's firewall was beyond his capabilities; he wasn't some genius and didn't want to risk his life. But as an operations and maintenance personnel with low-level maintenance privileges, he didn't need to resort to such brute force.

Washington politicians talk about national security every day on Capitol Hill, but in practice, Commissioner Smith outsourced almost all the underlying maintenance of the core databases of federal agencies to cheap third-party IT companies in order to cut budgets and reduce costs.

Under the long-term damage of the "happy education" in the United States, the local white and black populations simply cannot fill the positions of programmers that require normal logical thinking. These outsourced IT companies are filled with various Asians, and even Chinese.

Justin is a Chinese American with a U.S. green card.

He glanced at the time in the bottom right corner of the screen: 2:14:50 AM.

At this time every day, this dilapidated server performs a two-minute routine defragmentation and security protocol restart.

During this brief window, all internal security audits and behavior tracking procedures are physically suspended, similar to a laptop going into hibernation mode.

It was exactly 2:15.

The instant the system protocol refresh indicator light turned yellow, Justin's ten fingers blurred across the keyboard.

He skillfully bypassed the dormant firewall and, through a redundant code channel he had laid six months earlier, plunged directly into the FBI's internal personnel archives and internal affairs review database.

A search box pops up. Enter: Victor, former counterintelligence agent.

Press Enter.

Dozens of encrypted document packages popped up on the screen instantly.

Without hesitation, Justin downloaded everything and quickly decrypted and opened Victor's psychological evaluation report and final resignation review file in the background.

Since the download would take several tens of seconds, he quickly scanned the top-secret complaint records marked in red to confirm the value of the intelligence.

As he watched, Justin's lips twitched, and he almost burst out laughing.

This now high-ranking security chief at Raytheon didn't make a respectable job change for the high salary of a military-industrial complex; he was let go by the FBI's internal affairs department.

Records show that about five years ago, the FBI was engaged in a fanatical political campaign to hunt down spies.

Victor met a Chinese woman by chance at an ordinary party, and the two had a brief, casual affair after drinking.

Because he couldn't control his lustful desires, Victor was immediately identified as the prime suspect by the internal investigation department.

The FBI's Internal Affairs Department suspected that he had been recruited by the East and subjected him to eight months of comprehensive wiretapping, surveillance, financial audits, and even intensive polygraph interrogation.

The investigation was thorough, even uncovering the incident where the Ministry of Internal Affairs had spied on female students showering at Victor Elementary School, but they still couldn't find a single piece of substantial evidence of espionage.

He simply slept with a woman.

The higher-ups were afraid of repeating the mistakes of the "Li Moumou case" and taking Victor to court without solid evidence. This shrewd detective would definitely contact a lawyer he knew.

Then, after agreeing to pay the bulk of the compensation to the suesters, they turned around and took the FBI to federal court as well, demanding millions or even tens of millions of dollars in exorbitant compensation for racial discrimination and human rights violations.

To avoid a hefty fine that could have cost the director his job, the FBI leadership opted to settle the matter quietly.

They gave Viktor a small sum of money as hush money, claiming that "long-term high-pressure work has led to an unstable mental state, making him unsuitable to continue performing field missions," and through a combination of coaxing and deception, they quietly persuaded him to quit.

This is not the most outrageous.

What finally broke Justin was a follow-up record at the end of the file.

This agent, who had been treated like a thief by the FBI for eight months and was eventually stripped of his federal law enforcement powers and kicked out, actually went and registered his marriage with that Chinese woman in a fit of anger the month after he left his post.

"Seriously??"

Justin grumbled as the countdown in the bottom right corner of the screen had jumped to the last ten seconds.

The download progress bar has reached 100%.

Justin flicked his wrist, cleanly severing the data connection channel, and casually tossed a bunch of meaningless redundant data over the access path, erasing all traces of his less than two-minute intrusion.

At 2:17 PM, the security protocol was reactivated, and the server indicator light returned to its original dark blue color. Everything was as if nothing had happened.

Justin leaned back in the ergonomic chair and let out a long sigh.

