by Ben Shapiro
The throng grew, and then grew again. It poured out from the harbor area into the streets. It filled blocks.
Soledad casually slipped her way through the crowd.
Being dead certainly helped her escape scrutiny, she observed wryly. Aiden would have appreciated the irony. A few blocks away, she knew, Ricky O’Sullivan waited with the car. Her chances of escape were slim, of course. But she also knew that assassination attempts rarely ended with the assassin immediately detained: Oswald had made it to a theater; Booth had run for days. They’d catch her eventually, she figured, but they’d have to revise their estimate of her death first to identify her.
Aiden’s death had changed her, hardened her, she knew. She could fob off the California water crisis as political bureaucrats playing games. She could even pretend that Ricky O’Sullivan had been railroaded by a race-baiting system. But the drone attack—that was on Prescott. She had voted for Mark Prescott the first time. His promises of a better America, a more caring America, appealed to her.
Then, it turned out, caring was just a cover for control.
The drone had targeted both her and Ricky, but they’d made it to the trees in time. The military must have miscalculated; for whatever reason, she and Ricky had been stunned to see headlines touting their deaths. They’d hunkered down in the woods for a few days; by the time they made it back to camp, the group had disbanded, disappeared.
That night, as they sat by the fire in a country that had tried to kill both of them, Soledad broke down and cried. It was the first time she could remember, at least since the death of her parents. It wasn’t that Aiden had been so wonderful—there were times, she knew, she couldn’t stand him. But he represented hope to her in a way difficult to quantify. She believed in the inherent goodness of the system, despite everything, and Aiden represented that: a system made of good people who, when push came to shove, would stand against the powerful on behalf of the powerless.
And then the powerful killed him.
Meanwhile, after Aiden’s death, Ricky snapped back into the zombie state he’d been in before the rescue. He felt like a man apart, alone. The headlines about Soledad didn’t surprise him—of course the media and many Americans would celebrate her death. It was the easiest thing to do. Better to cheer the downfall of a lone terrorist than to hold up her cause for understanding.
He had been stunned, however, by the triumphalism with which the media treated his own death. He’d been acquitted, for God’s sake. He’d tried to serve his community. And there, on television, were faces from his hometown, Detroit, smiling at the news of his death. And there was Mark Prescott, telling the press that the killing showed that Ricky O’Sullivan trafficked in terrorism, and the killing closed the door on a “sordid incident sullying our national unity.”
Something had to change. He knew it. Whether Soledad was right or wrong no longer mattered to him. Something had to wake people up.
They had turned their motorcycles toward New York City.
Soledad felt the handgun in her purse. It was a 3D printed plastic gun; she’d bought it from a gun enthusiast in Ohio. He’d been a nutcase, obsessed with weaponry, with an industrial-grade printer in his garage. Prior 3D printed guns had been made with a few key pieces of metal to absorb the explosion of the gunpowder in the bullet—but this guy had perfected a method of making specialized bullets with a thicker shell that could absorb the brunt of the explosion. That meant no metal in the gun at all, just metal in the bullet. The plastic gun could be hidden in the bottom of her purse and wouldn’t set off a metal detector. And she could hide the bullet virtually anywhere. She chose to embed it in a pair of gaudy, dangling earrings.
That meant she’d have one shot.
She’d have to get within a few dozen yards of the president. But if she did, she knew, it would be enough.
Thanks to the foot traffic at the harbor, traffic had screeched to a standstill across the city. Brett and Ellen occupied one end of the limousine; Tommy Bradley sat across from them. For a few minutes, the White House chief of staff tried to engage with Brett and Ellen. When he realized they weren’t in the mood for small talk, he went quiet. Now they stared at each other awkwardly. Eventually, Bradley took out his cell phone and began making calls, smiling apologetically as he did so.
