Washington, D.C. The White House

Presidential Emergency Operations Center

President Craig Garner was having one of the worst days of his life; for the man who preferred to have hair-pulling situations under control, today was the day when he felt as if he had none.

He felt so tired, like everyone around him he did not sleep last night, only the constant supply of coffee kept him alert.

It all started the evening before when he was watching a game on TV and then his Secret Service detail barged into his room. Without so much as please, they hastily hauled him to the bunker. He knew that resisting them was futile. When they receive an evacuation order, they would disregard everybody, even him, until they arrived at a secure location. The only information they gave him was “Terrorist threat.”

As soon as he arrived, Martin, an agent in his security detail, informed him about what was happening in the Millennial Sports Arena. For the next hour, his eyes, like billions of others around the world, were glued to the TV screen—watching the unthinkable.

After 9/11, security measures were tightened to a very high degree, all for the reason of preventing exactly this kind of attack. Somehow, all their extensive preparations failed, and he was forced to listen to the deranged demands of a religious fanatic who was holding twenty-five thousand of his people hostage. He knew that not one of those demands could be accepted. When his Chief of Staff started to talk about a compromise, he silenced the man with one sharp look. Even if the price was the lives of all those people in the arena, the country could not bow to the terrorists. This was his final word on the matter, and he had no other option but to refuse them, even if that cost him his very soul.

The negotiators tried to buy some time so the plan for the rescue could be formed, but it was as if the terrorists didn’t really care if their demands were fulfilled. They could not even stop the live transmission because that would mean certain death to one human life every minute they were off the air.

At one point, the most horrifying thing happened. The terrorists were about to decapitate three young people on live television, blaming his procrastination as a cause. One of them was a young boy, barely out of his childhood. While the terrorist leader was spewing some religious drivel about punishing the infidels, the three hostages were trembling and kneeling in front of the three executioners who held big swords in their hands.

He already gave his consent for the SWAT teams to storm the arena, even knowing that particular order would result in many innocent deaths. There were no other options, and he prayed for a miracle, but not believing that it would be granted.

Many of those around him, and the majority of people watching from their homes averted their eyes; not wanting to see such a disturbing scene. Tears were streaming down their faces and they held those closest to them for support. But he could not look away; he steeled himself to keep his eye on the screen. This was his burden to carry, he needed to keep looking out of respect for three young lives that he swore to protect when he took the office… and was unable to.

That is why he saw the exact moment when the miracle he was praying for happened.

The three terrorists with the swords and their fanatical leader died in what seemed to him, the same instant. The white letters on the black flag behind them turned red and there was a fine red mist falling on the three bound people.

He held his breath while his mind was frozen in shock. Had the SWAT teams managed to get there in time? But there was no sound of gunfire. He glanced quickly around and saw that no one had an answer; they were all as confused as he was.

While one of the girls and the young boy were sobbing, looking at the floor, the other girl’s eyes were staring beside the camera, wide open. The camera was still filming and he could see her lips moving; he took the remote control that was on the table and pressed the button to increase the sound to the maximum. It was barely enough to hear what she was saying; it was the same word, whispered over and over again.

“Ghosts… ghosts… ghosts…”

***

The Missile Silo

Michael was pouring himself a freshly brewed cup of coffee; it was an old morning habit of his, even if his body did not really need it anymore to wake up.

Last night’s action was intense, and coming right after their mission in Somalia, quite exhausting. Oh, their bodies could have endured far more than that, but their minds were beaten. That was the main reason why they barely talked on the flight back to the silo.

Elizabeth and Anna were waiting for them when they came back, and so were Natalie and Lee, the two little girls Elizabeth transported to the silo. Nobody was really in a good mood but they all put on a happy face for the children.

Mary was with her husband on the AutoDoc level while he was undergoing regeneration treatments for his missing hand.

It always amazed Michael how much energy children had even after all they had been through, refusing to fall asleep until they could see that the team had safely come home.

The reason for the team’s low spirits was not remorse for ending the lives of fifteen terrorists, which was akin to taking out the trash. But all those security guards that lost their lives, were a bitter pill to swallow, and the sobering thoughts that if they had arrived just a bit later the whole world would have watched scenes of diabolical murder and destruction.

Soon after arriving to their missile silo base, each of them went to their separate levels; Michael took a long shower and hit the sack, and could feel Elizabeth coming in a little while later. She hugged him from behind while he slept; it was so calming that he didn’t even have any bad dreams, only a good night's rest.

