Mirrors: An NCIS-1 story

That was the last part of chapter 3, and chapter 4 is forthcoming.

Will do.

I need to finish introducing them first...

Working on chapter 4. lordroel we'll get formally introduced to most of our team.

I'll get more into the military team from the Carolinas, and why I'm using them as support (as opposed to the NCIS: New Orleans or NCIS: Los ANgeles teams, or even the Special Projects team based in Miami).

Chapter 4, Part I


Chapter 4



It is a man’s own mind, not his enemy or foe, that lures him to evil ways.



--Buddha



8:46 p.m. Greenwich Mean Time

3:46 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time

London, U.K.

Hilton Heathrow Airport Hotel



Ari Haswari was in a hurry.



If the Indian hacker-for-hire he chose to set up his transporter travel route did her job, Haswari would go from the Arabian peninsula to the United Kingdom in less than 10 minutes, undetected. No time could be wasted; Haswari had to be in America as soon as possible, without drawing the attention of the numerous international intelligence agencies who had him at the top of their most wanted lists. The transporter would facilitate the first part of his journey to the States.



One of the greatest advances in travel in the past three decades was the development of the transporter and, like a number of technological advances, its origin was extraterrestrial – specifically, Rann.



Because it worked exactly like the transporter in the Star Trek universe, though, the popular perception of the Rannians inventing the technology after watching an episode of Star Trek with the show’s creator, Gene Roddenberry, still lingered (one of the first things the Rannian Ambassador did after arriving on Earth was, in fact, to watch an episode of Trek with Roddenberry and President Ronald Reagan). In reality, the technology had been invented while Earth fought its first World War, and the Rannians helped develop the five transport networks in use – civilian, government, military, intelligence and private.



The civilian networks were the least used, high prices limiting the technology to multi-millionaire celebrities and entrepreneurs – such as Richard Branson, Jay-Z, the Kardashians, Lionel Messi and Bruce Wayne. Companies used the technology to transport rare items. The lack of ‘bandwidth’ kept it out of mass use for the time being.



Government, military and intelligence networks had priority, and used when necessary, or expedient. Some users still shared the viewpoint of Star Trek character Leonard McCoy towards the transporter of not wanting their “atoms scattered halfway across the universe”, and preferred the slower, and perceivably safer, means of aircraft to travel where they needed to go.



The private network became the domain of major corporate executives and the ultra-rich and powerful: Fortune 500 companies, Russian oligarchs, Chinese executives and Western businessmen had their own branches off the main network. President Luthor still had his own branch; so did the Justice League groups, the Global Guardians, and the Chinese, Russian and ‘nonaligned’ heroic groups.



Today, Haswari used the Interpol network to transport himself and his baggage, in quick succession, from Ra’s Al-Ghul’s compound to Dubai; to Ankara, Turkey; to Munich, Germany; and to Heathrow. Under the alias of German football official Thomas Mueller – looking more German than either his Israeli father or his Arab mother – Haswari appeared on a one-person pad behind a supply closet near the entrance to a stairway. He pushed a series of buttons he knew Interpol agents used to fool security cameras into not seeing them leave the closet and enter the hallway, while monitoring hidden camera footage that showed the entrance to the closet and the stairwell, and the nearby hallway.



Two minutes later, he saw an opening, and confidently walked into the hall, headed towards the front desk. Once he found the walkway to Heathrow’s Terminal 4, Haswari would take the six-minute walk to T4, then take the TfL Rail to Terminal 5. That’s where he’d take the 9:55 TWA flight to Baltimore-Washington Airport; by the time Interpol realized someone had used their transport network, Haswari would be in America.



Haswari hadn’t covered his tracks enough. Someone at Interpol headquarters in Brussels discovered the intrusion, and had already traced its origin to the Al-Ghul compound.



At 8:51 p.m. GMT, calls were made to MI5 – the U.K. domestic intelligence service – the American Central Intelligence Agency, and the Israeli security service Mossad. One minute later, another call was made: to Talia Head, the acting Chief Executive Officer of LexCorp.



Talia Head – a.k.a. Talia Al-Ghul, the daughter of the Demon’s Head, Ra’s Al-Ghul, the ecological terrorist who had sheltered Haswari since The Siege – was very interested in Ari Haswari’s whereabouts. Head took a call from her Interpol source at LexCorp’s Metropolis headquarters, wired 100,000 Francs to the source’s secret Swiss bank account, then made travel arrangements.



