Chapter Seven: Omniscient
The helicopter circled the area rocking back and forth, the noise from its engine filled the sky and its blades whisked the dirt into a swirling haze, before landing on the newly cleared tarmac. The doors slid open and two members of the Med-Evac team appeared, the men jumped out and ducked as they ran toward the injured victims.
Brennan and Castle were wheeled out of the staging area with Booth and Beckett at their sides. The paramedics on site held on to their I.V. bags as they escorted them toward the chopper.
"They're both stable, vitals are strong, they're good to go!" He shouted above the engine noise, handing over a stack of paperwork to one of the Med-Evac team.
"We got it!" He tucked the packet into his inside coat pocket. "You two coming with us?" He yelled, looking at Booth and Beckett.
"Yeah, they're our partners!" Booth shouted back.
"Whatever you want to call it! Come on!" He grabbed one end of Brennan's gurney and guided it toward the helicopter. The other medic took hold of Castle and the four of them made their way across the bumpy pathway before lifting them into the chopper. Booth and Beckett jumped in after them. They shook hands with the paramedics, waved good-bye to Rigsby and Van Pelt and disappeared inside before the doors slid close. The chopper lifted up and banked to the left before taking off into the sky.
Van Pelt felt her phone vibrating, she picked it up and saw it was Cho calling, but before she could answer, she saw him running towards them, breathless, waving with his phone in his hand. "STOP THEM! Don't let them take off!" His words trailed off as he watched the helicopter grow smaller in the sky.
Rigsby was alarmed at the concern in Cho's face. "What's going on?"
Cho bent over and struggled to catch his breath. "I just got word, the Med-Evac made an unplanned landing on their way here. They found their pilot dead, two of the three medics wounded, critically, the third was a hijacker. "Whoever was in that Helicopter… we have no idea who they are!"
"I never got a straight answer, is this Observer armed and dangerous? Shouldn't we get some back up?" Lisbon walked along the concourse with Peter and Jane.
"He's armed and I consider him dangerous, but he's not a killer or an assassin. Broyles has his agents all over the airport, but the Port Authority wants to reopen the runways as soon as possible. They aren't willing to keep it shut down now that all the victims and survivors have been accounted for. NSA's been here for awhile, but their focus is on the cylinder, don't look to them for help." Peter looked grim, thinking about Olivia and knowing anything could happen to her made him anxious.
"In other words, we are working with a bunch of bureaucrats who have their own secretive agendas. That's just great." Jane's snide tone dripped with sarcasm.
Lisbon ignored his comment and checked her watch. "We should check in with each other every twenty minutes. We'll head toward the C terminal, why don't you go toward the food court." She stopped Peter. "You armed?"
Peter shook his head. "It's the bane of a consultant's existence."
Lisbon reached into her blazer and pulled a small pistol out of the small of her back. "Here, we can deal with it later." She discreetly offered it to him.
"Is that wise?" Jane interrupted. "He's not going to make it through any security checkpoints, at least not without a fight."
"He's right, but thanks for the vote of confidence. I'll call you." Peter hurried away, leaving the CBI agents behind.
"He's more worried for her on a personal basis than a professional one. He said it himself, the Observer isn't a killer." Jane watched Peter disappear into the crowded concourse. The further from the collapsed terminal they walked, the more travelers and fewer rescue workers and DHS personnel they encountered.
She looked at him, irritably. "Why can't you just accept that partners watch each others backs? If there's a strong personal connection, we can count on each other to go the extra mile." The frustration was written all over Lisbon's face.
Witnessing the dynamics of her law enforcement peers had been eye opening. It was nothing like watching Van Pelt and Rigsby and their so called clandestine relationship. Agent Booth and Detective Beckett reminded her what it felt like to know your partner was in harm's way, and Agent Dunham had an intensity about her that she rarely saw. Like Jane said, their feelings were personal. She shrugged her shoulders and walked off.
"Maybe a coffee would make you feel less fussy." Jane suggested with a big smile.
