Soft Target 01 - Soft Target

by Conrad Jones

  Step away from the vehicle. Lie down and place your hands behind your head!” A voice boomed in the parking garage. The low concrete ceilings made it echo. A man in a dark suit, white shirt and dark tie was pointing a gun at Mido’s head. It was a big gun and Mido froze. His mind was more confused now than ever. Had Allah read his mind and heard the doubts that were rattling around in his head? Mido thought that his lord had deserted him because he had failed his task. This was his punishment. “You need to lay down right now, Motherfucker, or we will shoot you!” The voice came from a second man and Mido looked in his direction. The second man looked identical to the first, except his gun was bigger.

  Mido stayed very still and looked from one agent to the next. He was terrified; he looked into the boot and saw the three bags that contained folded sniper rifles. He wished that he had stayed at home in his beloved Iraq. “Okay, I am surrendering. Please don’t shoot me.” Mido said as he moved to lie down. His hands were shaking with fear, and he could feel beads of sweat running down his face into his eyes. He tried to blink as the sweat stung his eyeballs. He moved slowly, trying to bend down but the small bag that he had removed earlier was in his way. Mido reached forward to move it.

  The two men in suits were NSA agents. They fired simultaneously, and Mido’s head exploded as the high velocity rounds smashed through his skull. All his confusion disintegrated into a red mist.

  CHAPTER 5

  Disney Aftermath

  Yasser sat on his motel bed watching the television and smoking a cigarette. CNN had a news loop that kept repeating itself. Each time it was replayed by the network, they were adding more information. As new information was gathered, it was added a piece at a time as the story unfolded. Initial reports thought that it was one bomb that had exploded in the Florida resort. The reports that followed insisted that it was three, and then possibly more. No one seemed to be sure at this stage exactly what had happened. The only certainty was that the bombs had caused death and destruction in the heart of an American tourist institution.

  `We have blown up Mickey Mouse. That’s like shooting Kennedy, or knocking down the World Trade Centre. Generations of people will remember this day,’ Yasser thought to himself as he watched the news loop around again. “Who is responsible for this outrage?” asked a reporter who was at the scene. The local police Chief was trying to give a brief outline statement of what they knew so far, but they did not know very much. Eyewitnesses had given frightened and confused testimony that a series of at least three explosions had killed and injured hundreds of innocent tourists. “It is too early to speculate at this time,” he replied; then he repeated the same answer to the next three questions.

  The truth was that it was impossible to know how many people were holidaying in the area at any one time. The weather had been hot and sunny that day. Tourists headed for the water parks at Blizzard Beach and Typhoon Lagoon in the afternoon to take advantage of the sunshine. Epcot, M.G.M. Studios and Animal Kingdom were all mostly daytime destinations. Downtown Disney had a combination of shopping and entertainment facilities which made it a perfect destination for families in the evenings, and it had been full.

  How many of the tourists in the Orlando area were at the Downtown district at the time of the bombings? There was no way of knowing. The police and rescue services were at full stretch because of the scale of casualties and the uncertainty of further attacks. Identifying the dead and dying after such an attack would be a slow and painful task. The police would have to wait and painstakingly sift through hotel lists; they would need the full co-operation of the hotels in the area to try to assess how many people had not returned to their accommodation that night. Nobody could guess how many of the people that were on vacation in the area had simply packed up and left immediately, many tourists would be heading home fearing for their families’ safety from further attacks.

  Yasser had heard the first bomb blast from the car park. He knew from the planning sessions that they had carried out that the Mickey bomb had been timed to explode first at the Rainy Jungle cafe. The second, third and fourth explosions were timed thirty seconds apart. It was a much-used terrorist tactic to cause mayhem, as people ran from the first explosion, straight into the path of the secondary blast. When Yasser had driven away from the scene down Buena Vista Drive, he couldn’t be sure that he had heard all four planned explosions. He had definitely heard three, and he felt pleased with himself because another giant blow had been struck at the Infidel Americans.

  The shock of what had happened here and the impact of what was to follow tomorrow would stun the Western world and cripple tourism for years to come. He looked out of the hotel window toward Interstate 4 and saw the tail-lights of a thousand cars snaking off into the distance. The traffic would be gridlocked all night as people fled from the carnage. The traffic would be bad but he could not wait until tomorrow to leave. He checked his documents; he needed to fly tonight before the security services tightened the noose looking for the people responsible.

  Yasser stood before the bathroom mirror and shaved his dark boyish skin. He was twenty-six years old, but looked younger. He was young to be in charge of such operations as these, but his talent to organise, recruit, motivate and execute such attacks had been recognised years before. When he had first gone to the Sudan to be trained in religious camps, individuals were earmarked as those who would do and die, and those who could organise such people. Yasser was identified as the latter. When it came to motivating others, he was the best. His belief was that the West’s invasion of his homeland in Iraq and the oppression being felt by his Muslim brothers in Afghanistan was unacceptable. His ability to convince others to join in this global Jihad was incredible.

