The Seraphim Sequence: The Fifth Column 2 (39 page)

‘I don’t think anyone’s comfortable with that,’ Jay said.

‘I am,’ Nasira said. ‘Count me in.’

‘Unless you need me elsewhere,’ Denton said, ‘I’ll do it. With a helmet I won’t be recognized in the service tunnel.’

Chickenhead held up his hand. ‘Why not.’

‘OK,’ Sophia said uncertainly. ‘That was easy.’

‘So what are we doing?’ Damien said. ‘The infiltration team?’

‘We’ll be standing by in the terminal,’ Sophia said. ‘Once the EMP detonates we can use the airport’s evacuation as cover to move into the service tunnel.’

‘Why can’t we just use police uniforms like the advance team?’ Damien asked.

‘We only have four uniforms,’ Denton said. ‘I could get more but we don’t have the time. We barely even have time to prepare the decoy explosion and get the EMP ready.’

‘Security has heightened since the fly ban a couple of days ago,’ Sophia said. ‘Access to the terminal requires a passport and boarding pass that matches. We’ve taken the liberty of creating boarding passes for almost everyone for a flight originally due to depart tomorrow morning. It all checks out.’

She pulled the passes from a small pile of papers on the table. They were Virgin America flights to San Francisco.

Sophia glanced at Aviary, then at Abraham. ‘Unfortunately I don’t have passes for either of you, or your men. If you want in without a boarding pass, you need to either be dressed as a cop and part of our advance team, or part of the EMP team, protecting the EMP and,’ she winced, ‘providing reinforcements or diversions if we need them.’

‘What about getting through the security checkpoint?’ Jay asked.

‘Only the terminal is in use,’ Denton said, ‘for refunds, credit, complaints, that sort of thing. With no flights scheduled no one’s going through security to the concourses.’

‘Once the EMP’s gone off, both the infiltration and the hostage teams can move through the security checkpoints,’ Sophia said.

‘Using whatever means necessary,’ Denton added.

Sophia eyed him carefully. ‘Using distraction where necessary,’ she said.

‘What’s the hostage team for?’ Abraham asked.

‘The hostage team will be taking security personnel hostage,’ Sophia said.

‘That doesn’t sound like a great idea,’ Damien said.

‘We need a sustained distraction,’ Sophia said. ‘The EMP and the evacuation will only last so long. I need a hostage situation.’

‘Christ,’ Chickenhead said.

Abraham glared at him, then said, ‘Who will be on the hostage team?’

‘Whoever is willing to volunteer,’ Sophia said. ‘You’ll need leverage and you’ll need to string the process out. Give them something to do. Demands. They don’t have to be real but they have to be believable. The hostage team will be covering our ass.’

DC was almost laughing under his breath. ‘Shit,’ he said. ‘You know what? I’ll do it.’

‘You can have our best team,’ Abraham said, turning to Aviary. ‘Your jaguar knights.’

Aviary nodded. ‘I’m sure they’ll be up for that.’

‘Will they?’ DC said. ‘I mean, I need to know who I’m working with here.’

‘They used to be Force Recon,’ Jay said.

‘They can handle themselves,’ Abraham said.

‘Fine, but DC is in command of the hostage team,’ Sophia said. ‘They’ll keep the cops busy while the EMP team holds their position and the infiltration team—Damien, Jay and myself—RV at the hopefully open blast door with the advance team.’

Jay was nodding. ‘Sounds good. I like it.’

‘Well, I don’t,’ Abraham said.

‘The EMP is one use only, right?’ Sophia asked Denton.

He nodded. ‘Once it’s used, you can ditch it.’ He addressed the team. ‘We have other vans for our extraction, with FBI lettering and logos painted on the sides. We’ve covered them with adhesive for now. We also have FBI tags you can attach to your vest or shoulder for later when we escape the airport.’

Nasira laughed. ‘So I have to, like, wear three uniforms?’

Sophia didn’t smile. ‘Yep.’

Nasira’s smile disappeared.

‘This is how we enter the OpCenter,’ Sophia said. ‘I’ll be your prisoner. You captured me at the airport. I’ll be blindfolded, seemingly cuffed and seemingly unarmed. You’ll walk me into the OpCenter. The access tunnel runs for just under a mile and connects with the north and south tunnels. We take the south tunnel to the OpCenter main chambers and support area.’

