The pilot looked at her helplessly, his lips trembling with fear.
She threw a wadded piece of paper onto his lap. “These are the coordinates you’re going to fly to.” She kept the gun at his head. “You’re going to land there. Others will be waiting. Do you understand?”
He picked up the paper and nodded at her.
She kept the gun aimed at his head.
Behind her, the young prince helped Sam toward a leather couch on the opposite side of the cabin, out of sight of the two pilots. After helping him lie down, he cut away the bloody material from around the soldier’s leg, wrapped a thick bandage around the wound then secured it with white tape. Tenderly lifting his arm, he applied another sheet of disinfected bandage. Sam pressed the wadded cloth to stop the bleeding, then leaned back.
Unsure of what else to do, the prince cradled the soldier’s head in his lap and helped him drink some water. Sam drank and coughed then slowly closed his eyes. The helicopter accelerated, flying west. Time passed and the young prince fell into a stupor, completely overcome. Leaning his head against the bulkhead, he closed his eyes and fell into a childlike asleep.
Slipping away, he dreamed of his mother singing to him while holding him in her arms.
“When the battle is over,
And the evening winds come,
When spear tips glint in the twilight,
And the skirmish is done.
Then I hope that I am standing,
And brother, I hope that you are too
For on the other side of the war ground,
I will be thinking of you.”
TWENTY-THREE
Raven Rock (Site R), Underground Military Complex, Southern Pennsylvania
The men huddled in the semidarkness, the room only illuminated by a single battery-powered lantern in the middle of the conference table that was growing dim now, the white light having faded to a pale yellow that cast flickering shadows across the wall. Every breath the group took in had been breathed a couple times before and the air inside the sealed compound was growing heavy with carbon dioxide, the oxygen level falling fast. The power was out. The air purifiers and circulation systems had been off for hours. Every telephone, satellite, computer and communications system was down. There was no heat. There was no water. The toilets didn’t flush. No light but the failing lantern on the table. Soon, there’d be no air.
It was ironic, they all realized, how the situations had been reversed. The chaos from the surface had descended on them now, all the desperation, thirst and hunger, hopelessness and fear, falling like a blanket to overwhelm them with despair.
Looking at the group of conspirators, Fuentes realized they were no less isolated in the compound than they would be in a prison cell. “What do we do now?” he demanded of his staff.
No one looked at him.
“What are we going to do?!”
“Shut up, Fuentes!” someone sneered.
Fuentes’ face turned sour with hurt and spite. How far he had fallen! No one called him Mr. President any more. He sat in silence, trying to decide how to react, then, deciding on righteous indignation, stood up from his chair. “I am the president of the United States! I am the—”
The National Security Agency liaison rose up and faced him. “You are nothing, you ignorant fool! At best, you were a puppet, at worst, a redneck joke. Now shut up, or I’ll kill you and save us all the pain of listening to your whiny voice!”
Fuentes stood before the National Security Agency liaison, his breath coming in gasps of rage, his face wild with fear and intimidation. Then, realizing he had no other option, he sat down and stared blankly at the wall.
The National Security Agency liaison shot deadly looks in his direction, then turned away and drew a long breath. A couple days before, he had been on top of the world. Integrated into the bloody trenches of power, he was a player, not the main man, but someone they had to listen to. And his star was only rising. One day, if he played his cards right—and he was very good at this game of cards—he would be the king, and if not the king, then something very close. He was young and handsome, with so much to look forward to. Brilliant, rich and completely unfaithful to anything besides himself, he was the epitome of the type of leader the new world was begging for. Power had proven to be his great aphrodisiac and he was flush with it.
But all of it was gone now. He was a rat trapped in a hole. He was dehydrated. His hair was greasy. He hadn’t eaten in two days. His clothes were soiled, his underarms so rank he couldn’t stand the smell of himself.
Looking into the others’ faces, he wanted to throw up.
All of them were ugly now, their power and beauty gone. They were nothing. They had nothing. They were rotten, hungry and loathsome. Hideously, he saw their desperation. They had taken their shot and missed him and now the king was enraged!
Staring at the others, the National Security Agency liaison wondered about the old man. Had he slipped through their fingers? Was he able to escape? “Where is he?” he demanded to the empty faces around the table as he pointed to the empty chain.
A dark-haired woman across the table bowed her head and wept. “I thought he would stay with us,” she muttered through her tears. “I thought he was immortal!”
“Shut up, you stupid witch!” the former president tore into her.
The National Security Agency liaison turned to Fuentes. “Mr. President,” he sneered.
The former president turned and glared.
“You have hated your own country for almost thirty years,” the National Security Agency liaison went on. “There was hardly an affair or topic on which you did not pontificate. A dozen books. A thousand speeches. You made millions duping others into believing the United States was to blame. You assured us they would falter. You told us—”
There was a sudden knock at the door.
