Black Flagged Apex

by Steven Konkoly

  “Are they aware of your behind-the-scenes help?”

  “Not exactly. Some of our methods are not on the approved FBI tactics list,” Sanderson said.

  “I don’t envy your tightrope position over the FBI. One wrong step and you could find yourself back on the shit list,” Berg said.

  “Who’s kidding who? My name is still on that shit list. They just won’t admit it to my face. I just hope our covert assistance will be enough to help them stop this nightmare plot before it becomes a reality like Monchegorsk.”

  “Well, you’re not on the CIA’s shit list, I can guarantee that. Without your help, I’d still be trying to push a crazy theory up the chain-of-command, while our government remained blissfully unaware of the looming terrorist threat. Be careful with the feds, you can’t afford a misstep with them. None of us can afford that misstep.”

  “Thanks for the warning, and the kind words. I’ll watch my back with the FBI. Apparently, I’ve made the FBI director’s personal enemy list again.”

  “Not a good list to be on. That man has a long memory,” Berg said.

  “Tell me about it. I’ll keep you posted on our progress. Will you be able to leverage any more help from your contact in Moscow?” Sanderson said.

  Berg didn’t like hearing Sanderson casually reference his contact. It was no secret that someone on the inside had given them Reznikov’s location, but he didn’t like to hear any speculation or assumptions regarding Kaparov’s identity.

  “I’ll reach out and see what they can do for us.”

  “Understood. One of these days, I hope we can sit down and sip a good scotch. We both lost good people in this fight,” Sanderson said.

  “I look forward to it. Watch your back, General,” he said and disconnected the call.

  He returned to his seat and met Erin Foley’s suspicious gaze.

  “How would you feel about taking a trip to Russia?” Berg said.

  “I was afraid you’d ask me that. Do I have a choice in the matter?”

  “There’s always a choice, but I really need your help.”

  “What happened to the Zaslon group that would stop at nothing to find and kill me?” Foley said.

  “We’ll have to drastically change your look and give you a false identity. I think the work I have in mind will suit you,” Berg said.

  “Dare I ask?”

  “You have no idea exactly how critical your actions were yesterday. Killing that Zaslon operative enabled a chain of events that could prevent one of the most devastating terrorist attacks in history. If you agree to help me with this, I’ll give you the whole story. We still have a long flight ahead of us,” Berg said.

  “I’m in.”

  Chapter 8

  4:27 PM

  National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC)

  McLean, Virginia

  Special Agent-in-Charge Ryan Sharpe stood ready to address Task Force Scorpion on the ground level of the National Counterterrorism Center’s watch floor. NCTC’s director, Joel Garrity, had made significant changes to the floor’s configuration for the purpose of accommodating Sharpe’s task force. Garrity integrated his own personnel into the task force to ensure a smooth transition for the multi-agency team working under Sharpe’s direction, but still retained enough space and manpower to carry out the terrorist intelligence and analysis functions assigned to him by the director of National Intelligence. Given the scope of the potential terrorist threat posed by the Zulu virus, most of the center’s energy and resources would be committed to Task Force Scorpion.

  Sharpe looked up at the second-floor scaffolding that ringed the entire watch floor. The second floor mostly contained offices that would be occupied by the various liaisons assigned to the task force, giving each separate agency a reasonable modicum of privacy. Despite the overall spirit of cooperation and transparency fostered by the open NCTC layout, each liaison would be given the privacy to communicate freely with their parent organization. In addition to a massive FBI contingent, his task force was comprised of representatives from the Department of Defense, CIA, Homeland Security, White House, Department of Energy, Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control, National Security Agency and the Department of Justice. Garrity had run out of offices to house each separate entity and had modified a few of the smaller conference rooms to suit their purposes.

