Piranha Firing Point

by Michael Dimercurio

  The next few months dragged on as Pacino sank deeply within himself. Each day found him worse instead of better, until White suggested a change of scenery.

  Pacino scoffed at first, but finally set up Admiral Kane as the deputy force commander in Norfolk so that Pacino could take the SSNX hull to Pearl Harbor naval Shipyard for its fit-out. White went with him, appointing himself the liaison between Pacino’s temporary command post at Pearl and Kane’s headquarters in Norfolk.

  White was the glue that had kept this together, but even with all the shuttling between the two commands, the force was beginning to suffer a lack of leadership. Kane was too loyal to Pacino to fill the gap, and Pacino insisted on spending his time with SSNX, refusing to come back to Norfolk and retake his command.

  Then the call had come in this morning from Fort Meade, the home of the National Security Agency, one of the remaining intelligence organizations. In the reorganization of intelligence seven years before, the CIA and the Defense Intelligence Agency had been merged into the Combined Intelligence Agency. The National Security Agency had been tasked with eavesdropping of any kind, whether intercepting enemy radio signals or phone calls or computer network E-mails. Their tools were as varied as spy satellites and nuclear submarines sneaked into harbors with thin-wire radio antennae, even starting communications companies overseas. NSA had been targeted to come under the same reorganizational ax, to vanish with its functions subsumed by the CIA, but in the last instant the Director Mason Daniels had called in favors from Capitol Hill, and NSA had survived, even flourished, the budget meaty, the gadgets state-of-the-art. NSA was even considered a watchdog, an independent check, on the CIA. Mason Daniels had stepped down and turned over directorship to the former Chief of Naval Operations, Richard Donchez.

  Donchez was the subject of this phone call to Pacino.

  White had been on the way to the Pentagon for an afternoon meeting when he’d received the call a few minutes ago. Donchez had been found facedown on the carpeting of his office, in a coma. He’d been immediately helicopter-evacuated to Bethesda Naval Hospital. White heard about it before anyone else. His first call was to the Virginia state police barracks, to get the cruiser escort up 1-95. His second was to Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard, to Admiral Pacino, whose closest friend on earth was none other than Richard Donchez.

  “Bad news. Admiral,” White said to the video image when Pacino’s face appeared, the sunshine of the Hawaiian afternoon shining in the windows behind him.

  “What, Paully, you heard about the Cyclops system failing Cl?”

  White blinked. He hadn’t heard, and it was incredibly serious, something that could derail the SSNX program for a year, maybe more.

  “No, sir, that isn’t it. I’m calling because a few minutes ago I got a call from Fort Meade.”

  Pacino looked up uncertainly.

  “It’s Admiral Donchez, sir. He’s in a coma. They say it’s late-stage lung cancer.”

  Pacino’s jaw clenched. “How much time are they giving him?” “They ain’t sayin’,” White said, his Philadelphia accent infecting his speech. “Maybe days. Could be hours.

  The attending at Bethesda came up when I videoed him.

  Said any family members should get to the hospital now.

  He could fade out at any moment.”

  “Have a car waiting at Andrews Air Force Base. I’ll be there by the wee hours.”

  “But the SS-12 isn’t back yet,” White said, referring to the supersonic twelve-passenger staff jet. He’d just flown it back from Pearl, and it needed maintenance at Norfolk Naval Air Station before they flew it back.

  “I’ll grab an F-22 fighter. UAIRCOM owes me a favor.”

  Pacino’s shoulders seemed to sink, his head to grow heavy. White bit his lip.

  “I’ll meet you at Andrews myself, sir.”

  “No, Paully, you stay by Dick Donchez. Tell him I’m on my way. Even if he’s unconscious, you tell him.”

  “Aye-aye, sir.”

  The video image clicked out, Pacino hanging up on him. White leaned into the front seat. “Why are we going so goddamned slow? Tell the trooper ahead to kick it or we’re passing him,” he ordered the driver.

  “Yessir.”

  The car, usually whisper quiet, rumbled with the sound of the engine and the road and the wind noise.

  Paully White sat back, deep in thought.

