by Peter Telep
“There’s your answer,” said Josh. “Power plants need coolant water. You shut down the water supply, you shut down the plant. That’s why they usually build them near bodies of water. Look at that. There’s no water around that plant for miles. They need to pipe it in. Says they get ninety million gallons of treated waste water per day from the combined output of the 91st Avenue plant and the Tolleson plant.”
Corey scanned the website and said, “They have a retention pond that holds about a week’s worth of water. After that, they’re out of commission, and the lights go off.”
“And then you got an economic disaster,” Josh concluded. “They’re playing a game of dominoes, and they know exactly what they’re doing.”
Johnny came up behind them, out of breath. “Are you finished yet?”
“Almost,” answered Corey.
“Get me an electronic copy of that list—A-SAP.”
“Roger that.”
Johnny started away.
“Hey, one more thing,” Josh said. “The Port of Houston hasn’t come up yet. What if it doesn’t? What did they want with that ship?”
“I don’t know. Just add it to the list.”
* * *
Johnny returned to questioning Nazari. The professor’s face now resembled a grapefruit that had rolled beneath a Mac truck. His shirt was adorned with a necktie of blood, and his slacks bore matching patches on the knees. Johnny scowled at Willie. “I told you not to do anything.”
Willie shrugged. “I was just releasing stress and tenderizing him before we put a real fire under ass.”
Johnny snickered and regarded Nazari. “If you were a man, you’d stand up for what you believe in, not sit there like a coward. But you’re not a man. You’re a worthless piece of shit. You hide behind innocent Muslims and pretend to be an American... but you’re not. If you want to see how real Americans act, here we are. But not you. Not you.”
Slowly, Nazari lifted his head, his eyes igniting with a fanaticism that Johnny had never seen before, despite his years downrange in the Middle East. Indeed, Johnny was right about him. Despite his American citizenship, Nazari had jihad pumping through his heart like radioactive iodine, and there was nothing some jarhead former “action guy” from North Carolina could do to change that. He would not talk. He would not help. He would not do a damned thing.
So Johnny put a bullet in his head.
Or at least he imagined doing so.
Willie cleared his throat. “I know what happens now, Johnny. It’s all right. I’ll take it from here.”
“Roger that. But first, maybe we can talk to Pat. Get Billy involved. Those guys are all that and a bag of chips. They’ll have him crying for mama by the time they’re done.”
“They won’t get any farther than you,” Nazari rasped.
“Oh, so we’re ready to talk?”
“I have a message. Al-Saif, the sword, will pierce the heart of America, and she will bleed today like she’s never bled before.”
Johnny grabbed Nazari by the collar and spoke through his teeth. “I don’t think so.”
“You have me, you have a list, but there’s nothing else you can do. You can’t trust your government. You can’t trust anyone.”
“No, you’re wrong. And I’ll prove it.”
Chapter Forty-Six
“I keep telling myself we did everything we could. I just wish it were more.”
—Corey McKay (FBI interview, 23 December)
Nicholas Dresden stared vaguely at the morning newscast beaming from his seventy-inch television. As usual anchors from Fox News were commenting on the latest scandals casting dark clouds over the administration; however, Dresden was only half listening. A school bus’s diesel engine thrummed in his ears as he imagined it carrying kindergarteners across the Gold Star Memorial Bridge, on their way to some field trip.
The concrete roadway quaked, great rifts appeared, and then... the road dropped and those children plummeted over the side. Little faces twisted in horror pressed against the bus’s rear windows as they vanished into a foaming vortex of concrete and steel.
With a start, Dresden opened his eyes, caught his breath, and took a sip of his coffee, which had already gone cold.
Victoria strode into the living room with a haughty clack of heels. She struggled to secure an earring with French manicured nails. “What are you doing?”
Dresden kicked his bare feet onto the ottoman and pulled his robe more securely around his neck. He glanced perfunctorily in her direction.
