“Ripple attack,” she said, blanching. “First hit I-Drive with the gas, then they get in the water. They try to get under and hold their breath as long as possible…”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Heather Parker was blue-eyed, 5’4” tall, with her hair colored blonde and brown in layers. Her favorite song in the world was “Breakaway” by Kelly Clarkson. She had just turned fourteen two weeks before and, as her grandmother put it, she was “blossoming.” The bathing suit that she’d bought just six months ago that fit fine up top then was, well, way too small. But while certain parts hurt, she generally didn’t mind the stares. In fact the day before, her mother had dressed her down right solid for, as Mama put it, “preening.” What Heather was paying attention to through most of the dressing down, though, was a red and white Ford GT. She wasn’t sure what exactly she’d give up to take a ride in that GT, but it was a lot.
Heather’s family was down on midwinter break from Soddy Daisy, a small town outside of Chattanooga, Tennessee. She, her parents and her two brothers had driven down all of Friday, fighting the traffic, and yesterday was the first day they’d had in Orlando. The parents had decided that they wanted to go to Wet and Wild so was it her fault if the only bathing suit she had didn’t fit?
Heather enjoyed the stares but she enjoyed swimming just as much. She wanted to be an Olympic swimmer when she grew up but since the only pool she ever had access to was the county pool in Redbank, there wasn’t much chance of that. But she loved to swim, which was why she did it every chance she got.
She’d done all the rides at this point and was just enjoying the wave pool. The water got pulled in through grates, then pumped back out, making the wave action. It caused a huge splash up against the wall, but you could dive down, get pushed out and back and just generally enjoy the water there.
It was also the main source of processed water for the entire park.
Massoud Faroud also could not be called a sleeper agent. In fact, jihadist was pushing it. “Dupe” would probably be the best word. While he, too, stood with his fellows at the end of services and shouted “Death to the Infidel,” deep down he wasn’t sure about this whole jihad thing. Yes, the Prophet had declared the will of Allah, that the whole world must submit to the shariah.
But Massoud had lived under shariah law in Afghanistan. And, given the choice, he much preferred working as a maintenance man at Wet and Wild. Yes, the Prophet had decreed that women should be decently covered but… The Prophet, blessings be upon him, had never been to Wet and Wild. If he had, he’d probably have written something like “women should always wear bikinis. Preferably ones one or two sizes too small on top.”
But Massoud was a maintenance “engineer” at Wet and Wild. And he had lived under the Taliban. So when the imam cornered him and introduced him to some rather unpleasant gentlemen, one of whom spoke Pashtun as his native tongue, he had known he was, as his American boss would have put it, screwed. It was “Death to the Infidel” or “Death to Massoud.” Looked at that way, well…
On the other hand, they’d also promised that it wasn’t, in fact, “Death” to the infidel. The material was supposedly a caustic agent. All it was supposed to do was sting and possibly hurt the eyes, thus showing that the Movement could strike anywhere and any time. Prophet’s Beard, peace be upon it, they put that in the water all the time. In fact, Massoud had tried to point out that even high molar acid in the quantities they were inserting wouldn’t do much more than make people pissed. The unpleasant gentlemen had told him to mind his own business.
But he’d gotten the two blue barrels into the injection facility easily enough; it was part of his job after all. And, using all appropriate hazardous material handling techniques, he had gotten the two barrels, which had to be mixed in transfer, set up to inject. All sorts of stuff got added to the water all the time. Chlorine, of course, but also bases, stabilizers, softeners, hardeners for when the softeners were too soft and even materials to make the water more “slippery.” One or two more blue barrels in the large room was nothing to notice.
“You’re sure about this?” Massoud asked, taking the lock off of the lock-out/tag-out switch. “It’s not going to do much. It might not even be noticed. If it’s a base, I’d need to reduce the chlorine input—”
“Just turn it on,” the man snarled in Pashtun.
“Right,” Massoud said, flipping the switch up. The material started dumping but it wasn’t going at full flow. The suction from the injector was pulling some up, but just a trickle was getting into the water which for sure wouldn’t be noticed. He’d have to start the pump to get it all dumped. And he suddenly realized that the Pathan asshole probably didn’t know that. He might not notice the material was barely draining out for a while. Possibly never if he left soon enough.
There was no such thing as soon enough to Massoud.
Mike pulled the GT to a screaming stop on the same concrete pad the Orange County deputy occupied. The deputy was keying his shoulder-mounted radio with one hand and had his pistol drawn with the other. When Mike came screaming up, the radio was ignored for a two-point stance.
“Freeze!” the cop shouted. “Identify yourself!”
“Your boss is my bitch?” Mike asked. “And so are you if you don’t put down the piece?”
“Lieutenant Britney Harder,” Britney said, standing up with her ID out and her hands up. “Special Operations Command. U.S. Army SOCOM, that is,” she added since every dinkwater town had their own “Special Operations Command” these days.
The cop duck-walked forward, weapon still extended, then did a very credible weapons control maneuver to retrieve the ID. His jaw flexed, then he looked over at Mike.
“You?”
“Oh, Mike Jenkins,” Mike said, holding up his Georgian driver’s license.
When the cop walked over and took it from him, Mike waited until his eyes flickered to the license in confusion then, somewhat politely, removed the pistol from the police officer’s hand.
“Okay,” Mike said, laying the weapon between the officer’s eyes. “Here’s how it’s going to go. I don’t have time to fuck around with you. Call dispatch, tell them that we have a WMD terrorism incident at Wet and Wild and we need more response. Clear?”
“Clear,” the cop said, shaking his hand. The snatch had been lightning and his finger was nearly ripped off.
“Who I am is none of your fucking business,” Mike said, dropping the magazine, then disassembling the Sig Sauer one-handed. He held the pieces out to the stunned officer. “And there are people about to die.”
“Who?” the cop shouted as Mike started running for the entrance.
“Anyone who gets between me and where I’m going.”
“The level is not going down very fast,” the Pathan said, looking over at Massoud. “It is not going down as fast as it is supposed to. Why?”
“Hmmm…” Massoud said, frowning at the set-up through his mask. “I don’t understand it. We’re all hooked up. Injectors are open…”
“This is a pump, yes?” the Pathan said, drawing a pistol out from under his HazMat suit. “You will engage the pump, yes?”
“I knew I forgot something,” Massoud said. “Damn. The pump!”
“You will stop stalling,” the Pathan said, cocking the pistol and pointing it at his head. “You will start the pump. Now.”
VX is an organophosphate chemical and, as noted, rather stable. However, one of the things that will convert it to a nontoxic chemical is chlorine. Except at very high temperatures it doesn’t do so well, but it does do so. Thus the small quantities of VX that had been picked up had, thus far, had little or no effect. Most of the molecules were converted to an inert state, virtually harmless to anyone but a California Environmental Scientist, who would probably get cancer from them.