The Kill Button

by Tom Hron

  Is any of this real? wondered Harry as he watched Espargos disappear behind him. The president’s assassination was almost surely imminent and, unhappily, he’d started dwelling on Catherine again, leaving his mind stuck somewhere between heaven and hell. He had only six hours or so to get a grip on himself and decide on his next move or it would be too late. The critical thing was to remember that spies and political saboteurs always worked from the inside.

  CHAPTER 25

  ARLINGTON, VIRGINIA

  It was pitch-black above the ocean, but when you looked up the Airbus’s contrails were like bright strings in the sky. Air France 711 was on its way to the Dulles International Airport, just outside of Washington. Manassas was only 15 miles farther south, an ideal situation for what he had in mind, thought Harry. He set the Gulfstream’s engines at max-climb thrust, let the airspeed build to the mach speed limit, and started climbing. In an hour or so, he’d be right on the Airbus’s tail.

  “How close will you get?” Alexis’s eyes beamed like a child’s in the co-pilot’s seat. Harry had told her that she could get some “right-seat” time if she could come up with a flight into Dulles that he could intercept somewhere over the North Atlantic. It had only taken her a few minutes with Shawki’s laptop to find a flight number and the departure time of one out of Paris. The intercept afterward had been a simple matter of math, something he’d done countless times as a fighter pilot. “Fifty feet lower and a little way back,” he replied, “almost the same as for refueling in flight.”

  Shawki was in the cockpit’s jump seat and answered for him. “We turned off our transponder when we left Espargos and stayed low, and radar coverage is always poor out over the Atlantic. Now we’ll hide in Air France’s transponder signal, and its bloom will hide us completely, actually.”

  “I have to learn to fly, because I absolutely love this,” announced Alexis, though as much to herself as anyone. Her eyes were darting from the instrument panel to the windscreen and back again. The Airbus was getting closer.

  “What are Joe and Sweet Lips doing in back?” Harry set the auto-throttles to maintain the rate of climb.

  Shawki laughed. “Joe’s sleeping while the dogs are watching Sweet Lips, and the poor man can’t move without them growling at him.”

  Glancing into the cabin, Harry saw that Joe was fast asleep on the couch. The Frenchman was frozen in his chair with Cochise and Geronimo lying in front of him, and if he so much as took a deep breath, their heads snapped up.

  At 31,000 feet he caught the Air France flight, reset the auto-throttles to cruise, and switched the radios so he could monitor air traffic control. Now there was nothing to do but wait. Alexis’s eyes grew large as the Airbus’s tail loomed just ahead. “Don’t you have to fly the airplane?” she asked nervously. “We’re awfully close.”

  “No, pilots can’t fly as well as flight directors, seeing as everything’s so computerized.”

  She didn’t look so sure about flying now.

  Harry glanced into the cabin again, then motioned Shawki to close the cockpit door. “We need to talk,” he explained.

  When the door was closed, he faced Alexis. “Listen, how did Sweet Lips learn we had gone after the Dragon? We didn’t even know until the last minute that we were going.”

  “I’ve been wondering about that as well…” said Alexis as if she were a bit nonplused. “He could only have guessed if he had somehow been told that I had returned to Washington and telephoned Jefferies. That was the only time we were in the same orbit. Otherwise, we were like different planets.”

  Shawki’s eyes narrowed. “He is connected to Jefferies some way possibly?”

  Harry shook his head. “Jefferies is the one who first recruited me. We can almost certainly trust him, and besides, he loved Catherine and I don’t think would have hurt her for the world.” Then he remembered what complete fools both had been and added, “At least, not knowingly.”

  “You said back in Manama only two people knew that you were a counteragent.” Shawki’s voice was not much louder than a whisper. “Who was the other person please?”

  It was Alexis’s turn to look surprised. “You’re a counteragent.” She beat the air with her fist. “I knew it! When I stayed in Dumfries that one night I thought exactly that, and now I see that I had guessed right.”

