There Must Be A Mistake Ch. 21

"Sir, I thought this may be of some interest to you. This young man is out in the open, and away from his usual protection detail. According to our latest assessment, he is integral to their program. He might not be as important to you and Mister Silver, as Mister Zabo's son, Patrick, but he might bring a very high price.

There is an event scheduled for Thursday. They are expecting 5000 people to attend. Noone in their right mind would start a firefight, with that many possible casualties nearby. The police will have no choice but to let us take him without incident."

"Excellent Jeffrey, I'll show this to William. Call the flight crew and have them preflight aircraft number seven."

"Aircraft number seven, sir?"

"Yes, this is going to be a one-way trip for that aircraft. When the authorities board the aircraft looking for clues, it is going to explode."

"Oh my, it would be quite a disaster sir."

"Terrible, just terrible; they are our bravest and finest young men."

************

"Holy Shit, call the general tell him I'm on my way with an intercept."

Lucius heard Ray yell he had an intercept, and was five feet behind him when he entered the general's office.

"Who invited you Lucius?"

"Margaret did sir. She said it was time for us to get our tuxedos measured."

"I'll talk to you later Margaret."

"Thank you darling."

"What does the intercept have to say sir?"

"I don't know. I was interrupted, as soon as it was handed to me."

"Would you like me to read it to you while you find your glasses?"

"I don't wear glasses Lucius."

"When did you change to contacts sir?"

"Would you shut up so I can read this please?"

Lucius watched his general's face change as he read the intercept. Something was terribly wrong. He waited for his orders, and they weren't long in coming.

"Lucius take seven fully armed agents; get to Austin for a three day assignment. There will be a private jet waiting for you."

"What's going on general?"

"The vice president is going to try to snatch Gordon Thursday."

"Why Thursday, what's so special about that day. Is he going to be at the beach, or the ballgame?"

"No, the principal of the school Zoie Schneider attends announced to the newspapers that he's there and is going to give a speech to the board of directors, the Alumni Association, and the Who's Who of the area. Five thousand people are supposed to attend. One fucking hand grenade would keep the cops at bay, while they took a Gordon."

"Lucius take the best seven we have and get there. Coordinate with their people and try to stop this from happening."

"Sir, the way they've been training, I would throw their names into a hat and take the first seven names called."

"That's good to hear Lucius."

"As he was about to leave the office he stopped, turned around, and looked at the general."

"I've seen that look before Lucius; what's going on in that head of yours?"

"It's just a thought general, but it's a terrifying one. If they don't see Gordon on the dais, they could get pissed. They could cause havoc by opening fire on the police, and audience. Depending on how many members of the op force there are, we could have one thousand people dead or injured. I could see the vice president dancing on the graves."

"What can we do about it without tipping our hand that we have someone inside?"

"We can have the school move the affair to Wednesday at 4 P.M., and get in touch with all their alumni and guests by email or telephone. Announce the change publicly at 8 AM, over the wire services television and radio. The op force will not be able to make their changes, and get their people here in time to set up, and cause any damage."

"Brilliant Lucius, brilliant just add one more thing to really fuck them up. Add that Gordon will be doing it by teleconference from a military C5 aircraft on its way to Switzerland. He has been asked to give a lecture to the scientists at the prestigious C.E.R.N. Institute in Switzerland, where he will be awarded a medal for his invention. It will be easy to set up the conference from here."

Lucius laughed. "General, you are getting as sneaky, and as evil as I am."

"I will accept sneaky Lucius, but I have never known anyone, that can be as evil as you are."

"Thank you sir, I accept that as my highest honor."

As he was leaving the office Lucius said, "I can't do my fitting today Margaret. I have some evil and sneaky work to do. Dan is available. Why don't you go to his fitting with him? When he's finished, have him take you to lunch at a restaurant with tablecloths, cloth napkins, and real silverware. You will have to show him which forks to use, and to keep his elbows off the table. If you start to train him now, it will be easier, when he buys you the new house."

"So help me God Lucius, the next time I see you, I'm going to kill you."

