Take out the Takeout

Take out the Takeout

Who’s got the fish?”

“Still waiting”

It will be a bloody Sunday if they don’t find the fish. Agents Picker, Packer, Anthony and Sparks have been in the talk box since four AM. Picker is the dog, the agent in charge. Packer is coms, Sparky, surveillance and Susan B Anthony, no relation, is the shot caller. Elite antiterrorism team is an understatement.

Picker again, “The fish?”

Packer again, “Waiting for Homados.”

Homados, named after the Greek God of battle noise and screaming agony, is an Nvidia fourth generation AI processor coupled with a high speed surveillance computer. Homados tracks virtually all internet and cell phone traffic within a sixty mile radius of Seattle.

Of a couple hundred million conversations, Homados decided, “I’ve got two bombs and an Uzi, tomorrow will be epic!” is a real and actionable threat.

Packer, “Targets coming in”

Top of the list is a rally for presidential nominee Senator Angela Bohka at Gas Works Park. There is a lot of suspicious chatter around the event.

Rounding out the list is the Port of Seattle, Pike Street Market and the Space Needle

The Port of Seattle and Space Needle are always on the list and have significant security resources. But why the market? What does Homados know?

World Cup soccer. Every bar with a TV will have crowds swelling onto the sidewalk. China is playing England. If Pike Street Market is the target, they are looking for Hong Kong, Taiwanese or Northern Irish political groups.

It will be nearly impossible to defend the market from a suicide or car bomber. But, if the attackers are foreign nationals then Homados can collect and disperse all their communications without a warrant.

The rally is a bigger nightmare. No controlled access, no buildings or cars to shield the blast. If the motive is political and the terrorists domestic, then the law, FISA, prevents Homados from sharing any intel without a warrant. And without the intel, no warrant. Catch 22.

Further frustrating their mission is Bohka. She was offered heavy security based on the intelligence. She refuses to increase security or change the time or date of the rally. Bad optics.

Samantha, Sammy, Chin is seventeen and looks fourteen. She is a straight A student and a door dash messenger. At one hundred pounds dripping wet she can maintain 300 watts for two hours on a fixie. She is a badass.

Sammy and her cousin Dionne have a plan to break the bike delivery record from T-Mobile to Gas Works Park. Sammy is on Strava, a bike tracking AP, and Dionne is going to cover her with drone footage. The drone is to verify that she doesn’t cheat. The goal is to take the KOM, king of the mountain, from their friend and rival Iliana Garcia.

“Locked, loaded and ready to roll. Where is my cover?” Sammy to Dionne.

“Cover is locking on, don’t let us down!” Comes back.

And Sammy Chin is rolling. A drone is locked on. Homados is also locked on.

Homados reports that a threat is moving. Parker asks for location and identification. Homados requests a warrant as the fish is a US citizen.

“Homados has the fish, but we need a warrant.” Parker reports.

“The god damn fourth amendment is going to cost lives today.”SB Anthony shoots back.

Homados comes back. ” Speaker is a US citizen, phone is owned by a Chinese national, likely suspect’s mother. Phone can be tracked without a warrant.

“Triangulating…Apple phone IMEI number 62 778793 058411 6 is traveling northwest on Second Avenue.”

Picker takes command. “I need eyes, long shooters and a grab team. We need Seattle PD SWAT and any Fibby with a gun to report in. This is a rolling massacre so no cowboys.”

“I’m over second and Washington. What am I looking for?” Sparky has the drone positioned.

Parker, “An I-phone 11 is all I got.”

“I’m looking for a phone?”

Sparky’s drone has high resolution lenses, Infra-red and night vision capability. It has a top speed of sixty mph, an electronic cloaking system with a silent hover mode and a thirty eight caliber cannon, but it isn’t going to find one phone below with possibles in cars, on buses, on bikes and walking.

Homados calculates speed and location and transfers the data to Sparky’s drone.

“Suspect is on a leash.” Sparky puts the drone feed up on the screen. The rider is weaving through traffic with a drone following above. The bike is a fixie, a light weight, one speed favored by bike messengers. On the back is a food delivery box.

“Homados analyze.”

“Drone is counter surveillance. Bombs are in foil lined food delivery box, sensors unable to penetrate. Uzi is likely in the backpack. If the rider is pursued they will detonate the bombs after steering into a zone of maximum collateral damage. If the rider is killed the bombs will detonate.”

“And the rider?” Picker asks.

“No warrant.” Homados answers.

“Target?” Picker again.

“Port is no longer in play, Pike street market is ten minutes.”

“Put up a 10 minute map.” Picker commands.

“There!” Sparky points out an alley off Union.

“Get Seattle PD to jam the intersection at Second and Union. We need the rider to turn right on Union. We’ll do it again at Third. If we can get the rider into the alley we’ll terminate. We have to keep the rider out of the market.”

Snipers are deployed to the alley with instructions to shoot to kill.

Sammy checks the time, on pace except for the cluster ahead, it looks like a garbage truck hit a bus.

