Divine Fury (22 page)

Walberg saw the doors on the right side – away from him – open and then close.
 
He could hear them shouting and screaming hysterically.

“Stop!
 
Stop!
 
Stop shooting at us! Help!
 
Somebody help!”

He pulled off three more shots, hitting the side of the truck.
 
Maybe they couldn’t hear the rifle with the suppressor on but they’d certainly hear and perhaps feel the impact of the bullets.

Then the driver’s side door opened.
 
The big one.
 
He must have been too bulky to drag himself over the console with the gear shift in the way and get out the other side.
 
As he stepped hurriedly to the pavement beneath the truck, he immediately slipped and went sprawling on this face beneath the open door.

Through the scope, Walberg could see his face clearly as he pulled his head up and, still sprawled on the ground, searched the hillside.
 
He seemed so close, Walberg felt that he could pick which side of his face to shoot if he wanted.
 

“Bang,” he said softly. “Bang.
 
Bang.”

The driver struggled to his feet.
 
Holding on to the truck, he stumbled to the front bumper and then turned to make his way to the other side.

 
Following him with the scope, Walberg saw a big field of blue denim fill his vision.
 
He fired, catching him in the left buttock.
 
The big guy went down and stayed down.
 
Walberg could see him flailing.

He knew the kind of damage a .30-caliber round could do.
 
He’d seen the carnage on the battlefield.
 
He’d also shot a deer with one the previous year and watched the big buck drop as if he’d been hit by a sledgehammer.
 
When he dressed the buck, it looked like his heart had exploded.

He knew the guy he’d shot would probably survive.
 
But he doubted that he’d ever walk the same.

Walberg pushed back from the rock, pulled the rifle after him and stood up.
 
He could still hear them, not shouting now so much as wailing.
 
He could hear the moans of pain mixed in.
 
It was time to leave before another vehicle came down the road.
 
He had a date to keep in San Francisco.
      

* * *

It was close to midnight as Enzo Lee perused the website of the Soldiers of Christ Ministry from his home computer.
 
The range of books, videos, retreats, guided tours to the Holy Land and training programs for everything from losing weight to starting remote branches of the church was impressive.
 
The site almost glowed with the energy behind all of the many projects hinted at on its pages.

On a small tab entitled “affiliates” there were several links.
 
Most were to national church organizations, broadcast stations that carried Burgess’ sermons or sites apparently carrying additional Christian literature.
 
 
But one link was to an website entitled “Divine Fury.”
 

On the surface, Divine Fury seemed almost placid.
 
There was a stylized logo with a cross in the middle.
 
But the cross had been morphed in a subtle way so that it also resembled a
 
broad sword with handle and hilt elongated to form the “t” intersection and the blade dropping straight down to represent the bottom of the cross.

It was nicely done.
 
But Lee found the symbolism increasingly disturbing the longer he stared at the sword-cross.

As he clicked around on the site, any semblance of civility evaporated.

There was one discussion thread that seemed devoted to railing against blacks, Hispanics and Asians.
 
Another primarily focused on gays and lesbians.
 
Jews had their own rant fest with space for the occasional anti-Islamic diatribe.
 
The anti-abortion thread whipped its way around braless feminists and fornicating teenaged sluts on its way to its true targets – abortionists and their nurse assistants whose home addresses and photos – some with gun sights superimposed –
 
were sprinkled throughout the postings.

The level of discourse ranged from the erudite to the semi-literate and possibly deranged.
 
Any attempt at moderation seemed to have been quickly drowned out with the backslider relegated to the status of a lover of niggers, kikes, murderers, rag heads, gooks, queers, dykes or other hated subgroup that Lee couldn’t even identify from the slur.
 
 

After 20 minutes of reading, Lee felt physically tired from wading through the vitriol.
 
It was like stepping into the wrong, crowded elevator specially reserved for bigots and hatemongers.
 
He reminded himself that a mouse click and a 10-second wait would take him away from it.
 
Lee wondered idly if the cyber world had progressed to offering a virtual shower where the stink from a foul website could be washed away.

He searched for the name of a person or organization that would admit to some responsibility for the site.
 
Who could be behind it? Were they still involved?
 
Had the website perhaps been abandoned like so many others and then become a derelict vessel bobbing along letting anyone jump aboard for a rant or two?
 
