by Vincent Heck
"Until he acknowledges us."
"Then what?"
"Look, I don't know, yet, ok? Do we have video? Can we get video? What’s the signal like in his neighborhood? Which drones are over there?"
"We've got drone Fenix over there, we've got... Orion, and Gerakyl, too."
"Ok well what are we waiting for? Let’s get them into position, and let’s get the feed."
As the control center monitors set into position at the front of the control room, the picture of three video feeds piped back onto the screens. Each of them, momentarily, were displaying video from flying cameras, above the trees and buildings before finally arriving at Jason’s house. The video camera then steadied enough to display two men standing at Jason’s door.
“Wow, the accounts are true: Those men barely do move." Michael said.
He sat up in his chair.
"Knowing Jason, he's got a plan. He's too smart. Pan around the house please. Keep the feed for the front door still, though."
The main screen split into three screens. The middle view panned to the left of the house viewing the back, side, and the far right view panned to the right of the house. No view of Jason.
"Can we zoom out? Trace his phone and listen to the audio?"
"Sir he took the battery out of his phone and drained the juice. There is no audio inside that house."
“None? Anywhere? No satellite TV, or anything?”
“Nothing.”
"This isn’t going to be easy, guys. Can we get another covert surveillance drone over there? Can we get one in there? Are there anymore we can spare in the area? One as small as an insect or something?”
“All of our micros are on other assignments.”
“OK. Well, let’s hold off for now. Really, I don’t think it’s necessary for Jay, anyway. I want everyone to fall back. Get those guys outta here, we need him to settle down, we'll never catch him when he's on high-alert."
“It seems they left, already, sir.”
“You mean without permission?”
All Michael wanted to do was talk to Jason. He wanted Jason's opinion of whatever it was he thought he had discovered.
"Keep him on constant surveillance and make sure you brief me on any change. Even if it’s minor."
Michael left the control room and headed back to his office.
Sunday, May 25th 2003 3:07 a.m.
Jason crept back over to the door to look at the vestibule monitor again. The men were gone. He pulled out an electronic notebook and uploaded visual surveillance of the parameters of his property.
He panned around the whole house. His mind laid heavy with the thought of the men who visited him and how his experience almost mirrored Tameka's before she died.
They were chipped. He knew that, cause he was able to deactivate their body chips and send them away.
Jason decided to log onto the internet to search for Betsy Washington, Tameka's mom. Her point of view, surely, would tell him something he needed to continue.
Nebraska Avenue Complex
A small beeping noise skipped over the speaker with new information back at the DHS control room. The analyst stationed to monitor that drone fired up his walkie-talkie into Michael’s office. "Sir, we are getting signals from Badr drone."
“10-4. I’ll be right in.” Michael stormed from his office back into the control room. “What’s he doing?"
"He's on the internet."
"He hasn't typed any words, yet, though, has he?"
"No, his internet is just connected on its homepage.”
“This could be a decoy, folks. Eyes peeled. Someone keep your eyes on those video feeds, he could be sneaking out.”
The screen in the display room showed the exact screen that Jason had on his laptop. The curser blinked idle in the search box; the pointer laid flat in the middle of the screen’s desktop.
"What's he doing?" an agent asked. “Maybe he got up to go to the bathroom.”
“Make sure you circle the house with the surveil-drones. Be sure he’s not pulling our chain.” Michael said.
The cameras took a fast swipe around the entire house with no signs of activity. “Everything’s the same sir.”
The screen sat stagnant another few minutes before the connection to Jason’s internet disconnected.
"We've lost his connection, sir. He logged off."
"It was a decoy; we've got nothing here. Keep your eye on the video. He wasn't ever going to put anything in that search box. Make sure he doesn’t leave that house."
Jason sat at his desk. An intuition asked him to do an area search for intelligence drones. On his handheld device, he was informed that he was being monitored by four covert drones: Fenix, Orion, Gerakyl and Badr.
Badr monitored anything he’s doing on his internet feed – he helped design it. His team of physicists did a phenomenal job on the execution. It was named after the old Pakistani satellite series.
He had to get out of the house, but the tricky thing about the covert drones used by the DHS was that they were impossible to see with the naked eye.
It’d be impossible to identify. Typically, they disguised as insects and sat too high in the air to be able to detect, anyway. But, they could be anywhere from hiding in the bushes to inside the central air vents of his home. There was no way he could put Betsy’s name in that search box, she’d be dead or missing before the night’s over.
He shut down the internet and rummaged through his bookshelves for the first phone book he had on hand.
The phonebook he found was a few years old. After running his finger over a few pages in the phonebook, on the fly, he had to take a mental picture of the information: "Betsy Washington, Annandale, Fairfax County Maryland."
Let’s hope this is info is still good.
XI
World Trade Center, Building 7
Thursday September 6, 2001 10:22 p.m. EDT
Jason’s pen was buried somewhere under the crazy stack of papers sitting atop his desk. He had it a second ago, but lost track of it while reading the operation instructions and programming the assignments.