“Are you sick?” she asked.
He shook his head. “No one’s going to work today.”
“You gave them off?”
With a sigh, he rose from the sofa and padded toward her.
“Nicholas, what’s the matter with you? If you’re in a mood again, I’m not prepared to deal with it this morning. I have a benefit to plan, and I need to be out of here in twenty minutes.”
She never saw the kitchen knife jutting from his fist. She was far too busy with her damned earring, her damned benefit, her damned life to notice.
He wrapped one hand around her neck, as if to pull her in close for a kiss, then drove the knife up, into her heart. His face grew flush and his hand trembled. She gasped, eyeing him in utter disbelief until her expression twisted in agony, and she crumpled to the floor.
“It’s better this way,” he told her. “I didn’t want you to see what I’ve done.” He began to weep. “We had some good years, didn’t we? And you deserved better. I’m sorry. I’m sorry I became one of them. I’m just like Beb Ahmose now. Just like him.”
He drifted back to the sofa, where he removed the copy of Wired magazine featuring his interview. Beneath it sat an M1911A1 .45 caliber pistol that had belonged to his great grandfather Franz Dresden.
Wiping his bloody hands on his robe, he took a seat beside the pistol. He swallowed and wept again, just as his smartphone vibrated. Senecal’s name flashed like a bad fortune on the screen. Dresden ignored it.
* * *
After a quick glance at his watch, Johnny addressed the others gathered around him outside the marina’s office. “We have about fifty-six minutes.”
Willie looked dejected. “Based on what Gatterton told you, all we can do is sit here because they can’t vet our story in time. That’s insane.”
“Yeah, and we’ll live with this for the rest of our lives,” said Corey. “We knew this would happen. We have all the targets now, including the missing six. We know they’re hitting that bridge up in Connecticut. We know the Hoover Dam’s on the list. And now what? We don’t even make a call? Is Plesner still running interference for them?”
Johnny raised his palms to calm them. “I have an idea. It might sound crazy, but just listen and keep an open mind. We joke about the Marine Corps Mafia, right? Once a Marine, always a Marine. That’s no joke. And that’s something we can count on right now.”
* * *
In Charleston, South Carolina, textbook buyer and veteran Marine Norm Mack was eating a bowl of Cheerios at his daughter’s house, where he was staying for the holidays. His smartphone beeped with a push notification from one of his social media websites. Norm was a member of several private groups for veteran Marines and their families, including one on LinkedIn with over 33,000 members. He thumbed his smartphone and began to read.
A moment later, the spoon slipped from his hand.
* * *
In Orlando, Florida, retired Marine Corps drill instructor Clive Gleeson was roped off in a maze of anxious travelers leading up to the Southwest Airlines ticket counter. Gleeson was a gray-haired black man nearing sixty but still a monster at six feet five, 275 pounds. His wife had passed earlier in the year, and he would have celebrated Christmas alone were it not for the invitation from his son Marcus. Gleeson was flying up to Delaware to spend the holidays with the boy and his family. During a phone call to confirm his travel arrangements, Gleeson received a push notification from the Marine Corps League, Orlando Fa
cebook page.
What he read sent his heart racing, his gaze darting through the crowd.
* * *
In Jamaica, Queens, veteran Marine Richie Zahn, who had served in the First Gulf War when he was just eighteen, was up on the platform and waiting for his train into the city. He worked as a security guard in a Manhattan parking garage on West 25th Street. He was playing a golf game on his smartphone when one of his old Marine Corps buddies sent him a Twitter message. Zahn read the message, then, as instructed by his friend, he visited the 1st Marine Division Facebook page, with its 58,000 likes.
His mouth fell open as he read the latest post, then bounded for the nearest MTA police officer across the platform.
* * *
In Seattle, Washington, Irving Jones was lying in bed, trying to fall back asleep after the tenant upstairs had engaged in a shouting match with his girlfriend at 0300. Not yet thirty, Jones had been an Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) tech who had served two tours in Afghanistan and had been medically discharged eight months prior. His legs were still back in Kabul, shredded across a minefield. His smartphone flashed, and he checked the notification.
