The Big Blue Sky: Chapter Two-Twenty-six

CHAPTER TWO

“…I don’t want any Nano-bots in my medication to tell the government whether or not I’m taking my medication…”
Glen beck May 17, 2010



Doug had dozed off, slumped upon the sofa in the living room. It was less a fitful sleep than an exhausted one. The rain had moved off some time ago, leaving just the cold and damp ,which had worked its way into Doug’s Body. But it wasn’t the cold that wrested him from sleep, but rather Megan. She was shaking him. His eyes fought to open, finding her terribly alarmed. It was then he heard the pounding at the front door. Megan looked to the sound. That’s when Doug noticed the kitchen knife in her hand.

“Dad, wake up!” she exclaimed at hardly more than a whisper. “There’s a strange man at the door."

Doug groaned and forced himself to sit upright.

“Who is it?” he asked blindly. As if to underscore how dumb a question it was, Megan frowned and held up the knife.

Pain thundered in Doug’s head. The Brandy had taken a greater toll than he thought. He climbed unsteadily to his feet, taking the knife from her hand.

“Go upstairs and make sure your sister is okay.”

The knocking continued. It was urgent and loud. Still holding the knife Doug waited until Megan was safely upstairs then went to the door. He looked through the peephole and drew away quickly. Doug looked once more and took a moment, as if he wasn’t actually seeing what was there. It was impossible, he thought. Surely it was a product of the liqour, but when he looked a third time there could be no doubt.

Doug set down the knife and undid the bolt on the door. He turned the handle, pulling harder when the door stuck a bit. It had only opened a crack when Ahmed Fallahi burst through the door and into the front room.

“Hey!” Doug cried, his head suddenly clear. His mind was still fighting to accept all this. What was an Iranian spy doing in his living room and on a night like this? Fallahi was breathless and disheveled. He was dressed in a dark brown suit, which was almost black in the soft light. His black London Fog coat looked as if it had been slept in. Ther was mud on his knees and scratches on his face, probably from navigating the trees in the dark. More than that Fallahi was half out of his mind with fright.

“Douglas, forgive me,” Fallahi fought to collect himself.

“Ahmed, my girls are upstairs.” He took Fallahi firmly by the arm and led him across the room away from the stairs. Doug turned on the lamp beside the sofa. The golden yellow light threw their shadows through the picture window and out onto glistening wet lawn. Beyond that light the world faded to a silken darkness that seemed suddenly alive with danger. The nearest neighbor was better than a quarter mile away, well concealed by the forests and inky blackness of the Michigan night.

“You are the only person I can trust, Douglas.” He looked sharply to Doug. “Have you seen the news tonight?”

Doug fought a wave of emotion, as if tearing the words from his soul one syllable at a time. “I buried my wife today.”

“I am sorry,” said Fallahi, almost dismissively.

“Dad?” Megan appeared at the bottom of the stairs. In one hand she held her phone. She had already dialed nine-one-one, as she’d been taught. Her thumb hovered over the dial button.

“Its all right, sweetheart. There won’t be any trouble.” He looked to Fallahi. “Will there?’

“No, praise god, no!” Fallahi replied.

Doug nodded and Megan retreated back up the steps, leaving the men alone again. Doug sat on the couch. The headache had returned with a vengeance, finding refuge directly behind his eyes. It didn’t help matters as Fallahi anxiously paced the room. Doug felt suddenly queasy and thrust out a hand stopping Fallahi in his tracks.

“You are gonna have to stop that.”

“You understand I am an Iranian Patriot, completely deicated to the revolution that drove out the corrupt Shah and restored my country.”

“Ahmed, it is one in the morning and you are standing in my living room giving me a sales pitch from the Ayahtollah's tourist board.”

“I am sorry,” he said, turning and staring from the window out into the dark night and the wall of trees across the road. “I am so confused and…”

“What is this all about?” Doug asked.

Fallahi paused, and believed he saw something, an errant shadow, an unnatural movement among the trees across the road. He ignored, believing it the product of an exhausted and overburdened mind. He turned back to Doug.

“If our countries went to war legitimately I would fight with all my soul, and if necessary I would gladly martyr myself without hesitation.”

Doug shook his head. The pain behind his eyes was getting worse. “I’m trying to follow…”

“My old friend, make no mistake, our nations will go to war. Perhaps they are at this moment, but I must do everything to stop this war. If nothing else then everyone should know the truth.”

Doug stared blankly at the man. Fallahi was sweating profusely, his eyes darting everywhere, as if searching the room and the air for any answer. He was almost incoherent, a state Doug had never seen in Fallahi before.

“Doulas, I don’t know if I was followed here, but there isn’t much time,” Fallahi pleaded. "I thought several times someone…I tried to…Doug you must help me.”

“Ahmed, you’re not making sense!”

