by Bob Mayer
"They aren't asking us to surrender," Boomer hissed to Skibicki.
"I noticed," Skibicki replied.
"What now?" Boomer asked as he fired another couple of rounds.
"We know the tunnels. They don't," Skibicki said.
"So?"
"Remember the locker where I was inventorying the scuba gear?"
"Yeah?"
"We go there." Skibicki raised his voice. "Vasquez, on three we head for the scuba locker."
"Roger that, sergeant major."
"Uh," Boomer said, "what about the bad guys?"
"One," Skibicki yelled. "Two." He rolled over, put his back to the low wall and fired at the antiquated fuse box in the corner of Coulder's office. With an explosion of sparks the tunnel went dark. "Three."
Boomer stood and vaulted the wall, keeping low. He didn't fire, nor did Skibicki.
The men with Decker fired blindly, bullets scattering all over the room. Their muzzles made bright flashes and Boomer took the opportunity to fire right at one of the stuttering lights. A startled yell of pain rewarded his effort and the firing stopped on both sides.
To the best of Boomer's recollection the side tunnel was only about ten feet to his right. He duck-walked, bumping into a desk, recoiling, pushing right, breathing hard. He hit the wall, then felt it give way to open space. Someone brushed by him, moving quicker. He was in the side tunnel.
He stood up and moved quicker. He could hear light footsteps in front of him and followed.
"Damn!" Boomer hissed as he ran into a wall with his forehead leading.
"This way," he heard Vasquez whisper. Boomer headed in the direction of the voice and a pair of hands grabbed him and pulled him into the scuba locker. They could hear Decker's voice echoing through the tunnel they had left.
"You won't get out! We have the front door covered."
Boomer heard a screech of metal, then Skibicki's voice explaining what was going on. "There's an air duct back here. It'll be a tight fit. I know it comes out on the back side of the lava flow. I went up there one day and checked."
"You ever been in the duct?" Boomer asked, tucking his High Power back in the holster, then feeling his forehead. His hand came away wet with blood.
"No," Skibicki grunted and there was the sound of something metal hitting the floor.
"So how do you know it's a tight fit?"
"I'm hoping it's a tight fit rather than no fit," Skibicki said. "I'm going in. Follow me."
Boomer helped Vasquez up after the sergeant major. Then he climbed up himself. He was in a four-foot-diameter ridged steel tube that angled up at almost sixty degrees. Boomer began climbing, bracing his boots against the ridges. After what he estimated to be about twenty feet he bumped into Vasquez's sneakers.
"What's the matter?" he asked.
"It's getting tighter," Vasquez's voice was strained.
Boomer soon found out what she meant. The tube halved in size and jigged to the left before resuming its climb. Boomer got stuck halfway into the jig. His hips were stuck. He felt cloth and skin tear as he popped free.
Boomer blinked. Although Vasquez filled almost the entire width of the pipe, he could see a faint light seeping through around her. The light suddenly grew much brighter as Skibicki punched off the cap on the air duct.
Boomer made the last few feet. Vasquez's hands came down, grabbed his collar and pulled him out faster than he could move his feet. Boomer looked around. They were on the far side of the lava ridge from the tunnel just as Skibicki had promised.
"Let's get to my Jeep," Skibicki said. "This way."
CHAPTER 17
PALISADES PARKWAY, NEW JERSEY-NEW YORK
3 DECEMBER
8:12 a.m. LOCAL/1312 ZULU
The sun had raced around and come up again, bathing the east coast of the United States with light. Trace had spent an uneasy night in the motel. She'd wanted to call Hawaii again, but there was nothing more to say and it was the middle of the night there. She'd relayed the important information in her phone call to Maggie. Maybe she could talk to Boomer later today.
Through the leafless branches of the trees lining the highway, Trace could see New York City off to her right. She'd entered the Palisades Parkway at its start point, near the George Washington Bridge and that had brought back memories of Boomer. She remembered his telling her that he'd grown up in the shadow of that bridge on the other side of the river.
