Like they still gave those out.
And like Colonel Murdoch was a real air force colonel.
In Amy Summers’ experience, USAF colonels were either full-time flyers or full-time paper pushers, especially nowadays when there were much fewer USAF colonels to go around. She’d been happy, even intrigued, by the Kim Possible mission they’d given her on Sunday evening, keeping Colonel Murdoch sober and bagging a set of fingerprints off that asshole from Fort Hood. That had been fun enough, but this was just weird, even a little scary.
‘You’ll be fine,’ General Musso told her, just before giving her a hand-drawn diagram detailing the location of the listening devices in Colonel Murdoch’s room. ‘It’s all audio, no cameras. We just need you to go in, put yourself to bed, and go to sleep.’
And to tell nobody, she thought. That was the real deal. Nobody could know she was pretending to be Murdoch. And Murdoch was … well, who the hell knew?
Certainly not Corporal Amy Summers.
*
Master Sergeant Milosz pulled over in the civilian Jeep at their rendezvous point, on the corner of East Avenue A and North 20th Street, in the ashen wasteland of Temple’s western reaches. This part of town had burned sometime after the Wave and the landscape was an eerie wilderness of ruins and scrubby regrowth. Caitlin could hear animals moving through the thickets as she waited in the burnt-out remains of a brick bungalow. She had her pistol to hand, the Kimber Warrior, and Milosz had told her to think nothing of shooting at anything with teeth that got too close.
‘This is for what I am supposed to be doing tonight,’ he’d said. ‘Hunting vermin and dog packs. People will expect gunfire, and this part of the town, everything east of 14th Street, is off limits.’
It made for a decent enough pick-up point. According to Caitlin’s watch, Corporal Summers would be climbing under her blankets right about now.
As Milosz cranked on the handbrake, Caitlin emerged from the shadows of the ruined dwelling. She holstered her weapon and slung a small backpack over one shoulder, throwing up black puffs of dust and ash as she picked a way through the front garden out to her ride.
‘So, Colonel Murdoch, I see you are PFC Murdoch now, yes?’
‘I’m still the same girl inside, Sergeant,’ she replied as she climbed in.
‘So probably not Colonel Murdoch then.’
‘Probably not, Sergeant Milosz, formerly of GROM. I’m sure you know the drill.’
‘Like the fat Sergeant Schultz of Stalag 13, I know nothing,’ he said with a grin. His teeth gleamed white in the darkness of the cabin. ‘Mr Musso, he asks Milosz to undertake special mission for him. Milosz is happy to comply. Anything to escape tedious discussion of football which is not football back at hotel.’
The Ranger was in BDUs, as was she, although her uniform was slightly different, being that of a private first class in the Texas Defense Force - her battered winter-weight camouflage with the proper tags sewn on. Tusk Musso had seen to that personally. Her shoulder patch marked her as a combat veteran of the now defunct 1st Armoured Division. The triangular patch was similar to the one on her other shoulder, representing the 49th Armoured Division, now of the TDF. She knew enough of a potted history of both to breeze by anyone who might stop her briefly.
‘For purposes of propriety, ma’am, what should I be calling you?’ the Polish non-com asked, as they pulled away from the kerb.
The roads in this part of Temple had been cleared a few years ago, but neglected ever since. They were not impassable, but nor was Milosz able to drive at speed. He had to manoeuvre the Jeep carefully back to Adams Avenue, which was regularly cleared.
‘“Kate” will do,’ she said. ‘So, Sergeant, you ready to drive me back into the lion’s den?’
‘Of course, Miss Kate. I have chosen route that will avoid usual patrols of TDF knuckle-draggers. Is long and winding road, like song by English Beatles, but it will put you within easy walk of lion’s den. I shall wait for you for extraction.’
‘I may not get back to a rendezvous,’ she cautioned.
Milosz shrugged. ‘I fought in Iraq and New York. Nothing in life is certain, Miss Kate. Not for you, not for Milosz, not for anyone. But I shall wait. I have foraged some literature, and some mandarins, which I found in Killeen this morning. Mandarins,’ he repeated with evident satisfaction, ‘they are much more convenient than oranges.’
He handed her a brown paper bag filled with three examples of the convenient fruit and a copy of The Great Gatsby. The affable Pole kept a stash of mandarins in a separate bag for himself, she noted.
‘This book I read in New York, during the battle,’ he continued. ‘It survived with me and so now I think it charmed. Irrational, stupid, but I cannot let it go. It is listed as a great American novel, which I suppose it is, although I still do not understand this Gatsby man. Perhaps, if you take this book, it might be of luck to you too. And you might be able to explain this Gatsby to me when next we meet.’
Caitlin took the paper bag, finding herself unexpectedly touched by the soldier’s gesture. ‘Why thank you, Sergeant,’ she said. ‘I promise I’ll read this book again. It’s been a long time. Not tonight, of course, but I will read it.’
Milosz’s face lit up as they pulled on to Adams and began to speed up.
‘So you are familiar with this Gatsby character? Who is he, do you think, Miss Kate? He appears to be a little shady to me. Perhaps one thing, perhaps another.’
The Jeep began to eat up the tarmac as they headed for the Dodgen Loop. The break in the clouds sealed itself up again, plunging the ruined landscape outside the car back into darkness.
‘Well, let’s see,’ replied Caitlin. ‘As I recall, Gatsby is us, Sergeant Milosz. All of us. As you say, perhaps one thing, perhaps another. Not really to be trusted.’
Milosz nodded sagely. ‘I see. I thought he was filthy rum Johnny who made free with other men’s women. Good thing for him to be shot in pool at end of book, no? It is what makes America great to be weeding out his sort.’
‘Who’s to know, Sergeant?’ Caitlin said as they rounded the corner and sped up, heading for Fort Hood. ‘Who’s to know?’
48
DEARBORN HOUSE, SEATTLE, WASHINGTON
James Kipper was still uncomfortable hearing his own voice on the radio. He couldn’t help thinking of Kermit the frog addressing issues of national importance.
‘Oh, just get over yourself,’ Barbara told him. ‘You have a nice, deep presidential voice. You’re just not used to hearing it like everybody else.’
‘She’s right,’ said Culver, as he swirled a small measure of brandy in a crystal balloon. He was leaning an elbow on the mantelpiece over the drawing room’s fireplace. ‘You sound fine, Mr President.’
It wasn’t unusual for the Chief of Staff to still be working through the middle of the evening, but it wasn’t every night he joined the First Family in their private quarters either. He was here tonight at Kip’s insistence. Jed was one of the few people he could trust not to let due deference to the office get in the way of calling ‘Bullshit!’ when the call had to be made.
A brief fanfare of trumpets on the radio announced the start of his weekly fireside chat, which this Monday night they really were huddled around a crackling fire to hear - as were most people in Seattle and beyond, with wood- or coal-fired heaters. Now into the third week of December, you could smell the smoke in the air at night.
The trumpets still irked Kip. Every couple of weeks he tried to sell the producers on the idea of introducing his weekly pep talk with one of his favourite tracks: ‘Takin’ Care of Business’ by Bachman-Turner Overdrive. ‘But it’s appropriate,’ he’d protest when everybody said no. As always, the supreme executive power of the President of the United States of America turned out to be not so supreme after all. He’d eaten plenty of pizzas with way more supreme than he could ever call on. So trumpets it was.