Black Flagged Apex

by Steven Konkoly

  Frederick Shelby took the seat offered to him. The president had skipped to the part he didn’t know and suspected that Sharpe had withheld during their hospital chat. Sharpe still didn’t trust Shelby, which was perfectly fine with the director. A little distrust increased your longevity on the Hill. He was mostly interested in how Sanderson had managed to earn the president’s trust again so quickly. More importantly, Shelby wanted to know who Sanderson had used to neatly wrap this present and hand it to the president. Of the five people sitting in the president’s study, only one stood out as odd. General Kearney. He nodded with interest and let the president continue.

  “They feigned an attack against the public water supply, which drove bottled water demand through the roof and tanked the public’s confidence in our ability to defend against domestic terrorist attacks. Apparently, they used most of the virus to contaminate thousands of bottled water containers, shipping them to various targets along the east coast. One of the targets was the United Nations General Assembly. Sanderson’s people stopped that convoy. Another convoy delivered several thousand bottles of contaminated water to the U.S. Capitol Building roughly one hour ago.”

  “On a Sunday? Directly to the Capitol Building? Mills must have some serious connections,” Shelby said, shaking his head.

  “Apparently so. Deliveries are normally cleared by the Capitol Police at an offsite delivery center, during the week. I’m sure Mills took advantage of the bottled water shortage to arrange the delivery. With the House and Senate in session, this had the potential to destabilize the legislative branch and trigger a coup. Picture every Congressman and Senator sipping from one of True America’s poisoned bottles. Can you imagine the worldwide impact if these attacks had been successful? This could have shattered the world order.”

  Shelby bit his tongue. The plan itself was diabolical, but he could see where the president was going with this. Destabilizing the government. Coup d’état. World order. All big words he would use on camera to make True America sound like the greatest threat to humanity since the Nazis. More like the greatest threat to the monopoly his political party now enjoyed in D.C.

  “We’re tracking four additional convoys right now. One of them is headed up Sixth Avenue in Manhattan. The NSA is tracking this live. NYPD is already following the trucks in unmarked cars. We’d like to determine the convoy’s ultimate destination before Emergency Services takes them down. We have another convoy passing through Parsippany, headed east along Interstate Eighty. Probably headed to New York City. The two remaining convoys are further out, headed south along Interstate 476. One just outside of Philadelphia and the other approaching Allentown. We think these are headed toward the D.C. area. General Gordon has a helicopter strike force headed for the northernmost convoy. Philadelphia police will stop the other before it enters the city.”

  Since his agency’s law enforcement services clearly weren’t needed at the moment, Shelby didn’t pay much attention to what the president said. His mind scrambled to process the bigger picture. Shelby did his best not to grin, as the sheer audacity of Greely’s plan unfolded in his mind. He couldn’t think of two groups reviled by more Americans right now than the United States Congress and the United Nations.

  Unleashing the Zulu virus on them was a horrifying and repugnant act of terrorism, but on some deep level, Shelby was willing to bet that the attacks would have resonated with many Americans. According to polls, the number of Americans who closely identified with True America’s core message grew larger every day. A major part of their message centered on the sad state of politics in D.C. and the need to enforce a more isolationist foreign affairs policy. This was a desperate gamble by Greely and Harding. Despite most Americans’ daily grumblings about politicians, the horrific reality of their act would have driven True America’s support base into the ground. The success of Greely’s plan to send America a wakeup call would have destroyed the mainstream movement.

  “Director Shelby?”

  “Sorry, Mr. President. I’m just trying to absorb the scale and complexity of their plot. This is unbelievable.”

  “It’s hard to comprehend. By now, you’re probably wondering why I’ve called you in here. Today’s events will require special handling by someone I can trust. Sanderson has given us the location of the laboratory used to contaminate the bottles. It’s about an hour out of Scranton. I want your people to get there first. You can coordinate with the Pennsylvania Department of Health to get a HAZMAT team to assist your people on-site. I also want the FBI to take charge at the White Mills distribution plant in Honesdale. Sanderson’s people stopped the final convoy at one of the warehouses and left quite a mess. State and local police have already responded to the scene, but I don’t trust them with the evidence. This is too important.”

