by A. J Tata
Chapter 4
Unknown location
From his lair in Iraq or Afghanistan, or wherever his Internet protocol put him today, The American Taliban, Mullah Adham, watched the high-definition video uplinks of the attacks on Fort Brackett.
“Take that, bitch,” Adham whispered to no one in particular.
He sat cross-legged on a prayer mat as he absently tugged at his dark beard. He backed up the video and replayed it again, like a football coach watching postgame film. He saw as the camera had zoomed on the flashing green light of the MVX-90, then as the soldier had exited his own car, screaming for everyone to stop.
He paused the tape as he watched the young soldier duck when the explosion coughed outward from the curbstone. In successive frames, Adham kept his eyes focused on the soldier. He noticed a black object, an explosively formed penetrator, spit straight from the curbstone toward him and cut him in half as it moved at supersonic speed.
“Yes,” he whispered to himself.
He replayed it again, this time watching as a copper plate exploded through the car with the female solider and her two children.
“Sweet,” he whispered.
Adham, born Adam Wilhoyt, was raised in Davenport, Iowa, by his mother, whom he loved. He had no memory, until recently, of his father.
As usual, he was alone in his Spartan warren. Adham kept two pictures on the wall of his hut, not that he needed reminders of his transition from normal kid to The American Taliban.
One was a magazine photo of Ned Lieberstein, the FBI agent who had led the raid on his childhood home’s basement in Davenport. Lieberstein had been tracking his, Adam Wilhoyt’s, massive online game called Monument Hunter. The purpose of the game had been to find the quickest routes to famous American landmarks such as Mount Rushmore or the Jefferson Memorial and defend them from attack by the other players. Meanwhile, the other online gamers, not having arrived first to establish a defense, could choose to team with the attacking force or the defending force. Battles were being waged online for the survival of American landmarks. Adam Wilhoyt had written the code and placed it on the Internet to the delight of hundreds of thousands of users. It was an untapped goldmine.
Apparently, though, virtual monument hunting was illegal. Wilhoyt’s mother had unwittingly let the FBI into their home, and Adham recalled the SWAT team spilling down into the basement where he was sitting amid all of his computers and servers chewing up terabytes of information. Lieberstein had paraded him in handcuffs out of his house, along the sidewalk in front of the peering neighbors and into the waiting van, its blue lights flashing like spotlights, highlighting his embarrassment.
He was tried as a juvenile, spent a year doing community service, and ultimately graduated from high school by earning a GED.
In his school program, he actually started falling for a girl, Elizabeth Carlsen, a blond-haired, blue-eyed Scandinavian girl who was a research assistant at the library. She shared his interest in computers. They had met at the library, the only place the FBI allowed him to use a computer.
Without any compelling reason, one day about eighteen months after his arrest, he conducted a Google search on Lieberstein. He learned that the FBI agent had retired to Malibu, California, where he was marketing an online game called Shrine Seekers, which was essentially the Adam Wilhoyt code, and making millions. Lieberstein’s minor code modification had somehow circumvented the court’s ruling against Wilhoyt and had flooded the gaming market.
Something had flipped inside him that day. His government had screwed him out of a fortune. But it was more than that. His country, in the form of a bureaucrat named Lieberstein, had betrayed him, taken his dignity, isolated his mother, and stolen a year from his young life—an eternity—that he wouldn’t get back. He was not going to be the sucker his fellow citizens were by letting their government screw them over without ever standing up to it. Don’t tread on me, bitch!
While he worked out a plan, he found a job developing websites during the first day at the library, moved into his own apartment, and bought enough equipment to improve his hacking skills, riding electrons through forbidden mazes of security in the Pentagon, the FBI, the NSA, and anywhere he wanted to go. He dated Elizabeth long enough to fall in love before she had to move “somewhere down East.”
What he learned was that his country was corrupt at every level. Not only had they screwed him, but also they were giving the shaft to Joe Six-pack every day. One day he hacked into al-Qaeda and saw it was the same bullshit with different players. Then he hacked a few large private military contractors where he learned that more state secrets were held in the servers of those companies than in the Pentagon.
