Disruption: A River Of Secrets And Betrayal

by J. B. Jamison

  "A boat." Dasilva once again smiled, but Emily was rolling to fast to see it.

  "It’s a boat. Like you said, they're just moving up the river like everyone else, with no one paying any attention to them. No one notices, and no one cares. Yes...they are as good as invisible." It all comes out fast and clear, just like she's hearing it from her mind. She smiles because she can actually see the thing slowly passing through the city, doing what every other boat does; almost.

  "Ok, let's assume it could be a boat,” Dasilva said. “Do you realize how many boats go up and down the river every day, or even each hour?"

  "No!" Emily wasn't talking to Agent Arturo any longer. She was putting pieces together and throwing them out there for anyone listening.

  "Think about it. Just for a minute, think about it. If you wanted to put these things under bridges, why would you use the roads? Like you said, we monitor transportation of that stuff, doing it that way would be way too tough."

  The transportation people nodded and smiled at the compliment.

  "So why not just use the river? And if you don't want to be seen, you don't want to use one of the big ships. The NRC people are likely to stop them and do a mandatory scan. No, that won't work."

  Now the NRC people were onboard.

  "So what would you do? You'd find the kind of boat that everyone sees every day, but that isn't part of the normal security process."

  "A tugboat!". Someone across the table said.

  "Well, a towboat. A tugboat usually works in a limited area and if it went further someone would notice. But a towboat is different. It goes anywhere, hell, everywhere, and nobody pays any attention. Our friends out there are using a towboat."

  Whatever Agent Dasilva may have wanted to do about this idea, the group around the table had already run with it.

  "Ok then, it’s an idea worth pursuing,” Dasilva said. “Those of you with the Corp of Engineers, what's the best way to start looking at boat traffic at those bridges; see if anything jumps out?"

  "It’s underway right now." Arthur Nichols, head of emergency management for the New Orleans District said as he stood, put his phone to his ear and left the room.

  "We'll pull more videos from the bridges;” someone from transportation said. “This time we’ll look at the river instead of the bridges themselves."

  Lennie turned to Emily, "Sorry Em, that time off is going to have to wait. You stirred this hornet's nest, so I suggest that you get to work and keep it going." He turned back to the table, "Don't you agree Agent Dasilva?"

  "What, oh yes, no question about it. I'll handle any questions about regulations." Agent Dasilva paused a moment to understand what he had just heard himself say.

  Agent Dasilva looked around as conversations and phone calls erupted throughout the room, "Ok, that should do it for now. We'll meet here again at five this afternoon; sharp." He rapped his knuckle on the table for his own satisfaction.

  Emily leaned back in her seat, exhausted. She looked at the floor and whispered, "Thanks pop!".

  Chapter 36

  "Agent Graham, may I have a moment?" Dasilva said as they moved from the table.

  "Of course."

  "I have to say that I am impressed, and more than a bit surprised."

  "Sir?"

  "From your record, you appeared to be a very capable agent, but one who hasn't shown the initiative, or the drive, to jump into the deep end of the pool; if you understand what I mean."

  "The deep end...?"

  "I mean, look, you excelled in training, but when it was time for placements, you had your pick of some of the hottest locations where you could really make a difference for the agency. But instead, you picked this place."

  "And what's wrong with...?"

  "Don't get me wrong. New Orleans is a great city, and there is certainly work to be done here, but there were other places that would have given you the opportunity to be more in the mix of things and build the kind of reputation that really gets you somewhere. I've just assumed you didn't have that kind of drive. But this morning you showed me that you can play the game when you need too."

  "Play the game? Sir, I don't think that..."

  "Agent Graham, please. I'm not criticizing your behavior this morning; just the opposite. I like to see initiative in a colleague. But, in the future, when you intend to..."

  "Agent Dasilva?" Arthur Nichols of the Corps of Engineers walked up.

  "Excuse me, can we talk for a moment, about the boat?"

  "Agent Graham is the person to talk with about that." Dasilva looked Emily, "We'll talk more later. Keep me in the loop."

  "Of course sir." Emily said, followed by a deep breath, "Arthur, how are we doing?"

  "I thought you might need rescuing there Emily. Our new leader seems to have it in for you."

  "You know me, Art. I always seem to bring out the best in people. But, thanks. So, what do you think about the boat?"

  "Hell of an idea, that's for sure. But it makes sense. They go up and down the river, hauling who knows what, and nobody pays much attention to them. We're probably talking about one of the long haul boats, right?"

  "Yeah, I think we start there. I mean, so far they've put these things under two or three bridges here, but who knows what the real plan is? I mean, what if they plan to hit every bridge from here to Cincinnati, or Minneapolis?"

  "Do you really think someone would be able to have that many of those devices?"

  "I don't know Art, but I think we start with the worst case in mind and hope we've overestimated. So yeah, we're looking for the kind of long-haul boat that runs the full length of the rivers. How many of those would you say there are anyway?"

  "Oh, it’s not bad; probably only a hundred or so."

  "Ok, then we start by looking for any that stand out somehow; and we just narrow it down."

