by Akart, Bobby
In the United States during this time, almost everyone had an agenda. News networks were identified by whether they leaned left or right on the political spectrum. Television networks were known to cater to certain demographic groups. Print media attracted journalists who were like-minded thinkers.
Even authors of fiction, those who conjure up characters and scenarios to provide entertainment for their readers, couldn’t help but allow their personal beliefs to slip through in their writing. We’re all humans, after all.
Schwartz was different. He had wealth, and with his vast riches, he was able to exert a tremendous amount of influence over political candidates at all levels of governments, in any country. Money runs campaigns, and Schwartz was generous with his contributions, provided the candidates fulfilled a commitment to advance his agenda.
There was, however, one matter that he had not yet addressed. Something that would either bankrupt him or make him the richest man on the planet. Today, he would complete his quest to collapse the U.S. economy and cause the collapse of the dollar.
“Good morning, Jonathan,” he said in a cheerful voice as his son arrived in the estate’s magnificently appointed conference room. Television monitors were installed and framed as if they were works of art. To break up the walls, exquisite paintings adorned the walls, and sconce lighting allowed an eerie glow to cast shadows on the ceiling.
“Did you sleep well?” his son responded, imperceptibly nodding to the butler, who poured his morning tea. Father and son were accustomed to making small talk while the staff served their breakfast. Most mornings, the two men met in the dining room, but today, one that would not be forgotten by financiers around the world, required them to have access to all the electronic tools necessary to effectuate their plan and monitor the results.
“Tre bone, konsiderante,” Schwartz replied, relaying the fact he slept well under the circumstances. Schwartz chose to speak in Esperanto, an unusual, secretive language he’d learned from his father, a speaker and writer who’d traveled Europe following his release from a Siberian prison camp after World War One. Esperanto was designed to be an international language, loosely based upon Latin. “Grava tago atendas.”
An important day awaits. The words came out of his mouth with the singsong rhythm of an Italian cardinal speaking to one of his aides, or of Michael Corleone in The Godfather III.
“Shall I make the calls?” asked Jonathan, curtly dismissing the staff and directing them to close the doors as they departed. He’d been up for hours as the European markets opened. Before he went to bed, he’d alerted the family’s business associates in Asia to be prepared for a busy day.
Schwartz wandered around the conference room, pausing to survey the inhospitable winter landscape outside. The snow had fallen throughout the night, obliterating the line between the lawn and a small lake located behind the stately home. Schwartz chuckled to himself. Nature’s stormy wrath had a similar effect on the world as his life’s work—blurred lines and eliminated boundaries.
To a stranger, Schwartz might have appeared disinterested in making conversation with his son. As he focused on the white splendor that engulfed his home, one might mistake his faraway thoughts as unfocused, perhaps hearkening back to his native Hungary. But his mind was singularly focused on the task at hand.
When he began to speak, his son took meticulous notes. The Schwartz financial empire was comprised of many multinational corporations and organizations, utilizing a complex network of brokerage accounts enabling him to effectuate secretive transactions.
Schwartz continued to give his son direction, using his brilliant mind to announce his plan. A financial attack he’d plotted and dreamt about for many years.
“Dominica, St. Kitts, Providenciales, Cook Islands, Nevis, Panama.” His voice was grave as he listed the most used tax havens in the world, where offshore accounts and shell companies were the norm.
The intricacy of the trades was remarkable. The sums of money, billions, were astounding. Jonathan typed furiously on his iPad, his longish fingernails tapping the glass screen as he recorded his father’s directives.
“Father, this will take days,” Jonathan lamented when Schwartz stopped to gather his thoughts.
“No, it will not!” he shot back, taking his son’s demeanor as insolence. “We must complete these transactions before the opening of the Asian markets.”
“That’s in five hours.” Jonathan was wounded by his father’s rebuke. He shook it off, taking into account the magnitude of the moment. He added, “The Australian markets open an hour sooner.”
“Understood, son. Currency trades of this magnitude will have repercussions throughout the global financial system. They will draw attention, and rightfully so. That’s by design. I want them to notice. I want them to know their currency is under attack. Frightened animals act irrationally. We’ll be prepared for the next step when they do.”
Jonathan nodded and sipped his tea. He relaxed as his father’s tone changed. “These will be scrutinized by the CFTC. Taking a one-point-three billion short position in the euro, coupled with a corresponding long position in the dollar, will not go unnoticed.”
The CFTC, the United States Commodity Futures Trading Commission, had been established during Schwartz’s early days as a hedge fund trader to regulate options and futures markets. He’d been navigating through their regulations for decades, which was ironic because his trading activities were responsible for quite a few of them.
“I’m aware, but Washington is in chaos. The president is hiding. With the help of your friends, the regulatory apparatus will be focused on things other than their jobs.”
Jonathan continued to study the currency transactions. The size of these trades would rival those that triggered the Asian financial crisis in 1997 and the collapse of the British pound sterling in 1992. The process of short-selling and long-selling had been used by traders for decades to manipulate markets in their favor.
