“At least put a tail on Fraser.”
“I can't just start following a US senator without just cause.”
“How about a crater the size of Manhattan?”
“That'd do it, but right now, I don’t have enough evidence to issue a parking ticket.”
Mitch lowered his voice. “Don’t you find it coincidental that he’s coming here, right when this terrorist attack is going to occur? That son of a bitch knows it’s going to happen, and he wants to be here when it does.”
Lamar was silent for a few moments. “Alright Mitchell. I'll put someone on him, unofficially. If any questions are asked, I'll say . . . it was for his protection, because of the report of a terrorist threat.”
“Now you're talking.” Mitch glanced at the video screens. “Mind if we look around?”
“Look only. You see anything, call me. No cowboy bullshit.”
Mitch nodded. “What frequency are you on?”
Lamar gave him the frequency. “You carrying?”
“Yes.”
“Registered?”
Mitch smiled. “Depends what system you look in.”
“Make sure it doesn’t leave the holster.”
“Understood.”
Mitch and Christa left the command vehicle, slipped under the rope encircling the FBI zone and began strolling along the sidewalk.
“Are we looking for anything in particular?” Christa asked.
“I’ll let you know when I see it,” Mitch replied as he scanned the trucks, news crews and convention attendees heading toward the entrance. “If I pick out people, can you take a look at them?”
“Sure, just keep in mind, my battery runs down fast, and I’m strictly short range.”
“I’ll be selective.”
They strolled past several TV news trucks, one with a crew filming a reporter filing a story. Standing unobtrusively in the distance was a man in a suit, hands clasped together in front as he slowly watched people moving around him.
“What about that guy?”
Christa studied the man, her eyes gradually losing focus as she attuned her mind to his thought patterns. After a few moments, she shook her head. “He’s clear. Any particular reason you picked him?”
“He’s FBI. You can tell from the cheap suit,” Mitch grinned. “Just checking the Fibbies are on the right team.”
They moved on, drifting through the crowd. Several times Mitch selected people that caught his attention, and each time Christa gave them a clean bill of health. Ahead, an unmarked white van crept through the crowd, pulling up behind a fast food stall. Four men carrying large gray metal cases with an audio company’s logo on their jackets, jumped out. They pulled open the rear doors of the van and unloaded four large black metal cases.
“How about them?”
Again Christa paused as she studied the men. “Nope, they're good.”
Mitch watched suspiciously, noting the FBI agent stood off in the crowd ignoring them. He waited for the agent to approach the audio team, but the agent paid no attention as they carried the metal cases across the street toward the convention center. “God damn it!”
Mitch broke into a run, slipping rapidly through the crowd until he reached the first audio man. He put his hand on the sound engineer's chest. “Hold it, buddy. Mind if I see what’s in the case?”
“Audio equipment,” the engineer said, moving to step past him.
Mitch took a step forward, pressing the man’s chest more firmly. “I insist. Open the case!”
The sound engineer looked irritated. “You got a badge?”
“Open it!” Mitch ordered.
“Beat it!” the engineer said, attempting to push past.
Mitch grabbed the audio man's jacket with one hand as he pulled his gun with the other. “Open the case, now!”
“Okay, okay!” The sound engineer said, shocked, suddenly afraid. He placed the case on the ground and unlocked it, opening it wide to reveal an amplifier.
Mitch glanced at it, then turned to the second audio man, who had stopped to see what was happening. He aimed his gun at the sound technician. “Open your case!”
Grudgingly, the technician unlocked his case to reveal a portable mixing desk, as footsteps approached. Mitch turned to see several FBI men running toward him, one with a dog, the other drawing a gun.
“Put down the gun, sir!” an agent called, his pistol leveled at Mitch.
Mitch raised one hand. “It’s okay, I’m working with Lamar!” He slid the gun into his shoulder holster. “Have the sniffer dog check these cases.”
The FBI agent didn't lower his gun, but nodded to his partner to have the dog sniff the four cases. When the dog had finished, the handler shook his head, having found nothing.
Lamar, flanked by a group of FBI agents, came running from the command vehicle. “We got a report of a gun!”
“Can we go now?” The sound engineer demanded irritably.
The first agent nodded, holstering his weapon, then gave a quick report to Lamar, who turned toward Mitch with suppressed anger. “Damn it, Mitchell! I told you, no cowboy bullshit!”
“They weren’t checking the cases. They were walking them in through the front door”
“The FBI went over them at the end of the street,” the audio technician snapped, scowling at Mitch in disgust, “Before they even let us in here.” The technicians finished locking the cases and hurried off toward the entrance.
Lamar stepped close to Mitch. “Do you know how much heat I could get over letting you in here with a gun?”
“It could have been a bomb.”
“Yeah, and it could have been a sack of potatoes! But it wasn’t, was it? It so happens, a short inside the convention center blew the PA system this morning and they’ve been searching all over town for replacements. But as you’re not part of the security team, you wouldn’t know that, now would you?”
Mitch nodded, realizing he'd made a mistake. “I guess I’m a little jumpy.”
“Give me your piece.”
