Power Down

by Ben Coes

  “No,” Karim whispered.

  “Who is your leader?”

  Karim shut his eyes. He kept them closed, even as Bismarck shook his ear.

  “You’ve left me without a choice,” said Bismarck calmly, nodding at one of the nurses, who handed him another syringe. “I’m going to make the warmth go away again, Karim. This will hurt. I don’t have to do it, though. It’s your choice. Will you tell me now? What is the address?”

  Karim started sobbing uncontrollably, like a child, tears streaming down his cheeks. Bismarck thrust the needle into the IV at his forearm. Again the convulsions began. Karim’s head slammed into the steel, up and down, slamming hard. Soon, blood appeared under his head and started a slow drip from the stainless steel onto the terminal floor. His chest arched upward. And the screams came again, terrifying screams, hoarse and savage. Bismarck moved to the monitor while he let the terrorist convulse on the table in pain.

  Dewey, from the side of the frame, stood watching, mesmerized, sickened. He felt like he was watching a young boy with a housefly, slowly ripping its wings off. But this was no housefly, he reminded himself. Inside this man’s head lay the key to stopping untold damage, the key to saving countless lives. If they had to rip his wings off to prevent the deaths of more Americans, so be it. He glanced at the other agents; they too looked stunned.

  Bismarck allowed the terrorist to scream for another minute, then stuck another needle into his arm, which calmed him. His fast-paced breathing continued. Bismarck pushed the needle in. Karim’s head fell silently to the side. Blood continued to pour from the steel O.R. table. One of the nurses lifted the supine head, placed a towel beneath the skull to catch the blood. His skull moved now like the head of a doll, seemingly almost detached from the body. Bismarck checked the monitor. Then he returned to Karim’s side. He tugged at his ear. There was no response. He tugged again.

  “You’re losing him!” shouted Dewey. “He’s all we have. Don’t kill him.”

  “I told you to keep quiet,” said Bismarck between clenched teeth, not even looking up.

  Bismarck turned, pulled Karim’s ear again. Slowly, his eyelids opened.

  “There we are,” said Bismarck. “Are you ready to answer some questions now?”

  Karim’s skin appeared almost blue under the light. His eyes were opened less than a quarter way. His face was covered in sweat and tears.

  “Just one question, that’s all. Who’s the leader? What’s his name?”

  Karim’s eyes fluttered.

  “Goodbye,” he whispered.

  The monitor sounded a high-pitched monotone; flatline, as Karim’s heart ceased functioning.

  Dewey moved forward. When the agent to his right attempted to stop him, placing his leg out in front of him, then reaching for him with his hands, Dewey pushed him out of the way.

  “You killed him,” growled Dewey as he reached the steel table and began pounding Karim’s chest, desperately trying to revive the terrorist. Two agents quickly grabbed him from either side, pulled him back.

  “You fucking butcher,” said Dewey, struggling to free himself from the agents, who held him at the biceps. “He was all we had.”

  “He was trained,” said Bismarck. “There is no drug that will work if someone wants to die.”

  Dewey turned. The agents’ grips loosened. He looked around the room, at the nurses and other agents. No one said anything.

  What would’ve happened had Dewey done the interrogation himself, his way? He would never know. He walked toward the terminal door and out into the blinding snow.

  48

  J. EDGAR HOOVER FBI BUILDING

  Hector Calibrisi sat staring at the computer screen, mesmerized. On the screen, the picture showed a sidewalk running in front of a simple but pretty white Colonial. Calibrisi was watching the video for the ninth time in a row. Suddenly, on the screen, a man emerged from the front door of the house. He walked down the steps of the house, then toward the camera. The camera was out of view, the size of a gumdrop, attached to the telephone pole. The man walked down the brick walkway, then took a left and went out of camera range.

  After the man disappeared, Calibrisi turned to the woman whose computer it was. “Play it again, will you?”

  “Sure,” said Ashley Bean, rolling her eyes.

  She clicked the icon on the screen, rewinding the short clip. When the video was at the point just before the man left the house, she played it again.

  “Is that Buck?” Bean asked.

  “Yes,” said Calibrisi. “Our mole.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “No, of course I’m not sure,” said Calibrisi. “But he’s all we’ve got at the moment.”

