Patient Zero (36 page)

The DMS Warehouse, Baltimore / Saturday, July 4; 6:01 A.M.

GRACE AND I had a quiet breakfast in the mess hall before first light, then she headed off to muster her team while I made a call. I was hoping I’d wake Church up and get to hear him when he was off balance, but he answered on the first ring. Fricking robot.

Instead of “Hello” he asked, “Is there a problem?”

“No. I wanted to touch base about the Liberty Bell thing. You still cool with me taking Echo Team to Philly?”

“Of course,” he said, and it implied that I’d have heard different if he’d changed his mind. The communication flow with him was going to take some getting used to. I’m used to a lot more bureaucracy. “I advised the President of our concerns with safety during the holiday, and he approved all of my recommendations. The gears are already turning to get the pharmaceutical companies involved. The President will address a closed emergency session of Congress tomorrow. The full resources of the United States, England, and the other allies will be thrown against this now.”

Church briefly outlined the steps he was taking to bulk up security at the top twenty Fourth of July events scheduled across the country. It meant mobilizing tens of thousands of additional police and military, and though that had to be a red-tape nightmare Church seemed confident that it would all be handled. I guess having a rubber stamp from the Commander in Chief lit a lot of fires under the right asses. Points for Church.

“My question,” I said when he’d finished, “is what our actual status is going to be down there in Philly? I mean      we can’t exactly flash DMS badges, can we?”

“We don’t have badges,” he said. “I also discussed this with the President and obtained authorization for Echo Team to roll as a special detachment of the Secret Service. How familiar are you with their protocols?”

“I can fake it.”

“Last night I called a friend in the garment industry and appropriate clothes should be arriving by six-thirty. IDs were already sent by courier and Sergeant Dietrich has them.”

“You don’t like wasting time, do you?”

“No,” he said, and hung up.

I smiled and shook my head. So this is what it felt like to be in the major league.

I found Dietrich and got the material Church had sent. IDs for everyone plus a detailed set of notes from Church that included the names and numbers of the people we planned to interview.

I found Grace in the computer trailer. I told her about my call to Church. “How is it that he has this much power over the President? I mean      who
is
Church?”

Grace shook her head. “I’ve heard some bits and pieces of things over the last couple of years that add up to his having the goods on a lot of people in Washington.”

“The goods? As in      blackmail?”

“I think he quite literally knows where all of the bodies are buried, as the saying goes. He has leverage on a lot of power players and he uses it to get what he wants.”

“Good thing he’s on our side.” I paused. “He
is
on our side, isn’t he?”

“God, I hope so.”

“How’d he get all this dirt?”

“I can make a guess,” she said, arching an eyebrow, and then she tilted her head in the direction of the complex array of computer terminals that filled the room.

“MindReader?”

She shrugged. “It makes sense. It’s brilliant at digging into everyone else’s business without leaving a trace that it was there. That’s one of its unique and most dangerous features. With MindReader he can sneak into the Pentagon, read whatever files he wants, and then exit without leaving the usual signature. I’ve seen him do it.”

“Holy smoke.” I stared at the computer as if it was Aladdin’s lamp. “You ever heard the expression, ‘If that were to fall into the wrong hands it’d be curtains for the free world’? Well, that pretty much applies here.”

“Too right it does. There are only a handful of people in the world who have access, and Church has to personally grant us access through his mainframe router to allow us to log on each day. It’s no joke, and even though MindReader doesn’t leave a trace in other computers, all searches and operations are logged on his hard drive.”

“So Big Brother really is watching,” I mused.

“All the time.”

“Does the man ever sleep?”

“God, I’ve never seen him so much as yawn. I think he’s a cyborg.”

“At this point, it wouldn’t surprise me. Maybe there’s something in those vanilla wafers.”

She picked up a printout. “These are the names of the agency directors who have sent staff to the DMS. Nearly half of them will be in Philadelphia today for the Liberty Bell event, either as guests or on the job. Because the First Lady, the Vice President’s wife, the wives of fifty congressmen, and over a hundred members of Congress are all attending the event, it’s a security mishmash. Most of the chiefs will be there to make sure their individual Indians don’t let anyone of importance get scalped.”