  Keeping this task force focused would prove difficult at best, but Director Shelby had made it clear to him that the president wanted “all hands communicating” for this one. “No secrets.” Sharpe had been kept in the dark about the attempted raid on Sanderson’s compound; however, he now understood how close the raid had come to possibly derailing the CIA’s efforts to track down the Zulu virus in Europe. As much as he despised Sanderson and didn’t trust the CIA, their work had uncovered and stopped the first phase of Al Qaeda’s twisted plan. But had it been Al Qaeda’s plan from the beginning? Information passed to him minutes ago by Phillip Duncan, the task force’s CIA liaison, suggested otherwise.

  “Do we have everyone? Mobile HQ?” he said to Special Agent Mendoza.

  Mendoza nodded and pointed to an immense projection screen to their right, as they faced the group assembled in the middle of the watch floor.

  “Mobile HQ is up. Everyone is present.”

  The screen showed a grainy, live image of the Task Force Scorpion’s mobile HQ leadership team. The screen was one of several mounted to the second-floor decking. The largest screen, twice the size of the others, loomed directly above and behind their heads. It contained a map of the east coast, featuring the New York tri-state area to the far right. All of the known Al Qaeda cell locations within the tri-state area were mapped in red, along with several yellow markers indicating locations of interest. He’d explain these to the group. A lone red marker suddenly appeared on the far left edge of the screen, in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

  Sharpe was about to begin, but instead focused on an admiral standing to the far right of the group. Next to him stood an intense-looking blond woman wearing a dark gray suit.

  “Who’s the pair on the far right? The admiral and…”

  “They just arrived. The woman is Sanderson’s liaison to your task force. Callie Stewart. The Navy SEAL is Rear Admiral Mark DeSantos, director of the DIA’s Strategic Services Branch. He’s accepted full accountability for the integration of Sanderson’s people into the task force,” Mendoza said.

  Sharpe kept his gaze focused on Admiral DeSantos, receiving a quick nod from the SEAL, which he returned.

  “Damn it, I’m not comfortable with Sanderson’s people on the task force. Especially someone right in the nerve center,” Sharpe muttered.

  “How do you think O’Reilly feels? She nearly lost an arm thanks to these assholes,” Mendoza replied.

  “Keep O’Reilly and Ms. Stewart as far apart as humanly possible. You know how O’Reilly can get.”

  “Better than anyone. I’m not too worried. None of the operatives provided by Sanderson had any involvement with the events two years ago. Agent Demir was seriously impressed with the team assigned to Mobile HQ. Moriarty liked what she saw too.”

  “I’m less concerned about the field operatives. Let’s keep a tight watch on Ms. Stewart. I find it odd that Sanderson would insist on placing a liaison with us. Call me paranoid,” Sharpe said.

  “I feel the same way. I’ll make sure they understand the ground rules when your briefing is finished.”

  “I want to talk to her myself,” he said, turning his stare toward Mendoza.

  Mendoza nodded as Sharpe addressed the group. As soon as it was apparent that he would speak, the entire watch floor quieted.

  “We have a few new developments. Intelligence provided a few minutes ago by the CIA has identified and confirmed all of the addresses that received canisters of the Zulu virus. Eleven in total. Ten of the addresses are located in the tri-state area. We already knew about seven of these locations. The eleventh address is in Harrisburg, Pennsylva
nia. FedEx. Agent Moriarty, I want FBI rapid-response teams at the three remaining tri-state area locations immediately. The data just went live on your feed. I’ll coordinate a response for the Harrisburg location.”

  Kathryn Moriarty, special agent-in-charge of Task Force Scorpion’s Mobile HQ, acknowledged Sharpe’s order with the word “understood.” She didn’t waste words or time like so many other agents of her tenure, which was one of the primary reasons that Sharpe had chosen her as Field Lead for the task force. Like Agent Mendoza, she was also one of the most capable and decisive agents he had ever met. He had considered sending Mendoza out into the field to lead the team, but felt his skills would be better served helping him run the show at NCTC. He had worked extensively with Mendoza on Task Force Hydra and had grown comfortable with the agent’s unflappable sense of guarded optimism. Mendoza had talked him off the ledge more than once. If the Zulu virus conspiracy was about to take the turn he suspected, he’d need Mendoza more than ever before.

