“In other words, this guy could one day be your boss. Better not fuck up, Harvath,” said one of the operatives.

“I don’t know who you think you work for,” replied Scot, “but we all work for the president. That includes the CIA, though you guys think you’re above everything.”

“All right, all right,” said Morrell. “That’s enough. Let’s get back to business. Now, three male passengers have already been killed. Their bodies were dumped from a forward exit door onto the tarmac. We believe two of the men were the sky marshals working the flight. Preliminary reports seem to indicate that the third man was a guy named Lund, one of Mayor Fellinger’s bodyguards. No one has been able to get close enough to the plane to retrieve the bodies, but from what the CAG team can tell, all three were probably dead before they hit the ground.

“The flight manifest indicates that it took off full with three hundred twenty passengers and twenty-three crew members, including the pilots. Upon landing, the captain was able to get off a message that the plane was undergoing a hijacking and that the hijackers had threatened to blow the cockpit door with C4 if it wasn’t opened. That was the last that was heard of the captain. He had no idea how many hijackers there were. From that moment on, one of the hijackers took over communication with the tower. He threatened to begin killing passengers if anyone came near. There was some chatter in the cockpit and someone named Ghazi was addressed before a second man took over the radio and relayed the major demands. We know ‘Ghazi’ to be the code name for Hashim Nidal and believe it was him speaking. First, he demanded the unfreezing of all Abu Nidal assets being held by Egypt, and then demanded ten million dollars in cash, apiece, for Mayor Fellinger and United’s CEO, Bob Lawrence.”

“What makes you so sure it was Hashim?” asked Harvath.

“With twenty plus million dollars in cash on the line, I don’t care how loyal Nidal might think his men are, even the pope wouldn’t trust Mother Teresa with that much money. This is the kind of job you suit up for yourself. Now, there was also an additional instruction relayed to the Egyptians that they were not to connect any external power sources or the air-conditioning.”

“It’s got to be over a hundred degrees on the tarmac. How are they going to survive without AC?” asked one of Morrell’s operatives.

“Simple,” answered Harvath. “There’s an auxiliary power unit mounted in the rear fuselage that allows the aircraft to remain self-sufficient in both the power and air-conditioning arenas.”

“How the hell would you know?” asked the operative.

“Your mother told me,” said Harvath. “Where do you think I learned it?” He picked up the blue Boeing folder and tapped it with his index finger. “Regardless of what you may think, reading really is fundamental.”

The operative fumed and Morrell stepped back in to avoid further confrontation. “We’re wasting time here.”

“So, is the ransom going to be paid?” asked Harvath.

“Not if we can help it,” answered Morrell, who walked over to the lounge’s audiovisual cabinet, pressed a button to lower the flat-panel monitors, and inserted a DVD into the player. “This footage was taken at O’Hare International Airport yesterday as United Airlines flight 7755 was boarding. Somewhere in here we believe we have Hashim Nidal himself, as well as all of his men. With an aircraft of this size and almost three hundred fifty passengers and crew, he’s going to need a lot of help to keep things under control.”

Morrell then powered up his laptop computer, which was attached to a portable projector, and beamed a schematic of the 747-400 against the bulkhead. He gestured with a laser pointer as he spoke. “With a full passenger load, at the very least we figure he would need to post a man at the head and tail of each passenger section. That would make ten men, plus one or two extra to help take shifts and watch the crew.

“As is standard in airline hijackings, all of the window shades have been drawn, and in addition, the hijackers have covered the other windows, such as the cockpit glass, with what looks like aluminum foil,” said Morrell as he punched a key on his laptop and another image was projected onto the wall. “This picture was sent to us by the CAG team. You’ll notice it’s of one of the passenger windows, and there in the middle, there seems to some sort of suction-cup-like device. Apparently these have been placed on windows throughout the plane. We believe these to be motion detectors of some sort-”

“Those aren’t motion detectors,” interrupted Harvath.

“What do you mean?” asked Morrell.

“Motion detectors make no sense. Too many things can set one off, and when it goes off, how are the hijackers going to be able to verify what caused the alarm? Are they going to peek out a window and risk being shot? No. These guys are smarter than that.”

“Apparently you are too. What do you think we’re looking at, Agent Harvath?”

“Cameras.”

“Cameras?”

“Yeah, they’re called ‘flat-lens’ cameras. Silicon Valley is developing something like these for consumer use. Instead of the cameras that sit on top of your computer monitor like we have now, flat-lens cameras will be built into the actual monitor frame. It would be simple to rig some of those up as remotes. All you would need is a power source of some sort, maybe something as small as a watch battery. From what I can see, that cord hanging down is most likely an antenna. Hashim’s probably got a man somewhere in the plane monitoring the feeds.”

“Have you ever seen one of these flat-lens cameras in action?”

“The Secret Service was playing around with them a little bit, but the quality left a lot to be desired. It was hard to distinguish depth of field, but for a single airplane alone on the tarmac, even one close to the gate, having these all over would be like having a thousand eyes.”

“If they are remote cameras, couldn’t we block their signal?”

“You could try, but not knowing exactly what frequency they’re on, you’d never be absolutely sure you had them blocked.”

“There’s got to be some way around them.”

Harvath thought a moment before responding. “There might be.”

“What is it?”

“Nighttime. The cameras are not very good in low light. If you extinguished all of the airport lighting, the hijackers would be blind.”

“And we’d have all of our guys using night-vision goggles. Good, we’re making progress.”

“What do you mean by ‘all of our guys’?” asked Harvath. “Will it be us and the Delta team, or are the Egyptians going to want in on this one too?”

“As a courtesy, President Mubarak has mobilized Egypt’s counterterrorism unit.”

“Which unit exactly?” asked Harvath, leaning forward in his seat, deep concern etched across his face.

“Unit 777.”

“Unit 777? Thunderbolt Force? You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“I am not kidding you, Harvath. Like I said, President Mubarak did it out of courtesy to the U.S.”

“Courtesy to the U.S.? Morrell, do you conduct all of your operations with your thumb up your ass, or is this one just special?”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about the Egyptians and their 777 unit. Do you really think they’re going to sit idly by and let us run the show? What, if anything, do you know about this group?”

“They’re Egypt’s crack unit, formed by a presidential directive to conduct counterterrorism and hostage-rescue operations.”

“Crack, my ass. They’ve had heavy training from the German GSG9, the French GIGN, and even our very own Delta Force, but they’re far from being a crack unit. They can’t even hold a candle to Delta.”

“Which is why they are simply standing by.”

“You really don’t know what you’re talking about, do you?”

“Harvath, if you’ve got a point, then get to it, or else shut your trap.”