Act of War

CHAPTER 46

Cheng didn’t need to see the explosion at the Nashville storage facility to know that it would be seen and heard for miles. Hidden in the cardboard boxes were two large cylinders of hydrogen. They would create an incredible blast and better still, an incredible mess.

He had always believed that if you were going to make a mess, you should make the biggest mess possible. The more the authorities had to sift through, the longer it would take them to figure out what had happened. Anything that gave him more time was good. There was a lot of unfinished business yet to be done.

The first thing on his list was to get rid of the Navigator. The police would be looking for it.

The safest and fastest thing for him to do was to steal a vehicle from a long-term parking lot. He hoped that by the time anyone knew a car had been stolen, he would have already abandoned it and moved on to something else. He headed for Nashville International where he located an older Toyota Corolla and went to work on it.

Once he had it started, he transferred his belongings into the trunk and exited the lot. Steering onto the highway, he plotted a course north for Kentucky. After Louisville, he picked up I-71, which would take him north toward Cincinnati and from there, Columbus.

He knew driving late at night was dangerous. With fewer cars on the road, the odds of being pulled over for a minor or even nonexistent traffic violation increased exponentially. Nevertheless, he chose to push through. He wanted to have mapped out his target and to be there when their doors opened in the morning. He also needed to send an update to Beijing. If he could also squeeze in even half an hour of sleep, he would be better able to focus on everything he needed to achieve.

He arrived in Columbus shortly before dawn. Using the last of his sterile cell phones, he called a Chinese asset named Wei Yin and gave him a code word. When he arrived at Yin’s home in Dublin, a suburb just outside Columbus, the paunchy, middle-aged Ph.D. with glasses and thinning hair was waiting for him. He was sitting in a darkened downstairs window. As Cheng pulled into the driveway, Yin pressed the garage remote, the door opened, and Cheng drove in. Yin then pressed the button again and closed the door behind him.

They said few words. They were not friends. Theirs was purely a business relationship.

Yin was rusty and uncomfortable. He had not provided sanctuary for a Chinese operative in twenty years. His primary function in the United States was espionage. As a research fellow at the Battelle Memorial Institute, a leading science and technology development company, he had access to a wide array of sensitive and important American projects.

Forgetful of what the specific protocol was, Dr. Yin fell back on his upbringing. He offered his visitor tea and something to eat. Cheng accepted both.

As the doctor cooked a traditional Chinese breakfast, he used Yin’s computer to “link surf” the Web. He knew how the NSA’s sophisticated algorithms worked and he was careful not to conduct key word searches about what had transpired in Nashville that might be picked up and flagged. He merely clicked from one link to another, trying to zero in on what he wanted.

From what he could tell, the authorities didn’t appear to know who was behind the death of the police officer or the storage facility fire. That, or they weren’t making anything public.

There was also no mention of the murder of Wazir Ibrahim or Mirsab, the engineering student assigned to the Nashville cell. While that was a good sign, he was wise enough to know that just because the information was not in the press didn’t mean the authorities were unaware. He would have to proceed with an abundance of caution. Disguising himself wouldn’t be a bad idea either, especially considering everything that had happened in Nashville.

He knew the CCTV system had been taken offline, so there would be no record of his having been there, but the officer’s behavior still bothered him. It was too aggressive, almost as if he suspected something bad was happening. Perhaps Cheng was making too much of it, but he didn’t think so. He was worried that somewhere, dots were being connected.

After breakfast, Yin asked what else the visitor needed. Cheng wanted to lie down for a few minutes, then to shower and change. There had been no time to return to the hotel in Nashville for his belongings. Not that it mattered. There was nothing in the room, nor in his suitcase, that was incriminating. He planned to contact the hotel, check out over the phone, and have them FedEx the bag to the poultry plant in Nebraska. Then, all he would need was a new vehicle. That was where Yin had come in.

Cheng was to collect the princelings and transport them to the Second Department’s asset known as Medusa. To do that, he was going to need an appropriate vehicle. He wanted a low-key minivan, preferably white or silver, with tinted windows. He would be covering a lot of ground over the next thirty-six hours and the vehicle had to be completely reliable.

After Cheng had showered and changed into the clothes Yin provided, the research scientist drove his visitor past multiple Columbus used car lots until the man identified the vehicle he wanted. When the lot opened forty-five minutes later, they test-drove it, and Yin bought and registered the van using one of the false identities and the cash he maintained in case of emergency. Cheng instructed him to submit a request to the Second Department for reimbursement.

More an academic than a field operative, the mild-mannered Yin had been anxious to be rid of his surprise guest the moment he had arrived. After the van had been purchased, his visitor told him he would be responsible for disposing of the stolen Toyota sitting in his garage. Yin wasn’t looking forward to driving it to a bad part of town and leaving it running, in hopes that someone else would steal it, but if that’s what was required of him, that was what he would do. Anything to hurry the visitor on his way. This was more intrigue than Yin cared for and he would be glad to put it all behind him.

Cheng, though, had demanded one more thing. It was eleven hours from Columbus to Boston, and he expected Yin to do the driving.

Having Yin drive would allow him to sleep and keep his timetable moving forward. His body clock was already upside down from the time difference between China and the U.S. If he didn’t rest, he could very well make a fatal mistake. He needed to be sharp.

Cheng was not happy to have been sent to collect the PSC’s precious little princelings. He had never met a single one of them who wasn’t spoiled and arrogant, but those were his orders. He would do as he had been commanded. It was exactly what he had told Yin when the man tried to make excuses about why he couldn’t drive him to Boston.

Cheng had been quite terse. His stress levels were mounting. There would be multiple radiological sensors along the East Coast. Allegedly, the shielding for the device he was carrying was 100 percent effective. The technology had been developed by the Americans, and stolen by the Chinese, to protect spacecraft from radiation. Colonel Shi had attempted to reassure him that they never would have been able to get the devices into the United States in the first place, much less keep them hidden, if the containers were not perfectly suited to their task.

It was easy for Shi to downplay his concerns. He was safely ensconced back at the Second Department in Beijing. He didn’t have to drive around with the device in his trunk.

They had driven cautiously, but not overly so. Yin had set the minivan’s cruise control appropriately and they stopped only for gas or to use a rest-area bathroom.

Despite his fatigue, it had been difficult for Cheng to fall asleep. His mind kept running through all of the things he had to do and how he would have to handle any contingencies. It was only through sheer force of will that he finally silenced his thoughts and was able to get some sleep.

When they arrived in Boston, Cheng asked Yin to conduct a few errands for him and then he let him go. He had kept him in the dark on everything, except the destination. Yin had no idea why he was in the United States, why he needed the minivan, what was in the large, hard-sided case, or what he was doing in Boston. It was better that way for both of them.

Cheng had encouraged him to pay cash for a bus ticket, return to Columbus, and forget everything that had transpired since his phone had first rung. He watched Yin get in a cab and disappear.

Once he was gone, Cheng got back in the minivan and headed for Boston’s South End. After finding a parking spot, he climbed into the back and, using the bicycle locks Yin had purchased, secured the device to the tie-down eyelets in the cargo area.

He packed his laptop and the other items he didn’t want to risk leaving behind in the backpack he’d had Yin pick up and stepped out of the minivan.

Locking the doors and turning on the alarm, he put the hood of his sweatshirt up, threw the backpack over one shoulder, and walked toward Chinatown.