The Eighth Day (16 page)

“You always were the coolest, even when you were spooning out smashed Cheez Doodles from the bottom of your Coca Cola.”

“You know, if you forget that, I promise to forget you wet your pants when I jumped out of the closet in your room that night.”

“You scared me to death!”

“So wanna do me a favor?”

“What do you need, kiddo?”

“If I told you a phone number, could you tell me who it belongs to?”

“Sure; it’s called a reverse directory.”

“What if it’s a cell phone?”

“Well, I got a friend over in Wireless that can maybe give me a location down to a cell.”

“Good. I’ll call you at about 4 o’clock.”

“Hey Carly, is this for a news story?”

“No, I had dinner with a guy last night. I just want to check to see that he is where he said he was going to be.” She little white lied with a lascivious lilt in her voice.

“Oh, okay, I got it.”

“Thanks, Harry; talk to you later.”

Secret Service agents had surreptitiously visited the facility the day before and made their quiet plans. No one, except the head of security and the CEO, were aware of their true identities and mission. Local hospitals were stocked with Type AB blood. Major overpasses were identified and would be manned along the route. People along that route would momentarily be inconvenienced as their cell phones dropped calls. A new, high-tech addition to the “bubble.” The reason for this security was because the president was here. He had come to this remote Virginia facility to witness the top secret testing of a revolutionary new weapon in the war on drugs. The head of the White House security detail referred to all the president’s mobile security needs as the “bubble.” It was an unseen sphere of security in which the Commander-in-Chief traveled.

Hiccock was driven to the secluded location by the Secret Service. He had to pass through a magnetometer and have his White House I.D. card swiped through a portable scanner. The resident ordered him in attendance to get an unbiased assessment and explanation of the science behind the satellite-based defoliant. Hiccock was briefed only four hours earlier. From what he gathered, the device worked from 100 miles up in space. It could bathe up to 200 acres with protoplasm-inhibiting beta rays. Once it was positioned into geo-synchronous orbit over a target country, it could wither and brown that nation’s vegetation. The farmers on the ground would never suspect anything more than blight or Hot Soil.

The test on this day was accelerated. 100 times the normal exposure was being beamed to a field of sprouts. The president watched as 10 technicians stood in the field as proof of this device’s safety for humans, while it killed the lifeblood of the flora and fauna around them. The president, however, was 300 yards away from the target.

“What is the principle behind the beam?” Hiccock asked, sitting ten feet from the president.

The head of the project, Professor Di Consini, explained the process to the president’s science advisor, who would have known this already if he weren’t chasing bad guys. “We modulate a band within the ultra-violet spectrum by the square of its base frequency. The wavelength variations dilate the photosynthesis receptors of the organism. This causes the protoplasm to disperse as in the natural life cycle of the plant cell.”

The president looked to Hiccock as a UN delegate would look to a translator for the interpretation of something a foreign dignitary had spoken.

“They put the plant through thousands of day-night cycles in a very short period of time, in effect accelerating the life cycle of the plant and bringing it to an early old age.”

“Precisely. Except it all happens without the plant maturing.”

“Wow, if you could lick that, you could grow forests overnight!” Hiccock blurted out, impressed.

“Yes, we got here trying to make a ‘super grow light’ if you will. All we managed to do was to kill the plants without them growing at all. Unfortunately. the laws of thermodynamics prohibit us from also accelerating the maturity process which would have led to growth.”

“So the plants die of old age on the inside while never sprouting on the outside,” Hiccock concluded.

“That’s why this is such a destructive device,” Di Consini said, topping off Bill’s observation.

“Are there any downsides to this process, Professor?” the president inquired.

“Just one. Photosynthesis creates oxygen from carbon monoxide. Thus the accelerated oxygen production also starves the plants of monoxides, contributing to their early demise.”

“But you are also creating an oxygen-rich environment as a by-product,” Hiccock pointed out.

“Exactly, and that can aid a spontaneous combustion.” Di Consini liked Hiccock. He was smart.

“So, will a target field suddenly combust into an inferno?” The president caught the drift of the conversation between the two scientists.

