The Enemy Within

CHAPTER 12 PRESSURE COOKER

Under a dismal, overcast November sky, throngs of onlookers, reporters, and camera crews pressed against the police barricades deployed to maintain a security zone around the bomb-gutted National Press Office building. The FBI-led task force charged with investigating the bombing had sealed an area a full city block wide around the crime scene.

Helen Gray stopped short of the police line, taking a good hard look at the organised pandemonium gripping the area just two blocks from the White House. Parked squad cars, ambulances, fire engines, and official vehicles belonging to nearly a dozen different federal and District of Columbia governmental agencies jammed almost every square foot of Fourteenth Street. Hard-faced D.C. police officers, wearing rain gear against the impending storm, manned the barricades, checking identity cards before allowing anyone in or out of the secure zone. (jars and trucks were backed up noseto-tail for blocks in every direction.

The entire downtown was in gridlock, generated by the bomb-related street closures and by the tidal surge of the morbidly curious who were flocking to the site. To avoid the worst of it, Helen had walked from her temporary office at the Hoover Building instead of trying to drive the relatively short distance. This was her first visit to evaluate the evidence accumulated in the first few hours of the investigation. She’d stayed away until now to allow the technical experts some room to work. But from the number of vehicles parked outside the press club, she was one of only a handful of people in official Washington who had been able to resist the temptation to play backseat driver.

“You still think this is a good idea?” Peter Thorn said quietly into her right ear, eyeing the crowded street in front of them. “I’ve an idea that your bosses might not welcome another busybody poking his nose into their business just now.”

Helen turned toward him. Like her, he was in civilian clothes instead of uniform. With the media already deep in a feeding frenzy over the press club bombing, neither saw any point in attracting attention to themselves. She shook her head decisively. “You’re a recognised expert on terrorist tactics and weapons, Peter. I’d hardly call somebody with your experience a busybody.”

“Maybe you wouldn’t. But I’d say you’re biased.” He smiled tightly.

“Truth is, this is way off my patch and you know it.”

Helen shrugged. “So? Last time I looked, the Bureau didn’t have a monopoly on brainpower. You might see something our people have missed. And if you don’t, there’s still no harm done.”

Privately, she was less certain about the wisdom of her actions. She’d invited Peter to come along on her own initiative without permission from Special Agent Flynn. Some of her reasoning was soundly professional. But she couldn’t deny that many of her reasons were more personal. And by involving an outsider in an FBI investigation, she risked a reprimand if Flynn officially objected to his presence despite the kudos she’d earned by smashing the Temple Emet attack. She looked inward for a moment, again considering whether or not she was willing to accept a black mark on her near-perfect record for his sake.

The answer was yes.

She still remembered that look of anguished frustration on Peter’s face when they first heard the news about the bombing. Standing idle on the sidelines in the aftermath of the deadliest terrorist attack in U.S. history would have been more than he could bear. Besides, Helen admitted to herself, she treasured every moment spent in his company. Being completely separated from him for the long days and nights her work on the task force would probably require might have been more than she could bear. If involving him meant breaking every single one of her precepts about keeping her work and personal lives separate, so be it.

Certainly, the prospect of even an unofficial role in the search for the press club bombers had worked wonders on Peter. Despite his worries that his presence might get her in hot water, he couldn’t hide his eagerness to join in the hunt an eagerness that mirrored her own. The death toll from the attack was still climbing as crews found more bodies inside the wreckage, but it had already soared to nearly two hundred. She wanted to find the terrorists who were responsible for the blood bath to find them and destroy Hem before they could strike again.

Helen felt something patter down on her hair and looked skyward. The first full drops of cold rain spattered across her upturned face. She grimaced. There probably weren’t any significant clues outside the building for the storm to wash away, but the worsening weather would make their job even harder and more depressing than it already was. At least it might thin some of the crowds surrounding the explosion site.

She tugged at Peter’s elbow. “Come on, Colonel Thorn. Let’s get inside.”

He nodded gravely. “After you, Agent Gray.”

They made their way through the milling crowds to the police line. A young cop stepped forward to meet them. His rain poncho whipped in a sudden gust of cold wind. “Sorry, folks. You’ll have to move back. No one’s allowed any further.”

