This Changes Everything

by Darrell Maloney

  “Most people call me Pete, sir. It’s easier to pronounce than D’Ambrosio.”

  “You have no accent, Pete,” the general said. “The name says Italy, but the voice says the Bronx.”

  Pete smiled.

  “Close on both counts, General. Third generation, from Sicily. My grandparents arrived in Harlem and liked it there enough to stay. I’m the first one to leave the State of New York in three generations.”

  “What’s wrong with Harlem?”

  “I didn’t like the winters. I thought I’d move down to south Texas where I told it was warmer.”

  He smiled even more broadly.

  “Then look what happened. Four feet of snow outside. Darn the luck.”

  Stephens knew he was going to get along well with Pete. He liked him already.

  The suite had two doors behind Pete’s desk.

  One door was closed and had two small silver stars mounted at eye level.

  The other was halfway open and was obviously a restroom.

  In the years prior to Saris 7 the Air Force had been trying to modernize its terminology.

  “Chow halls” were now “dining facilities.”

  “Brigs” were now “detention facilities.”

  And “latrines” were now “restrooms.”

  To most people it didn’t make much of a difference, of course.

  But to a few, like USAF Chief of Staff Lester Mannix, certain terms seemed an affront.

  He was famously quoted as saying, “The Army has latrines. The United States Air Force, by God Almighty, has restrooms!”

  “General, if you’re ready, I’ll show you your office.”

  “Show away, Captain.”

  She led him through the door marked with the stars, which was to his liking. It was a very unpretentious way of telling visitors that behind the door was a flag officer, without saying his name.

  The office was expansive, easily twice the size as the outer office.

  A very large oak desk occupied the center of the room, flanked on each side by an oak chair facing the general’s chair.

  Directly in front of the desk were two other chairs of a matching style.

  On one side of the room, sharing a wall with the outer restroom, was a doorway leading to a second restroom. This one was intended as a private facility for the general only.

  On the other side of the room was another doorway. This one was to a conference room with an expansive table surrounded by thirteen chairs.

  It was easy to tell the general’s chair. It was centered on one long side of the table, and the only chair made of leather.

  -40-

  “This will do nicely,” Stephens announced.

  Captain Swank smiled.

  Pete beamed.

  “Pete, do I have any appointments this afternoon?”

  “Only two, sir, and they’re tentative. I told both parties they might be postponed if there was a glitch breaking you out of the hospital.”

  The general smiled. Pete had a sense of humor he could appreciate.

  “One of them is the defense counsel, A Captain David Wright.

  “I told him protocol provided for you seeing your other appointment first, General Mannix.

  “But the Captain insisted he’d already spoken to General Mannix, and the general wanted him to have first crack at you.”

  “I see. Were those the general’s words: ‘have the first crack at me?’”

  “Yes sir. Captain Wright was adamant that I note that on the record. That the phrase came not from him but the general.”

  “And what time is Captain Wright coming?”

  “Two p.m., sir. Umm… I mean fourteen hundred hours.”

  “How much time do I have with him?”

  “One hour, sir.”

  “And the general?”

  “General Mannix requests your presence at fifteen thirty. It’s a twenty minute drive and your driver will be waiting at fifteen hundred hours.”

  “Very well. How about lunch?”

  “Your choice, sir. If you wish to have a working lunch the dining hall is prepared to deliver surf and turf to your office at thirteen hundred. If your choice is to visit the dining hall your private dining room is available anytime you’re ready. The 82nd Services Squadron Commander requests you perform an inspection and morale visit of the facility at your leisure.”

  “The Services commander’s name?”

  “Lieutenant Daily, sir.”

  “Let me guess. The original OIC didn’t survive the first freeze. Daily was a young enlisted troop who was field promoted because there were no other officers to take charge.”

  “Yes sir. Unfortunately it’s quite common.”

  “Please tell Lieutenant Daily there’s no need to inspect his facility. I’m sure it’s first rate.

  “And I won’t do a morale visit. Such visits are a pain in my neck and do nothing to improve morale. No airman wants a two-star general they’ve never met looking for dust and dirt in their workplace.

  “Tell the lieutenant I will, however, walk through the kitchen after my meal and shake some hands and say some kind words. That’s all the troops really want, is for someone to thank them for their hard work occasionally.

  “You can tell the lieutenant I’ll take my lunch at thirteen hundred sharp every day.

  “I’ll have evening chow at eighteen hundred sharp each day. If I’m five minutes late for either meal I’ve been detained and I’m not coming.”

  “Yes sir. Anything else?”

  “Yes. Tell him I rarely eat breakfast, but if I’m in the mood I’ll just show up unannounced. I’ll go through the serving line just like all the other troops, and I’ll sit at one of the tables or booths with some of the airmen.

  “Tell him on those days I want no special attention and if he approaches me I’ll probably shoo him away and tell him to leave me alone.

  “On those days I want to be treated just like any other Joe Shmoe.

