Credible Threat (Episode One)
Brush Contact
Xavier’s gut always tightened when that phone went off. Only six people in the country had the number to the phone in the wooden faux humidor on the corner of the credenza behind his desk. If one of them saw fit to call, it could only mean one thing: trouble. More than trouble, a dire threat to the very existence of the country and their way of life.
The phone had been hard-wired into the grid. Power outages wouldn’t affect it. Nor would cutting the phone lines. Not even a massive EMP would shut it down. But, if that happened, the country, and Washington, DC, were facing much bigger problems than any those six people could possibly be reporting and that boggled his mind. While he knew that there had not been any sort of EMP, it didn’t make him any happier to hear the buzz.
The phone had been designed only to buzz. Being contained in what was basically a locked, wooden Faraday cage amplified the buzz within the confines of his office, but no one would hear it even standing just outside the door.
He slipped the required key fob from his waistcoat pocket and thumbed the unlock button. He even heard the thunk of the release over the buzz, just before the lid lifted itself open.
He took a deep breath and snatched up the receiver. Although it still made him feel ridiculous, he answered with the proper codename. “Sandman.”
For a moment, there was silence on the other end of the line. Then, the words that he’d dreaded hearing for the past twenty-four hours. “Confirmed, Sandman. We have a credible threat.”
He didn’t know how far he’d have to go or what the ultimate cost would end up being before this was all over. For the moment, he only knew one thing: it was time to activate one of their failsafe agents.
•••••
“We’re gonna be late!”
Aaron Pratchett heard his wife, Marie, yell from behind him as he strode down the stairs, shrugging into his jacket, his tie draped around his neck. He stopped at the bottom and surveyed the kitchen as he slipped his tie into place and tied a neat half-Windsor knot.
Tyler and Alexis shoveled the last of their breakfast into their over-stuffed mouths and scrambled to get the bowls into the sink. Alexis’ science project—the ol’ reliable vinegar and baking soda volcano—sat on the end of the kitchen island.
Marie waddled down the stairs and into the kitchen. Aaron watched her from behind as he straightened his tie.
Tyler ducked past both of them and pounded up the stairs.
Marie glanced over her shoulder at Aaron and frowned as his gaze moved up from her ass to meet hers. “Come on, slow poke! Another Monday awaits.”
It really was true, what they said. Pregnant women did have a glow. She’d never looked more beautiful to him.
Alexis shrugged her backpack on by the back door and rushed back into the kitchen to grab her lunch bag and the volcano. She struggled to get everything lifted up and balanced before Aaron strode over.
“Here, I’ll get this out to the van,” he said as he slid his hands under the volcano’s plywood base. “You just head out there and get belted in.”
At nearly eleven years old, Alexis hadn’t yet hit the rebellious stage. “Thanks, Daddy.” She skipped out to the four-year-old Chevrolet Astro van which sat at the back of their driveway.
“Come on, Ty! It’s time to go,” Marie shouted, her hand pressed against the small of her back as she maneuvered toward the back door.
“Coming, Mom!” Ty shouted back from upstairs. “I’m just grabbing my homework!”
“You should have already had that packed up,” Marie shouted. “You had all weekend!”
Aaron hefted the volcano out to the Astro and slid it into the back, threw the door shut and hurried back to the house.
He picked up his briefcase and the three rolls of blueprints off the chair by the back door and stood waiting for Tyler to scramble down the stairs. Marie glared as she stalked up to him.
“What is it with him? Always leaving things ‘til the last minute?”
Aaron smirked at her. “We’ve got plenty of time. Don’t worry.”
“Says the perpetually-late Mr. Pratchett?” She shook her head and stepped out the door, hand pressed to the small of her back, heading for the Astro’s passenger seat.
“Baby can’t come soon enough,” Aaron muttered. He juggled the blueprint tubes and the briefcase into one hand and leaned in to grab the doorknob as his gangly teenaged son pounded down the stairs two at a time. Tyler didn’t slow until he got to the door.
With a self-conscious grin, Tyler met Aaron’s gaze. “I’m here, Dad. No worries.” He ducked past Aaron and toward the van before Aaron could swat at him.
