Phantom zero, p.8
Phantom Zero, page 8
Which was why he had to be calm. Allowing himself to succumb to rage would only make things worse.
“Vehicle plate comes back to a rental agency in Des Moines,” Alan said. “The company usually rents farm equipment to smallholders who don’t have the capital to purchase their own harvesters, tillers, et cetera.”
“Is that relevant?” Zero asked, trying not to sound frustrated.
“Well, they’re relevant because our spies are driving a van registered to them. The agricultural connection is interesting, though. It could be another place for them to store product.”
Zero’s fingers twitched. “People. Not products.”
“Yeah, no shit, asshole. I’m not that much of a prick. People or drugs. They still have a massive opium trade. People can be transported with minimal guards because, sorry to say, people are easy to control when they’re scared and dehumanized. Drugs, on the other hand, are usually shipped with large numbers of heavily armed people who don’t fuck around.”
“You think Meridian might have a private army.”
“I not only think that, I also think that they’re going to send that army after us.”
“So they’re checking the house waiting until we come home,” Zero said.
“That’s my guess.”
Zero took a deep breath, releasing it through his nose. “Okay. We should follow them. They could know where this army is. We can find out and take the fight to them. They might have resources, but those resources won’t be unlimited, especially because they still need to maintain secrecy to continue their illegal activities.”
“That’s a good idea,” Alan said. “Next time I see one of them, I’ll let you know, and we’ll follow them.”
The footage the two of them were looking at was from the night before. Meridian’s van had jamming equipment. They couldn’t prevent Alan’s cameras from picking them up, but they could prevent the sensors from flagging them immediately as a threat. It wasn’t until the video was uploaded to permanent storage that the system flagged it and sent Alan the alert.
Which wasn’t acceptable.
“We can’t wait.” Zero said. “They could have made it all the way here, and we would never have known.”
“The sensor suite here is far more comprehensive and attached to a lot of machine guns,” Alan replied. “It’s not likely that they could make it all the way to the cabin without being seen.”
“But not impossible.”
No,” Alan said softly. “No, not impossible.”
Zero nodded. “We need to go to the house and watch for them. Check that. I need to go to the house and watch for them. You need to stay here and watch the girls.”
“That works for me.”
‘Have you identified the three individuals in the van?”
“Nope. I’m working on that, but I don’t expect to find anything. I didn’t get a clear enough image to differentiate them from any other generic-looking Caucasians.”
“I think one of the men might have been Iranian.”
“Exactly. I can’t even nail down an ethnicity.” Seeing Zero’s returning frown, Alan added, “Don’t worry. We’ll see that vehicle again. As soon as we do, we’re on their trail. Well, you are.”
“Right. I’ll go to Langley and stake out the house. As soon as I see them, I’ll follow them.”
“Call me as soon as you see them. I can log into your truck’s surveillance equipment and sync that with my area surveillance and maybe give you a bird’s eye view to go with your on-the-ground view.”
“Sounds good. Thank you.”
“Least I can do, right?”
Zero didn’t answer that question. “I’ll go talk to the girls.”
He headed upstairs. Sara sat on the easy chair, still staring at her phone. Mischa sat on one end of the couch, not watching the tattoo competition show on tv. Her hands were folded in her lap, and she was staring at her knees, downcast. She looked so small.
“Girls,” Zero said, “I need to talk to you about something important.”
Mischa looked up at him. Sara rolled her eyes dramatically. The immature act of rebellion sent a flash of irritation through Zero. “Sara?” he said calmly, “This is important, and whether you’re mad at me or not, I need you to listen.”
Sara sighed and set the phone on the arm of the chair.
“Thank you,” he replied. “I’m going to conduct reconnaissance on a suspected Meridian cell. I need you two to stay here with Alan.”
“What?” Sara exclaimed. “That’s not fair! We want to help!”