As she drove, the route paralleled the river. The Hudson flowed in its glacial bed past her toward the Atlantic and on the Jersey side, high cliffs—named the Palisades by Henry Hudson when he'd first sailed up the river—looked down upon the dark water.
Trace felt a familiar feeling ignite in the pit of her stomach, overshadowing even the present crisis she was in. She was returning to the Point. Like Pavlov's dog hearing the bell, her body responded to four years of psychological and emotional strain and terror. Every West Pointer going up the Hudson felt it, no matter what the occasion for their return. Trace often imagined that even an old graduate being assigned to take over the Academy as superintendent felt it. There was no getting over the memories of Beast Barracks and four years inside the gray walls of the Academy.
It didn't matter how far along on the Army chain of evolution a graduate was. The Point kept him or her in its grip. Even first-class cadets nearing graduation would aimlessly wander the barracks halls on Sunday nights in their tattered gray bathrobes or sweats, feeling the oppression of another week looming. In the Academy's perverse way there was even an official ditty for the mood listed in the issued Bugle Notes (the cadet bible) called the Sunday night poop:
Six bells and all is well.
Another weekend shot to hell.
Another week in my little gray cell.
Another week in which to excel.
Oh, hell.
The last two words were uttered with all the anguish and exasperation only a cadet could muster.
As she crossed the state line from New Jersey to New York, the Palisades Parkway veered away from the river and moved inland, crossing under the New York State Thruway. The terrain grew more hilly, and Trace passed the turnoffs for New City and Harriman State Park. The closer she got, the greater her anxiety.
Looping around the bulk of Bear Mountain, the parkway came to an end at a traffic circle. The first right led to Bear Mountain State Park. The second to Bear Mountain Bridge and Anthony's Nose on the far side of the river. The last exit, before looping back on oneself, was Route 9W. The sign pointed the way to Fort Montgomery, Highland Falls, and, ultimately, West Point.
Trace took the turn, going by the Revolutionary War sites of Fort Clinton and Fort Montgomery. For a young country like the United States, West Point was about as old and venerable a site as could be found to place a military academy. It was geography that fixed the name, and it was geography that dictated the early military significance of the site.
She passed through the small town of Fort Montgomery and took the turnoff on 218 into Highland Falls, the town that lay just outside the main gate to the Academy.
Since Trace's day, the Academy had expanded south, gobbling up what used to be Ladycliff College on the river side of the town and turning it into an extension of itself, housing the museum and a brand-new visitors' center. Trace had not been back to West Point since graduation and she turned into the visitor center to get acquainted with any further changes that might have occurred since her day. Besides, she was still somewhat at a loss about how to proceed. She didn't exactly envision herself digging up Custer's grave on a bright, wintery Sunday morning. That might attract a bit of unwanted attention. She had never been in the cemetery during her time as a cadet and she had no idea how many people visited it or how accessible Custer's grave was.
Despite the early hours, busloads of tourists were there at the center, eager to see how their tax dollars were being spent. Their official tour guides were the wives of officers assigned to West Point—a keen public relations move. The women
could talk about their "husband's cadets," in a motherly tone, giving the impression of the Academy being one big happy family. That there were numerous off-limits signs posted all over the Academy saying "Authorized Personnel Only," wasn't noticed by most of the tourists. The signs blocked off all the barracks and academic areas from the public. A less naive person might wonder what it was the Academy didn't want the public to see. After all, there was no classified training going on at the Academy and it was fully funded by the taxpayer.
Trace walked past a group waiting to board their bus and entered the center. A large gift shop to the right sold practically every article of clothing ever made with the valuable addition of a West Point emblem stenciled on it, along with assorted coffee mugs, glasses, pennants, bumper stickers, and posters. In the other direction, an area housed several displays telling about "life" at the Academy.