  He looked at his small frame in the mirror. He was slim and lean, his skin was dark and his eyes were olive green, they looked through you, not at you, they seemed to be lifeless like those of a shark, and although attractive to some, a cold malice behind them chilled you if you looked too long.

  Yasser put some eye shadow around his green eyes, and applied mascara to his long eyelashes, he put lip-gloss on and pouted in the mirror at his reflection, and then he took the bobble from the long ponytail that he wore on the back of his head and brushed his thick black hair. Yasser dressed in a casual pastel coloured tracksuit and pink trainers, and to add to the effect he put on a pair of women’s Dolce and Gabbanna glasses. The lenses were broad and round and they covered most of his face. Yasser’s long hair and slim frame made him look all the more feminine. He blew a kiss to his reflection in the mirror, and as he shook his hair again, Yasser became Yasmine.

  CHAPTER 6

  San Francisco

  Hassan reached the truck that had been left next to the park, in a suburb of the city called Little Italy. A beautiful Catholic church could be seen across the park through the trees, he spat in the direction of the church as he got closer to the truck. He looked down the hill toward the bay; the Coit Tower, which looked like the end of a giant fire hose, was perched on the rocks that overlooked the harbour.

  Whoever had left the truck for Hassan had placed four plastic traffic cones around the vehicle, so that it did not look out of place; it simply looked like it was making an innocent delivery. Hassan looked beneath the only traffic cone that had a flashing yellow light on top of it, beneath it was the key. He moved the cone from in front of the truck, opened the lock and climbed in. It was a small gas storage tanker, the words ‘America Gas’ were painted down the side of the Mack driving rig, which had five thousand litres of propane gas stored in the bulbous tank behind his cab. Anyone looking in his direction may have thought it odd, that this man who was dressed in Islamic clothing, with a `ZZ top’ beard, was delivering propane in Little Italy, but no one saw anything as he started the engine.

  Hassan reached beneath the passenger seat and took out a red cool box, which had been hidden there; he noticed it still had the price tag from Publix supermarket stuck on it. He lifted the lid and placed the contents o
f the box onto the seat next to him. He put a claw hammer and a roll of silver duct tape next to each other on the passenger seat. He then removed two grenades and a reel of fishing twine, which he placed on his lap. Lastly, he removed a `38 calibre Smith and Wesson, which he slid under the driver’s seat. He decided to set up the truck in preparation for the attack while it was quiet, as he did not want to be disturbed, and he needed to make enough time to enable him to pay a visit to the old maritime museum on the way. The men that had ridiculed him would pay for their insults with their lives.

  Hassan recognised the two different types of grenade that he had been given, from his training in Somalia. One was a regular explosive fragmentation grenade, the other a phosphorous device. He needed no further instructions; the plan was deadly simple.

  He turned to face the rear window of the Mack truck and smashed the glass with the hammer. He used the claw to pull the glass remnants into the cab, and the broken window left the exposed bulkhead of the gas tank only feet away from him. He taped the two grenades to the tanker’s metal bulkhead. He then tied some twine to both activation pins, and attached it to his steering wheel. When the time was right he would pull the twine, which would release the activation pins. Hassan knew that one grenade should be sufficient to rupture the tank and ignite the gas; if it did not, then the phosphor grenade would do the trick.

  Hassan firmly believed he was a Mujahideen warrior fighting the Jihad. If he were to fail today, then he would bring shame on Islam. With the grenades in place, he put the truck in gear and drove toward the museum.

  Hassan pulled the America Gas truck to a stop, mounting the curb. He was fifty yards from the huge scaffold structure that covered the front of the maritime museum. The truck was facing the Ghiradelli chocolate factory at the bottom of Polk Street. The workmen who had shouted insults to him earlier that morning all wore yellow hats and high-viz jackets. Hassan watched as they swarmed over the scaffold. At every level, stonemasons, carpenters and painters were all busy repairing the old building to its former glory.

  Hassan engaged drive and steered the truck toward the legs and supports of the steel scaffold that resembled a metal spider’s web. Hassan slammed his foot down on the accelerator pedal as the truck made contact with the scaffold poles; the vehicle lurched forward tearing the scaffold away from the building as it roared down the road. Steel bars clanged to the floor along with wooden gangplanks, men lay injured all over the road, while some still clung to the building above, hanging on for dear life itself. Hassan looked in the rear view mirror at the scene. There were bodies scattered all over the road. Men lay prone on the tarmac, some were not moving, while others were crawling and screaming because their bones were broken. Hassan spotted the man that he had heard called McAllister by his supervisor earlier that morning. He was about thirty yards away lying on his side in the road, his heavy moustache and ponytail identified him from the other injured men. The truck’s wheels screeched as Hassan put it into reverse, revving the engine as it closed the distance between himself and his tormenter.

