Line of Succession: A Thriller

by William Tyree

  They picked up a jogging trail that stretched under a thick canopy of poplar trees. Following Carver’s lead, they went as fast as they could for the length of a football field before stopping. Angie was still foggy, but she moved well with O’Keefe’s help. Carver crouched to peer between a pair of shrubs. The traffic helicopter was still hovering over the bridge where the car was parked. It had been joined by two Army Huey attack choppers.

  “We don’t have long,” Carver said. “They’ll have boots on the ground within ten minutes.”

  “It would suck if they released dogs,” Eva said.

  “We’re one hill away from the Potomac Heritage trail. There’s an oak and beech forest not far from there that runs all the way to Arlington. It’s our only shot.”

  Washington D.C.

  5:15 a.m.

  Agent Rios led Dex and LeBron to the Metro Center station entrance as the day’s first orange line train was about to arrive. The mid-career secret service agent’s hands trembled. Sixty-six hours ago he had shot two assassins dead on Martha’s Vineyard. For that, he had no regrets. It was the prospect of using his weapon again that bothered him.

  They passed the turnstiles without incident and descended the steep escalator toward the platform. Rios’ senses were highly attuned to the few souls scurrying about the station. He heard the conversations of strangers at impossibly long distances. He could smell the trash on the other side of the tracks. Everything seemed magnified.

  His phone buzzed. The caller ID displayed a variation of a Pentagon telephone number. He answered.

  “This is General Wainewright,” the voice on the other end said.

  It took all Rios’ willpower to remain polite. The Secret Service did not answer to the Pentagon, but rather, to Homeland Security. Still, he realized all that could change depending on who occupied the White House by nightfall. It was best to be cautiously subservient. “Yes sir,” he answered.

  “Are you alone?”

  “No sir.” Rios did not elaborate further.

  “I’m glad you didn’t lie to me, Agent Rios. I hate liars.”

  Rios put his hands on Dex’s and LeBron’s shoulders and backed them up against a concrete column. He looked left and right, but did not see any cameras or enemy agents. He returned the phone to his ear as the train entered the station slowly and loudly.

  “Is there something I can do for you, sir?” Rios told the General. “I’m about to get on the subway.”

  “Yes, Agent Rios. You and Secretary Jackson can report to me at the Pentagon and join my team.”

  “I work for the White House, sir. It’s really not my choice.”

  “Don’t play dumb,” the General said calmly. “This is your last chance to play on the winning team.”

  The train doors swooshed open before them. Rios ushered Dex and LeBron inside with him. He motioned for them to stand near the doors, in case they had to jump off at the last moment. He took a moment to inspect the surrounding seats. Behind him, a masked Chris Abrams emerged from behind one of the wide concrete columns on the platform. He kicked Dex in the back and plucked LeBron from the train just as the doors began to close. Rios lunged for the exit. The doors clamped around his left wrist. His hand was saved only by a safety feature that caused the door to hiccup open for an instant before sealing again.

  Dex managed to get to his feet to catch a last glimpse of LeBron struggling in Abrams’ clutches as the train headed into the tunnel.

  Agent Rios screamed into the phone. There was nobody there. Like LeBron, General Wainewright was long gone.

  Burlington, North Carolina

  5:20 a.m.

  While Madge slept, Nico sat at her computer in the living room, navigating past a series of firewalls that would lead him to the Pentagon’s virtual inner sanctum. As always, he did not attack his target head on. He had begun by finding the name of the IT firm that the Pentagon had hired to service their legacy network systems. He quickly found Novi Technical Group, a small company in nearby Fairfax. A look at the source code from their corporate site – a quick WC3 diagnostic racked up more than thirteen-hundred coding errors – told him that the company’s employees had little time to spend on themselves. While the IT firm had undoubtedly been very meticulous in securing the DOD’s formidable intranet, it was likely that the firm’s employees were too overworked to spend any time on their own corporate security, where a copy of their work for DOD would certainly reside. It was a classic case of a hairdresser with bad hair.