Every morning TV news show was in a state of frenzy; every channel in the world was covering the same story. The identical footage, but with a hundred different theories about how the terrorist attack ended, with dozens of commentators in different languages.

The images of security guards lined up in body bags were disheartening; they died while doing their jobs, trying to protect the innocents. The terrorists’ actions did not end with killing those heroes; they damaged all those families they belonged to; people who were now grieving, never to see their loved ones again… only to mourn.

While part of Michael felt regret for not being able to arrive sooner, deep inside his soul a knot of anger and hate was solidifying, aimed at all those responsible for the last night’s events. The terrorists who did the deed were punished, but there were others out there, the people who financed it all, who planned it, who gave the order. While Murat al-Rashid led the attack, he was not smart enough to organize it all. If he ever found out who the members of this ‘High Council’ were, his hand would not waver, and he would end them without a second thought.

Be that as it may, now was not the time to deal with that; now his main concern was Alice.

Max had shown him the footage of her interrogation, and it was gruesome. She extracted the intel but the lines she had to cross to get it were beyond the pale. She would never have been put in such a situation if it weren’t for him.

What made him feel even guiltier inside was that if he had to choose again between her peace of mind and getting the info, he would have made the same choice, the stakes were just too high.

He needed to talk to her right now. The same type of conversation Jack had with him, a long time ago. There are times when necessity asks of you to do more than you are prepared, and afterward, you need someone to tell you that it was all right, for a greater purpose since you were fighting on the side of angels. Otherwise, self-doubt and insecurity will worm its way inside your soul, and tarnish it.

Half an hour later, Michael and Alice were in a transporter, hovering twenty miles above the silo. The view around them was mesmerizing, right in the middle of the stratosphere. The curvature of Earth was surrounded by a blue layer that merged with the black one above. Clouds were slowly passing beneath them, a perfect place when one would come to meditate.

Only Alice was not looking at that image, her gaze was fixed on her hands that she was rubbing against each other, trying to scrub off things that weren’t there. Michael waited until she was ready, so that silence lasted for a long time before she uttered the first word.

“You saw what I’ve done,” she said it not as a question, but as a statement of fact.

“Yes, I did.”

“I… have never gone that far… It was horrible. I could see myself doing those things to him as if I was someone else. He cried and begged… but I did not stop… until he broke…”

Michael nodded. “Yes, it was terrible, but it was also necessary; you saved all those people by doing that.”

Her head moved from side to side, negating his words.

“Maybe we could have gathered the intelligence some other way. Max would have seen the beginning of the attack— “

“Look at me, Alice.” Michael used his commanding voice, and she, conditioned with the years of training, snapped her head upwards.

“If you hadn’t done what was needed, twenty-five thousand people would be dead, and God knows how many more after that nuclear waste poisoned the area.”

“But— “

“I’m not finished.” He cut her off abruptly. “Max calculated the timings of the events. If we had arrived ten minutes later, there would have been nothing we could do to stop it. The SWAT teams were about to storm the place and the terrorists would have activated the bombs. The mere fact we made it in time was a miracle you are directly responsible for.”

He could see that she wanted to say something again and lifted his hand in a stopping motion.

“Without the intel you extracted, today would be the blackest day in our nation’s history. All this amazing alien technology we have, all our upgrades, would be useless to prevent the tragedy. Therefore, if you are looking for someone to join you in this pity party, you are looking in the wrong place. Alice, you have nothing to be sorry for and we are all so damn proud of you.”

She held his fierce gaze, searching for the truth in his eyes. Then, the wall of guilt broke and she relaxed. It was as if someone had lifted a tremendous burden placed on her shoulders. Tears started streaming down her face while her tense and rigid posture slackened.

“Thank you… I needed that,” Alice whispered while the first tremors were beginning to shake her body.

“I know, little sister,” Michael said, calling her by the nickname they gave her a long time ago. He opened his arms and she laid her head on his shoulder.

Alice cried for a long time, but this was a good kind of cry, cathartic. One of those that washed away all the doubts, self-recrimination, and guilt.

They stayed like that for a while, looking at the white clouds beneath them, as they passed by in their never-ending journey.

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"The intel you've got is never the intel you want."

Schlock Mercenary maxim

;)