America's Sunset: A Post Apocalyptic Fight for Survival (12 page)

Chapter 23 ~ Attack Preparation

At 3:11am, Ahmed stopped the van a short distance from the airport service entrance gate. Far enough to not be seen by security, but close enough that they could make a hasty retreat. The airport was shut down for the night, with only one security guard on duty. They cut the locks on the gate, and quietly sneaked inside. Carefully they closed the gate behind them, and fastened their own lock in place. They’d been surveilling the nighttime guard long enough. Every night at 3:30am—give or take five minutes—he opened his lunch bucket, and pulled out his thermos of coffee. Then, he’d walk from the main terminal with thermos in hand over to the small airplane hangar, where the small planes and private jets were kept. The planes stored in the hangar were one and two-seaters owned by a couple of local ex-pilots. After the guard did his hangar rounds, he’d head back to the main terminal and have a snack.

Ahmed and Harish waited in the parking lot until the guard was about halfway between the terminal and the hangar. He never locked the back door of the terminal. Instead he’d prop it open with a small stick because the lock sometimes jammed, and he didn’t want to walk all the way around to the front of the building to get back in.

“I don’t understand what the big deal is with a small-town airport?” Harish asked. Who’s going to care if some small-town airport gets blown up? Shouldn’t we be part of something bigger? We should be targeting one of the big American cities, like New York or Los Angeles or San Francisco. We’re putting ourselves at risk for something that seems like a waste of time.”

Ahmed shook his head. “You don’t spend much time thinking, do you, Harish? You’ve wasted your life being brainwashed by Americans’ lies. The reason we’re here is exactly because it is a small town.”

“I thought it was Dawson Chambers that we were after, for the sins he committed against our sacred leaders.”

“We are here for Dawson Chambers, but the sacred ones have bigger plans in mind, not just the sins of one infidel. This power crisis from Allah is a blessed opportunity. Why make one man pay for a crime when you can make an entire country pay for generations of evil? Our leaders have undertaken a new strategy. Did you know that half of America lives in small towns like this one? Don’t answer that, of course you don’t. You’ve been blinded by the big city and constant lambasting of American media. While the bulk of evil transgressions occur in the big cities, our leaders have come to see that the heart and soul of America resides in small-town USA. Small towns are the backbone of America. At one time our leaders were blinded by the media and misinformation, much as you still are. They thought everything bad that happened in America happened in New York or Los Angeles. But that’s not entirely true; evil lives in every city and town in America, no matter how small.”

“I don’t know,” Harish said. “This just seems so easy. There’s little security, no Department of Homeland Defense, no military, and an insignificant police force. Even the Americans don’t believe this place is worth protecting. They see no value in it.”

“That’s where you’re oh so very wrong, brother. America doesn’t understand itself as well as we do. Their over-exaggerated sense of importance has blinded them to the truth. They’ve forgotten what’s important, where their real strengths lie. It’s in the people. And now, they’ve left those people unprotected and vulnerable. Our prophets have truly seen the light. That’s why we’re attacking here, in a small town. There is no security, no protection; it’s just lying here, trusting and open. It’s so easy.”

“But it’s only one small town. Will they really care? Will they even know about it?”

“If it was only one small town, brother, then I would agree with you. But it’s not. There are hundreds of towns and hundreds of people like us, true believers that will strike out on the same day we do. And have no fear about the word getting out. Our prophets have a plan for that. The people will know. The people in small towns and the people in big towns will all know, and feel the arrow in their heart.”

As the guard strolled into the hangar and the slow-close hinge eased the door shut behind him, the brothers sprang into action. They made a beeline for the fuel depot, pausing only momentarily to pull the guard’s holding-stick out of the terminal door, and easing it quietly shut.

When people fly in and out of airports, they rarely take the time to think about all the little things that go on behind the scenes. It takes hundreds of staff to maintain the operations of a full-size airport. From cleaning crew, to baggage handlers, to security personnel, to cooks, management and many others. Travelers typically concern themselves with things that they see face to face. There’s the security personnel that have their own set of priorities. Most travelers think they’re just there to confiscate the bottle of over-sized hand lotion. Baggage handlers of course have nothing better to do than to scrounge through their luggage, and steal prized souvenirs from far off destinations, forever ruining their holiday memories. Meanwhile, administration staff sit in offices all day coming up with new rules to further impede the innocent travelers from having a carefree travel adventure. In reality, airports are small cities that come to life bright and early and shut down late after sunset … never truly asleep. They slumber through the wee night hours with a skeleton crew preparing for the next big day.

Most travelers probably don’t think about things like the tens of thousands of gallons of gasoline and jet fuel that are stored at airports. It’s not something that airports advertise. Who wants to think of all those gallons of highly explosive fuel sitting there just waiting to go boom. There is a small army of trucks and baggage transporters and emergency vehicles that need fuel, and they’re only there to support the big gas guzzlers, which of course are the planes themselves. The biggest airports have entire tank farms that are fed either by pipelines, or a constant stream of supply trucks. Two of the big concerns for fuel storage at an airport are of course safety and secondly water. Water is not a good thing to have in the fuel line of an airplane. Stringent controls are taken to make sure that airplane fuel is free from water. It’s one thing for an automobile to have water in the fuel line driving down the road, but another thing entirely for an airplane to have the same problem at thirty thousand feet. Water to extinguish a house fire is welcomed, but water that extinguishes the controlled explosion of fuel in a jet engine is not.

