The Theory of Games (14 page)

Another burst of static on the headset, “Chalk 1 Leader! Chalk 1 Leader! I’m hearing fire from your direction!”

“I just got hit, you fucking idiot! Do you have the First Lady?”

“Yeah, yeah, she’s here. I’ve got her.”

“Good. Hold her tight. Take her to the Ground Floor on the West Wing. I’m going to personally beat the crap out of her.”

He stomped down the stairway leaving streaks of blood on the brass hand rail and turned to his right past the Presidential Barber Shop. Chalk 2 was engaged in a nasty little firefight at the far end of the corridor. The stairwell opened up behind the Secret Service agents who had attempted to set up a defensive perimeter just outside their office door on the left. They did not anticipate his arrival behind their position.

His HUD dimmed and then brightened from his wound. He held his breath to steady his aim and watched as the targeting laser traced a small circle at the base of the skull of the first Secret Service agent whose eyes were wide with fear while he furiously sprayed bullets from his Uzi down the hallway towards the lobby where Chalk 2 was returning fire.

He pulled the trigger and the agent spun about, his eyes as big as silver dollars, his finger locked on the Uzi’s trigger, spraying the ceiling above.

Quickly he took out the second agent and then the third. He pressed the send button, “Chalk 2 this is White Knight Leader, hold fire, hold fire, I’m coming out.” He left the stairwell and walked over to where the Secret Service agents lay on the ground. One was still gasping for life; trying to suck air into his lungs even though his windpipe had been blown out. Again, he lifted the night vision goggles from his eyes – this time with the muzzle of his pistol, his left arm now almost useless – so he could look into the dying man’s eyes.

“Where is he?”

The Secret Service agent could not answer; there was no air in his lungs. A tiny gurgling sound issued from his mouth.

White Knight Leader turned away in disgust and then - with a fury that came from being four minutes fifteen seconds behind schedule and having a blown out left arm – he pivoted on his left leg and just punted the dying Secret Service agent’s head into eternity. The sound of the agent’s third dorsal vertebra snapping was clearly audible above the din of the firefight just down the next hallway.

Chalk 2 Leader – who had been running back up the corridor towards this morbid tableau – stopped in his tracks and looked with awe at White Knight 1. He had never seen a man kicked to death before.

“Wherethefuck is Chalk 1 with the First Lady?”

Chalk 2 Leader blinked.

“I’m talking to you, shitforbrains, wherethefuck is Chalk 1?”

Stray rounds from the firefight up ahead were screaming past his head and smashing into the wall behind him kicking out small puffs of plaster.
It’s amateur night at the White House and I’m going to get my ass smoked,
he thought.

Just then Chalk 1 Leader descended the staircase pulling a screeching First Lady behind him. She looked almost nothing like her press photos. Her immaculately coiffed hair was now disheveled. The right side of her face was purple with contusions.
At least Chalk 1 Leader smacked her up a bit. Good.

A wicked thought flashed across White Knight 1’s brain which was no longer working correctly. Maybe it was the frustration of now being five minutes and 38 seconds behind schedule, or maybe it was just because he was a very wicked man.

He grabbed the First Lady by the back of the hair and threw her head first into the door to their right. Her anterior nasal spine shattered as it smashed into the door labeled “WOMEN’S RESTROOM”. White Knight 1 followed in her inside the tiled room.

The First Lady lay face down on the floor, a river of blood issuing from her nose. Her dark silk dress was halfway up her thighs. Her famous posterior prominently displayed.

Everything was quickly going to shit for White Knight 1.
Drastic situations call for drastic solutions
White Knight 1 thought. His hand was reaching towards the zipper on his combat fatigues when the door to the near stall burst open and the President of the United States threw himself at White Knight 1’s throat.

Caught off guard, White Knight 1 crashed to the floor; his Desert Eagle Special clattered across the tiles. The President threw himself on White Knight 1’s chest and pinioned the soldier arms beneath his six foot 1 inch frame; his years as a community organizer not wasted on the President.

Ahh, shit, how can things get any worse?

And then White Knight 1 heard a sound from above and looked up.

