Blackout

by Jason Elam

  Wednesday, July 22, 11:00 a.m. EDT

  Washington, D.C.

  When Scott and Khadi opened the door to the Room of Understanding (a term coined by analyst Evie Cline because War Room had sounded too violent), the five people inside quickly turned their heads. Then, seeing that Riley wasn’t with the two, they just as quickly let out a collective groan.

  “Oh, it’s only you,” Joey Williamson complained.

  “What, no hugs? No kisses? Not even a ‘Welcome home, Daddy’?” Scott said sarcastically. For once in his life, he wasn’t in the mood for the banter that usually took place around the office. And seeing the “office” he was in just soured his mood more.

  Back in Denver, they’d had a roomy, state-of-the-art facility. Now the team was crammed into an undersize workspace, the analysts working in back-to-back cubicles and Scott and Khadi each stuffed into a separate closet-size office with walls so thin they constantly got distracted by each other’s phone conversations. What little extra room there had once been was now occupied by a laminate-topped conference table. And they expect us to save the world from this little space? Unbelievable!

  “Meeting in five minutes,” Scott said as he walked through to his office to change out of his suit. Slamming the door behind him, he yanked off his clip-on tie and threw it across the office—which wasn’t a great feat, since if he stretched both arms out to the side at once, he could almost touch both walls.

  Soon his suit pants were replaced with ratty-bottom jeans and his dress shoes with Birkenstocks. He flipped through the assortment of black T-shirts hanging from a pole he had strung from the ceiling and pulled one out. Nice! Uriah Heep—Heep ’74. My favorite Dickens character turned progressive rock band. After slipping it over his head, he walked back into the main room.

  “Drop what you’re doing, and gather round, kids!”

  “That was only three minutes,” Evie Cline whined. “You said we’d have five.”

  “I lied. Let’s go!”

  “Apparently Pa had a bad meeting today at work,” Virgil Hernandez said.

  “Can it, Virgil.” Senior analyst Tara Walsh was the one who cracked the whip around the RoU. Her stunning looks reminded Scott of Jaclyn Smith in her Charlie’s Angels days, but her personality was at times closer to the Wicked Witch of the West. Still, if he was forced to admit it, Tara’s face was the one that most often visited him as he drifted off to sleep at night.

  “Yeah, what she said,” Scott commanded. “Besides, it was an excellent meeting. Couldn’t have gone better.”

  “Then what’s got you down, Scottybear?” asked Evie, who hated to see anyone feeling low.

  “‘Scottybear’?” Khadi said, giving Scott a curious look. Scott just shrugged in response.

  “I know what it is,” Hernandez answered. “He’s got the Riley Covington blues!”

  “Hernandez, just leave it alone,” Scott said angrily.

  Gooey, the fifth and most recent addition to the analyst crew, cleared his throat and began playing a blues riff on an air guitar.

  Dom dom dare dare, doe doe doe doe doe dom dom dare dare

  Wellll, I kidnapped my best friend while-a he was a-clamming.

  Dom dom dare dare, doe doe doe doe doe dom dom dare dare

  Yeeaah, said I kidnapped my best friend while-a he was a-clamming.

  Dom dom dare dare, doe doe doe doe doe dom dom dare daarre

  Dom—Thought he’d be glad,

  Doe doe doe dom—Turned out he was mad.

  I guess I just gots me them, uh, Ri-ley Co-ving-ton blues.

  Evie, Hernandez, and Williamson all put down the cell phones they had been waving and burst into applause. Soon Khadi joined in. Scott, who desperately wanted to unleash a biting comeback to Gooey, instead found himself laughing. Tara, who was giving him an exasperated, can’t-you-control-your-children look, only made him laugh harder.

  “Okay,” Scott said when he finally caught his breath, “so today what I learned is that I have the absolute power to totally destroy my best friend’s life, but for some reason I can’t seem to find a way to make him like it.”

  “Have you tried drugging him or possibly beating him into submission?” Gooey suggested.

  Scott looked thoughtful. “Props on the ideas, Goo, but unfortunately Khadi keeps the key to the pharmaceutical cabinet and Riley could probably kick my butt from here to next week. But way to think out of the box.” The rest of the team congratulated their fellow analyst.