Trace veered left and stopped in front of a display, staring across the velvet ropes at a "typical cadet's room." She was reminded of the different rooms she had inhabited in New South Barracks. Memories came back to her in waves, each one leaving a trail of emotion as the thought receded: the cold, winter nights that never seemed to end until they turned into bitter, gray mornings where plebe roommates would talk to each other only to pass essential survival information like who the officer of the day was, while they prepared their room for the daily AMI—morning inspection; the sunny spring days with the trees high up on the cliff behind the barracks just beginning to show green and having the feeling in her chest that she just wanted to explode and be somewhere else and be doing anything else, not sitting here in her room studying Napoleon's campaigns, afraid to walk out the door for fear of being stopped and hazed.
Trace had heard that there were some plebes who were so afraid of leaving their room to go to the latrine that they urinated in the sinks in their rooms. She was glad she had never been that desperate, although she and her roommate had ended up eating toothpaste, they'd been so starved in the third week of Beast Barracks. Toothpaste was authorized, but they couldn't buy food at the small cadet store.
They'd been broken, some swiftly, some more slowly, depending on the strength of character each individual brought on R Day. By the end of the first day each new cadet had received a haircut, been put in uniform, and marched in formation to Trophy Point where they'd sworn their oath of allegiance to the United States. By that time, half of them would have marched in step into the Hudson if told to do so, they were so disoriented. And instead of backing off, the pressure had increased through the years at the Academy until what resulted was a "graduate," able to recite MacArthur's duty-honor-country speech and the number and weight of the links in the Great Chain.
But they were not only supposed to be able to recite facts, Trace knew. They were supposed to live Duty-Honor-Country. And she had tried as best she could for thirteen years in the Army. But something had gone wrong, badly wrong.
Trace curled her fingers around the rope blocking off the room and tried to remember who she was before she arrived at the Academy. Because she now realized she no longer was who she had been when she'd graduated. And since her four years at the Academy had taken her previous life from her, she felt totally empty and drained.
Tears flowed for the second time in twenty-four hours, but these were not tears of anger, but tears of profound loss for the idealistic seventeen-year-old girl who had walked into a meat grinder in 1978 and seventeen years later finally realized she had gained nothing and lost everything.
*****
From the visitor center it was only 200 yards to the main gate of the Academy grounds proper. As Trace drove to the gate, she wasn't surprised when the military policewoman on duty waved her through despite the fact she had no Department of Defense decal on the windshield of the rental allowing access to the post. Because it was such a tourist attraction, West Point was an "open" post, meaning that anyone could enter.
*****
Behind Trace, the MP's head swiveled and noted the license tag. The MP dashed inside the small building that stood in the middle of the gate and picked up the phone. She dialed the duty NCO at the Provost Marshall's office.
On the other side of post, the duty NCO put down the phone and looked in the instruction binder he was issued when coming on duty. A new piece of paper had been paper clipped to the front of it. The description of Trace's car and its license tag number was there, with orders to be on the lookout and to report it if spotted to the phone number listed. The NCO noted that since the phone number had only five digits, it had to be on-post. He dialed and it was picked up on the first ring.
"Major Quincy."
"Sir, this is Sergeant Taylor at the Provost Marshall's office. We've spotted that red Beretta coming through Thayer Gate."
"How long ago?"
"Not more than a minute. Do you want me to alert my patrols?"
"Negative," the major said. "Just order your people on patrol to look for it. If it's spotted, your people are not to approach but simply to keep the car under observation and report to you. You will immediately give me a call. Is that clear, sergeant?"
"Yes, sir."
"I say again, you are only to report back to me. Your people are not to approach the vehicle or alarm the driver in any way."
"Yes, sir."
The phone went dead. Sergeant Taylor was curious and also somewhat irritated with the officer's attitude. He pulled out the reverse directory phone listing for West Point and looked up the number he had just called, wondering what office he had talked to. The five digits were listed under the office of the superintendent.
