Almost a thousand miles away, inside the director’s office in Folcroft Sanitarium in Rye, New York, a thin man in a gray suit leaned forward to monitor Ben’s computer. Harold W. Smith was Ben’s boss, and the head of CURE, a secret organization dedicated to protecting America.
Smith had protected the country for decades, and although his mind was still as sharp as it had ever been, the growing aches and pains in his body reminded him of his mortality — and of the fact that his job was more important than any single life, including his own.
When Smith’s assistant, Mark Howard, disappeared in Afghanistan, he had needed to find a replacement. Mark had worked directly with Smith at his office, but in his absence, Smith had reconsidered the nature of the job. One day, perhaps soon, he would be forced to find a permanent replacement. That person would need to have experience running an organization similar to Smith’s, so Smith set up a separate agency, designed to safeguard America’s borders. It was a small version of CURE, complete with a disciple of Sinanju. At first, Smith worried that his successor would not understand the purpose or need for Sinanju. Fortunately, Stone had been itching to get back into the field and was well on his way in his training.
Smith did not have personal feelings for the people who worked for him. He could not afford to. Most did not even know the man they actually worked for. But when it came time to appoint a director for his new organization, Smith spent an exhausting amount of time searching through personality profiles. Sadly, only four people matched his profile.
He saw a special combination of patriotism, honor, and duty in Ben Cole — something that was sadly rare these days and established a base for him in a presidential bunker near St. Louis. Smith’s background check revealed why Ben had come to love his adopted land so deeply.
His birth name was Benjamin Maugaine. He was born in Yehud, Israel and was a member of Israeli’s Mossad agency, working with his wife Sarah as part of a sleeper cell in Egypt. They had been placed on a ten-year mission to monitor extreme Islamic activity. Ben and Sarah were expected to cover their own expenses, so Ben started a small tech company, and the couple were happy in their adopted country. For the most part, the people of Egypt were nice. A few objected to Ben and Sarah’s heritage, but most saved their energy for haggling at the marketplace.
Problems began when Ben was hired to repair the network for a regional governor. It was so large that he required Sarah’s help. While they were setting up the network security, Ben installed a secret monitoring system that would allow the Mossad to track all of the governor’s internet activity. The work was going well, and the governor himself even stopped to see how Ben and Sarah were doing. He seemed to be a pleasant man, so Ben did not think anything when he kissed Sarah’s hand.
But when Ben went to his car to get more equipment, the guards would not allow him back inside. For a moment, he thought that their plan had somehow been detected. But how?, he wondered. No one in the governor’s mansion understood the most basic premises of networking, much less the advanced techniques that Ben and Sarah were using. He waited outside the gate for Sarah to return, but by the time the sun set, she was still inside the governor’s mansion. Ben approached the gate, and this time, the guards aimed their rifles at his chest.
“My wife is still inside!” Ben said.
“Leave!” one of the guards said, motioning with the barrel of his rifle.
Ben held his open hands to his side to show that he was unarmed.
“We were called here by the governor to repair his network. Please, call inside and you will see that I’m telling the truth!”
The guards did not move. Ben could see a look of concern on one of the guard’s faces. Something was wrong.
“Leave!” the first guard ordered.
Ben returned to sitting on one of the large stones outside of the governor’s property. His mind began racing. What had gone wrong? Had someone revealed their true identities? If so, why did they only take Sarah?
The change of the guard came, and the man who had earlier showed concern strolled up to Ben and grabbed him by the back of his shirt, leading him to his car.
“Please, come with me,” he whispered, appearing to yell and point at Ben for the sake of the omnipresent security cameras. “Go home. You can pick your wife up tomorrow.”
“Why won’t he let me take her home now?” Ben asked, appearing to yell back at the guard.
The guard hesitated just for a moment before slamming Ben against his car and pointing down the road. “The governor is a man of powerful lusts. Please, for your wife’s sake, go home.”
Ben appeared to curse at the guard as he entered his car.
“Thank you,” Ben said. “I will not forget you.”
The guard walked back and bragged to the other guards how he had berated the Jew. Privately, the guard, whose own sister had been a victim of the governor, felt shame.
When Sarah was finally returned home after three days, Ben took her to a hospital. Ben collected enough evidence to press charges of kidnapping and rape against the governor. He filed all of the proper paperwork with the local magistrate. He was surprised that they accepted the case, and even more so that the trial had been set for the following week.
At first, the trial seemed to be going Ben’s way. The governor not only admitted taking Sarah, he admitted sexual liaisons with her. He took care to provide lurid details of his actions, while staring at Ben.
Ben submitted the results of the hospital stay, including a makeshift rape kit that would identify her attacker’s DNA, and a sworn statement by Sarah that the governor had raped her. At that point, the governor’s lawyer made a motion. He produced one piece of paper and handed it to the judge.
“The governor had wished to avoid this,” the lawyer said, glaring at Ben. “But, since the plaintiff has produced evidence in an attempt to implicate the governor of a crime, the governor is prepared to admit to an…indiscretion, but he also wishes to file counter charges of adultery.”
The judge looked at the paper and nodded seriously.
“Your client will be advised to keep marital relations within the scope of his four wives,” the judge said with a smile. “Now, about the serious charges against the Maugaine woman. Since such damning evidence has been provided, there is nothing I can do other than order that she face summary judgment.”
