Threat Level Black (32 page)

Madison Square Garden was neither near Madison Avenue nor appreciably square, and the last time anything approaching a garden had been on the spot, the local Indians were unloading swampland on the Dutch.

Which made it the quintessential New York landmark, if not the essence of New York itself.

“You’re being kind of hard on the place, Andy,” said Macklin as they walked across Eighth Avenue. Ordinarily that would have been suicidal, but the area had been blocked off for the game. Traffic snarled through the rest of the city, but the streets around Madison Square Garden were a veritable island of peace and tranquillity.

Except, of course, for the troop trucks, Humvees, Stinger antiaircraft missile batteries, two tanks, and upward of five thousand National Guardsmen, soldiers, and police officers.

“You’d think they’d’ve let a pretzel guy inside the barricades,” said Fisher.

“Well, well, Cassandra showed up in person,” said a voice from behind a phalanx of approaching soldiers.

“Kowalski, it’s about time you got here,” said Fisher. “Did you find the UAV yet?”

“I have half the damn Air Force flying overhead, Fisher. You sure as hell better be right.”

“Only half, Kowalski? I thought you had pull.”

“Yeah, yeah, wiseass. Real funny. How are they getting the gas into the place, anyway? Did you think about that?”

“I thought about it, but I couldn’t figure it out,” admitted Fisher.

“We have the ventilation system guarded,” said Macklin. “And the backup generators. Everything’s been checked and rechecked. Power goes off, we’ll have it back on in a jiff.”

“Unless they blow up the bomb overhead, right?” said Fisher.

“Well, yeah.”

“Or within five miles.”

“Or more, depending on how good the bomb is,” said Macklin. “But if they don’t, we’re fine.”

“That’s what I like about you, Michael: You’re always looking on the brighter side of things.”

“Maybe I should get more batteries,” said Macklin.

“Nothing’s going to happen,” said Kowalski. “I think this is all just the product of Fisher’s wild imagination. Even the maestro of conspiracy falters once in a while.”

“Don’t lie, Kowalski,” said Fisher, taking out his cigarettes. “I get it wrong
all
the time. Want one?”

“I wish I did smoke,” said Kowalski, shaking his head. “What a fuckin’ nightmare. I don’t know whether to hope you’re right or wrong.”

“Wrong’s better,” said Fisher. “What’s the latest on the florist trucks?”

“NYPD’s got a good handle on it,” said Macklin. “They have an exclusion area and they’ve already searched beyond it. There are no vans within ten blocks.”

“Oh,” said Fisher.

“Oh?”

“Stop the trains.”

“Which trains?”

“Anything that goes anywhere near Penn Station.” He threw his cigarette away and began running toward the nearest police command post. “Amtrak, LIRR, New Jersey, subways—everything.”

“Andy?” yelled Macklin.

“Just do it!”

Faud huddled near the end of the passage, sipping the last of his bottles of water. He did not know exactly when the time would be. He knew only that he was to wait until the lights blinked off.

The journey across the tracks had been an ordeal—a train had come just as he opened the panel—but it was past. The rest now was easy.

When the lights went off, he would put on the heavy coat and the hat, pull up the two tanks that looked like an oxygen pack. He would need the goggles to see. He had a light, but it was better to use the goggles: The light would give him away.

Faud would carry the pistol in his hand.

Several times he had thought of dressing and being ready, but the weight of the gear dissuaded him. He also had been instructed to keep the tanks in their insulated case for as long as possible.

The air tube where he could insert the gas was only a few feet from the shaft he had to climb. He had a small drill to make the hole. Once the nozzle was inserted, he would set the unit down and turn the wheel at the base of the tanks, activating the pressure feed. The gas itself was under very high pressure and would probably fill the ventilation system itself so long as it remained hot, but there was no way of knowing whether the loss of power would permanently disrupt the forced-air system, and the mechanism was designed to cover that contingency. The room above the insertion point had steam pipes that would make the system considerably hotter than the seventy degrees necessary for the sarin to remain a gas. If the auxiliary power came on, the gas would be forcefully pulled into the building, killing everyone within seconds; but even if it didn’t, the flow of air through the system and the difference in pressure would bring the gas up into the building.

As long as Faud managed to find the right duct line. There were three; he had to tap the one farthest to his right as he climbed from the shaft.

That was what he had been told. He knew a great deal about the gas, but nothing about the shafts.

If all else failed, he had already decided on an alternate plan: He would pass the ventilation shaft and walk to the end of the room, where the stairs led to a hallway behind a concession area. He would simply turn on the gas and walk through the stuffy building. Those who did not die of the gas would die from the panic as they tried to escape.

