“I thought it was down here?” she said, not able to face climbing a flight of stairs right now.
Once on the first floor, he rushed down the hallway and without stopping for a breath, lifted his boot and crashed into the door of the apartment directly above that of former President Truman. The elderly couple inside was transfixed to the television set when Butler crashed into their world. With Butler dressed head to toe in full military dress, the gentleman, a veteran himself, didn’t know whether to call the police or stand to attention.
Swanson fell in behind him and instantly kicked into polite FBI mode. “Apologies for disturbing y--”
“Grab whatever tools you can find and follow me,” interrupted Butler, ignoring the couple completely.
Opening the window onto the fire escape, Butler made his way down to the window below. As expected, it was not ordinary glass but thanks to the old guy’s tool bag, he began to pummel through the bullet resistant glass from many decades earlier.
“Go and see if he’s got any guns,” ordered Butler, manically battering at the glass.
Swanson appeared back with an old Army issue M1911.
“He really wants it back when you’re done with it,” she said, holding it for him to see. “He says it’s a collector’s piece and worth a fortune.”
To Butler, it looked like any other old M1911, although it was in very good condition. He then noticed the writing on the barrel: S.MFG. CO. ELIZABETH, N.J., U.S.A.
Butler turned back and with one final swing, managed to break through the window. “What’s the serial number?” he asked, climbing into the apartment.
“S.800010,” Swanson read, climbing in after him.
Butler helped her down onto the floor and took the pistol from her admiringly. “That’s some old guy, it’s probably worth about a hundred grand!”
Holy fuck!” she replied, taking it back and trying to work out if it was made of some type of precious metal.
“It’s who made it that makes it valuable, not what it’s made of.”
Butler lifted the trap door to reveal the tunnel below, reaching out for the gun. Swanson handed it over and then noticed the apartment. It was like travelling back to the olden times. It reminded her of the sets of
Mad Men
, one of her favorite shows.
“Come on!” shouted Butler from the tunnel below, snapping her out of her thoughts. “Grab a flashlight, they’re on the table, and follow me.”
As she made her way down the ladder she could already hear Butler pounding along the tunnel ahead. On reaching the bottom, she tried her best to keep up but he was already well ahead. His faint glow in the distance disappeared into the blackness of the tunnel. So this was one of the famous White House tunnels, the subject of so many myths and legends. However, from what Butler had told her, this one didn’t figure in any myth or legend, as nobody had known about it for over 60 years.
When she reached the end of the tunnel, totally exhausted, Butler looked as fresh as he had first thing in the morning. She really needed to try this Parkours thing that kept him so fit.
He stood smiling triumphantly. “It looks like he’s got out,” announced Butler happily.
At her confused look, he further explained, “The capsule is down here, so he must have used it to get out at some point. If he were in his residence, it would be up there. It’s one way, you can’t call it, not that you need to. The president can’t exactly leave this way and appear entering the White House somewhere else. It also means it can never be used to break into the residence. So from a security perspective it’s perfect.”
“So if it wasn’t here how were we going to get in?” she asked between breaths.
“Any way we could. I’d have tried to climb up the shaft and cut my way through the floor of the capsule if I had to.”
“It’s metal,” she pointed out.
“I’ve never seen it. It was stuck up at the residence before.”
“What now?” she asked, having regained most of her breath and composure.
The sound of automatic gunfire from above answered her question.
With so much happening at once, Jack’s eyes were darting around the room. Why had Kenneth handed him the cell? Why was Lauren Swann not Lauren Swann? And what the hell had he just done to Russia? He brought his cell phone to his ear, while screaming at Kenneth or anyone to get the Secretary of Defense on the phone.
“Ilya, I’m sorry,” he managed before the line went dead.
Everything went dead. The TV blinked and went black. His cell had no signal displaying. The Navy Watch Commander was hitting the receiver bar on the landline telephone trying to get a signal. His cell was down also.
The scream of the agent from the doorway caught everyone’s attention. One of the students who had been standing innocently beside him stood with a knife dripping with blood in his hand. The other nine students, including the imposter Lauren Swann, had produced knives seemingly from nowhere and attacked with all the ferocity and skill of hardened and seasoned killers. They quickly overpowered the surprised Secret Service agents in the doorway and secured their handguns and MP-5 submachine guns. Frank had already reacted, along with another of the president’s detail and rushed Jack towards the lounge, the only door they could get access to. While one agent laid down cover fire, Frank threw Jack into the lounge.
“Get him!” screamed Kenneth Lee in Chinese.
The students, who were in fact Chinese Special Forces soldiers, began to move as the highly trained team they really were, eliminating the rest of the threats in the room and securing the Secret Service agents’ weapons. Their knives were made of a composite, undetectable to the scanners that had been used as part of the search that each of them had had to submit to on entry. Surprise had been their biggest weapon and having selected exclusively fresh faced and student-aged looking operatives, it had worked perfectly.
Just as it had worked at every one of the secure locations across the nation. The two hundred and fifty killers had pulled the same trick at each of the Future Leader program tours. In the space of a few minutes, they had wiped out almost the entire line of succession and the majority of the military chain of command. Having secured arms at each of their locations from the guards they had surprised, the teams were systematically scouring and eliminating each of the predetermined targets they had been given at each location.
On relaying the order to Admiral Keeler to launch the attack on the Russians, the Secretary of Defense had been slaughtered along with most of the Joint Chiefs at Raven Rock. Those who were at the Pentagon met a similar fate shortly afterwards. Mount Weather had similarly seen the slaughter of all high-ranking cabinet members and military personnel. No one had been spared. If they were at all linked to the chain of command or the succession plan, they had been killed.
