by Ty Patterson
Chapter Seven
Zeb drained a water bottle that a cop thrust at him and nodded gratefully in thanks.
‘How would anyone know where I was?’ he wiped his lips with the back of his hand and patted his hands dry against his thighs. ‘I walked to Regent Street after I left you. I’m sure no one followed me.’
‘I don’t mean you,’ his friend grunted, his attention on the screens that was filled with police cruisers, ambulances, emergency workers. Officers had cordoned off the carnage trail and had erected temporary barriers to protect the privacy of the dead and the injured. ‘Berlin, yesterday, London, today. Tell me there’s no connection.’
‘Different M.O,’ Zeb replied. ‘AR15 in Germany, cab, here.’
‘But the same kind of loner attack.’
‘We know that for sure?’
‘At this stage we don’t know anything,’ the head of MI6 growled, ‘other than thirteen people are dead, fourteen if you include that driver, and more than thirty injured. This is the worst killing spree London has ever experienced. With a vehicle,’ he clarified and then remembered the uniformed officer next to him. ‘Assistant Commissioner Joel Moss,’ he introduced, ‘meet Zeb Carter. It’s best you forget his name and face.’
‘One of yours, Sir Alex?’
‘I wish. From across the pond and that’s all I will say.’
‘You need any medical attention?’
That reminded Zeb that his body was one big hurt. He fingered his left shoulder and winced when he hit a tender spot. ‘Nothing’s broken,’ he said, ‘I’ll keep. There are others who need more attention,’ and with those words the air in the vehicle turned grim.
‘You know him?’ Moss asked him after a while. ‘The cab driver.’
‘Never saw him in my life.’
The officer nodded as if he was expecting such a reply. ‘Had to ask. Anyone take your statement?’
‘No, sir.’
‘No need for that,’ the assistant commissioner waved away his formality. ‘I’ll get a couple of officers in here.’
The statements took twenty minutes as the cops made Zeb go through every minute of his day, making him repeat details over and over again. They took his fingerprints, photographed him and read his statement back to him.
‘We’ve got an ID,’ his friend said when he re-entered the van. ‘Cameron Walters. Forty-three years old. Lives in Walthamstow, north-east London. One room flat. Been driving his cab for over ten years. No close friends. Divorced eight years back. No children.’
Lone wolf, flashed in Zeb’s mind.
‘Still think there’s no coincidence?’ Sir Alex challenged him.
‘Anything to connect the two men together?’
‘Give us time,’ his friend snapped. ‘We aren’t magicians,’ and then he held his hand up in apology. ‘Sorry –’ he broke off when his phone rang. He cupped it to his ear, whispered into it, muttered an apology and left.
As if on cue, Zeb’s cell rang. ‘Don’t tell me. You’re in the thick of it in London, too,’ Beth’s cheery greeting didn’t mask her anxiety. ‘Someone filmed your chase and take-down and put it up on social media. Your face is hazy but Werner had enough to identify you.’
‘Can we do anything to shut down that clip?’
‘Working on it. Clare’s on the phone to the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, Sir Alex -’
‘He’s here. He ducked out to take a call.’
‘Yeah, so she’s managing that end. Meg, Broker and I, we’ll make sure your mug’s not on the internet. How bad is it over there?’
‘Like a war zone,’ he said as he watched emergency workers carry a shrouded body into an ambulance.
‘My gun?’ he asked Moss when Beth hung up. ‘I threw it away somewhere on Regent Street.’
‘We found it. It’s gone to the lab for ballistics tests.’ He shifted uncomfortably, ‘I heard you on the phone. Your prints, photographs…’
‘I think what’ll happen,’ Zeb grinned humorlessly, ‘is you or someone in the Metropolitan police will get a call. My identity will mysteriously disappear. You’ll tell a story to the press.’
‘We’ve already got that,’ Moss ran a hand tiredly through his short hair. ‘A SAS officer is the one who took down Walters. What about the clips though? I’m sure many people were videoing the incident on their mobile phones.’
