6:20 A.M. Local Time, September 27th
Lufthansa Flight 298
Over the Atlantic Ocean
Their stay in Germany had been unexpectedly brief, Harry thought, gazing out the window of the Airbus at the predawn sky. The folder tucked securely into his carry-on bag explained why.
The team had been recalled stateside, ordered to stand down “pending an internal investigation.”
Harry didn’t need to guess what that meant. He knew. It wasn’t the first time his team had been subjected to the bureaucratic intrusions of an investigation designed more for the purposes of saving face than arriving at the truth.
Truth. The official motto of the Central Intelligence Agency was taken from the Gospel of John, “For you shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free.” Harry had often thought they would have been better off going with Pilate’s cynical soliloquy, “What is truth?”
For in the high-stakes poker of espionage and international relations, truth was rarely even on the table, let alone in play. And all players were equally concerned that it remain that way.
The airliner was less than half full, mostly weary businessmen catching the trans-Atlantic flight after a tiring week. He glanced back and caught Hamid’s eye. The agent had put his seat back and was doing his best impression of complete inertia. Harry wasn’t fooled, recognizing the quiet tension in the Iraqi-American’s body, the complete awareness of his surroundings.
The team had come aboard separately, under a variety of new identities assigned to them by the CIA chief of station(Berlin). Harry flipped his wallet open, gazing at the passport of one Todd Winters. A small grin creased his lips as he thumbed through the snapshots placed within by the station’s ever-meticulous staff.
Mighty good-looking woman. Didn’t even know I was married…
11:09 A.M. Tehran Time
The Ayatollah’s Residence
Qom, Iran
Major Hossein felt the presence without turning, that sixth sense that had kept him alive so many times alerting him to the presence of man.
He ignored it, looking out from the balcony across the holy city. It had been almost twenty-four hours since the Ayatollah had laid out before him the sketch of President Shirazi’s plan, but the enormity of it all still stunned him. The audacity of it.
Fortune favors the audacious.
The strike was cunning in its conception, but the practical side of Hossein had detected a fatal flaw from the outset. There was no fall back. If the attack failed and they were implicated in its execution-had an entire nation ever before committed suicide?
Like he was doing now. Hossein rolled the rough coral beads of the tasbih between his callused fingers, mouthing the names of Allah in a silent prayer.
From the doorway, the Ayatollah Isfahani smiled once more at the audacity of the man. There were not many in Iran, even in these days, who would refuse to recognize the entrance of the Supreme Ayatollah. That this major did so was at once testament to both his irreverence and his bravery. Isfahani whispered a quiet prayer that Allah would overlook the one while blessing the other. Everything depended upon his success.
He took two steps out onto the balcony and Hossein turned to meet him, his face stoic.
“Are you ready, major?”
Hossein’s only reply was a brief nod, but Isfahani could see the doubt in his eyes. “You understand why this has to be done, I trust?”
“Yes.”
1:09 P.M.
The mountains of the Alborz
Mobility was the chief asset of any modern army, but the men below them hadn’t been utilizing it to their advantage. Thomas shaded the binoculars with his hands before passing them back to Sirvan, endeavoring to keep sun from glinting off the lens.
They were looking down into the bivouac of a platoon of Iranian soldiers. Two trucks were parked at the edge of camp, clearly the group’s transportation. Not using them to leave the mountains ASAP was going to be their last mistake.
It had taken the Kurdish fighters just under twenty-four hours to catch up with the men who had butchered their fellow villagers. Or at least soldiers like them. No one among the rebels seemed to care, least of all Thomas.
Sirvan placed a hand on Thomas’s shoulder. “You were a sniper?” he asked, recalling their conversation of the previous day.
The American replied with a nod.
“Then remain here and spot for Estere,” Sirvan ordered, handing him the binoculars.
“Don’t I get a weapon?” Thomas asked, a glimmer of hope appearing ever so briefly.
White teeth showed in the Kurd’s swarthy countenance. “I’m sorry, Mr. Patterson. Hawre will remain to provide security.”
And then he was gone, moving silently through the scrub to rally his fighters and organize them for the attack.
