Kill Them Wherever You Find Them (31 page)

"Yes sir, that is correct. No . . . I just
realized I left a vital detail out. Somebody else is providing them
with details about
The Project
!"

"Yes, Dr. No'am Abrams. He was the head of
the facility spearheading the Quantum technology of
The
Project
."

He noted Tzipora's use of the word "was." He
got to know No'am fairly well over the years when work would cross
their paths. Highly intelligent but socially a little awkward, he
feared that Dr. Abrams would not fare well in prison. A soldier, he
knew that he faced the death penalty. Such would not be Abrams'
fate. He wasn't sure which fate was worse.

"The guards will be here shortly to escort
you to prison where we will continue this interview this afternoon.
There is one more fact, first, that you should know before we
conclude."

"What fact would that be
ma'am
?" In
spite of himself, he could not keep from his voice his obvious
dislike of this woman.

"All these years that you were doing Mona,
No'am was as well."

The fact that she was actually working for
Iran was the penultimate thread to unravel in the carefully weaved
tapestry of Avi's life. Knowledge that she was using No'am,
physically and emotionally, to garner information on
The
Project
was the ultimate thread to not just unravel but to
snap, sickening him to the point where he nearly vomited. If he had
had anything to eat in the last twenty-four hours, he very well may
have.

Menachem wished Tzipora had not divulged this
information, but she was the senior of the two, and he had learned
to trust her instincts. Instincts that nearly always proved to be
spot-on, solving mysteries whose resolutions defied some of the
agency's top investigators. For this particular case the Prime
Minster himself had asked that Tzipora be the lead. Menachem was
grateful that she chose him as her second. Not only were there
items of their craft that he was glad to learn from her, but this
case would also propel his own career into the stratosphere if
successful.

By now, nearly everybody assigned to the
floor arrived, huddled in small groups, speaking in low voices
about what little they had guessed since the General had walked
out, ashen-faced, without a word to anybody. A few vocally hoped
that the Shin Bet officer would clue them in, disappointed that
Cohen's door remained closed.

Nobody could have guessed what would happen
next.

Two military police guards exited the
elevator, each so large it was a wonder they both fit in at the
same time. Turning to lock the single elevator with access to this
top floor, then locking the stairwell completing the lockdown of
the floor.

Once in the main office area the men pulled
their side arms free of their holsters, heading straight to the
General's office without a word or so much as a glance at the
assembled employees.

The General's office door had previously only
opened briefly once before, when he left – at that time nobody
realizing exactly what was transpiring. The way he exited, though,
tipped them off that something big was going down. Now the door was
opened again but the bulk of the guards obscured any view into the
office before being closed abruptly behind them.

Noticeably shaken, staring blankly forward,
Avi was escorted in chains out of the General's office. Twice he
stumbled as the guards pressed him to walk faster than the shackles
allowed.

The assemblage couldn't help but stare. A few
lips formed a silent question as they parted for the guards to take
out a long admired, highly respected and trusted senior member of
the Senior Staff. He was once referred to as the "Golden Boy" of
the General Staff, a nickname that stuck, though nobody would have
the chutzpah to say it to him directly.

That he was a respected confidant to both
Ashkelon and Aharonson would be an understatement. The effects of
this surreal scene unfolding before them would have a significant
impact on morale, and coffee room conjecture for some time to
come.

Unknown at the time, they would never see
General Ashkelon again. He was a man all held in respect and even
honor as fair leader, silently feared by a few. Neither Aharonson
nor the Shin Bet officer ever once spoke about the events of the
day. The staff members were informed, consequently, that measures
to augment internal security were being put into operation. Each
person would be required to undertake polygraphs and psych exams as
conditions to retain their security clearances. Counter-espionage
measures were also stepped-up.

Whatever it was that he did, shadows of
suspicion were now cast over everybody who worked in the building –
though just a handful had any link whatsoever to
The
Project
. Despite the fact that everybody was curious to know
what he did to merit being escorted from the building in shackles,
nobody was foolish enough to ask.

Highly decorated over the years and promoted
to the rank of Aluf, a General, Isabella Aharonson was raised to
the rank of Rav-aluf, Chief of the General Staff, four days after
receiving news of the passing of Lt. General Ashkelon. Deserving of
this honor, she regretted the circumstances that led to her
promotion, especially the death of her friend and predecessor. As
did Ashkelon's wife, Isabella would blame Avi's betrayal – personal
and professional – for the General's untimely death.

Thinking of Ashkelon as a family member, he
was very much a father figure to Shoshanna and a grandfather to her
three grandchildren, Lt. General Aharonson donned the black armband
of a person in mourning when she learned of Dan's passing, an
armband she would wear for a full year.

General Aharonson decided she would not move
her belongings to Ashkelon's until the full year of mourning was
complete. During this year of mourning and memory, Isabella wanted
his office to remain as was, with the sole exception of removing
Avi's picture and anything associated with him.

~ ~ ~

Avi's prison cell was claustrophobia inducing
small. Isolated from the general population, stripped of all
clothing to wear only prison garb made of a sturdy paper-based
material, he was placed on a 24-hour suicide watch.

Absolute silence, no window, light only
emanating from a single bulb recessed in the ceiling behind some
kind of glass that was unbreakable; not even a door handle for the
door that was precisely flush with the wall. He was entirely
alone.

With no point of physical reference, save it
be for the light above and the thin mat on the ground serving as a
bed, the small cell was rounded-out with only a metal toilet that
had no lid or handle to flush, a motion detector built into the
wall doing that job.