“I know, I was originally assigned to the detail. How’s this helping us?”

“The President, at Mr. Church’s urging, has contacted each of these directors to put themselves at our disposal. We can set up meetings, and we can interview them personally.”

“During a major event?” I goggled.

“Well      we’d have to pick our moments,” she conceded.

I was skeptical. “All well and good, but how can we interview them with all of the speeches and rallies going on?”

“The rededication only lasts two hours.”

“Good point,” I said. “Okay, let’s mount up and ride.”

El Mujahid / The Motorways Motel / July 4

THE FIGHTER SAT on the edge of the motel bed in cotton trousers and a tank top that showed off his huge shoulders, bull neck, and the corded muscles of his arms. He had removed his bandage to let his guests inspect his face and the slash mark was a livid red line surrounded by green and purple bruises.

The two men seated on the couch stared at him. Ahmed, Amirah’s brother, was on the left, his face showing concern for his brother-in-law. Next to him was a young black man with wire-framed glasses and a knit
kufi
on his close-cropped hair. His name was Saleem Mohammad but was born as John Norman twenty-six years ago in West Philadelphia. He was a graduate of Temple University’s MFA theater program where he specialized in stage makeup and costume design. For two years after graduation he worked on and off Broadway, but eighteen months ago he met an African-American mullah who introduced him first to the teachings of Muhammad and, later, to the more radical teachings of El Mujahid. Saleem had been totally captivated and over the months moved smoothly from a study of the Koran to a more specialized study of fundamentalist politics. Years of repressed anger bubbled up and came to a boil when he saw the tapes of El Mujahid’s diatribes on Western interference in Middle East culture and religion. Unlike many of his fellow converts to the faith, Saleem was thoroughly primed to accept the belief that extreme measures were sometimes necessary in order to protect the followers of the one true God. Saleem looked like an artist, which he certainly was, but in his chest beat the heart of a soldier of the Faith.

Sitting there on the couch, he looked very young to El Mujahid, but the Fighter could see familiar fires burning in Saleem’s eyes. It pleased him. The Fighter was amused by the young man, but he also felt proud of him, of his depth of conviction. For nearly an hour they had discussed scriptures and had all prayed together. Now, their prayer mats rolled up, they sat and talked. El Mujahid had taken off his shirt and bandages to let Saleem take a close look.

“Can you do it?” the Fighter asked.

“Yes. What you want is      easy. I mean, there’s nothing to it.” Saleem looked at Ahmed. “I thought you said you wanted me to do something difficult?”

Ahmed shook his head. “I said I wanted you to do something important.”

“It needs to hide everything,” said El Mujahid, “the cut, the bruising.”

Saleem smiled earnestly. “Give me an hour and I can guarantee you that no one will recognize you or see that injury. I have everything I need at my apartment.”

“That’s excellent.”

They agreed on a time for Saleem to return and the young man left, looking a little starstruck at having been in the presence of El Mujahid. One of Ahmed’s agents tailed him surreptitiously though both he and El Mujahid were convinced of Saleem’s dedication to the cause. When he was gone, the Fighter pulled on a shirt and buttoned it up.

“By now Gault knows that I’ve eluded his assassins and that we have the trigger device,” El Mujahid said. “If he was man enough to grow a beard Gault would be pulling it out by now. He must be very confused over what has happened.” He paused. “Where is the shipment from Amirah?”

“Andrea installed it over a week ago, and it is very cleverly hidden. No one will detect it,” Ahmed said, referring to his American girlfriend, a woman he’d converted to their brand of Islam a few years ago. He gestured to a suitcase that he’d brought with him.

“Which version did Amirah send? I tried Generation Seven on a village and it was impressive.”

“Generation Ten.”

“Ten?” gasped the Fighter. “You mean Generation Seven—”

Ahmed grinned and shook his head. “My sister is ambitious and her anger toward the Western Satan is very great. She did not say much in her coded message, but she said that this will sweep America like the breath of God.”

