Leave No Child Behind

by Randy Overbeck

  In unison, all four men leaned forward. He had seen the same reaction numerous times at trials when he had unveiled the right evidence. He knew what it meant and pressed on. He rose from his chair and moved over to the lighted map of the Midwestern US.

  “It would appear that an unidentified number of foreign terrorists entered the US somewhere in this region.” With the pointer on the tray below the map, Harold indicated the area bordering Canada, western New York state and western Pennsylvania. “Two of these terrorists encountered Officer Birch on a state highway here.” His pointer tapped a spot on the lighted map of western Pennsylvania and a white dot bloomed on the map and started blinking. The four men all stared intently at the visual display. Samson was grateful he had taken the time to work up the program with the Situation Room computer expert earlier this morning.

  Studying their reactions, he continued his explanation, drawing on delivery skills he had honed as a prosecutor in the courtroom. “At least these two men, and probably more, continued south across Pennsylvania and traveled into Ohio to Cleveland.” Sliding the pointer along the described route, he tapped again and this time a blue dot glowed and began blinking in time with the white spot. “There I would further speculate, these two men, Mohammed Armdi and his partner, were executed by the leader of the cell, probably for allowing themselves to be discovered.

  “Likely then, based on what we have learned from other captured terrorists, these two men have been replaced. Now we believe this cell is on its way to here, Hammerville, Ohio.” The pointer moved to a spot a scant two inches below the blue dot on the huge map and Harold tapped the screen again. A larger red dot exploded, pulsing like a heart beat.

  “Given the time frame of these events and the information we have pieced together, it is my assessment that we can expect some kind of terrorist activity in this area to correspond with the scheduled execution of Asad Akadi.”

  “Which is?” Gregory’s pen clicked relentlessly.

  “In thirty hours, at 6:00 p.m., tomorrow,” answered Samson. The eyes of all four men were focused on the red dot, flashing on and off in the map of northeastern Ohio.

  “What steps have you taken?” asked the President.

  “We have sent alerts to all law enforcement agencies in this area and asked them to increase their already high vigilance. We have informed them that a terrorist cell may be planning an operation within the next thirty hours.”

  “I still hear a ‘but’ in your explanation, Mr. Samson.” Gregory leaned his head down so his eyes over the top of his glasses would have an unobstructed view of the Director of Homeland Security.

  “Yes, sir, I am still very concerned.” As Samson watched the other men, he saw their faces harden and knew he was in for a debate. He plunged ahead. “Mr. President, it is the best judgment of my team that we should postpone the execution by four days and move the site to the nearby maximum-security prison at Lucasville, Ohio. This would give us time to set up additional precautions and establish a net to capture the terrorist cell when it moves with Akadi.”

  “And what reason would I give for this move?” asked the president, arching one eyebrow.

  “Technical problems,” Samson responded. “Since Akadi is the first prisoner to be executed at HBE, we could say that we have discovered an error in the injection system. But since it is critical that Akadi suffer the consequences of his actions, you are ordering him moved to the prison in Lucasville for execution on Tuesday evening.”

  President Gregory nodded his head slowly. Two slow clicks of the ballpoint pen. Samson took his chair again and everyone was silent, awaiting the President. Finally, Gregory asked, “Thoughts anyone?”

  “I can’t fault Harold’s analysis. This is critical information his team has uncovered,” began Garcia, nodding to his colleague.

  Samson was immediately on alert. In his years as a prosecutor, he had learned that when opposing counsel started with a compliment, they were usually getting ready to unleash a frontal attack. Of course, the CIA Director was supposed to be on the same team, but Samson wasn’t sure.

  “But it’s possible that his assessment is flawed,” said Garcia. “For example, if these two were terrorists as Harold believes, it’s just as likely they are acting alone and were killed in some dispute over a drug deal.” When Samson started to object, Garcia held his hand up. “Almost always, when these terrorists are preparing for an attack, there is considerable chatter. Look at the reports of talk in the month before 9/11.

