Washington D.C. | 2011
Mark's POV
"The car ride back to the SSC was marred with tension and plans upon plan on how to manage the crisis," I told the IG, my voice rough. "But I remember the call that came through every word."
Flashback
The secure line in the back of the transport chirped. It wasn't a ring; it was a summons. I stared at the caller ID. Admiral Wallace. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs.
I picked it up.
"Mark," Wallace's voice was gravel grinding on steel. "Tell me I didn't just read a preliminary report stating that we have two KIAs and a bird drifting toward the Indian Ocean."
"You did, sir," I said, staring out the tinted window at the traffic, the image of Bradley's swollen eye still burned into my retina. "I transferred command to Colonel Gregory at 1445. The impact occurred at—"
"I don't care about the timestamps, Mark!" Wallace roared, the sound distorting slightly over the encrypted line. "You fucked up. I know it was a freak impact. I know the UIO scrambled the transponder. Nature took a swing at us. But you weren't in the chair when it happened. You walked off the deck during an active insertion."
The guilt I had been holding back surged, a bitter bile in my throat. "I had a family emergency, Admiral. My son—"
"I know about your son," Wallace cut me off, his tone dropping to a dangerous, quiet rumble. "And as a father, my heart breaks for you. But as the Chairman? You are the Deputy Commander of Space Systems. Accountability is yours because it was your command. Those men are dead on your watch, Mark. Not Gregory's. Yours."
I closed my eyes, the truth of it hitting me harder than any reprimand. "I accept full responsibility, sir."
"Good. Because you're going to fix it," Wallace snapped. "Ops Command is blind. They're screaming for eyes on that mountain range. The survivors are dug in, but the Taliban is hunting them. We can't get air support in without telemetry."
"I can re-task the NRO birds," I suggested, my mind shifting back to tactics, trying to bury the emotion.
"Too slow. They're on a different orbital plane," Wallace countered. "For now, I'm reassigning the NOAA research satellites and the geological survey birds. They aren't military grade, but they have thermal. It's sloppy, but it's eyes."
"It won't be enough," I said, the tactical approach needed to be reconsidered. "The resolution is too low for individual heat signatures in that terrain. We need high-res, real-time tracking if we want to guide a second extraction team in without getting them slaughtered."
I took a breath. This was going to be a hard sell.
"Admiral, I need permission to go outside the network," I said.
"Outside? What are you talking about?"
"Private sector," I said firmly. "There are commercial imaging constellations passing over that sector in twenty minutes. High-res. Sub-meter accuracy. I know the CEOs. I can get access."
"Absolutely not," Wallace said immediately. "You want to involve civilians in a classified extraction of a compromised unit? If this leaks, Mark... if the media finds out we lost two men because our billion-dollar satellite got taken out by space junk and we had to beg a tech billionaire for help? It will be a circus. It will be the end of the department."
"With all due respect, Admiral," I interrupted, my voice rising. "I don't give a damn about the media. We have fifteen Marines hiding in a cave, bleeding out. If we don't get them eyes, they are going to die. All of them. The media trial that would commence after that happens will be worse than anything a leak could cause."
There was silence on the line. Heavy, judging silence.
"I won't let it leak," I promised, my voice was low and intense. "I'll handle it personally. I'll call in favors. But the lives of those soldiers matter more than the PR nightmare. We owe them this. I owe them this."
The silence stretched for ten agonizing seconds.
"Do it," Wallace finally growled. "But Mark? If this goes sideways, it's not just your career. It's your freedom. Fix this."
"Yes, sir."
The line went dead. I lowered the phone, the weight of the decision settled onto my shoulders like a physical load. I had permission. Now I just had to save them.
End Flashback
"The decision was made," I told the IG, my voice steady despite the tremors in my hands that I kept hidden beneath the table. "I had the authority from the Chairman, but I needed the asset. And I knew only one person crazy enough and fast enough to provide it."
Flashback
The transport car tore through the wet streets of the city, the sirens cutting a path through the gridlock. I stared at the phone in my hand. The contact simply read ELON.
We had been working together for some time on the early stages of the commercial crew program. It was a relationship built on friction—his chaotic ambition against my rigid adherence to safety protocols—but beneath the arguments, there was a grudging, mutual respect. He wanted to reach the stars; I wanted to secure them. We trusted each other to get the job done, even if we disagreed on the method.
I hit dial. It rang twice.
"General Naird," Elon's voice came through, surprisingly clear. "To what do I owe the pleasure? We were just reviewing the static fire data on the Falcon. You're going to like the ISP numbers."
