American Terrorist (The Rayna Tan Action Thrillers Book 1) (12 page)

“The prince does.”

The prince the cleric mentioned was Prince Saad, one of the minor members of the Saudi royal family. He was the one who supplied the basic operational funding for the imam’s mosque and livelihood.

“Prince Saad is old enough to be your grandfather. He will not last long and then what will you do?”

The imam took a breath. Prince Saad’s impending death had weighed on his mind just as his son had said.
 

“You know I am right, Father, but you are afraid. Afraid that you have been living a lie and that it is finally catching up to you.”

Ahmed’s words struck at the imam’s heart. His conviction had waned over the years but the fear of the unknown was greater than the glory of what might be.

“Your idea of setting up in America is too expensive. Others have a big head start on you. You cannot succeed.”

“But they are not me.” Ahmed balled his fists and raised them as a sign of power. He sneered. “Do you know how cheap it is to set up shop? A couple of computers, a chin-up bar, some spare land, fertilizer and a few AK-47s and we are in business. Father, you are a toothless tiger. For years, you have talked of jihad but you have never done anything. When I went to war, you pleaded with me not to go. Well, I went and I conquered. I am a warrior of Allah, something you never were and never will be.”

“You cannot talk to me like that,” sputtered his father.

“Didn’t you teach me to always tell the truth? The truth is that battles are won by warriors, not cowards, not sheep.”

The defiant face of a son’s scorn confronted the father’s righteousness. The imam snapped. “You are my son, my heir. But you are behaving like a barbarian, not a holy man. And you surround yourself with savages who corrupt you even further. I will tolerate this no longer.”

“I never claimed to be holy. I don’t even care to be. And stay out of my business.”

“Everything is my business. It has my name on it and I can take it back.”

“Then your legacy will be nothing.” With that, Ahmed turned and charged out of the room.

“Ahmed! Come back!”

But Ahmed just kept walking.

***

Casey was floating on air. Because he was known primarily as “the tech guy,” he didn’t get out into the field that much. In fact, he was exempt from the brutal desert training the other guys endured. However, this was a great day. He not only was allowed to go along on a mission, he got to hold some bastard’s head while Ahmed’s sword lopped it off. He was still tingling from the excitement of seeing the blood splash into the air as the headless corpse quivered. What was even better was that it was preserved on video for all to see. Even though no one could see his face or recognize who he was, he wanted to shout,
“It was me! It was me! It was me, you assholes!”

The a-holes Casey referred to were the jerks in California who gave him a hard time. A freak of nature in his native Iraq, he had red hair and fair skin. When he was born two decades ago, terrorist activities by radical Islamists were just beginning. His far-thinking radicalized father thought Casey’s “normal red-blooded American complexion” would eventually make the baby a valuable asset for the movement in the United States and arranged for the family’s immigration.

The first order of business was to change their names and infant “Majid Toma” became “Casey Thomas” when the Thomas family settled in North Hollywood. The father got a job processing packages and parcels at FedEx—a perfect job for getting or sending drugs, merchandise and cash from the Middle East to the U.S. Not wanting to draw suspicion, his services were used only sparingly—three or four times a year—but that was enough to generate almost half a million dollars a year for the overseas caliphate and the small jihadist cell that the Toma family was part of in LA.

Casey’s youth was problematic. Muslims didn’t accept him because he was too “American-looking” and Americans were suspicious of his olive-skinned parents and sister, even though they participated in neighborhood fundraisers, sang Christmas carols and donated to the local food bank. This attitude by the inhabitants of his new home country so hurt and infuriated Casey that the only thing he took solace in were the countless hours he spent immersing himself on terrorist websites where he could fantasize about turning every one of his tormentors to particles of radioactive waste.

When Casey turned eighteen, he ecstatically announced to his parents that he would move back to Iraq to take part in the eradication of the Little Satan, Israel and the Big Satan, the United States, with Tiger Claw, a new organization he had found on the deep web. Tiger Claw, led by Ahmed and Fatima, would be his new family.
 