‘My team will look into that.’
‘They can do that?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Can I ask who you are?’
‘Me? I’m just a tourist.’
* * *
Zeb hung out at the edges of the crowd after leaving the van. The cab was still against the lamp post, its front damaged extensively. Bloodied as well. Tire marks on the sidewalk, marking its travel. Shattered glass and debris on the street. People wept near him while others spoke in hushed whispers as if loud voices would be disrespectful to the dead and the injured.
A police officer walked down the street with a loud hailer, urging the crowd to dissipate, for Londoners to resume their normal lives. He saw the mayor appear on a mobile screen, a live broadcast.
Zeb shook his head unconsciously and wondered again what triggered someone to kill others in such a monstrous way.
London will get back to its feet again, he thought. It’s a resilient city. As will Berlin.
But who else was out there? Who was plotting such similar attacks, and where?
Chapter Eight
Ram Bahadur was making his final preparations when Zeb caught his New York flight from Heathrow that evening.
The Indian software developer washed his car, greeted the watchman in his building and went up to his apartment. He lived alone in Borivali, a north-western suburb of Mumbai. His flat, a modest two-bedroom residence, was sparingly furnished. A couple of couches in the living room, a TV, a dining table, no photographs, no paintings, no decoration of any kind.
He went to the second bedroom which he had converted to a study and sat at his desk. He opened a website, donned his headphones and started listening.
He had to be in the right frame of mind for what he was planning in the day time.
* * *
Zeb was yawning and stretching as his flight commenced its descent to JFK. Ten forty-five pm local time.
In Mumbai it was eight fifteen am.
Ram Bahadur drove out of his building. His normal commute took close to an hour, to a technology hub where his employer’s offices were.
That day, his drive took twenty minutes, to a school.
He was lucky to find a vacant parking space. He climbed out of the car, opened his trunk and removed a gym bag.
He leaned against his vehicle and when a school bus arrived, he bent down and unzipped his bag.
Children climbed out of the bus, chattering excitedly, a teacher urging them towards the gates.
Ram Bahadur brought out an AK47.
A passing car swerved, its driver looking at him in astonishment. A scooter honked. ‘That looks real,’ a woman screamed from the back of a cab.
The weapon was genuine.
Ram Bahadur commenced firing at the school children as Zeb’s flight landed in New York.
* * *
Zeb’s step faltered when he turned on his cell phone after clearing the border checks at the airport.
CALL US ASAP! Meghan had texted.
‘Where are you?’ she asked immediately when he dialed her. Her voice was tight. Controlled. The usual lightness and humor missing.
‘Coming into the concourse,’ he replied. ‘What’s up?’
‘I see you,’ she replied. ‘Look to your right.’
He turned and saw his team, all seven of them. The sisters in front, Broker by their side, Chloe flanking Beth, and behind them, towering over them, Bwana, Bear and Roger.
All of them grim-faced.
Small things. A bunch of people crowded around a wall-mounted TV. A South-Asian woman sobbing. An elderly man comforting her. Beth’s green eyes
narrowed to tiny pinpricks. Meg’s left hand twitching the way it did when she was impatient.
‘What?’ he asked them when he neared.
‘That’s all you’re carrying?’ Bwana rumbled, nodding at his backpack.
‘Yeah, why?’
‘Where’s your Glock?’
‘I left it behind in London.’
‘Told you,’ Roger told his friend in an aside, reached down and produced a holster and a gun.
‘Your spare gun. We picked it up from the office.’
‘What’s going on?’
‘Come on,’ Meghan urged them impatiently. ‘Time’s wasting.’
‘Where are we going?’
‘DC. Our Gulfstream’s here, waiting for you.’
‘DC? Why?’ he stumbled when Beth grabbed him by the elbow and forced him to trot.
‘Clare’s called us to a meeting. Did you watch the news?’