While Big Springs Airport was just a small regional facility, it too stored hundreds of gallons of fuel. Not much jet fuel, but plenty of small plane fuel for the prominently small plane fleet. Contrary to popular belief, small plane fuel is much more combustible than jet fuel. Just because jets are bigger and faster, doesn’t necessarily mean they need a more flammable source of energy. It was a fact not lost on two brothers looking to get the biggest bang for their buck.

The fuel tanks at Big Springs were above ground. Harish and Ahmed worked together to place the explosive devices on the two large tanks. They placed a large and a small explosive charge for each tank. One at the supply line leading out of the tank, intended to blow the valve off and allow fuel to leak out. The second charge positioned to ignite the spilled fuel released from the first charge. Ahmed placed the charges and the timers as Harish handed him the devices and tools from his backpack.  About halfway through their task, they could hear the security guard cursing his bad luck when he realized he would have to walk around to the front of the building to get in. They paused momentarily till they were sure the guard was gone.

The second tank went quicker, and before long Harish and Ahmed were making their way through the service gate and into their vehicle. As Harish drove away, Ahmed went through the checklist one more time of the places they’d have to visit that night. They’d already been to both gas stations; one on the north side of town, and one on the south. Small towns didn’t have many 24-hour gas stations, which was another reason why Big Springs was an ideal location for them. Working under cover of night with no one around was ideal. Diverting the security guard at the airport was considered an acceptable risk. The grocery store was a different sort of operation. While the burning fuel at the airport and gas station tanks would escalate the damage, the grocery store attack was intended to strike directly at civilians. Damaging an already crippled population’s main source of food, was physiologically devastating. Nobody was flying these days, but everyone needed to eat.

The last target however was the most heart-wrenching of all. Harish was uncomfortable with it, but Ahmed was not. Ahmed understood the stakes, and he knew this would strike to the very core of every infidel’s fear. The elementary school was an obvious and easy target for many reasons. Lack of security was why they left it for last on their list. The sheer gut-wrenching atrocity of it was what resonated with Ahmed; he could be very pragmatic about some things. People would be outraged and devastated. When they discovered the real reason for the attacks, their fear would compound exponentially. Ahmed hid from Harish his respect for the outright genius of such an attack. His leaders truly were inspired by Allah. During moments like this, Ahmed believed he truly was on the right side of the coming war.

A hint of sunrise began to appear over the treetops as they approached the newly constructed Big Springs Elementary School. Its modern twin blue steel roofs curved over the main entrance and drop-off zone. It was one of those designs that reminded Ahmed of a shopping mall.
What kind of sacrilege did these infidels inflict on their own children?
Ahmed thought.
A school should be a place where young minds are taught the ways of the world. They should be taught faith, to respect their parents, and to value what is important in life. They should learn to give back to the planet, and Allah. Instead, here the infidels begin their indoctrination into a culture where the almighty dollar is everything. Where it’s more important to learn how to buy things and to consume vast resources, instead of being a better person that cares for those less fortunate. The seeds of greed are planted here. They learn to be better than their fellow peers, to compete for things that have no importance. Games, and gadgets, and clothing. They teach their young girls to be promiscuous, instead of assuming their proper role in society under the faithful guidance of the men of their family.

Harish initially insisted that they skip the school. He refused to take any part in the attack. Ahmed had to reassure him that the children wouldn’t come to any harm in the attack. The explosion would take place in the early hours of the day, long before the children arrived at school. Now, however, they were running behind schedule. They should have been done an hour ago, but there were patrol cars around the gas stations slowing them down. Harish had tried again to get Ahmed to skip the school, but he wouldn’t. The list was fixed and calculated by their leaders for maximum impact. It was meant to be followed implicitly. Nothing was to be left off the list. It was not up for negotiation.

On the way from the grocery store to the elementary school, they passed by the school bus depot. Ahmed noticed one car in the parking lot.
The infidels already had some of their vehicles working again. They are a persistent bunch. It was important to strike now, before they gained any more momentum,
Ahmed thought. 

The drivers wouldn’t be arriving for a while, and it would take even longer before they picked up the children and headed for school. Ahmed assured Harish they would have plenty of time to finish their work. “Besides, how many kids are really going to school these days?” he asked Harish. “They’re all too busy lamenting the loss of their precious gadgets and toys during the power outage.”

Ahmed harbored no remorse for the devastation they were about to inflict upon this city. Children may be innocent for a while, but eventually they become part of the evil that is this corrupted society. If a few were lost in the attack, he was sure Harish would be upset, but it was a small price to pay. Very small indeed.

