by Tom Abrahams
“Bottom line,” Matti rasped, “is a new world order. SECURITY starts it. It’s a tough sell. An attack gets support.”
“An attack where?”
“Here.”
“When?”
“Any minute now.”
Brandon stood again and folded his arms across his chest. He bit his lower lip and paced back and forth. He looked into the bathroom again before wearing a path between the bed and the room’s narrow entry hall. After several minutes, he stopped and buried his face in his hands.
“Do you believe me?” Matti asked, not sure if she was loud enough for Brandon to hear her. “Do you believe this is the Capitol all over again?”
Brandon pulled his hands from his face. “I have every reason to think you’re crazy and overreaching. I just killed a person, a person sent to your hotel room to kill you. I believe you, Matti Harrold. I believe you.”
“Good.” Matti swallowed. “Then you need to help me stop it.”
CHAPTER 41
HOUSTON, TEXAS
Dillinger Holt pulled an airplane-sized bottle of vodka from his bag and poured it into his empty coffee cup. He looked around at the café crowd. Nobody was watching him. He scanned his computer screen, reminding himself of his genius, and toasted his newest missive.
“They’re gonna have to name the website after me,” he half-joked, imagining for a split second how the masthead might appear with his name in large bold letters. It could wait. First, he had to cut and paste the new article and send it to his editor.
WHAT’S IN A NAME?
WOULD S.E.C.U.R.I.T.Y. BY ANY OTHER NAME SMELL AS SWEET?
By Dillinger Holt, Senior Correspondent
If The SECURITY Act is meant to help protect us, why are so many against it? Congressional leaders from both parties express doubt in the legislation and in those pushing it at home and abroad.
—EXCLUSIVE—
President Felicia Jackson calls it “what the PATRIOT Act was meant to be”. That may be more revealing than any of the language in the legislation’s four-hundred-and-sixteen-page draft. The muddy, cloudy nature of the bill’s text is raising flags among those who consider the document an overreach of authority and a threat to the Bill of Rights’ Fourth Amendment.
“This is like Big Brother on steroids,” said Florida Republican congressman Don Eaker. “I can’t vote for something that gives such undeniable power to our government. Throw in the fact that the president wants to share that intelligence with foreign powers? I think our founding fathers would roll over in their graves.”
The SECURITY Act, an acronym for Surveillance of Electronic Correspondence Under Regulated Intelligence and Telecommunication, would grant unprecedented authority for local and federal law enforcement to eavesdrop and record conversations, emails, text messages, and social media postings, without warrants. They require only what the legislation calls “fair and reasonable cause”. That ambiguous threshold has one high-ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee crying foul.
“This is illegal,” said New Hampshire Representative Steven Lawrence. “It’s so far beyond what the Fourth Amendment would allow, I can’t believe we’re discussing it.”
The measure does have its proponents.
“Is it going to take another terrorist attack before we take the threat seriously?” asked Democrat Senator Bentley Blakemore of Colorado. “How many more people have to die before we understand the threat?”
Senator Blakemore is a cosponsor of the upper chamber’s version of the SECURITY Act. He has also been among the half dozen lawmakers to travel overseas in attempts to convince allies of its benefits. He made no apologies for the aggressive nature of those international trips.
“Yes, we pushed,” he admitted. “We had to push. The terrorist threat is not exclusively domestic. If we are going to effectively cope with the growing global concern, our allies must share intelligence with us. We must share it with them. If it frays the edges of the Fourth Amendment, or the Magna Carta for that matter, so be it.”
Blakemore believes he has the support to pass the legislation in the Senate, despite contrary reports, and his colleagues in the House already have the majority of votes secured for passage. He can’t speak to the foreign, multilateral agreement pending at the G12 summit this week in Barcelona.
“This is unprecedented,” concluded PLAUSIBLEDENIABILITY.INFO Security Analyst Bob Kurk. “Even if this passes both houses and there’s an international agreement among three or four countries, the US Supreme Court could strike this down as unconstitutional.”
Kurk served as Undersecretary of State during the Obama administration after fifteen years of service in the Central Intelligence Agency. Prior to that he served a decade in the US Marine Corps. He has a law degree from Harvard and is a graduate of the United States Naval Academy. He is currently a consultant for the security firm Wignock Homeland Intelligence Group.
“That said,” he conceded, “under the right circumstances, the American people might acquiesce. If there were another attack, for example, that reawakened the fear we felt in the days after 9/11 or the Capitol attack, then I could see the justices concluding it has merit.”
Congressman Lawrence reluctantly agreed with Kurk. “If there’s another attack, another failure by the joint intelligence community, then there might be no stopping the momentum of this effort. It would pass. My constituents might demand it.”
With suspected terrorist Sir Spencer Thomas apparently alive and on the loose, anything is possible.
Holt called the editor and held while she read through the article. She giggled as she mumbled through it on the other end of the line.
“You’re killing it, Holt!” she squealed. “That last line? So inflammatory. I love it. Seriously. So good. All is forgiven. What’s next?”
“Next?”
