Khan was just what the National Counterterrorism Center had been warning about ever since 9/11. A homegrown radical Islamic terrorist who joined forces with an overseas jihadist. These two had behaved in the same ‘draw attention’ mode as the Empire jihadist. “What about the TATP? Who made it and where?”
Jackson blinked. “The two men were staying at a cheap motel in west St. Louis for the last seven days. The St. Louis field office agents and the city police SWAT team raided the motel room late Wednesday evening. They found commercial chemicals and tubes that had traces of TATP residue. We think the TATP was made there and carried into the arch within the clothing of the two men. There is no way it would have survived a road trip from Memphis without detonating.”
Andrew touched the edge of his desk. He tapped his fingers. “How did the two get their rifles up to the top of the arch? They had to go through magnetometers like everyone else.”
“They did go through them,” Jackson said. He looked to his right. “Agent Richardson, this element of the report comes from the work of your people. Can you assist?”
Richardson leaned forward, his broad shoulders tense under his pin-striped black suit. “Deputy director, intense interrogation of all employees at the visitor center turned up a cleaning woman who admitted to placing the rifles on top of the lead car of the south side tramway just before the jihadists arrived. While the cable area above the tramway cars is normally closed during tram use, there is an access hatch inside the operator alcoves of both the north and south trams. It appears one of the jihadists pulled the operator out of the alcove by pretending to be sick, while the second man opened the hatch and grabbed the rifles. Shots were fired by the second jihadist, which caused a stampede of escaping tourists down the north side stairwell. That stopped when both jihadists fired warning shots, then placed the explosive bottles and detonator phones at the entrance to each stairwell.”
Andrew winced. “Don’t tell me. The cleaning woman was of Iraqi heritage and still has family back in Iraq. She cooperated because Alkoury threatened to kill her relatives.”
Richardson nodded. “Just so.”
He ground his teeth. The best security could not defeat human fear and the impulse to protect a family member. “What else? Any good news?”
Ramsay raised his hand. “There is good news, actually. Through the joint analysis of the phones and computer by our two branches we recovered records of cell phone calls and emails to people in five other American cities.” Bald-headed Ramsay looked very pleased with himself. “Those cities are San Francisco, Houston, New Orleans, Miami and Chicago. Decryption of the message packets gave us the IP addresses, names and locations of the recipients. The essence of the messages sent was that Islamic State wanted the sleeper cells of jihadist sympathizers to rise up and attack major public landmarks in those cities. As of this morning our agents have raided an apartment on Castro Street in San Francisco and have arrested three men and one woman on charges of planning to plant explosives on the Golden Gate Bridge, while holding hostage several carloads of people, which hostage taking was to be livestreamed on YouTube.”
Coldness swept down Andrew’s neck. The Islamic State chieftains were not aiming for a massive attack on densely populated areas like train stations and airports. Instead, they were aiming to hit major American cities as a signal that America could not protect its citizens from being taken hostage, nor could the nation protect landmarks known around the world. This new data reminded him of the targets hit by the 9/11 attackers. The fourth 9/11 plane had been heading for either Congress or the White House, and only the bravery of the plane’s passengers had caused it to crash in a Pennsylvania farm field, rather than on top of Congress. The attacks on the Empire State Building and on the Gateway Arch now made sense. Too much sense.
“You said people were contacted in five cities. What news from the other locations?”
Ramsay nodded slowly. “The Chicago field office tracked the email sent there to the south side residence of two men from Somalia who were here on tourist visas issued by Kenya.” The man’s satisfied expression went dark. “Local SWAT teams and five agents mounted a raid this morning on the residence. They entered front and back. One man in the front living room was tackled and cuffed. The rear entry team came upon a second man in a bedroom. That man had on a suicide vest holding multiple dynamite lengths. Before they could do anything the man set off his vest, destroying the rear of the house. One agent was killed and two SWAT officers were seriously wounded.”