“If there’s something–”
“You give me the piece, or you take a ride down to the watchhouse, and this time, no fake email crap is going to get you released.”
Reluctantly, Mitch placed his gun in Lamar’s hands.
Lamar pocketed the weapon. “Stay out my face, Mitchell. Your credibility with me is in the toilet.” He turned and stormed back to his command center while the FBI agents dispersed around them.
“That could have gone better,” Christa said.
“Yeah, I could've shot the sound guy!” Mitch said bitterly.
The two way radio crackled to life with Gunter’s voice. “Mitch, you receiving?”
“Go ahead,” he said, lifting the two way to his lips.
“We are on the southern side. Nothing so far. People everywhere. This is a hopeless security situation.”
“That’s an understatement,” Mitch muttered without sending, then transmitted, “We’re going to swing back past the entrance. Meet you at the western corner.” He gave Gunter the FBI frequency in case he needed to call Lamar directly, then slid the radio back into his pocket. They started back along the street toward the entrance. “I hate situations like this. I used to get stuck with them on protection duty. Fool politicians walking around with targets tattooed on their heads saying ‘shoot me’.”
“Relax. The FBI know what they’re doing.”
“Do they? Then why the hell are all these vehicles here? All these people?”
“It’s the nature of the beast,” she replied as she hooked her hand into the crook of his arm.
Mitch continued to study the faces and vehicles all around them with suspicion as they approached the entrance to the convention center. “How about them?” he asked, indicating the red jacketed convention security men at the entrance checking everyone who entered with hand held metal detectors.
Christa sighed, feeling it was pointless but nevertheless concentrated on the first security man. She fell s
ilent as her focus sharpened, then she gripped Mitch’s arm. “Yes! Him!”
“How about the other one?”
She studied the other security guard as he ran a metal detector over a visitor’s pockets. “Yes. Both of them!”
Two more guards came through the convention center doors. One began speaking to the two guards on duty while the other stood silently by.
“What about the two new guys?”
Christa took a slow breath and concentrated. “The guy talking is.” She changed her concentration to the other man. “The fourth one isn’t. He’s okay.”
Mitch guided them slowly across the street, behind a news van. When they were out of sight of the security guards, he switched on his radio. “Gunter?”
“We are here, waiting for you,” Gunter’s voice crackled back.
“It’s the convention security guards. Christa's confirmed three are conditioned. Could be more.” He pocketed the radio, wishing Lamar had not confiscated his gun. “This is beating the odds. No way they can condition so many without frying enough people to give the game away.”
“Remember what McNamara said in the car? They can test alpha waves to identify who is susceptible.”
Mitch changed frequencies and called the FBI command vehicle. “Lamar, you said the convention security had been thoroughly tested. What kind of testing? Who did it?”
“How the hell do I know?”
“Find out. The convention security guards are compromised. They’re part of it.”
“How do you know?”
“It’ll take too long to explain, but it’s them. Have your people arrest them. Arrest them all.”
“I can’t go in there and arrest forty or fifty security guards. They can’t all be in on this.”
“Check how they were tested. If there was a brain test using something called alpha waves, then all of them are part of it. They were hired because of their alpha wave patterns.”
“Alpha waves? What the hell are talking about?”
“Just do it, Lamar. Find out. You want proof, this is it!”
“Okay Mitchell, alpha waves, but if this is another wild goose chase -”
“It isn’t.”
Lamar grunted unconvinced and switched off.
Mitch stepped back around the news van to take another look at the entrance. The third security officer finished giving instructions to the two men on door duty, then hurried down the stairs with the unconditioned guard toward the rear of the convention center. The conditioned security officer glanced behind him, checking they were not being followed, while the fourth followed apparently unconcerned at being seen.
Mitch raised the two way radio to his lips. “G, there’s two security guards heading south around the building, one conditioned, one not. Tail them, but keep your distance.”
“Affirmative.”
“Come on,” Mitch said to Christa as he started after the two guards.
The two convention security officers disappeared into a cross street, while Mitch and Christa hurried to the corner. The cross street was almost as crowded as the main road, but the security officers were nowhere to be seen. Gunter and Mouse appeared out of the crowd and joined them.
“Did you see them?” Mitch asked.
“Plenty of FBI guys hanging around, no convention security guards,” Mouse said.
“They’re either in one of those vehicles, or down that side street over there. Gunter, you and Mouse keep an eye on those trucks. Christa and I will take a look in the side street.”
The side street’s entrance was blocked by a barricade, although there was no FBI agent on duty. Parked thirty feet down the narrow street was a large white eighteen wheel semi, with guards at either end. A thick, orange, insulated cable joined the prime mover to a smaller truck, which hummed furiously with the sound of a generator at full power. One of the guards standing outside the white truck saw Mitch watching them. Mitch turned away, then arm in arm with Christa, casually crossed the side street.
“Could you make either of the guards?”
“Neither of them are conditioned.”
They had almost passed out of sight of the side street when Mitch felt Christa’s legs buckle under her. He caught her, taking her weight until they were out of sight of the alley, then she slumped into his arms. “What is it?”
She rubbed her forehead weakly. “Something hit me.”
