Gnash (7 page)

They’d met when he was at the academy and she was only seventeen.  She never grew up and he grew up too fast flying combat missions over Iraq during the first Gulf War.  They drifted apart and one day he came back from an extended training mission to find their house on base mostly empty, a pink post-it note stuck to the bedroom wall saying she was done with all this military crap and she was going back home to Colorado with Eva.  The court gave her custody based on their belief that it wasn’t a good idea to give a military parent with no spouse custody because they might have to deploy at any moment.  He’d gotten himself stationed close to his daughter for two tours in Wyoming and one at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado, but all the other years he’d had to be content with seeing her during the summer and every other Christmas.

He picked up the phone again and dialed his ex-wife’s number.  “Hello.  Daddy, is that you?” his daughter asked nervously.

“Yeah, baby girl, it’s me.  I’m ok.  There’s been a scare here, but no big deal.  You know how the news agencies make a big story out of small stuff. ”

“But the news said that there was a chemical weapon attack and that everyone was sealed inside.  Are the chemicals inside with you?”

“They’re not, honey, don’t worry.  Everyone is fine here.  This whole thing is just a classic overreaction to a little problem and the media ran away with a story.”

“Don’t tell me that, Dad.  Your work got attacked, the president is dead...”

He choked on some spit in his mouth, “What?” he exclaimed.

“Haven’t you heard?  A Secret Service agent shot him earlier today and a whole bunch of other presidents from all these foreign countries.  They’re all dead and no one knows where the Vice-President is.  The news says that he’s being sheltered for his protection until things get sorted out, but it’s been hours and he hasn’t been on TV yet.”

“Oh my God.  Honey, are you sure about this?  We don’t have a television here in my office so I didn’t know anything about it.”

“Yeah, Dad.  I wouldn’t make this up.  There was some big meeting that they all were at and there was a protest, but they were shot by some guy on the inside.  And a few minutes ago they started reporting about attacks in Europe and Asia too.  Pretty much everywhere, Dad, I’m scared.”

“Baby, there’s nothing for you to worry about, you guys live in a very small town where nothing is going to happen, ok?  Thank you for checking up on me. I’m fine, we’re all fine here, but I’ve got to go and find a TV somewhere.  I love you.  Don’t worry, that chemical attack was outside of the building.  Ok?”

“Alright, daddy.  Call me back as soon as you can.  School is cancelled tomorrow so call me whenever you can get back to your phone.” 

He ended the conversation with the same kissing noise he always made at the end of their conversations.  When he hung up, his hands flew over the keyboard of his computer bringing up an internet news site.  Sure enough, there was the headline,
Five
Heads of State Murdered in One Afternoon
.  He read the article quickly and found that six Heads of State had actually been shot by a member of the Secret Service, but the Prime Minister from the United Kingdom survived the shooting and was listed in stable condition in an undisclosed location. 

The president was dead.  His running mate, now Vice-President, had been selected more for his ability to capture the youth vote than for his demonstrated leadership skills.  The French had already sworn in their Prime Minister as their new president.  The man was known to have very aggressive mood swings and showed most of the indicators of someone attempting to hide schizophrenia.  The new President of Russia was a former member of the Communist Party from the USSR days of that country and it was rumored that he’d been in the KGB.  He was an advocate for returning Russia to the glory days of the past, including a reconsolidation of the former USSR satellite nations.  The political climate of the world had skewed drastically in the last several hours.

He clicked on a link that listed several attacks occurring elsewhere in the world.  There were bombings at several large hotels in Europe.  A train had been derailed by a truck parked on the tracks in India and it spilled chemical waste into a residential area.  Riots were happening in Kenya after their president was murdered today in an apparent military coup.  Every time he refreshed the page to go back to the site that listed the attacks there were more and more events occurring.