  Once they were all seated around the table, Scott began his debrief of the meeting with the president. Other than the team’s occasional comparison of Secretary Moss with various bodily parts, Scott was able to get through it without interruption—a sign that this group of social misfits fully understood the gravity of the threat facing the nation.

  “So your job is to find those weapons,” Scott concluded.

  A rare silence surrounded the table, until Williamson spoke up. “Bypassing any tired needle-in-haystack clichés, do you have any suggestions as to how we might accomplish said task?”

  “Well, gee, Joey, for some reason I thought that was your job.”

  “I know, boss,” Williamson said, sounding unusually flustered. “But where in the world do we begin? I mean, this is like a global Where’s Waldo?”

  Scott sat back for a moment to think, then said, “First off, I think your Where’s Waldo? simile comes dangerously close to qualifying as a needle-in-haystack cliché. Second, I would start by checking shipping manifests. The weapons could have been taken out of the DPRK by boat, but with the way the world is watching that country, I’m guessing they were trucked to another port. Khadi, who else could have a vested interest in this little scheme working?”

  “Well, it could have shipped from China or continued south to Southeast Asia. Or maybe northwest to Russia—no doubt they’d like a shot at finally being the number one dog on the block. Possibly it could have gone west to the Indian subcontinent, Pakistan, maybe even to Iran and the Middle East. I don’t think there’s any need to go into their feelings toward us. From there you’ve got Egypt and North Africa—all of whom would probably be dancing in the streets if America crashed.”

  “So, Khadi, let me get this right. Basically you’ve narrowed our search to the Eastern Hemisphere,” an exasperated Hernandez said.

  “Look at it this way: I just ruled out half the world in one fell swoop. Not bad for a day’s work,” Khadi answered with a smile.

  Despite the daunting task that had just been laid out for them, the analysts had to nod their heads in appreciation of Khadi’s mighty display of analytical prowess.

  “Listen, gang, I realize what I’m asking you to do is a near-impossible task,” Scott said. “But you guys understand what’s at stake. I’ve got every confidence in you. Tara, you divvy up continents and then keep the kids on task. If you reach a roadblock, come talk to Khadi or me.”

  Everyone stood with Scott as he rose to go, but then dropped into their chairs when he sat down again. “You know, in this past year, the intel you guys have come up with has saved thousands of lives. Now I’m asking you to save millions.”

  “No pressure,” Evie said with a grin.

  Scott smiled grimly. “Actually, I hope you feel more pressure than you’ve ever felt in your life, because finding these EMPs is probably the most important thing you’ll ever do. It’s even more important than breaking into the top five of the WarCraft III global ladder.”

  “Seriously? Wow,” Gooey answered.

  “Wow is right.” Again Scott stood. “Now get out there and find me two EMPs. And if your computer screen should happen to go blank, you’ll know you were just a little too late.”

  Thursday, July 23, 9:30 a.m. MDT

  Inverness Training Center, Centennial, Colorado

  Keith Simmons’s face contorted as he squatted, then pushed himself back up. Sweat had completely darkened his clothing, and his right leg had just the slightest tremor. On the bar across his shoulders hu
ng 625 pounds of black metal weight. Normally he could get eight to ten reps without too much trouble, but today he was straining just to get to number five. Letting out a yell from the depths of his being, he pushed his body to standing position and stepped back, indicating for Afshin Ziafat to guide the bar down onto its pegs.

  Keith tried to hide a limp as he slid out from the apparatus, but obviously he didn’t do a good enough job because Afshin asked him, “Are you sure you don’t want to have a trainer look at that ankle?”

  Last Saturday, Keith had gone to his sister’s house to hang out for the evening. After dinner, he and his two teenage nephews and young niece had walked up to the neighborhood school to play some soccer. As usual, Keith had begun messing around and showing off, and at one point he broke away and ran down the field, dribbling the ball all the way.

  Just before he shot into the open goal, his right foot hit a dip in the grass. Even as his ankle was turning, Keith knew it wasn’t good. He fell, shouting out a few words for which he’d later had to ask forgiveness from God and the kids.