Brett turned to Ellen. He whispered to her, “I need to go now, sweetheart.” She looked up at him quizzically. He continued, “They won’t let me go anywhere once we get to the airport. I need to get down to the harbor. But you listen to me: whatever you do, you get on the plane with Prescott. I don’t know whether this attack will come at the event or not. But I want you out of this city.” He paused. “I’m so sorry for this, Ellen. I’m so sorry for everything. We could have had a life together.”
She looked at him, dead in the eyes. “Brett Hawthorne, I want you to know this: you are my hero. You always were. I am so proud to be your wife. I wouldn’t trade my life for anyone’s.”
They felt the urge to kiss each other—then they remembered Bradley in the car, and hugged instead. “Take a bullet for you, babe,” he said.
“Take a bullet for you, sweetheart,” she answered.
Before Bradley or the Secret Service agent in the car could react, Brett reached for the lock, popped it open, and stepped out into traffic. By the time they responded, Brett had dodged through the cars, sprinted around the corner, and was gone.
In the car, Bradley glared at Ellen. Then he dialed. “Yes, Mr. President,” he finally said, after the yelling subsided. “I’ll take care of it. And yes, I’ve got Mrs. Hawthorne right here. He’ll be back. I’ll tell security to keep an eye out for him down there.”
Brett reached the outskirts of the crowd just as the event began. Everyone in the huge throng could see the developments—Prescott’s team had made sure to place enormous television screens throughout the area, projecting the events of the day for the overflow crowd. There, up on the dais, stood Imam Anjem Omari, giving an invocation. “ ‘Whoever kills a soul unless for a soul or for corruption in the land, it’s as if he has slain mankind entirely,’ ” said Omari. “ ‘And whoever saves one life, it’s as if he has saved mankind entirely.’ So says our Holy Koran. And we all stand together against those who murder. Make peace, for Allah has proclaimed it so.”
A polite applause rippled through the audience. Brett began to muscle his way forward, his eyes trained on Omari. The imam walked to the edge of the stage, then took his seat. Beside him sat Mahmoud, his nose bandaged. Brett began moving more quickly through the crowd now, weaving in and out. He was within 150 feet of the stage when the president rose to his feet for his introduction.
A video played on the screens flanking the stage: video of soldiers hugging crying family members of the slain, of Coast Guard members directing activity on the Hudson, and then, finally, of President Mark Prescott hugging the protester. Then his theme music began to play, a hard-pounding rock track, and he strode to the stage, waving to the crowd, grinning, giving the thumbs-up.
The crowd roared its approval.
It made Brett queasy. There were no pictures of the fallen in Afghanistan or Iraq. No pictures of the bombs going off under the bridge. President Prescott was a hero, the man who could bring America back together again.
He had no time to focus on all of that, though. Omari and his friend were whispering. Omari nodded, smiled softly, then glanced at his watch.
The president stood at the microphone, let the cheering wash over him. It felt as he always thought it would: better than the election, better than the inauguration. It felt as though all of America held him in its embrace. He raised his hands once more, and the crowd silenced, as if a conductor had told his orchestra to play pianissimo.
“My fellow Americans,” he said, “we stand strong. We stand together. And today, we show the world, we will fight. We will win. And we will build.
“As we speak, I ha
ve authorized our air force to strike targets in Syria …”
Syria? Brett thought. What the hell is in Syria?
Prescott continued, “Our intelligence tells us that this vicious terror attack was masterminded in that war-torn country. We felt the brunt of their rage, and we took their best shot. Now they will take ours.”
Screams, shouting, jubilation. Brett had never heard a crowd respond like this to any politician. “And,” the president of the United States continued, “we will not stop there. We will build, as I promised we would. As of this morning, I have signed an executive order authorizing the Work Freedom Program. We have much rebuilding to do, and every American will play a part in that rebuilding!”
The roar redoubled.
Mahmoud, Brett noticed, had edged toward the stairs on the stage.
