Chapter 35

Wednesday morning early, we were at Morton eating breakfast. We had just finished when the crew moved the helicopter to the apron and were waiting for me and the few security going with me.

At 0730 the helicopter landed at Reagan International where Eric, Ben, Anne, Andrew and couple secret service agents joined me and two of my JBG security.

A few minutes after we had taken off Ben and I both got the same call, “Jared picked up the truck; it is now parked at the farm.” My call came from Robert. Ben’s had come from the CIA, generated by video from the drone.

Thirty minutes later I picked up the David Clarke headset so I could talk to Josh Martin the pilot, “Fly to the coordinates I gave you and see if it is safe to land there.”

Fifteen minutes later, as we were circling the dealership Josh said, “Nice clear area - no poles, no wires - I can put you down there.”

“Do it.”

Ten minutes later - with the exception of the pilots - we walked into the showroom and to a cluster of people.

With my badge open and in my hand I said, “I want the boss, the service manager and the truck rental manager front and center NOW.”

Several minutes later they were all three in front of me.

We followed them into a private office, “What can we do for you that is so important that all the big shots are here?”

“You rented a box truck to Jaed Tayfur yesterday and it was picked up this morning. Vehicle identification number 1HTMNAAM95H693599, is that correct?” I asked as I slid a copy of the rental agreement Robert had hacked from the cloud.

“Yes that is a copy of the lease agreement. Why are you so interested in that truck,” lease manager Louis Redman asked.

I ignored his question and asked one of my own.

“That is an International MV series truck with On-command connection diagnostics and monitoring link. Can that truck be disabled - shutdown by a computer command sent to it?” I asked.

“I don’t think so. That’s not something we have ever been asked to do,” the service manager replied.

“Call the factory and find out if it can be done; we are working with a deadline,” I said.

Ten minutes later there was still no answer from the factory tech department.

“Apparently they are unable to answer that question or unwilling. We have several meetings we need to attend. If you get an answer, call this phone,” I gave him one of my cards.

We flew on to Harrisburg to the pre-raid meeting with the various SWAT teams.

The second helicopter that I asked Lorrie to send to Harrisburg was sitting on the tarmac in front of the general aviation terminal. When the rotors stopped turning I stepped out and walked to the Blackhawk with Eric, Ben, Andrew and Anne following. The fuel truck had just left.

I gave the crew their assignment, the terrain map and coordinates. I checked the handheld aviation radio I had to make sure we could communicate.

“Your call letters for today are Firebird 1. Load the tubes; we may need them, the other option is not looking so good,” I said.

As I finished multiple police vehicles approached to carry us to the meetings. It was 1100 when we finished.

The Harrisburg FBI and DHS directors presented the overall plan that the SWAT teams were going to use in the three-prong raid. I stayed out of the planning; I did know that the machine shop raids carried risk because they were located in a mix of residential and light commercial areas. These people should know and have planned how to deal with the local problems.

The Harrisburg SWAT teams were going to raid the machine shops on a cue from Eric’s DHS group. Eric was in over-all charge with his Harrisburg director of the FBI and DHS leading the raid at Avon Heights.

One decision Ben had made that I supported was that the local cell blockers were to be activated on all the raid vehicles to prevent calls. Those blockers had a range of several hundred yards. It also meant that the teams could only communicate by 800 Meg radios.

Federal teams from the DHS and FBI along with Hershey, Hummelstown, Palmyra, and Annville PD SWAT team were going to raid Avon Heights. Every single house - all twenty of them including the mosque - were going to be searched, with the DHS and FBI taking on the barn.

We had reason to believe all the men in the community were involved in Jaed’s little plot in one way or another.

According to shipping records large amounts of ammunition had been delivered in the last few months to every house in Avon Heights, all of it the same caliber - 7.63 x 39 - ammo for AK47 from a couple different suppliers.

The general thought was that they were preparing for a big fight or were removing the powder from the rounds to make more explosive devices. That was certainly possible since Tiam had told him there were no more ingredients available to him.

There was that waiting game I hated so much but finally at 1200, video showed better than two dozen men from the houses - including the Imam from the mosque - converging on the barn.

Microphones placed by miniature drones the night before - disguised as old cow dung - began to transmit conversations and prayers, including the joy that after weeks and months of preparations they were finally going to kill thousands of infidels for the glory of Allah.