The small table next to the window in the food court, was still occupied by an FBI Agent whose life had been turned upside down, and the strange visitor who was responsible for it. Olivia imagined, this was what it felt like to find out you are a character in a book, whose ultimate purpose had yet to be divulged and whose storyline was still unknown. The initial shock of seeing what might be had subsided enough that she no longer wanted to lash out in anger or disbelief, now she wanted answers.
"What do you mean, they will make it right? Who is coming?"
The Observer sat at the table across from her, his back straight, his hands in his lap. His voice was quiet and held little emotion. "There is more, Agent Dunham. It is best you see for yourself."
Her finger barely touched the surface of the paper, the image of a grown son with a wife seemed too surreal to touch. The sense of foreboding she had experienced was replaced by a feeling of urgency and she turned the page to see what would be next.
"Agent Booth? I need you to answer some questions." The third medic sitting in the front of the chopper motioned him to come forward.
Booth approached him, and Thomas Jerome Newton smiled, he pulled his weapon out and pointed it at his face. "Hand me your gun very slowly, or my associates will shoot." He nodded, looking beyond Booth.
The deception had completely blindsided Booth and it took him a moment to comprehend what was happening but he looked over his shoulder and saw one of the medics holding a gun to Brennan's head. The other medic had an arm across Beckett's neck, and his gun pointed at Castle, Booth knew he had no choice but to comply. "Okay, easy does it, we don't want anyone to get hurt. What's this about?"
"Your gun, slowly please." Newton smiled wickedly.
Booth did what he was told, he extracted his gun from his shoulder harness and held it out dangling it on his finger, Newton took it from him.
'What's all this about. Who the hell are you?" Booth was as angry at allowing himself to be deceived as he was of being threatened at gunpoint.
"Please, we don't wish to harm you and your colleagues. Whether you know it or not you are linked to something we have been looking for. Something very important." Newton's smug look and superior manner was meant to intimidate. He was polite to a fault and strangely diplomatic for a hijacker.
"My partner needs medical attention! If he doesn't receive treatment, his importance is a moot point." Beckett argued, her brown eyes sparked angrily.
The man who held her captive, squeezed her, causing Beckett to gasp. "Not so, I looked over their chart, neither of their injuries are life threatening." He had taken her weapon away and smirked at the others, enjoying himself as he manhandled her. He purposely used his foot to jostle Castle's gurney.
Beckett struggled against him, but her assailant twisted her arm behind her, causing her to stifle a cry of pain.
"Beckett..." Castle spoke unexpectedly. "Kate, do what he says, please." His eyes were still glazed from the drugs, but he was with it enough to understand what was going on.
"Mr. Castle is right. You can relax, we aren't going to kill you... unless you provoke us." Newton chuckled. He motioned to the man who held a gun to Brennan's head.
The impostor urged Brennan to sit up by grabbing her arm and jerking on it. Booth looked ready to leap on him until Brennan put her hand up.
"Booth, stop." She looked at him intently. "Captors use force, intimidation and violence as a ploy to undermine the confidence of their prisoners." She struggled out of the hijacker's grasp. "We'll cooperate."
Booth hard resolve wasn't going anywhere, but he knew Bones was right. He'd been a soldier and knew that war often brought ruthless and unimaginable tactics. His fists were still clenched, but he backed off.
"You are quite logical, aren't you Dr. Brennan?" Newton said with a hint of admiration. He turned to the others and his polite demeanor turned menacing. "Do it."
The hijacker took Booth and Brennan and forced them to sit on the floor of the chopper with their backs to each other. He tied their hands behind their backs and pulled the piece of rope tight enough that even made Booth start with pain.
"Detective Beckett, which one of you would like to witness the other being punished? "We don't have to go there if you comply with our wishes." Beckett seethed with anger but knew she had to play along.
"Okay, but let me be clear. I'm not afraid of you." She let her captor take her wrists behind her back and tie them with another piece of rope. He pushed her into the corner of the helicopter and looked pleased with himself when she hit the ground and whimpered. Satisfied that she wasn't going anyplace, the hijackers joined Newton at the front of the helicopter and the chopper banked to the left and moved on.
"Beckett?" Castle whispered. "You have to stay alive. I know we can get out of this mess, but only if you're not dead."
