Line of Succession: A Thriller

by William Tyree

  Agents Carver and O’Keefe came in just as Colonel Madsen began addressing his staff. “I’d like to inform everyone that Treasury Secretary Hudson is using this base as a temporary command post for a joint investigation into yesterday’s events.” He waited a moment for the officers to absorb the idea that the Secretary of the United States Treasury had effectively taken over command of the base. “And as Garrison Commander, I’m prepared to do anything in my power to see that she has our full cooperation.”

  “Thank you, Colonel,” Eva said as Madsen sat down. “Everyone, I’d like to introduce NSA case officers Carver and O’Keefe. Carver is formerly of CIA counter-terrorism and will be leading the investigation.”

  “With all due respect,” Carver said, “This is news to me, Madam Secretary. Agent O’Keefe and I are engaged in a classified operation that reports directly to the White House.”

  Eva folded her arms across her chest. “The White House?” she said. “To whom specifically?”

  Carver was afraid to name the President, and not just because Eva was the President’s not-so-secret girlfriend. The investigation was strictly off-the-grid.

  “Well?” Eva said.

  “We report to Chief of Staff Julian Speers,” Carver replied.

  “Have you had direct contact with Julian in the past twelve hours?”

  “No ma’am.”

  “I’ll be honest,” Eva said. “We don’t know where the Chief of Staff is now. He hasn’t responded to calls. Considering the state of emergency we’re in, I’ll take full responsibility for the disclosure of your classified mission. Now I’ll give you a chance to transfer operational details to me in private.”

  She excused Colonel Madsen and his staff. They rose uncertainly and began filing out. O’Keefe leaned close to Carver, whispering in his ear. “Are you sure we can trust her?”

  “No,” Carver said, “but the fact that she dismissed the brass is probably a pretty good sign that we should throw her a bone or two.”

  Eva tapped the table with her pen. “Before we get off on the wrong foot, I need you to explain why Nico Gold is on my base.”

  Carver was caught off guard. He was used to getting his way, and it was clear that Eva was significantly more hands-on than Julian. “Nico is a specialist in rare languages as well as computer…”

  “I’m painfully aware of Nico’s qualifications. I’m asking how a notorious international criminal found his way onto this base.”

  Carver didn’t care how hot Eva was. He didn’t like anyone baiting him. “Again, his skill set…”

  “Let’s get some history out of the way,” Eva said. “When I was Executive Director of the IMF, Nico Gold hacked into our systems and drained our coffers of billions. I wasted two years of my life chasing him in some of the world’s most unpleasant countries. We finally caught him in Syria, where he was living with a group of Iranian dissidents and learning Farsi. I pushed to prosecute him in Saudi Arabia, where he would’ve gotten the death penalty. I was overruled.”

  Carver’s neck grew hot. He had done his homework. He was quite familiar with Eva and Nico’s tangled past, but never thought this operation would by on anyone’s radar. “Nico Gold isn’t politically convenient,” Carver said, “but he solved in one day what our agents couldn’t crack in a year.”

  Eva considered this for a moment. ”Fine. I’ll allow you to use him while we’re in crisis mode. But whatever deal you made, know I’ll break it when this is over.”

  Rapture Run

  Julian Speers walked through the cavernous command room and lingered between two rows of workstations occupied by eight soldiers on each side. He pretended to look for a network printer – General Wainewright had given him some bullshit assignment to draft legal documents regarding military power during martial law – but he was really just snooping. He looked over the shoulder of a Ulysses communications specialist and saw satellite imagery of several Iranian armor brigades. A massive formation trucking across Syrian territory toward Israel.

  Speers leaned so close to the specialist that he could smell the man’s cucumber-scented shaving cream. “Is that for real?” he said. “I mean, that’s not some war game, right?”

  “Oh it’s real,” the specialist confirmed a little too eagerly.