Lee also wondered whether those writing the comments that advocated beatings, bombings, assassination, sexual assaults or genocide were getting any encouragement.
 
He clicked on a tab that said “contact” and it automatically popped up an email form addressed to the “Deacon.”
 
He stared at the form for a minute before deciding on the indirect approach:

Dear Deacon,

When I read the comments on the website, I wonder how the sentiments fit into the teachings of God and the Bible.
 
If I am opposed to abortion, gay rights or discrimination against whites, what is the proper way to show that?
 
Can I do more than just march with a sign or contribute to the cause?

Thanks,

Curious
     

That night, Lee found the reply waiting for him:

Dear Curious,

 
Mankind is an animal that frequently requires more than gentle persuasion to do the right thing.
 
Indeed, one can argue that only war and loss of life have enabled many ‘good’ things in history such as the founding of the United States, the spread of Christianity and even the end of slavery.
 

 
The battle today between the Devil and God for the soul of our society is as important as any war in the past.
 
The Crusaders of today should adopt the same attitude as the Crusaders of ancient times:
 
Nothing
can be allowed to stand in our way.

I look forward to continuing our correspondence.

With His love,

Deacon
 

Chapter 28

HARRY BLOUNT AND Bobbie Connors were already in the Bunker when Enzo Lee arrived in the early afternoon.
 
After the pleasantries, Blount got Lee a Diet Coke and two Pellegrino waters for himself and Connors.
 
Then, he pulled out a sizable bowl of peanut M&Ms and put them on the conference table between them.

“It’s about the best I can do for dessert,” he said.
 

“Perfect!” said Connors, spooning a half dozen into her hand.

“Thank you both for coming,” said Blount.
 
“I know we’re all coming at this from different angles and our priorities and responsibilities are different.
 
But at the same time, I’m under the impression that perhaps we’re all hunting the same animal here and if we can put some things on the table, maybe we can figure out what it is.
 
If so, then I think we all win.”

Blount led off, recounting what he knew about the spyware on his computer.
 
His security experts were convinced the medical center’s robust firewall and malicious code filters would have detected the keystroke capture program passing through an Internet connection.
 
There was no evidence it had entered the system concealed by encryption, compression or other techniques commonly used to disguise such programs.
  

So, they had to assume it came into the network through some physical connection – a computer, a thumb drive or another type of device.
 
Once inside the network, the spyware had searched the network and installed itself inside every Thinkpad laptop, ignoring every other device.
 
It had only sent out captured data from Blount’s computer.

“I guess my proclivities are well known,” said Blount.
 
“I mean as far as computers go and…yeah, I guess I am pretty compulsive about keeping a record of everything.
 
So, they knew I’m a Thinkpad guy.
 
My email address is common knowledge.
 
So maybe they used that as the final identifier – just focus on the guy with a thousand emails with my address.

“And the best we can do in terms of timing – when the spyware first hit our system – puts it Sunday morning, just over five weeks ago,” he said.
 
“That’s April 18 to be exact.
 
That would be when the device carrying it was hooked up – presumably physically – with our network.”

“That’s also when Scott Truman was killed,” Connors interjected.
 
“More than a coincidence?
 
That would be my bet.”

“Right,” said Blount.
 
“From the campaign perspective, this explains a lot.
 
All the dirty tricks.
 
The Wainwright endorsement, or maybe I should say ‘non-endorsement.’
 
Some of these things like the media events were publicly known.
 
But the advanced knowledge and knowing the big picture of the campaign gave them time to prepare and pick the best spots to tie us in knots.
 
It worked.”

“Can your computer pros figure out who sent the spyware or received the information from your computer?” asked Lee.

Blount shook his head.

“There is nothing traceable,” he said.
 
“You know how these guys operate.
 
They take over computers and control them remotely so they can build in layer after layer of protection.
 
They erase all the obvious evidence.”

Connors next provided an update on the Truman murder investigation.
 
United Air Lines records showed that the San Jose programmer, Oscar Wilkins, had flown from San Francisco to Fort Lauderdale two days after Truman’s death.
 
But the major carriers showed no other flights for the computer programmer after that.
 
Of course, South Florida had at least a dozen smaller carriers plus scores of individual airplane owners happy to fly passengers on short hops around the Caribbean.
 
Not all of them kept records and most wouldn’t bother to check the identification of passengers so long as their credit cards cleared or they paid in cash.