by Ben Coes
92
JOINT BASE ANDREWS
Simonds heard the electric chirp from the hallway outside the ICU. When a second chirp occurred, she jerked her head, as if she’d been slapped. A Styrofoam cup full of coffee dropped from her hand to the floor. She sprinted toward the ICU.
A persistent, high-pitched alarm was coming from one of the monitors.
Simonds went to the woman’s side, quickly scanning the half dozen diagnostic monitors arrayed next to the bed. The alarm was connected to a device that monitored brain-level activity. Simonds touched the woman’s cheek and started rubbing it. Suddenly, one of the woman’s eyelids fluttered ever so slightly. For more than a minute, Simonds continued to rub her face. Slowly, the woman’s swollen eyes opened. They were beyond bloodshot, the whites turned dark red. She struggled to look around the room. Her eyes found Simonds.
“Listen to me carefully,” the woman whispered, reaching for Simonds’s hand. “They’re going to kill the president and the vice president of the United States.”
The woman coughed and lost her grip, struggling to keep her eyes open. A look of pain crossed her face.
“Largent works for them. They murdered the man named Trappe. Largent will be president. Please, it is true. It is why they killed Lindsay. I told him. They killed him because they knew people would listen to him. Please, listen to me. They are taking over your country…”
93
FEDEX FIELD
Dellenbaugh stood behind the podium, every sentence causing eruptions of cheers as he announced his plans to seek reelection.
“America was founded by men and women just like you and me,” he roared. “All Americans are revolutionaries. The reason this country becomes greater and greater is that we are all revolutionaries, refusing to sit back and allow our freedom to weaken. We are fighters!”
Out of the corner of his eye, Dellenbaugh noticed Chambliss, the lead advance man. He was staring at his phone, an anguished expression on his face.
Dellenbaugh turned back to the teleprompter.
“The fight is not over, my friends,” he continued. “The revolution will never be over. Together, if you give me four more years, we will make America better than it’s ever been!”
94
JOINT BASE ANDREWS
Simonds nearly tripped as she scrambled frantically toward the cockpit. The two CIA pilots were talking. They looked up at Simonds as she ran toward them, their eyes growing wide.
“I need a phone!” she yelled still halfway down the long passage to the cockpit. “I need to talk to Hector Calibrisi! This is Emergency Priority!”
Jonas St. John, the pilot to the left, was momentarily flummoxed, then turned and grabbed a mike.
“This is Captain St. John. This is an Emergency Priority. I need immediate access to DCIA Calibrisi.”
“Roger, Captain. Hold on.”
The crackle of static hit the air. St. John handed the mike to Dr. Simonds.
“This is Calibrisi.”
The cacophony of the crowd at FedEx Field drowned out the noise.
“Hector, it’s Nina Simonds. She woke up.”
“You have to talk louder,” said Calibrisi.
Simonds took a quick breath, despite the panic she now felt, understanding what was happening.
Be strong.
“She spoke,” said Simonds, her voice trembling. Her emotions were getting the better of her, but she kept going. “I’m quoting what I remember. She said, ‘Listen to me carefully. They’re going to kill the president and the vice president.’ She said Largent works for them, that they killed Lowell Trappe, that Largent will be president. She said it’s why they killed Lindsay, that she told him and they knew people would listen to him, so they killed him. She said they’re taking over the country.”
95
FEDEX FIELD
The chopper tilted left, cutting from the sky and descending toward FedEx Field in the distance. The stadium grew larger with each passing minute, surrounded by acres and acres of cars glinting in the afternoon sun.
Calibrisi hung up his phone. He tried to process it all as he stared at Dewey, momentarily frozen.
“Oh, no,” he whispered, understanding the full meaning of what Dr. Simonds had just told him—at what the woman had said. His heart raced as he looked around, momentarily speechless—paralyzed—helpless.
“Dewey,” said Calibrisi. “It’s—”
The chopper coursed lower, then landed on a cordoned-off stretch of grass immediately adjacent to the stadium.
