“General,” Stonewall interrupted, “they’ll never give Dani a copy of the schematics for the B-61.”
“No, I don’t expect they will. However, your Air Force stores several of them at Aviano in Italy, as well as a few other bases throughout Europe — and these things require constant maintenance. Arielle, I’m sending you up to Aviano to get some hands on experience right away. This is actually what I’ve proposed to Jim.”
“Not a problem, sir,” Arielle replied.
“I didn’t think it would be. When the time comes, you’ll be with Stonewall and whoever they assign to the recovery operation.”
“When do I leave?”
“Go ahead and get ready to go. I haven’t heard anything from Jim or anyone else so I’ll hit up General Logan as soon as I can. In the meantime, go ahead and get ready and then head over to Tel Nof. I’ll have a plane waiting for you. If Logan nixes this, I can always recall you but I want you up there this morning. The sooner you can familiarize yourself with those weapons, the better we’ll be. I don’t know how much time we’ll have before we launch this so you’ll need to get up there right away. Stonewall, you’ll be accompanying here. I would imagine they’ll want Arielle to have an escort — I sure would. It’s close to a three hour flight so you should be able to make it there before noon.”
“Understood, Tamir,” Dani replied. “We’ll see you when we get back.”
“Good morning, Madam Secretary, Mr. Secretary,” Shishani said to Johnson and Axelsson. “I am General Mohammed Shishani, Imam Baghdadi’s chief of operations. I trust the ride over from Batman wasn’t too uncomfortable for you. When we realized we might have the opportunity for you to join us, we didn’t know what we might have for available transportation for you. I trust everything worked out.”
“Mr. Baghdadi…” Secretary Johnson began before getting cut off.
“Madam Secretary, you will address Imam Baghdadi as ‘Imam’ or ‘Your Excellency,’” Major Cantor interrupted.
“Imam… Baghdadi,” Secretary Johnson began, clearly irked not only by Cantor’s interruption but also noticing the video cameras. “I must vehemently protest the way we’ve been treated. Our plane was shot down over Turkey and nine of our staff have been killed, several others have been injured. Then, we’ve spent about the last seven hours on a couple buses while your lackeys drove us here. We haven’t slept or eaten anything since your pilots shot us down!”
“Madam Secretary,” Shishani began, “your plane was not shot down last night. If your plane had been shot down, none of you would have survived. As it is, when we realized you might be passing by, we sent out a flight to request that you land at Batman Air Base. The fact that you did not comply with our request leaves only yourselves to blame for the death of your countrymen.”
“That’s absurd,” Axelsson protested. “We were never ‘requested’ to land at Batman and you know it. One of your pilots ordered us to land. After we started our descent, he then shot up our plane.”
“General Shishani,” Colonel Marshall followed up, “I’m the remaining pilot. Our other pilot was killed when your fighters fired at us with their cannon. As the Secretary stated — after we began the descent into Batman. We were on our way in to Batman when your pilot shot our plane full of holes. He only has himself to blame for getting himself and his cohorts shot out of the sky,” she added, still clearly vexed though showing a mild sense of satisfaction at the destruction of the four Turkish F-16s.
“Yes, it is an unfortunate situation all around,” Shishani continued.
“Unfortunate!?!” Axelsson practically hollered out, almost demanding an answer.
“Unfortunate?” Secretary Johnson added almost simultaneously. “I demand that you free us immediately and arrange transportation back to the United States.”
“Secretary Johnson, you will not be going anywhere,” Baghdadi broke in, somewhat to the surprise of the Americans. “You have continually berated, chastised, condemned and humiliated me on the international scene — guards!” Baghdadi ordered. And with that, four of the guards each withdrew a razor sharp Jambiya dagger and charged towards Colonel Marshall and Secretary Johnson.
“What!?!” Secretary Johnson cried out in horror as two guards grabbed her. However, her horror suddenly changed to shock with the realization that the guards were not going to kill her but humiliate her as they proceeded to none-too-gently completely cut the clothes off of both Johnson and Marshall. Thirty seconds later, both of them were completely naked.
“Madam Secretary, it is now your turn to be humiliated. You see, I caught one of my grandsons watching one of your decadent movies — I forget the name of it, Star something or other — and this princess served as a sort of trophy. You are now my trophies for all the world to see. The video of this will be released to multiple media outlets in just a few minutes. We’ll see who is humiliated before the world now. Bring them to me,” Baghdadi said, addressing the guards. “Each one of you will be on display at my side from now on.”
“You just wait,” Colonel Marshall exclaimed as two guards brought her beside Baghdadi. “There’ll be a team of SEALs coming to get us. If I’m right, they’re probably already on their way.”