"Dan if you kill Lucius, who will you use as your best man?"

"I don't want either of you to talk to me. If it's anything important put it in writing, and mail it to me."

He didn't receive an answer.

He yelled, "Did you two hear me?"

"We are writing down our answers. I will take them to the post office this evening. You should receive our answers in Friday morning's mail."

"When you are finished writing your answers, hand them to me."

"That's not what you told us to do."

"In the Army, you always follow your last order. Follow my last order Margaret."

"I won't do it, unless you marry me."

"I'm going to send you back to Pennsylvania."

"Go ahead, Dan, it will be the last time you get your retirement check sent to the correct bank, or the correct bank account number."

"I hate you Margaret."

"You will regret you said that to me Dan. You better apologize before I pick up the phone."

"Why, who are you going to call?"

"I'm going to call Boyer, Pennsylvania and speak to a friend of mine in the computer division. It seems you've been overpaid for several years, and the government wants their money back. You should be getting a letter from them within two weeks."

"Bullshit Margaret, you don't have that kind of power. I'm going to call your bluff."

"So you're not going to apologize for saying 'you hate me?'"

"I hate you Margaret."

"Thank you general, I have to make a phone call."

"Enjoy yourself Margaret."

Lucius said, "Remember general: Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned."

"Lucius leave now."

"Yes sir. Don't disturb Margaret, she's on the phone."

***************

"General Morgan, Mister Schneider is on line six."

"Hello Dycke, did you get the full brief, or just a headline?"

"They gave me the full brief Dan. I can't believe the principal did this. I'm going to have his ass fired. The school has a confidentiality clause for all its students. Zoie and Gordon are out of class and on their way to my home. They are covered; no one can get near them."

"Does anyone at the school know they are engaged?"

"I don't know. I do know Zoie did not wear her engagement ring to school this morning. I will ask her if she mentioned it to anyone. If she did she becomes a target full-time, doesn't she?"

"You know the answer to that as well as I do Dycke. I would draw and quarter that principal, before I killed and fired him. He has no idea what he's done. He's put five thousand influential people in danger. They could sue the school for negligence, and win.

My second in command, Colonel Lucius Canyon is on his way to Austin now. He will be in Charleston, in about 4 ½ or 5 hours. Have the head of your protection detail and some of his people meet them at the airport to go over the ground rules. Lucius likes to work alone. Tell your team leader that in advance so there is no fighting between the good guys.

When I tell you Lucius is the best there ever was, believe me. I had him kicked out of the service, because he gets the job done, but he never obeyed the rules.

"He sounds more like a British SAS than an American infantry Colonel."

"It's a very apt description of him. The Brits don't mind when their Special Air Service teams go a little above and beyond board to get information that will help their infantry.

From the day Lucius graduated West Point, he was different. He had a different mindset than every other graduate. I will paraphrase the way he explained it to the Disciplinary Board, as I was trying to get him kicked out of the service. He was his own worst enemy while he testified under oath. The Army does not like mavericks. We like order. Everything has a box, and you have to fit into that box. Lucius never did, but his commanders always loved him, because his jobs always got done, and in record time.

For his opening statement he said to the Hearing Board, as he pointed to the sixty of his men who came to support him, "These men do not belong to the Army; these are my men. I trained each one of them individually, and in groups. They know how to fight only one way, my way, not the Army way, but my way. They follow my orders, they use my tactics, and they follow me. They don't follow my sergeants they follow me. A good officer should always lead from the front, not from the rear. You can't see, feel, or know what the enemy is thinking from behind your soldiers. You don't know what your soldiers are feeling, smelling, seeing, tasting, hearing, or sensing, if you're not in the fight with them.

If you are eating hot food, and sleeping on a dry cot thirty miles from the front, and your soldiers are eating MRE's, and standing guard in the rain, you have a totally different perspective of what's going on with the enemy.

When you receive a prisoner in the rear area, and you want to interrogate him, you sit him in a chair, you give him a smoke, and you're nice to him. You have all the time in the world.

