Earl Smith, eighth-generation farmer in Iowa took a sip of powerful, black coffee and tried to keep his eyes off the newspaper. Though the drying fall bean crop out of this kitchen window was a more pleasant sight, he couldn’t help but be drawn back to the images on the paper.
          “Goddamn terrorists!” he frothed, adjusting his JOHN DEER hat. “Them bastards! They fight like cowards!”
          “Pa!” his brown haired wife Caroline admonished him as she wiped the cereal from the face of their two-year-old son. “Mouth, dear.”
          Earl shot the child in the high chair a glance and snorted, “Better he learns early on, hon! He may have to go off to fight someday, like my ol’ man and his ol’ man before him! The world is nuts honey.”
           “Yes, dear.”
           “Hell, I grew up in the eighties when all we worried about was the Russians nuking Chicago. Not joke, all we had to worry about then was the shift in the wind to catch some radiation.”
          “Yes dear, I grew up then too,” Caroline gently reminded him as she refilled his large coffee mug.
          “But at least ya knew who them bastards were! They fought ya in the open. Oh sure, they still got spies over here lookin’ up our—“ he glanced at the child again, blissfully playing and censored himself, “—addresses! But hell, these freakin’ creeps from over there! Hon, they fight like cowards!”
          Carolina swept back her hair and pointed at the smaller headline on the front of the paper. “I see where some of them Al-Quaida guys were over in Iowa City trying to case the crop dusters. Lordy, what that would mean!”
          Earl slapped the table, but the child never startled. “Yeah! So them sumbitches can spread anthrax or AIDS or whatever all over the cities! Damn surprised that ain’t happened yet!”
          Obviously disgusted by the events, but trying to quell his anger, Caroline sat down and said gently, “Terrible, dear.”
          “Says here that unnamed sources have told the investigators that them bastards were gonna fly a plane into the SEARS TOWER in Chicago on the eleventh!”
          Caroline nodded. “It is a big target, dear. Awful.”
          “And if that plane hadn’t been grounded for repairs BAM! Lights out!” Earl shook his head and frowned. “I wonder how they come by that stuff? Unnamed sources? Who the hell is that?”
          Caroline rolled her eyes to the ceiling and said, “Earl, honey, you know what you think of the intelligence community. If this attack slipped past and all of these terrorists fooled even them, I would almost pity the ones that didn’t go to see Allah.”
          Earl drummed his fingers on the table and stated, “I bet I know what is happenin’ to them guys right now!”
          The child in the high chair giggled and drummed his fists on the tray. Earl stood up and stretched, not caring for the picture in the paper of the Military Police at the airport in Des Moines. “Never wanted it all to happen here, never wanted military to have to be out in the open like that. Let’s hope the fellas we got on the wall are takin’ this serious.”

*****

In AREA 68, several stories deep under the soil of Utah, Dr. Steiner smiled at the blonde agent in the corner of the pristine examining room. The withered old man wearing white coat walked around the rectangular wooden table and with a heavy German accent addressed the agent, “So tell me Thor, are you getting soft?”
          The hulking agent in black from MAJESTIC SERVICES shook his head from side to side and looked down on the much smaller man. His mane of blonde hair was tied back, but his ponytail stuck to one shoulder of his black duster coat.
          “Nope, doc, not a bit,” Thor grumbled as he rubbed his heavy beard. “Why do ya ask?”
           Dr. Steiner’s crystal blue eyes glanced up into the glowering expression of the gigantic agent and then pointed to the table. “This one here could still walk with a crutch when you brought him in.”
          Thor took off his hard billed Harley cap and ran a meaty hand through his hair. “Dead men tell no tales, doc, but a crippled man can still talk.”
          Dr. Steiner laughed, realizing the usually humorous man before him was out of jokes. The other man in the room, a much smaller person than either of them, lay affixed to the wooden table. Only half of his body was on the table when his twisted lower body hung off the end. This man of Arabian extraction was tied down with two heavy black belts, his body sweated damp, bruised and distorted. The man lived, but not by a great margin, Steiner mused. Both of his shoulders were dislocated and one of his legs was shattered at the calf. The old doctor drew out a large syringe full of fluid from a clear bottle and injected it into the Arab’s forearm.
          As the screaming increased, Dr. Steiner observed Thor glaring at the small man intently. For all of his cruel brawn, Thor Alexander was usually quick about his job, the little doctor knew. Thor took no great pleasure in torment, Steiner ruminated, but this case was different. The fact that the agent insisted on staying to watch the interrogation of this man from the terrorist cell in Kansas City touched Dr. Steiner. Thor had some emotion in that massive chest after all.
          “So, little mousy,” Dr. Steiner said to the man on the table, “Are we ready to resume?”
          “I have rights! Even in this country! You cannot do this to me!” the man moaned, barely comprehensible.
          Dr. Steiner roared with laughter. He then informed the man on the table, “Nein, nein, Mein Herr! You have this all wrong! You see, you exploited the softness and openness of our free society, but in what you did, you left yourself open to us. Coming in here on a VISA and then assuming another identity, you have become an illegal alien, Mein Herr. But in a sense, you really are not here, are you? That name on your ID card, Abdul Akbar? It is a false identity and thus, no one will ever know you are gone. Do you comprehend what that means?”
          Thor lurched off the wall, grabbed the terrorist by the curly black hair and yanked his head back so far Steiner feared Abdul’s neck would snap. His snarling lips close to Abdul’s ear, Thor told him, “And if you disappear, no immigration service one will ever miss you!”
          Dr. Steiner sighed as Thor released him. “I am glad Tina tracked this cell by their computers and mailings. She is a good acolyte for you, Thor. Abdul’s friends confessed already under the suggestion of our drugs.”
          Abdul then sang a song he never wanted to tell—how his cell planned on highjacking a plane and flying it into the EMPIRE STATE BUILDING but the flight plans were nixed and his group was grounded. He told of terrorist money from Iraq and Saudi Arabian sources. He then sang a tune of German cells of Arabs trained and funded by various countries intelligence forces.
          Thor walked to the door and put his hat back on. “When ya get all them names and dates down perfect-like, lemme know doc!” Thor muttered as he unsealed the door.
           Dr. Steiner nodded. “Good day, soldier.”
          Thor glanced back at Abdul, closed a few snaps on his duster and threw out, “Helluva drug ya got workin’ there doc! He spilled his guts better than if I sliced him open! A terrific unnamed source.”
          Steiner nodded. “He would tell me where his mother keeps her panties if I asked him.”
          “And the other drugs,” Thor seemed to desire information, Dr Steiner thought. “Are ya gonna give ‘em the long ride?”
          “Ah, my boy! You know what naughty things I have in my arsenal!” Dr. Steiner looked up into the face that towered over him and winked. “After I extract all I need, there will be no end to what he feels from the business end of MAJESTIC sciences.”
          Thor rubbed his chin, satisfied with that and then waved a hand at the table. “Ok, I was just wonderin’ about…”
          Steiner’s eyes went to the man hanging off the table and a wry grin spread over his wrinkled face. “Oh? Why I bothered to nail his testicles to the table if I was going to torture him with drugs? Well, Thor, I am just a big meanie!”