  By four a.m., Nico had hacked into the company’s internal network and located an unencrypted Excel document containing one employee’s login information for a variety of sensitive federal systems.

  The old rush was returning. He felt invincible. Bulletproof. As fervent in his belief in what he was doing as ever. He hadn’t felt this way in Oklahoma, where Agent Carver had asked him to break into the old professor’s email. Nor had he felt it in Baltimore, when he had broken into the DOD’s personnel files for Colonel Madsen.

  This was personal. This was about ideology. Much as he hated the idea of anyone continuing President Hatch’s foreign policy, the idea of military rule was far worse. But crippling the Pentagon’s communications with a virus wasn’t the answer. If only he could broadcast a simple message inside the Pentagon’s network that would make the Pentagon sheep think twice about what they were doing.

  The breaking news ticker flashed across the bottom of Madge’s customized desktop: Tragedy in Washington: President Hatch killed. Successor to be sworn in. Details forthcoming.

  So the Joint Chiefs were going public. The world was about to change. He had to hurry.

  Washington D.C.

  5:35 a.m.

  Speers surfaced from the tunnels under Roslyn Station, where Agent Rios was due to deliver the Defense Secretary. He pulled the baseball hat low over his face as he stood in the shadows and watched the platform. A few early bird commuters – mostly men wearing gray suit jackets and ties despite the uncomfortably hot weather – stood staring into the screens of their mobile phones. The rumble of an approaching subway car shook the concrete. He spotted Agent Rios and Dex, both peering anxiously through the glass, as it rolled in. There was no sign of Dex’s son.

  Dex charged off the train and threw a looping right hook that cracked Speers on the cheekbone. Speers fell back and covered up, more stunned by the audacity of Dex’s punch than hurt by it. Rios grabbed Dex from behind, easily subduing the much smaller man.

  “They took LeBron,” Rios explained as Dex retreated to a corner of the platform to compose himself.

  Speers dusted himself off and touched his face, which was already beginning to bruise and swell.

  “You said my wife was alive,” Dex said. “You sure as hell better not be lying.”

  “She’s with the two best federal agents in the entire country,” Rios offered.

  “I’d like to hear it from him,” Dex said, pointing at Speers.

  Speers wiggled his jaw from side to side. It seemed safe to talk. “Okay then. The so-called terrorists that attacked your boat were led by an ex-military man of Bosnian descent named Elvir Divac. They weren’t supposed to hurt anybody. The Joint Chiefs hired them to make you a believer.” Speers knew the story sounded crazy, but it was clear by the look of enlightenment on Dex’s face that it rang true. “When Angie fell overboard, they didn’t know what to do. They saved her because they were afraid they wouldn’t get their money. But they were wrong. The Joint Chiefs were going to eliminate them either way.”

  Dex’s eyes reddened. “Why did you bring me here?”

  “I thought if you knew the truth, you might want to see her alive again. I thought you might help us.”

  “But they’ve got my son now.” The next train pulled into the station. It was bound for the Pentagon. He headed toward it. “You’re on your own.”

  The Pentagon

  6:02 a.m.

  General Wainewright’s armored SUV entered the Pentagon’s subterranean parkin
g facility and stopped at the private entrance reserved for top brass. General Farrell stood in the concrete archway, smoking his fifth cigarette since the Willard Hotel’s wake-up call had come at 4:45 a.m. He dropped the butt and stamped out the smoldering cherry just as the Chairman got out of the car. After losing Dex Jackson, it wasn’t hard to imagine Wainewright blowing off his head for a simple infraction like smoking.

  The two met each other with only a glance and walked at a quick clip. “Did you see the Ambassador?” Farrell said. He was anxious for any news on Iran’s pledge to go after Allied Jihad camps in Pakistan. The two walked past a Lance Corporal distributing Kleenex to a trio of weeping civil servants. “What’s their problem?” Wainewright said too loudly.

  “They’re grieving,” Farrell replied as they rounded a corner toward the elevators.

  “For who?”

