Double Eagle
Headquarters
M Street Georgetown
Washington, DC
December 22, 2017
Except for the throng of last minute shoppers and usual crowd of people walking to the boutique restaurants that dotted Georgetown’s streets, it was a quiet evening. Spence sat in the darkness of his office enjoying the solitude while he waited patiently for a report on the evening’s events a few miles south in Alexandria. The operation had been meticulously planned, and he had reviewed every detail carefully. He trusted the leaders and had great confidence that the manner of execution and the clues left behind would lead authorities to Al-Qaeda. Cutting off the head of the snake had always been an effective tactic, and Spence had no doubt that this event would really stir the pot with the public and with the Congress. The outcome would include cries for more funding in a futile effort to stop these violent terrorists’ attacks. In reality, additional money would prove counter-productive, as it would permit Spence to further infiltrate the nation’s security network. Fear would widen the funding streams to combat the external threats, and the focus of the special anti-terrorism teams from multiple organizations would be right where Spence wanted it: on Al-Qaeda and its affiliates.
A small screen lit up on a pager in the middle of Spence’s desk. The signal had been routed through multiple nodes around the world but reached his device seconds after transmission. Spence looked at the screen which showed just the number “2”. Spence pounded the table in anger causing the little device to jump up from the desk’s surface and land face down. “2” signaled mission failure.