If Haswari was going to Washington, so was she.



3:52 p.m. EDT

Washington, D.C.

The White House



President Luthor never made use of the couches in the Oval Office whenever speaking with anyone. He sat behind his desk as a symbol of the power he held; the furniture was arranged to face the desk and its sole user. If a head of state or ambassador visited, he or she sat in an easy chair situated to the President’s right, three feet from his desk; Congressional leaders, intelligence directors, military officers sat in the couches arranged eight feet from the desk’s front.



It showed the relative respect Luthor had for his Vice President that Frank Rock sat in the chair to the President’s right. Rock drank a cup of black coffee, while Luthor had a bottle of water. Rock still had no idea what the President ate at all, or drank other than water, whereas Luthor seemed to know Rock’s culinary and beverage preferences intimately – just like he knew so much about the former general’s life.



“Just spoke with Homeland,” Luthor said. “President Boehner’s asking questions at Andrews. Wants to talk to me. “



“I can’t blame him, Mr. President,” Rock said. His respect for the office of the President of the United States was immense; he still wasn’t fully certain about the man currently holding that position, but tried not to let it show. “He is the President, or a President. He’s used to getting his way.”



“That has crossed my mind, Frank. I don’t want to go there uninformed. Look at page one.” Luthor picked up a folder and gestured to the one in Rock’s hand. “Skim through it real quick.”



Rock skimmed the first page inside the folder as ordered. “Updated target list on Earth-17 isn’t as complete as I would expect, sir. I’m surprised there’s anyone over there to send us intel, to be honest. I expected their World War III to be total, no survivors in their CONUS.”



“Their defense shield held better than expected, Frank. It’s not on that page, but we’re getting intel from some surprising places.”



“Such as?”



“Laurel Canyon in Los Angeles. Pontiac, Michigan. Cleveland, Ohio. New Orleans. And from more expected places like Roseboro, Oregon; Mount Vernon, Illinois; and Charlottesville, Virginia. This tells us not all the missiles got through. Their defense shield held. I wonder how much was saved?”



“I assume you’ll talk to him about those FEMA camps being set up across the country?”, asked Rock. The VP referred to the temporary FEMA camps being set up for the so-far estimated seven million refugees from Earth-17



“I’m sure he’ll have questions about them.”



“Mr. President, you may want to reconsider the suggestion from the President of Earth-23—”



“I’d prefer not to use federal resources on that project and strongly believe the private sector will deliver better results,” Luthor said. Rock knew Luthor was referring to his LexCorp company, which was in fact in the final stages of taking over the camps from FEMA. Rock saw the plans four days ago, and was somewhat impressed with LexCorp’s plans to turn the camps into their own separate towns, or extentions of nearby cities and towns.



Of course, Luthor stood to benefit from LexCorp’s exclusive contract financially and in other ways. The President would likely face close scrutiny from both Congress and the media in the days to come, and Rock wondered if the public that supported Luthor would ask its own questions or go along with whatever Luthor said. “Before I gave up day-to-day leadership to my CEO, I was involved in the planning. It was a hell of a thing, Frank.”



“Setting up a livable community in months from nothing, you mean.”



“Hiding it from the alien and his costumed friends,” Luthor replied, with a hint of disgust, referring to his ‘former’ arch-enemy Superman, and the rest of the Justice League. “But yes, setting up communities as well. They’re cutting edge models and my peop—the LexCorp people have learned much about setting them up more quickly and thoroughly than this first generation. Imagine, if Yellowstone exploded – or one of Superman’s enemies destroyed half the country -- we can comfortably resettle the people in the other half in days!”



“That’s a bold vision, Mr. President.”



“And I have no doubt I’ll be able to allay Mr. Boehner’s concerns about his people,” Luthor said, looking at his LexTech smart watch. “Marine One should be here in five minutes. I want you in the Situation Room while I’m gone.”



Luthor got up, as two members of his Secret Service detail entered the Oval Office. They would escort Luthor to the Presidential VH-60N White Hawk helicopter designated Marine One that would take him the short trip to Andrews Air Force Base nearby in Maryland. Rock would go into the White House Situation Room below ground, monitoring news and intelligence on Luthor’s behalf.



“Good luck, Mr. President,” Rock said, as Luthor nodded his assent while leaving the Oval Office, walking the short distance to the South Lawn to await Marine One.

Nice, to bad that show never got of the ground.