El Mujahid murmured a prayer.

Ahmed nodded to the suitcase. “Your clothes, identification, weapons      everything is there. Once Saleem performs his magic tricks then you will be able to walk among them and not be suspected. Everything is in place, my brother, and Andrea will be on site to make sure that it all goes smoothly.” He paused and gave his lips another nervous lick. “There is one more thing. My sister sent something for us. She shipped it using Gault’s own pipeline and it was delivered via international hazardous materials courier to a hospital in Trenton, New Jersey, late yesterday. The accompanying papers and forms were flawless so that no eyebrows were raised. My sister is very clever.”

“That she is. What did she send?”

Ahmed smiled. “Well      on the package it said that it was samples for bacteriological research. Something to do with plant blight. And in truth that’s what most of the contents were, heading from one of Gault’s labs in India to a research facility here in the States, but of the twenty-four vials of infectious materials there were two that contained something quite different.” He paused and repeated that. “Quite different, Allah be praised.”

“Tell me      ”

“She sent Generation Twelve of the
Seif al Din
.”

“Do we need more? I thought—”

Ahmed shook his head. “This is not a weapon, my brother. If Generation Ten is the Sword, then Generation Twelve is the shield.”

The Fighter looked confused, and then as understanding blossomed a great mass of pent-up tension left his body in a long exhale. “Allah be praised, all blessings to His name.”

Ahmed reached out and squeezed El Mujahid’s arm. “She
did
it!” he said in an excited whisper. “We have an
antidote
. Amirah did what no one else has been able to do      she created a cure for the disease. We can release it as planned and then only the godless Americans will die but we—we, my brother—will survive!”

The room swam around him and El Mujahid slid from his chair onto his knees. For weeks now he had been mentally and spiritually preparing himself for what he believed was a suicide mission. He had accepted the will of Allah that he should die from the
Seif al Din
as he released it on the Americans. It was so small a price to pay to deliver a killing stroke unlike anything ever inflicted on an enemy. Total annihilation of the Americans and an ocean between the wasteland that North America would become and the rest of the world. But now     
now
!

He lowered his reeling head to the floor and gave praise to Allah, weeping with joy, weeping with the knowledge that the one true God had chosen to spare him and to let him continue to fight for His truth here on Earth. Paradise was a wonderful promise, but El Mujahid was a fighter and had regretted leaving the battle with so much to be done.

Tears sprang into Ahmed’s eyes as well and he knelt down next to his brother-in-law, his friend, and together they prayed, both of them knowing that it would all work now, that nothing could stop the
Seif al Din.

Nothing.

The DMS Warehouse, Baltimore / Saturday, July 4; 6:44 A.M.

WE TOOK TWO cars, a pair of brand-new DMS SUVs—BMW X6s that were equipped like James Bond cars with hidden compartments, armor plating, front and rear video, spy-satellite downlinks, and even fore-and-aft machine guns hidden behind faux foglamps. Church really loved his toys.

“No ejector seats?” I asked Grace as we climbed into the lead vehicle.

“You joke, but we have a Porsche Cayenne with an ejector option for driver or passenger.”

“Really?” I grinned and switched to my best Sean Connery. “My name is Ledger. Joe Ledger.”

She gave me an icy stare. “So help me God, if you call me Pussy Galore or Holly Goodhead, I’ll shoot you and leave you by the side of the road.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” I said, and then under my breath added, “Miss Moneypenny.”

“I’m serious. Dead in a ditch.”

I mimed zipping my mouth shut. We were all dressed in dark suits, red ties, and white shirts, with little American flags on our lapels and wires behind our ears. Pretty damn impressive for twelve hours’ work. I mean, I can wear off the rack but Bunny is a moose. I marveled at Church’s network of contacts. It must be nice to have so many friends in so many “industries.” One of these days I was going to have to find out who the hell Church was.