  “Those are my favorite meals because I get a chance to remember what it was like to be young and just like everybody else.

  “Before people decided to fawn all over me like I was somebody special or something.”

  He turned back to Captain Swank.

  “Any other flag officers on the base? Besides Mannix?”

  “Yes sir. Brigadier General Haslett. Army. He was the post commander at Fort Sam Houston before we consolidated bases. He brought half a battalion over here with him. It was all he had left.”

  “Damn.”

  “Yes sir.”

  “Please extend my condolences to the general and tell him I’d like for him to join me for dinner one night soon at his convenience.”

  “Yes sir.”

  “Now then, Captain. Tell me a little bit about our Major Bennett.”

  -41-

  “Major Bennett was Technical Sergeant Bennett six months ago,” the captain explained.

  “Our previous commander, Major Calloway…”

  She hesitated, as though she were about to say something unflattering or slanderous.

  “Go ahead, Captain. Give it to me straight.”

  “He deserted, sir. He said he’d had enough of this crap. That he was headed north to Oklahoma. To see whether any of his family was still alive.

  “Tech Sergeant Bennett was in charge of the legal aid office. He did wills and powers of attorney. There were only the two of us left. The base commander gave him a field promotion and made him a major, then put him in charge.”

  “That’s not the way it works, Captain. A technical sergeant doesn’t outrank a captain. Why weren’t you placed in charge?”

  “He was my non-commissioned officer in charge, sir. I was an airman first class. I got field promoted too so I could be his deputy. As long as you’re here I’ve been appointed your adjutant.”

  “Don’t take this the wrong way, Captain. I’m sure you’re a fine officer and will make a fine adjutant. But this is a hell of a way to run an Air Force, isn�
��t it?”

  “Yes sir. Yes indeed.”

  “So all the prosecuting attorneys are gone?”

  “Yes sir. Some died in the first freeze, others abandoned their posts. For the prosecution team the major brought in three attorneys from Randolph Air Force Base on the other side of the city.”

  “I thought Randolph shut its doors.”

  “It has, sir. Like Fort Sam Houston, all the personnel have come over here to ride out the freeze. All except for a skeleton team of security and engineers who are babysitting the base to make sure it’s not taken over by looters.”

  “Who’s in charge of the prosecution team?”

  “A Captain Aduddell, sir.”

  “Pete, set up an appointment tomorrow afternoon for Captain Aduddell. Leave it up to him if he wants to bring his entire team. Tell him I want to meet all of them eventually, but he can decide when. If he wants to do a one-on-one first that’s fine with me.”

  “Yes sir.”

  “Tell him I want two things from him tomorrow. I want the charge sheet and I want a detailed rundown of the case they have against the colonels.

  “If they don’t have enough for a conviction I’ll not have them waste everyone’s time. I’ll tell Mannix it’s a bullshit case and I’m not going to let him proceed.

  “I also want a commitment from all three of them that they have it inside of them to send two Air Force officers to their deaths.

  “Because if they cannot do that with clear hearts and clean consciences, I will fire them on the spot and get someone else.”

  “Yes sir.”

  His assistants departed and the general found himself alone.

  He sat at the desk and got the feel of the chair.

  It was way too short. He adjusted the height, to raise it up a bit higher.

  As he did so he wondered why people always assumed flag officers were giants among men.

  Perhaps it was the stature of their position.

  Maybe just an idiotic assumption that in order to make general one had to be great not only in ability but also in stature.

  At five feet ten inches Stephens was average height for an American man. But for some reason people tended to assume he was taller.

  He made a mental note to ask Sid Sherman why that was.

  Sid was a civilian, one of the few civilian friends he had left. They’d known each other and socialized together for years, and Sid was the most respected clinical psychologist in Utah.

  He was also Stephens’ go-to choice any time he had a question about the human mind and how it worked.

  He wondered how many times he’d pick up the phone and call Sid at three in the morning to get something clarified as this court martial progressed. He knew a lot of the evidence would pertain to state of mind or interpretation of events.

  And if he was going to place two men before a firing squad he wanted to make damn sure they were given the benefit of the doubt.

  His prosecutors would no doubt claim the accused had ill intent in their hearts and minds. They’d damn well better prove it.

  -42-

  Stephens was up bright and early the next morning, just as the dirty brown sky started to lighten a bit by the rising sun behind it.

  His smart watch told him his pulse was eighty, a bit high for him, and the air temperature was a crisp twenty four degrees.

  The air was thicker here than in Ogden. He’d noticed that when he arrived eleven days before. He didn’t know the local elevation; his smart watch wasn’t smart enough to tell him that. He assumed the Alamo City was a bit lower than northern Utah.

  Of course all air was thicker everywhere now, since its dust content was several times what it had been before the Cupid 23 strike.

  A lot of people were in respiratory distress, their lungs incapable of filtering all the dust and dirt in the air.

  He noticed the coughing and wheezing going on around him had gotten better, though, since the early days after impact.