Helen pushed her Bureau ID under his nose. “I’m on the task force.” She nodded toward Peter, who held his own identity card in plain view.

“Colonel Thorn is a liaison officer from the Pentagon.”

The policeman scanned both cards quickly but thoroughly, carefully comparing the pictures with their faces. He looked up. “Okay, you can come through.” He pointed toward a temporary trailer parked just outside the entrance to the National Press Office building. “Just sign in at the command post, please. You’ll be briefed on site protocol there.”

The rain was falling even harder by the time Peter Thorn and Helen Gray strode across the narrow gap between the command trailer and the press building. Both of them carried sealed bags containing sterile, white plastic suits and plastic booties that would go on over their shoes. Special Agent Flynn’s instructions to his special task force were dear. He wanted to make sure the investigators themselves didn’t track in clothing fibers, dust, or mud that might confuse the — forensics experts combing through the explosion site. They’d also been issued hard hats that were color-coded to indicate status and function at a glance. As a member of the FBI task force command section, Helen’s was black. After minor haggling with the agent manning the security desk, Thorn had been issued a blue hard hat. The color proclaimed his status for now as an on-site observer.

Thorn looked up for a moment before entering the building, ignoring the rain sleeting into his face. From the outside, there was little visible bomb damage. The windows on all the top floors were blown out, and there were scorch marks visible on the concrete facade either from the blast itself or from the resulting fires but beyond that, the structure itself seemed largely untouched.

But when he and Helen stepped out of the central stairwell a few minutes later, he realised how horribly deceiving those external appearances were. It was hard to believe that this charred slaughterhouse had once been the third floor of the National Press Office. Rust-brown smears of dried blood were splashed everywhere on the scorched floor and walls. Massive hydraulic jacks braced the ceiling and some of the walls, indicating the immense force of the explosion.

Teams of coroners’ assistants in white protective suits were hard at work in every corner of the room, still tagging bodies and parts of bodies for eventual removal. Similarly clothed photographers moved among them, taking hundreds of pictures to build a coherent record of the scene for later use in the investigation. Even the distribution of the dead could provide important clues to the number, distribution, and types of bombs that had gone off inside the room.

Other teams of FBI agents and forensics specialists worked around and among the coroners, making precise measurements, sifting through the rubble, and collecting even the tiniest fragments of metal, plastic, paper, and cloth for more detailed lab work and analysis. In what was almost an obscene parody of an archaeological dig, even the smallest pieces of possible evidence were carefully tagged with the time of discovery and their precise location. Brigh. 1 hard hats identified experts in explosives. White, yellow, and green helmets signified fingerprint, finer, and electronics specialists. Everyone wore the same plastic suits and thick rubber gloves.

Thorn breathed in and fought down a sudden impulse to gag a foul stench hung in the air a stomach-turning blend of smoke, blood, the sickly sweet odor left by explosives, and the acrid reek of powerful disinfectants. He heard Helen coughing, but though pale, she was in full control when he looked at her.

She swallowed hard and motioned toward the near corner of the dining room where several other members of the task force command section stood conferring over a set of blueprints. “I’ve got to check in. Coming?”

Thorn nodded and trailed her through the tangled heaps of smashed, burned tables and chairs, careful to stay inside the cleared paths marked by yellow police tape pinned to the floor. He was already treading on ice just by being here without express authorisation, so there wasn’t much sense in trampling ungathered evidence.

The shortest of the men grouped around the blueprints glanced up at their approach. “Helen, glad to see you made it through the mob out there.” He looked curiously at Thorn, clearly not able to place him.

“Tom, this is Colonel Peter Thorn. He’s with the JSOC and one of the Army’s top counterterrorism experts,” Helen said, accurately if somewhat disingenuously. She turned to Thorn. “Colonel, this is Special Agent Thomas Koenig. He’s the number two man on the task force.”

The two men shook hands and stood sizing each other up while the other agents introduced themselves in a blur of names Thorn forgot almost as soon as he heard them. Aside from Special Agent Flynn himself, Koenig was the man who could make or break this informal consulting role Helen envisioned.

