“What pressure can we bring to bear—economic, diplomatic, political, it doesn’t matter to me—to keep Israel’s and Iran’s neighbors from getting involved here?” he asks. The question is posed to the director of national intelligence, but it’s actually for the entire room.
“We’re talking to Syria, Iraq, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia through back channels, but the truth is, Syria’s in the same boat as we are,” the secretary of state answers.
“Meaning that their alliance with Iran will obligate them to come to Iran’s aid if Israel’s counterattacks reach a crisis point,” the president says.
“Yes, sir.”
“And the Saudis are going to feel the heat once this starts to look like Israel is killing Arabs,” SecDef chimes in with characteristic bluntness.
The occupants of the room soberly nod in agreement as the stark reality of what they’re facing sinks in. To be sure, this is not the first time the world has faced the specter of a Third World War. Nor is it the first time such a threat has come from the Middle East. It isn’t unprecedented for the United States to feel the need to apply carrot-and-stick pressure to stay Israel’s retaliatory hand, as President George H. W. Bush and his cabinet did when Iraq lofted SCUD missiles toward Israel during the First Gulf War. The world waited to see whether Israel would respond in kind, waited with the same breathless, fearful anticipation that fills the White House Situation Room at this moment.
“What are we doing to keep Israel from making a counterstrike if this thing reaches a tipping point?” the president asks, recalling the forty-first president’s efforts.
The secretary of state leans forward to answer. “The usual entreaties, Mr. President. But this is a very different situation from Desert Storm.”
The president nods. He certainly didn’t need to be told that. But still…“You need to get on a plane. Right now. Do whatever you have to, promise whatever you have to…threaten, I don’t care, but do whatever you can to keep Israel from escalating this thing.”
The secretary of state nods. “Given what Iran is doing, Mr. President…it may not be up to Israel.”
Just then, the plasma monitor at the head of the room flickers. What was previously a hard-line video feed to the Pentagon is replaced with a jumble of pixelated static. The White House chief of staff orders an aide to see what he can do about restoring communications.
Then Alex Garnett’s voice fills the room.
* * *
On the large screen in the Overwatch Op Center, Alex watches as the president, his cabinet members, and his staff react to his unexpected and disembodied voice. “Mr. President, my name is Alex Garnett. I’m an attorney for the Office of General Counsel for the CIA.” Alex can see a trio of aides rush out of the room, no doubt hell-bent on figuring out what the hell was going on, but he stays focused on the president, who looks uncharacteristically confused. He leans forward and asks a question, but whatever he’s saying is lost in a cloud of garbled static. “Gerald—”
“Something’s wonky with the signal,” Gerald reports. “Remember, this is a work-around and—”
“I need to hear him, Gerald,” Alex snaps.
“I’m trying.”
Alex lowers himself to the microphone Gerald jury-rigged and speaks with as much command as he can muster. “Mr. President, Iran and Israel have been manipulated into a conflict with each other.” Onscreen, the president furrows his brow. This confirms that although Alex can’t hear the president, the president can hear him. And although Alex can’t understand the president’s garbled response, the man’s incredulous expression screams that he finds what Alex is saying preposterous. “I know how this sounds, Mr. President. But Ayatollah Jahandar’s death was an assassination. He was murdered with a weaponized strain of swine flu.”
Alex watches the video feed as the White House Situation Room explodes, everyone talking at once, stunned expressions and wild gesticulations. Through it all, the president stays calm, though his face says he remains highly suspicious. Alex presses on. “I believe Iran is under the impression that Jahandar’s death was orchestrated by the Israelis.” This is conjecture on Alex’s part, but it seems reasonable. Jahandar’s death and Iran’s military aggression are no coincidence. “But it wasn’t, sir. We killed Jahandar.” The static-filled audio feed from the White House grows louder as everyone in the Situation Room talks over one another. But then Alex loses visual. A uniformed navy officer strides into the room and beelines for the video-conference camera. Within seconds, the man’s ministrations to the camera—no doubt trying to figure out how the secure connection to the Pentagon has been compromised—completely blocks Alex’s view.
