Fischer climbed to his feet "Don't know if 'short debriefing' is in my vocabulary, but I'll try," he said with a pained smile. He went on to give a concise review of the logistics of the operation and how it played out up until the point of storming the building.
"Once we had secured the immediate perimeter of the building, we had no choice but to go in," Fischer drawled. "Our boys and girls would have been sitting ducks waiting outside the building any longer, taking on fire. Besides, you—" he said with slight implication in his tone, but looking at no one in particular—"wanted visual confirmation of their nest and laboratory." He hung his head low. "As you know, the building was booby-trapped with high-potency explosives. Our people didn't stand a chance once inside." He looked up, his eyes burning with wounded pride. "But the Seventy-fifth Rangers Airborne Regiment and the rest of our military achieved the objective over there. We got their leader, and not one terrorist escaped the operation."
"Thank you, General." Home said earnestly. She turned to Ted Hart. "Mr. Secretary, can you enlighten us as to the state of Homeland Security?"
Hart cleared his throat with a harsh cough. "It goes without saying that the alert level is still on 'code red.' Our borders are closed to all commercial travel. We have extra law enforcement and emergency services standing by in every region of the nation."
"Mr. President," the nondescript, bespectacled Director of the FBI chimed in. "We have every available field agent on the street working with the local law authorities."
Ted Hart nodded. He looked over in Gwen's direction with a raised eyebrow. "Dr. Savard, can you update the status of the new drug treatment?"
"Potential treatment," Gwen emphasized. "The manufacturing plant is up and running. We'll continue at it twenty-four/seven, but we're at least six days away from production."
Aaron Whitaker spoke up. "No question. Our military did us proud over in Africa." He saluted General Fischer with a tap over his bushy eyebrow. "Although we got Kabaal, we haven't confirmed we nailed Abdul Sabri. So I think we had better operate under the assumption that we have not eliminated this particular terrorist threat. And even accept the possibility that their army of terrorists is already on our soil."
Though Gwen did not like the belligerent Secretary of Defense, she nodded fervently in agreement with his point.
"Mr. Secretary, that is exactly what we are assuming," Ted Hart said, crossing his arms over his chest.
Katherine Thomason raised a hand.
"Yes, Madam Secretary?" Home said.
"I understand. And I agree with the others." Thomason closed her eyes and nodded solemnly. "But we may never know exactly who among the terrorists died in that Somali lab."
"Your point, Madam Secretary?" Home asked.
"Say, by the grace of God, days pass… weeks pass… and we see no signs of the virus. Just how long do you propose that we run the country as a fortress?"
The President leaned forward and tapped his touching fingers against his chin, which he often did right before intervening in a conversation. "Katherine, America will be a fortress until the moment we believe it safe to be otherwise." His eyes narrowed. "And not one second sooner."
When Noah awoke in his guest bedroom, he realized he had slept past The Brotherhood's midnight deadline for troop withdrawal and right through until late Tuesday morning. Though he knew the ultimatum was moot after the raid on the Somali base, like most other Americans, he still anxiously anticipated the deadline's passing.
When he saw that it was already 10:21 A.M., he reached for the portable phone and dialed Gwen's cell number.
"You just waking up?" Gwen asked in amazement.
He recognized from her light tone that nothing ominous had happened during his sleep. "Weird, huh?" he said. "I find a one-day round-trip to an African war takes a toll on my body. Maybe I'm low on melatonin." He chuckled. "No word?"
"Nothing," she said. "But no news is definitely good news in this case. How are you?"
"Fine," he said, standing from the bed and walking to the mirror over the dresser. "More to the point, how are you?"
"A little sore, but it's mainly my ankle. Otherwise, okay."
Haldane paused. Up until this moment their days had been so preprogrammed through this crisis. "So, um, what's next?" he asked, studying his face's dense stubble in the mirror and noting how much more hollow his cheeks had become since the appearance of the Gansu Flu.
"We prepare for the worst. And we hope to hell it doesn't happen." She paused. "I don't know, Noah, but something feels incomplete, you know?"
It wasn't until she spoke the words that he realized they encapsulated his feelings, too. "Exactly," he said.
"Let's meet in my office in a this afternoon to review where we stand, okay?"
"Done."
Haldane hung up the phone and headed for the shower.