Above him he saw a pair of legs extruded from the ceiling – walking about as if they were riding a bicycle – falling through the object geometry. He could clearly see that these were the Florsheim-clad feet of a Secret Service agent walking about in the Press Secretary’s office one floor above the Women’s Restroom where the President of the United States was now beating the crap out of him.

And then he heard a clear sound - a voice that was not on the battle net crackling through his headset - it came from
outside
and it said, “It crashed. We have a crash. Reset.”

And then everything went black very quickly.

CHAPTER 4.1

It was Saturday night at Big Poppa’s and, if possible, it was even more over the legal capacity than the last time we played there. The gig had started at nine and for the last three hours I had been blessedly transported away from the events of the last two weeks. My world had been reduced to eighty-eight black and white keys and that was just fine by me.

Maybe because of Nick’s funeral a week ago or maybe for some other reason deep inside, John the Howler started off the last set of the evening with a monologue.

“When I was a child growing up in the hill country of Mississippi I was raised by my Granmaw,” he began. “She was a church-going woman. But the man she was married to, my step-Granpaw, was a bluesman.” I don’t know why but the half-drunk crowd was respectful and listened up.

“My church-going Granmaw taught me that the Blues came from the sanctified church,” John continued. “Granpaw taught me the Blues. Granmaw taught me Gospel. Gospel is the theory, the spirit, the
soul
of the Blues.”

John spun around and addressed the All Mojo All Stars, “You ready to take them to church?”

“Yeah!” we yelled back.

John spun back around to the crowd, “You ready to go to church?”

“Yeah!” the crowd yelled back.

“Let’s take ‘em to church.” Clyde the Foot, quick-counted a 2/4 and we launched into ‘Wings’ with that wonderful line, “You can’t drive a Cadillac to Heaven.”

It was a sublime set. We segued from Wings into Goin’ Down, did a couple of Delta inspired originals and ended up with Boom, Boom, Boom. I opened my eyes after the last chord, blinking to adjust to the stage lights, and I saw Katelynn entering the bar from way in the back. She had another fucking FedEx envelope with her.

This time Kate didn’t wave and holler for Billy Joel. She just squeezed her way through the crowd to the side of the stage and waited for me.

“Do you know the contents of the FedEx envelope?” I asked the Authoritarian Man.

“No, we don’t,” he replied.

This was a shock. Until now, every action, every movement of mine up until this point in the story the Authoritarian Man knew; knew in fact in greater detail than I remembered. They knew the room where I stayed at Maxwell (I didn’t remember), they had the receipt from the last breakfast that Katelynn, Bill, Nick and I shared. They knew the names, and probably the social security numbers of everyone that worked on the Stanhope simulation. It was at this point that I realized that we were entering
terra incognita
for the Authoritarian Man. And, because of this, the balance of power had perceptibly shifted in my favor. From here on out I could tell him the truth or not. I was in control and I was going to press this advantage any way I could to help Bill and me get the hell out of here.

“It was a plane ticket,” I told the Authoritarian Man truthfully.

“A plane ticket to where?” he asked.

“A plane ticket to Washington.”

CHAPTER 4.2

It’s always unsettling flying into Washington Reagan – my friend Matt Case calls it ‘Dutch International’ in honor of the fortieth president’s old radio moniker – partly because the approach is over the Potomac River and the plane is sinking inexorably lower and the water is rising up to swallow you and your brain becomes absolutely convinced that an awful drowning death is imminent. Then at the last possible minute a bit of causeway appears under the wheels and then a runway and you touch down with a lurch and a squeal of brakes and the pilot throttles back and you’re thrown forward in your seat, the restraints trying to cut you in half at your waist, and then the first half of the internal terror is over and you’re taxiing to a gate.

The other reason why flying into Dutch International scares the shit out of me is because when you leave the airport you find yourself in Washington, D.C., the vertex of the world’s power and the Pro Bowl of intrigue and deceit and I know I’m desperately out of my depth. I am a little Midwestern pan fish swimming with the barracudas. Every time I fly out to Washington something bad happens.