  Syria didn’t even border Iran. Had Iran sent armor through Turkey or Iraq to get to Syria, it would’ve been an international incident. The fact that nobody knew about it had to mean that Iran had been airlifting its tank battalions into Syria quietly for months, and with Syria’s full cooperation.

  And there was only one reason Syria would allow Iran to build up such a massive force in its territory – to eliminate a common enemy.

  Then the Specialist turned and gave Speers the once-over, and seeing his civilian clothes, said, “Interrogative: should you be here, sir?”

  Speers straightened up. “I sent a document to a printer called V11XT. Any ideas?”

  The specialist pointed to a large multi-function machine near the Con, where General Wainewright sat on an elevated throne of steel.

  Speers found his print job incomplete due to a paper jam. As he cracked open the machine, General Farrell and Dex Jackson converged on Wainewright’s perch at the same time. Speers decided to linger at the machine and see if he could pick up anything juicy.

  “Get any shuteye?” he heard Wainewright ask Dex.

  “Nah. I heard Fort Campbell debunked the Allied Jihad tape. That set my mind off on all sorts of tangents.”

  “Nonsense!” Wainewright shouted. “Fact: Faruq Ahmed was Yemeni, for chrissake, and we have evidence that he personally carried out the suicide attempt on Speaker Bailey.”

  “That’s bunk,” Dex shot back. “Our embeds within the Allied Jihad say they never heard of the guy.”

  Speers loitered a little too long at the printer. Wainewright made him, shooting a glare so cold that the Chief of Staff’s chin quivered. He tapped Farrell and Dex and pulled them into an adjoining room. Wainewright frowned at Speers through the Plexiglas before frosting the glass.

  He turned his attention back to Dex. “We have proof,” Wainewright said now that they were alone. “The suicide tape.”

  “How’s that?” The corners of Dex’s mouth and the corners of his eyelids succumbed to gravity’s pull. He wore every bit of his trauma on his face.

  “Fact: we have a tape made by the Monroe suicide bomber, Faruq Ahmed. He says he speaks for the Allied Jihad. We handed it over to CNN, and they’re running it every fifteen minutes.”

  Farrell lit up another cigarette and held it between his thumb and middle finger. “And we’ve located some targets,” he said. “In Yemen. Suspected Allied Jihad cell. The public wants this.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Meaning we’re going to take out the target. The American people need this.”

  Dex’s face tightened. “Since when do we kill to make the public feel good?”

  Wainewright sat at the table and folded his hands before him.

  “Dex, the country is in an unprecedented crisis. We need leadership, and there’s no clear line of succession. We’re prepared to make you the next President of the United States.”

  Dex leaned back in his chair and took in the proposition. His heart was flapping within his chest at breakaway speed, but he managed to mask his exuberance as he spoke. “What makes you so sure I’d want the job?”

  Farrell laughed with abandon. “What do you take us for? We all heard that audio file going around congress during the last election.”

  Dex looked up. “What audio file?”

  Farrell was enjoying this. “The recording of a certain telephone conversation…” He paused, enjoying seeing Dex squirm. “…featuring a certain Defense Secretary calling the GOP Committee Chair, probing about support for a Presidential run.”

  Dex’s face turned red. “So I’m ambitious,” he admitted. “I was critical of the President’s policies. That’s no secret.”

  “This would be a chanc
e to be your own man for a change. Do things your own way.”

  Dex didn’t trust Farrell, and that went double for Wainewright. But he had always wanted the Presidency, and this administration’s incompetence in foreign policy had made him want it more than ever. Dex hesitated for a moment longer, if only to think about the most graceful way to say I do. “If called,” he uttered lamely, “I will serve.”

  Wainewright grinned. “Then demonstrate that you’ll take our advice seriously.”

  “If you mean Yemen…” Dex said in a near whisper.

  “Dex,” Wainewright said firmly, “understand that we don’t need your permission to do this. We’re calling the shots right now, and nobody on God’s green earth could stop us.”

  “But we’d rather work as a team,” Farrell told Dex. “We’d be the brains, you’d be the face. Offer’s on the table.”

