The Perfect Weapon

by Christopher Metcalf

  “You are doing fine from what I can tell.” Preacher smiled and drank some more coffee. He smiled again at the image Lance was looking down on. To anyone in the restaurant, this looked like a young couple and a father. Marta caught his smile and he quickly glanced upward to let her in on the joke.

  “Just a little frustrating working through the FBI’s bureaucracy. Even with highest level clearance coming after your work in Detroit.”

  “Still nothing in Philadelphia?” Preacher interrupted.

  “Nothing concrete. But the four men you identified are under surveillance.” Seibel took a sip of coffee and looked up this time to see what they had been smiling at. He missed nothing. They ate in silence for a few moments. It was kind of nice, and to be truthful, it was kind of like a family gathering. He couldn't help but be something of a father figure in their lives.

  “And New York?” Marta asked.

  “The focus is actually moving to New Jersey, where one group was taken in for questioning just yesterday.”

  “Anything good?” Preacher asked.

  “Nothing I’ve heard yet.” Seibel was obviously frustrated having to work through the FBI’s counterterrorism task force. “They can reach me anywhere nowadays, well in cities at least.” He held of a behemoth of a cell phone. He didn’t like it any more than Preacher or Lance did. It felt like a ball and chain.

  “Where are you off to next?” Marta again.

  “Back to D.C. tonight. Coordination with inter-agency operations. And then to New York.”

  “Where is Foxy?” Preacher had a mouthful of pancake. He loved to eat breakfast for dinner. He had learned from his travels that it was an American trait.

  “Foxy, Tarwanah and Jamaani are set to leave the Point tomorrow for Boston. I may need them to deviate to New York or New Jersey, but we’ll see.” This was an amazingly open and direct conversation. There simply wasn’t the time for Seibel to challenge them with his mind games. He needed Lance, or Preacher, to keep up his bomb maker trance. His work in each city had uncovered details and leads that others could never see. Marta gave him an extra set of eyes along the way.

  “We should be back in D.C. in four days max. Do you need my latest to brief the taskforce again or do you have that covered?” Preacher couldn't address the taskforce himself. None of them even knew he existed.

  “We’ll see. I’m sure taskforce leaders will want your report.” Seibel drank more coffee and pushed his cup to the edge of the table as the waitress approached with a coffee pot in hand. She refilled all their cups. Marta glanced at her watch. It was nearly time to go. The three of them had already looked over the information, maps, photos and lead sheets in the motel room across the street. Dinner was just chat time, which was something Marta was never comfortable with. Especially with Seibel.

  She glanced up where Lance was hovering. She couldn’t see him, but he could see her and looked into her eyes to see the discomfort she felt sitting this close to Seibel. If Preacher wasn’t with her, the two of them would surely not be sitting in a diner talking about the weather. She was less enraged than she had been in months, but she still wanted and planned to kill the man across the table from her. She wondered if he knew his days were numbered, or if he even cared.

  Seibel caught her glance upward again and furrowed his brows. Once or twice was one thing, looking up to the same spot six times now was downright strange. What was she looking at? What was she thinking? He broke the silence.

  “So, who are you?” He asked Marta.

  “Felicia Brownfield, Springfield, Illinois.” She sipped at the steaming coffee.

  “High school?”

  “Westmoore. College at Mizzou. Majored in journalism. Work for the Wichita Eagle as a business reporter.”

  “Excellent.” Seibel liked the cover. “Are you sleeping?”

  The question was a left-fielder and out of bounds. He shouldn’t be asking about her personal life. She didn’t work for him anymore and did not have to answer his little inquisitions. Lance, from above, was quick to notice the tightening of her mouth. It only lasted a microsecond, but it was the first step toward the onramp to anger. And that was obviously why Seibel had asked. He couldn't help being a prick, a controlling, ice-cold prick.

