by John Whitman
Jack put down the dossier and leaned back in his chair, clasping his hands behind his head. He shrugged. “We only spy on the ones who collect big guns and try to hijack sodium cyanide. Call us crazy, but we worry that people who go to the trouble of stealing huge quantities of poison might be tempted to use it afterward.”
Marks nodded. He managed to look both guilty and set upon at the same time, his shoulders slumped with the burden of responsibility. “Some of my people may have gotten overzealous. It’s true. But Jack, the government you serve is illegal. They’re not allowed to do most of the things they do these days. This place we’re in, Counter Terrorist Unit, is it part of the Federal government? Is it FBI, CIA, what?” Jack didn’t answer. “See, it’s unconstitutional for the federal government to have secret organizations that spy on its own citizens. That’s what people fought and died for in 1776. People today forget that.”
“So now you’re George Washington?”
“We make a big deal out of the President of the United States,” Marks said. “Look at the guy in the White House now. There’s all this talk about the NAP Act, which side he’ll take. Maybe he’ll veto it, maybe he won’t. Meanwhile, the majority of the people are against it! The media talk like it’s government’s decision. But it’s not. It’s ours. We have the ultimate power to veto anything the Federal government says or does. That’s why the Founding Fathers designed the government the way it did. They didn’t want a repeat of the government forced on them by the British.”
Marks paused. “Take you for instance.” Marks leaned forward, resting his chin on his overlapping hands. “Forgot whatever story you told us to get into Greater Nation. You’re military, right? Or at least ex-military.”
Jack didn’t answer. Interrogators don’t answer questions unless it suits their purpose. Marks, however, didn’t seem to need an answer. “Right, I knew it. Probably ex-military. Moved right from some special unit right into a Federal agency, correct? So they take you out of a uniform to avoid the posse commitatus law, but they sic you on American citizens anyway. They figure that’s enough to avoid any illegalities. But it’s not. Have you ever read the United States Code? I have. I know what section 242 states. You should know, too.”
This was what differentiated Marks from all the other domestic wackos. He wasn’t a beer-swilling red-neck in jackboots and suspenders, nor was he a wild-haired, polygamist pseudo-messiah. With his Boss suits and his easy recitation of constitutional law, Marks resembled nothing more than an evangelist whose message was freedom from the tyranny of the Federal government. When he spoke of posse commitatus, he referred to the law forbidding the United States military from engaging in police actions on United States soil. The law itself was an echo down the years of the Founding Fathers’ abhorrence of redcoats marching through the streets of colonial America.
Marks demanded, and got, eye contact with his captor. “It was illegal for them to send you to spy on us.”
Undaunted, Jack laughed. “If you think that was illegal, wait until you hear this.” He leaned forward, bringing his face close to Marks’s. Marks reminded him of his friend Walsh, but without the mustache. Jack said in a low voice, “Your friend Frank New-house was an undercover agent for the DOJ.”
Marks’s face executed a serious of pirouettes worthy of a prima ballerina. His eyes lifted, then collapsed into confusion. He smiled in disbelief, then frowned as he considered the possibility. Finally his face settled into neutral territory. “Impossible.”
Jack felt immensely satisfied that he had cracked Marks’s shell. “Not for a government like ours,” he countered.
Marks studied Jack, his eyes roaming across the landscape of his face, the position of his hands and shoulders, the pace of his breathing. The militia leader appeared totally unselfconscious about his own staring, oblivious when Jack returned his gaze with a fierce glare. When his scan reached down to the tabletop, Marks’s gaze ascended, restudying Jack’s body until his eyes found Jack’s. Nearly a minute of silence had passed.
“You’re not lying,” Marks decided. “You believe it’s true.”
“I know it’s true,” Jack said.
Brett’s eyes widened. That’s the first time I’ve seen him actually surprised, Jack thought. That’s the first chink in his armor. Everything would flow from that moment. Interrogating prisoners was like chipping mortar off a wall. As a whole, the mortar is cohesive and strong, but once the mason breaks off that first piece, the whole section falls apart.
