the Utah facility as it daily analyzed petabytes
Drone Command had continued to beg, borrow, steal, and lease several more drone systems as well, including the recently decommissioned Blue Devil 2 hybrid airship, which the air force had spent over $200 million to develop but had decided to mothball. The nearly four-hundred-foot-long airship was capable of carrying thousands of pounds of surveillance payloads and keeping them aloft for twelve hours at a time. Ashley had deployed the Blue Devil 2 with a Gorgon Stare wide-area surveillance package over Los Angeles just two days before the Hollywood attack and was eager to find out what evil the Mind’s Eye “visual intelligence” software had uncovered. Until they could discern an attack pattern, DHS had ordered a general mobilization of all LEO resources. State, county, and city law enforcement agencies were on high alert; police reserve units were called up; television and radio stations ran public service ads extolling citizens, “If you see something, say something. Don’t be afraid to call in anything suspicious.”
The unfortunate side effect of the extra security precautions was that the anxiety level of the average citizen shot through the roof; emergency rooms were filling up with as many heart attacks as panic attacks. Valium prescriptions were at an all-time high. Paranoia was increasing, too, and the number of concealed-carry permit applications had overwhelmed the ATF online application system. DHS urged the public to remain both calm and vigilant, but the number of cities declaring martial law rose daily. Racial and ethnic tensions were rising as well. Just like after 9/11, American flags were popping up everywhere, especially on cars. But now, so were Mexican flags, with the same intensity. Ironically, American Hispanics—many of whom had served in the U.S. military or had relatives on active duty—were flying the American flags. Mexican flags were most commonly flown on American university campuses like UC Berkeley by liberal Anglos and foreign-born nationals.
What stung Myers most was the right-wing militia and “prepper” groups harping about impending martial law. She actually shared that concern and had raised it with her attorney general. The 2007 National Defense Authorization Act (signed into law by President Bush) and the 2011 NDAA (signed into law by President Obama) gave Myers ample legal warrant to deploy U.S. armed forces in counterterror work on U.S. soil, in effect, turning them into cops on the beat.
It was getting harder and harder to tell the cops from the troops. More and more police brandished assault rifles and flash bangs, wore tactical vests and helmets, and rolled through town in armored vehicles. Civil libertarians wondered if they were local law enforcement or an occupying army.
For over a hundred years, the Posse Comitatus Act and the Insurrection Act had strictly forbidden the use of federal military forces to perform police functions on American soil out of fear that future presidents would be tempted to use them to achieve their political objectives, suppress political opposition, or overthrow the government entirely. Two hundred years of Latin American history had proven those fears fully warranted.
But the twenty-first century posed global threats and challenges to the nation far beyond the scope and resources of the local city cop on the beat who polished his apple and swung a nightstick as a deterrent to local mischief. It was a slippery slope, to be sure, but a necessary one. Police were taking on more and more military- style operations.
The only alternative to the heightened security measures, as extreme as they appeared to be at the moment, was to do nothing and simply hope the violent chaos spree would just go away. Myers knew it wouldn’t, so the extra precautions and higher alerts were initiated. She’d do whatever it would take to guarantee public safety, even if the public didn’t like it.
Malibu, California
Pearce and Johnny Paloma sped along the Pacific Coast Highway in Johnny’s restored ’73 Stingray.
“So this writer guy is in on this mess?” Johnny asked.
Pearce pressed the release button on his Glock, checked to see that the .45 magazine was fully loaded.
“According to Ian, Babak Ghorbani is Ali’s uncle on his mother’s side. That puts him in it up to his neck until I find out otherwise.” Pearce slammed the magazine back into place and racked the slide.
Ten minutes later, Pearce and Johnny Paloma approached the high-walled beach house under cover of early morning darkness. The distant surf down below hissed softly in the sand as low tide ebbed away.
A former L.A. cop, Johnny easily disabled the civilian security system, then proceeded to the rear entrance while Pearce picked the front door lock. After Johnny had cleared the back slider lock, Pearce gave the signal and they both made their way in.
The house was silent. Pearce and Johnny met up in the living room. Minimalist modern furnishings. Hand- scraped hardwoods. Hell of a view of the Pacific through a big picture window.
They made their way to the master bedroom.
Two people slept beneath a white silk comforter. Pearce yanked it off, grabbed the middle-aged man by his silk pajama top, pulled him onto the floor, and shoved his Glock in the startled face.
“Please! Please! Don’t kill me!” Ghorbani screamed in Farsi.
Johnny snapped the bedroom lights on.
Pearce saw out of the corner of his eye that Johnny had a gun in the face of Ghorbani’s bed partner, also on the floor.
“Where’s Ali Abdi?” Pearce roared in Farsi.
“Who?” Ghorbani asked in English, blinking heavily. “My glasses, I can’t see.”
Pearce saw a pair of rimless glasses on the nightstand.
“Try something stupid, please. I’m begging you,” Pearce snapped.
The middle-aged man’s quavering hand reached up to the nightstand and found the glasses. He pulled them on. He frowned at Pearce in confusion.
“Is this a robbery? Please, take anything.”
Pearce jammed the cold muzzle of the gun barrel against the man’s deeply lined forehead. Ghorbani’s partner whimpered from the other side of the bed.
“I’ll ask one more time. Where’s Ali Abdi? Your nephew?”
“I don’t know.”
Pearce kicked the man’s feet apart, then stepped on one of his bare ankles, bearing down with his full weight until the small bones cracked beneath his steel-toed boot.
Ghorbani shrieked with the new jolt of pain, completely forgetting his bleeding head wound, and clutched at his broken ankle. Pearce unsheathed his razor-sharp KA-BAR knife and stuck the tip of the blade into the left nostril of the bearded man’s face.
“Last chance. If you don’t want to whistle like a tea kettle every time you sneeze from now on, you’d better start talking.”
Ghorbani’s mouth opened and closed a few times, trying to form words through his panic and pain. The syllables finally caught in his throat, like a cold engine finally turning over on a winter morning.
“I… I haven’t seen him since I was last in Iran, twenty years ago. He hates me. So does his mother, my sister.”
“And why should I believe that?”
“Because it’s the truth!”
“Hey, chief, come take a look.” Johnny motioned with his pistol at the figure on the floor. Pearce frowned. Crossed over.
The simpering voice cowering by the side of the bed turned out to be a twenty-year-old Iranian boy, pretty and fey in a pink UCLA tank top.
“This your girlfriend, Babak?” Pearce asked.