“You here on a mission, Pete?” Koenig asked finally.

Thorn shook his head slightly. “Just a watching brief, Tom. This is the FBI’s solo show as far as I’m concerned.”

He noticed Koenig relax minutely and hid a wry smile. Despite the clear edicts placing domestic terrorism incidents under the Bureau’s jurisdiction, turf battles with other interested agencies and departments like the DOD were not uncommon, especially in such a high-profile case.

“Where’s Flynn?” Helen asked, scanning the room.

“On the phone with the White House again, I think,” Koenig answered. He sounded disgusted. “Between the National Security Advisor, the press secretary, the head of the Secret Service, and half a dozen other lesser lights, I suspect Mike’s talked to half the god damned executive branch already.”

Thorn shook his head. As much as he wanted in on this investigation, he didn’t envy the FBI the task of trying to cope with the nation’s rattled political leaders. By targeting so many congressmen, opinion leaders, and important journalists, whoever had masterminded the press club bombing had struck squarely at the heart of the current political elite. From everything he’d seen on TV and read in the papers last night and this morning, both Congress and the administration were undeniably and understandably in a panicked uproar. They wanted concrete results, and they wanted them now.

He suspected that was part of the reason the FBI had summoned Flynn to Washington from the West Coast instead of handing the task force command to one of the Director’s immediate subordinates. Ever since he and his investigative team had cracked the Golden Gate Bridge massacre in less than forty-eight hours, Special Agent Michael Flynn had a media reputation as a miracle worker.

From what Helen had told him, Flynn’s reputation inside the Bureau was equally impressive but very different. He didn’t try walking on water to obtain results, he drained the whole pond. He was a detail man a man who paid attention to every piece of evidence, no matter how insignificant it seemed at first. As a rookie, Flynn was said to have solved his first big case a kidnap-murder by following up on what at first seemed only a typo on a bank deposit slip.

That was just as well, Thorn thought, carefully studying the bomb-shattered dining room. He doubted there would be any miracles this time. Everything he’d seen so far seemed professional to his practiced eye. The timing, the way the charges had been placed to maximize the damage and casualties. Everything. He said as much aloud.

Koenig shrugged noncommittally. “Maybe.” He nodded toward the red-helmeted explosives experts scouring the wreckage. “Our boys have already identified at least six separate devices. There may have been more.”

“All triggered simultaneously?”

“Or so damned close together it makes no real difference, Colonel,” Koenig said.

They were definitely up against a pro, then, Thorn decided. Bomb-making was a far more sophisticated and dangerous art than most people realized knowledge that several vaporised sixties radicals had acquired the hard way. Rigging a series of six charges to go off at the same time required either enormous luck or practiced skill. Right now he would put his money on skill.

“And the explosive used was plastique?” he asked.

Koenig nodded again. “We’re picking up residues all over the place. The lab work will take some time, but we’re pretty sure it was standard commercial-grade C4.”

At least that was good news. Explosives intended for peaceful civilian use included chemical tracers that would help law enforcement zero in on the manufacturer and even on the specific batch. Given enough time and a lot of legwork by its agents, the FBI should be able to track the plastique used here back to its source.

“What about those phone calls claiming responsibility? You think they were genuine?” he asked.

Koenig frowned. “They were genuine, all right. Both came in before the news of this massacre hit the wires. We’ve got partial audiotapes from the two newspapers, but I don’t know that they’ll lead us anywhere.”

“Oh?”

“Whoever made those calls used a lot of electronic filtering on his voice,” Koenig explained. “Plus, he was reading from a prepared script. We’ve got our sound techs trying to pick up what they can, but they tell me it’s like listening to a robot, not a man. Hell, the call could even have been computer-generated. ”

That was another indication that they were up against at least one professional, Thorn realised. He shook his head. No matter what the politicians wanted to hear, he suspected that finding those responsible for this butchery was not going to be fast or easy. “Does the Bureau have any data on this New Aryan Order? Anything that would make you believe they could mount a strike like this?” “Not much,” Koenig admitted. “We’ve got a handful of groups calling themselves that in our database one in Maryland, one in Idaho, two in the South, and a couple more in the upper Midwest.” He scowled. “We spent most of last night poring over the bias of the top wackos and their chief lieutenants, but I’ll be damned if we could see anyone with the guts or the brains needed for this stunt.”