At 7:45 a.m. on September 11, is when I’ll have the first communication with the base from the squawk box. That’s when procedures will begin.
Jason couldn’t see how anyone could get away with the elaborate scheme he was planning for drills, but it was what they had discussed with the Brendenhall Financial Group. The drills, to him, were silly because, surely, the U.S. military would catch a group of people planning to run a huge commercial plane into the White House before it happened, right?
He was stumped trying to figure out how to make the drill as difficult as possible because it’d take them about an hour and twenty minutes to run from Boston’s airport down to D.C. That’s ample time for the fighters to get there. It should be an easy task. How do I plan this?
His commission was to come up with a plan that the U.S. defense could not stop. It felt impossible.
Jason had been a part of many silly, outlandish, drills. This was the first drill he was commissioned to take head of; it was his baby. He was going to be sure that no matter what, he knocked this out of the park.
During the Brendenhall meetings, they had discussed the guy before him that was not very good. His drills were shoddy, his preparation was skimpy, and his teams weren’t prepared for war, or U.S. protection, either.
Jason liked that he had a reputation to be the most complicated innovator. He wanted to grab this project by the bullhorns and revamp American terrorist security.
His phone rang.
Vanessa.
“Hey, sweetpea. It’s late, you should be in bed.”
“I am. I want you to continue your story until I fall asleep.”
“Alright, babe.” Jason sank back into his creaky desk chair. Vanessa laughed. “Your old chair.”
“So, what?” Jason laughed back, “My old chair has serv
ed me well for a long time.”
“If you say so, daddy. One of these days you’re gonna wish your chair wasn’t so loud – like when on an important call with the president.”
“Maybe the president has an old creaky chair, too.”
Jason looked out the window into the NYC streets. The time he had with his daughter in his office had become a comforting time of the day for him. It was always late, and his one-on-one phone conversation about something he loved -- history of what he considered to be the great American people and the things they’ve achieved. The moment, how it existed, belonged only to him and his angel.
“Where did we leave off? I always forget.” He asked.
She never forgot. She always knew where.
“New York City was attacked and burned down.”
“Oh, right.”
New York City
Up around modern-day mid-town, Manhattan, George Washington sat at his post for the next few days. The British had invaded New York City and had set up camp.
Most of the British Red Coats were stationed in Staten Island. More of the surly Red Coats had set up shop in Manhattan and Brooklyn. Washington angrily pondered what his next move was going to be.
Washington’s servant brought him food.
“Anathang else I can do for ya massa?”
“No.” Washington grimaced. “This God-forsaken country. They come over here to steal thy freedom because of our prosper. Little can be done in such a case. The nerve of these men.”
Washington’s servant could only listen as he stood at attention in front of his master. Washington rubbed his own nose and chin.
“A navy would serve much purpose. We could have stopped this. And all they give me was a ficken turtle. Now our city burns, and thousands of Red Coats roam our land.”
“They try to put you to death, massa?”
Washington looked up at his servant. He knew treason was definitely punishable by death.
“I’m from this land. But, for the rest: sometimes where there’s innovation and rebellion, there’s revolution.” Washington answered. He looked into the eye of his servant; the servant who was a slave, himself.
“Want freedom is in all us, massa.”
“Yeah… ‘tis true.” There was a moderately long silence before a knock at the door.
The servant promptly made his way to the front door in the next room.
“Good day. This is for General Washington.” The man stood there in his three cornered hat and handed the servant a message.
“One moment, kind sir.” The servant said. He closed the door and brought the letter to Washington.
Washington grabbed the letter. “What did he call me?”
“He says, ‘Can I’s speak to Mr. Gener Washington’, sir.” Washington glanced at the envelope which was, also, addressed to “General Washington” from the British army.
“Take it back.” Washington said without opening. “I shall not accept this.”
The servant returned the unopened letter to the door. “I’m sorry sir, Mr. Washington is not accepting.” The servant handed the letter back to the messenger. “You have a fine day, sir.”
Once the servant returned to Washington’s side, the general spoke.
“They haven’t come to fight, or enforce law. They’ve come to enslave. They want us to surrender. This plays well.” He said.“They still wish for us to do all the work and them receive all the benefit. We are a nation, and we will not be forced to surrender.” Washington stood up abruptly. Gather your belongings. We’ve got to move. We’ve got to fight.”
XII
Virginia: Sunday May 25th 2003 11:30 a.m.
CURRENT HSAS: ORANGE – HIGH RISK
Jason woke up to the sharp beeping of his notebook. His dream had revealed a new reality to him: The 9/11 war games were commissioned by a group he was a former member of: The Brendenhall Group.
The Brendenhall Group was made up of all the brightest people in the world from government, media, business and sometimes, even entertainers. They thought of themselves as the new founding forefathers. Twice a year, they would secretly come together to discuss solutions to world issues and the influence they have. The focus was to act in concert to reach any particular world goal. Possibly, they were a part of the mysterious panel that made up “The Summit.”
