Patrick was about to shake his hand when a very distinctive phone rang in the outer office. “Batphone,” someone called out, but it was picked up before the second ring. At the same instant, Hayes’s pager went off — he acknowledged it, but didn’t need to read the message. Moments later, an aide came to the door: “Meeting in the Gold Room in fifteen minutes, sir.” The Gold Room was the Joint Chiefs of Staff conference room. This was an unscheduled meeting — Patrick knew something was happening.
Hayes knew it, too. “Thank you.” He turned to General Falke: “Wombat, I need an intel dump right now.”
Falke had already been on the phone as soon as he heard the “Batphone,” the direct line between the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff’s office and the chief of staff of the Air Force. “It’s on its way, sir,” he said. “I’ll have an aide drop it off for you ASAP.” A few moments later, an aide stepped into Hayes’s office with a folder marked “Top Secret”—the “intel dump,” the latest intelligence summaries for the entire world updated minute-by-minute, and the “force dump,” the latest force status reports from the eight Air Force major commands. A moment later, another aide came rushing in with the latest force status reports for the Single Integrated Operations Plan (SIOP) and non-SIOP nuclear forces. Although, technically, the American nuclear forces were under the combat command of the U.S. Strategic Command, a unified military command, in day-today operations the nuclear-capable bombers, land-launched intercontinental ballistic missiles, and their warheads were under Air Force control until gained by Strategic Command.
Hayes was putting on his Class A blouse and getting ready to hurry off to the “Tank,” what most everyone in the Pentagon called the Gold Room. He nodded to Patrick as he hurried to the door. “I’ll be seeing you, McLanahan. Good luck.” An aide rushed into the Chief’s office to hand him another folder, and then he hurried off, followed by his deputy and his chief of operations.
“I have a message for you, sir,” the aide said to Patrick. “Your civilian attorney is waiting for you at the Mall Entrance right now.”
“My civilian attorney?” Patrick asked. “I don’t have a civilian attorney.” The aide shrugged his shoulders and departed, leaving him alone in the big office.
It was a long, lonely walk to the Mall Entrance, and an even longer walk outdoors into the hazy sunshine. Patrick felt as if he should take off his hat, remove his jacket with his stars and ribbons on it. He felt strange, having junior officers salute him, like he was some sort of spy in a military costume trying to infiltrate the place. He had been kicked out of the Air Force almost the entire time he’d been in that building, and he hadn’t even known it. The Pentagon now seemed alien to him. A few hours earlier, he’d walked into this place apprehensively, but feeling very much a part of what this place was all about. Now all that had been taken away from him.
Patrick didn’t see anyone at the entrance who looked like he was looking for him. But he didn’t need to talk with an attorney anyway: there was going to be no court-martial, no appearance in court, no opportunity to fight the charges brought against him. He was out, just like that.
There was a big stretch limousine parked fight in front of the Mall Entrance in a “No Parking” zone, with a Secret Service-looking agent, a female, in a long dark coat and sunglasses standing beside it, and he thought that had to be for the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff or the Secretary of Defense so they could be whisked off to the White House.
This was indeed a very exciting place to be, Patrick thought. He certainly had had a very exciting, very unusual career. He thought back about all the missions and all the situations he had found himself involved in over the past twelve years: thought about how many times he had made that “Batphone” ring, how many times the chief of staff of the Air Force had stood before the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs or the Secretary of Defense or even the President and had been unable to explain what was going on because Brad Elliott hadn’t informed him or anyone else what he was going to do before he did it. How many frantic limo fides had he been responsible for? How many sleepless nights, tirades, memos, confused phone calls, and lost careers had he and HAWC caused because of their own brand of warfighting?
No matter — it was all over now.
But as Patrick approached the limousine on his way to the taxi stand that would take him to his hotel, the Secret Service-looking agent approached him. “Excuse me. General McLanahan?”
“Yes?”
She removed her dark glasses and smiled at him. “I’m not wearing a disguise this time, Patrick.”
He stared at her harder, his mind finally returning to the here and now. “Marcia? Marcia Preston?” He shook her hand warmly, then gave her a hug. “You have this thing for always popping up unexpectedly, Marcia.” Marcia Preston had been one of the first U.S. Marine Corps combat fighter pilots, but she’d seen only limited duty in that capacity. Her knowledge and expertise in military affairs, foreign military capabilities, tactics, and both land and aerial combat had led her to be chosen as an advisor and aide to two successive National Security Advisors to the President. Patrick glanced into the limo’s windows, but of course could not see anything. “Who are you working for now, Colonel? Last I knew, you were working for General Freeman in the National Security Advisor’s office.”
“It’s not Colonel anymore, Patrick,” Marcia said. “And my new boss wants to speak with you. He’s waiting for you.”
“He’s waiting for me? In there?”
“Hey, General!” Patrick turned toward the familiar voice and was surprised to see none other than Hal Briggs emerging from the limousine.
“Hal? What are you doing here?”
Hal Briggs waved him over to the car so they could talk discreetly. “I got a deal I couldn’t refuse, sir.”
“I’m not a ‘sir’ anymore, Hal. Just Patrick.”
“That’s okay, because I’m just ‘Hal’ now, too,” he said with a smile. “Early retirement, same as you.
“How did you know that?” Patrick asked. “And why in hell did you accept early retirement? You haven’t done anything wrong — in fact, after that rescue in Russia, you’re a genuine hero. I’m the one who screwed the pooch. You didn’t punch out because of me, did you?”
“With all due respect, old buddy,” Hal said, with a broad smile, “I don’t do shit for no one unless they give me some serious money or some serious humma-humma, if you catch my drift. But if I was going to trash my career for anyone, it would be for you. How’s that?”
“Sounds like bullshit to me. What is going on, Hal? How did you know where I was? How did you know what happened to me? I just found out ten minutes ago.”
“My new employer knows everything, Patrick,” Hal said. “He wants to talk with you, too.”
Patrick’s warning antennae were tingling like crazy. Having trusted friends like Marcia and Hal together helped, but this strong feeling of caution couldn’t be ignored. “You know this guy, Hal?” he asked. “Did you check him out first?”
“No.”
“No? You stepped into a car with a guy you don’t know and you didn’t check him out first?”
“I said I didn’t check him out, and I’ve never met him — I know of him. But you definitely know him.”
Patrick looked at Hal suspiciously, but with a gleam of interest in his eyes now. Hal noticed it, stepped aside, and let him peek inside. He saw Chris Wohl inside, also in civilian clothes, looking moody and inconvenienced as always, and he wondered if the Marine Corps veteran had retired also. Then he looked in the very front of the passenger compartment — and his chin dropped open in sheer surprise.