by James Hunt
“Homeland works very fast, and they’re not taking any chances.”
“Where is he? How can I talk to him?” she asked, stepping forward. The severity of the situation removed all pretense of rank and seniority from her mind. As far as Angela was concerned, being a border patrol agent was the least of her concerns. She wanted answers and didn’t give a damn how demanding or insubordinate she might appear.
Drake seemed to understand but continued to maintain a professional tone. “We don’t currently know. Agent Martinez’s location is top secret. Hell, I can’t even get hold of my own agent. How do you think I feel?” He raised a calming hand to put her at ease. “But rest assured, he is safe.”
“And what are they doing to find my family?”
The question itself encompassed everything Angela feared most. What kind of monsters was she dealing with? She remembered the man in the video speaking with a clear British accent. She remembered that he had said something about demands.
“What do they want?” she asked.
“We’re not sure. A complete shutdown of Guantanamo Bay, for starters. The immediate end of aid to Israel. The usual terrorist nonsense. As of now, none of that is happening.”
Angela looked around the room, crippled with frustration. “Where’s the FBI? Where’s Assistant Director Thaxton?”
“I called them back only moments ago. They should be arriving any time now.”
Angela covered her face and rubbed her forehead, overcome with the familiar and unpleasant feeling that her entire world was falling apart. She thought about how she had been roped into assisting the FBI to investigate the terror cells. It was after her and Martinez, during a routine patrol of their sector, had found a truck packed with explosives in a remote part of the desert. Just days ago, she had found herself embroiled in an investigation that stretched way beyond her profession.
She had undoubtedly stirred something up. Now it all began to make sense to Angela. Her family’s abduction and captivity were a direct response to her involvement, a repercussion for actions taken against the Islamic State, no matter how inadvertent.
Drake’s office phone suddenly rang, and he answered it.
“Yes, Special Agent Sutherland…” he said, phone against his shoulder as he scribbled on a pad.
Angela remembered the name all too well. Sutherland was one of the FBI agents who had directed the raid. Their mission had been to save Martinez after he’d disappeared while pursuing his own independent investigation into the sleeper cells. The agents had found Martinez and killed every suspected terrorist in the building.
Angela was the key to exposing the operation for what it was—a slaughter. Had ISIS really managed to get her address and personal information quickly enough to abduct her family within hours after the raid? Or were there other forces at work? Paranoia began to set in. It was the same paranoia that had afflicted Captain Martinez, her trusted partner, in his mission to expose the ISIS cells around Texas, whose existence he believed the government was covering up.
Drake glanced up at Angela, holding the phone against his ear. “Yeah… yeah, she’s here.” He paused to listen. “Roger, sounds good. See you in a bit.” He hung up and flashed Angela a look of reassurance. “FBI team is on the way. They promised to do everything in their power to find your family and get them home safely.”
Angela wanted so much to believe it, but the FBI wasn’t on her list of most-trusted organizations. “Great,” she said to Drake. “I certainly hope they stick to their promises.”
Closed-Door Meeting
Not much was known at the Del Rio Border Patrol sector involving Angela’s situation. For most agents, it was business as usual, since no one beyond a handful of government officials had seen the video. For whatever reason, the terrorists hadn’t publicly launched it yet. It hadn’t gone viral, though no one currently knew where the encrypted URL had originated.
For the past couple of days, Angela’s situation had been a mystery to her peers. She had been an agent for less than a year and had grown close only to her partner, who was said to be in protective watch.
Among her acquaintances, there was Captain Sheila Reynolds, a steely-eyed redhead who never gave Angela much mind, and Agents Jack Bernasconi and Roger Tyson, two senior border agents who knew their way around. The others Angela hadn’t gotten to know very well.
Now she was better well known around the station than she would have preferred. Attention was something she had neither asked for nor desired, especially in the wake of the death of one of their own. Rookie agent Jeremy Dawson only days prior had been killed in the truck explosion that set off the investigation Angela now found herself in. Too much had happened in too little time, and Angela needed to get her head together—if such a feat was possible.
She sat in a closed conference room at the side of a table, with Jennifer Thaxton, a young assistant director with the FBI, at one end, and Chief Drake at the other. A blank projector screen was lit up behind him as Thaxton spoke on one of the conference phones, providing updates to her superiors in DC.
To Angela’s right sat Special Agent Sutherland, an aggressive and no-nonsense FBI man she didn’t fully trust. Across from them sat Special Agent Lynch and Agent Hopper, two middle-aged men, quiet but lethal in their abilities, as Angela had seen during the FBI raid.
They had all arrived back at the station in a relatively short period. Angela tried to compose herself, to shield her emotions in the same way the FBI agents were so good at, and just listen. Her family’s very survival relied on these people, and she wanted to believe that they could help.
After she got off the phone, Assistant Director Thaxton flipped open a thin binder in front of her as though they were in some kind of board meeting. She glanced up at Angela first and got straight to business.