His confused twenty-year-old mind had seen too much. Like a child watching his parents fight, he saw the machinery of nations and corporations struggling for survival. What he learned was that with the Internet, one person could do what one country could do. He also figured out that the rule of law only applied when the law wanted it to.
If his country was going to be at war, then so would he. But he wanted to be somebody. He checked out Nietzsche from the library and thought he could be the Beast with Red Cheeks. He studied Camus, reflecting on the notions of absurdity and nothingness. Delusions of grandeur dancing in his mind, Adam then sought a different perspective. He tried contacting his father before he made his decision, but the man would have nothing to do with him. That act of omission led him to make the biggest decision of his life: He bought a plane ticket to Islamabad, Pakistan, and began to live a life of minimalism. He sought the fame that Nietzsche said he needed and felt the nothingness that Camus promised.
From there, he began floating between madrassas, where he was called “Amriki.” The American. After a year, it was The American Taliban. Because of his size, over six feet tall, he learned to survive as the fittest in the madrassa. With his Internet and newfound mechanical skills, he became valuable to his suspicious new friends. His IQ hovering above 170, he learned to negotiate with his would-be adversaries. Adham convinced the tribal leaders in Western Pakistan, the Quetta Shura, that he could be of value and showed them a homemade video where he taunted the American government.
The elders liked what they saw, especially that Amriki had worked to learn Arabic and Pashtun. His words floated effortlessly between the languages. He even taught various bomb makers the skills necessary to remotely view and detonate roadside bombs. With the right equipment, the triggerman could be one hundred yards or ten thousand miles away.
The al-Qaeda and Taliban elders were impressed.
In less than a year, he had catapulted himself from a juvenile delinquent in America to a person of immense worth in the enemy’s camp. He thrived on that feeling of value. He had brilliantly subjugated himself to al-Qaeda, knowing that their leaders were just as useless as the leaders in America and just as frustrated; and he had risen to prominence. It would have been impossible in America.
The doctrine didn’t matter; the power was the intoxicating drug.
After his first taped message to America, pronouncing himself as Mullah Adham, The American Taliban, al-Qaeda and Taliban forces saw increased funding from the diaspora. Mullah Adham was a sensation. With each performance, his sandbox grew and soon he was doing live streaming Internet performances, bouncing Internet signals around the globe. The senior leadership of al-Qaeda and the Taliban were thrilled, viewing him as a strategic combat multiplier.
And like that moment in the library after Google-searching Lieberstein, Adham had another moment. A squad of Delta Force commandos had nearly killed him when he was visiting his friend, Commander Hoxha. If not for the trapdoor and tunnel system beneath Hoxha’s house, he would have been captured. That night, everything had changed.
Adham had tacked up another photo in his hut: Captain Chayton “Jake” Mahegan.
Looking now at both photos, Adham powered up his MacBook, logged into his Facebook page, and then looked into the small camera that was streaming live.
Adham was piping his feed into outer space, redirecting off several satellites before hosting on a specific bird to which all of the major cable channels had access. His beard would not come in as fully as he might want, so he had used henna to darken the hair.
“America, the attacks have begun. Women and children, especially, beware. These are inverse attacks and we are not sparing the most vulnerable. Actually, we are targeting them. Today you saw some unique explosives. If you want answers, ask your Captain Chayton Mahegan of the US Army. He knows exactly how we are doing this. And next, coming soon to a computer near you: beheadings. We have captured American spies and things will get pretty crazy from this point on, so let’s chat tomorrow. Peace, out.”
The camera panned past Adham sitting cross-legged on his prayer rug, beyond the AK-74 leaning against the wall, and to a kneeling individual bound at the wrists. The person was wearing a US Army combat uniform. On either side of the captive were two hooded men wielding long, curved swords.
A tan-colored sandbag covered the prisoner’s head. On the front in bold black Magic Marker were the words, “Life’s a Bitch.”