“We must build,” said Prescott, “because America always strives for the highest apex. We dream big, and those dreams become reality. Look around you: they destroyed one of our bridges, but we have built thousands upon thousands of monuments to human ingenuity together. Only together!”
Brett glanced behind him—he could see a large man in a baseball cap, his head down, approaching his position from behind. An agent, no doubt. Brett began moving forward again. He was no more than seventy feet from the stage. Mahmoud had left the stage now, and seemed to be moving away from the dais.
Prescott gestured toward the skyline. “And we will build even higher. We won’t just build monuments, though, to materialism. We will rebuild ourselves. Better than we were before. More charitable. More giving. We will ask more from all Americans, and they will respond, because Americans always respond.”
Brett was so focused on Mahmoud that he bumped into a smaller woman in front of him—pretty, close-cropped hair, in her early fifties. “Pardon me,” he mumbled.
Then he saw her hand in her purse.
He’d seen that arm angle before. He knew what a person looked like before they pulled a gun from concealment. He could feel the threat before he even knew he felt it.
He responded instinctually. “Gun!” he shouted, grabbing at her hand. Before she could respond, he’d wrested control of it from her, but she managed to pull the trigger, firing uselessly into the air.
The crowd around them panicked, moving a thousand directions at once, women falling to the ground, men trampled. On the stage, Secret Service agents jumped onto Prescott to protect him, then hustled him off the stage as sirens began to wail and screaming broke out en masse.
Brett realized he was holding the gun a split second before he felt a large man jump on his back, slam him to the ground. The man put his knee to the back of Brett’s head, driving it into the pavement. “Dammit, you idiots,” he gasped, “it’s not me you’re after.”
He glanced up at the face of the Secret Service agent on his back.
A thick burn scar marked his face near his ear.
Then everything went black.
Ellen had watched the proceedings aboard Air Force One. She watched the flustered anchors on the major news networks try to get a bead on the story, giving out unverified information, then retracting it. She knew Brett had no cell phone, so she had no one to call—instead, she waited.
It took nearly an hour for the presidential motorcade to come steaming onto the airfield at LaGuardia. The Secret Service rushed out of their vehicles, ran to the side of the presidential limousine, and created a phalanx around the president. Ellen watched as they brought Mark Prescott, his head covered, up the stairs to the Boeing VC-25. By the time they released him at the top of the stairs, he was cursing a blue streak, shouting. “Dammit, I want some answers! How could you let something like this happen? We had security, didn’t we? And now I look like I’m cutting and running from the site of a terrorist attack?”
He spotted Ellen and ran over to her, his face red with anger. “Your goddamn husband …”
“My goddamn husband was saving your life,” she said slowly.
Prescott laughed harshly. “Bullshit. He had a gun on him. He fired it. I want to know why.”
“That’s not his gun.”
“How the hell would you know? You haven’t seen your husband for months.”
“I know my husband.”
Prescott sneered. “Here’s what I think. I think your husband showed up at that event because he’s got a fixation with the imam. I think he’s so suspicious of the imam that he actually thought the imam was going to try some sort of attack on the event. And he came to break it up.” Prescott was working himself into a full rage, spittle flecking his upper lip. “I tried to reason with him. I tried to reason with you. But enough. I’ll find whatever charges I need to find to press against him.”
“Mr. President,” she said, “you need to calm down.”
“Calm down?! Have you seen these pictures? You said I was weak. You said it. Now, don’t I look weak? Like I can’t stand up to threat with the entire goddamn American military at my back?” He stormed past her. Tommy Bradley shrugged at her apologetically. As he followed the president, she grabbed his coat.
“Mr. Bradley, where are they holding Brett? He’s got to know this is crazy, right?”
Bradley looked at her, shrugged. “I don’t know anything,” he said. Then he followed his boss.