‘I was in a flight,’ he protested. ‘I slept all the way through.’
‘Mumbai,’ Meghan snapped a glance at him. ‘Seven children killed. Dozens critical. The fatalities would have been higher but the killer’s gun jammed.’
Chapter Nine
‘This is what we know,’ Clare said at two am in DC. They were in her office, in an anonymous building on Sixteenth Street Northwest. The White House was visible if they craned their heads from the solitary, street-facing window.
‘Otto Freisler, thirty-eight years old, garage mechanic in Berlin. Single, white, male.’ A second finger on her hand straightened as she addressed them in the board room. ‘Cameron Walters, forty-three years old, cab driver in London. Another single, white male. And just a few hours ago, Ram Bahadur, thirty-five-year-old software developer in Mumbai. Single, male, not white.’
‘Total –’
‘Death toll in the three countries,’ she anticipated Chloe’s question, ‘is sixty-three. Many are still critical and doctors expect more fatalities.’
The silence that fell over them was as thick as the night. A chair squeaked. A water bottle opened. Meghan. She drank, capped the bottle and placed it back on the table. Her face was pale, her skin looked like parchment.
‘There have been some developments. All three men were very active on social media,’ Clare announced.
‘But Eric said –’ Zeb frowned.
‘I know what he said. That was then. The Germans have found Freisler had alias accounts. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, you name it, all three had these.’
‘I’m guessing all three were right wing supporters.’ Broker hazarded.
‘Ram Bahadur is still alive,’ Clare corrected him. ‘He was captured by bystanders. He hasn’t said a word. And his politics and beliefs are decidedly to the left.’
‘He’s a Hindu?’
‘Correct, and Freisler and Walters, Catholic, though none of the three seemed to be very religious.’
‘Any contact between them?’ Zeb asked. Why are we here? He questioned himself. These aren’t the kind of missions the Agency gets involved in.
‘No. Single, male. That’s what the killers have in common.’
‘And access to guns in countries which have strict ownership laws,’ Beth piped up.
‘Yeah.’
‘How did they get those weapons?’
‘No one knows. Look,’ Clare rested a hand on the table, the lines on her face showing. ‘The Berlin attack was day before yesterday. Investigations need time.’
‘Ma’am,’ Zeb raised his hand and his boss smiled reflexively. She had repeatedly asked them to drop the formal epithet, but her urging hadn’t worked. ‘Why are we here?’
‘President Morgan,’ she straightened as if her boss was in the room, ‘wants us to get to the bottom of this.’
She raised her hand to silence the chorus of voices that broke out. ‘Not us alone. There’s a meeting tomorrow,’ she looked at her watch and corrected herself, ‘today, of various agencies, us included, to work out responsibilities, that kind of stuff.’
‘Ma’am, there’ve been no such shootings in our country,’ Megan objected.
‘Not recently, no, and the president wants to keep it like that, and not just here, but in other countries too. Enough,’ she stopped their rising voices. ‘Grab some sleep. We’re meeting at the Pentagon at eleven am.’
Chapter Ten
Mohammed Yunus finished his evening prayers and exited Istiqlal Mosque as Zeb was waking up in his DC hotel room.
The mosque was a landmark in Jakarta. Its highlight was the forty-five-meter diameter central dome. The building stood across from a church on the corner of Jalan Lapangan Banteng and drew traffic and tourists.
The forty-eight-year-old bank clerk put on his shoes went to Jalan Veteran and flagged a passing Ojek, a motorcycle taxi.
‘Jalan Subaraya,’ he told the driver and climbed on. He held on to the bike as the vehicle navigated the macet, the traffic gridlock that frequently gripped the city.
He alighted at the flea market, a street lined with stalls selling trinkets and ornaments. It was lit up in the evening with sellers proclaiming the specialty of their wares as loudly as they could. Tourists and Indonesians browsed and bargained as they drifted through the street.
