Crosses to Bear (Vatican Knights Book 6)

by Rick Jones

  When they were in Mexico City, the Lohamah Psichlogit could not run interference by communicating with their deep ops at the passport gate, fearing that incoming transmissions could be appropriated. Instead, they needed a field agent to get Ezekiel—the Fourth Man whose photo was red-flagged all over the system’s Watch List—through gates without question or examination, so he could make the flight to Europe. And Obadiah had the ties, recognizing known ops and passing through their stations without an inquisitive look, the passports duly stamped.

  Once Ezekiel had passed through the gates, then Obadiah had achieved not only his goal, but the goal of the Lohamah Psichlogit as well. Obadiah got the Fourth Man through; therefore, he was no longer needed. So it was up to Ezekiel from that point on to pick and choose his moment to exterminate Obadiah. And he had chosen Madrid.

  Paled then thought how Ezekiel would make a good replacement if he had been an Israeli, a good field general. And as soon as the Vatican was laid to waste by the Omega Strain, then the world would band together and strike at the heart of terrorism and intolerance. There would be no more temporary cease-fires or diplomatic meetings filled with empty promises. There would be no more struggles on shared fronts over pieces of land rightfully owned by Israel. Time for diplomacy was over. And the time for preemptive strikes was now.

  Yitzhak returned the satellite phone to his pocket, stood before the bank of monitors on the wall before him, clasped his hands behind the small of his back, and watched the everyday events of the world go on.

  Then: “Intercept and zoom in to the coordinates of that last call,” he told the tech manning the console.

  Within moments the GPS satellite was able to trace and locate Ezekiel’s call, the glowing image of his vehicle from which he made the call showing up on the screen as a blip that moved in an easterly direction.

  “Inform field operations to intercept him, but not to engage. I only want them to run interference should anyone try to stop our man for any reason. Utilize the uLocate software to the GPS of his phone and to that number. I want to know where he is at all times. Is that understood?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Once the Vatican had been laid to ruin with corpses lying chest-high in St. Peter’s Square, Paled would then issue an order for his men to place Ezekiel within the crosshairs, and pull the trigger, with Ezekiel’s death serving to keep the conspiracy safe. Once the Fourth Man was terminated, Paled knew there was nothing that could tie him to the Lohamah Psichlogit.

  Nothing.

  Furthermore, Ezekiel’s bank account would be hacked into and the Lohamah’s deposit for his services would be retrieved without so much as leaving a cyber-footprint.

  Paled smiled.

  He absolutely loved it when a plan moved by the direction of his will.

  #

  Ezekiel was no fool. He knew the moment he hung up that Yitzhak had every intention of monitoring his every movement. He also understood that his phone would be the mechanism used for tracking. So he kept it close, knowing that Paled’s men would provide him with the needed security during his travels through France, and then to Italy.

  Even though his counterfeit passport resembled the real thing with photo and stamping, his facial prosthetics were not exactly academy award quality, especially when seen up close, which could draw the suspicions of border agents at France and Italy. And now that countries in Europe used some form of facial recognition programming to tag flagged individuals, he needed to avoid identification as the prosthetics clearly altered the landmarks on his face, avoiding detection. But should a border guard’s suspicion be raised, he knew Paled’s men would intervene and clear him a path, since his getting to Vatican City was paramount.

  He continued to drive east, the gum of the adhesive starting to itch his skin beneath the prosthetics, a mild annoyance.

  When Abraham Obadiah conscripted his services several months ago after witnessing first hand Ezekiel’s very special skill set, Ezekiel saw a golden opportunity for retribution against Kimball Hayden, and against those who followed him like apostles—those who saw him as the one who could bring salvation to hotspots around the globe when, in fact, the man couldn’t bring salvation to himself.

  He knew Obadiah to be the one who orchestrated the kidnapping of Pope Pius years before, and knew that he had connections that could benefit him in the long run. So he became Obadiah’s acolyte under the Lohamah Psichlogit’s umbrella, knowing all along that the agency was trying to set him up as a patsy as the Fourth Man, who would eventually penetrate the ranks of the Dearborn Mosque, and thereafter be labeled as a terrorist whose image would be captured and posted on every Watch List across the globe.