Ben’s eyes shot open wide as he looked at the judge.
“How is this even possible?” Ben asked.
“You will remain silent,” the judge said, slamming his gavel.
That was when Ben saw the smile and nod between the governor and the judge. The trial had been fixed.
After Sarah entered the courtroom, the verdict only took fifteen minutes. The judge struck his gavel, and pronounced the sentence: death.
Ben rose from his chair and was forced back down by armed guards.
“Sarah!” he screamed as his wife was led away.
She did not have the strength to call back to him, but gave him the best smile she could. She would not allow his last sight of her to be anything but love.
Ben was taken home and Sarah’s body was returned to him that evening with a court order to have her buried immediately. Ben sat quietly, cradling his wife’s lifeless body until there were no more tears to cry. Ben buried his wife — and his humanity — the following day.
After reading his final report, Ben’s superiors ordered him to return to Israel. When he refused, he was cut off from the Mossad. His cell phone was deactivated. The website he used to send files to his handlers no longer existed.
Benjamin Maugaine was on his own.
Ben spent the next few days following the movements of the governor and the judge. And one week after he buried his wife, Ben struck.
The judge had been an easy target. He went to the same restaurant every evening, so Ben simply walked to his table, shot his bodyguard and kicked the judge to the floor. Ben stepped on his throat and stared into the man’s eyes as he emptied his pistol into the judge’s chest.
Ben had thought the governor would increase security after hearing about the attack, but nothing appeared out of the ordinary. He waited for the governor to enter his garden, which he did every evening before going to sleep. The alarm began ringing just as the governor reached his treasured blue lotuses, but it was too late. Ben emerged from his hiding spot and shot multiple rounds into the governor. Seeing the palace guards heading his way, he sprinted toward the small ladder he had strapped on the back wall.
As he dropped to the ground on the other side, he ran into four guards. He immediately recognized the guard who had warned him about his wife. He dropped the man with a non-lethal strike to the neck. The others were not as fortunate. Ben ran to his car, but guards were already posted there.
Ben managed to escape, but the government’s fifty-thousand-dollar bounty on his head made it difficult to move during the day. He had one last hope: an American CIA operative named Mark Cole.
Mark and Ben had become instant friends after Ben arrived to Egypt. Ben had quietly helped Cole over the years, providing classified information to assist in his cases. In return, Cole sent all of his electronic work to Ben and Sarah.
Now Ben’s life depended on him. He arranged to meet Cole at an underground bar in Nasr City. Ben entered the dimly lit bar and made a wandering path among the patrons, searching for signs of a set up.
Seeing no immediate threats, Ben found Cole sitting quietly at a table toward the back of the bar. Cole was a middle-aged man with an eternal smile and a ready joke, the opposite of every agent Ben had ever met. On more than one occasion, he had defied his own superiors to do what he believed to be right. Ben hoped that the United States did not intend to turn Ben over to Egyptian authorities, but even if they did, he knew that Cole would not help them capture him.
“Evening,” Ben said, sitting across from him. “I assume you heard about my run in with the governor.”
“Oh, I think everyone heard,” Cole said, tilting a glass that already had three limes on the edge. “By the way, my boss said to arrest your ass if I saw you.”
A worried look came across Ben’s face.
“Don’t worry. He said I couldn’t keep the fifty thousand dollars. Besides, as he likes to constantly point out, I never listen to him. Welcome to the bottom of the bucket,” Cole said, smiling. “They better be glad they didn’t do that to my wife, or I’d have wiped out the entire damn government.”
“I thought you were divorced,” Ben said.
“Yeah, but that’s not the point. Sarah was one of the good ones. So what can I do?”
“I need a way out of this country.”
Mark tipped back the last swallow of his gimlet, and set the glass on the table.
“My African and Asian connections are on the wall, so they won’t be any help, but I can get you to New Jersey.”
“America?” Ben asked.
“Land of the free and home of the brave!” Cole said, raising his glass. “God bless America!”
Ben lowered his face at the outburst.
“What do I owe you?” Ben asked.
“We’re brothers,” Cole said. “This one’s on me.”
Cole started pulling strings until there was none left to pull. He called in every favor he had, and was finally able to smuggle Ben to the waterfront, where he had booked passage on a cargo ship. When the Egyptian Special Forces found them, Mark drew the soldiers away. Ben silently headed to the ship when he heard gunshots.
“Bring it, bitches!” he heard Cole yell, followed by a war howl and more gunfire.
Then the firing stopped.
When Ben reached American soil, he knew that he had to change his name, so he registered as Benjamin Cole, in honor of the man who had given his life to secure his passage.
Harold W. Smith was the only American who knew Ben’s true story, so when a low-level bureaucrat suggested that they trade Ben over to the Egyptians for a political favor, Smith forced the man into early retirement. Benjamin Cole was an intelligence commodity, not a political token. Smith quietly steered him into a position with the CIA, where he would have stayed if 9-11 had never occurred.
After 9-11, Ben became an invaluable asset to American intelligence. His work with the CIA thwarted a dozen attacks on American soil. Ben’s record placed him on Smith’s short list of possible replacements. Once he began studying profiles closer, Smith could find no one more American than this man, born on the other side of the world.
That, however, did not give Ben the right to shirk his duties. Smith wrote a small report on Ben’s failure to follow up on the Sinanju flag, and closed the connection between their computers.