  “I’ll send teams to each location immediately, Mr. President. What about Mills or Greely?”

  The president looked at Jacob Remy for guidance and also locked eyes with General Kearney.

  “Owen Mills, Jackson Greely and Lee Harding are dead. Owen Mills owns a massive estate on Lake Wallenpaupack, right outside of Honesdale. Their bodies can be found near the pool toward the back of the estate. No local police response has been detected in that area, so it appears that Sanderson’s attack on the estate went unnoticed. I’d like to keep this as quiet as possible for now.”

  “How many bodies are we talking about? I can’t imagine they were hanging out alone,” Shelby said.

  “About twenty. One of them belongs to Sanderson’s team.”

  “Twenty bodies? Exactly what are my people expected to do at the estate?”

  “Keep local law enforcement away until we can get a Special Operations strike force up there. Send a small group,” the president said.

  Shelby understood immediately. Later today, General Gordon would land several helicopters at the estate, creating enough mayhem to explain the sudden appearance of twenty bodies. He’d play along with that, in the interest of national security.

  “That sounds easy enough.”

  “There’s one more thing. I need you to remove any and all pressure on Sanderson’s people.”

  “Already done, Mr. President. I revoked the warrants and released the agents being held in Brooklyn. I’ve also removed them from the wanted lists. After examining the evidence gathered by Task Force Scorpion and speaking with Special Agent Sharpe, I’ve concluded that Sanderson had been working in good faith, on the nation’s behalf, despite his methods. The digital recordings of the NCTC watch floor confirm that Callie Stewart indeed sacrificed herself, along with others, while trying to stop the suicide bombing,” Sanderson said.

  “Frankly, I’m relieved to hear that this is your independent conclusion. We’ve invested an inordinate amount of trust in Sanderson’s word.”

  “Don’t get me wrong, Mr. President. Sanderson is a dangerous character. I don’t fully trust him, but based on the evidence, his organization’s assistance was instrumental to stopping the final stage of Greely’s plan. My task force was on the verge of a breakthrough, which is why NCTC was targeted. They had unofficially concluded that the Fort Meade attack had been orchestrated to fail and that the Hacker Valley compound had been filled with weekend warriors having little to do with True America. Sanderson’s information serves to reinforce the task force’s belief that Greely’s splinter group was behind everything. Mills, the bottled water connection…it all makes sense. I imagine the remaining four targets will directly support Greely’s extreme version of the True America manifesto.”

  “In my opinion, the True America manifesto is a clear and present danger to the stability of the United States,” Jacob Remy offered.

  Here we go, Shelby thought. The idea of a splinter cell didn’t sit well with the president’s chief of staff.

  “I agree. Which is why I think we got lucky in Pennsylvania. The last thing this country needed was a public trial of Greely, Harding and this Mills character. They would have become martyrs for the True A
merica political movement. Sanderson did us a huge favor. I just hope he left us enough evidence to track down the rest of Greely’s people. I’d like a solid link back to the NCTC bombing. The families of the victims deserve the closure.”

  Jacob Remy looked like he was about to make a point, when General Kearney turned around and made an announcement.

  “Mr. President, NYPD just stopped the Manhattan convoy at the GE Building loading docks. The driver was killed in a brief firefight.”

  “Thank you, General.”

  Frederick Shelby added this target to his mental calculation. Was NBC the target? NBC owned more than half of the seventy-story building, housing most of its corporate offices and studios there. Greely despised the media, on both sides of the political spectrum. Shelby wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if the next convoy stopped at the News Corporation Building to deliver some contaminated water to Rupert Murdoch’s empire. Knowing three out of the six locations, he could probably guess where the rest of the convoys were headed. He’d be willing to bet his job on the likelihood that one of the convoys was headed to lower Manhattan. Greely and Harding had clamored for the public overthrow of Wall Street well before it was cool to hate Wall Street executives. The convoy headed to Allentown would probably turn east on Interstate 78, unless General Gordon’s commandos reached it first.

