Tehran Decree (25 page)

‘But this is incredible Mr. President, let me be one
of the first to congratulate you and welcome you back.’ Jenkin’s
extended his right hand in an elaborate show of false concern.
Garner ignored it.

‘You are not one of the first to welcome me back
actually...you are one of the last,’ A pretentious smile flickered
across the vice president’s face.

‘I understand your attitude sir...but you must
remember, politics is a very serious game...their can be no long
lasting sentiments based on evanescent emotions. You’re back,
alive, and well, this is a victory for America, we have outwitted
them at there own game. How on earth did you managed to pull it off
so convincingly?’

‘By sheer good fortune, security agent James Black,
my double, happened to be sitting in the front passenger seat. I
was partially predisposed due to a cigar smoking incident, which I
bitterly regret, and I was prostrate in the back of the car.

James crawled over the back seat, offered his total
allegiance, and we swapped lapel badges and wallets, then I
struggled into the front passenger seat. I did my best to act and
look like a security guard. The terrorists fell for it completely
and I was able to escape,’ Jenkins smiled triumphantly, faking his
emotions, and trying his best to emulate a better relationship
between the two men.

‘End of story then sir?’

‘Not quite...there’s the little matter of your
strange behaviour during the crisis,’ Jenkins frowned.

‘My strange behaviour?’

‘Yes...you dropped a MOAB device in order to kill one
man...that man was me!’

‘But you were already dying of plutonium poisoning
...once the Iranian’s had you at their mercy they would have
tortured you for weeks, creating untold suffering, and then they
would have chopped your head off over the Internet for all the
world to see.’

‘No, I think not, you had to end your own suffering.
Knowing that I might still be alive drove you to distraction. You
couldn’t stand the idea that I might just survive and return as
your president, so you compensated for your fears. By dropping the
biggest bomb you could lay your hands on, knowing the no one could
possibly emerge alive...especially the president of the United
States.

Lets face it Steven, your lust for power knows no
bounds it’s turned you into a psychopathic madman. A man prepared
to kill any number of people in order to be the most powerful man
in on earth.’

‘You can say and think what you like sir, your
prerogative, but you’re overlooking one thing, as vice president it
is my duty to take over the president’s job should he be unable to
perform his duties. As far as we were concerned you were a prisoner
without volition; the moment the presidential motorcade entered the
Sydney cross city tunnel. So lets face it Frederick, you were in no
position to run the country.’

Jenkins was right, according to the 25th amendment he
had every right to take over, and run the country as he saw fit --
even to the point of disposing of the entrapped president -- even
though this may have amounted to bureaucratic assassination.

The plutonium poisoning and the MOAB incident,
excessive as they were, could in all probability be legally
justified in a court of law. But these were Machiavellian tactics
and not the sort of thing morally responsible democratic countries
should be practicing, but being morally responsible wasn’t real
politics. It was Machiavelli himself who said...
Force and
prudence are the might of all governments that ever have been or
will be in the world.
Jenkins had certainly used force but it
was his twisted prudence that worried Garner.

Jenkins forced a flat smile, ‘We’re both grossly
overwrought over this horrible business Mr. president...may I
suggest we allow ourselves a cooling off period,’ Garner looked
sharply at Jenkins then reluctantly nodded. At this stage it would
undoubtedly be extreme folly to try to impeach Jenkins for his
inept handling of what was a really difficult situation -- there
had to be another way -- there was, but it would have to wait a
more favorable time

The current political turmoil also forbade any
prolonged infighting as this would severely weaken the government
at a time when it needed to be at its strongest.

