Mounting Fears

62

WILL STOOD ON THE PODIUM, LETTING WAVES OF APPLAUSE AND WHISTLES WASH over him. It had been his best speech of the campaign, he knew, and those who did not see it on live television would be bombarded with half a dozen carefully constructed sound bites the following day, the last before the election.

He shook hands on the podium and in the green room for half an hour, then was whisked back to the Presidential Suite at the Hotel Bel-Air. As he walked into the suite he saw Kitty Conroy standing, holding a telephone. Half his campaign staff was assembled in the room.

"It's Kate," Kitty said. "I mean, the director of Central Intelligence."

Will took the phone from her. "Yes?"

"Mr. President," Kate said, "one of our Navy SEAL teams now in Pakistan has apparently located the warhead."

"Is it secure?"

"No. A team of eight is on the ground in a village hardly big enough for that name. Apparently, there are more goats than people, but we know it's a hotbed of Taliban and Al Qaeda activity. They estimate fifty men in the village. We have a live feed from the team right now. A Lieutenant Parsons is the leader, code name Striker."

Will pressed the speaker button on the phone and hung up the receiver, motioning everybody to sit down and listen. The voices were low, but intense.

"This is Striker. I'm twelve yards from the house, and my readings have doubled. This is definitely ground zero. There's a window, and we're going to approach." There was the sound of feet on gravel, running.

"Striker, this is Hitman. Do you require support?"

"Negative, Hitman. We're planting the charge now. Start for base camp, we'll catch up. Hang on, a vehicle is approaching the house."

"I see it, Striker. It appears to be a large flatbed truck, covered with a tarp."

"They're going to move it," Striker replied.

"The tarp is off. There is what appears to be a missile on the bed, but there is no warhead."

"Hitman, start your stopwatch on my mark-detonation in three minutes. Fire a Hellfire at the vehicle five seconds early."

"Roger, Striker."

"Three, two, one, mark." Again, the sound of running feet.

"Kate," Will said.

"I'm here."

"What kind of charge is he planting?"

"C-four."

"And a Hellfire missile to be fired at the truck?"

"Correct. It's shoulder-mounted."

"Is the combination of the two explosions going to endanger the team?"

"They have three minutes to put ground between them and the village, and there is available rocky cover. They'll be all right if the warhead doesn't detonate."

"Are you telling me that one or both of those explosions might detonate the warhead?"

"We don't know for sure. I'm told that the people holding the warhead may have modified it. The standard warhead is set for airburst. If they've altered it for a contact burst, then the force of the explosion could set it off."

"And we have no information on whether they've done so?"

"None."

"I would have liked to have had the opportunity to consider that possibility," Will said.

"I'm sorry, Mr. President, but we've been listening to this mission for less than four minutes, and, in any case, we have no direct contact with the team leader. We're listening on a one-way relay, and in order to contact them, we would have to call the base in Afghanistan, they would call a chopper, and the chopper would contact the team."

Will heard somebody at Kate's end say, "Ninety seconds." He stood and listened, straining for any sound. All he could hear was heavy breathing and running footsteps.

"Keep going, Striker," a voice said into the radio. "I'll be right behind you after I fire the missile."

"Roger, Hitman," the panting Striker responded, and the footsteps continued.

Will looked around the room. Everybody was staring at the telephone, rapt.

"Thirty seconds," a voice at Kate's end said.

"God help them," Kitty said, then was shushed.

"Ten seconds, Striker," a male voice said.

"Take cover!" Striker shouted, abandoning caution.

A whoomp sound came from the other end. "Missile fired," a voice yelled, followed a second later by a large explosion.

"Three, two, one," Kate said. There was a noise, then another explosion, followed a fraction of a second later by a shrieking noise, followed by silence.

"Their radios are fried," a voice from Kate's end said somberly.

"What does that mean, Kate?"

"Charlie, call downstairs!" Kate yelled. "I want a tremor report instantly!" She came back on the line. "This is not good, Will."

Will could hear a telephone ringing at her end. "What's happening?"

A male voice replied. "Detonation confirmed."

"Will," she said, "the warhead detonated. The team on site is dead, along with everybody else in the village, and maybe some of the other villages and other teams, too."

Other voices were shouting information at her.

"Will, I'm told that a chopper was in the air between ten and twenty miles from the village. That will be gone, too."

"How soon will you have a casualty and damage estimate?"

"Everybody here is on that," she said. "I'll have to call you back, and I don't know when."

"I understand," Will said. "I'll be here. I'm sorry about your team, Kate. I'll want to call their families myself."

"I know you will. Good-bye for now."

Will hung up and looked around the room at the shocked faces. "You know everything I know," he said. "You'd better all get some sleep."

"Mr. President," Kitty said, "you're going to have to throw me out of here." There was a murmur of assent from the rest of the people present.

"All right," Will said, "Somebody send out for some coffee and sandwiches. It's going to be a long night."

WILL WAS DOZING in an armchair, his jacket off and his tie loose. Daylight was filtering through the blinds, and the clock read a little after seven a.m. The phone rang. He jerked awake and pressed the speaker button. "Yes?"

"Mr. President, I have a preliminary report," Kate said.

"Go ahead."

"The base in Afghanistan has made contact with all but two of the teams. The first we know about, the second was in a village four miles away. Both teams, one Navy SEAL, one Agency, comprising a total of nine men and two women, are presumed dead. All the other teams witnessed the detonation from a greater distance and from cover and have reported no casualties. They have all withdrawn to their base camps in Afghanistan and will be choppered out during the next twelve hours or so. An estimated one hundred to one hundred fifty villagers are presumed dead."

"I've heard nothing from Pakistan," Will said. "Has their government been in contact with anybody there?"

"Our station in Islamabad has canvassed its sources, and their estimate is that the Pakistani government believes that the people in possession of the warhead inadvertently set it off. It appears that we can, if you wish, deny involvement."

"No. I won't do that," Will said.

"There is one other report that you may find interesting," Kate said. "One of our sources has reported a gathering of more than a dozen top Al Qaeda and Taliban leaders in the region. There is some reason to believe that they may have been meeting in the village where the warhead detonated."

"I want every effort made to confirm that, and I want names as soon as possible," Will said.

"We're working on it, Mr. President."

"Call me back when you have more details," Will said. "I'm going to ask for network time at eight."

"Yes, sir."

Will hung up and turned to Kitty. "I want five minutes on all the networks at eight o'clock," he said.

"I'm on it," Kitty replied.

AT SEVEN-THIRTY A. M., Will spoke to President Khan of Pakistan. It was a tense conversation, but Khan seemed to grasp that what had occurred may have solved more problems for him than it created. He told Will that he had already dispatched troops. At eight a.m., Will broadcast from a conference room at the hotel. In a somber voice, he divulged every detail at his disposal, except the names of the dead, pending notification of their families.

At noon, as he was returning to Washington to pick up Kate, Will received another call from President Khan, confirming half a dozen names of those leaders killed in the detonation, and Will released them to the press on Air Force One.

He spent the remainder of the flight speaking to the families of the American dead.