The House of War: Book One Of : THE OMEGA CRUSADE

by Carlos Carrasco

  “Yes, lots of tunnels,” Machete says, lifting the box of cigars towards Ahmed.

  “No, thank you.”

  Machete shrugs and drops the box back on his desk. He pauses to light the cigar, bringing it to life with several short puffs. His eyes fix on the lit end and he seems to withdraw within himself.

  Ahmed Aziz waits until his host has savored a few long draws from his smoke before talking again.

  “You have tunnels,” Al-hakim repeats.

  “Ah yes, the tunnels,” Machete returns to the moment. “It’s too dangerous to use them tonight. Some of them Yankee drones have real sensitive ears on them, you know? They can hear an ant pissing in sand. No tunnels tonight. We’ll just have to wait.”

  “You’re being paid very well to get us and our weapon to America,” Ahmed says.

  “And I will do just that,” Machete replies. “When I think it is safe to cross, we’ll cross. Until then, just take a chill pill, Ali Baba. It’s not like I don’t want you to blow up gringos. We’re on the same side.”

  “We have a schedule.”

  “You’re on my schedule now, raghead,” Machete says coldly. “Is that clear?”

  Patience, Ahmed tells himself, restraint. “Yes, it is clear.”

  “Good,” Machete says biting down on the cigar. “You can leave now.”

  09:08:07

  Augustine Koenig hears his PalmPal chirp with an incoming message. He snaps awake. He rises from the RV’s narrow bed and plucks the PalmPal from its belt-clipped sheath. Augustine thumbs its small display screen and reads the short message that scrolls across it.

  [Well done. We’ve struck gold. Have a Merry Christmas!]

  Excellent, thinks Koenig. They all suspected that breaking into the ‘American Ayatollah’s’ secret office would pay off handsomely and apparently, it did. Sheik Qassim Abdul Zahra has long been suspected of being the ‘Godfather of terrorism in America’ but Qassim was always careful to plot his dirty business behind closed and electronically impenetrable doors. Outside those doors, the Sheik also had an army of lawyers that made him invulnerable to prosecution. Zahra earned the whispered nickname of the ‘Teflon Turban’ because no prosecutor has ever been able to make anything stick to him. Worse yet, prosecutors had grown wary of even investigating the ‘Motor City Mullah.’ It was certainly never done publically because even the most obliquely drawn connection between the Sheik and terrorism in the press would bring out thousands of protestors in dozens of cities. All too often acts of terror would accompany these demonstrations against ‘Islamophobia in America.’ Two of the Federal government’s more ambitious D.A.’s were killed for their trouble in the last public investigation of Qassim.

  Nobody wanted to touch Sheik Zahra. Nobody but the Crusade, that is. Homeland Inquisition needed to know what Zahra was hiding so as to better counter the resistance the Sheik was more than likely to throw at them. Now that the revolution was on, there was nothing to lose and so much to gain. Augustine Koenig and Doug Ditka readily, even eagerly, volunteered to break into the Sheik’s office.

  Qassim’s inner sanctum was a windowless, soundproof chamber with a ceiling mounted sensor which continuously scanned for eavesdropping devices and signals. A glass, crescent-shaped conference table dominated the room. Nine swivel chairs were spread along the inner arc of the crescent and one plush, leather chair was centered behind the outer arc. The one computer in the room was not connected to the internet or even the network that managed the rest of the Salafi Cultural Center and Mosque. It sat on one side of a small desk in the far side of the room. Beside the desk there stood a single file cabinet. There were no phones inside the chamber and its lead-lined walls made cellular transmission into and out of it impossible. After breaking in, Augustine had to prop the steel door open with a couple of chairs to allow a faint signal to keep him connected with his partner Doug.