“I’m standing in a CIA facility at this very moment.” This last part is, if not an outright lie, a severe stretching of the truth, but Alex has a high enough mountain to climb. One step at a time. “Mr. President, this facility will prove to you beyond all reasonable doubt that everything I’m telling you is true.” Then he turns to Gerald. “Can you send them our location or something?”
Gerald, still hard at work at the computer terminal, shakes his head. “We’re too far underground. I can’t get a cell signal, so I can’t get a GPS location on my phone.” He works the computer for a few seconds—his fingers flying across the keyboard—and adds, “I’m trying to send them a data packet instead. Hopefully, they can trace us through the IPX they’re using here.”
Alex doesn’t know what an IPX is but Gerald’s use of the word hopefully is what concerns him. Hope is something he has in very short supply. The other thing he lacks is time. To his right, Rykman stirs, threatening to shake off the grip of unconsciousness. Alex’s voice finds a new level of urgency as he returns his attention to the microphone. “Mr. President, this facility is an underground bunker about fifteen miles from CIA headquarters at Langley. But of greater concern is what’s going on in the Middle East. Sir, Iran needs to know it is taking action based on fabricated intelligence.”
Suddenly, Alex’s entire world goes white. Someone shoves white-hot needles into his ears. The room around him swims, rotating off its axis, as his inner ear struggles to regain equilibrium. He’s confused, deaf, blind, and disoriented. His hands shoot out in front of him in a vain effort to quiet the vertigo seizing him. It’s all he can do to stand up, as his ears report an incessant high-pitched whine.
The M84 stun grenade is little more than a magnesium-and-ammonium-nitrate pyrotechnic charge encased in a thin aluminum housing within a perforated cast-steel body. When detonated, the charge produces what’s called a subsonic deflagration. But the grenade’s nickname—“flash-bang”—is far more descriptive of its capabilities. The flash is brighter than six million candelas. The bang is louder than a hundred and seventy decibels. The flash ignites all the photoreceptor cells in Alex’s eyes, rendering him effectively blind. Normal sight will return to him in five seconds, but the stun grenade is merely the opening salvo in this attack.
The tear-gas canisters come next. If Alex weren’t deaf, he’d hear them clattering their way down the Op Center’s metal staircase en route to the floor, spraying phenacyl chloride. His hands reflexively shoot up to wipe tears and gas from his eyes. He staggers in Gerald’s direction.
The realization that Rykman is not where he used to be comes two seconds too late.
Without warning, Alex is slammed into one of the Op Center’s workstations. A kidney protests in searing pain as Rykman delivers a solid jab into it. The DCIA throws a flurry of punches, yelling a variety of obscenities. Alex kicks his foot forward to catch an advancing Rykman in the chest, buying himself three seconds to look over at Gerald, bending over and coughing violently.
A gunshot. Gerald snaps back. He flies toward the floor, leaving behind a comet trail of red mist. He lands on the concrete with a sickening thud, a wet slap as if his body were nothing more than a sack of raw meat.
Alex doesn’t have a millisecond to react to the horror of what he’s just witnessed because this first volley is followed b
y a series of gunshots. He feels bullets surge past him and is seized with violent clarity: He needs to get close to Rykman. The attack is the work of Rykman’s men. They retreated only to take up the arms they’re now using to try to kill him. The only chance Alex has of surviving the next sixty seconds is if he gets close enough to Rykman that the Overwatch personnel won’t risk a shot for fear of hitting their boss. With every ounce of strength he possesses, Alex launches himself against Rykman and the two men tumble to the floor like clumsy lovers.
Rykman lands on top and presses all of his considerable weight—one hundred and seventy-five pounds, most of it muscle—down on Alex. Alex tries to fight back but finds himself gasping for air. Rykman removed the makeshift tourniquet from his thigh and is now repurposing the cord as a garrote, tightening it around Alex’s throat. Alex’s eyes bulge. His lungs scream for air. His jaw is open wide, but he can’t draw a breath. All he can see is Rykman’s wild eyes and clenched teeth. It’s a terrifying sight—not one of rage or vengeance, but of raw homicidal intent. Then this image—so vivid only milliseconds ago—starts to lose color. Everything around him is bathed in a ruddy gray. His hands flail at Rykman’s eyes in a last-ditch effort at survival, but they miss their intended target. A realization begins to overwhelm him that this is how he’s going to die.
