As Walker responded, a few feet from him his boss, Hank Colby, agent in charge of security, got a call from Tony Takayasu in Indian Head, Maryland.
Other officials, including Colby’s supervisor, were patched in to the call.
“Agent Colby, this is an urgent update to the sub stances found at Malmstrom and Washington State,” Takayasu said. “We’ve identified a potential threat. The substances are components of a complex radio explo sive.”
“Have you confirmed it here? We’ve swept and scanned everything.”
“No. It’s a newly engineered fabric. Undetectable. We can’t take risks.”
“Fabric?” Fabric was everywhere-curtains, flags, school banners. Clothing, upholstery. “Give us details.”
“We’ve got nothing yet,” an NSA official explained, “but we’ve locked on the item’s frequency range. Our satellites will alert us to any radio activity.”
“Won’t it be too late by then?” Colby’s boss said.
“Should we detect a signal, you’ll have time to respond,” the NSA official said. “And, as a counter measure we’ll use the satellites to release a radio pulse to thwart any trigger signal. But the pulse is a last resort because of the downside.”
“The downside?”
“It’ll knock out all power and wireless transmission for a minute, or two,” the NSA official said. “Meantime, sir, your team should work on removing your protectee as soon as possible.”
“Will the Vatican pull the pope out?” Colby’s boss asked.
“Not without confirmation,” Colby said.
“You have my authority to physically remove the pope at your discretion, Hank,” Colby’s boss said.
Colby’s ulcer burned.
He looked for Walker and found him behind a curtain consulting a floor plan, talking on his radio to agents.
83
Cold Butte, Montana
The choir’s first song ended; the pope clasped his hands together in approval.
The audience applauded and Samara raised her camera to her face. Her finger moved over the button.
In one minute she would rewrite history.
In one minute the world would know her pain.
In one minute she would be with her husband and child.
She would activate, wait one minute, rush to the pope with her camera, then detonate. Her finger touched the raised button, caressed its smooth surface during the loud applause as she framed her target one last time before-
Someone bumped her.
A hand clamped over her camera, seizing it from her as someone gripped her arms, lifting her from her chair.
Two big men in suits.
“Medical emergency, Samara. Come with us,” one said into her ear over the applause.
People watched as they took Samara away. News cameras recorded her escort from the gym. Most shrugged as attention turned back to the pope. The children commenced their second song.
From a steel chair in the command post, her wrists and ankles restrained in plastic handcuffs, Maggie Conlin watched events unfold.
The command post was housed in a customized RV equipped with banks of radios, computers, cameras and TV screens to monitor the papal event. Maggie had seen Samara’s arrest.
“Oh, thank God, they’ve got her!”
Agents in the truck were annoyed that Walker had placed Maggie with them rather than in a patrol car. Some suggested it was to keep her from the press.
“Please, you have to let me talk to Agent Walker!” “Ma’am-” a frustrated agent turned to her “-you need to be quiet, or we’ll remove you to a police vehicle.”
In an empty school hall, the agents placed Samara’s wrists in plastic handcuffs, leaving her hands in front of her. Walker then joined them to rush her out of the school to a cordoned area shielded with steel Dump sters. Explosives experts in protective gear immedi ately examined her.
News teams were kept back. Cameras were trained from a distance on the puzzling events rapidly taking place.
Colby called Walker at the scene, advising him that the weapon may be encased in fabric. Walker advised the bomb unit, but their search of Samara was in vain. Nothing was detected.
Members of the bomb squad then began walking
Samara toward a restricted area, beyond a far corner of the school parking lot, where the FBI and ATF bomb units were situated, along with the Montana Highway Patrol.
A specially built bomb hut, half buried and draped with blast mats, sat in an isolated corner. They would keep her in custody there.
But it was a long way off.
Walker didn’t go. He hurried back into the school and called Graham to alert him to search the house for a new fabric purchase.
“A flag, material, anything?”
Returning to the stage, Walker feared that Samara wasn’t working alone.
Half a world away, in Addis Ababa’s Mercato, in the secret bunker hidden under his fabric shop, Amir and his senior commanders also watched events.
Huddled before a bank of laptops and TV screens displaying an array of images, they studied live news coverage of the pope’s visit, a replaying of the grisly flag test, and a geo-display map showing the school.
Other images included Samara’s martyr video, which would be sent to news organizations after her mission was completed.
“Something’s amiss,” one of the commanders said. “She should have activated at this stage. And we can’t contact the security cell.”
“She’s been arrested, look.” One of the men touched the TV monitor showing Samara being taken from the gym.
“We must abort,” the first commander said. “This jeopardizes everything, the network. It could lead them to us. Do you agree?”
Amir blinked thoughtfully, then tapped his computer keyboard. He’d reviewed Samara’s reports and her notes on the agenda for the choir.
They would sing three songs.
Then the pope would thank the children. Personally.
“Patience. We’ll override and detonate from here.”
At the house, Graham watched Samara’s arrest on television with a sinking feeling.
Where’s Logan?
Graham searched the audience, then scanned the choir as it began the final song.
He called Walker.
“Walker, it’s Graham, I’ve got more information.”
“We’ve removed Samara.” Walker had returned to the stage. “We’ve removed the threat.”
“She should’ve had a boy with her, a nine-year-old boy named Logan Conlin, or Logan Russell.”
“Logan.”
“You should remove him, too.”
At that moment, in Addis Ababa, Amir nodded and a code was entered into a laptop.
The weapon’s one-minute activation count began.