“Like before, from the chopper? That energy weapon?”
“No . . . different, very different.” She pushed him back, dropped to her knees and retched.
Mitch raised the two way radio to his lips. “Gunter, I need you here, now.”
He knelt beside her, putting his arm across her shoulder while she heaved again, then broke into spasmodic coughing. He produced his handkerchief and wiped her nose and mouth. While Christa recovered, Mitch noticed a thick black cable stretching across the road, from the side street. It ran back past the FBI barricade to the prime mover, and ahead to a TV news truck with a large satellite dish mounted on the roof. There was another guard standing outside the satellite truck, but he was watching the activity down the street and hadn’t noticed them. Christa indicated her wave of nausea had passed, so he helped her to her feet.
He noticed her eyes had dilated. “What happened?”
“It was like a knife. It hit me so suddenly I thought my head was going to explode.”
“Could you tell where it came from?”
“The big truck back there. There’s something in it.” Her face had turned a sickly green.
Mitch glanced behind them, but no one was coming. “They’re not after us. Maybe they weren’t aiming at us.”
She took a deep breath. “Then I hope they never do.”
When Gunter and Mouse appeared beside them, Mitch indicated the side street. “There’s a truck down there putting out something that knocked Christa off her feet. It’s outside the FBI cordon and the FBI people watching the back door are missing.”
“Could they be conditioned?” Gunter asked.
“That or dead,” Mitch replied. “No way that alley would not be watched. And there’s something in that news truck, but only one guard.”
“ . . . On the outside,” Mouse cautioned.
Mitch released his hold on Christa, and turned his attention towards the satellite truck. “They won't be expecting this.”
“Expecting what?” Mouse asked uncomfortably.
Mitch smiled, then strolled casually toward the satellite truck. He stepped onto the road where the solitary guard stood. “Excuse me.”
The guard turned to look at him. “Yeah?”
“Is there an ex-NSA asshole by the name of McNamara hiding in there?”
“Huh?”
“Nah, I didn’t think so.” Mitch nailed the guard’s chin with a punch that drove him back against the side of the satellite truck. The guard reached for his gun, but Mitch rushed forward, pinning the weapon as he slammed the guard's head against the metal skin of the truck. As the guard sank to the ground unconscious, he relieved him of his weapon, then gave the others a concerned look. “How did he get this gun inside the cordon?”
“They've penetrated the FBI!” Mouse concluded.
“Not Lamar,” Mitch said. “Someone on his team.”
Mitch opened the truck's rear door and jumped in, holding the captured gun level. A man sitting at a control panel looked up surprised, then reached for a button on the console. Mitch caught the man’s hand over the alarm button, as he clubbed his head with the gun. The operator slumped forward unconscious, then Mitch pushed him onto the floor. Behind him, Mouse and Gunter hauled the first guard into the control room and dumped him beside the sleeping operator. Christa climbed in last, pulling the door shut behind her.
Positioned above the console were four screens, three of them were relays feeding information to and from the semi. The fourth screen displayed information for aligning the dish antenna with a communications satellite in geostationary orbit. It was the th
ree feed screens that caught their attention, displaying three green luminous perspectives of a human brain with crosshairs moving rapidly from one point to another. Where the crosshairs met, a small pinpoint of light glowed for a fraction of a second, then the targeting reticules moved to new coordinates. The retargeting occurred so rapidly that at times the reticules blurred.
“That’s how they do it!” Mitch exclaimed. “The damn thing is mobile! It’s in the truck!”
“And it is highly automated,” Gunter added, judging the speed of the retargeting process.
“At least we know what happened to the unconditioned security guard,” Mitch noted dryly.
“We’ve got to do something!” Christa said. “Get him out of there.”
“It’s too late.”
“They’ve only just started!” she said.
“At that rate,” Gunter said, “It will be all over before we could get in there.”
“If we could get in there,” Mouse corrected.
“Ya, and even if we could stop it, we do not know what damage we would do by ending the process prematurely.”
“That’s what hit you, Christa,” Mitch said. “You must have caught some of the fall off.”
She swallowed, remembering the shattering pain in her mind as she stared at the glowing translucent green brain in triple perspective on the screens. The knowledge that a man was being transformed as they watched made her feel ill again, but for a different reason.
“Let’s get Lamar over here,” Christa said.
“Soon.” Mitch motioned for Mouse to take the controls.
“Why not now?”
“Because if there’s someone on the FBI side under their control, anything useful will be destroyed before it's discovered. We’ll call Lamar, when we’re ready.”
Mouse slid into the seat in front on the console and studied the controls.
“It’s like watching brain surgery on television,” Mitch said, fascinated by the ghoulishness of it.
“It's not TV folks,” Mouse said, studying the fourth screen displaying the satellite alignment data. “We’re bouncing off a NSA satellite. Very secure. Take a look at screen four, about six lines down, where it says SGS. That’s Satellite Ground Station.” He pointed to the words, Sincom One. “That’s the other side of the bounce. It’s a two way transmission, signals going both ways, using massive bandwidth. There’s a ton of data bouncing off that satellite.”
The Siren Project Page 25