The Rule of Nine

by Steve Martini

  He had spent Saturday finishing up the logos on the 727 and arranging for the delivery of a truckload of Jet A fuel from the airport on the east side of Vieques Island. After pumping the tanks full and paying for the fuel, Thorn hitched a ride with the driver of the tanker back to the airport, where he caught a flight to San Juan, and from there to Washington.

  It was now late Sunday night. The area around the Capitol was quiet, but well lit. Thorn was carrying an attaché case. He had lied to the two Saudi pilots on board the plane back in Vieques about many things, including their ultimate objective. As far as he was concerned, they didn’t need to know. And as long as he was packing the item in the briefcase, Thorn was in control.

  At Capitol Street he turned left, away from the domed monolith, and headed instead toward the intersection of First Street. He ended up kitty-corner from the Library of Congress and stopped at the traffic light. Standing at the curb waiting for the light to change he had to keep himself from looking up.

  Thorn knew that he was being watched and, no doubt, recorded by at least three or four, and maybe as many as half a dozen, surveillance cameras.

  He was standing in the middle of Government Square. Except for the area around the White House and parts of North Korea, it was probably the most heavily watched patch of ground on earth.

  The feds had installed cameras, night-vision equipment, and God knows what else under the cornice of every building. Rumor had it that there were antimissile missiles deployed around the Capitol as well as the White House. During the daytime, tourists could stand on the steps of the Supreme Court and look across to see snipers in their black garb as they milled around with their rifles on the roof of the Capitol Building.

  On his last visit Thorn had seen metal domes on the roof of the Capitol that looked suspiciously like the housing for the MK-15 Phalanx installed on naval war ships. The Phalanx was a twenty-millimeter chain gun, radar directed and capable of rapid fire to take down incoming missiles or planes if they penetrated the outer defenses around Washington. None of this particularly bothered him.

  When the light changed he crossed at the intersection and continued straight on, along the south side of the Supreme Court Building. Across the street was the Library of Congress with its Beaux-Arts architecture and shallow dome topped by an ornate windowed cupola and capped by the Torch of Learning. This and the light from the windows in the cupola lit up the night sky with the old-fashioned feel of the nineteenth century.

  The dome and the cupola were clad in copper that had long since acquired the brown patina of a dirty penny. Half a block down he stepped off the sidewalk and through the gate of a low, iron picket fence bordering the front yard of one of the old Victorian houses that lined the block. Most of the stately old homes along the street now housed lobbying groups and other organizations with regular business before Congress.

  It was Sunday and late enough at night that the lights in the old Victorian were out. Only the streetlamps provided illumination, and Thorn avoided these by huddling in the shadows under a tree in the front yard. Quickly he went down on one knee, opened the attaché case, and removed the little brown bat.

  His hands were trembling. Thorn knew that this was perhaps the riskiest part of the entire venture. He would either succeed or fail within the next three or four minutes, and he would be likely to get only one shot. Damage or loss of the bat and his only backup was virtual suicide. He would have to take the large laser designator and find a way to get up into the building. Given the tight security, this was virtually impossible; chances were he would be either caught or killed. If Thorn had to make a choice, it would be the latter.

  He pulled out the laptop and turned it on. A few seconds later there was a slight vibration and a gentle whirring sound from the little bat as Thorn tossed it into the air. A second later the sound disappeared. Thorn watched the computer screen as he piloted the little brown bat with the small joystick using the mounted camera as his eyes.

  Quickly he climbed above the streetlights and over the trees. In the distance he could see the bright lights on the Capitol dome as the bat gained altitude. It crossed over the intersection at Second Street just as a Capitol police car cruised by beneath it.

  Thorn maneuvered the plane with the joystick, varying the speed of the motor with a small wheel that he rolled back and forth with his other thumb. Banking to the left, he saw the brown copper dome of the Library of Congress illuminated by the torch on top of the cupola. He aimed the bat directly at it. He wondered if he should circle around one time just to get the lay of the land and then decided against it. The brightness from the cupola was too much. Thorn needed to get it down and out of the light as quickly as possible.