She sat, stunned. From her vantage point aboard Air Force One, through the windows of the airport, she could see guests filtering through security. Security, of course, was heavy—every person and their baggage moving through a metal detector and an X-ray machine, bomb-sniffing dogs all around. She’d gone through the same routine herself before being allowed onto Air Force One.
Except for a man she didn’t recognize at first, who emerged with his bodyguard from the presidential motorcade. The bodyguard carried a large duffel bag. Next to them stood a Secret Service agent; he carried a burn scar near his ear.
Secret Service quickly approached, but the agent drew them aside. After a brief conversation, they parted to let the men through.
Ellen put her head in her hands. She had no plan for Washington, DC—she and Brett hadn’t had time to come up with a strategy. But she knew she would have to turn the president down. And she knew that the consequences could mean legal action, maybe even military action, against the Republic of Texas, against her, and against Bubba Davis.
When she looked back to the front of the cabin, she saw the two men from the motorcade entering. She didn’t recognize the first. She felt a flash of recognition as she saw the second: Omari. As his colleague stuffed the duffel bag he’d been carrying in the overhead compartment, all she could see was Hassan’s body, facedown in the bathtub. What was so important about that tape? He knew Brett had seen it already—he knew Brett was tracking down the other man on the tape, clearly.
The safety announcements came over the loudspeaker. She buckled herself in, watching Omari and his man sit two rows ahead of her. Omari bowed his head, mumbling to himself. She couldn’t catch the words—they were in Arabic, and she didn’t speak the language anyway. The plane began to move.
The plane took off smoothly, flying to the northeast, then beginning to turn. Through her window, she could see the city fading behind her, leaving her husband behind, presumably in some cold cell somewhere. Air Force One continued to make a 180-degree turn, flying over the city. They’d gained altitude now, on the ascent as they moved south toward Washington, DC.
Then, oddly, the plane began to drop. The buildings of Manhattan grew nearer beneath the plane as Ellen watched curiously through the window. The voice of the pilot poured through the speakers: “Ladies and gentlemen, don’t be concerned. The president has requested that we descend to a lower level over the city of New York in order to take publicity photos.”
Publicity photos? Today? Ellen thought as the plane descended. As if the pilot were reading her mind, he continued: “The president wants to let Americans kno
w he will not be cowed by any violent attempt against him. Thanks, and please ensure your seat belts are fastened.”
Ahead of her, Omari still muttered in Arabic.
Then he unbuckled and stood up. In his hand, he held what looked like a cell phone, powered on. He said, much louder now, “La ilaha illa Allah.” Then again. The other man chanted along with him.
Suddenly it hit her: Mohammed had not sought out Omari for help. Mohammed had been a courier to Omari, bringing him a weapon. Brett had been right: they had planned the terrorist attack at the event, but the chaos had destroyed their timeline. Oh, Brett, she thought. Oh, Brett.
The plane circled lower as it approached the center of Manhattan. Ellen realized then what she had to do. Why, perhaps, God had given her no children to leave behind. Why she had been fated to marry a patriot and a military lifer. She was one, too: a soldier in a war. And she had to act now, before they hit downtown.
The other passengers looked around uncomfortably, paralyzed by a peculiar inability to overcome their political correctness. She unbuckled her seat belt and edged to the aisle. Then, she got up calmly and walked toward Omari. Before she could speak, Mahmoud cut her off, grabbed her hand, twisted it behind her back, then threw her to the ground. “He has a bomb!” she shouted.
Secret Service agents appeared behind Omari almost instantaneously; two agents pulled guns in the press cabin itself. Omari held up his phone. “All I want is to negotiate,” he said. “President Prescott will speak to me. I know he will.”
The agents froze. Omari had been invited by the president. This had to be an enormous mistake, something that could be worked out.
From the floor of the airplane, Ellen looked up at Omari. He was lying. She could see it. He was stalling for time. No more time, Ellen thought to herself. No more talk, negotiations, games. A line from her past crept into her head for some reason: No loitering, cadet. She almost smiled as she remembered.