He looked at the compressed file that had already been packaged in the center of the screen and pressed the Enter key without hesitation.

The file, following the hidden routing path of the East, disappeared silently into the massive torrent of data and was passed on to his superior.

Justin didn't know exactly who urgently needed this intelligence tonight, but he knew very well that Thor's security chief was probably in big trouble tomorrow.

The next morning.

-

Lyon sat in the driver's seat of the Ford Explorer, wearing a gray waterproof jacket, with a black baseball cap on the passenger seat next to him.

He glanced at his watch; there were less than forty minutes left before his scheduled meeting with Victor, the security chief at Raytheon.

Just as he was about to start the car, an old cell phone lying in the glove compartment suddenly started vibrating.

This was a spare phone he had found a few days earlier on a homeless man who had died in a dark alley.

Since the number belonged to a homeless man, it was completely untraceable and had no connection to his real identity or bank account.

In addition to giving the phone number to Ray, he also asked Alex to register the number as an emergency backup contact method in the Dead Mail box and send it to the other side of the ocean.

Lyon frowned slightly and picked up his phone.

A long text message from an unknown number lit up on the screen.

Since this broken phone didn't have any advanced decryption software, the sender clearly used a primitive but effective method to circumvent the review process.

The entire text message did not use any sensitive words. Instead, it was composed of a large number of Chinese and English characters split, misaligned, and even pinyin and Chinglish. 99.9% of people in the United States would only think it was a bunch of gibberish.

But Lyon is now fluent in both Chinese and English. He only glanced at the fragmented characters twice, and his brain automatically pieced them together into coherent sentences.

This is an urgent intelligence report from the Eastern Intelligence Headquarters.

The Dead Mailbox couldn't keep up with the conversation between Leon and Agent Thor, and Alex, that conspicuous fat man, had already entered a period of silent dormancy as instructed.

To ensure that Lyon would not suffer any losses in the upcoming coffee shop meeting, the Eastern executives decisively activated this one-way emergency communication line, delivering the information to him before the meeting.

Leon leaned back in his chair, his deep, steel-gray eyes scanning the text on the screen rapidly.

The first half of the message concisely exposed the true nature of that senior executive at Raytheon.

In addition to Victor's dark history of being asked to leave the FBI, Dongfang also urgently confirmed the identity of the Chinese woman with whom he had a relationship.

That woman wasn't some top-tier agent lurking in the East at all; she was just an art graduate who ran an independent gallery of less than three square meters in Chinatown.

Her daily routine consists of nothing more than the art gallery and the supermarket, and has absolutely nothing to do with any secrets.

The FBI bureaucracy simply labeled her a spy, a "swallow," based solely on her skin color and bloodline.

Continuing on, the latter half of the brief message takes a turn, transforming into a professional psychological profile and strategic analysis provided by the think tank of the Eastern Intelligence Headquarters.

The intelligence clearly indicates that, based on Victor's previous experience with the FBI, the FBI's psychological assessment of him, and his deliberate marriage to this Chinese woman after being persuaded to leave the company, this is likely the case.

He earns a million-dollar annual salary from Raytheon, but deep down he is definitely not an honest person loyal to capital, much less a pure American patriot.

His current actions are likely driven more by the professional inertia of doing things for money.

Therefore, if he encounters significant difficulties in finding Old Bill, he will most likely be inclined to give up and do something half-hearted.

He would delay progress and shift blame to Raytheon's top management, and even, when he was sure he couldn't find the person, he would fabricate a report that old Bill had been used by corporate spies from another company and died on the street, in order to appease Raytheon's top management.

In the ensuing meeting, the profilers from the Eastern leadership advised Lyon to go with the flow and direct Victor's investigation toward the most chaotic, filthy, and even police-restricted homeless encampments and gang areas in the West Side.

This approach not only greatly increases Victor's workload in conducting field visits, but also instills a strong sense of dread in him.

More importantly, once Victor's energy was drawn into those chaotic neighborhoods, it became difficult for him to go back and re-examine the old apartment where Leon had lived, and it was almost impossible for him to suspect that the information Leon provided was deliberately misleading him.