  Dex shook Wainewright’s hand, then Farrell’s. “I’ll support the strike,” he said. “But we’d better have something credible to take to the press.”

  Farrell smiled and dragged on his cigarette.

  Yemen

  Five men sat around a campfire, telling jokes. The camp smelled like goat dung and saffron-spiced stew. There was absolutely no wind.

  At night they cordoned the camp off with temporary fencing that they transported on a sled pulled by a pair of horses. The fencing allowed the children to play at night without their mothers chasing after them. It also allowed the herders to sleep without worrying about predators getting to the flock.

  Suddenly three of the horses trotted out from behind a canvas tent. They were spooked. One of the men stood up, clutching a Kalashnikov rifle and gently shooed them away with one hand. Then more horses came through camp, picking up speed as they approached the perimeter. They were out of control. The man with the Kalashnikov aimed at the first horse as it leaped over the fence. Not because he wanted to shoot it. But because he hoped to prevent the others from following it into the black yonder.

  The other men shined their lights in the opposite direction, looking for the predator that had made the animals restless. There was no sign of anything.

  They heard the high-pitched screech an instant before everything vanished in a flash of white light.

  Fort Campbell

  10:15 a.m.

  The base’s Joint Ops media center was a cramped trailer with a low ceiling and the décor of a charter school library. Eva found Carver there at his laptop. He was hooked into the CIA Ethernet, which, for security reasons, still required a regular Ethernet cable. Eva glimpsed an Oklahoma State University faculty dossier on his monitor before Carver sensed her presence and clicked to a safety screen.

  Eva stood behind him with her hips cocked to the side. “Anything I should know about?”

  Carver tried to hide his annoyance. “No, Madam Secretary.”

  “You do realize who you’re talking to.”

  Carver figured that given the high level assassinations, Eva was now the second or third most powerful person in the United States, depending on whether the Vice President survived his wounds. But he had sworn his silence and loyalty not only to Speers, but to the President himself. “With all due respect,” he told her, “you’re a paper billionaire.”

  “You’ll have to spell that out for me.”

  “Regardless of what glorious title you might inherit, you’re not at Site R with the President right now. That really limits your influence.”

  Eva pulled up a plastic chair and sat across from him. “I’m going to tell you something that I haven’t told anyone. The President’s broadcast last night was shot at least two years ago.”

  Carver revealed nothing in his expression. “Go on.”

  She switched on her phone and showed Carver a satellite image of a farming area on West Virginia’s eastern border with Maryland. “See that mountain?” she said, pointing to a digital GPS marker she’d placed there. “Last night my helicopter was hovering right over this area, where Rapture Run is supposedly located.”

  “I’m still listening” Carver said as he memorized the longitude and latitude.

  “Two years ago, Congressman Bailey presented a bill that would protect this area as a wildlife preserve.”

  “That must happen all the time,” Carver said, although his mind was racing with possibilities. He already knew that Congressman Bailey was connected to both Lieutenant Flynn and SECDEF Jackson.

  “Not like this,” Eva said. “I just pulled up Congressman Bailey’s bill. It had a rider that contracted Ulysses to completely seal off the wildlife preserve with a massive fence. We’re talking a border fence. Like the one we’re building between us and Mexico.”

  “Typical pork barrel spending,” Carver said dismissively, although he knew better.

  “This is different. Rapture Run was built without the knowledge of the Security Council. I can’t even say for sure if the President knew. Yet Congressman Bailey and obviously someone high up in Ulysses knew that a military installation was going to be built there.”

  “And then Bailey turns up dead,” Carver said, deciding to give Eva some validation. He wasn’t about to tell Eva about Lieutenant Flynn and the missing Stingers. Not yet, anyhow. Until he could speak to Speers, or the President, it was way too early to trust anyone.

