will report directly to me,’ Kratos replied. An SAC was the most senior field agent rank within the FBI.
‘Good. It seems you are going to be very busy Mr. Kratos. Don’t let me detain you any further – keep me posted,’ Posey said dismissively, knowing full-well that it would be the attorney general that Kratos would keep well informed.
As soon as the Director of the FBI had left the room, everyone started talking at once. No one voice could be heard above the babble. President Posey decided he had to take back control. Annoyed, he first drummed his fingers on the oval table, a gift to the nation from Richard Nixon in the nineteen-seventies. The drumming had no effect, and so he violently slammed the table with the palm of his hand. Silence was instantly restored, and everyone looked expectantly at the President.
Posey surveyed the room; his dark-blue, penetrating eyes individually eyeballing in turn everyone sitting around the table.
‘Is there anyone in this room who thinks for one goddamned nanosecond that Paul Dias’s so-called accident was nothing less than an attempt to kill him because someone didn’t want him to talk to us about Operation Olympus?’ Posey asked quietly.
No one spoke; a few shook their heads.
‘Outside the people in this room,’ Posey continued in the same aggressive tone, ‘nobody in the whole wide-world knew what this meeting was to be about – how we are going to radically change America and the world – nobody. Let me assure you all,’ he continued, his voice now low and menacing, ‘that Paul Dias’s accident only delays matters; it is by no means the end of Operation Olympus. However, it clearly indicates that someone in this room has, at the very least, been guilty of loose talk or, at the worst…’ Posey paused and let his dark-blue eyes roam around the room again, watching his words sink in. ‘…Or at the worst, is guilty of orchestrating the accident in the hope of completely destroying our efforts.’
There were murmurings of objection among the Cabinet members, which were quickly squashed by a reprimanding glare from Posey.
‘Until further notice, nobody in this room, nor any member of their immediate family, is to leave Washington without my written approval. This meeting is adjourned to a date to be confirmed. I repeat and very, very strongly emphasize that it is adjourned, not cancelled,’ Posey added, much to Themison’s relief.
**
Back in his office in the FBI building less than a mile down Pennsylvania Avenue from the White House, Ari Kratos was receiving an update on the attempt on Secretary Paul Dias’s life.
‘There is some doubt as to what happened, sir. But the limited CCTV footage we have, suggests that the Tesla might, and I stress might, have deliberately swerved into Dr. Dias. We are trying to find any bystanders who filmed the incident. When the Tesla pulled up, the two so-called bodyguards jumped in the car, which then sped off. We haven’t managed to trace it…’ SAC Carl Rutter began, but he was interrupted.
‘Couldn’t you follow it on the CCTV network?’ Kratos drawled.
‘Only until it reached Pennsylvania Avenue, sir; all cameras in the avenue have been compromised. We don’t know where it went,’ Rutter said.
‘Goddammit! I thought all those cameras were made secure from cyber-attack after that fiasco at an inauguration a few years back,’ Kratos snapped.
‘Apparently not, sir,’ Rutter replied. ‘We are reviewing the Department of the Environment and Agriculture’s internal security footage to find out more about the bodyguards. Nobody in the building seems to know anything about them. And we have every available ghetto-bird in the air scouring the whole city for the Tesla.’
‘And have your helicopters seen anything?’ Kratos asked sarcastically. He hated slang synonyms like “ghetto-birds”.
‘No, sir, not yet.’
‘Which suggests it’s already undercover, and that is going to make life damned difficult unless we get lucky with an eyewitness.’
‘I think we need to go public with this one, sir, and as soon as possible. Someone, somewhere must have seen something?’
‘I agree. Leave that one with me, Carl. You get back to the building and take control. I don’t know what the hell Dias was going to talk about, but he sure as hell has got the White House in a spin.’
**
Meanwhile, President Posey had retired to the Oval Office accompanied by Vice President Peta Hopeit, Attorney General Adam Themison, and the president’s chief of staff, Jake Jefferson.
Themison knew that Posey considered the little group now sitting nervously in front of the president’s desk, to be his inner Cabinet, his highly trusted friends, at least, to the extent that a politician can have highly trusted friends. The group usually included Paul Dias. Sometimes Adam Themison wondered just how trustworthy even this little group was.
‘Right, so who do you think it is?’ Posey asked, spreading his hands wide as if opening the floor for discussion.
‘Are you for real, sir?’ Peta Hopeit asked. ‘You seriously think someone in the Cabinet is attempting to de-rail this whole project?’
‘Oh, come-on girlie,’ Posey said.
Themison knew the ploy well; he had seen the President use it many times. Posey wanted to stir up his vice president with unseemly familiarity because he knew that, when mad, Peta Hopeit would say exactly what she felt.
‘We’re all politicians, girlie; we do what we think is necessary to achieve our ends…whatever the cost,’ Posey continued.
‘I think that is highly cynical and offensive, sir…’ Peta began.
‘Yeah? So, who do you think it is?’ Posey asked again, ignoring her objection.
‘Haden Ploutonos,’ she replied without hesitation.
‘Why?’ Posey asked.
Themison smiled inwardly at the president’s intuitive success; he knew Posey loved being right.
‘Because he hates any suggestion of change that is not instigated by him. It’s either him or Eve Até…’ Peta said, but she was interrupted again.
‘Eve! She’s not even in the Cabinet…’ Jake Jefferson was about to defend his principal secretary when he too was interrupted.
‘Don’t be so goddamned naive, Jake. Ploutonos has being screwing her for years; why do you think she is on your staff? And we all know that she loves making mischief,’ Posey said with a knowing glance at the Attorney General.
‘This is far more than making mischief, Mr. President,’ Adam Themison said quietly, yet he couldn’t hide his embarrassment. He didn’t think anybody knew about his one brief indiscretion with Eve Até at a Party conference many, many years ago. If Posey knew, then who else now had that potentially fatal piece of intelligence about him?
‘Indeed, it is, Adam. Indeed, it is,’ Posey said, rubbing his eyes with the tips of his fingers. Themison realized that the president was very tired from all the stress that his office entailed, despite his bluster.
‘This could completely destroy our grand plan;
