Chapter 316: Lock On (Patreon)

Transformers Begin : Table of Content/Chapter List

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Upon hearing the words of the young white man sitting in the passenger seat next to him, Linping, who was holding the steering wheel, frowned slightly.

Everyone in the car had an extraordinary background and were all CIA agents.

Half a month ago, the CIA had sent several agents to follow a target into this Far Eastern country.

Unexpectedly, the main person in charge of the tracking mission, a senior CIA agent named William Chen, completely lost contact with the agency the next day.

Among the vast number of CIA employees, Chinese-American agents were a relatively small group.

As one of the few Chinese-American senior agents in the CIA, Linping had always had contact with other Chinese-American senior agents. Although he was not very familiar with William Chen, he had dealt with him before and knew that he was a very capable and diligent senior agent.

Half a month ago, Linping had heard about the mission that William Chen had received.

Although restricted by the CIA's internal confidentiality principles, he was not clear about where the mission was executed. However, he had heard some rumors.

What he didn't expect was that William Chen would encounter trouble on this mission.

The CIA's Asian division couldn't get in touch with him, and it wasn't until a few days ago that two CIA agents who had gone on the mission with him reported his disappearance to the Asian division and requested assistance. It was then that the US side realized the severity of the problem.

A senior agent had disappeared during a mission, and not only was he Chinese-American, but he also lost contact in this Far Eastern country.

This was the worst-case scenario.

In the best-case scenario, he might have been arrested by China's national security system, which was a relatively common occurrence between countries. As long as the two countries privately contacted each other and made some compromises, it was possible to exchange the captured agents.

The trouble was if William Chen was killed by the target he was tracking during the mission, or if he took the opportunity to defect and seek refuge in this Far Eastern country.

The former situation would indicate that the CIA's initial risk assessment of the mission was not rigorous enough, and the resulting consequences would not be as simple as losing a senior agent. Various uncertainties could potentially cause them to lose more manpower.

But if it was the latter situation, it would not just be a friction between the intelligence agencies of the two countries, but would escalate to a height of international political disputes.

The CIA was clearly aware of the severity of the problem. After a brief meeting at the US headquarters, they quickly activated an emergency plan. In addition to mobilizing three senior agents, including Linping, to rush to the Far East, there were also more than ten people from the headquarters and the Asian division accompanying them. Among them were top-level hackers like Thompson, who was in the car with Linping, and senior agents like Wang Bo, who were skilled in disguising and gathering intelligence.

Their mission was not just to rescue William Chen, but also to investigate the cause of his disappearance, find out if this Far Eastern country was up to something, and capture Ada Wong.

"...What does it mean that the investigation given to me by the higher-ups two days ago, which is about a young Chinese man named Sun Cheng who may be holding something important, is all about?" Linping asked, feeling that something was not right but unable to pinpoint the source of his unease.

"They had been in China for several days, but in the past few days, the CIA had almost mobilized most of their manpower in the country. Unfortunately, they not only failed to find any trace of William Chen, but even the task target they were tracking, a woman named Ada Wong, seemed to have disappeared into thin air without a trace.

Helpless, the CIA could only secretly collect intelligence from the Chinese intelligence agencies through the hidden agents who had been lurking in China for many years.

At the same time, they continued to investigate limited clues and re-investigated people who might be related to 'Ada Wong.'

So, in the city of Nandu where William Chen disappeared, the CIA dispatched special agents who had entered China and quickly locked onto another Chinese youth named Sun Cheng, who had direct contact with Ada Wong in the past and had left many records in the CIA's database.

"So what? Thompson, are you saying we found the right person? Is this Chinese man named Sun Cheng also related to William Chen's disappearance?" Linping asked quietly while driving.

The command given to him was to investigate 'Sun Cheng' in secret, so only Linping and two other senior investigators in the team knew about it, and the others were unaware.

"It's hard to say. The kernel of the Microsoft operating system generates a short usage record code every time it is started. Although most professional computer engineers who are proficient in programming have the ability to clear records, I don't think many people besides hackers or some confidential research institutions would bother to clear these records..." Thompson, a young white hacker recruited by the CIA, shook his head and then answered affirmatively, "All I can say is that this Chinese man named 'Sun Cheng' is very suspicious..."

"That's enough..." Wang Bo sat back in the back seat, his eyes cold. "It seems that we must follow this clue and investigate it thoroughly. Let's create an opportunity for me to enter the company of this young man named 'Sun Cheng' in the next two days and see if I can find any clues!"

He was a senior agent recruited and trained by the CIA's Asian branch for many years. Although his status was not as high as that of senior investigators like Linping who were directly sent by headquarters, he was much more familiar with Asia, especially the Far East, so his words had to be listened to even by Linping and the other two senior investigators responsible for this investigation.

Moreover, even Linping felt that it was necessary to investigate Sun Cheng seriously.

He nodded slightly, "I will arrange it as soon as possible. We will discuss the details after we return to the residence. You should also be careful and not be too careless. After all, this is the capital of China, one of the five permanent members of the United Nations. China's national security system was established in the 1920s and has a history of nearly a hundred years. We cannot afford to cause any trouble here!"

Thompson shrugged and continued to manipulate his computer on his knee.

Wang Bo nodded solemnly. He had been responsible for China for a long time and naturally understood this country's counterintelligence capabilities. The reason why the branch only arranged two new recruits who had not been developed for long to assist William Chen when he contacted the CIA for help last time was because they were afraid that those old faces had already been targeted by China's national security system.

The car soon fell silent.

However, they did not know that at this moment, an invisible light spot flashed in the sky more than two thousand meters above the car, and at the same time, an electromagnetic wave was transmitted to somewhere tens of kilometers away.

"Lock the target's travel trajectory and wait for further instructions..."

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Next Chapter >>Chapter 317: Decepticon, Attack