‘Won’t the guards at the OpCenter scan for our RFID chips in our arms?’ Grace said.

Denton placed a handful of pill-shaped chips on the table. ‘We’ll be needing some minor surgery before we begin tonight.’

Jay’s eyes opened wider. ‘Oh fuck off, I’ll be on the EMP team.’

Denton started laughing.

Sophia suppressed a smile. ‘What he means is, he’ll be taping it to your clothing, under your cuff,’ she said. ‘They scan through your sleeve. If they bother at all.’

‘With those RFIDs, does that mean you can shoot their weapons?’ Aviary asked.

‘Sadly, no,’ Denton said.

‘And once we’re in?’ Damien asked.

‘You take me directly to security command,’ Sophia said. ‘We … besiege and then divide into small teams.’

Everyone’s mouths hung open, stunned.

‘Besiege?’ Damien said. He almost visibly gulped.

‘We have five small EMP devices at our disposal. We use four, we have one spare just in case,’ Sophia said. ‘That means one team remains at security command. Grace?’

Grace gave Sophia a single nod. She had no problem with that.

‘And—’ Sophia started.

‘I can do it,’ Damien said quickly.

‘OK. So one EMP device at security command, that’s Grace and Damien,’ Sophia said.

‘These devices are timed; no fancy remote detonators, nothing to interfere,’ Denton added. ‘Set it and forget it.’

‘Nasira, Chickenhead, you can take the super-array,’ Sophia said.

‘I’ll take the systems center,’ Denton said.

Sophia nodded. ‘From security command, Grace can seal all the Blue Berets inside their barracks on the sub-level below us. She’ll also be capable of sealing any door you want. Once you have your EMP device in place, return to security command and tell Grace to seal the door. Grace, Damien, you guys should seal yourselves in security command. Anyone who wants in, use your radio or four knocks on the door. Simple as that. Grace, if you don’t hear four knocks you don’t let them in.’

‘And then?’ Jay said.

‘And then we extract,’ Sophia said. ‘Return to the airport, put on your FBI hostage rescue vests. The rest of your uniform remains the same. Keep your Magpuls.’

‘That’s a lot of role-play,’ Damien said.

 ‘Yes, can we pull off these impersonations?’ Abraham said.

‘If you look like you belong, there’s nothing you can’t do,’ DC said.

Abraham seemed satisfied with that answer because he said nothing further.

‘Everyone RVs back at the terminal,’ Sophia said. ‘We move to the vans in Garage West, peel off the adhesive that covers the FBI logo and letters and we’re good to go.’

‘So,’ Aviary said, ‘what can I do to help?’

‘You tell me,’ Sophia said.

‘She’s good with explosives,’ Damien said.

Denton thrust a finger onto the airport map. ‘The transit tunnel,’ he said. ‘Cave in one side. That way, if we have any unwanted company they’re forced to enter from the south end.’

‘But then we’re forced to exit from the south end,’ Sophia said.

‘If we’re in our so-called FBI disguises that shouldn’t matter, should it?’ Abraham said.

‘Aviary, can you make me a batch of high explosives?’ Sophia said. ‘Enough to cave in a tunnel, with some to spare. Give your shopping list to Nasira, we don’t have much time.’

‘You got it,’ Aviary said.

Sophia made a mental note to set up a separate encrypted channel to communicate only with those she trusted: Nasira, DC, Chickenhead, Damien and Jay. Even Grace was excluded. She hoped she wouldn’t need it, but she felt it was necessary.

She reached for the P99 in her waistband. ‘Abraham, you said something about surplus firearms. What do you have?’

‘My men are already armed. This is what we have left over,’ Abraham said and gestured to the far wall of the warehouse, now stacked with duffel bags.

Sophia’d thought they were Denton’s bags until now. Abraham strode over and unzipped a bag. She followed him.

‘Carbines, a few tactical shotguns, pistols. Some ammunition.’ He removed a carbine from the bag. It was sand-colored and compact, with a stubby barrel. ‘SCAR 17S. Accurate enough, reliable. Fires 7.62 rounds.’

He handed it to her to inspect. It was ambidextrous and the charging handle looked a bit strange at first glance. The modular rifle was made by the same company that made the P99s she’d used in Desecheo Island. She nodded and handed it back.

