The God Complex: A Thriller (15 page)

Despite their police outriders
, Secret Service Director Paula Suarez and Attorney General Lynn Bertram could not get near the FBI Headquarters building. Crowds had gathered overnight and swelled during the morning as the news of the treasonous plot spread. The outrage felt by most Americans at the attempt to assassinate the President in order to derail the disarmament process was palpable.

“
Do we dare walk through that?” asked Lynne.

Paula Suarez had risen through the ranks
of the Secret Service and was more than capable of looking after herself but even she was not sure. The crowd was vying for blood and all but ready to lynch any of the plotters should they have the misfortune to venture within their grasp.

Before they
made a decision, another procession of vehicles approached. It was a military entourage with no intention of allowing the protestors to block their way. The vehicles careened towards the crowd, horns blaring. Unsurprisingly, the crowd parted and the vehicles swept through into the underground car park entrance.

“Follow on,” Paula
said to her driver, who was able to squeeze through before the crowd moved back behind the insistent convoy.

The military vehicle
s drew to a stop at the elevators, allowing their occupants to disgorge. From the five vehicles— four Humvees and one limousine— only two men exited: a man in full dress uniform and another man who Lynne recognized as the imposing figure of Senator Bertie Noble, Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.

Both
she and Paula rushed to catch up with the two men.

“Senator Noble,” said Lynne warmly
. He was a man you made a point of keeping on your side.

“Ah, Lynne my dear,” he boomed
, bending down and kissing her on the cheek. “And the delightful Miss Suarez,” he added, offering Paula the same courtesy. “This is Colonel Steve Andrews, US Air Force. He’s attached to the Special Operations Command.”

Both Lynne and Paula nodded
in greeting to the uniformed man.

“Are you here for the handover?” asked Senator Noble.

“Thankfully!” said Paula. “This investigation is way beyond our capabilities in the Service.”

“To be honest, only 9/11 comes close in scale,” agreed Lynne, selecting the executive level button on the elevator.

“Shocking, truly shocking,” said the Senator. “You may be interested in why we’re here. Who are you scheduled to meet?”

“Deputy Director Howard Kliner
. I believe he’s going to be personally running the investigation.”

“Howie’s a good guy
. In fact, you’ll probably want to come with me. I’ve called a meeting with the Director and I’ve a funny feeling Howie will be joining us,” he said, patting the laptop safely tucked under the Colonel’s arm.

“Why
, what’s happened?” asked Lynne, noting the sly grin on Senator Noble’s face.

“You’ll see soon enough,
” he promised, leading the way to the Director of the FBI’s office at the far end of the corridor.

“Jim,” he boomed
, entering the office without knocking.

FBI Director
Jim Walker looked up from his desk, covering the mouthpiece to the phone call he was in the middle of.

Senator Noble took a seat and waved for him to carry on as if he wasn’t there. Lynne and Paula waited
in the outer office area with the Colonel and the exceptionally perturbed personal assistant to the Director of the FBI. Her boss was exceptionally important and as such, so was she. People didn’t barge into her office, let alone the Director’s.

“How dare he!” she exclaimed
. “Who does he think he is?!”

“A man who does as he pleases
,” advised Lynne Bertram. Actually, she was the FBI Director’s boss.

“Well
, I’ll be having words when he leaves. I’ve never seen anything like it!”

“Good luck with that,” whispered Paula Suarez to Lynne
.

Deputy Director Kliner rushed into the outer office
. “I believe he wants me urgently,” he said, as he came up against the immovable PA.

“He’s on the phone to the
—”

“Howie, is that you?” boomed Senator Noble from the inner office
, oblivious to everything else around him. “Get in here! Jim’s finishing up his call. And bring everyone else with you!”

H
owie gave the PA an apologetic look and did as instructed by Senator Noble, ushering Lynne, Paula and the Colonel with him. They entered to find the FBI Director hurriedly ending his call.

“Senator Noble,” said
Jim, as he replaced his handset. “I believe you wanted to see me?”

“Urgently, yes,” replied Senator
Noble.

“How can we help?” asked Jim.

“Actually, I’m here to help you,” said the Senator, gesturing for the Colonel to bring the laptop to the desk. “Colonel, if you wouldn’t mind setting it up here,” he said, pointing to the desk facing the guests. “I believe you’re in the process of taking over the investigation from the Secret Service?” he asked rhetorically. “Well this may make your job a little simpler. Colonel?”

