by Brad Taylor
As he staggered through the protestors, looking like a grisly rendition of Johnny Blaze, the chemical cauterized his esophagus, burning to his spine. The protestors fell away in horror, the ghastly smell of burning flesh following Austin in a putrid wake. Mercifully, a second later, his arms dropped, and he collapsed on the side of the road, dead.
The white phosphorus continued to burn, tendrils of thick smoke rising from his melted face like steam from miniature volcanoes.
15
Jennifer felt the pin slip back into place and muttered under her breath. The lock was becoming an absolute demon, a test of wills for her to conquer. Unlike a traditional key, with ridges and valleys, the key that worked this lock had the ridges built into the side, with the key itself flat on both top and bottom. It made the entire pick a learning process, something she would really rather not have to do on a live mission.
She kept tension on the barrel and gently went at the pin again, knowing she was running out of time. Any minute now, she would get the call that the target was headed back to his room. And she absolutely despised failure.
When the call came, it was not what she expected.
“Creed, Koko, this is Pike. Target is down. I say again, target is down.”
What on earth?
“Say again?”
“Too much to explain over the radio. Someone took out the target. Killed him inside the Dig. I’m still here, just outside the crime scene. Security is all over this place.”
She felt the pin seat and gave herself a mental cheer. She said, “So what’s that mean for me?”
“Not to be callous, but I think it means you’ve got all the time you need. Creed, I want you to break out the scanner. See if you can find the hotel security net. There’s a guy right in front of me talking into a radio. I’m sending you a picture of the model of his radio.”
“Roger that.”
“Koko, how’s it going?”
“I have one more pin, and I’m through the bar outside the safe. What happened to the target?”
“I don’t know. Well, I know someone slit his throat, but I don’t know if the whole ‘meet the journalist thing’ was a setup, or if someone beat him to the meeting. Either way, he’s dead.”
Jennifer felt the last pin slip home. Yes. She said, “Creed, Creed, this is Koko. I got the lock. How do I remove the bar?”
“Pull out on the handle and it will release the legs, extending them out.”
She did, and miraculously, it worked. She tossed the bar onto the carpet and withdrew a screwdriver for the plate hiding the universal access key. Creed shattered her concentration, breathless. “Koko, Koko, I have the security net. They know who the dead guy is. They’re sending security up your way to inspect the room.”
She started unscrewing the label, asking, “How much time?”
“I don’t know. They just called on the radio, telling someone to check the room. If they’re in the building already, maybe seconds. If it’s going to some command post, minutes.”
She popped the label and said, “Okay. I’m chancing it.”
She heard Pike say, “Your call, but plan an exit.”
She glanced toward the bathroom, seeing it was just like the bathroom in their room one floor below—meaning the only hiding place would be behind the shower curtain. Not optimal. She surveyed behind her, and Creed burst through her earbud, sounding as if he were face-to-face with the devil, panicked. “Koko, Koko, they’re coming down the hall. I see them on the fish-eye. They’re at your door!”
She grabbed the Bloxsafe secondary lock and leapt up, jumping over the bed to the sunken television room next to the balcony. In one fluid move, she threw open the sliding glass door, whirled around it, and slammed it closed again. She looked below, seeing a fall of eight dizzying stories ending in manicured landscaping. She tossed the Bloxsafe bar out into space and threw herself over the railing, grabbing the lower bars and hanging, leaving her hands as the only thing left visible to the room.
She heard Pike come on in his bored, pizza-delivery voice, meaning he was worried. “Koko, Koko, this is Pike, status?”
She whispered, “I’m on the balcony. Creed, what do you see?”
“Two men entered. Door is now closed. Don’t know what they’re doing, but they’re in your room.”
Pike said, “Koko, can’t they see you on the balcony?”
“I’m hanging below it.”
She heard nothing for what seemed like a minute, Pike racing to exit the Dig, then: “Jesus Christ, Jennifer, I see you, I see you. Anybody can see you.”
A little miffed, she hissed, “Anybody except the security in the room. What did you want me to do? Jump?”
Creed said, “They’ve left the room. One went back down the hall. One is standing guard outside.”
Jennifer pulled herself up, flipping over the railing and taking a breath. She surveyed the exterior of the hotel and said, “I might be able to climb to our room.”
Pike said, “No. Too risky. I don’t mean the climb; I mean because someone will definitely see that.”
“Pike, you’re one floor below me. I can get there in about a minute. Two tops.”
“No. You get seen playing spider monkey, and we’re in a world of shit. And before you say it, I’m not letting you sit on that balcony until the sun goes down.”
“What do you propose?”
“Creed and I will get you out. We’ll distract the guard, and you slip out. Just tell us when you have the computer.”
Computer?
“Say again?”
“You got the secondary lock off, right? Which means you can get in that safe in about thirty seconds. You no longer need twenty minutes to download anything. Just take the whole damn computer. He’s not going to miss it.”
She shook her head, realizing why he was against the climb. She said, “It’d be nice if you thought about my welfare instead of the mission.”