  Rapture Run Cafeteria

  Deep beneath the cornfield that masked the bunker’s very existence, the Rapture Run cafeteria operated as if it had always been there, with eight cooks standing behind a counter and a lunchroom that could seat a hundred at a time. Speers grabbed a tray, but he wasn’t here to eat. He was here for information. He inserted himself into line next to Corporal Hammond, who was managing two trays of food. “So,” Speers said. “How long you think we can stay down here before Wainewright starts eating the enlisted men?”

  Corporal Hammond eyed the gut that hung over Speers’ belt. “I’d say we’ve got more to fear from you than him.”

  A dozen servicemen stood in the chow line on either side of them, each shuffling along with assembly-line precision. Speers and Hammond first came to a pile of egg salad that looked positively regurgitated. Speers covered his mouth to avoid taking in the odor.

  “Guess you never had to eat in a mess hall,” Corporal Hammond said.

  “Once. I went with the President to Camp Pendleton on a campaign stop. We ate with the Marines.”

  Hammond smirked. “Didn’t I see that on TV?”

  “Oh I’m sure every conservative in America saw the President puke on the base commander. In slow-motion, no less.”

  Hammond put a double helping of the egg salad on one of the trays. “The General loves this stuff,” he said.

  “So,” Speers said, feeling a bit of camaraderie build between him and the Corporal, “Is the Joint Chief’s office a good career stop?”

  “Big time,” Hammond said. “Plus, it beats combat. I like my arms, fingers, legs. I like to keep ‘em attached to my body.”

  The first cook looked at Hammond and said, “Tofurkey or Soy burger?” Hammond took both and advanced in line. Speers rapped his fist on the aluminum surface and said, “Hit me.”

  He caught up with Hammond, who was waiting for sweet potatoes. He edged close to him. “Y’know, I’ve been with the President since he was Governor.”

  “It’s gotta hurt,” Hammond said.

  “General Wainewright seems to be taking it well, don’t you think?”

  Hammond kept his gaze on the food in front of him as he neared the salad. “The General can’t afford to get emotional. He’s just doing his job.”

  “We both know he’s doing a little more than just his job.”

  “Make time, Corporal!” the cook scolded. Hammond took two of the little Caesar salads and bolted for the dessert area. Speers kept on his heels, his tie brushing the pair of chevrons on the Corporal’s sleeve.

  “I like you,” Speers lied, “so I’m going to give you a chance to save your ass.”

  Hammond turned around and peered up
at the Chief. “Look around. I’d say you’re the one in hostile territory.”

  The cafeteria was full of armed Ulysses soldiers and yes, they all seemed to be watching. But Speers was undeterred. He leaned in close and whispered into Hammond’s ear. “You all can’t stay down here forever. And when you come up for air, Wainewright won’t be able to save you from the CIA. Fact is, he’ll probably sell you out just to save himself.”

  “They wouldn’t be interested in me.”

  “They’ll be interested in everyone involved in the conspiracy to assassinate the President and commit treason. Both offenses are punishable by death.” Speers grabbed Hammond’s right arm and squeezed it hard. “I don’t think they’ll have trouble finding a vein.”

  The Corporal broke free from the Chief’s grip. His hands shook as he lifted the two trays and looked for the exit.

  Fort Campbell Intel Lab

  1:40 p.m.

  Agent Carver stormed into the lab cubicles where Nico sat at a computer wearing headphones as he sifted through mountains of intercepted Muskogee audio files. He was going to shoot the person who had given Nico unsupervised access to a computer. Nico saw him coming. He took his headphones off. “What’s up, Spook?”

  “Hacked into my pension yet?”

  “I’ll make a nice deposit if you can get me a Presidential pardon.”

  “If you’ve gotta use a restroom, do it now,” Carver said. “I’ve requisitioned a plane.” The truth was that he had forged a travel authorization in Eva Hudson’s name. The Treasury Secretary had turned Fort Campbell upside down so quickly that people were willing to believe anything you told them. “We’re going to Norman, Oklahoma.”

  “What for?”

  “Professor Emeritus Hitchiti. The last living Muskogee speaker.”

  “He’s still alive?”