The House of War: Book One Of : THE OMEGA CRUSADE (23 page)

Now as Holly Villa sits in the back of her limo, she feels that all her gains and future plans are in danger of being lost. Holly has little doubt that the President’s kidnapping is the opening salvo of a right wing conspiracy to overthrow the government. As a freshman Senator, Villa joined Homeland Security Chief Janet Napolitano in warning the government of the right-wing radicalizing of returning troops, but few paid either of them any heed. She is suddenly afraid that they’re about to be proven correct. Holly knows right-wingers well and there is no love lost between them. Villa spent the bulk of her career as a lawyer and Senator battling their kind. She made many enemies among them along the way since her first victories defending illegal immigrants from deportation. When, in her first term as Senator, Holly spearheaded the drive to dismantle the wall between California and Mexico and drive the Minute Men from the state, conservatives railed against her.

“Senator Villa’s campaign against our own border defenses takes the focus off the invasion across the southern border and directs it against her own citizenry,” said one popular pundit. “If this is not a brand of treason, I don’t know what is.”

Never one to countenance an attack, Holly Villa was quick to respond in kind. She went on FOX News to face her detractor.

“These people crossing the border are not our enemies,” she told the network’s more bellicose host. “They are the flotsam and jetsam of wrecked societies who cross no-man lands looking for the same things immigrants before them crossed seas and wildernesses to find. It is treason against the very idea and ideal that is America to turn our backs on them. It is a crime against the
tradition of this great nation to forcibly return these desperate souls to the sinking ships of the failed states they flee.”

Four years later the same pundit confronted her again when she worked to have UN soldiers placed on the war-torn border. “Do you honestly believe that replacing our own soldiers and volunteer citizenry with United Nation troops is in the best interest of the country?”

“I think an impartial force on so contested a border is in the best interest of world peace,” she answered. “And so, yes, it is in the best interest of our nation. Or would you rather the fighting, with its savage atrocities on both sides continue?”

“And what about the Alien Resident Enfranchisement Act,” the pundit continued. “Do you really believe that alien residents have a right to vote in our country?”

“These good people you dismiss as ‘aliens’ have enough of a past in this country to be given a stake in its’ future,” Villa declared. “So long as they pay the fee and have been here the requisite ten years I don’t see what the problem is.”

“Ten years and five thousand dollars is nowhere near enough, Madame Senator. You set too cheap a price on so valued a privilege as is our right to vote in these United States.”

“Then by all means sir,” Holly countered. “Add the centuries their people lived on the land before documentation was demanded of them. Add those centuries to the sweat and blood equity earned working jobs that our own sons and daughter wouldn’t stoop to perform. Add them together and I think you will find that they have already paid for that vaunted vote in full!”

The confrontations propelled Villa onto the national stage as well as garnered her several death threats. It also convinced O’Neill’s to tap her as his 2016 running mate.

Holly now sat quietly in the back of the limo mulling over her options. Recalling the old observation that the vice-Presidency ‘wasn’t worth a bucket of piss,’ she knows her choices are few. Still, she has to try. Villa decided that staying in California, away from the action, was the poorest of her choices. Holly needs to be in Washington, she needs to be seen in the White House dealing with the crisis. However, following procedure, Homeland Security grounded all flights. The sudden loss of communications rendered her unable to reach
anyone who could secure one. That would not stop her. Come hell or high water, Holly was getting to the White House. The kidnapping and loss of satellites has ‘military coup’ stamped all over them. Villa will not trust her fate to their care, regardless of what protocol calls for. She gathered up her chief aide, driver and a couple of her guards and hit the road. They will take turns driving her to DC. The people will see that she can be a Presidential as William Jennings O’Neill.

Across from her, sitting uncomfortably between two of her Secret Service agents, her aide, Enrique Salinas points out through the limo’s back window.

Holly Villa turns her head to look out the back. There are two news vans following them. One is from the local KLTV station and the other is emblazoned with the logo of the ever nettlesome FOX network.

She turns the limousine’s intercom connection to the driver on with a flick of her thumb.

“Can we possibly go any faster?”