The last line of the message was simple: "Delete your SIM card and replace your device after reading this message."

After reading the last word, Lyon pried open the back cover of the phone, pulled out the SIM card, snapped it in two with two fingers, and casually threw it into the sewer grate outside the car window.

As for the broken phone, he threw it back into the storage compartment.

Leon put his hands back on the steering wheel, his eyes watching the windshield wipers swing back and forth, his mind rapidly processing the information he had just received.

He suddenly discovered a blind spot mentioned in the intelligence report.

The intelligence report stated that after Victor was dismissed by the FBI on the trumped-up charge of "possibly being recruited by a Chinese person," he went and registered his marriage with the Chinese woman in the second month after leaving the company, out of a rebellious spirit.

Lyon's eyes narrowed slightly.

This guy is a bit rebellious; he has a rebellious streak.

The FBI suspected him of being a spy and gave him a hard time, but he promptly went and married the Chinese woman.

What if—if Raytheon's top management, because of the loss of Bill's hard drive data, suspects Victor of taking bribes, protecting a corporate spy, or even suspects him of being the traitorous corporate spy—

Could this guy, after being wronged by capitalists again, really turn around and become a spy in a fit of anger?

Leon originally only planned to go to Blue Mountain Cafe to play a game of cat and mouse with Victor and then leave.

But now, he's very interested in meeting this elite agent who's been driven to treachery by the American system.

Lyon narrowed his eyes, then turned the car key, shifted into gear, and stepped on the gas.

The Ford Explorer's engine roared as it sped through the puddles and headed straight for the agreed-upon Blue Mountain Cafe.

Blue Mountain Coffee Shop is a tastefully decorated boutique specializing in hand-drip coffee, located on the outskirts of downtown Seattle.

The morning rush hour was over, and there weren't many people in the store. Soothing light jazz music was playing.

Lyon pushed open the glass door, his gaze sweeping across the hall, and immediately locked onto the two men sitting in a secluded booth in the corner.

The man on the left looks to be in his forties, wearing a well-tailored dark gray bespoke suit. His deep eyes give him a cool and shrewd look. He is Victor, the security chief of Raytheon Corporation.

On the right, the slightly younger Carter is wearing a smart black tactical jacket and sits upright, bearing obvious traces of a former military field agent.

Lyon walked straight over, pulled out a chair opposite them, and sat down.

"Officer Vance." Victor looked at Leon, but did not stand up; he simply nodded slightly.

"Director Victor."

Leon leaned back in his chair, casually beckoned a waiter to order a black coffee, and then turned his gaze to Victor.

"Seattle traffic is always so bad, I hope I'm not late."

Victor ignored the polite remark, leaned forward slightly, placed his hands on the table, and got straight to the point.

"We've spoken on the phone about William McIntyre."

Victor stared into Leon's steel-gray eyes. "Our company is very interested in his current whereabouts. We heard you saw him on Halloween."

At this point, Victor took out a white envelope without any markings from the inside pocket of his suit and gently pushed it to the center of the table.

The envelope was thin, but it contained not ordinary banknotes, but a bearer check that could be cashed at any time.

"Everyone is very busy, and we at Raytheon have always respected the helpful citizens who provide clues."

Victor began in a businesslike tone, "This is just a small token of our appreciation. We hope it will help you remember Halloween more clearly."

Carter sat silently to the side, simply looking at Leon with an air of entitlement.

In their view, the Seattle police, even the now-famous counter-terrorism hero Leon, were only asking to meet in person because they thought it was inconvenient to discuss prices over the phone and wanted to extort a large sum of money; it was just a normal intelligence transaction.

But they had no idea that money was just a number to Lyon now.

Lyon lowered his eyes and glanced at the envelope.

Then, he extended two fingers, pressed them against the edge of the envelope, and pushed it back to Victor intact.

"Director Victor, you may have misunderstood."

Lyon picked up the black coffee that the waiter had just brought him and blew on it to cool it down.

