Judgment at Alcatraz by Dave Edlund (carter reed .txt) 📕

Semtex packed into the bus would detonate. Close to the worst possible outcome, but not unpredicted.

The terrorists were left where they fell after having their fingerprints taken and their faces photographed. Then a military demolitions team arrived at the site. By now, a couple days had passed, and the corpses were bloating. Didn’t matter to the IDF. What they would do was far more severe than allowing the Muslim cadavers to decay in the midday heat.

The military engineers wrapped each of the five bodies in det cord, which also secured ten bricks of C4 explosive to each body. It was a grisly task, but none of the engineers shied from their duty. The slaughter of the school children fueled a raging hatred that only time could quench.

Once their task was completed, all retreated a safe distance. And then, with cameras rolling, the detonator was pressed. In a microsecond, the remains of the five terrorists vaporized. All that was left was a red mist that slowly settled across the arid land.

In the days following the tragedy, Danya came to realize what had nagged her so much at the outset of the mission. No escape vehicle, no means of egress, other than the bus itself, which was clearly a poor means of escape. The terrorists had never intended to leave alive, nor had they intended to allow the hostages to be rescued. Their aim was to attract global attention to their cause, and to impose a severe penalty upon the Israeli people and government for past transgressions.

Although the Mossad team, under her command, performed like clockwork, they could not prevent a disastrous outcome to the mission. It was a bitter lesson, one that she refused to forget. A lesson that seemed relevant to her current situation.

She surveyed the young faces gathered around her, and vowed to do all she could to prevent any harm to these hostages.

She whispered in Sue’s ear, “Did you see any of the terrorists carrying bags or backpacks?”

“No. Just those ugly machine guns, or whatever they are.”

Good. Maybe they don’t have any explosives.

Danya continued surreptitiously surveying the guards and the features defining the room they were in. There were four gunmen, and they appeared to be more relaxed than they should be. Clearly, they didn’t consider the hostages to be a threat. From the far side of the room, she saw Toby enter, escorted by the woman she’d observed previously speaking with her friend when the other people were taken hostage. Toby walked among the assembled people, but didn’t seem to have a special destination in mind. The woman who’d escorted her spoke briefly to one of the guards before leaving.

“Remember,” Danya said to Sue, “when the shooting starts, hit the floor, all of you. Promise me.”

The school teacher nodded. “We will. I promise.”

“I need to go see someone. I’ll look for you later.” Danya rose and walked across the floor to Toby.

At the sight of her friend, Toby smiled and closed the gap.

“Thank God. I’m so happy to see you. I didn’t know where you were, or if you were safe. When I couldn’t find you, I was hoping you’d gotten away.”

“Follow me.” Danya led Toby with a hand on her elbow.

They sat on the floor close to the door she’d entered through. She noticed the red mark on Toby’s check.

“What happened?”

“One of the terrorist leaders hit me after I called him and his girlfriend crazy.”

“The woman that directed you in here—she’s the girlfriend?”

Toby nodded. “They asked me to join them. Said they want me to be the spokeswoman for the group.”

“Did they say what they want? What their demands are?”

“Nothing specifically. But generally, they want ancestral lands to be returned. I don’t know exactly how they think that’s supposed to happen. But they have drones loaded with radioactive material, and they said they will release it over the Bay Area if their demands aren’t met.”

Danya knew the threat, if credible, was a nightmare scenario. In essence, a poor man’s dirty bomb, without the difficulty of the explosives. It was a threat Mossad had studied in great detail.

“Did they say what type of radioactive material?”

“Cobalt. And another one, an odd name. It began with an S.”

“Strontium?”

“Yeah, that’s it. Cobalt and strontium. They flew one of the drones to San Francisco, they said, to a park, and they were going to call the police and tell them where to find it.”

“Not a good sign. Do you know how many drones they have?”

“I counted seven lined up near the ferry landing. But maybe they have more. I don’t know for sure. Is that stuff—cobalt and strontium—is it bad?”

Danya nodded. “Yeah, it’s bad. If they’re not bluffing—and we have to assume they’re not, since they delivered a sample to the police for authentication—they could render the Bay Area uninhabitable for generations.”

“I don’t understand. Since this radioactive material is so dangerous, how did they manage to get a hold of it?”

Danya raised an eyebrow. “There are a lot of people who will sell anything to anyone for a relatively modest amount of money. Actually, it doesn’t surprise me at all. It was only a question of when, not if.”

“We can’t let them carryout their plan. We have to do something.”

“And we will. Now, tell me everything you can from your conversation. Everything. No detail is too small or insignificant.”

For the next twenty minutes, Toby relayed all she could remember. Periodically, Danya interrupted to ask questions.

No sooner had Toby finished, when Sacheen appeared at the doorway.

“That’s her,” Toby said. “That’s Sacheen.”

s

Sacheen was engaged in conversation with two of the guards.

“The police helicopter is on its way in,” she said. “It will land here soon. Time to collect the kids.”

As if an important question was forming in her mind, she swiveled her head left and right, taking in the large space.

“Where’s Charlie?”

One of the guards shrugged. “Haven’t seen him. Maybe Dolan knows where he is.”

She looked beyond the guard’s shoulder. “Dolan. Come here for a minute.”

The man shuffled over, his weapon still hanging