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Driver |
| Written by Rick Robinson | |
| Tuesday, 27 November 2007 | |
On his right forearm, and it was growing. Mild at first, then like an insistent mosquito bite he had to scratch. He hated scratching, feeling like some man-animal having to rake his fur. He wondered what it would mean this time. He tried not to move. The day was bright, the cherry blossoms doing justice in front of the Capitol building. He waited with the other drivers, all standing in a row leaning against their limos waiting for their charges in the cool morning in Washington DC. Senator Helios was late for the airport. He was always late for the airport. Ever since Helios started to use charter flights in his second term, he had no motive to hurry. He could take his time, working the halls of Congress for whatever self-serving project he was promoting. Build consensus, make deals, gain votes. Win. He always won. The tickle was a warning. Driver was nervous. The other drivers in the line took up the position. Arms folded, standing at the left-front of the black Crown Victoria, they looked like a row of Men-In-Black statues with black caps and dark sunglasses. Driver looked down the line, wondering if others felt any premonition, any foreboding. Were they on guard too? He thought. No one seemed concerned, all game-faced waiting the same way they did every morning. Blue-tooth in their ear, ready for the call to prepare and leave, Congress would be recessing today and they would return to their districts en masse. The border-security vote would wait. Again. Closing the US borders was a big issue in a election year. He hoped the tingle would leave. Sometimes it did. When it didn’t, he knew something was coming. He had to think and remember the Homeland Security procedures for congressional drivers. Remember the evasive procedures they taught at the Bondurant Driving School. And where the closest safe haven was. From here at the Capitol building, it was behind the Four Seasons hotel on 5th Street NW and O Street. NSA agents, or the FBI would take the Senator from there, and Driver would go to debrief at the Department of Transportation, his employer. He felt he was now ready, but he didn’t know what for. His heart was racing, the tingle growing, spreading down his arm. The Senator’s office rang in his ear, depart in five minutes. The Senator was in the Limbo Bar, a street level watering hole at the south side of the Cannon House Office tower, a five-story glass box of offices. Other drivers were getting their calls, and the group began to move. He found a spot directly in front of the bar on C Street SE just around the corner of New Jersey Ave SE and parked. He assumed the position again, seeing Senator Drago’s driver pulling up nearby. Helios and Drago had Bloody Mary’s together many mornings. This was their sendoff before the recess. Helios security detail was lounging near the entrance by the Closed sign. He chatted with Drago’s guard, and seemed to enjoy the spring morning. No one looked on alert. But it didn’t feel right. Driver felt stupid. These tingles, like premonitions of nothing, were embarrassing. He again didn’t tell anyone, even though the last time the tingle happened it was just before the attempt on the Chief Justice’s life. The shooter was caught, an illegal immigrant from Central America. Helios was on an immigration committee panel with the Chief Justice at the time. The shooter was caught purely by luck just before he started blasting. His machine pistol was ready to rip. The Chief was the target—he’d have got Helios as collateral damage. He tried to ignore it, looking down his fingers now sparkling, insistent though it was. And getting stronger. He could see the senators moving inside the bar, getting coats and turning toward the door. Just now exiting as the security guys fell in step behind them under the awning. The senator’s overcoats flew back behind them as they were lifted up and blown backward, glass raining down on the group. The concussive impact from a block away shattered the face of the building, raining shards of greenish tempered glass and framework down to the street. Driver fell to the curb between left front wheel and gutter, face down. Booming echo’s ricocheted off the facing buildings as they bent under the surge of the truck bomb that had detonated behind the Capitol Buildings rear entrance. The east entrance and back half of the Capitol Building collapsed, encasing hundreds of already dead victims under tons of cement and woodwork. Heavy with traffic from the Congressional recess proceedings, the terrorists had scored a victory. With the materials assembled in Central America, easily transported over the borders in rural Texas, the bomb was constructed as a conventional tactical weapon to be used against Congress, to achieve the objective of disrupting the US government and destroy a US national icon. It worked, again. They rushed to act before congress closed the borders. Driver was partially pinned under the shroud of aluminum framework, miraculously only mildly bleeding from a cut on his arm: just where the tingle used to be. The large gash had clotted, as he awoke and raised his head to see the awning had collapsed showing a leg and shoe visible beneath the rubble. People shouting, someone screaming, sirens blaring as the US takes the first terrorist attack since 911. Driver laid back, hearing in his mind the alarmist talk-show host Helios liked so much, who warned, ‘Trust your intuitions. Another is coming. ‘
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