Aaron twisted the doorknob to ensure it was locked and swung the door closed, testing it again before finally scurrying toward the Astro.
He started it up, put it in reverse, and turned in his seat to back out of the driveway. They hadn’t gone more than ten feet before two dings issued from the speakers, followed by a tinny, computerized voice.
Pairing with Aaron’s phone.
Marie parroted the notification. “God, I hate that damn thing.”
Aaron sighed as he rolled to a stop to allow Mrs. Schneider from down the block to walk her jittery Chihuahua across the driveway. Chauncey nearly vibrated as he strained against his leash. Aaron had never seen the appeal of having such a high-strung dog.
Mrs. Schneider smiled and waved at them as she crossed. Aaron returned the wave as Marie tsked and waited impatiently for him to back farther out.
When she had cleared the driveway, the van’s tires squawked briefly as he tromped on the accelerator and surged out into the street.
“Now you’re in a hurry?” Marie crossed her arms.
“Got the McKinley proposal this morning,” he muttered before he tugged the shifter into “Drive” and stomped on the gas.
“Wait!” Tyler screeched from the seat behind Aaron. “I forgot my lunch!”
“Probably on purpose,” Alexis muttered.
“Shut up, brace-face,” Tyler shot back.
Aaron pursed his lips and met Tyler’s gaze in the rearview mirror and rolled his eyes. “I’ll give you ten bucks. You can buy lunch in the cafeteria,” he said as the Astro shot down the street.
Aaron glanced at Marie, as she tried to arrange the seatbelt over her belly. “Just another manic Monday,” he quipped.
After several minutes of pounding the dashboard in frustration at the drivers clearly and deliberately slowing their progress, Marie sighed when Aaron pulled the van to the curb at Tyler’s school and shoved it into park.
Tyler quickly jumped out, yanked the door closed, and stepped up to the driver’s window with his hand out.
Aaron glanced at it for a moment. “Right. Ten bucks.” He shifted on the seat and stuffed his hand into his pocket, pulling out his money clip. He stared down at it and thumbed through the bills before tearing one out. “Got nothing smaller than a twenty.”
He caught his son’s gaze. “Make sure I get the change back.”
“You bet. Thanks, Dad.” Tyler grinned as he snatched the bill and started towards the sidewalk, a big grin on his face. “See you tonight!”
As Tyler headed into the crowd of arriving students, Aaron watched him go.
“There’s an opening in traffic, Aaron. Let’s go.”
He scowled and yanked the van into gear and shot away from the curb without so much as a backward glance.
“It’ll take even longer to get where we’re going if we get in an accident,” Marie said.
At Alexis’ school, Aaron had to take extra time getting the volcano out of the back of the van and making sure Alexis could carry it into the school without too much trouble. Once she had the volcano, her backpack, and her lunch bag balanced and ready to go, he guided her up to the sidewalk. “Good luck in the Science Fair, Lexi.”
She flushed. “Thanks, Dad.”
As she started off along the sidewalk, Aaron hustled to the driver’s door and jumped inside.
“Alone at last,” Marie said.
“Not for long,” Aaron said as he started the van and looked over his shoulder for a break in traffic.
As the Astro surged from the curb, the hands-free pairing message was cut off half-way through.
Incoming call from Owens, Michael.
Aaron puffed out a breath. “Should have known that was coming.” He glanced at Marie before pressing the “Answer” button on the steering wheel controls.
“Hi Mike,” he spoke into the air.
“Why aren’t you here, yet?” Mike’s voice spat from the tinny speakers.
“Just dropping the kids off at school.”
“I was hoping you’d be here early so we could go over the proposal one more time.”
Marie rolled her eyes.
“It’s as good as it’s gonna get, Mike,” Aaron said. They’d been over it a hundred times this past weekend, in between bouts of volcano building.
“Never hurts to go over it one more time,” Mike snarled. The anxiety in his voice came through despite the crappy speakers.
“It’ll be fine, Mike. Once I drop Marie off, I’ll be there in a flash.”
