“What is it? Make it quick, I’m due for some downtime,” she snapped.
“You may not want any — not with this going one.” He thrust a message form at her. “Chechnya and the Russians. It’s exploding again. And the chemical weapons thing — they’ve got proof this time. Maybe a thousand dead so far.”
Chechnya. She stared down at the message, not opening it. If she started reading it, she would have made her decision. She looked back at Xerxes. He was already in the car, door open, waiting for her.
“We can have you there in four hours,” Mike continued. “You’re the closest one — you could beat everyone else to the story.”
That went without saying, didn’t it? She was always first — always.
Still, she hesitated, utterly tempted by the possibility of life without broadcast news. Not without it, maybe, just not taking first place every time. This one would blow over, as they always did. Then there’d be another hot spot, another story. Would it hurt this once to sit it out?
She opened the message. The details were there. She looked up at Mike, her eyes gleaming, already planning on how she’d spin it. Mike started rattling off her itinerary, drawing her away from the crowd and toward a waiting ACN aircraft. He reached out and rested his hand on the spot that had so recently felt Xerxes touch.
Xerxes! She turned back to look at the staff car and saw it was already pulling away. A tidal wave of regret washed over her, replaced almost immediately by a mental list of resources she’d need, contacts, accommodations, the normal preparations for conducting a long siege in a foreign country.
“Bottled water, lots of it.” She started listing off her other requirements, including a request for her favorite cameraman, all the while staring at the car disappearing across the tarmac.
TWENTY
The Marine staff sergeant stood in front of the ragged formation, surveying the men and women lined up. Supposed to be the cream of the crop, they were, but you sure couldn’t tell it from the way they looked now. Long hair, ragged jeans, and smart-ass smirks on most of the faces. Talking, playing grab ass, checking out the chicks, all the normal things that a group of forty teenagers might do when they were strangers.
Mostly teenagers, he amended. Not all of them. Ten of them were coming from the Fleet or the Corps, maybe had some idea of what to expect. They’d have been through boot camp at least. Knew how to march. Must have done something right or they wouldn’t have earned one of the few slots at the Naval Academy reserved for fleet sailors and marines.
He’d check their records out first, try them out in some leadership positions and see how they shaped up. Not every enlisted man was cut out to be an officer — but then, not every college grad or senate nominee was, either. At least the priors knew what an officer did.
And there he was, the one he’d been looking for. Hanging back on the last rank, quietly at attention, watching everything without seeming to look at it directly. The staff sergeant let his eyes linger on the young sailor, wondering how much of what he’d heard was true. No matter — he’d find out soon enough for himself. But there was one thing this particular plebe was going to learn right off, and that was that Staff Sergeant Carter was his god for the next two weeks.
Smith felt the staff sergeant looking at him, but kept his eyes caged, staring straight ahead as though they were encased in iron bars. It was a lesson from boot camp that had come back immediately in the first moments that the Marine had barked at them.
He still couldn’t believe he was here. Not after… not after Greece. Just to have survived without being court-martialed, not losing a stripe, no punishment at all unless you counted the flack he’d had to take from some of the guys on the boat. Especially after they found out about Annapolis.
Admiral Magruder’s words came back to him. It was just before they shipped him off, maybe two weeks after everything had been resolved.
“You ask questions. That’s good. You’re not afraid to make a tough call. Also good. I’m going to make sure you know how to ask the right ones from now on — and how to live with the answers,” the admiral had said.
Annapolis.
“You got something on your mind, slimeball?” a voice shouted in his right ear. Smith barely repressed a flinch.
“No, Staff Sergeant Carter.”
“Then wipe that shit-eating grin off your face. Now, asshole.”
Smith’s inadequate attempt earned him five laps around the field. He loved every single one of them.
Glossary
0–3 leveclass="underline" The third deck above the main deck. Designations for decks above the main deck (also known as the damage control deck) begin with zero, e.g. 0–3. The zero is pronounced as “oh” in conversation. Decks below the main deck do not have the initial zero, and are numbered down from the main deck, e.g. deck 11 is below deck 3. Deck 0–7 is above deck 0–3.
1MC: The general announcing system on a ship or submarine. Every ship has many different interior communications systems, most of them linking parts of the ship for a specific purpose. Most operate off sound-powered phones. The circuit designators consist of a number followed by two letters that indicate the specific purpose of the circuit. 2AS, for instance, might be an antisubmarine warfare circuit that connects the sonar supervisor, the USW watch officer, and the sailor at the torpedo launched.
C-2 Greyhound: Also known as the COD, Carrier On-board Delivery. The COD carries cargo and passengers from shore to ship. It is capable of carrier landings. Sometimes assigned directly to the air wing, it also operates in coordination with CVBGs from a shore squadron.
Air Boss: A senior commander or captain assigned to the aircraft carrier, in charge of flight operations. The “Boss” is assisted by the Mini-Boss in Pri-Fly, located in the tower onboard the carrier. The Air Boss is always in the tower during flight operations, overseeing the launch and recovery cycles, declaring a green deck, and monitoring the safe approach of aircraft to the carrier.
Air Wing: Composed of the aircraft squadrons assigned to the battle group. The individual squadron commanding officers report to the Air Wing Commander, who reports to the admiral.
airdale: Slang for an officer or enlisted person in the aviation fields. Includes pilots, NFOs, aviation intelligence officers and maintenance officers and the enlisted technicians who support aviation. The antithesis of an airdale is a “shoe.”
Akula: Late model Russian-built attack nuclear submarine, an SSN. Fast, deadly, and deep diving.
ALR-67: Detects, analyzes and evaluates electromagnetic signals, emits a warning signal if the parameters are compatible with an immediate threat to the aircraft, e.g. seeker head on an anti-air missile. Can also detect an enemy radar in either a search or a targeting mode.
altitude: Is safety. With enough airspace under the wings, a pilot can solve any problem.
AMRAAM: Advanced Medium Range Antiair Missile.
angels: Thousands of feet over ground. Angels twenty is 20,000 feet. Cherubs indicates hundreds of feet, e.g. cherubs five = five hundred feet.
ASW: Antisubmarine Warfare, recently renamed Undersea Warfare. For some reason.
avionics: Black boxes and systems that comprise an aircraft’s combat systems.