“There is more, son,” Schwarz continued. “The U.S. markets will be closed indefinitely, but their equities will be sold internationally, nonetheless. I want to put pressure on corporate America to force Washington to intervene abroad. I want you to systematically dump our positions in American equities too.”
“Father, we stand to lose a considerable amount of earned profits gained.”
Schwartz sighed and managed a sigh. He pulled his maroon-colored silk housecoat closed and stuck his hands in his pockets. Looking at the winter wonderland outside, the thought of his goals being realized warmed his heart.
“It’s all for the greater good, son.”
Chapter Three
Haven House
The Haven
Ryan Smart sat in a comfortable, rolled-arm chair in the corner of their master bedroom, sipping his morning drink concoction, a fifty-fifty blend of Couple’s Coffee and Fairlife two percent chocolate milk. His daily routine, when he didn’t have to hit the ground running, began with perusing the day’s news headlines on his iPad and waiting for his lovely wife to wake up. Blair started to stir on her own, and Ryan paused to admire her beauty.
“I’m so lucky to wake up next to someone so beautiful every day,” he said in a soft tone as she sat upright in bed. His compliment was corny, yet sincere. He loved her more than life.
Blair’s long blond hair covered half her face, and the half that was visible revealed an eye that was barely open. She slowly shook her head from side to side in disagreement.
“You can save that one for the Thanksgiving prayer, buddy.” Blair immediately fell backwards onto her pillow and pulled the covers over her head. Then she added, her voice muffled by the covers, “It’s too early. Go away.”
Ryan laughed and took another sip of his coffee drink. He considered teasing Blair and even ripping all the covers off her to get her good and riled up, but he resisted his devious urges. They had a long day ahead, one of many to come, he presumed. He would need his wife and partner well rested.
“Can I talk to you?” he asked sheepishly.
Blair slowly removed the blankets covering her head. Her hair was now completely over her face, making her the perfect vision of Cousin Itt from the classic Addams Family shows. “Go ahead. I may or may not be listening.” She covered back up and got settled in to catch a few more winks.
Ryan ignored her efforts to hide. “Things are escalating. Overnight, riots broke out in cities across the country. I’m starting to see a pattern here. The locations aren’t the usual high-profile targets to garner media attention. Instead I’m seeing places like Nashville, Phoenix, and Richmond. Even Charlotte.”
Blair started to come to life, as Ryan knew she would. “What pattern?”
“In all the reports I could find, there’s a noticeable effort to target the suburbs. Especially wealthy and middle-class neighborhoods. I’ve been looking at images of families driven out of their homes by fires. You know, mom, dad, and two small children holding nothing but their freakin’ teddy bears.”
Blair sat up and propped herself against several pillows. She reached for her bkr water bottle. The iconic glass-and-silicone bottle was a constant companion to Blair, as she’d vowed to stay hydrated. “We’ve talked about these rabble-rousers before. They always seek media attention. What’s the point in going into the burbs?”
“I don’t know, but it can’t be coincidental. The national media hasn’t mentioned it, really. They’ve shifted their focus back to what the president is going to do, and how all of this relates to the Supreme Court.”
“Have they identified any specific groups who are behind the riots?” asked Blair, now fully awake and reaching for her own iPad.
“No, but there are some images that have emerged on Twitter. You know, thugs dressed in head-to-toe black outfits. Leather boots, faces covered in black bandanas and topped off with a black hat or mask. It’s all intended to intimidate anyone who dares to stand in their way.”
“They have their uniforms and we have ours—camo.”
Ryan chuckled. “Just like the blues and the grays of the Civil War. Every army has their own colors.”
“Well, there’s also this,” added Blair as she held up her iPad. She routinely checked news from Florida. She pointed to an image from the front page of the Gainesville Sun newspaper’s website. It depicted a group of armed men patrolling the streets of an affluent neighborhood. All were carrying AR-15s and dressed in camouflage clothing.
“Exactly,” said Ryan. “That’s what I’m talking about. Newton’s laws of quantum physics.”
“Huh?” Blair wasn’t that awake yet.
“You know, for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction,” Ryan explained. “On New Year’s Eve, somebody, and I have no idea who, fired the first shots.”
“Big ones,” interjected Blair.
“Oh yeah. But now the ground war has begun. It’s almost like a civil war between left and right. The Antifa bunch do what they do best—create a lawless environment. You know, anarchy. The guys on the opposite end of the spectrum bow up and show they’re tough by walking down the street carrying their guns. In the past, everyone mouthed off at each other and then went home. Not now.”
Blair continued to read through the article from Gainesville. “The good old boys from Ocala who came to join their friends in Gainesville shot and killed three UF students who were part of the Antifa protestors.”
“Were they protesting or setting fires like in these other cities?” asked Ryan.
Blair scrolled further down the article. “Apparently, the students, dressed in black like the others, were carrying lit torches toward a gated community near Gainesville Country Club. Fires had already been set around town. Before they could scale the gates, the good old boys opened fire. Three were killed, and half a dozen were wounded.”
“How would the guys from Ocala even know to be there?” asked Ryan.
Blair shrugged. “Beats me.”