Ahmed and Fatima were too young to be considered parental models. Ahmed was the fearless warrior Casey’s father never was and Fatima, even though she was completely inaccessible to him, was the hottest babe he had ever laid eyes on. He would die for them.
 

Casey introduced Fatima to a family connection in Los Angeles who had a laundromat. Tariq was a middleman for connecting imported drugs and local dealers. He too would become a key player in Ahmed and Fatima’s quest.

Casey was the key man for Tiger Claw’s web presence. He was building Tiger Claw into a legend on the deep web centered on Ahmed’s deeds. Ahmed was like Rambo, Bruce Lee and Genghis Khan rolled into one. Occasional, fleeting glimpses of a scantily clad Fatima were irresistible, and the organization started building a small network of followers, recruits and supporters. The pitch, while tailored to whoever was looking, were variations on the same theme: train in the desert and turn into a man; learn methods of lethal destruction—guns, grenades and your own body; put into practice with forays into the field; and rape, pillage, and plunder.
 

For a guy who was a social misfit, Casey had great online people skills. Entirely anonymous, never showing his face or his voice, he adopted whatever persona or avatar he felt would be best to connect with whomever he was in contact with. To university students, he could be a graduate engineering student at MIT or a music major in Indiana; to the groupie terrorist chicks, he was the new Osama. American prisons were fertile ground for finding potential recruits and Casey was now pretending to be an ex-convict turned online Muslim chaplain, chatting with Worm, a hardened inmate at San Francisco Penitentiary.
 

Hey, Imam, great news. I get out in a week.
 

Fantastic, Worm. You deserve it. You’ve made great progress.

Thanks for putting in a good word about me.

No problem.
(Casey had been sending progress reports to the prison authorities, telling them how Worm had rehabilitated himself and demonstrated great humanitarian potential.)

Can we hook up? I got nowhere to go. Haven’t been outside for ten years. Got no friends except other low lifers like me.

You’re not a low life. We been talking a long time. I know you’re a good Muslim man.

Yeah, well, that ain’t worth shit out there.

We’ll figure something out.

Yeah? I know you got big time connections.
(Worm’s despair came through even without direct visual or oral communication.)

Yeah, of course.

Appreciate that.

I’ll be in touch and waiting for you when you get out.
 

You’re the man, Imam.

Na, you’re the man. What you want to do when you get out?

That’s part of the problem. I don’t know how to do anything other than what I know how to do. And that’s what landed me in here.

You didn’t take part in any of the training?

Hey, man, I only made it to fourth grade before I dropped out. Never had no use for book learning.

You ain’t said shit about that.
 

Only book I read is Playboy.

 
That sucks. Especially now they took all the good stuff out.

What you mean by that?

What’s a skin mag without skin? You didn’t know?

Hell no. They don’t tell us that shit in here.

Well, we got a lot of catching up for you to do when you get out. See you next week.

Casey clicked, “End chat,” teeth grinding hard, knowing he had no way to deliver on what he had just promised. In fact, knowing what he knew about Worm, he was surprised the authorities would let him out. Casey’s letters must have done one hell of a sell job.
 

Although Ahmed announced the existence of the American Muslim Militia in the video, Casey believed it would take at least another six months before it would be ready to use someone with Worm’s talents. Casey sighed, knowing this was probably the last time he would ever talk to Worm again. Oh, well. Time to move on. From his monitor, he saw that someone had found one of his sites on the deep web. Got to check this out, too.

***

San Francisco

Two teenaged stoners, Freddy Jamieson and Alex Fraser, sat in Alex’s bedroom, mesmerized by what they had found on the internet. There was the ultimate treasure trove of wonderfulness—bombings, massacres of kids, old farts, bitches... no one was spared. And they couldn’t believe what they were hearing. How the United States was screwing up the world, how it was responsible for why Alex couldn’t afford to buy any gas for the van.
 

Even worse, it was incredible that the U.S., this country they were born in, allowed the Jew bastards to take over everything. Money, movies, everything. The Jews had taken over their country and it needed to be reclaimed. No way they were going to allow the Jews to dominate them. So committed were Alex and Freddy that they didn’t even think about going to the porn sites. After all, it was the damned Jews who controlled them.