The FBI man spread his hands. “Of course, this could be a whole new set of slimeballs calling themselves the New Aryan Order one we hadn’t picked up before. Hate groups don’t pay much attention to copyright laws.”

“Or they might be getting help from someone you don’t have on file yet,” Thorn suggested quietly. “Somebody with a good working knowledge of demolitions and security procedures.”

“You have a candidate in mind, Colonel?” Koenig asked, narrowing his eyes. “Does DOD have some psycho exRanger or Green Beret on the loose that we should know about? Is that why you’re here?”

Thorn shook his head and then stopped. He hadn’t seriously considered that possibility before. Much as he disliked the prospect, he had to admit that the FBI agent’s suggestion might have merit. The Army’s special forces put a great deal of effort into screening out the bad apples, but no psych profile ever developed could guarantee one hundred percent perfection.

“We might also be looking at an overseas link between extreme rightist groups,” Helen broke in. “Don’t forget those references to a German neo-Nazi we picked up from Burke and the rest during the synagogue siege. We know that Sword was getting sophisticated military supplies from old East German arsenals. Maybe this mysterious ‘Karl’ and his friends have started supplying military expertise as well.”

“Could be,” Koenig agreed slowly. Ties between the National Press Club bomber and a foreign terrorist group would complicate the whole investigation. Because the attack took place on U.S. soil, the FBI would still have primary jurisdiction, but the State Department, CIA, and Pentagon would have a much louder voice if there were a connection to radicals overseas.

Another agent joined the small circle, a taller, older man with slate-grey eyebrows and a harassed expression. The badge clipped to his protective suit read “Flynn.”

“What’s up, Tommy?”

Koenig swiveled toward his boss. “Just batting around a few theories, Mike. About whether or not the bastards who blew the hell out of this place were ex-military or might have had help from foreign terrorists.” He nodded toward Thorn. “This is Colonel Peter Thorn. He’s with the JSOC.”

“I see.” Flynn turned his gaze on Thorn, clearly taking in his lean, well-muscled form. “You’re with Delta Force, Colonel?”

Thorn nodded. “Until recently. I run a special intelligence outfit out of the Pentagon now.”

“I see.” Flynn’s gaze sharpened. “You’re not on my official observers’ list, Colonel.”

Thorn noticed Koenig and the other FBI agents stiffen. Hell. He nodded again, speaking before Helen could intervene on his behalf. If Flynn was going to be a hard-ass about this, there wasn’t any point in dragging her name and record through the procedural mud. “That’s right. I came down on my own hook.”

“I’ve already got more than four hundred agents and other personnel working this case, Colonel. Is there something we’re not doing to your satisfaction?” Flynn’s voice was dangerously quiet.

“No, sir.” Thorn stood his ground. With all the pressure the FBI agent was under from above, he couldn’t blame the older man for bristling at yet another outsider tramping through the crime scene. If their roles were reversed, he would probably feel much the same way. “But I’ve spent close to ten years studying terrorist tactics. I thought you might find that useful on an unofficial basis.”

“I see.” Flynn gritted his teeth. “Look, Colonel Thorn, besides the experts going over this building with a fine-tooth comb, I have agents out interviewing every survivor some under hypnosis. There are others checking the records of every parking garage and taxi company in the metropolitan area. I even have teams reviewing every inch of footage shot by the Metro security cameras for every station within walking distance just on the off chance we might spot something. So I’m going to ask you again. Is there some solid angle you think we’re missing?”

Reluctantly, Thorn shook his head. “No, sir. Not at the moment.”

“Fine. Then please go back to the Pentagon and let us get on with the job. There are already investigators from every damned agency and police force known to mankind crawling through this mess, and I sure as hell do not need the U.S. Army’s Delta Force adding its own two cents.” Flynn raised his voice, addressing his next comments to the poker-faced agents in earshot. “This is real life, not a movie, and this task force is not going to go running off at half cock to hunt for some supervillain. That’s not the way I work, and that’s not the way to produce results. Instead, we’re going to work systematically through the facts as they exist. I want hard evidence, not fancy theories. Is that clear?”