The two continued reading their respective news articles before Ryan went to the kitchen and prepared Blair’s coffee. When he returned, he got down to business before he left for the morning briefing at the Haven Barn.
“I had a text from Alpha. We’ve had a few new arrivals, and I suspect more will be coming throughout the day. I wanna get jobs assigned to everyone so we can be ready for anything that comes our way.”
Blair sipped her coffee. “Sounds good. I’ll check the roster and try to make a few more calls, but, Ryan, I can’t chase these people down. Either they’re gonna take advantage of what we have here, or they’re not.”
“I totally agree. Do you need me to assign anyone to you? You know, admin, security, anything?”
“Nope,” she replied with confidence. “Today, I’ll do an orientation for some of the new peeps. My focus is going to be on establishing routines and a sense of normalcy. Idle time creates idle minds, and idle minds concoct drama that we don’t need. This is not a time for sitting around commiserating or hand-wringing.”
Ryan laughed at the tough nature of his wife. She was sweet and adorable on the exterior, but on the inside, she had a resolve that nobody should underestimate. He approached Blair and gave her a kiss, something he’d never failed to do in all of their years together.
“We know what to expect,” he began. “Now we need to make sure everyone is on the same page. I love you.”
They kissed again and the two embarked on the second day of the apocalypse, fully expecting more surprises to be thrown their way.
Chapter Four
CNN Center
Atlanta, Georgia
At This Hour host, Kate Bolduan, sat upright in her chair and addressed the camera. “As we continue to keep our viewers abreast of the situation with foreign exchange markets via the chyron on the screen, I’d like to move to another topic that has been heavily on the minds of legal analysts. I’m referring to the president’s use of executive orders following a contentious election.”
CNN had maintained its regular programming lineup as it continuously broadcast scenes from areas around the country that were directly impacted by the attacks of New Year’s Eve. Bolduan was joined on the news set by two attorneys.
One was Jeannie Ray, a former attorney for the Clinton Foundation and a member of the now disbanded special prosecutor’s team headed by Robert Mueller. The other, a longtime Washington insider, Rachel Black, had been the United States associate attorney general but was best known for her legal representation of President George W. Bush during the 2000 presidential election recount in Florida.
Bolduan began the conversation with a pointed question directed at Rachel Black. “Rachel, you’ve been down this road before, in a way. You have a contested election, the electorate is angry at the result, and political animus rules the day. What advice do you give the president?”
“Kate, today is a deeply divided time. There is an anger out there, a rage, that isn’t healthy. In the lead-up to this election, the acrimony that we were seeing, um, we also saw in the 2016 election, and we saw it again this year. It is a bitterness, to the point of being apoplectic, that is tearing us apart. In my opinion, it’s corroding the very fabric of our democracy.”
Bolduan pressed further. “Rachel, isn’t the president partly to blame for this hostility? I mean, take his use of executive orders and the recent firing of his cabinet. Why wouldn’t that justify the anger and rage you referenced?”
“First of all, Kate, as I argued in 2000, just because one side doesn’t like the results doesn’t mean you can overturn the outcome afterwards. Bush versus Gore was the first attempt I’ve seen to delegitimize an election, and it happened again in 2004, 2016, and now in 2020. It’s sour grapes from a bunch of sore losers, in my opinion.”
Bolduan held up her hand and tried to tone her guest down, but before she could speak, Jeannie Ray, the other panelist, fired back, “I think Rachel is missing the point here. Or avoiding it, whichever. The matter before the Supreme Court has nothing to do with the allegations
of election fraud and ballot manipulation. We’re talking about the president’s own cabinet speaking out to protect the nation from someone who is clearly mentally unstable. The Twenty-Fifth Amendment was put in place for a reason, and we were seeing it properly implemented until the bloodletting.”
Black chuckled and shook her head condescendingly. “The bloodletting, a term coined by this network, is a farce. The cabinet serves at the pleasure of the president. He can fire any of them, or all of them, as he deems fit. Just because it doesn’t suit your political agenda doesn’t make it illegal.”
“Politics has nothing to do with this,” Ray shot back. “We’re talking about a mentally unstable president who needs to be removed from office. The people who know him best—his cabinet, his co-workers, if you will—agreed. The law was followed, and he should’ve stepped aside in the best interests of the country.”
“That’s a load of crap, and you know it,” countered Black. “The president has undergone more scrutiny from the media than any in history. He has submitted himself to frequent physicals and mental-acuity tests since the issue regarding his mental competence was raised on day one of his presidency. Besides, where was the vice president and the cabinet before the election? Hmm? They rode his coattails back into office, and lo and behold, the traitors to the nation tried to remove him in order to take over.”
“Traitors is a pretty strong word, don’t you think?” Bolduan interjected a question in an effort to take back control of the interview.
The two female panelists were having none of it. This was their stage now.
Ray ignored her question and was now glaring at Black. “Traitor? The vice president is a good man, widely respected on both sides of the aisle.”
Black laughed at the statement. “Yeah, sure, when he’s a convenient stooge for the left. Do I need to remind you of the names he’s been called? The accusations made about his religious beliefs? The way he’s been treated—”