New York, New York

19:58:27

Sanjay Vas is into the first few hours of his back-to-back doubles holiday shifts at the United Nations Tower security desk. The UN complex is closed to the public until after New Year’s Day. With no public to contend with and with all but the Secretary General on holiday leave, Sanjay and his partner Sam Ericson have the light duty of guarding a nearly empty building.

Of all the people he works with, Sam is Sanjay’s favorite. His coworker Ericson is always pleasant, never gripes about anything and he is always nice enough to inquire after Sanjay’s parents, wife and his medical studies. Sam is a good man whose only fault seems to be his misplaced loyalty to the New York Giants. Vas, a Jets fan has had many opportunities to tease Sam about it, particularly with the Giants dismal season thus far this year. Like Sanjay, Ericson is an inch shy of six feet tall, though broader of shoulder and well-muscled. Sam’s hair is the same light brown of his eyes and cut in the short, tight manner preferred by the military.

To get them through their long shifts, Ericson arrived with a dozen movies for them to watch through the long hours ahead of them. They were all Christmas stories he said, holding out the iridescent, silver dollar-sized discs in the palm of his hand.

“That’s a whole lot of Christmas,” Sanjay said as he went through them.

“Tis the season.”

“You know of course, I’m a Hindu?”

“Nobody’s perfect, Vas.”

“True enough,” Sanjay said. “Otherwise we would all be Jets fans.”

After their initial rounds though the UN complex, Vas humored his partner and sat down to watch
‘The Lion in Winter’
with him on a small disc player they set up in front of the panel of security screens. Sanjay enjoyed the old movie but he didn’t understand why his partner would include it in a collection of holiday films.

“You call that a Christmas movie?” Sanjay asks as the credits roll.

“Sure,” Sam insists in reply. “It’s the story of a family getting together to celebrate the Christmas holiday.”

“But they spent the whole time trying to kill each other,” Sanjay objects.

“And yet, they didn’t,” Sam says. “That was their Christmas miracle.”

Sanjay laughs and shakes his head.

Sam shuffles through the stack of discs and pulls one out. “Alright, we’ll try something more traditional, something lighter and upbeat. Here we go;
‘It’s A Wonderful Life.’
The latest flick banned by the FCC. You’ll like it, I promise.”

“I’ve seen that movie.”

“A classic like this one can stand to be seen again and again.”

“Okay,” Sanjay agrees. “But I got to use the head first.”

“Bring back a couple of hot chocolates with you.”

After his trip to the bathroom, Sanjay goes to the commissary to buy a couple of hot chocolates from the machine. Because the rules allow personal cell phone use only within the confines of the employee commissary, Vas decides to check his messages. To his surprise, the phone is not working. The screen does light up at his touch, but it is blank. There are no icons for the apps, nor is there a message advising him that the network is down. That’s curious, he thinks and puts it away. He buys two hot chocolates from a vending machine and heads back downstairs to his post.

When Vas returns to the lobby, he is taken aback by the sight of half a dozen soldiers at the desk with Sam. It is highly irregular, as there are no visitors scheduled until the 2
^nd
of January, but Ericson’s apparent familiarity with them puts Sanjay at ease.

“Sam?”

“Ah, Sanjay,” Sam says. “Come meet my old army buddies.”

Vas approaches with a smile, a nod and a “Hello.”

The soldiers return the nods and smiles.

The oldest of them, a man Vas thinks to be some fifty years of age, six feet of solid and still robust build steps forward, offering a thickly veined hand.

“Merry Christmas, Mr. Vas,” he says in a strained and scratchy baritone.

Sanjay notices eagles on the man’s epaulets and a scar-marbled throat under his square jaw. Vas hands Sam his cup of hot chocolate and takes the old soldier’s hand.

“Thank you, Colonel,” Sanjay says. “A very, Merry Christmas to you all.”

They all nod and smile some more. A long moment of silence follows.

“Army buddies, huh?” Sanjay asks just to break the soundless moment. They all nod, smiling, their eyes fixed intently on him. He takes a sip of his drink to alleviate his growing discomfort. The side arms are bothering Vas. It’s against protocol. Sam knows it. He can’t imagine the soldiers don’t know it as well.

“Yeah,” Sam says. “We served together in Iraq. We were in Baghdad during the evacuations.”