  “Aside from that obscure comment on the one Syrian website, ‘Allah’s Voice,’ my people have picked up nothing. These guys like to proclaim their victories in advance, at least to each other. If they were really planning such an operation, I think we certainly would have heard something by now.”

  “What’s your take, Tom?” President Gregory turned to the FBI Director.

  Dickson didn’t hesitate. “My people received Homeland Security’s call to arms this morning and I only learned the details about a half hour before we started. Jerry has a point; we should’ve heard more about any such operation by now. We’ve learned no more than the CIA guys.”

  “But--” the president said.

  “But,” the FBI Director continued, his massive body alone commanding attention, “Harold makes a pretty strong case out of the circumstantial evidence he has collected. Besides, if I were these guys and I got it into my head I was going to spring my guy, I’d go about it pretty much as Harold described. Maybe the cell got in under our radar and are in place right now.”

  Samson admired Dickson’s courage in his admission. If the terrorists have gotten in, it would have been on his watch and everyone in the room knew it.

  “Okay, thanks,” said the president.

  Ryan Gregory turned to his Chief of Staff. “Any thoughts, Dean?”

  Settler raised one bony finger to his forehead and slowly massaged a point in the center of his temple. “I don’t know, Mr. President. While Harold makes a good argument, we need to remember that it is mostly speculation. There’s not a lot we know for sure. I tend to agree with Jerry. We would likely have heard something, anything by now if there was an effort to spring Akadi. As Harold said himself, the prison’s virtually impregnable. And besides, I have every confidence in our people and in HBE’s staff.”

  Samson remembered that Harold Barr, the Harold Barr of Harold Barr Enterprises, is an old friend of Settler, and a major contributor to Gregory’s election campaign. Alarm bells went off in his head.

  “I assume Homeland Security is coordinating with the administration at HBE?” Settler turned and looked at Samson.

  Gregory interjected, “What have you told Warden Cromer, Harold?”

  “I’ve worked very closely with James Cromer and have tried to keep him informed. But the full scenario I presented to you this morning only took shape in the last three hours. I didn’t think I should brief him until I had a chance to present the information to you, sir.”

  “I concur, Harold,” responded the president. “Let’s call him now and you can review the possible threat and I can get his assessment as well. Do you have the number here or should we get it?”

  “Yes sir, I have it.” Samson pulled his IPhone from his jacket pocket, scrolled through some numbers and slid the device across the table to Gregory.

  Settler intercepted it and said, “I’ll take care of that, Mr. President.” He read the screen and punched in the numbers on the pad on one of the three speakerphones.

  It took less than thirty seconds.

  “James Cromer here.”

  “Good morning, James. This is President Gregory. I’m calling from the Situation Room and I’m here with Jerry Garcia, Tom Dickson, and Harold Samson. And of course, Dean Settler.”

  “Hey James,” Samson said aloud and the others followed suit.

  “James,” the President broke in, cutting off the greetings. “We called to discuss some developments concerning Akadi’s execution. We all just received an update f
rom Harold on some new intel and I wanted you to hear it.”

  “Thank you, Mr. President,” came the response through the speakers.

  “I’m going to have Harold brief you much the same as he did us, a few minutes ago and then I want to know your assessment of the situation.”

  “Certainly.”

  Four minutes later Samson was finished and the President asked, “James, did you get that?”

  “I believe so,” said Cromer.

  “What do you think, James?”

  “Obviously, we are concerned about the threat,” the warden said. “Possible threat,” corrected Garcia.

  “Possible threat,” acknowledged Cromer. “I’ve got to be honest with you, Mr. President. Around here we’ve always worked from the assumption that these boys would try to mount some kind of threat. It’s the only way to keep my people on their toes and safe. Now that we have some credible intel, we’ll take some specific measures; we’ll double the outside patrols and change the internal lock codes on a random basis, at least for the next two days, until this thing is done.”