Anything that the U.S. government saw as top priority could influence what came down from “The Summit.” Jason, for the first time, cared beyond a fleeting thought about who that panel of people were.
His device chimed in aggravation a, seemingly, millionth time before Jason gave it attention.
::Twenty-two messages from Maxwell Bradley to Christine Upton.::
Jason rubbed the crust out of his eyes to get a better view. He clicked one of the messages. "Hey Christine, I'm sorry we had to cut our night short last night. Is everything OK? I'm worried."
He clicked another.
"Hey did you get my message?"
Another: "Hey Christine, babe."; Another: "Does this have anything to do with Jason?"
I forgot to put the stupid thing back on auto.
Jason forwarded all the messages to Christine as he staggered to his feet from his deep sleep of 7 hours. He checked the front door, the men were still gone. Jason needed to figure out where this Operation Faith came from. Who, exactly, is ‘The Summit’, and what are their plans?
Typically, on Sundays, Jason went into work at 12 noon. He wondered if he could waltz into that building as if nothing ever happened. If he went to work, there was no telling if he were coming home that day.
But, somehow, he wasn't sure.
With 11:45 quickly approaching, his internal debate concluded -- he wasn't going.
He decided to prepare himself for a new life; one of, probably, being on the run.
He turned on the TV to see what the news was reporting. He imagined his face on the main news story putting him inside some sort of scheme that would vilify him to the public.
The top story at 12 noon had to deal with a major threat from the middle-east.
"Officials say that al-Qaeda still have cells in America and are planning a terrorist attack sometime around Super Bowl. They say there is no threat to the game, after more analysing of the intelligence they have. Nonetheless, sources say the threats should be taken seriously and the football commissioner could think about rescheduling the game."
The football league commissioner spoke next. Jason turned up the volume as the story continued.
“We have been going over options for this year’s Super Bowl,” the NFL commissioner said. “and when we come up with a solution, we will inform you as soon as possible. For now, the games have not been rescheduled, or cancelled.”
The news reporter returned: "The new al-Qaeda tapes are what are called fatwas. The new tape accuses American Christians as devils, repeatedly using the quote: 'kill the pagans wherever ye finds them.'"
Jason, from his knowledge, didn’t think al-Qaeda had the means to attack on such a large scale twice in such a short time. It had only been two years after 9/11. It took them eight years between the 1993 bombings and 9/11 at the World Trade Center. That was the reality. The report concluded with President Harris delivering his thoughts from a separate event he was at that day:
"America won't stand idly by with the current conditions of our safety. We plan to take drastic actions against these radicals."
Jason’s concentrated thought was interrupted by his home phone’s ringtone.
Who could, possibly, be calling at this time? He thought to himself. His conflicting thoughts chaotically mixed in his head so much he couldn’t grab a hold of any of them.
On a whim, he answered.
"Jay, don’t hang up, it’s Mike."
Jason was at a loss for words. His arm took on a life of its own; he nearly slammed the phone on the hook before the memories of a man picking a 6-inch splinter out of his forearm in Afghanistan softened
his initial fear. "Mike, what's going on?" He asked.
"A few guys panicked because you saw top secret information."
"Mike, I'm the Deputy Secretary; only one person should know something I don’t know in this department. I run the daily operations, how am I supposed to do my job, if—you know what? What happened?"
"Well, ultimately, someone must’ve dropped the ball; could have been me, could have been anyone else. I’m surprised you didn’t know. I actually don’t believe you, to be honest. Then again, the whole thing is sort of a work in progress. But, you know how these things go. We don’t talk about the most covert things all willy-nilly. You probably were there when we discussed this? I mean, you did stop coming to the meetings.”
“Probably? Was I, or wasn’t I? Cause I don’t remember.”
“You’re usually on your toes with this, Jay. You stopped coming after you lost Vanessa. You’re trying to tell me you don’t remember this? Seriously? You’re acting weird.”
“Who’s The Summit? Brendenhall?”
“The Summit can be anyone influential, Jay. You know this. You know just as much as I do about The Summit.”
Jason sensed a genuine exasperation in Michael’s voice. He was honestly confused with his ignorance.
“But, have you ever thought to question that?” Jason asked. “I mean, who? Does that mean that if I get enough power I could be a part of The Summit?”
“To be honest, you may, now, be a part of The Summit, and don’t know. With the emails I’ve been getting lately, I believe you have influenced several recent Summit orders. But listen: I need you to say, right now, that you are still OK with things. Go on record – the pledge, remember? It’s important that you’re on board. You’re a key part of this all. We’ll work it all out later. No harm, no foul."
"OK, well if I am ok with it, I’ll tell you that. If I’m not I’ll tell you that. But, tell me what it is. Is what we’re doing something that went to congress?"