by T L Yeager
Many broke and ran. Several hesitated, looking back at the noise. Fazul aimed and fired a third shot. It pierced the neck of the next closest man. A cry of pain rang out and as the mortally wounded man dropped, Fazul could see that the bullet had passed through and struck another behind him. Two for one, Fazul thought.
Two soldiers drew up alongside Fazul, the hall barely wide enough to accommodate their width. In the next eight seconds, a fusillade of bullets ripped down the passage. Shrieks of surprise and cries of horror mixed with the thunderous concussions belching the jacketed lead down the hall.
“Hold your fire!” Fazul cried. The casings of the final shots chimed off the wall. Writhing bodies littered the floor.
Those that had not been hit quickly disappeared into their rooms. Halfway up the hall a woman pulled herself up off the floor. Her leg hung at an odd angle below the knee. She hopped away on her good leg, wailing with each limp.
Fazul closed his left eye and sighted the back of her shoulder. He imagined her heart pumping and then being torn apart. The shot thrust her forward, spinning her face up before she bounced off the floor.
Fazul moved up the hall. He stood above the first lifeless body, the tank top now soaked with the man’s blood. He spit on the corpse.
“You were warned!” he yelled at the top of his lungs. “Stay in your rooms!”
He turned, the soldiers parting to let him through. Anas was standing outside the door, his mouth agape. The rifle lay slack at the end of his fingers.
“Feel free to finish the wounded if you can’t stomach seeing them suffer.” He shoulder checked his brother and turned down the stairs.
42
Velden Residence, Aruba
Maddie called up the map app on her phone and switched it to hybrid mode—this provided the satellite image but kept the road names and resort designators. She focused on the salina, a low, flat saltpan that separated the resort from the neighborhood where Geert had taken them. The row of houses curved toward than away from the resort. From above, the formation looked like a caricature of a wave, hanging too far forward and about to crash into the saltpan. Maddie dropped a pin on a house at the tip of the wave, closest to the resort. It would be a great surveillance location, but the lines of ingress and egress were exposed and under watch by the drones. It would have to do, though – getting any closer would require moving through police lines. That would take time and add risk that she couldn’t afford.
She snapped a screen cap of the map, and then zoomed out and snapped a second. A distance estimator bar in the lower right corner of the second picture was locked into a scale that showed five hundred feet and two hundred meters. The meters were longer and just about matched the width of Maddie’s thumb. Starting at the house with the pin, she counted just shy of three thumb widths. Five to six hundred meters. A great distance for sniping, but too far for wi-fi.
She emailed the screen capture to PTang. ‘I can get to the pin’, she wrote. ‘The area in between is open. Any way to make that distance work? Getting closer will be difficult.’
Eleven minutes later, still waiting for Geert to return, she received a reply from PTang. ‘You’ll need a computer. Preferably your Mac, if you brought it,’ PTang wrote. She had indeed brought her Mac. It was in her backpack.
‘You’ll have to construct a receiver-transmitter. See attachment. We can steal our own Wi-Fi from one of the houses. I’ll load programs to your computer before you go. I’ll connect to your computer through the house internet and then we’ll use the receiver-transmitter to amplify the Wi-Fi signals back and forth from the resort. I think this can work. Reply your thoughts.’
The attachment appeared to have been stripped from the web. A crude copy-and-paste that showed steps for converting a basic satellite TV dish into a Wi-Fi antenna. At the top of the page, a list of supplies included the dish, copper wire, a square of metal and specific connectors. It looked fairly simple, but Maddie was not the woman for the job. Geert was the electrician. Based on the MacGyver-esque electrical connections running along the lip of his outdoor pavilion, Maddie guessed Geert was perfect for the job.
Geert pulled up not long after.
“Two old pistools and a jachtgeweer without ammo,” Geert yelled as he approached from his truck. He produced a snub-nosed revolver from his pocket. “I went with this one. Not in the best shape, but he had two boxes of ammunition.”