Sure enough, Marks’s eyes fell to the floor, and when he looked up, he had something to say. But Jack was not prepared for it. “Then he’s already reported everything we know to you guys. Are you going to stop the terrorists?”
Jack rolled his eyes. “Jesus Christ, the only terrorists here are you! Don’t you get it? All Ramin knew was a rumor, the same kind of crap we get off the Internet every day. There is no terrorist cell.” He shook his head. “You militia nuts need to leave investigations to the investigators.”
Marks scratched his nose and sat back. “I guess you’re right. Because you must know all about the safe house.”
“Oh, yeah, we got your safe house.”
“Not my safe. The terrorist one.”
Jack felt a curve slide by him. “Explain.”
“Safe house. Frank Newhouse must have told you if he’s one of you guys. Right?”
Jack sat forward so fast his chair slid back from the table. “Pretend I don’t know anything about this safe house. Tell me.”
Marks tried to scratch his chin, but the chain wouldn’t let him. He laughed at it. “You know, I think you’re right about the terrorist sleeper cell. It’s probably all a set up. Of course.” Marks’s eyes glazed over, and Jack could almost see the wheels spinning behind his eyes. “It’s actually easy to do. The government creates the need; the people feel the need; the government sneaks in what it wants. Of course. You might as well forget about it.”
“You can start making sense any time now,” Jack growled.
The militia leader’s eyes refocused on Jack. “You probably don’t have to worry about it, Jack. The government was probably just setting us up. You’re saying that this Iranian kid was a fake lead, so the hints we got of a terrorist hit this week are probably fake, too. Danger disguised inside a gift. The government sets up a fake terrorist cell to cause fear. Then they offer the gift of new legislation that’s meant to save everyone. But hidden inside the gift is the very thing the people fear — the loss of their freedom.”
Rising to his feet, Jack shook his head. “Why is it always a conspiracy theory with you people?”
Brett’s answer was simple. “Because the government is conspiring against us.”
“Tell me about the safe house. Tell me about the terrorist hit.”
“Ask Newhouse.”
“I’m asking you!”
The leader of the Greater Nation shrugged. “It’s nothing to me, either way. This is where we found some of our information. It’s where we got Rafizadeh’s name. It also looked to us like they were planning a big hit soon. It’s an apartment over near Exposition. You can check it out for y—”
Jack was already out the door.
8. THE FOLLOWING TAKES PLACE BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 10 A.M. AND 11 A.M. PACIFIC STANDARD TIME
10 A.M. PST Senator Drexler’s Office, San Francisco
Debrah Drexler spent twenty minutes on the phone in her office, canvassing her colleagues.
“I’m on the red-eye tonight,” she said to Alan Wayans, the Senator from Illinois. “I’ll be there in time for the vote. You’re still on board, right?”
Alan Wayans had cultivated his public image as a stalwart standard-bearer of the moderate left, an image he owed far more to his handlers than to himself. Those who fought beside him in the political trenches knew him as a second-guesser and doubter whose private nickname was “Other Way Wayans.” He wasn’t spineless, but his backbone was frail enough that he often had to be propped up. Wayans, just shy
of fifty, also had a weakness for strong-willed women, a fact that Debrah had discovered early and used often.
“Sure I am,” Wayans replied in a flat, Northern Plains drawl. “You wouldn’t believe the pressure, though.”
Wouldn’t I? Debrah thought.
“I had Latt from Tennessee drop hints that if I switched votes, they’d allow that rider into the appropriations bill for me.”
“Don’t go for it, Way,” she said. “This thing’s too important. And it’ll all be over in twenty-four hours. Just hang tight. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
She hung up and checked the time. After one o’clock East Coast time now. She could make the call. She hesitated, her hand hovering over the phone on her desk. There was no turning back from the call she was about to make, and it frightened her. Debrah had defied riot police, locked arm in arm with other globalization protesters in Davos and Italy. She’d faced the bright lights of the media and the displeasure of opposing administrations in voting against war in other countries. But this…this was more dangerous than anything she’d done before. The morality of her goals could not mask the fact that what she was about to do was illegal.