His place in Paradise would be guaranteed no matter what else happened.

The imam had insisted on giving him a plan to escape after he placed the gas, and told him it was his duty to follow it.

Was it, though? The imam had been wrong on many things; perhaps he was wrong on this as well.

Was it sacrilegious to ask such a question?

Faud finished the water. He should not think of it anymore. His path now was clear. He had only to wait for the dim light at the far end of the shaft fifty feet away to go out.

The lights on the coast shone like the diamonds of a woman’s necklace, glittering against the blackness of the nearby water. A yellow string of jewels circled the shore, the lights of cars on the Belt Parkway.

A 747 had just taken off from Kennedy Airport; Howe could see it climbing off to his right. Air traffic in the region had been strictly curtailed, and the few flights allowed into the New York metropolitan area had to follow instructions to the millimeter. Two Air National Guard F-16s circled over Manhattan, ready to pounce. Another pair was standing by on the ground in nearby New Jersey.

Howe’s aircraft, the Iron Hawk, was not equipped with offensive weapons, but its AMV radar provided a finer detection net than the F-16s’ APG-68. So far all he’d spotted were a few birds. The radar popped them on the screen momentarily, briefly tracking them before its program decided for sure that they were birds, not a cleverly designed aircraft whose radar profile mimicked a seagull.

If Fisher was wrong, Howe would look like a fool. He could already hear Nelson’s voice and see Blitz’s disapproving stare. But he had decided he didn’t care. He had to do what he thought was right, which meant risking looking like a fool.

No, it meant he
would
look like a fool sometimes. But it was worse to
feel
like a fool.

Howe checked his fuel and the rest of his instruments, then began a turn as he banked over New Jersey. Patrolling like this was surprisingly difficult; it was so boring that the natural temptation was to wish something would happen. That he didn’t want: Among the eight million people down there in the city was his friend Jimmy, who’d scalped tickets to the basketball game Fisher thought was the target. Howe had tried calling him but gotten only his machine.

The F-16 pilots were jumpy despite the cool and laconic snaps of their communications. When an Airbus heading in from Chicago failed to acknowledge a ground communication, the lead pilot jumped on the air so quickly that the airliner’s captain apologized three or four times for what was, at worst, a moment’s inattention.

“Iron Hawk, this is Falcon One,” said the F-16 flight leader as they worked through their patrol pattern.

“Iron Hawk,” said Howe, acknowledging.

“Viper Flight is about to take off,” said the pilot, informing Howe that a second group of F-16s was coming up to spell the first group. Falcon One and Two would head back once their replacements were on station. Another pair of F-16s would take their turn below on standby, providing blanket coverage of the airspace.

Howe started to acknowledge when a ground controller from an FAA station to the north came onto the line with a warning: A light plane was straying off its flight plan toward the restricted area north of Manhattan and, thus far, had failed to answer hails.

The pilot in Falcon One opted to check it out himself, instructing his wingman to remain in the patrol area until he was relieved. Even as he was giving the instructions, the F-16 pilot was changing course and lining up an intercept on the small plane, which was just heading over the Hudson River south of the Tappan Zee Bridge.

“It is what they say it is,” Howe told Falcon One, checking the contact with the AMV radar. He was too far to see if there was a bomb aboard. “Nothing else there.”

“Falcon One.”

Howe checked his position, orienting himself in the night sky as he flew westward, tracking over New Jersey as he flew toward the light plane. The police had already been alerted to check all of the airports in the area that might be used to launch the UAV. Vehicle-based installations of Stinger missiles were guarding the main power plants in the area, and a separate F-16 flight was over Indian Point, the nuclear power station along the Hudson up near Peekskill, fifty-something miles north of New York City.

Everything was covered. Except what they didn’t expect.

And what would that be?

A light plane reconfigured to hold a bomb?

The civilian pilot was answering the F-16’s radio call.

If Howe had the UAV, he’d set it up in a barn somewhere north of the city, one that had an open field for it to climb through after the rocket engines ignited. When the time came, he’d pull open the big doors and fire away.

Something flashed in the sky ahead. Howe’s breath caught in his chest as his brain tried to make sense of what his eyes had just seen.

Fisher stood on the A train platform, hands on hips. Six National Guardsmen with M16s and bulletproof vests watched from the stairs behind him; another knot of men patrolled both sides of the long platform, which sat between the north- and southbound tracks.

NYPD had already considered the problem of trains coming into Penn Station, which sat below the Madison Square Garden area, and posted details to search the trains before they got to the station. The job was not as difficult as might be imagined: Relatively few trains were inbound to the station at this time of day, and their progress could be easily tracked.