The team in the talk box watch the rider turn right on Union. A firetruck with lights flashing is blocking the next intersection. The rider starts for the alley.

Sammy starts to turn. The sunlight streaming into the alley lights up a carpet of broken glass. No way, thinks Sammy and with a bunny hop she is on the sidewalk and another three hops up a terraced landscape feature and she is skidding sideways across the slick tile of the front portico entrance to Rainier Bank.

The team holds their breath. If the rider goes down, KABOOM!

The back tire hits a fountain and stands the rider up. A half turn and a rail slide down the stair bannister and the rider is clear of the intersection heading towards a hundred thousand soccer fans.

The decision is made to run the rider over with a garbage truck on Pike before the market and hope the heavy vehicle takes most of the blast.

The garbage truck breaks free of the second street mess and speeds towards Pike. The plan is to drag the rider under the truck before the bomb detonates. That means speed, maybe forty miles an hour, even if it means hitting a building or some pedestrians. It is a grisly cost, benefit scenario but they are out of options.

Sammy turns right on Pike, away from the market. She steers onto the sidewalk as there is a speeding truck coming recklessly up the road.

Picker orders the garbage truck to abort.

There is only one target left and it is thirty minutes away.

The team watches the rider turn up Fifth Street to Westlake Avenue, the projected route to the senator’s rally. The rider is keeping up the pace. Westlake Avenue runs along the lake. In this weather the lakefront is swarming with families. There is no spot to take out the rider without unacceptable collateral damage. This rider is smart.

“Homados, attack scenario?” Parker asks.

“Highest likelihood is for rider to park the bike and move away into shooting position. When in place rider will detonate the bombs causing distraction. The senator will be hustled off the stage. The rider should be able to fire one hundred to two hundred rounds in the 10 -20 seconds before being neutralized. There is a high likelihood that the assassination will be successful. Casualties are estimated at one hundred and fifty.”

“Why?” Parker asks.

Based on social and print media there are 23 general motives to kill the senator, number one is…”

“Stop list.”

Packer realizes they are wasting time. Today, there is probably a hundred reasons and a hundred possible assassins for every politician, left, right or middle.

Sparky repurposes the drone to fly ahead looking for an intercept point where a bomb would kill the fewest people. Odds are high they can do better than one hundred and fifty. The who of it doesn’t matter.

Homados puts the map up as Sparky explains. ”After the rider turns onto Northlake, the neighborhood changes. There is a closed boat yard with a parking lot across the street. It is too close quarters for a truck attack so we’ll have to terminate the rider and take the blast. If we time it right, it will be mostly cars and the boat yard that suffer.”

Homados calculates the safe blast distance for the shooters to be 175 feet. SB Anthony finds two sniper nests in the boat yard that will give them a clear shot to the kill zone.

As the snipers arrive, they find the boat yard gates locked and guarded by aggressive dogs. They cut the chain and, safe in the car, they pushed through the gates letting the dogs out.

Sammy turns off Westlake onto Northlake while the team watches.

Two minutes to kill zone.

“Why does a terrorist say two bombs and an Uzi on a cell phone? Why not two cheeseburgers and a peperoni large? They gotta know we listen.” Parker muses.

One minute to kill zone.

No one answers as they all watch the drone feed.

Thirty seconds.

The dogs see Sammy first and charge. She is trapped between the parking lot and the boat yard. The snipers, realizing that the rider will never get to the kill zone, have to reposition. The rider is still in the road as they reset. Before they can get off a shot, Sammy bunny hops onto a flatbed trailer and then onto a retaining wall and over on to a car in the lot. The dogs are stymied for a minute before navigating the obstacles to follow Sammy into the lot. One of the snipers gets off a wild shot which takes the rear view mirror off a Subaru. Sammy never hears it. She can’t lose the dogs in the lot. She spies a Porsche and rides up it and jumps the far wall into the bushes on the other side. The dogs can’t follow. Down the slope is a bike path to the park.

Sammy is on an adrenaline high, but the KOM is toast. Might as well finish she thinks. As she approaches the park her WTF radar goes off. It is a rifle barrel peeking out of a Sani-hut. Without thinking she charges the hut, braking her front wheel hard, lifting the rear and pivoting the bike into the Sani-hut. SMACK! The force tips the hut over and onto its back. The rifle goes off harmlessly.

The security response is startling. And the guns are all pointed at Sammy.

“Don’t shoot!” Picker yells as the team arrives.

It takes a few heartbeats for Picker and the guns to figure it out, but finally they drag the shit bird out and away.

Sammy explains Strava and KOM’s to the team in the talk box. She asks Picker why they came after her. Picker explains that Homados had identified her as a terrorist.

“Maybe.” Sammy offers.

“It is because it’s programed to look for bad guys and so it sees them everywhere. Maybe it needs a rosier outlook.”

They cut Sammy loose.

A minute later there is a knock at the van door, Parker opens it and there is Sammy holding the food box. Parker freezes.

“Is that a bomb?”

Sammy opens the box.

“It’s two bombs, one bacon and one artichoke and an ouzi rice with lamb.