The room fell into silence.
The knocking came again. Heavy. The butt of a rifle. Determined.
The door started cracking upon its hinges.
The National Security Agency liaison turned and swore.
TWENTY-FOUR
Offutt Air Force Base, Eight Miles South of Omaha, Nebraska, (Headquarters, U.S. Strategic Command)
Mary Dupree paced the halls, not knowing where she could go but feeling as if she had to move, as if she had to do something, as if she had to act. She was alone now, Sara and her family having left. No one really claimed her, but no one seemed willing to make her leave either. They fed her, allowed her to move freely, gave her and Kelly a place to sleep, but otherwise ignored her, unwilling to answer any of her questions, unwilling to tell her what to do or where to go.
After pacing the halls for half an hour, she walked to the cafeteria and ordered a cup of coffee, which grew cold between her fingers as she stared down at the cup.
She knew things were getting better. She could see the trucks outside the base. There was light traffic on the highways now. Cargo aircraft flying through the air. A few lights in the distance at night. More, she could see it in the eyes of the men and women all around her. Relief. No more hesitation. A sense of justice in the air.
They had reached and passed the tipping point.
Which left her much like Sara and her family had first found her; alone with Kelly but not much else. No real sense of purpose or possession. No real sense of hope.
But things were different now. She had seen too much, heard too much, experienced too much to ever be the same again.
Which created a burning question, and an intense desire to find the truth.
Forty minutes later she walked down the hallway, exited the headquarters building, and crossed a dry patch of grass. The base chapel was before her. She looked around, then walked inside, not because she was seeking its comfort but because it was empty and the only place where she could be alone.
She sat on the back pew. The chapel was dimly lit. A row of white candles lined the back wall. A tiny fountain bubbled under the candles, the water r
olling over a miniature waterfall of small stones. A stained glass picture was illuminated behind the pulpit, Jesus standing at a large wooden doorway. “I stand at the gate, and knock” was inscribed under the stained glass.
Mary settled on her pew.
Sitting there, alone for the first time in weeks, maybe months—it seemed like years—she thought, her eyes closed, her mind drifting back.
The memories were too powerful to ever be too far away.
A cold morning in Chicago. Her daughter dying in a hospital bed. No hope for the mother or the child.
She shivered as the memory filled her empty soul, recalling the morning she had gone to the hospital to check Kelly out and take her home.
*******
She stepped off the bus, then paused on the sidewalk to glance up at the sky, the autumn sun breaking through the gray band of clouds. She looked left, then turned right and moved down the crowded sidewalk, meshing with the hordes of pedestrians, all of them unaware of anyone around them. Moving slowly, she walked toward the hospital. Although she had steeled herself for this moment, her stomach was rolled in knots, her face a mask of false composure to hide the pain inside.
Her daughter, Kelly Beth, was going to die. Maybe today. Maybe next week. She might even live a month, but she was going to die, there was not a doubt in Mary’s heart.
There was nothing more the doctors could do. It was time to take her home.
Mary felt sick at the responsibility and sadness of giving up. But the cancer had won and it was time to concede. It was time to make her daughter comfortable and surround her with love instead of chrome beds and tile floors, with color, not the grayness of the cracking hospital walls, with friends instead of overworked and hurried staff.
As Mary walked, the skies continued to clear, but with each step closer to the hospital her heart quickened in her chest. Reaching the enormous building, with its sandstone walls and cement stairs, she slowed almost to a stop. In her mind, she already smelled the disinfectant and highly polished floors. Her stomach rolled inside her and she paused halfway up the stairs.
Once she entered the building, it would be over. She would be committed. She would take her daughter home. And once she took her home, the fight would end.
But if she waited long enough, maybe it wouldn’t come. Maybe there’d be a miracle. Maybe her daughter would be healed. Maybe she would wake up from this nightmare. Maybe . . . .
Maybe nothing.
Suddenly she felt dizzy and almost fell back on the stairs. Her legs weakened underneath her and she had to grasp the handrail. A passerby paused to help her, but she quickly waved him off. Looking around, she realized she had actually turned around. Facing the street now, she had walked down several stairs.
She took a determined breath then turned and walked back up the stairs.
*******
Mary shuddered and pulled her sweater close, her eyes focusing on the chapel once again.
Yes, on that day, she had taken Kelly home. But her daughter was alive and healthy now. And Mary wanted to know how it was done.
Looking around, she realized she wasn’t alone. A young man was sitting on the pew across from her. She glanced in his direction but he lowered his head as if to pray and she quickly looked away. But something about him seemed to draw her to him and she looked at him again. His face was quiet and calm. His eyes remained closed. A gold band glittered from the first finger on his right hand.
When he opened his eyes, she smiled awkwardly and turned back to the altar. Catching her eye, he nodded toward the painting that took up most of the front wall. “It’s a beautiful picture, don’t you think?”
