Against All Enemies

by John Gilstrap

  Boxers didn’t bother to look up as he said, “Hey, Boss, did I hit it?” He rumbled out a laugh.

  Jonathan pulled away from the tripod-mounted spotting scope. “I hate you,” he said. Boxers was the most natural shooter Jonathan had ever known, and he’d been that way since the beginning. It was as if bullets responded to Big Guy’s whims.

  Boxers stood, brushed off the front of his T-shirt and jeans, and held out his hand for the controller. “I push the buttons because you need the practice.”

  As Jonathan handed over the box, his phone buzzed in his pocket. The caller ID said unknown.

  He pressed the connect button and brought the phone to his ear. “Yeah.”

  “Yes sir, Mr. Horgan,” a man’s voice said. “This is Cale Cook at the western guard shack. There’s a visitor here to see you. He identifies himself as a Colonel Rollins, and he says it’s important that he speak to you now.”

  Jonathan didn’t know the security team out here at the compound very well, so Cale Cook could have called himself by any name, but he knew all too well who Colonel Rollins was. “Take a picture of him and send it to my phone. I’ll call you back when I get it.”

  Boxers’ face showed that he’d been eavesdropping. “What’s up?”

  “Roleplay Rollins is here.”

  Boxers recoiled at the words as anger settled in his eyes. There was a time not too long ago when Big Guy would have hurried to beat the man to death, and Jonathan would have let him. The three of them had a history that involved Jonathan’s and Boxers’ last days with the Unit, and it had not ended well.

  Jonathan extended his palm to settle his friend down. “Take it easy. Past is past. He saved our asses and we owe him a solid.” His phone buzzed, and displayed a picture of the man the visitor claimed to be. Jonathan called the guard shack. “Send him up to the lodge and have him wait on the porch. We’re on our way.”

  “Should we escort him?”

  “Is he alone?”

  “Alone and unarmed. I searched his vehicle.”

  “No,” Jonathan said. “Let him go solo. It’s hard to get lost when there’s only one road.” He clicked off and looked to Boxers. “This should be interesting,” he said. “Let’s pick up the weapons and ammo. We’ll break Zippy down later.”

  Boxers pointed through the Hummer’s windshield toward the front porch of the stylishly rustic structure that had started life a hundred fifty years ago as a log cabin, but whose original owners would recognize nothing but a portion of the western wall. “There he is.”

  Colonel Stanley Rollins, US Army, stood from one of the porch’s cane rockers as they approached. He wore jeans and a white polo shirt, and an expression that was impossible to read.

  “Looks like Roleplay is a civilian today,” Boxers said.

  “He hates that name.”

  Big Guy chuckled. “I know. That’s why I like it.”

  “Don’t start anything,” Jonathan said. “Not until we hear what he has to say.”

  “I’ll call him Stanley, then.”

  “He hates that even worse.”

  Boxers looked across the console. “Yeah.”

  Jonathan opened the door and slid to the ground. “Hello, Colonel,” he called as he approached the lodge. “This is a genuine surprise.” He extended his hand as he closed the distance, and Rollins walked down the four steps to greet him.

  “Hello, Digger,” he said. His handshake wasn’t the bone crusher that it used to be. “Nice to see you again.”

  “Stanley!” Boxers shouted, feigning delight. “Hasn’t someone fragged your ass by now?”

  Rollins didn’t rise to the bait. “Big Guy,” he said. “Pleasant as always.” He pointed to the Hummer. “And still the environmental conscience that you’ve always been.”

  Dubbed the Batmobile by Boxers, the lavishly customized and heavily armored Hummer was one of Jonathan’s favorite toys.

  “Let’s talk inside,” Jonathan said. He led the way up the steps, turned the key and pulled the heavy wooden door out toward them. He stepped aside to allow the colonel to pass.

  As he did, Rollins rapped on the door with a knuckle. “Impressive. What is that, oak?”

  “Something like that,” Jonathan said. “I believe in living securely.”