  As he lay in the grass, he kept praying, Please let it be nothing; please let it be nothing. But when he stood up, his fears were confirmed. He hobbled back to his sister’s house and began a regimen that he had been following during all of his off-hours since then—ten minutes ice, ten minutes heat, ten minutes ice, ten minutes heat—over and over, trying to get the joint back into shape before training camp started in another week and a half.

  Grabbing Afshin by his damp shoulder, Keith said, “Rookie, you’ve got to learn now. Never—I mean never—let a trainer know you are injured if you can help it. Letting a trainer know means letting the coaches know, and letting the coaches know means letting the owner know.

  “Soon you’ll lose all your free time. Unless it’s surgery-worthy, you’ll end up having to come in at least an hour early every day for rehab. Then it’s practice with everyone else. Then afterward, it’s another hour or two of getting rubbed, twisted, and yanked. Trust me, kid; it’s not worth it. Besides, I’ll be past this in no time.” Keith laughed. “Come on, it’s your set.”

  But underneath Keith’s surface of confidence was a sea of doubts. As he helped Afshin pull fifty pounds off the bar for his own set of squats, he pondered the future of his career. Five years ago, he would have bounced back from something like this in no time. Now it seemed every little injury turned into a rehabilitation. What is it Riley’s grandpa always says? “Why does everything have to be a project?” No doubt! Especially in football. Nothing’s easy anymore.

  So why keep doing it? he wondered, even as his mouth was automatically encouraging Afshin. “Push it! Push it! C’mon, Rook!” It’s certainly not the money—I’ve got plenty of that. And while I enjoy the fame, I’m getting to the point that a little anonymity might be nice for a change. So what is it?

  Suddenly the answer came to him, and with it came a feeling of sadness and frustration. It’s because I have nothing else! Look at Riley; he’s got meaning to his life—real meaning beyond just hitting people for the sole reason that they’re carrying an oblong ball. He’s shown that he can take or leave football. But me? This is all I have. If I weren’t playing football, what would I be doing other than sitting around playing Guitar Hero and hoping my phone would ring?

  The thought so depressed him that he missed Afshin’s step back.

  “Keith!”

  Keith quickly took hold of the bar and set it in place.

  “Come on, man, you can’t leave me hanging like that,” Afshin said angrily.

  “Sorry, Z, my mind drifted off.”

  “Well, let it drift off when the bar’s on your shoulders,” Afshin replied, walking off to find an open stationary bike.

  Not good, Keith thought. He had broken one of the cardinal rules of the weight room. If you’re spotting someone, you have to keep your head in the game, because you might be the only one keeping a friend from an injury, possibly even a career-ending one.

  Frustrated, Keith leaned against the cold metal squat rack, rehearsing in his mind his nonlimping walk across to the bikes. As he did, he absentmindedly watched one of the weight room’s six flat screens. All were tuned to ESPN and were muted with the closed-captioning on. Suddenly, a uniformed Riley appeared in a box next to the SportsCenter anchor.

  Keith chuckled to himself. As much as Riley tries to stay out of the spotlight, his face probably shows up on this channel more than anyone else’s. But then he saw something that made his heart sink. Through the magic of Photoshop, Riley’s Colorado Mustangs uniform transformed into a Washington Warriors uniform. Keith’s eyes dropped to the captioning in time to read, “We’ll let you know as soon as we hear if the trade rumors are confirmed.”

  A string of profanities came from across the room where Chris Gorkowski had thrown down a set of dumbbells. All around, guys began talking, but Keith was too stunned to move. Afshin came running over, but by the time he arrived, Keith’s shock had transformed into anger. Pushing past the rookie, Keith strode toward the door of the workout facility—all pain in his ankle forgotten.

  Thursday, July 23, 11:40 a.m. EDT

  Washington, D.C.

  Riley leaned back on the leather couch, savoring the combination of flavors in his corned beef Reuben. The meat was lean and perfectly seasoned, the sauerkraut still had the slightest of crunches, and the dark rye bread was toasted to perfection. Just think, I could be sweating with Keith and Afshin back in Denver!

