Why not add a one-on-one showdown with Swanson to the agenda, even if it meant leaving a trail of breadcrumbs to help his enemy along? It would be interesting.
His mind was made up by the time his plane began to be buffeted around the sky by the turbulence of the Rocky Mountain air prior to landing at Denver International Airport.
SYBELLE SUMMERS AND THE Lizard arrived at the Pentagon only to find that General Middleton was out at Quantico for an emergency conference of Marine leaders. The president had increased the national alert status to orange.
Freedman went to his desk and logged on to his mainframe computer while Summers put on a pot of coffee and checked the unopened mail. They would have a concise report for Middleton by the time he returned.
“Here’s some good news,” called Freedman. “The medical status of Double-Oh has been upgraded to ‘Good,’ and he’ll be flown back here in a few days.” He went back to the screen. “And here’s an e-mail from Sir Geoffrey saying that Delara Tibrizi is doing okay but is wondering about Kyle.”
“So are we,” Sybelle said and went to her own desk and flipped through copies of the
“Whoa! Sybelle, would you please come over here?” A pulsing chime was repeating from Freedman’s computer, and a small red rectangle flashed in the upper right-hand corner. Something had pinged the automatic warning system he had designed to track any queries about members of Trident.
He clicked some keys and the NCIC/Interpol symbol appeared, along with the expanded data. “Somebody is checking Kyle’s fingerprints in the FBI’s National Crime Information Center system! The request lists him as a John Doe and an ‘unknown suspect.’”
“Unknown suspect? That would indicate he’s alive and being held prisoner. Does it say who has him, or where?”
The Lizard was frantically scrolling through data, calling up new screens of information. “No. It doesn’t even carry a high priority. Bingo. Look at this link to some photos that are being run through the government’s face recognition software. Kyle, for sure.”
“I’m calling Middleton,” Sybelle said, reaching for the encrypted telephone. He was in a car being driven back to the Pentagon and answered on the first ring. “Gunny Swanson is alive, sir, and someone is checking his fingerprints.”
Middleton paused before answering. “That fucking Swanson. Where is he and who is checking up on him?” The general could hear the Lizard clack the keyboard, and Sybelle switched them all onto a conference call.
“It looks like the original ping came from the FBI but has since branched out to cover databases around the world, under the flag of the Department of Homeland Security. The ping registered about noon, so we are several hours behind on this.” Freedman tapped a pencil on his desk.
“Stay on it, Liz,” said Middleton. “Get into the system and sidetrack whatever you can. Do what you can to slow them down. I will be in the office as soon as I pay a visit to the Hoover Building and talk to the Feebs.”
“Yes, sir. Got it.”
Middleton replaced the car’s secure telephone in its cradle and stared at the surrounding traffic. Rush hour never ended around Washington, and thousands of cars and trucks were creeping along bumper to bumper. “Sar’nt Johnson!” he barked at his driver.
“Sir!”
“Turn on your fancy spinning lights and that siren and get us out of this mess and over to the FBI place pronto.” The general buckled his seat belt and was thrown back against his seat as Johnson launched the big sedan across a thick band of traffic and into the lane especially reserved for emergency vehicles. He roared around the cars ahead, tapping bumpers when necessary. Middleton held on, hoped for a safe landing, and repeated to himself, “That fucking Swanson.”
CAROLYN WALKER CHECKED THE big wall clock in the office that was adjacent to the interrogation room: 5:10 P.M. The clock was a discount store special, and a federal agent precisely adjusted it twice a day to the correct atomic time. Why not just buy a better clock? She blinked and turned her attention back to the man strapped into the chair on the other side of the one-way mirror. “We’ve got bupkis. Nada. Diddly-squat. Three damned hours and he hasn’t said a word.”
“That’s not exactly true, Carolyn. He has told us to go fuck ourselves at least a dozen times, in several different languages,” corrected Dave Hunt.
“He doesn’t look like someone who was scared out of his wits after hours alone in that room, buck naked and motionless.”
As if he knew they were watching, Kyle Swanson yawned. Since his head was also strapped to the chair, it was mostly just opening his mouth and flexing his jaw muscles.
“We’ve got to report in soon. I can’t believe that we’ve caught an assassin red-handed and he’s mocking us.”
The urgency they felt to identify him was not shared by everyone in law enforcement, for they were being very cautious about making a splash until they could do so without infuriating the international community. The French had not even known they were in the country when they made the arrest on a public street. Now safely back home, they had run into a stone wall. Since the national alert level had been raised, traffic had picked up on the computers, and they felt their efforts were falling on deaf ears. They had made a routine blood draw from the suspect to furnish DNA samples but were curtly informed that the backlog was so great that their samples might not get tested for a week. Other requests were being similarly delayed, and their entire system was slowing down, the memory being packed with reams of useless data.
Walker pushed rimless glasses up on her head and fluffed her brown hair in frustration. In her early forties, she was a thorough intelligence professional who had come over to the DHS from the CIA in the big reorganization after 9/11. With a doctorate in psychology and years of interrogation practice, she believed she could get to any suspect. She sighed. “We still don’t even know his name.”
“Nope. Still Mr. X.”
“We have to do more, Dave. If we can’t scare him with words, then we must employ some physical stress. I recommend that we use Level Two techniques.”
“I agree. Should we file it up the chain of command?”
“Not yet. Not yet. I can order a Level Two decision on my own authority. Let’s crack this guy.”
“Dangerous game, Carolyn,” Hunt warned. “I can almost hear a special blue-ribbon commission questioning us now. At least let’s file a short summary saying our John Doe may be on the terrorist watch list, just to get a time stamp on it and protect our asses.”
“Life was easier when we didn’t have so much power,” she said, recalling the time when the agency did not worry about such particulars. “Okay. They get a synopsis, but I’ll keep the particulars vague to buy us more time.”
Agents Evan Brown and Kealoha Kepo’o were large men who had been specially trained in advanced interrogation techniques, ways to intimidate people and make someone hurt like hell without leaving a bruise. Both had played football in college, Brown at Florida State and Kepo’o for Hawaii, and their imposing size was part of the drill, for when they sauntered into an interrogation room, they carried a sense of menace. The subject immediately knew that polite questioning was over.
Everything was choreographed. They were federal agents, not thugs, and their job was to persuade the prisoner to answer questions. Walker and Dave Hunt had briefed them well and let them read the transcript of what had been asked so far. They studied the man through the mirror and decided their next move.
The unidentified subject finally seemed disoriented by the cold, heat, sleep deprivation, bright lights, and hours of questioning. Mixed music, yelling-loud rap lyrics followed by classical melodies so soft that they could barely be heard, had also taken a toll. Walker now shifted the music to a soothing concerto for flute and violin, let the room go dark, and set the temperature just a shade above normal. Comfort. Within five minutes, the man’s head sagged to his chest. At that moment, she switched off the cameras and the music and turned on the bright lights, and the two big agents stepped into the interrogation area.