The senior FBI agent waited briefly to make sure the others had heard him before turning his attention back to Thorn. He lowered his voice again. “Wait until we’ve found these bastards, Colonel. Then you or Agent Gray here are perfectly welcome to shoot them.”

Great, Thorn thought, I didn’t fool him at all. He knows exactly who brought me inside.

Flynn looked at Koenig. “Have somebody escort the colonel through the security barrier, Tommy. I’m sure he has work of his own to do.”

Thorn nodded stiffly and did an about-face, following the shorter FBI agent back toward the staircase. He studiously avoided looking at Helen. Seeing the concern for him on her face would only make things worse. The FBI was within its rights, and he was out of line. But knowing that didn’t make it any easier just to walk away.

Thorn was alone in his office, staring at nothing in particular, when Joe Rossini stuck his head in through the door. “You have a minute, Pete?”

“Hell, I’ve got days.” Thorn heard the unfamiliar bitterness in his voice and clamped down on it. Self-pity was for five-year-olds He nodded toward the empty chair in front of his desk. “What can I do for you, Maestro?”

Rossini gingerly lowered his bulk into the seat and leaned forward.

“Heard you had a rough time of it with the FBI today.”

“Word travels fast.”

The analyst nodded. “Better than light-speed.”

Thorn snorted. He shrugged his shoulders. “I tried sticking my nose in where it didn’t belong and got slapped down. End of story. The FBI has the domestic counterterrorism ball, and we’re out of the game.”

“You really think that?” Rossini asked.

“No,” Thorn said flatly, surprising himself. He shook his head. “Flynn and his team are good. Hell, they’re better than good. But I can’t help feeling that we’re all behind the curve on this one. Somebody out there blew the shit out of the National Press Club, and he and his friends are still on the loose. Hunting these bastards down strictly by the book might take too damned long.”

“You think they’ll hit again,” Rossini said, more as a statement than a question.

“Why not? Whoever they are, they just killed two hundred people within walking distance of the White House. Why should they stop now?” Thorn sat up straighter. Flynn had every right to keep him off the official investigation, but the FBI couldn’t stop him from using the resources at his own disposal. But what more could he do? As part of a larger U.S. intelligence effort, his analysts were already pressing ahead to learn more about the suspected links between American neo-Nazis and those in Europe.

Then he remembered something Flynn’s deputy had said. “I think we should start pulling some personnel files from Army and Navy records. I want the name and service record of every Green Beret, Ranger, and SEAL who’s been booted for bad conduct, race prejudice, or mental problems. Say over the past fifteen years.”

Rossini whistled softly. “You really think we’re dealing with one of our own guys who’s gone off the reservation?”

“Maybe. Maybe not.” Thorn shook his head angrily. “I don’t know, Maestro. This could be just a worthless shot in the dark, but I’m damned if I’ll sit idly by while somebody starts burning this country down around our ears.”

Hamid Algar scouted the parking lot carefully and covertly. A chill, light rain was falling, and he zipped up his leather jacket, trying to get the collar tighter around his neck. The dampness seemed to soak into his bones. He hated the rain the way a soldier hates mud or dust or flies. The Syrian had seen nothing but rain since coming to Seattle. The climate was as foreign as the food and the language and the people. He sustained himself with the knowledge that this campaign would not last forever, and that however uncomfortable he was, he would be making a lot of the Americans he despised even more uncomfortable.

The lot was full despite, or perhaps because of, the rain. At this predawn hour the lot was crowded with semis, their drivers taking time for a quick breakfast before pulling back on Interstate 5 and heading north. Located between Tacoma to the south and Seattle to the north, the truck stop provided food and showers, even beds, besides diesel fuel.

The Syrian moved deeper into the parking lot, paying careful attention to each vehicle. Glowing overhead lights highlighted the moisture that coated every surface. He was looking for a specific kind of truck driven by a certain kind of company. Nothing local. He needed someone heading on through the city, which was why he was here at this misbegotten truck stop at this accursed hour in this unholy rain. For the second morning in a row.

