CAMP DAVID, MARYLAND
Jack Junior and his dad stood at the number one position on the skeet range, just beneath the high house.
The range officer, Mike Cravy—a three-time NSSA national champion shooter—pointed at both men. “Ready?”
Jack and his dad both nodded back. “Ready.”
“You won the toss,” Ryan said.
Jack took his stance and raised his shotgun, a Benelli SuperSport Performance Shop semiauto. He smashed the oversized red release button and the bolt slammed home with a satisfying thunk.
“Pull!”
The first bird flew out of the high house behind him. Jack fired, smashing the bird, just as the second bird darted from the low house. He shattered that one, too.
“Nice job, son.”
“The first station’s easy.”
“No, I mean everything else.” He looked his son in the eyes.
“Thanks to what you and Gavin did, we avoided a global economic apocalypse, recovered the five trillion, and stopped a potential holocaust.”
Jack shrugged. “That was more Gavin than me. You’re up.”
Ryan took his position, a case-hardened Caesar Guerini Summit Limited over and under in his hands. A real beauty, a recent anniversary gift from his wife. Another classic beauty.
The President laughed. “That train thing you did was pretty slick.”
Jack grinned. “I always said it’s better to be lucky than good.”
“I think it was a little of both.”
Jack’s decision to take out the warehouse refrigeration unit was based on Gavin’s intel that the computer could only operate at millikelvin temperatures.
What Gavin didn’t tell him was that those near-absolute-zero temperatures were achieved through a process known as “laser cooling,” not freon and a compressor like an old Maytag making ice cubes.
Destroying the warehouse HVAC unit had no effect whatsoever on the quantum computer’s subatomic cooling. But tearing out that motor, the transformer, and the electrical lines along with it temporarily disrupted the power supply to the building. That disruption lasted less than two seconds before the emergency backup generator kicked on. That was just enough time to disrupt the laser cooling mechanism. Once disrupted, the TRIBULATION system completely shut down and had to be rebooted.
Jack’s attack also distracted the warehouse security team long enough to give the FBI SWAT a window to insert and seize everything before TRIBULATION could resume operation. They grabbed the scientists, programmers, and hardware before the five trillion could be disbursed and before the attack on Snow Dragon, scheduled for launch just seven minutes after the moment Jack disrupted the power.
Ryan raised the shotgun to his eye, lining up the Bradley white front bead on top of the silver mid bead like a little snowman. “Pull!”
Cravy hit his remote and the orange clay disk shot out of the high house. The twelve-gauge jerked on Ryan’s shoulder. The bird exploded in a cloud of orange dust just as the low house bird launched out of its thrower. Ryan fired.
Missed.
The clay crashed harmlessly into the grass behind them.
“Maybe it’s time for shuffleboard, old-timer.” Jack smiled.
Ryan looked at Cravy. “I’ll take my extra here.”
“Yes, sir.”
Ryan loaded a single shell into the top chamber and stepped up to the square.
“Pull!”
The low house bird sped into the sky. Ryan crushed it. He turned back to his son. “Back to even, boyo,” he said with a wink.
Cravy grinned. He liked working with the Ryans. Good guys. Not like some of the congressional pricks the President sometimes brought out here.
Jack and his dad marched over to the second station.
Jack reloaded two more shells and stepped into the square. He punched the release button, racking his first round, then raised his Benelli to his eye. He put the front red optic and brass mid beads together into their figure eight.
“Pull!”
The high house bird darted across the sky. Jack led it and pulled the trigger, busting the clay. The second bird flew past in the opposite direction. Jack nailed that one, too.
“You missed your calling,” Ryan said. “You should go pro with that thing.”
“Two stations does not a champion make,” Jack said. He turned to Cravy. “Right, Mike?”
Cravy grinned. “Well, two in a row’s a good start. You just gotta work your way up from there.”
“How far up?” Jack asked.
“Oh, I dunno.” Cravy scratched his chin thoughtfully. “A couple ten thousand more oughta do it, for starters.”
“I’ll be lucky to hit the next one,” Junior said, stepping out of the square, changing positions with his dad.
