by Camden Mays
The only benefit Cameron saw from the short trip was alone time with Hannah. He quizzed her about small-town roots and questioned why she did not have the typical southern drawl. Turns out, her mother was an educator at a college and was very strict about proper grammar and pronunciation.
Back at CTC, the team had moved to one of the larger mission rooms to act as their war room for project Titan Shield. Jason Albright continued to coordinate with his FBI counterparts working the Roslin investigation, sifting through chemical sheets and data while Amy Wiggins, the communications specialist, coordinated with the NSA, looking for clues with cyber chatter.
Amir Abdullah had joined the team at CTC and worked closely with Amy parsing threads of communication. Raymond Hernandez of Homeland Security seemed to disappear at long intervals but had briefed the group on border issues.
Cole Cameron and Hannah Jacobs joined the team in the war room, and everyone was working to synthesize all of the information and data coming through.
As the hour grew late, a knock at the glass door revealed a friendly face for Cameron. Darryl Capps was back in town and motioned for Cameron to walk with him. The two meandered down the hall, and Capps patted Cameron on the back.
“Great work setting up the Abul takedown. You were spot on.”
“But a little late I’m afraid,” Cameron sighed.
“Dude, there’s no way you could have seen that coming. Hell, no one did.”
“Where are you headed?” Cameron asked, realizing he was blindly following Capps.
“The cafeteria! Man, I’m starving for some good ol’ American food!”
“Sorry, I can’t join you, we’re knee deep in shit back there and have nothing for the briefing with McCune.”
“Bullshit! Man’s gotta eat!”
“Nope. Gotta go my friend.” Cameron said turning to walk away.
“I need to get you back out on the range. Keep your skills sharp. That stuff in there is going to eat you up and then spit you out soft as Jell-O.”
“Yeah…yeah,” Cameron waved his hand as he walked back toward the war room.
“We might have something,” Amy said as Cameron entered back into the room. She threw up chatter posts on the large screen for all to see.
“You know we’ve never been able to get a solid lock on Hasni’s location.”
Amir jumped in and pointed to the Arabic text boxes cascading down the screen.
“So, this is a group chat of numbers pulled from Abdul Mahib’s cell phone that we've been surveilling. Seems innocent enough, they are chatting about the best places to get dalma. It is a Middle Eastern dish. It needs to be served fresh and is great with lamb or juicy vegetables.”
“OK. I’ll keep that in mind on my next trip to the middle east,” Cameron said growing impatient.
“Well, I know it may be a stretch, but if you look at this message here, the sender uses the Arabic pronoun ‘huw(a)’ or ‘he’ in English instead of ‘hadha’ or ‘it.’ He is stating that we will plan on having ‘him’ here in his town next Sunday. What if dalma is code for Hasni?”
“It could just simply be a typo or bad grammar, right?” injected Albright.
“Could be,” Amir said with greater excitement. “But Amy and I started to cross reference locations with earlier references to dalma and found that on two other occasions we had HUMINT on the ground suggesting Hasni was at the respective places that correspond with the posts.
“Including Ash Shihr,” Amir’s voice trailed at the end, and Cameron knew why. Ash Shihr was the place of Grant Ramsey’s last mission. It ended his career.
“Also,” Amy added, “the locations are suspect. Would you really brag about serving dalma in Sayhut?”
She paused then continued, “according to the post, the meal will be Sunday afternoon.”
“What’s today?” Cameron asked truly unsure.
“It’s Thursday…well make that Friday morning now” said Albright.
“Guys, this is good,” Cameron said trying to contain his excitement. “Do we know what time dinner will be served on Sunday?”
“15:00 Zulu.”
“That’s 10:00 here and 18:00 in Yemen?”
“Correct.”
“OK. Let’s get a jacket ready, and we can brief McCune first thing in the morning. In the meantime, Amy, see if you can get the logistics going to get Darryl Capps assigned to us. He can join Amir and me to get over to Riyadh Air Base, Saudi Arabia.
“Then we will need CENTCOM to put us on the Regan if it is still out near the Gulf of Aden. We’ll probably need to helicopter in close to the town.”
“You’ll be cutting it close on time. Fourteen to fifteen-hour flight to Saudi Arabia, then another three to four to get on the ship, set up with the Seal Team and run the ops?” Amy voiced her concerns about the logistics.
“Yeah, it’ll be tight, so let’s line it up, so we are ready to go when we get clearance. You sure you don’t want just to have CENTCOM set it up with a Seal Team?”
“Look, no one knows more about Hasni than me. I need to be there when we grab him.”
Hannah stood up and stretched.
“Since Jason and I are the domestic grunts we’ll keep working Roslin with our teams in Arizona. But I think I should get up to New York and see if I can’t find, Grant Ramsey.” Now officially listed as a ‘person of interest,’ Ramsey was being sought for questioning by the FBI while McCune had designated a team of her own to hunt him down.