“Oh, this is bullshit.”
And then he received a Twitter message from a friend. A breath later, a text message came in from an old Marine Corps buddy.
Swearing aloud in disbelief, he switched on his light, grabbed the M9 Beretta from his nightstand, and dragged himself into his wheelchair.
* * *
In St. Paul, Minnesota, triage nurse Carmen Guzman had been staring all morning at the strange man seated in the emergency department waiting area. Admittedly, the overnight shift was a Halloween freak show 365 days a year, but this individual seemed dangerously odd, bundled up in a parka despite the well-heated room and clutching something in his pocket. As he rocked in his seat, he tossed awkward glances at her, and then he frowned at the front doors. Guzman, a veteran Marine who had spent four years as an 0111 administration specialist, had left the corps, gone to nursing school, and had graduated at the top of her class. She stayed in touch with her old friends from the Corps through a Facebook page called “U.S. Marine Corps Females,” with over 9,000 likes and some particularly poignant messages from fellow vets. However, she had never come across a post like the one glowing on her phone’s screen. She locked gazes with the odd man, and for a few seconds, she could almost see a blood-red aura glowing around his head.
As her breath escaped, she reached into a desk drawer for her purse.
* * *
In Chicago, Illinois firefighter/paramedic Victor Lugano was at the wheel of Ambulance 93 and backing into Engine Company 42’s station when his phone beeped. He and his partner had just transferred an elderly patient with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) from a nearby assisted living facility on North Wells Street to Northwestern Memorial Hospital. This was a call they had answered so many times that they could make the run with their eyes closed. Lugano stepped outside the garage and into the imposing shadows of the skyscrapers across the street. He read a text message from a friend who was a firefighter down in Alabama, an old buddy from the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit. They had fought together in Iraq at the Battle of Najaf.
“Holy shit,” Lugano muttered. “Is this for real?”
* * *
In Arlington, Virginia, Mr. Eric Gordon was en route to work at the J. Edgar Hoover Building in Washington, D.C. when he received a phone call from a former FBI colleague who had resigned to help his wife open a Karate school. Like his old friend, Gordon had spent two decades as a Reconnaissance Marine before retiring to accept a job with the Bureau, where he led an Evidence Response Team. After the brief but breath-robbing conversation, Gordon pulled over to the shoulder just as he reached the 14th Street Bridge, which was actually a complex of five bridges spanning the Potomac River to connect Arlington with D.C. He stepped out of his car and turned back toward the oncoming traffic. The broad, stern lines of the Pentagon swept below the rising sun.
Gordon squinted toward the far end of the bridge... and then he saw it.
* * *
In Los Angeles, California, Sergeant LaToya McBride was already pounding away on a treadmill inside the LA Fitness Club on Hollywood Boulevard. She arrived like clockwork each morning at 0430. After her workout, she would shower, change, have breakfast, then drive over to the Marine Corps Recruitment Station in Burbank, where she worked alongside two other recruiters. She had grown up in South Central LA and had enlisted in the Corps over a decade ago. She loved her job and was adept at relating to and recruiting young females unaware of the many occupational specialties available to them in the Corps. The flashing notification on her phone prompted her to slow the machine to a walk.
After reading it, she glanced around the gym, then sprinted for the locker room.
* * *
In Seadrift, Texas, Corey, Willie, and Josh were huddled around one of the computers back inside the marina’s office, their wide-eyed expressions aglow as Corey rapped on the keyboard. Meanwhile, Johnny stepped outside to accept a call from Mark Gatterton.
“Johnny, I’m getting notifications and text messages... my phone won’t stop ringing.”
“I know, it’s great, isn’t it?”
“Are you insane?”
“Come on, son, we’re Marines. We took action.”
