Fury From Within

Chapter Twenty-Three

The traffic flowed steadily for a summer Sunday evening, placing Igor only 90 minutes from his next destination in Philadelphia. Before he left the embassy, Igor asked his friend Sergey to keep a close and personnel eye on the fluid situation involving the Peace Enforcer at its downtown location. If Sergey saw the weapon was removed by the American FBI and not the terrorist, the better for Russia and the world.

Igor realized Sergey had his connections and could possibly swing a visit to the area. At least if the FBI had possession of the weapon, Russia could protest via diplomatic channels for its eventual return. It would be considered a major political embarrassment for Russia but hopefully it would be kept “close hold” between the countries spy agencies.

Careful to maintain the speed limit, Igor didn’t require any unnecessary attention at this juncture of the mission. The Russian embassy vehicle he drove came absent its customary diplomatic plates, a generic Maryland plate added in its place. The 2009 Toyota Corolla also had its trunk loaded with grenades, an AK-47 with cursory ammunition, and night vision goggles. That along with his personal 9mm would be a police officer’s dream stop. Right up there with a major drug bust. The newspapers would have a field day with his background and his Russian Embassy ties.

Approaching the first of two rest areas, Igor saw a highway sign announcing city mileages: New York 132 miles placed on top, with Philadelphia 53 miles right below. Igor reached over for the file on Fort Mifflin that Sergey had provided him. It was time to get acquainted with the area surrounding his destination. Pulling into the busy Maryland House Restaurant parking lot, he would pause for a few minutes and scout the best approach to take.

He had less than an hour to reach his target.

Peter constantly monitored Jimmy’s actions as he maintained his 1,000-foot altitude; below them lay Baltimore Harbor with its ships at anchor or heading out into the Chesapeake Bay. It had been an uneventful 10 minutes since Peter fired the second bullet through the Helicopters windshield to gain the pilots silence. He heard tales of hijacked airliners whose pilots conversed with their hijackers, leaving the radio on to relay to ground controllers their precise location.

That wasn’t about to happen, Peter was too smart for that.

The Air Traffic Controllers no doubt tracked him on radar. The ground controllers were informed of the hijacked helicopter by his FBI supervisors and clearing a traffic path for him, at least he had hoped so. With his transponder being in the off position, the helicopter would be hard to locate.

What really worried Jimmy was his present course; he would approach Philadelphia’s International airport and hence another heavily congested airspace. He had to say something even if he was ordered to keep his mouth shut.

Half-turning in his seat, Jimmy could see Peter pointing his weapon at him, indicating for him to turn around.

“Look buddy,” Jimmy said. “I have to tell you about the area we are heading into,” pausing to see if Peter would stop him, hearing nothing in return he continued. “When highway 95 approaches’ the city of Philadelphia, it runs parallel to the cities International Airport, that’s a lot of heavy duty air traffic. It would be wise to steer clear of that area. I can plot us a course……”

Peter cut him off.

“Enough,” he said, knowing exactly where they were and what they would encounter along the way. “Do you actually think I would allow you to provide us a course? What kind of fool do you think I am? Keep your mouth shut and fly. You have performed well up to this point; I would hate to see anything happen to you.”

Jimmy realized time was running short and he had to take some type of action. He would have to attack when they landed or even while they were in the process of landing.

Yes, that’s it, while they were landing.

Forsythe stood toe-to-toe with Boris in front of the Red Cross building. He wanted information, and he required it pronto.

Boris smelled a deal. It had to be a foolproof deal; one that would grant him immunity and transportation back to Europe, having already missed his reserved flight the night before.

Forsythe brutally pulled Boris aside, away from the gathering of people on the sidewalk. He didn’t require their conversation to be overheard. Satisfied that they were safely out of earshot, Forsythe dug his claws in.

“Boris do you remember our little conversation? Forsythe said referring to the torture he had to endure.

He remembered it only too well, allowing his hand to traverse the cuts above and below his right eye. He still experienced difficulty breathing from the blows to his stomach, possibly breaking several of his ribs in the process.

“Yes, Michael, I will remember it for the rest of my life,” Boris said. He now stared directly at Forsythe, knowing he truly held the upper hand this time, unlike earlier when Forsythe performed the old bait and switch. Promising him a quick return home in trade for his information on the Washington DC weapons location.

“But now, I want a commercial flight out of Dulles.” Boris looked at his watch, realizing that a Swiss Air flight was departing in 3 hours. “And I want to leave now. I will provide you the location of where our friend is flying to when I am safely aboard and granted Diplomatic Immunity.”