“Something happened today, Doug, but it is not what it seems. This is only the beginning. You must understand that what has happened, and what will happen will change the world as much as the discovery of fire!”

“I can’t…” Doug had heard quite enough. He stood and took Fallahi by the arm, but the man pulled away, almost throwing Doug to the floor. He caught himself and looked up, chagrined and angered to find Megan at the stairs again.

“Dad?” she still held the phone, her thumb still poised. It was up and away from her as if she might throw it or wield it as a weapon.

“Megan, please!” he said sternly, righting himself. “Go upstairs with your sister and close the door!” Doug fumed at Fallahi. “You’re frightening my children, Ahmed.”

But Fallhi’s attention was momentarily distracted, his gaze out the window and at the trees. He had seen something move there and knew what was about to happen. It seemed a proper justice, from some universl point of view, as if the years spent as hunter required balance and for him to become the prey. Strange, he thought, but a man who knows he is condemned feels nothing. He only felt remorse for leading them to a friend’s door, and resolved to lead them away if he could. What other choice did he have. He’d leave and go to his fate hoping that Doug would carry the story, andbegin the investigations and upheavals necessary to put the world to right again, or at the very least find some small justice.

“Listen to me, I haven’t much time,” Fallahi continued. “Just know that everything is a lie. We are being tricked into war for a greedy few, for a Frankenstein monster.” He looked again to the window, but seeing nothing was far worse. His brow crumbled as he turned to Doug again. “They have come for me.”

“Who has come for you?”

Fallahi skirted the question. “A month ago I received information from an informant within the opposition in Tehran. Douglas, a nightmare is about to be unleashed upon the world, a weapon that will shock and horrify beyond any measure of Nagasaki and Hiroshima. Doug, do you remember Istanbul?”

“I don’t…” Doug squeezed his eyes, as if that would help him make some sense of all this.

There was movement again, much closer this time. A shadow slipped past the window with blinding speed. Fallahi missed it, but Doug saw clearly, though there was no chance to react.

Suddenly a man appeared through the still open door. He was dressed from head to toe in black, his trousers tucked into a dully polished pair of combat boots. A wool cap was pulled down tightly, so that only the man’s unblinking dark brown eyes and lips were visible. He was holding a pistol in a gloved and, and it was already pointed at Fallahi.

Two quick shot exploded in the room. The .45 caliber rounds struck the Iranian in the face and exploded the back of his skull, covering Doug with blood, bits of brain and sticky chunks of scalp and hair. Fallahi pitched backwards onto the couch and slid to one side leaving a broad crimson smear across the beige fabric of the couch.

Doug was frozen, unable to move. He was looking at the gunman with a mixture of dread and disbelief. He thought of the girls the instant before the gunman hammered him with a punishing roundhouse in the temple. The world flashed to white, the slug sounding like a freight train for the fraction of an instant before the white faded to a blackness as deep and dark and complete as death.

The Big Blue Sky: Twenty-five

The mood in the White House Press Briefing Room was explosive. This late at night the bleary-eyed reporters, many of whom had already put in a thirteen hour day, squinted against the harsh lights of the windowless room. It was unprecedented that the President would call a Press conference so late. But as developments from the Gulf leaked out steadily there was little doubt as to the subject. Cable news channels picked it up live just after eleven thirty on the east Coast. CBS interrupted David Letterman’s monologue, his usual retinue of devoted fans suddenly staring at an empty presidential podium , a jumble of news cameras and unidentified heads moving back and forth and in and out of focus, as if it was some confused game of musical chairs. They were still milling about and chattering when the president strode unannounced across the plain stage and went directly to the podium without any announcement.

“Just over eight hours ago,” the President began, the reporters caught off guard and quickly scrambling to their seats and camera spots. The President’s expression was as weighted and severe as the moment. At the back of the room the CNN reporter kept talking, some inane nonsense about the rarity of a late night Presidential announcement and missed the first few moments of the speech before being poked in the thigh by a BBC journalist.

“Just over eight hours ago a distress signal was intercepted by one of our ships. That signal contained encrypted information that led Naval personnel to believe they were in fact dealing with a downed American aircraft inside Iran.”

A wave of shock swept through the room, a mixture of gasps and murmurs.


There were heated discussions between the President and his staff prior to calling Press Conference. There were those who thought that the administration should remain quiet and see what hand the Iranians and the republicans would play on this issue. Others believed he should be strong and unwavering, giving the Iranians what amounted to an ultimatum. The opinions were varied and loud, but it was the President’s that won in the end.

The Press and opposition would get the news soon enough and spin or misconstrue the situation to, what he believed would be, a dangerous degree. Moreover the Iranians were awakening and surely would have their own spin on the situation, and would have nearly a day’s lead on the story in Asia and Europe. In the President’s opinion the situation depended upon who got out first and loudest, and he wasn’t about to be second best here. He continued.