  “At this point, we haven’t recovered a single canister of the virus. We know that four canisters were shipped to each location around New York and that the rest were likely sent to Pennsylvania. Let’s get with our FedEx contacts and confirm this,” Sharpe said.

  “Already on it, sir,” Special Agent O’Reilly replied.

  “It appears that forty canisters went to Al Qaeda cells clustered in the tri-state area. Seven of these cells were already under FBI surveillance. A coordinated strike by an unknown force took down six of them. No canisters were recovered. One cell is missing and presumably retained their canister. We’ll see what we find at the other three locations. Surveillance records have provided us with a possible avenue to investigate. One of the killers removed his ski mask at the wrong time, and we captured an image of his face. This person has just been identified as Julius Grimes, a member of the fringe political group True America. A connection between True America and the virus is speculative at this point, but I want to dig deeper into this organization. True America is one of several groups that my team has tracked for the past year, and I don’t believe this is a coincidence. They’ve been stockpiling high-end weaponry and recruiting ex-military types. Apparently, Grimes is a Best Buy manager by day and an assassination team leader by night.”

  “What is his status at the moment?” asked Jason Volk, NCTC watch floor supervisor.

  “Missing. He didn’t report for work this morning. I have a feeling we won’t catch any easy breaks on this one, ladies and gentlemen.”

  “Will we be putting other possible True America militants under surveillance? How extensive is the list that you’ve developed?” asked Salvador Guerrero, Homeland Security’s primary liaison to the NCTC.

  “Yes. That’ll be one of our primary tasks. We’ll start to break down these assignments immediately. My list of possible militants is a short one. As a legitimate political movement, True America has rapidly expanded over the past three years, with political action offices in every major city and thousands of volunteers. The early extremist views and calls for a government overthrow were quickly moderated as its popularity grew. Lee Harding, one of the group’s founders, used to give speeches every week, espousing a violent overthrow of the government. Same with Jackson. As it stands, we rarely ever see True America’s original leadership council. They’ve been replaced by a growing number of governors, legislators and public sector types that have pledged to support the movement to retake America in 2008.”

  “This is a vast, well-connected organization. We’ll need to move cautiously in the direction of True America,” added Dan Moreno, counsel for the Department of Justice.

  “Mr. Moreno is right. True America is a multi-faceted organization, with over twenty million supporters and thousands of grassroots volunteers. We’ll need more than Grimes’ involvement to take this outside of the task force. Currently, there is no detectable nexus between the militant arm and the mainstream political movement. We tried to tie the two together, but the sidelining of Greely and Harding severely hampered our efforts. We don’t know if their vanishing act was purposely orchestrated to draw attention away from the extremist elements of the organization or if it was a forced ‘retirement’ imposed by mainstream leadership. Either way, it doesn’t matter. The militant arm has been stockpiling sophisticated weaponry through several known arms dealers. They’re up to something. Grimes’ appearance at an Al Qaeda safe house wasn’t a coincidence. More like an extremely bad omen. We’ll start with the list my team has cultivated and see where it takes us. Special Agent O’Reilly will take the lead on this and provide tasking,” he said, nodding to O’Reilly.

  “The majority of this task force will continue to investigate leads related to the confirmed Al Qaeda network in the New York tri-state area. At least three of the cells are connected to Imam Hamid Abdul Mohammed, the radical founder of Masjid Muhammad, his own mosque right in the heart of these neighborhoods. Hamid Mohammed is without a doubt connected to Muslim extremists and has been under surveillance for years. He’s been preaching to young Muslims since he arrived in the U.S. from Saudi Arabia six years ago, and he is suspected of recruiting at least one of the men involved in plotting to blow up a police station in Philadelphia. The White House has been looking for a reason to send him to Guantanamo Bay ever since he landed on U.S. soil.”

