Lauren waved to two of her team members from the management assessment course. They had obviously not done particularly well. Cheyenne was seen as the worst option of all, although there had been a couple of die-hard fans of the
War Games
movie from the 80s who had actually picked it as a first option. It was considered a bit of a strange choice for the Future Leaders program but had always been there from the inaugural event three years earlier.
Next to leave would be the White House, Capitol and Pentagon groups, their buses would leave in an hour. The Raven Rock and Mount Weather complexes were nearest to Camp Trust and their groups would be last to leave.
Lauren rushed out to wave her two new friends goodbye.
They stood waiting as those in front were checked onto the bus. She hugged them as they stepped forward and onto the bus.
“Text me when you land!” called Lauren, sticking her head around the doorway.
“They won’t be able to text or call; all cells are taken once you leave the building,” replied the very officious Trust employee who had checked and double-checked the Cheyenne group onto the bus.
“Why?” asked Lauren.
“It just is,” said the official, waving Lauren away. “If you have anyone you want to text or call, do it now. You won’t be able to once we get to the plane until you arrive back here tonight.”
As the bus pulled away, not one of the group looked up They were all busy typing messages explaining they’d be uncharacteristically silent for the best part of the day.
With nothing better to do, Bill Swann had caught the sunrise. Beautiful shots across the Maryland landscape with the sun twinkling on the early morning dew were going to be spectacular. With the sun up and the drama of the early morning light gone, he turned to his hunting rifle. The air was breathless and perfect for a day’s hunting. He tracked deep into the wilderness and set up a few targets. He had the best part of the day to amuse himself before his niece returned. He lined up his first shot, three hundred yards, a warm up. He squeezed the trigger, another ounce and the rifle would fire.
The rumble in the distance stopped him instantly. It was a rumble he knew only too well. Lying prone on the ground, he felt the vibrations echo through his chest. He listened with his trained ear, filtering out the sounds echoing off of the hills around him and focusing on the original sound. It was off to his left, the same direction as Camp Trust and Lauren. He jumped up and made off as fast as his legs would carry him. Even his beloved camera was dumped to aid his speed.
“
White House!” called the Trust employee.
Lauren and Mike stood up and joined the forty-eight other very eager students filtering out towards their waiting coach. Excited waves from those still waiting for their coach bade them farewell and good luck.
As they filed onto the bus, the same message was barked out to them. Their cells would be taken from them and only returned at the end of the day, so any messages they wanted to send had to be sent now. Lauren and Mike quickly fired off messages to their parents, Lauren copying hers to her Uncle Bill.
With the cells safely collected from the passengers, a metal detecting wand, much to the consternation of all on board, ensured that no one had tried to hide theirs away. The coach pulled away from the main building and turned left at the end of the road instead of turning right towards the main road. The driver then turned right towards the main garage that housed the Trust’s motor pool, a massive two-ended open warehouse. It seemed he planned to drive through the building and out of the other side, which would have them back on the route towards the main road.
“That’s weird,” said Lauren to Mike. “The other coach driver made exactly the same mistake with the earlier group!”
Anybody watching would have seen one bus full of kids entering one end before shortly leaving the other end. The only difference was that it wasn’t the same coach and it wasn’t the same kids.
The package was sitting on his desk waiting for him. The brown paper envelope was stamped ‘URGENT’. Nothing else, just ‘urgent’. Intrigued, he picked it up and tore it open. A DVD was inside. Having no idea of what it contained, he called a tech support guy. He wasn’t shoving a random DVD into his computer not knowing it wasn’t some type of virus designed to bring down the whole television network. It wouldn’t be the first time the network had been targeted.
Being the Fourth of July and a Saturday made no difference. All leave had been cancelled as the biggest news story since the twenty-four hour seven day news station had come into existence was playing out before them. The technician appeared within minutes, carrying a standalone laptop totally unconnected from any servers linked to the network. The laptop revealed nothing untoward and it appeared all the DVD contained was a video file. Just to be safe, the reporter requested to borrow the laptop just until he had viewed whatever it contained. A hardcore sex movie or worse was not something he was keen to have linked to his own business machine. The techie took the hint and left.
The reporter hit play.
The screen changed to a time stamped image of the ocean, the person holding the camera held up a newspaper to confirm it was the date that was showing at the bottom of the screen. The image panned from the newspaper across an expanse of ocean to an aircraft carrier. The image zoomed in on the number painted on its side and the flag on the ship. The numbers were easily visible as 063 and the flag clearly visible as the Russian flag.
The reporter typed ‘063 aircraft carrier’ into his computer and the top hit was the Wikipedia page for an Admiral Kuznetsov. He really didn’t see the big deal. It wasn’t like the world didn’t know the Russians had an aircraft carrier. As the aircraft carrier passed by, the image swung around to three red and white checkered water towers. The image then bounced around for a few minutes before it settled on a street sign on a deserted and rather neglected street. The sign pointing to a small collection of outdoor shops clearly read Midway Mall.
Armed with the information he had, it didn’t take long to discover that no Midway Mall like the one in the video existed, certainly not in the United States. It was only after considering the name a little further he entered Midway Islands into his search engine. The scenery certainly fit. A further search of water storage tanks revealed the three very recognizable tanks from the video.
