scurry out of sight.
"Are there any rats down here?"
"Nah, the alligators eat'. Lets go."
"Crap, I hate tunnels," groans Andy as they quick walk through the domed passage.
"How will you know when we're there?"
"See those code numbers on the wall? That's how. The master map is on of the Facilities Administration web site. They're a coordinate system."
About ten minutes later Jim says, "Ok, we're almost... Wait, that's it," as he points to a code on the wall. Above them they can see tiny, pencil thin shafts of light piercing through a metal cover. A steel ladder is fixed to the wall leading up to it, about ten feet above the ceiling of the tunnel.
"We're not as deep over here as we were back at Bander. This part of the campus is a bit lower. They made the tunnels more or less flat so they can push equipment through. I'm texting Phil, you text Ben and Ryan."
A few minutes later Andy says, "All clear."
"Ditto from Phil. Here we go," says Jim as he starts up the ladder. Andy follows a moment later.
At the top, Jim carefully and quietly pulls a locking bolt and slowly raises the metal door. A beam of light descends into the shaft.
Jim whispers, "Bingo, we're right under them."
He very carefully and silently raises the metal door to the vertical position and locks it place. Cautiously he climbs higher and looks around.
Beneath the trailer it is dark, but all around the sandy white concrete in the midday sun glares brilliantly. He crawls out. Andy climbs up and joins him under the trailer.
Stealthy, they crawl in opposite directions and, about one third from each end of the trailer, they affix Andy's microphones. While most of the trailer floor is wood, parts are steel, the magnets will work perfectly. Steel is a good conductor of sound.
Andy creeps back into the shaft and then down into the tunnel as Jim affixes a final microphone beneath the center of the trailer then slips back into the shaft. He closes the hatch above him and slides the bolt back in place.
"Where's the Ethernet?" Andy asks.
"Right here," says Jim pointing to a covered metal outlet cabinet. "They had these installed at all the entrance points since so much of the HVAC system now is computer controlled. The Facilities engineers all have laptops and can control just about any heating, ventilation or A/C system on campus with them but they need hardwired access down here. The campus wireless network doesn't reach this far."
Opening the outlet cabinet, Andy sees the RJ45 socket and a power strip. He pulls out a small device, plugs it into the power strip and connects a short Cat5 cable between it and the campus Ethernet port. He pauses until a small LED glows green.
"Working! This will grab the weak signals from the wireless mics and resend them over the network," he says.
As they turn to leave, Jim says, "No, this way. We'll go out through the dome. Just in case anyone spotted us back in Bander."
The dome exit is only a few hundred feet away. The door from the tunnel opens to a sub-basement. Jim turns out the lights in the tunnel, locks the door behind them and they climb the stairs to the main floor. From there, the leave via one of the many doors designed to accommodate large crowds.
Outside they wave to Ryan and Ben who join them. From about 100 yards away they survey the trailer. All is still. Andy pulls out a very rooted smart phone. He taps and drags at its screen.
"Everything's working fine, I'm getting data streams from all three. It's all being captured on a server."
"Can you hear anything?" asks Ryan.
Quickly attaching a Bluetooth ear piece and tapping the screen again he pauses, listens and says, "Wow, better than I thought! I can hear them talking as though I were in the room!"
"Are they saying anything important?"
"Nope, just a lot of crap."
"We better get lost. We don't want to seem too popular over here. I say we head back to the Union," says Jim.
"Good, I'm hungry," says Ryan.
"Didn't you just have a pizza?" asks Ben.
"Yeah, but that was a whole hour ago," says Ryan as they head down the wide walkway towards the main part of campus and back to the Union.
Friday, April 15, 2022
Time: 1:00 PM
Gathering in the Union for another lunch, the guys sit among the fast food debris, wrappers, cups, paper plates. Andy fiddles with his smart phone. Ryan is on his laptop, Ben and Phil are texting. Jim is leaning back and staring at the ceiling.
Ryan finally looks up and say, "Alright, guys. What'a we do now?"
Jim, still staring at the ceiling says, "Expose them."
"How?" asks Phil.
"Hold that thought, Mark's here," says Ben.