  After the Omega Strain was secured, he would then be terminated, this he knew. The Fourth Man, a terrorist presumably working with terrorist groups in the U.S., Canada and Iran, would end up being buried so deep that his corpse would never be found, and his silence regarding the Lohamah Psichlogit’s involvement in the scheme of things cemented.

  But Ezekiel had an agenda of his own.

  As soon as the strain was obtained, he skillfully managed Abraham Obadiah and Yitzhak Paled to believe that they were in total control when, in fact, it was he who played them by making them believe that they were in charge. And this was key.

  He needed Abraham Obadiah to get the strain. And once again to get him back to Europe by bypassing all the passport and Watch-List stations. Once in Madrid, he would use Yitzhak Paled to get him to Vatican City uncontested. But it was the in-between game that made Ezekiel the superior tactician.

  He had always known that he existed only to serve the needs of the Lohamah Psichlogit. Once his purpose had been exhausted, so would his life. So he played his hand with careful consideration and undying patience.

  Since it was clearly understood that Ezekiel and Obadiah were working in tandem by Lohamah principals, they did not expect Obadiah to go offline with a weapon of mass destruction upon the mission’s completion. It was this scripted action by Ezekiel which concerned them greatly as the principals believed that it was Obadiah who captained the decision, not him. So Ezekiel used this to his advantage the moment he overheard Obadiah tell the courier in Mexico City that he would maintain possession of the missing vial to suit his needs, while omitting the reason as to why he was keeping it, from the courier. And this played right into Ezekiel’s lap. He quietly sent word to Paled that Obadiah’s intentions were to destroy Vatican interests, and then point the accusing finger at the Fourth man, a flagged terrorist, as the perpetrator, in order to drum up global animosities, which Paled considered to be brilliant. But it was something the Lohamah principals would never agree to, since the act would be considered an act of terrorism.

  But Paled saw a great opportunity in this, one that Ezekiel nourished with ideas, believing that the support from allies would be wholehearted. Sorties could be flown, and their enemies pulling back from their borders with Hamas made into an afterthought, as their regime was reduced to bodies that littered a desert landscape.

  And Ezekiel continued to feed him with the light of these goals, with Yitzhak seeing the success in this. Wiping out the Vatican would fuel hatreds across the globe, igniting passions of millions who would want justice by way of retaliation. And Israel would be forever safe as long as the collective support remained steady.

  But Ezekiel knew that the leaders would disavow Obadiah and order his immediate termination, long before the vial could be used to cause irreparable harm. And Yitzhak agreed, proposing to play upon the concerns of the Patriarch and lobby for total control over the matter, proposing a forty-eight-hour window to neutralize the situation.

  But when the Patriarch voiced how deep his concerns were, Paled knew that Obadiah would never get out of Madrid alive. So when facial recognition pointed him out at the airport, Yitzhak had no choice but to send an intercept team, who would have jeopardized the conspiratorial undertaking he had with Ezekiel.

  That was when Ezekiel received a text m
essage from Yitzhak: IN/PROTO:TER, for Initiate Protocol: Terminate.

  When Ezekiel realized that Obadiah had been made and would only serve to draw unwanted intention, he had no choice but to take him out since Obadiah would never allow him to walk solo with the vial.

  Once Abraham was out of the picture, then he would have to rely on his own skills to avoid detection all the way into Rome. Once the mission was over, he knew that he would never be allowed to live with the secrets he kept. Paled would see to that.

  So he kept his phone close, knowing that he would put it to good use and beat Yitzhak Paled at his own game.

  That’s right, Yitzhak, he told himself. Keep on thinking that you’re still in control.

  Ezekiel continued to drive east.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  The White House

  President Burroughs was sitting in close counsel inside the Oval Office when word came in from Langley that a transmission was sent from one of their overseas operatives planted inside Israel’s Yoqneam facility, a biohazard laboratory.