The time stamp showed twelve hours ago. He really didn’t get the relevance. The Midway islands were in the middle of the Pacific. Big deal. He set it to the side, just as almost every other network reporter who had received the same video had done. He had more pressing news to work on. The Russians had held a press conference to complain about the building of a secret runway on their islands. They had informed the world they were going to destroy it. Unfortunately and rather embarrassingly for them, poor weather had ruled out the bomber strike that they had planned for that morning. Having made such a big deal about the ecosystem and how fragile it was in the area, they had no option but to wait. Missiles would risk damaging the surrounding wildlife.
He finished his piece to camera and considered the Midway footage again. He really didn’t see an angle or reason for it to be aired but sent a copy to the newsroom editor with a note about his findings. He’d let her decide. Little did he know, his research and the footage would start a war in less than two hours.
Jack woke up before the alarm. In fact, he had been awake most of the night. His call with President Chernov with regard to the runway had niggled at him throughout the night. It didn’t make any sense; the arctic island they were talking about was barely a couple of hundred miles from a chain of Norwegian islands very similar in climate and structure. If they wanted a runway, they’d have just built one there.
He had asked the National Reconnaissance Office to treat the area as a priority and a number of KH-11satellites had been redirected to gather as much information as they could. So far, they had uncovered the same as the Russians. The runway was well camouflaged but if you knew it was there, you could see at least part of it. As Ilya had stated, the US flag was in fact flying and to add to the problem, it looked as though it should have been camouflaged and the netting had been blown aside.
He had left explicit orders that should they uncover anything further he was to be disturbed. He knew Ilya was on shaky ground in Russia. Covering up the B2 bombing of the Kremlin would have cost him significant political clout and certainly put him at loggerheads with his military. A blatant disregard for the sovereignty of her land was not something the Russians would take lying down. Jack needed an answer and quickly.
Too distracted for the gym, he grabbed a sandwich for breakfast and made his way to the Situation Room. All was quiet. Updates were constantly streaming through on the screens. News footage continued to show the orderly lines forming at supermarkets and gas stations with the rather disconcerting sight of armored personnel vehicles watching over in between their almost constant coverage of the military build-up. As the news channel broke to ads, Jack noticed that the usual medical and fitness ads had been replaced by top named brands. Viewing figures drove ad spending. If the big boys were spending on the News Channels it was because America was watching them. An ad for the Trust, hugely patriotic and proud to tell the viewers just how much they were behind the military and America, ‘
America’s Savior, America’s Future’,
it proudly proclaimed as the ad finished and the screen gave way to the Trust’s favorite line. Jack had an urge to throw something at the screen but was interrupted from those thoughts by Kenneth.
“Good morning, Mr. President.” He entered the room, ushering away the analyst that was following behind him.
“What was that?” asked Jack, looking at the analyst dejectedly walk away before the door closed and blocked the view.
“An update for you, no news on the runway,” he said, quickly changing the topic. “The Trust students will be here shortly. Will you meet them in your residence or in the West Wing?”
“We’ll see how the morning pans out,” said Jack evasively. He really wasn’t in the mood to entertain. “When’s the National Security briefing scheduled for?”
“One p.m.,” replied Kenneth slightly awkwardly.
“Why so late? I thought it was scheduled for ten?” Jack had clocked Kenneth’s discomfort.
“I’m not sure. A number of attendees were unavailable this morning,” Kenneth lied. He knew exactly why it was delayed. He had delayed it himself.
“It better not be because of these bloody Trust tours,” replied Jack, having a sneaking suspicion that was exactly why the security of their nation was being put at risk.
Kenneth remained quiet. The president had nailed the situation on the head. Roger Young had requested that, as the sites the students were visiting were currently home to the nation’s most powerful men and women, it would be great if they could meet and talk to the kids who would hopefully be following in their footsteps. Although not a public supporter of either party, the Trust looked after the politicians that looked after them. As such, a failure to comply with Roger’s request may impact on their revenues or pension plans since many ex-cabinet members were well paid consultants or board members of Trust companies.
Jack contemplated calling the meeting anyway, just to prove a point. But he was bigger than that. He’d make the point at the meeting. It certainly wouldn’t happen again, that was for sure. The Jack King that had been elected was back. It was no longer the Jack King mourning his wife and seeing out a very simple presidency - thanks to the Trust’s cash – that they were dealing with.
“I’ll be in my study,” said Jack, leaving Kenneth standing in the Situation Room.
Kenneth withdrew the photo the analyst had handed to him that was meant for the president; the runway was just visible in the arctic midnight sunshine. As per the previous photos, the difference with this one was a large area circled by the exceptionally diligent analyst. Others had looked and glanced over it thinking it was just a shadow on the water or a rock formation. The analyst hadn’t agreed. He had looked further and even gone to the trouble of measuring the mass. He had uncovered three possible matches of submarines that matched the dimensions he had predicted. It was a very large submarine and one of the reasons most had rejected it. At over five hundred feet long, very few submarines would fit the bill. But the list attached was just a little too close to the truth to let the president see.
Kenneth went in search of the analyst, to whom he had promised he would inform the president about his findings. He had also sworn him to secrecy. The president would want to discuss the findings with the Joint Chiefs due to its highly sensitive nature. The analyst was, as instructed, waiting for Kenneth in the photo office, just a few doors away and unmanned, thanks to the holiday and it being a Saturday. Kenneth checked nobody was watching before entering the office. The analyst stood to attention when he stepped into the room.