  “Okay, time to roll.” Preacher sat forward and pushed his plate and cup a couple of inches into the middle of the table. He tapped the table twice to be sure he had both their eyes. He looked at each of them. “We can talk in a couple of days. We have your enormous cell phone number in case we need to reach you before then. Does Foxy have the same pager number?”

  “Yes. And he’s carrying one of these as well.”

  “Crap. That definitely makes me think less of him. What about Tarwanah and Jamaani? Are they packing those things?”

  “Yes. It is now standard procedure. You’ll get one soon.”

  “Nah, it will be awhile.” He turned to Marta. She was calm. “Ready?”

  “Yes, let’s go.”

  They got up from the table. Both Preacher and Seibel pulled out wads of cash. “Let me, please.” Seibel insisted and dropped a few bills on the table. A man paying was customary, but Marta was the only multi-millionaire at the table. She had made strategic deposits and opened several safe deposit boxes. Preacher had no idea where it all was stashed, only that she had an endless supply of cash.

  The three of them walked out of the restaurant. On the sidewalk under bad neon, Seibel tried to make up for his behavior. “Thanks both of you for your work.” He turned to Marta. “Especially your volunteer work. It is greatly appreciated by me and those at the highest levels of your government.”

  “Which government is that?” She couldn’t help herself. And she did have every right to call him on his sanctimonious b.s.”

  “The government of the United States of America, of course.” Seibel bowed as he said this. He spun on his heel and walked to his car.

  They turned the opposite direction to walk to theirs.

  “That was fun, we need to do it again sometime.” Preacher put an arm around Marta. She pressed herself into his body as they walked, needing the touch, the affection.

  “I’m going to need a full report on what he, you saw from up there.” Marta had already come to appreciate the additional set of eyes they had working for them. She understood the basic idea that Lance, the ghost, couldn’t really see anything more than Preacher could, but in the weeks since he had told her about this set up, she had witnessed on many occasions the magic that was at work here. Lance simply saw things that others missed, even her.

  “I’ll give it to you on the road. Some of it is pretty interesting.”

  “I’ll bet.” She smiled and squeezed his arm.

  Preacher opened her door for her and she got in. He walked around and got in the driver’s side of the minivan. They were the image of a happy young couple. Seibel watched from across the parking lot and was pleased, really pleased, even happy. He knew from direct experience, from Braden and from Fuchs and others, that these two people were a couple of truly messed up human beings. The simple fact that they could find pleasure or happiness together was heart-warming.

  His mood changed to sadness when he thought of what he was going to have to do to them within weeks, maybe days.

  Interstate 40 holds a special place in Preacher and Lance's heart. He drove out of the way on their route to Los Angeles, just so he could share I-40 with Marta, all the way from Oklahoma City to Barstow, California where the highway ends and you have to take I-15 the rest of the way into L.A.

  They stopped in Albuquerque to sleep and eat good Mexican food. They diverted into the Petrified National Forest and the Meteor Crater so Marta could see and touch what Preacher wanted to share with her. Along the route, they listened to an entire 'Learn to Speak Turkish' set of cassette tapes. It ticked Preacher off that he didn't know the language at all. Marta had learned a little from Josef, her number three, who Lance killed back in Baghdad.

  Their time together cro
ssing the country in the mini-van bonded the two of them, like a young couple traveling cross-country to begin a new job and new life.

  "Seni seviyorum," Preacher squeezed Marta's hand and told her he loved her in Turkish as they descended from the mountains dropping down into the valley. Behind the smog, Los Angeles was spread out before them.

  Chapter 40

  Maybe it was the water. Or maybe it was those letters up there on that hillside. Or perhaps it was just the traffic.

  Whatever it was, Lance noticed it first from up there at 10,000 feet. Preacher was right behind him in seeing it. The “it” in this instance, was the complete absence of anything he felt like blowing up. Sure, there were targets, like Disneyland and Sunset Strip and Grauman’s Chinese Theater, but they weren’t the heart. They weren’t at the heart of America. It was wrong.

