The Girl in the White House

by Nick Harlow

  “Well, then, we’ll bring the sofa out here. It’s not doing you any good sitting on the floor.”

  “Thank you.” He looked up at the teens, all crouched around him in front of the items they’d put on the floor. “So as soon as I get things set up here, I want you all to go into the other room and lock yourselves—”

  “No.” Sydney shook her head and pointed at the ceiling. “That’s my father up there and I’m not about to lose another parent. I’m not going to hide when I can do something and fight back. And I’m not leaving you out here alone. You already took a bullet for us.”

  “Miss Donovan—”

  “End of discussion, Agent Ryan. Everyone else can go in the other room if they want but I’m staying with you. I know how to handle a gun because you’ve taught me. Besides, if you pass out, there won’t be anyone here to stand watch. Or take care of you. It’s pretty obvious you need someone to keep an eye on your condition.”

  “I’m not hiding either,” said Scott Rusch. “We’re in this together, and we’re stronger together. And you’re not one hundred percent, Agent Ryan. You tell us what we need to do, and we’ll do it. You may be in charge, but we’re not leaving you out here by yourself.” All the other teens agreed.

  Ryan shook his head. “Great. I’m stuck here with the world’s most stubborn generation. Well, I guess if you’re all determined to help, we may as well figure out what we’ve got. So I need to know your names and what sort of things you know how to do.” He cocked his head at Scott Rusch. “I already know who you are, so what skill sets do you have? Besides being the polar opposite of your father.”

  Scott Rusch chuckled a bit as he pointed at a gun. “I’m a really good shot. But always at a shooting range. I’ve never had any desire to go hunting.”

  The Agent handed him one of the guns. “Think you can you handle a Glock?”

  “Absolutely. I have one.”

  “Great.”

  Sydney’s eyes widened. “Whoa. The son of the country’s most powerful liberal with a gun. Your father would disown you. Where’s Instagram when you need it?”

  “Hey, I was born in rural Kentucky. You can get arrested there for driving without a gun rack.”

  Agent Ryan smiled as he looked up at the surgeon’s daughter. “Okay, I already know Andrea has medical skills and her job is going to be keeping me alert.” He looked at a tall, slender blonde kid with an old-fashioned crew cut and wire-rimmed glasses. “What about you?”

  “I’m Vince Brennan. I’m an intern at a television network.”

  “You know how TV stuff works?”

  The kid nodded. “Sure. The control panel I spotted in the auxiliary Oval Office is pretty simple since there’s only one camera and the stuff in that Situation Room looks like what we have at the network. And I’m kind of an electronics geek. I know how all kinds of communications work. My dad is the chief engineer at the network and he’s been taking me to work since I was five.”

  “Okay.” He turned to a petite brunette with huge brown eyes and an innocent face who probably weighed a hundred pounds soaking wet. “How about you, short stuff?”

  “I’m Jordan Reese. My dad is the head of the National Rifle Association.” She picked up one of the guns, popped out the clip, put it back in, then loaded one bullet into the chamber. “Lock and load, Agent Ryan. Let’s rock.”

  Ryan smiled and nodded. “Well, so much for judging a book by its cover. Okay, including Miss Donovan who has been out to the shooting range with me, so far we’ve got three people who can handle guns.” He turned to the last teen, a dark-haired guy around six-foot-three built like a Coke machine with black horn-rimmed glasses. “And I guess you’re my muscle.”

  “Nope. Another book cover you got wrong. I’m your one man geek squad. I start at MIT in the fall.”

  “You are...”

  “Kyle Sutherland. My aunt is the Senator from Florida, Jane Sutherland.”

  “Yeah, I know her. Well, you’re built like Clark Kent. What are you good at, Kyle?”

  “I can figure out stuff. My dad calls me MacGyver ‘cause I can make something out of nothing. I’ve already applied for two patents.”

  Ryan pointed at the floor. “Okay, whiz kid, maybe you can make something useful out of all this junk.”