  TUESDAY OCTOBER 29 pentagon e-ring suite OF THE chief OF naval operations alexandria, virginia Admiral Richard O’Shaughnessy answered the video phone when his aide. Lieutenant Doreen O’Connell, looked up at him and indicated it was the director of the Combined Intelligence Agency.

  “Hi, Chris,” O’Shaughnessy said, his deep baritone voice commanding yet matter-of-fact.

  “Hi, Dick. We need to be on for three o’clock. My DDO has me scheduled later.”

  O’Shaughnessy looked at his watch. It was quarter to three. Chris Osgood, the DCIA, never gave him less than two hours’ notice. And that stuff about the DDO— short for Deputy Director for Operations, Chris’ number two at the agency—was their code that the CIA director had something that couldn’t wait.

  “Where are you calling from?”

  “Car. I’m well on the way.”

  “You’re not dressed,” O’Shaughnessy said, amusement in his voice, noticing Osgood’s pressed shirt collar and striped tie.

  “What am I supposed to do, give you a show? And see myself on the evening news strip teasing when some idiot with a microwave interceptor grabs the cell call and peddles it to the evening news?” Osgood smiled over his half-frame reading glasses.

  “Three it is,” O’Shaughnessy said, clicking off. Standing up he said to his aide, “Doreen, I’m going running early.”

  O’Shaughnessy was tall, over six feet three inches, yet weighed in at less than eighty-five kilograms. He didn’t look thin, but like the decathlon athlete he once was.

  He was fifty-eight years old, used to being told he looked ten years younger. His hairline was healthy, showing more forehead now than he had a decade ago, but the increased real estate was barely noticeable. His skin was taut, his chin strong, his cheekbones prominent, his eyes dark brown under thick brows. But, of all his features, the most striking were his ears. They protruded impossibly out into space. He had commonly been referred to as “monkey ears” in his days as a midshipman and later as a junior officer, though predictably they were never mentioned now that he was the Big Boss. He had once hired a new aide because, as he had told Deanna that night, “Know why I hired him? Only one reason. He has big ears. Nothing shows good character like big ears.”

  He was a natural-born speaker. His voice was fully an octave deeper than most large male voices, the boom of it full and musical. He spoke with his hands, surveying his crowd, his delivery able to set up the most hilarious jokes, his expressions animated yet natural.

  But when Dick O’Shaughnessy was the listener, his charm seemed to vanish. Those who had suffered briefing him had described his blank, penetrating stare, always accompanied by extended silences; sometimes lasting so long that grizzled war veterans lost their nerve in front of him. O’Shaughnessy had even become afraid of being lied to by his inner circle, so intimidated were they. He had tried to work on that aspect of himself, trying hard to interject warm words or sounds of encouragement when he listened, but more often than not he was listening too intently to remember to do that.

  To lessen the intimidating effect of his stare, he’d taken to wearing half-frame reading glasses. For some reason, peering over the rims of the half-frames gave him a fatherly quality. He didn’t use them just as a prop, however, since he genuinely needed the reading glasses now, the Writepad displays having gotten harder and harder to read with each passing year. Yet they illustrated another problem he had. He had difficulty hanging on to the glasses. They managed to disappear every time he needed them. Deanna found them in all his service jackets, briefcases, lying around the house, yet they were never around when he neede
d them. Finally, Deanna had ordered forty-five of them and distributed them to his aides, his personal assistant, his driver, placing five of them at his favorite chair, five in his staff car, three in his briefcase, two in his workout bag, five in his desk, and one in each jacket pocket. And still he mislaid his glasses.

  After his aide left the office, O’Shaughnessy quickly undressed, pulling on the worn but comfortable jersey reading navy ‘80 and a pair of Seal running shorts. He made his way to the VIP entrance, then stopped to return to the office to pick up his bar-coded ID—absentmindedness kicking in again. He had been stretching out for a few minutes when Osgood’s black limo pulled up.

  Christopher Osgood IV was young for the position of director of the CIA. Osgood was in his late forties, his hair slightly thinning, not enough to detract from his near-perfect good looks. Osgood shared little in common with O’Shaughnessy save his slimness and good nature.

  Osgood was an Anglo Protestant from Boston, his father prominent in Massachusetts politics.

