Drone Command

by Mike Maden

  Many of the same millionaires and billionaires in his party who complained—rightly—about gross income inequality were partly to blame for the crisis. The middle class was being decimated by so-called free-trade agreements and, worse, the pursuit of profits at the expense of people and the nation. High-tech corporations like HP, Facebook, and Microsoft decried the shortage of American engineering talent, which simply wasn’t true. Lane had seen the numbers. Every year, twenty-five thousand freshly minted American engineering graduates couldn’t find STEM employment. But the high-tech companies kept clamoring for H-1B visas—fast-ticket entry for lower-wage technical talent from abroad—even as they were laying off tens of thousands of high-wage American employees year after year, exporting their jobs to lower-paying foreign labor markets.

  Just like the Republicans, too many Democrats gladly signed on to legislation that incentivized job exports and eagerly encouraged unfettered immigration, legal and otherwise. Those two policies alone were enough to decimate the great American middle class and trap the working poor. Lane was proud to be an old-school Kennedy Democrat, the party that used to work hard for working Americans instead of working hard to get reelected. He was determined to right the ship.

  Lane took a swig of his beer. The sweet bite of the Revolver’s blood orange peel was a perfect match to his savory grilled cheese.

  He thought about his meeting back in the Tank. Something nagged at him. The United States was spending tens of billions of dollars every year preparing for a potential war with China. So why in the hell are we even trading with them? The answer sickened him.

  By locating their operations in China for the cheap labor—and in order to avoid the labor regulations that protected American workers—too many American corporations had unintentionally helped fund China’s massive military expansion, including the Wu-14 that now threatened America’s carrier fleet, which, ironically, protected the sea-lanes that enriched those American corporations and their officers in the first place.

  Lane was also the proud son of a proud Vietnam veteran. Like most thinking Americans, Lane understood that the values of communism, like those of radical Islam, threatened human rights and freedoms. Tens of millions of Chinese had died under Mao’s reign of terror, and that was no accident. Communism was to Mao what fascism was to Hitler. America would never have traded with Germany after the war if the Germans hadn’t renounced fascism, and yet the Chinese government not only had never renounced communism, but it also still actively promoted and defended it.

  It was time to put a stop to all of it.

  The Wu-14 situation was the first problem at hand, but that was only a symptom of a much bigger issue. It was clear to him now he had to find a way to completely transform the Sino-American relationship. Either China was a friend or a foe. It couldn’t be both. If he could somehow help Sun push through his reforms, China might become a trusted ally instead of a strategic competitor. But how could he help Sun at a time like this?

  The original mission he initiated with Pearce and Myers was to secure the design of the Wu-14. But the mission profile suddenly changed in his mind. If Pearce was going to die, it needed to be for something more significant than just a missile blueprint. Unless the Sino-American relationship changed, the Chinese would inevitably build a more powerful missile in preparation for future conflict anyway.

  The path was now clear in his mind. Lane wouldn’t lose the chance to change China and make America more secure in the process. He’d do whatever it took, even if it cost him the presidency. Or worse.

  So be it.

  THIRTY-NINE

  BRIGGS CEMETERY

  JACKSON, WYOMING

  APRIL 1993

  The backhoe roared as the caretaker gunned the engine, dropping the last bucket of dirt onto the grave. The air smelled like exhaust fumes in the dimming light. Not very ceremonial, but efficient. Hand digging was too expensive these days and the cold slope was hard and rocky. The caretaker didn’t usually run the backhoe until after the family had already left with the flowers and their friends, but there weren’t any of either at his dad’s gravesite. Troy didn’t have anywhere else to go just yet so he stood around and watched.

  A tall man in a gray windowpane sport coat and a cardinal rep tie approached from the bottom of the hill, stopping to the side. He had neatly trimmed silver hair and a mustache to match, with sharp green eyes. He looked like an executive or maybe even a college professor. The man watched the backhoe bucket pound the mound of dirt with a heavy metallic clang. When the backhoe finished, it pulled away, heading clumsily through the weeds for the maintenance shed. The man with the silver hair made the sign of the cross. Noticed Troy watching him. The man nodded curtly, a sign of respect. Turned and left.

  Troy had no idea who he was. Not one of the VA doctors, that was for sure. He knew every one of those sons of bitches. They wouldn’t dare show their faces here today. He checked his watch. It was time to keep a promise he’d made to himself.

  FORTY

  BIG SKY TATS

  JACKSON, WYOMING

  APRIL 1993

  Fat JoJo sat spread-legged on a stool, hovering over a customer. His thick fingers deftly guided the tattooing needle over the man’s forearm, filling in the details of a flaming skull. Two of JoJo’s men had draped themselves on the torn vinyl waiting seats, thumbing through worn biker mags and smoking cigarettes. They were both heavily tatted—a perk of the job. One was tall and lanky with wild, bushy hair. The other was shorter and broader like a fireplug, his shaved head offset by a scraggly goatee and a silver-skull earring. JoJo’s custom ’66 Chevy 4x4 was parked out front, riding high on its six-inch lifted suspension and thirty-six-inch knobby tires, still midnight black with orange flames raking the hood.