  Shawki wasn’t giving up. “Harry, who is the second person?”

  “I told Joe yesterday—the president. I’m actually working for him. After Jefferies recruited me, the president secretly contacted me. We talked about his fears his administration was not only infected with foreign spies in high places, but also the State Department, the CIA, and the NSA, among other agencies, were out to destroy him. The State Department and the CIA in particular are full up with his political enemies, example being, every time he turns around the New York Times or the Washington Post are running articles that attack him and his policies, particularly on foreign affairs and terrorism. These stories are often based on leaks of classified information, and in many cases make it impossible for him to govern. He was certain the Aurora project would expose some of them, since it represents the kind of technology that many don’t think we should have unless the rest of the world has the same thing. Half of Washington thinks we’re the evil empire, and the town has become a dangerous place. It doesn’t make any difference which political party holds the presidency, the other side is out for blood.”

  For a moment Shawki and Alexis, faces agape, looked as if they needed oxygen. Finally, Shawki recovered his senses and continued with his third degree. “The president said all this to you, warned about how much danger you might face.”

  “Well, no, not exactly, since we only talked once.” Harry frowned because of how utterly stupid he must have sounded. “Almost everything was coordinated through Jefferies. That’s why Skeleter knew so much, because of the wiretap Alexis told us about.”

  All of a sudden, she had a question. “Why did he choose you? Had Jefferies or he ever explained?”

  “He was sure there were spies left over from the past two or three administrations when he took office, since all of them had been so chummy with the Chinese, and they and the Russians had previously stolen so much classified information. Nuclear secrets, bugs in the State Department, maybe even planted there by the CIA, missing computers, Aldrich Ames and Robert Hanssen, classified files on terrorism, the list goes on and on. He felt certain they’d go after the Aurora next.” Harry shrugged one shoulder. “I was in place as the test pilot and he once flew fighters, which most people don’t remember, so that played a big part as well.”

  “But they shot you down,” Shawki said sharply. “It doesn’t make any sense.”

  “I don’t think they meant to,” answered Harry. “I screwed them up when I tried saving the airplane. I’m convinced Skeleter and General Drucker had planted some kind of homer in the Aurora and once it was lost in space the Russians or Chinese could have gone up after it. Hell, we don’t even have the Space Shuttle anymore, meanwhile their space programs, despite being more primitive, are doing just fine.”

  Alexis scrunched up her face. “Yuck, their intentions were to have you run out of life support and die a slow death. They would have opened the Aurora in a space walk and thrown you out into your own little orbit.” Then she shook her head. “Oh, well, at least you would have been cremated in a blaze of glory once your orbit had deteriorated enough. What a way to go.”

  Alexis’s dark humor silenced them—all three being reminded that death had never been far away in the past few days. They were being educated in a deadly game where they could never be sure of the players or rules, one where even if they were right they still could be wrong. They were being hurled through events where treachery was the rule and the truth was illusory. They were playing a game of Russian roulette with a half-full cylinder. Spin it again and see how everything works out.

  Alexis was the first to shake the creeps. “My God, then who do we have in back?” she a
sked quickly. “He can’t possibly be with the Mossad.”

  “For all I know he might be the one who’s SiddhArtha, not Skeleter as I said before,” answered Harry. “My guess is he’s an ex-Soviet KGB agent who now works for the FSB, the Federal Security Bureau, the successor agency for Russia. They’re the only ones with the best advanced technology to have recovered the Aurora, and Skeleter has probably worked for them for twenty years.”

  Alexis looked like a ghost. “He would have killed me, since I knew too much.”

  “Yes, when he thought it was safe to do so.” Harry let the moment hang. “He and his girlfriend thought they had you cold, but you crossed them up. I think they meant to give you a week or so and then do it. They couldn’t instigate a FBI chase to corroborate your guilt, help you escape, then kill you right away. They thought they could find you and do it later.”

  “I kept doubling back and then switched cars.”