Geert hadn’t questioned the request for a gun. He’d called Maddie a lunatic again but he saw where her mind was headed. Geert had explained that there were few guns on Aruba. They averaged less than ten murders a year. Most of those murders did involve a gun, but usually an unregistered one. Owning a gun wasn’t an inalienable right like in the States. You could get a permit if you proved you had a need. That might include sport, protection of property or self-defense. Still, Geert guessed that almost all the guns on the island were unregistered.
“A friend of the guy brought it to him by boat a good long while ago,” Geert said. “Hasn’t been fired in years.”
Maddie took the revolver in her hands. It was a Colt Cobra. Before she even manipulated the action, she could see it needed oil. She pulled the pin in the cylinder and spun it. All six chambers were clear.
Jack Ruby had used a snub-nosed Colt Cobra to kill Lee Harvey Oswald. This one was old enough to be the murder weapon. The veneer was long worn off the wooden grip. Maddie ran her thumb over the Colt emblem at the top of the revolver’s handle, just shy of the black American steel that formed the business end of the weapon. She drew back on the hammer, turned away from Geert and pointed it at the horizon. With a light pull on the trigger, the pistol snapped. Dry firing an old centerfire revolver was not advised. It could damage the pin. But the action needed to be tested.
“This is great, Geert. Thanks.” Maddie reached behind her back and stuffed the revolver into the waistband of her shorts. She’d clean and oil it later.
“It came with a shoulder holster,” Geert said, turning back for the truck. “I’ll get the ammo as well.”
After he retrieved it, Maddie told him she had another project for him to take a look at.
“Wat de hel?” he asked, as he scrolled through the steps.
“A Wi-Fi antenna. If we can get into one of those houses, we can point it at the resort and connect in. I have a hacker who works for me.”
Geert raised his eyebrows. “I hate computers. But I can build this. Give me a couple of hours. Enough satellite dishes on this island to sink a cargo ship. I’ve probably got one in the garage.”
While Geert worked in the garage, Maddie set up her computer in the living room. Once it was up and running, she dialed PTang.
“My friend here is building the antenna,“ Maddie told her. “I’ve got my Mac up and running. It’s connected to the internet.”
“I emailed you some software to load,” PTang said. “Two executables – run them one at a time. The first is a remote desktop. This allows me to control your Mac. The second is an automated Wi-Fi connector. Run it from house and it will find, hack and connect to the strongest link available.” A keyboard clicked away in the background.
Maddie hadn’t started her computer in two days. The mass dump of emails was just dropping to her inbox.
“I’ve got the email.”
After loading the remote desktop software, she backed away from the screen and watched as PTang took control of her Mac. Screens opened and closed. Download bars inched left to right. She soared through configuration windows.
“All done,” PTang said over the phone. “When time comes to aim the antenna, point the center of the antenna’s dish at the middle of the closest building. It’ll look strange, like the receiver is facing the ground. But this allows the dish to collect the best signal.”
“I won’t be able to call you from up there. They took out the cellular service. I’ll send a text when we leave here so you can keep an eye out for an email once I get in and set up. Or I’ll Skype you.”
“Okay, Mrs. Gunt. I be here.”
It took Geert closer to three hours to craft the antenna. He’d needed to run out to his electrical supplier for the connections required to hook it to the Mac. The finished product resembled the pictures in the instructions so closely, it was hard to tell the two apart.
Maddie had searched online as Geert worked. She’d never heard of people using a dish for Wi-Fi, but sure enough, there was plenty of information on the web. Amplify the signal, and you have more than enough strength to stream data over distances. People living in remote locations, where internet wasn’t available, posted stories of mounting a homemade antenna to a pole and capturing signals that were miles away.
“Text Pich Tang,” Maddie commanded Siri. The text app opened. “We’re leaving now. Probably take us an hour or two to get into a house and setup. I’ll hit you with an email once I’m connected.” She hit send and the text message whooshed from her phone.