  Inside, the foyer led directly to a living room, fifteen by fifteen feet, beyond which a dining area led to a closed door that hid the kitchen from view. A stone fireplace dominated the eastern wall—the wall to the right walking in. Stairs in the far northwest corner led up to the sleeping levels. In decorating the place, Jonathan had leaned heavily on his experience at Colorado ski lodges. Woodsy artwork hung from exposed pine walls across the way on the north wall, while a rack of eight long guns took up much of the front, southern, wall.

  “Wow,” Rollins said. “I guess I keep underestimating just how friggin’ rich you really are. What is this place?”

  “Pretty much what it looks like,” Jonathan said as he nudged a switch on the wall to wake up two dangling chandeliers made of antlers. “This is a place to escape to, to unwind. Two hundred twenty-five acres of seclusion.”

  “And a guard patrol?”

  “When did you become a reporter?” Boxers asked as he pulled the door closed.

  “Who would see this and not be curious?” Rollins said.

  “Which is a good reason to have a guard patrol,” Jonathan said. He motioned to the leather sofas and chairs near the fireplace. “Have a seat, Colonel. Suffice to say that things happen out here that are best not witnessed by curiosity seekers. Think of it as my company’s testing grounds.” He let the words settle in. “Can I get you something to drink?”

  Rollins waved the question away. “No, I’m fine, thanks.”

  Big Guy was already halfway to the wet bar in the back corner of the dining area. “I’ m not,” he said. “You want your usual, Boss?”

  “Please.” On his own, this would be the time of day for a martini, but since Boxers was tending the bar, that meant a couple fingers of Lagavulin scotch. Boxers didn’t have the patience for the delicate chemistry that was a good martini.

  Jonathan settled himself into a chair, crossed his legs, and locked in on Rollins’s eyes. “You know, Colonel, I don’t think either one of us wants the charade of small talk. What say you get right to what you have on your mind?”

  Rollins leaned forward in his chair and rested his elbows on his knees. “I presume you remember Dylan Nasbe.”

  “Boomer? Of course I do.” Dylan had joined the Unit shortly before Jonathan was on his way out, but it was a small, tight community. Plus, Jonathan had had some recent dealings with Dylan’s wife and son. “Is he okay?” The scotch floated over Jonathan’s right shoulder, clamped in Boxers’ fingers.

  “No,” Rollins said. “He’s gone rogue.”

  “What does that mean?” Boxers asked as he took the sofa for himself.

  “It means he’s killing off Agency assets.”

  “Bullshit,” Boxers said. “He was a good kid. No way would he do that.”

  “And yet he is.”

  “Why?” Jonathan asked.

  Rollins shrugged. “Why does anyone do anything like that? Something went crosswise in his head, and he started wasting people.”

  Jonathan and Boxers exchanged looks. “I’m not buying it,” Jonathan said. “I mean, I can imagine him whacking Agency guys—who among us hasn’t considered that a time or two?—but I don’t buy that he’s crazy. He’s got a reason.”

  “Lee Harvey Oswald had reasons, Dig,” Rollins said. “So did John Wilkes Booth and Charles Manson. But so what? Murder is murder.”

  “The Army is up to its nipples in shrinks these days,” Boxers said. “Somebody has to have wondered the obvious.”

  “You already know some of it,” Rollins said. “Those assholes who came at his family undoubtedly screwed him up at least a little.”

  “No,” Jonathan said. “Well, of course it was traumatic, but I spoke with Boomer not long
after that. He was okay.”

  “His deployments, then,” Rollins said. With an acknowledging hand to Big Guy, he added, “Nipples-deep in shrinks as we are, there are no doubt hundreds of possible diagnoses, but none of them can be tested because we haven’t been able to talk to Boomer because we don’t know where he is.”

  “Why does it have to be Boomer?” Jonathan pressed. “You’ve got a couple of dead Agency guys—”

  “Three,” Rollins interrupted. “Three dead Agency guys, and they were all in the same AO as Boomer during his last deployment.”

  Jonathan recognized the acronym for area of operation. “So? After we punted on Iraq, Afghanistan was the only AO we had left. There have to be thousands of cross-links between the Agency dead and soldiers in country.”

  “And what makes you think they weren’t killed by the Taliban?” Boxers asked.