  “Why do you keep watching the same clip over and over?”

  “I don’t know. There’s something about it. It’s just bothering me. Play yesterday’s clip again.”

  Bean clicked an icon in the corner of the screen, displaying precisely the same scene, of Buck walking down the brick walk in front of his house. Other than the color of his suit, which today was gray, and the day before dark blue, it was hard to see a difference between the two sequences.

  “Play today’s one more time,” said Calibrisi. “Humor me.”

  Bean again clicked the video from that morning. Calibrisi watched it for the eleventh time.

  “I don’t know why, but there’s something wrong today,” said Calibrisi. “One more time, Ash.”

  Jessica handed the cabbie a twenty-dollar bill, then climbed out of the cab. She had completely lost track of time, so consumed by the crisis, stuck at FBI headquarters for so many days on end. The cold air felt good against her legs. She walked up Wisconsin Avenue for two blocks, then took a right. She had not been home for two days. She did not own any pets, so she didn’t actually need to go home. Still, she wanted to take a shower in her own shower, water her own plants, and get her own mail. She also wanted to grab a few changes of clothing; who knows when she would be back.

  The sky in Georgetown was overcast. Big brass streetlights lit up the brick sidewalks, storefronts, and town houses. A rare Washington snowstorm was on its way. The winds had begun to pick up. She turned onto Twenty-fourth Street, passing Standard Bakery. The smell of fresh-baked bread wafted out. In the morning, when she was home, Jessica would roll out of bed and walk down and buy a coffee and raspberry muffin. She didn’t have time right now.

  Jessica lived in a brick, three-story town house in a quiet neighborhood of Georgetown, just off Wisconsin Avenue. The house was built in 1864, and still had its original floorboards, windows, and overall character. As she walked down Twenty-fourth Street, she smiled. She loved Georgetown, loved her neighborhood and street. Its familiarity—brass lanterns, brick fronts, black doors—let her escape the events of the past few days: Long Beach, Capitana, Savage Island. They dominated her thoughts almost constantly. For a few brief seconds, she thought about her neighborhood, the ordered line of town houses, the simple beauty of the thin, cobblestone street. She let herself drift away, if only for a few stolen moments.

  She came to the front of her house, #88. She inserted the big silver key into the front door, turned the lock, then pushed the big, black-painted wooden door in. There, on the ground, was a pile of catalogues, envelopes, and mail. She stepped inside, shut the door behind her. She didn’t have much time, one hour, before she had to catch the helicopter to New York City.

  Vic Buck stared at the photograph on the wall, transfixed. The black-and-white photo showed a sailboat tipped nearly perpendicular. A fierce wind filled the large sail and pushed the sloop nearly horizontal. Perched out over the water, strapped into harnesses, two teenage girls leaned back. Behind the boat, the ocean was a choppy black, interrupted by whitecaps. The girls smiled as they tore through the water.

  Buck did not show any emotion as he stared at the photograph. In fact, Buck no longer saw the photograph. After a full minute of staring at it, he had stopped seeing sailboat, ocean, and teenage girls. What he s
aw, instead, was a beach, and an image of himself on that beach. It was the image that had been etched into his mind for ten long years now. It was the picture of himself in the future, after this whole ugly business was done and over. It was getting closer now, he felt it. He could almost taste it. But he also felt it slipping away.

  Suddenly, he was awakened from his silent contemplation by the sound of a key in a lock. It came from downstairs. He continued to stare at the photograph for another few seconds. His focus returned to the image in front of his eyes. The girl on the left, he had no idea who she was, long blond hair, heavyset. But the girl on the right, the one with the smile, that one was obvious; short, auburn hair, tanned, face covered in freckles, adorable. He stared at the girl for another second or two.

  He reached down, pulled the leather glove on his left hand tighter, then did the same with his right. He reached up, pulled the ski mask down from his forehead so that it now covered his face, except for the two eye-holes.

  Finally, he reached to his left armpit, pulled the Glock 36 from the nylon shoulder holster. Calmly, he reached for the black steel silencer in the right pocket of his down coat. Without looking, as he continued to stare at the black-and-white photograph of Jessica Tanzer, sailing one summer day long ago, he screwed the silencer onto the muzzle of his semiautomatic weapon.

