Globusz^® Publishing 

At Tariq Amin’s mansion on the hill overlooking the bay in Baku, his servant opened the front door and respectfully bowed as he let Amin, Max Landau, and two soldiers in. They followed Amin as he led them down a hallway that was adorned with expensive artwork and into a prayer room where they kneeled down and gave thanks.

After a few minutes, Tariq said to Landau, “I should spend more time in prayer, but there’s no need to hold up our progress. If things have calmed down at the docks, you and the men could take the parts from the garage down to the yacht and begin the assembly, I’ll join you shortly.”

“Yes, Tariq,” Landau said before he and the two soldiers left the prayer room. Landau then made a telephone call down to the yacht to check the status of the area, and things were back to normal. He then ordered two of the soldiers to bring the military truck up to the mansion.

In the prayer room, Tariq Amin was still kneeling down in thankful prayer. He then sat up with his head raised, his arm extended, and his hands open, and was hardly able to contain his elation because the first phase of his plan was nearly complete and had cost him far less then he expected. By tomorrow morning, four deadly weapons will be on their way to four major cities around the world. Amin was pleased with the odds that at least one of the four bombs would make its way to the targeted city. Amin left the prayer room feeling really good about him self and had an enthusiastic bounce in his step as walked to his first floor study to get on his computer. His long awaited moment was almost here, and there was no reason why he should not start preparing his letter claiming responsibility for the disaster that would soon befall the four cities. On that fateful morning, Amin and the rest of the world will be watching the televised news as millions of people begin fleeing the poisoned cities. Amin fantasized as he saw himself walking from the television over to the computer and pressing the send key as he proudly transmits his letter to all of the world’s major news agencies.

“I Tariq Amin, guided by the will of Allah, take full responsibility for the bomb blasts in the cities of New York, Los Angeles, Paris, etc. The infidels have no one to blame but themselves for this just punishment. For too long, the faithful people of Islam have tolerated the transgressions of the infidels... ”

‘That’s a fine start,’ Amin thought, ‘There will be plenty of time to finish the letter later.’

It was not long before the military truck was backing into the spacious garage where Max Landau and the other two soldiers were waiting to guide the truck in and close the garage door behind it. Not being familiar with this particular neighborhood, Landau was not about to take any chances with Amin’s rich nosey neighbors that might have a lot of lazy time on their hands.

“Was there any problems at the dock after we left?” Landau asked.

“Nothing that we couldn’t handle,” said one of the soldiers, “The police came and looked at us and drove away like cowards, then an ambulance came to clean up the two bodies.”

“What about our men who were shot?”

“They’re fine, they’re on their way back to Ismailly for treatment.”

“You did good, we don’t need to call attention to ourselves around here, and I don’t suppose that Abdula’s body washed up yet?”

“Either he’s one hell of a good swimmer, or he’s dead,” the soldier said.

The men began to load the first of four five-foot by three-foot wooden boxes into the back of the truck.

As they were loading the last box, Tariq Amin walked into the garage sipping some wine. He walked up to the men and motioned Landau away for a private conversation.

“Still no word from Tafar?”

Landau was expecting the question and pretended to ignore it by running back over to the truck to help the soldiers wrestle with getting the last box tied down on the truck. Then he walked back to Amin and said, “I’m sorry, Tariq, what did you ask?”

“I asked you if there was any word from Tafar.”

Landau looked down at his feet and said, “I lifted our communication blackout to call Tafar and Ella. I didn’t want to have to tell you this, Tariq, I was hoping that Ella would be here to tell you herself.” He looked at Amin and could see in his eyes that he was already braced for the pain.

“Tafar is dead, Ella thinks it was the same CIA agents that foiled our plan in Batumi. She is concerned that they might have followed us to Baku.”

Amin bowed his head sadly and walked away to another part of the garage. Not fived minutes before, he was on top of the world, now he has just heard that his best soldier is dead, and the bastardly CIA could very well be outside his mansion gates right now. He threw his wineglass smashing it on the garage wall.

Landau followed him and said, “I know this is hard for you, but war takes its toll on the lowliest soldiers and the bravest of leaders.”

“Yes, Tafar was a good soldier, my first, and my finest. I’ll never forget when I first met him. He came from a poor family, but that is what I was looking for, someone who was hungry, and ready to prove himself. I saw something special in him, he had that strong, fearless quality that very few leaders have. Damn, I should have ordered him to send someone else to Tbilisi ”

“You mustn’t blame yourself, Tariq, he wouldn’t have listened to you anyway, he wanted to go himself, and you couldn’t have talked him out of it.”

“You’re right, he always insisted on doing things himself, especially when he felt responsible for the plan. That’s why our men respected him so much, they knew that he would put his life on the line before he would ask them to. For an uneducated man, he was always looking for ways to further our cause.”