  As he approached the dome, he lined it up with one of the crosshatched ornamental iron pieces. These ran from the balustrade at the base of the cupola down to the lower edge of the dome. There were eight of them. Thorn had studied the photographs for weeks. As he approached within a foot of the ironwork, he abruptly pulled the joystick and rolled the power wheel back. The nose of the little plane, along with the camera, suddenly pointed straight up. A flash of blinding light filled the camera’s lens from the Torch of Learning, followed by the blackness of the night sky.

  The plane stalled. Then it fell tail first. The image on the screen shook and pixilated as the bat hit the domed roof. Thorn sucked in air and held his breath as he winced. The plane teetered on its tail. If it flipped onto its back, it would be over. The little brown bat would slide down the dome until it either fell onto the walkway below or became wedged behind one of the ornamental pediments at the edge of the roof. Either way, it would lose its signal and Thorn would no longer be able to control or retrieve it.

  A second later the plane flopped forward, and the image shook and broke up a little as the camera’s tiny transceiver absorbed the shock. A few seconds later the picture stabilized. The four powerful magnets on the feet of the little bat clung to the ornamental iron like glue.

  Thorn smiled. They would have to pry the little beast off if they wanted to get their hands on it. He let out a palpable sigh of relief, then laughed. He had to catch himself before he made too much noise or wandered out into the glare of the streetlights. He felt absolutely giddy. The rest would be a piece of cake. Unless the Arabs flew the jet into a ditch, the mission was a lead-pipe cinch. All they had to do was deliver the package.

  Thorn had been training for the maneuver with the bat for almost a month. But until he actually put the little plane at risk, there was no way to be sure if he could pull it off.

  Peering into the computer’s screen, Thorn was looking up into the lights of the cupola over the main reading room of the Library of Congress. The balustrade around the base of the cupola was no more than ten feet away. Hunting and pecking he hit a few keys on the computer.

  He could throw the joystick away now. Instead he ran his finger over the laptop’s touch pad. The tiny servomotor kicked in and the small camera began to pan. The camera and the laser diode were mounted on a gimbal, like a compass on a ship. They could turn in any direction, right or left, up or down. He aimed the camera at the target, lifted his finger off the pad, and looked at the screen. It was perfect. He couldn’t believe it. A few adjustments in the morning and he would be set.

  He held his breath. One final test. He clicked a few more keys on the computer and suddenly he heard the signal, a periodic beep. He had to turn down the volume on the computer, otherwise somebody on the street might hear it. It was like a human pulse. The only thing pounding harder at the moment was Thorn’s heart.

  Quickly he turned off the diode to save the battery, shutting down all the power to the little bat. It was settled into its nest for the night. Now if only the wind stayed calm and the weather clear, Thorn had it made. He had already checked Weather Underground, one of the major weather prediction sites on the Internet. The forecast for tomorrow was bright and clear, with a high of seventy degrees. All they had to do was deliver the bomb, and
Thorn would take care of the rest.

  By the time we reach the Hotel George in downtown Washington, it’s already late. Joselyn and I are exhausted. Herman slept on the plane while Joselyn and I talked, so by the time we land, Herman has gotten a second wind. He wants to go and at least take a gander at the Washington Court Hotel, where Thorn is checked in.

  “Listen, leave it alone,” says Joselyn. “Everything is under control. The FBI has already confirmed that he’s checked in, and they have him under surveillance.”

  Joselyn has assured us both that her contact in the Capitol has everything in hand, and that Thorpe is on board. According to Joselyn, Zeb Thorpe has received firm instructions from the director of the FBI as well as the attorney general. They have Thorn under round-the-clock surveillance. They would pick him up, but they want to know if he is working with anyone else. So for the time being, they are watching and waiting.

  Joselyn’s source has warned us to be careful, not to take any chances. He has assured her that the Hotel George, where we are staying, only half a block from the Washington Court Hotel where Thorn is booked in, is now under full protection. Both city PD and federal authorities are now watching it.