They look towards the main entrance. Mark and another agent are at the far end of the dining area.
"Quick, Phil, follow me. After the Carrington incident, we don't want him to see you with us, in case he gets any ideas," says Jim.
They dash out a nearby exit into the underground pedestrian corridor that connects to Langly Hall and, from there, into another underground corridor. A moment later, they emerge from the Physics Building and walk calmly across a small quad of buildings towards the bush shrouded back entrance to East Gym.
Back in Jim's loft, Andy begins looking over the logs on his computer. He flips through screens of text intently and then turns and says, "I think I got something."
"What?"
Bader got an encrypted message with the time table and the final details. Now I know where the command center is."
"Where?"
"A farm, about half way between Mason City and the Illinois line. NSA has taken over the place. They're secretly sending in Apache helicopters. Here, I have a satellite map."
"How old is that picture?"
"A year or so."
"Can you get something current?"
"Maybe, I know a geo-mapping database site that might have something current. I'll check."
A few minutes later he announces, "Yep, here's one. Taken in the last 12 hours."
They study the picture and see the area has several trucks poised near the farm house and a few satellite uplinks. Several large dark areas can be seen in the farm yard.
"Where are the copters?"
"Probably under camouflage nets, those darker areas. Let me work on this and see what I can piece together. I'll meet you guys back at the Union around 5."
"Ok, see you then," says Jim as he leaves for class.
Time: 5:00 PM
They gather back at the Union. Andy has his laptop. He plugs the power brick into a wall socket and turns it on.
"So what's the schedule?"
"Well, from the Bader intercept, and what I was able to extract from the other files, Munson gets to DSM then takes a helicopter at about 1:30 PM that lands out on the roof of the parking garage. They escort him across 23rd Street at about 2:45 PM which will blocked off from both ends. He enters Bander from the north side, up the elevator to the first floor and then a bit of prep time, makeup, cold drink, whatever. Then in the lobby, he does a meet and greet with President Alec and some locals. Then they walk out the main entrance and onto that platform they're building in front of same. There will be risers behind them. Munson and Alec will take chairs behind the podium and the other dignitaries will be seated in front of the platform with the rest of the crowd."
"Risers?"
"Yeah, full of the student prop people, who will be expected to look raptured by every word he says."
"Nice."
"Allec will make the introduction, Munson takes the podium, cue the networks, set for 3 pm. DeWitt is at a fund raising conference for moonbat political action groups in San Francisco along with her billionaire boys club who finance them. "
"At 3:05 a bomb goes off under the podium killing Munson. It's all broadcast live on the networks and cable TV."
"Then bombs will go off in Kansas City, Saint Louis, Atlanta, Columbus, and other places. Main feeder p
ower lines on the Midwestern ISOs are next, cell phone and land line communications are cut."
"In the confusion, DeWitt's Homeland goons strike and round up the convention delegates, governors, and so forth. The convention is decapitated."
"How does she get the Homeland people into the state capitals?"
"They're already there. Thousands of them. They're in hiding, waiting for the word."
"A 'shocked' DeWitt is informed within minutes that Munson is dead and that there have been bombings across the country. About an hour later, at a quickly arranged press conference, she gives an 'impromptu' stem winder of a speech blaming the assassination on confederationalist radicals in the Convention movement and their tea party and the state rights supporters."
"She says that she's discovered that this is all part of a plot to take over the government through the Convention. She'll say she was working with Munson on a compromise. She'll say that Munson was going to expose the radicals in the convention and renounce them and, for this, he was assassinated by his own people. She'll claim to have proof that these same radicals were also ready to commit terrorist acts elsewhere and she'll describe the plan to sabotage Indian Point."
"She'll claim that the Convention movement has been subverted and that it's now a threat to the country. She'll declare marshal law, hit the Internet kill switch, and order a shutdown of all non-approved communications nationwide, saying that she's doing it to protect the country from a radical, anti-progressive coup."
"Then she'll say that, in the name of national security, she's dissolving the Convention and Congress, canceling the Fall elections, taking control of the rebel state governments and ordering a roundup of the opposition leadership."
"The military will