Wet Desert: Tracking Down a Terrorist on the Color

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He had traveled east much farther than he expected, and he still couldn't see it. Staring at the heat radiating out of the desert for so long while riding made it seem like a constant mirage. Many times he wondered if he was going the wrong direction, but the setting sun behind him was as good a guide as any. He wished he had brought a compass, and wondered if he had aimed slightly too far north and missed the inlet completely.

He rode on. He was moments from giving up and changing direction when he finally saw it, a smudge of green in the distance. It had to be water. Otherwise, nothing could grow. He accelerated. Five minutes later he arrived at his destination. It was water, but it was not the Colorado River. He didn't need to touch it to know the brown water was salty, and came north from the ocean during high tides. It wasn't the Colorado River, but it soon would be.

Shutting off the engine, he climbed off. He felt sore from the long ride and his mouth was dry. He stripped off the helmet, then fished around in the rear compartment and brought out his water bottle. The water was warm. He took a long swig and looked at the bottle. He felt like an idiot for not bringing more. He had spent way too much time hiking in the desert to be this short sighted. It was just another reminder that he had not expected to get this far. The first few explosions were meticulously planned to the finest details, but this afternoon had been rushed, and he knew it. He felt damn lucky to be in the right place at the right time.

He left the bottle on the quad and clomped over to the water in the awkward riding boots. If it were cleaner, he would jump in. He definitely needed to rinse off the dust and sweat from the long ride. However, when he reached down and touched the water it almost burned his hand. The water had to be well into the nineties. The thought of jumping in made him cringe. He could imagine the salt on his back after he dried off in the heat.

No matter. He looked north into the dry desert. The Colorado River was coming. He expected it within an hour or two. It would change everything. When the river arrived he wouldn't be able to drink it, but he could definitely bathe in it. He stared at the horizon and tried to imagine what the water would look like as it traveled toward him.

He looked across to the opposite shore of the salty stream and realized there would be far too much water to fit in the channel. He looked back at the quad and wondered if he should move it farther away. If only there were a small hill nearby, where he could watch the water approach. Unfortunately, this place was as flat as a pancake for miles in every direction. He thought about the All American Canal, and how much water was in it. It had seemed large, sure, but not much larger than this channel. He admitted to himself that the canal had to have been much deeper. When it came down to it, he had no idea how much water would be coming from the north. But he felt sure that the water would arrive gradually, then build up slowly, giving him time to escape on the quad. Of course, that was all a guess, since he had not been able to witness the floods at any of the dams.

CHAPTER 39

8:05 p.m. - The Colorado River Delta, Mexico

They had been flying across the delta for almost fifteen minutes before they saw anything. Grant saw it first, far on his right, which meant they had aimed too far east.

"Over there." Grant pointed.

"Yeah, I see it," said Special Agent Williams.

The helicopter banked right toward what looked from a distance like a muddy lagoon with weeds growing around the perimeter.

"We almost missed it," mumbled Lloyd. "We could have been flying around all night looking for it."

As they approached, Grant saw a group of people standing around two dune buggies. His first thought was, "why so many?" He expected the bomber to be alone. Could the events of the last thirty-six hours have been a group of environmentalists? Why hadn't he seen the signs? When he decided to fly into Mexico, it had been to find a single person. Although he had no details in his head, he had thought they could potentially apprehend the guy, or at least draw attention to him so the local authorities could get him. But if the perpetrator ended up being a group, not an individual, what, if anything could they do by themselves? Grant had always felt he would recognize the man if he saw him. Now he realized that expectation had been absurd.

"Hey, what are they doing?" Shauna yelled from behind.

Grant looked and saw some of the group pointing at the approaching helicopter and a group of men scrambling toward one of the dune buggies. For an instant he thought they would jump into the vehicle and attempt to escape, but he saw them reach into the truck and retrieve something approximately five feet long and round. As they swung the item around out of the truck toward the helicopter, Grant felt sure it must be some kind of missile launcher. They intended to blow the chopper out of the sky.