THIRTY
HE’S A smart little shit, Tyler Donovan thinks as he looks down the Schmidt and Bender 3–12x50 Police Marksman II LP scope of his M40 sniper rifle. From his vantage point atop the stairs looking down on the Op Center, he has a clean shot at Alex. Or he would if the bastard hadn’t been smart enough to get within inches of Director Rykman. Or maybe the lawyer isn’t smart so much as lucky. Just as he’d been lucky back in that parking garage. Donovan’s not an accomplished marksman by any measure, but he’ll be damned if he’s going to let Alex slither out of his gun sights again. Clouded by his own resolve, Donovan doesn’t think to let Rykman finish choking the life out of Alex. He wants the satisfaction of ending this asshole himself. Alex’s proximity to Rykman complicates matters, sure. Is it as clean a shot as he’d like? No. But circumstances in combat are rarely ideal and the cloud of tear gas is dissipating rapidly. Looking at Alex’s head framed in the illuminated reticle of his scope, Donovan is confident he can make this shot without striking his boss.
* * *
Through the literal fog of the clearing tear gas and the figurative one of bloodcurdling rage, William Rykman has never felt so satisfied. He’s about to crush the threat Alex poses as firmly as he’s crushing his windpipe. Before Donovan and his men’s counterassault, Rykman had been stirring back to consciousness. He’d heard enough of Alex’s conversation with the White House Situation Room to reason that the wretched little computer geek figured out a way for Alex to communicate with the president. It seems like Alex got out enough information to compromise the Overwatch. But containment will be tomorrow’s problem. There are numerous options at Rykman’s disposal for dealing with this kind of breach in operational security. They range from classic plausible deniability to the extreme step of bringing the president into the fold of secrecy. And if the president won’t recognize the necessity of the Overwatch’s patriotic mandate, well, there is an even more extreme step available.
For the moment, the only person Rykman is going to kill is Alex Garnett. The little shit’s eyes are beginning to roll up to the back of his head, exposing a white that bespeaks imminent death.
* * *
Tyler Donovan’s index finger curls around the trigger of his M40 and begins to apply the four pounds of pressure that will send a single 7.62x51mm NATO round into Alex’s head at the speed of 2,550 feet per second. Alex won’t feel anything. He’ll be alive one moment, dead the next. Like throwing a light switch.
* * *
There are no words for Alex’s last conscious thought. The instinct that causes his fingers to jut out and dig into Rykman’s thigh is purely survival. It takes two beats of his heart—an eternity, given the circumstances—for Alex’s thumb to find its target. But fortunately, Rykman’s bullet wound is right where he remembers it being.
The reflexive howl of agony is its own reward. Alex might die, but he’s not going gently into that good night. No fucking way.
* * *
Through his scope, Donovan sees his boss snap his head back. The man’s in obvious pain, but the action has the benefit of clearing Rykman’s head from Donovan’s shot. A sniper rifle does not a sniper make, however. Donovan may have the equipment, but he lacks the training. It takes two full seconds for him to recognize that his shot is pristine and pull the M40’s trigger. In that interval, Alex reaches up and yanks Rykman downward, intending to head-butt him, but the maneuver pays a much more valuable dividend.
The rifle cracks with a commanding report. The top of Rykman’s head is ripped off his skull, like the lid on a can of dog food peeling back. Alex is hit in the face with a spray of blood and tissue. He doesn’t have time to think about this now. He’s too busy barrel-rolling away from Rykman’s corpse. His attacker isn’t limited to a single bullet, and therefore, Alex is still facing the threat of death.