  O’Shaughnessy had met Osgood four years ago at the Marine Corps Marathon, run annually in the city in the springtime. At the time, O’Shaughnessy was one of Donchez’s dozens of deputies. Osgood said he was a mid-grade CIA employee. He’d asked O’Shaughnessy to train with him, since he was frequently in the city at lunchtime or after work. O’Shaughnessy had agreed, and on their thrice-weekly runs he’d ask Osgood about work.

  Osgood would say a few words, mostly shrugging it off.

  O’Shaughnessy had eventually learned that he worked in intelligence, but had not gotten Osgood to open up about it beyond that. They contented themselves to run, commenting on the weather, letting their friendship grow.

  Osgood’s and O’Shaughnessy’s runs in the last two years had begun to be more than workouts. Since O’Shaughnessy had taken over the Navy and Osgood the CIA, the runs had become intelligence briefings for O’Shaughnessy, and gossip mills for Osgood on Capitol Hill office politics. Occasionally, when something was up, Osgood would schedule a run early, like today. Calling O’Shaughnessy with only fifteen minutes’ notice was breaking new ground, though. Something had to be up, O’Shaughnessy thought.

  As usual, they started out slowly, picking up the pace only when they crossed the Arlington Memorial Bridge.

  Once they were past the Lincoln Memorial, no one near them, Osgood started talking.

  “Something’s brewing in Red China,” he said without preamble, talking between deep breaths.

  “What?” O’Shaughnessy asked.

  “Armies are mobilizing all across the border. Seventy armored divisions, one hundred forty infantry divisions, support units all across the western border of White China. Four million uniformed men, all strung out along the border.” O’Shaughnessy said nothing, not wanting to break the flow of the CIA man’s monologue. When Osgood had paused long enough, making it clear he had stopped talking, O’Shaughnessy said, “Sounds like the entire People’s Liberation Army.”

  “It is.”

  “They calling this an exercise?”

  “Nope. Nothing published.” Osgood pointed to the right. “Long way? Around the Tidal Basin?”

  “Yeah. I’ve been missing miles. They don’t refer to their real exercises as exercises, do they?”

  “Nope.”

  “So maybe it is just an exercise.”

  “They’ve pulled the divisions manning the Mongolian frontier. Airlifted most of them.”

  “Fuel for that must have cost millions.”

  “Yup. They pulled their divisions off the Indian border too.”

  “That was gutsy. Nipun in India’s not the nicest guy, and he’s spoiling to grab territory.”

  “We found out that all PLA military leaves are canceled.”

  “How’d you find that out?”

  “Leg’s cramping,” Osgood said, which is what he always said when O’Shaughnessy asked a question that went too far. The Navy man smiled, saying nothing, waiting for the spook to continue. But he didn’t.

  “All leaves?”

  “Every man.”

  “I hate when it gets cold early,” O’Shaughnessy said as two pretty young women came jogging by from the other direction. Osgood smiled at them. They smiled back, then shot quick glances of appreciation at O’Shaughnessy. “Getting dark earlier now.” The women were out of earshot behind them. “Every goddamned man?”

  “Yup.”

  “What else?”

  “All the airwing fighter aircraft have left the western and central bases. All of the jets have been moved east.

  All within a few hundred kilometers of the White China frontier.”

  “Another couple million in fuel. They flying around or staying on the ground?”

  “Ground. Under camouflage tarps. In bunkers built within the last few days. In tents. In barns. Wherever they can be hidden.”

  “And other than that, all’s normal?”

  “Nope,” Osgood said, his Harvard education sometimes undetectable amidst his yups and nopes.

  The Thomas Jefferson Memorial loomed ahead, looking gloomy in the fading fall light and the overcast of the day.

  “So what else?”

  “This is Release 24.” Osgood referred to the top-secret classification designating information that could be shared only with the president and cabinet members and a few select agency heads, such as the director of NSA.

  The only classification higher was Release 12, the president’s own classification.

  “Okay.”

  “The Red Chinese leadership has been evacuated from Beijing, lock, stock, and barrel. Beijing, governmentally speaking, is a ghost town.”