  Once inside the office, Augustine immediately set about removing the hard drive from the computer. Koenig then searched through the desk drawers, adding three thumb-drives, a legal pad of hand-written Arabic notes and an unused, still-packaged, disposable cell phone from a half-empty case that once contained fifty just like it. He stuffed them all into a small, black gym bag and turned his attention from the desk to the four-drawer filing cabinet. Once he snapped the lock on it, Augustine recorded the contents, page after page, on his PalmPal. There were several hundred sheets of paper, mostly in Arabic, divided among the top three drawers. The last drawer contained musical discs. He shuffled through them and realized that they were all copies of Kid Jihadi’s latest rap album, ‘Infinite Intifada.’ It was a curious find in the office of man known to deplore all Western music, but Koenig figured that if the Sheik was going to listen to any Western music it would be the crap that Kid Jihadi produced. Augustine grabbed a handful of the silver dollar-sized, plastic-wrapped discs and tossed them into the gym bag. Lastly, he lifted several fingerprints from the edge of the table, desk and armrests of chairs.

  Koenig was on his way out when his partner Ditka warned him about Qassim and his bodyguard. Their arrival was a small but annoying glitch in the otherwise smooth operation. While Augustine was sorely tempted to empty his clip into the Sheik’s head and be done with him, he resisted. Everyone was under strict orders to avoid all unnecessary violence during the opening nights of the coup. Instead of killing the Motor City Mullah and his muscle, Koenig steered the men into the inner office and handcuffed them to the legs of the conference table.

  “Why are you doing this?” the Sheik demanded of Augustine as the cuff closed around his wrist.

  “Kielbasa,” Koenig answered. “I haven’t had a decent link of sausage since you ragheads ruined this town.”

  Doug Ditka laughed approvingly at his answer to Zahra when, minutes later, they sped off to join their families in Cleveland. En route they uplinked the material from the file cabinets. In Cleveland they were met in front of Saint Anthony’s Church by fellow crusaders who took the gym bag from them. That was a few short hours ago. Once the goods were delivered, Augustine caught up with his family. After kisses and hugs he collapsed on the one of the RV’s pull out beds and fell asleep amid their happy, bubbling banter.

  The text message from Homeland Inquisition woke him in time for morning Mass. Augustine Koenig clears the message from his inbox with a smile, glad to know that his first mission for the Crusade is a success.

  “Happy to help,” he says to the PalmPal. “A Merry Christmas to you!” The machine converts his voice to text and transmits it with a tap of an icon.

  Augustine turns the slender machine in his hand and chuckles appreciatively. His PalmPal is one of the few communication devices on the planet that is working properly. A simple chip and program added to the mass-produced machine allows it to function through the electromagnetic static raining down on the world, rendering all unenhanced devices useless to their owners. This control of the world’s satellites will give their revolution a clear advantage in the days to come. The technological high ground, impressive as it is to Koenig, is not what brought him onboard, willing to risk life, honor and family in a battle against, what could turn out to be, all the nations of the earth. It is the Crusade’s moral high ground, the vision of a world so desirable and so readily attainable, offered by Colonel Miguel Cesar Pereira that convinced Augustine to join.

  Koenig sheaths the PalmPal and looks about the cramped quarters of the RV. His wife Anya is tying a green and red ribbon on their eldest daughter’s curly, blond ponytail. Young Elsa is trying to catch her reflection in the window, complicating her mom’s effort. At the back of the RV, his son and youngest daughter sit with Anya’s aunt and uncle watching ‘It’s a Wonderful Life.’ Augustine notices that it is one of his favorite scenes playing. George Bailey is visiting Mary at her home after not having seen her for years. Koenig believes that Jimmy Stewart’s nervous handling of his hat while he plays at being disinterested in Mary is still some of the most exquisite acting ever committed to fi
lm.

  “What do you think, daddy?” Elsa does a spin before him, showing off her new dress and ribbons.

  “Beautiful,” Augustine says. “A princess fit for the King of Kings!”

  “And aunty M made me a new veil,” his daughter says holding the laced cloth up by two of its corners. “It’s a giant snowflake!”

  “Oh my, but that is lovely,” Augustine says. “The angels looking down from heaven will simply adore it.”

  “Let’s get our coats on,” Anya advises. “Mass begins in five minutes.”

  The adults secure the little ones in their coats. Even though they only have a short walk from their parking spot in the church lot to its front door, they add scarves and hats to the kids’ outer wear. It is fifteen below zero outside the RV and the flurries that fell on them in Dearborn have followed them east, turning into big, sticky flakes.