She snatched the phone up and dialed before she could reconsider. It rang twice before her contact answered. “Gonzales,” said a firm female voice, not unlike her own.
“Sela, it’s Senator Drexler,” Debrah said.
“Yes, Senator.”
In a small cubicle in an office in Langley, Virginia, Sela Gonzales’s heart thumped. Drexler never called her for small talk. But she kept her voice impersonal and professional.
“I need information on someone. The name is Frank Newhouse. I’m not sure who he works for. All I am sure of is that he’s doing something for the DOJ right now. Can you get me his file?”
Sela hesitated. She spoke in business tones, using everyday phrases, for the sake of anyone who might wander by her cubicle. “I’m not sure I can help you with that request, ma’am. We’ve had a. change in policy lately.”
Debrah understood her to mean that there was an increase in security. The Barnes Administration was notoriously tight-lipped. Technically, the intelligence agencies worked for the entire government, not just the executive branch, but Barnes and his people considered all parts of government as theirs. They disliked prying eyes, and rejected congressional requests for information on everything from environmental impact reports to judicial nominees.
“This is important,” Debrah said. “Very important.”
“I suggest you try going through other channels,” Sela said cautiously.
“I can’t,” Debrah said. “I have a contact at CTU that can’t get the information. But it’s life or death.”
“I. ” Sela abandoned her professional tone and lowered her voice. “If it’s information like that, then I may not be able to help. And if I can find something, I can’t copy it, I guarantee.”
“Can I have someone meet you?”
Sela hesitated. Sela Gonzales had no illusions about herself. She had never imagined when she joined the CIA that she would become a national hero, or save the world, or even help overthrow evil dictators by traveling on camelback across arid deserts to support freedom fighters. She did not even pretend to know who was right and who was wrong in the endless internecine wars inside and outside the intelligence community. The issues were too enormous for her brain, and the political stakes were so high over her head that she did not even pretend to comprehend them. In an effort to find some solid ground in the whirls and eddies of politics, she had grasped one solid rock of understanding: the elected officials have a right to know. Beyond that, she made no claims, and she was perfectly willing to hide behind her credo and let those same politicians hang in the wind if need be. She was no martyr. But she would sing that credo to herself like a mantra: the elected officials have a right to know.
“Yes,” she said at last. “Zachary Taylor Park in half an hour. Tell them to meet me by the stream.”
10:08 A.M. PST Westwood, California
He had been Frank Newhouse for so long that when he thought of himself (when he thought of himself at all), he used that name. But the truth was, when he looked in the mirror, as he did at that moment, he did not think of himself at all. He thought of the mission and his ability to accomplish it. He thought of the steps between where he was and where he planned to be. And he only felt satisfaction when those steps were clearly laid out before him. It didn’t matter if they were difficult steps — he was no stranger to difficult missions. He cared only that the steps were clear, that the goal was quantifiable.
Frank Newhouse hated abstracts. Though not especially well-educated, he understood enough about art to recognize Impressionism, Cubism, and Surrealism, and to know that he despised them. He looked at his reflection and did not see squares, circles, triangles. He saw pale eyes and arched eyebrows under a protruding forehead and black hair short enough to spike out of his skull. He observed a face that no woman had loved and few had tolerated. He saw experience etched definitely into his skin with lines more accurate than memory could ever be. His eyes traced a thin scar along the ridge of his left eyebrow, a record of mortar fire more concise than any CNN report. He did not begrudge a single line or scar. They were real, they were honest. He had passed through the great museums of the world unmoved, but would pause appreciatively at any photograph of war and death. There was no pretense in pictures like these. They were real.