  That was probably due to the dust beginning to settle. Or maybe people’s bodies were just getting used to the dirty air; perhaps adjusting to it.

  He tried to remember back to the first freeze.

  He tried to remember whether the same thing happened after Saris 7.

  God, that was a horrible time. People were unable to get enough air into their lungs, and there was no easy remedy.

  Those who tried to breathe without masks inhaled so much dirt it clogged their nostrils with a sticky brown sludge.

  Those who used masks inhaled so hard to get air through them they were passing out.

  People were falling down in the middle of streets and sidewalks, some dying on the spot.

  What made it worse was they were sometimes left there for days.

  Ambulance and police crews were suffering like everybody else and were critically short-manned. Their vehicles, being run twenty-four seven, were choking out on the dirt in the air and dying themselves.

  The only remedy was to pull out their air filters every couple of hours and beat them on the ground to rid them of the excess dirt.

  General Stephens always loved starting his day with a brisk walk. Even when he was a young man, with a lot fewer responsibilities and a lot fewer cares.

  As he got older he slowed down a bit.

  He walked at a slightly slower pace and decreased the distance.

  But he never got out of the habit of getting out on all except the very worst weather days.

  It helped him put things into perspective and to, as he put it, enjoy all the very best things God left for us… the birds singing, the sun rising, the world waking up and spreading its glory.

  At his house outside of Ogden it was a daily ritual for him and his wife Eleanor. Usually her poodle Cinnamon tagged along, but not always.

  If the sidewalks were just a tiny bit damp Cinnamon balked and insisted on staying home.

  Cinnamon considered herself French royalty, you see, and it just wouldn’t do for a dog of her stature to get her feet wet.

  It was bad enough she had to share her palace with such common humans.

  She tolerated them because they doted on her, but some things just couldn’t be overlooked.

  On damp days she begged off from their morning walk, preferring her perch upon the south end of the “good couch” to await their return instead.

  The general asked Eleanor of her plans to continue the ritual in his absence.

  “I’ll leave it up to Cinn,” she answered. “I hate to go alone. If the princess deems it dry enough I’ll walk her around the block. Otherwise I’ll curl up in front of the fire with a good book.”

  The general would put no “maybes” on his morning walks. They meant way too much to him, and were among the things he missed the most while he was serving time in the quarantine ward.

  On this particular morning the air was thick and brisk, the breeze biting and cold.

  But he didn’t mind.

  Most of the rest of his day would be spent discussing a broad legal dilemma.

  He inhaled deeply and strode along a cleared sidewalk which surrounded “Freedom Park,” the base’s old parade grounds.

  He instinctively knew that this was the best part of what would be a very long day.

  -43-

  It was once said there were two types of generals in the United States military.

  One type strived to be hated by his men.

  He was the hard case type of leader. Or, put a little less delicately, and in a term more typical among soldiers, a “hard-ass.”

  This general firmly believed that one could either be loved or respected, but not both. That a firm leader who took no crap would never be loved but would always be respected.

  On a battle field, being respected was far more important than being loved. A battalion of men, knowing that half would perish or be wounded, would follow a general into battle anyway if they respected him enough.

  Those same soldiers, asked to follow a beloved but not necessar
ily respected general in the same battle, might just weigh their options.

  For nobody wants to die. Not even soldiers fighting for their country.

  Sure, they’ll do it. They see it as their duty when called upon. They’ll do it because they’re patriots and because it’s what they signed up for.

  But they won’t do it because they want to.

  The thinking goes that when a respected leader orders soldiers into a deadly situation, he had earned the right to do so. He has proven himself just as fierce, just as patriotic as his men. And he has shown himself just as willing to die.

  A beloved leader, though, may be beloved because he was soft or easy on his men. Perhaps trying to curry favor with them, but more likely because it’s just his nature.

  In such a case, his treatment of his men might be misconstrued; might be misinterpreted to indicate the leader might be soft.

  Such a leader, when ordering his men into battle, might have some troops who hesitate. Who might wonder if the general is so easy, so soft, that he’ll overlook a man’s refusal to go quietly into that dark night.

  They’ll wonder if they twisted an ankle on their way to the battle and had to drop out of the advance, would the general give them a pass.

  Or they’ll go, but they’ll drag their feet.

  They’ll look for the first excuse, the first opportunity to retreat.

  They’ll adopt another old adage: better to retreat a coward than to die a hero.

  Most soldiers have a preference for the type of man they’d prefer to lead them. Some choose the brutal dictator of a man, who never eases up and never gives quarter, but is highly respected.

  Others choose the general who treats his men as family. Not as equals, but as worthy of fair treatment. They see the best generals as someone not unlike their fathers or grandfathers. Someone who may be strict, but will take the time to teach and provide guidance.

  In the Air Force commanders typically aren’t asked to lead their men into battle.

  In the Air Force your typical grunt/working airman: the crew chief or the supply technician, seldom meets a general in their day to day duties.

  In the Air Force generals are judged by a slightly different standard.