Nobody noticed the small, dark man. He wore jeans and running shoes and a dark brown leather jacket. Like everyone else, his head and shoulders were hunched down against the rain as he attended to his business as quickly as possible.

Algar’s hair was cut short, and he was clean-shaven. From his appearance, he could have been Hispanic, Arab, Italian, or even Polynesian. His driver’s license carried the name Lopez and certified that he was American-born.

He moved through the wet, floodlit darkness, reading license plates, looking at the lettering on the cabs. All of the trucks on this side of the stop were, just by being on this side, northbound. The question was, how far were they going?

Finally, the Syrian found the rig he was looking for. It had Canadian plates and it was parked right in the center of a long row of darkly gleaming trucks. Better still, it was hauling a massive tanker load. He took the time to circle the vehicle, alert for anything that might make it less than the perfect choice.

Nothing. The tanker truck was perfect for his purpose. He swung around, scanning the lot for anyone who might be watching him or who might note his presence. Nobody was in view, and he quickly ducked under the trailer, up in front where it joined the tractor.

Pulling a small cloth-wrapped bundle from under his jacket, Algar unwrapped a rectangular, mottled brown-black metal box. Then he swiped at the underside of the trailer with the cloth, making sure no water or grease would interfere with the magnets attached to one side.

As he’d been taught by his Iranian instructors at Masegarh, Algar placed his burden exactly in the center, just ahead of the attachment point with the tractor unit. The magnets took hold with a strong clack, almost jerking the box out of his hands. As a test, he tried to shift it, and found it nearly impossible.

Half hidden in a cluster of cables and wires, the box blended nicely with its surroundings. Just to be sure, he splashed muddy water from a puddle over it, completing the camouflage.

He flipped a switch, arming the device. The box beeped once, indicating it was armed and ready. The switch also enabled an antitamper circuit, so that any attempt to remove it would fail catastrophically.

Satisfied, the Syrian quickly stood up and looked around again as he wiped his muddy hands clean on the cloth. Still nobody in sight.

Algar gratefully went back to his old blue Chevy Nova and ducked in out of the hated rain. He’d parked the car so he could watch the only exit out of the parking lot. Now, he thought, the only hard part was to stay awake while he waited.

About thirty minutes later, the Syrian spotted “his” truck lumbering out of line and turning toward the exit. He started his own engine, pulled out, and fell in behind the tanker. Its size made it easy to follow, and he took up position a few car lengths back. He checked his watch. It was almost 6:00 A.M. Even better. The truck driver was probably a little behind schedule. They were heading into the first wave of the morning rush hour.

Jane Kelly cursed her luck that rainy morning. The darkness and wet streets had slowed traffic, and that, combined with a five-minute delay in getting out the door, had completely screwed up her timing. If she wasn’t pulling into the garage at work by 6:45, backups and traffic jams slowed her down and then she didn’t get in until 7:30. Her boss was going to raise merry hell again.

Right now, at 7:10, the thirty-three-year-old CPA maneuvered her three-year-old Nissan through the clogged traffic, heading north on 1–5. She sighed. At least it was moving this morning. She didn’t notice Hamid Algar’s car behind her, any more than she noted the tanker truck one car ahead. Cars behind her weren’t a problem, and those in front were merely obstructions. The tractor-trailer ahead was a large one, and it blocked her view of the lane forward, but what would she see? Just more wet cars.

Hamid Algar watched the Canadian tanker truck with satisfaction. The driver had driven straight north in the thickening traffic until Seattle’s skyline appeared out of the low clouds and mist.

He had no trouble staying behind the tanker as it followed Interstate 5’s winding curves. He had driven the route many times, and even taken some of the possible alternates each time with the sensing device in place. It had functioned as advertised. In a job like this, one hundred percent reliability was the only acceptable performance.

Algar had already moved over to the right lane when the truck passed the Madison Street exit. There was only one path it could follow now, and with a sense of farewell, he took the exit and drove off into the city center. He’d take Highway 99 south back to Burien. The interstate was much too crowded.

Jane Kelly didn’t see the Syrian leave. And even if she had spotted his battered blue Nova behind her, it would only have been one of a dozen cars turning off at Madison. She was nearing her own exit, Denny Way, less than a quarter mile away.