They traveled the same path as before. With the sun fading into the afternoon sky, Geert turned from the little used dirt road onto the two-lane strip that passed for a highway in Aruba. Using the good side of the binoculars, Maddie looked for the police car as they approached the neighborhood.
Plan A was the simplest. They’d drive up to a house, force their way into a garage and pray there wasn’t an alarm. Geert said alarms were rare in Aruba—solid doors and bars on the windows were more their style. They’d open the garage, pull the truck in, put the door down to hide it, and then get to work.
Plan B was more nebulous. If there were people around, especially police, they’d have to park out of sight and set out on foot. They’d wait for night fall if they had to.
Orange cones blocked the entrance to Regal Palms, but there was no sign of activity. Geert drove over the sidewalk to avoid the cones. They worked together, navigating the sleepy streets and making their way to the edge of the neighborhood. As they moved closer, Maddie eyed the upper reaches of the resort.
Geert followed a curve, heading to their right and then turning left as they made their way around the bottom lip of the wave. A white terracotta roof set the objective house apart from the rest. Maddie noted that the curtains and blinds were all closed as they turned into the empty driveway.
There were two houses that looked equally distant from the resort. Both were positioned such that the house would prevent the terrorists from seeing them in the driveway or along the left side where you entered the garages. Both also had a cement apron fronting a side door that was visible on the satellite images. Only one had a fence around the backyard. Geert and Maddie eyed it simultaneously, turning to one another and smiling. It was a privacy fence.
The concrete driveway was just long enough to accommodate the truck. Maddie got out and met Geert at the back. Piles of tools and spools of electrical wire filled the bed. Geert rummaged to the bottom and produced a long crowbar.
“That ought to do it,” Geert said.
Maddie stepped on a landmine of dried dogshit as she pushed the gate open and held it for Geert. Each of them tried the door handle leading into the garage but it was locked. It did shake in the frame, though. Enough that the tip of the crowbar would fit in the opening.
They worked together to seat the edge of the bar into the small gap between the door and the frame. Maddie pushed the three-foot-long steel rod toward the door, almost making contact before the screws in the strike plate chewed through the wood frame and the door sprung open. It slammed into a trash can hidden behind it.
The garage was empty, the owners having taken their vehicles with them. With the house being one of the closest private residences to the resort, it’d probably been one of the first emptied in the mandatory evacuation.
Geert activated the garage door and went to the truck. Maddie scraped the dogshit off the bottom of her sneaker using the edge of the stair leading up into the house.
The front bumper of the truck was nearly touching the wall before there was enough clearance to close the door. Maddie hit the button and watched as the light from outside disappeared.
A small mudroom led from the garage to a kitchen with white cabinets. Adjoining the kitchen was a family room where a flat screen TV was mounted to the wall. Beneath it, two black boxes sat on a turquoise side bar. The smaller box on top bore multiple lights, several strobing periodically.
Maddie pulled a pen light from her pocket. She lifted the box and read the back, confirming it was a combination modem and wireless router. The factory password was included on the label. Maddie hoped it would be that simple.
They worked their way to the front of the darkened house where stairs led up to the second floor.
“Anybody home?” Maddie yelled from the bottom.
After waiting just a second, she led them up. Both straps of her backpack were pulled tight against her shoulders. In her arms, she cradled the dish, its wires bundled tightly with zip ties. Geert followed, a bag of tools clinking with each step.
To the left there was a hall bath and two bedrooms. They had a guest room feel—neat and tidy with little in the way of personal effects.
“Massief bedroom,” Geert said. He’d gone straight at the top of the stairs, opening the only closed door.
Maddie turned and followed him in. Afternoon sun was trying to burn through the blinds. The windows faced west, toward the resort and the sun, which was heating the back of the house.