Frank looked at Jack for guidance. They had made their way through to the president’s bedroom where Jack had grabbed his own pistol from his bedside cabinet. Nobody had followed as yet, but gunfire was echoing throughout the residence and the White House. They were trapped. On one side was the hall; not an option. The minute they stepped into it, they’d be at the wrong end of a shooting gallery. On the other, the president’s study and a dead end.
“Jack it’s over, you may as well come out!” shouted Kenneth triumphantly. Jack did not miss the fact that he hadn’t called him ‘Mr. President’. “We’ve eliminated the entire line of succession and military chain of command. Once you’re gone, America is leaderless!”
Frank stood ready to defend the president with his life, something Jack was not going to let him do. It would be a totally pointless death and very unbecoming of such an excellent agent. That and the fact that Jack could more than look after himself.
“We fight together,” said Jack adamantly, making it clear they were equals. He would stand tall and fight like the great soldier he was. He owed it to all the men and women who had served him so well and, if Kenneth’s taunts were true, had been murdered.
Frank nodded. He understood, but he wasn’t sure whether he would be able to do what the president asked and not take the bullet for him. He was conditioned from entry into the protective detail. You took the bullet, no questions asked.
“Why bother, Kenneth? There are four hundred missiles heading our way!” shouted Jack through the door, realizing the total futility of their actions.
“Oh, Jack, you have no idea. That’s not what this is about,” said Kenneth, “They’re satellite killers, not nukes! We’re not destroying America, we’re taking it.”
Jack laughed. “The Chinese take America? Ridiculous. Our forces will obliterate you off the face of the planet!”
“They’ll be too busy fighting Russia for us, Jack,” taunted Kenneth.
“Jesus! Don’t you know anything about us, Kenneth? We don’t lie down and take it like
you
little fuckers would,” he fumed. “The American people will stand and fight.”
“Jack, the American people don’t know what to think, they’ve just lost power, television, phone signals, the internet. In fact, everything. They have nothing but a little water pressure. The Trust controlled it all and we just switched it off. Just as they discovered Pearl Harbor was being bombed, they lost everything.” Kenneth was loving it. Jack had nowhere to go and he could gloat as to how easy it had all been and how easy it was going to be.
“They probably think we’ve been nuked by the Russians, but they’ll never know any better, they’ll be too busy fighting for food over the next few weeks.”
“The Army doesn’t need the chain of command,” Jack said. Every time Kenneth spoke, he just wanted to wring the smarmy little fucker’s neck.
Kenneth went quiet as he received an update on his cell. An entirely separate and secure network was installed to allow the Trust to communicate beyond the kill. The first salvo had been fired by the US and NATO forces in Europe. It was a massive strike that had eliminated a huge number of Russian forces. The might of the US forces was overwhelming. Kenneth sent a second message and received instant confirmation it had been received.
“Not gonna happen, I’m afraid,” replied Kenneth. “You see, we’ve just castrated your mighty forces.”
With the news of the strike on Pearl Harbor, Admiral Keeler had ordered his troops to stand by to attack. He just needed the order. When it came, they were off and running almost instantly. The first wave charged off, desperate to avenge their colleagues in Hawaii. It didn’t take long for them to be within range. The advanced tracking systems and target designators lit up across the battlefield. Targets were selected by computer and relayed to a central database. This ensured that no object was over-targeted and an equal distribution of weaponry would ensure the maximum number of kills per salvo.
With the president’s command to teach them a lesson in power, Admiral Keeler held back his long-range weaponry and waited until almost every piece of equipment at his disposal came into effective range before firing. It was a massacre, with the Russians taking massive casualties. The long range Howitzers, Abrams tanks and Apache choppers made mincemeat of the far less impressive forces. The Air Force hadn’t even got in on the game yet. Their bombers and A10 tank killers were going to have to pick up the pieces at this rate.
As they readied for a second volley, everything stopped. The command center that had been a buzzing hive of activity was silenced. Screens went blank and all radio chatter ceased. Admiral Keeler walked out of the mobile command center where he had stationed himself, just a few miles from the action. A flight of F-22 Raptors screeched overhead. As he watched them, each rocked slightly, then flipped and dived straight into the ground, their pilots having no chance to eject before they crashed, exploding in a massive fireball.
“What the fuck happened?!” he screamed to anyone around.
Nobody heard him.
His cell rang. At least something was working. “Admiral, what the fuck are you guys doing?” screamed the posh British accent of the Brigadier General in charge of the British forces.
“I’ve no idea, we’ve lost all communications,” he replied.
“What and all fight? We’re sitting here watching the Russians just tear into your guys without them firing a shot back!’ he screamed in frustration. “We’re trying our best to protect them but the Russians are mighty pissed and there’s a hell of a lot of them!”
Admiral Keeler’s phone died just then, no signal showed on the screen. He had no idea what was happening but he was no use there. He yelled for a jeep. He wanted to get to the front line.
“
Castrated?” asked Jack.
Kenneth laughed. “You’ll never know. Good bye, Jack.”
“Wait, Kenneth. One thing. Why?”
“Because we can,” Kenneth replied before shouting something in Chinese. Bullets started to pound into the door they had barricaded as best they could but it wouldn’t hold for long.
“Sir, the study,” instructed Frank, moving back towards the door to nowhere.