Back Blast

56

A middle-aged secretary called for Denny Carmichael as he sat on the sofa outside the office of the director of the Central Intelligence Agency. “The director will see you now.”

Denny walked into the office of the D/CIA, a seventy-three-year-old former congressman and senator from Alabama who had also served in the directorships of Homeland Security, Defense, and even Energy. The man’s political career began in the state house in Birmingham, and it had never stopped, covering a period of fifty years.

Carmichael saw D/CIA as an intelligent man, but ultimately nothing more than a carpetbagger, a pol who took the reins of U.S. intelligence only because it was considered by others to be a coveted position, and his friend the president asked him to do so as a personal favor.

Despite the negative view the director of the National Clandestine Service held for the chief of the CIA, the man had left Denny alone, having gotten the hint from the former director of intelligence that the less one knew about the inner workings of Denny Carmichael’s NCS fiefdom, the better for one’s own tenure. Denny got things done… no need to dig into just how he accomplished this.

But now, as the two men shook hands perfunctorily and Denny sat on a sofa across from the handsome septuagenarian in the four-thousand-dollar suit, he worried that was all about to come to an end in the director’s mind, because D/CIA was finally getting serious heat from those above him.

The director said, “Not sure if you’ve heard yet, but I’m heading to Capitol Hill tomorrow morning for a closed-door session. I’m going to have to talk about this mess going on in the District. And I’m not going to get away with saying I don’t know a goddamned thing, even though the truth is that I really don’t know a goddamned thing.”

Carmichael said, “I understand, sir. Please know, I kept this situation off your radar for your own good.”

“I’m sure you did, and nine times out of ten I need you to do just that. But this time my willful ignorance has bit me in the ass, because I don’t know anything more than what I’ve seen on TV and read in the papers.”

“Yes, sir. Unfortunately, the enemy gets a vote, and this personality we are after has proven extremely difficult to remove from the chessboard.”

“Cathy King over there at the Post says it’s a homegrown threat. That true?”

Carmichael heaved his shoulders. “More or less.”

D/CIA cocked his head and looked at Carmichael through narrow eyes. “More? Or less?”

“He used to be one of ours. Former SAD Ground Branch.”

D/CIA winced as if he’d just put his hand on a hot plate. “Don’t tell me it’s the Gray Man.”

“I’m afraid so.”

“My predecessor told me about this one. He’s on the presidential kill list. Number one target, from what I remember. Is that right?”

Denny corrected him gently. “Actually he’s the number one target who is also a U.S. Citizen. He’s number nineteen on the list overall.”

“Right,” D/CIA said. “You know, I get to claim some plausible deniability with you and your exploits, since the president has supported your work for so long. I mean, hell, when POTUS is also president of your fan club, I can let a lot of things slide. But not this time.”

Carmichael said, “If you can run interference with Congress and do your best to keep the DOJ away from this, even for just a couple more days, then I give you my personal guarantee that we will terminate this individual, and there will be nothing more to do but handle a little after-action fallout.”

Carmichael expected D/CIA to open his drawer and pull out a bottle of Maalox. He wasn’t suited for this type of work. But the next thing the man from Alabama said surprised him greatly.

“What alternative do I have? I can already hear them in the congressional inquiries. Carmichael’s your top spook, they’ll say… This happened on your watch. Hell, the Republicans are already plucking the chickens and heatin’ up the tar.”

Denny said nothing. Must have been some sort of Alabama reference, he assumed.

D/CIA said, “I can take some heat and buy you some time. But not much. What else can I do for you, something that might make killing this man easier?”

Carmichael blew out an inward sigh of relief. Then he decided to press his luck. “There is one other initiative that might be helpful, sir.”

“Let’s hear it.”

“Unmanned aerials.”

“Unmanned aerials? You mean drones?”

“Small ones. No more than three up at any one time. Crisscrossing the District. We have the best facial recognition suites known to man, but this personality has gone to great lengths to defeat them. If we were able to find, fix, and finish him from the air, then we could end this situation in short order.”

“Finish.” D/CIA said it softly, a statement, not a question, weighing the import of that word.

Denny nodded slowly. He had expected some shock from the man, but the older man showed nothing to indicate this was unexpected.

“You are asking for armed drones, then?” the director asked.

Denny replied defensively. “There are weaponized platforms that are extremely discreet. Virtually undetectable, and fundamentally no chance for collateral damage considering all the fail-safes and controls we have in place to prevent accidents and overkill.”