"Although I am an undercover police officer who is exposed to car exhaust fumes on the streets every day, I am not so destitute that I have to sell the whereabouts of a bankrupt homeless man to make extra money."

Victor stared at the envelope that had been pushed back at him, momentarily stunned.

He had initially thought that Lyon's vague response on the phone yesterday was just a ploy to raise the price, but this sudden refusal left him momentarily speechless.

"So why did you invite us out for coffee?"

Victor took the envelope back, his tone now tinged with wariness.

"To save everyone's time."

Lyon took a sip of coffee, the bitter taste making his senses even more acute.

"You've been searching for ages downstairs in my old apartment building, but you're looking in the wrong direction."

Lyon put down his coffee cup, tapping his fingers lightly on the table, and began his carefully prepared misleading maneuver.

"Old Bill did receive a pizza at my charity event that day, but he left after taking the food."

95

"You know, those homeless people have their own circles and rules."

"Where did he go?" Carter couldn't help but interject.

"In those shabby alleys on Twelfth Street in the West End."

Leon looked at Carter, his tone resolute.

"He kept muttering nonsense about navigation and accuracy."

"I heard from other homeless people that he seemed to have offended some drug-using gang members over there, and it seems he owed money or stole something he shouldn't have."

Upon hearing "12th Street," Victor and Carter frowned almost simultaneously.

"But after I arrested Fatty Z, 12th Street has now become a complete no-man's land."

Lyon sneered, "Every day, some new gangs pop up out of nowhere and start fighting each other over a street corner."

"The streets are full of homeless people urinating and defecating anywhere and addicts searching for fentanyl everywhere. You better pray that the old man hasn't been stripped naked by those lunatics and sunk into the sea."

Upon hearing this clue, Carter couldn't help but sigh heavily and rub his cheeks in frustration.

"Damn it—"

Carter muttered a complaint in a low voice, "That place is a complete mess now, like a cesspool. It's impossible to do this job."

If the target really did sneak into that lawless area, the workload for these corporate agents in suits and tactical jackets to go in and investigate would be absolutely catastrophic.

The probability of being shot in the dark is probably greater than the probability of finding the person.

Leon looked at Carter's breakdown and gave a helpless smirk.

You'll get used to it.

Leon leaned back, sighed, and abruptly changed the subject, starting to complain to the two of them.

"Actually, I really don't understand. Just to find a bankrupt, crazy old man, your Raytheon executives would actually send managers of your caliber to the streets of Seattle to eat dust?"

Victor paused slightly in his coffee cup and glanced at Leon.

"This is the company's job," Victor replied casually, but his tone was clearly not very enthusiastic.

"Come on."

Lyon spread his hands, his tone full of sarcasm.

"We all do dirty work, we all know each other."

"I'm in the police station, and those politicians sitting in the city hall with the air conditioning on all day just make decisions on a whim."

"Today they tell us to arrest drug dealers, tomorrow they tell us to be gentle with them, to be considerate of their feelings, and to pay attention to whether they are from minority groups."

These words struck a chord with Carter. Hearing this, he turned to look at Victor and saw that although the supervisor still had no expression, he did not refute him.

As a former Air Force intelligence officer, now working tirelessly in the field, Carter strongly resonated with the helplessness of being given incompetent orders by his superiors.

"I totally understand, my friend."

Carter nodded repeatedly, as if he had found a kindred spirit, and began to pour out his grievances.

"Our company's legal department and those senior executives are also in this messed up state. They only look at the reports and don't care about the actual difficulties at all."

Carter pointed outside the door, "A while ago, they sent us out on a field mission to investigate old Bill's house."

"We had just finished reporting back and were about to leave work when we saw a parking ticket on our car window, even though our car was parked in the designated parking space downstairs at the company."

"Victor had just torn down the ticket when the executives called us back for an overtime meeting."

"And when we finished working overtime and came out, there was another ticket stuck on our car!"

"I can't take the blame for this."

Lyon shrugged, looking like a dead pig that wasn't afraid of boiling water.

"Patrol officers also have KPIs. If we don't go downstairs to issue tickets to big companies like yours to generate revenue for the police station, next month's bonus will be gone. We're all just trying to make a living."