  He lifted the sandwich from the table he had pulled over by the couch and took another bite, dropping a big glob of Thousand-Island-dressing-infused pickled cabbage on his plush white robe. Bummer, he thought with a smile, picking up the blob with two fingers and popping it into his mouth. Gonna have to make sure the laundry service knows to soak that.

  Riley knew he should probably be up and doing something, but he so rarely had any time off. Besides, Scott had interrupted his vacation. He deserved a little bit of R & R.

  He also knew that a lot of what he was feeling was just plain tiredness. Between his whirlwind two days and Skeeter’s knocking on his door at 2:15 that morning to let him know he had made it, Riley was simply exhausted.

  That late-night meeting with Skeeter had been interesting. It had been obvious that Skeet was still angry. He had wanted to go immediately to Scott’s house. When Riley told him that there was no way he was getting dressed so that Skeeter could go give Scott a pounding—as deserved as it may be—Skeeter had demanded a first-thing-in-the-morning smackdown.

  Riley knew that the best thing he could do would be to keep the two men apart as long as possible. The fireworks resulting from that initial meeting could leave a bad taste for months to come. So while Riley made the excuse that he was extremely worn-out and needed to sleep late, the real reason he was still lounging in his room was to let Skeeter calm down before meeting with Scott.

  However, Riley would have a hard time convincing anyone that he was making any sort of sacrifice by keeping the peace. He had told Skeeter that he didn’t want to be disturbed until 1:00 p.m. That had given him time to sleep in, brew up some coffee and have some cereal, get some reading in, then order up this incredible sandwich from Mackey’s Pub downstairs.

  As he ate, he casually watched SportsCenter. Scott had asked him to wait until the trade was announced before he called anyone back home in Denver. He felt bad knowing that his teammates and friends would be caught totally off guard, but he understood Scott’s reasoning. This was a very delicate negotiation that Scott, Khadi, and Stanley Porter were involved in. If word got out and then the deal fell apart, it would be embarrassing for all parties, particularly if there was any hint of governmental involvement.

  But Riley had a feeling that everything would work out just how Scott wanted it—it always did, didn’t it? After all, I’m a Warrior and not a Mustang. I’m here in muggy Washington instead of beautiful Colorado. And they call me a golden boy!

  But here he was, and here he would stay, beca
use he had every confidence that Scott, Khadi, and the gang would work the negotiations. And also because he had a feeling that if need be, the talks would broaden to include one owner’s tax problems and the other owner’s son, who had just been convicted of an intent-to-distribute-cocaine charge.

  Yep, I’m a Washington Warrior. No two ways about it. The same feeling of nervousness that he had felt the previous night came back. Thankfully, I don’t have to report until Monday. But still . . . isn’t that just putting off the inevitable?

  Something on the television pulled Riley out of his musings. On the screen he saw a picture of himself dressed out as a Mustang. Then, as the anchor spoke, his uniform slowly morphed him into a Washington Warrior.

  “. . . unconfirmed report that Riley Covington has been traded to the Washington Warriors. If this is true, it would cause a general outcry of ‘What are you thinking?’ among the Mustang faithful and would probably lead to a marked increase in lottery sales among the Warrior fans who have just hit their lucky day. The terms of the alleged trade have not been announced, but word is that Washington is considering sending Denver four senators, two congressmen, and the Lincoln Memorial. We’ll let you know as soon as we hear if the trade rumors are confirmed.”

  Guess that means I can call Keith now, he thought, reaching for the phone. But before he had a chance to dial a number, the phone rang. Whitney Walker, the caller ID said.

  Riley debated whether or not to answer it. Whitney was a sports reporter from the local Fox News station in Denver. She was a class act and had helped Riley out of a major jam just a couple months ago.

  Riley’s hesitancy came not from the fact that she was media. She had already proven to him that she could be trusted to quote him accurately and in context—something that was a little too much of a rarity among many in the journalistic field. His concern was that since meeting Khadi seven months ago, Whitney was the only female who had piqued his interest. In fact, it was piqued enough that even though he and Khadi were only in the loosest of relationships, he had felt a lot of guilt over his two or three coffees with Whitney—all of which were media-related, he reminded himself, purely professional. Still, there’s something about those green eyes of hers and the way she laughs that just brightens up a whole room—and she knows football!