***
Kwong Chong Lee wondered why a woman as ill as the last passenger had felt such an urgency to attend a low key ceremony like this one. “Ibn Battuta Mall, please,” he instructed the driver. The Mall was a magnet for Orientals who loved the Japanese Gardens and ethnic restaurants. Lee knew that if he was traced back to the Mall there would be a dozen men who fitted his description there. He, on the other hand, would not go into the Mall at all, but he would use his Gold travel card to take the Metro to Business Bay, where his car was parked. He hoped that he had thought of everything.
Kwong Chong Lee touched the screen of his iPhone and it came alive, showing the time as 13:23 and asking for a time delay period; he typed in ten minutes. He would be well on his way to Ibn Battuta by the time the bus exploded.
***
Todd and Max abandoned the Pajero in front of the marquee, much to the annoyance of a loud Indian security guard. Jamie was just a few steps ahead of them, arguing with a security guard who was refusing to allow her to go dockside. As Todd and Max arrived they flashed the warrant cards which had been given to them that morning by the Brigadier so that they could gain entry to the Schools Symposium cordon. The guard looked at them, nodded, and let the threesome through.
“The bomb must be on one of these buses,” Jamie said breathlessly. “The drivers are all gathered together in a huddle over there.” She headed off towards a small gathering of Indian school bus drivers.
“Please return to your buses immediately,” Max ordered in as authoritarian a voice as he could muster. The men did not move. Todd stood in front of the men and opened his jacket to reveal a Sig Sauer P226 pistol. “Now!” he said loudly.
The men scurried back to their buses. There were eleven buses in total, but only ten drivers. As they each took to their driver’s seats Todd raced to the empty bus. It had BASA stencilled on the side. He walked up the side of the bus and, using his knife, he began to remove the stencilling. The vinyl began to peel away, leaving yellow paint underneath. Todd swore under his breath.
Running along the line of buses, Max stopped at a large bus which also bore the BASA acronym. He took hold of the driver’s arm and said, “Come with me.”
The driver complied without complaint. They stood in front of the Nissan school bus. “Is this one of your buses?” Max demanded to know. The driver looked closely at the bus, and shook his head.
“No, sir. We have thirteen buses, but all are much larger than this. No, we have no Nissan buses.”
“Run down the line of buses and tell your friends to get as far away from this bus as they can, do you understand?” Max said. The man nodded vigorously and raced away.
Max jumped into the bus with Todd, looking for signs of explosives, but there were none. Todd noticed a piece of new white flat conduit, the type used in buildings to contain wiring. Using his knife, he pried off the plastic, which had been glued on. Beneath there were wires running into the air conditioning compartments and down under the seat to a welded metal box. Todd took in a deep breath, then exhaled slowly, trying to steady his nerves.
“Max, I daren’t cut any wires. I might trigger the bomb. We need to move the bus.”
“We need to get off the bus. It could go up at any minute!” Max said urgently. He leaned out of the door and pointed to a large group which was making its way towards the parked buses. Jamie, who was waiting outside the bus, followed the direction in which he pointed as he gasped, “Warn them!”
The three of them looked on in horror as sailors in dress whites and a large number of children headed in their direction. There must have been over a hundred people in the blast area. Now they had no option but to move the vehicle.
“We’ll move the bus, you clear the crowd,” Max offered gallantly, but Jamie shook her head.
“No time, Max, unless you can hot wire a bus as fast as I can, and that isn’t likely.” The two men ran towards the bus exit, deciding that the next best option was to move the crowd very rapidly.
“Here, use this,” Jamie said as they passed her. Todd took the leather wallet containing Jamie’s gold shield from NYPD. It had no validity in Dubai, but it was shiny and it looked authoritative, and the American sailors would recognise it instantly.
Todd and Max ran at the oncoming crowd, flashing the badge and yelling, “Police! Get back to the ship, you are in danger!”
Sailors, used to obeying barked orders, shepherded and carried the children out of harm’s way, finally realising the danger.
Todd kept the crowd moving whilst Max tried to intercept the only two men heading towards the bus - Admiral Trey Jackson and Ron Styles, the Consular official.
“There’s a bomb on one of the school buses! You must go back!”
“Who are you?” demanded the Admiral.
“We’re special agents, and one of us is trying to move the bus before it goes up. This isn’t a drill, sir. This is real.”
The bus revved up and the clock showed 13:31. They were now eight minutes into the ten minute countdown, but there was no way for anyone to know that, except The Shadow.
“Jamie has the bus going,” Max stated. “We need to get away.”
“Jamie Johnson?” Styles asked as he pushed by Max, abandoning his cane and running towards the mobile bomb. Max and the Admiral had no alternative but to follow.
Jamie had managed to get the bus started, but her arm could not move the gear stick; she was just too weak. Tears of frustration flowed down her cheeks.
Ron Styles was the first one to the bus, followed by Max and the Admiral. He gently lifted Jamie from the driver’s seat as she struggled to remain where she was.
“Gentlemen, please carry this brave lady to safety,” he said calmly. “I’ll take the bus to the far end of the dock and take cover.”
