Steven Konkoly
Black Flagged Apex
For Kosia, Matthew and Sophia. Still my favorite people in the whole world.
About Black Flagged Apex
Black Flagged Apex takes place on the heels of Black Flagged Redux. Admittedly, I took a little heat for ending Redux with the virus canisters unrecovered and Petrovich's team still pursuing leads related to Al Qaeda's possible intention to unleash the virus in the United States. For me, this was a logical cut off point for the novel, since most of the conflict had been resolved in the novel, and I couldn't go any further without locking myself into another 500 pages. I'm not ready to present a one-thousand-page novel to readers, and I assume that many of you feel the same. As you read Apex, I think you'll better understand why I separated the two stories. They are uniquely different in many ways. For those that found the Redux ending to be abrupt, I thank you for persevering to read the series.
Like Black Flagged Redux, keep in mind that the scenes occur in chronological order and are labeled in local time. Here is a short list of the time zone differences between the locations featured in the Black Flagged Apex and the U.S. East Coast: Argentina +2 hours, Moscow +9 hours, Germany +6 hours, Novosibirsk +11 hours, Sweden +6 hours.
Finally, don't forget about the character list, which can be accessed from the link below and is accessible through the table of contents. You can also print one from my blog www.stevenkonkoly.com. I'm not saying you'll need it, but Black Flagged Apex adds to the memorable character list from Black Flagged Redux.
As always, enjoy the book and don't hesitate to contact me with your thoughts and feedback at stevekonkoly@gmail.com
"Apex"- Latin, meaning high point or culmination
BLACK VEIL
Late April 2008
Chapter 1
Special Agent Ethan Reeves rubbed his eyes and took a sip of bitter coffee from a worn blue travel mug. Sunlight crept through the open doorway connecting the front room of the apartment to the kitchen, spreading along the worn gray carpeting. Through the opening, he heard Special Agent Dave Howard rummage noisily through cabinets and drawers. Muttered obscenities floated into the quiet room, causing a barely discernible grin to form on his face.
"The sugar's gone," Reeves said.
"What happened to the rest of the packets?"
"You forgot to put them in the fridge last night. The mice showed up again. Crapped all over the kitchen table too," Reeves said.
"Sorry about that. I'll head out a little later. This place is fucking disgusting. Did I mention that before?" Howard groaned.
"That's the first time today. I'll call the incoming team and let them know what they need to bring," he said blandly.
Reeves shook his wireless mouse and brought one of the computer monitors back to life. He leaned back and slouched in the stiff, inexpensive office chair that the Newark field office had finally approved. Before these arrived, they had suffered through the day on folding chairs, frequently standing up to stretch out ever-tightening backs and hamstrings.
By mid-afternoon, he usually spent more time standing than sitting. At the end of a week's rotation, Reeves felt twice his age. His body would slowly recover over the weekend, eventually returning to normal before he reported to the Newark field office on Monday. There, he would enjoy a few days of slightly less mundane work, constantly dreading the arrival of Friday morning, when he would report for another week of duty holed up in their surveillance post. One week on. One week off. Pure agony.
So far, the realities of stakeout duty had met few of his preconceived notions. Instructors at the FBI Academy tried to manage every new agent's expectations about the job, but they had failed miserably to prepare him for the inevitable stakeout assignment. Reeves stubbornly held onto his pre-academy fantasies; daydreams that put him in a desperate position to singlehandedly apprehend one of the nation's most wanted terrorists and stop the next 9/11. He needed to cling to this delusion, because after five months of reviewing digital feeds and adjusting surveillance equipment, cynicism had started to blanket his romantic notions about life as a special agent in the FBI.
His partner, an even-keeled, fifteen-year veteran of the bureau, did his best to maintain an enthusiastic façade, but Reeves could sense that Special Agent Howard's FBI spark had been extinguished long ago. Howard quickly steered their conversations away from work, focusing on family, friends, hobbies, vacations…anything but FBI work. Luckily for Reeves, Dave was an entertaining and comical storyteller because as a single, newly minted agent, their lives had little in common beyond their FBI credentials.
He activated two more monitors and searched the first screen for the "digital highlights" function. Despite the FBI's frugal interior decorating job, the surveillance package deployed in the apartment was state-of-the-art. Little expense had been spared to provide a nearly automated system, which made their jobs infinitely easier than any of their predecessors'. Long gone were the days spent coordinating bathroom breaks and snapping pictures through a 35mm camera equipped with a telephoto lens. Ironically, they rarely looked out of the apartment windows at their surveillance target. They could watch everything from the monitors.
The new system employed four digital cameras providing continuous, automated coverage of the target house. The powerful night vision equipped cameras worked simultaneously from different windows to capture each and every detail. The system even provided limited thermal detection capability, which could roughly pinpoint the location of any human or large dog within the house. Laser microphones continuously scanned exposed windows for vibrations and automatically recorded the conversations within.
All of this information was automatically uploaded to a location unknown to either agent, where it was closely analyzed on a timeline determined by investigative prioritization algorithms. Based on their extensive experience at this location, the data review for the first-floor occupants of 32A, South 20th Street, started later in the morning. They had never been contacted by the Data Analysis Group (DAG) prior to lunch before today.
Even with all of this automation, their duties included a cursory review of the video and audio surveillance recordings. Since neither of them spoke Arabic, their only responsibility regarding the audio involved reviewing "irregularities." These included arguments, languages other than Arabic, or female voices. Even that job was simplified by the software, which screened the different feeds and highlighted these portions for them based on embedded protocols. The video review required a little more effort.
They typically reviewed the night's digital highlights before breakfast, quickly catching up to near "real time" on the daily feeds. The system flawlessly drew their attention to anomalies detected by the sensors: late night visitors, lights at unusual hours and telephone calls after the team recorded "all quiet" in the house. The suspects in the target apartment kept a pretty tight schedule, which made the job simple. Reeves or Howard would check the highlights, if there were any, and together they would conduct a fast-speed scan through the video, further searching for any obvious irregularities.
They weren't required to remain awake once they logged "all quiet," since their stakeout was classified as an intelligence gathering activity. The four men living together in 32A had raised enough red flags to warrant further investigation, but hadn't been classified as an immediate or developing threat.