“A shortcut?” The analyst seemed confused. “No, sir.” He pointed down the corridor. “Our office is just down there a little ways.”
Christ. Thorn knew that some of the armed forces’ more traditional-minded senior officers bitterly resented the special warfare community’s growing clout and stable budgets. He guessed that someone in charge of Pentagon office space had decided to exact some petty vengeance by installing the JSOC’s new intelligence outfit in the most godforsaken place possible.
He trailed after the younger man until they came to a brown steel door set into one of the corridor walls. It was equipped with an electronic card reader and a ten-key pad. The letters “JSOC–ILU” were stenciled at eye level in fresh white paint.
McFadden gestured toward the door. “Welcome to the Dungeon, Colonel.” He reddened. “I mean, that’s our nickname for it…” His voice trailed away.
Thorn took pity on him and smiled. “Seems appropriate, Mike. Okay, the Dungeon it is.” He pointed his index finger at the door. “Now let’s get inside and get to work.”
“Right.” McFadden moved in front of him to slide his ID card through the reader and to input the code needed to open the door. Thorn noticed that the other man was careful to block his view of the lock’s keypad. That was a mark in his favor. Even though the analyst didn’t pay much attention to his personal appearance, he obviously took the need for security very seriously indeed. So his priorities were straight.
The door buzzed suddenly and unlatched.
“We each have our own card, sir,” McFadden explained, stepping back as the door swung inward. “You’ll get yours and the number code when you sign in at the Security Office.”
Nodding his understanding, Thorn walked briskly into what McFadden called the Dungeon. At first glance the accommodations looked better than the bare corridor outside but not that much better. There was a lot more light, the walls were painted a pale blue, and at least someone had laid a worn brown carpet over the concrete floor.
Beyond the secure door a narrow hallway opened on to a common area. A large table surrounded by chairs filled the center of the room and a small table off to one side held a coffeemaker and a stack of paper cups. Other corridors led off-from this central room into the rest of the complex.
Thorn didn’t have time to notice more. Several men and a couple of women were gathered near the coffeemaker, clearly waiting to greet him. They ranged in age from their early twenties to their mid-to late forties. All of them were civilians.
One of the oldest, a tall, balding, heavyset man, stepped forward right away and held out a huge, bearlike hand. “Colonel Thorn? My name’s Joe Rossini. I’m your deputy director. Welcome aboard.”
“Thanks.” Thorn shook hands with the man who would be his number two for the next year. Steeling himself to make the white lie sound sincere, he said, “I’m glad to be here.”
Rossini nodded toward the others. “The rest of these eager, shining faces are your section leaders.” Dark brown eyes gleamed behind the thick lenses of his plain blackframe glasses. “They crack the whip on the other analysts, keep the computers humming, and generally do all the real work around here while I fill in the New York Times crossword puzzle and think deep thoughts.”
Thorn grinned. Whatever else he was, at least Rossini wasn’t the kind of pompous bureaucrat he’d feared being saddled with. He paid careful attention as the big man introduced the others one by one, matching faces to names for later reference. He hadn’t wanted this posting, but he was here now and he planned to do the best job he could.
When Rossini finished the introductions, Thorn looked the group over one more time. “I won’t make a speech right now. I’m sure you’ll all hear my voice far too often and far too soon.” There were a few mildly nervous chuckles at that. He waited for them to die away before continuing in the same easy, informal tone. “I do want to make one point, though. I care a lot about accuracy and about the truth. What I don’t care much about is strict military formality. So you don’t have to keep calling me ‘Colonel’ or ‘sir.’ My first name’s Peter and I expect you to use it. Okay?”
They looked relieved.
“Great. That’s it, then. I’ll see you all later in the day.” He turned and nodded toward Rossini. “Right now the Maestro here and I are going to get better acquainted.”
His new deputy’s thick black eyebrows shot up in surprise at Thorn’s use of his office nickname. Half hidden behind the other analysts, Mike McFadden gulped audibly and faded away down one of the corridors.
Thorn smiled inwardly. He’d filed away his guide’s first, accidental revelation of Rossini’s handle for use at the first suitable opportunity. In his experience it never hurt to have a reputation for being ultra-observant.
The man they called the Maestro wasn’t slow on the uptake himself.
Rossini saw McFadden vanish, glanced at Thorn, and pretty clearly mentally added two and two together. The big man shook his head in mock dismay. “So what do people call you behind your back, Pete?” he asked.
Thorn shrugged, smiling. “I suspect you’ll find out a hell of a lot sooner than I will.” He motioned in the general direction of the rest of the complex. “How about giving me the fifty-cent tour before we get down to business?”
“To hear is to obey.” Rossini led the way down the right hand corridor.
“We’ll start with the Regional Analysis sections…”
Beyond the meeting room, the Intelligence Liaison Unit’s quarters branched out into a warren of small offices crowded with cubicles, desks, computers, and filing cabinets. Maps, blackboards, and bulletin boards hung from the walls almost everywhere Thorn looked. Every room held two or three people either hunched over computer keyboards or conferring together in earnest tones. Television sets flickered in several corners, tuned to the major news networks with the sound muted.
The whole organisation gave off a feeling of energy and quiet excitement. One bulletin board held rows of small black-and-white snapshots showing the high-ranking terrorists confirmed killed in Amir Taleh’s crackdown. Another tracked the ongoing disintegration of the HizbAllah’s command structure.
Thorn liked what he saw so far. These people weren’t just going through the motions. They were genuinely committed to their work.
He could also sense Rossini’s pride in his creation. In a little over a month, the big man had molded a disparate collection of forty or so counterterrorism experts drawn from everywhere across the vast alphabet soup of U.S. intelligence agencies into a unified team. That was an impressive accomplishment. Thorn knew a lot about motivating soldiers to work hard when their lives and those of their comrades were on the line. He was savvy enough to realise that he knew a lot less about motivating people when the stakes were more abstract.
The JSOC Intelligence Liaison Unit might be Major General Sam Farrell’s brainchild, but it was obvious that Joe Rossini’s drive and dedication had brought it to life.
His office was about as far back inside the complex as it was possible to get right next to Rossini’s. They shared a secretary and a photocopier. Beyond that and the same basic floor plan, the two rooms didn’t have anything in common.
The deputy director’s office was a mess. A series of framed photographs on the walls gave the room a personal touch. They showed a smiling Rossini, his wife, and an assortment of four or five children in a variety of settings. Everything else was work-related. Almost every square inch of desk and floor space was piled high with computer printouts and floppy disks. And books. Books on terrorism and psychology. Books on weapons, explosives, and sabotage. Books on the climates, cultures, and histories of different parts of the world. Stacks of books that were piled so high and so precariously that you had the feeling the slightest tremor would start an avalanche.
Slightly stunned by the sight of so much crammed into so little space, Thorn pulled his head out of Rossini’s room and ushered the big man into his own barren work area. None of his own personal effects had arrived from Fort Bragg yet not that he would have very much to hang on the walls even when they did, he realised.
He shut the door behind them, tossed his uniform cap onto his empty chair, and perched himself on one corner of the desk. He gestured toward the room’s only other seat. “Take a pew, Maestro.”
“Thanks.” Rossini sat down heavily.
Thorn watched the big man closely, noting the way he winced as he straightened his left leg out. He had been limping by the time they finished the brief tour. “Your knee giving you trouble?”
“A little. Too much football when I was younger and too many extra pounds now. My wife and kids watch my calories for me, but the weight doesn’t seem to come off.” Rossini dismissed his personal problems with a
