Zero Option

26

Brigadier General Carrothers sat in the Chemical Corps operations module of the Army Command Center, sipping his second cup of their notoriously noxious coffee. The Army Command Center, unlike those of the other services, had been constructed down in the basement of the Pentagon, presumably to protect it from enemy bombers. Despite heavy-duty air conditioning, the place smelled of mildew. The entire Pentagon building had been built on pilings in a tidal swamp; the state of the tide in the Po tomac could be determined by how far up the wall the concrete was sweating. Legions of bored watch officers over the years had marked the range of various tides on the wall in black Magic Marker.

Major Mason was on the phone, having a discussion with the duty officer at the Anniston Army Weapons Depot, when the module intercom sounded off.

“CW module, you have a call from Fort Mcclellan on line thirty-six, secure.”

Carrothers signified he would get it and picked up the STU-in handset.

The caller was the provost marshal, asking for Major Mason.

“No, this is General Carrothers. Did you pick that guy up?”

“Good evening, sir. No, sir, we did not. He wasn’t at the motel, and the local police report no sign of the Fort Gillem sedan in either Oxford or Anniston. We have the Highway Patrol looking. The sedan is distinctive: it’s a white GSA Crown Vie. If he’s out on the interstate, they should find him.”

“Is there any indication that he knows people want to find him?”

“Well, General, we called the DCIS regional office and spoke to his supervisor, a Mr. Sparks. He says he talked to Stafford this evening, but Stafford wouldn’t tell him where he was exactly. Only said he was hi Anniston.”

“Did this Sparks have any idea why one of his people was nosing around the Anniston Depot?”

“Sir, he got kind of coy when I asked that question. I got the sense that he wanted to get his hands on Stafford just as much as we do, so there’s a chance he does know what the guy’s up to. But if he does, he wasn’t going to tell me. I think we’ve got a pretty good chance. That vehicle is pretty distinctive.”

“If he’s still in it,” Carrothers said. “Where’s the last place you would look for that vehicle?”

The provost marshal thought for a moment. “Here, on post.”

“Yeah-And the local cops won’t look there, either. Get your post MPs out and take a look around. This guy may be smarter than we thought.”

Twenty minutes later, an embarrassed provost marshal was back on the phone, announcing the Crown Vic’s discovery in the motor pool’s parking lot. Stafford was now driving a black Chrysler sedan.

“And when did he engineer this little swap, Colonel?”

“This evening, General. While we were downtown rousting the Holiday Inn.

If he’s running to Atlanta, he’s there and then some by now.”

Carrothers hung up on him without reply. He had successfully suppressed the urge to yell, but he figured telephone rudeness would convey his displeasure. He back-briefed Major Mason.

“He’s a cool one, this guy,” Mason observed. “Assuming he figured out the MPs were on the way, that took some balls to drive back to the post and swap cars.”

“I’ve got this bad feeling that somehow this guy has figured out why that team showed up at the DRMO in a Atlanta,” Carrothers said. “His boss is obviously pissed 4 off at him, and yet he apparently went all cute when the provost tried to find out why DCIS wants him.back.”

Mason nodded. “Well, sir, the bad news is that we may have an intergovernment coordination problem; the good news is that the missing cylinder was destroyed with its container.”

Carrothers stared across the module at the major. Then faces were gray in the artificial red-tinged lighting. “You absolutely, positively sure of that, Major?” “Oh, yes, sir, General,” Mason said, putting a stiffly. sincere expression on his face. “General Waddell said that’s what happened, so that’s what happened. General, Sir.”

Carrothers treated Mason to a stony glare, but then he looked away. The screens on the Command Center communications consoles stared back him.

Waddell had made things very clear to him. The Army Chemical Corps could not have lost a weapon. It was simply not possible. And senior officers in the Chemical Corps who persisted in turning over rocks related to this unfortunate matter would do so at their professional peril.

But what had Sue said? Trust your instincts? All of them?

“Mason, here’s what I want,” Carrothers said, getting to his feet. “I want that Anniston sweep team reconstituted and reinforced. Four trucks instead of two. I want them sent back into that DRMO at Fort Gillem.

Tonight, like between zero one hundred and zero five hundred. I want them out of there before first light. Out of Atlanta beforei sunrise.

This time, I want them to search that whole place, not just the demil area. I don’t want anyone to know about this at the DRMO. I want an MP detachment from Anniston to go along to set up a discreet cordon around the DRMO so nobody intrudes while this is going on. If anybody does intrude, I want that person apprehended.” “Yes, sir,” Mason said, reaching for the secure phone.’; “I’ll get right on it. And General Waddell, sir?”

“I’ll handle General Waddell, Major,” Carrothers replied. “He’s got a social function tonight, and he’s leaving for a PACCOM tour on Monday.

One more thing: I want that DCIS supervisor, Sparks, on the horn after you get the reaction team in motion. Move out, Major.”

“Yes, sir. Moving out, sir.”

Carrothers walked through the main operations center and out the glass doors into the basement segment of the F-ring. He walked along the semidarkened corridor, which, was lined with forklifts and stacked pallets. The ceiling was cluttered with steam pipes and electrical cables serving the enormous building above. He walked along the silent corridor until he came to the escalator up to the ground level. It being a weekend evening, the escalator was turned off, so he sprinted up the seventy feet of steel steps to the [A-ring. Then he did what he usually did when he needed ‘ to think about a problem: He walked around the five-sided A-ring at a brisk stride, his leather heels echoing in the empty corridors. I He was already way out in front of his friendly front lines with the orders he had just issued. The higher echelons of the Army obviously wanted this matter buried. j There would be some swift and meaningful retribution handed out at the lower levels in Anniston, or, more likely, at Tooele, for letting the thing get away, but if Waddell found out he was having the team go back into the DRMO, Carrothers knew he might join the various guilty bastards up on the scaffold. His chances for a second star and command of the Chemical Corps would vanish.

Luckily, General Waddell was going on travel again, which is why he wanted them in and out tonight, on a weekend, when there should be nobody there. He personally would call the commanding officer at Fort Gillem and tell nun that the last exercise had turned into a Lebanese goat-grab and that he was rousting the team out to do it again, until they got it right. Just one more exercise, if you don’t mind, Colonel.

No big deal.

But the crucial question remained: Had the weapon been destroyed, as everyone was hoping and praying? Or had it been found and stolen by someone at that DRMO? And if it had been stolen, what would the guy who found it do with it? Try to sell it? Or maybe blackmail the Army for money? Pay me off or I’ll tell the world you lost one? He didn’t even want to think about the other possibilities that a missing can of Wet Eye presented.

He couldn’t escape the conclusion that this DCIS agent, Stafford, had stumbled onto something relating to the missing cylinder, that Stafford had somehow discovered ‘ that the Anniston team’s first visit had not been an exercise. But there was no way he could know that — unless that was what he was doing down there in the first place.

He shook his head. No way. He was thinking in circles here. Just as he was walking in circles around the five sides of old Fort Fumble by the Sea. A propane-powered tractor rattled past him, pulling a wagon train of Xerox paper down the otherwise-empty corridor. He headed back toward the basement escalator.

Two issues to resolve, he thought. First, Fort Gillem: Revisit that DRMO, make damn sure there is no trace of a Wet Eye cylinder there. And, second, talk to the DCIS supervisor in Smyrna, find out what the hell his Washington agent was really doing at that DRMO in the first place, and why he had gone off on his own to Anniston. He’d have to think of a pretext for the call. Well, for starters, the guy had shown up at the Anniston Army Weapons Depot, where he had no business to be.

We fervently hope, he thought as he trotted down the escalator.