Estere was prone in the grass, her eye already on the scope of the rifle as she aimed down the bluff into the enemy camp. Her dark hair was pulled sharply back from her face to keep it out of her eyes.
Thomas crawled to her side, adjusting the binoculars once more to his eyes. The fighter named Hawre knelt less than five feet away and behind them, an AK-47 in his hands.
The mountain had grown silent, the whisper of the wind the only sound of nature remaining. It was the calm before the storm.
It was almost as though Thomas could feel the Kurds moving into position. Though their movements were shielded from his eyes, he had been on enough ops through the years to be able to predict where they would be taking up positions.
He counted a total of forty soldiers in view below them, and there was no way to know whether that was all of them. They might even have a patrol or two out. Thomas stole a glance at the pistol on Estere’s hip, wishing it was in his hand.
There were two soldiers on guard duty by each of the transport trucks. He had just turned the binoculars carefully to examine them when a shot was fired.
It was a signal. At that instant, Thomas heard the well-nigh simultaneous whoosh of two RPGs leaving their tubes, one from each side of the valley. One for each truck.
The trucks exploded a moment later, the fireball nearly blinding Thomas as the bodies of the unfortunate guards were vaporized.
The rifle beside him spat fire as Estere got off her first shot. “Target?”
“An officer,” Thomas stammered out, still trying to recover his vision. “To your right.”
“Range?” she demanded, swiveling the rifle on its bipod to acquire the new target. “I need the range.”
“Hundred and eighty meters,” replied Thomas. Rifle fire filled the air as Sirvan and Badir’s forces descended the slope, as the panicked soldiers tried to rally.
He felt the sniper rifle recoil beside him, watched the officer crumple into the dirt, a clean headshot. Soldiers were falling all around, caught in the ambush.
“Target?”
Something felt suddenly wrong, the hairs on the back of Thomas’s neck prickling even before gunfire exploded behind them.
He turned just in time to see Hawre fall, his body nearly cut in two by bullets. Thomas screamed out a warning, throwing himself toward the fallen Kurd.
Bullets fanned the air near his head as Thomas reached him, grabbing a fragmentation grenade from the dead man’s belt.
Things seemed to slow down, crystallize, as he grasped the situation. Their assailants were sweeping down from the ridge above, acting stupidly, he realized even as he pulled the pin on the grenade. They were bunched up.
He heard the crack of a pistol shot as though through a dream, saw one of the five men stagger. The frag landed among them and Thomas grabbed Hawre’s AK.
Their attackers dove for the ground, seeking whatever cover they could find against the grenade. One man tried to run. The blast caught him square in the middle of the back and he collapsed, screaming pitifully.
Thomas aimed the barrel of the AK up the ridge, seeking out their hiding places. Movement came from a thicket and he squeezed the trigger gently, a burst of fire ripping out from the rifle’s barrel.
The movement stopped.
His eyes scanned the landscape carefully, looking for further threats. Three bodies were in sight. Another perhaps lay dead in the scrub.
That left one. Thomas hit the magazine release and checked on his ammunition supply. Seven rounds remaining. It would have to be enough.
He looked over and saw Estere laying there prone on the hill, a Tokarev pistol clutched in both hands, her eyes focused intently up the slope.
Then he saw it, a betraying movement out of the corner of his eye. A hand reaching for a discarded Kalishnikov about ten meters to his right.
Thomas held his breath, shifting the AK carefully to his shoulder. The man had learned caution, and was crawling forward on his belly, Thomas judged, unable to see anything but the hand.
Time itself seemed to slow down as the man shifted forward. He had almost reached his rifle when he put his head up to look.
Thomas squeezed the trigger twice, sending two 7.62mm bullets crashing through the man’s brain.
Target down. He felt the tension drain from his body and realized suddenly that the palms of his hands were slick with sweat. He didn’t remember being that nervous in years.
Silence. It hit him suddenly, that all the firing, even from below in the camp, had ceased. Estere rose and walked over to where one of the Iranian soldiers lay moaning, his legs nearly torn off by the grenade blast.
She aimed the Tokarev down and pulled the trigger once. The moaning stopped suddenly.
