The Knesset Building
West Jerusalem
6.00 a.m. local
Ben Meir closed the report and glared at the men in front of him. The chief of Mossad, Shin Bet and the Unit bowed their heads as if back at school and they had been called to the headmaster’s office.
“You’ve just given me a 5,000 word report that could have been written in five, We. Don’t. Have. A. Fucking. Clue.”
Nobody dared point out that that was technically six words.
The chiefs of Mossad and Shin Bet both looked at Daniel Rosenberg, the head of the Unit and the man whose men were responsible for watching and losing the weapons.
Ben didn’t miss the subtlety of their attempt. “Don’t look at him to take the blame, you’re all bloody useless. Now get out of here and find those weapons before those Arab fucks destroy us!”
As the chiefs left through a side door, Ben pressed the intercom bottom and screamed “Next!”
The day had started badly and he had no misconceptions that it was only going to get worse.
“Good morning, Mr Meir,” said the head architect of the Jerusalem building project as he entered Ben’s office.
“I’m not so sure you’ll think it’s that good a morning,” offered Ben as a greeting.
The architect was responsible for a key component of Project Ararat, although of course he had no idea that was the case. As far as he was concerned, he was responsible for the building of a major new airport and a number of key government buildings. World renowned, he had dropped everything to take on the project for his spiritual homeland and holy city.
“With two months to go, everything is on target. The sun is shining on another beautiful day and I’m not sure there is anything you can say that will spoil it.”
Ben looked at the architect and almost felt sorry for him.
“Well, try this,” he offered, straight-faced. “You don’t have two months, you have twelve days.”
The architect initially laughed but on seeing Ben’s face, he stopped and looked questioningly at Ben who simply nodded in return.
The Architect slumped a little in his seat.
“Well that certainly did it,” he said, resigned to the enormity of the task that lay before him. “Resources?”
“Whatever I can spare but at least a thousand engineers are on their way to your sites as we speak.”
Ben pressed the intercom button. “Next!” he screamed. The architect took that as his cue to leave and quietly left through the side door, contemplating exactly how to get sixty days of work completed in twelve.
Ben looked up as the next cheery “Good morning” made its naive way towards him.
This was going to be a particularly nasty one, thought Ben. Logistics for project Ararat were a nightmare already. The head of the group had argued he needed a hundred days not sixty. Now he was about to find out that he only had twelve.
Ben caught sight of the anteroom to his office. There were at least another three waiting beyond logistics and many more were scheduled to arrive throughout the morning. It really was going to be a particularly horrible day.