  O’Shaughnessy paused to think this over. The Washington Monument was coming up ahead as the path verged away from the Tidal Basin.

  “This is no exercise,” O’Shaughnessy finally said.

  “Bingo. And you didn’t even go to Harvard.”

  “Fuck you, Osgood.”

  As another group of runners came toward them, the two men fell silent. When they were alone again, Osgood started in.

  “President’s been briefed. She’ll be calling for Pink’s opinion.”

  Bill Pinkenson, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, was an Army four-star general, a cavalryman, a tank guy.

  Pinkenson was of medium height, tanned, good looking in a baby-faced way, an amazingly gregarious officer, quick with a joke. He didn’t have the kind of statuesque appearance that O’Shaughnessy had, yet once people met Pinkenson, they never forgot him. He was the consummate politician, and had been maneuvering through the Pentagon for decades, loving every minute of it. He and O’Shaughnessy had been close since the naval officer had first reported to duty in D.C., the Army officer having shaken O’Shaughnessy’s hand at their first meeting.

  He’d insisted that he and Deanna tailgate with Pinkenson and his wife, Jackie, at the Army-Navy game the next weekend.

  “And Pink’ll probably want your opinion,” Osgood said.

  “Mine? Why?”

  “Because the Navy’s going to have to weigh in on this thing.”

  “Back up there. You’ve got the balloon going up in eastern Red China, the Reds preparing to jump over the line and retake White China. Civil War, round two. Except this time they mean to win.” The runners turned and headed east, along the mall, the Capitol Building a mile ahead of them. “Doesn’t sound like the Navy’s got much to do with this. Oh, sure, hopefully President Warner will decide to support the White Chinese, and we may even invade at Shanghai or anywhere else we get a beachhead. My special forces will be involved, the Marine Corps will be saddled up and put on the ground, and we’ll start up the ships of the Navforcepacfleet, get the transports fueled up and ready. We’ll even escort the Merchant Marine boys into the East China Sea. And of course, the carrier guys will get into this, flying air support for the beach landings. We’ll have ourselves a busy time of it, with a war like this. But compared to the Army, the Navy’s got an easy day. So why did you mention I�
��d have to render an opinion?”

  “Think again. Something’s wrong.”

  O’Shaughnessy paused, looking over at the Smithsonian as they ran by, the Air and Space Museum coming up on the right.

  “Okay, I thought again. I don’t see anything wrong.”

  “How about this? Why would the Reds begin to think they could get away with this? With your fleet and an Army rapid deployment force all ready to go next door in Japan, and the Reds are going to jump across the line and duke it out, force the Whites into the East China Sea? Just like that? What about Uncle Sam? Don’t they think we’ll do something? We’ll bring our fleet up to the White Chinese shoreline, offload a bunch of Marines and Army infantry and cavalry and artillery boys, with our jets pounding the sand with all kinds of smart bombs, and the Reds will be smashed. Why would they waste the effort? And if they didn’t see us as a threat, why are they doing this now? They would have done this ages ago. Your western Pacific fleet was all beefed up for this contingency, and the Reds knew that. So why, all of a sudden, is our fleet and RDF no big deal?”

  Had Osgood been looking at O’Shaughnessy, he would have seen the admiral’s blank, piercing glare. For now, O’Shaughnessy just stared straight ahead at the Reflecting Pool in front of the Capitol.

  “Far side?” he asked Osgood, indicating they should either turn back now or continue to the other side of the Capitol block by the Library of Congress and the Supreme Court.

  “Yeah.”

  O’Shaughnessy spoke. “Maybe the Reds believe they would overwhelm us with people—four million men to our half million. Their force is overwhelming.”

  “You don’t believe that. Admiral. We disproved theories like that twenty-five years ago. Look at the war with the UIF—they outnumbered the allies ten to one during the Cha Bahar invasion. But our smart weapons and equipment gave us a force multiplier. Same thing here—”

  O’Shaughnessy interrupted. “I know. I know. learned the lesson. I just wondered if the Reds did.”p>

  “Sure, they did. That’s why they’ve behaved all this time. Until now.”

  They ran in silence for a half mile, all the way around the Capitol, passing the Reflecting Pool on the way back, running this time on the north side of the mall.