“Estere!” Thomas turned to see Sirvan appear from below, at the head of his fighters, his clothing stained with blood. He swept his sister into his arms, embracing her fiercely.
For a long moment, Thomas stood there, awkwardly, his hands still gripping the nearly-empty AK. Then Sirvan glanced at him over his sister’s shoulder and mouthed a single word.
Thanks.
5:30 A.M. Eastern Time
CIA Headquarters
Langley, Virginia
A light rain was falling as Director Lay’s car wound its way through the network of checkpoints stretching into the bowels of the parking garage. It was shaping up to be an ugly day, not to mention the weather.
The sight of Ron Carter standing next to his parking space did little to lighten his mood. “What’s going wrong now, Ron?” Director Lay snapped, exiting the limousine as his bodyguard opened the door for him.
“I’ve got something you need to see, sir.”
“Don’t you always?” Lay asked, regretting the sarcasm moments after it left his lips. When Carter failed to rise at the sally, the DCIA sighed. “My office or yours?”
“Yours, sir.”
Lay nodded to his bodyguard as they entered the elevator. “Take us up, Pete.”
Not another word was spoken between the two men until the door of Lay’s office closed behind them. “Coffee?” Lay offered.
“No thanks, boss. Any more caffeine in my system and something’s bound to go haywire.”
“Late night?”
“Didn’t go home,” was the succinct reply. “We got this about four hours ago.”
Lay accepted the thick folder, taking a seat behind his desk. “What is it?”
“A report from Dr. Maria Schuyler, over at Bethesda.”
“She’s running their bio-weapons research department, right?” Lay asked, his brow furrowing. “What does she want with us?”
“If you will recall, boss, we had the boys at Intel send over those pictures of the cadaver from the field team. It would appear as though that fell within her purview.”
“The pictures were scrubbed of background data, I trust?”
“Of course, sir. We got another memo from her at 0400, demanding to know where they were taken.”
“Great,” Lay murmured. He was suffering from the beginnings of a headache, and from the looks of the day, it was only going to get worse. “And we replied?”
“We haven’t. I figured you’d better take a look at her data before formulating a response.”
The DCIA opened the folder with a half-hearted gesture. “What did she conclude?”
“That’s something I think you should read for yourself, sir.”
By the time he had finished fifteen minutes later, the blood had largely drained from Lay’s face. His fingers trembled as he tucked the last sheet back into the folder. Outside the window, the rain continued to fall unabated.
“Did you have the Intelligence Directorate run her figures?”
The analyst nodded wordlessly.
Lay pursed his lips together, still staring out the window. “Dear God, they’ve opened Pandora’s grave…”
7:45 A.M.
Dulles International Airport
Virginia
The movies never show you losing your luggage, Harry thought, suppressing an amused smile at the irony of it all. No indeed, the movies never showed the mundane truth of the spy business, and he found that mildly funny. No trace of his humor escaped onto his face, however. He wasn’t a spy. He wasn’t Harry Nichols. He was Todd Winters-average Joe Citizen-and mad as the devil over losing his luggage.
That the aforementioned luggage consisted of a teddy bear for a child he didn’t have, Swiss chocolates for a wife he had never seen, and paperwork for a company he had never worked for was largely extraneous. The average businessman would raise Cain over losing them, and so that was the part he had been assigned to play.
All the world’s a stage. A sharp buzz jabbed at his ribs as his cellphone went off. “Winters speaking.”
It was Hamid’s voice. “Hey, Todd! You just make it in, bro?”
“Yeah, I’m still at the airport. The turkeys over here lost my luggage.”
“Well, hurry on down just as soon as you can. Grandma’s put on the roast in celebration of your return.”
The rest of the team had left the terminal without drawing untoward attention to themselves. Time to exit, stage right.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a uniformed man headed toward him, a suitcase in one hand and an oversized, stupid-looking stuffed bear in the other.
“Here you go, Mr. Winters. Somehow they got sent to the opposite end of the terminal by mistake.”
Harry snarled something appropriately ungracious under his breath and stalked off, the very picture of a weary, haggard businessman just off the red-eye, balancing the bear and suitcase with practiced clumsiness.