‘Good. We take these in bags. And we’ll need some new pistols. How many rounds do you have for these weapons?’

‘Box of a hundred nine mil, half that in forty-five. A dozen shells for the shotgun and a few hundred for the SCARs.’

‘That doesn’t sound like a whole lot,’ Jay said.

‘He’s right,’ Sophia said. ‘Even if you had spare, you don’t have the mags. I doubt we’ll have time in a firefight to feed new rounds into our mags.’

Abraham swallowed. ‘I’m sorry, but this is all we have. I’d get more but the government has a ban on almost all types of ammunition that we use.’

‘This will have to do then. What pistols do you have?’ Sophia asked.

‘A few Glocks, one or two with flashlights. Six including my own. Nine mil.’

‘There are nine of us,’ Jay said.

Abraham looked disappointed. ‘You don’t have any of your own firearms?’

‘Yeah,’ Chickenhead said, placing his L22 on the table. ‘This is the best we have.’

Nasira pulled her Sig Sauer P229 pistol from her jeans. ‘We have a few rounds left.’

‘Somehow I’m guessing you don’t have compatible magazines,’ Sophia said.

Abraham shook his head. ‘I’m afraid not.’

Before he’d finished speaking, Sophia had already unzipped another bag and found a few pistol-sized cases. She snapped one open and was pleased to see a subcompact Glock G26—or Baby Glock as she called it—inside. Much like her P99—which only had three rounds remaining—it was a great subcompact 9mm pistol for concealed carry. She released the mag and saw it was at capacity with ten rounds.

‘This will do nicely,’ she said, turning to the others. ‘We’ll use these SCARs as support weapons for those who remain above ground, but the infiltration and advance teams will need at least one pistol each.’

‘Nine mil for a primary weapon?’ Jay said, eyebrow raised. ‘You sure, Soph?’

‘We shouldn’t even need a primary weapon,’ she said. ‘But we also don’t plan for
shouldn’t
.’

‘I also have a couple of Glock 39s,’ Abraham said, ‘but I’m afraid I don’t have any ammunition to fill the mags.’

Jay looked crestfallen.

‘Denton, how’s your ammunition?’ Sophia asked.

‘All used up in Miami against the zombie horde,’ he said.

‘Chickenhead?’ she said.

He frowned and tapped the curved black magazine protruding from his bullpup L22. ‘Only a few rounds left, mate.’

‘You can’t bring that inside anyway,’ she said. ‘You’ll need a pistol.’

‘Here’s some more rounds’ Grace said.

Sophia watched as she placed two Glock 21 magazines on the table.

‘Where did you get those?’ Sophia asked.

‘Picked them up along the way,’ Grace said. ‘They’re yours if you need them. I already have a full mag.’

Grace’s Vector SMG used Glock 21 magazines with thirteen rounds apiece.

Jay picked one up and inspected it. ‘They’ll stick out of the Glock some, but hell, I’m not complaining.’

Grace glared at him. ‘You’re welcome?’

‘Yeah, um, thanks,’ Jay said.

Denton palmed the other mag and shared a terse nod with Grace.

‘How many is that?’ Damien asked.

‘We’re short by two pistols,’ Sophia said.

‘I have my own,’ Aviary said.

‘So we’re short by one. Here.’ Sophia handed the Glock she was holding to DC. ‘You can have this one.’

‘I’m not even going down there,’ DC said. ‘I’ll be in the airport, remember?’

‘Exactly, and you need to take hostages. I’m no expert, but you might need a gun for that.’

‘The jaguar knights have their own pistols,’ Aviary said.

‘That’s nice, but Sophia can’t walk down into the OpCenter without any sort of weapon,’ DC said. ‘That’s suicide.’

‘So was coming here,’ Jay said. ‘Just saying.’

DC thrust the pistol back into Sophia’s hand. She put it down and removed her P99 pistol from her waistband. She only had three rounds in it, donated from Nasira.

‘Nasira, what’s your count?’ she said.

Nasira didn’t even check, she already knew. ‘One.’

‘I have a full mag,’ Sophia lied. She handed the Glock back to DC. ‘Keep it.’

He took the pistol reluctantly. Nasira racked her pistol. Her chambered round popped into Sophia’s hand. She pocketed it and planned to add it to her magazine later. Four rounds would have to be enough.

‘Forgive my crude language, but you must have a lot of balls to pull this whole operation off,’ Abraham said.