  Kyle looked at the floor covered with items that included several cell phones, combs, makeup, hair spray, prescription bottles, a pack of cigarettes, a lighter, a disposable underwater camera, a purple Pilates band and a bunch of other odds and ends. “Not necessarily junk, Agent Ryan.” He picked up a few of the cell phones and studied them. “None of these have any service.”

  “They’ve obviously got a jammer down here somewhere.” He turned to Sydney. “Okay, Spitfire, take TV Guy and find out if we can contact the outside world. But if we can, don’t do it yet.”

  She pointed at the two-way radio. “What about that thing? It was connected to his wrist microphone.”

  He shook his head. “Not government issue. Obviously what they’re using to communicate off the grid. But that doesn’t mean we can’t use it to eavesdrop. I’ll monitor any chatter and maybe we can learn more.”

  “Suppose they try to contact Brooks?”

  “I’ll do my best impression.”

  “Anything through your ear piece?”

  He looked down and exhaled. “Nothing but static. I turned off my microphone just to be safe. We can listen to them but we don’t want anyone listening to us.”

  “Got it.”

  She started to get up but he grabbed her hand. “Listen, your dad’s a tough guy and a Marine. If anyone can get out of this...”

  “I know. Still wanna help. He’s a hostage and we’re not. I can’t sit here and hope things work out.”

  “I realize that, but you’re not bulletproof, Spitfire.” He turned to the group. “None of you kids are. Everyone your age thinks that, and so did I when I was your age, but you’re not. So please listen to me and don’t give me the bobblehead nod. Be extremely careful. I don’t want any of you kids going rogue. Check with me before you do anything. And shooting at a human being is a lot different than a paper target at a range. But if someone shoots at you, don’t hesitate to shoot back.”

  Sydney nodded. “We get it. You’re in charge, Agent Ryan.”

  “Not sure I believe you, but if something happens to me, I want you to promise me that you’ll lock yourselves up in another room.”

  “Sure.”

  “Now I really don’t believe you.” He grimaced and reached for his leg.

  The doctor’s daughter picked up all of the prescription bottles and studied them. “This one is pain medication, Agent Ryan. It should help you.”

  “That’s mine,” said Scott. “I had elbow surgery last month.”

  The Agent took the bottle and studied it. “Do these things make you drowsy?”

  “If you’re ready for bed, they’ll knock you right out. During the day they do tend to make you pretty sluggish. But it will at least take the edge off as far as the pain is concerned.”

  He tossed the bottle back in the pile. “Pass. I need to stay awake. And alert.”

  Andrea stood up. “Let me find a first aid kit and see if there’s anything that can at least take care of the pain without making you drowsy. And maybe something to stitch you up. There’s got to be a ton of medical supplies down here.”

  Sydney nodded and pointed to a room down the hall. “There’s a medical facility at the end of the hall. They probably could do heart transplants in this place.”

  Agent Ryan leaned back a bit. “Okay, guys, here’s the deal.” He patted Andrea on the hand. “Florence Nightengale finds a first aid kit and stays with me to keep me awake. Spitfire, you and TV Guy check the communications and see if we’ve got anything that works. MacGyver, you’re on invention detail. Speaker’s kid and Short Stuff, there’s an arms locker down the hall. I’m sure they’ve cleaned it out but go check. If it’s empty look around for anything we can use as
a weapon. And then go back to the food storage room and bring out some stuff to eat and drink. We might be down here awhile and need to keep our energy up. Stress burns through a lot of calories.”

  Scott looked at the agent. “Hey, if we’re all getting code names, I’m not wild about being known as Speaker’s kid. Since my dad is a total jerk I’d rather not be associated with him.”

  Ryan studied his face. “Okay. You’re now Wingman.”

  “I like it. Why Wingman?””

  He cocked his head at Sydney. “Cause you look like you should be at her side. With her in charge.”

  Sydney blushed a bit, but had one question. “Agent Ryan, what’s the protocol for something like this? I mean, someone taking over the White House? Is there some sort of playbook for this kind of attack?”

