Chapter 62
Shoshana and I returned to the TOC after breakfast, finding Jennifer behind the computer with a headset on and Aaron watching
the news on TV. Jennifer saw me enter and said, “Roger all. Stand by, Pike just came in.”
She handed me the headset and said, “Veep’s got one of the cell phones.”
Which was a welcome surprise, to say the least. He’d been burning holes in the sky for about an hour and a half with no luck
whatsoever, which is why I’d decided to forgo my next loop around the city and go get breakfast.
Because we had nothing else we could do, but we weren’t content to simply sit and wait, we’d split up into the same teams,
me with Shoshana and Jennifer with Aaron, and had conducted rotations driving around the city looking for bad guys and the
mysterious rental car that had disappeared days ago. The one that might be a VBIED.
We’d focused on likely target areas away from the Jewish center where today’s ceremony was being held precisely because the
security there was airtight. Instead, we’d driven by both the Israeli and American embassies, the Newbery Airport where they’d
arrived, and the Ecoparque where we’d located the van. Unsurprisingly, it was still parked where we’d found it, the terrorists
afraid to retrieve it.
I took the headset and said, “This is Pike, go.”
Veep said, “One of the numbers found on the dead guy’s handset from the park just went live, but only for a few seconds.”
“Where is it? Did you send a grid?”
“I couldn’t get one. It literally turned on and then back off within thirty seconds, but it’s live.”
Shit. I said, “Alright, keep punching holes in the sky. Any issues with doing that?”
“None that I’m aware of. The pilots might have to do a touch-and-go at the airport to pretend like they’re still running a
test flight, but my down time will be minimal.”
I said, “Keep at it. Focus on the area of the city where you picked it up. It might have been running for a minute or two
before you came overhead. I want to pick it up immediately next time.”
I gave the headset back to Jennifer and Shoshana said, “What did he find?”
“One of the cell numbers went active very briefly. Not enough for a lock-on. He didn’t get the chance to interrogate it.”
Shoshana nodded and said, “That’s good news and bad news. The good news is they’ve obviously run out of SIM cards and had
to use an old one. The bad news is they know it can be tracked, so they are turning it on, using it, then turning it off.
Most likely just sending text messages.”
“I agree. Nothing we can do now but wait for it to come back on. You want to make another lap around the city, or do you want
to let Aaron and Jennifer take one?”
Shoshana said, “Their turn. I want to be here in case that phone comes up again.”