"To the families who have already lost someone in this madness, you have my most deepest and heartfelt sympathies, and I will personally visit each and every one of you when I return. I have a wife and daughter that I love dearly and understand how I would feel in your situation. I am truly sorry. For those of you who have loved ones there, don't give up hope! I will stop this! God bless you and God bless the Unites States of America."
"But why do you have to go, Daddy?" Deanna cried. Tears rolled down her pink cheeks. Alexander brushed them away with his thumbs and pulled her closer to him.
"People are dying, baby. Every minute I waste, more innocent people die. I have to go and stop that." Moore hugged his daughter to him, kissing her head. Tears welled in his eyes, but he tried not to shake since his little princess didn't need to see fear or sadness from him at this point. He had only a moment to spend with his family while the SOCOM people readied an aircraft and his gear. That moment would cost another life, but there was nothing he could do about it.
There was very little chance that Alexander would be able to walk away from Ahmi this time. He was one man, and there were thousands of AI bots there and one big-assed bomb. But the one thing that would push him through it was in his arms at that moment. Sehera slipped in behind her daughter and stroked her hair. His daughter already stood nearly to Alexander's chin. He leaned his head forward and propped his cheek against top of her head, stifling a sniffle against her.
"Daddy will be back," she said, looking at her husband of thirty years and stroking her daughter's long, straight black hair. Sehera was understandably shaken, and Alexander could see it in her eyes. Not since the Desert Campaigns had the two of them seen such a no-win situation. But they had come out of that hellhole alive, and they had to have hope now.
"You come back, Daddy! You hear me! You come back," Deanna pushed back and pounded him in the chest with her fist and then laid her head back down against it, drying her tears against his shirt.
"You know, you get more and more like your mother every day. I'll see you soon. I love you, princess." He kissed her one last time and then hugged her and Sehera to him in a three-way hug.
"I love you, Daddy."
"I love you, too, Alexander," Sehera whispered in his ear and nuzzled at his cheek.
Alexander stood straight and winked at his daughter and patted her head one last time. He turned, choked his tears down, and stepped through the doorway of the office that Deanna had been using as her room. Once out the door and out of the sight of his family, Alexander propped against the hallway wall, allowing himself to collapse in a torrent of emotions for a brief second. He struggled against tears that now flowed from his eyes. He sniffled and wiped his eyes and then stood straight, turning his emotion to pure rage. Pure. Rage.
Thomas, Clay, and Michael had been standing watch outside the doorway, and the three marines made every attempt to act as if they hadn't seen or heard what had just transpired. They all stood stiff and soundless, but Moore was certain the three soldiers turned Secret Service had seen him in his moment of weakness.
"Thomas, you take care of them."
"You have my word on that, Mr. President," the marine assured him.
"Sir, we need to get you to the Starhawk. We have everything ready for you there."
"Calvin Dean?"
"He is in route to intercept up just outside the park on I-4," Kootie replied.
"I wish I could talk you out of this, sir, but I gave up on talking you out of things nearly four years ago." Thomas looked solemnly at him.
"I have to stop this, Thomas."
"We understand, Mr. President," Clay replied with a nod. Alexander wasn't sure if the big marine NCO looked as if he could cry or bite super-hardened, metal-plated composite nails in two. "Sir, I have a family, you know. And I've always felt that it was the love I have for them that was the reason I kept doing what I do. You know what I mean, sir?" Moore only nodded at the marine, and then he took a deep, calming breath, swelling out his chest.
"All right, let's get on with this. I've got a bunch of crazy fucking Seppy robots to slay!"
"Oorah, sir. Oorah."
"Intel shows only the one gluonium source, sir," General Brown pointed out in the holoprojection of the Disney World complex to Moore.
"Are we sure?"
"Yes, sir. Gluonium is pretty damned hard to hide. We just weren't looking for it at Disney World. We'll have to start looking for it everywhere from now on."
"Yes, you will. Okay. One bomb. That is good."
The Starhawk zoomed at six hundred kilometers per hour across the Tampa treetops. Thomas sat at the gunner's seat on the left side of the lifter, while Clay sat on the right side. The two marines scanned for potential threats beneath them that they could pepper with the forty-millimeter cannons. Two FM-12s flanked each side of the lifter in fighter mode. The formation of the Starhawk and the four mecha fighters tore across the Florida morning toward the Disney complex.
Moore dropped his underwear to the deck of the troop carrier, feeling the warm, humid air wash over his body, giving him a slight run of chills up his spine. A marine colonel helped him step into the organogel undergarment for the armored environment suit. The cool pseudo liquid immediately adjusted to his body temperature and lubricated itself so that the garment slipped on like a second layer of skin, forcing the chills to dissipate rapidly. The gel filled in all the space between his body and the outer layer of the bodysuit and was filled with anesthetic and other chemicals that would keep him from itching, burning, chafing, or any other uncomfortable thing that might require a physical adjustment that couldn't be made once inside the suit. The garment was comfortable. In fact, it had been suggested that it was the most comfortable "second skin" garment ever invented by mankind. Moore didn't really give a shit. It was part of the suit. He needed the suit to do what had to be done. Doing what had to be done was the only thing going through his mind at the moment.
"Been a long time," he said to himself. Alexander eyed the little needle-nosed vial in his palm. Then he jammed the injector into his neck and then pulled the zipcord up his back. He placed the sticky- tab tight over his right shoulder and worked his neck from side to side, forcing the air bubbles out from the turtleneck with a schlurrp. Then the colonel helped him into the back of the e-suit jumpboots. Alexander could feel the warm sensation of the stims, painkillers, and immunobooster coursing through his veins. With each heartbeat, he felt a surge of invulnerability flood his body.
"Obviously, not your first time in an e-suit, sir," the colonel said with a grin.
"I once spent thirty-seven and a half days in one, Colonel. Worst fucking time of my life," Moore replied. The colonel looked approvingly at him. The young lieutenant on the other side of the suit looked at Moore skeptically. "I highly recommend it if you ever get the chance."
"I thought the record in one of these things was only nine days, sir?" the lieutenant said knowingly, almost calling out the president for lying.