American Shutdown - Chapter 21: Who Will Blink First?

Peg saw her cell phone light up with her daughter’s number. She showed the screen to Sam before answering it, “Marianna, where are you? What are you up to? I’m here at the F.B.I. command center with your dad and Bernie Soloff’s wife. Have you been following what’s on the news about M-Mtek?”

“Yes, I have. I just found out how dangerous it appears to be. Are you guys all right? Is Bernie still in there? I want to come home and be with you. How’s Mimi, doing?” Marianna rattled off in staccato fashion.

Peg dove into her daughter’s chain of questions, starting with, “You don’t need to come home. We’re just sitting it out waiting for who’s going to blink first, Bernie or the F.B.I. Your dad’s hoping it’ll be Bernie. He still has an M-Mtek HR guy in there with him and that’ll probably be a major factor in the negotiations to end this deal. Your dad was part of the negotiating team until he informed the F.B.I. agent handling the deal that he was p.o.’d about them jamming the wireless communications Bernie was using to control M-Mtek’s national network. Bernie was also remotely controlling an explosives booby-trap system he had installed at the plant.”

“Christ, Mom. He thought of everything. He must be really angry,” Marianna commented.
Peg told her daughter that her dad thought the F.B.I.’s tell-all approach was too aggressive and might set Bernie off on a rampage.

“Marianna, just stay where you are,” her mom advised. “I got to go now. Agent Ramos has come in and is walking toward us. I think he wants to talk to us. Bye. Luv you. And, your dad loves you, too.”
Marianna obstinately finished the call with, “I might still come home, tomorrow. Bye. Luv ya”

Agent Ramos got the group’s attention by opening with, “I just want to tell you that we are in the process of going in and rescuing Ishaan Gilbert. That’s about all I can tell you about it and I trust this will stay between us for now. The teams we send in to do this kind of work are the best at what they do. We can only hope and pray Bernie sees the futility of doing anything rash. Sorry, but I have to return to the negotiating team out at the wall. I just wanted to give you a heads up on things.’

As he quickly turned to leave he said over his shoulder, “Probably could use your prayers right about now.”

Inside the conference room, Ishaan had noticed Bernie’s face was more ashen than earlier. He asked, “Bernie, you ok?”

“Yeah, I guess. I haven’t had my meds since this morning and I’m feeling off kilter about now,” he informed Ishaan.

“Ishaan, they’re going to come in here like gangbusters. I can feel it in my bones. They’re going to take a chance that the jamming disabled all the booby traps. They might send in one of those military robots first to check that out. Maybe they’ll come in through the bathroom skylight after that. Or just barge in here from the halls - maybe after dropping percussion bombs first.”

“Ishaan,” Bernie continued, “put these plugs in you ears and go stand in the far corner. You’ll be more protected over there in case they use a percussion bomb. Crouch down and cover your face just in case they do. Sorry about all this. Liked your speech, though. At least you never called the kids hostages.”

“What about you, Bernie. You going to just sit there and take it?” Ishaan wanted to know. “Do you have a live weapon in that big black bag of yours?”

Bernie wearily moaned back to him, “Yes I do. Don’t worry about that. Just do what I said. Put the ear plugs in, go over in the corner, crouch down and cover your face. You’ll have a front seat for all the action.”

He and Ishaan could hear rumbling through the ceiling coming from the direction of the bathrooms. Ishaan saw Bernie reach down to take out what he thought was an AKA from the black bag and put it lengthwise on the conference table facing the door.

The noises from above grew louder. Bernie reached again into his bag and set a pill vial on the table surface along with a sealed parchment envelope. “Hey, Ishaan. Do me a favor, will you. Give this envelope to my wife, Mimi. And give her my love, too, will you?”

Ishaan mournfully said he would carry out both requests.

Bernie then opened the pill container, took a large red capsule from it, put it into his mouth between his teeth and snapped down on it. Almost immediately, Bernie jolted back in his office chair, lurched forward toward the table and remained motionless with his forehead resting on his laptop’s keyboard.

Ishaan stood in the corner frozen with disbelief of what he had witnessed. He could faintly hear through his earplugs loud gruff voices from outside the closed door ordering all who were in the conference room to come out. Ishaan was stunned to the point the could not answer.

In an instant the door was shoved into the room and a team of battle clad men with assault rifles trained on Bennie and Ishaan barged in yelling for them to identify themselves.

“I’m Ishaan Gilbert,” he answered. “That’s Bernie Soloff over there. I think he’s dead. He took a red pill of some kind just before you barged in here. He died instantly.”

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American Shutdown by Benjamin F. Campanelli
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