James Cobb: The Arctic Event

“You could have used another set of eyes up with you on the ridge. You might have acquired your targets faster and been out of there faster.”

Smith didn’t consider arguing the points. You didn’t argue when you knew you were in the wrong. “Points all taken, Top. I blew it.”

“Yes, sir. You did. But it was the way you blew it…” The sergeant hesitated. “Begging the colonel’s pardon, but may I speak off the record?”

There was a formality in the ranger’s voice, the kind often used by a noncom when bringing a potentially sensitive subject up with a superior.

“I’m here to learn, Top.”

The instructor studied Smith out of thoughtful, narrowed eyes. “You are an operator, aren’t you, Colonel? The real shit, not just a pill roller getting his ticket punched.”

Smith stalled, lightly oiling the dismounted bolt of his rifle, considering his answer.

Covert One did not exist. Smith was a member of no such organization. Those were absolutes. Yet this grizzled Special Ops trooper would no doubt be a master at seeing through bullshit. Likewise, Smith had come here to learn, especially about himself.

“I’m telling you that I’m not, Top,” he replied, selecting his words carefully.

The ranger nodded. “I get what you’re saying, sir.”

Now it was the instructor’s turn to pause in thought. “If you were an operator,” he went on finally, “I say that you’ve worked solo a lot.”

“What would make you say that?” Smith inquired cautiously.

The ranger shrugged. “It sticks out all over you, sir. In a lot of ways, you’re good. And I mean damn good. You’ve got all your personal moves down solid. I’ve rarely seen better. But they’re just your moves. You kept trying to do it all yourself.”

“I see,” Smith replied slowly, replaying the morning’s exercises in his mind.

“Yes, sir. You forget your people and you forget to think for your people,” the noncom continued. “That setup you ran on the ridge this morning probably would have worked just fine for one man, but there was more than one of you. I don’t know exactly what you’re doing in this man’s Army, Colonel, but whatever it is, it’s making you forget how to command.”

Forgetting how to command? That was a stark assessment for any officer-a brutal one, in fact. Could it conceivably be a valid one?

It was a startling thought, but it was entirely possible, given the peculiarities of his career path.

USAMRIID was not a conventional Army unit. The majority of its personnel were civilian, like his late fiancée, Dr. Sophia Russell. Directing a research project at Fort Detrick was more akin to working in a major university or a corporate laboratory than in a military installation. It was a peer-among-peers environment that required tact and a mastery of bureaucracy more than a command presence.

As for that other peculiar facet of his life, by the very nature and structure of the job, mobile cipher agents frequently operated alone. Since being drawn into Covert One in the aftermath of the Hades crisis, Smith had worked with a variety of allies in the field, but he had not borne the burden of being directly responsible for them.

It was one thing to make a bad call and get yourself killed. It was quite another when that failed call caused the death of someone else. Smith understood that. There had been a time in Africa years ago, before Covert One, when Smith had made such a failed call. The personal reverberations and pain of that decision lingered to this day. It was one of the things that had diverted Smith into the rarified world of medical research.

He slid the oiled bolt back into the SR’s receiver. Had that move been a form of cowardice? Possibly. It would be something to take a long and hard look at.

“I see what you mean, Top,” Smith replied. “Let’s say that particular requirement hasn’t come up with me recently.”

The instructor nodded. “Maybe so, sir, but if you keep wearing those oak leaves, it will. You can bet your ass on it.”

Or someone else’s.

Smith was still pondering the instructor’s words when an alien sound intruded into the forest quiet: the muffled purr-growl of a powerful two-cycle engine. A camouflaged all-terrain vehicle appeared through the trees, tearing up the trail from the Huckleberry Ridge base camp.

The young female soldier braked the ATV to a halt in the grove short of the mountain warfare class. Dismounting, she jogged toward them.

Smith and the ranger sergeant got to their feet as the courier approached.

“Colonel Smith?” she inquired, saluting.

“Right here, Corporal,” Smith replied, returning the salute.

“A call came in for you at base camp, sir, from the officer of the day at Main Post.” She produced a piece of white notepaper from the breast pocket of her BDUs. “As soon as possible you are to call this phone number. He indicated it was very important.”

Smith accepted the slip of paper and glanced at it. That was all that was required. The number was one that Smith had long ago committed to memory. It was not so much a phone number now as an identifier and a call to arms.

Smith refolded the paper and stowed it in his own pocket, to be burned later. “I’ll need to get back to the fort,” he said, his voice flat.

“That’s been arranged for, sir,” the courier replied. “You can take the quad down to base camp. They’ll have a vehicle waiting for you.”

“We’ll take care of your gear, Colonel,” the instructor interjected.

Smith nodded. It was likely he wouldn’t be back. “Thanks, Top,” he said, extending his hand to the noncom. “It’s been a good program. I’ve learned a great deal.”

The sergeant returned the solid handgrip. “I hope it’ll help, sir…wherever. Good luck.”

The highway leading down to Fort Lewis snaked through the forested foothills of the Cascades, passing a series of small towns undergoing the economic conversion from logging to tourism for their sustenance. The sixth-largest Army post in the United States, Fort Lewis served as the primary staging facility to America’s defense commitments in the North Pacific and as the home base for the Army’s cutting-edge Stryker brigades. Scores of the massive eight-wheeled armored fighting vehicles could be seen occupying the post motor pools and rumbling down the access roads to the firing ranges.

The fort also served as home for the Fifth Special Forces Group, the Second Battalion, Seventy-fifth Rangers, and a squadron of the 160th Special Aviation Regiment. Thus, the members of the base cadre were well acquainted with the requirements and necessities of covert operations.

The officer of the day didn’t ask questions when Smith checked in at the headquarters building. He had been advised to expect this sunburned and bearded stranger in sweat-stained camouflage. He had also been ordered by the highest of authorities to grant Jon Smith every possible assistance.

In short order, Smith found himself seated alone in a headquarters office with a secure communications deck on the desk before him. He dialed the contact number without consulting the note he had been given. On the East Coast of the United States a phone rang in a facility the public believed to be a private yacht club in Anacosta, Maryland.

“Yes.” The answering voice was a woman’s, toneless and crisply professional.

“This is Lieutenant Colonel Jon Smith,” he said with careful deliberation, not for the human at the far end of the circuit but for the voice identification system that would be monitoring the call.

The device’s verdict must have been favorable, for when Maggie Templeton spoke again it was with considerably more warmth and animation. “Hello, Jon, how’s Washington? The state, that is.”