“But do you realize what you’ve done?”
“Didn’t you read my note?”
“How could I miss it? You posted that message and your target list all over the web, on every social media site there is! It’s going up on military forums... it’s even trending on Twitter, for God’s sake.”
“That’s right. I hope the damned president starts talking about it!”
“But Johnny, you don’t understand—”
“Oh, I understand everything. We didn’t have time for the government to vet our story, so I’m letting every Marine who ever served do it. Some of them won’t believe me. That’s okay. But those who are willing to take a chance on a brother will get down to those locations and remain vigilant. I told them to be our eyes and ears. I told them to call the police, but if some of them put down these bastards before the cops get there, then so be it.”
“That’s what I’m worried about. This could turn into something—”
“What? Something great? If the Arabs can start a revolution with social media, then maybe we can stop a terrorist attack.”
“I just... I can’t believe you did this.”
“It’s pretty bold, I know. But it’s not something we decided to do. It’s something we had to do, despite the system and ourselves.”
“I’m at a loss, man.”
“No, you’re not. We’ll make it. Now look here, I’m not sure when we’ll talk again, so... thank you. For everything. I mean it.”
“I have a feeling you’ll still need me when this is over—and I’ll be there. Something’s in the wind—judging from the call I took a half hour ago. Looks like I’m about to acquire a bigger stick.”
“What do you mean? I thought you’re too hot for the suits up on the hill.”
“Yeah, well apparently today I’m not so controversial—at least according to Cathy Grantham. She’s the White House’s Counterterrorism advisor. She says I’m an asset. Go figure. And I might be in a position to keep your sorry ass out of the brig. Speaking of jail, what’re you doing with Nazari?”
“It’s better you don’t know.”
* * *
Nearly seventeen hundred miles north in Toronto, Edward Senecal tried once more to reach Nicholas Dresden. With a sigh of resignation, he left a voice message: “Nick, it’s almost time, and I wanted to take this opportunity to applaud you for your intestinal fortitude, for your visionary leadership, and for—most of all—having the courage to help us lead the United States of America out of some very dark times. No matter what you see or hear, you must focus on the future. We’ve been friends for most of our lives, and that will not change. We’ll make it t
hrough this together. I’m certain of it. Now, call me when you can. I’m here.”
Senecal lowered himself into his home office chair, consulted his watch, then removed a framed photo from his desk. Emile wore his little league uniform and smiled. With a roar, Senecal sprang to his feet and hurled the frame across the room.
“Daddy?”
He faced the doorway. Celine was still in her pajamas and gaping at him. “Are you okay?”
Senecal scooped her into his arms and whispered, “I will be, sweetheart. I will be.”
* * *
At precisely 7:56 a.m. Eastern Standard Time, Mirsab stepped onto the platform near track #2. Oddly enough, he felt insignificant among the thousands bustling through Jamaica Station. That feeling would not last long. He was speaking with his sister Zehna, who had moved to the northern platform at Woodside Station and was in position.
Before Mirsab could utter another word into his smartphone, all three westbound trains pulled into Jamaica with a deafening rumble and hiss, the platform reverberating beneath his feet. Zehna spoke again, but Mirsab heard only unintelligible garble.
“What is it?” he asked, raising his voice.
“I said I’m not afraid anymore. And I love you. Allahu Akbar!”
“Okay, yes. Allahu Akbar! I love you, too.”
“Wait. I think someone sees me. It’s a policeman. He’s running toward me. I’m going to do it now! I’m going to do it—”
“Zehna! Zehna!”
The thundering footfalls of commuters exiting and boarding trains continued—even as the Day of Judgment began...
Mirsab remained there, his mouth falling open, the crowd not missing a beat and schooling around him to pass through cars and make connections.
Before he realized what was happening, people slowed to regard their smartphones. Some gathered in knots to share what they were reading, holding up their screens, gaping, a few covering their mouths, one teenaged girl beginning to cry.
