“That’s part one. It’s definitely safer to chat verbally online. Some use FaceTime, though that runs through your phone, so it’s like making a phone call. Others use the encryption on Signal or WhatsApp—or even video games that let you meet up in cyberspace, like Second Life, Minecraft, and Fortnite, since people often overlook games. But even those get run through your ISP.”
“Which means?”
“It means that when you’re sitting in your living room and shoot ing PlayStation pals in Call of Duty, the folks at Xfinity, AT&T, or any other ISP can always do a little eavesdropping. And since those of us in the military and intelligence community don’t like it when people are eavesdropping, our tech folks came up with part two—exploiting one of the few digital loopholes that’re currently left—the one thing that’s on everyone’s phone . . .”
“An app.”
“An app,” Waggs said with a nod, tapping the one labeled Black House. Onscreen, its digital logo appeared. “Even though they load on your phone, every app has its own proprietary protocols to communicate. That means it’s actually more secure than your computer.”
“So instead of using an existing video game . . .”
“Uncle Sam made its own.” She clicked the screen, revealing her own avatar, which looked exactly like a taller, thinner version of herself.
“That’s you?”
“Don’t be the ruiner of all things,” Waggs warned as, out the back window, the security guard appeared again in the distance. “They even let you pick your favorite weapon,” Waggs said, pointing onscreen to a high-tech gun that looked more sci-fi than military.
“Ripley’s pulse rifle,” Nola said, recognizing Sigourney Weaver’s gun from Aliens.
Waggs tilted the phone, and onscreen, digital Waggs followed the tilt, looking around and revealing an empty alley. Graffiti on the walls was in Arabic. “To anyone else, Black House is another mindless first-person shooter game, but when you scratch the surface, with modules for Iraq, Afghanistan—they even built some of the neighborhoods where our safe houses are in Qatar—you’re looking at the safest online place for senior military leaders and secret squirrels to have real-time, untraceable conversations.”
“Tell me how it—” Nola cut herself off. “It also interacts with other apps. Why would the military allow that?”
“It may look like a game, but the intelligence community doesn’t play games when it comes to security. When Black House first started, it was a closed system, meaning you could only talk to other Black House users. The problem was, for many missions, you need to do more than talk. When we caught bin Laden, y’know how many informants had to be paid? Or how many had to be flown to other countries for their own safety? To do the job, Black House had to interact with the real world. So now, once you enter its virtual universe, you can book flights on it, send money through it . . .”
“Or make a dinner reservation.”
“In the training module, they even teach you how to pay your informants by shipping them tanzanite, which apparently is now the jewel of choice for scumbags in the Middle East,” Waggs explained. “Even Tiffany’s started carrying it.”
“So if someone tries to trace you . . .”
“It’ll take them back to the black hole—back to Black House itself, which is far safer than risking your life and revealing your location on some hackable airline app. All you need is . . .” Waggs reached into her purse, rummaging for a moment, but quickly pulling out her own phone and holding it next to Nola’s. “Install the app. Pick a meeting place. Black House connects us and takes care of the rest.”
For a few moments, Nola sat in the back seat, staring intensely toward Waggs, but looking through her, like she was working through permutations.