“Not yet. I’m just following a van to see if it can lead us back to Meridian’s forces. We need to know exactly how many they have and what they’re planning to use them for.”
“See, this is the kind of shit I was worried about. I knew you were going to cut us out and take over. It’s not fair. We were the ones who started all of this.”
“Perhaps you should let Papa finish,” Mischa suggested.
Zero nodded. “Thank you. I’m going to conduct reconnaissance. Alan will stay and watch you. You two are to remain inside of the cabin. Not the deck and not the porch. Inside. There’s more than enough food and water, and you have access to every kind of entertainment imaginable.”
“Thank you so much for our lovely prison cell,” Sara said.
Zero ignored the sarcasm. “If you notice anything out of the ordinary, you are to let Alan know right away.”
“How long will you be gone?” Mischa asked.
“I don’t know,” Zero answered honestly. “Possibly overnight. Possibly longer.”
Sara’s brow furrowed. “Wait. Where exactly are you going?”
“I’ll be close by,” Zero said.
“No, screw that. You ripped Mischa and me a new one for not being honest. You don’t get to be dishonest with us. Where will you be?”
Zero frowned, but this time Mischa had her sister’s back. “She’s right, Papa. This street has two ways.”
A wave of love washed over Zero at the way Mischa butchered that saying. She had no idea how adorable she sounded. She had no idea how it felt to love his daughters the way he did. She had no idea how desperately he needed them to stay small and safe and innocent and protected.
Damn it, why don’t you two want to be safe? Why don’t you want to just be where I can make sure that nothing bad ever happens to you?
He looked away for a moment. It was the only way he was going to be able to answer them the way he knew he needed to.
“You’re right. I’m sorry.” He looked back at them. “Alan’s surveillance system detected a van spying on our house in Langley. We’ve done some investigation into Meridian’s presence in the United States, and we believe they’re pooling resources from their human trafficking and drug distribution networks to prepare an armed assault on us. They don’t know where we are yet, so we think they’re trying to wait us out until we return home. I’m going to go there and wait for them to return, then follow them and figure out exactly what they’re planning. Once we have that information, we’ll be able to decide what to do next.”
“That decision will include taking us with you,” Sara said firmly. “I’m not twiddling my thumbs while everyone else fights.”
Zero hesitated. “I… can’t promise that.”
“I’ve beaten Meridian before, Dad. I can handle whatever it is.”
“You’ve beaten elements of Meridian’s human trafficking arm,” Zero replied. “You’ve never faced a coordinated attempt on your life.”
“It’s an attempt on Mischa’s life, not mine. They won’t be expecting me.”
Zero wasn’t sure if Sara was just being petulant or if she actually believed that detail would give her an advantage, but either way, it illustrated that Sara wasn’t ready for this. “I’m sorry,” he replied. “I’m not saying no, but I can’t say yes until I know exactly what we’re getting into. You’ve been out of the game for a while, Sara, and even when you were in the game, you never trained to the level Mischa and Maya did. You can’t keep up in every situation, and I won’t put your life in danger to satisfy your ego.”
Sara stiffened. Mischa shifted uncomfortably. Zero held Sara’s gaze, though it broke his heart.
Sara’s lower lip began to tremble. Tears formed in her eyes, and she quickly wiped them away. She took a deep breath of her own, forced a smile she clearly didn’t feel, and said, “All right. Fair enough. If you decide that I can help, then I want to.”
“Yes,” Zero replied. “If the threat is suitable, I’ll allow you to join us.”
She nodded. “Okay then. Good luck and happy hunting.”
She jumped to her feet and headed for the bedroom. When Zero heard the door close behind her, he sighed and turned to Mischa. “Mischa, I’m so sorry to have to ask this of you, but—”
“I’ll keep an eye on her, Papa,” Mischa replied. “But you must keep your promise. If you determine the threat is suitably minor, then you must allow Sara to be a part of the resolution. She needs this.”
Zero hated lying to his daughters. He would give anything to be able to keep his promise of honesty right now.
