Empire

“Tell us where to go and we’ll shoot,” said the guard.

“We’re Special Ops,” said Coleman. “We know how to use them.”

There was only a moment of hesitation. Then men began running. The bad news—but fully predictable—was that the receptionist said, “The lines are dead.”

To which Reuben said, “Then somebody get in your ranger jeep and get to a building that still has a phone. The Holocaust Museum. Not the Jefferson Memorial.”

The good news was that they were up-to-date weapons that seemed clean and had plenty of ammo. Reuben and Coleman grabbed them and ran for the car. There was a ticket on the windshield. Coleman turned on the windshield wiper and after a few swipes it blew away as they drove back along Buckeye Drive and then under the 395 overpass. “Who had time to write us a ticket?” said Reuben.

“It was probably an envelope filled with anthrax,” said Coleman. “That’s why I didn’t take it off by hand.”

“No, don’t turn there—we’re not going to try to shoot from the Jefferson Memorial. The Independence Av bridge and the cars on it will block any kind of clean shot.” Reuben directed him up to West Basin Drive as he checked to make sure both weapons had full clips.

“You realize this is Friday the thirteenth,” said Cole.

“Screw you,” said Malich.

They drove among the tourist cars until they came to Independence Avenue itself, which was completely blocked going toward the bridge, and had no traffic coming the other way.

They stopped the car and ran for it. Not that far along the bridge—but too far, if the terrorists had already made it out of the water long enough to have traffic blocked.

When Reuben and Coleman got onto the bridge, they saw two rocket launchers being set up simultaneously, while a guy with a protractor—a simple junior-high protractor!—was standing at a particular fence post and now was indicating where the launchers should be aiming.

Another guy—there were only the four in wet suits, as far as Reuben could see—was standing in the westbound lanes, which passed behind the retaining wall and did not go over the bridge. He was holding a sign.

“There’s more guys than that,” said Coleman. “Somebody cut those phone lines.”

“I wonder what that sign says,” said Reuben.

Whatever it said, it was enough to keep the drivers in place without much honking. And because of the blockage going that direction, traffic was stopped cold the other way, too. It would delay any military vehicles that might attempt to stop them. And delay was all they needed. With these guys, there’d be no escape plan. Though if they did happen to live long enough to get away from the Tidal Basin, they’d no doubt run to the Holocaust Museum and start killing Jews and Jewish sympathizers—which is what they would assume the Holocaust Museum would contain. Oh, yes—and schoolchildren.

Reuben knew they wouldn’t get that far.

He and Coleman had line of sight. They got down, and—

And a bullet pinged into the guardrail.

So they dropped down prone and sighted under the rail. They both fired.

The guy with the protractor spun and dropped. A shoulder wound, probably, thought Reuben. “Were you aiming at him?” he asked.

“No,” said Coleman. He’d been sighting on the guy with the sign.

“Then I must have been,” said Reuben.

One of the boneheads in the car behind them had rolled down his window. “Is this, like, a war game?”

“This is not a drill,” said Reuben calmly. “Get down inside your car as low as you can.”

By now the guys with the launchers were lying flat, still preparing their launch. There was no clear shot at them.

The guy who had held the sign was firing at them. And Reuben and Coleman couldn’t get to a different position, because now the shots hitting around them were pretty steady. The close ones were not coming from the guy with the sign.

“They’re not trying,” said Reuben. “Wherever their sniper is, he could kill us anytime.”

“Just trying to pin us down,” agreed Coleman.

“Shoot for the launchers themselves,” said Reuben.

“I’m left,” said Coleman.

But by the time he said that, Reuben was already firing at the left-hand launcher. Which their bullets knocked over. And by the time they corrected to aim for the other, the rocket had launched.

Reuben guessed that their sniper would be unable to resist watching for the explosion when the rocket hit. So he got up and ran to a different position and Coleman followed him, and there would be no last stand in the Holocaust Museum because they got all three of the remaining wet-suit guys… as they watched the column of flame and the plume of smoke rise above the grassy hill of the Washington Monument.

“Either they hit the White House or they didn’t,” said Reuben. “We’ve got that sniper to catch.”

“He was shooting from over to the left of the World War II Memorial,” said Coleman.

“And you can bet he’s got a car.”

Their pursuit of him ended quickly. Now the choppers were coming in and military vehicles were jouncing over the lawns and here was Reuben in civilian clothes carrying a rifle and so he had to stop for a conversation. It wasn’t long—Coleman’s uniform helped—and soon there were soldiers and choppers in pursuit of the sniper. But what kind of pursuit was it when nobody knew what he looked like, what he was driving, or where he might be going next?

“Did any of those clowns from the ranger station get a message to you, or did you just come when somebody reported shooting?” said Reuben.

“The choppers went up,” said the lieutenant, “when the cellphones started jamming.”

“And you didn’t send them to the Tidal Basin?” asked Reuben.

“Why would we do that?” asked the lieutenant.

Which meant that indeed, no one knew about the plans that Reuben had drawn up. Except, of course, the terrorists who had followed them.

There was nothing useful to do now except get to the top of the hill and see where the rocket had landed.

It had taken out half the south facade of the West Wing.

“Where was the President?” asked Reuben. He was talking to himself, but by now the lieutenant, who had climbed the hill with them, was talking over a military wavelength.

“At least twenty,” the lieutenant repeated. “Including the President, SecDef, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs.”

How strange. For the death of a village wise man, Reuben had been able to keen and wail in grief. For the death of a President he respected and admired, he didn’t have a tear or even a word. Maybe because he knew the old man in that village, and he didn’t know the President, not personally.

Or maybe because Reuben hadn’t drawn up the plans that killed the old man in the village.

Not that Reuben didn’t feel anything. He felt so much that he was almost gasping. But it wasn’t grief. It was resolve. Gnawing at him. He would do something. There must be something he could do.

The lieutenant turned to them with a face like death. “They got the Vice President, too.”

“He was in the same meeting?” said Reuben, incredulous. “They’re never supposed to be in the same place.”

“His car was broadsided by a dump truck and pushed into a wall. He was crushed.”

“Let me guess,” said Coleman. “The Secret Service killed the truck driver.”

“The truck driver blew himself up.”

Reuben turned to Coleman. “They’ve got a source inside the White House,” he said. “How else would they know what room the President would be in?”

Coleman touched his elbow and Reuben allowed him to lead them away from the lieutenant. “At least you know it wasn’t timed solely to coincide with your being at Hain’s Point,” said Coleman. “That was just a bonus for