  "We're on it. It’s just ten right now. How soon do you want an update?"

  "How about ten-fifteen?"

  "Right, there's no reason to rush things is there?"

  "Agent Graham, another minute please?" Dasilva returned.

  "Certainly sir."

  "Plans are in place to find that boat?"

  "Yessir, we're underway."

  "Good. Look, Graham, it’s your show. Your boss and I are going to be tied up dealing with media for a while. This thing is creating a feeding frenzy, and we’re getting yelled at by pretty much everyone. I just got a call from a senator demanding that we reopen the waterway to avoid crippling the entire southern part of the country. He accused us of creating another Katrina."

  "With radiation."

  "That doesn't seem to register with him. But I imagine his phone hasn't stopped ringing, so he's just passing the yelling along to us."

  "Aren't we lucky."

  "We’re going to be dealing with that for a while, so you're the point person on this for now."

  "Thank you, sir."

  "Don't thank me; it just makes sense. You also have the personal background with boats, so that might help. Besides, it looks like you're going to be around anyway, so you might as well show us what you can do."

  Emily was trying to decide if that was a compliment, a challenge, or a threat.

  "Just one thing Agent Graham."

  "Sir?"

  "No more surprises. If you get any more of those out-of-the-box ideas, you bring them to me first. Understand?"

  "Understood." Emily knew that understanding something did not necessarily mean that you were agreeing to do it.

  Emily smiled as she watched Dasilva walk toward the crowd of media, brushing the dust from his jacket, adjusting his tie and smoothing his hair.

  She felt the vibration and reached into her pocket for her phone. She looked at the caller ID, took a breath, and hit the button.

  "Emily? This is Linda at Torchwood. Do you have a minute?"

  Chapter 37

  Since Torchwood was on the way to the office, Emily did the math and figured she could spend fifteen minutes and
still get to the meeting with the behavioral team. Linda said her father had something important he needed to talk to her about, and they had to talk today.

  He was sitting in a wheelchair; dozing. She touched his shoulder. He raised his head, and a smile appeared on his face.

  "Hi, hun. Its good to see you."

  "Hi, dad. Getting a quick nap?"

  "Hey, I need you to bring me some more ice cream. You know, the bars with the peanuts? Not those other things...don't bring those. Nobody likes them."

  "I thought you liked those sandwich things."

  "Yeah, but nobody else does. They all like the peanut things, so bring more of those."

  "Ok, dad. I'll bring some the next time I come in. The nurse said there was something important you wanted to talk with me about."

  "Yeah, I need that ice cream. The boys will be coming around tonight, and I'm out."

  "That's what you needed to talk about?"

  "Yeah, well, there is one other thing. You need to call the home office and tell them they need to get off their asses and get me a cook that knows how to make coffee. I've not had one decent cup on this entire trip. You tell them they'll find this cook standing on the next lock wall we come to, and there had better be a new cook ready to get onboard; one who knows how to make a goddamn cup of coffee!"

  And that quickly, again, he was gone.

  "I'll get your ice cream dad, but I'm not sure I can get back here today."

  "What ice cream? Where's my shoes?"

  She gave him a hug and stepped into the hall.

  "Thanks for coming Emily, he wouldn't tell me anything but said it was important."

  "Yeah, he needs ice cream."

  "You're kidding. I'm sorry you came all the way for that. I didn't know."

  "Nah, it’s ok. It’s probably going to be the most sane moment of my day."

  Twenty minutes later she and Lennie stepped into the conference room the behavioral team had commandeered as their workspace.

  "Ok, everyone,” Lennie said, “as I said earlier, Agent Graham here will be the point person for the investigation. From here on, you report directly to her. I suggest you bring her up to speed with what you have so far."

  Lennie pointed Emily to the chair at the head of the table and kept talking.

  "Emily, you know Carrie Williamson, the team lead."

  "Carrie, why don't you bring Emily up to date."

  Carrie nodded and glanced at her notes as Lennie left the room.

  "I'll give you the key points, and then we can try to answer any questions you might have for us, or you can fill us in if we're missing things."

  "Sounds good."

  "First, we agree there are probably more devices out there. With the effort involved in the design and placement, and the lack of a clear payoff yet, it suggests something bigger than what we've seen so far. So, we do believe there are more devices; maybe a lot more."

  “Let me ask you something here,” Emily said. “We were just talking about the possibility of a towboat being used to place the devices. If that's true, a towboat could run the entire length of the river. How does that idea fit with your thinking?"

  "It is one very possible scenario. As I said, there must be some payoff for all this work, and it must be something big enough to merit the amount of effort involved. Nothing should be ruled out at this point."

  "Ok, got it. What next?"

  "The people behind this. The scale of this is significant, even with just the bridges involved so far. From designing the device, to securing the radioactive materials inside them, to transporting the devices to the river and placing them under the bridges; this would take a lot of people with a lot of knowledge, and some very specific levels of expertise. Someone had the engineering skills needed to design the devices. Someone had the expertise with radioactive materials to use it without getting killed in the process. Someone knew how to find the materials from a wide range of sources and then knew how to get them to the device builders. Finally, someone came up with the plan for placing the devices in some very public areas without being noticed."