But he couldn’t. Not with the lives of his children on the line.
“I will. I promise.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
A bead of sweat formed on Todd’s face as he listened to the report. He was used to being nervous, but that didn’t make it any easier to hear about a domestic terrorist organization thriving in the forest a two-hour drive from New York.
“And this cell is still active?” he asked when Maya finished.
“If you’re asking if we wiped them out, the answer is no. They had children there.”
“Right.” Todd rubbed his brow. “Right. No, yeah, I get that. Did you tell the FBI where it was?”
Maya hesitated a moment. “I thought you did that when you sent us there. Then the FBI said they couldn’t help us because of the kids on the property.”
“Right. I did do that.”
Penny grabbed Todd’s hand and squeezed. Todd gave her a half smile, than said, “Okay, well, you got some information. As expected, it’s cryptic, but we might still be able to use it. This Ninth Circle is almost certainly a reference to Dante’s Inferno.”
“Which circle is the ninth again?” Trent asked.
“Ice. It’s a frozen wasteland where sinners who commit treachery are kept.”
“That fits with the idea of this being revenge for getting his company shut down,” Maya said. “We still don’t know why?”
“No, and to be honest, Specter, it’s not at the top of my priority list right now. I’m pretty sure nothing happened bad enough to justify mass murder.”
Penny squeezed his hand, and he sighed. “Sorry. We’re all a little tense. Okay, so let’s work through this: The Ninth Circle is frozen. The sign of the prophet Jonas is… He was swallowed by a whale, right?”
“He was in the belly of the whale for three days,” Penny said. “Then coughed up on shore to prophecy against Nineveh. The sign is a parallel to Jesus Christ’s death, three-day burial, and resurrection.”
“First he’s Lucifer, and now he’s Jesus,” Todd muttered. “What a tangled web he weaves. We only got a two-day warning too, and then what? What’s the unimaginable consequence?”
“Fire, weeping, and gnashing of teeth,” Trent replied.
Todd chuckled. “Just once, I’d like the answer to be a stern talking to or a strongly worded letter.”
“Well, strongly worded letter people don’t build cult towns in the Catskills.”
Penny lifted the hand not holding Todd’s to her lips and bit her nails gently. “OWLS, maybe.”
“OWLS?”
“The Orbital Weapons Launch Station.”
Maya remembered first. “That’s the Space Force program that replaced STAR WARS, right? Trent and I went to Tanzania to recover a data core that contained information on how to control those satellites.”
Now Todd remembered. “Right. That’s when Zero came out of the woodwork.”
“Now he’s out of commission, and Maya and I are handling this by ourselves,” Trent said. “It’s all come full circle.”
“We don’t know for sure that it’s OWLS,” Todd said.
“What else could it be, honey?” Penny asked.
Todd sighed and ran his hand through his hair. “Okay, well, might as well assume the worst. I’ll call DoD and have them put the satellites on standby so the weapons are inactive. You said you found some of the organizations and government officials working with him?”
“Yes. I didn’t have time to make a list, but I’ll send Penny the information I downloaded. It’s quite a bit.”
“Yeah, we figured. I’m jumping ahead a little, but my best guess is that you two are going to keep hunting Keller while we delegate action against the secondary parties to other organizations. Might be worthwhile to get every nation to shut down any orbital weapons they might have. Ground nuclear forces are already on standby, so we’re good there.”
“What should we do?” Maya asked.
“Right. Sorry. Thinking out loud. I’ll have the jet bring you here while Penny works on a destination. We’ll get a transport with some cold weather gear ready and figure out exactly where this ninth circle is.”
“All right. We’re in the truck now on our way back to the airport. We should be in D.C. in two hours.”
“Sounds good. See you two soon.”
They hung up, and Todd sighed heavily. “Okay. So we’re looking for somewhere cold. Where do you think that might be?”
