4.22: Unknown Soldier
OOC: This episode is written presuming that 4.22 is the series finale of The Unit. That said, information here is subject to change if the series does somehow miraculously earn a renewal.
Tactical Operations Center
Fort Griffith
Missouri
"Are we sure?"
Tom glanced over at Katie as the two of them walked down the hall toward the forward TOC. Though the two of them maintained a brisk pace, they may as well have been talking about whose turn it was to do the laundry. "As sure as we're gonna be," he said. "You think it's bad intel?" His eyebrow arched as he reminded himself that she was one of the foremost intelligence experts in the country (at least, if you asked anyone that had actually worked with her, which was a small and generally ignored minority of rank and file INSCOM staffers).
"If we're talking about a major city blowing up, I'd like to double-check my sources," she replied with a shrug of the shoulders.
"Your sources are a guy at SecDef who tried to leave Mack for dead and a guy who keeps appearing and disappearing more than David Copperfield," Tom pointed out. This got him a mildly irritated look from Katie, but she couldn't argue either point. "We'll check it again," he said to appease her as they walked through the door directly into the front of the main room.
"Katie," Brian Falkenborg called the moment he laid eyes on her. "Something's off."
She moved immediately to join him, tuning out the sound of her husband ordering the final countdown and discussing with several of the analysts the local response from the Atlanta police and the mayor. It wasn't her concern at the moment. "What do you mean?" she asked. Brian didn't have her field experience, but he was very smart, and he was a hell of an analyst. She peered over the big man's shoulder as he pinched the bridge of his nose.
"I just don't like this," he admitted. "I keep looking for a sign, but...why Atlanta? What the hell is even there? If this is what we've been waiting for, if Drake only gets one shot, why Atlanta?"
Katie glanced up at the back of her husband's head. Tom was also from Georgia, and she wasn't about to ask him if he could think of anything, but she had to admit that Brian had a good point. "Okay," she said, nodding a little. "If it's not Atlanta, then where is it?" she asked, knowing she only had a few moments to run with this - they were already committing their resources to Georgia and she couldn't just turn the whole operation around on a whim. "Where would you pick?"
"He's been operating a lot out of California. Maybe Los Angeles," Brian theorized. "Then there's the obvious. New York or D.C." He looked pained, obviously trying to conjure up a miracle answer for her when there wasn't one, "But if it was New York or D.C., why did he waste all his time in California?"
She stood beside him and saw the obvious pain and frustration on his face. They had been workmates for two years now, but it was a glimpse into how much weight he took on and how it wore on him. She understood now why he'd questioned his commitment, why he hurt so badly. Awkwardly, not sure how to comfort him, she put a hand on his shoulder. "Just try to see what you can do," she said softly. "I'll see what I can do for you." And she left him be, uncomfortable and as usual bad at comforting anyone.
That suspicion now in her mind, the first thing she did was come up behind her husband and put a hand on his back. Gently, she pulled him aside. "Tom," she said quietly. "Brian's not sure it's Atlanta. I'd hold something back if I were you."
He arched an eyebrow, clearly tired of running in circles for what was now something like a year and a half. "What is he thinking?"
"That big statements are not made in the state that gave us Krispy Kreme donuts and your arrogant ass." She didn't laugh at her own joke. It wasn't that time. "He's looking at other options. I need bodies."
"We're stretched thin already." His lips were pressed in a thin line as he considered all the implications. "I'll give you what I can, but it won't be much. Can you reach your people?"
"I can try."
"Do it."
Katie grabbed the nearest phone she could get her hands on and dialed two numbers. The first only required her to wait for a tone before she hung up. The second had a Washington area code. She didn't wait for Baker to greet her before she started talking. "Richard," she said. "I need you to confirm where this bomb is headed, because I sure as hell don't think that it's Atlanta. Is there anything you can do?"
On the other end of the line, there was a long pause and then: "I can think of one thing." And the line clicked dead.
She was about to write him off as turning tail on her, until half an hour later when she received another call. This time, it was Baker who was talking first, and he sounded urgent. "It's not Atlanta," he said brusquely. "He's got three of them. He says it's St. Louis, Philadelphia, and Dallas." And he ran off three license plate numbers that she hurriedly wrote down and passed to Michaela Gerhardt, who was standing by to process any and all incoming information.