Andrew felt his gut begin churning. “What did the front entry team find out? About their Chicago target?”
Ramsay looked to Richardson, then back to him. “Analysis of that man’s cell phone showed the two planned to put on their suicide vests, cover them with winter coats, then take the elevator to the top of the Willis Tower, to Skydeck Chicago. They may have had in mind doing a hostage taking with internet broadcast from the top of Willis Tower, similar to what the Gateway jihadists did.”
He let out a sigh. This coming weekend would have been beyond deadly if the San Francisco and Chicago sleeper cells had been successful. “Please email me the name of the special agent and his family contacts. I have the Chicago PD number. What of Houston, New Orleans and Miami?”
Richardson sat forward. “Deputy director, we have the names and photos of sleeper cell jihadists in all three cities, but none were present at the residences to which Alkoury sent his emails. Our field offices and local police and federal marshals are conducting an intensive search of public monuments in those cities, along with a video review of airport, train and boat departure sites.” The tall agent looked aside to Ramsay and Jackson, then back to Andrew. “Do we distribute these photos and names to local media? It might help us locate these jihadists.”
Andrew knew the question was one reason he occupied the second highest position within the FBI. Life and death decisions like this fell to him to decide. “Not yet. If we assume the Islamic State handler gave orders for all attacks to happen this weekend, then we have time for the ground searches to pay off. I assume your people are monitoring bank, ATM and credit card activities that might be carried out by any of the suspects in the three cities?”
“We are monitoring their financial records,” Richardson said. “When do we advise the public, if not now?”
Andrew blinked at the man’s persistence. Still, persistence was one hallmark of a good agent. And Richardson was far better than good. “If we can’t find these jihadists by midnight East Coast time, release the photos and names to local television stations and to the national networks. And pursue any relatives of these people! I don’t want the St. Louis Cathedral in New Orleans blown up with worshippers inside!”
“Neither do any of us,” said Jackson. “The agents in the Terrorism Screening Center worked through the night last night. They and SIOC are pursuing all leads to these jihadists and none of my people will leave this building until they are caught.”
Andrew felt slight satisfaction at the man’s statement. Deep dedication was another sign of a good agent and there were plenty of them in SIOC, in the TSC and in CIRG. And also out in the field offices. If he were not required to stay in the building while the director was away talking to people in Congress and the White House, he would have found an excuse to take a flight to Miami or Houston. His wife’s family hailed from Houston and while the place was a giant octopus of roads, streams of cars and millions of people, still, it had the history of Sam Houston woven into the city’s nature. He scanned the all too serious faces of Jackson, Ramsay and Richardson. Perhaps one of them knew something about the second matter related to these ISIS attacks on American landmarks.
“What about the intruder? Any useful data from the Gateway Arch event?”
Richardson’s lips curved into a half smile. “My SIOC people and Special Agent Ethel Lowenstein from BAU One at Quantico are building a comprehensive file on the man. The clothing brands worn by Green Mask in both appearances led us to review
the retail videos of both the REI and Men’s Wearhouse stores in Utah, Colorado, Arizona and New Mexico. That review produced names and images of 141 young men with blue eyes, black hair, height of six feet three, weight of 160 pounds and a slim frame who have bought clothing from those stores,” the agent said, his low bass voice sounding confident. “Our field offices are checking the travel histories of the suspects with an eye to ruling out some of them based on a suspect’s presence elsewhere during the two recent terror events. Video and first hand witnesses are providing the exclude out data. Any suspect who cannot be linked to a location other than St. Louis and New York City will be personally interviewed by an agent.”
“Good,” Andrew said. “But this intruder has red hair he has dyed black. That is unusual. Are you passing that data on to the field offices and agents reviewing these suspect files?”
“We are doing that,” Richardson said. He looked down at his own smartphone, which Andrew realized had been set to vibrate while the man was in his office.
“News?”