  Troy marched into the shop, straight toward JoJo. The fat man didn’t budge. Kept working his needle.

  JoJo’s tallest man leaped up to block Troy’s path. “Wait your turn, bud—”

  He swallowed the last syllable as the heel of Troy’s hand crashed into his jaw, snapping his mouth shut and shattering his front teeth. He grabbed his face, stifling a scream. The other man jumped to his feet but didn’t make a move toward Troy, who was four inches taller.

  Troy stood over JoJo, hands flexing. JoJo motioned for his customer in the chair to get up, which he did, then he raced outside. The heavy skin artist shut off his needle and finally looked up. “What the fuck is this?”

  “My old man is dead.”

  “I heard. Something about a brain tumor. That’s too fucking bad.”

  “You hit him on the head when he couldn’t fight back, you cowardly shit.”

  “And you knocked me out cold. I figured we were even.”

  “You figured wrong.”

  “You want me to throw him out?” the other man said.

  JoJo laughed. “If you can.”

  The shorter man reached behind a counter and grabbed a baseball bat. Pointed it at Troy. “Get the fuck out now.”

  Troy glowered at him.

  The man raised the baseball bat up, ready to swing. “You think I’m kidding?”

  “You’re wearing an earring,” Troy said. “I thought maybe you wanted to kiss me.”

  The bald-headed man shouted and raised the bat over his head as if he were going to chop Troy down like a tree. Troy charged at him and caught the bat above the man’s gripped hands before he could bring the bat down. Troy easily twisted the bat around and grabbed the barrel and handle, the man stupidly still holding on to the bat, trying to win the wrestling match. Big mistake. Troy easily pushed the smaller man back toward the chairs against the wall until the man fell into one. Troy kept pushing the bat against his throat until the man’s face turned red and he finally let go. Troy pointed the bat at him. “Don’t move.”

  Troy turned around with the bat in hand, ready to start pounding JoJo with it. But JoJo had other ideas. H
e stood by the doorway, pointing a long-barreled Colt .357 Magnum at Troy’s chest. A smile twisted his pockmarked face.

  “Looks like a robbery to me. Self-defense, too.” His fat thumb moved toward the hammer to cock it.

  A hand grabbed the pistol around the cylinder, locking down the hammer, then wrenched it hard in a vicious 180-degree turn. The heavy steel pistol twisted so fast it broke JoJo’s wrist and trigger finger.

  JoJo dropped to a knee, yelping, his fractured hand empty of the gun that was now in the steady grip of the man from the graveyard.

  Troy raised the bat to brain JoJo.

  “Troy,” the man said. The authority in his voice checked his swing.

  “What?”

  “He didn’t kill your dad.”

  “What’s that to you?”

  “He isn’t worth going to jail for.”

  “He needs to pay for what he did to my old man.”

  “He just did. He won’t be inking anybody for a while now with that broken hand.”

  “Nobody asked you.”

  The man’s fierce green eyes didn’t ask anything, either.

  “Listen to him, boy,” JoJo hissed, teeth clenched in pain.

  Troy looked around. The two other men had hobbled to the back of the shop, tending their wounds, no longer a threat. He gripped the bat tighter. Wanted to piñata the fat man’s skull and watch the candy spill out.

  “Knowing when you’ve won is half the battle.” The tall man opened the pistol cylinder and dropped the big shells onto the floor. “Killing him will only hurt you in the long run. Trust me, kid. If I thought he needed killing, I’d do it myself.”

  They left JoJo on the floor, alive.

  But two minutes later, JoJo’s big custom pickup with the orange painted flames was burning to the ground.

  The man had to give Troy at least that.

  FORTY-ONE

  SALLY’S WAFFLE HUT

  VICTOR, IDAHO

  APRIL 1993

  They sat in a booth at the back of the empty diner. Troy was wolfing down his second Denver omelet while the man smoked a cigarette. He’d introduced himself on the steep, winding drive through the Teton Pass. Said his name was Will. Knew his dad a long time ago.

  They’d eaten in silence since arriving an hour before, a few miles out of town, just in case JoJo changed his mind and came looking for trouble in one of Troy’s familiar haunts.

  Troy scraped up the last bits of egg and hash browns with his fork and shoveled them into his mouth, then pushed the plate away. A middle-aged waitress with puffy eyes and an easy smile cleared away the mess, then refilled Will’s coffee cup and Troy’s Coke. Will gave her a wink and she nodded, her cue to stay away for a while.

  “Thanks for back there,” Troy finally said. The first words he’d spoken since they’d left JoJo’s shop.

  Will nodded, sipping his coffee. “Sorry about your dad.”

  “How’d you know him?”

  “The war.”

  “You were in the army, too?”

  “Not exactly. But we served together.”

  “CIA?”

  Will smiled. Bright boy.

  “Your dad was a good man. It was a bad war.”

  Troy shrugged.

  “He ever talk about the war?” Will asked.

  “When I was a kid, he talked about it more. Not so much lately.”

  “But he was living it, wasn’t he?”

  “He was having a hard time. PTSD, I think.”