Di Consini resisted the temptation to coddle the president too much for following the science jargon. So he didn’t say, “Why yes, my boy, I think you’ve got it!” Instead he flatly informed him, “It’s possible, given a windless day, high solar heat, or electric storm. We found that if we slow the process, we also reduce the combustible risk, but lengthen the kill time.”

“I see.” The president pondered this as he observed the field being bombarded by silent, invisible plant killing rays.

Di Consini continued, “Sir, we are 10 minutes into this hi-powered test. Each ten-minute segment roughly equals a week under normal exposure. Six weeks in application or 60 minutes in this test will kill off approximately 98 percent of the crop.”

“Hiccock, do you see any downside?”

“Three big issues sir; one practical, one legal, the other ethical.”

“Go on,” the president urged, impressed at the speed with which Hiccock’s mind had processed this new invention and already categorized and outlined his thoughts into three distinct talking points.

“The professor has given us a powerful weapon. Legally I would think it amounts to an act of war against the country we point it at. I would imagine we must keep this totally top secret or the planters can cover their crops or farm hydroponically in caves or underground. But lastly, this can be used to throw a country into famine, sir--turning green fertile fields into dust bowls. Will we ever be tempted to turn off the food supply of a country whose politics we don’t like?”

“Bill, that’s why I like keeping you around. You never let the fact that I am your boss sugar coat your logic.”

“I know
you
wouldn’t do such a thing, sir. But will your successors be tempted?”

The president mulled this over as he watched the field of sprouts through binoculars and the 10 “guinea pigs” standing out there being,
what was it?
- Modulated.

Hiccock saw this as his chance to make his call. “Sir, I need to make a call. I’ll be right back.” Hiccock stepped some thirty feet away and tried to use his cell but got no signal. Then he remembered “the bubble.” The Secret Service was experimenting with an electronic jamming device that would make it impossible for anyone to signal or give real time intelligence to any would-be conspirators using an ordinary cell phone, or other electronic surveillance equipment. So he went inside the building and asked permission to use the phone on a secretary’s desk.

“Thank you for remembering,” Carly spoke through the receiver.

“I only have a second,” Hiccock said as he placed her number back in his wallet.

“So can you tell me what you’ve briefed the president on today?”

Hiccock held the phone out and looked at it like he just heard a squealing noise. “Carly, is that one of those stupid questions reporters just have to ask in case your subject has an instant brain tumor and forgets what this is all about?”

“Come on, Bill, give me something. I go on the air in three minutes.”

“Nothing like cutting it close, huh?”

“I promise. I will credit whatever you tell me to an anonymous high-placed administration official.”

“Okay. The president is considering asking Congress for additional funding for homeland security to raise the level of preparedness of our National Guard and Coast Guard,” Hiccock informed her, knowing the president himself had told 10 members of Congress this already and they would probably beat Carly to the air in the next two minutes to blab it to their constituents. By tomorrow it would be old news. But it gave her what she wanted. Bill still didn’t know why he wanted to give her anything at all. She was cute; still, she showed no interest in him. He was just being a little silly here and he knew it. But she was cute!

Carly didn’t care about the questionable value of the “insight” she was getting from her “high-placed source;” she looked at her cell phone hoping the number would appear. Instead it read “private call,” meaning the caller ID feature had been turned off at the other end.

“How much, Bill?”

“58 billion but you definitely didn’t hear that from me.”

“I understand.”

“Look, I got to get back. This squares us right?” Hiccock said as he started pulling the phone from his ear.

“For what?”

“For whatever reason I feel the need to help you.”

Carly laughed, “See ya around, Bill.” She pressed end then called her cousin Harry.

“Harry, can you tell me where the last call on my phone came from?”

It took about one half of a minute, then she heard Harry say, “Got it,” with some satisfaction. “He was on a land line, real simple. Arco Systems and Design, Alexandria, Virginia.”

“Thanks, honey. Love ya, bye.”

She had 30 seconds ‘til airtime. Just enough to rehearse her opening line as she checked her hair in the news van window.

“Carly, 15 seconds!” The cameraman informed her.

She adjusted her blazer and planted her feet. She turned around and checked her background. The portico of the White House was right behind her.

“Stand by,” her cameraman said.