  "So, its potentially a large group."

  "Absolutely." Another member of the team spoke. "If the method of placement is a towboat, it is unlikely that they have all of the devices on the boat at one time; the risk of being harmed or caught because of the radiation is just too high. That means there must be others who are getting the devices to the boat as they are needed, which involves moving a lot of devices over a lot of territory."

  "This is a group of very smart people," Carrie said. "And it’s a project that has been in the works for a long time."

  Emily looked up from her notes. "How long?"

  "Years. Just collecting this much radioactive material would take that long. There is a lot of it out there, but it’s usually in small amounts. That's the primary reason we've not seen more of this type of thing before."

  "That also explains the whole casserole idea." It was the other voice at the table again. "They collected what elements they could find, and just put them together to make the amounts needed for each device. We can also be secure in thinking that some of the material, if not most, came from outside the country."

  "You’re saying this could be more than a domestic act?" Emily felt the tingle on the back of her neck.

  "It can't be anything else. While the people leading it may well be domestic, which we don't know yet, the overall event reaches well outside the country."

  A few seconds of silence before Emily spoke.

  "Ok then, do we know anything yet about any of these people? Who they might be and so forth?"

  "We began with the person with nuclear expertise,” Carrie said, “since that is such a unique field. We have narrowed it down to five individuals we believe have the ability to be involved in something like this. They all have a background in academics and are involved in nuclear research projects, here and abroad. Arthur is leading the group following those leads." Carrie nodded to a young man at the other side of the table.

  "We should have more on them by afternoon." Arthur looked back to his laptop.

  "Second is the engineer who designed the container, which also calls for some very specific expertise in this situation. We have eleven individuals on the short list there, eight of whom are in academics and three in government work. Lesele is leading that search."

  "We just narrowed it to nine,” Lesele said. “All in academics. The others don’t have the mix of skills needed here."

  "Excellent." Carrie smiled. "Hopefully that will get even narrower this afternoon."

  "Just how do you narrow the search down from here?" Emily asked.

  "There are several things we look at. First, as I said, are basic skills. Does the individual have real expertise in the specific areas required for this event? Then we look at where the individual is, and in this case, where they have been for that past few years, and of course, where they are right now. We look at their personal backgrounds and history. Everything from their financial status, political status, their mental and emotional status, anything that might help create the picture of who the person really is, and what they might be capable of. And, we look for any connections with others, especially others on our short lists. That is key, and can raise someone to the top of our list very quickly."

  "Amazing."

  "It’s what we do. The group here is a mix of experts from a range of fields, from psychology to biology, to philosophy and religion, and even a couple of folks with interest in parapsychology."

  "You mean ESP and that kind of thing?" Emily asked.

  "Not that we necessarily accept them as having the same credibility as other scientific practices, but yes, we consider things like ESP and even things like witchcraft and Voodoo. Whether they are valid practices or not, they are belief structures that are common in the types of people we deal with. If we ignore them, we may miss information that leads directly to the person we need to find."

  "That may explain why
some people look at what you do as being a bit, uh, strange?"

  "Agent Dasilva, you mean?"

  "Hah, not necessarily him, but I do recall seeing a slight grin when he mentioned your involvement this morning."

  "Yes, we are used to it, though. The important thing is that we use whatever resources we can use to get into the head of the person we are looking for. If we can understand them, even if a part of their thinking is complete fantasy, then we can find them and help you guys stop them."

  "That works for me. So where do we go from here?"

  "We'll continue narrowing the lists, and will have an update for you this afternoon. If we find anything significant, I'll be in touch immediately."

  "I'll do the same."

  Emily and Carrie stood and shook hands, while the rest of the group went back to their various conversations and list-narrowing.

  "Before I go, can I ask you a question?" Emily glanced at the floor as she asked. "It’s kind of strange, but it sounds like that might be right up your alley."

  "Sure, what is it?"

  "Well, it’s my dad." Emily gave Carrie the brief history, ending with the visit just before this meeting.

  "That has to be difficult to deal with, especially with everything else going on." Carrie focused on the human side of things.

  "Yeah, it’s a challenge. But what I'm wondering is, the whole idea of the group using a towboat came from something dad said to me when we talked when he was in one of his rare lucid moments. He's still in there somewhere. I'm wondering if I ought to tell him more about this whole thing and see if, you know, if he has any ideas or something. I doubt he'll even understand, but I was just wondering."

  "Well, what have you got to lose? Some of the research on dementia is really fascinating, especially in patients who still have their clear moments. It seems that as the brain begins to lose connections in places, it actually creates new connections between things that hadn't been connected before."

  "Like when he talks about a dog he had but mixes up the time and place he had it."

  "Exactly. One theory is that memories are still there, but the roadmap has been changed, and one idea leads to one that was completely unrelated before. You might not learn anything at all, but I can't see that it would hurt anything if you told him about this."