Mike Maden - Drone

The Arkansas State Police had just killed three Bravos and the fiery explosion had destroyed the weapons they’d been carrying. The identity of the fourth man couldn’t be determined, but if they could have run an instant DNA test or found fingerprints on the charred remains, they might have been able to identify him as Hamid Nezhat, Ali’s most senior Quds Force commando.

One by one, the Bravos were getting picked off by the relentless efforts of courageous LEOs all over the country. Good police work was winning the day. Broken fingers, cracked skulls, and a couple of unauthorized waterboarding incidents loosened up a few tongues, too, along with the vigilance of ordinary citizens. Even the Russian mob helped out a time or two when it suited their interests.

The Arkansas incident confirmed Donovan’s suspicion that the Bravos had broken up into smaller groups, though how many was still unknown. The attacks also were growing less frequent, probably because of the full-court press the DHS was putting on, or so Donovan hoped.

Known Bravo and Castillo drug houses were raided and then later staked out, sometimes by citizen volunteers because there weren’t enough uniforms to cover them all. Two Bravos were killed that way, and three more were wounded before they escaped.

There were a few setbacks. A Claymore mine exploded on a popular camping trail in Yosemite, killing a newlywed couple. An empty one-hundred-pound bag of rat poison had been found adjacent to a water reservoir near Birmingham, Alabama. A car racing past Temple Emanuel in St. Louis, Missouri, fired an RPG and hit the building, but fortunately it did little damage and no one was inside at the time of the attack. However, a U.S. Marine private at home on leave from active duty in Afghanistan saw the attack and chased the vehicle as it raced up I-270. St. Louis police units joined the chase and shot out the tires, slamming the car into the guardrail. The three Bravos inside came out shooting and were killed by a river of lead.

The LEO community began to suspect that a significant corner had been turned in the hunt. They didn’t know how right they were. But Ali Abdi knew. His rogue teams were required to report in on a regular basis by means of a covert encrypted cell-phone network that the Iranians had deployed throughout the United States. Fewer and fewer teams reported in, and fewer and fewer media reports about terror acts were going out. That was all Ali needed to know. His latest plan to provoke an American invasion of Mexico had failed.

The Iranian commando had just two more cards to play, then he’d have to resort to last-ditch measures. He prayed it wouldn’t come to that, but he was more than willing to pay that price since the reward would be his triumphant entrance into heaven.

Washington, D.C.

Senator Diele hung up the phone, fighting the desire to shout for joy. His Democrat counterpart, Cleeve Gormer from Ohio, the Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, had eagerly agreed to Diele’s proposal and guaranteed he could deliver a majority vote on the Democrat-controlled House Judiciary Committee if they acted quickly.

Gormer hated Myers’s guts. She had sided with the Pentagon when the army requested the Lima Army Tank Plant to temporarily quit manufacturing M-1 Abrams tanks that it said it no longer needed for wars it had no intention of fighting anytime soon. Gormer was furious. It didn’t matter to him that the army estimated it would save the taxpayers over $3 billion to shutter the facility for just three years. The LATP provided hundreds of highly paid jobs in Gormer’s district. Like most politicians, he viewed military spending as another source of constituent employment and, hence, his own source of job security. Luckily, he’d managed to defeat the generals on this issue, but he swore retribution on Myers if he ever got the chance and Diele had just offered it to him.

There was a soft knock on his door.

“Come.”

Diele’s personal assistant, a pretty young freshman intern from Brown, entered with a tray larded with fried eggs, bacon, hash browns, and coffee, and set it in front of him at his desk. She was a beautiful girl and his eyes raked over the curves of her body. But the era of incriminating Facebook and Twitter posts had curbed Diele’s animal appetites for volunteer staff. Instead, he thanked her politely and she left.

Diele’s mouth watered. This was a real workingman’s breakfast. Not like the prison fare of oatmeal mush and tepid green tea his haggard wife served him at home these days.

Dolores Hidalgo, Mexico

It was a warm September evening in the provincial city, and the night was exceptionally special. September 15 was the eve of Mexico’s Independence Day, the night on which the warrior-priest Father Hidalgo uttered the grito from his pulpit, declaring Mexico’s independence from Spain. Father Hidalgo had called for the abolition of slavery and led a peasant army to its first victories against the ruling Spanish government. He was the George Washington of Mexico, “the Father who fathered a nation.”

But tonight President Barraza—ever the showman—would be the one to utter the cry from the pulpit of the Hidalgo church instead of the local priest. The symbolism was as subtle as a telenovela romance, but perfect-ly effective for the bold young president to project his growing defiance and contempt toward the colonial aspirations of los norteamericanos . At Hernán’s urging, he’d been stoking Mexican nationalism ever since the Aztec Dream attack and promoting the conspiracy theory that the Bravo attacks in the U.S. were part of an elaborate plan to justify an American invasion of Mexico.

Antonio was just as glad that Hernán had elected to stay home in Mexico City to enjoy the festivities with his own family this evening. Lately, his brother had become increasingly grim and too unpleasant to be around. The president was thankful, however, that his wise and efficient sibling had arranged for a live national television broadcast of the event tonight.

Traditionally, the president of Mexico uttered the grito from the balcony of the National Palace at 11 p.m. on September 15, as would mayors all over Mexico in their respective towns. But this year, instead of occupying the National Palace, President Barraza wanted to stand in the symbolic heart of his people.

Father Hidalgo’s church, along with the giant statue and monument towering out front commemorating him, was a big tourist draw, and the town plaza was always crowded on the holiday. But this year, the nation’s patriotic fervor had been stoked to a fever pitch by perceived American injustices and carefully orchestrated Barraza jingoism. The spirit of revolution was in the air.

For security reasons, the crowds had been kept far back from the entrance of the church, though there was a standing-room-only audience inside. President Barraza’s image was projected on a giant portable JumboTron erected in the plaza for the event, and stacks of Marshall speakers thundered with his voice as he delivered his patriotic sermon. The plaza rang with the noise of the liquored-up crowd, hundreds of popping firecrackers, blaring patriotic music, and Barraza’s ear-busting harangue.

And then the screams.

Two rockets whooshed out of the sky, smashing into the crowd like the fists of an angry god, tearing flesh, shattering bone.

The cries were drowned out by the roar of the Reaper’s turbofan engine as it swooped in low over the treetops and dove toward the wide-open doors of the church.

The drone’s wide, fragile wings were clipped off as they slammed against the heavy wooden door frame, but the large bulbous nose and slender fuselage shot through like a spear into the sanctuary. The big four-bladed prop sliced into skulls, torsos, and limbs as it raked over a line of pews. The blades finally stopped spinning when the drone ran out of fuel, but the scalding-hot engine pinned a keening middle-aged German tourist to the floor who later died of severe burns on her upper body and face.