Avi was confident that there would also be a
fish-eye surveillance camera somewhere, that could view the
entirety of the small cell, and most likely some kind of microphone
to monitor any sound. The video surveillance was probably protected
beside the light source. The miniature microphone could have been
just about anywhere.

His hair, already military standard in
length, was shorn to nearly bald when he first entered the prison
and relinquished his clothing along with the items in his
pockets.

Gaunt from emotional exhaustion, lack of
sleep and food, coupled with the earlier worry about Mona; Avi knew
that he was but a shell of his former self, the fading ghost of the
man he was a few short days ago. Had he been on the streets like
this, his own parents would have walked by without so much as a
flicker of recognition.

He wondered when they would receive word of
his incarceration. He knew that the security services would already
have been investigating them, probably for several months now, to
make sure they had no complicity in his betrayal. Once they learned
of his imprisonment and eventual court martial, they would – could
– never be told of the full circumstances leading to the same.
Likely they would never have been told anything at all other than
that it was a matter of "national security."

His mother would cry, often. He had no idea
what his father's reaction would be. Probably one of stoic silence
with later tears shown to none, not even his wife. Avi innately
knew that he would by no means be allowed to see his parents again.
Not knowing how he could face them, this would be for the best –
for himself anyway.

Without reference for the passage of time, no
clock, sun, or moonlight, he had no idea how long he had been in
this cell. It may have been an hour or several hours. Time was his
first sense of disorientation. He was to learn in the coming days
that the lightbulb would never be extinguished. There would be
times he was allowed to sleep, followed by times when – sleeping
for who knows how long – he would be forced awake by a guard.

Meals, too, never followed any
distinguishable pattern. Sometimes he could swear that lunch was
handed through the small, sliding door at the base of the door to
his cell just minutes after he had finished his breakfast. At other
times the gnawing in his stomach led him to believe twelve or more
hours had passed since his last meal.

When somebody came for an interview, a
medical/mental evaluation, or the delivery of food, he always stood
at the other end of the small cell. At such times he was shackled
by waist-high handcuffs bolted to the wall that would automatically
clamp closed around his wrists, then automatically release open
again once he was allowed to move about. He never knew when people
were to arrive for an interview. When they did he never once was
allowed to leave the cell; chairs were instead brought in for the
interviewers.

As Tzipora had threateningly promised, they
did go to the prison for a follow-up interview. He supposed it was
that same afternoon but the disorientation took hold quickly,
leaving him in doubt as to any reference of time.

He was never beat, which actually came as
something of a surprise to him given his situation as a highly
placed soldier-turned-traitor and enemy of the state. Physically
strong, he realized he would have preferred beatings to isolation
and absolute disorientation. He didn't even have the benefit of
growth of hair as an indicator of time lapsed because an attendant
frequently - how frequently he could not guess - shaved his face
and keep the hair on his scalp to no more than stubble.

At least two times, chemical interrogations
were employed. Interrogations occurred less frequently, eventually
not at all. Or so it seemed to him. It was either a day since he
last spoke with an interrogator, a month, or even longer. He could
not be sure. It appeared that either the interrogators came to
accept that he was telling the truth, or that he had nothing more
to share.

He wondered if he would die in this cell or
simply go insane. For a while he would exercise to try and keep his
body in relative shape. One day - night? - Avi reached the
conclusion that it wasn't worth the effort. Either he would
languish in this cell or be executed at the hands of the state as a
traitor. One way or another, there just seemed no point in staying
physically fit.

The State of Israel publicly prided itself on
being a moral, just government and society based on Judaic
principles of equality and justice. Avi always believed that,
accepted that his service as a soldier defended this "high ground"
position. His treatment of the last weeks, or maybe already months
or even years, instilled not just a doubt of this moral public
relations coup but contempt for the very idea.

"Put me on trial and end this already! I
can't take this anymore – please just let me die." This was the
first time, he believed, that he lost emotional control in the
cell; lashing out vocally to his captors. For the first time since
viewing her tongue ripped from her mouth Avi sank to the floor,
sobbing uncontrollably.

Unsurprisingly, there was no response from
his captors. Redemption, even the smallest amount, wasn't to be
found. Alone, isolated, scared, he realized that even his very
thoughts were now working against him, mocking and taunting the
fool-turned-traitor.

Table of Contents

23. Who Pulls the
Strings

"Be thou prepared, and prepare for thyself, thou, and all
thy company that are assembled unto thee, and be thou a guard unto
them."-
Holy Bible, Ezekiel 38:7

Somewhere in the Negev Desert,
State of Israel

Moshe gave Jeff a
little information on the
jet as they returned to Israel, just enough to assure him that
cutting his visit home was necessary, a decision not taken lightly.
Nothing was said that could have fully prepared him for what he was
to hear in the conference room of the facility.

He knew Dr. Abrams as well as anybody could,
the young military man by face and reputation only. The news just
shared worsened his fear that his family was no more safe in Israel
than they would be if they remained in Colorado; perhaps even less
so. If an enemy nation – Jeff figured it had to be Iran given the
weakness and disorganization of the other nations of the Middle
East, other than perhaps Turkey – if an enemy nation could reach
into the very Israeli military General Staff, as well as the head
of one of the facilities of
The Project
, how could anybody
guarantee his family's safety?

He made a mental assessment of the countries
that first came to mind:

Egypt, with an uneasy peace with Israel, was
going through an internal tumult having overthrown their first
democratically elected president, a member of the Muslim
Brotherhood. The head of the judicial branch was now in charge
until new elections could be held. They were now brokering yet
another cease fire with Hamas in the Gaza Strip before full-scale
war broke out.