Albright contributed. “And I’m still sorting through the chemical data sheets from Roslin, I know you were focused on their VX project, but from what I see, they have all the precursor elements needed for others as well, VR and even that horrific Russian cocktail known as ‘Novichok.’ ”
“I know, but the only thing in the vault that was empty was the Y44 containers. I think the containers had sensors on the bottom so there should be some data feeding to a status report of date, time, weights, temperatures, and things like that.”
“Yeah, I was working down that path with all of the data we got when we were at Roslin, but there are a lot of corrupted files.”
“Yeah, someone tried hard to scrub the system. It’s going to take some time to reconstruct them,” Amy said.
“Alright, look, I know its late,” Cameron paused looking for Hernandez, then realized Raymond deserted them some time ago.” Amy and I will finish the jacket for our briefing. Shouldn’t take us much longer and you all can get on out so we can be somewhat coherent in the morning for our presentation.”
Friday morning came very early, but the team methodically walked through their intel and hypothesis about Hasni’s scheduled visit near Sayhut. McCune was hesitant but dialed Kingman’s assistant, and in a few short minutes, the Director was on a video conference with them.
The team presented their findings a second time. Kingman was more decisive than McCune.
“Good, I’ll get with CENTCOM, and we’ll set up a drone strike and blow the bastard away.”
“I think that would be a mistake, sir,” asserted Cameron. “Our theory is that Roslin was the first step and we are potentially looking at additional threats. Getting HUMINT at the location and snagging him alive would offer us the best chance of knowing what we’re up against.”
“I appreciate your take on it, but I know the President is facing political pressure to make a statement and a show of force against these sons of bitches.”
“I understand sir, but if we miss this opportunity, we may just be striking a match. I mean, I don’t think we can afford another Ash Shihr type incident. We should at the very least have visual confirmation on the target.”
Kingman held up his hand interrupting Cameron.
“Ash Shihr was a shit show, no doubt, and we have had to deal with that fallout, but I know this President, and he will want to push this so that he can interrupt the evening news declaring his victory to the world.”
Kingman shuffled in his seat in front of the camera, processing
his thoughts.
“That leaves about forty-eight hours to get him or the information you need, because I can promise you this, that airstrike will come, and you better be the hell away from there when it hits. I’ll authorize the mission with that forty-eight-hour window, so get to it.”
The monitor went blank, and McCune turned to Cameron and sternly warned, “Don’t screw this up,” as she left.
“Copy that.”
The phone in the room rang, and Amy answered. After a few seconds, she stretched the receiver toward Cameron.
“Hmm…it’s for you, Cole. It’s Capps, and he is pissed. He just got back and was headed out on vacation.”
“Tell him I’ll see him on the plane.”
“This ought to make for a very long flight for us,” chided Amir in his Arabic accent.
Hannah joined Cameron as he left the building.
“You be careful over there.”
“Yeah, your watch you back too.”
✽✽✽
West Los Angeles, CA
Abu al-Himyari sat in the small and dimly lit apartment room surfing the TV channels searching for news coverage of his victorious blow to his sworn enemy. He smiled when he finally landed on a prolonged segment covering the Roslin event. He relished the media coverage as it hyped up speculations of additional attacks. A bright light broke through the dark room from the window.
“Close the blinds!” al-Himyari demanded.
“I’m just checking the front of the building, Abu,” replied the young man as he obeyed the command.
“It is the same as it was the last time you checked.”
Al-Himyari had become increasingly frustrated with his nephew over the last few days. Despite his constant reassurance the young man’s nervousness and anxiety had him doubting the young man’s ability to carry out his task when the time came.
It had been a week since Abu al-Himyari had initiated the first phase in a chain of events designed to unleash fury on the infidels. Hasni had handpicked him for this role, telling him that he was destined for greatness by the hand of Allah.
Surely, Allah’s hand was upon him. After all, the border crossing looked derailed just when the Native American policeman showed up. ‘Allah’s providence,’ al-Himyari reasoned. And the attack at the Roslin Research Center could not have gone any better.
Hasni had promised the infidels would pay for the pain and suffering they inflicted on the believers. Both he and al-Himyari were well acquainted with suffering. After losing his wife and daughter, in what was considered collateral damage by the U.S., al-Himyari found a channel for his rage in Hasni’s rhetoric and mission.
Hasni was not just a leader in words but also in action. That is what he admired most. Even though Hasni was a man of action, he had proven disciplined as well. Strategically placing cells in the U.S. in crucial places and patiently waiting for the right opportunity to deliver a decisive blow.
Hasni was not merely seeking to strike fear in the hearts of the people. Instead, he desired the utter destruction and fall of the United States, but not before he delivered a personal message to those he held responsible for his loss.
When the godless Russians began discussions with Hasni, al-Himyari had objected. He felt they were as bad as the U.S. But Hasni had convinced him that only by working with the Russians would they realize their ultimate goal. To him, they were merely an instrument of war.
It was the Russians who provided them with information on Roslin and orchestrated the production of VX under the guise of a particular secret government project for Y44. It paved the path for Hasni’s cells to deliver on his promises.
To prove their loyalty, they provided Hasni critical information on a covert operation in Ash Shihr. With that information, Hasni avoided capture and delivered a strike to the enemy.