“This is what we know as of 0900 hours: Border Patrol Agent Gannon’s family was abducted between the hours of 1200 and 0200 following our raid in the Juarez Desert and subsequent recovery of Captain Martinez. We have assessed that the perpetrators are operating in relatively close proximity to this area.”
That much made sense to Angela. But it also brought larger, more disturbing questions about the vastness and reach of the terror network, whose existence the government had, according to Martinez, been downplaying for the past two years.
Thaxton continued in her standard non-emotive tone as Angela waited to hear their solution. In the end, it was the only thing she cared about. “In order to abduct the Gannon family, take them into captivity, and record a video within the time it was posted, they couldn’t be operating more than one to two hundred miles from here. Even that is pushing it.”
“I saw concrete walls,” Angela said, cutting in. She paused, lowering her head. “When… when I saw Doug on his knees, the wall with the ISIS flag looked like something in a warehouse basement.”
“Precisely,” Thaxton said.
She clicked the button on a remote control. An aerial image appeared on the projector screen. Several spots on the map were circled, surrounding the Del Rio and greater Val Verde County area. “These are the industrial sites we know of, some of them vacant and ideal for running operations. The key is to narrow them down one by one and extract your family before it’s too late.”
The words “too late” sent a crushing blow to Angela. She didn’t even want to consider such an outcome. Looking around the room, she counted four FBI agents, including the assistant director. She knew them to be tight-knit and secretive in their operations and wondered how they planned to do so much in the time allotted.
“How do you plan to do that?” she asked outright, gaining looks from everyone in the room. “I mean… with such a small team. I count at least twenty different locations marked on that map.”
Thaxton folded her hands together. “I’m glad you asked. We have someone here who may be able to answer that.”
The doors opened as if on cue, and a man in a suit walked into the room. His hair was brushed back
in a wavy froth, and an ID badge dangled from around his neck. His strong blue eyes flashed around the room as he circled the table. He was tall with a trim graying beard and walked with the confident stride of a man prepared to take charge.
“I’d like to welcome our special liaison from the CIA, Chief Special Agent Lyle Burke.”
Burke nodded at the room and remained standing near the projector screen, folding his arms.
“Special Agent Burke has over twenty years’ experience in counterterrorism operations and can be a great asset to this investigation, given his decision to be a part of it,” Thaxton continued. She nodded at him to speak, and he stepped forward.
His demeanor was as serious as that of any government official Angela had ever encountered. She felt slightly better with the CIA involved. The more the merrier, she believed, and was ready to give him the benefit of the doubt. He looked at her specifically as though he knew her. She felt strange as their eyes locked and quickly glanced away.
“Just flew in, and I only know what I’ve been briefed on so far. Homeland wants this thing wrapped up soon, before it goes national.”
“What does that mean, exactly?” Angela said, feeling her anger rise. “Are they concerned about my family or more about this leaking onto the six o’clock news?”
“Agent Gannon,” Chief Drake called out. “Please let the man speak.”
Angela said nothing and looked down, balling her fists underneath the table.
“I understand your frustration,” Burke said. “And I can understand how afraid you must be. How frightened for your family you are and how much you want them back.” He went to the other side of the table, standing directly across from her. “But I’m not here to talk endlessly. I was sent for one express purpose: to help rescue your family from these terrorists.”
Thaxton cut in. “Homeland Security has a point, though. If this were to get on the news, it would be much more difficult to contain the threat and focus our rescue efforts.”
Burke walked past the assistant director, circling the table in thought. It seemed as though he knew more about the situation than anyone else in the room.
“The video stream was disseminated carefully to top officials in the FBI, CIA, and Homeland Security.”
Sutherland raised his hand. “Has the president seen the video?”
Burke stopped right behind Angela’s chair, glancing at Sutherland seated next to her. “He has been briefed on it, yes.”
“Agent Gannon made an earlier point about our numbers,” Sutherland continued. “I tend to agree. We can’t possibly search all these locations in time. It would take days.”
“We’re in the process of assembling a counterterrorism field team to handle the brunt of this daunting task,” Burke answered.
The FBI agents looked at each other with subtle expressions of suspicion as Thaxton spoke up. “Sounds like you’re casting a pretty wide net. Where do we fit in this master plan?”
“You will advise and cooperate however the president sees fit. He wants to ensure that we get it right this time. That there is no stone left unturned. That when we go into a building, it’s the right one. These terror cells frequently change their locations to throw us off. We’ve got a dozen analysts on it now, trying to close in on their location via IP address, but we’ve only recently discovered that they aren’t using a fixed IP address or URL.”
Burke walked past Angela’s chair and toward his satchel resting on another. He carried it over to the table and opened it, pulling out a MacBook, setting it down near Chief Drake, and flipping it open. The screen displayed a paused image of the terrorist video, showing the knife-wielding masked man standing behind Doug, who wore an orange jumpsuit and whose face was concealed under a burlap sack.
Angela could see the image out of the corner of her eye and turned away as sickness gripped her stomach. The reality was too hard to face. She couldn’t think of seeing Doug helpless and on his knees again. The image had been already seared into her brain.