This mission was becoming real, at last. Frank was tired of the subterfuge. He tolerated it without complaint, of course, because it was necessary for the completion of the mission. But he was relieved now that the clandestine part of his task was near its end. No more pretending to serve a false master.
Frank’s mobile phone rang. “What?” he answered. Only two people had this number: his superior and his contact. His superior, he knew, was otherwise occupied at the moment. His contact didn’t rate much courtesy.
He listened to the voice on the other end, telling him what he wanted to hear. The plans they had carefully laid during the last six months were falling into place. But his contact ended with a warning: “Just be careful. CTU is getting warmer. They don’t realize it yet, but they might.”
Newhouse shrugged. “We expect them to sniff around. It’s part of the plan. If they get too close, they get too close, and we’ll deal with them.”
“You might want to ditch that apartment, though.”
Newhouse considered. “Yes,” he said, and hung up.
10:13 A.M. PST Downtown Los Angeles
Jack Bauer double-parked the SUV on Exposition near the campus of the University of Southern California, and the address Marks had supplied after a little more prodding. It was a six-story beige structure with dark brown trim on the railings of the tiny, unusable balconies outside each front window. Four broad steps climbed up to the glass double doors and the rust-framed intercom that served as security. On the way over, Jack had Nina Myers call the building for him, talk to the manager, and get the pass code. He beeped the code into the panel. The door buzzed and he entered a hallway with dark brown carpet, stained by two decades’ worth of parties hosted by USC college students indigenous to this region.
Jack ignored the elevator and entered the stairwell, a stone shaft rising up, criss-crossed with stone steps and metal rails. Jack climbed as quietly as he could in the echoing shaft, until he reached the fourth floor. He slipped out into a hallway that smelled of mildew and Lysol and hurried to apartment 409. The door, like all the others, was eggshell white and dirty. Jack knocked once. When no one answered, he pressed his ear to the door. Hearing nothing, he stepped back and kicked the door hard. It didn’t give on the first try. Hurrying before anyone came to investigate, he stomped on the door again. The dead-bolt held, but the wood frame did not, and the door flew inward.
Jack drew his gun and moved inside. He really didn’t expect to find anything, since the Greater Nation had been there before, but he preferred to enter any room with a
gun in his hand if he could.
He was in a one-bedroom apartment with a tiny kitchen on his left, a dining table beyond that, and a living room, bathroom, and bedroom ahead. There was nothing on the walls and minimal furniture, causing Jack to reach three conclusions in sequence as he moved down the hall. First, that the Greater Nation had stripped the place; but that wasn’t true because there were a few items left. Second, that he was in a typical college dorm, where cinder blocks and plywood served as bookshelves; but that didn’t feel right, because it was missing the posters and Ansel Adams or museum art reprints that were typical of college students. Third, that whoever lived here had no interest in creature comforts.
The living room was decorated only with a futon, a few bookshelves, and a desk that, by the telltale signs of stray wires and plugs, had been stripped of its computer. Jack glanced into the bedroom, where he found four sets of bunk beds crowded into one small room.
The bathroom was bare except for a thin sliver of soap left in a bone-dry soap dish in the bathroom. Even the medicine cabinet was empty. Jack opened and closed it, then stared at the mirror as though he might see the remnants of some previous reflection.
Jack went back into the living room. The desk was bare, but he guessed that the occupants had used a laptop computer there — there was a data port in the wall and a generic mouse pad sitting on the desktop. The drawers were empty, as far as he could tell, but he would leave the real investigation to forensics.
He activated his cell phone and called in. “Get me Sharpton,” he said to the operator.
“I’m sorry, Agent Bauer, he’s unavailable,” the receptionist replied.
“What do you mean unavailable? Get him out of the toilet and—”
“No, sir, he’s…he’s been put on disciplinary leave.”
What the—? Jack wondered. What had happened in the last forty minutes? “Where’d he go? I need to reach him. Is he on cell phone?”
“N-no, sir, he hasn’t left the building. He’s still with Mr. Chappelle.”