“What is it?” said Dewey.
Suddenly a series of loud, insistent beeps came over commo—three long, three short. At the same time, Calibrisi’s phone started vibrating and flashing red. He looked at the message scrolling across the phone:
FLASHCON 13:27:40: SILVER LION DOWN
The vice president of the United States was dead.
Dewey reached for the door handle.
“Hold on,” said Calibrisi, barely above a whisper.
Dewey paused.
“The woman spoke. They’re going to kill the president.”
“What—”
“The vice president is dead. It’s a conspiracy. They’re going to kill the president.”
Dewey waited a half second, then charged to the back wall of the chopper.
Calibrisi tapped his ear twice.
“This is DCIA Calibrisi, voice RECOG.”
“Hold please. Voice RECOG.” There was a three- or four-second pause. “Affirmative. You’re live, Director Calibrisi.”
“Requesting Tier One stream into POTUS one-two-nine,” said Calibrisi.
“Hold for FBI Omega.”
A short pause, then: “This is Daniels, Hector,” came the deep voice of the FBI in-theater operations commander. “I have Omega. We’re hot, Hector—POTUS is on stage and speaking.”
Dewey opened a cabinet on the back wall, exposing a neatly arrayed, sizable collection of weaponry. He quickly scanned the cabinet, sizing up his options; he was familiar with every rifle, handgun, SAM, explosive, and submachine gun in the large cache. He grabbed a pair of pistols and slammed mags into them. He chambered a round in each gun, then grabbed a few extra mags.
“Listen to me carefully, Nick,” said Calibrisi. “You have a live-shooter scenario. Assume it’s multiple gunmen in some sort of sniper set.”
Daniels paused for a brief moment, then panic hit his voice.
“We need to get him off the goddam stage!” he said.
Dewey handed Calibrisi a handgun and an extra mag, then leapt from the chopper.
“One more thing, Nick,” Calibrisi said calmly over commo. “This is an inside job. Make sure we have our ducks in a row before you give the go to remove Dellenbaugh. Dewey and I are entering the stadium now—I need an immediate visual black pass.”
“Understood,” said Daniels. “You got it.”
Dewey and Calibrisi moved into the delivery area beneath the stadium. FBI agents clutching carbines registered their entrance but did not attempt to stop them.
“You take the field, I’m going up,” said Calibrisi.
Dewey moved into a sprint, despite the pain from the stitches in his hip. He came to a tunnel that emptied out onto the field. A line of armed agents stood at the end of the tunnel, moving aside as Dewey approached.
The crowd was in pandemonium, cheering at everything Dellenbaugh said.
Dewey moved along a steel cordon at the edge of the field. He was met by a pair of armed SWAT agents in tactical gear. Dewey lifted the Velcro patch on his jacket, revealing a plastic ID, which both men quickly examined and then stepped back, nodding at Dewey.
Why aren’t they taking him off the stage?
Dewey’s eyes scanned the massive crowd. For the first time, he glanced to the stage. In dark pants and a button-down, sleeves rolled up, tie hanging down, his hair slightly messed up, President J. P. Dellenbaugh was pointing to the crowd as he spoke. He had all one hundred thousand of them waiting on hi
s every word as the brilliant midafternoon sun illuminated his big frame in a silhouette.
Dewey reached the side of the stage. It was a mess of bodies, like a rock concert. Everyone was standing and cheering. He instinctively scanned the first several rows in front of President Dellenbaugh, but it seemed pointless. The crowd was a blur of movement—people standing and clapping, arms raised out toward Dellenbaugh, placards in the air, children on the shoulders of parents. Chaos.
But there was something. He saw something. He didn’t know what, but it was somewhere. He studied the rows in front of the stage. What was it? Dewey moved behind the stage and slipped between the front row of people and the stage, pushing toward the middle—just behind where Dellenbaugh was now standing and waving at the frenzied crowd.
