Fahd stumbled over debris in the road. He looked down to right himself and noticed an irregular object. He stared in horror. He began to shake. Below him was the face of a woman. Not her head, dear Allah, not her head. Three-quarters of her face was removed from the rest of her body, an eye along with distorted and grotesque lips and cartilage from the nose, tattered bits of a forehead, all soaked in blood. He heard it now, crashing against his bleeding eardrums. Screams and screams and screams of terror. He looked around, turning in every direction, edging away from the demonic mask of death near his feet. The screams grew louder and louder in his head, and he turned to look but could not find the source of the voices. Only as he began to limp maniacally across the road, no longer caring what he stepped on, glass or flesh, did he realize that the screams were his own.
12
John Savas stepped up the curb onto the sidewalk in front of 26 Federal Plaza. He wore a dark suit and sunglasses, and carried a coffee in one hand and the New York Times and his briefcase in the other. As was clear to anyone who knew him, the tension of the last few weeks had begun to extract a toll. His shoulders sagged slightly, and behind the sunglasses, his eyes were bloodshot from lack of sleep.
He swung into the main entrance of the FBI building, keeping his coffee level while dodging exiting and entering figures, rarely taking his eyes of the page he was reading. He glanced up at security, nodded toward the well-known faces, handed off his items, went through the required checks, grabbed his items, and found his place back in the article as he approached the elevators.
Several figures were waiting in line. He smiled, glimpsing a young woman with waist-length red hair. Today she wore a bright-green dress complemented by red sneakers, and stood apart from the crowd waiting for the elevators, staring straight up at the wall to her left and seemingly caught in another trance of some kind. Savas glanced back down at his article and slowed to a stop behind her.
“Greetings, Kemo Sabe,” the young woman spoke.
“Someday I'm going to learn how to sneak up on you, Angel.”
“I doubt that, John.”
“Yeah, so do I.”
“You look like shit.”
Savas laughed. “Thanks, doll. I'm looking forward to the weekend and a little rest.”
“Sorry to hear that,” said Lightfoote, moving toward the elevator. Before Savas could process her words, the bell rang and the doors opened.
As soon as Savas stepped out of the elevator onto his floor, he knew something was wrong. The normal rhythms of work were completely out-of-whack as agents darted from place to place among a din of rising voices. Already he could see Kanter in the back pointing and shouting commands; then, spotting Savas, he called him over with an imperious wave of his hand.
“See you soon, Captain Overlord, sir,” Lightfoote said sweetly.
“What?” asked Savas distractedly, but by the time he turned to look, she was already flitting across the room. Savas spilled his coffee over his New York Times, cursed, and marched forward after dropping both in the trash.
Kanter was in prime form. Already his tie was askew and his receding gray hair hung in growing disarray. A fire burned in his eyes, and his jaw jutted forward, signaling that he was in the crazed problem-solving mode that made him so skilled as an administrator, as well as such a pain in the ass. Kanter didn't waste any time getting to the point.
“This is it, John!” he said, grabbing the ex-cop's arm in a vicelike grip and dragging him across the room. “No drill. We have a bona fide event right now in New York City.”
“What?” sputtered Savas. “An attack? Today?”
“That's right. Looks like it's down by the UN — not the UN proper, thank goodness. We have some confirmation on that, at least. But in the immediate area. Set your team up now, John. I want everything you can get on this pouring in ASAP.” Kanter left his side and stormed off toward another team.
Savas headed toward the Operations Room for Intel 1. On his way he banged on the office doors of his group members. “Let's go! We need to move right now to the OR!” Of his six team members, only the angular form of Matt King emerged.
“I supposed from all this chaos that we must—”
“Shut it, Matt. Mail me the essay. This is real. Let's move.” Savas turned and nearly crashed into the hairy form of Hernandez.
“Manuel, please, to the Operations Room. This one looks real, and we might just burn through all the wires you duct-taped together. I need you in there making sure we fly straight; you got it?”
“I'm on it.”
“Please don't tell me we're running any beta versions of anything.”
“I live by a don't-ask-don't-tell policy for software, John.”
Savas stared harshly at the ceiling for a moment. “The system better not crash.” He pushed past Hernandez and felt him following behind as they headed to the Operations Room. Along the way, they were joined by J. P. Rideout and Frank Miller. The four strode into the OR.
“OK, where's Rebecca?” asked Savas, glancing around the room with some anxiety. Over the last few years, he'd come to count more on Rebecca Cohen than on anyone in the group. Her sharp mind, grounded personality, and holistic way of thinking kept the team focused with the right perspective. She was also a whiz with the crises system Hernandez had set up. Today would be a bad day for her to call in sick.
“I'm here, John,” she said, whisking into the OR. He breathed easier.
“All right, now if we can only get Angel in here, we can start to break this thing down.”
Hernandez tugged on his arm and pointed across the room. Savas followed his hand to the end of the half-moon desk. Lightfoote sat there; somehow she had entered before they had come in, or perhaps she had floated in like some ghost without anyone noticing. As he looked at her, she paused her furious typing to raise a hand, eyes still on the screen, giving Savas the thumbs-up.
Aside from Savas and Hernandez, the remaining members of Intel 1 were busy logging in and bringing up the system. Awaiting commands from Savas, some were already running the analysis software.
“OK, folks, all I've got for the present is that there was an attack Midtown East by the UN. Rebecca, let's bring up the police and fire data. Angel, can you get a live satellite view up?”
An enormous projection screen was draped over the far wall, some ten feet in front of the table. It flashed to life, showing five smaller sub-divisions superimposed over a larger background. One screen, corresponding to Lightfoote's terminal, blinked and came to life, displaying a view from space. It quickly zoomed into the island of Manhattan just south of the Queensboro Bridge. Smoke obscured a region of several blocks near the United Nations building. Other screens flashed and showed a stream of text — emergency bulletins from several New York City agencies.
“Excellent. Rebecca, why don't you run the link to Larry's office and dump the live feed. OK, what do we have folks?”
In the time it took him to say these things, several of the other screens flashed on, revealing varied scenes. One was cutting between local and national coverage of the event on television. Another was funneling information from Internet search engines through one of Manuel's algorithms.