Carter shook his head helplessly, and the atmosphere miraculously eased during this exchange of grievances.

Lyon keenly sensed that the time was almost right. He turned his head and cast his gaze at Victor, who had remained silent with a slight flicker in his eyes.

"This is the same rule everywhere in America."

Leon looked at Victor, his tone seemingly casual.

"A manager of your level must have suffered a lot of humiliation at the hands of those idiots above you, right?"

"What security chief? It sounds glamorous, but in the end, you still have to hold your nose and clean up the messes for those higher-ups."

Upon hearing this, Victor's fingers tightened slightly as he held his coffee cup. Leon's words reminded him of his past when he was kicked out of the FBI.

Victor put down his coffee cup and let out a long sigh.

His previously tense and guarded shoulders slumped as he leaned against the back of the sofa.

"yes."

Victor sneered, "Those high-ranking officials sitting in air-conditioned rooms will throw any dirty water down there just to keep their positions."

"No matter how much you do, if they think you have a problem, you're just a disposable resource that can be sacrificed at any time."

Victor shook his head, saying with disgust, "You want me to go to 12th Street and ask those street gangsters who can't even count to 20 and can't tell east from west for clues?"

"Ha. I saw through their tricks a long time ago. No matter how high their titles are, they're just high-ranking security guards who take the blame for their superiors."

""

Leon calmly watched Victor, noticing the disdain in his eyes, which was exactly as described by the Eastern Intelligence Headquarters.

This former FBI agent, driven to rebellion by the American system, now truly has no loyalty to Raytheon whatsoever.

He's just coasting along for a high salary; if he encounters a serious problem, he'll definitely choose to forge a report to get by.

The objective has been achieved.

Lyon stood up and reached out to tug at the hem of his windbreaker.

"I've given you the clue. I hope you find the person you're looking for in that lousy place."

Lyon picked up a tissue from the table, wiped his hands, and casually threw it into the trash can.

Then, he took a folded note from his pocket and placed it on the table in front of Victor. Inside was a cell phone number that Leon had taken from the body of another homeless man, a phone that had not yet been put into use.

"This is my private backup number."

Leon looked down at Victor, his tone becoming meaningful.

"If you encounter any problems during your investigation that are difficult for the company's agents to handle, feel free to call me anytime."

Lyon placed his hands on the table and lowered his voice.

"I am an ACU team leader with a certain reputation within the system, while you are the security director of a large company."

"We're all sensible people, so maybe we can help each other out in the future."

After saying that, Leon didn't look at Victor's reaction, turned around and pushed open the glass door of the coffee shop, striding into the gloom outside Seattle.

After Leon left, a brief silence fell over the corner booth of the café.

Carter stared intently at the note with a string of numbers written on it that Leon had left on the table, then leaned back abruptly and slammed heavily onto the leather sofa.

"Oh, Jesus Christ——————"

Carter clutched his hair with both hands and let out a desperate wail. Leon was gone, and he no longer needed to worry about his image.

"We've been searching every nook and cranny of Seattle for half a month for that damn bankrupt old man. And now you're telling me we're supposed to look for him in some cesspool like 12th Street?"

"I'd rather go back to the office right now and write a hundred-page PowerPoint presentation declaring the mission a failure!"

Victor ignored Carter's complaints.

His gaze was deep and sharp, fixed on the inconspicuous note on the table.

Victor held up two fingers, picked up the note, and gently rubbed the rough paper with his fingertips.

"Do you think he's like an ordinary street patrolman?" Victor suddenly asked.

Carter paused for a moment, then stopped scratching his hair.

"What do you mean? Isn't he the counter-terrorism hero who just wiped out the Blood Gang?"

'

"No, it's not that simple."

Victor shook his head, recalling the expressionless eyes Leon had held when he spoke.

"The ease with which he controlled the pace of the conversation, and the sense of pressure he exuded, are things that a redneck cop who only knows how to shoot in the street could never possess."

"He's more like a trained politician, or—an intelligence officer."

