The Oval Office, The White House
Washington, DC
President Starling watched the broadcast, shaking his head. Morrison had said it was the Assembly behind the hack attacks, and now these Utopians were claiming responsibility. At first, he had thought it might be one group claiming credit for another’s work, but he was assured that was unlikely. Which meant Morrison was wrong. “Do we have any intel on these guys?”
FBI Director Fitzgerald held up a tablet computer. “Yes, sir, but not a lot. They’re a fringe group, eco-nuts. They’ve been linked to several protests surrounding pipelines and logging operations over the years, but nothing like this. Certainly nothing technical. No hacking.” He looked up from the tablet. “Frankly, Mr. President, this just doesn’t match their MO.”
Starling nodded, rereading the script broadcast through the hack of the Emergency Broadcast System. “Clearly they’ve gone to computer camp.” He sighed. “Do we know who they are? I mean, names?”
“We have a few, but they haven’t really been on our radar. If we monitored every environmentalist organization, we’d have nobody left to investigate the real crimes.”
Starling grunted, motioning at the television, now on a news channel, the talking heads delighting in the chaos. “Look like real crimes to me.”
Fitzgerald bowed slightly. “Of course, Mr. President. I didn’t mean to imply otherwise.”
Starling raised his hand. “No need to apologize, Cliff, I know what you meant. Find them, round them up, and I’m going to have to address the nation. Let the networks know.” He frowned, tapping the transcript of the broadcast. “Do we know what ten cities they’re talking about? Have we detected any poison?”
Fitzgerald shook his head. “No idea, sir, though every city with a population over one million is performing testing now and advising their communities to not drink the water.”
Starling sighed. “God help us all.” He looked out the windows at Washington, DC, now secure under the blanket of darkness, the capital of their great nation for some reason left untouched. “How long can a city like New York hold out?”
“Days at most. And that’s the problem, that’s what they’re talking about in their message. They’re targeting our cities, our modern way of life. There’re no farms in cities. All of the food is brought to the cities. They’ve disrupted our shipping systems, rail and road traffic, and now our water supply, which is also transported in through aqueducts and tunnels. The human body can last weeks without food, but only days without water. People will become desperate for water within a few days, and they’ll drink from the taps unless we shut down the supplies. If we don’t, and these Utopians have indeed poisoned the water, then people will begin to get sick. Millions will be dying in our biggest cities, and there won’t be anything we can do about it.”
“Can we be sure there’s a poison?”
“No, that’s the beauty of what they’ve done. Because they created havoc through these hacks, our citizens have no reason to doubt their claim about the poison. There doesn’t need to be a poison to create panic. I guarantee you, Mr. President, before this week is through, we will have people killing for the last bottle of water in their local supermarket.”
Starling closed his eyes and drew a deep breath. He looked at Fitzgerald. “Arrest every member of that group, now. Do whatever it takes. I don’t give a shit if it stands up in court next year, our country needs saving today.”