When I get a prisoner at the front line, I want everything he knows, and I want to know it now. The prisoner is going to hurt, and I am going to be the one that hurts him. I am the officer. It is my job. It is my responsibility to keep my men safe, and battle ready. This person entered my safe zone, holding a weapon, with the intention of killing me, or one of my men. He will not be allowed to hurt anyone ever again. He will swear, before his god, he will never raise a weapon in anger at another person for the rest of his natural life. When I am finished interrogating him, I will know everything he knows, including the size of his grandmother's shoes.

The Russians used a very effective interrogation method of interrogation when they invaded Afghanistan. They would take two men, and tie them to chairs, facing one another. They would take a rasp and start sawing one of the men's teeth down, while the other man watched. They wouldn't stop until the man's jawbones were showing, or the man who was watching answered every question the interrogator asked him.

I don't carry a rasp with me, so I improvised. I used anything that was available. I don't waste ammunition, or use anything that is issued to me by the United States government. I use what the enemy brought with them to kill my men, or other members of the United States military. I will work my ass off to keep that from happening. If I have to kill fifty of them, to save one of us, fifty of them are going to die. We didn't ask to come here. We were asked to help a country who was in trouble, and unable to sustain itself from attacks by an outside forces.

If the politicians in Washington would take the gloves off us, we could be out of here in three months. Someone should tell them they don't know how to fight a war. Allow them to sign the documents, call the Pentagon, and tell us where to go. Then they should congratulate each other on a job well done, go to lunch, and forget about us, until we call them and tell them that their problem has been taken care of in a satisfactory manner.

They shouldn't be allowed to tell us, we are not allowed to fight on Tuesday afternoon, between three and seven, because some holy guy is going to be passing by. Let us do what we do best and get the job done quickly and efficiently. Fewer people will die that way, and most of them that do will be the bad guys.

Many high-ranking officers have praised my work and the work of my men. They have given us the Unit Battle Citation and put medals on my soldiers and my chest. We received these awards without any loss of life among my soldiers. We have not avoided any battle assignment. Often, we have joined others, who were already in the thick of battle. This is not a miracle. This is a sign of a well-trained, cohesive, fighting unit with only one goal: Kill the enemy. Kill them all. Show them no mercy."

They show themselves proudly holding the head of a recently decapitate non-combatant, and our public says 'how terrible of them.'

If we were to do the same thing to one of them, it would be headline news for a month. A dozen congressional committees would be formed to investigate this tragedy. The person who committed this dastardly deed would be compared to Hitler, Stalin, and Betty Crocker.

You should not relieve me of duty sirs, nor should you praise me. I was only doing my job. What you should do is find 1000 officers like me to train and lead our soldiers into battle. Our soldiers would be served better. Their Commanders would be served better. The Pentagon would be served better. The Politicians in Washington would be served better. The President of the United States would be better served.

THIS COUNTRY OF OURS WOULD BE BETTER SERVED, AND IT WOULD BE SAFER."

I was sitting at the prosecuting attorneys desk; and I wanted to stand up and cheer. The prosecuting attorney grabbed my wrist to keep me from reacting. He wrote me a note: 'He just signed his own death warrant. He's out of the Army.'

As I thought about it, I knew what he meant. The Army has a hierarchy, and orders come from the top down. They don't come from middle managers up, and a Lieutenant Colonel is considered a middle manager. A Bird Colonel is management, and rarely sees the front lines. It is even rarer to have a "General Officer' in the field of battle, but some of the great ones always find themselves leading their troops from the front.

General Theodore Roosevelt Junior led his troops onto Utah Beach on D-Day, June 6, 1944. General Omar Bradley led the main thrust into the heart of Germany, and was never more than five miles from the front at any time. General George Patton was considered by the Germans to be their worst nightmare. He was also the worst nightmare to the Commander in Chief of all US Forces in Europe: General Dwight Eisenhower. He was twice removed from command, because of insubordination. Once he slapped an enlisted man, and the second time he insulted the Russians by leaving them out of the speech.