Traffic was still moving, thank goodness, although her speedometer now hovered at the fifteen-mile-an-hour mark. Up ahead, the highway curved a little to the left as it went under Olive Way.

The Olive Way-Boren Street underpass was especially wide, almost a tunnel. Above the highway, the two arterials intersected less than a block away, and the entire area had been roofed over.

The tanker truck passed beneath the intersection and out of the rain. The street surface was dry and lit by bright lamps on the ceiling of the underpass.

Hamid Algar’s box sensed the change in the surrounding light. Although small, the increase was enough to register on a sensitive photocell. A microchip brain attached to the photocell noted the change and began tracking the time. Unlike the bright beam of a passing headlight, this light lasted a tenth of a second, two-tenths, three, four. Five-tenths was enough. The microchip triggered a tiny electric pulse.

Inside the box, a firing squib detonated a shaped-charge warhead. The squid also ignited a magnesium flare. Designed to punch through inches of armor, the warhead penetrated the tanker truck’s milled steel shell easily, pushing a superheated jet of gas and metal into the liquid propane tank through a jagged, glowing hole.

The explosion died.

In its place, liquid propane began boiling out of the three-inch hole with a sound like a steam calliope jammed on high, changing to a gas as it hit the air. But when the streaming gas hit the box’s hissing magnesium flare, it ignited into a roaring jet of flame. The heat of the jet, hotter than a blowtorch, opened the hole larger and larger in a chain reaction until the entire front of the steel tank disintegrated. Propane gas mixed freely with the air. At that point, only milliseconds after the bomb went off, the rest of the tanker’s cargo disappeared in a devastating explosion.

The near-dawn darkness was overpowered by a searing orange-white fireball. Trapped by the ceiling of the underpass, the leading edge of the fireball spread out horizontally ahead and behind, but a final, titanic blast split the overhead structure and peeled it back. Slabs of concrete and steel weighing hundreds of pounds landed half a mile away, smashing through roofs and flattening cars and pedestrians crowding Seattle’s busy streets.

One car length behind the explosion, Jane Kelly had only a single, anguished second to understand what was happening before the roaring mindless wall of flame engulfed her Nissan.

She and all the others trapped in the four-lane underpass were incinerated. More than a dozen other cars and trucks on either side of the explosion were also scorched and burned. The vehicles on Olive and Boren streets above were either flipped over or fell through into the inferno below.

Half a minute after the echoes of the enormous blast faded away, stunned motorists left their cars on the highway and stood staring in shock and terror at the burning mass of twisted steel and concrete clogging the gap where the overpass had once been. Buildings on either side of the highway were burning, and the agonized screams and shrieks of those who were trapped and on fire tore through the sudden silence.

Burien, Washington Hamid Algar and his two comrades, Anton Chemelovic and Jabra Ibrahim, watched the television in rapt fascination. Coverage of the disaster had started only moments after Hamid had returned to their apartment, and now, like the rest of Seattle and America, they viewed the live television feed. But while the rest of the country watched in horror and fascination, the three Iranian-trained commandos were performing battle damage assessment.

The picture now on television came from the roof of a nearby office building. From above, the destroyed overpass looked like nothing more than a giant, blackened hourglass filled with rubble and twisted metal. Emergency vehicles surrounded the crater.

The reporter now on camera, stunned by the carnage and rattled by the lack of hard information, kept repeating the single, inadequate word: “tragedy.” It had been a tragic accident, there had been a tragic loss of life, and so on. Area hospitals were jammed and some of those with less critical injuries had been farmed out to smaller clinics. At the moment, the death toll stood at twenty-five, but that was expected to climb rapidly as searchers pulled apart the rubble. Sixty-three had been seriously hurt. Seattle’s burn wards were full.

The National Transportation Safety Board had already dispatched an investigative team to the area. They would land at Boeing Field at 2:10 P.M. Algar, Chemelovic, and Ibrahim all relaxed slightly. At least initially, the Americans were treating the tanker blast as an accident. They would find no immediate clues that this was a terrorist attack. When the NTSB’s investigators discovered the truth later, their trail would be days old, and it would be a very faint, very cold trail.