“I am thinking about your welfare. That damn climb is dangerous, even if you don’t think so. And I told you I’d give you a prize, but you have to accomplish the mission.”
She grinned, carefully sliding the door open. She whispered, “That prize was for picking the lock. I did that. I’m a Jedi now.”
“Okay, the Jedi prize was just some ice cream. The mission prize is much better.”
Kneeling at the safe, careful to remain absolutely silent, she clicked her earbud twice, letting him know she understood, then went to work on the universal access lock. In fifteen seconds, she had it unlocked, swinging the door open and hearing Pike say, “Creed, meet me on his floor. We’re going to walk down the hallway arguing with each other. When we get just past his door, with the guard’s back to it, we’re going to get into a fight. As security, he’ll have to react. You copy?”
She saw a wad of bills and a Dell thirteen-inch laptop. She heard Creed meekly say, “Uhh . . . Roger that.”
She closed the door, relocked it with the universal key, and began screwing the label cover back over it. She heard Pike say, “Okay, listen, do you want me to hit you, or do you want to hit me?”
Before Creed could answer, she heard, “Never mind. I’m on the way up. I’ll talk to you then. Koko, give me one click for still working, two clicks for ready to go.”
She clicked twice, then slid up to the door, seeing the guard through the peephole. She waited.
A minute later, Pike came on, saying, “Koko, Koko, we’re thirty seconds out.”
She clicked twice again and put her eye to the peephole. She faintly heard loud voices that grew stronger. Pike and Creed entered the vision of the peephole, Pike towering over Creed, waving his arms and shouting. They both ignored the man in front of the door. They got past him, the man turning to watch them go, and Creed drew back and walloped Pike on the side of the head with a clumsy hammer fist, hitting him s
o hard Pike’s skull bounced against the wall.
Ouch.
She heard Pike shout, “Have you lost your fucking mind?” and wondered if that was an act or if he was actually pissed at the force of the blow. Pike dove into Creed, slamming him into the ground, and the security man leapt at them, grabbing both by the collar and attempting to break them apart.
Creed looked like he was about to soil his pants in panic and fear, screaming and kicking his legs like a child. Jennifer waited, knowing Pike would do more to protect her exit.
Lying on top of Creed, preventing him from moving, Pike slapped one arm around the security man’s neck, bringing him close and pinning the man’s face to his chest.
She opened the door and slipped out, preventing the door from slamming behind her. She began trotting toward the elevator, hearing Pike say, “Whoa, whoa, I didn’t know you were security. I’m sorry. I thought you were attacking me . . .”
His voice faded into the background as she entered the stairwell next to the elevator. In seconds, she was back in their makeshift TOC, breathing heavily, the adrenaline still coursing through her.
Ten minutes later, she heard the door open, and Creed entered, by himself, smiling as if he’d just accomplished the impossible.
Jennifer said, “Where’s Pike?”
“Did you see me out there? Did you see what I did?” He mimicked throwing a fist, his eyes glistening.
She said, “I did. That was a pretty good cover play,” then repeated, “Where’s Pike?”
“Oh, he’s with security. We might be getting kicked out of here.”
Jennifer rolled her eyes, and Creed said, “How about that mission? I did pretty good, didn’t I?”
Jennifer smiled at him and said, “You did, Creed. You really did.”
He flushed at the attention, and the door opened a second time. Pike entered, the first words out of his mouth being, “What the fuck is your problem? I said slap me. Slap me. Not punch the shit out of my head.”
Pike stalked over to him, and Creed cowered, his early bravado gone. Jennifer stood and said, “Pike, don’t you dare.”
Pike stopped his advance, putting his hands on his hips and shaking his head, saying, “Tell me you got the computer.”
She pointed at the desk where it sat and said, “Tell me you didn’t get us kicked out.”
He grinned and said, “Nope. Not tonight anyway. They agreed we could stay one more night, since all the flights have left for the day, but tomorrow we’re persona non grata.”
She nodded and said, “Okay, now tell Creed he did a good job.”
Creed said, “You said to make it believable.”
Pike laughed and said, “Okay, okay, Creed, maybe I wasn’t specific enough. You did all right under pressure. Makings of a Jedi.”
Creed beamed and said, “So I get a prize too, right? Like you promised Jennifer?”
Pike said, “I think you’d better call it a win with the ice cream. I seriously doubt you want the prize Jennifer’s earned.”
Creed looked confused.
Jennifer stood with her mouth open, not quite believing that Pike had just said what he had.
Pike said, “What? You know I’m right on this.”
16
The insidious bleating of the fifty-inch high-definition television overshadowed the panoramic view of the Moroccan coastline, as both father and son were once again glued to another story about the single death in Nevada. The Sky News reporter, standing in front of Ramstein Air Base, an American Air Force base near Landstuhl, Germany, breathlessly repeated the exact same facts that had been cycled endlessly for a day and a half. The only twist was his attempt to interview a screaming mob of German protestors, all waving signs decrying the use of the air base as a staging ground for US Air Force drones.
Tariq said, “Who would have thought one small strike would cause so much interest. Perhaps we are working too hard.”
