Final Assault (14 page)

Which was right about now.

Mickelson moved away from the window and walked the length of the room again. He was still concerned with history. He had thought it appropriate that they were here—the Map Room had been the situation room for Franklin Delano Roosevelt and his staff in World War II. They had sealed off the room, not allowed entrance from anywhere except the corridor— not even from the diplomatic reception room next door—and posted a guard in that corridor.

Mickelson had noted the historic parallels to Franklin—two presidents with the name Franklin, two wars on which the survival of the world depended, and the use of this room as a central place from which it was all staged. Only now they had electronic equipment against the far wall, enough communications devices to keep the entire world informed five times over, and several large screens that were currently shut off.

Franklin had grinned at Mickelson when he’d mentioned the parallels. “The White House is old enough now, Doug, that we can find parallels for anything.”

“What do you mean, sir?”

“Well, you chose to see a great war being fought from this room. I see a room filled with personal defeats. This was the place where President William Jefferson Clinton gave the famous August seventeenth speech that nearly brought down his presidency.”

“You don’t think your presidency will end here,” Mickelson had said, shocked.

Franklin’s grin had faded. “I don’t think so. I think the truth of this room is that it is being used as it was intended to be used, as a way station, a place to relax outside of the function of the diplomacy that was usually going on next door.”

“There is no diplomacy tonight.”

“War is diplomacy of a different sort.”

“I was raised to believe that war was the failure of diplomacy.”

Franklin had nodded. “It is. How can you have diplomacy with a group whose culture you do not understand and whose language you have never heard?” And that was when Franklin had turned to the fire. The first lady, a slender silver-haired woman who had given up her place as CEO of a major corporation to accompany her husband to the White House, had looked at Mickelson then. In her intelligent brown eyes, Mickelson saw both reproach and understanding.

Now she had her right hand on her husband’s back. “Thayer,” she said softly, “this room is not comfortable. Perhaps we should do as the Joint Chiefs asked and use the war room in the basement.”

The basement was a euphemistic term for the bunkers that had been built below the White House. The first set had been built during the Cold War of the previous century. The current set, shown to the president and his cabinet on their first day in office, was the fourth incarnation of the same plan. Only this one had been modernized during the presidency of Franklin’s predecessor. The bunkers actually made Mickelson feel as if he had stepped into the middle of someone’s paranoid fantasies.

In addition to all the working rooms, from conference rooms to offices to situation rooms complete with their own electrical grid, there were apartments for the various governmental officials and their spouses, several kitchens—stocked with enough food to last years—and a defensive system that should withstand any kind of bombardment save total destruction of the Earth itself.

Mickelson hated the bunkers worse than he hated being in the Map Room. To go to the basement seemed to him as if they were conceding that the aliens were going to win the war.

Franklin turned to his wife, but as he was about to answer, his beeper went off. Mickelson stiffened. He knew what that meant—they all knew what it meant— but Franklin checked his wrist’puter anyway.

“The aliens have entered Earth’s orbit,” he said.

For a moment, everyone in the room froze. Mickelson knew that if he lived through this attack, he would remember that sentence forever. And the somber tone Franklin used to express it.

O’Grady turned on the screens. Most of them showed the video pictures from the telescopes. One hundred eight alien ships, looking like black shadows against the Earth. One hundred eight, all with the capability to destroy everything.

“Have those ships seen the missiles yet?” Franklin asked.

No one answered. Everyone in the room knew as much as he did.

“Have they?”

“Sir, there’s no way of telling from here,” said Grace Lopez. She hadn’t moved from her chair.

“Then someone go find out!” Franklin snapped.

O’Grady headed toward the door. He glanced one last time at the screens as he did so, as if he saw his own death depicted there. And then he disappeared into the corridor.

Mickelson gripped his hands tightly together. The missiles had left Earth’s orbit, and in a few minutes, the alien ships would see them. If the aliens didn’t take the bait and go after the missiles, the missiles would hit the tenth planet in sixteen days.

Sixteen days for one attack. This was the slowest moving war in Earth’s entire history.

O’Grady returned a moment later. Yolanda Hayes, the science adviser, was with him.

Mickelson was startled at her appearance. He hadn’t seen Hayes since the night he introduced her to Leo Cross, about a year ago. Then she had been stylish, made-up, and manicured, her hair cut in the latest style. Now, she wore no makeup at all, her nails were ragged, and her dress was rumpled. Her hair needed a cut, as well.

It wasn’t that she seemed depressed. Just distracted.

“Mr. President,” she said.

“Yolanda.” Franklin hadn’t turned his attention from the screens. “Do those ships know about the missiles?” “Not yet, sir,” she said. “They will shortly. They can’t quite see them yet. We don’t know if they have the right equipment to detect them without a visual.” Mickelson bit his lower lip. If they had already detected the missiles, then they weren’t responding. Having the missiles hit the tenth planet wasn’t the defense they were all hoping for.

Those ships had to leave Earth’s orbit.

All of them, preferably.

“I got word that General Banks and her crew got off the International Space Station,” Hayes said. “They’re on the
Endeavor II”.

Franklin nodded. Mickelson took a deep breath and held it for just a moment. Banks and her crew had done a fantastic job launching the missiles. All of the senior White House staff had been notified of this suicide mission. No one expected Banks or the crew to get off the ISS. The fact that they had managed it was nothing short of a miracle.

But, he knew, they needed more than one miracle to get them to Earth in one piece.

“Where is the
Endeavor II?”
Franklin asked.