  Preacher and Marta stepped into a phone booth and deposited all the change he had in his pocket to call the coded number on the card Seibel had handed him.

  “Nosar lied, or at least told us a lie, whether he knew it or not.” He blurted when Seibel answered on the second ring.

  “What?”

  “He told some truths, but he lied by pointing us out west. Dallas was never in play. There is nothing out here in California. I think the whole scene in Detroit was a setup to take us off target.” Preacher looked from Marta’s face up to Lance who was now sitting on top of the phone booth watching high-priced sports cars drive by.

  “Slow down. You found evidence, traces and players in every city so far. You’ve uncovered a gold mine of potential cells.” Seibel was walking somewhere as he talked. His breath was forced.

  “Listen. Stop walking and listen.” Preacher waited two seconds and continued, “It was all a set-up to lure us, to lure me away from the real target. We moved teams into the field away from real targets. I can feel it.” Marta was hearing this for the first time as well. She closed her eyes and moved through the last couple of weeks since Detroit.

  “Where, how did you come to this conclusion? What is your source on this?” Seibel was stopped and listening now.

  “No source, just patterns and recognition and process. It was brilliant, friggin' brilliant. He played us all in order to get it all set up. It is going to happen within days, maybe two days.”

  “Where?” Seibel had his eyes closed 3,000 miles away.

  Preacher took the phone from his ear and pressed it against his chest. “Do we tell him? He could put a bunch of people in our way.” He asked Marta. She was his only partner now.

  “You’re talking New York and Washington, right?” She was with him, already looking at what they’d missed in tracking all these fake, planted leads.

  “Yes.”

  “Tell him Washington.”

  He brought the phone back up to his mouth. “Washington.”

  “You’re sure?” Seibel asked. If we pull teams from other cities and those places go boom, we will pay. You and me.”

  “Move anyone available to Washington, now. It is where I would hit to make the largest impact. No doubt."

  “What about New York?” Seibel was no amateur. Not easily buffaloed.

  “Have to keep looking, working there. But primary needs to be D.C. We are getting on the first flight. See you in the morning.”

  “Okay, thanks.”

  “Use that big-ass cell phone and make some calls. Get people moving.”

  Preacher hung up the phone and leaned into Marta, putting his forehead on her shoulder. He was thinking, searching for things he’d missed. She stopped him.

  “No time to doubt yourself. Nosar didn’t lie. He told us Anwar’s plans. But Anwar planted them in him and others. He has always been a master at deception, right? Whether letting a Russian convoy through one day and blowing the next one up the following day. Or setting five cans of soda beside the road only to have the sixth trigger the explosion when picked up. He played all of us.” Marta pushed his forehead back with her own to bring his head back up. “Let’s go. LAX is 15 minutes away.”

  She pushed him out of the booth and took the keys to drive. Funny thing, right when she was getting into the car she looked up right where Lance was hovering and shook her head. Marta had learned Preacher’s patterns and knew where his out of body alter ego could be found. She was disappointed in him for missing the signs. But not as disappointed as she was in herself for not seeing them.

  Anwar turned off the street into a driveway. It was a home like any other on the block. A car was parked in the drive already. He cut the engine and got out to grab a package from the back seat. He walked to the side door and entered, just like he had done hundreds of times before.

  Inside, three men sat at the kitchen table. They were all Middle Eastern, like him. And they were all trained in building large destructive bombs. He had taught each of them. Anwar took a seat at the table and looked at each.

  “Brothers, it is time. Our plans have brought us together one last time. Word reached me that others have been captured, arrested in Detroit, Chicago and other cities. None of us are under surveillance. The other teams have successfully lured the FBI away from us. We must take advantage of this window and fulfill our destinies.”

  His statement was followed by a round of “Allahu Akbar” from the others.

  “You have your missions. You know your targets as well as you know your own homes. Your devices are assembled. We are ready.”