The Admiral and Max did as they were asked, but Max felt compelled to say, “Sir, you do realise…..”
“It’s OK, I realise the risks. Now, go!” The gears crunched and the bus turned towards the far end of the dock, which was thankfully empty. Max watched the brave Consul drive away, wondering whether he would make it out alive and realising that the Consul was doing what needed to be done, in the full knowledge that his was likely to be a suicide mission. The two men half carried an exhausted Jamie towards safety.
“So far, so good,” Ron said out loud to himself, wondering why, as an overweight, balding diplomat, he should be risking his life with a wife and four kids at home. He was bordered on one side by the sea and on the other by a large warehouse building, and so straight ahead was his only option, but even that option would soon run out as the roadway was blocked by an empty crane. He decided that he would abandon the bus there and find cover, diving into the sea if he had to.
Ron was almost at the end of his run when a door slid open to his right and around fifty workers walked out onto the dock, looking in his direction. He would have sworn loudly if he wasn’t a Mormon Bishop in his spare time. Suddenly, from somewhere close behind him, he heard a loud click, and he knew he had only one option.
***
The fitters and welders were pleased to be leaving the stuffy workshop for an hour, and were looking forward to a break in the fresh air when they saw a yellow school bus careering towards then at speed. Then, as they froze, certain they were to die, the man in the bus turned the wheel forcefully to the left, and the bus began to turn away from them but towards the sea.
***
Ron thanked the Lord that he had been able to spare the men their lives and looked on without concern as the bus headed off the jetty and into the Gulf, which was fifteen metres deep here. He had made his peace with God long ago, and he felt a sudden, unexpected peace overcome him as the tyres screeched and the front wheels left the ground.
Ron let the wheel go, folded his arms and closed his eyes. His silent prayer had only got as far as ‘Heavenly Father, please look after Marissa and the children…” when the bus was engulfed in a fireball that tore the bus apart and incinerated its
only occupant.
The bus crashed into the water and turned it into a broiling, seething mass before erupting like a volcano as the remainder of the explosives were detonated.
The workmen on the jetty were flung to the floor by the power of the shock wave, many losing their hearing when their eardrums burst, some being cut with flying debris.
Water, glass and shards of metal flew high into the air. Hot metal embedded itself in the wooden elements of the jetty, whilst other shards of white hot metal welded themselves to the steel jetty supports.
***
Everyone’s eyes had turned to watch the slow, almost balletic, pirouette of the bus as it closed in on the water, and then they shied away in horror as it lit up like a torch. The explosion, still deafeningly loud from almost half a mile away, rocked even the seasoned sailors. Jamie buried her head in the shoulder of Admiral Jackson, who looked on in a mixture of awe and sadness.
“Goodbye, Ron,” he mouthed almost silently. “It was an honour to know you.”
***
Six miles away at Ibn Battuta, the countdown reached zero and the Shadow listened but heard nothing. Not to worry. He hadn’t expected to. He just smiled to himself.
Chapter 32
Apartment above The Madrassa, Al Safa, Dubai:
26th February; 2pm.
Mullah Khaweini had always felt like an outsider in Islam. It was true that the faith welcomed converts, but the Imams and Mullahs always viewed converts from the West with some suspicion. Khaweini had raised millions of dollars for the Jihad with his criminal scams in Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Qatar, but he always felt that he had to do more to win the approbation of his peers in the leadership of Al Qaeda.
At a meeting in Pakistan a year before, he had listed the achievements of his group; over four hundred young men radicalised, three of his students had become martyrs in Europe, dying to further the cause, and, he had raised $6.2 million. His immediate superior, and the second most wanted man in Al Qaeda, shrugged off his achievements by noting that in 2011 alone four Saudi sympathisers had given that amount each when some American or Western Government had slighted them, thwarted their plans or had otherwise annoyed them. Khaweini wanted to mention that the sympathisers in question would give six million and by the end of the week the interest from their oil investments would have replaced it, and that his money was hard earned, but he said nothing.
Televisions were banned in the grounds of the Mosque and the Madrassa and so Khaweini was watching a live news feed on the internet, and the first reports had not been good. The reporter had announced that, although there were rumoured to be many injuries, the death toll was thought to be small, perhaps less than five. Khaweini was not too discouraged, as the local news channels often underplayed serious security issues. Nonetheless, he was still watching when there was a tap at his door.
The door opened and Samir, who taught Islamic History, slipped into the room, closing the door quietly behind him.
“Mullah, you have a problem with the council.”
“What? The council are in session? How? And why am I not invited?”
“The meeting is about you, Mullah. I fear you are about to be suspended by the council.” Samir cowered as the Mullah raged.
“These men are cowards and supplicants of the playboy princes of Islam! They have always been uncomfortable with Jihad and with radicalisation, but why raise their concerns now, when we are on the cusp of achieving so much?”
“The suspension is not due to the plans for Dubai, it is due to allegations of abuse and homosexual rape of one of the students.” Jamal looked directly into the Mullah’s eyes for any sign of guilt, and he was rewarded. It was brief and transient, but it was there.
“This is insanity! I am a chosen vessel for Allah, a soldier of the Jihad. Why would I stoop to below the lowest, Samir? Tell me that.”