Forsythe grabbed Boris’s jacket lapels, pulling him in close. “Look here you sad excuse for a human being. I’m trying to save thousands if not millions of lives from being lost,” throwing him to the ground before kicking him once more in the ribs.

Forsythe looked back at the group of officers and agents who were watching the impromptu interrogation; he could see the look of disapproval only from the uniformed officer. His agents were ready to restrain the uniformed officers if need be, knowing the importance of the information Boris possibly held.

Forsythe reached down to help Boris, pulling him up, brushing the grass clippings off his clothing. “Boris, I will put you on the plane personally if need be. You can be home at 27 Alter Strasse, in Bern, Switzerland by tomorrow morning.”

A look of surprise shot across Boris’s face concerning his personnel address, one that he thought a closely held secret. “How did you locate my home Michael?” Boris said his voice cracking.

“We have our friends around the world, Boris,” Forsythe said, now taking his own turn at grinning.”

Boris rubbed his hands over his ribcage in obvious pain, his earlier bravado having vanished.

“I want your personnel guarantee of my safety Michael,” Boris replied meekly.

Forsythe put his arm around Boris to help him walk due to his busted ribs. “You have it, scouts honor,” Forsythe said. “But I will require the information right now, none of this waiting three hours bullshit.”

Stopping a few feet short of the group, Boris turns to Forsythe, the pain showing upon his face. “If you are aware of my new address, that means the FSB is also aware.” His expression now turned to one of fear.

“I would say that this is a high probability Boris,” looking to his assembled group who stood awaiting their new assignments before turning back to Boris. “Do you have a new request you would like to make at this time?

The sun beat down upon Boris’s exposed head as he stood facing Forsythe, the sweat once again beading on his brow, the cut above his eye feeling the sting of its salt content. He hoped to avoid Washington DC and its unbearable humidity on this trip, but other forces of nature had taken that possibility out of his hands.

“I want to enter your witness protection program,” he said, wiping the sweat from his brow, careful to avoid his open wounds.

The request seemed reasonable from his end, but Forsythe allowed Boris to sweat some more, wondering if he had anything else of value to provide before answering. The longer he waited, the more Boris would sense rejection and drop some more bait for him to bite. Standing in front of Boris, staring down at his pathetic figure hunched over to one side in pain, Forsythe realized there was more. His honed instincts of being in the FBI for 25 years told him there was additional information to be gleaned.

“Speak and I’ll listen. You have 2 minutes to tell me what is going on here and then where the rest are.”

This was an unseen blow, one that caused him more pain than the shot to his ribs. Boris was getting too old for this type of work, knowing his life expectancy was now considerably shorter if he returned to Switzerland.

“They are heading to Philadelphia, or just on its perimeter,” Boris said. “The Muslim gentleman is going to detonate one of our devices at a historical Fort up there. Fort Mifflin.”

Forsythe nodded. “Okay that piece of information has bought you access to your bank account in Switzerland.” He knew more was forthcoming. “Keep talking.”

Boris managed a smile. “He will detonate it at 8:35 PM,” he said, his breathing shallow from the broken ribs. “If you call your Secret Service you will have confirmation that your President will have just landed in Air Force One at the adjacent International Airport. It was planned that way in case he was missed in Washington.”

Forsythe spoke rapidly into his cell phone, able to confirm that the President would indeed be flying from Maryland in Philadelphia at the time mentioned. His next call was to his superiors, telling them to get on the horn and move the president. He also needed another helicopter.

Turning back to face Boris, he said. “We’ll talk about the other weapons when I get back.” He then motioned Jim Thomson over.

“Our new found friend here is about to enter the witness protection program. See that he is taken care of.”

“Until we meet again Boris,” said Forsyth.

“Until we meet again Michael,” the pain in his ribs causing him to take shallow breaths, “and thank-you.”

“Okay,” Peter said, pushing the weapon into the base of Jimmy’s scull. “I want you to land in a park coming up on your right hand side,” forcibly pushing Jimmy’s head to one side in order to look in the direction he was pointing.

“All-right I see it, you don’t have to be nasty about it,” Jimmy replied. He could see a business parking lot and a patch of green alongside the Delaware River, still some 4 miles short of the airport itself.

“Land this piece of junk now!” Peter said with his weapon still in place, ready to use it if the need arose.

Jimmy slowed his helicopters forward speed to achieve a landing on a small patch of land, one that was surrounded by trees and power wires that could only make his landing even more hazardous.