  Shawki looked like he needed Xanax. “I don’t understand. Why didn’t they just let the FBI catch her? End of problem, yes?”

  Harry shook his head. “That’s got me stymied as well. It can only mean they didn’t want her talking about the leprosy, which makes me wonder why. You said it had been salvaged long ago, so we’re missing something important.”

  “Like who’s got it?” Alexis stared from one to the other.

  Her question stopped them dead, leaving the cockpit quiet with the slipstream as the only sound. Finally, Shawki broke the silence with a glance at Harry. “Why did the Frenchman come after us when we were searching for the Black Dragon, rather than Skeleter or Reechi?”

  “Well, it would have been almost impossible for them to leave the White House on a moment’s notice without a hell of a good reason,” said Harry. “Skeleter and the Aurora, Reechi being on the Lincoln, Catherine and Drucker dead. The president has to be super suspicious of them by now. Way too many coincidences.” Then he felt his fear rise again. “That’s why I told Joe that I thought they will try assassinating him.”

  “My God,” Alexis said with alarm, “we have to do something. Can’t you call him?”

  “I don’t dare because this has gotten so complicated. I was given an identification code to use if I thought there was an extreme emergency, and the call was to go to the president’s nuclear football, the secure Satcom radio and handset that’s never more than a few feet away from his side. A military aide keeps it in a special briefcase. Jefferies and the president believed that would be the safest place to call, since there’s nothing more secure in the world.”

  “Then why don’t you call?” cried Alexis.

  “Remember when I asked you to tell us absolutely everything on our way to New York? Who were the three men in the first meeting that you had with the CIA, when you were accused of murdering Chambers?”

  “Magruder, Reechi, and Scirpo.”

  “Scirpo, what does he do?”

  “He’s the director of the National Security Agency.”

  “The one that everyone once called the No Such Agency, before all the political wrangling and news stories about wiretaps.” Harry glanced at her. “Come on, Alexis, you’re better at this stuff than me. Didn’t you think it was a little odd that he was over at Langley? Now tell me what the NSA does every day. Think.”

  All at once her face looked frozen. “They distribute the daily codes to the White House, the ones for the football.”

  Harry dejectedly shook his head. “I can’t call because Scirpo must be in the loop somewhere, and I’m almost sure he’s the one who had me shot down. No one knows more about computers, satellites, high-frequency radio waves, and lasers than the NSA. It makes sense.”

  “You’re driving me crazy, completely,” Shawki said. “First you told us that Skeleter was SiddhArtha.”

  “What’s the cliché©? I was stringing Sweet Lips along, since he’s all we have.”

  “If they kill the president, we’ll be blamed because we will look guiltier than they do. You stole a White House airplane. Alexis stole two cars, there’s three murders, the Dragon, who would ever believe that we’re innocent?”

  What could he say, Harry wondered, since the question was way beyond rhetorical?

  “How does the FBI fit in?” Alexis was now over his pop quiz. “They keep chasing us.”

  “Skeleter and Magruder are just using them. In the last few years the FBI hasn’t performed very well, with some of it being inherent, the best example being pre nine-eleven. They would likely run a nationwide manhunt for a miniature poodle if someone in the administration told them to. We’ve simply been made to look guilty, all part of the plan.”

  “What do we do?” asked Alexis sadly.

  “Frankly, I’m not sure,” said Harry. “Sweet Lips had two men inside his submersible who were probably Russian technicians, and we let them go. I’m sure by now Skeleter and his pals have been told we’re on our way back.”

  “But that puts the president at even greater risk,” exclaimed Alexis.

  “I can only pray he’s up to speed.” Then a resolute mind-set settled over Harry like the single-mindedness he always felt before one of his test flights. At some point, you simply made things happen, even though you knew the ending might not come out the way you wanted.

  “The president told me to do whatever was necessary to expose the spying and political sabotage in his administration. Now I have an even more important reason, since someone murdered Catherine.”