Richardson looked up. His brown eyes were bright. “Agent Lowenstein has posted the results of the interview of the two veterans who assisted the intruder at the arch. One of the men cupped his hands so the intruder could step on them as a means of reaching the arch roof by way of the ceiling hatch. She says adhesive patches applied to the spots on the vet’s pants where he wiped his hands after the intruder’s tennis shoes left his grip document the presence of pollen common to New Mexico and Arizona. In particular there was distinctive chamisa pollen like that reported found on the paraglider bag.”
Most interesting. If reliable the new data reduced the states of possible origin for Green Mask from four to two. “Useful data. Did the veterans have any impressions to convey about the intruder?”
“They did,” Richardson said, putting his smartphone into his coat pocket. “Marine Recon veteran Wayne Mendoza was the one who cupped his hands to help the intruder. He told the interviewing field agent that he thought the intruder was unusually strong and with an excellent sense of balance, based on how the man stood on his cupped hands. Mendoza also says he believes Green Mask has a sharp Roman nose, based on how close Mendoza was to the face of the intruder. He says the outline of the intruder’s nose was very clear under the green bandana.”
Andrew liked that datum. It ruled out any young men with visibly deformed or small noses. Good criminal investigations always paid attention to details, including the smallest details of any case. Now, they had the man’s DNA profile, accurate physical parameters, facial information, his recorded voice and voluminous data on the shotgun handled by the man, the paraglider and its bag, and hair samples that showed he dyed his red hair regularly. No imagery of the man at the arch showed red roots on his uncovered head, which meant this young man dyed his hair frequently.
“So we have 141 young men from four states who show up in customer videos as having visited the REI and Men’s Wearhouse stores in four states.” He hated to do this, but it was necessary. “Such clothing could also have been bought at second hand stores. Get your agents to check video records for any second hand stores in the cities with both stores in those four states. Do the same for indigent guest houses maintained by churches and volunteer agencies in the four states. It is possible our intruder obtained his clothes from such a source, rather than from first hand purchase.”
Ramsay grimaced. Jackson frowned thoughtfully. Richardson nodded quickly. “My agents will expand their video searches to those locations in the four states. Or should we limit the search to just Arizona and New Mexico, based on the pollen data?”
Andrew shook his head. “Focus on all four states. Do not exclude any state from the video file search. And have one of your SIOC agents put up a Reward Notice on eBay, Tinder, Twitter and YouTube that offers $10,000 for information leading to the identity of Green Mask. Maybe someone knows this man. Or has heard him boast about helping people escape from jihadists. Advise me of the exclusion and expanded search results.”
“Will do,” Richardson said.
Andrew looked to the man who’d first spoken. “Chief Jackson, keep me advised of the status of your search for the jihadists in Houston, Miami and New Orleans. And give me a ten minute warning before you release names and photos to the media. The White House press secretary will need to know what we are doing before he gets questions about it.”
“You can count on it,” Jackson said, standing up.
Ramsay and Richardson also stood. The bald-headed CIRG boss lifted one black eyebrow.
“Deputy director, we are making progress. Attacks in two cities have been thwarted and we know who is active in the other three cities. We’ll find them.”
Andrew stood up, his mind filled with too many worries. “But will you find them before they kill themselves and too many citizens? Or they set up a show on YouTube that makes America look like a toothless lion? The president is following what we are doing. She expects results yesterday. Pursue these bastards. Grab them. And follow back the emails to the European contacts of Alkoury and Khan. Islamic State has mounted plenty of attacks in Europe. I worry they may be planning similar landmark attacks in the EU. If so, our European allies need to know about those attacks before they happen. Dismissed.”
The three turned and walked out of his office. Andrew turned and walked over to the glass wall window that gave him a glorious view of downtown Washington D.C. He stared across the building roofs, fixing his attention on the white stone spire of the Washington Monument. God forbid any attack on that spire!