  FORTY-THREE

  It was five A.M. and Flannery and Son’s cement contractors were scheduled for a major pour. The framing crew was finishing up the last few forms as the cement-pumper truck set up over the site at the Fulton Street subway station.

  There was already a line of seven heavily laden cement trucks queued up on the street outside the gate, each one waiting to disgorge ten cubic yards of concrete. More trucks were on the way. They would be rolling in and out all day, dropping their load into the hopper of the pumper truck as the cement crew moved the hydraulic-powered chute around, pouring the concrete as they spread and leveled it.

  “Hey! You got a problem.” One of the drivers milling around outside the gate yelled over the sound of the idling diesels. He pointed to the second truck in line. Its giant mixer barrel on the back was not revolving.

  The driver of the truck leaned out of his open window. “I know. Batch plant didn’t give me enough water. Had to shut my mixer down. How about I get inside to use your hose to get some more water in the mix?”

  The guard at the gate looked at the officer in charge. Both private guards and transit police provided security for the construction site. The transit cop nodded, and the private security man with the clipboard wrote down the license number of the truck as well as the owner’s name and contractor’s license number from the driver’s-side truck door. He then swung open the gate and waved the truck inside.

  The guard raised his hand and stopped the truck just as it was about to enter. “Two water trucks parked over there.” The guard pointed off to the left, a fair distance from the site of the giant open hole over the subway. “Tell ’em to give you a hose. They should have more than enough water.”

  The driver smiled, nodded, and drove through the gate.

  Ahmed sat in the left-hand seat as the 727 climbed through twelve thousand feet. He could see the white surf and the azure blue shallow waters just off the beaches on the southwest coast of Puerto Rico as he and Masud held the plane on a steady course headed north.

  They had a full load of fuel. The two air-to-air missiles were now slung under the wings, attached to the pylons that Ahmed and his comrade had helped to install.

  The two Saudis were mystified by how easily Thorn had managed to bulldoze his way past the inquisitive onlookers on Vieques after the plane landed. A handful of bureaucrats from the U.S. Department of the Interior who worked at Camp Garcia came by to look when they heard the plane come in.

  The workers made the trek a half mile or so from the dilapidated offices at the camp to the airfield, some of them in cars and a few on foot. Thorn took charge, showing them some papers and telling them that he’d already called in the incident to the FAA, and that a Federal Aviation Administration inspector was being dispatched from Washington to Vieques to investigate. He would be there Monday morning.

  This put an end to all their questions. A few of them lingered, wandering around the outside of the plane for a few minutes, and then disappeared.

  As soon as everything calmed down, Thorn went back to work on the plane. He finished the spray job on the company logos just forward of the wings and skipped the big one on the tail section. He told the two pilots it wouldn’t matter.

  Thorn arranged for a load of fuel. As soon as it was delivered, he started up the engines and turned the plane around so that its nose was pointed down the runway. Finally he went over last-minute instructions with them and then departed for the airport on the other side of the island.

  For two nights Ahmed and his comrade slept on the plane. They were armed and instructed to kill anyone, quietly if they could, who approached the plane or tried to get on board.

  Then early Monday morning before daybreak they broke out the two air-to-air missiles from their crates inside the plane, mounted them to the pylons under the wings, and armed them both. Within a half hour they had the engines warmed up and were headed down the runway. It was six thirty A.M. None of the government workers would show up at Camp Garcia for another hour and a half.

  Ahmed piloted the plane on a northwest course sixty miles out to sea before heading due north. The plane climbed over puffy patches of tropical clouds casting shadows on the water below. He kept his transponder turned off and stayed well out over the ocean. The plan was to avoid ground-based radar from Puerto Rico and the frequent radio inquiries from the island’s air traffic control towers. Forty minutes into the flight, he turned ninety degrees to starboard and put the plane heading over the ocean forty miles north of Rafael Hernández Airport on the extreme north end of the island.

