The Zarrabian Incident Read online

  He didn’t have to wait long. There was a loud rapping on his door. He waited a few seconds as if he’d been asleep, thumped a foot on the floor, waited a couple more seconds, then turned on a light. He fumbled with the door latch for a second before opening it. He looked out sleepily and squeezed his eyes shut as a flashlight shined in his eyes for a moment.

  One cop was at his door. The other stood a bit back, his hand on his gun handle. At least they got that right.

  He squinted at them sleepily and put on his practiced accent. “Sí, señores? Can I help you?”

  “Sorry to bother you. There was a break-in at the store, and we wondered if you’d heard or seen anything.”

  “Oh man, no. Sorry man. I been sleeping.” Zarrabian pushed his fingers through his rumpled hair as if to straighten it.

  “How long you been here, sir?”

  Zarrabian looked alarmed. “They tol’ me it was OK to sleep here. I don’ want no trouble, officers. I got my card.”

  “No, no. We’re not here to trouble you. Just want to know if you saw anything.”

  “No, lo siento. Sorry, mister. I musta slep’ through it. They steal a bunch of stuff, sir?”

  “It looks like the robbers were after guns and ammunition. You be careful, OK? Whoever robbed the place is armed and dangerous.”

  “Oh, man, that’s bad. I’ll be real careful.”

  “OK, sir. And if you see anything, call us right away.” The officer handed Zarrabian a card.

  “Sí, sure, no problem. Uh, they gotta pay phone roun’ here? I don’ got no cell phone.”

  “Never mind. Sorry to disturb you.” They turned away. Zarrabian closed the RV door and clicked the lock. Peeking under his curtain again, he saw them rapping on the the door of one of the veterans. They wouldn’t bother him again.

  He returned to the bed and pulled open the big drawer underneath it. Several rifles, shotguns, and hand guns gleamed dully in the dim light. Dozens of boxes of ammunition were stacked down one side. He closed the drawer. Satisfied, he turned off the light, lay down on the bed, and closed his eyes.

  Christine leaned back from her computer screen, took her reading glasses off, and massaged the bridge of her nose. Outside her office, the newsroom was almost quiet. Most of the lights were off. A few reporters were scattered around the room, their faces lit by the eerie glow from their computer screens.

  Christine pushed the glasses back onto her nose and leaned forward. She clicked her mouse. On the screen, the Harrier jet was hovering two hundred yards from the Golden Gate Bridge. She clicked. The picture moved forward one frame. Click. Click. Click. Frame by frame, the anti-aircraft missile shot out from the bridge while the pilot ejected, then the Harrier bloomed into a fireball and started to fall. She rewound and repeated it once, and then again.

  She was startled by a sudden voice behind her. “Jesus, you’re still here.”

  Grant Petri was standing in her office doorway. She swiveled around in her chair. “Grant. Didn’t expect you here on the Left Coast.”

  “Good to see you too.”

  “Right.” She swiveled back to her screen.

  “I caught the last flight out of JFK once I was sure they had everything under control in New York. You OK?”

  She answered without turning back to him. “I blew out my sail and lost the race. A terrorist fell out of the sky into my lap. He pointed a gun at me and hijacked my boat. He tossed my GPS overboard and stole my phone. The Coast Guard fired a machine gun at me and then boarded my boat, handcuffed me, and locked me in a steel room. An FBI guy questioned me. When they finally turned me loose, your goons pounced on me. I spent four hours in front of your cameras, answering questions like I was some Joe Victim instead of a real reporter. Sure, I’m just peachy.”

  “You were great. Ratings are through the roof. This story put you on the map.”

  “I was already on the map, Grant. And I’m supposed to be investigating the news, not making it.”

  “OK, OK.” He stepped closer to see the Harrier footage. “What’s that?

  “Nothing. Just reviewing all the footage. Everybody thinks I was right there in the thick of it, but the truth is I had the cheap seats. Couldn’t see a damned thing. Gotta catch up so I won’t look like a bumpkin for my interviews tomorrow.”

  “Maybe some sleep, too. You look like hell.”