Taylor's irritation disappeared. Whatever was going on was at the highest levels possible at the Academy, and one thing Taylor had learned after three years of duty at the Academy: there was the law, then there was the superintendant's law, and the second one had overruled the first one on more than one occasion in Taylor's experience. He remembered the time an MP had caught a pair of male cadets, naked and in a rather awkward carnal position up at Redoubt Number 4. The two cadets had been gone from the Academy the very next day and the MP shipped off to Korea with orders to keep his mouth shut. The story never made the blotter report or the news and that was the way West Point wanted it.
In the same manner suicides among the Corps of Cadets were totally blanketed with secrecy along with drunken accidents by senior cadets in their shiny new cars. Avoiding negative publicity was more important than anything else, even the law. Taylor wondered what the driver of the Beretta had done to draw the attention of the superintendant's office.
In fact, he wondered so hard about it that it reminded him of something else that the Provost Office sergeant major had told him and he picked up the phone and made another call.
Trace was surprised by the number of cars going onto the post this early on a Sunday morning in front of her. She was part of a line of a dozen or so vehicles. Trace accelerated through onto Thayer Road, passing the Thayer Hotel on the right and Buffalo Soldier Field to her left. At the end of Buffalo Soldier Field, she came to a stop sign. The road to the right went down to the river, 200 feet below. Straight ahead was the cadet area, and to the left, the road wound its way up to Michie Stadium and Lusk Reservoir and the various housing areas.
A small temporary sign indicated going to the left for the Scout Jamboree at Target Hill Field, and the other cars all turned in the direction, which helped explain the unusual amount of traffic. Trace went straight, deciding to go around the Plain before heading toward the cemetery. A low stone wall and concrete walk was on her right. As a pair of cadets jogged by, Trace thought of the hundreds of times she had made the run out to Thayer Gate and back from the barracks, a round trip of about two miles.
Officers' quarters crowded the hill to her left and then she came to a fork in the road. Straight ahead, the road dipped down, running between Mahan Hall and Thayer Hall. To the left, the road passed between the cadet barracks and the academic buildings. Trace turned left and very slowly drove by.
Sunday morning was when the Academy was at its least active, and there was little sign of life as she passed New South Barracks, her home for her first two years. Not for the first time she wondered what sadistic mind had decided to cover every building with gray stone. Certainly not the most inspiring building material and with the current overcast sky, one that was sure to dampen even the most buoyant heart.
Bartlett Hall, home to the hard sciences taught at the Academy, was on the right while old Pershing Barracks, still standing from the days of MacArthur, was to her left. It was there that Trace got her first real surprise on the grounds. The road, which used to continue straight ahead and go around the Plain, was gone. The Plain had been expanded since her time, and where the road had been there was now only smoothly cut grass. Her only option was to turn to the right and go by the library. Trace stopped the car, glancing in her rearview mirror to make sure no one was behind her. She stared out at the green surface of the parade field, remembering sweating out there in the fierce summer sun, learning to march. About the only good memory she had of the Plain was her final parade just prior to graduation when she finally could believe that she would be out of the Academy after four long years.
Trace continued on, her mind and heart overwhelmed with memories. She had a job to do, but she found it difficult to not pluck at the scar tissue that surrounded her core. Whether positive or negative, the Academy was a part of her life. What she had learned after years of active duty and more recently, the revelations about The Line, still wouldn't totally eradicate the four years spent at her "Rockbound Highland Home."
Trace was surprised to hear the distant chatter of helicopter blades and she twisted her head to watch an aging Huey helicopter fly by, then dip down over the horizon in the direction of the river on the north side of the Academy. The road curved around, following the contour of the Plain, overlooking the Hudson River below. Trophy Point and Battle Monument went by on the right and Trace was reminded of the chapter in her manuscript that had started this whole mess.