It was raining outside, a slow miserable drizzle as he wound his way toward the Agency car. Harry slid inside, tossing the bear carelessly onto the seat between himself and Davood. Hamid glanced back from the driver’s seat, a grin splitting his face. “Why if it isn’t Goldilocks and the baby bear!”
Harry leaned back against the seat of the car and shot a murderous look at his friend. “Just shut up and drive.”
As they pulled onto Dulles Airport Road, another car, nearly obscured by the rain, swung out to follow them…
2:56 P.M. Local Time
Mossad Headquarters
Tel Aviv-Yafo, Israel
Shoham turned away from the monitor with a look of sadness in his eyes. “He’s not eating.”
The general’s words had been a statement, rather than a question, but his aide answered anyway. “No, sir.”
“What are we getting from Langley?” Shoham asked, glancing back over his shoulder at the image of Moshe Tal on monitor.
“Officially or unofficially?”
“Unofficially, of course,” the Mossad chief clarified, irritation creeping into his tones. “What are our sources telling us?”
“Virtually nothing, sir.”
“And what do you mean by virtually?”
“If the Americans rescued the other hostages, they’re keeping it a very tight secret. We were, however, able to confirm that they had an NCS strike team deployed during the operational window.”
“Any details?”
“None, except that briefs were sent to General Westheimer with instructions to cooperate fully with the Clandestine Service.”
The commander of the American forces in Iraq, Shoham mused. Interesting. “Locate Lt. Laner for me as soon as possible. I have a few questions he may be able to answer.”
8:25 A.M. Eastern Time
Virginia
Five minutes had passed since Hamid had first noticed the car in back of them, and now Harry was sure of it. They were being followed.
He ran his thumb down the screen of his TACSAT. “Hamid, there’s a gas station 1.5 miles ahead. I want you to pull in there. I’m gonna call Langley and have them run this guy’s tags.”
“Roger that.”
Harry exited from the mapscreen and dialed a number from memory. “Good morning, Hannah,” he said when the encryption sequence finished. “I need you to run a number for me. Yes, it’s got Virginia tags. I’m looking at a brown Ford Taurus, license number: Echo-Yankee-Golf-three-seven-niner. Yes, I know it will take a couple minutes, just do it as fast as you can. Yes, I’ll wait.”
The car slowed, turning off into a small Mobil gas station on the side of the highway. “Hamid,” Harry instructed, covering the phone with his hand. “I want you to go into the store and buy some gas, a couple bagels and a coffee.”
“I’m fresh out of cash, boss,” the agent grinned. “Loan me a twenty?”
Harry rolled his eyes. “Makes that forty you owe me,” he said, placing a bill in Hamid’s outstretched hand.
“Don’t worry-it’s deductible,” was the Parthian shot as Hamid pushed the door open, exiting into the drizzle.
“Yes, Hannah, you’ve got it?” Harry asked, realizing his phone had come alive again. He listened patiently for a moment. “Thank you, that’s what I figured.”
“What did she tell you?” Tex looked back as Harry closed the phone.
“The car is owned by a Richmond rental agency. It’s currently leased out to one of the Beltway Bandits,” he replied, referring to the high-priced consulting firms that had sprung up around D.C over the decades. “She says it would take two or three hours to find out the specifics of who is driving.”
“There it goes.” Davood observed, looking out his window. Sure enough, the Ford Taurus rolled right on past on the highway, its speed unchanged. Harry watched it go, his eyes narrowing as it disappeared into the mist.
“Keep an eye out,” he said finally. “I’m gonna get out and pump.”
“They just turned into a gas station off the Airport Road. I drove on past.”
“Do you think they detected you?” the man asked, speaking directly into his headset as he glanced out past his wiper blades at the rain.
“Impossible to say. This rain made the following distance close.”
The man nodded, thinking through his options. He was running short on time, no matter what he chose. In the end, he opted for confirmation. “Lead to Car Four, take up following position. Car Five, head to the I-495 ramp and wait there for go-orders. I’m headed into the station for VISDENT.”