“You still have to drop Marie? Can’t she catch a cab from one of the kids’ schools?”
Beside Aaron, Marie stiffened. “No, Mike. She can’t,” Marie said and sat forward to stab the disconnect button on the console. “Asshole,” she muttered.
Aaron’s gaze snapped over to her as he stopped at the red light in front of them. “You know I’m gonna pay for that when I get there.”
“Sorry, but your boss is—”
The ringing of the phone through the speakers cut her off. Before even waiting for the tinny voice to announce who the call was from, Aaron thumbed the answer button on the steering wheel.
“Look, Mike –”
A male voice from the speakers cut him off. “Operation Watchdog,” the deep baritone said. “Repeat: Operation Watchdog. Acknowledge.”
•••••
Marie was ticked off that Mike would phone back immediately. Sometimes, the things he asked of Aaron were above and beyond the call of duty, to say the least.
Her immediate reaction to the voice coming from the hands-free unit’s speakers was it was a wrong number. She waited for Aaron to hang up.
But he, too, just sat there. Even when the light turned green, his foot stayed on the brake pedal.
She turned in her seat to look at him. He was staring straight ahead, his jaw slack.
“I say again. Operation Watchdog. Acknowledge,” the voice on the phone said.
Her gaze snapped back to the hands-free’s screen as, behind them, horns began to blare.
Aaron cleared his throat. “Acknowledge,” he said. It came out dreamy and far away.
The hands-free screen showed the call disconnected.
Marie’s gaze edged over to Aaron’s knuckles as they whitened on the steering wheel. She swallowed thickly.
She lifted her gaze to his face and saw his jaw tighten. Urgency bloomed in his eyes. When she thought about it later, she would say he was...rebooting.
Aaron’s foot moved from the brake to the gas. The tires squawked as the Astro van shot forward, just after the light turned red.
Horns blared as the Astro shot into the intersection and made a wide right-hand turn.
Marie peered in the other direction. They had been waiting to turn left. “Aaron, you’re going the wrong way.”
No response. He barely even blinked.
“Aaron?” She rested a hand on his forearm.
He jumped and tore his gaze briefly away from the road, looking at her as though he had just realized she was there.
“Aaron, this isn’t the way to my office.”
He turned his attention back to the road. Again, no response.
The van picked up speed as Aaron dodged in and out of traffic, changing lanes without shoulder checking. Wherever they were going, Aaron was in a hurry.
“Slow down! You’re going to get a ticket or worse!”
He accelerated.
Marie clamped down on the arms of the Astro’s bucket seat. “I’m gonna be late for work! Where are we going?”
Finally, she got a response from him. “I’ve got to get to the bus depot.”
“The bus depot? What for? What’s going on? Who was that?”
Now he was back to silence, again.
Marie screamed when Aaron took a sharp right-hand turn from the left-hand lane, across three rows of traffic. Through the window, she could see drivers straining to stop their cars before they collided with her side of the van.
Marie was sure at any moment, she’d hear police sirens behind them, and Aaron would be hauled off by San Francisco’s finest.
Maybe I could tell them I’m having labor pains? That might work.
As the van cleared the intersection, Marie spotted the Greyhound sign several blocks down. It was clear to her that her husband had spotted it as well because Aaron accelerated again. She didn’t dare look at the speedometer.
The Greyhound depot came up on their right. Aaron yanked on the steering wheel, sliding them into the entrance. Two people on the sidewalk, crossing the entrance, jumped out of the way.
“Aaron, watch out! Be careful!” Marie was shocked by his behavior. It was as though he was someone else.
Aaron shot the van across the parking lot and into the passenger drop-off space. He slammed the gear stick into Park, ripped his seatbelt off and turned quickly in his seat. “I’ll be right back.”
He thumbed the lock, unlocking the doors.
Marie pounded her hand down on the Lock button. “No way! You’re not going anywhere until you tell me what’s going on.”
He scowled at her. “Take your hand off that button!”
“Tell me what the hell’s going on!”
He screwed his face up, the way he did when he was really angry. “I don’t have time! I have to get in there!”
Marie set her jaw. “Fine. Then I’m going with you!” She unlocked the doors and yanked hers open.