“You gotta give me more. This is gold and we’re mining new territory here. Our unique visitor number is through the roof. Our retention is crazy. The shares on social media are enough to make me give you a raise.”
“No rest for the weary?”
“None,” she said. “Aren’t you glad you’re not in Barcelona? Maybe I should send you to Houston more often.”
“Or not.”
“You don’t like the barbecue?”
“It’s fine.”
“So what’s next?”
“I’ve got some sources in Barcelona at the summit,” he said, but stopped himself from saying too much. “I think some big news is developing there. It’s connected to Sir Spencer, connected to Horus, connected to SECURITY. It’s big.”
“When can you have it all sewn up?” she said, champing at the bit. “I’ll need it lawyered, I’m sure.”
“Twenty-four hours.”
“Okay.” She sighed. “I’ll need a little teaser before then though. Anything you can give me.”
“Fine.”
Dillinger hung up and absently checked his text messages, hoping he’d find one from Karen. Then his memory caught up with him. He slapped the device facedown on the café table and raised his hand to catch the waiter’s attention. He needed food. Coffee and vodka weren’t cutting it. Not today.
CHAPTER 42
PASEO DE TAULAT
BARCELONA, SPAIN
The sweat-drenched Fernando Barçes lay in bed. It was a good sign, Jon Custos thought. It meant the drugs were working.
Custos wiped Barçes’s forehead with a towel. He was sitting bedside, playing nursemaid to the patient he wanted to save long enough to kill.
Custos sat in the dark, only the dim ray from a hallway bulb casting a thin fan of light into the room. He knew this was the last night on Earth for both of them. They’d both die for the greater good in hours.
There were no seventy-two virgins at the other end of their martyrdom. Custos was more selfless than that. His sacrifice was for the betterment of man, for the new world.
He’d been taught that the United Nations and NATO weren’t enough to
amalgamate global power. Instead, they were as corrupt as any despotic government. They could not stop the United States from unlawfully invading Iraq. They could not prevent the genocide in Syria or the rise of ISIS in the fading days of al-Qaeda’s influence.
Despite the best efforts of the Eurozone, western Europe was increasingly fractured by culture and religion. The Germans never wanted what the British sought. The French and Spanish couldn’t agree what wine to serve with fish. The Greeks couldn’t pay back a loan any more than they could keep graffiti from soiling the reconstructive architecture of Athens. And eastern Europe was so embroiled in civil conflict, its people longed for the security and stability of the Soviet Union.
The only way to solve the world’s ills was unity: a single power, a single people. The citizens might resist at first, but in the end they would succumb to the notion that one world government was the way forward.
“Extremis malis, extrema remedia,” Sir Spencer had once explained. “Do you know what that means, Jon?”
Jon had recognized it as Latin, but hadn’t understood it.
“It means extreme disease needs an extreme remedy,” Sir Spencer had translated. “Guy Fawkes, the seventeenth-century inspiration who failed at his wonderfully deviant Gunpowder Plot, was rumored to have said it as he fought for his religious and political freedom.”
“I’ve heard of him,” said Custos. “The antiestablishment protestors always wear a Fawkes mask.”
“Very good.” Sir Spencer had nodded. “Yes. And loosely translated from that staid expression is the saying ‘Desperate times call for desperate measures.’ These are desperate times, Jon. Very desperate.”
Custos understood the desperation as he watched the world devolve into sectarian and racial violence on nearly every continent. He knew then, Sir Spencer was right.
Huxley and Orwell were right too, Custos believed after reading their novels, even if they didn’t understand the benefit of their fantasies. Hidden in the sarcasm and political satire of their watershed fiction, they both saw what the world could be. They feared it perhaps, but they knew it was necessary and inevitable.
The Magna Carta was ancient. The Fourth Amendment was antiquated.
But one government, one financial structure, one umbrella under which all people would live and find shelter, was possible. It was prophesized in the Bible.
“Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain?” Custos recited from the book of Psalms as he sopped up sweat from Barçes’s neck and chest. “The kings of the Earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together.”
Custos had not read the New Testament. He hadn’t learned its parables or learned to live by the word. He’d only memorized the verses his teacher thought relevant.
He was unaware that the prophecy was for the end of the world and not a new beginning. He prayed there, in the relative darkness, mouthing counsel he didn’t fully understand.
“Whoever is not with is against me,” he recited from the book of Matthew. “And whoever does not gather with me scatters.”
Custos, for all of his intelligence, guile, and brute strength, was a man who had been misled the entirety of his life. From the thieves who taught him how to fleece unsuspecting tourists to the knight who used him for his own selfish purposes.
He couldn’t see that. He saw himself as a servant, a disciple.
Barçes moaned and Custos flinched.
“It’s okay, viejo,” he told the old man. “You are healing. You are improving. Soon you’ll be strong enough.” He flattened his palm against Barçes’s forehead, which felt close to normal. The fever was definitely coming down.
Barçes’s eyes fluttered open and he turned his head toward Custos. He inhaled through his nose and suppressed a cough, wincing until the urge subsided.