  “This should be more than enough to bring him in for questioning,” said Guerrero from Homeland, glancing over at the representative from the Department of Justice.

  “We’d love to bring him in, but he never returned to his apartment after leaving his mosque on the night of the killings. According to the Newark field office, he vanished without a trace,” Sharpe said.

  “Has the FBI searched the mosque?” Callie Stewart yelled from the back of the room.

  Agent Sharpe glanced sharply in her direction and responded. “On what grounds? I would need a warrant to authorize a search of the mosque, and as it stands, I don’t think there’s a judge out there that would issue one based on my strong suspicion that Muhammad is connected to some of the men killed yesterday. The men attended his mosque, but beyond that, we have no evidence that the men are directly connected to the Imam. Quite frankly, we had no evidence that the men under surveillance in the houses were connected to Al Qaeda.”

  “Then how could the FBI authorize the surveillance?” she persisted.

  “The Patriot Act provides us with an expanded range of options for intelligence gathering, with fewer restrictions. However, it does not give us the right to search Hamid Muhammed’s mosque. Unless Justice can find me a judge that will approve a warrant to enter one of the most controversial mosques in the country,” Sharpe said.

  Before Dan Moreno from the Department of Justice could answer Sharpe’s rhetorical question, Stewart continued. “What if you suspected that some of the canisters might be hidden in the mosque? Are any of the missing cells connected to Hamid Muhammed?”

  “None of them directly. The three cells with solid ties were eliminated last night. Special Agent Moriarty and her crew will turn Newark inside out to find Mr. Muhammed. If he’s alive, we’ll find him shortly,” he said, not exactly sure why he was answering to one of Sanderson’s lackeys.

  “Unless he’s hiding in his own mosque. I’d keep a close watch for anyone bringing takeout orders to 38 Jay Street,” she said and whispered something to Admiral DeSantos.

  “Since a warrant to raid any of the area mosques is off the table, we need to focus on finding Hamid Muhammed and the missing cell. Like Mr. Muhammed, the cell under surveillance on Sherman Avenue never returned to their apartment after sunset prayer at the Islamic Cultural Center. We have three additional addresses to investigate, which will add more names to the list.”

  “I have SWAT assets headed to each site. They should all be secured in under ten minutes,” Agent Moriarty said through the teleconference feed displayed on the large screen to his right.

  “We’ll hit a good lead if we keep adding more data to the cr
unch pile. Any last questions? Good,” he said, without really waiting for anyone to respond.

  “I want to give Agent Moriarty something solid to pursue by tomorrow morning. It’s going to be a long night.”

  Sharpe watched the crowd of agents, analysts and technicians head to their assigned stations on the floor. He was amazed how nearly seventy people could be swallowed whole by the vast watch floor. Once the group assembled in front of him had dispersed, the room fell silent again, giving him the false sense that nothing would be accomplished here. He missed the crowded, poorly ventilated operations rooms at the J. Edgar Hoover building, where he couldn’t yell across the room and expect to be heard above the din of activity and voices.

  Everything was different here. Everyone wore Bluetooth earpieces, which connected each person to both their desk node and NCTC issued touch-screen phone. Using the NCTC application on the touch-screen phone, they could access the approved external and internal directories from anywhere inside NCTC, allowing them to quickly communicate with any other station in the building or place a secured call outside of NCTC. The level of activity in the room would soon rival the New York Stock Exchange trading floor, yet he still felt like he might be interrupting someone’s concentration if he used a normal voice to talk to Agent Mendoza, who stood right next to him waiting for his marching orders.

  “Frank. Get O’Reilly moving in the right direction with True America and stand by to hit the ground running with any new leads from the three new Al Qaeda locations. We need to turn something over quickly,” he said, glancing in Callie Stewart’s direction.

  “You could have just texted me that message with your new gadget,” Mendoza said.

  “You know damned well I don’t know how to send a text message. And I have no intention of looking like one of those idiots talking to himself,” Sharpe said.