* * *
Law stood near the door of the suite, pacing back and forth. He held his cell phone, waiting for the message. Every minute or so, Law looked out through the peephole in the door to see if anyone was coming.
The sound of President Dellenbaugh’s voice echoed through the suite, mixed with the full-throttle cheering of a hundred thousand men and women.
Law told himself he wasn’t nervous, but he was. He held up his hands, trying to hold them still. But they trembled, ever so slightly, like leaves on a branch.
Law’s sniper rifle was in a fixed position, the bipod atop the waist-high concrete barrier between the main room and the seats at the front that overlooked the playing field. The rifle was covered with a black tablecloth Law had removed from the dining table inside the suite.
* * *
Even the tall man in the second row was on his feet, clapping and cheering like everyone else, even as he waited for the moment he knew would soon be there. The moment when Ellsbury or Law killed the president.
Bruner felt a vibration in his pocket and pulled out his cell phone.
FR—8
MISSION SUCCESS
The vice president was dead.
Bruner put the phone back in his pocket as a surreal sense of light-headedness washed over him, like an epiphany. Bobby Largent was now vice president of the United States.
He looked back up at Dellenbaugh, who stood just feet away from him.
“In four years, we have cut the deficit in half,” thundered Dellenbaugh, “and if America gives me four more years, we will end the deficit forever!”
Bruner felt the steel skeleton of the gun tucked beneath his left armpit. He glanced above Dellenbaugh. His eyes swept left and right, scanning the suites, waiting for the moment.
Shoot, for God’s sake.
Bruner knew he could simply pull out his pistol and fire. The bullet was chambered. The safety was off.
But Bruner also knew it was the final option, a last resort. If he moved on Dellenbaugh, it would be a bittersweet victory. He would be dead in seconds, taken down hard by one of the dozens of FBI shooters arrayed across the roof of the stadium, or by a Secret Service agent nearby, one of the dozens within the envelope of the president.
Bruner was an excellent marksman—he had no doubt he would succeed—but he also had no doubt he would be killed in a hail of bullets within seconds.
The larger objective would be accomplished, but he would not be there to see it, to witness the reclamation of America, to watch in the coming hours as the Middle East and major parts of Europe were destroyed in thermonuclear heat.
He would not be there to watch as Islam was wiped from the earth in a brutal, inhuman, but necessary attack.
He would not be there to feel the power of vengeance for the daughter he loved, the daughter Islam wiped from the earth so many years ago.
Bruner placed his hand inside his jacket as his eyes swept the sides of the stage.
Shoot, he thought, picturing Ellsbury and Law.
His fingers brushed the butt of the pistol. He started to remove the gun from the holster, then paused, glancing again above the crowd to the suites—to Law and Ellsbury. What were they waiting for?
Shoot!
* * *
Inside the FBI in-theater command center, located on the roof concourse of FedEx Field, Daniels went to what looked like a black briefcase. He held his thumb against the digital reader until the locks on the case popped open.
Before he could open it, a loud ring came from inside.
The phone was a secure emergency link to FBI CENCOM in Quantico, Virginia.
Daniels opened the case and lifted the phone.
“CENCOM River Two,” came a voice. “This is a code nine nine, Daniels. I repeat, nine nine.”
“Please advise, River Two.”
“Move your teams now,” said the man. “Take rules of engagement to an improvise orange scenario. Then—not before—remove POTUS.”
“Affirmative, CENCOM. Seeking exclusion and process.”
“Exclusion and process in place. Get moving, Daniels.”
Daniels hung up the phone then triggered commo.
“This is an Emergency Priority command,” he said, urgency in his voice. “I have Omega. We are in a live-shooter scenario. Squadron Two, you are to hold. Shooters: VPOTUS is dead and POTUS is now in imminent danger. I want all snipers locked and loaded! You have in-theater aim-and-fire exclusion. You see something, you shoot. Access points, suites, roof: get looking, and if you believe you see someone targeting POTUS, you take them down.”
Daniels exhaled and looked around the small command center, where several agents were working. They looked up, consternation and shock on their faces, aware for the first time of the grave situation.