  When he heard the door shut, he turned. He moved past the railing at the top of the stairs into her bedroom. He settled back, behind the door. It was nearly pitch-black, but she would be coming up the stairs, and when she did she would flip the light switch on. He didn’t want to be seen when that happened.

  He heard a low whistle. It was Jessica, whistling a Christmas carol, “We Wish You a Merry Christmas.” He smiled, raised the weapon, cocked to fire. The sound of the whistle grew louder as she walked to the bottom of the stairs.

  Calibrisi now sat alone in front of the computer terminal. He had told Ashley Bean to take a break. He finished watching the clip of Vic Buck walking down the brick walkway for what was the twenty-eighth time in a row.

  Then, he saw it. He knew he would see it, and he did. He paused the video. He marked a square around Buck’s hands, then zoomed the image out and in. Then, in a split screen, he quickly replayed the video from the day before. He performed the same exercise, squaring off the hands, then zooming in. He studied only the hands. The gloves. Yesterday, big, thick, ski gloves. Winter gloves. Today, the gloves were different. And this is what had eaten at him since the first time he’d seen the clip. Today, Vic Buck’s gloves were not winter gloves. No, he knew what they were because he himself had owned several pairs of these gloves. They were standard-issue CIA gloves. They were the gloves every agent was given, the gloves that were worthless in any sort of weather. They had but one purpose. Today, Vic Buck had set out to take someone’s life.

  Calibrisi lurched for the phone, dialed Jessica’s office.

  “Deputy Director Tanzer’s office,” said Rosemary, her assistant.

  “Is she there?” asked Calibrisi, panic in his voice. “It’s Hector.”

  “She went home, Hector. Then she’s headed to New York. Call her cell.”

  Calibrisi hung up, then dialed Jessica’s cell phone and waited for the ring.

  49

  BATH IRON WORKS

  BATH, MAINE

  The sharp, fishy aroma of clams hung on David’s fingertips. He sniffed them, almost unconsciously, as he drove to work, the soft drone of Rush Limbaugh in the background. It was Friday, just before shift change. As he drove the pickup truck across the Winnegance Bridge, he took another whiff. He couldn’t explain exactly why, but he loved the smell of clams.

  “Why do you keep smelling your hands?” asked Dickie. Dickie Roman worked with David. They lived on the same street in Phippsburg, in a row of neat, double-wide trailers just off the main road near Sebasco.

  “Clams,” said David, smiling. “I went clamming again today.”

  “You’re fucking crazy,” said Dickie, shaking his head and lighting a Winston Light. “It was practically zero today.”

  “I love them,” said David. “I love the feeling when you hit a big one just under the mud. They squirt saltwater at you. It’s a game. And the taste. I just love it.”

  Dickie exhaled, shaking his head. “Yeah, well, I guess where you towel-heads come from they don’t have clams, do they?”

  “No,” said David. “God saved the clams for the saltwater hillbillies up in Maine, saved you from starvation.”

  An odd pair to say the least, a fifty-five-year-old, chain-smoking high school dropout from Maine and a twenty-eight-year-old, clean-cut, light-skinned Jordanian, they shared a laugh at their own expense. Dickie was David’s only friend in Maine. Dickie was a hideous creature. They bonded over a steady diet of racist jokes, cigarettes, cheap beer, and, of course, work. Always the work. They had worked together now for more than three years. David and Dickie were part of the day crew at Bath Iron Works, two of the 1,300 men who worked, in two shifts, around the clock to build and assemble the engine works on the Aegis, America’s most elite warship. The Aegis was a nimble, fast ship that nevertheless carried a complex array of highly sophisticated, advanced weaponry. There were more than 800 Aegis destroyers that patrolled the seas under the American flag, from the coast of Taiwan to the Persian Gulf.

  David pulled the silver Ford F-150 into a parking lot, next to the massive green warehouse and drydock facility of Bath Iron Works, Maine’s largest employer, the most important manufacturer of warships in the United States, a division of General Dynamics, one of the U.S. defense industry’s giants.

