Tom Clancy - Executive Orders

"How old are those guns again?" the Director asked.

"Eleven years. Long before the ban was passed," Criminal answered for FCI. "They may have been totally unused until today, virgins, Dan."

"Somebody's set up a network that we didn't know about. Somebody real patient. Whoever the purchaser turns out to be, I think we'll find that it's a nicely faked

ID, and he's already flown the coop. It's a classic intelligence job, Dan," FCI went on, saying what everybody was thinking. "We're talking pros here."

"That's a little speculative," the Director objected.

"When's the last time I was wrong, Danny?" the assistant director asked.

"Not lately. Keep going."

"Maybe the Lab guys can develop some good forensic stuff" — he nodded to the assistant director for the Laboratory Division—"but even then, what we're going to end up with won't be good enough to take into a court, unless we get real lucky and bag either the purchaser, or the other people who had to be involved in this mission."

"Flight records and passports," Criminal said. "Two weeks back for starters. Look for repeaters. Somebody re-conned the objective. Must have been since Ryan became President. That's a start." Sure, he didn't go on, only about ten million records to check. But that was what cops did.

"Christ, I hope you're wrong on the sleeper," Murray said, after a further moment's reflection.

"So do I, Dan," FCI replied. "But I'm not. We'll need time to ID his house, assembly point, whatever, interview his neighbors, check the real-estate records to come up with a cover name and try to proceed from there. He's probably already gone, but that's not the scary part, is it? Eleven years at least he's been here. He was bankrolled. He was trained. He kept the faith all the way to today to help with that mission. All that time, and he still believed enough to help kill kids."

"He won't be the only one," Murray concluded bleakly.

"I don't think so."

"WILL YOU COME with me, please?"

"I've seen you before, but—"

"Jeff Raman, sir."

The admiral took his hand. "Robby Jackson." The agent smiled.

"I know that, sir." It was a pleasant walk, though it would have been more so without the obvious presence of armed men. The mountain air was cool and clear, lots of stars blinking overhead.

"How's he doing?" Robby asked the agent.

"Tough day. A lot of good people dead."

"And some bad ones, too." Jackson would always be a fighter pilot, for whom inflicted death was part of the job description. They turned into the Presidential Quarters. Both Robby and Sissy were struck by the scene. Not parents themselves—Cecilia's medical problem had not allowed it, despite the best of efforts—they didn't fully understand how it was with kids. The most horrific events, if followed by a parent's hug and other signs of security, were usually set aside. The world, especially for Katie, had resumed its proper shape. But there would be nightmares, too, and those would last for weeks, maybe longer, until the memories faded. Embraces were exchanged, and then also as usual, man paired with man and woman with woman. Robby got himself a glass of wine and followed Jack outside.

"How you doing, Jack?" By unspoken agreement, here and now Ryan wasn't the President.

"The shock comes and goes," he admitted. "It's all come back from before. The bastards can't just come after me—oh, no, they have to go for the soft targets. Those cowardly fucks!" Jack cursed as it came back again.

Jackson sipped at his glass. There wasn't a whole hell of a lot to be said right now, but that would change.

"It's my first time here," Robby said, just to say something.

"My first time—would you believe we buried a guy up here?" Jack remarked, remembering. "He was a Russian colonel, an agent we had in their Defense Ministry. Hell of a soldier, hero of the Soviet Union, three or four times, I think, we buried him in his uniform with all the decorations. I read off the citations myself. That's when we got Gerasimov out."

"The KGB head. So, that's true, eh?"

"Yep." Ryan nodded. "And you know about Colombia, and you know about the submarine. How the hell did those newsies find out, though?"

Robby almost laughed aloud, but settled for a chuckle. "Holy God, and I thought my career was eventful."

"You volunteered for yours," Jack observed crossly.

"So did you, my friend."

"Think so?" Ryan went back inside for a refill. He returned with the night-vision goggles and switched them on, scanning the surroundings. "I didn't volunteer for having my family guarded by a company of Marines. There's three of them down there, flak jackets, helmets, and rifles—and why? Because there's people in the world who want to kill us. Why? Because—"

"I'll tell you why. Because you're better than they are, Jack. You stand for things, and they're good things. Because you've got balls, and you don't run away from shit. I don't want to hear this, Jack," Robby told his friend. "Don't give me this 'oh, my God' stuff, okay? I know who you are. I'm a fighter pilot because I chose to be one. You're where you are because you chose, too. Nobody ever said it was supposed to be easy, okay?"

"But—"

"But, my ass, Mr. President. There's people out there who don't like you? Okay, fine. You just figure out how to find them, and then you can ask those Marines out there to go take care of business. You know what they'll say. You may be hated by some, but you're respected and loved by a lot more, and I'm telling you now, there's not one person in our country's uniform who isn't willing to dust anybody who fucks with you and your family. It's not just what you are, it's who you are, okay?"

Who am I? SWORDSMAN asked himself. At that moment, one of his weaknesses asserted itself. "Come on." Ryan walked over to the west. He'd just seen a sudden flare of light, and thirty seconds later, at the corner of another cabin, he found a Navy cook smoking a cigarette. President or not, he wasn't going to be overly proud tonight. "Hello."

"Jesus!" the sailor blurted, snapping to attention and dropping his smoke into the grass. "I mean, hello, Mr. President."

"Wrong the first time, right the second time. Got a smoke?" POTUS asked, entirely without shame, Robby Jackson noted.

"You bet, sir." The cook fished one out and lit it.

"Sailor, if the First Lady sees you do that again, she'll have the Marines shoot you," Jackson warned.

"Admiral Jackson!" Those words made the kid brace again.

"I think the Marines work for me. How's dinner coming?"

"Sir, the pizza is being cut right now. Baked it myself, sir. They oughta like it," he promised.

"Settle down. Thanks for the cigarette."

"Anytime, sir." Ryan shook his hand and wandered off with his friend.

"I needed that," Jack admitted, somewhat shamefully, taking a long drag.

"If I had a place like this, I'd use it a lot. Almost like being at sea," Jackson went on. "Sometimes you go outside, stand on one of the galleries off the flight deck, and just sort of enjoy the sea and the stars. The simple pleasures."

"It's hard to turn it off, isn't it? Even when you went communing with the sea and the stars, you didn't turn it off, not really."

"No," the admiral admitted. "It makes thinking a little easier, makes the atmosphere a little less intense, but you're right. It doesn't really go away." And it didn't now, either. "Tony said India's navy's gone missing on us."

"Both carriers at sea, with escorts and oilers. We're looking for them."

"What if there's a connection?" Ryan asked. "With what?"

"The Chinese make trouble in one place, the Indian navy goes to sea again, and this happens to me—am I being paranoid?" SWORDSMAN asked.

"Probably. Could be the Indians put out when they finished their repairs, and maybe to show us that we didn't teach them all that big a lesson. The China thing, well, it's happened before, and it's not going anywhere, especially after Mike Dubro gets there. I know Mike. He'll have fighters up and poking around. The attempt on Katie? Too early to say, and it's not my field. You have Murray and the rest for that. In any case, they failed, didn't they? Your family's in there, watching TV, and it'll be a long time before somebody tries anything else."