Harry shifted the nozzle to his left hand, his eyes roving the terrain around the gas pumps. The possibility of a sniper could never be ruled out, but visibility was poor enough to make that unlikely. A sedan pulled into the gas station and Harry shoved his right hand deep into the pocket of his overcoat, his fingers closing around the grip of his Colt.
The car swung around the CIA vehicle and stopped at the pump ahead of them. Harry watched carefully as the driver exited the vehicle, a dark-skinned man perhaps a few years younger than himself.
The shadow looked over to see his quarry staring back at him from five feet away. He recognized the face from the photos he had been shown. Harold Nichols. Field leader of the NCS Alpha Team for the last four years.
Reading his dossier had been one thing. Coming face to face was another.
The CIA man’s right hand was buried in the pocket of his overcoat and the slight bulge told him there was a gun there.
He smiled across at Nichols, the type of world-weary smile strangers might exchange. “Crummy day, ain’t it?”
His quarry responded with a nod and a grin so casual that it almost deceived him. Then he noticed the eyes. They hadn’t changed. He turned back and swiped his credit card to pay for fuel. He might well need it.
Harry replaced the nozzle and screwed the gas tank cap back on, locking it securely in place.
“What’s your take?” he asked, sliding into the back seat of the Agency car.
“Military or law enforcement training,” Tex observed tersely, his eyes still on the sedan in front of them. “Packing a gun in a holster there in the small of his back beneath that Virginia Tech jacket. Of Mediterranean descent by the face.”
Harry nodded. He had picked up on the training, but missed the gun-then again, the men in the car had enjoyed a better line of sight.
“There’s a lot of law enforcement personnel this close to Washington,” Davood interjected, caution in his tones. “Good deal of ex-military in consulting, too.”
Hamid glanced back at the younger man through the rear-view mirror. “Most of them don’t carry-and the cops carry openly.”
“There’s nothing we can do about it here,” Harry said after a moment. “Keep an eye on our six and let’s move it out.”
When they left the gas station, the sedan did not follow. And the black Mercury Sable that eased up alongside as they merged into traffic turned off well before reaching the interstate…
7:09 P.M. Tehran Time
The Alborz Mountains
Iran
Something had passed between them, Thomas realized, glancing over at Estere as they marched along the mountain trail. Something, he knew not what, had changed. He had seen it before-the friendship formed in the crucible of battle. They were comrades, now. And perhaps more.
Sirvan walked a few paces ahead, at the side of a drowsy-looking donkey laden down with munitions. But for the nature of their weapons, Thomas might have thought himself transported back in time. No, the weapons were familiar. He hefted the Kalishnikov in his hand, his fingers gliding across the scarred wood in an almost sensuous caress. He knew this gun. It had saved his life. One among many.
Glancing over, he caught Estere staring at him. She met his gaze unabashed, her lips parting into a teasing smile. He smiled back, chuckling to himself as the fighters continued their march into the mountains. Yes, indeed, perhaps more.
Estere was not the only one who had changed, Thomas thought to himself that night, sitting by the campfire between Sirvan and Azad Badir. The attitude of the entire group had changed toward him. He was one of them now, one of the peshmerga. The loaded AK at his side was his badge of membership. They trusted him now, insofar as they trusted any man.
A chill autumn breeze fanned the fire, sending sparks dancing into the night sky high above their heads. Thomas’s gaze shifted across the burning embers, to where Estere knelt, cleaning her weapon by the firelight. Her fingers moved nimbly as she reassembled the sniper rifle with a speed no sergeant could have faulted.
His mind flickered back, remembering the look in her eyes when she had executed that wounded Iranian earlier in the day. A glance devoid of pity, empty of emotion. She had been a fighter in that instant, focused on one thing and one thing only. The extermination of her people’s enemy.
She glanced up from her work to find him looking at her and a small, secret smile tugged at the corners of her mouth.
He grinned. A fighter, yes, but no less a woman…
10:58 A.M. Eastern Time
NCS Operations Center
Langley, Virginia
“One of the boys over at Intel just pulled this off the Iranian subnet,” Bernard Kranemeyer announced, aiming his remote at a screen on the far side of the room.
The screen came alive as a video began to play-raw, low-definition footage, but the meaning was abundantly clear. They were watching a firing squad.