Yunus wasn’t interested in buying anything. He headed straight to a stall he had rented. The woman he had hired to run it greeted him and gave him a bunch of bills. Money, she had made from selling the fake antiques on display. ‘Terima Kasih,’ he said bowing. Thank you. He peeled off a few notes and handed them to her, her fees, and waited till she disappeared out of sight.
He reached beneath the counter and brought out a bag. Withdrew the AK47 and stroked it for a moment.
And then went out in the middle of the street and opened fire.
* * *
Zeb caught the news when he met his team for breakfast. Eight of them arranged around one large table. Joking, laughing, the way friends did. The dining room wasn’t crowded. A couple of families, a few suits poring over files and emails, and them. The ubiquitous wall-mounted TV was playing a news channel. At first no one paid it any attention when the news flashed and then the first ‘Oh no’ reached them.
Zeb looked up and froze. His friends looked at him and turned to the screen where a grave-looking presenter was standing at the mouth of what looked like a busy street.
Shooter in Indonesia. Flea Market. Gunman opened fire on people. At least eleven dead. Final body count will be higher because of the crowd. Shooter captured and taken away by police.
Ambulances and cruisers raced behind the reporter. An emergency crew carried a bleeding man into a vehicle. Another man consoled a sobbing woman.
No, the killer hasn’t been identified yet, the presenter answered in response to a studio question and gave a little more detail.
The screen switched back to the studio where a somber anchor asked a simple question.
‘Berlin, London, Mumbai, Jakarta. Which city will be next?’
Chapter Eleven
‘What are we doing here?’ Zeb whispered to Clare when they arrived at the Pentagon and after clearing security checks were led to an enormous room.
‘Wait and watch,’ she replied and went to greet other arrivals.
‘Wait and watch,’ Zeb said when Meghan quirked an eyebrow at him. They moved to the end of the room, backs to the wall, pulled out chairs and seated themselves. A few generals knew him and his team from their time in the military. None of them were present.
Daniel Klouse, the National Security Advisor entered the room and everyone straightened.
‘Let’s get this to order,’ he started as he sat at the head of the table. Four-star generals flanked him, several suits spread out, and at the far end, Clare, her team behind her.
Zeb recognized the directors of the CIA, FBI, the NSC and the heads of several black-ops agencies. Klouse had winked in their direction on entry but hadn’t greeted them. The NSA was their friend, he championed their cause if there was a need. The Agency had delivered on ev
ery mission it had undertaken and its stock was high with the President.
‘Why don’t we do some introductions?’ a general growled.
‘He commanded the International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan,’ Broker murmured. ‘He’s now with US Central Command. Accused of sexism. Trying hard to save his career.’
Zeb nodded. USCENTCOM was responsible for theater-level operations in the Middle East, Central Asia and parts of Africa.
‘What have these shootings got to do with the military?’ he asked.
Broker shrugged. Beth blew hair out of her face. Bwana stifled a yawn and shifted in his chair. He and Bear, all of six feet four inches and built like the sides of barn doors, all of it muscle, were squeezed uncomfortably in their seats.
‘Go ahead,’ Klouse responded to the general and those seated began introducing themselves.
Some of the most powerful men and women in the country mentioned their grand-sounding titles until it was Clare’s turn.
‘Director of Strategy,’ she said.
The general waited but she said no more.
‘I haven’t come across you.’
‘I have heard of you,’ she replied and a ripple went through the room at her tone.
He flushed and looked at Klouse for support but the NSA had found something fascinating in the ceiling.
The general was nonplussed. He opened his mouth to make a suitable reply. Thought again and glared at the Agency operatives.
‘They have clearances to be here?’
‘Yes.’
‘What do they do?’
‘They’re my aides.’
‘That many of them?’
‘I strategize a lot.’
‘What-’
‘Enough,’ Klouse said curtly. ‘’Y’all know each other now. This isn’t the time or place for turf wars. How many of you have heard of Jakarta?’
Hands around the table shot up.