No problem thought Jimmy as he purposely overshot the first landing attempt, causing Peter to pistol-whip him about the head in response.

“I’ll give you one more chance,” Peter said, once again placing the gun at the base of his skull.

Jimmy was stalling for time. During the ride up he had told Peter the maximum speed he could achieve in the aging helicopter was 85 knots or the engines would blow. Of course, this was a lie; the helicopter could achieve 130 knots on any given day. It was just one of Jimmy’s tactics; fortunately for him it worked. Saving the best for last he still had the landing to look forward too. Realizing that only the pilot and co-pilot seats were built to be shock absorbent to accommodate a hard landing, he could steer the craft into a semi-controlled crash. This presented the possibility of disabling Peter as soon as they were on the deck. That was his last and only hope.

Peter realized Jimmy was trying to stall for time. “If you don’t land this helicopter in less than 30 seconds, your brain is going to be splattered across the windshield.”

Jimmy half turned in his seat, facing down the gun barrel that was now was in his face, smiling at Peter in the back seat. “No problem,my friend,”—pushing the helicopter into a steep dive before leveling off quickly at 250 feet to make sure he could steer clear around the tree’s that were abundant in the park.

“Now,” Peter demanded, firing once more through the co-pilots windshield.

“You asked for it,” Jimmy said, bringing the helicopter down at a rate of descent four times higher than recommended by the manufacturer. At this rate of speed, the helicopter was hard to control even for a veteran pilot such as Jimmy,as the helicopters tail rotor swung around and hit an overhead power line — slicing the line in two and cutting the power for the 500 people in the immediate area. With his tail rotor disabled, the helicopter swung wildly in a tight circle before crashing into a 75-foot oak tree. Luckily for its occupants they survived the initial crash with the tree’s canopy assisting the helicopter by stopping the top main rotor from its dangerous spin, causing it to come to an abrupt stop and imbed itself in a 10 inch overhead branch. From there the helicopter basically slid down branch by branch the remaining 30 feet to the ground. The grounds impact on the cockpits aluminum structure was immediate, pushing the structure inward and crushing the front pilot and copilot seats, killing Jimmy instantly.

With Peter positioned behind Jimmy, he was able to use Jimmy’s body as a shield and rode the remaining distance down essentially on his back of his seat.

It didn’t take long for a small crowd to gather around the mangled wreckage, curiosity keeping them at bay due to the downed power lines wiping around like a 4th of July fireworks display. It was only a matter of a few minutes before Police and Fire services would arrive on the scene.

Peter awoke to find himself lying on top of the pilot. He could feel something heavy lying across his back but he was basically unharmed. Reaching behind him, he was able to forcefully grab and push a jagged piece of the aluminum craft off his back and extract himself.

Peter had only one objective at this point, to reach his rental car he had pre-positioned only 200 meters away. His detailed planning had him position a second rental vehicle on one of the side streets in the small town of Essington, which happened to be 6 kilometers south of the airport. He knew he would pass through here coming from Washington and would want to dump whatever vehicle he had at the moment and switch to a “clean” untraceable one for his next phase of the operation. Little did he expect that his mode of transportation would be a helicopter.

Staggering out from the mangled aluminum mess, Peter took a few weary steps, trying to regain his balance, blood flowing from ahead wound. Taking one look back at the wreckage before starting to walk away — Peter realized he was lucky to have survived at all.

Several courageous members of the crowd were now attempting to extract Jimmy from the wreckage, not knowing the FBI agent was already dead. This rest of the crowd was pointing towards Peter and gasping as he regained his composure and was now jogging away towards his pre-positioned car.

He had to hurry, he could hear the sirens wailing in the distance and evidently heading to the crash scene.

The area of Essington where Peter had placed his rental car contained a mixture of small business’ and town homes. This combination allowed Peter’s car to go unnoticed and not arouse suspicions of the diligent neighbors. Jogging across the street from the park, Peter was able to seek shelter in a vacant storefront as the first police cars arrived on the scene. Watching from his vantage point as the ambulance arrived right behind the police. It was only a matter of minutes before the bystanders would inform the police of his escape from the wreckage.

Seeing his car brought a sigh of relief to Peter, removing the advertisement for a local deli that someone had placed on his windshield before getting in and quickly driving off. Careful to obey the traffic laws, not wanting to be pulled over at a moment such as this, Peter stopped his new vehicle for a stop sign, this allowed the passage of several additional fire fighting vehicles. Peter managed a smile, knowing he was only minutes from the Fort and his end goal.