Lisbon and Jane were almost to the C terminal when he suddenly stopped. "Lisbon, are you hungry? 'Cause I'm hungry, when was the last time you ate?"
"Are you kidding me? There's a federal agent missing, not to mention a weird metal cylinder and secretive DHS consultants roaming around and you're hungry?"
"Well, how about a cup of tea?"
Lisbon rolled her eyes and started walking away when the call came in from Van Pelt.
"Boss, we got a big problem here. The Med-Evac chopper that picked up Castle and Dr. Brennan? We don't know who is behind it, but they've been kidnapped. Agent Booth and Detective Beckett were abducted with them."
"What do you mean… they were kidnapped?"
"Cho got a call from the LA County Sheriff's department. The chopper was hijacked, the pilot's dead, but one of the Med-Evac team was able to give us a description of the one we didn't see. White male, late 30's, tall with light brown, blonde hair, blue eyes."
"Christ! How could this happen? Have you talked to DHS or NSA about this?" Not much shocked Lisbon, but this came out of nowhere.
"Agent Broyles knows, he looked like he was going to burst a vein in his forehead when we told him. If you see Peter Bishop, tell him to check in with him, he's not picking up."
"Yeah, okay." Lisbon shut her phone ending the call.
Jane looked at her expectantly. "I guess that means we aren't stopping for lunch."
Lisbon didn't bother with a reply, she called Peter and was surprised when it went directly to voice mail. "Come on, let's see if we can't find Agent Dunham and Peter. Who the hell would want to kidnap Richard Castle and Dr. Brennan?"
"Possibly a book critic?" Jane said under his breath.
They walked the length of the concourse scanning the different waiting areas, looking inside the kiosks that sold magazines, candy and drink. Finding no sign of Agent Dunham, Lisbon abruptly turned around. She called Peter again, and like before it went straight to voice mail.
"Damn it." Lisbon looked annoyed. "Jane, tell me what's going on. Why would Dr. Brennan, Castle and their partners be kidnapped. Why is any of this happening."
"I can't answer those questions, but remember what Peter said? He said the Observer shows up at events he deems important. What if something more important is happening here than we realize? What if we can't see it because we're in the middle of it, maybe we're part of it?" Jane was dead serious.
"I don't even know how to respond to that. Look, we want answers, then lets find the bald headed Observer and Agent Dunham, that's the first step." She thought about what Jane said but knew it was a chicken and egg question, one that she didn't think anyone could answer.
Olivia had turned the page in the book and instead of an image, she found the front page of a newspaper.
The headline on the article gave her a sinking feeling in her gut, it was something she and Peter had discussed, but only in theory.
SOFT SPOTS ON PLANET - MASSIVE DYNAMIC ACCUSED OF COVER UP
WSC Denies Claims of Coming Invasion
by Alexis Castle, Exclusive to The New York Times
The byline made her pause, Alexis Castle. Olivia knew this was important, but like everything else in the last year, she filed it in a mental cabinet of questions she now kept locked in her brain. The content of the article didn't surprise her, it talked about Massive Dynamic and their role in unexplainable science related events and the think tank of Doctors and researchers who had worked on many extraordinary discoveries since 2013. It went on to tell about documents that had been uncovered by unknown sources that implicated Massive Dynamic and the WSC on covering up knowledge of specific sites throughout the world, but specifically in the U.S., that would be used as portals for a coming invasion. But when she came to the bottom of the page, she took notice.
Adding to the mystery surrounding the work of Massive Dynamic and its subsidiaries, their C.O.O., Nina Sharpe has not been seen in person in over a year, oddly mimicking the disappearance of the multi-conglomerate's founder, William Bell, who has not been seen since 2009.
But the final part of the article was the one that sent a chill through her spine.
The unknown source claims to have found proof that an invasion from enemies unknown to us is eminent. The spokesperson for the newly formed World Security Council, Samuel Weiss, has denied all allegations, and condemned it as a ploy to undermine the organization's effectiveness to fight terrorism at home and abroad.
Sam Weiss?
Olivia looked up at the Observer, but he continued to look vague and with little expression.