"That's not why I'm calling, Elon," I said, cutting straight through the pleasantries. "We've been working together for a while now. You know I don't make calls I don't have to make."
"I do," he replied, his tone shifting instantly, losing the casual edge. "You sound serious, Mark. What's going on?"
"I need a favor," I said, my voice low. "A big one. And I need it with no questions asked. Not now, not ever."
There was a pause on the line. I could hear the faint click of a keyboard in the background. "No questions asked usually means 'highly classified' or 'highly illegal.' Which one are we dancing with tonight?"
"Both. Neither. It's a life-or-death situation, Elon."
"Will this land me in trouble?" he asked, the businessman warring with the maverick. "I have shareholders, Mark. I have the FAA breathing down my neck as it is."
"It might," I admitted brutally. "But if it comes to that, I will be in far more trouble than you. I am the one making the request. You are just... complying with a national security imperative. I take the fall. All of it."
Elon chuckled, a dry, sharp sound. "You're putting your neck in the noose. I like that. It shows conviction." The keyboard clacking stopped. "If I do this, Mark... you will owe me. A favor. A real one. In the future, when I need a roadblock removed or a permit expedited, I'm going to call you. And you're going to answer."
I closed my eyes. I was selling a piece of my soul, potentially compromising my future command. I saw Bradley's face. I saw the two empty spots where Marines should be standing. I pondered on it for just a moment.
"Agreed," I said. "You have my word."
"Done," Elon said. "What do you need?"
"Access," I said. "I need a direct feed from your best imaging satellite. The one with the experimental optics. I need it re-tasked to Sector 4, Afghanistan. I need full control for the next four hours."
"The high-res prototype?" Elon whistled low. "That's precious hardware, Mark. But... it's in a polar orbit. It's actually in a good position." He paused. "Okay. I'm authorizing the handshake now. I will grant access of it through SpaceX servers to the SSC mainframe. Give your engineers twenty minutes to synchronize the encryption keys."
"Thank you," I breathed out.
"Don't thank me yet. Save the world, General. Then pay me back."
The call ended.
I didn't waste a second. I dialed the Ops floor.
"Gregory," I barked the moment the line connected.
"General, we are still blind," Gregory's voice was tight with stress. "NOAA feeds are grainy. We can't distinguish friendlies from rocks."
"Help is coming," I said. "SpaceX is patching us in. You're going to see a new handshake request on the secure server. Authorize it immediately. It's a high-res commercial feed."
"SpaceX?" Gregory's voice spiked with fear. "Sir, what did you do? That's a civilian link. Bringing a private feed directly into the SSC command loop during a classified extraction? The firewall protocols alone..."
"It does not matter," I interrupted him, my voice hard. "In the face of this danger, the protocols are irrelevant. We need eyes, Brad. I got us eyes."
"Mark," Gregory said, dropping the rank, his voice dropping to a whisper. "If they find out you bypassed the NRO for a private contractor... this is a court-martial."
"I know," I said.
"Okay," Gregory said, the loyalty in his voice solidifying like concrete. "Okay. I will help you. If this becomes worse, if they come for you, I authorized the handshake. We share the load."
I felt a lump in my throat. "No. It's on me. I have just arrived at the SSC. I'm at the checkpoint. I will be up in five minutes. Get that feed on the main screen, Colonel."
"Yes, sir."
End Flashback
"The plan was sound, but physics is a stubborn adversary," I told the IG, my voice devoid of the frantic energy that had consumed me that night. "The SpaceX asset was in a polar orbit. It wasn't sitting over the target like our bird was. We had to wait for the orbital pass. We waited for over an hour with the GMS offline, the technicians scrambling and failing to bring it back. For sixty-four minutes more, our men were in the dark."
I looked at Major General Woodkin. "Sixty-four minutes is a lifetime in a firefight."
Flashback
The main screen at the SSC flickered. Static washed over the room, a digital snowstorm that grated on every nerve ending I had left.
"Come on," I muttered, gripping the console. "Give me eyes."
"Handshake complete," a tech shouted. "Decrypting stream... Now."
The static snapped into focus. The resolution was breathtaking. Unlike the grainy, washed-out thermal of the NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) birds, this commercial feed was razor-sharp. I could see the heat signatures of individual rocks. I could see the cooling engines of the wrecked extract vehicles. And I could see the heat blooms of fifteen Marines huddled in a defensive perimeter at the base of a ridge.