Chapter 24 ~ Just Watch

Michael stepped out of the transport with a cell phone to his ear and a flushed face.

“Yes, sir, I totally understand what you’re saying, sir.” Michael listened to the raised voice coming from the cell phone, nodding his head in agreement. “No, sir, I didn’t mean any disrespect. Yes, sir, I do understand the chain of command.”

Michael lowered the cell phone from his ear, looking at the screen. The call had been terminated. Michael paced around the parking lot, all but deserted except for the transport. There was no denying the logic of the decision his commanding officer was making.
But
, Michael thought,
there is no actual substitute for being out in the field.
Sure, the commander is going by the book. That makes perfect sense. I’d probably go by the book too,
he thought to himself
, if I was up on the 26th floor sitting in a cushy chair behind a big desk. But I’m not, I’m actually out here in the field watching everything firsthand. Has that guy even read my field reports?
He wondered.
Maybe my reports just suck?
Not likely. If anything, Michael’s reports were far too detailed and precise for his commanding officer to bother reading
. I can’t just think my way out of this one. If I don’t follow orders, I’ll probably have my ass dragged up to command and kicked nine different ways till Sunday. But if I do follow orders this entire operation could go south in a hurry. In which case I’m suddenly get my butt kicked twenty-seven ways till Sunday. Dammit!
Michael threw the cell phone across the parking lot and continued pacing.

A voice called out from the transport, “Sir, that’s government property. We can’t be leaving that lying around a parking lot, sir.”

“Yeah, yeah, Humphries,” Michael yelled back. “Get your ass  back in the transport. I’ll get this sorted out.”

Michael retrieved the phone and walked back to the transport. Inside Humphries and Jeffreys had their eyes glued to their monitors.

Not a word was said between the three of them. Jeffreys had only been out in the field for a few months, and this was the first real mission he’d been on. He wasn’t about to screw it up by questioning his commanding officer and risk facing disciplinary action, no matter what he thought of his orders. As far as he was concerned, Humphries was a jackass.
I’m sure the sergeant knows full well what is government property and what isn’t. There’s no point in pissing off the people on your side. My daddy didn’t raise no fool. What he did raise, was a man that knew when to follow orders.

Right now, headquarters had told Sergeant Michael to simply observe the actions of the suspected terrorist cell. They were on a fact-finding mission. There would be no engaging the suspects today.

Jeffreys considered himself pretty lucky to have drawn this mission in the first place. It’s not like he was the top of his class. There were smarter techs than him with more experience who would have been drooling to get a chance to work inside this new vehicle. It was one of the agency’s next generation of surveillance vehicles that were meant to blend into urban settings. That itself wasn’t anything special. Cops have been running surveillance ops in civilian streets since before Starsky and Hutch.

This was different though.  There weren’t any rules governing the agency to prevent them from gathering whatever information they felt necessary. As a quasi non-government contract agency, they only had to answer to themselves. If things went south, which had happened before, then the government politicos had an easy out. They simply fired the rogue contractors. Contractors that acted like a bunch of cowboys as they trampled the rights and civil liberties of fine US citizens. No politicians had to have their reputation smeared, or worse yet jeopardize their chances for re-election.

Getting busted and called out was to be avoided, but if they did it wasn’t the end of the world. They simply closed up shop. Six months later, they’d spring up with a whole new name, new personnel, and a new contract. Security couldn’t just be abandoned because a bunch of cowboy contractors had screwed up. Nope. Those terrorists were out there, threatening the lives of Americans everywhere, and they needed to be dealt with. Rules could be flexible. The agency could act with impunity.

They didn’t teach Jeffreys all that in training camp, but he’d done his time with the regular military fighting in the Gulf War. He knew this was different. Sure, there was a chain of command, but it was more like corporate ladder-climbing than the army obstacle courses he was used to running. The agency was big politics, not big guns.

Humphries piped up again. “We’re not gonna just sit here and watch this cocksucker are we, Sergeant? I mean, look at this guy. He’s guilty as all fuck of some anti-American behavior for sure. If not, I’m sure this fancy rig has got enough database connections that we could make up something to arrest him for.”

“That’s enough, Humphries. We’re not here to fabricate and falsely arrest people. The bosses want us to be sure of who we have before we take any serious actions. Those kind of decisions have real world consequences. Especially if we’re wrong.”

“C’mon, Sarge. Can you remember the last time the government actually admitted they were wrong?”

Michael grabbed the back of Humphries’ chair and spun it around so they were face to face. “Is there some reason you want me to kick your ass, cadet! Is there something I’ve said or done to lead you to believe that this is a democratic mission and that everyone in this vehicle gets a say in how things are done?” Veins in Michael's neck were bulging ever so slightly.

“No,” Humphries answered.

“No what?” Michael said sternly.

“No, sir.”

“That’s right. Sir. This may not be the army, but there is a chain of command in existence.” Michael paused for a second as he looked over to Jeffreys. Jeffreys remained silent. “If there is any doubt from either of you as to who is sitting at the top of that chain of command, then I suggest you express it now.”