  Seated were CIA Director Doug Craner, Chief Advisor Al Thornton, Attorney General Dean Hamilton, FBI Director Larry Johnston, and Secretary of State Jean Abercrombie. In the hands of each member were transcribed copies of the conversation taken from the video feed.

  “All right,” the president began, looking at the sheets, “what exactly is it that I’m looking at here?”

  Craner spoke first. “Mr. President, we received intel from one of our deep covers inside the Yoqneam facility inside Israel. And what you have there is a transcribed report taken from the video conversation between Yitzhak Paled, the head of Mossad’s Lohamah Psichlogit Group, and a man believed to be a courier.”

  Spying on allies was not unique in today’s world of espionage, with just as many foreign moles secreted inside American agencies with about as many U.S. players buried in theirs. Occasionally, there comes a major strike of black information that will come across the presidential desk, one to raise hackles in concern.

  “As you know, Mr. President, Yitzhak Paled is the leading force behind the Lohamah Psichlogit. And we all know that the Lohamah’s function is to shape public perception through the use of deception. But what we’ve been able to ascertain here is confirmation that Mossad is in possession of the Omega Strain, not the terrorist faction we were led to believe.”

  The president read over the transcript:

  COURIER: He never said where he was going with the vial.

  PALED: Duly note in the chain-of-evidence that the twelfth vial of the Omega Strain is believed to be in the possession of Abraham Obadiah. Location currently unknown. And that all possible efforts are being made to locate him. In the meantime, I will notify Patriarch and inform him that the disavowal protocol is to be initiated, and that Abraham Obadiah is to be terminated with extreme prejudice. The vial is to be returned to Mossad immediately.

  COURIER: I know. I know he’s a friend of yours and an asset to this agency. And I know that your decision was not an easy one to make. But in the end it is what it is, and protocol is protocol. It’s sad to see someone like Abraham Obadiah lose his way.

  (COURIER LEAVES CHAMBER)

  PALED (phone conversation): Yes, sir. It happens sometimes. People we sometimes hold in the highest regard sometimes go rogue. I’m confident that he will be found within forty-eight hours. (PAUSE) Yes, sir. I see no other alternative.

  END OF CONVERSATION.

  The president, from that page, picked up on a few key points. First off, the name of Abraham Obadiah. A few years ago Obadiah was a deep-cover operative who bogusly served as an attaché at the Embassy of Israel in D.C. when, in fact, he was a Mossad plant believed to have orchestrated the kidnapping of Pope Pius in order to do what they did best, which was to shape the perception of the public to better Israel’s interests with the global community. And they were brilliant at it. But when the pope was rescued by a team masquerading as the HRT, Obadiah disappeared completely from the grid with suspicions that Mossad was keeping him dark, with the organization denying that such a man ever existed in their employ.

  “Abraham Obadiah,” Burroughs whispered, setting the script aside. “How did Abraham Obadiah obtain the Omega Strain, when we have positive proof that the Fourth Man, a known terrorist from a faction working out of Dearborn, a person who is not Abraham Obadiah in any way, shape or form, get control of the virus?”

  Alan Thornton offered a theory. “There is a possibility that the Fourth Man could be in the employment of the Lohamah Psichlogit, with Obadiah driving him. All the terrorists murdered by the Fourth Man inside the Galveston facility were all American born. We now believe that this Fourth Man was able to penetrate the fundamentalist ranks in Dearborn with Mossad’s aid, and under the guise as a member from the Dearborn faction, was actually working with the Lohamah Psichlogit Group.”

  “Why?” asked the president.