Harry leaned forward in his chair, puzzled by the direction their debrief had taken. The video only ran for forty-five seconds. The last forty-five seconds of a man’s life.
He watched dispassionately as the DCS hit PLAY again, slow-motion this time as the rifle volley crashed out, leaving the man crumpled like a broken doll against the stone of a courtyard.
“Who was he?” he asked as Kranemeyer turned back toward them, a sheaf of papers in his hand.
“Farshid Hossein, according to the accompanying files,” was the reply. “A major in the Iranian Revolutionary Guards.”
“Do we know him?”
“He was a commander in the Quds Force commandos in Iraq. Personally responsible for the torture and beheading of Sergeant Major Juan Delgado back in ‘06.”
The words struck Harry like a blow. The memories began to flow unbidden through his mind. Delgado. Basra. Operation TURTLEDOVE.
Delgado had been Harry’s #2 on the operation, a Ranger with almost twenty years in the Army. He had run point for the military wing of TURTLEDOVE, an operation designed to drive a wedge between the Quds Force and their Shia base of support in Basra. A big, easy-going man, he and Harry had hit it off well from the beginning.
And then Delgado had been captured. The counter-insurgency operation quickly turned into a search-and-rescue, but it had been fruitless. The NCO had been beheaded within twenty-four hours of his abduction.
“Why don’t I know this name?” Harry asked
“He was known as Abu al-Mawt in Iraq,” came the answer. Harry looked away, his eyes closing, as the scenes came flashing back through the mists of the past. The Father of Death. The masked figure standing behind Delgado as the sword came down.
Well, he had gone to his reward…
9:35 P.M. Tehran Time
The Presidential Palace
Tehran
To be this close. It was almost heady, to be able to smell victory. President Mahmoud F’Azel Shirazi sighed, leaning back into his chair. At the age of 58, Shirazi was a small man, standing about 5' 6", with no discernible paunch. His face was classically Persian, partly hidden behind the greying scruff of a carefully-trimmed beard. He walked with a slight limp, the result of a leg wound suffered during the Iran-Iraq War of the ‘80s.
He had been a young man then, but he was young no longer. The years had taken a toll upon his body.
It would be enough. As it had been revealed unto him in a dream, he would live to see the destruction of the Satan. What more could a man desire?
“Harun,” he said at long last, lifting his gaze to the man standing before him. “It is good to see you.”
Colonel Harun Larijani bowed from the waist, his eyes still fixed on the floor. “Thank you, sir.”
Shirazi smiled, rising from his chair and circling around the desk. “Let us dispense with these formalities, nephew,” he remonstrated, embracing the younger man and gently kissing him on both cheeks in the traditional Middle Eastern greeting. “Your father is well?”
“Yes, my uncle. He is well.”
“He will be proud of you,” Shirazi stated, disengaging from the embrace and returning to his chair. “Sit.”
“Thank you.”
“I assume you’ve seen this?” the Iranian president asked, turning the screen of his laptop around so that his nephew could view it.
“The execution of Major Farshid Hossein? Yes.”
“Your thoughts?”
“I am puzzled by the motivation of Isfahani in this action,” came the ever so cautious reply.
Shirazi nodded. “The Ayatollah is still a very powerful man, and bears watching. He was one of my advisors when we moved Hossein’s Guard detachment in on the Jew and it does not necessarily surprise me that he would seek to take independent action in the wake of this setback. Something like this-very damaging to a man’s pride. Your opinion of Hossein?”
The young man hesitated. “I served with Hossein only briefly, but that was sufficient to impress upon me a man who, although brave, was consumed with his own arrogance. Had he been possessed of enough humility to heed my advice, I feel assured that the Americans would not have escaped.”
It entered Shirazi’s mind that the description of Hossein might apply more accurately to his beloved nephew, but he kept those thoughts to himself. Larijani was a useful tool, competent to obey orders, if not to give them. “Then it will delight you to know,” he said, clearing his throat, “that they did not all escape.”
The look of surprise on his nephew’s face was enjoyable. “Yes, indeed,” Shirazi continued, “one of them is still in our country. Hiding out in the mountains with our old friend Azad Badir.”