  They walked inside and punched their cards into the clock next to the door. They walked down the long, covered hallway to the men’s locker room. David opened his locker and put on a worn pair of overalls. The locker room was crowded. It always was. He’d learned that fact long ago.

  David reported to his shift and picked up where the night shift had left off. He and his nighttime counterpart were responsible for forging a custom piece of one of the large steel rods that would, in a few months time, constitute the warship’s drive shaft. He inspected the work of his counterpart, Tim. He knew Tim. Tim did excellent work; David felt an obligation to work his hardest, to produce quality craftsmanship, for Tim mainly, but also for Bath Iron Works, his employer; he felt obligated to match Tim’s excellent work, to live up to his end of the bargain. He ran his hands along the six-foot section of steel and nodded to himself. “Today,” he thought to himself, “I will finish grinding the six shank. It’s almost done. Tim will be surprised.”

  After an hour and forty-five minutes grinding the toaster-sized sander against the metal rod, David let the switch go. He turned the sander off and took off his mask and helmet, then his gloves. He nodded to Mark Jonas, the foreman. He had to hit the head.

  David walked through the pit to the bathroom. It was located in the middle of the warehouse. He peered casually down at the ground. The stalls were empty. He went to the fourth stall. Once inside, he shut the door and unhitched the clasps on his coveralls. He let them fall to the ground. Then, he let his underwear fall on top of the overalls. To anyone looking from the outside, from the sinks or the urinals, it looked as if he was sitting down on the toilet.

  But David was looking up. There you are, he thought. It had taken him almost a year to find a good place, a place no one would discover, ever, under any circumstance. He’d been trained to use his locker, but that wouldn’t work here. He knew it the day he’d walked in. So he’d had to improvise.

  Standing on the john, he reached up and pushed the square ceiling tile up, until it sat freely on his hands above the thin aluminum ceiling frame. As he’d done at least once a week for more than two years, he slowly rotated the ceiling tile so that it flipped over. He lowered it down and then sat down. He then reached down, felt the large lump taped to the underside of his scrotum and pulled it quickly from the tape. It was a small hunk of soft material, grayish, with small hard objects pepper
ed throughout, like pieces of orange glass. He knew what it was. He’d learned how to use it. How to set the detonator. He saw the movie that showed the explosion, the film they showed all of them, of the explosion in the laboratory. Octanitrocubane. He stared at it for a moment, then added it to the pile that now resembled a small pillow. Finally, he checked the detonator. It was still in place; two stainless-steel tubes within a glass cylinder, a pair of small red wires sticking up into the air; the two wires that would receive a cellular transmission from somewhere and blow all of Bath Iron Works, and half of the small city of Bath, into oblivion. He’d set the detonator up on a weekend shift over three separate trips to the bathroom. He smiled at the sight of the device.

  Suddenly, the door opened. He heard footsteps. He peered down and saw two running shoes. He didn’t recognize them.

  He looked up at the empty rectangle in the ceiling. Could the stranger see the missing square? Probably. This wasn’t the first time. Unless it was the maintenance man, Joseph, nobody would care. Even Joseph probably wouldn’t care. Still, the empty rectangle, the black abyss of the missing rectangle, sent shivers down his spine.

  He waited as the man took a pee. If someone were to come in and have to take a crap, he would have a problem. So far, in two years, that hadn’t happened.

  The toilet flushed. The man walked out without washing his hands.

  David stood. He raised the ceiling tile up to the ceiling and gently moved it into place.

  “Soon,” he whispered out loud. He smelled his fingertips once more, the odor of the clams. “Soon.”

  50

  88 TWENTY-FOURTH STREET, N.W.

  GEORGETOWN

  Jessica’s whistling grew louder as she reached the landing halfway up the stairs.

  Buck listened, hidden behind her bedroom door. He had always liked the song. Why do some people like certain songs and not others, he asked himself. For example, he hated “Silent Night.” But “We Wish You a Merry Christmas,” which she now whistled, now that was a classic. He grinned as he considered this. Such a significant moment in the life of one person—her last moment on earth, in fact—and here he is, thinking of something so utterly trivial as which Christmas carols he preferred. Well, it made him smile, at least.