Tuesday became Wednesday and then Thursday. Friday all the flights were started to get all the college security people in place for the Saturday night debate. The ones furthest away were picked up Friday morning.

Joni and Paula were each working on one of the Bombardiers as flight attendants today. They were paired with one of our regulars; the Bombardier usually carried two attendants when it is at capacity. Each Bombardier was making a three stop trip this morning and the same this afternoon. That would bring today’s numbers to 200.

Lorrie had one of the professional UAL attendants that worked for us part time give them training with the plane in the hangar. Then she made them go through the preflight speech and hand motions to the recordings until they had it perfected and followed that up with coffee, tea, soda and snacks cart service.

They also got a quick course on how to physically control an unruly passenger and get control of the situation with the help of Vicky and Ching Lee. They were going to get the full course later.

They had both flown on a couple of short G5 flights on Thursday and loved it.

With CPR and first aid completion cards in their pockets, there were more smiles now than frowns. It is a miracle what even little success stories will do for one’s confidence and self-esteem.

You would have thought we had given Joni a million dollars – her smile was that big when she was looking in the mirror, trying on the uniform Lorrie required.

When Lorrie pinned the brass lapel pins on their jackets Thursday morning, there were tears.

Joni Athens
Flight Attendant
JBG Flight Services

Paula Craft
Flight Attendant
JBG Flight Services

Jason had carried Paula to MVA Tuesday afternoon with enough documentation to change over her NC license to a MD license. It was another success story for the four. They could now go to outlets or the shopping center without having to ask someone to carry them. Marcy assigned one of the pool cars with the GPS locator so we could critique her driving if necessary.

Tomorrow both Bombardiers were going to PA to pick up 100 J&J construction workers to be parking lot attendants. They were big, burly, gruff and I am not going to put up with any B/S out of you; do as I say and move it kind of guys. One plus was they already had all of the new 2016 regulation reflective gear needed for event parking in Montgomery County.

J&J was paying for all the motel costs for them. Sunday they were going by bus to the new J&J Virginia site for a tour and to help layout the yard since it essentially had to be done from scratch. Then the Bombardiers were going to pick them up at Dulles for the flight to PA at 4 PM. The morning run for the Bombardiers was the three stop return trip. Joni and Paula were going to get a lot of flight time in just three or four days.

Friday afternoon I flew over to the convention center in one of the 407s and landed in the parking lot. I had with me the latest reports from Robert and Burt.

The three groups had been changing a lot of their plans. The arrest of the arsonists and the subsequent interviews of the group leaders by the Montgomery County sheriff’s office had not gone over well.

Andy had been right that they would try again; Friday night there was trash-can banging and bottle throwing in front of the center. They were trying to draw the security away from the rear of the building. They did not know that security had been doubled or that the guys there had one of the infrared drones.

Two guards responded to the commotion out front while Charlie and Hoss – the same two who had operated the gun drones in Morocco – stayed in the back lot flying the drone around the perimeter. The infrared cameras allowed the operators to see four more men coming across the rear parking lot carrying gas cans again.

A few minutes later they were surrounded and trapped like the rats they were. Instead of calling the Montgomery Police Department this time, Andy had them restrained to a light pole in the middle of the parking lot. They stayed there until he got there at daylight and sent Charlie and Hoss to search the car that had been left outside the parking lot.

With the first group, the only information we had came from the things our guards collected off their person before the county police got there. Their lawyers were waiting for them when they were unloaded from the squad cars. No one ended up with anything.

Andy had spent the night on the island in the Horsey house to be close to office. Robert came in early because he was monitoring the Middle East social media traffic and all the email accounts that he had bugged.

I met Andy in the refreshment center and together we took the information that Charlie and Hoss had collected to Robert. It only took Robert a few minutes to tell us that we had 4 street level hoods with lengthy rap sheets that were most likely were paid for their services.

“I guess we won’t be getting anything out of these guys either,” Andy replied.

“I’m not so sure of that. Let’s go raid Howie’s toy box in the armory and take the chopper over so we can be there before light,” I replied.

Howie was teaching me how make and to set off the distractions in the compound during the hostage rescue training. It was a quick course in pyrotechnics and included a description of everything he had to make things go boom in the new ways and the old ways.

I searched through the boxes until I found what I wanted. Luckily it was still tagged to tell me for sure what it was. As I was closing the door on the vault the early pilots were showing up for work. I grabbed the first chopper pilot I saw. Twenty minutes later we were landing in the convention center parking lot.

The group was towards the back side of the parking lot. Charlie had them zip tied together around a light pole. Andy and I walked over to them. I was putting on gloves as I walked up to them.

“Charlie, give me all their IDs – they need to be on the bodies for the medical examiner to find,” I said.

I looked at the IDs to make sure that I put them on the right person.

“Retie their hands with this, use a few extra loops. Then cut the zip ties and make sure that you put them in your pockets,” I instructed Charlie and Andy as I handed them the green colored cord. I had brought three different coils of cord: green, orange and red.

One of the guys was named Gus; he seemed to be the leader. “Gus, what’s in the plastic jugs?” I asked.

“I ain’t telling you anything. I know my rights – I want a lawyer,” he shouted at me.

“Problem is I am not a cop and you don’t have any rights that matter to me,” I replied.

I sloshed the can, then unscrewed the cap and carefully smelled it. “Gasoline huh – I guess you were planning on a barbecue” I said.

I turned the 5 gallon jug around and shoved it as hard as I could with my foot against the concrete base of the light. When it hit the base without the cap on, gas sloshed everywhere and all over them. I did the same thing to two of the other jugs at the other guy’s feet.

The fourth jug I turned around and slid it between Gus’s feet. I stuck the end of the red cord a couple feet into the jug and ran it out straight. It was a 20 foot roll.

“Andy, Charlie, is there any fresh coffee in the convention center? Why don’t you go get a fresh cup, pick up my mug from the chopper and refill it? Take the pilot with you. I will meet you at the chopper say in 6 minutes and we will fly home,” I said.

After they were out of ear shot, “Gus, this cord is cannon primer or dynamite cord. If you ever watched any old John Wayne movies they would shove a nail into the end of a stick of dynamite and push the cord into the hole. The longer the cord and the slower the burn rate, the further you could run before the explosion.”

“The red burns at a rate of one foot for every 30 seconds. The problem is the gas is wicking down the cord; has it wicked 2 or 5 feet? When the burn and the gas meet you are going to be in the middle of the inferno. The experts say you will live about 2 minutes in the flames; that will be two minutes of hell,” I said. “You will be the barbecue, unless you answer my questions,” I said.

“Who sent you to burn the convention center? Who paid you?” I asked.

“You don’t have the balls to do that,” Gus replied.

“Oh, I got balls – they are called ovaries – and they make me a wild mean bitch some days. Last chance; who sent you, who paid you?”

His buddies were saying, “Tell her – she is crazy enough to do it.”

“Fuck off bitch,” Gus replied.

I walked to the end of the cord and lit it with the lighter I had brought. I then walked towards the chopper and didn’t look back.

Edit by Alfmeister

Proof read by Bob W,