“Where would you hide if you were Lucifer’s Gift?” Penny asked.
“Somewhere inaccessible,” Todd replied immediately. “I know I’m not going to survive a head-on fight with any sizable military force. I want to be somewhere very hard to reach. He took care of the air threat already, so I’m not worried about airstrikes, but surface-to-surface missile strikes are still a problem. That rules out anywhere flat.”
“Why does it rule out anywhere flat?”
“Say I’m in Greenland or one of the flat plains of Antarctica. They don’t know exactly where I am, but with the latest missile technologies, they can just fire a long-range missile in a general direction and use their onboard radar to scan for any anomalous installations. Any known civilian station in Antarctica is going to have a transponder broadcasting a friend signal, so they’re not going to accidentally hit a research station. Radar picks up something it doesn't like, missile heads there and blows it up. They can just fire a couple of dozen missiles and cover the entire continent, and maybe a half dozen more to cover Greenland, and a dozen more for Siberia and Canada. It's clumsy, but it would work."
Penny frowned. “Are we maybe giving him too much credit? Or possibly too little? He could be dug underground, or he could be somewhere in the wilderness thousands of miles from military reach. And if he is in Antarctica, he’s definitely thousands of miles away.”
“Yeah, it’s possible,” Trent agreed, “but since you’re asking me, I’d say a very prominent mountain installation with a clear view of the sky, probably at middle latitudes. I’d nominate the Himalayas, the Alps, and the Rockies.”
Penny nodded. “Very well. I’ll start looking there. My team has some more data from the phone calls Keller made. They haven’t triangulated the source yet, but they’ve identified the specific cell signal he used. I might be able to narrow down our choices that way.”
“Good deal,” Todd said. “I’ll call the President and update her, then call the Pentagon and make sure we’re shutting down OWLS and DEDALUS.”
“All right. Todd?”
“Yeah?”
“We can stop him, right?”
Part of being a good EOT leader and sometimes a good husband to Penny was being able to state confidently things he felt uncertainly. “Honey, there is no doubt in my mind that your genius, my persistence, and Trent’s and Maya’s capability will far outstrip anything this asshole can throw our way.”
Penny smiled. “I can tell your nervous. You’re only grandiose when you’re nervous. But I love you, and that was nice to hear whether you believed it or not.”
“I believe we have to stop them,” Todd replied. “So we will. Whenever we have to do something, we find a way.”
“Now that was honest.”
Todd bent down and kissed her forehead softly, then headed to his desk to make the calls.
***
Maya stepped closer to Penny’s screen. It displayed an image of the Swiss Alps. A red dot in the middle of the range indicated the location of Keller’s compound. The Ninth Circle.
“How did you find this?” she asked.
“The phone call the FAA received was sent thorough a distributed 5G network spanning the globe in an attempt to prevent tracing. That’s why it took us so long to find an origin. My analysts were able to measure the signal strength and degradation at the various towers and trace it back to nine separate cell towers in Switzerland, Austria, and France. Triangulating those signals gives a location that roughly blankets the mountain range. I scanned the area with our reconnaissance satellites and found a structure not listed on any of the Swiss government’s registries. I took a closer look, and there it is.”
“They weren’t blocking reconnaissance satellites?”
“Oh, they were. That’s how I knew I was looking in the right place. I just oscillated the signal until we were able to pick up an image from the few moments we were able to get through. They’re still jamming us, so I can’t get a real-time image, but I have a composite of the place so we have an idea of what we’re looking at.”
She tapped a key, and the screen showed a glacier between two mountain peaks. On one end of the glacier was a thick concrete slab—a helipad—and a few hundred feet past that was a concrete bunker pressed against one of the two peaks. On top of the bunker was a massive radio dish nearly as wide as the roof. It was pointed almost straight up. That was the source of the signal that had shut down air travel all across the world. That was where Maya and Trent would find Dr. Adrian Keller, the Lightbringer, and bring him to justice.