  “So I take it that you don’t agree with Harold’s recommendation that we should move Akadi to a new location?” asked the president.

  “Sir, I have great respect for his assessment, but in all humility, Akadi is a lot more secure inside this facility than he will be in transport, at least in my opinion.”

  “Thank you, James,” said President Gregory. “For now this specific intel is for your ears only.”

  “Of course, Mr. President.”

  Settler reached over and switched the speakerphone off. The president asked, “Any final thoughts, gentlemen?”

  “Just one, sir,” said Settler. “If you do decide to move Akadi and postpone his execution, it may set off a firestorm. With all the trouble we had in closing Guantanamo and housing these terrorists on US soil, there’ll likely be a good deal of criticism and finger-pointing if we postpone and move him. Your critics in the media are going to have a field day, not to mention our ‘friends’ in the Senate.”

  “I doubt that anyone would make that case,” countered President Gregory.

  “Sir, you know we can’t control what the media will say, especially this close to the election.” Settler’s hollow eyes studied the President. “Sir, the polls say that Akadi’s execution will give you a reasonable margin to win the election. Harold’s plan would move the execution to election day. Who knows what postponing it will do to that margin?”

  President Gregory looked first at Settler and then let his glance move around the table and land on Samson. Harold could read the body language and knew he had lost before the president uttered another word.

  “For now, we stay the course. Harold, if anything changes in the next 24 hours, I want us all back in here and we will reassess.”

  “Yes, Mr. President.”

  “Keep me apprised. I have three more rallies yet today.”

  Chapter 28

  “No one has seen ’im since fifth period yesterday,” Jerod said, as we walked down the steps on our way to lunch the following day. “I talked to Lisa in the counselor’s office and she said that Rashid didn’t sign out yesterday.”

  We turned the corner and headed down the main corridor. Straight ahead loomed the huge picture window that overlooked Lake Harold. On good days the view was an incredible sight with the sun glistening off the pristine lake, the crystal clear water lapping gently at the shoreline. But over the past 24 hours the weather had worsened and the snow dropped out of a brooding, dark sky and turned the cold-whipped waters into a frothy monster.

  We were still about a hundred feet away from the student cafeteria, but already the sound of teens jabbering at lunch barreled down the corridor. Jerod stopped and said, “While you were teachin’ yesterday afternoon, I tried to track him down and found out Rashid wasn’t in his classes all afternoon.”

  “Maybe there’s a logical explanation. He’ll probably be in my class sixth period and we can talk to him then,” I said with more conviction than I felt.

  “I don’t think so,” Jerod said, shaking his head. He grabbed my arms with both hands, forcing me to stop and looked directly at him. His face was only a few inches from mine. Okay, I had to admit, standing there staring at his aqua blue eyes, this wasn’t all bad and just then, a strange thought occurred to me. Had a group of my students happened upon us there in the hall--not likely as it’s off-limits to students at that time of the day--if they’d had seen us, face to face, whispering and glancing furtively around they would have assumed we were clandestine lovers.

  Studying his face there in that vacant hall, I noticed how his eyes were swollen and drooped with fatigue. His chin was edged with what would have passed for a double five o’clock shadow. Jerod usually liked to exude the rumpled-guy look, but today his shirt looked like it had been on the floor of his apartment for a week. Even his southern boy smile was vacant and that worried me more than anything else.

  “Jerod, you look terrible,” I said.

  “Gee, thanks,” he replied, his lopsided grin back momentarily. “You don’ look so hot yourself.”

  “I’m serious. You look like you haven’t slept.”

  “I haven’t. After I took most of the afternoon to try to find Rashid, my boss called me and told me I had t’ come back to work. When I got off this morning, I came straight here.”

  “Was something at HBE wrong?”