The subway was a somewhat different matter, though here, too, the police seemed to have corralled the problem. The stations on Thirty-fourth street—not just at Eighth and Seventh Avenues but Herald Square on Sixth as well—were closed. Trains were permitted to run through on the lines but there was no stopping.

“What’s going to happen?” Kowalski asked Fisher, joining him on the platform. “They pack the train with the gas, then arrange to set off the E-bomb when it’s in the station?”

Fisher didn’t answer. A light lit the tunnel at the far end. The platform vibrated with a low rumble as the A train approached. The noise of the train’s steel wheels grinding against the rails crescendoed into a loud smack of rolling thunder as the train sped through the station. Fisher saw that there were armed policemen and Guardsmen in each car.

“Maybe we should have them just shut down the trains,” said Kowalski after the train passed. “You think? We can. We’ve arranged it.”

“Not necessary,” said Fisher. He went over to the edge of the tracks. “Okay.”

“Okay what? Stop the trains?”

“Nah. That’ll tip them off.”

“But—”

Fisher jumped down onto the tracks.

“Jesus, Andy, are you out of your mind?” yelled Kowalski. “That’s a live track. You touch that third rail and you fry.”

“You coming?”

“No fucking way.”

“Your call. Tell Macklin to meet me inside Madison Square Garden.”

“Inside where?”

“If I knew, I wouldn’t have to go this way, right?”

There was no reading on the radar. The flash had come from the ground well in the distance. Howe hit the magnifier command, confirmed that it was clean, and then went quickly to the infrared screen, even though the computer should have already used the sensor to compile its “read.”

Nothing.

So what had he seen?

He nudged his left wing down, sliding the Iron Hawk into an orbit over the spot where he had seen the spark of light. All he could think of was the flash of a rocket—or the UAV—taking off.

The F-16 pilots were talking about the light plane. Howe ignored them, pushing against his restraints. He had to find the stinking thing: He had to see it so he could shoot it down.

Or, rather, tell the others to shoot it down.

“Iron Hawk, this is Falcon Two.”

Was that it, the blur at the right side of his windscreen?

The smudge disintegrated into a shadow. Howe started tacking south and then saw lights on the ground, red lights….

A fire?

With that much of a spark?

He eased back even more on the throttle. The Iron Hawk practically walked over the spot: The gear said the plane was doing only 120 knots at 3,000 feet.

A fire truck. Several fire trucks.

Something shot into the sky.

A gas station was on fire.

He was surprised to realize he was a little disappointed. He had no right to be: No doubt the men fighting the blaze down there were in every bit as much danger as he would have been, if not more. He pulled back gently on the stick, starting to recover.

“Iron Hawk, Falcon One is escorting this aircraft out of the restricted zone. Pilot appears lost,” said the F-16’s pilot.

Howe acknowledged. He switched the radar back to its standard settings; the F-16 and the private plane were at the top of the scan area, heading to the northwest and a small airfield where a squad’s worth of regular Army soldiers would be waiting along with local police and a federal marshal. The small plane’s pilot was about to spend several of the most uncomfortable hours of his life.

Howe cut back east, heading in the direction of Connecticut. The replacement F-16s were now on station. Howe checked in with the new pilots, one of whom he thought he knew from a temporary assignment in Alaska nearly a decade before.

Before he could ask, a civilian ground controller broke into the circuit.

“We have a landline threat, a phone call,” said the man, his words rushing together in his excitement. “A hijacking on Qual-Air Flight 111 out of Boston!”

The Viper commander acknowledged the communication calmly, then checked with his military ground controller. The Qual-Air flight was legitimate, a charter plane that had just taken off. The civilian controllers were still in the process of contacting the pilot to see what was going on, but there was no indication that the plane had been hijacked.

A hijacking?

More likely, a ruse intended to cover the real attack, thought Howe.

The airspace over the corridor was effectively locked down; controllers began holding takeoffs and diverting anything that might come even remotely close. The two F-16s on the ground in New Jersey took off. Viper flight began tracking north, one airplane on a direct intercept with the other hanging back in reserve.

Howe tracked southward over the Hudson River, certain that this was a trick. But where would the real attack come from?

The west, he thought, where there were plenty of places to launch the UAV. He banked ten thousand feet over the George Washington Bridge, turning in that direction. As he did, the radar buzzed with a contact forty miles beyond the clutter of the land. It was low, close to the water. Howe stared at the display, where the red triangle for the unidentified object glowed like a pinpoint in the long-range scan.

Probably another bird, he thought.

He waited for it to disappear from the screen.

It didn’t.