The next video came onscreen. A young man wearing battle fatigues and a balaclava to disguise his face began to talk. From the sound of his voice, Freddy and Alex figured he had to be close to their age. It made them hang on every word even tighter.

“Hey, you. Yeah, I mean you. You gotta hear my story but, while I’m telling it, you gotta watch what I did today. It’ll blow your mind.”

The beheading video played. The young man’s voice narrated while human atrocities played onscreen… Ahmed leading the charge to slaughter defenseless villagers, fleeing women cut down like dominos from an onslaught of firepower.
 

“I was a normal kid from Idaho. Went to Coeur d'Alene for ice fishing, watched sluts getting banged by a million guys, and watched every Freddy Krueger movie and show by the time I was thirteen. But as I grew up, everybody was against me because I’m different. The worst are the Jews. They control Hollywood. They control banking. Hell, they even control the internet and try to stop messages like mine from getting out. We’ve got to stop them and the only way we can is through groups like us. Now we’re opening up and looking for people, but not just any asshole. We want reality men, people who know pain and want to give it back to the bastards with every bit of everything they have. Just like this!”
 

Then there was the final shot of Ahmed’s sword coming down on the head of the Syrian Christian and the head rolling on the ground. “Yeah, that was me holding down that sucker’s head. Me! Me!”

The masked young man came back onscreen. “You want to be part of the change, there’s something for you to do, too. Hey, if I can do it, anyone can do it. You want in, just let us know and we’ll find you.”

The screen went black.

A chat message appeared:
I showed you this because I know you are special. That you feel the world is in a mess. That the evil of Jews, Christians and Americans has gone on for far too long. The question is, “Are you willing to correct this wrong? Are you ready for battle?”

Alex couldn’t type fast enough:
HELL YEAH, WE WANT TO GO. ALEX FRASER AND FREDDY JAMIESON. SIGN US UP.

There was no response so Alex typed some more.
WHEN WILL YOU LET US KNOW?

Moments later, this message appeared onscreen.
We will check you out. If you pass, we will be in contact.

Then the screen went black. Alex typed like mad but was unable to find any trace anywhere on the web of what they had just seen.

***

Al Juwat, Iraq

Casey was interrupted by a tap on his shoulder by his Filipino buddy Nabil.

“Hey, Nabil, you’re just in time. I just finished pulling down our latest creation. What’s up?”

“Hey, we got a meeting, Casey.”

“Yeah. With who?”

“Ahmed and his old man.” Nabil told him.

“The imam?”

“Yeah. Cool, eh? Maybe he took notice of what we did back at that village.”

“Now that’s got to be worth something,” smiled Casey enthusiastically.

Chapter 12

Casey and Nabil exited the internet room and walked down the venerated brick hall and into the room of Imam Abu. They entered to see Ahmed and the Muslim leader sitting on the floor on a colorful hand-woven Iraqi carpet with its intricate geometric patterns. “Peace be unto you,” said the two young men in unison. When there was no response, they silently sat down in front of the father and son.

For a few minutes, not a word was spoken, but Casey was stoked. In the years that he had been there, he had never met privately with the imam.
 

Maybe he finally recognizes what I can do. Hey, if I can convert Worm, I can get anybody. Yeah, my Arabic’s not so hot, but English? I’m your man. Or maybe Ahmed showed him the video from this morning. I was hot damn with that rifle. Bang! Bang! Bang! Got you, bitch! And you, too, old man. You and your stupid grandchildren! Allahu Akbar. Or maybe he’s going to say something about that guy whose head got whacked. I made sure it didn’t move... and it’s all on video!

It was impossible for Casey not to show his enthusiasm and, as he looked to his friend sitting beside him, it was clear that Nabil’s pulse rate had climbed considerably too as agonizing minutes passed.

Finally, the imam pulled an iPad out of a blue cotton bag and placed it so that it faced Nabil and Casey. The elderly statesman loaded a media player app and hit “Play.”