He stood up quickly to go next door and talk to Bob Lewis, a contractor that sat in the cubicle next to him, but he got extremely light-headed and had to sit down.  The wheezing got worse and it felt like he couldn’t breathe. 
Fuck this,
he thought as he ripped off the protective mask,
that chemical attack was outside and all this security did its job
.  It became slightly easier for him to breathe but his lungs were still rattling noticeably.  “Hey Bob,” he croaked over the cubicle walls.  No answer.  “Bob!”  Still no answer. 

He struggled to his feet and shuffled to the corner of his cubicle.  Bob wasn’t sitting at his desk.  He turned towards the door into the hallway and attempted to walk but his feet wouldn’t move and his legs felt like they were made of lead.  His head was pounding and he couldn’t get a good, solid breath of air.  His vision went black at the edges and he began to feel as if he were looking down a long tunnel.

“What the hell?” he said as he began to sway back and forth.  The world went black and he fell sideways onto the floor.  He felt the rough carpeting on his cheek but he couldn’t make his body respond enough to lift him up.  Bryce’s last thoughts were of Eva and the trip they were supposed to take to the Caribbean this summer, and then he passed out.

***

16 April, 0610 hrs local

Best Western Hotel

Lawton, Oklahoma
 

The phone beside his bed rang.  Grayson jerked awake, startled from a bizarre dream.  He picked up the receiver.  “Donnelly here.”

“Grayson!” Emory’s voice sounded relieved.

“Hey Em, how you holding up?”

“Everything is messed up here.  The federal government is closed today and there have been police cars and emergency vehicles speeding by the apartment all night long.  The news said that there hasn’t been any communication from inside the Pentagon in several hours and they’re preparing to send in an emergency chemical response team to determine what’s going on inside.”

“What the hell are you talking about?  I’m sorry babe,” he corrected himself.  “What’s going on, I thought everything was fine and they were working to disengage the automatic locks on the doors.”

“That’s what they thought, but all communications stopped sometime in the middle of the night.  At first they attributed it to the watch officers falling asleep, but the news said they’ve been trying every number in the book and at this point, someone should have answered.”

“I wonder what the hell happened in there,” he said as he sat up and reached for the remote.  “When I went to sleep it seemed like there was an electrical malfunction in the safety locks.”

“They also released some additional information this morning that they’d been withholding.  There was apparently some kind of attack by armed men inside the Pentagon while it was locked down.  The Vice-President is supposed to hold a news conference at ten o’clock Eastern time.  Apparently he made it through alright and there weren’t any attempts on his life.”

“This is all so bizarre.  The president, the Pentagon, all these attacks and disasters everywhere.  This is all related, there’s no way this stuff happened without some terrorist group behind it.”  It was an obvious statement, but he simply spoke what he was thinking.  They talked for a few more minutes before hanging up.  He showered and checked the time.  He was hungry and there was still about two hours until the Vice-President’s press conference was set to begin so he decided to go get some breakfast.  He grabbed the Cobalt’s keys and went out to the parking lot. 

The small diner he picked was crowded to the point of being a fire hazard.  Luckily for Grayson, the patrons waiting to be seated were in groups of two or more, so he was able to sit at the counter and order a plate of biscuits with sausage gravy, a favorite of his that he ordered every time he made a trip to the Midwest.  The conversation across the room was kept to a low buzz as the thirteen-inch television in the corner was tuned to a national news channel and turned up as loud as it could go.

Nothing new came out from the news as he ate but he decided he definitely wanted to go back to his hotel room for the VP’s address to the nation since he could barely hear the TV.  He dropped cash on the bar and forced his way through the crowd at the door.

The sun was shining bright in the early morning sky and it was a perfect spring morning.  The day outside would be beautiful, but he planned on spending most of it in his hotel room watching the news.  He fished the keys from his pocket and walked up to the compact car.  “Shit,” he said out loud.  The front driver’s side tire was flat.  He hurried to the trunk to get the spare. 