Carly waited to see the tally lights on the BetaCam camera nestled on her cameraman’s shoulder. Although he was rolling tape, the feed from the camera was simultaneously being up-linked to a microwave tower in D.C. It was then routed through the master control switcher in the D.C. control room of MSNBC. From there it went by broadcast cable to their satellite up-link facility in Fort Lee, New Jersey. Through 130 miles of space, up to Weststar 7. Known in the business as a bird, the satellite sits in geo-synchronous orbit above the equator, capable of distributing broadcast signals to thousands of dishes around the country and the world.

MSNBC has learned exclusively today that the president, who is at this hour in Alexandria Virginia, at Arco Systems, is considering asking Congress for 58 billion dollars in additional funding to …”

Falad almost fell off his chair. He looked once again at the corner of the screen that held the little geometric design with the word ‘LIVE’ in it. He ran as fast as his regulation boots would carry him across the marble.

General Nandeserra was taking a bath when he forced his way in. Falad had no qualms about this breach of the man’s privacy, because the General himself ordered Falad to find him immediately as soon as the U.S. President’s whereabouts were known, no matter what time of day.

Falad used an apologetic tone anyway. “General, we have a location on the American President outside the White House and in range of Samovar.” The general immediately stood and stepped out of the bath, Falad looked around and handed him a towel.

He went straight to his computer and opened a Word document of the Arabic translation of Chesapeake. He typed in the word “execute” in Arabic and the computer jumped to the 32nd word on page 217. He wrote down 217,32. He then entered Alexandria. That was a lucky break, because that proper name was in the book. 495, 56. He searched for the letters V (0,4,107) and A (0,1,34). Then he found the letters A, R, C, and O. Falad picked up a regular, non-secure phone and called AT&T international information. In his best American accent he responded to the automated audio prompts, “What city and state?”

“Alexandria, Virginia.”

“What listing?”

“Arco Systems.”

A young woman operator cut into the line and said, “Hold for your number…”

“Excuse me, but I am also looking for the address,” Falad stated in a tone and manner consistent with some businessman from Norfolk.

“I have Arco Systems and Design, 1401 Juno Boulevard in Alexandria. Hold for your number.” A computerized voice then spewed out the 10-digit number to his already hung up phone.

One of the General’s aides entered with the map, which Falad had instructed him to fetch as he rushed in. The aide was already studying it and called out the address’ coordinates in Alexandria. The General wrote them down in a coded way that had been designed to indicate the end of the message. He picked up the phone and dialed a number he alone knew and had memorized.

It was mid-afternoon in Quebec, Canada when Muhammad Al Kazir’s cell phone rang. Like the Samovar team, he was paid a handsome wage while all manner of his life was subjugated to one and only one purpose: watch, wait, and answer the phone when it rang. He had been waiting for five months, since he had entered Canada on a student visa.

“Yes, General,” Muhammad said, knowing the General would be the only caller ever on this phone. The General started reading off the numbers as Muhammad wrote them down, then repeated them. He knew not what the numbers were, or what they meant, or even to whom he was about to call and relay them to. When they checked the numbers, he simply said, “Fargo Bank. Allah Be Praised,” and hung up. He waited five seconds then dialed the number, which he too had never written down, only memorized.

At the “safe house” in Washington D.C., four of the five members of the Samovar team were off in their own respective areas of the large six-room apartment. One was out getting toilet paper and other necessities. Samovar happened to be looking at the phone when it rang. He caught it on the first ring. “Yes?”

After he had double-checked the numbers, he opened the James Michener tome and started with page 217, the 32nd word. It took all of three minutes as the long-anticipated message was finally unfolded before him in Arabic. He looked up the address on a map identical to that of the General’s. He knew how to get there for he had spent months driving around, studying Washington D.C. and exploring its surrounding areas, only to find technology, which he could download to his smart phone, had all but rendered that exercise a mere curiosity.

With his bedroom door closed behind him, he opened his closet. There, hanging in meticulous military order, with color-coded tags, two inches apart so as not to wrinkle, were 27 uniforms, all custom tailored to his size. A tag on each one identified the municipality it had been crafted for. That information had been a gift from a Moslem student who got a job working the night shift at the biggest dry-cleaning company in the Washington D.C. area. As they came in for cleaning, he painstakingly photographed and measured each uniform. Those pictures and measurements were sent back to the General’s staff, where women, plying needles, replicated the uniforms from dyed bolts and other garment industry staples. The badges were crafted by metal workers in the desert of his country. Each uniform was shipped to him via international Fed-Ex, as innocently as any three-pound large box.