  “Even on my bad days, I still look better than you.”

  He smiled. “I’m glad you’re OK, Christine. See you in the morning.”

  She looked over her shoulder at him. “Thanks. See you in the morning.”

  She turned back to her screen and replayed the video of the Harrier jet’s demise.

  Erica Blackwell stood in the back of the Oval Office. Behind the huge presidential desk, a makeup artist was putting the final touches on President Whitman’s face. The White House TV producer and his cameraman were fussing with the camera, getting it positioned just right. They’d already checked the sound and double-checked that the backup camera was fully operational.

  The director called out, “Sixty seconds, Mr. President.”

  Blackwell walked over to the president and shooed the makeup girl away. “You got this, Mr. President?”

  Whitman looked up from his notes. “You know I do, Erica. This is good stuff.”

  “This could be the most important speech of your lifetime, Mr. President.”

  “I know, I know. You’ve told me that ten times already. Stop worrying. This is what I do. You write ‘em, I deliver ‘em. OK?”

  The director’s voice cut in. “Thirty seconds. Ms. Blackwell?”

  Blackwell stepped back. The president cleared his throat, glanced at his teleprompter, then squared his shoulders and looked into the camera.

  “Five, four,” the director said aloud, counting down the last three seconds on his fingers. At zero, he pointed at the president. The camera’s red light went on.

  “Good morning,” said the president.

  The Pancake House was alive with the sounds of breakfast: diners talked, newspapers rustled, waitresses called out orders, silverware clanked, food sizzled on the grill, and coffee cups rattled against saucers. The summer fog had claimed the morning; a cool, gray gloom prevailed outside.

  Christine sipped coffee at her favorite booth in the corner. She skimmed the news on her tablet and occasionally glanced at the door. In spite of the seeming ordinariness of the scene, she sensed tenseness in the air. Brows were furrowed. People gesticulated and shook their heads. The light, energetic feeling that usually pervaded the Pancake House was missing.

  She spotted Special Agent TJ McCaig and another FBI agent coming in the door. McCaig was wearing his usual FBI uniform: a conservative gray suit, light blue shirt, and dark blue tie. His partner was a handsome young man, maybe twenty-six, of Arab descent. He was wearing sharply creased slacks, a crisp shirt, and a sports jacket, but no tie. He had a laptop computer under one arm. Must be the new FBI look, she thought.

  “Ms. Garrett, good morning. This is my partner, Special Agent Omar Bashir.”

  She stood up and shook hands with Bashir. “Mr. Bashir.”

  “Pleased to meet you, Ms. Garrett. I’ve seen some of your reports.”

  McCaig nodded toward Bashir. “Agent Bashir is our computer whiz. He hooked up your station’s news van with our network and got word to the Coast Guard for us.”

  “You’re the one who got me arrested?” she asked.

  Bashir blushed.

  “Just kidding,” she said. “You did your job.”

  The waitress arrived. “Can I get you something, gentlemen?”

  McCaig answered for both. “Just a couple cups of coffee, thanks.”

  “Some breakfast, Ms. Garrett?” asked the waitress.

  “Yeah, the usual.”

  The waitress left. Christine turned to the agents. “Thanks for meeting me this morning. I know it was short notice.”

  McCaig leaned back. “So you’ve forgiven us for capturing you at
gunpoint on the high seas?”

  “Whatever. First, there’s something I forgot to mention when you questioned me yesterday.”

  McCaig reached into his jacket for his notepad and pen, but Bashir interrupted. “I got this, boss.” He flipped open his laptop, fingers poised over the keys.

  Christine continued. “As we were sailing through the fog, he compared himself to the eclipse, all dark and red, rising over the sand dunes of the desert while they were training for this mission.”

  McCaig raised his eyebrow again. Bashir’s fingers were flying on the keyboard.

  “I know,” Christine said. “It’s really random. But you said you wanted to see into his head, so there it is. He said he was like how the moon makes tides with its invisible forces.”

  McCaig’s brow was furrowed. “Invisible forces? He’s like the moon? That’s pretty abstract stuff, but you never know what little tidbit matters. We’ll put it in our report.”