‘You don’t need balls for this,’ Sophia said. ‘All you need is nothing to lose.’

‘And everything to destroy,’ Denton said.

Damien peered through the back window, fogged from Jay’s heavy breathing, at the approaching airport. They passed a thirty-foot horse statue rearing into the night. It had glowing red diode eyes and black veins that ran thickly across its fiberglass body.

‘Demon horse,’ Jay said. ‘Cool.’

‘We’re not even there yet and this place is creeping me out,’ Damien said.

‘Where are the other three horses of the apocalypse?’ Jay asked.

‘The artist who made that died in an accident while working on it,’ Aviary said from the front passenger seat.

‘Thanks,’ Damien said. ‘I feel much better.’

They passed another thirty-foot-tall sculpture, this one a concrete rendering of Anubis, the god of death and the afterlife.

‘I thought they were trying to be subtle with the OpCenter,’ Grace said from the driver’s seat.

‘It’s like a warning,’ Damien said, mostly to himself. ‘To stay the hell away.’

‘Not today,’ Grace said.

She drove up the inbound lanes of Peña Boulevard, into Garage East. Once she’d parked on the third level, Damien slipped his concealed earpiece in one ear and climbed out of the car.

‘How’s your leg?’ Aviary asked.

Damien realized she was talking about her knife wound in his thigh. By the time they’d reached Denver there wasn’t even a scar left.

‘It’s fine,’ he said.

She smirked. ‘No hard feelings?’

Damien felt Grace’s eyes on him as he opened the trunk and retrieved his daypack—full of shielded radios for post-EMP communication.

‘Only for a repeat offense,’ he said.

Aviary nodded and moved off toward the van that housed the EMP. Abraham and his men were standing around it. Damien joined Grace—already in her police uniform—and Jay and they walked toward Jeppesen terminal. Jay was carrying a duffel bag loaded with Magpul PDRs and their Glocks.

Most of the team were carrying the Glock 26s, but Jay and Denton had opted for the larger caliber 39 chambered with .45 rounds. The 39 was an equally excellent and concealable subcompact—although less concealable with Grace’s longer magazines—but Damien didn’t like it as much because it had a hell of a lot more kick and was sometimes a challenge to get immediate follow-up shots on target when that fraction of a second counted. Obviously Jay had no such concerns.

Damien saw Sophia, DC and Chickenhead—dressed as a police officer—on the way in, but he ignored them. A bunch of Abraham’s men trailed casually behind DC. Damien recognized a few of them as the jaguar knights from New York. He felt a coil of anxiety slowly unwind as he stepped into the terminal. It was real now. This was happening.

He showed his passport and boarding pass to security and was waved through. The terminal’s tented ceiling, which from a distance looked a bit like meringue, was more like a circus tent from the inside. It had three dozen masts woven with miles of steel cabling supporting a multi-peaked white fiberglass roof. There was a large fountain still under construction in the center. The warmth of the terminal’s temperature control made Damien’s skin flush.

He felt Grace’s breath on the side of his face. ‘You asked about my first operation,’ she said.

He turned to her. ‘I know.’

‘No, you don’t,’ she said. ‘When I was taken into Project GATE, I was an orphan.’

It took a second for Damien to process what she was saying. Everyone’s first operation in Project GATE was to eliminate their parents. But she’d never had to pull that trigger. Shoot her own family. Not like he’d had to.

She was facing him squarely, her mouth slightly parted. ‘I’ve been weird,’ she said. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘Why?’ Damien said. ‘I mean, not why are you sorry. Obviously that’s a good thing I guess.’ He realized he was babbling. ‘Why were you weird?’

‘Because liking you complicates things.’ She squeezed his hand, then released it, fingertips brushing his.

‘You said your first op was what made you switch sides,’ he said. ‘What was your first op?’

Grace looked around to make sure no one could hear them. ‘Jay failed his first operation,’ she said.

She turned and walked away. He was alone in the crowd. Reaching into his pocket, he grasped the small gold wristwatch that had been his great-grandfather’s. When he was a child and sick with food poisoning, his father had given him the watch and asked him to keep it safe. If his parents were alive and right here today, he wondered what he would say to them.

‘Hey, everything good?’ Jay slapped him on the shoulder.