"Where are you?" she asked, confused as to how he could get that information.
"I don't know yet. I've got to go, he's coming." And he hung up on her again. Katie stared at the phone for a second, in shock, as all the pieces clicked together. Ignoring Michaela running license plates, ignoring Tom giving new orders to the team to get them reassigned, ignoring everything until everyone was looking at her.
Then she looked up and met her husband's eyes. "He's in the car with Drake," she said, still in disbelief.
Tom stared back at her, his eyes widening a little as he was equally shocked by the news. He wasn't a fan of Richard Baker by any means, but even he knew being in the car with Leon Drake was practical suicide. It certainly surprised him that the SecDef bureaucrat would go that far, and he saw the fear for the man in his wife's eyes.
That was when Kayla patched a phone call through from the President. Forced to take the call despite seeing her in pain, he listened for a long moment before he hung up. Reluctantly, he broke the silence: "Washington wants a briefing. Katie, you're coming with me. Brian, you have the wheel. Let's go, people."
But as he moved by his wife, he squeezed her shoulder gently, letting her know that he understood her discomfort.
****
Washington, D.C.
She spent the whole flight over and walk through the White House doing two things: ignoring how uncomfortable she felt in full dress uniform, and continuing to try and get through to Stephen Brennan. She wasn't stupid enough to try Baker and risk him getting caught, but maybe her old friend could get to him before she could.
When they stepped into the Situation Room, however, she snapped to complete attention. The two of them briefed the President on what they had, and in return they got briefed on what Washington had. Namely, that they had collared a known ex-KGB officer that Tom had dealt with in the past. They had tracked him down using the intelligence Bob had passed on from his Russian source the week before.
"I want you two to talk to him," the President said, giving the two of them an even look. "And find out how far this goes. Do I make myself clear?"
"Yes, sir." Katie nodded slightly. Something about his tone, the arrogance of it, rubbed her the wrong way. "But all due respect, sir, I'd hold my tongue before making demands of the people who saved your life."
Tom didn't have to look at her for her to know that he thought she was crazy for saying that (then again he shouldn't have been that surprised considering she'd also confronted Naval admirals, Congresswomen, and other Army officials). The President just looked at her for a moment, taking pause, before he said, "My apologies, Colonel. Let me know as soon as you two have anything."
"Yes, sir." She nodded and satisfied, walked out of the room.
While they waited for the Russian to be brought up from custody, Tom briefed her on his dealings with the man, something about a failed assassination attempt in Venezuela that seemed only tangentially related. Still, Katie filed it all away. She had no idea what might be useful in her interrogation. She let Tom take the lead - it was his mark and he had the background.
When the man started trying to goad Tom and then met the business end of a phone, Katie wasn't really all that surprised. She just folded her arms over her chest and let it happen. The bastard deserved after eighteen months.
While Tom was interrogating the Russian, she watched every move, contemplating everything that had come before. She still remembered seeing all those red tracker dots on that TOC monitor. It didn't end with Drake, or with this guy. This organization had people around the world, and they couldn't stop them all. Even if they finished this, here, now, it would never be completely over, not unless they stormed half the world - which was implausible. That last hope she had of complete peace slipped away, and that made her angry.
"You're not getting a deal," she said, pushing up off the wall while the Russian was still nursing the new facial wound from the phone. "The only deal you're getting is that if we don't stop these bombs? You're going to burn in hell with the rest of us."
"You don't even know where to start."
"We know exactly where to start." Tom smirked at that. "You tipped your hand. You wouldn't be so desperate to get out of here if you didn't know these bombs were somewhere here. So: tell us where the hell they are, and then you save your own ass. Otherwise we all go down."
Katie, behind him, was already dialing, calling the Situation Room and then calling the TOC to reassign her people. This was Tom showing why he'd made CO of the Unit in the first place. She was ignorant to her husband grabbing the bastard by the throat and demanding the location of the bombs.
"It's at the National Cemetery. Singular," he told her, dropping the Russian to the floor as the man held his trachea and tried to catch his breath. "Get someone to deal with him," was his only instruction to the officer posted at the door as the two of them left him lying there. He had no doubt that the man would get what he deserved.