  Bashir interrupted. “Wait a sec. Ms. Garrett, did you say he called the eclipse ‘dark and red?’”

  “Yes, those were his words.”

  “It must have been a lunar eclipse. You’d never call a solar eclipse dark and red.”

  “Is that important?” asked McCaig. “It’s just a metaphor.”

  “No, sir, it’s not just a metaphor.” His fingers flew on the keyboard and there were a couple mouse clicks. “There hasn’t been a solar eclipse visible from the Northern Hemisphere for a couple years. So it had to be a lunar eclipse. They’re more common.”

  “So?”

  “If he said he saw it rising, an astronomer might be able to figure out exactly where he was training.”

  McCaig turned back to Christine.

  “You sure that’s exactly what he said? That it was rising?”

  “Mr. McCaig, that’s what I do. He was quite specific that he saw the eclipse rising ‘Before we boarded the planes.’”

  “Right. Huh. OK, good work, Bashir.” He started to rise. “We’ve got a busy day, Ms. Garrett.” Bashir hastily closed his computer.

  “Actually, that wasn’t the main reason I wanted to see you.”

  McCaig hesitated, then sat back down.

  “A couple more things. First this.” She lifted a laptop from the seat beside her, opened it, and turned it so they could see the screen. It showed the US Marines Harrier jet hovering near the bridge, about to be blown up. “Watch.”

  She clicked the mouse, and the scene began to move forward in slow motion, frame by frame: first nothing, then the missile from the terrorists, the pilot ejecting, and finally the Harrier exploding.

  The video stopped. McCaig looked at her questioningly. “I’ve seen this.”

  “Look again.” She started it over and ran it frame by frame, then stopped it as the first flash appeared from the terrorist’s anti-aircraft missile. “There. Look carefully.”

  McCaig leaned forward. “OK, the terrorist just launched a missile. So what?”

  Christine clicked the video forward a bit. “Now look.”

  “OK, now the Harrier pilot is ejecting.”

  “Right. Thirteen frames later.”

  Bashir spoke up. “What’s the frame rate?”

  “Thirty.”

  McCaig looked at Bashir. “And this means?”

  Bashir answered. “The pilot, sir. He couldn’t have reacted that fast. Thirteen frames . . .” He looked up at the ceiling for a moment. “That’s about 430 milliseconds. Less than half a second. I don’t know about jets, sir, but it takes the average human about a half to three quarters of a second to hit the brakes in a car when they see something. Even a Marine pilot couldn’t react in less than half a second. And it must take some time for a pilot to do whatever it takes to eject.”

  “Two and a half seconds,” said McCaig.

  Christine said, “Right. So doesn’t that mean he must have started ejecting before the terrorists launched their missile?”

  “That does seem odd. I’ll pass it on to the navy boys.”

  “There’s another thing. Look at this.”

  She brought up a grainy, highly enlarged image of the terrorists on the bridge making their preparations.

  “This is a still photo from a minute or so before the Marine Corps helicopters blew up the terrorists.”

  McCaig leaned in close. “What the hell?”

  Bashir looked too. “Uh, he’s going down the rope?”

  “Yeah, but look there on the girder below him.”

  Bashir peered closer at the picture. “Is that a man? Under the bridge?”

  “Sure looks like it,” said McCaig. He leaned back. “These guys are laying explosives, two helicopters are about to kill them, then one climbs over on a rope and what, hides?”

  “That’s what we wanted to know,” said Christine.

  “And then the other guy chases after him. It makes no sense. Where’d you get this?”

  “The reporter on our helicopter took some stills with a Nikon and a 500-millimeter jiggle-stabilized zoom lens. He usually just takes videos, you know, traffic, crashes, cop chases, stuff like that. But he wanted a couple high-res stills and just happened to get this.”

  “One of those two must have been your terrorist, the one you rescued.”

  “That’s my guess too.”

  “Why I haven’t seen this photo? Didn’t you give us copies of everything?”

  “We did. A few minutes ago.”