“At last report,” Hayes said, “still attached to the ISS. But the fact that the crew is in the shuttle means that it’ll leave any minute now. It probably already has.” Mickelson hoped so. They were running out of time. He glanced at the screens. The shadow ships seemed darker somehow. More ominous.

He couldn’t concentrate on Banks and her crew. He had to think about the rest of the world. If those ships didn’t follow the missiles, then the first part of the plan had failed.

“I hope to hell this works,” Franklin said. “How soon will we know if they take the bait?”

“They’ll have to respond within the hour, sir,” Hayes said. “And once they commit ships to chasing the missiles, those ships will not be able to return to Earth.”

“Once they commit?” Franklin said. “You’re that certain that they will?”

“Yessir,” Hayes said without missing a beat.

Mickelson remembered the meeting where this plan was drawn up. Franklin had asked the same question then. But, like Mickelson, he had probably thought that the aliens would see the missiles and then follow them immediately. Neither of them had expected this delay.

“The laws of physics are on our side, sir,” Hayes said.

“I’m glad something is,” Franklin muttered.

Mickelson’s ’puter vibrated against his wrist. He looked down, saw that he had an important call, and pressed a button to transfer it to his personal pocket phone so that the entire room didn’t have to hear the whole conversation.

He took the phone out of his pocket, flipped it open, turned his back on the group, and answered. One of his most trusted deputies gave him the quick code. Mickelson thanked him and hung up.

Franklin was still clarifying details with Hayes.

“Excuse me, sir,” Mickelson said. “That was my European team. The last of the major cities have been protected.”

“That was too close for comfort,” Franklin said. “Someone want to tell me again why Europe was the last to be covered?”

“It was the second run,” Mickelson said, and then wished he hadn’t. Franklin knew that. He was just getting edgy and wanted someone to take it out on.

“It was too close,” Franklin said. “It’s all been too close. Finishing our cities six hours ago was too close.”

“The factories are still running at full capacity, sir,” Hayes said. “We’re going to cover as much as we can even with the aliens overhead. We’re not going to stop unless they stop us.”

“I know that, Yolanda,” Franklin said. “I just want some movement. That’s all. I want those aliens to leave orbit. And I want it now.”

He hadn’t raised his voice, but the effect was the same. No one else in the room spoke. The first lady hadn’t moved away from the fireplace. She was watching her husband with a mixture of bemusement and concern.

“Is this the slowest damn war in the history of the planet? Or am I just impatient?” Franklin asked.

“We’re covering great distances, sir,” Hayes said. “We can’t expect—”

“I suspect the Roman conquest seemed a lot more protracted,” Mickelson said, knowing that history could sometimes distract Franklin. “Imagine having to cover the same sort of great distance with primitive equipment—and not having instant communication.” Franklin glared at him. “I hate it when you do that, Doug” And then he smiled, although it was a distracted smile.

Aldrich entered the room, glanced at the screens, and then stopped in front of Franklin. “Sir—”

“Tell me that the ships have left Earth’s orbit.”

“I could, sir, but it wouldn’t be the truth.”

Franklin shook his head. Then he glanced at Mickelson. “All right. What were you going to report?” “Just that we got a final update on the state of the population, now that they know the aliens have entered orbit”

“Wonderful,” Franklin said. “Let me guess. They’re scared and beginning to riot.”

“No, sir,” Aldrich said. “No rioting. In fact, they’re remarkably calm.”

“That’s a tribute to you, dear,” the first lady said. Franklin rolled his eyes. “Don’t suck up to me now, Cara.”

“I never have, Thayer.” She spoke softly.

He turned toward her and the look that passed between them made Mickelson jealous. He’d never had anyone look at him with such perfect understanding.

Aldrich waited a moment before adding, “The last of the military and the police are being pulled back from the rural areas and the small towns. The cities, even though they’re crowded, are extremely silent.” “Seems almost unnatural,” Killius said.

“All of this is unnatural,” Mickelson said. He would have put money on more disturbances in the cities, or the largest new city—the camp out in Death Valley. Hundreds of thousands of people opted to camp there, afraid, apparently of the nanorescuers and the government control. They had formed their own control, filled with survivalists and gun nuts, but it seemed to be working for them.

Tavi Bernstein had said earlier that she believed the city in Death Valley would remain a city if the world survived.

Mickelson looked at Bernstein now. She hadn’t left her place beside the fireplace. She was watching the screens with a calmness that seemed false. He went to her side, wanting to put his arm around her, but knowing that wouldn’t be appropriate.

She looked up at him. “Somehow I never really believed they’d come back.”

Propriety be damned. He put his arm around her and pulled her close. Her small body was rigid, but it slowly relaxed into him.

He had believed the aliens would come back. He had believed it so deep down that their appearance was almost anticlimactic. He just wanted to get through the next few days, to receive the answer to the question he’d been harboring since he understood what the aliens were doing.

He wanted to know if the human race would survive.

“We’re as ready as we can be for them,” he said to her.

“I know that.” Her voice was soft. Tavi’s reputation was built on her toughness. The fact that she let him touch her, that she revealed a soft side at all, showed how deeply worried she was about all of this.

“Thayer,” the first lady said again. “We’d be getting better updates in the basement.”

Franklin’s lips thinned, but the fondness he had shown her earlier remained in his eyes. “I hate it when you’re right, Cara,” he said.

Then he paused. For a moment, Mickelson thought Franklin would keep them in the Map Room.

Franklin’s gaze turned toward Mickelson. “I guess it’s time to go to a new room, where we make our own history.”

Mickelson nodded. He didn’t want to go to the basement, but he knew the move was inevitable. And the time was now, while they were waiting.