  “It’s a white Christmas!” The little boy, Emil cries out when the door to the RV is flung open.

  “The very best kind of Christmas,” Anya says, walking him down the narrow steps.

  They walk across the snow-swept lot. In short order they reach their fellow stragglers on the church steps. Augustine scans the crowd, looking for possible signs of trouble. He sees none. At the top of the steps, on either side of the twelve foot arched doors, two young men also scan the worshippers as they file into the church. On the lapels of their long, dark woolen coats, Koenig spots the Cross and Omega pins of the Neo Knights Templar. The guard on the right spots the same pin on Augustine’s lapel and gives him a knowing smile as the ex-cop climbs the church steps with his family in tow. The sentries will remain outside, guarding the doors to the church. Another two Templar will protect the rear of the church and another one or two will be secreted among the worshippers on the inside.

  It is a sign of the times, the ex-cop notes with an inward sigh. Maxists and other anti-Christian bigots were disrupting Masses and other church services with growing frequency. In several sad instances the faithful were firebombed or sprayed with bullets while worshipping. A growing number of churches organized volunteer parishioners and/or hired round-the-clock rent-a-cops to protect them from activists, vandals and terrorists. Cleveland’s Saint Anthony’s is a ‘Crusade church,’ one of the many churches in the country through which the Second American Revolution was planned. As such, Saint Anthony’s enjoys the protection of the Templar. The young men will defend their charges with their lives if they have to. Under their long coats are Uzis and Stun-Batons to aid them.

  A sign of the times that will soon be a-changing, Augustine prays. He looks up at the statue of the church’s namesake saint over the arched entryway. “Help us find our way, won’t you, old friend?”

  Above Saint Anthony, the twin, twisting gothic spires reach to a heaven that has never seemed closer to Augustine Koenig.

  06:05:04

  Sam Ericson sips his coffee and looks out the broad, floor-to-ceiling windows of the United Nations Secretary General’s office. The view is an impressive one. Snow has just started falling from a cloud-packed, dove-gray sky. Through the flurries, the cityscape is spread out before him as far as the eye can see. Sam is reminded of a snow globe that rested on the living room mantle of his parents’ home for many years. He smiles at the memory of the long ago Christmas that landed the trinket on its shelf. Ericson was seven years old at the time. He remembers the thrill of exploring the family’s newly purchased Bensonhurst home with his two younger sisters. They were ecstatic, feeling like royalty merely because they would each have their own bedrooms.

  There would later be darker years in his family’s history. Colonel Miguel Pereira pointed out to Sam that his family was torn apart by the same influences and forces that caused the disintegration of the society they lived in. Having identified those forces and influences and with the help of his wife and her kin, he was eventually able to heal his own family. Soon they would apply those lessons to all that ailed the nation and, if God willed it, the world.

  Ericson basks in the happy memory of that long ago Christmas for a few precious moments before turning his attention to the street beneath him. He examines the perimeter the NYPD has set around the United Nations complex. First Avenue has been blocked from Forty-Second to Forty-Eighth Street. Every street between them is barricaded at Second Avenue. There are cops at every intersection re-directing the light Christmas traffic. Some gawkers have started to gather, mostly behind the saw horses on the south and north end where SWAT trucks are parked besides trios of armored troop carriers. A couple of hundred soldiers are mixed in among the police up and down the line. Their leaders have set up a joint command post half way up Forty-Fourth Street. A police and an army helicopter orbit the tower, busied by keeping the swarm of news choppers from getting too close. Sam looks from the scene outside the window to his laptop on the Secretary General’s desk. On its screen, he has a view of the rear of the UN Tower. Everything from the back of the complex to the East River has been cordoned off including the FDR, its traffic diverted off the Drive at Fifty-Ninth and Forty-Second Street.

  The Police began arriving at ten O’clock, a half hour after Ericson released his workmate, Sanjay Vas. Sam advised him to go straight to the police.

  “Don’t you worry about me, Sanjay,” he told him. “Cover your own rear and tell them everything you know and everything you saw.”