When I walked off the jetway, Lieutenant Colonel Finley was waiting.

“Finley was there, inside the terminal?” the Authoritarian Man asked.

“Uh huh,” I answered and we both knew that was something pretty unusual because since 9/11 airport security was tight but the security at Reagan was the tightest of all. Nobody, absolutely nobody, without the highest security was allowed near the jetways without a boarding pass.

Finley extended his hand and greeted me warmly. I couldn’t help but notice that West Point ring (
Duty
,
Honor
,
Country
; USMA Class of 2006) and I wondered to myself: it’s fucking impossible for someone to go from shave tail lieutenant to light colonel in five years. It’s not unprecedented; it’s impossible. And he’s got top security clearance as well.

“Glad you could make it on such short notice, Professor Grant,” Finley pumped my hand.

We exchanged the usual ‘flight okay?’ babble as we walked down the corridor, through security and out of the terminal. Finley motioned to what had become standard issue for the power elite in D. C.: a black SUV with government plates that was parked in a ‘No Loading’ zone. A uniformed security guard waved to Finley.

“Do you remember the license plates, Jake?” the Authoritarian Man asked.

“Sorry, Jim, I don’t. They were, you know, the standard U. S. government plates: white with blue numbers.”

“How about the car, Jake, do you remember anything about that?”

“It was a big, black gas-guzzler. That’s all I know.”

“Okay, about what time did you land in Washington?”

I told him.

“Maybe there’s something on the security tapes.”

“Sounds reasonable,” I answered, “Look, this is a good time to take a break. How about some coffee and a visit with Bill?”

“Sounds reasonable,” the Authoritarian Man answered.

Ten minutes later Bill bounded through the door dragging one pissed-off handler behind him. Now that he was no longer in a choke collar there was nothing stopping Bill from putting his full strength into going where he wanted to go when he wanted to get there.

Bill looked good. I hoped I looked good to him. Somehow we both knew that we owed it to each other to get healthy, get our strength back because there was soon going to be a moment when we would make our move. We would have one shot, one roll of the dice and we had to do anything we could to tip the scales in our favor.

The junior Authoritarian Man came into the room and handed a sheaf of printouts to his boss. I was still petting Bill who was slurping away at my arm when the Authoritarian Man showed me the pictures from the security cameras at Reagan.

It was me all right, walking around, blinking in the bright D.C. sunlight, sucking down a quick cigarette, but there was never a clear shot of Finley’s face; the brim of his officer’s hat was too low on his forehead, his back was turned, there was always something. The back of the SUV was clearly visible, though.

“You can make out the license plate numbers pretty clearly on these pictures,” I told the Authoritarian Man.

“Yeah, they’re pretty clear,” he said noncommittally.

“Okay, so you could run the tags,” and as soon as I said it I realized:
they had already run the tags; they’re fake.
Fake tags, fake top security badges, a fake major general, who can put together an operation like this?

CHAPTER 4.3

They took Bill away. The handler wasn’t making much progress dragging him out the door until I told Bill to behave. I thought it was important that we sandbagged and gave every appearance of cooperation until the time came for us to make our move. As Bill was leaving they brought the coffee in. The Authoritarian Man poured me a cup and handed it to me. It seemed like he was prepared to leave my right hand untethered to the gurney.

“Where did you and Colonel Finley go after you left Reagan?” the Authoritarian Man resumed the questioning.

We pulled out of Reagan and headed north into the spaghetti bowl of freeways. For a brief moment I caught a glimpse of the classic, cliché establishing shot of Washington, D.C.: the Tidal Basin, the bridge, the monuments and then Finley turned onto a series of off ramps and on ramps and we were headed west. It was a short drive; not even ten minutes in the usual D. C. traffic before we pulled up in front of the North Gates.

“The Pentagon,” the Authoritarian Man said.

Yup, the Pentagon. I’ve driven past it a dozen times but I’ve never gone through those gates. Security was tight – what a stupid thing to say - but Finley’s papers were in order, I guess. After plenty of saluting we drove right over to the west side, the very spot where the plane smashed into the building on 9/11.