He opened the trunk and leaned inside to flip back the carpet covering the spare tire.  As he undid the latch holding the tire in place and began to lift out the tire he felt a sharp pain in his right side and dropped it.  He started to turn and was hit again, harder, in the stomach and then the side again.  His legs were kicked out from under him and his head hit the rear bumper.  Two men began to kick him in the ribs and in the head.  He quickly began to lose focus and through his blurred vision he saw a fat man in overalls.  “That’s enough.  I don’t wanna kill the bastard, just rough him up a little so he learns his manners.  Lord knows we can’t cover up killin’ a white boy.” 

Jim Bob, the farmer from the casino last night, leaned down in front of Grayson.  “I told you not to fuck with me boy. Don’t bother goin’ to the police, they work for me.”  He straightened up and gave a half-hearted kick at the prone man.  “Alright, let’s go boys.  We got our orders step up our training for a big mission that the colonel wants us to do.”

Grayson tried feebly to get to his knees but his head swam and he vomited onto the ground near his face.  Through swollen eyes he saw a shiny new pick-up truck drive by and then he passed out.

***

16 April, 1000 hrs local

The Bunker

Washington, D.C.
 

The Vice-President of the United States wiped the sweat from the palms of his hands on his trouser legs.  Across from him was the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.  The White House Press Secretary looked at him and said, “And, we’re live, Mr. Vice-President.”

He placed his left hand on an old, well-worn bible and raised his right hand.  The Chief Justice told him to repeat after him, “I, Alfred Sawyer Holmes…”

“I,
Alfred Sawyer Holmes…”

“…do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute…”

“…do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute…”

“… the office of President of the United States…”

“… the office of President of the United States…”

“… and will, to the best of my ability…”

“… and will, to the best of my ability…”

“… preserve, protect and defend…”

“…preserve, protect and defend…”

“… the Constitution of the United States.”

“… the Constitution of the United States.”

“Congratulations, Mr. President,” the Chief Justice said as he held out his hand to be the first to shake hands with the newly appointed President of the United States.

“Thank you, John.”  He shook the Justice’s hand and walked to the podium.  The cameras readjusted their angle and a member of the staff standing near the cameramen gave him the thumbs up.  “Today we grieve the loss of our nation’s president.  Allan Gosebeck was a true patriot and he died in service to his country.

“Yesterday, April 15
, that patriot was murdered by a coward who misled us all into believing that he was something different than he really was.  He murdered our president and the heads of state of four other nations.  My sincere condolences go out to our friends from Russia, Japan, France and Germany who, even as I speak here today, are grieving the loss of their own leaders and making the difficult decisions of how to carry their countries through these dark days of random terror attacks across the globe.

“In a coordinated attack on both the life of President Gosebeck and our nation’s military, we have been dealt a savage blow.  It doesn’t matter if these attacks were orchestrated by the same group or if they were separate incidents, I promise you that we will find those responsible for the planning of these events and they will be brought to justice to answer for their crimes.  We already have the man who allegedly carried out the attack in Portland yesterday in custody and it’s only a matter of time before we seize the others involved.

“The situation at the Pentagon is still critical and is a developing story.  I have never made a habit of keeping information from my constituents, first at the local, then the national level.  Now, my constituency is every man, woman and child in the United States and I will not withhold information from anyone. 

“As I speak, efforts are being made to enter the Pentagon in order to determine what happened and why they stopped responding to outside communication at approximately 3:45 Eastern time this morning.  The situation, as we know it, is that yesterday at roughly the same time that the president was assassinated a group of armed men attacked the crowd at a retirement ceremony and another of their group set off a chemical agent that locked the building down.  The group on the inside was subdued, but not before a significant loss of life was inflicted on the attendees of the ceremony at the Pentagon.  We know for sure that thirty-seven people were pronounced dead on the scene by the Pentagon medical personnel.

“We were in regular contact with the police force inside the Pentagon and tests of the air were negative inside the building for any chemical agents.  The all clear was given and attempts were made to open the doors but they would not open due to some type of electrical malfunction to the computer system controlling them.  Then, in the early morning hours, all communications from the inside stopped.