Nolan looked up from the table with a hopeful expression. “Is there something you can do for me, to avoid going back?” he inquired.
“Maybe,” Kara said.
“So, what kind of projects do you do?” Nolan asked.
“Nope. It’s our turn to ask a question,” Hail said. “When you said that your brother was killed in The Five. Which plane was he on?”
“Virgin Atlantic flight 1082. It was shot down leaving Orlando International.”
There was a long silence.
Hail told Nolan, “It’s your turn to ask a question.”
He took a moment and then asked, “What type of projects do you do?”
Hail answered, “After my family was killed in The Five, I just couldn’t go on with life as usual, business as usual. So, I decided to have my ships modified with both defensive and offensive weaponry. I did this in preparation for killing every person on the FBI’s Top Ten Most Wanted Terrorist list. The CIA also has a list, but it’s classified.”
Nolan laughed, “And how in the world do you expect to do that? Most of those targets are so hot and dug in so deep, it would take a volcano to bring them into the light.”
Hail nodded toward Kara and said, “That’s why we have Ms. Ramey on board. She provides us with CIA intelligence, so we can track down the terrorists and kill them.”
The pilot chuckled again and shook his head. “Do you have any experience killing people, let alone taking out hardened targets?”
“We just killed Kim Yong Chang,” Hail said with pride. “The public doesn’t know this, but he was a North Korean who was trying to buy and build ICBMs. We also blew up his warehouse, the place where all the ICBM parts and pieces were located.”
Kara picked up where Hail left off, and she said, “That was what your mission was all about. Blowing up the warehouse just in case Hail’s crew failed.”
“That was you?” he asked, truly stunned.
“Yep, and then you came along and screwed it up,” Hail added with an accusatory edge to his voice.
The lieutenant commander cringed at the accusation and sat back in his chair. He looked like he’d been hit by a blast of arctic wind.
“So why did you bomb the hotel?” Hail asked, now sounding more fatherly than antagonistic.
Nolan remained pushed far back in his chair — as far from the table as he could get without physically getting out of his chair. At first, he said nothing. But Hail let the question hang out there. They were waiting for an answer. For some reason, Foster felt that this answer was pivotal to his future. He could give them some BS story, and Hail might keep him on board, but he sensed that they already knew the answer. They were simply waiting for him to confirm or deny it the truth.
“I think it has something to do with my brother,” he began, explaining quietly, as if the weight of the truth was crushing his words before they could leave his mouth.
“Like I said, he was killed in The Five. We were very close. Hell, man, we were twins. I don’t know many twins who aren’t close. But after my brother was killed, I was really bummed out. I didn’t give a damn about anything. I stopped doing a lot of stuff that normal people do, like bathing and eating and taking care of myself. And deep down, I knew that I needed to resolve the unresolvable, and the only way I could think of doing that was by getting some payback. You know like bombing the hell out of the people who were responsible. It’s my only gift. Bombing and shooting people is my only talent.”
Nolan paused for a moment and looked down at the table. He continued, now softer than before.
“How sad is that?” Another pause. Tears formed in his eyes.
Continuing in a shaky voice, Nolan said, “But that payback thing never happened. The United States never really responded to the attack of The Five. The intelligence side of the government went into overdrive trying to figure out the who and the why, but like killing Osama bin Laden, it was taking too long. At least
too long for me. So, I guess when the mission to go into North Korea was given to me, it seemed like it was destiny. It was my time to do something to avenge the death of my brother.”
Nolan paused and took a sip of water.
“When my commander came over my radio and told me to return to my ship, the words just didn’t register. I mean, you must understand, it was my destiny to go in and bomb the hell out of North Korea. And then, right when I’m five miles off the coast, I get called back.” Nolan’s tone oscillated to anger.
“I was pissed. I switched off the radio and decided to have a look around, maybe find some prime targets. The two things I didn’t count on was taking out a hotel and being shot down by a Chengdu J-20. Hell, the North Koreans weren’t supposed to have any advanced aircraft like that at their disposal.”
The lieutenant commander pulled back on his justification as if he were slowing wild horses. He realized that his little speech may have been interpreted as a rant, but it was true. Up to this point, he had never shared those facts with himself, let alone perfect strangers.
There was another long foreboding silence that fell across the table as if someone had died.
“What do you want to do?” Hail asked the pilot.
“What are my options?” Nolan sounded beaten down, as if the pressure he was under had just crushed him.
Kara Ramey responded. “I think we can either get you assigned to our little black ops project we have here, or we can get you discharged from the Navy. Whether that would be an honorable discharge or not would have to be determined.”
“What about now, like today and tomorrow and next week?” the pilot asked.
Hail responded evenly, “Until we get things sorted out, you can stay on board. We will set you up with a stateroom. I’d like you to teach some of our pilots some of what you know about flying a jet. Mostly attack and tactical instruction.”
“Your pilots? Are those the youngsters that came to pick me up in the ocean?”
“Those are two of them.” Hail said.
“Why kids? I don’t get it.”
“Many of them are like you, like me and like Kara. They lost someone in The Five. Many of my pilots lost their parents in The Five, and I’ve become their legal guardian. Some of my other pilots won online flying contests that my programmers created and hosted. The prize the winners received were high school and college
educations, which they attend aboard my ships. Some of my young adults are from bad neighborhoods and needed to escape so they had a chance to reach their full potential. These kids, as you like to refer to them, can do amazing things with drones. They can fly them sideways, if required. It would be interesting to put them in a simulator next to you, flying an F-35, and see who comes out on top.”
The lieutenant commander thought about it for a moment.
“Well, it certainly sounds better than spending time in the brig at Miramar. OK, you have yourself a speed test dummy. Is there anything else I can do for you?”
The waitress arrived with the food.
“Sure, eat up and we’ll get you situated,” Hail told his new pilot.
Nolan reached over to take a sip of wine.
“Are we still doing the you ask a question then I ask a question? Because I still have a lot of questions.”
Hail shrugged and poked his fork into his food. “I think we can just have a normal conversation. But you don’t want to be asking the CIA anything. They don’t like to talk about their work, as I have found out.”
Hail gave Kara a playful smile and then stuffed a wad of lasagna into his mouth.
“What do you want to ask?” Kara asked with a polite smile.
“I know a little about Hail Industries. Aren’t you a startup nuclear company of some type?”