Mary glanced at the stained glass and nodded.
“It’s a replica of a window in the Sistine Chapel.”
“It’s beautiful,” Mary said, then stood up as if to leave.
The man caught her eye again. “Do you notice anything about the painting?”
She studied the painted glass a moment. “Not really.”
“Look at the door,” the stranger told her.
Mary studied the picture, then noticed something she hadn’t seen before. “There’s no door handle,” she said.
The man smiled at her. “He stands at the door and knocks. But the door can only be opened from the inside. We have to take the first step. We have to let him in.”
Mary looked at him, then nodded. “I understand,” she said.
TWENTY-FIVE
Arlington National Cemetery, Overlooking Washington, D.C. (Three Weeks Later)
President Brucius Marino stood on the crest of the hill, the highest bluff in the area, and looked over the devastated city. A wind was blowing from the southwest, but it was warm and clean, having blown up from the mountains of southwestern Virginia. There was no more smoke or haze in the air. In fact, it smelled clean. The haze of dust and ash was gone now and the sun was warm, the atmosphere having gone through the process of cleansing itself. His chief of staff stood beside him. Behind him, his security detail. All the men were quiet as he looked out.
The Capitol dome stuck out against the horizon. How had it survived? Half of the Washington Monument protruded even higher, a stubborn, blackened needle jutting into the sky. Looking at it, he felt a sudden sense of pride.
Turning southeast, he squinted against the sun. The city was in ruins still, but there were signs of life around. The Chesapeake Bay was full of ships, military and civilian, enormous freighters and cargo vessels, most of them from overseas. Convoys of trucks were lined up at the ports now, some of them stretching for as far as he could see. He knew the same was true at other cities all along the eastern and western coasts. Aid from their oversea allies.
Looking across the city toward Andrews Air Force Base, he knew the military transport with fighter escorts would be touching down within the hour. King al-Rahman was on board the transport aircraft. They were prepared to prosecute him. Justice would be done.
The worst of it was over now.
It was time to get to work.
The chief of staff waited in the background, giving the president time to think. After a few minutes of silence, he stepped forward. “What are we going to do?” he asked.
The president took a deep breath. “We’re going to rebuild,” he said.
“Everything, Mr. President?” The chief of staff looked at the scarred horizon.
“Of course,” Marino answered. Lifting his foot, he stomped the ground below him, marking the hallowed place. “We’re going to rebuild it all. And we’re going to start right here.”
*******
Sara Brighton stood behind the president, looking out on the same scene. But she didn’t see any of it. Her mind was somewhere else.
She had lost so much. Her husband. Their home. Their lives together. Everything they owned. They had paid the price for years now, giving up their time as a family, driven by the military to foreign lands, moving every year or two, any sense of hometown or stability for their children long past gone. Sara had done her best to raise them, but it had been more or less on her own. Her oldest son lay in the hospital, critically wounded now. Her other sons? Where were they? She didn’t know.
But as she stood there, she thought of none of this. She didn’t mourn the loss of her husband or her home. She didn’t mourn for her children or the world they had faced. She didn’t wallow in the bitterness that she could have so easily reached out and embraced.
The only thing she thought about were some of the soldiers she had known.
The young son of a good friend who had died from his combat wounds after being attacked by a roadside IED. One man had been killed instantly by the bomb. Four other soldiers in the Humvee had been terribly burned; no more skin, no more hair. For months, each of them had fought an agonizing battle to survive but, one by one, they had succumbed to their burns, the last one, her friend’s son, passing away almost nine months after the attack.
Thinking of these young sons, the words of A. E. Houseman’s “
Here Dead We Lie” slipped into her mind.
Here dead we lie
Because we did not choose
To live and shame the land
From which we sprung.
Life, to be sure,
Is nothing much to lose,
But young men think it is,
And we were all young.
Why were they willing to do it? She didn’t know. She had asked a young soldier once. “We’re just trying to help,” he said.
She thought back to an incident Sam had told her about. One of his sister units had been sweeping through one of the most dangerous neighborhoods in Baghdad when they came upon a car in the afternoon sun, a little boy inside. The windows were rolled up, the doors locked. Inside the car, the heat was deadly. But they couldn’t get the boy out.
The soldiers started searching, going from house to house, looking for the parents, anyone who knew about the child. No one claimed any knowledge. Realizing they had to do something or the little boy was going to die, and despite some desperate warnings, one of the solders had decided it was time to get him out.
Breaking the front window, he unlocked the door. The car bomb went off, having been rigged to explode when the doors were opened.
Again, she thought of what the young solder had told her.
“We’re just trying to help.”
*******
President Marino turned around and walked to Sara. Seeing the look on her face, he stepped a little closer. “Are you all right?” he asked, reaching for her hand.
Sunrise: Wrath & Righteousness: Episode Ten Page 11
