‘Your wildest dreams are about to become your wildest nightmares if you don’t get to work,’ Jarvis snapped. ‘The only reason you got security clearance to be in here at all is because I asked for it. How long?’
Hellerman did not look up as he worked feverishly at his console. ‘The code is complex, unsurprisingly, but I can have it cracked in an hour or two.’
‘We have a minute or two,’ Jarvis pointed out.
‘Which is why I’m creating a work — around,’ Hellerman said as his fingers flew across the keyboard. ‘It won’t give us a permanent signal but it will be enough to give Lopez a decent look through the eyes of our unwitting assassin. I only hope it’s enough for her to identify them.’
‘She won’t need long,’ Jarvis figured. ‘An eye — point position can be triangulated, and the Secret Service can move in and quietly remove whoever it is before they can be made to act.’
Hellerman nodded as new data flooded down his screen.
‘I’ve got signals traffic at eight hundred eighty hertz in the vicinity of the White House,’ he said, his voice touched now with excitement. ‘Can’t pinpoint the location but it’s definitely there. Somebody’s acting as a booster in the crowd.’
‘So we’re looking for two people,’ Jarvis muttered. ‘Can you locate the booster?’
‘No,’ Hellerman said, ‘but I can do the next best thing. I can give you their number.’
Jarvis watched as on a second screen a cell phone number popped up. He didn’t need to look at it for long to know whose number it was.
‘LeMay,’ he said finally. ‘Damn it, MJ–12 do want this attack to go ahead.’
‘The Director FBI is in the crowd,’ Hellerman confirmed.
Jarvis felt his cell phone vibrate in his pocket and he answered it immediately. ‘Jarvis?’
‘It’s Vaughn,’ came the reply. ‘We just did a scan of Hannah’s frontal lobes and we found the device.’
‘Good,’ Jarvis replied, ‘where are you both now?’
‘We’re on our way to the White House just like you ordered, but isn’t that the last thing we should be doing?’
‘How the hell did Hannah’s implant get through the X — Ray scanner without being detected?!’ Jarvis asked, ignoring Vaughn’s last.
‘Because it’s not metal,’ Vaughn replied. ‘It’s made from a biodegradable polymer, a synthetic mesh that mimics human tissue. It looks like the Chinese got further down the road with these implants than we thought. They don’t even use conductive probes any more, but instead the implant has a mesh rolled up inside it that is injected through a needle just one micrometer thick. The mesh unravels once the implant is in place. Believe it or not, the mesh actually melds with the victim’s brain tissue once injected and remains there for a limited time before breaking down and disappearing, and is designed to allow the interception of communications between the brain’s neurons. It’s based on some kind of advanced technology being developed by Harvard to treat neurodegenerative disorders — the Chinese must have copied the tech’ and incorporated it into their devices. Even the internal chips are biodegradable, and the whole thing unravels and embeds itself in the brain in less than half an hour. We’ve only tested this on mice in the US, but the Chinese have gone much further.’
Jarvis stared into space for a moment before replying.
‘No evidence left behind,’ he said finally. ‘Is the implant still in place?’
‘Yeah, the doctors don’t want it out of her until they’re sure they can remove it without causing permanent damage.’
Jarvis took a deep breath before he replied.
‘Good,’ he said. ‘Leave it there and get Hannah into the White House right now. We have control of her chip, so she won’t do anything that she shouldn’t.’
There was a long pause on the line. ‘What are you going to do?’
‘That’s a matter of national security, literally,’ Jarvis replied. ‘Get her there and I’ll take care of the rest, okay?’
Jarvis shut off the line and saw Hellerman looking up at him from the corner of one eye as he worked.
‘What are you looking at?’ Jarvis snapped. ‘I know what I’m doing.’
‘I know,’ Hellerman replied, ‘but I don’t know if what you’re doing is the right thing.’
Ethan weaved the Harley Davidson through the dense lines of traffic, the big bike’s loud engine helping to clear the way as drivers heard him coming and pulled aside to give him more room. The Sportster was slim enough to slip through the gaps he was offered, the rumbling engine echoing through the ranks of traffic.
Ahead, a large Ford Ranger occupied by a beefy looking man in a white vest pulled across and blocked Ethan’s path. Ethan saw the shaved head and cruel grin of the driver reflected in his rear view mirror as he looked back and chuckled at the sight of Ethan’s Harley pinned among the traffic behind him.
Ethan slipped the bike into neutral, took his hands off the bars and reached beneath his jacket. He pulled out the 9mm pistol and aimed it at the Ford’s rear view mirror. The big driver’s smirk dissolved into panic as his eyes widened and then Ethan fired.
The bullet smashed into the mirror and shattered it into thousands of sparkling pieces that showered down onto the road as drivers to his left and right cried out in horror. The Ford Ranger’s engine growled and it pulled over. Ethan slipped the pistol back into its shoulder holster, kicked the Harley into gear and pulled past the truck, not dignifying the driver with even a glance as he continued on his way off DuPont Circle and south toward Pennsylvania Avenue.
XLII
‘It’ll work, trust me. We’ve just gotta work fast!’
Nicola Lopez sat in the Secret Service “Horsepower” bunker and watched the screens before her. The agents not assigned directly to the President’s side had set her up in the bunker with seven screens; two of them overlooked the White House south lawn, four more the streets surrounding the building via traffic cameras, and a final screen that was at that very moment blank.
Secret Service Agent Daniel Hopkins loomed over Lopez’s shoulder. He was in his forties but in supreme physical condition, his gray suit barely containing his muscular frame, his jaw broad and an air of confidence surrounding him that marked him out as likely a former Special Forces soldier.
‘I don’t like this at all,’ he muttered as he looked at the screens. ‘We can’t do a damned thing from in here if this doesn’t work.’
Lopez sat and waited patiently for the seventh screen to show an image.
‘We have top people working on this,’ she said without betraying the slightest shred of doubt. ‘We know how they work and our best people are right now about to figure out how to show us who is targeting the President.’
‘That so?’ Hopkins murmured. ‘And how would they be doing that?’
‘It’s long and complicated,’ Lopez said. ‘But as long as we can intercept the signals and get a trace on their origin, we can bring this entire attack to a close without a single shot being fired.’
‘And if you can’t get a trace or intercept these signals you’re talking about?’
Lopez smiled tightly as she stared at the screen and hoped against hope that Hellerman was on top form, because she still did not know who was going to make an attempt on the President’s life.
Her lack of a reply did nothing to instill confidence in her Secret Service escort.