They nodded to each other. Tehran would be pleased.

Chemelovic, a Bosnian, had actually made the bomb. His gift for electronics had earned him special training in demolitions at Masegarh, and now both of his teammates praised his work. Algar told him several times exactly how he had placed the device. By the time the Syrian finished retelling the story, Chemelovic had a grin covering half his face. His skills had won a great victory in the war against the godless West.

Jabra Ibrahim rose from the couch and snapped the television off.

“Come on, both of you. Help me pack.”

Ibrahim, a Lebanese, had provided security and cover for the three-man cell. He’d rented the apartment, done the shopping, and organised all the logistics during their short, one week stay in the Seattle area. He was the conscientious one, the one who’d worked on their laptop computer while the others watched television.

Their personal gear went into one duffel bag, and their tools and weapons into another two. While Algar and Chemelovic cleaned up, Ibrahim meticulously went through each room, each closet, and each cupboard looking for anything that belonged to them or came from them. A scrap of paper, a button, anything that might provide a link to them.

When Chemelovic and Algar returned from loading their gear into the Nova, they helped in the search. A few small items were found, a tool under a piece of furniture and a sock, one of Algar’s, under another. Shamefacedly, he took possession of the offending article and stood next to Chemelovic as Ibrahim, the team leader, berated them both for sloppy security.

Finally, he handed each of them a rag and a bottle of cleaning solution. Systematically, they wiped down every smooth surface, every wall and every object capable of holding a fingerprint. While none of them had ever been fingerprinted by the American government, a print here might link them to some past act or location, or some future one.

Just after noon, they were finished. The three piled into the blue Nova and pulled out of the lot. Ibrahim drove, and he stopped in front of the apartment complex’s rental office. Grabbing an envelope, he jumped out of the car and ran in.

The day manager, a stout, middle-aged woman, glanced up from her crossword puzzle. “Oh, Mr. Rashid. You here to check out?”

Ibrahim nodded. “Yes, Mrs. Hume. We all finished the program this morning.” He’d rented the three-bedroom apartment on a weekly basis with the story that he and the others were reps from a Silicon Valley data processing company who had come to the Seattle area to attend courses at Microsoft University. It was a common and believable cover one which no one felt compelled to check.

“And how did you do?” the manager asked, busy counting the money in the envelope he’d handed to her.

Ibrahim smiled. “We received top marks, Mrs. Hume. Straight As.”

General Amir Taleh finished reading through the latest status reports from his widely scattered forces and nodded in satisfaction. The first two of his planned attacks had been carried out with perfect attention to detail. A third, set for the Houston area, had been scrapped at the last moment to avoid tighter security at the intended target a railroad crossing near a poor, predominantly black and Hispanic neighborhood. He shrugged. His field commanders had acted intelligently there. It was too soon to risk compromising the whole operation to press home an attack against higher odds.

He looked up at Captain Kazemi. “You understand I wish to see the latest videotapes as soon as they arrive?”

His aide nodded crisply. “Of course, sir. I’ve left explicit orders at the communications center.”

Besides the trained agents in embassies and elsewhere who made up his official intelligence network, Taleh found himself relying increasingly on news reports from the United States to monitor the progress of his covert war. Curiously and foolishly left uncensored by their government, the networks were a unique and useful source of information. They mirrored, and often led, American public and political opinion.

And from what Taleh had seen so far, the right notes of hysteria were beginning to be sounded over the American airwaves. He picked up the phone on his desk and punched in the internal code for the head of the operations planning section. “Colonel Kaya? Come to my office immediately. Bring the next set of strike orders with you.”

He hung up and rocked back in his chair, envisioning the havoc his next set of signals would wreak on the United States.

Every attack against America sprang from his mind from his will. When he saw the results, it was a personal satisfaction. It was partly revenge for all the evils the Americans had inflicted on his beloved country over the years, but he knew revenge by itself was pointless. That was where his predecessors had failed. His terror operations only had merit if they were part of a larger campaign.

Taleh smiled fiercely. The initial stages of SCIMITAR had gone well. It was time to increase the tempo.