The silence in the room hung over both men. Until: “Just one perfunctory question, Denny.”

“What’s that?”

D/CIA leaned forward. “Have you lost your fucking mind?”

Carmichael sighed. Clearly, he would not be getting his armed drones.

“I’m not putting fucking remote-controlled killing machines in the airspace over Washington, D.C.!”

“I understand, sir. We’ll proceed without them. I just thought you understood how dangerous a situation we have here, from a political perspective, if nothing else.”

D/CIA snorted out a laugh. “There is one thing you are not taking into consideration, Carmichael. One thing that makes me very different from you.”

“And what’s that?”

“I don’t really give a damn about your Gray Man. I hope you get him before he murders more of our good people, but this really isn’t my fight. And I don’t care about politics. Not anymore. CIA won’t be my last job, but it sure as hell will be my last government job. I’ll be a college president three weeks after walking out the door here, and no one at UCLA or Duke is going to give a rat’s ass that a rogue assassin rampaged around in D.C. for a few days shooting fascist spymasters before he was shot dead.”

Neither Ohlhauser nor Babbitt were fascists, nor were they spymasters. But Denny got the point.

“I understand, sir,” Denny said, but it wasn’t true. He was tired of kissing this man’s ass. It hadn’t won him what he wanted. So he changed gears. “You don’t want to be involved, I get it. But understand this. I will get what I need. Even if I am forced to pursue other avenues.”

“You mean you’re going to go to POTUS.”

“I haven’t ruled it out.”

The director said, “I’m the goddamned director of the CIA. You report to me.”

“And I have reported.”

The seventy-three-year-old fumed. “You see yourself as the king here, Carmichael. The master of all you survey. You don’t think you can be stopped, do you?”

A small snicker from Denny now. “Not by you, sir. No.”

D/CIA rose to this challenge. “I might not be a killer like you, but by virtue of my title and rank, you know I have access to people who can stop people like you.”

Carmichael just smiled. “You have direct access, of course. You just call me up, and I arrange it. Which means, I have access to the same assets as you.”

“That a threat?”

Carmichael shook his head. “Nothing of the sort. I am just reminding you that I serve as a buffer between you and the elements out there that could be harmful to you.” He paused. “Politically. I am speaking in purely political terms. Don’t get dramatic.”

“Get out of my office.”

Denny stood and turned for the door. Then, just as Denny knew he would, the director blinked.

“Carmichael?”

Denny turned. “Sir?”

“Go back to your cave. Kill this man who’s causing so much trouble. I’ll give you a lot of latitude, just like you were going after some high-value target overseas. But I’m not giving you killer robots.”

“Very well, sir.”

He turned to leave again, but once more the director called out. “They tell me you have been sleeping in your office for the last week.”

“Well… I’ve been working.”

“I’ll abide a lot of your extreme actions, Denny, but not that one. Not even considering your situation. Sets a bad tone for the younger generation when we old folks don’t behave with the proper decorum. You’re a divisional director, for God’s sake. Start acting like one. This isn’t a boardinghouse.”

Carmichael blew out a hidden sigh of frustration. “Sir.”

Carmichael stuck his head in Suzanne Brewer’s TOC just five minutes later. Brewer had been leaning over one of her analysts while he checked a possible Gentry sighting in Foggy Bottom. It wasn’t Gentry, the two of them decided almost immediately, so Suzanne was just about to head back to her office when she looked up to find herself facing the director of her division.

“Sir?”

She’d grown accustomed to Denny’s clipped voice.

“I need a safe house, stat. You keep the TOC running here, but I need to get away from the Langley Campus to work without the director’s interference. I want to be linked to you with a dedicated umbilical, not out in the boonies, but close by.”

Brewer thought a moment. “Springfield Twelve has all the coms you’ll need.”

Carmichael shook his head. “Alexandria Eight has better security, I’ll go there.”

“We haven’t used Alexandria Eight in years.”

“It’s a fortress. I want a fortress.”

“Yes, sir. I’ll get a team there stat to sweep and clean, and pull tech staff to get everything online. I’ll oversee it personally. Give me a little time to prep and we’ll schedule a movement to your new facility by the end of the day.”

“Good,” Denny said, then he disappeared from the doorway.

“Sir?” she called after him, and he returned. He looked annoyed. “Zack Hightower isn’t answering his phone.”

“Don’t worry about it. He’s doing something for Mayes. You might or might not get him back.”

“But—”

Carmichael interrupted. “Alexandria Eight, Suzanne.”

“Yes, sir.”