  “I dunno. With Asad’s execution coming up, everybody’s jumpy. The talk among the guards is that they think somethin’s up. Rumor is that the warden got a call from the president.”

  “Of HBE?” I asked, confused.

  “Naw. You know, Ryan Gregory, president of the US of A.”

  “Really? Why would the president call your warden?”

  “I dunno! They don’t tell us peons,” he answered irritably, the exhaustion leaking through his words. “But my guess would be two words.”

  “Asad Akadi.”

  “Three stars for the lit’l lady. My supervisors had everybody pull double shifts, so as soon as I left here, I got the call and went straight back to work. Just got off a few minutes ago.”

  “Jerod, you need to go home and go to bed,” I said, allowing concern into my voice.

  He nodded his head. “I plan to, as soon as I get something t’ eat.” Then his grin was back briefly. “Unless you want to join me?” he asked quickly, breaking the tension.

  “You’re impossible!”

  “Yeah, and you love it,” he said and then just that quickly the grin disappeared. “I just wanted to tell you what I found out.”

  “I thought you said you never found Rashid.”

  “I didn’, but I got his schedule from Lisa and checked with all his afternoon teachers. The only teacher I could find who saw him at all was Bruce Airhart, you know him?”

  I nodded. “Yeah, math. Kids call him Mr. Airhead.”

  “That’s him. Anyway, he said Rashid showed up in his fiftth-period class, just like normal. Then in the middle of the class, a guy comes to the door and ask’d to see Rashid. He said he let Rashid go out in the hallway to talk and forgot about him. It wasn’t till the period had ended and he saw Rashid’s backpack under his desk that he realized Rashid never came back in.”

  “Did he say who the guy was?” I asked.

  “Said he didn’ know ’m but said he was some older guy.”

  “Maybe Rashid’s uncle?” I asked, sounding a little too hopeful.

  “You mean the one who has no listing in the four-state area?”

  I said mostly to myself, “I hope Rashid’s not in trouble.”

  “I hope we’re not in trouble,” he mumbled.

  “What?”

  “Nothin’. I’m just tired. I just came over to tell ya about Rashid...oh, and for the great food. I just wanted to make sure you knew. Let’s get somethin’ to eat and then I’m heading for a bed, even if I have to go alone.”

  He started walking down the hall, his
gait loping. Still, with the difference in our strides, I had to hurry to catch up and we walked in silence for a while. Then I asked, “Did he tell you what he looked like?”

  “Airhead said he didn’ get much of a look at him. He was too busy explainin’ the beauty of the Pythagorean theorem. Said he was about my height, dark skin, black hair and he thought a trimmed black mustache. Sound like anybody we know?”

  We rounded the bend to the cafeteria and came face to face with the teen lunch crowd. I glanced over at Jerod but he was peering straight ahead. I figured he was surveying the clusters of students, trying to locate Rashid. Then I felt his body tense. I followed the direction of his stare, hoping he had found Rashid. I turned to look at the far wall, where one set of vending machines stood waiting for students’ eager quarters.

  Right then, at the end table nearest me, I was distracted by two students arguing loudly and facing off, spoons in hand, apparently ready for a good old-fashioned food fight. Pondering for only a moment the likely impact upon my new red sweater, I stepped in front of Jerod to block the airborne mashed potatoes and flying macaroni and cheese. Just before I reached the two squabbling teens, I felt my arm yanked hard and I was pulled roughly to the floor. I tried to turn to look, even as I was falling to the floor, but then all hell broke loose.

  My head slammed against the linoleum and Jerod’s body landed on top of mine. Crushed, I had the wind knocked out of me. Jerod used his other hand to shove the two arguing freshmen aside and turned the table on its side. In the haze of time frozen, I tried to grasp what he was doing.

  Then I heard several loud pops and saw the edge of the overturned table splinter as a fusillade of bullets hit the Formica. Then I heard a man with an Arab accent shout, “Everyone, down on the ground!”