by J C Ryan
Closer investigation of Sullivan’s situation was ordered immediately.
The councilors were only satisfied this time it was real when they got the report, shortly after seven a.m. DC time that Sullivan was really in hospital, really in the ICU, and only his family and closest colleagues could visit him, and then only if in possession of the ICU code.
Graziella’s messenger was one of those colleagues who were allowed to visit. Though they couldn’t be in the room with him, they could see him through the window.
Sullivan was reported to be in a bad way. Graziella’s contact was there when the doctors told his wife and children that the prognosis was bleak. He’d probably not make it past the forty-eight-hour mark, and if he did, he’d most likely never regain consciousness.
The doctor didn’t actually use the word vegetable, but that was the situation in laymen’s terms. Another episode would kill him instantaneously, and the next forty-eight hours was the most critical time for that to happen.
Only after hearing all that did Graziella relax and put on a wretched face while suppressing a smile. There’d be no need to plan his death now. He’d saved her the trouble.
***
It tickled Carter to be admitted to practice as a “brain specialist” at Walter Reed Army Medical Center.
The White House physician assisted in setting up the subterfuge with the administration of a light sedative, which put Sullivan out for about an hour. During this time, his family could see him hooked up to medical equipment—an array of frightening monitors, tubes, cannulas, and wires. No one—except “the brain specialist”, his assistant, and a couple of nurses who were in the know—was allowed into the ICU.
Chapter 92 - En route
Each of the teams of CIA and EA operatives embedded in the diplomatic missions would carry at least one of the Blackjacks and perimeter scanning devices. Those were the devices which they got from the Spetsnaz troops who raided Freydís and reverse engineered. Sticking to naming conventions the CIA techies aptly named it the PeriD’ice.
They’d take these devices with them in case they were allowed to go with that country’s forces to apprehend the Nabateans. They would use them to defeat any electronic perimeter protection measures they expected the Nabateans would have. And of course, if allowed inside the Nabateans residences, the Blackjacks would scan all electronic devices and download information. This would negate the need to rely solely on the word of the various countries’ heads of state to share information.
Of course, these devices had to be kept hidden from the eyes of the other countries’ security forces at all times.
***
The flight to New Delhi took off at four a.m. from DC with the Under-Secretary of State for Indian Relations aboard and Irene along to brief her on the background of the Nabateans. There’d barely been time for the two of them to gather a change of clothes before they were off.
They expected that the Under-Secretaries for India, the UK, and Japan, leading their respective missions, would have the easiest of all the undertakings.
India and the US had cordial relations, as did the US and Japan, whose mission was to take off shortly after their own, and of course the US and the UK were allies. All three delegations would have with them a pair of CIA agents for each target to accompany the taskforces who would do the arrests and to observe the questioning of the Nabateans afterward.
The UK was also expected to be a walk in the park. In fact, if they’d been allowed electronic communication, a simple call from Bill to his counterpart in MI6 would have seen the London-based Nabatean council member in custody almost before they’d ended the conversation.
Although the Japanese delegation was expected to achieve the same outcome as the UK and India groups, the CIA agents assigned weren’t expected to have an easy time of it in their observations during the interrogations.
Japan’s interrogation techniques weren’t nearly as barbaric as the Saudis. But in a modern country with such a high standard of education and advancement, it was shocking to learn their pre-trial techniques were undoubtedly the reason for their ninety-nine percent conviction rate.
While the number did include guilty pleas without undue force, most were obtained by confessions made to the police under duress.
It was an eyeopener for many to learn that techniques which would result in an acquittal in the US were standard procedure in a highly-cultured country like Japan.
***
The mission to China was one calling for acumen. Chinese memory was long, and it hadn’t been that long ago when the US Navy’s showdown with them in the Alboran Sea had embarrassed them. That incident would no doubt have left a lingering bad taste in their mouths.
The assessment was they wouldn’t be keen to work with the US on anything, especially not anything involving security agencies. Bill was dead set against sending any of his agents to China.
Constance Pierce’s predecessor, the former Secretary of State, was tapped as a special ambassador to convey the news to China. He was the last to have had neutral if not mildly cordial relations with China, and though now retired, he had informed Grant upon his departure from office he stood ready to help his country in any way they needed him. Grant respected him greatly and trusted him to get the job done.
The former secretary would try to convince President Zhang his country was literally sitting on a time bomb. He’d explain who the Nabateans were, what their mission was and had always been, what the rest of the countries who had an infestation of them intended to do, and that there were two of them in his country. After that, it would be up to the Chinese.
If nothing else, the Chinese were expected to deal with the problem swiftly, decisively, and in complete secrecy. Even if they jumped the Zero Hour gun, the two Nabateans in China would simply disappear, very quickly, with no clues left as to what had happened.