  “Don’t forget Dewey,” Alexis said quietly.

  Afterward all three realized there was little more to say.

  A few hours later Harry repositioned himself in his seat when he heard a radio exchange between ATC and Air France.

  “Seven-eleven, descend and maintain two-zero thousand.”

  “Roger, maintain two-zero thousand, Seven-eleven.”

  The Airbus reduced power and Harry followed, keeping the Gulfstream close behind the passenger jet. He doubled-checked that his navigation light and strobes were switched off, then turned to Alexis. “We’re starting our approach into Dulles, so ask Joe to come up front. I’ll need his help.”

  She took Joe’s place in back, the dogs went on alert, and the Gulfstream’s cabin crackled with tension. Then air traffic control handed off 711 to approach control and Harry switched frequencies as well. “I’ve set our radar to ground tracking,” he explained to Joe, “and when I see Chesapeake Bay we’ll do an emergency descent to just over the water. Approach will see us on radar but won’t quite know what to think when they lose us at the lower altitude, so help with any conflicting traffic. We’ll keep our lights off.”

  The city lights of Baltimore and Washington glowed on the dark horizon. The Airbus’s tail became more obscure as both airplanes descended. When the octopus-shaped coves of the east shore of the Chesapeake shone on the Gulfstream’s radar, Harry dropped full flaps and gear, then chopped power. The bottom fell out of the airplane, causing Alexis and the Frenchman to cry out a little.

  Approach control instantly radioed, “Seven-eleven, traffic at six-o’clock, less than a mile.”

  “Ah, looking but no contact, Seven-eleven.”

  Harry watched the Gulfstream’s altimeter spin backward.

  “Seven-eleven, turn right two-eight-zero.”

  “Roger, two-eight-zero, Seven-eleven.”

  “Traffic is now at four o’clock and two miles.”

  “Still looking, Seven-eleven.”

  Harry guessed that approach control would think a Cessna or Piper without a transponder had come off a small general aviation airport and had inadvertently climbed into the controlled airspace, then dropped back down. They would alert the Department of Defense, but by the time the F-15s got into a position to look, he’d be gone. He set a course for Manassas and a few minutes later landed, taxied in, and shut down.

  “Joe, take Sweet Lips out and watch him.” He then turned to Alexis. “Let’s make sure that no one’s around and then steal a second car. Let’s get a move on b
ecause I don’t want to hang around here any longer than necessary.”

  It took them only a few minutes to find the key for an older Ford minivan near where Alexis had stolen the Oldsmobile. Harry, being the tallest, had run his fingers along the slots in the cargo rack on top, and sure enough, a spare key had been hidden there. He told everyone to jump in and off he went toward Old Town Manassas. They found the brown Chevy that Alexis had ditched right where she’d left it, although they didn’t stop the first time they drove by. Harry drove around the block, dumped Joe off, and told him to check out the area. This is the last place anyone would expect us, but let’s not take any chances, he explained. A few minutes later they picked up Joe and he said everything looked clear. Harry then let the minivan fall silent. “All right, Sweet Lips, we know who you are,” he said in a harsh voice.

  There wasn’t a sound.

  “You and I will drive back to Washington in the Chevy.” He next let the news sink in. “I wonder what Skeleter, Magruder, and Scirpo will think when they see us riding together.”

  “You have it all wrong,” said the Frenchman, “because I’m on your side.”

  “We think that you had a homer installed in the car and the moment we start out they’ll know, and it won’t be what they expect.”

  Another dead silence.

  “They won’t be able to stand it, and one of them will have to investigate,” continued Harry. “They will believe that you sold them out, just so I wouldn’t kill you in revenge for Catherine’s murder. Why else would we be riding around together?”

  “Your imagination is running wild, so give it up. I’m not whom you think.”

  “Then why were your men trying to kill us at the Dragon? That wasn’t nice.”

  “Maybe they were just a little overzealous. I told them that we wanted to reach the Black Dragon first.”