by Dan Kelly
“They’re working on it every hour of the day. My people are the best there is. They’ll come up with what is needed.”
“I have no doubt of that. The time it takes them to do that is the issue. We may be running out of that. I always prepare for the worst. That way there are no surprises. I don’t like surprises. Perhaps going underground is the way for us to go. I’m going to call a meeting for tomorrow night at seven. Hopefully, by then you’ll have more info on these two interlopers and ways to deal with the countermeasures being used against us.”
Chapter 23
-Chicago-
At three that afternoon, the Sentry group was once again assembled in their conference room reading what Sal and Collette had drafted. It wasn’t Pulitzer Prize material, but it definitely was an attention getter.
AUTHORITIES CLOSING IN ON AMERICA’S TORMENTORS
Some solid leads have finally been developed that could result in the capture of the individuals behind the recent rash of attacks against the American people. Every agency of the United States government has been diligently and tirelessly working to bring these malevolent malcontents to justice and it appears that their efforts are going to finally pay off. Although the authorities declined to reveal the identity of their suspects, they did disclose that they are major players in the world of commerce.
President Weinstein will be holding daily press conferences to keep the American people up to date on the investigation’s progress and the steps being taken to deal with the disruption in communication and electrical power services. He strongly believes that these ‘societal criminals’ days are numbered.
When everyone had finished reading what they had written Sal answered the anticipated question. “We didn’t follow Ernie’s suggestion and drop some names because we thought by implying the authorities knew who some of them were by referencing to the world of commerce this would create more uncertainty by having all of them infer that the powers that be had targeted them rather than just primarily shaking up the people whose names are mentioned.”
Collette added, “We’ve all pretty much concluded that the people behind all of the onslaughts on our populace are extremely wealthy. The financial resources required to pay for everything they’ve done are enormous and we believe it’s a safe bet that these resources came, in large part, from commercial enterprises.”
Nodding his head in approval Joel said, “Great job you two. Sal, if the President gives us his approval do you think we can get the media to use it tonight?”
“As far as the broadcast media is concerned, definitely yes. The President through his press secretary can announce that he will be holding a press conference at let’s say 6:30 tonight. Although representatives of the print media will attend the press conference, it probably won’t appear in their publications until tomorrow.”
Hank stood up and said, “Okay, it’s my turn at bat now. I’ll call the President and brief him on what we have in mind and press the point that he must act immediately, that he doesn’t have the time to form a bloody committee to evaluate the idea.” Hank headed for his office, leaving the rest of them sitting there to ponder over what else they might do to put an end to this nightmare.
Fifteen minutes later Hank returned with a grim smile on his face. “He reluctantly agreed to go along with our plan. He’s concerned about the possible fallout from the megabuck contributors to his campaign coffers who are big players in the national and international business communities. He’s afraid they’ll be outraged over the possibility that they’ll be tainted by the negative publicity that will be generated by the reference made to the culprits being ‘major players in the world of commerce’. Damn these politicians! When I pointed out to him that one or more of his precious backers could be playing key roles in the attacks against this country, he refused to acknowledge the possibility. All these political types think about is themselves and their next election. I cautioned him to tell no one what he was going to say at the press conference other than he had some comments to make regarding the progress that has been made in the investigation of the recent upheaval in the service sector of our economy.
“People, this announcement must be a big surprise to our adversaries in order to have the impact on them that we are seeking. I had to resort to threats to get him to promise he wouldn’t leak this out to any of his contributors.”
Astonished Barbara exclaimed, “You threatened the President of the United States? That must be against some kind of law.” Then with a mischievous wiggle of her eyebrows she asked, “What did you threaten him with?”
Smiling with a mischievous look of his own he replied, “I told him if he didn’t keep his lip buttoned I’d make public his sizable off track betting activities. He loves the ponies, but the ponies don’t love him. So far this year he’s lost over $40,000. If his gambling habit got out, it wouldn’t do his public image any good and his married life would make Afghanistan look like a high school football scrimmage. His wife has no idea about his gambling activities.”
Collette asked, “How do you know about them. I worked for the man and never picked up on any rumors that he was like many of us normal folks who have a vice or two on our backs. He always acted so aloof from the sins of us commoners.”
“As you folks should know by now, I have some very unusual sources. The source for this little tidbit was really off the wall. One of the cleaning crew for Air Force One found a note on the President’s seat after he had returned from a flight somewhere. It must have slipped from his pocket. On it was written ‘1,000 to win on Dream Boy in the third at Hialeah. As with all trash on our leader’s air taxi, it was shredded and then incinerated, but the guy who found the note blabbered to a fellow employee who happened to blabber to the wrong guy who was a member of the White House’s internal security who reported it to his boss who is one of my sources in that august abode. I made some discreet inquiries and found out he was a serious gambler. End of story.”
