State of Siege - Tom Clancy [42]
"You know, that's the problem with security today," Grey said. "You can set up all the fancy antiterrorist protection you want, they can still get through the old-fashioned way. A jerk with a meal knife or a hat pin can still grab a flight attendant and take over an airplane."
"That doesn't mean you have to make it easy," DeVonne said. "No," Grey agreed. "But don't kid yourself that any of it's really going to work. Terrorists will still get anywhere they want to go, just as a determined assassin can still get to a world leader." The phone beeped, and the desk sergeant answered the call. It was for August. The colonel hurried over. If and when they left this room, the squad would instantly switch to the secure, mobile TAC-SAT phone. While they were here, they still used the secure base lines. "Colonel August here," he said.
"Brett, it's Mike." In public, the officers observed formal protocol. In private conversation, they were two men who had known each other since childhood. "You've got a go."
"A go is understood," August replied. He glanced over at his team. They were already beginning to gather their gear. "I'll give you the mission profile when you arrive," Rodgers said. "See you in thirty minutes," August replied, then hung up. Less than three minutes later, the Striker squad was buckling themselves into the helicopter seats for the ride to Andrews. As the noisy chopper rose into the night and arced to the northeast, Colonel August was puzzled by something Rodgers had said. Typically, mission parameters were downloaded to the aircraft via secure ground-to-air modem. It saved time and allowed the process to continue even after the team was airborne. Rodgers had said he was going to give them the mission parameters when they arrived. If that meant what he thought it meant, then this was going to be a more interesting and unusual evening than he had expected.
New Fork, New York Saturday, 10:08 P dism.
When the violinists had first arrived in the Security Council chambers, they assembled behind the horseshoe-shaped table on the main floor. Their musical director, Ms. Dom, had just arrived. The twenty-six-year-old had given a recital in Washington the night before and had flown in that day. While Ms. Dorn reviewed the score, Harleigh Hood stood by the curtains in. front of one of the windows. She peeked outside at the darkening river and smiled at the jiggling lights reflected on the surface. The bright, colorful spots reminded her of musical notes, and she found herself wondering why sheet music was never printed in color-a different color for each octave.
Harleigh had just released the edge of the curtain when they heard pops in the hallway. Moments later, the double doors on the north side of the chamber slammed opera and the masked men ran in. Neither the delegates nor their guests moved, and the young musicians remained where they were, in two tight rows. Only Ms. Dom moved, protectively positioning herself between the children and the intruders. The masked men were too busy to notice her. They were running down the sides of the chamber, surrounding the delegates. None of the intruders said anything until one of the men grabbed a delegate and pulled him off to the side. The intruder spoke to the man quietly, as though he were afraid of being overheard. The delegate, who had been introduced to the violinists earlier in a receiving line-he was from Sweden, though she forgot his name-then told the group that no one would be harmed as long as they stayed quiet and did exactly as they were told. Harleigh didn't find him convincing. His collar was already sweaty, and the whole time his eyes were moving all over the place like he was looking for a place to run.
The intruder resumed talking to the delegate. They sat down at the horseshoe-shaped table. The delegate was handed paper and a pencil. Two of the intruders checked the windows, opened the doors to see what was behind them, then took up other positions.