“I’m right there with ya.”
Ten hours later, they were standing by the lake behind their Great Falls, Virginia house. The morning sun was burning off the mist.
“Ours is pretty too,” Janice said, again leaning against Bill with his arms around her as they both appreciated the panorama of God’s creation in a new light.
“Yes, you are.”
She turned in his arms, “Bill, that line’s getting a little o…”
He kissed her. She threw her arms up over his shoulders and pulled him in tighter.
They continued to kiss like that until little Richie started running around them with his toy helicopter and saying, “Boom. Boom. Boom.”
XXXIII. THE HOMECOMING
A month and five days after the collider was disabled and the universe was safe, Brooke stood on the wharf looking out over the warm, tranquil waters of Pearl Harbor. For forty minutes, she had watched the USS Nebraska, from when it was a dot on the horizon until she steamed past the Arizona Memorial with all hands manning the rails in tribute and salute to the fallen men and ships of December 1941. The SSBN 739, the USS Nebraska, Mush’s boat, was built to deter any future nation from even contemplating a similar attack.
From the bridge of the boomer, Mush let his exec dock the boat. His total concentration was on the blonde standing on the pier with her arm in a sling. At that second he patted the cold, titanium edge of the conning tower as he whispered “goodbye, old girl” to his first wife.
Acknowledgments
I am blessed to have a mastermind group of individuals who guide me through the specifics of lives that I have not lived. They freely lend their experience, knowledge, and achievements to me so that I may tell you a better story. In no particular order (because they would all be first on the list) they are:
Colonel Michael T. Miklos, US Army Retired, who provides a dash of warrior spirit in my story recipe that makes all things military in my work very tasty and, more importantly, correct.
Len Watson, my science soulmate, who places no limits on his contributions and encouragement of me when I am deep in the insecurity of building a story.
Anthony Lombardo, Retired First Grade Detective NYPD, who keeps all those “gotcha” e-mails from gun enthusiasts at a minimum as he makes my weapon choices and police procedure… bulletproof.
My cousin, author George Cannistraro, whose brilliant analysis always points me to golden nuggets of plot and character that I didn’t see.
Editor Sue Rasmussen, who was with me brick by brick as I built the book. Sue’s ability to decode what I thought was English into words and sentences that now read exactly like I meant them to was a luxury that I had the good fortune to enjoy.
Monta, who shares my life and shares me with the writing process. Without a complaint, she allows me to work at times when we should be at play.
To MHC who, with a few choice words, reached across the great divide that separated my aspiration from her tremendous fame and achievement. She steeled my confidence by giving me a glimpse of what was possible.
And my publisher, Lou Aronica of The Story Plant, who is a Zen master at compelling me to be a better novelist. He has potent “mojo,” which puts me under the illusion that no challenge is too big, no rewrite insurmountable.
And finally to you, the reader. I have been thinking about you since I wrote the first sentence. And unless you jumped right to the acknowledgments before reading the book, I assume you stayed with me to the last line. Thank you, for without you I am writing to myself.
A Word about Mush and Subs
Which is also to say a word about courage, honor and sacrifice. I met Dudley “Mush” Morton posthumously through the excellent work of William Tuohy. His book, The Bravest Man, affected me like a rocket’s red glare over Ft.McHenry. Everything I thought knew of war and human commitment to a cause was crystallized between the pages of that book. My invention of a third generation Morton to embody the best traditions of the service is my feeble attempt to encapsulate the tremendous respect, reverence and awe that arises in me whenever I read or hear of bravery in the face of adversity. My efforts in this book are a mere penny toward the trillions in the debt-of-honor we owe those who fought, fight, and will fight again to preserve our way of life.
In the writing of this story, I used many reference books, two in particular: Stealth Boat: Fighting the Cold War in a Fast-Attack Submarine by Gannon Mchale and Silent Steeclass="underline" The Mysterious Death of the Nuclear Attack Sub USS Scorpion by Steven Johnson. I developed the deep-water intelligence plot in this book from tendrils of the accounts in those and other books. However, it wasn’t until after The God Particle was in editorial that, amazingly, a veteran submariner who served on the USS Growler said, “Oh, like Blind Man’s Bluff!” Ten seconds later, I was feeling foolish. Coming at subs from the land, I only knew what I read. Obviously, I never heard of or read Blind Man’s Bluff: The Untold Story of American Submarine Espionage by Sherry Sontag, which is, as I found out, a very popular and well known nonfiction book. If you loved the sequence under the sea to retrieve the crucibles, you will love Blind Man’s Bluff. But read my next book, The Devil’s Quota, first.
About the Author
TOM AVITABILE, a Senior VP/Creative Director at a New York advertising firm, is a writer, director, and producer with numerous film and television credits. He has an extensive background in engineering and computers, including work on projects for the House Committee on Science and Technology, which helped lay the foundation for The Eighth Day, his first novel. In his spare time, Tom is a professional musician and an amateur woodworker. He recently completed his fourth novel, The Devil’s Quota.