Daniels continued over commo. “Field teams: Get inside the suites now! We are looking for gunmen within line-sight of the president. I want weapons hot when you enter those suites. Now go! Go!”
Daniels again: “Squadron Two, prepare to remove POTUS, on my go, not before.”
“Roger, Omega, this is Squadron Two, ready on your go, sir.”
* * *
Dewey moved along the front of the crowd that was gathered behind the stage. The stage came up to his chest. He calmly scanned the rows in front of the stage as he made his way toward the area directly behind Dellenbaugh.
With every step, with every second, his eyes came up empty. There were too many people, too many possibilities—and yet something told him he’d seen something. Some part of him, whether instinct or the trained skills of an operator, had registered a false look, a threatening movement, a face from a file. He didn’t know which—didn’t have time to know—and a cold shiver bloomed at the base of his spine and shot through him as he realized he might never know.
Then he saw him. It was a tall man in a suit in the second row, standing like everyone else and cheering for Dellenbaugh.
What was it? Think, goddammit!
Dewey pushed aside swarms of people who were pressed up close to the stage, many reaching out toward Dellenbaugh. And then he saw the man’s eyes. It was his eyes that gave him away. It was the same flash of movement he’d seen from behind the stage. The man’s eyes went from Dellenbaugh to something else—to the sky above. Dewey followed the trajectory. The tall man was scanning the roof, the suites …
Scanning with the trained focus of a killer.
* * *
Eight two-man FBI tactical teams—spread around the stadium along the roof concourse—charged down fire stairs and started moving suite to suite, opening every door, guns out. Suites that were occupied were left alone.
One of the teams encountered a locked door. The lead agent took a step back and kicked the door, but the lock held. The second agent lifted a compact steel battering ram from across his back as the first agent kicked again, to no avail. The agents stood across from each other and grabbed the battering ram.
“Two, one—” whispered one of the men.
They slammed the battering ram into the door just above the handle, swung it back, and slammed again …
* * *
Ellsbury, who was across the stadium from Law, was slouched on a chair at the back
of the suite, out of sight. He listened as J. P. Dellenbaugh walked onto the stage, the crowd erupting in pandemonium.
“Thank you! Thank you, everyone!”
Then Ellsbury’s cell phone vibrated.
FR—8
MISSION SUCCESS
Ellsbury stood. He skulked low toward the front of the suite, carefully setting the Hecate sniper rifle in between two seats in the front row, then lay on his stomach and prepared to fire.
He found Dellenbaugh in the scope, adjusting the optic ever so slightly.
Ellsbury put his right index finger to the safety and slid it off. His finger found the ceramic trigger just as Dellenbaugh took a few steps to his left, taking him out of the crosshairs as he waved to the crowd on that side of the stadium.
Ellsbury held still and steady, waiting for Dellenbaugh to return to the podium.
* * *
Law heard a noise from somewhere in the hallway outside. It was a muffled scream from the next suite down, followed by boots pounding along the corridor. They were coming closer.
A low ding came from his cell phone.
FR—8
MISSION SUCCESS
Law ran to the front of the suite. He knelt and took up position behind the rifle, then slowly pulled off the tablecloth just as he heard a foot striking the door.
Another kick followed, as Law put his eye to the scope and his left hand found the safety and flicked it off. He adjusted the scope, finding President Dellenbaugh’s smiling face within the crosshairs of the sniper rifle.
Then a louder sound jolted him. He recognized the steel-on-steel violence of a battering ram striking the door.
* * *
Dewey reached beneath his jacket and shirt, grabbing the butt of his gun. He pulled it out and held it down by his side as he marked the man across the stage.
Dewey moved the safety off, then put his finger on the ceramic trigger.
Suddenly, Dellenbaugh took several steps away from the podium as a fantastic roar erupted from the crowd. It was Dellenbaugh’s daughters who caused the commotion as they came running across the stage, followed by Amy Dellenbaugh.