  “General Gordon, how long until your air units intercept the northernmost convoy?” the president asked.

  “Just inside of twenty minutes. We’re trying to coordinate this for an open stretch of road with limited traffic. It might happen after Allentown.”

  “Thank you, General. Jacob, Frederick, will you follow me into the Oval Office for a moment?”

  Shelby followed Remy into the Oval Office, past a seasoned regular Secret Service agent. When the door shut behind him, the president turned and leaned his back against the front of his desk. There was no invitation to sit.

  “What exactly did your task force uncover regarding Hacker Valley? I was told by General Gordon that the compound was filled with heavily armed domestic terror cells. This is important. I’m about to level some heavy accusations against True America, and I need us to be on the same page. What leads you to suspect that Hacker Valley was some sort of diversion?”

  “Very few of the militants—”

  “Terrorists,” the president corrected.

  “Very few of the terrorists captured or killed fit the profile of an active True America operative. This could have been a recruiting drive for True America, but I feel pretty confident in my assessment that the compound had been stuffed with anti-government weekend warriors in order to send us in the wrong direction. I also have strong reason to believe that the attack on Fort Meade was orchestrated to make it look like our public water supply was in jeopardy. The sergeant involved in the shooting has disappeared, and his vacation schedule fits the profile of every True America operative we’ve recovered. And I don’t think it’s a coincidence that NCTC was hit soon after Special Agent O’Reilly placed a call to Laurel’s chief of police to check the specifics of his vacation.”

  “This is all very compelling, Director, and I’m sure you’ll get this all sorted out later, but right now you’re missing the bigger picture.”

  “I don’t understand, Mr. President,” Shelby said, fully understanding exactly what was headed his way.

  “I’m not convinced this is the end of True America’s plot against the government, and I have no intention of waiting around for round two. Starting tomorrow, we will systematically dismantle True America.”

  “I’m not sure there’s anything left to dismantle. Their training compound has been destroyed. Their plan has been stopped cold; most of the experienced personnel have been killed or captured and the three ringleaders are dead. Do we have new information from Sanderson or the CIA?”

  “Don’t play word games with me, Director. I expect your agency to assist the Department of Justice in the execution of warrants against all of True America. I’ve authorized the attorney general to start the process. We’ll begin right here in D.C. while the embers are still hot.”

  “I don’t appreciate your analogy, Mr. President, and I think you’re jumping the gun on this. There’s not enough evidence to sustain your course of action in the long run. At least at this point. I can assure you that my agency will conduct an extremely thorough investiga—”

  “I’m not waiting around for six months while you assemble data and question thousands of witnesses. We need to strike this organization down now.”

  “While the public is still outraged and confused? I’ll restructure Task Force Scorpion to address these investigative needs, and put them to work immediately. We’ll figure out exactly what happened, starting with Al Qaeda in Europe.”

  “I don’t feel like I’m making myself clear…”

  “Mr. President, you have made yourself abundantly clear. I have just been trying to tactfully steer you away from a disastrous course of action. You cannot take advantage of the situation to flush True America down the toilet. This is a political attack and little more.”

  “The movement’s founding fathers tried to poison thousands of Americans in an unholy alliance with Al Qaeda!” the president shouted.

  “And these founding fathers have been pariahs within the mainstream True America movement for years. They’ve been an embarrassment…relegated to speaking to libertarian gatherings at the Howard Johnson’s or ranting about government intervention at county fairs. They’re irrelevant within the movement. This whole nightmare was dreamed up by two dried-up, desperate hacks unable to come to terms with the fact that the movement they started thirty years ago has been succeeding without their help for the past decade. Take a look at the targets. The United Nations. Congress. NBC. This is nothing more than two highly persuasive lunatics taking one last swing at a revolutionary wet dream they had in the seventies.”