Landau thought for a moment about not telling Amin something that he probably did not want to hear, but he couldn’t stop himself.

“Some of the men, including myself, thought that Tafar was motivated by greed, that more than anything else, he wanted to be rich like you, the man he idolized.”

Amin looked coldly at Landau and said, “What? Do I not pay you all well? None of you has to worry about any earthly pleasures? I’ve always treated all of my soldiers alike, none better than the other?”

“Forgive me, Tariq, that isn’t what I meant, of course you pay us well, and treat us equally and for this we are very grateful. If it weren’t for you we would probably all be lying dead somewhere. Tafar on the other hand was a dreamer, he wanted more, much more than you could ever give any of us.”

Amin snapped out of his mournful thoughts and said, “What Ella said about the CIA, do you think they may be watching us?”

“I doubt it, they could have seized the shipment and arrested us a dozen times by now. Once we load these boxes on the yacht, no one could touch us, half of our army is down in the dock area, and they will fight to the death.”

“You’re right, I probably shouldn’t worry,” Amin said as he pulled out a gold pocket watch from under his robe, “Let’s take the parts down to the yacht, and make sure there are no problems with the components. We’ll leave for Iran at 10:00 P.M.”

“Tonight?” Landau said, “I don’t think that’s a good idea, Tariq, we told the port master that we would set sail in the morning, there’s no need to attract suspicion.”

Amin looked at him and said, “Maybe you’re right, double the guards around the clock, we’ll sail for Iran in the morning.

In the CIA’s RV they were monitoring the activities around the mansion’s garage.

“That truck wasn’t in the garage very long at all,” Frank said as he watched a monitor, “They probably loaded something on that military truck and closed the door to make certain that no one saw them.”

The group in the RV watched as the truck came out of the garage and left the grounds of the mansion and went back down the hill toward the docks.”

“What the hell’s going on,” Hoskins said, “You don’t think that they already had some cesium stored in the mansion? Henry, the military truck has left the mansion and should be coming your way in a few minutes.”

“Yes, I’ve been listening in,” Henry said as he was monitoring the yacht from his location on top of the ‘Maiden’s Tower’, “They just took the tarp partially off one of the crates on the yacht and removed the lid from it. The soldiers are just hanging around eating some grapefruit, but one of them looked like he was measuring the canister inside the crate, but I couldn’t tell for sure,” Henry said.

“Okay, let’s see what they’re up to,” Hoskins said as the video monitor showed that the terrorist truck had just arrived back down on the dock next to the yacht. The local street merchants quickly pushed their carts away from that area of the dock when they saw Max Landau and a soldier get out of the truck. They stood on each side of the truck to help the driver back the vehicle onto the dock near the yacht.

After the truck was backed in, the soldiers manually unloaded one of the boxes from the rear of the truck and carried it onto the yacht. It was immediately obvious to everyone that the new boxes were bigger than the cesium crates, but weighed less as two of the soldiers carried them easily. Landau and another soldier lit up some cigarettes as they stood guard by the front of the truck.

Henry was still on top of ‘Maiden’s Tower’ watching the activities through his binoculars, while everyone in the CIA’s RV were closely watching the video coming in from the predator.

When the soldiers finished loading all four of the new boxes on the yacht, they purposely set one down on the deck near one of the cesium canister crates.

As the soldiers started to remove the top from one of the new boxes, Hoskins said, “Okay everyone, let’s see what the hell’s in that box.”

“I have a very uneasy feeling about what it may be,” Frank said with a fearful voice.

“So do I,” Henry said.

Henry’s binoculars and the camera from the predator intently zoomed in on the soldiers as they used a crowbar to pry open the lid on the wooden box. The lid easily came off and exposed a cylindrically shaped object inside.

“My God, tell me that’s not what I think it is,” David said.

“It has a timer face and a keypad, it’s not a bubble gum machine,” Frank said.

“The bastards are going to assemble dirty bombs right before our eyes,” Hoskins said.

The soldiers on the yacht yelled out to Max Landau to tell him that they were ready. After he hobbled aboard the yacht, Landau took a seat in front of the box holding the bomb and flipped open a small door slot that concealed a battery switch. He turned the switch on and the led display above the keypad lit up. He then typed in a combination of numbers on the keypad and the large door panel on the front of the bomb popped opened exposing its inner core chamber. Landau then told the soldiers to carefully hoist one of the cesium canisters from its crate and lay it inside the bomb where it fit like a hand in a glove. Next, they clamped harnesses around the cesium canister to hold it in place inside the bomb. They closed the bomb’s door shut and started laughing and high-fiving each other in jubilation.

Landau typed in a code on the bomb’s keypad that locked the chamber door panel and he flipped off the battery switch and the LED display went dark. He then has the soldiers transfer the grapefruit from the cesium crate to the new bomb box. Once the bomb box was sufficiently filled with fruit, the soldiers nailed the lid back on the box.