  “While we maintain that the country doesn’t negotiate with terrorists, the fact that your father has a gun to his head changes that playbook. And since they assume Brooks has us under control down here, they’ve more than likely threatened to do something to you if your father doesn’t cooperate. You’re actually the most valuable hostage they think they have. So whatever you do, don’t get captured. I think we’re okay for right now. The big problem is that since Brooks was an agent, whoever is running things upstairs obviously knows the playbook and rules of engagements in this scenario. Which means we can assume they will do the opposite of what we expect. Our guys outside will try to make a deal and talk them into surrendering, but after a certain amount of time they’ll realize it’s not going to happen and they’ll storm the place.”

  “And... what does that entail?”

  Ryan shrugged. “Let’s not go there, Spitfire. Since you want to help, focus on what we can do down here. If we can make a difference from the inside, it will really help. But first we need to figure out exactly what we can do that won’t get any of you kids hurt. It’s still my job to protect you.”

  Sydney shook her head as she finished checking everything on one side of the bunker’s Situation Room, then turned to Vince, the television intern. “They’ve taken all the phones and cut all direct communications down here. I can’t find anything that works. You find anything useful?”

  He shook his head. “Nope. I must admit they’ve been very thorough. Smashed every computer terminal and cut all the wires. They’ve turned everything into a big pile of junk.”

  “So we’ve got no cell service, no regular land line telephones, no radio we can use without alerting the enemy, no wi-fi—”

  “Hang on a minute.” Vince’s eyes widened a bit. “I just thought of something. About what you just said.”

  “What did I say?”

  “No wi-fi. We might have another way to communicate with the outside world.”

  “Huh?”

  “Yeah, yeah, I’ll bet they forgot.”

  “Forgot what?”

  “About communication without wi-fi.” He cocked his head toward the auxiliary Oval Office. “They might have overlooked something in there that I spotted earlier. C’mon.”

  She followed Vince as he quickly headed toward the room. “There’s nothing in there but a TV camera with a link to a satellite, and I’m sure they’ve cut the lines to that, too.”

  “Yeah, but there’s one thing a President always needs when he addresses the nation. A teleprompter.”

  “What, you planning on writing a speech?”

  “No, listen. A teleprompter is nothing more than a one-way piece of glass on a camera connected to a word processor. Generally the terminals are never used for anything else, but they are still computers. No one would ever think to use it to connect to anything but the prompter. And I’m betting since there was no reason to upgrade it because it is only used to write text, nobody did. And it’s the only computer terminal the bad guys didn’t bother to destroy.” They headed into the auxiliary Oval Office and he pointed at the terminal. “It’s still got an old tube monitor, so that means it hasn’t been upgraded. I’ll bet no one has turned this thing on in years.”

  “But we’ve got no wi-fi.”

  “Exactly. I don’t want the thing to have wi-fi.”

  “Huh? Then what good is it?”

  Vince sat down in front of the teleprompter terminal and pushed the button to turn it on. It began to whirr and beep. “Yes! It’s pretty old, but it still works.”

  She looked over his shoulder. “Old technology is good?”

  “For our current situation, it’s perfect. Better than the latest iPhone.” He waited for the computer to boot up, then started navigating with the mouse when the screen on the ancient monitor cleared. “Now we have to hope it has what I need.”

  “Again, we have no wi-fi. So what’s the point?”

  “It wouldn’t matter if the computer had it because, as you said, we have no signal. But in this case, we’re glad the thing has obsolete technology created before wi-fi existed. Which means it probably has something that modern computers don’t.” His eyes lit up. “Ah, just as I thought. It’s got a modem.”

  “How does that help us?”

  He turned to her with a gleam in his eyes. “Sydney, back when dinosaurs ruled the earth, there was something called dial-up. You connected to the internet via a phone line. And it still exists. We can use it. If our friend MacGyver can invent something for us to get a connection from this old computer to a land line, we’ll be able to get information to the outside world.”