  Christine pulled a memory stick from the laptop and handed it to him. “Here, take this copy. This is going on the air in about an hour, but I doubt your analysts saw it yet. You may get questions, and—”

  “Thanks. Anything else?”

  “Maybe. But . . .” She paused.

  “Aha. Now the good Samaritan wants a favor.”

  “I scratched your back.”

  “So you did.” McCaig thought for a moment. “OK, how about this. According to an FBI source who spoke on the condition of anonymity—” McCaig paused. She nodded, and he continued. “Remember that other body that fell from the bridge before your terrorist did his rope escape?”

  “Of course.”

  “He was dead before he hit the water. A bullet to the head and two to the chest. From a nine-millimeter Glock.”

  “You mean these guys were shooting at each other?” she asked.

  “Draw your own conclusions.”

  “OK, that’s a fair trade. Thanks. But you still owe me one. A big one.”

  “I do?”

  “Watch.” She turned her computer screen so that McCaig and Bashir could see it, and clicked the Play button of a video. A blurry, jumpy cell-phone video started playing. All they could see was a pair of legs wearing bright yellow foul-weather sailing pants, ending with a pair of boat shoes.

  “What’s this?” asked McCaig.

  “Just watch.”

  A few seconds later, the picture started jiggling and moving, showing fog, a flash of her boat’s winch, the sea, and then a man appeared. Christine froze the picture.

  “That’s him.”

  “Damn!” said Bashir.

  McCaig peered intently at the screen for a long time. “Can you zoom it to his face?”

  Christine magnified the image. McCaig stared at it for another long moment.

  “How’d you get this?” he asked.

  “Remember I told you during the interview that I got a phone call from my boss, and that the terrorist made me give him my phone, then answered it?”

  “Yes.”

  “I pretended to be holding out on him for a second, and turned on the video camera.”

  “But he took your phone with him. How’d you get this?”

  “I had my phone set up to sync through the cloud network server and to this laptop. Picture and videos get transferred automatically. He turned off the phone after he ended the call, probably before it could send the video to the network.”

  “But you have it now.”

  “Yeah, so he must have turned the phone back
on, right?”

  McCaig scrutinized the picture again, then leaned back in his chair. “Right. Thanks very much for bringing this to me. Is there any point asking you not to go on the air with this?”

  “No.”

  “OK, I had to ask. Listen, Ms. Garrett . . .” McCaig looked at her for a long time, thinking. She waited.

  “Bashir, would you mind if I spoke to Ms. Garrett alone for a moment? It’s a . . . a private thing. Do you mind?”

  Bashir looked nonplussed. “Uh, I guess . . . sure, boss, no problem. I’ll wait at the breakfast counter.”

  Christine cocked her head as he walked away. “That’s not what I expected.”

  “You said I was going to owe you one. A ‘big one’ I think is the word you used.”

  “I was right, wasn’t I?”

  “I’m going to pay you back right now. But you can’t use this directly or tell anyone where you got it. OK?”

  “I can’t use it? What good is it?”

  “It will give you a lead you can follow to discover this same information yourself. You won’t have to involve me, the FBI, or anyone else. It will just be a good investigator doing an excellent job. Yes or no?”

  “OK. Yes.”

  “Zarrabian. That’s his name.”

  “Jesus Christ, you know him?”

  “I know his name.”

  “And . . .?”

  “Are we even?”

  “Yes. But—”

  “That’s all. Maybe you found it at the UC Berkeley registrar’s office. Something like that.” He waved at Bashir, who ambled back.

  Suddenly a waitress yelled out from behind the breakfast counter. “Quiet everyone! It’s the president!” She turned up the volume on the TV on the wall as the crowd in the restaurant fell silent. The president’s face appeared on the screen.

  “Good morning,” the president began. “Yesterday our country was attacked by a well-organized, well-funded group of terrorists. The forces of evil have once again reached across our borders and attacked us at home.

  “The magnificent Golden Gate Bridge was an icon of California and the West, and a symbol of America’s engineering and artistic greatness. Its destruction was calculated to kill our citizens, to wreak economic havoc on one of our largest metropolitan centers, and most importantly, to frighten and demoralize us.