  “President Hatch,” Farrell hissed. “It might be old news to you by now, but the rest of the world is just getting used to the idea.”

  The press release had come out of the Pentagon as scheduled at five a.m. sharp. It had been a deliberately terse and obtuse statement issued directly from the Pentagon:

  The President died at Camp David after a suicide pilot of Yemeni heritage crashed a plane loaded with explosives into the area. Also among the dead was Secretary of the Treasury Eva Hudson. The Pentagon is working with the other branches of government to maintain the continuity of our federal government. A pivotal ceremony at the Lincoln Memorial will take place before ten a.m. today. There are no further details available at this time.

  “It never occurred to you to postpone the press release?” Wainewright said.

  “We didn’t notice Dex was missing until eight minutes after it went out.”

  The idea had been to give the public three hours or so to absorb the grim news – just long enough for the Pentagon to spin Dex’s inauguration as a swift, necessary step to stabilizing the country. By the time opposing members of the Senate and the House figured out what had happened, they would realize that they were outnumbered, pitted against the Pentagon, the Judicial Branch, several members of Congress, and a reeling American public that would do anything for the sake of stability. If possession was nine-tenths of the law, then the White House would be theirs before anyone could contest it.

  At least that had been the plan.

  They stepped into a waiting elevator and descended four floors to the NMCC, where they would run the last stage of the operation.

  “And if Dex doesn’t show up?” Wainewright said.

  “He’ll show,” Farrell said. “We have the boy.”

  The elevator doors opened at the entrance to the NMCC vault. Two Ulysses MPs saluted as the Generals entered. A crew of fresh communications specialists was on duty. All had been hand-picked by Chris Abrams. The previous crew was still sequestered at Rapture Run, and would be held there until Wainewright could ascertain whether they could ever again rejoin the general military population. In the event that the 279 Ulysses and Armed Forces personnel at Rapture Run were deemed a security risk, Wainewright was prepared to flood the bunker with nerve gas, then bury the entire facility under five-hundred tons of lime, concrete and dirt.

  In the far corner of the cavernous command room, Abrams stood and saluted. He wore a black t-shirt and forest green cargo pants. On his right cheek was a four-inch square bandage that covered a grenade wound he had taken during the firefight in Baltimore. Wainewright and Farrell made eye contact with Abrams, but did not acknowledge him in front of the staff. Instead they went into a private conference room and waited for Abrams to follow.

  As a rule, they treated Abrams like a walking weapon of mass destruction. His reputation in the mercenary trade was without equal, and he made as much money as the CEOs of many Fortune 500 companies. That made him far too dangerous to risk any public association. Until now, they had never met him in person. Instead they used pawns such as Corporal Hammond to deliver messages back and forth and negotiate payments. With Hammond now dead and the other intermediaries confined to Rapture Run, Wainewright and Farrell had no choice but to communicate with him directly. These were desperate times, and Abrams was the only person in the world they could trust to take out the remaining targets.

  As Abrams entered the room, the Generals watched him in the same way that a child might watch an exotic tiger in a zoo. He closed the door and sat at the far end of the conference table. Then he pulled a meal substitute bar from his pocket and began eating.

  “You need to finish the job you were hired to do,” General Wainewright told him.

  The mercenary’s mouth was full as he spoke. “If you had kept tighter reigns on your Treasury Secretary, General, Angie Jackson would be pushing up daisies.”

  Farrell, who prided himself on knowing when to play yin to Wainewright’s yang, jumped in. “Let’s just focus on next steps.”

  “We’re tracking Blake Carver and his little entourage,” Abrams said.

  Wainewright was outraged. “Tracking them? I want Eva Hudson’s head on my desk. Kill them now.”

  “Not yet, General. First, Agent Carver will lead us to Julian Speers.”

  “Exactly,” Farrell chimed in. “Speers wasn’t even on the original target list. But it’s clear that he’s going to be hugely disruptive.”

  “Unacceptable,” Wainewright insisted. “I want immediate gratification.”