Chapter 5
Dare County, North Carolina
As Mullah Adham was making his announcement, Mahegan was halfway across Croatan Sound on his return trip. He was in a perfect rhythm, arms windmilling through the slight chop that had followed the sunrise and the accompanying winds. With each stroke closer to Roanoke Island, and farther away from the wildlife refuge, his sense of foreboding grew.
A sharp pain rocketed through his left arm as it struck something hard just beneath the surface. He thought: bull shark. Frequently they came this far into the sound through Oregon Inlet to the south. Presently, it was the middle of mating season when they inhabited the brackish water the most. Mahegan had scraped with a bull shark or two in the past year and knew that they accounted for the majority of shark attacks inside the sound and along the Atlantic coast.
He snatched the knife from his leg strap and pushed away, blade open and at the ready. He was expecting the bump and bite technique the sharks employed to stun and then attack their prey.
But nothing came thrashing toward him. Then he thought: alligator.
He saw nothing above the water and could not see land. He placed himself in the channel, about a mile from Roanoke Island. He floated perfectly still and blew out some air, deflating his lungs so that he would submerge. Keeping his eyes open, and knife at the ready, he saw a dark mass about five feet to his front ambling slowly with the tide, which was moving to Mahegan’s right. Going out.
He studied the mass for a moment. His initial impression was that it was a dead animal of some type, killed maybe by an alligator. Perhaps it was an alligator. He cautiously approached the object, registering what looked like floating hair on one end and different colors, like clothes swaying with the ebb and flow of the water. Coming closer, Mahegan noticed brown work boots and a frayed rope tethered around the ankles of what he knew now was a human being.
He quickly closed the distance, using the knife to cut the ropes tied around the body’s ankles, then pulled the dead weight above the meniscus of the water. He put a hammerlock around the body’s torso, bringing back the memory of the last time he had done this: dragging Colgate out of the vehicle a year ago.
Mahegan sucked in some air and turned to look at the face to determine if this was a rescue or a recovery mission. He had seen his share of combat brutality and its effect on the human body: blown-off heads, sucking chest wounds, and amputated limbs. But the mangled face that stared back at him was as horrific as anything he had ever seen. Half chewed, half bloated and distended, the person was unrecognizable and certainly dead.
Recovery mission. He tucked away his knife and positioned himself to sidestroke the remaining mile to his landlord’s boat, or wherever he might wind up on the island. He tied the length of cut rope around the body and had just enough to tie a bowline knot around his waist, easing his tug just a bit. The tide was beginning to move and with the extra weight, he would almost certainly wind up farther south than his start point. He let the pull of the tide, which was southeasterly, help him, didn’t fight it, and he surged toward Roanoke Island.
Mahegan hit the first of the marsh about a half mile south of where he had hitched the boat to the buoy. Not bad for dragging an extra two hundred or so pounds. Though now he had to wade through a hundred meters of mud and saw grass. He lifted the corpse onto his back and trudged through the muck, each step becoming easier as the ground became firmer. Only once did a moccasin coil. He simply stepped away quickly from its thick head and hurried on.
Mahegan placed the body on the sandy soil above the marsh line and took notice of his location. He wanted to remember everything for his report to the police. He turned and looked at the sound. Mahegan figured he was right that he’d found him about a mile out, though the trip back had felt longer with the body. He could see the cut in the land to his north where the boats would pull out of Millionaires’ Row into Croatan Sound for their big fishing trips into the Atlantic Ocean. He figured he was about three-quarters of a mile from there, and Midgett’s boat would be tied up about three hundred meters south of that. So, he had about a half mile to go. With those calculations locked in his mind, he turned to the body.
He had laid the corpse faceup and guessed that by the build and size of the body it was a male. Black hair was matted to the purplish remnants of his face. A black jacket, like a Windbreaker, covered part of his bloated neck. He saw a blue T-shirt beneath the jacket and the man was wearing denim jeans over brown work boots. The man’s hands were chewed and he could see several of the bones on both hands. Where there was skin left it was bloated and dark like the face.