Damien let the watch slip back into his pocket. ‘Yeah, all things considered.’ He turned to Jay. ‘I think I’ll stay in the airport with you.’

Jay looked pleased. ‘Glad to hear. That way we might actually survive.’

Grace’s voice crackled in Damien’s earpiece. ‘I have access. Still waiting on Nasira and Denton.’

‘Guys, get down there,’ Sophia said. ‘Grace and Chickenhead are waiting on you.’

Through the crowd, Damien could see Sophia and DC. DC placed a hand on her shoulder, but said nothing. For a moment they seemed to share an unspoken understanding, then DC turned and disappeared deeper into the crowd.

The flight information boards loomed above Damien. The word
CANCELED
appeared next to every flight. The fly ban had been in place for a few days now and no one knew how long it would last. Many of the people here were trying to get refunds for their flights and they weren’t happy about it.

‘I feel like I’m in a Dan Brown novel,’ Jay said.

Damien looked over to see him tapping his foot on a stone block engraved with Freemason symbols. ‘Please don’t make this any worse than it has to be,’ he said.

Jay was looking above Damien’s head. ‘I think someone just did.’

Damien followed his gaze to the flight information boards. The flights were being updated. In a furious wave that rippled from board to board, the word
CANCELED
was replaced with newly prescribed boarding times. Actual boarding times.

‘Oh shit,’ Damien said.

Over his earpiece, Sophia’s voice came loud and clear. ‘Change of plans,’ she said. ‘Stand by.’

‘What the hell do we do now?’ Jay said.

Damien had no idea. But he hoped Sophia did. He saw her emerge from a camera store with a disposable camera in hand.

‘DC,’ Sophia said. ‘I need you to get to the FAA control tower now.’

‘How do we do that?’ DC said.

‘Grace and Chickenhead will escort you,’ Sophia said over the radio. ‘Go. Now.’

***

DC stepped out of the elevator into the FAA control tower. The tower was square in shape with rounded corners and a 360-degree view of the airport through large plates of glass.

‘Could I have your attention, please?’ DC yelled, pitching his voice somewhere between auctioneer and boxing coach. ‘We are taking over this tower.’

The eight men and women inside the tower turned to the source of the voice and startled at the sight of his drawn Glock G26. There were more staff than he was expecting. With this many people, it was pretty clear the airport had every intention of clearing flights for take-off.

‘We’d appreciate it if you could raise your hands and not pass out,’ he said. ‘This is not a drill.’

The original plan had been for DC and his team of five jaguar knights to take the security office at the airport, so now he was improvising. He motioned his men out of the elevator and they spread out and wrapped the security cameras with duct tape. DC removed the cell-phone jammer from his bag. Several adjustable antennas protruded from one end, making it look like some sort of alien device. It was now jamming all cells except his own. His men moved around the desks, unplugging and removing all telephone, ethernet and fiber-optic cables. They stood guard over the staff individually, making sure they didn’t try any clever attempts to call for help online. Not yet, anyway.

‘Provided you’re capable of following our instructions,’ DC said, walking through to the main quadrant of the tower, ‘we won’t harm you. Who’s in charge here?’

A man in a black business shirt and slightly oversized gray suit pants offered his hand. ‘That’s me.’

‘Nice to meet you,’ DC said, approaching him. ‘Do you have a name?’

‘Brian,’ he said. ‘Brian Connolly.’

DC smiled. ‘Brian Connolly, we have quite the job to do today. But we’ll get through it just fine, and if you and your staff cooperate you’ll all be released unharmed.’

He surveyed the equipment that fringed the control tower. One panel flickered with red digits, another showed a map of the airport with positions of boarding aircraft. There were four racks holding thin plastic strips with writing scrawled on them—each strip represented a single flight and each rack represented its status and controller. Beyond that, a row of computer screens and a screen floating above Brian’s head on an adjustable arm.

Brian rubbed the gray stubble under his chin. ‘What do you want me to do?’ he said.

DC flicked through the plastic strips. ‘I need you to ground all departing flights not already on the taxiway. And I need you to divert all incoming flights to other airports.’

‘Uh, we don’t have any due just yet,’ Brian said. ‘The ban was only lifted moments ago.’

DC turned to face him. ‘We’re going to be here for a while. You need to turn
everyone
away. Do you understand me?’

Brian’s face crinkled. ‘I …  yeah. I’ll … we’ll see what we can do.’