“Seeing that bomb had to be single most terrifying moment of my life,” Brad said.

“I don’t think you’re alone with that thought,” Leslie said.

“The way that canister fit perfectly inside that bomb leads me to believe that they’ve been planning this for some time,” Hoskins said.

“That’s right,” Henry said, “Right down to using the scent of the grapefruits to throw off any bomb sniffing dogs that cargo inspectors might have.”

“For the moment, the only good news is that they didn’t arm the bomb,” Frank said,

“Leslie, you have to get us the best close up shot of the inner-workings of that bomb,” Hoskins said.

Coming right up, I’ll put it on the monitor on the right.”

Within a minute, the monitor showed the rewinding video until Leslie stopped it at a point right before the cesium canister was being loaded into the bomb. She typed in some more commands and the monitor showed a close up still picture of the inner-core of the bomb.

Everyone in the CIA’s RV was quiet for the moment while Frank has his nose to the screen studying the picture.

“What do you make of it, Frank?” Hoskins asked.

“Do you really want me to tell you?” Frank said as he continued to study the bomb on the video picture.

“I’m afraid so.”

Frank pointed to the monitor and said, “You see these boxes on each of the cylinder, they are a pair of French made C-4 modules. You’ll also notice that the bottom and the sides of the bomb are made of a thicker, heavier material than the top door section. This means that the bomb is always bottom heavy and the door will always face pointed upward. When the bomb is triggered, the C-4 has more than enough power to blow open the door and the thin upper casing of the bomb, and catapult the cesium canister skyward, like a bullet. If they place the bomb in a well-constructed concrete pit they’ll get even more altitude on the blast.”

“They’ll probably loosen the lid on the canister too, to make sure the cesium spreads freely in the atmosphere,” Henry said, “The higher the canister is rocketed, the more the wind will spread the cesium.”

“That’s right, and if they were smart enough to get this far, it’s a safe bet that they’ll be smart enough to calculate the best locations, time of day, and weather patterns for the bombs to take full advantage of the wind,” Frank said.

“Maybe we should hold those morbid thoughts for now and focus on a plan to seize the bombs tonight. Henry, you’re the expert, we’ll keep an eye on things and let you work on a good plan to seize those bombs. Give us a call if you need anything at all, we’re not going to screw around with these crazy bastards, if we have to, we’ll drop that yacht to the bottom of the sea.”

“I’m one step ahead of you, Jack, I already had one of my men rig the aft section of that yacht with an explosive,” Henry said.

“You work fast, Henry, we’re going to sign off now and give you time to set up for tonight, We’ll keep the predator armed and ready to assist you the moment you need it.”

“I appreciate that, one thing I know that I’ll need tonight is a night-vision scan of the dock area and the mansion tonight, this way you could back up my people if we miss any unfriendlies moving about.”

“We’ll take care of that, Henry, you could even have your people check in with us so we could chart their locations.”

“Sounds like a plan, I’ll check in with you as soon as it gets dark,” Henry said.

Another set of binoculars was also focusing on the events happening on Tariq Amin’s yacht. The binoculars lowered and revealed the watchful eyes of Abdula Nassir who was observing the situation from another yacht out on the Caspian Sea. Not many people knew that Abdula was a strong swimmer, an ability that he had always taken tremendous pride in. More than once in his younger days he had to swim away from an approaching Israeli gunboat, it was always a case of holding your breath underwater until they passed, or getting shot.

What happened today was by far the most deadly situation that Abdula ever found himself in. Only a few hours ago, the only thing he had on his mind was money, now it was purely revenge. He couldn’t believe that Tariq Amin had the audacity to try to rob and kill him. ‘The feeble old bastard will pay for this’, Abdula thought, ‘He and every living and nonliving thing that Tariq Amin ever held dear will pay for this’.

Abdula put down the binoculars to rest his eyes for a moment and looked behind him at the pool of blood down on the lower deck floor of the yacht. ‘Tariq Amin could only dream of dying so quickly’, Abdula thought to himself.

It was fortunate for Abdula that the retired couple was leaving port and cruising slowly out of the bay so he could grab on to their yacht and climb aboard. After he easily dispatched of the old couple, he took the helm of their boat and cruised a mile out to sea where he tossed the two bloodied bodies overboard. He turned the yacht around and slowly went back into the bay where he continued to keep an eye on Amin’s yacht. He rummaged through the old couple’s personal items on the yacht, looking for money, keys, anything that he could use to help him hide and plan his next attack, and also escape, should the need arise.

For now, he sat patiently waiting and watching for Tariq Amin to make his next move and had every intention of making sure that neither Amin, or his yacht, leaves the Bay of Baku in one piece.

‘Amin’s plans for terroristic grandeur died the day he turned on Abdula Nassir’.