  Now finished with his meal, Abrams put a boot up on the table. His pant leg raised up just high enough for the Generals to glimpse his ankle holster. Farrell didn’t have to look at Wainewright to sense his displeasure. He had already told the Chairman that terminating Abrams after the operation was not an option, since he claimed to have an elaborate scheme of retribution planned in the event that he was double-crossed.

  Abrams remained calm. “It will happen like this. I will direct the operation from here. Our ground troops will corner them. Then we’ll deploy the USOC team to take them out.”

  “You’re scared. Otherwise you’d do this yourself.”

  The mercenary’s face grew surly. It was true. Agent Carver had gotten the better of him in Baltimore. He had been lucky to escape with his life. Still, he didn’t appreciate being called a pussy.

  “Chris,” Farrell chimed in, “I think what General Wainewright is trying to say is that he’d like you to handle this personally.”

  “Fine,” Abrams said. “But it’s going to cost you.”

  *

  Haley Ellis watched as the tall, sinewy bald man with pockmarked skin sat at a laptop computer linked into the network. The monitors around the room lit up with headshots of Eva Hudson, Agent Carver, Agent O’Keefe and Julian Speers. Abrams addressed the room. “These are the people we’re looking for,” he announced. “You can begin sharing these profiles with our Ulysses field operatives.”

  Ellis watched helplessly as the message was dispatched to public and private units all over the city. The message below each read: WANTED FOR CONSPIRACY TO ASSASSINATE THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. LETHAL FORCE AUTHORIZED.

  She jumped in her seat as a hand touched her shoulder. She looked up and locked eyes with General Farrell. “Miss Ellis,” he said as he towered over her. His breath smelled like eggs Benedict and coffee. “I’m afraid there have been some changes in the command structure. Perhaps no one notified you. The NIC is no longer welcome here.”

  Force a smile, she told herself. “I’m aware of that, General. But I worked with Agent Carver at CIA, and I thought I could be of some help here today.” It was the truth. Before accepting the post at NIC, Ellis had made a career stop at CIA, where she and Carver had worked two cases together. She watched as Wainewright chewed on the answer. She had no intentions of helping the investigation, but it was essential that she buy some time. She had to figure out what the Joint Chiefs were up to and get word to the Director.

  “We already know a great deal about Agent Carver,” Farrell said.

  It was time to improvise. “We’ve implemented n
ew facial recognition software onto the network over at NIC,” she said, referring to the network of surveillance cameras in the Capitol. “The system is barely out of beta mode, but it’s already very effective. I think it could help us locate the targets.”

  Farrell nodded slowly. “Very well. You can stay.”

  U.S.S. Ronald Reagan

  The Mediterranean

  From his perch on the carrier’s massive bridge, Captain White watched the Israeli coast burn as bright as an Arizona sunrise. His staff watched live footage of an Egyptian trawler firing rocket-propelled grenades at a Ferry full of Israeli citizens. Egypt had not officially joined Iran, Syria, Hezbollah or HAMAS in declaring war on Israel, but it had also done nothing to stop wave after wave of private Egyptian vessels with armed citizens taking potshots at the exodus of Israeli refugees.

  The U.S. was still sitting on the sidelines. White couldn’t believe it.

  “We’re tracking fifty-six boats leaving Tel Aviv,” the Ensign reported. “All full of civilians. All packed to the gills.”

  “I see ‘em,” Captain White said as he followed the real-time satellite feed.

  The carnage was happening well within striking distance of White’s strike group, but he was powerless to do anything. All the treaties and alliances in the world seemed to have been tossed on the trash heap without explanation. If his orders stood, every one of those refugee boats would be sunk.

  The U.S.S. Reagan’s official motto was Peace Through Strength. Yet Admiral Bennington had ordered the carrier strike group to move out to international waters. The best White could do was cite engine problems with one of the CSG’s destroyers, using this as an excuse to remain in the theatre. Bennington had not demanded a more detailed report, and Captain White took that to mean that his heart was not entirely into the order for defiance of the NATO pact either. White was going to maintain his position as long as he could and hope for a reversal.