When she reached over to unbuckle her seatbelt, he snatched her wrist. “You can’t...”
She yanked her hand free of his grip. “Try and stop me!”
With the seatbelt out of the way, Marie pressed her hands against the seat to maneuver herself around until she could slide onto the ground.
“For fuck sakes,” Aaron muttered. She heard him open and slam his door shut while she reached for her door to steady herself. She snatched her purse off the floor and slung it over her shoulder.
By the time she’d closed her door, he was many, many hurried steps ahead of her on the sidewalk, headed for the bus depot entrance.
“You sonofabitch,” Marie muttered and waddled after him, heading for the sidewalk. “Aaron, wait for me.” She’d never catch him at this rate.
Pressing her hand to the small of her back, she tried to go as fast as she could, but Aaron was in great shape, always had been. By the time he turned to go through the automatic doors, she was barely half-way there.
By the time she got inside, he was striding through the middle of the crowd, heading for the departure platform.
Is he actually going to catch a bus?
She watched as he neared a bus that was loading. If she hadn’t been watching him, she would have totally missed the man who strode out from behind one of the support pillars on the platform. He passed Aaron, going the other way. The two of them nearly collided.
None of that was remarkable except two or three steps later, Aaron slung a backpack onto his shoulder while he turned around and headed right back toward her.
Backpack? He didn’t have a backpack.
Marie came to a halt amidst the busy, early-morning crowd, her eyes locked on Aaron and the backpack which had appeared in his hand.
He stopped before her and rested a hand on her arm. “Sorry about that. I was in a hurry.” He glanced around the depot, hefted the backpack on his shoulder and looked at his watch. “We still have time to get you to work if we hurry.”
Exasperated, Marie yanked her arm from his grasp. “Are you kidding me?”
“What?” Aaron looked confused.
“Go to work like nothing happened? Screw that! I want you to tell me what the hell is going on.”
He reached for her arm again. “We’ll talk about it on the way to your office.”
Marie growled in frustration and plucked her cellphone from her purse. She touched the screen and put it to her ear.
“Hi, Ron. It’s Marie. I’m afraid I won’t be in today... Yeah, Alexis is sick... Thanks, I will. See you tomorrow.”
She yanked the phone away from her ear, stabbed the screen and dumped the phone into her purse, her gaze locked with Aaron’s. “That takes care of that. Now, what’s going on?”
Aaron sighed in exasperation, then gave his head a shake and shrugged good-naturedly. “It’s just...a new assignment from work, that’s all.”
Marie crossed her arms. “Uh-huh, sure. And I’m the Queen of Sheba.”
He prodded at her arm, she presumed to try and get her turned around. “Can we at least talk about this in the van?”
“We’re not going anywhere until you tell me what’s going on, Aaron! You get some weird phone call and suddenly, it’s like your life depends on coming here. Do you know how many times we were nearly in an accident?”
Aaron’s gaze flickered around the depot again. “We were never in any danger.”
“You didn’t see the look on some of the other drivers’ faces, Aaron. I’m due in two weeks. The least little thing could be dangerous for me, right now.”
Aaron held out a placating hand to her. “Believe me, I am painfully aware of that.”
She scowled at him. “Look, just tell me what’s so important that you—”
He stood there watching her, waiting for her to finish the question.
She furrowed her brow and looked down at her belly.
“What’s the matter?” he asked, concern peppering his voice.
She grasped his upper arm and squeezed. “My water just broke.”
He glanced down at the floor and frowned. “Are you sure?”
Marie rolled her eyes. “Of course, I’m sure. A woman knows when her water breaks.”
He shrugged. “I mean...there’s no puddle or anything.”
Aaron snapped his head down at the trickling sound of liquid hitting the floor.
•••••
Thanks for reading!
Credible Threat was originally written as a complete thirteen-episode thriller. If you’re the kind of reader who hates cliffhangers and prefers to binge the whole story, you can pick up the full season right now from Stories Rule Press and keep reading immediately, just click here.
The next episode will be here soon. The rest of the season is waiting whenever you’re ready.