Chapter Forty-eight

Five minutes had elapsed before Jansen finally
regained most of his senses and took a good look around taking note
of his bearings. It was flat, virtually everything that had been
standing had been leveled, random piles of blackened rubble were
all that remained of the warehouse. It was a scene straight from
hell and nothing could possibly have lived through the massive
onslaught

It was strangely silent, as if somehow nature had
made a mistake, and was sulking with embarrassment in the
background not wanting to show herself -- then unexpectedly, the
silence began to vibrate -- humming, like a subdued penny whistle
it permeated the backdrop. Nature was cooking up one of her
favourite tricks in this part of her domain. Repeated through time
immemorial she was in the throes of perpetuating a sandstorm,
perhaps in a half hearted attempt to cover up the ugly hinterland
scaring. Storms of this nature came in different grades and
different ways. Some just sprang up instantly out of nowhere,
others gradually made their way on stage.

Judging by the intermittent nature of the phenomena
this one could be either type, it was hard to tell. It could take
hours to mature into a death trap, or appear full blown in an the
next instant. He put both hands to his mouth and repeatedly shouted
as loud as he could sending the words to all and sundry.

‘Hello...is anyone still alive!’

Slowly his team began to surface, as sand covered
objects arose from the desert surrounds, and dusted themselves
off.

Jansen made a quick head count -- by a miracle of
middle eastern quackery everyone was still alive. He tugged at his
inside pocket and hoped that the explosion had not damaged his
satellite phone too much. He pressed the direct line button which
would put him in touch with defence minister Hayes.

The phone put out a scratchy series of beeps above
the static. A long pause and a faint voice came over the line

‘Hello Hayes here...’

‘Hold your horses sir, I can hardly hear you,’ Jansen
moved around and manipulated the phone to get a better
reception.

‘Hello Jansen speaking...it’s all over sir...the
Yanks have blown everything to bloody hell with their MOAB bomb.
There isn’t a stick of wood still standing here,’ defence minister
Hayes came over loud and clear as he shouted into the phone.

‘It’s not all over commander...you need to find
evidence.’

‘Evidence? Evidence of what sir?’

‘The bodies of Farid Kazeni and Habib Sharazi.’

‘Your bloody joking sir...the largest piece of human
tissue here would be about as big as a finger nail, most of it
would have been vapourised, with a lot of luck you might just find
a little finger to go with the nail.’

‘I’ll make it clear for you commander, the PM wants
evidence that we were the first on the scene, and it was us who
finally cornered the BIB in the warehouse. He wants a political
feather in Australia’s cap...something to show the Americans that
we metaphorically pulled their nuts out of the fire, then perhaps
they’ll stop blaming us for the this whole bloody debacle.’

‘Got your message sir...I’ll do my best,’ Jansen
looked around and scanned the debris field. It was immediately
obvious that no one could heave possibly survived the detonation.
There wasn’t even a respectable pile of bricks to hide behind and
the tallest debris pile was no more that a foot high. Jansen
collected his men together.

‘The Yanks have done a fantastic demolition job lads
however, we’re going to comb the area for human artifacts. That
means we need to collect anything that is remotely human, including
personal effects...especially personal effects that identify a
particular person, such as wallet, driving licence, credit cards,
love letters,etc.’ And we’d better start now the last thing we need
is to get caught up in a ferocious sand storm.

Over the next hour a pile of blackened, amorphous
objects, and burnt clothing began to accumulate. Then the first
charcoal coated, human head, appeared on top of the pile. The skull
seemed to be the hardest anatomical artifact to fragment, even for
a MOAB device

The head count continued until six of the grizzly
items dominated the debri. All the heads were so mutilated and
burnt that it was virtually impossible to identify them by visual
recognition alone. A small pile of personal items began to
accumulate next to the human heads.

Sergeant Worsely used his SAS jack knife to dig below
the compacted layer of rubble in the middle of the warehouse ruins
-- trying to find the administration office the BIB were using
before the MOAB blast.

The knife struck something hard and he rapidly
cleared the rubbish around it. He shouted to Jansen.

‘I’ve found a tiled area sir...could be the admin
office.’ Worsely recalled that the floor area of the main building
consisted of patches of concrete slab, interspersed with compacted
earth, but there was also a tiled floor in the administration
office.

Jansen looked around the immediate debris field for
signs of human habitation, there just had to be some evidence of
BIB presence, they could not have gotten out of the admin office
before the MOAB struck.

