November 4, 1999, Madison Square Garden

The building is packed and the crowd is screaming as the New York Knicks and the Boston Celtics fight it out. A young girl walks alone to a restroom. Two females are stalking her. As the crowd cheers, she dies violently when she picks up a basketball card. Soon five other fans die before the rest room is closed.

As the police cordon off the area, Fleet Walker, the internal auditor for the Boston Celtics observes the scene with the Knicks' internal auditor. A police detective informs them that a note was left in the rest room: "Retribution for the U.S. cruise-missile attacks on terrorist camps in Afghanistan and Sudan in August 1998. Long- live Osama bin Laden. There will be more to come."

One week later Fleet Walker is contacted by FEMA. They would like to talk to him. There has been an earlier fan killed by the same toxic sarin at a recreation basketball game in Trenton, N.J. A basketball card was left at the site of the kill. One week later, twelve fans are killed, in a rest room in the Celtics' arena. A basketball card is found, and Fleet believes that the same group that terrorized baseball is active again.

Two weeks later the terrorist strike again at the Detroit Pistons' arena: 21 fans die horrible deaths. The hospital's autopsy reveals that these fans are killed with sarin. Another basketball card is at the scene of the atrocity.

Under pressure from the owners of the basketball teams and repeated inquiries from William Douglass with the FBI and Pam Olson with FEMA, Fleet struggles to find a connection between the murders. Finally, Fleet realizes the common thread: the deaths are occurring in arenas in the order of the birth of the teams. Also, the signature basketball cards are of players who played in a specific All-Star game in which Elvin Hayes was tossed from the game by a particular referee who did not like him.

With that information Fleet warns Douglass and Olson that the next attack will occur in the Los Angeles Lakers' arena. The police, FBI agents, and FEMA personnel stake out the Lakers' arena.

But days before the game, Douglass and the FBI receive an extortion demand of 4 million dollars worth of diamonds to stop the killings. The first extortion drop is merely a dry run in the waters around Key Largo as the two female terrorist watch the FBI arrest the wrong person.

After the death of 28 more fans in Los Angeles, Douglass receives another extortion demand of 5 million dollars worth of diamonds. The drama climaxes in Chicago's abandoned underground freight tunnels that are flooded with river water.

One of the terrorists is not captured, allowing for another Dangerous Ice plot in which extortion threats and more chemical weapon kills occur in National Hockey League arenas.

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