“Thank you
, Senator,” said the Colonel. “A short while ago, the NSA alerted us to a communication from a charter jet that included the words ‘Cash’ and ‘Rigs’. Upon further investigation, we discovered we have very good reason to believe that the two main suspects that you are currently hunting, namely the CIA assassins Copernicus Harris and Jake Miller— Cash and Rigs— are aboard that aircraft as we speak.”

“Outstanding
!” said Jim. “I’ll get my teams in place. Where are they?”

“That won’t be necessary, we
’re taking care of it,” said the Colonel.

“Like hell you are
! I want those boys in my cells downstairs!”

“It’s not up for debate,” said the Senator
, ending any further discussion. “As a courtesy, I’ve arranged for you to witness the arrest. The Colonel is setting up a link with the feed to the operation. Once the men are in custody, we, of course, will have them transferred to you. Make no mistake,” cautioned the Senator, these are two highly trained and exceptionally dangerous individuals. Their files are classified and way beyond the clearance of anyone in this room.”

“Even yours
,” said Jim sarcastically. He had scanned through the files for the investigation earlier in the day with his Deputy, Howie. Solid black lines riddled every document as detail after detail was redacted for security purposes. All Jim Walker knew about Cash and Rigs was their age, height and weight, and even then their weight was as recorded on entry to the Marines fifteen years earlier.

“We are due to intercept them in the next
…” the Colonel checked his watch, “…fifteen minutes.”

“Intercept?” asked Howie.

“Two F22 Raptors are on course to intercept and direct the aircraft to land at Creech Air Force Base in Nevada where we have a team of Air Force Combat Controllers who are more than capable of taking them into custody.”

The laptop screen came to life
. The image of an empty sky filled the screen, while the speakers relayed chatter between two pilots and the ground controllers.

“They
’re around 300 miles from visual sighting of the aircraft,” translated the Colonel.

The chatter continued and the sky seemed to zoom closer.

“They’ve been given the go ahead to intercept. Those were their afterburners kicking in,” explained the Colonel.

“Wow,” said Paula
. “That looked very cool!”

The colonel smiled, “If you want to try
—”

“Down boy,” warned the Senator
, seeing the sparkle in the Colonel’s eye.

T
he Colonel immediately returned his attention to the screen. “The small dot,” he pointed to the top right of the screen, “is the target aircraft ,and the chatter you can hear is our attempt to contact the pilot.”

“They’re not responding
?” asked Howie.

“So far no
, nothing,” said the Colonel, listening intently as the small corporate jet began to fill their screen.

“
What’s that?’ asked Lynne, listening closely.

“Yes, I hear it to
o, it’s like a tapping,” said the Colonel, grabbing a pad and pen from the FBI Director’s desk and scribbling furiously.

The small plane nosedived on the screen.

The Colonel finished writing. “The pilot was tapping Morse Code to us, using his radio transmitter. He obviously can’t speak, and from the dive, I assume either Cash or Rigs realized what he was doing.”

“What did he say
?” demanded the Senator.

The Colonel checked his translation carefully before speaking
. “Shoot us down. He’s saying ‘shoot us down’.”

“Oh my
God,” breathed Lynne. “That poor brave man.”

“But why?” asked the Senator
. “Creech was chosen because it’s remote. Why would he want us to shoot him down, there’s nothing there!”

“It’s still within fifty miles of Vegas and let’s not forget what these guys were trying to stop,” said the Colonel
.

“Nuclear disarmament,” said Howie.

“You don’t think…?” asked Lynne, voicing what the rest of the room was thinking.

“No,” replied Senator Noble
. “I mean what’s to gain from it?”

“Who knows with some of these crazies
?”

“Our
pilot is asking what he’s to do,” the Colonel said. “They’re not getting anywhere with the other pilots and the course and trajectory they’re currently on will take them to the Las Vegas strip.”

Senator Noble shrugged and looked
at Jim. “They’re your suspects,” he said. “Your call.”

“The pilot is prompting for a decision
. He’s over open desert with zero chance for collateral damage. That’s going to change very shortly,” advised the Colonel urgently.

Jim looked
at his boss, Attorney General Lynne Bertram, who in turn looked at Senator Noble. He looked away. It was their call. She nodded.

“Take them down,” said Jim Walker
abruptly, shaking his head in despair for the innocent pilot who had sacrificed himself.

The Colonel relayed the message over the connection and they all
watched as the two Raptors fired one missile each into the helpless jet. It exploded before tumbling in a million pieces to the desert floor thirty thousand feet below.

“Well it looks like the US Air Force has saved you the expense and hassle of a major manhunt
and resulting trial,” announced the Senator, standing up. As far as he was concerned, the meeting was over.

The Colonel closed the laptop.