Getting the right holsters and guns was a little more problematic, but, here again, one of his team members, posing as a tourist, took telephoto pictures of actual officers on duty. He then simply went to various police supply stores and bought the leatherwear. The guns were as easy to get by attending one of the hundreds of gun shows the Americans loved to convene. Complying with the “waiting period” rules, which were purposely made impotent by the pressure of the gun lobbies in the U.S., was not an issue for a foreign national with nothing but time on his hands with which to build his arsenal.

He chose the uniform with the tag “Alexandria,” and pulled the leather that was similarly marked from a series of drawers. He found the appropriately tagged gun in the footlocker that held all the guns and ammunition. He also took out a Walther PPK and screwed on a silencer. As he adjusted the tie he had learned to make like a good soldier, he gave himself one more full inspection in the mirror. Stepping out of his bedroom, he found one of his men sitting on the couch watching a satellite feed of Al-Jazeera. An anti-American protest was being covered. The sounds of the shouting and guns being fired in the air, which normally accompanied these planned “spontaneous” uprisings, provided a background noise that would help with the next step. He approached him, silently raising the Walther, and pulled the trigger. There was a small popping sound, which was lost in the cacophony emanating from the TV; the top of his head rippled as the bullet went straight through, his blood then pouring out. Before the body had time to slump over, he walked into the kitchen as team member two was just turning with a cup of tea. “I made you a cup…”

The cup shattered washing his shirt in tea, and then blood as two more bullets slammed into his body. He fell back with a crash. That brought the third member of the team out from his room. He was shocked to see his comrade slumped over on the couch, the cushions soaked red with blood. His eyes slowly rose up and he flinched upon seeing Samovar pointing the gun at him. It all became clear to him at that instant. He held up his hand in the gesture that means “wait” and got down on his knees as he started praying. The man closed his eyes as Samovar put the gun to his forehead and fired. Samovar then heard a key turning in the lock of the main entrance. As the young man entered, Samovar fired three times. The grocery bag dimpled with each shot as the door was splattered with exit wound blood. Without so much as a sigh, Samovar wiped down the gun, and strategically placed it on the floor next to the first victim, for the authorities to find. He opened a drawer and took out a kilo of cocaine. He ripped one side of it and dropped it on the table to appear as if it had haphazardly fallen.

He went back to the closet and lit the sleeves of six of the uniforms; he dropped one onto the carpet that ran throughout the apartment, the flame instantly catching the nap. He watched for a brief second as the doorway to the room was consumed with the spreading fire. Retrieving the phone, he left closing, but not locking, the door. There was nothing in the house, on the dead men, or in their aliases that would connect them to the General or his country.

Samovar went down to the garage and collected the Ford Taurus he had rented weekly from Hertz for the last six months. He placed the cell phone under the rear tire of the car, which was parked facing outward in the spot. Inside he entered Arco’s street address into the GPS app on his smart phone. He put the Ford into reverse and released his foot from the brake momentarily; the car inched back slightly. Through the open window he could hear the cell phone crunch. He then slipped it into drive and punched the accelerator hard. The rear wheels spun and screeched as the cell phone was catapulted out from under the tire, smashing into the concrete wall of the garage into a million pieces.

Samovar drove in accordance with all traffic laws and resisted the urge to speed. Following the female computerized voice of the app through the series of “right turn ahead” and “exit ahead” prompts, directed him, with Global Positioning accuracy, to his appointment with history.

The Barclay’s Bank in Quebec was Mohammed’s last stop in Canada before he would return home. Having served his country, and now retrieving his $50,000 bonus for making that one phone call for the General, he entered the bank and proceeded directly to the safe deposit boxes. The key had been sent to him five months prior. He hadn’t known which bank it belonged to until the General disclosed this tidbit at the end of the phone call. As he returned to his car with an attaché case full of 500 one hundred-dollar bills, he had visions of living like a wealthy man at home, with the ability to pray openly, and re-grow his beard, and maybe marry and have sons. He didn’t notice the man following him in the underground parking lot. He too had received a call from the General today.