He comes up from the roll and looks around. The first thing he sees with any clarity since the flash-bang did its work is a phalanx of Overwatch personnel arrayed against him. Three men spill down the metal staircase clutching semiautomatic handguns. Another man at the top of the stairs holds some kind of rifle. Alex ducks for cover before the shot is taken. A computer monitor explodes directly behind him. As he finds with all of his victories, the relief of the moment is short-lived. The trio of Overwatch agents surrounds him, and he’s under no illusion that they plan to take him alive.
“Freeze!” It’s a very loud bellow, but strangely, it doesn’t seem to come from any of the men. “Weapons down!” This is also odd. Alex is unarmed. “Drop ’em!” the voice continues. “Drop ’em now!”
Alex stares at the three men in total confusion. Who’s talking? And how can he drop a weapon he doesn’t possess? The surreal moment lasts for a few seconds as the three men slowly lower their guns to the concrete floor. To say this is unexpected is a massive understatement, but Alex doesn’t have time to process it. A new group of men—a second group? Alex can’t be sure—swarm the area. They all have guns of their own, and they wear the dark green suits of the Agency’s security protective service. “Down on the floor!” one of them barks. “Down on the floor!” Alex begins to raise his hands in surrender. He doesn’t want to have survived the past ten minutes only to be shot by his own cavalry.
EPILOGUE
THE WHITE HOUSE
9:30 A.M. EDT
ONE DAY LATER
“THIS ISN’T a negotiation,” the president of the United States says. “There has already been too much loss and too much bloodshed on both sides of this conflict.” This is true. In the past thirty-six hours, the Israeli and Iranian militaries have inflicted a lot of damage on each other. The casualties won’t be fully known for another three weeks, but the CIA estimates that they number in the thousands. It’s only by dint of the work of the State Department and the presence of the John C. Stennis in the Persian Gulf that the United States has been able to keep Iran’s allies from entering the fight. If they had, or if Iran’s ability to project power in the region through means other than its air force and Mersad missile system had been more effective, the death toll would have been worse. Far worse. “In fact, sir, the CIA informs me that yesterday Iran attempted a nuclear attack on Israel by flying a nuclear warhead on a MiG into Israel’s airspace.”
“That’s a very dangerous accusation, Mr. President,” the State Department official says, translating for the newly elected supreme leader of Iran on the other end of the phone. “If there were any merit to it, then I imagine that Israel would be sitting underneath a mushroom cloud.” Both men know why it isn’t: the bomb failed to detonate. Neither, however, knows the reason why. The knowledge that the nuke would most likely fail to work was known to only two men, b
oth recently dead.
“As I said, sir, I’m not on this call to negotiate with you. Nor am I interested in dissuading you of truths we both know. Among those truths is the fact that the Israelis had no part in, or responsibility for, your predecessor’s unfortunate death.”
“Or so you have claimed,” the translator says for Namdar. “But you have offered no proof of this either.”
“Ayatollah Namdar,” the president says, clutching the phone receiver tight, “believe me when I tell you that any such proof would include evidence of Iran’s culpability in the deaths of six Americans.” He doesn’t bother to specify that the six Americans he’s referring to are the six Overwatch agents held hostage and murdered during an ill-fated rescue attempt by the U.S. Special Forces. Nor does he volunteer that he knows about the hostages thanks to Tyler Donovan’s detailed account of the Overwatch’s activities. His only concern at the moment is making clear to Namdar that Iran is engaging in a game of diplomatic brinksmanship: to exonerate Israel, the United States is willing to admit the existence of Solstice, but it will also place the loss of six American lives on Iran’s doorstep in the bargain. “I might also remind you, sir, of America’s military capabilities thanks to the presence of a carrier strike group in the Persian Gulf and our ability to rapidly redeploy our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.”
“Are you threatening military action against my country, Mr. President?” the translator asks on Namdar’s behalf.
The American president’s reply is quick. “I’m expressing my fervent hope it won’t come to that.”
There is a long pause on the line. Finally, the president hears a flood of Farsi and the translator says, “My predecessor did many things right, Mr. President. He also left room for much improvement. One of those areas is the relationship between our two countries. It is my hope that my election as supreme leader will mark a new chapter in the relationship between our two nations. The easing of sanctions, for example.”
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