  “It’s still their movement, and I have no intention of waiting around for the rest of Greely’s snakes to bite,” the president barked.

  “Don’t expect my agents to participate in a political coup.”

  “If I can’t count on you to rally FBI support, I’ll find someone who can.”

  “Good luck, Mr. President. Oh, if I remember correctly, we still have a Black Hawk helicopter sitting on the ground inside Argentina, among other things,” Shelby reminded him.

  “Are you threatening me?”

  “Not at all, Mr. President. I’m just reminding you of the multitude of domestic and international laws you’ve violated over the past few weeks, directly or indirectly. If that’s it for now, I’d like to contact my task force in Pennsylvania. We wouldn’t want any local cops arriving at Mills’ estate before the Special Operations road show arrives. I’ll show myself out,” he said and turned for the hidden door leading to the hallway.

  Chapter 59

  2:44 PM

  Interstate 78 East

  Allentown, Pennsylvania

  Staff Sergeant William Gaskey revved the GAU-2/A 7.62mm Minigun, spinning its six barrels at nearly ten revolutions per second. His spade grips had been rigged with a sealed thumb switch, which powered the gun drive motor without engaging the feeder system or ammunition booster motor. With the barrels rotating, he could depress either of the two triggers attached to the grips and instantly deliver a virtual wall of steel. The electrically driven, air-cooled machine gun could fire up to fifty 7.62mm rounds per second at a sustained rate, utterly devastating anything in its sights.

  Two days ago, he had put the gun to work against a terrorist compound in West Virginia. Today he would use the gun to stop a semi-trailer on the highway. A convoy of trucks had just run a hastily assembled local police roadblock near Allentown, headed full speed through civilian traffic. The past week had been the strangest of his career. He much preferred Combat Search and Rescue (CSAR) missions or Special Operations pickups in Iraq or Afghanistan. Something didn’t sit right with him about using these helicopters on U.S
. soil.

  “Starboard gun. On my command. Two-second burst into the lead truck. Direct your fire at the cabin,” echoed his headset.

  “This is Sierra Gun. Two-second burst. On your command,” he replied.

  He felt the twenty-ton MH-53M Pavelow bank to the right and drop at the same time, commencing its gun run. His stomach tightened in response to the sudden downward pitch, and he tightened his grip on the gun handle, ready to disable the tractor-trailer. The interstate suddenly appeared in his view, along with two dark green semi-trailers, spaced evenly along the road. Three of the five trucks in the original convoy had stopped after the lead truck crashed and rammed through two Allentown cruisers at the first roadblock. According to the latest intelligence, only the lead driver was affiliated with the terrorists, so they would limit the engagement to the first truck.

  The interstate behind the trucks was clear of civilian traffic. Several police vehicles trailed the convoy at a safe distance. He assumed the pilots had confirmed that the interstate was clear of oncoming traffic. The helicopter dropped nearly even with the road and sped ahead of the first truck, veering left for a few seconds, before turning hard right on what appeared to be a collision course with the lead vehicle in the convoy. He placed the driver’s side door in the center of his gun’s iron reticle.

  “Starboard gun. Two-second burst. Fire.”

  **

  Brandon Osborne put his book down and closed his eyes. He’d been in the car for over an hour and was already bored out his mind. They were headed to see his grandparents in Phillipsburg, which wasn’t too much further down the interstate. They normally visited for a mid-afternoon lunch, but his grandparents had a church function lasting until two, so they had decided on dinner. Their late start meant that Brandon wouldn’t get back to Scranton until nine. He’d miss half of his Sunday night Call of Duty Three game. Every Sunday night, starting at eight, at least a dozen of his school friends played Call of Duty Three in multiplayer mode through Xbox Live. They usually played until ten, but sometimes continued beyond that. Brandon could think of no better way to start his school week.