“We were told that Child Protective Services were outside the Mosque this morning. An investigator was looking for Jamil, but he is at the hospital in protective custody.”
“Nonsense! He is at the hospital because he is ill. Isn’t he?”
Samir shook his head. “Mullah, it appears that Jamil asked to be taken to a place of safety, and the hospital was chosen. The illness was just a cover story.”
“This smells of Javid. It has his Western sympathiser stink all over it. When does the council rule, Samir?”
“Within the hour, Mullah. Then you will have no protection from the civil police or authorities.”
***
Fifteen minutes later, with Samir back in council, Khaweini had packed his bags and was halfway through overwriting his computer hard drive. He had been provided with software that deluged the formatted drive with nonsensical digital data, mostly random 1’s and zeroes, seven times before shutting down. Any original data would be so fragmented as to be useless, even to the most skilled forensic technicians.
He picked up his mobile phone and spoke to his sponsor at the Madrassa, who was angry on Khaweini’s behalf.
“Do they not know that these simple farm boys lie to get out of their duty as warriors for Islam? They are cowardly and craven and I do not see how the council could doubt you.” He paused. “Especially when we are only days away from our goal. Today, many Americans will have died, and by the end of the month the remainder will be running back to their homeland, fear etched on their hearts.”
“I cannot be distracted, father of my soul, I must leave and carry on the Jihad. We are so close. But I fear that my absence will be portrayed falsely as guilt of this heinous crime,” Khaweini said respectfully.
“My son, you must do God’s will. May Allah bless your efforts. Go. We will defend your honour.”
Within the hour Khaweini would be at the safe house he had purchased with funds he pilfered from the Jihadist bank accounts. He believed it was right and proper for him to do so, as he was in the pursuit of a righteous cause.
***
Jamie was on her way back to the hospital, although she had argued so vigorously that she had to be sedated first. She believed she was being given simple pain relief, but there was more in the syringe than she knew.
Todd and Max had been detained, and were awaiting representatives of law enforcement to question them. The Sheikh had assured them that they would be free to go once they had been debriefed.
In the immediate aftermath of the explosion everyone had been ushered onto the Enterprise, out of harm’s way. The vessel was secure and was protected at all times in port by armed guards. The sailors had tried to make the unexpected visit to the Aircraft Carrier seem like an adventure, but many of the smaller children just wanted their mothers.
Max and Todd stood on the afterdeck and looked at the water where the bus had gone down. Ron Styles was one hell of a man. He must have known from the moment he put that bus in gear he was a dead man, but he got on with the job without a complaint. In fact, as Max noted, his concern was for Jamie, who received the man’s last ever smile as she turned around to wish him luck.
“We were lucky, Todd. It doesn’t feel like any kind of luck I’ve ever encountered, but luck it is, all the same.”
Todd nodded. Had it not been for the heroics of Jamie and Ron Styles, dozens if not hundreds of kids and sailors would have been killed or maimed. Todd shuddered at the thought.
***
The Shadow was back in Business Bay and was livid. The second instalment of his payment had not been wired to his account. At first he had thought it was because only one lousy American had died, but that was not the case, according to the bank. All that the Bank of Burundi would say was that they had a wire transfer approved but the account had been rendered inoperative earlier that day. They would not say why. Kwong Chong Lee tried Khaweini’s phone for the fourth time in as many minutes. If the man did not pick up soon, Chong would invoke the cloud protocol and seek the man that way.
***
Khaweini had walked across the park to the prayer room in the facility buildings. He enter
ed as a Mullah, dressed in full robes, and emerged casually dressed in khaki shorts, Ralph Lauren polo shirt and a baseball cap. His hair was tied in a ponytail. With his large Ray Ban sunglasses, he was almost unrecognisable. By tonight, the beard and hair would be gone. It was strictly against his beliefs, but he had a greater cause - the downfall of Dubai - and in order to achieve that, he had to become a Brit again.
Khaweini adopted a mid-Atlantic accent as he instructed the taxi driver to take him to the Mall of the Emirates, from where he would walk to his safe house.
“Where are you coming from, sir?” the Indian driver enquired, in a clumsy attempt to build a rapport worthy of a tip.
“I, my man, am a citizen of the world, but I was born in England.”
“You like cricket, sir? England do good now…” The conversation consumed the fifteen minute taxi ride.
***
Todd and Max had been kept waiting for hours, and they were tired. The rush of adrenaline they had experienced earlier had evaporated, and their blood sugar was low as they needed to eat.
The school buses had all gone, and the two friends were sitting in a cabin on board the Enterprise with a sailor standing guard at the door. They had been told that they were not prisoners, but that the guard was there to assist them because it was easy to get lost on board the giant carrier.
“Todd, I am not at all comfortable with this. I just don’t understand what Khaweini was thinking. Why import a huge amount of explosives and use them all in killing school kids? It doesn’t make any sense.”
“US school kids in the main, Max. He was striking back at the Great Satan.”
“But why the overkill? It would still have had the desired effect if he killed a handful of innocent kids. I still don’t get it. Unless….”
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