"I have control," I announced, my voice booming across the floor. "Ops Command, this is General Naird. We have high-res visual. Patch me through to the Ground Commander immediately."
"Patching you in, sir," Gregory said at my elbow. "You are live."
"Ground Command, this is Eye in the Sky," I said. "We see you. You have a platoon-sized element of hostiles moving up the wadi to your East. Distance: four hundred meters. Do you copy?"
"Solid copy, Eye in the Sky," the Ground Commander's voice crackled, breathless and distorted by gunfire. "We are taking effective fire from the North. We can't move the wounded."
I scanned the screen. I saw them. Muzzle flashes were blooming like strobe lights on the thermal feed from a ridge line above the Marines.
"I see them," I said. "Elevation twelve hundred. Three shooters. They are suppressing you for the main element flanking East. If you stay there, you will be overrun in ten minutes."
"We have no cover to move!"
"You do now," I said. I looked at the extraction choppers—two Blackhawks and a Chinook—circling ten miles out, afraid to enter the hot zone without telemetry. "Air Boss, vector the gunships to Grid Alpha-Seven-Nine. Danger Close. Light up that ridge."
"Copy, General. Inbound."
I watched on the screen as the gunships swept in. The thermal feed bloomed white as the chain guns tore into the ridge. The three hostile heat signatures vanished.
"Ridge is clear," I barked. "Ground Command, pop smoke. QRF (Quick Reaction Force), move your ass! You have a two-minute window before the East element crests that rise."
"Moving! Moving!"
The screen showed the Marines breaking cover. They were dragging the wounded, a desperate, uneven caterpillar of heat signatures moving across the cooling desert floor.
"Hostiles cresting the East rise!" Gregory shouted, pointing at the screen.
I saw them. A dozen bright white dots swarming over the hill.
"Gunships, shift fire, East! Suppressive only, don't hit my men!" I ordered.
The ground erupted. The SpaceX feed was clear enough that I could see the Taliban fighters diving for cover as the sand around them turned to glass.
"Landing zone is hot, but it's your only shot," I told the Ground Commander. "The birds are coming down."
The extraction helicopters flared, kicking up massive dust clouds that obscured the visual for a heart-stopping ten seconds. I held my breath. The entire SSC floor was silent.
"Load them up! Go, go, go!"
Through the dust, I saw the heat signatures merge with the massive engines of the Chinook. One by one. The wounded first. Then the perimeter guard.
"Taking fire!" the pilot screamed over the comms. "We are taking small arms fire!"
"Return fire and lift off!" I yelled.
I watched a few frantic muzzle flashes from the door gunners. The Chinook lurched into the air, banking hard.
"Status?" I demanded.
"We are away," the pilot's voice came back, shaking. "All packages aboard. We took some rounds to the fuselage, one WIA on the way up, leg wound, stable. But... we have everyone. No new KIAs."
"Get them home," I whispered.
I slumped back against the console. The feed from the SpaceX satellite continued to track the empty valley floor, now littered with the cooling bodies of the enemy. We had done it. We had pulled them out of the fire.
I breathed a sigh of relief, deep and shuddering. But as the adrenaline faded, the cold reality of the Pentagon rushed back in. I looked at Gregory. He wasn't celebrating. He was looking at me with the expression of a man watching a funeral procession.
The rescue was a success. But the disciplinary shit storm was just beginning.
End Flashback
The room was silent. I had laid it all out. The panic, the decision, the delay, the unauthorized use of a civilian asset, and the ultimate, messy salvation of the unit.
IG Steinbach adjusted his glasses, his face unreadable. He looked at the transcripts, then at me.
"You admit to leaving your post during a critical insertion," Steinbach stated. "You admit to bringing an unsecured, civilian satellite feed into a top-secret command loop without prior authorization from the NRO or the DoD."
"I do," I said.
"And you assert that this action saved the lives of the surviving fifteen Marines?"
"I do."
Steinbach nodded slowly. He looked to his left, then his right.
"The Inspector General having heard this entire narrative now finally opens the floor for questions from the tribunal," he announced.
He turned to Major General Grabaston. "General Grabaston?"
Kick Grabaston smiled, a thin, predatory curving of his lips. He leaned into his microphone, his eyes locking onto mine with malicious glee.
"Tell me, Mark," Kick said, his voice dripping with false sympathy. "Did you contact the family of the fallen? If yes then did you inform them of your role in the demise of their loved ones? Is the health of your child more important to you than the health of the men and women in the armed forces of the United States?"