‘How long will you need to get this airport clear of air traffic?’

Brian thought on that for a moment. ‘Uh, about twenty, thirty minutes.’

‘You have ten.’

DC walked out of earshot of the staff, shoved his pistol into his waistband, removed his freshly activated cell phone and dialed the number for the police substation under Garage West. It rang twice.

‘Denver International police station, Sergeant Hadfield speaking.’

‘My name is DC and I’m a member of the Akhana,’ DC said matter-of-factly. ‘I’d like to inform you that my team has taken the FAA control tower staff hostage. It might interest you to know that we have explosives placed at various points throughout the airport.’

‘OK,’ the sergeant said. ‘That’s a lot of information. The only thing I can ask you right now is that we want no one to get hurt. We don’t want the hostages hurt and we don’t want you and your team hurt.’

‘That sounds perfectly reasonable,’ DC said. ‘I have two requests of my own that I’d like to share with you. One: you evacuate the airport, including all police officers and the substation itself. Two: I would like to speak to a SWAT negotiator from downtown.’

‘DC, we really want to help you,’ the sergeant said, ‘but we will need our officers to enter the airport to help evacuate civilians.’

‘Fine. Do what you need to do. But I’d like to make it very clear that any attempt to breach or make entry to the control tower, or any attempt to place snipers within six hundred yards of the control tower, will result in at least one fewer controller making it out of here alive.’

‘We understand, DC, and we’ll take your request very seriously. If it’s OK with you, I’m going to put you in touch with a SWAT negotiator who can help you get what you want.’

‘You can contact me on this number,’ DC said, and ended the call.

Right now, the police would be looking up the registration details of the SIM card. He wondered how long it would take them to figure out the identity was fake. Not that it mattered. All he was trying to do was buy Sophia’s infiltration team some time to get in and get out. At this rate, they were going to need all the time they could get.

He held down the pressel switch in his pocket. ‘This is DC.’

‘Go ahead,’ Sophia said.

‘Flights are in the process of being grounded. Anything inbound is being turned away. I’ve demanded the police withdraw from the airport. They want to assist in the evacuation so don’t be surprised if you see a whole bunch of cops running around hot and bothered.’

‘Not a problem,’ she said. ‘How long do we have?’

‘Twenty,’ he said. ‘I’m pushing for ten.’

‘We can’t wait twenty,’ she said. ‘We’re doing this in ten. Any longer and we have to scrap the whole op.’

‘Sophia, take care down there, OK?’

‘You’re not my bodyguard any more, remember?’

He knew she was smiling. ‘Roger that,’ he said.

‘Nasira, Denton, are you there?’ Sophia said.

DC waited for their replies but no one reported in.

‘I haven’t been able to raise them for a while now,’ Sophia said. ‘Something’s wrong.’

DC turned to find a member of his jaguar knight team aiming a Glock at him.

‘Lay down the pistol,’ the knight said. ‘And the microphone. Hands in the air.’

‘What are you doing?’ DC said.

‘Do as I say,’ the knight said.

DC slowly reached down and removed his Glock. He placed it on the ground and stepped away, then removed the mic from his collar, wire and all, and placed it at his feet.

The knight gave a nod. ‘And the fancy sword.’

‘Jesus,’ DC said. He slowly removed his jacket to reveal his tachi sword sheathed in its saya. He took it out and laid it down next to his pistol. ‘Satisfied?’

‘Not yet,’ the knight said.

***

‘What the hell is going on?’ Sophia said, covering her earpiece conversation with her cell phone.

‘Sophia, please understand that we are only trying to help,’ Abraham said, cutting in. His voice was soft, annoyingly calm. ‘Detonating the EMP while we have people in the air is not the path.’

‘The path?’ Sophia said. ‘We’re clearing the airspace. I don’t understand your problem and I’d appreciate you explaining it to me.’

‘There is no problem, ma’am,’ he said. ‘We simply want to ensure that the airspace within the EMP radius is clear. I really don’t want you doing anything detestable. Not any more. That chapter in your life is closed now.’

‘Listen to me,’ Sophia said, pushing her way out of the crowd’s nucleus to somewhere she wouldn’t be overheard. ‘I don’t know what you think you know about me, and at this point I really don’t care, but we
need
the EMP to disable the service tunnel’s face recognition or we’re toast.’