  PRESIDENT DONOVAN LEANED forward, trying to hear what four of their captors across the room were saying. Two Secret Service Agents, and two members of the Capitol Police. They noticed, stopped talking, and moved farther away while one pointed a gun at the group from the door.

  “Mister President... ”

  He turned and saw Gladys looking at him. “You okay, Gladys?”

  “Yeah.” She reached over, took his hand, and worked her fingers into his clenched fist. “Take a breath. Your daughter is a smart cookie. She’ll be okay. And no way they’ll hurt her. Mayfair is just trying to push your buttons.”

  “I realize that, but Sydney’s not smarter than a bullet.”

  “Yeah, but she’s smarter than all of these guys. Did you happen to notice which agents assigned to this part of the White House aren’t here?”

  “Not really. I know which ones are dead when I passed them in the hall. Johnson, Banks and Harrels. Who’s missing?”

  “Ryan and Brooks, the new guy.”

  “Ryan is always with Sydney. You think Brooks is with my daughter too?”

  “They’re the only other ones who were on duty in this area, Mister President. And I overheard Brooks asking your daughter about the bunker tour this morning. Wanted to know who was on the tour. Particularly which tour Speaker Rusch’s son was on. And you probably don’t know this, but the tour was starting the same time they took us hostage.”

  “Oh, great. But why in the world would they be interested in Scott Rusch?”

  “No clue. However...”

  “What, Gladys?”

  She cocked her head at their captors. “I’ve never seen Capitol Police when Scott Rusch has been here until today. Don’t they just take care of the Speaker? I wasn’t aware his son had a security detail.”

  “He doesn’t, and you’re right.”

  “Was the Speaker scheduled to be here this morning?”

  “No.” He slowly nodded as he considered the possibilities. “The only reason they got access is that they’re working for Mayfair, probably to make sure Scott became a hostage. I recognize one of them but not all. Anyway, I can’t believe Ryan would be involved. I’ve known him for years. Hell, his father was an agent.”

  “He’s not part of it. There’s no way. He considers Sydney the daughter he never had. And you wouldn’t request that he be her regular agent unless he was the best we have. It’s gotta be Brooks. I didn’t want to tell you this, but he’s been very critical of you. And I know he’s become close friends with Agent Mayfair, who seems to be running things.”


  Donovan turned and looked at the rogue agents. “Okay, but Brooks might have already killed Ryan. If that’s the case, Sydney’s in trouble down in the bunker.”

  “Ryan’s the smartest agent we’ve got. And you know he’s very protective of Sydney. If there’s a way out for her, he’ll figure it out. He’d die before letting her get hurt.”

  “But if he’s already dead...”

  “Try to have faith, Sir. We’ll get out of this. And so will your daughter. She’s picked up some of my New York street smarts.”

  He smiled a bit. “Well, that’s something you can’t learn in a book. I sure hope you’re right, Gladys. I’m willing to die for my country, but I can’t lose my little girl. She’s all I’ve got left. But I’m not sure there is a way out of this situation without people dying. Somewhere. If not here, then overseas, because that deadline is coming up. And soon.”

  THE TEENAGE BOY NOW known as MacGyver removed the cover of the teleprompter computer using a dime as a screwdriver, then took a close look at the components. “Oh, yeah, this will definitely work.”

  Sydney looked over his shoulder. “You’re familiar with old modems?”

  “Sure. Actually, the simpler the better considering our situation. All I have to do is connect this thing to a phone line and we should be able to communicate.”

  “But all the lines are cut and they took all the phones. We don’t have any phone cords that will connect to the jack in the wall.”

  “I can make one if I can find the right materials.” He sat down in front of the terminal and began to type. “Let’s see what kind of system this thing has.”

  “Okay, stupid question... even if you can connect to a phone line, how are we going to talk to someone? We don’t have a phone handset and this old computer surely doesn’t have a microphone built in.”

  “It doesn’t, but we can probably use the microphone from the dead agent if Vince can adapt it. And if that doesn’t work, we can connect to the internet and get a message out that way. Send an email.”