“You’re a fighter,” Custos said in Spanish, holding the man’s gaze. “I knew you were the right choice. You were destined for this. I have no doubt. Together we will succeed.”
Barçes closed his eyes and turned away. He mumbled something, a whisper Custos couldn’t hear.
Custos held the old man’s chin and turned his face back toward him. He lowered his ear to the patient’s mouth and asked him to repeat himself. The old man tried to shake free of Custos’s grip but couldn’t.
“Tell me again,” Custos insisted, tightening his hold. “I want to know what you said to me, viejo.”
“L’infern t’espera, diable,” Barçes said. “Hell awaits you, devil.”
Custos smiled at the old man before he pressed his lips to his sweaty forehead. “Tal vez te veré allí, viejo.”
“Perhaps, I’ll see you there.”
CHAPTER 43
WORLD TRADE CENTER
BARCELONA, SPAIN
The assassin was heavier than she looked. It took both Matti and Brandon to move her from the floor into the shower. Matti retched a couple of times.
“You’ve never seen a dead body before?” Brandon flipped on the faucet and unwrapped a bar of soap. He looked at her reflection in the mirror.
Matti shook her head and closed the glass shower door. She wiped her lower eyelids with the tips of her index fingers. Her mascara was running and it stung.
“My mother’s funeral was closed casket,” she admitted, sniffing. “I wouldn’t have wanted to see her anyway. I guess you’ve seen plenty?”
“I have.” Brandon wrung his hands free of soap and held them under the running tap. “Afghanistan. Iraq. Syria. Ours and theirs.”
“Do you ever get used to it?”
“No,” he said. “Faces stay with me. I probably have hundreds of them floating around in my head. This one will join the rotation.”
“Have you ever…” Matti looked at her feet. She couldn’t finish the question.
“Yes.” Brandon dried his hands with a towel and turned to wrap his arms around Matti. She buried her face in his chest and shuddered. Her arms slipped around his back and she squeezed.
They held each other for what felt to her longer than it probably was. She squeezed again and let go of him, pulling away from his hold.
“We have work to do.” She sniffled. “I can’t wallow.”
“So we leave her here? I’m the White House chief of staff. I killed someone. Shouldn’t we report this?”
“We don’t have time. By the time we deal with this, it could be too late.”
“Okay.” He exhaled, planting his hands on his hips. “We’ll figure this out. I’ll deal with it.”
“Good.”
“What’s first, then?”
“We find the guy who’s about to light the fuse.”
“Where do we start?”
“I think he’s the guy who killed the flight attendant.” Matti led Brandon out of the bathroom. “I know they’ve got him on surveillance. We need to figure out where else in the building he’s been.”
“Good.”
“Turn around,” Matti said, twirling her finger. “I need to change.”
Brandon obliged. Five minutes later they were in the manager’s office, making an argument to view the security video.
“There’s way too much footage for you to review,” he suggested. “I don’t know about showing you what I have, regardless. Who did you say you are?”
“Let’s go about this another way,” Matti suggested. She was standing across from the manager, leaning on his desk while he sat behind it. “Have you had any alarms in the last seventy hours? Any alerts for doors that shouldn’t be accessed or that automatically trigger notifications?”
The manager looked at Matti and then at Brandon. He pursed his lips and turned to the computer monitor on his desk. He pecked at the keys and then clicked the mouse.
“We’ve had three alerts. One was a rear service entrance. One was an emergency exit. One was a basement storage closet ceiling tile.”
“A ceiling tile?” Matti asked. “You have cameras in ceiling tiles?”
“Not a camera,” the manager corrected. “
It’s a sensor. Some of our ceiling tiles have sensors if they provide access to our infrastructure—plumbing, security, electrical.”
“That’s odd, isn’t it?”
“Not necessarily,” he said. “Rodents can trigger them. That’s what happens most often.”
“Can you check the alert?” asked Brandon. “Is there a camera nearby? Maybe we could narrow our video search that way.”
“Possibly,” the manager huffed. “This is highly irregular. You’re not police.”
“No,” said Brandon. “But we do work for the president of the United States.” He flashed his White House badge again. “I know this isn’t a badge. But we wouldn’t be asking if this weren’t critically important.”
The manager studied them again. He clucked his tongue against his teeth before picking up his phone to call security.
“I need someone to walk me through video access,” he said, cradling the phone in his neck and banging the keyboard again. “I’m looking for a basement storage closet feed. It would coincide with the alert code I’m emailing you.”
Matti hoped this would work. If it didn’t, she was out of luck. She didn’t know where to start if this stalled.
“Thank you,” said the manager. “I’ll need five minutes on either end of the alert.”
Brandon sat down in the empty chair next to Matti and motioned for her to sit too. Matti reluctantly plopped into the chair and waited.
“Stop,” Brandon whispered, touching her arm.
“Stop what?”
“I can tell you’re chewing on the inside of your cheek,” he said. “Being stressed out isn’t going to help our cause. You need to stay calm and in control, Matti.”
Matti ran her tongue along the inside of her ragged cheek. She hadn’t even noticed she was doing it. She stopped, folding her arms across her chest and looking away from Brandon without saying anything.