  Thornton went on. “Think about it. The Fourth Man kills off his team for what reason? He does it because he knows that their identities will be connected to the Dearborn faction, which automatically raises red flags and immediate appropriation of all communication from American intel. The Dearborn faction then contacts their foreign connections both in Canada and Iran that the strain had been secured. This appropriated transmission is confirmation that they were the ones who committed the theft, not Mossad, when it was Mossad who engineered the scheme all along by way of deception, by getting a plant inside the mosque. When this Fourth Man did not return to Dearborn as the Michigan faction thought, all subsequent communications died off. But not until damning evidence against the faction had already been intercepted regarding the possible use of the strain against U.S. and Israeli interests. We now believe that the Fourth Man, a Mossad agent, went off the grid by going south, the last place we would ever look, and handed the vials over to Abraham Obadiah, who then transferred all but one of the vials to his courier.”

  It was all coming together for President Burroughs.

  Israel perfectly schemed the theft with undying patience and impeccable planning, a skill that made Mossad one of the best in the world. It didn’t matter who their allies were. If they needed to bolster their interests with outside support, then they would do so, even if it came at the expense of deceiving the United States. And they came close. Very close.

  After intel intercepted the Dearborn communications, meetings had been born as to the defensive measures to be taken against a country that was all but untouchable in the Middle East in Iran. But the answer was clear. Utilize our strengths, which happened to be our ally in Israel, to pound the nuclear and bio constructions into the ground with preemptive strikes. Something Israel had been wanting to do since Iran’s building of the nuclear facilities.

  But the potential cost could have been devastating to the U.S., if the strain was still within its borders. The handler may have been given the green light to open a vial, the Omega Strain wiping out millions in retaliation. And this act alone, would have been the catalyst to bring a world at war.

  As much as Israel wanted to commit to immediate strikes using the intercepted communication as their right to protect their sovereignty, Burroughs nevertheless applied the political brakes, telling Israel to maintain themselves until the whereabouts of the strain could be located, with U.S. concerns so weighted that they caused many sleepless hours amongst the White House brass.

  And Israel understood this. But their concerns were just as heavy, letting the U.S. know that their patience had a limit as well.

  “And what’s Israel’s position on all this?” Burroughs finally asked.

  “Right now,” said Craner, “they’re amassing fighter jets at the Nevatim, Bir Gifgafa, and Ramon airbases.”

  “They’re not pulling any punches, are they? They want this done.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I assume you have a copy of this video,” the president asked Craner.

  “We do.”

  “Good.” The pres
ident fell back into his seat. “I want you to send a copy of the transcript and the video to the Prime Minister. I’m curious as to what he has to say about all this. And I want to speak to him personally, as well.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Make sure those planes remain on the tarmacs. There’s no need for preemptive strikes knowing that the strain is not in, or has the potential of being in, hostile hands.”

  “That’s not completely true, Mr. President,” added Thornton.

  “How so?”

  Thornton turned to Craner, the gesture giving the CIA Director the floor. “As you see by the transcript, Mr. President,” Craner began, “it’s clearly stated that Abraham Obadiah is in possession of the missing vial.”

  “I saw that. So I don’t see a problem here.”

  “I’m afraid there is a problem, Mr. President.”

  President Burroughs gave Craner an inquisitive look. “You want to tell me about it then.”

  Craner nodded. “It appears that approximately three hours ago . . . Abraham Obadiah’s body was discovered in a bathroom stall in Madrid. The vial was not on his person.”

  That caught Burrough’s attention as he sat straight, his spine erect. Although the news was good in the sense that the strain was beyond U.S. borders, it didn’t tell him where it was, and the man believed to be in possession of the virus was lying dead on a commode somewhere in Spain. “Come again.”

  “We’ve learned that he was traveling with a second man.”

  “The Fourth Man?”

  Craner shrugged. “Possibly. But facial recognition failed to pick him up. The physical dimensions of his body are there to say yes, but the face says no.”

  “He could have been using facial prosthetics,” added Dean Hamilton, the AG.

  The president shook his head. “No way. The pros would have picked it up right away.”

  “True,” Hamilton said. “But not if Obadiah got him through the passport lanes and security checkpoints manned by Mossad operatives. He could’ve walked right through without drawing so much as a suspicious eye.”