Yousef grunted, spat an olive pit into a bowl, then said, “Sensationalism doesn’t serve our purposes. I don’t care about drone strikes. I don’t care about Afghanistan. Or Yemen, Iraq, or Syria. I care about Saudi Arabia. We are being corrupted by the West, and the only way to stop the rot is to cripple those same people.”
Tariq said, “But you have to admit, that attack was pretty ingenious. I told you my man was smart.”
“Smart, yes. For that single attack. But dumb that you let him do it. He’s the one who is supposed to be our sleeper cell. Our inside man, and now he’s hunted worse than Osama bin Laden when he was alive. I cannot believe how much attention this attack generated.”
Tariq said, “It was the price of doing business. He was on his way to Somalia, more than willing to become cannon fodder in some tribal fight. I recruited him by playing on his desires.”
“By paying for the drone and giving him information on the air base?”
“Yes, Father. I had no idea his little attack would generate so much interest. I thought it would be a minor blip on the news, with him crashing the drone into a fence, but I was prepared nonetheless. He has a complete set of new identification, a new bank account, and a string of safe houses. And like I said, he’s smart.”
“Where is he now?”
“In Houston. Waiting on the arrival of your tanker. He knows not to do anything else. He’ll just keep his head down.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yes, of course. I talked to him yesterday on the phone I gave him.”
“Does he still have access to the original bank account?”
“No. Anything from his life in Nevada has been severed. We have multiple different accounts to use. Why?”
“Because I don’t want to confuse missions. His is done, for what little good it did. Ours is now beginning. The real mission. Where do we stand with Ring of Fire?”
Tariq inwardly sighed but was afraid to show any reticence at the questions. His father had done none of the work, other than provide the money, and yet he expected instant results. He still had no understanding of how much effort the Planes Operation had taken, and this one was no different.
“Nothing has changed from two days ago. The tanker left Gibraltar, and the explosives are in place. It was clean, so no problems there. The container ship is in port in Algeciras, but it’s leaving soon, and I can do nothing with it until I can deliver the package to Jalal. He’s still here, waiting.”
Offhand, Yousef said, “So we miss September eleventh.”
Confused at the turn of the conversation, Tariq said, “Yes. We talked about this. We can’t do a synchronized attack because each attack has to be different. We do one, and they’ll defend against the method. So we do a different one. Then a different one again. That was the plan all along.”
Yousef said, “I like the symmetry of another spectacular attack on the same day as the one before.”
Before Tariq could answer, the doorbell to the suite rang. Yousef said, “That would be the package you need.”
Tariq opened the door, finding a bellman for the hotel holding a canvas satchel. He took it, tipped the man, and closed the door. He held up the satchel and said, “So, do I finally get to hear what the mystery is all about?”
Yousef smiled, saying, “You remember my new venture in food sterilization in Riyadh? The new plant we invested in?”
“Yes? The one designed to prevent diseases in produce and meat? What’s that got to do with this satchel?”
“The method is irradiation. It’s done with an isotope called cobalt 60, the same thing used for radiation treatment in cancer patients.”
Tariq opened the satchel and withdrew a slender cylinder, capped at both ends. He said, “And this is the isotope?”
“Yes. The plant is going into production next week. It was some work, getting the isotope out of the official controls for such things, but I managed to
do it.”
“And if I include this on the container ship from Algeciras, what does that get us?”
“When I decided to invest in the plant, the only thing everyone could talk about was how deadly the isotope was and how it would contaminate city blocks if the plant exploded. Getting the approvals was like convincing everyone I wasn’t introducing Ebola into the kingdom. Blow up that tube, and you’ll contaminate the entire port for a minimum of forty years. You’ll turn it into another Chernobyl.”
“Is it safe? I mean, do I need to tell Jalal anything specific?”
“It’s safe in the container. Once it’s out, no. It’s deadly.”
Tariq smiled and said, “So at least two of the events will succeed.”
Yousef popped another olive and said, “The final one concerns me. We don’t control the ship. We don’t even control the men.”
“Father, trust me as you did in 2001. We didn’t control those martyrs then any more than we do now, but it worked.”
Yousef slapped his hand onto the table, causing the bowl of olives to jump. “No, it didn’t. One plane ended up in a field. The one that was to strike the capital. The greatest target. It was missed. I don’t want to repeat that.”
He stabbed a finger at the screen and said, “I don’t want another symbolic attack. I want destruction. I want them to bleed.”
Tariq said nothing, knowing his father, once on a familiar tirade, would continue until he ran out of energy. It was a speech he’d heard many times before. Although not a member of the royal family, Yousef was a powerful entity of the ruling elite of Saudi Arabia, equal with the Bin Laden construction group and just as staunch as them about preserving the Islamic traditions within the holy lands of the kingdom. Traditions that he believed were being assaulted on a daily basis by the West. Women’s rights, religious freedom for those who didn’t practice Islam—even discussions about the blasphemy of homosexuality—were now tolerated by the royal family, and it was all because of the influence of the West, led by the United States.