“By the time they even know where to begin to look, Allah’s vengeance will be felt by hundreds more,” al-Himyari told his nephew as he turned the TV off.
“Let’s get back to work.”
The two moved to the kitchen, donned their chemical suits and masks and continued working with the precursor materials in their makeshift lab. Al-Himyari’s nephew carefully applied the skills and knowledge he had gained as a chemical engineering student at UCLA. He went to the fridge and carefully removed the last canister labeled Y44.
✽✽✽
Santa Monica, CA
William Garrison leaned back in his home office chair, dejected and exhausted. Dealing with FBI agents, ATF, and state and local officials in Tucson, in addition to the emotional burden of the tragedy had taken its toll. Adding to the weight was Garrison’s overwhelming sense of guilt.
What had begun as an easy ticket out of his financial woes had escalated into unforeseen horror with the loss of lives he had not anticipated.
Grant Ramsey had caught Garrison at the most opportunistic moment in his life. The middle-aged man, pushing sixty was over-leveraged, and he had counted on exercising his stock options, but that required a transaction event.
His Santa Monica home was nothing compared to some of his peers in Bel Air or Brentwood. Still, it was well beyond his reach. He was certain Roslin was destined to be bought by a competitor, but the deal had fallen through.
On his third divorce and the heel of a failed buy out of Roslin, his was ripe for the picking when Ramsey offered him a way out. Garrison wanted to believe that at any other time he would not have been so easily swayed.
It was not supposed to go down like this. Grant Ramsey assured him no one would be hurt. His role was merely to provide access to Roslin for two men who were working with Ramsey. ‘Corporate espionage,’ he was told.
Then Ramsey required that he provide additional clearance for Frank Alvarez, the VP of Research and Development and place suspicion on Clarisse Johnson to get her reassigned. Now, they were both dead.
Garrison knew it was only a matter of time before someone would be knocking on his door and he would have to account for his role in the events. He scribbled a note on his desk then opened the desk drawer and removed a Ruger .38 Special.
He flipped the cylinder open and verified the hollow point bullets rested in the chambers.
Garrison thought, Now, time to end this miserable bastard of a life.
CHAPTER 13
The Gulf of Aden
On the long fifteen-hour ride to Riyadh Air Base, Capps behaved just as Cameron expected. It was as if he had to go through all five stages of grief over the loss of his coveted time off. Cameron ignored him and stayed focused on planning the operation before finally getting some sleep.
They left Andrews Air Force base at 15:45 Friday and landed in Saudi Arabia at 10:33 Zulu Saturday. Between the fifteen-hour flight and the time zone change, Cameron felt as if his forty-eight-hour window had collapsed considerably. They were pushing it.
The aircraft taxied and stopped near a V-22 Osprey aircraft with its crew ready. Its Rolls-Royce T406 engines were already running. The team stepped off the plane onto the tarmac, then directly onto the V-22. They strapped themselves in just as the tiltrotor military aircraft did a vertical takeoff.
As an aviation enthusiast, Cameron marveled at the technology of the Boeing aircraft. It had the combined performance of a helicopter and of a fixed-wing aircraft. It can function as a helicopter with its rotors in a vertical position. Once the rotors are converted to a horizontal position, it transforms into a turboprop airplane with high-speed and high-altitude flight capabilities.
The aircraft’s route took them east of Yemen then back west once they were in International waters. By 14:40 Zulu the aircraft hovered over the USS Ronald Regan and began its vertical descent onto the aircraft carrier’s deck. As the tires touched down, a Marine liaison greeted the team and escorted them to a briefing room.
A familiar gruff voice came from the behind them into the room.
“I don’t know who I pissed off to get stuck with you again.” Capps and Amir recognized the Captain’s voice.
“Sir, this Cole Cameron, this is his mission.” Cameron and the Captain shook hands.
“You know, I’m not your friggin’ water Uber!”
“Yes, sir!”
“He’s messing with you Cole,” Capps offered Cameron relief.
“The hell I am! Anyway, the Bravo Seal Team will be in shortly, you all can start your meeting then. In the meantime, let Officer Burke know if you need anything. Get this done and get it done right so you boys can get off my damn ship.”
“Yes, sir!”
The team connected with CENTCOM via satellite transmission. They met Sara Wang who would be their eyes from the sky and voice in their earpieces. She uploaded satellite images on the screen while Colonel Fetterman laid out the mission details.
The District of Sayhut with a population near twelve thousand sat near the coast and west below a desert mountain range. The target was located in the Northwest part of the city. They identified the infill and exfil spots about ten kilometers from the target as well as the backup plan. There was debate over the best squeeze spot for snagging Hasni, but eventually, that was settled.
Three inconspicuous vehicles and drivers, who were in country assets, would be waiting for them in the mountain range. The drivers would then head south toward the small city, dropping off one of the Bravo team members that would set up a sniper position in the hills for overwatch.
The choke point for grabbing the AIJB leader was near the center of the town which meant the three vehicles would be required to go nearly a kilometer back through the town in route to their exfil location. It was not an ideal situation, but given the time constraints, it would have to do.
✽✽✽
Counterterrorism Center – Langley