For hardware I had my old familiar .45 with me, snugged against my ribs, with two extra magazines clipped to my belt. Around my right ankle was a sweet little Smith Wesson Model 642 Airweight Centennial, a hammerless .38 revolver that is one of the most practical backup guns around. I also had a Rapid Response Folder, a tactical knife that could sit in a pocket clip and with a snap of the wrist would produce a 3.375-inch blade that, although short, was more than enough in the hands of a good knife fighter. I’m a very good knife fighter and I prefer speed over blade length any time. With all that I felt that I was a bit overdressed for the party, considering that we were going to interrogate government officials not storm the Bastille, but I’m one of those guys who believes that the Boy Scout motto is one of the most useful pieces of advice ever given: Be Prepared.

Grace looked very nice in a tailored suit that was a good balance of weapon concealment and curve revealment. No way that this was off the rack. She had on a light touch of makeup and a very enticing pink lipstick. The makeup was within professional guidelines, but the lipstick—I’m pretty damn sure—was a personal choice with a different agenda and I hoped that it wasn’t my male ego or wishful thinking at work here.

All I said was, “You clean up pretty good, Major.” I gave her my best smile as I said it. The one that puts the crinkles around my eyes. Grace, however, did not pull around to the back of the warehouse and immediately undress. Her fortitude was commendable in the light of that smile.

She said, “Buckle up for safety,” and inflected it in such a way as to convey about fifty separate possible meanings.

Just as we were heading toward the main Warehouse doors I saw a figure step into our path: Rudy, and he was also dressed like a Secret Service agent. Grace slowed and when she stopped Rudy opened the back door and climbed in.

I turned around to look at him. “Halloween’s not till October.”

“You’re hilarious,” he growled as he thrust an ID wallet into my hands. I opened it.

“Rudolfo Ernesto Sanchez y Martinez, MD. Special Agent, United States Secret Service,” I read. “Is this some kind of joke?”

“If it is then Mr. Church is the only one who knows the punch line.”

Grace smiled. “Mr. Church is impressed with you, Doctor.”

“Rudy,” he corrected.

“Sorry. He told me you grilled him pretty thoroughly the other day.”

I was surprised. “He admitted that?”

“He didn’t go into details, but he gave the impression that you got a good read on him.”

“Interesting,” said Rudy. “Joe      he wants me with you when you do the interviews.”

“I’m okay with that, Rude, but if we get into anything today      ” I let it hang.

“Then I’ll run and hide, don’t worry, cowboy. I’m a lover not a fighter.”

Grace turned and gave him an appraising stare. “I’ll bet you could handle yourself.” And again there were a lot of ways to interpret that. Rudy gave her an elegant incline of the head and settled back in his seat.

“Are you carrying a gun?” I asked him. At his request I’d taught Rudy to shoot a couple of years ago, shortly after he started working as a police psychiatrist. He thought it would help him with his patients if he more fully understood the power—both real and imagined—of a gun.

“You’ve seen me shoot, cowboy. Am I qualified to carry a handgun in public?”

“It would not be in the best interests of public safety.”

“Then there you go.”

Grace put the car in gear and we rolled out of the Warehouse with Echo Team behind us. When we were on I-95 heading north toward Philly, Rudy asked, “Won’t the real Secret Service know that we’re fakes?”

Grace shrugged. “Only if we tell them, and it will be need-to-know. Our credentials are real, authorized by the President himself.”

Rudy said, “Wow.” He hadn’t voted for the President but the office and what it represented was bigger, and held more meaning, than any single person who had held it. Maybe more than all of them put together. A certain degree of respect was appropriate no matter what your personal political views were. “That’s a lot of power.”

“Mr. Church knows—” she started to say but Rudy cut her off.

“No, it’s a lot of power to give us. Our team.” He paused. “The
eight
of us.” When I turned to him he went on, “We still have a traitor in the DMS, and that means that one of the men in the car behind us could be a spy or assassin. Or worse, a terrorist sympathizer.” He waggled the ID case. “And this is an all-access pass to the President’s wife and half of Congress. Is that wise?”

Grace smiled at him in the rearview. “Mr. Church has confidence that we’ll stay in control of the situation.”

All Rudy said in reply was, “Room Twelve.”