The President barked, “Pull!”
Killed two clays.
“Oh, so I guess now we’re getting serious,” Jack said.
“I’m always serious. I thought you knew that.”
Jack laughed. “That move of Logan’s, putting the near-kelvin-zero operation inside of a frozen food warehouse? Makes me think he must have watched a lot of Breaking Bad.”
He led the way to the third station. His dad followed.
“It was a damned smart play. The whole operation was. Logan knew to begin his drone attacks in the area where SBIRS had been knocked out. DoD’s still looking into it but they think his people might have been the ones to disable it.”
Ryan sighed, frustrated.
“The bastard really bamboozled us. Hell, who am I kidding? He got the better of me is what it boils down to. White Mountain Logistics and Security was the perfect cover for his plan. He was in deep with the federal government, and his operations were global. He could move any kind of material to any location of his choosing without raising any suspicions because he was a trusted and security-cleared defense contractor. And I bought into it, hook, line, and sinker.”
“Can’t blame yourself for that one, Pop. What he planned was so freaking crazy, no one could have predicted it.”
Jack stepped into the square at the third station. He saw the set of his dad’s jaw. He was taking this all really hard. Time to change the subject.
“I never did hear the rest of the story on Runtso. Gavin thought he was one of the good guys.”
“Those birds aren’t gonna shoot themselves.”
“Fine.” Jack stepped up and loaded two more shells into his shotgun.
“Pull!”
Bang, bang. Two dead clays.
Jack shrugged. “So, what about Runtso?”
“The FBI went over those cartridges Gavin found with a fine-tooth comb. It led them to some other files stashed in other interesting places. The bottom line is that Runtso totally bought into what he called the ‘Heist of the Universe.’ It was a real ego trip for him. But when he found out about Logan’s war plan, he got cold feet.”
“So, not exactly a good guy.”
“Not exactly. He helped let the horse out of the barn and tried to chase it down after the fact. If he hadn’t shown up in Barcelona to meet with your friend Renée while you were there, Logan’s plan might have actually worked.”
The President stepped into the square, yelled, “Pull!” Killed two clays.
“Next station, gentlemen,” Cravy said, pointing at number four. They headed over.
“Whatever happened to the Parsons woman?” Jack asked.
“Interpol found a corpse that might be her washed up on shore in Montenegro. It’s hard to tell from the level of decomp, so they’re running DNA tests.”
“That’s too bad. A real waste of genius.”
“Genius doesn’t matter as much as character,” Ryan said. “Heraclitus said that character is destiny. But I think it’s loyalty that’s destiny. Logan loved himself more than his country and was willing to destroy it. Parsons loved her own ambition more than her science, and it got her killed. I’ll take an honest man or woman over a smart one any day.”
Jack took his position, loaded his weapon. “Pull!”
Cravy let fly. Two puffs of red dust hung in the air.
Jack changed positions with his dad.
The Caesar Guerini barked twice. Two birds shattered.
The Ryans followed Cravy over to the fifth station. They didn’t speak. Jack’s mind was clearly somewhere else.
“What’s bugging you, son?”
“Logan. Where the hell did he go?”
Ryan darkened. “We may never find the bastard.”
“I can’t let it go until we do.”
“Well, don’t let it ruin your game today, old man. You’re up.”
Jack stepped into the box. He pulled two more shells out of his pouch and loaded them.
The President laid a hand on his son’s broad shoulder.
“I also wanted you to know that Renée Moore is getting her star at Langley. She died in service to her country, trying to bring Runtso in. There’s a ceremony next week, if you’d like to attend.”
“Yeah, I would.”
Ryan smiled and squeezed his neck. “I’ll join you, if you don’t mind. I read her service jacket. She was a real patriot, one of our best and brightest.” He looked at his son. “You two went to school together, didn’t you?”
Jack looked at his dad and nodded slightly, unable to speak. He took a deep breath and gathered himself up. Ryan stepped back.
Jack brought the gun to his eye.
“Pull!”
Two clays flew.
Jack missed both.