  McAllister lay on the tarmac, confused as he watched the tanker race toward him. He thought he had been involved in a terrible accident when a gas truck had brought down the scaffold, but as he looked incredulously on, the truck’s reversing lights came on, and the vehicle lurched toward him. It was almost as if the driver was aiming for him deliberately. He raised his head from the tarmac, desperately trying to get his broken body out of the vehicles path but to no avail, the last thing he heard was the loud crack as his hardhat collapsed beneath the crushing weight of the truck, his skull split, spilling its contents across the road.

  The truck lurched forward again. Hassan weaved slowly through the injured men that lay prone and helpless in the road. He aimed the truck at the men that were still moving as he drove down the bay road toward Pier 39.

  Hassan had driven about a mile by the time he approached Fisherman’s Wharf and Pier 39; they were on his left hand side as he past them. Tourists milled around the shops and stalls that sold fresh crab of every size and description. The cafe bars and restaurants were full of tourists on both sides of the road as he drove the gas truck toward Pier 39. He heard the sound of sirens coming toward him and he slowed as the emergency services passed him by. They were heading toward the carnage that he had left behind him at the old museum. He turned toward the bay and looked out at Golden Gate Bridge. There was mist and low cloud covering the top of the huge red structure. He looked toward the Rock, Alcatraz. He saw the passenger ferries carrying tourists from the famous redundant federal penitentiary. It had once been the home of such famous gangsters as Al ‘Scarface’ Capone and ‘Machinegun Kelly’. The huge white ferries took tourists from the empty prison back to Pier 39. Hassan could hear the incessant barking of hundreds of elephant seals, drifting from the bay on the wind.

  Hassan steered the truck in the direction of the ferry terminal and veered left across the pavement toward the entrance to Pier 39. The security chain that was stretched across the terminal entrance snapped like cotton as the vehicle struck it at speed, and hurtled toward the waiting crowds.

  The waiting area at Pier 39 looked like a car lot. The dock itself made a square, one edge was the sea wall where the ferries docked, two sides were made with old tramcars that tourists could sit in to shelter from the freezing bay winds and the final edge was the entrance from Bay Road. The centre of the square was cordoned into a long zig-zag queuing area where people waited in line for the boats to take them to ‘The Rock’. A ferry had just docked; the pier was full as one ferry load of passengers waited to board, while another was disembarking.

  Petur Petersson was an Icelandic national; he was blonde-haired and blue-eyed, as was his wife Ingrid, his son Petur Jnr. and daughter Anna. They stood huddled together in a line waiting to board a ferry that would take them to Alcatraz. They were shifting their weight from one foot to the other, as cold people do. They all wore the same style fleece jackets with San Francisco embroidered on the front. The two men wore black jackets and the women pink. They laughed as they counted how many people had the same style fleece tops as they did.

  Mark Twain said: “The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco.” ‘Never a truer word was spoken,’ Petur thought as he had paid for the four garments earlier that morning. Even though the sun was shining and the sky was blue, it was bitterly cold, the sea breeze caught out many tourists who had arrived in the bay wearing shorts and t-shirts. By lunchtime most days, hundreds of tourists had been forced to buy fleece coats from the market traders to hide them from the bitter bay winds.

  Petur heard the loud, ‘Thwack’ as the security chain snapped; he tried to make sense of the scene, a large gas truck appeared to be out of control, it ploughed through the crowds at speed. The vehicle crushed everyone in its path as it headed toward the ferry, which had just docked. Most of the crowd had nowhere to run, hemmed in by the sheer numbers of people on the dock. Petur turned and grabbed his family, pushing them out of the path of the truck, which showed no sign of stopping. He looked into the cab as it neared; the driver seemed to pull some invisible cord. Petur was thrown clear as the concussion wave from the grenades hit him; his ears were ringing from the blast when the gas truck exploded, turning Pier 39, the ferry and hundreds of people into a fireball.

  CHAPTER 7

  Grand Canyon / Hank

  Hank Lyons stood in front of a low stone wall at the edge of the Grand Canyon. He was in a resort called the Bright Angel Lodge. The Canyon view in front of him was truly awesome to behold. ‘People use the adjective awesome too much’, he thought. “You don’t know the meaning of the word until you’ve seen this,” Hank said to himself.

  If you stand in the cold Arizona morning, waiting for dawn at the edge of the Grand Canyon, you would have no comprehension of the enormity of the landscape in front of you. As the sun rises and the canyon is revealed, rock formations sculpted by years of erosion are illuminated, long convoluted shadows are
cast onto giant screen-like cliffs. It is only when you notice details such as tiny trees or people walking on the trails below, that you can truly put the size and scale of the canyon into any context.

  Hank stood alone and watched the sunrise; a man approached the path that he was on, heading toward the accommodation lodges, he was coming from the rim trails; the rim trails were the narrow gravel footpaths that hugged the edge of the canyon’s south rim. It was a little early to have finished walking the rim trails, Hank pondered but he thought nothing of it. Tourists often started their walks as dawn broke in the Grand Canyon, taking advantage of the cooler temperatures in the mornings. “Morning, Sir. Isn’t that a sight?” Hank said to the dark skinned man as he approached.