“Where?”
The Iranian president stood and walked over to the large map that was spread across one wall of his office. “Somewhere in this circle, by last report.”
“Badir is a fox,” Larijani observed wryly.
“And how do you bring a fox to terms?”
“You lure him from his coverts, into the open where his wiles are of no avail.”
“Exactly!” Shirazi exclaimed, pleased by the response. He reached over and pressed a button on his desk. “Send Dr. Ansari in, please.”
1:03 P.M. Eastern Time
National Navy Medical Center
Bethesda, Maryland
“I’ve got the video feed up, Maria.”
Dr. Maria Schuyler turned to smile at the technician that had just entered the room. “Thanks, Ted. I should be able to take it from there.”
“Sure thing.”
In her mid-fifties, Schuyler had worked as a biochemist at A.I. Dupont for fifteen years before enlisting in the Army following the death of her first husband in the Pentagon on 9/11. Since then, she had become the U.S. military’s leading expert on biological warfare-a job that was typically quite academic. Not today.
With a sigh she turned to her computer and depressed a single key, bringing up the feed. “Good afternoon, director.”
“It isn’t, but I thank you anyway, doctor,” the voice of David Lay replied over the uplink. His face was clearly visible in the webcam, and he looked worried. Very much so.
“I understand.”
“I’m here with the president, Dr. Schuyler. Can you encapsulate your report for him?”
Lay’s face was replaced by that of President Hancock and Schuyler cleared her throat, looking down at her notes. “You must understand, Mr. President, that I have little to go on. All we’re working from is a medium-resolution photograph provided by the CIA, which is hardly enough to make a positive diagnosis.”
“Yes,” Hancock interrupted, “I understand. Your conclusions, doctor.”
“My diagnosis, based solely on photographic evidence, is that the victim was suffering from a particularly virulent case of the pneumonic plague.”
“The Black Death?”
“Essentially, yes, Mr. President, although pneumonic plague is the less common variant, called the Red Death in medieval times. Both it and its more famous cousin bubonic plague are caused by exposure to the bacteria yersinia pestis-the primary difference between plagues being in mode of transmission. Pneumonic plague is caused by breathing in the plague bacteria.”
Hancock cast a glance off-camera, presumably at David Lay. “So, it could be spread in an aerosol?”
His question smote her to the heart. There was something here they weren’t telling her. “Yes, sir. That is one of the scenarios we lined out in wargames last year-the possibility of a bio-terror attack on New York city. We did not use the yersinia pestis bacterium as the base of the scenario, but it would have the same effect.”
Director Lay cut her off before she could ask any questions. “There was a further component to your diagnosis, doctor. Perhaps you could elaborate for the president.”
“Of course. If you will look at the photograph, you will see that every blood vessel in the man’s body is outlined in black. That would indicate that the plague entered the man’s bloodstream before death-we’ve seen that before. However, I have never seen it to such an extent, which leads me to the following conclusion, which is purely speculative. Which is that this man was exposed to a more virulent strain of bacteria than any we’ve ever seen. Far more virulent…”
8:35 P.M.
Parker and Zakiri’s apartment
Manassas, Virginia
“Agent Zakiri just left Langley,” the voice in his headset informed him. “You’ll want to be moving out of there.”
The man nodded his head, toggling the headset mike as he looked around the small apartment. “We’re almost done. Thanks for the heads-up.”
He switched the radio off and walked over to a man standing in front of Hamid’s computer. “Find anything?”
“I’m through his firewall without any trouble,” the tech replied. “Mirroring is almost finalized.”
“All the data is on there?” The leader asked, gesturing to the small thumb drive inserted in the front USB port of the computer’s tower. After all the trouble they had experienced tailing the CIA team earlier in the day, he had expected Zakiri’s computer to be a harder task than it had proved.
“Yes. We can go through it later.”
A man in a black sweatshirt and jeans emerged from the bedroom holding a camera in his hands.
“Everything photographed?”
A quick nod was the only reply. The leader glanced around the room. “Everything back in place?”
Both of his men answered in the affirmative and he smiled grimly. “Then let’s move it out.”