  Vas did so and twenty-five minutes later the first squad car arrived. Two cops, one black and the other Hispanic, walked warily through the open gate. Ericson met them in the plaza with Colonel Sean Grant. Santos and Hendricks tagged along with M-16s to discourage New York’s finest from any unnecessary heroics. They stayed back by the tower entrance.

  “Merry Christmas officers,” Colonel Grant greeted the two young cops in his scratchy voice.

  The pair of policemen looked nervously from the grinning Colonel to the stone-faced, M-16 toting soldiers.

  “Merry Christmas to you,” the Hispanic cop said furtively. “We got us a report of a break in…”

  “That’s right,” said the Colonel. “We did the breaking in. And we’re holding the Secretary General hostage. Would you like to talk to him?”

  The two policemen look at each other and then back at Colonel Grant who was offering his cell phone to them.

  “Your phone is working?” the black cop asks.

  “Sure is,” Colonel Grant said. “Check it out. You do know what the Secretary General looks like, don’t you?”

  “Not really,” answered the Hispanic cop.

  “I do,” said the black cop, taking the phone. He tapped its screen which came to life with the image of Simon Aguilera seated in high-backed, leather chair. “Hello. Um… Mr. Secretary General, are you alright?”

  “Who is this?” Aguilera’s voice demanded over the phone’s tiny speaker.

  “I’m Officer Isaac Jones, NYPD. We got a report that you are being held hostage.”

  “I am. I’m locked in one of the offices, somewhere in the middle of the building, I think.”

  “Have you been hurt?”

  “No, they haven’t hurt me but there are American soldiers here, lots of them, tearing the place apart. You’ve got to do something.”

  “We’re on it sir. Please stay calm.”

  Colonel Grant held out his hand and Officer Jones gave him back his phone.

  “Here’s what’s going on boys,” the Colonel said after putting his phone away. “We are stripping this den of thieves and godless vipers of every hard drive and searching it for certain documents of interest to us. We expect to be finished by six p.m. tonight. If we’re left alone, then by that hour we will release the Secretary General and evacuate the premises. If, on the other hand, your bosses choose to intervene, we’ll have us a nasty firefight that nobody wants. No telling who might get killed in something like that. You, me, the Secretary General; there’s just no telling when the bullets start flying.

  “Thank you for your interest, and again, a very Merry Christmas
to you both.”

  Colonel Grant then put his thumbs to his ears and flapped his fingers, Hee-Hawing in imitation of Sam Wainwright’s character in “It’s a Wonderful Life.”

  “This way, gentlemen,” Sam Ericson said, gesturing the two confused policemen towards the gate.

  After one last wary glance at Santos and Hendricks, the cops turn to go. Another two squad cars arrived as Sam locked the gate after them. He repeated the ‘donkey salute’ at the new arrivals before returning to the UN Tower.

  Two hours later the perimeter is complete and the UN Complex is rung round, tight as a noose, with troops and cops. Sam Ericson looks up from the street to the roofline across the avenue where he knows a SWAT sniper has him in his sights. He raises his coffee cup at him in salute before taking another sip.

  Colonel Sean Grant enters the office. “Green team is all done,” he says, pouring himself a cup of coffee. “Team red needs another hour.”

  “We’re way ahead of schedule,” Sam observes.

  “How is it looking out there?” Sean Grant asks, mixing sugar into the coffee.

  “All quiet,” Sam says. “They’ll wait till six. There’s less paperwork in doing nothing.”

  “And more overtime,” the Colonel says, joining Ericson at the window. “On top of holiday pay no less. They should thank us.”

  “They will,” Sam says. “One day.”

  03:02:01

  President William O’Neill can’t eat. He stares at the food spread out before him and sees only colors and shapes devoid of any allure. He passes the sunken dishes of the steam table and goes for the large chrome coffee urn. He pours himself a cup and turns to the tables. There are some fifty soldiers or so scattered about them. Most of them are looking at him and his small party with a mixture of curiosity and pity. The latter angers him and he finds himself glaring back at the room. A few look away but most stare back at him unabashedly. Some of them even answer his glare with contemptuous smirks, which are made all the worse under the ridiculous camouflage Santa caps they are wearing. The festive air with which these rogue troops are committing high treason troubles the President, irks him the way nothing ever has.