“We’ll obviously want the remains to confirm they were on board,” said Jim Walker.

“I’ll get the Colonel to come back to you on that
. A HAZMAT team will need to okay the site and any remains before anyone gets their hands on anything.”

“H
AZMAT team? As in, radioactive material?” asked Paula. “Do you really think that?”

“Classified,” said the Senator, leaving
them all to wonder exactly how much the Senator knew and wasn’t telling them.

“I’m not sure I should cancel the manhunt,” Jim
called to the disappearing Senator’s back.

“Trust me, cancel it
! They’re gone!” he yelled back. The Colonel scurried to catch up with him.

“Well,” huffed
the PA, scurrying into Jim Walker’s office when the Senator left. “I don’t think I’ve ever met such a rude man!”

“He’s not
trying to be rude, he just thinks he owns everything,” sighed Lynne, taking a seat.

“And probably does,”
said Jim.

“Coffee
s?” asked the PA. She had deliberately not offered while the Senator had been present to teach him a lesson.

Taking the
ir coffee orders, she left the deflated atmosphere in the room.

“
Do you ever think you’re just a pawn in a much bigger game?” asked Howie Kliner, the Deputy Director, taking a seat next to Lynne Bertram. “And you’ve no idea what the bigger game is?”

“Never more so than today,” said Paula
. “From the minute this all started, it’s smelled rotten.”

“I’ve gone through the evidence against the
alleged plotters and it’s certainly compelling but where the hell did it come from?” asked Howie.

“Delivered to the
news network not long after the attack in Santa Cruz.”

“
Who compiled it? What agency had the resources to undertake surveillance against some of the most powerful members of the government?”

“Not us
,” said Jim, answering the question, in case anyone thought he had some shadowy department tucked away within the bowels of the FBI.

“Nor us
,” said Paula.

“Although you have access…”

“Not to everyone. Remember, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs and the Secretary of Defense are sitting in your cells below us and their security is handled by the Department of Defense, not us.”

“Good point
.”

“And don’t forget I’ve got
eight agents sharing those cells,” she snapped.

“Why?” asked Lynne
. “There was no mention of Secret Service agents implicated in the evidence, was there?”

“Of course not, but we still have to protect the First Lady
and the Vice President.”

“Even if
they tried to kill the President?”

“If
?! When it’s definite, I’ll get my guys out of there in an instant. Until then, they’re still under our protection, in jail or not.”

“You’ve got armed guards within my holding cells?” asked Jim furious
ly, reaching for his phone.

“No, we’ve got two unarmed
guards with the First Lady and the VP, and another six armed agents stationed outside the cells.”

“Santa Cruz
…” said Howie thinking out loud. “The attack was supposed to be against the President, who was three thousand miles away.”

“We’ve got over forty bodies at the scene, p
redominantly Surenos gang members, two professors, a few research assistants and a few police officers. How does any of that equate to a Presidential assassination plan?”

“You
’re forgetting the use of military grade equipment and the four bodies that we have been unable to identify and whom appear to have never existed. Smacks of conspiracy,” reminded Paula, who knew the evidence as well as anyone.

“The forty others were collateral?”
suggested Lynne.

“And the tele
scope, let’s not forget the timeline, it was one of the first to go,” said Jim, scanning down the report on his desk.

“Do we know why that was targeted?”

“Something to do with the capability for spying. Our ‘enemies’ were going to be very upset at its capabilities,” Lynne said.

“That doesn’t even make sense!” exclaimed Howie in frustration.

“Have any of them talked?” asked Paula. “They certainly didn’t with us.”

“Other than to tell me
that I’ll be lucky if after this I’m just a down-and-out on the streets,” replied Howie, with concern in his voice. “I mean, seriously, the VP, Secretaries of Defense, State, Energy, Homeland Security and Treasury?” He ticked them off on his fingers. “The National Security Advisor, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Director of National Intelligence, the Director of the CIA, the White House Chief of Staff and let’s not forget the First Lady, all downstairs in our holding cells?”

“
Amongst others,” added Lynne.

“And your point?
”

“Forgetting the
First Lady, it’s almost the entire National Security Council, the very people responsible for keeping our nation safe!”

“With me here, it’s pretty much
only the President who’s missing,” said Lynne.

“You’re not thinking
…?” asked Jim, then his desk phone buzzed. He lifted it, listened, and replaced it, speechless.

“What?” asked Howie.

“The President’s arrived to see the First Lady.”

“How secure is this building?” demanded Paula
, getting on her cell.

“
Nowhere near as secure as the White Hou—”

A
n explosion reverberated throughout the building.