  He pulled four items from the package he had brought in from the car. He handed each man an envelope and kept one for himself. They opened the envelopes at the same time. Inside, each found a personal letter written by their leader, written by hand in a script that spoke of education and philosophy and dedication to cause. Each letter was signed the same – Osama bin Mohammed bin Awad bin Laden.

  The letters had been written the month before in Sudan, where bin Laden, the leader of al Qaeda, hid in exile. The words were private, but could be shared with others if Anwar was successful in bringing his audacious plan to fruition. He looked around the table at the other three men and knew he had done it. Years of planning, putting people and pieces in place, building lie upon lie to mislead the Americans. His plan, their plan, was in its final days of preparation.

  The faces around the table represented the locations Anwar had placed them up to two years earlier. Each held jobs, kept up relationships, played active roles in the community. To his left sat New Jersey. Next to him was Philadelphia. And on the right, was Washington. D.C. This meeting wasn’t necessary from an operational standpoint. They each had their explosive devices assembled and loaded. He had personally visited each and helped in the assembly. The bombs were powerful, and would be glorious in their destructiveness.

  This short meeting was merely to look them in the eyes and give them their personal letters from al Qaeda’s leader. He could see the confidence each man held in their heart after reading the message written exclusively for them. “Brothers, we are ready. We will strike this evil nation with vengeance and retribution for their years of oppression and undying support for the illegal Jewish state. Your years of work and dedication will be repaid with the respect of your brothers around the world. We will surely all be welcomed as heroes by Allah when we pass from this life.”

  He reached out his hands onto the table. The others joined his hands. “Allahu Akbar, Allahu Akbar.” Their chorus of chants lasted for another minute. It was followed by hugs and kisses. Anwar bid them all farewell at the door and watched them drive away. In two days, this country – this world, would never be the same.

  Both Preacher and Lance were in a trance as they flew five miles above the earth from Los Angeles to New York. Most people on the red-eye overnight flight were asleep. A few passengers were reading. Marta watched Preacher from the seat beside him, holding his hand.

  Preacher had his eyes open but was a world away. Lance was lying on the wing of the 747 looking down at the pinpricks of light in the blanket of darkness below but not really seeing anything. T
hey were reaping the benefits of two brains thinking in one head. Conscious and subconscious. Lance knew it was all just him, but he could distinctly feel each personality working through the problem. Preacher was focusing on Washington, D.C. Lance was caught up on Philadelphia for some reason. He was supposed to be thinking about New York, but Philadelphia kept creeping into view.

  They ran through people, faces, names, locations. And then Lance sat up suddenly out there on the wing. Preacher broke from his stare and looked out at him. Marta did the same. She didn’t see anything, of course. But she knew what Preacher was looking at.

  “Geez, you think?” Preacher said to Lance. He knew what the ghost was thinking, of course.

  “Got to be. Look at the pattern. After Nosar and Detroit, there were arrests in Philly, New York and DC. Players are in custody, people let their guard down, a little at least. Only natural.”

  “Damn.” Preacher shook his head.

  “What is it?” Marta wanted in on the conversation going on in Preacher’s head.

  “What do New York, Philadelphia and Washington D.C. all have in common in the last two weeks, according to Seibel?” He asked her while leaning his head back.

  She thought for a few moments and got it. “People have been arrested, taken in for questioning.”

  “Cells were broken up. Players were taken off the board.” He added.

  “So what does it mean?”

  “I didn’t see it until a minute ago. Actually, he figured it out.” Preacher gestured out the window.

  “What did he figure out?” Marta asked as she looked out the window at the lights flashing on the plane’s wing.

  “Counterterrorism resources have been reduced somewhat in each market after the arrests. Efforts have been doubled in other cities. It is plain and simple a classic dodge. What if they let us have those cells so others could complete their missions?” Preacher shook his head.

  “Like doubling back to a place after it has already been searched and cleared. That's how the Mujahedeen did it time and time again in Afghanistan after the Russians moved them out of a location.” Marta knew her history well. Especially Russian history.