Barbara said, “Wow, he must have popped his cork when you threatened him.”
“Well, I hit him with it in a humorous way so it kept the flak to a minimum. He wasn’t thrilled that I knew this secret about him, but he rode with the punch and acquiesced.”
Joel said, “Well, I guess it’s hurry up and wait time again. Hank, what’s the arrangement with the tails you have on the people we thought warranted it? How often do they check in with you?”
“Every morning at eight and any time if they have something significant to report.”
Wringing his hands, Ashok voiced what was on everybody’s mind. “Geez, I sure hope they come up with something soon. This sitting and waiting for something to happen, good or bad, is going to make an antacid addict out of me.”
Joel responded with, “Tania, did you get together with Collette and start to check out the remaining people on our list?”
“We tried, but the constant interruptions in telephone service along with the off again on again power outages made it impossible to accomplish anything useful.”
“Well, our amazing brainiac here”, pointing to Ashok, “and our Air Force sky jockeys have bought us some time by temporarily squashing those obstacles. Instead of sitting on our hands and doing nothing, let’s take advantage of the opportunity and split up the remaining list and see if there’s anyone else of interest on it.”
Glad to have something to do that might help them rein in the creeps behind all of the national mayhem, they all eagerly headed for the offices to bang away at their phones and keyboards with a vengeance.
Chapter 24
-Washington D. C.-
When Sam Ferguson got the word from the President to call a news conference for 6:30 that night, but wouldn’t give him any details other than he would be talking about the ongoing investigation concerning the unprecedented strife the nation was experiencing, he threw caution to the winds and called Halkias from his office phone. He had to warn him of the possibility of imminent big trouble looming on the horizon and goi
ng through James Hollingsworth would take too long. He’d just have to take the risk of the conversation being recorded or being overheard.
When Halkias found out who was on the phone and got the gist of the message that Ferguson was delivering in a coded, double entendre kind of way, he angrily interrupted Ferguson with, “You must have the wrong number. I don’t know what you are talking about. Please don’t call here again.” and then broke the connection.
Halkias was furious that Ferguson had risked discovery by calling him directly with such a damning message. How can someone on the one hand be so intelligent and on the other hand be so stupid?”
Unbeknownst to either of them, part of Ferguson’s phone conversation with Halkias was overheard by Lorraine Caldwell, the President’s right hand girl, who was outside Ferguson’s office door about to knock before entering when she heard Ferguson saying some strange things. It sounded like a lot of gobbled gook to her, but it aroused her curiosity and was added to her memory bank along with his unusual behavior that day she ran into him on his way out to attend to some personal business when he should have been in his office preparing for a six o’clock press conference. She didn’t connect the two instances. She just had them stored in her phenomenal memory for future reference if the need arose. Since he was on the phone she elected not to knock, but call him on the intercom when she got back to her office.
The news conference went as planned with the President giving an Oscar winning performance. On occasion, when responding to a question from a reporter, he embellished the written script a little, but he did it with such finesse that it only enhanced the chances of the message eliciting the desired impact. Watching the news conference from his office Hank’s thinking, “Why am I so surprised? All successful politicians are award winning actors. They’ve got to be or they’d never convince anyone to do anything. Let’s hope our enemies are convinced we’re closing in on them.” Hank doesn’t know it yet, but that thought is going to come back to haunt him.
Chapter 25
-Elizabeth-
At seven o’clock the following evening, all of the members of The Last Resort, all but Sam Ferguson, are seated around an exquisite, deep mahogany, circular conference table of exceptionally large proportions in the offices of Ubiquitous Argosies, Inc. The effect of last evening’s press conference clearly written on their countenances. It has produced the desired impact. It’s is reflected in the concerned looks on their faces and in the questions they are firing at Halkias.
David Zadikoff, whose feathers hardly ever get ruffled, is fit to be tied. “How the hell did they get onto us? Where did we slip up? Did someone get careless and open their yap?”
George Palmer explodes with, “Who gives a shit? We’ve been made. What the bloody hell are we going to do now? They’ve even come up with a way to deal with the service interruptions.”
James Hollingsworth shows the gelatin he’s made of by asking, “Where can we go to lie low until all of this blows over?”
Ronald Baltzinger shows he’s made of sterner stuff and reveals his penchant to gamble no matter what the bet might be by saying, “Roughly ten percent of the U. S. population is considered extremely wealthy. That’s approximately 30,000,000 people. The odds of the seven of us being picked out of this crowd are slim to none.”