  “You’re both getting defensive,” Rollins said.

  “Of course we’re defensive!” Boxers yelled. Jonathan could tell he was spinning up to a bad place. “And why aren’t you? Haven’t you turned you back on enough of your brothers over the years?”

  Jonathan extended a hand to calm his friend down. “Not now, Box.”

  “Screw you,” he snapped, and his face instantly showed horror. “Not you. Him. Not only do you lay this on your own Army, you have to lay it on our Unit brother.”

  “If you’ll calm down, I’ll explain it to you!” Rollins shouted. He could get spun up, too.

  Jonathan knew it was time to play peacekeeper. “Quit shouting, both of you. Colonel, I encourage you to make your case quickly, and with minimal bullshit, and as you do, keep in mind that you’re talking about a friend who’s given a hell of a lot for his country.”

  Some of the red left Rollins’s face. None of it left Boxers’.

  “Some bad things happened on Boomer’s last tour,” Rollins said. “I can’t go into details, but he’d been working a source for quite some time, and then the source was killed. We think he blamed his CIA counterparts.”

  “Why would he do that?” Jonathan asked.

  “Because we blame the Agency for everything,” Rollins replied. “Some things never change.”

  “There’s a giant step between blaming and killing,” Boxers said. “What proof do you have?”

  Rollins looked to the ceiling and scowled, as if to divine his next words. “There’s proof, and then there’s proof. We don’t have any of the latter. What we do know is he came home, walked away from his marriage, and disappeared.” His eyes bored into Jonathan. “And I mean disappeared. Off the grid.”

  “You know, we’re trained to do that, right?” Jonathan said. “In fact, we’re paid to do that when we’re in hostile territory.”

  “But domestically? Who would do that?”

  Jonathan waited for him to get the absurdity of his own question.

  Rollins acknowledged with a nod. “Okay, other than you, who would do that? Within a few days of his disappearance, the first of the Agency guys was killed, shot with a five-five-six round from a long ways away. Over two hundred yards, as I recall. He was on his way to his car in the driveway, and it was a perfect head shot.”

  Jonathan felt tension in his chest. That wasn’t the kind of a shot most amateurs could make.

  “Three days later, the second agent was taken out as he exited a coffee shop outside of Fredericksburg, Virginia, not far from your stomping grounds. Five-five-six again, center of mass, hollow-point round. Perfect shot and no one heard it.”

  Boxers’ ire had transformed to concern. “Was this a coffee shop he went to regularly?”

  Rollins nodded. “Every day. How did you know?”

  “Was the first guy—the head shot—a hollow point?”

  “No.” Rollins smiled. He saw that Boxers got it.

  “He was worried about collateral damage,” Big Guy said. He looked to Jonathan. “He’d studied the guy’s routine and used HPs as a safety.”

  “What about the third?” Jonathan asked.

  “Another head shot,” Rollins said, “again from long distance. The interesting thing there was that the shooter showed great patience. The agent had been standing for ten minutes with his kid at the end of the driveway, waiting for the school bus.” He looked to Boxers. “Like before, this was a daily routine. He waited till the little girl was on the bus, and the bus was on its way before he shot. No one heard or saw anything. By the time his wife woke up and noticed he was missing—and then found the body—he was already stiff.”

  Jonathan took a pull on his scotch as he pushed the pieces into place. “That still doesn’t mean Boomer did it,” he said. Even he heard the weakness of his words.

  “Doesn’t matter,” Rollins said. “The Agency thinks he did, and they’ll move heaven and earth to find him and take him out.”

  “What about due process?” Boxers asked.

  “Where have you been the past few years?” Rollins countered. “The alphabet agencies stopped caring about due process when the regime changed. That was about the same time when beat cops started riding around in tanks. This isn’t your childhood America anymore.”

  “So, we’ve got a lot of conjecture and assumptions,” Jonathan summarized. “Cut to the chase, Colonel. Why are you here?”

  Rollins cast a nervous glance to Boxers as he said, “We want you to find Boomer and bring him home.”

  “Well, that’s not gonna happen,” Boxers said. “I don’t hunt down my friends.”