Chapter 93 - The French Connection
The whole stratagem to pull the wool over the Nabateans eyes about Sullivan took about three hours and had the advantage of giving him some much-needed rest. By the time, Walter Reed Army Medical Center’s latest “brain specialist” with his “understudy”, Dr. James Rhodes, could talk to Sullivan again—in his hospital bed in a private room with the blinds drawn—he looked and sounded a lot better. He was eager to please his king.
Carter made a big fuss about his loyal servant who, despite his serious wounds, was so loyal and brave to put his king’s well-being above his own. Sullivan was smiling proudly.
Carter explained there was just one more important topic to cover before he would let his faithful servant get his merited rest.
Where were the laboratories and IT centers of the Nabateans located and how to get to them?
Sullivan’s face brightened up, he smiled, and started talking.
The main medical and all technical labs, as well as the IT control center, with the servers holding every bit of information about the Nabateans since 106 AD were in underground chambers below Graziella’s mansion in Paris.
He’d been there a few times. Carved out of the limestone substrate, it was not in any way connected to the known Parisian catacombs, as far as he knew, and could only be, as far as he knew, accessed through a secret passage in her library. At least that’s how he and Graziella accessed it the few times when he was there.
Sullivan also explained that from what he understood about their technology, the triggering of the two antimatter bombs was controlled by the quantum computers located in those underground facilities.
“What is the plan with those facilities?” Carter asked.
“They are to be destroyed as soon as the bombs in DC and New York have detonated, your majesty.”
“How?” Carter dreaded the answer Sullivan was about to give.
“Your majesty, the whole place has been rigged with thermobaric explosives. It will incinerate everything and everyone inside.”
“Everyone?” Carter asked incredulously. “Are you saying they plan to k
ill the people that work for them?”
“Yes, your majesty, all of them, there are more than one hundred people working there.”
“Oh, my God!” James whispered measuredly. “Thermobaric explosives yield six to seven times more explosive power than TNT of the same weight—every living being in its path will be evaporated.”
Images of the neatly-stacked pile of decayed bodies in the Nabatean library in the caves of Matera flashed before Carter’s eyes. “This is how they are going to try and guard their secrets. They must have already copied everything they want.”
James nodded, the blood having drained from his face. “And we still don’t know when it’s going to happen.”
Five minutes later, shortly after seven thirty a.m., Sullivan was in a medically induced coma. Carter and James were speeding to the White House in a military helicopter to inform the President and Bill.
Securing those laboratories and IT center in Paris had become their number one priority.
A hurried conference with the President and Bill took place before they brought the grim news to the rest of the NSC members.
Their assessment of the French was that they were unpredictable at the best of times. Nominally allies, they had a prickly way of showing it, and it was by no means a given that they would be easily swayed to cooperate, at least not in any way that would see the US removing the contents of that underground complex.
Carter and Bill couldn’t help but smile when James was heard mumbling something which sounded like, “Damn Frogs only exist as a country because we liberated their sorry asses in WWII. I would’ve expected a bit of gratitude from them.”
Grant heard it and smiled, but his mind was working on the concern about another illegal operation. And even more concerning was the carefully coordinated schedule would be thrown into disarray if they had to first convince the President of the French Republic there was a clear and present danger.
Even if the French cooperated and stormed the facilities, they didn’t have the technical knowhow to operate quantum computers. If the US were to supply the skills for that in a joint operation, admittedly theirs were limited to the people working on the QIT project. It was debatable how much of it the French would be prepared to share with the US after the operation on their soil.
There were no arguments about it—the contents of the laboratories and IT center were more important than the apprehension of the council members. Not only did they have to stop the clock on the trigger of the antimatter bombs, they had to save and apprehend the hundred-odd scientists who were about to be killed, and they had to get their hands on all the information in those facilities—it contained every fragment of information, technology, history, and much more about the Nabateans from 106 AD up till now.
The Paris mission, everyone agreed, had become the top priority.
Bill explained to the President that the CIA had an “asset” within the Direction générale de la sécurité intérieure (The General Directorate for Internal Security), a French intelligence agency responsible for counter-espionage as well as counter-terrorism, countering cybercrime and surveillance of potentially threatening groups.
He didn’t elaborate about the “asset”, and no one asked. Even if they had, Bill would not have divulged that information. Having someone over there who could help them pull it off was a relief. The only catch was Bill was the only one who had contact with this asset.
It didn’t take much for Bill and the other security advisors to convince the President the Paris mission required Bill’s personal oversight.
Three of the top experts on the QIT team received taps on the shoulders and were escorted to the White House in a hurry.
By eleven a.m., Bill found himself on an eight-hour commercial flight heading across the Atlantic for the capital of France, where he would enlist the help of his asset and assist her in planning and executing the mission. He had not a moment’s hesitation or doubt that Simone would be willing to do what was asked of her, but he needed time to convince her of the urgency of his request—there were only twenty-two hours left to Zero Hour. He made a quick calculation—by the time he had landed in Paris, cleared customs, and contacted Simone, he would have twelve hours left.
