Chapter 56 -- HUWSSFIIHGQMIRSEPNBY
General Anthony signed resignedly as his secretary appeared in the door of
his office.
"Thanks, Margaret," he said. "I'll just be a minute."
She had developed the habit of walking to the door about five minutes before
it was time to leave for a meeting. He
had brought her with him when he accepted the post, from his former army
command. She had worked for him for three years before, and now worried about
him. The past days, since what was now being called 'Black Friday', had aged
him. He was conscious of the fact that the long list historical events
referred to as 'Black Friday' included the stock market crash and a
presidential assassination, and wondered what this one had in store. He got
up, put on his coat and picked up his briefcase.
His driver delivered him to the White House, where he was swiftly ushered to
the Situation Room. As usual the heads of Homeland Security and Justice were
there, along with the Secretary of Defense, the Director of National
Intelligence, the FBI director, and the heads of the NSA and CIA. Only a
handful of others who were not Cabinet officers or agency heads were present.
They were always the same - the content of these meetings was closely guarded.
He was the last to arrive, and after the perfunctory greetings were over he
opened his briefcase and pushed to one side. The Justice Department was in
charge of the operation, but Anthony always found himself the object of most
of the questions. Especially as nothing of use had yet been uncovered.
The Attorney General went around the room for a report from each head.
Anthony noted that there was nothing of substance, in fact no developments at
all. A few exchanges between the various attendees yielded nothing else of use,
so once again the all eyes turned to him as the AG addressed him.
"General, is there anything you can add?"
He had expected it, and with nothing new from the others he used one of the
responses he had prepared.
"As I understand it," he said, looking down at some papers he had placed in
front of him purely for effect, "the only thing of substance we have at this
point is the one participant who was arrested. Is that correct?"
"That's it," the AG admitted.
"Has the FBI been able to learn anything from the bullets and cartridge cases
at the scene? From the looks of it there quite a few."
The FBI director looked down at some papers, looking as he didn't want to be
there any more than Anthony did.
"What we have, General, is four hundred forty six identical cases, .40 caliber,
all from the same manufacturer. Ballistics test results on the bullets are
still being compiled, but without a weapon to check against they're not of
much use. The recovered bullets so far are the same - full metal jacket with
a flat nose, a common type. We know from witnesses and some videos some were
being fired from rifles, or carbines, in some cases, and
from handguns in others. We haven't been able to identify the manufacturer
and model or the carbines from the little video we have, and nothing on the
handguns. So aside from the ammunition, we not be able to identify them at all."
"And approximately, how many, black-clad gunmen suddenly appeared from nowhere
on a Friday afternoon and shot forty-eight people with identical guns and
ammunition?" Anthony asked. "Like an army was assembled, equipped and trained
for this. What else does that suggest?" he said to no one in particular,
almost as if to himself.
"That's exactly what it looks like," Clarence Gresham, the FBI director, said.
"The black-clad gunmen disappeared in seconds after dispatching their targets,"
Anthony said. "There were getaway drivers, probably almost as many as shooters.
In several cases vehicles were left behind. Nothing on them?"
"Nothing so far," Gresham replied. "They were registered to several businesses
which turned out to be dead ends - they had only been in business for a couple
of years and none of the contact information led anywhere, just rented
addresses which were also dead ends. Probably set up for this purpose."
"So this could have been in the works for two, or more, years," Anthony said.
"Nothing but dead ends, tracks thoroughly covered. What are we hearing from
the usual suspects? Clarence, you've interrogated a few by now, haven't you.
And we have chatter to go through. Robert, anything at NSA?"
Robert Meyers was the NSA chief. Neither NSA or FBI had anything.
"Of course we're analyzing the traffic," he said, "trying to pick up something
useful."
"But surely the guys you watch all the time, the militia, these white, what do
you call them..?"
"White supremacists," said Gresham. Anthony hated the term, knowing it was
used to scapegoat the massive population of dissident citizens by associating
them with a handful of mostly mentally ill malcontents. He spoke as he did as
much to needle the director as anything else. "Of course. We have an eye on
them at all times. The odd thing is, they seem as mystified as anyone else.
There's the usual crackpot claiming credit or blaming someone, but so far
those have just that, crazy people making noise to hear themselves talk. But
we are following every lead, no matter how remote."
"So at this point we have," said Anthony, "exactly nothing."
He paused, without seeming to move his head scanning the faces. To forestall
another useless exchange he asked "Have you been able to get anything from the
one that was caught?"
"No," replied Gresham. "He's not been cleared by the doctors yet, and when he is I'm
fairly sure his lawyer will do everything he can to prevent him from talking. I'd expect
him to clam up, but you never know."
"I would suggest," Anthony said, "that you find a way to separate him from his
lawyer long enough to apply some of the appropriate drugs. It's a long shot
but it's the only one you've got. Although you might start by getting a bug
in his cell to see if he says anything while he's asleep. For that matter,
you can listen in while he's with his lawyer, if you can bug wherever they
meet to talk."
"We'll do that, of course," Gresham said. "But General, what are the
prospects of this being a foreign actor. The amount of resources that must
have gone into this would be considerable."
"The intelligence people are, I hope, on top of that," Anthony replied. He
wasn't about to get in on that. The secretary could handle it if defense was
involved. He couldn't see it happening though - of the two main suspects
Russia was too busy with other problems and China was nearly to the point of
having bought the country.
The AG looked over at the CIA chief.
"Nothing except some chatter after it happened. From the intercepts related
to it, they seem to be as surprised as we are. The Russians are monitoring
the situation. The seem more than anything else to be worried about
instability. The Chinese more so, they uh, they seem to be worried about a
threat to their business interests here."
Of course they to, Anthony thought. They're buying the country and don't want
anything upsetting the schedule.
"All right then," said AG Simmons. "Unless there are further developments today,
we'll.." He paused, looked down at his phone. "Just a moment, please." He
went over to the door that was always locked with guards posted outside during
their meetings. He stood in the open door for a few minutes conversing with
someone who was standing outside, then came back to the table.
"I've just been handed a communication from the president," he said. "Give me
just a minute." He sat down and read the paper, then sat looking at it for
much longer that it could have taken to read it. At last he looked up.
"We're going to be here a while longer," he said.