  Jonathan said, “By ‘bring him home,’ do you mean alive or dead?”

  “Preferably alive.”

  “But dead would be okay, too.” Boxers growled.

  Rollins worked his jaw muscles. “No, dead would not be okay, Box. But don’t forget that every Agency wet work contractor is out looking for this guy. If they get him, he’s toast.”

  “Then why not just leave it to them?” Jonathan asked.

  Rollins recoiled. “You said it yourself, Dig. He’s family. Boomer deserves better than a bullet. I don’t care what he did, he deserves better than that. If you can get to him first, maybe you can talk him down. If he hears that you’re the one hunting for him, maybe he’ll take the time to at least tell his side of the story. This is serious stuff.”

  Jonathan leaned back into his seat and crossed his legs. The math here wasn’t working for him. “You said bad things happened to him over there on his last tour. I won’t even ask you for those details—at least not yet—but if the bad stuff is traceable to specific interactions with specific Agency assets, then I presume the remaining assets have become much harder targets.”

  “All the targets have been eliminated,” Rollins said.

  Jonathan exchanged a confused look with Boxers. “Then what’s done is done,” he said. “Good reasons, bad reasons, that’s for others to decide. I’m not a cop. I’m not going to traipse all over hell’s half acre to bring a colleague into custody.”

  “It’s more than that,” Rollins said. “The killings are real—they really happened—but that’s not the punch line.”

  “Good Christ, Stanley,” Boxers said with a derisive laugh. “Can’t you just for once in your life deal from the top of the deck? Why does everything—”

  “He’s a traitor, guys,” Rollins said. “He’s selling secrets to the world.”

  Jonathan’s heart skipped. “What kind of secrets?”

  “The most damaging kind you can think of,” Rollins said.

  Chapter Three

  “I can think of some pretty damaging secrets,” Jonathan said.

  “And with all due respect,” Rollins said, “the ones you know are pretty old and yet they’re still damaging if released. Boomer had access to the same smorgasbord of highly classified, compartmentalized information, and his are brand spanking new.”

  “Traitor is a big word,” Boxers said. “Why haven’t I read about any of this in the news?”

  “Because he’s not leaking to the news,” Rollins said. “He’s leaking
directly to foreign intelligence services, and they know better than to cut off the gravy train.”

  “Meaning that they haven’t told the press?” Boxers asked.

  “Exactly.”

  “Well, that won’t last for long,” Jonathan said. “Not all intelligence apparati leak as badly as ours, but they all leak, sooner or later. Are we talking deployment strengths and launch codes, or are we talking the president’s high school yearbook photos?” Among the worst-kept secrets in the world, as far as Jonathan was concerned, was the fact that the United States considered far too many trivial details to be highly classified. It was no soldier’s prerogative to make such a judgment on his own, but by casting such a wide net, the government had deflated the value of classified labels.

  “Somewhere in the middle, as far as we can tell,” Rollins said. “The worst we’ve seen so far is a list of Agency assets in various countries around the world.”

  “Wow,” Boxers said. “You’re telling me that he’s doing the same thing that you say prompted him to kill when it was done by others?”

  “More or less, yes.”

  Jonathan’s hand shot up. “Ding-ding. Bullshit bell. You said, ‘more or less,’ ” Jonathan pressed. “That’s a hedge. Give me both the more and the less.”

  Rollins sighed, clearly caught in an obfuscation. “There are differences,” he said. “We think Boomer killed because the Agency gave up civilian assets. Boomer, on the other hand, is only giving up career assets.”

  “In what part of the world?” Boxers asked. From the look on Big Guy’s face, Jonathan believed that Boxers was beginning to see the same crack in the story.

  Rollins looked up at the ceiling. This guy had tells on top of his tells, always had. “No especially hot spots,” he said.

  “Be more specific,” Jonathan pressed.

  “Okay, he’s given up France, Switzerland, and Italy, so far. But that’s not the point—”

  A laugh escaped from Jonathan’s throat before he could stop it. “That’s a lot less than more, Colonel. Jesus, how can you equate Paris to Kabul?”