He was not allowed to participate in the D-Day landings, and was given charge of a fictitious Army the Germans were sure was going to attack at the Pas-de-Calles. He was never at the front lines even during the most famous battle of his career, when his 3^rd Army relieved the surrounded 101^st Airborne Division in the city of Bastogne, Belgium.

Closer to our time frame, General Norman Schwarzkopf was the commander in chief of Desert Shield and Desert Storm. He was never anywhere near the front lines.

General Frederick Franks was in his Abrams Tank directing VII Corp, in what is now known as 'THE HAIL MARRY.' He led the Corp through three major battles. VII Corp defeated Saddam Hussein's vaunted Republican guard, while they tried to make their escape from Kuwait. The Corp killed or captured over 10,000 men. They destroyed thousands of tanks, artillery pieces, blew up thousands of tons of munitions and supplies.

When VII Corp was finished with these actions, Franks looked to the north and saw Baghdad was totally exposed. There was nothing to stop him from walking into that city, without a shot being fired.

Franks called Schwarzkopf.

Schwarzkopf called Rumsfeld.

Rumsfeld talk to Bush 1.

Bush 1 said "NO." It's not part of the UN mandate."

("Oh well, what's another war for Bush 2 to fight. 2300 US soldiers were killed. Thirty thousand were injured and/or maimed for life. A few trillion dollars was spent and nothing was accomplished, except our friends in the military industrial complex made a fortune, and some high-ranking thieves in Afghanistan now have fortunes tucked away so they can live like kings instead of presidents. The exponential growth of the US deficit caused by these two wars is blamed on the Democratic Party, even though they were not in power, during either war.)

***************

"Holy shit Dan, I'm glad he's on our side."

"So am I. Dycke regardless of how many people you have around Payne, and yourself, it would be great if you two got out of town."

"I have business to attend to in Glen Falls. Now might be a good time to take care of it."

"It would be an excellent time to take care of it, but don't go there directly. File single flight plans to several Midwest cities, then to points in Canada. When you come back, find an airport north of Glen Falls to land. They know you fly into Albany several times a year. They may have access to the US Air Traffic Control System, and have an alert out for your tail number if you land there."

***************

Being pulled out of school, without being told why, was one thing, but going home at high speed with four cars surrounding you was another.

When they entered the apartment, the head of security was waiting for them.

"Little Miss don't ask questions. There are suitcases in your room. Pack everything you need for a one-month deployment. You are going back to Temple with Gordon. You will be safer there than you are here. Move; we leave in fifteen minutes. Gordon pack your stuff, this is not a drill."

"Yes sir."

Gordon was packed in three minutes. Monty trained him in the science of an emergency departure.

Zoie was another case altogether. She took one piece of underwear at a time, folded it neatly, and put it in the suitcase. She went back to her draw took another one and did the same thing.

Gordon said, "Zoie sit down."

"I can't, I have to pack."

"Zoie sit down."

She stuck her tongue out at him, but she sat down on her bed as she was told to do.

Gordon pulled her underwear drawer out of her dresser and dumped it into the suitcase.

She screamed, "You can't do that, they will wrinkle."

"Miss Schneider if you say one more word, I will throw all your undergarments on the floor, and you will go pantiless while you're at my home."

She was about to complain, when she saw the look on his face, and knew he was not fooling around. She folded her arms around her chest and stayed mute.

He threw the empty draw on the floor, pulled out the next one, and emptied it into the suitcase. He continued until the suitcase looked like it could not possibly close. He pulled the top over it and he was right. There were too many clothes and it, and Zoie laughed at him.

Gordon didn't. He picked her up and sat her on top of the suitcase.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?"

"I'm compacting your clothes."

"You're going to iron every piece of clothing in there. The wrinkles will never come out."

He didn't answer her. He reached for the zippers on both sides of the suitcase and pulled him close. He kissed her, thanked her for being the appropriate weight, and threw her on the bed.

"That was not funny Gordon."

"Wait until I fill the next suitcase. I may have to sit on your lap to close it."