by davidberko
Wendel didn’t want to look at the screen, yet he somehow forced himself to look downward. Anger seized him.
He swore out of desperation. “If we answer one of your damn questions, then what?”
Alfonso grew slightly hopeful. He carefully checked his expectations though with the Germans’ track record from the last two hours of interrogation. He’d give them both failing grades for cooperation thus far. But perhaps now he finally had them in his corner.
Their heart rate is up significantly. Both the man and woman, a calm voice watching the Germans’ vitals said from deep within Agent Marcello’s ear canal.
He interpreted the message in one way: now was as good a time as there would ever be to get somewhere.
“If you make a call for me to whomever it is you liaise with from Scorpion, then we can talk about your freedom.”
“What about Edda?” an ornery Amalia demanded rather sternly.
Alfonso smiled at her spunk. “I don’t think you have position to talk with me that way missy.”
Suddenly there was a hasty exchange of whispers between Wendel and Amalia.
Alfonso looked from his left to right. “Well?
What have you decided it’ll be?”
Wendel took it upon himself to be the spokesman. “We will make this call.
But after we’re cleaned up and offered a meal.”
The answer wasn’t entirely remarkable. Alfonso contained his excitement over the progress. His face hadn’t changed for the last five minutes. “I suppose that could be arranged.”
“What happens now?” Amalia asked.
“I get the communications gear ready, eat my meal, and then maybe let the cook know to save a couple of plates for you guys,” he said turning to leave. When he got a foot away from exiting, the door opened outward for him. “Sit tight, kids,” he said through an ear-to-ear grin.
--
Chapter 13
Jeddah, Saudi Arabia
Jabour had signed, sealed, and delivered. Securing the spaceport in the capitol of the UIC would be instrumental to the Mahdi’s plans. In anticipation of King Kahlil’s yes, Howard’s fleet of spaceships eagerly waited in spacedock for their upgrade and ordinance.
Unless the FRN or the Israelis freed Damion and Christophe from the Ozarks, the only hope for the world would die in a Scorpion maximum security facility deep underground.
The stars were aligning just so for Howard to take his seat of power over his world-wide kingdom. No mere mortals could possibly stand in his way of his lifelong plans for a new world order.
Maxwell, also known as Jabour in the Middle East, had run his campaign beautifully. He thoroughly convinced the clerics and even the king himself the Mahdi was coming….A half-truth. Nevertheless, a demigod like the Mahdi would indeed establish his rule in New Babylon—Sector Three (D.C.).
…
The celebratory dinner came and went. The lamb, rice pilaf, roasted red pepper humus with a basket of piping hot pitas, and garden-fresh salads…all gradually passed.
Jabour dabbed the corners of his mouth with the cloth napkin from his place setting. Several strokes later he dropped the used-up napkin over his plate. He looked to each of the leading clerics and addressed them by their first names, one at a time.
“….Thank you so much for accompanying me on my palace run,” he smiled broadly. “As a token of my appreciation, I will mention your names to the Mahdi. He will reward you for your devotion and faith to the cause.” This elicited an overflow of obligatory thankyou’s from each of the religious leaders. Shortly afterwards they watched with unhinged jaws as Jabour abruptly got up without another word and disappear into the throngs of hungry patrons still waiting to be seated.
That would be their last time they ever saw him.
--
Epilogue
A hastily crafted plan didn’t necessarily mean swift success. Failure could come even quicker. Time was one thing the agents in this mission didn’t have much of.
The parking garage the Interior Minister of Germany’s motor pool used would be where the hit occurred. Baruch volunteered to be the driver of Sofia’s heavily armored limousine. Seth would be the one to pull the trigger and start the series of events. Baruch would then punch it when the bullets started zinging.
The interior minister would predictably try to get the driver’s attention to give him instruction where to go. Once the partition separating the front of the limo from the passenger area went down, that’s when Sofia would realize she had been done in. And Tyrone? He would be quarterbacking the efforts from his mobile office—the SUV. Not only would he pay attention to the police frequencies, but also every applicable CCTV camera over the major intersections along
the decided route Baruch would take with Sofia’s limo.
--
Twenty-four hours whizzed by. Same room…inside the belly of the white whale. Three high-pitch whistles in a period of a minute sounded. A weird substance waiting in tubes on the side of the big white machine suddenly began to be sucked up like a straw. Green gas slowly vented into the chamber where Azriel lay dormant.
The monitor that recorded in real-time the thirteen-year-old’s vital signs started acting up. The boy’s heart rate climbed back up towards normal. The green line on the EEG machine squiggled up and down like a seismogram graph recording an underground tremor.
Stacy had almost fallen asleep in an armchair ten feet across from Azriel. The once-tranquil environment suddenly filled with unfamiliar noises caused her eyelids to flutter, her head to stir.
“Huh, wha—” she softly murmured, beginning to rise from her place of slumber. Once her vision adjusted to the dark room her focus shifted to a screen which displayed the operation’s progress. It literally just moved from ninety-nine percent to done when her stare found it.
Stacy touched her heart at what she saw. Electricity surged throughout her body. The moment had finally arrived. The manufactured family would soon all be together. Everything had gone to script. So far.
The door to the miracle machine banged open with little to no warning. Any leftover gas now dissipated into the operating room in a fog.
Azriel rose halfway up from the gurney. His eyes burned brighter than before. His skin even had a glow to it. When the boy looked to his right and saw Stacy, the first thing he said was, “Mom, where’s dad?” The imaginary grocery bags slipped from her slack arms and crashed to the floor. The stunning message sucker-punched Stacy, almost causing her to double over. A new reality had dawned.
At that very moment intense rays from the morning sunrise penetrated the window blinds and set the whole room awash in its radiance.
A gentle knock on the door made Stacy whirl. “Who is it?” her voice trembled a little.
A familiar voice came over the intercom,
“Just open it.”
Too her surprise, Azriel was already at the door compliantly turning the door handle per the man’s instructions.
There Ephraim Markov stood, sporting a warm smile, his eyes sparkling like black diamonds.
“Welcome to Masada, son.”
End of Part 1
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