Picking up on Baltzinger’s comment in an attempt to calm down those that aren’t handling the contents of the press conference very well Halkias says, “Ron’s right. There’s no indication that we’ve been identified. That news conference was just a ploy, a scattergun tactic designed to shake up whoever is behind the recent turmoil that we have created in the recent weeks. They have no idea who we are, but are hoping that the little spiel the President rattled off will rattle us and perhaps put a monkey wrench in our plans by persuading us to forego whatever we have in mind or getting us nerved up enough to start making mistakes, mistakes that could lead to our capture. It was a smart move on their part, perhaps even brilliant, but it failed because it’s not going to work.
“We’re proceeding on course, but we’re going to move up the timetable for the next steps in our plan. Jim’s idea of finding a safe haven has some merit, but we should use it as a new base of operations not a place to lie low. I think it is an excellent idea to go underground until we’ve accomplished what we’ve set out to do for the following reason.
“Now I know I said that there’s no indication that we’ve been identified, but that’s not entirely true.” Halkias told them about Joel and Barbara’s visit to his offices, what Feldman had found out about Clear Sky Enterprises, the subsequent attempt to follow them in their plane which resulted in Feldman’s plane crashing and the possible consequences of the ensuing investigations to find out what caused the crash. “I may be overreacting, but I’d rather be careful than sorry.”
When Halkias told them of the visit to his office by the two suspicious strangers, this prompted Hollingsworth and Palmer to recall the unusual encounters that, in Hollingsworth’s case, his maid and, in Palmer’s case, his CFO “Julio Ramirez had told them about. Baltzinger was reminded of the conversation he had with Tania Russo in the casino in Atlantic City and especially the way it had ended. When Halkias was finished, they shared these encounters with the rest of the group.
The calm that Halkias had managed to somewhat restore was completely shattered after these men spoke their piece. Feldman had had enough. “God damn it! Every one of you knew what we were setting out to do wasn’t going to be a walk in the park. We’re not dealing with idiots here. The current powers that be are intelligent and they are not going to surrender their domains without one hell of a fight. You all knew this going in. Just like you all knew going in that we will prevail because we’re more intelligent, better able to adjust to changing conditions and have the resources and determination to win. Nothing has changed. How some of us have apparently showed up on their radar I don’t know. I do believe, however, that it was by mere happenstance and not by any one of us screwing up. We are too damned disciplined to do that, so all of you get your act together.”
Quiet returned to the conference room and looking at everyone individually before he spoke Halkias broke the silence with, “Up to now, everything has gone as planned. Even the temporary neutralization of our disruptions of the nation’s communication and electrical networks has been anticipated and Bob’s people are closing in on the solution to that little problem now that we know what the problem is. There could be no reaction until we had an action to react to.
“This is what I propose. Let’s initiate Phase Three of our plan starting tomorrow. At first, no one will connect this phase with the earlier two. That’s to our advantage because no out of the ordinary resources will be allocated to deal with the new threat to America’s foundation, its government. By the time they do, it will be too late. To distract the powers that be further and keep the enemy’s resources focused on Phases One and Two, when Bob’s people come up with the solution to the countermeasures being used to thwart our service disruptions it will be applied immediately. Also, instead of attacking entire regions of the country the towns and cities to experience communication breakdowns and power outages will be selected randomly this time around. This will make it harder for our enemy to locate the sources of the disruptions. It will be like looking for a needle in a haystack.
“Also, we’re going to include the Pentagon in this series of attacks. Our goal here is not to destroy their entire operation but to annoyingly cripple some of their subsystems.”
Feldman tacked on to Halkias’s comments an update to the progress being made in the development of a resolution to the enemy’s actions. “My research lab informed me just before out meeting started that they’ve come up with a tentative solution to the service disruption problem. If the test runs are successful, they’ll be ready to go tomorrow morning. My lab has also developed a strain of bacteria that causes severe diarrhea which we can use to contaminate select water supplies. It can be embedded in a
soluble powder contained in a capsule that is also soluble and dropped into select reservoirs across the country. The capsules can be delivered via our drones.
“Another reason we’re targeting municipalities randomly and it also apples to our controlled invasion of the Pentagon’s computer systems is that our latest weapon against the tyrannical despots that have reduced our country to second rate nation status is much more devastating than anything we’ve developed so far. It doesn’t just interfere with normal software operations and cause hard drives to crash. It reduces all of the internal desk top and server hardware to molten electronic trash. Instead of taking days to restore normalcy to a computer system, it will take weeks and in some cases months to get systems up and running again. We want to keep the destruction to a minimum yet effective level for our purposes. When we take over, it will make our coupe a lot easier to enforce if we have high tech tools at our disposal.”