The man had been sent a photograph of Muhammad Al Kazir five months ago. He had been waiting since then for his message to execute. He didn’t know who this man he followed was, or why the General wanted him silenced. He didn’t know if the man who he just “drew a bead” on was a Moslem or an infidel. All he knew was that his $50,000 assassin’s fee was in the man’s briefcase. That would be enough for him to disappear down in the islands until this murder had “cooled off” and long since been relegated to the open case file as a robbery-homicide.

In less than 30 minutes of his phone call, the General’s word to the mullahs, that there would be “no loose ends,” was carried out. Five people, potential loose ends, had been eliminated and at least two more would die in the next hour or so.

In the Virginia countryside, the modern offices of Arco Systems and Design stood out like an off-white slab of halvah. Samovar wished he could taste the sweet dessert cake one more time before meeting Allah, but he was sure sweeter and tastier delights awaited him in the next life.

He pulled up to the guardhouse at the main gate and addressed the officer, “I’m here to help out with the security detail. I’m Johnson, how are you?” He extended his hand as he affected the perfect mid-Atlantic accent which he studied and had mastered two years earlier. Samovar’s eyes fixed on the man standing 20 feet ahead in the unmistakable regalia of a Secret Service agent, long brown rain coat, sunglasses and a curly wire coming from his ear.

The guard, recognizing the uniform and badge, accepted him as what he appeared to be. The fact that the president’s visit had been kept secret actually made the guard more easily accept the last-minute appearance of this cop. No one at the company had been informed of the intended arrival until the Secret Service showed up at 8 a.m. making sure no one could call out, even to tell their wives, that Mitchell was expected. It only made sense that some cops were caught off guard and had to scramble to work. “Well Johnson, the Secret Service is all over the inside; your guys are out on the walkway.” He checked his clipboard. “There’s Captain Yates up there.”

“He’s a good boss. Thanks. I’ll report to him. Where can I park?”

“Right over there in the visitor’s spot.”

Samovar offered a short salute and drove towards to the designated spot. The agent in the raincoat held up his hand. Samovar pulled up to the man. “I’m supposed to report to Captain Yates up ahead.”

The agent said nothing but scanned every detail of the man, the uniform, and the interior of the car. Avoiding his gaze, Samovar saw in the rear view mirror that the guard at the gate was waving him through. The agent glanced up at the guard, and didn’t pay him any attention. The agent didn’t really care if this Johnson cop was the guard’s brother-in-law.

“I.D.” was all the agent had to say.

Samovar’s hand grazed the butt of his service weapon on the way to his shirt pocket. Readily placed there, as it was in every uniform, was the appropriate photo I.D. A driver’s license was tucked into every wallet in each pair of uniform pants back at the apartment. Family photos, two hundred in assorted bills, credit and Social Security cards were also duplicated in every billfold. This precaution was taken in the event a cop, during a routine traffic stop, happened to catch a glimpse of its contents.

After checking the photo on the Alexandria Police Department I.D. against the face before him, the agent handed the card back. “How come you’re late?”

“Had a court appearance, and a judge who wanted to give the jerk-off I arrested every possible chance to walk, based on me being a fuck-up! Shot the whole morning to shit!” Samovar, a.k.a. Johnson, gave him a look that said, ‘You know what I mean?’

The agent waved him by without saying a word.

He prayed to Allah that the agent hadn’t seen the crime movie in which Robert Duvall and that “black actor” played policemen and from which he borrowed, verbatim, the line of dialog concerning the judge. As he got out of the car, he adjusted his holster and put on his cap, briefly hesitating to inspect his reflection in the side view mirror. This act was purely for the sake of the guard and president’s security man, who, still watching, would surely read it as the actions of a man about to meet his boss and …maybe the president.

The test had gone well. One hour and twenty minutes, after the beam was turned on from the satellite that had been launched from a Department of Defense shuttle mission three years earlier, the sprouts were dead. The 10 test dummies, as Hiccock thought of the technicians who built and believed in this thing, were seemingly fine and no worse for the wear.

The president was impressed. “Professor Di Concini, you have made a substantial scientific development here. On behalf of America, I thank you for all your efforts.” He then shook the hands of a few of the research team members before he, Hiccock and a few other military men exited the demonstration area.