“I’ve since obtained the hostage video, and our top analysts are reviewing every detail in the three-minute message,” Burke said, pointing at the screen. He looked up and noticed Angela turned away, shielding her face from the room. “I’m sorry, Agent Gannon. If you’d be more comfortable skipping past this part, you can leave the room and rejoin us later.”
“No. I’m fine,” she said, sniffling. “I don’t want to miss a thing.”
Burke nodded and continued. “We have a male speaker with a distinctive British accent. Several analysts are trying to identify him through voice sampling and body type comparisons with known terror suspects in our database. We hope to identify him soon.”
The man stood frozen in the frame with his knife pointed at the camera—Doug’s hood hadn’t been removed yet. The image was wrenching for Angela, and she had to turn away from the screen again.
Burke walked toward the projector screen, with its array of pinpointed locations, and pointed at it with his laser pen.
“In this video, the speaker makes a demand on behalf of the Islamic State, clearly identified by its visible flag. Demands included the release of all prisoners from Guantanamo Bay, ending all mosque surveillance throughout the United States, and the liquidation of Israeli financial assets and support.”
Burke took a deep breath and pulled his cell phone out of his pocket, checking the time. “Challenging goals for sure. And the given time limit of twenty-four hours makes it even harder to achieve.”
Angela waited for the answer. She couldn’t envision any plan that didn’t include the swift rescue of her family. If only there was something more I could do, she thought. Her daughters needed her. Doug needed her.
Lost in her own thoughts, her attention drifted from Burke’s remarks to a plan of her own. “What if we were to go around the terrorists and take control of this thing ourselves?” she said, gaining sudden looks from everyone.
Burke eyed her intently. “I’m not sure what you mean.”
“I mean that we get the media involved. Get this thing out there. Tighten the screws on this terror cell. How many of them could there possibly be?”
Burke thought to himself and glanced at his cell phone screen again. “I can assure you that this administration is not on board with that. They want things to remain quiet, which is their version of control.”
Chief Drake leaned forward with his own take. “You give the terrorists a platform, it’s only going to benefit them in the long run. I happen to agree with the administration on this one.”
“Whether or not this gets all over the Internet and the front pages is beside the point,” Burke said, resuming control of the conversation. “This particular terror cell is making these outlandish demands to buy themselves time, to distract us from something larger. If our intel is correct, they’ve been in this country for years, and they’re planning something big.”
Burke talked as if the government were helpless and the terror cell had been given free rein all this time. Angela found herself baffled by such thoughts. What was the point of the CIA, the FBI, and even her job with the border patrol if not to prevent the exact scenario they found themselves in now?
Burke ended his speech with a chilling reminder of just how far the enemy was willing to go. “Two weeks ago, there was a series of attempted break-ins at nuclear power plants in the southern and Midwestern United States. In all cases, the perpetrators got away. Here in Texas, one of the only two power plants in the state reported a break-in that resulted in several badges being stolen. There were also reports of a man in a gray van videotaping the plant.”
Sutherland stood up, visibly upset. He rested both hands on the table, palms down, and shifted his glance from the assistant FBI director to Burke. “When did this happen? And why weren’t we made aware of it?”
Burke seemed to find Sutherland’s mild outburst amusing. “From what I hear, Agent Sutherland, your team had its hands full searching for this Captain Martinez.”
“This is bullshit,” Sutherland said, looking to Thaxton to back him up. “We’re supposed to be sharing information, not withholding it from each other. Haven’t we learned from past mistakes?”
“That’s enough,” Thaxton said, urging Sutherland to take a seat. He slowly complied.
With Sutherland calmed down, Burke continued. “I apologize for keeping you out of the loop, but in fairness, the FBI was made aware of the break-in. Apparently, they just didn’t disseminate the info far enough.”
Burke’s eyes met Thaxton’s, which Sutherland noticed. “You knew?” Sutherland said, whipping his head around to the assistant director. “Why not tell us? I just don’t get it.”
As usual, Thaxton remained poised and calm, with her arms folded at the table. “I needed your team focused on finding Captain Martinez. Everything else was secondary.”
“We’re getting way off track here,” Angela said boldly.
Burke looked at her, surprised but seemingly impressed with her fortitude. “I happen to agree, Agent Gannon,” he said to the now-silent room. “The important thing is that we all have to work together on this, every agency. We have to move on several fronts. Not only do we have to find this terror cell and rescue the hostages, we have to protect these hard targets from attack. It’s going to take planning and coordination, and we don’t have a lot of time.”
Chief Drake turned to Burke with a question of his own. “I noticed that in the video, the speaker demanded that we stay out of their way lest they harm Angela’s family. Do you believe that this was a direct threat against the very action we plan to take?”
Burke thought to himself for a moment and nodded. “They used a British speaker to emphasize the universal appeal of their ideology. That was no accident. And by keeping us looking in so many different directions, they’re buying themselves time. But mark my words: this is and always was about a major attack.”
“I’m just curious,” Chief Drake added. “Where does the administration stand with that theory?”