  Formerly known as Ramey Air Force Base, the field had been turned over to civilian use as part of the base closure program a few years earlier. The Air National Guard and the Coast Guard still retained a presence there. It was also used by the airfreight carrier FedEx as its hub for the Caribbean Basin.

  Ahmed climbed to twenty-five thousand feet and put the 727 into a circling pattern out over the water as Masud listened to their VHF radio receiver. They had plenty of fuel. He was scanning the frequencies, searching for their quarry.

  “Federal Express flight 9303—Squawk 1423, runway two north. You are cleared for takeoff.”

  “There it is!” said Ahmed. He couldn’t believe it. It was exactly as Thorn had said. The airport at Rafael Hernández usually didn’t have FedEx flights any farther north than Miami or Memphis, but today they did.

  Flight 9303 was headed for Newark Liberty Airport in New Jersey. The wide-body DC-10 would dwarf the smaller 727. And anyone familiar with the FedEx flight schedule would know that the carrier never used smaller planes on such long-haul routes. But by the time anyone on the ground or in the air saw the plane, the 727 would be so close to its target that this would be the last thing on their minds.

  Ahmed continued to circle, holding his altitude at twenty-five thousand feet and waiting as the huge wide-body took off and slowly climbed toward its cruising altitude.

  Almost twenty minutes later Masud spied the larger plane cutting through a cloud deck eight thousand feet below them and still climbing. Ahmed continued his arc around in the circle and fell in behind them, still five thousand feet above the larger jet. He went into a shallow dive and used his altitude to pick up speed and close the distance on the other plane.

  When he got within a half mile, he eased back on the throttles and flew fifty feet above the tall tail of the DC-10 to avoid the air turbulence off its wings and its jet wash.

  The bigger plane had a slightly slower cruising speed than the 727 and Ahmed wanted to be careful to avoid getting on top of it. He hugged in as close as he dared, knowing that with his transponder turned off, the collision avoidance system on the DC-10 was blinded. From out in front there was no way that the crew on the flight deck of the large wide-body could see them.


  In less than a half hour they were more than a hundred miles off the north coast of Puerto Rico, well beyond the range of ground-based radar, in an area approaching no-man’s-land, the heart of the Bermuda Triangle.

  Once inside the chain-link gate, the driver of the large cement truck made a broad-arcing turn toward the two parked water trucks. But instead of continuing on, he stopped. He turned the wheel and started to back up. The reverse safety bell on his rear wheels started to clang and by the time the guard at the gate turned and saw him, the truck was moving backward on a direct line toward the open cavern over the subway.

  “Where the hell’s he goin’?”

  Two of the transit cops looked over. One of them shook his head, then started to wave his arms back and forth. “No. No. Not there.” He took a few tentative steps toward the moving truck. “Hey, dimwit!” he yelled at the top of his voice.

  The driver looked at him for an instant before pressing the accelerator to the floor. The weight in the back of the truck was the only thing that slowed it down. The cement truck started to back up faster, its reverse safety bell now ringing frantically. As the transit cop realized there was something wrong, both he and his partner started to run toward the moving truck.

  One of the workmen, still hammering forms, hearing the bell bearing down on him, looked up and threw his body out of the way as the rear wheels barely missed him. They rolled right over the wooden forms, crushing them, and kept right on going. The forms didn’t even slow down the heavy quad set of dual wheels.

  “Stop!” The workman leaped to his feet and jumped up onto the truck’s running board as it passed by. He reached inside and tried to grab the steering wheel.

  The driver wrestled him for control of the wheel, but the framing contractor was big and burly and by now was flowing with adrenaline.

  The Somali driver grabbed the Sig Sauer nine-millimeter pistol next to him on the seat, pressed the muzzle against the workman’s forehead, and pulled the trigger. In a cloud of bloodred spray, the workman’s gaze fixed as his body tumbled backward off the truck. A second later the driver felt the steering wheel pull to the right as the front left wheel of the massive truck rolled over the dead laborer.