When the numbers were crunched, there were a number
of human skulls missing, but there was also the possibility they
could have been totally vapourised in the sustained heat flash,
which must have desimated the entire building.

Interestingly, non of the peripheral evidence seemed
to belong to hierarchical BIB members.

There was only one other possibility. The two men
looked at each other and Worsely emulated an arcane smiled.

‘Are you thinking what I’m thinking sir?’

‘Of course, we’re both men of the world...so lets
shift some of this rubbish and see if we can find the entrance to
the tunnel they must have used.’

The team worked feverishly to move as much material
from the tiled area as soon as possible; thirty five minutes later
a square four by four metres had been cleared.

It was still difficult to see the splices between the
tiles and Worsely fashioned a crude sweeping brush made from paper
sheets and cardboard. He proceeded to sweep the entire area. Jansen
watched intently as the tile pattern started to form. Some of the
gaps were irregular with serrated edges where the ground was
uneven, it was obviously a rough tilling job. Then he noticed that
six of the tiles were neatly placed together as if they had been
stuck to a wooden board or concrete slab. Jansen looked at his men
and pointed to the array of tiles on the floor.

‘This is it gentleman...I’ll lay ten to one this is
the entrance to a cellar.’ Many corporate warehouses and buildings
had cellars in Muscat. Cold rooms were often incorporated for the
storage provisions and supplies as well as residences for wealthier
Arabs and their families. Prolonged forty degree heat tended to
become an insufferable impasse, even for some of the Arab
population.

Jansen glanced toward the sun, shielded his eyes,
then looked at Worsely.

‘Did you see that?’

‘What sir?’

‘Movement over younder...looked like a dung coloured
vehicle,’Jansen pointed towards the road in the distance.

‘Nothing there sir.’

'That's strange sergeant, I could swear there was a
vehicle just disappearing near the horizon.’

‘Not likely sir...probably a car or truck turning off
the road heading south.’

‘I’d like to agree with you sergeant...except
something like that has happened two or three times lately...its a
bit too surrealistic for my liking. I get the impression it’s a
vehicle trying hard not be seen by us.’

‘You mean we’re being observed.’

‘Exactly.’

‘Your imagining things commander, the desert does
that sometimes...it plays tricks on your senses. What with the
heat, the endless terrain and possible mirage effects,’Jansen
grimaced warily -- from his own personal experiences over many
forays, in extreme conditions, he knew it was possible for the mind
to make blatant mistakes of judgment. Light had its own behaviuor
patterns and the brain had limited perceptibility -- it also had
the ability to create graphic detail which did not actually exist
in reality.

‘Okay sergeant, you may be right...I’ll try to relax.
Lets get on with the excavation.’

Chapter Forty-nine

The team swept all traces of sand from the floor and
Worsely wafted his hands across the top of the tiled slab
indicating the need to check for booby traps. He whispered to the
team.

‘They could still be down there and they could still
be alive...so no unnecessary noise,’ after several minutes of
careful digging and clearing the top surface, the tiled concrete
slab was checked for wires, and carefully lifted from its
mooring.

A musty smell emanated from the exposed shaft, and
Jansen peered down into a dank, black-hole. A makeshift rusting
steel ladder receded into the darkness.

Jansen put his finger to his lips indicating
continued silence and caution.

Worsely strained at the chance to go first, such
adrenaline charged actions were his forte and he had lost non of
his youthful daring do. He slung his Mac 10 over his shoulder and
pulled out the Beretta 92F automatic pistol he always carried
during his many sorties. He descended the steel ladder with one
hand and kept the cocked Berretta poised for action in the
other.

Sergeants in the SAS and in the army generally always
seemed to be large men and Worsely was no exception. His broad
shouldered, six foot frame, filled the shaft space more than
adequately. Jansen and the rest of the troop watched with baited
breath as the ground slowly swallowed him up. Finally his mauve
berry vanished in the black shaft and the team above were reduced
to audio contact only.