“Subsequent information corroborated that conclusion and a decision was made to send in a rescue team. All indications are that Iranian forces ambushed that rescue mission with significant loss of American life.”

The room fell silent. ABC and NBC broke into regular programming a moment later.

“I have subsequently placed all our forces throughout the region on the highest alert. Details remain sketchy, but there have been survivors and they are currently in Iranian custody…”

“Are you considering military action?” someone yelled.

“I can tell you that all options are on the table,” said the President.

“Are any military operations under way?” cried another reporter, a woman from MSNBC.

The President Ignored the question. “We expect the Iranian authorities will adhere to the International rule of law, especially in light that this was in fact a rescue mission, and not a military incursion. We have already made that clear through diplomatic channels directly to the Iranian government…”

“Have you spoken with President Ahmadinejad?”

“We are already using all means at our disposal for the safe and immediate return of our personnel. The full power of the United States military and the Federal government has been mobilized to bring a speedy resolution to this manner, and return our people safely to their families. Thank you.

The room erupted into an uproar as a deafening crescendo of questions chased the President as he strode quickly from the podium.

“Is the US and Iran currently in a state of war?” shouted the man from FOX.

“What about the downed pilot?” asked reporter from the Washington Post. But without acknowledging a single person the President left the stage and was instantly engulfed and ushered away by a phalanx of aides and Secret Service.

The Big Blu Sky-Twenty-four

They stood beside the Bosporus, not far from Molly’s hotel. The lights from the Asia side blinked like so many stars in the building humidity, crowded upon the hillside and silhouetted against the curtain of black night. To the west a storm was growing, tendrils of bright gold and blue lightening reaching across towering thunderheads. The thunderheads built until the jet stream tore away the tops in ghost-white shrouds. The hum and chatter of the living city was silenced in gusts that drew snow-white tassels upon the black waters of the channel. Molly and Doug were leaning on a rail. She felt electric at the warmth of Doug’s arm so close to hers.

She was thinking that it would be nice if Doug kissed her, though she would never have dared to utter such a thought out loud. He was so attractive and interesting, and so married, and Molly wondered if she could ever be the “other” woman. Still, there was a connection that was impossible to deny. Whether or not she would act on that attraction was still an open question.

He was away in thought. Molly looked up at him and noted that far away expression. It was as if he was struggling with something.

“Care to share, Doug?”

He shook the thought away.

“Thinking about Shosa and Fallahi. On some levels I can understand the Iranians positions and motivations, but then they do all this stupid shit that erases any sympathy for their position.”

“The nuclear thing?”

“Truth of it is, a few technologically advanced nations are wrong to prevent new technologies from reaching less advanced nations. Its quite impossible really. It would be akin to banning the piston engine because they might produce tanks instead of automobiles.”

“Don’t you think that the technologies that provide weapons of mass destruction to rogue or irresponsible states is different?”

"Maybe."

"So what is Fallahi's part in all this?"

“Iran’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and their embassies provide a support network for international cells funneling money, messages, supplies, weapons.”

“Like the CIA.”

“You argue like a lawyer,” he smiled.

“Got my law degree at John Marshall.”

“"I'll concede that there’s a fundamental difference. The Iranian government is loaded with former Revolutionary Guard commanders; Minister of Energy, Welfare and Social Security, Housing and Urban development, Labor and Social Affairs. The Minister of Education headed the Secret Police in Tehran at one point.”

A virtual military junta,” Molly observed.

“Exactly.”

“And Fallahi?”

“Listen, I have no illusions about Fallahi.” Doug folded his arms and leaned back against the rail.

“What is that relationship, if you don’t mind me asking?” she said.

“Not asking as a federal Agent?”

Molly smiled. “Off the record.”

He breathed deeply. “We use one another, and there is an implied respect in that.”

"But you don't completely trust him?"

“Two Years ago three men murdered an Iranian-Kurdish dissenter in Lindsborg, Sweden. Reportedly Fallahi was in Sweden at the time and closely matches the description of one of the assassins.”

“Anyway,” he stood to face her. “Enough of politics.”

In flashes on distant lightening, the city lights sparkling in her eyes, Doug was taken by her dark beauty. The wind tugged a lock of hair across her cheek, and it was all he could do not to push it away. He knew too well where that could lead, but still the temptation remained. He imagined kissing her soft lips, drawing her into his arms. It had been so long since he had felt a woman. He thought of Jane, struggling with cancer and felt so ashamed simply for the thought, but Molly was here and so beautiful.

“Want to come up for a bit?” she asked, her eyes like deep dark beckoning pools. He looked away, towards Asia. He smiled and, when he felt a bit stronger, found her eyes once more.

“Maybe its best that I just say goodnight.”