The room was a cavern compared to the others. A king-sized bed covered in a grey comforter with orange starfish took up the center of the room. Its four large posters were level with Maddie’s eyes. A remnant of floral perfume hung in the air.
Maddie rounded the room, scanning. A romance paperback on the first nightstand showed that the woman of the house slept on the left. For the man, a weathered espionage thriller titled Jackdaws by Ken Follett. A jewelry box on a low-slung dresser was open and filled with bracelets and earrings.
Maddie stopped and scanned the windows. Two sets of louvered blinds flanked either side of the bed. All four were down and turned toward the floor. Light shone in around the edges, between the slats and through the holes where the strings that controlled them ran straight on either side.
“Let’s leave all the blinds down for now. No sense in making any changes or taking a chance on them seeing movement.” As she said it, she walked to the set of windows to the right of the bed. Maddie lifted a slat just enough to peak out.
The backyard was a thin strip of grass that surrounded a plunge pool. Maybe thirty yards wide, the yard was fully enclosed by the privacy fence which ran straight along the back and disappeared on both sides. Two palms marked the rear corners of the fence and the land dropped away not far on the other side.
“Got a clear view of the resort from here,” Maddie said.
Geert had already busied himself. He removed the lamp and Ken Follett novel from the nightstand.
“We can zetten the dish here.” He pulled the nightstand away from the wall. “Unless it needs to be outside.”
“Nah. Inside is fine.” Maddie grabbed an edge of the nightstand and helped Geert move it into position in front of the windows.
“It’ll ruin the nightstand.” Geert set the dish apparatus on top of the waist-high side table.
“Too bad,” Maddie replied. “They’ll have something to talk about. They’ll wonder what the hell was going on when they find this.”
“Hold it bestendig.”
“You’re using a lot of words I don’t know,” Maddie said, taking control of the dish. Geert pulled four lag bolts, a hammer and a ratchet from his bag.
“Hold it. Keep it constant,” Geert clarified.
He set the first bolt in one of the holes in the plate at the base of the dish’s arm. Using the hammer, he tapped the point of the bolt into the wood top of the nightstand. Once it was sunken deep enough to stand on its own, Geert used the ratchet to screw it down tight.
After the first bolt was secure, the antenna stood on its own and Maddi
e was able to release her grip. She moved to the other side of the bed and stared at the floor.
It’d make a perfect shooting position, she thought.
If she pulled the mattress from the bed, it would give her enough height to position a rifle barrel just above the base of the window. She’d crack it, to open the firing lane, but not enough to make it visible from a distance.
The bedroom’s only drawback was that it was too obvious. The house was a natural pick. A tailor-made sniping position with direct line of sight and the shortest shooting distance. Any soldier worth his salt would pinpoint it as soon as they started taking precision fire.
For now, the only shots being fired would be invisible. The snub-nosed .38 was just about worthless beyond twenty yards. She’d have to be content sniping the resort’s Wi-Fi from behind closed blinds. Hopefully firing PTang, a technological mole, would do some damage. If nothing else, they stood to gain some intelligence that Maddie could pass on to Chuckles.
“It’s gereed,” Geert said. “Ready.” A few more clicks of the ratchet and the last bolt was tight.
Maddie pulled her Mac from her backpack and booted it up. She found a plug for the cord and set it up on the nightstand beside the antenna. Geert loosened the bolt at the back of the dish that allowed the angle of elevation to be changed.
“Angle it down a nudge. Then square it up on the window,” Maddie said.
A few seconds later her machine had settled from the boot. She clicked on the network connection list and counted five Wi-Fi signals. The strongest, a random set of letters and numbers, had to be the router in the family room. She clicked on it and was asked for a password.
“I’ll be right back.” She ran from the room.
Downstairs she pulled her phone from her pocket and snapped a picture of the silver sticker on the router. The EESID matched the jumble of letters and numbers she’d selected. The WPA2, a password was listed below it.
