Ben Solomon, at the next console, groaned. “It’s going to get dicey here. Ava never gets it in one. And she flubbed her lines at both rehearsals. And look who she’s paired with. Chip Manning—”
Hal smiled at the remarks of his sixty-year-old assistant director. He’d heard several like it in the past ninety minutes. But that was Ben. After hiring the man for this job consistently for the past nine shows, Hal knew what to expect.
“It’s a crying shame what this business has come to,” Ben muttered. “Chip Manning teaches a couple of government trainees a few karate chops at a Sunset Strip dojo and his press agent calls him ‘a career martial artist who advises members of America’s intelligence community.’ And Ava Stanton is nothing more than a glorified supermodel. She’s no Elizabeth Taylor, that’s for sure.”
“She’s no Elizabeth Berkeley,” Green replied, suppressing a laugh. “But that’s what we’ve got now, Ben. Ava Stanton wiggles her assets on a prime time soap and she’s a star.”
“Please,” Ben muttered in genuine horror. “Don’t use that term with me. I remember the real stars— Bogart, Jimmy Stewart, Bette Davis, Bergman—”
“What the hell is that?” Hal suddenly cried.
Rising to his feet, he lifted his gaze from the monitors to stare through the immense windows overlooking the auditorium. Ben tried to rise but got tangled in his headset. He heard confused cries, shouts, even nervous laughter from the audience.
Chip Manning and Ava Stanton had just launched into their scripted “off-the-cuff-sounding witty banter” when they’d been upstaged by a prop. Behind their backs, the top of the huge Silver Screen Awards sculpture had opened up and eight armed men wearing black masks had slid down short ropes to the stage.
This absurd, ridiculous, almost surreal scene had been greeted by nervous titters of laughter mingled with cries of surprise and alarm. Is this all a part of the show? the audience collectively wondered. Maybe a publicity stunt for Chip Manning’s new movie?
“Clear the stage!” Hal Green shouted into his headset. “Security, get them off, now—”
Obeying the director, several security men rushed onto the stage to intercept the masked invaders. Armed only with nightsticks and electronic stunners, they’d never had a chance. Every trained assassin had dropped to one knee, raised his weapon, and fired into the uniformed ranks.
The explosion of weapons, then the red tracers warbling across the stage to rip through flesh, muscle, and bone had ended any notion that this was some sort of prearranged stunt. People in the audience stumbled into the aisles, trampled over each other, trying to flee the auditorium, only to be turned back at the doors by the handsome ushers and seat escorts provided by the Dodge Modeling Agency. These young men, who’d already donned black headscarves and green armbands, waved submachine guns, firing into the air in an effort to throw back the panicked mob.
Meanwhile, on stage, Chip Manning and his tough-guy five o’clock shadow were giving the world a demonstration of his martial arts skills. With lightning quick evasive maneuvers, he’d managed to flee the attacking gunmen faster than his lovely co-presenter who, hobbled by her high heels, was easily brought down by the butt of an assassin’s gun.
Up in the control booth, the director heard a crash, turned to find a trio of armed men breaking in. Black headscarves covered all but their eyes, and each carried some kind of machine gun with a banana clip and a big ring under its barrel.
The single security guard inside the booth aimed his sidearm. The chatter of a machine gun stopped him, eliciting cries of horror from everyone in the small space.
“Put your hands up!” One of the masked men was aiming his short, stubby machine gun at the control booth crew. The invader slapped a gloved hand on Hal’s shoulder and roughly yanked him off his chair, to the floor.
“Bastard,” Ben Solomon spat. He tried to strike back, but the terrorist threw the older man off, hitting him with the butt of his gun.
“Ben!” Hal cried.
Now both men were cowed and down on the floor. The masked man herded them into a corner. The second gunmen pushed the soundman and the rest of the staff into the opposite corner.
The third masked man strode to the center of the control booth, machine gun resting on his elbow. He scanned the room, then spoke.
“This auditorium, this event is now in the control of the United Liberation Front for a Free Chechnya. Cooperate and you may live. Resist and you will most surely die.”
“LAPD respond! Respond!” cried the uniformed dispatcher over the radio. “This is an emergency, the Chamberlain Auditorium is under attack. There’s gunfire, officers down. Repeat. We are under assault.”
Static was the only answer.
Security Chief Tomas Morales squeezed the dispatcher’s shoulder. “The system’s down. Or the signal’s jammed. We can’t talk to the outside. I hope the cops figure out what’s going on. Until then, let’s open up the arsenal.”
Nodding, the young dispatcher stood and hurried to the next room.
“The goddamn phones are out too,” said a woman at the next desk, a bank of security monitors in front of her. Heavyset, with short red hair, Cynthia Richel slammed the receiver into hits cradle. Today was her forty-fifth birthday.
Cynthia turned to the security chief. “I could have predicted this, Tomas. In fact, I did predict this. I told them land lines. Land lines. But the architect ignored me and went wireless. He put control of everything through that goddamn computer. ‘Sanjore’s vision of the future,’ claimed the papers.” Cynthia snorted. “Well guess what? When the shit hits the fan, the future doesn’t work!”
Morales shifted his gaze to the dozens of monitors in front of Cynthia, all displaying scenes of terror and chaos, save one.
“The network has gone to commercials,” noted Morales.
“Someone’s thinking.”
The dispatcher returned, handed out weapons. Cynthia dangled the barrel of a handgun between thumb and forefinger. “What am I supposed to do with this. I’m a computer programmer.”
That wasn’t entirely true and Tomas Morales knew it. Before joining Summit Studios, of which the Chamberlain Auditorium was a part, she’d been an intelligence officer in the U.S. Air Force.
Morales checked his weapon, removed the safety. “Then tell me what’s wrong with the computers.”
Cynthia Richel set the gun onto the desk. “Five minutes ago some kind of overlord program took control of our security protocols—”
A succession of strange noises interrupted her. Over the sounds of shots, screams, and thundering feet, the entire auditorium shook from an eerie, rhythmic booming, like dozens of gongs sounding off one after the other.
Cynthia’s full face went pale.
“What’s wrong?” asked the dispatcher.
Morales already knew. “That was the sound of the steel doors closing all over the auditorium. Those doors are meant to be activated in case of fire — after the building has been evacuated — to isolate the damage to one section of the structure.”
“Now they’re obviously being used as jail house doors,” said Cynthia, “to trap all of us inside.”
Morales scanned Cynthia’s computer screen. “Can’t you do something?”
“Sure.” Cynthia Richel picked up the weapon again, this time by the handle. She checked the magazine like a professional, flicked off the safety. “Tell me where to aim.”
Special Agent Craig Auburn had memorized the evacuation route the old-fashioned way, by walking it ten times.