♦ ♦ ♦
Valery arrived home after visiting Justine at the hospital. Her wife had come through the anesthesia and gall bladder surgery in good shape, despite being fifty-four years old. Two years younger than Valery. She had canceled all her Friday client appointments earlier in the week and that allowed her to spend most of the day at the hospital. While Justine had awakened within a few hours after leaving the surgery room, she had had a poor night’s sleep, thanks to frequent visits by nurses checking her vitals. That meant her wife often nodded off in the midst of their chattering about an upcoming opera they both wanted to see. Valery had not minded. She’d brought a book and the local paper with her when she’d arrived at Christus St. Vincent. She had eaten a chef’s salad for lunch at the hospital. And now, with Justine slated for her second walk around the corridors of the hospital and follow up PT exercises, she had come home. Sitting on the red leather couch the two of them had picked out years earlier, she aimed the TV control at the flatscreen and switched it on. The screen brightened and showed the CNN logo with Breaking News filling the screen.
“Police raids in San Francisco and Chicago have captured five suspected radical Islamic terrorists,” reported Leslee Howden. “An FBI agent died in the Chicago raid on a house in the Harvey suburb, while two Chicago SWAT officers were severely wounded. Neighbors told CNN that an explosion had leveled the rear of the house.” The blond woman, who looked impossibly slim and perky and awake for it being late evening in New York City, looked down at her glass top desk, clearing seeing a video image that might replicate the images behind her that showed raid locations in the two cities. She looked up. “The source of the explosion is reported to be a suicide vest worn by a second man in the terrorist house, but that has not been confirmed.” She paused, touched the earbud in her right ear, and nodded. “A source in the San Francisco police department tells CNN that the three men and one woman captured in a Castro Street apartment block were intending to block traffic on the Golden Gate Bridge, capture some motorists and set explosives on nearby support cables in expectation of bringing down the bridge.” She paused, looking distracted. “I’m told we have a live report from Jack Wilshire, senior terrorism reporter who is reporting from outside the FBI’s J. Edgar Hoover building in downtown Washington, D.C. Jack?”
Valery grabbed the bottle of Perrier water that sat on the coffee table in front of her, took a sip from it and watched as the image of a for
ty-something white man wearing a black suit took form on the video wall behind Howden. Why was so much terrorism happening in so short a time?
“Leslee, a source of mine in the FBI says the raids in San Francisco and in Chicago were the result of information gained from the cell phones carried by the Gateway Arch hostage takers,” Wilshire said calmly as raincoated citizens walked behind him on the sidewalk in front of the gray concrete building. “My source, who insists on confidentiality since he is not authorized to speak on current operations, says the cell phones contained a record of calls to jihadists in Dusseldorf, Germany and to Raqqa in Syria, the headquarters of the Islamic State. My source says the recent attacks on the Empire State Building and the Gateway Arch were ordered by an IS leader in Raqqa. The purpose of the public hostage taking attacks, which did not include mass killings unlike prior attacks in Europe, Africa and India, was not known to my source. However, he speculated there may be a terror campaign underway that is aimed at famous American landmarks. Leslee?”
The blond CNN anchor looked thoughtful. “Jack, is there any evidence of landmark attacks set for other American cities?”
The stocky man frowned. “When I asked that question of my source, he said ‘maybe’. He said agents in St. Louis and here in D.C. are working on the digital records left by the Gateway terrorists and hope to gain information on future terror targets. Back to you Leslee.”
“Thank you, Jack.” The woman looked directly at the camera. “We go now to an interview I did earlier today with Josy Tompkins, who formerly worked on the National Security Council that advises the president on issues relating to national security. Miss Tompkins had some interesting thoughts about the recent surge in terror attacks within the USA.”
Valery pushed the mute button, not wishing to hear more wild guessing by academic talking heads. She had heard enough wild-eyed chatter during the summer after a terror attack in Sydney, Australia. She preferred factual news versus hypothetical speculation. Which thought brought to mind the image of young Jeffrey Montgomery Webster.
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