Now the folly of this trip, against the direct orders of the FBI, became blatantly obvious. His mind raced. They would all four be killed, because of him. He thought quickly of his wife and children. He loved his wife more than he had ever realized before and ached for her. She would be forced to raise his kids as a single mother. It was tough enough to be a kid without having to deal with a parent's death. He didn't have enough life insurance, he realized. They would suffer.

"Look," Shauna said, pointing.

The group had taken the round device from the dune buggy, and laid it on the ground. They proceeded to unroll it. It was white.

"It's some kind of banner," Shauna added.

When the group finished unrolling, they spread themselves along the banner and lifted it up, revealing the message THE SIERRA CLUB supports the Restoration of the Colorado River Delta. The group held the banner high and shuffled their feet to pivot it slightly to align it with the helicopter.

"Want me to land?" asked Lloyd.

Grant didn't know. As they approached the group, he could see some of their faces. A man with a bushy black beard held the banner at one end. A blond girl with a headband and ponytails stood next to him. Both wore worn clothes. Something told him that neither was the bomber. They both looked like demonstrators, or at least like the ones he'd seen on TV. The girl looked like the type to live in a tree. He could easily imagine the man laying down on the tracks in front of a train transporting nuclear waste, or handcuffing himself to the blade of a bulldozer at the site of a new highway.

The helicopter had reached the group now and Lloyd circled around them. They rotated themselves to keep the sign visible. Grant scanned their faces, but the banner obscured some. He could clearly see two blond guys and four women. Grant felt nothing as he scanned for some sign, some indication. What if they got closer? There were too many of them. It would be impossible to get a good look at all of them from the helicopter. He looked back at the man with the black beard and decided he couldn't rule him out as the bomber.

"You want me to land?" asked Lloyd again.

Grant looked up. The pilot was waiting for an answer. "Yeah, okay."

The helicopter sprayed the sand in all directions as it landed. The four passengers waited until the rotors were almost stopped and the sand settled to open the doors. When Grant opened his door he saw that the group holding the sign had approached the helicopter and he could hear them chanting something like: "…orado". When he heard it the second time, he understood.

"Restore the Colorado. Restore the Colorado," they chanted.

As Grant and the others climbed out of the helicopter, the rhythm and energy of the chant seemed to increase. "Restore the Colorado. Restore the Colorado." The group seemed energized by the chopper's arrival and Grant realized that the four of them were likely the first audience for this protest.

A few more steps and both groups stopped, facing each other. The pace and volume of the chant increased. Grant recoiled as they began to thrust the banner at him in rhythm with their voices. He waved his arms in the air for them to stop, but it only increased their energy. He scanned the group and focused on a few faces. A blond man directly in front of him, also sporting a full unkempt beard, reminded him of a picture he'd seem on one of the tabloids of Brad Pitt when he grew a beard for one of his movies. The man's eyes looked mean and uncivilized. Could he be the bomber?

A girl to Grant's left caught his eye. She was a beautiful brunette with big eyes and long straight hair over a white t-shirt. She was young. She was chanting like the others, but without the hostility. He would be shocked if she was older than fifteen. He felt sure she had not masterminded the explosion at the Glen Canyon Dam.

Farther left, Grant spotted a man wearing a white polo shirt. Unlike the others, he was clean-shaven and professional looking. He looked more like the sort who just got off work than a protestor. Lacking was the urgency in his eyes like the rabid blond guy directly in front.

Grant wondered how, or if, the stalemate would end. How long could they go on? But he sensed the energy of the group was dying. When he scanned back to his right, the black bearded guy he'd first seen from the helicopter had stopped chanting and was motioning with his free arm for them to stop. It took a while for Black Beard to quiet them, but after a few half-hearted attempts, they stopped.

"Why is the FBI traveling in a tour helicopter?" yelled the blond guy in front.