  “He try the VA?”

  “He preferred self-medicating. Jack Daniels mostly.”

  “I’m sorry I wasn’t there for him. He saved my ass more than once. He ever tell you about the tunnels?”

  Troy nodded. “When I was little. Gave me nightmares. Didn’t give me all the details.”

  Will did. How a local Viet Cong commander got wind of Will’s marriage to the daughter of a prominent South Vietnamese politician in a Catholic ceremony—a particular affront to the godless Communists. Six weeks later, they killed Mai and her family when Will was away on assignment.

  “I recruited your dad’s unit to help me hunt the bastard down. Found out he went underground, along with his VC platoon. Barracks, hospital, you name it, it was all down there. We finally found the tunnel entrance and your dad was the first one in.”

  Will described the hand-to-hand fighting in the dark. And their capture.

  “Dad was a POW?”

  “Not exactly. After they roughed us up, they stripped us of anything of value, looking for intel. Lost the only photo I had of my wife. Even stole my crucifix. Then they shipped us off to a regular NVA camp to get us to Hanoi, but a Green Beret unit intercepted us before we got there.”

  “Wow. I had no idea.”

  “I have other stories about your dad if you ever want to hear them. You know, he was about your age when he was over there. He had a big brass pair on him, and then some.”

  Troy was lost in thought, imagining his dad’s ordeal under the cramped earth. He shuddered. “Yeah, maybe someday.”

  “I only just heard through the grapevine he’d passed. What happened?”

  “He got in a fight one night. That fat fuck in the tat shop, JoJo, hit him in the head with a bottle, knocked him out cold. I took Dad to the county hospital to get him checked out. They did X-rays, found a tumor. Doc asked me about his overall health. I described some of the symptoms. The doc thought maybe the tumor had something to do with Agent Orange. Referred dad to the VA.”

  “And the VA didn’t do its job.”

  “Told him the tumor was inoperable. Gave him six weeks to live. Handed him a bunch of pain pills and wished him luck. He died like a fucking dog.”

  “The VA is a crapshoot. Sometimes you get lucky, sometimes you don’t.”

  “He used to say he was the luckiest guy in the world. The only problem was that it was all bad luck.”

  Will grinned. “He was a funny guy.”

  “So how’d you handle it? I mean, the war and all.”

  “One day at a time.” Will lit another cigarette. “Don’t be too hard on him. He lost a lot back in the jungle. We all did.”

  “Seems to me he brought it all home with him. Drove my mom away, that’s for sure.”

  “Yeah, I heard about that. I met her once. A beautiful gal. Your dad was crazy about her.”

  “He was just fucking crazy. She couldn’t take it anymore.”

  “Wars don’t just hurt the men who fight them. I’m sorry you and your mom were collateral damage. You had a sister, too, didn’t you?”

  “Yeah. I did.” Troy’s face darkened.

  Will clapped a hand across Troy’s broad back. Nothing to say.

  Troy came back to the present, took another swig of soda.

  “So what are your plans now?” Will asked.

  Troy drained his glass. The ice crashed against his mouth. He wiped his face with his sleeve. “Work, I guess.”

  “What about college?”

  “Me? Nah. I dropped out of high school my senior year. Never graduated.”

  “I know. I saw your school records.”

  Troy frowned. “How?”

  Will smiled. “I used to be a spook, remember?”

  “Oh, yeah. That’s right.”

  “You’re a smart kid. You should be in school.”

  “I’m not going back to high school. Forget that.”

  “No. I’m talking about university. A real one. Ever thought about Stanford?”

  “Are you kidding me? I couldn’t get into there. I don’t have the grades, and I don’t have the cash.”

  “What if I could get you in?”

  “How? Unless the CIA runs the admissions office.”

  “Not exactly.”

  Will pulled out h
is wallet. Handed Troy a business card. “I’m a research fellow at Hoover. I’ve got a little pull with the dean of admissions. Your SAT scores are strong enough to get you in with the right academic reference.”

  “What reference?”

  “Me.”

  “Even if I could get in, I couldn’t pay for it.”

  “I can get that covered, too.”

  “I’m not a charity case.”

  “I didn’t say you were. But Stanford’s loaded. They put scholarship money aside for students like you. And I’ve got a friend who lives in Palo Alto. Paraplegic. Needs someone to cut the grass, wash the car, that sort of thing. Has a garage apartment and three squares a day he’d swap out for the labor.”

  “What’s the catch?”

  “No drugs, no booze. Keep your nose clean and your grades up, or at least passing.”

  “Why me?”

  “Why do you think?”

  Troy looked at the card again. DR. WILLIAM ELLIOTT, NATIONAL SECURITY RESEARCH FELLOW, THE HOOVER INSTITUTION, STANFORD UNIVERSITY.

  “What if I fuck it up?”

  “The only way you can fuck it up is if you don’t try.”

  “I dunno. It’s been a long time since I was in a classroom, and I wasn’t very good at it.”

  “It’s not like high school. You’ll be around the brightest students in the country, learning from some of the best faculty in the world. I’ll get you set up with any tutors you might need, but I doubt you’ll need them.”