He rolled the man over halfway and removed the rope he’d been using to tug him. He felt both pockets for a wallet and came up empty. Returning to the front, he checked both Windbreaker pockets and both jeans front pockets. Nothing.
He unzipped the jacket and checked a small inside pocket. Nothing. He wanted to remove the man’s boots, but the leg swelling would make it too difficult to replace them and he figured he had done enough investigating.
Mahegan did one more check of his location, looked at the man, his path through the marsh, and one last look at the remaining rope around the man’s left leg. He knelt down again, and then moved the rope above the line of the hiking boot. He untied the left boot and pulled at the uppers. The skin bloated out and he knew he wouldn’t be able to get it back the way it was.
All of his life Mahegan had been writing his name inside his shoes and boots. Living in cramped or communal quarters such as he did, he wrote his name on everything, not so that people didn’t steal his stuff but so that he could kick their ass when they did.
As he checked the left boot, he saw a black letter T, a couple of unreadable letters, a C or O, an H, followed by an S, and a new word, PET. He looked harder, pulling at the leather and determined it was a C.
“Tchspet?” he muttered.
He retied the boot as best he could, opened the right one, and was able to fill in the blanks.
“Teachspet.”
At least he had a name.
He shook that boot once and noticed it felt slightly heavier than the previous one. Both were waterlogged, so it was something else.
He placed the boot on the ground, reached in, pulled up the insole, and shook the boot. Still nothing. He angled the boot so that he could see inside and noticed a small rectangle directly beneath the heel. He lifted the rectangle with his fingernail and got it on the third try.
The sun caught the yellow glimmer of something wedged in the base of the shoe. The notion of a round peg in a square hole occurred to him as he reached in and pulled the object out.
He held in his hand a shiny gold coin. Flipping it over, he noticed it had an eagle on both sides and a small “c” beneath the talons. It looked so perfect it seemed fake. Probably was a good-luck piece
of some sort.
Then Mahegan looked at the man’s decaying face and thought, This didn’t bring him any luck at all.
Chapter 6
On Roanoke Island near the Queen Anne’s Revenge guesthouse, Sheriff’s Deputy Roland Williams said, “What you got here is your basic A-one dead body.”
Williams was dressed in his starched khaki Dare County police uniform. It was a warm September afternoon and he wore the short-sleeve summer khakis, making him look more like a park ranger than a law enforcement officer. Mahegan stared at the reflecting aviator shades that allowed a veiled glimpse at his pea-sized eyes and thin eyebrows. Heavyset, Williams tried to suck in his hanging gut as the crowd gathered, but his attempt to defy nature was unsuccessful.
Not exactly Barney Fife, but close, Mahegan thought.
“Say you found him when you were swimming in the sound?”
“That’s what I said,” Mahegan replied.
“About a mile out?” Suspicious this time. Mahegan noticed Williams’s hand drifting ridiculously close to his pistol. Spying the bulge in his top left pocket beneath Williams’s name tag, Mahegan wondered if that was his one bullet.
“That’s right. Dragged him in about a half mile down the island and then carried him up here.”
“You one of them Copperhead carpetbaggers?”
“Not sure what you’re talking about, but it’s just me,” Mahegan said. He knew about the tension created when contract companies swept into small town America. Some created jobs, others didn’t. He had to assume that there was some animus between the locals and Copperhead.
Mahegan said, “Well, anyway, here it is. I am happy to help if you need me.”
He had laid the body at the intersection of Old Wharf Road and the trail he had followed from his landing point. He didn’t want to bring the corpse all the way up to Queen Anne’s Revenge, so he stopped about a hundred meters short, hid the man in some tall grass, walked up to the restaurant, called 911, and then walked back to the body and waited. Williams got there twenty minutes later with lights flashing, calling for backup, which still hadn’t arrived. Leaving his flashers on, Williams guaranteed drawing a crowd, which was now about twenty strong.