As a former senior FBI counterintelligence agent, Victor was actually quite excellent before he was forced to leave the company. However, his professional habits were completely activated by Leon, and now he sees everyone as an intelligence agent.

He began to frantically deduce Leon's true motives, following the logic that led him to assume the darkest possible interpretations of everyone.

He refused our check.

Victor stared at the note and analyzed it to himself.

"This shows that he is not short of money, or rather, he doesn't care about these tens of thousands of US dollars."

"But he left his private number and offered to provide assistance by identifying himself as a police officer."

Victor frowned, his mind racing.

What's he after? Does he want to make a deal with me? Or does he want to cooperate with me?

Victor quickly listed several possibilities in his mind.

Could it be that Leon intends to use his influence to access Raytheon's vast security network and intelligence channels during the future internal factional struggles within the Seattle Police Department?

Or perhaps this rising counter-terrorism hero has offended someone he shouldn't have on the black market and is trying to use his connections to settle things?

Or perhaps————

Victor's eyes suddenly darkened.

Could it be that Lyon has a large amount of illicit overseas money in his hands and wants to use his authority as security chief and Raytheon's shell projects to launder his assets?

It's impossible that Lyon himself is the business spy who hijacked Old Bill's deal, and now he's leaving his number, planning to wait until things calm down and then turn around and cooperate with him to resell the company's core secrets, right?

Victor grew increasingly alarmed as he thought about it; he felt that Lyon's move was extremely shrewd.

But he had absolutely no substantial intelligence to support these wild fantasies.

Ultimately, the confusion caused by overthinking made Victor feel irritated.

He rubbed his temples hard, forcefully cutting off his wandering thoughts.

Regardless of what Lyon is plotting, he is definitely a highly valuable potential ally.

Victor carefully folded the note back into its original creases and tucked it into the inside pocket of his custom-made suit.

Having done all this, Victor let out a long sigh and brought his thoughts back to the thorny task at hand.

"Carter."

Victor picked up his now-cold coffee, took a sip, and his tone returned to its coldness.

"We still need to investigate on 12th Street, but don't get too excited; we probably won't find anything."

""

"Then how are we going to explain this to our superiors?" Carter asked, frowning.

"That's exactly what I need to consider."

Victor sneered, "The higher-ups don't care how chaotic 12th Street is; they just think we've done a bad job."

"I need to start compiling a perfect investigation report."

"For example—that corporate spy was a reckless and unruly young man. After extracting all the information and data from old Bill in the abandoned building on 12th Street, he shot the old man dead, and the trail went cold."

Victor looked at Carter and said, "Only by muddying the waters and pinning the blame on that corporate spy we've never met can the higher-ups find no reason to target us."

Carter nodded in agreement immediately after hearing this. As long as he wasn't allowed to go to Twelfth Street and fight the mob, he didn't care how the report was fabricated.

"Let's go."

Victor gestured for Carter to pay the bill.

The two pushed open the glass door of the coffee shop and stepped into the gray streets of Seattle.

Carter walked ahead, heading first towards the Raytheon company vehicle that was parked in the white-lined parking space on the side of the road.

He had just walked around to the front of the car when his feet suddenly froze on the spot.

"Motherfucker!!"

Carter stared out the windshield and let out a desperate curse, so loud that even passersby turned to look at him.

Victor walked slowly behind, his hands in his suit trouser pockets.

He followed Carter's trembling finger.

On the windshield of their black SUV, below the wipers, was a brand-new Seattle Police Department parking ticket.

The red lettering of the violation stood out starkly against the gloomy weather.

Carter's chest heaved with rage. He reached out and ripped the ticket off, clutching it in his hand, wanting to tear it but not daring to. He could only rage helplessly.

As Victor watched this scene unfold—the third ticket they'd received in the past two weeks—Leon's earlier comment echoed in his mind: "Police officers also have KPIs."

Lyon appears to be on administrative leave, so he couldn't have put up the note. It must have been done by one of the patrol officers who's been inexplicably excited lately.

"Haha—What can I say?"

Victor remained silent, only smiling with relief.