His team of nine, on the plane with him, included the top three QIT quantum computing experts, three FBI bomb disposal experts, and three EA special forces operators.
An hour before Bill and his team departed, he had dispatched one of his Deputy Directors to London with a brief for the head of the Secret Intelligence Service, commonly known as MI6. As in the case of Simone in Paris, he also had no doubt that MI6 would be keen to join the party and send the necessary manpower over the channel to assist in his operation.
***
When the plane took off from DC and reached cruising altitude, Bill reclined his seat and closed his eyes. He sighed long and deep, exhausted. Since Sean and Dylan walked into his office and told him about Jason Sullivan, he had gone through the most taxing eighteen hours of his life, and he had a gut feeling the next twenty-four was going to be worse.
But even as fatigued as he was, his mind was just too busy and too excited to allow him to fall asleep right away.
A little smile broke across his face as he allowed his brain to meander away from the perils of his coming mission to something more pleasant.
He and Simone Bouvier had a history. It had been over a decade since he’d last seen her, but the pull they’d had toward each other in their youth still made itself felt.
Forty years ago, during the Cold War era, their affair had held all the passion of youth combined with danger. Simone at twenty-five was an exquisite woman, exotic and sensuous. Bill, also in his mid-twenties, was a newly-minted CIA agent. He was good-looking in an American collegiate way, but his looks concealed a mind as sharp as a stiletto.
Both appealed to Simone.
Thrown together in a joint US-French covert operation, they fell hard for each other. After six months, Bill was reassigned and begged Simone to marry him and leave France. She, in turn, challenged him to leave the CIA and stay with her in Paris. With the fervency of youth, they argued as passionately as they had loved, and in the end neither would give up country or job for the other.
When Bill left, Simone promised him that whatever she could do for him or his agency, she would, short of betraying her country. He’d made the same promise. And from time to time, they had lived up to that promise when they had helped each other to overcome bureaucratic hurdles in each other’s government that would have hampered the successful outcome of missions.
They went their separate ways, and eventually each married other people.
They’d had correspondence intermittently throughout their years apart, and Simone always ended with what he’d thought was a teasing reference to her youthful declaration that someday she’d track him down and make him marry her.
Now, he was on his way to ask for Simone’s help in a covert mission in Paris. He knew she would help him, but given their history, he also reflected that he’d been alone for a long time. He missed his wife, nine years’ dead, but the grief had faded and become an old friend.
Simone divorced her unfaithful husband seven years back. She had been alone as well—that’s what her letters said. And in those same letters, she had been threatening, again, that she was just waiting for retirement before she would get over to America and make him marry her.
At the age of sixty-five, he’d thought he was passionate only about his job, except now, at the prospect of seeing Simone again, he had to admit, his body was telling him something different.
Chapter 94 - Diplomatic maneuvering
Meetings with the heads of state of the UK, India, and Japan went as expected. As soon as they received agreement and were introduced to the heads of the security agencies who would execute the captures, they began joint operations planning.
Meeting with the King also went as planned. Surprisingly, and to their relief, the King agreed to wait for
Zero Hour. He was also delighted to agree to have CIA agents present from the beginning to the end.
They met with the Mabahith to jointly plan the arrest and be ready at Zero Hour.
***
Former Secretary of State Abraham Goudy was granted a meeting with China’s President Zhang, who conveniently was also the head of the National People’s Congress and the People’s Liberation Army.
The US ambassador to China wanted to accompany Goudy but was told in no uncertain terms that President Zhang would see Goudy alone—no one else of his entourage was welcome.
The ambassador and Goudy understood. This unusual request and purported urgency that was communicated with the request to meet with the President would have raised red flags for them—the Chinese didn’t like surprises.
Goudy had a few objectives; first, convince the President about the danger posed by the Nabateans and the need to take action. Second, convince him it was imperative to synchronize Chinese actions with those of the other countries involved in Operation Rock Concert and wait for Zero Hour.
However, Goudy was mindful the thorniest part of this meeting was going to be the disclosure of the identity of one of the two Nabatean councilors in China, Zhang’s long-time friend and ally in the party, Vice-Chairman Lin Zhou Li.
Goudy was fully aware disinformation about key people in an adversary’s government and security agencies was a favorite strategy of spy agencies across the globe. He was equally aware Zhang would know it, too.
Goudy’s naming Zhang’s friend as a Nabatean plant would be as difficult as convincing Zhang of the Nabateans’ threat in the first place.
Therefore, he began by listing everything he’d been told about the Nabateans, emphasizing their acts that would be most dishonorable in Chinese tradition. He accentuated the threat the organization posed to every country on the planet.