“Oh, my,” Vas says. He knows that Ericson served during the war, but he didn’t know any of the details. Sanjay himself never broached the subject with him. On more than a few occasions he witnessed Sam rebuff such prying from others with jokes. It was obviously something he didn’t want to talk about. Sanjay is familiar with the phenomenon. His own father spent a quarter of a century in India’s military and never spoke a word of his time in war-ravished Kashmir. The elder Vas had a ragged, thumb-thick scar across his midsection which fascinated the young Sanjay. Vas asked him about it several times growing up but his father always explained the scar away as a ‘shaving accident.’ Eventually Sanjay got the hint and stopped questioning his father about his time in the military.

“That was a dreadful time,” Vas says and takes another sip of chocolate.

“Yes, it was, Mr. Vas,” the Colonel agrees. “Still, that was then and this is now. If we’re to have any kind of future worth having, we must both remember the past and live in the present. Don’t you agree?”

“Well, yes, I suppose so.”

“Carpe Diem,” Sam says, tapping his Styrofoam cup to Sanjay’s own.

Vas smiles at his friend. The Latin phrase, he knows, is part of one of Sam’s tattoos. The words encircle a large, Celtic cross on his coworker’s right arm. Sanjay has seen it often in the employer’s locker room. He doesn’t know why thinking about it now fills him with unease. It’s not the tattoo, he tells himself. It is the guns that bother him. He shouldn’t have to say anything about it, but Sanjay thinks, for the sake of their jobs, he will have to.

“So, what brings you here today?” Vas asks, thinking it best to approach the subject obliquely.

“They dropped in to wish us a Merry Christmas,” Ericson says. “And they’re here to help me seize the complex.”

“What?”

Before Sanjay can gather his thoughts, two of the soldiers close in on either side of him. One pulls the pistol from Sanjay’s holster and the other plucks his radio from its sheath. Just as quickly the two soldiers step back away from him. The one with his gun keeps it trained on him.

“Sam,” Sanjay pleads. “What’s going on, Sam?”

“We’re seizing the complex, just like I said,” Sam answers. “But I don’t want you to worry. You’re a good man, Sanjay. You will not be hurt, I promise. You will only be detained until noon tomorrow.”

“Detained? I don’t understand, Sam.”

“You will, Sanjay,” Ericson says. “You will in time. For now though, go with the nice soldiers. Here, take the movies. They’ll help you pass the time.”

Not knowing what else to do or even what to think, Vas takes the discs and player from his coworker. Sam then turns his back to him and begins showing the Colonel something on a clipboard. Vas thinks of his family back home in Woodside Queens as he stares down the barrel of his own gun.

Sanjay Vas follows the soldier’s nod to the bank of elevators.

19:45:10

Simon Aguilera thinks there is no better view of Manhattan than the one from his office atop the United Nations Tower. The office of the Secretary General of the United Nations also offers Simon an unparalleled view of the world. It is this latter vista that he is contemplating as he stares out his window at the city’s nightscape. His three years as Secretary General have greatly expanded
his grasp of international politics and given him the perfect base of operation from which to advance his revolution. It is a revolution he has served faithfully for nearly three decades starting with his steady rise through the ranks of Hugo Chavez’ New Socialist Party. His loyal service brought him to the attention of Venezuela’s Supreme Leader and thrust him onto the world stage.

When Chavez hand picked him eight years ago to represent Venezuela at the UN, his instructions were brief and to the point. “Gather our revolution every advantage you can Simon, but; more importantly, you must thwart the United States at every turn. Isolate them every way you can. They are the revolution’s greatest enemy.”

It was not something Simon needed to be reminded of. He sympathized with Hugo’s contempt for America. The nation’s policies and its very way of life were understandably repugnant to anyone with modernist sensibilities. Simon himself considered the majority of Americans to be little more than fat, selfindulgent sheep, arrogant in their slavish devotions to crass materialism and long dead gods.

“Americans are incapable of vision,” he once confided to a comrade. “All they can come up with are shopping lists.”

While stripping the United States of its last vestige of super power status would go a long way to advancing Venezuela’s revolution, Simon Aguilera’s ambitions are not so provincial. At forty-seven years of age, Simon is not only the youngest Secretary General who ever served the UN, but he likes to think of himself as the purest internationalist that ever walked through its doors. Aguilera’s life and work are dedicated to creating history’s first world government.