hurt him. “Do what he says. Now!”
The foreman seemed to lose all his strength then, just as Brett said he would. Obediently he held out his keys to show them, then turned toward the gate in the chain-link fence of Avilla Electroplating. Heinny felt a shudder of pleasure go through him. He liked hitting people, and besides, everything was going as planned, and that also made him happy.
Then a moment later it all went to hell in the weirdest way. Out of nowhere, Jack grabbed the muzzle of Heinny’s semi-automatic with one hand and pushed the line of fire away from the foreman. With the other hand he smashed the barrel of his own gun against Heinny’s temple. The single light over the building spun around several times and Heinny felt the ground jump up and knock the wind out of him. Somewhere far away Jack was yelling, “Federal agents! Drop your weapons!” At the same time, the floodlights that weren’t supposed to work suddenly exploded in blinding light, and dozens of other voices were shouting things like “Down! Down!” and “Don’t move!” and “Federal agents!” and “You’re under arrest!” Heinny was pretty sure he even heard a helicopter whooping down from above.
His head was still swimming. He tried to get to his knees but someone kicked him in the stomach. Then the same person leaned in close to him, blocking out the blinding floodlights. It was Jack, but Jack was now holding a badge in his hand. “Jack Bauer, Counter Terrorist Unit. You are under arrest for assault, conspiracy to commit murder, and conspiracy to commit a terrorist act against the United States.”
Jack Bauer knelt down even farther until his voice was a hiss in Heinrich’s ear. “I spent six months listening to your Greater Nation bullshit. Now you’re going to tell it to the prosecutors. And you’re going to help me get Brett Marks.”
At the same time, three thousand miles away in Washington D.C., three of the most powerful men in the world climbed into a limousine in front of the White House. Only one of them had been elected — President Harold Barnes, elected by the slimmest margin of the popular vote, which had not stopped him from turning a narrow victory into a powerful mandate. Across from him in the limo sat two men who also wielded immense power despite the fact that no citizen in any state in the Union had ever cast a single vote for either of them. One of them was Mitch Rasher, short, round, and brilliant, the President’s political advisor since his days as a Florida governor. The other was James Quincy, the Attorney General of the United States.
Rasher glared at the AG with undisguised annoyance. His words, however, were directed at the President. “I don’t like this,” he said. “It’s not the right call.”
Quincy returned the glare. He was more intimidated than he let on — Rasher had the President’s ear and could, essentially, make anything he wished into the law of the land — but like a man facing a pack of dogs, he understood that showing fear was a far greater sin than feeling it. “It makes perfect sense for me to come along,” he replied directly to Rasher. “You’re going to San Francisco for the Pacific Rim conference, and then you’re heading to San Diego for the NAFTA discussion. Both of those items involve Justice.”
“That’s not why you’re going,” Rasher retorted. He had a way of leaning into his words that gave his rotund figure all the menace of an avalanche. “You’re trying to get a boost for the New American Privacy Act. The whole idea of going to San Francisco was to put distance between us and NAP before the vote.”
“You guys supported this bill,” Quincy protested. “You guys helped me get some of the senior members in Congress to propose it.”
“Well. ” Rasher said, “that was then, Jim. Now, even if it passed the Senate, I’m not sure we’d. ” he trailed off.
The AG turned toward Harold Barnes. “You told me you were behind it, Mr. President. Don’t tell me you’re saying you’d veto it?”
Barnes stared at the window as though considering the AG’s words. In truth, he wasn’t doing much of anything. He had found this to be the surest type of politics — to surround himself with strong opinions and listen to those opinions wage war with each other. Leadership, he had decided long ago, meant presiding over those who had deep convictions.
Rasher ran interference. “There are degrees. There’s fall-on-your-sword support and there’s letthe-other- guy-fall-on-his-sword support. Guess which kind you get.”
“No one is getting cut by this,” Quincy argued, his eyes locked on Barnes’s distant expression. “This bill helps us stop terrorists. Period.”
Rasher raised his hands. “Preaching to the choir, Jim. But CNN tells me fifty-two percent of the people think NAP goes too far. We can score more points by scuttling it and looking good in the popular polls.”
Quincy sneered. “We don’t do what’s popular. We do what’s right.”
Rasher laughed derisively. “Is that what we do?”
1. THE FOLLOWING TAKES PLACE BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 3 A.M. AND 4 A.M. PACIFIC STANDARD TIME
It was three o’clock in the morning and Jack Bauer was on his belly in a barranca in the high desert above Los Angeles. He couldn’t see his team or even hear them, but he knew they were moving into position. He could taste the dust in the air, kicked up by their boots as they surrounded the compound. Bauer lifted his head above the lip of the barranca and studied the collection of one- and two-story houses surrounded by a ten-foot wall. There were lights strung across the top of that wall every fifteen feet. At the moment each bulb gave off only a faint orange glow, like the ember of a dying fire. But they were motion sensors — the minute anyone moved within ten yards of them the lights would flare up and silent alarms would go off inside the compound, turning all his careful planning into chaos.
Jack stifled a yawn. He hadn’t slept much in the past two days. After the sting operation in King City, he’d led the interrogation of Heinrich Gelb, the neo-Nazi turned Greater Nation foot soldier. They’d put the screws to Peterson and Edgars, too, of course, but Jack had known from the start Heinrich would crack first. His youth was against him, but there was more to it than that — Heinrich was a weakling. That’s why the little Greater Nation hit squad had chosen him to be the heavy when they attacked the foreman— cowards always make the best torturers. So while Edgars and Peterson were stuck in their little rooms giving the cold shoulder to the other interrogators at the Counter Terrorist Unit, Heinrich sat in his metal chair under a bright light, pouring his guts out to Jack, the video recorder, and the Federal prosecutor. Heinrich was still talking when Federal prosecutor Martin Padilla gave Jack the nod he’d been waiting for.
On any other case, CTU satellites would have put Jack’s quarry in an electronic vise. Not only would Jack have known where his target was, he could have known what he had for lunch and how many bites he took before he swallowed. But Jack’s case was so low on the priority list that he’d had to rely on human intelligence and a payphone to confirm his target’s whereabouts. His request for a CTU special entry team was rejected, and his call for FBI or Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms units fell on deaf ears. All personnel had been assigned to higher-priority missions. Jack had been forced to commandeer the local special response team. Local training was hit or miss. He just hoped that if rounds started going off, they hit what they aimed at and missed him.
His ear bud chirped twice: his Baker team was in position. Once the signal came in from Charlie, he’d broadcast the go tone, and the fun would begin.
The local special tactics team was out of Lancaster, California, which borrowed its law enforcement from the L.A. County Sheriff Department. The L.A. Sheriffs had provided him with their Special Entry Bureau, their version of SWAT. That was a good unit, but they’d gotten most of their experience serving high-risk warrants and laying siege to cornered bank robbers. He’d done his best to prepare them for the possibility of real resistance.
“These Greater Nation guys are militia,” he had said during a midnight briefing. “Real militia, at least as far as they’re concerned. They’re probably well-trained and they’re definitely well armed. They’re anti-government types.”
One of the SEB guys, with “Bastion” taped across his vest, laughed. “They’re all anti-government when we kick down the door.”
Jack didn’t smile. “Most guys are only fighting to stay out of prison. These guys just might fight for a cause. I just spent six months with them. There are a lot of true believers on the other side of that wall. They’ve got just