Ten minutes after they left, Stephen Brennan came walking up to the door, flashing an FBI badge. "I'll take it from here," he said.
****
Arlington National Cemetery
Arlington, Virginia
They were already too late. By the time they got there, Richard Baker had Leon Drake tackled to the ground and was beating the daylights out of him. Not a bad right hook for an office lackey, Katie thought to herself, jumping out of the car. What happened next happened so fast she didn't even have time to react to it.
"Baker, get clear!" Tom barked, pulling the service weapon he kept under the seat of the Mercedes. In one fluid motion, he was barely out of the car before he clicked back the safety. Baker instinctively glanced up and let go of Drake, barely getting out of the way before two shots slammed into Drake's center mass and dropped him. Perhaps letting it all boil over, Tom didn't even stop, advancing on the prone form of the man who had been responsible for all the havoc his team and their families had endured over eighteen months. He stood over Drake and without even looking, pumped two more shots into him, killing him instantly. He then turned and looked at Baker. "Where's the bomb?"
"I don't know. He didn't say," Baker admitted, still breathless as he flexed a sore hand. "All he did was make a phone call to some contact who didn't show."
"His Russian minder says it's here somewhere." Tom glanced around. "Katie. Call Bridget and see if the team learned anything that can help us," he said, as he went with Baker to start looking for the bomb.
Katie nodded, dialing back to the TOC. "Katie, we've got you on speaker," Bridget said, "Tell us what we can do."
"There's only one bomb. Here at the National Cemetery," Katie explained. "The other locations have to be decoys. They only mentioned one bomb."
"The others were all decoys." That was Charles, who moved to stand beside Bridget. As the team's resident bomb expert, he was the best person to help her. "There was no uranium in any of them."
"Tell me everything you know, Charles. We're running blind here."
"Okay." He nodded a little. "The two we found were in cars. They were all remote activated by cell phone..."
"Shit."
"What?"
"Baker said all Drake did was make one phone call to somebody who didn't show..."
"He activated the bomb." Charles swallowed. "It's probably in a car. Tell me when you find it."
But Katie wasn't listening beyond that first sentence. She was already sprinting to find her husband and Baker. "He's already activated the bomb," she said, breathless. "The phone call. It activated the bomb. They're cell phone activated." She looked between the two men, knowing they were already running out of time. "Charles says the other two were in cars."
The three of them turned and ran back toward the BMW that Drake had driven there, ignoring his corpse on the ground. A search of the car yielded nothing. "It has to be part of the car," Tom said. "We're going to have to roll it."
"How the hell are we going to do that?" Katie asked, looking incredulous.
In one of possibly the most bizarre instances in her entire military career, they ended up using a recently dug burial plot, parking the car over it, and stealing an electric handsaw from a nearby construction truck. The question remained which of them was going down to take care of the bomb. Surprisingly, it was Baker who pushed her husband back, tossed his jacket and tie to the grass, and stepped into the hole.
"What the hell are you doing?" Tom asked, staring at him.
"Last I checked, I'm not the one with a wife of twenty-six years and an urge for a baby," Baker replied, ignoring his confused look.
"You're not qualified to..."
"Then make me qualified." Baker gave him a hard look. "You're still judging the man I used to be. It's impossible to you that I could change. If you want to hate my guts, fine, but I'm here to help whether you like it or not, so give me the goddamn phone." That momentarily silenced Tom, and Katie was even startled, just handing him the phone so Charles could walk him through the procedure.
The last eighteen months all boiled down to ninety seconds as the two of them watched the former bureaucrat disassemble the bomb, while they did their best to keep the car from falling on his head. When he was done, breathing hard, scared out of his mind, it was Tom who reached down a hand to help him up.
After all that work, all that time, it was finally over.
Except for that it wasn't.
****
Fort Griffith
Missouri
Everyone had come home alive. Everyone had been reunited. Both Leon Drake and the Russian who had backed him were both in body bags. Unsurprisingly, Stephen Brennan had disappeared, and Richard Baker had tendered his resignation before he, too, had vanished from view. The members of the 303rd had convened for an all-hands meeting, where they had comforted and congratulated each other over a year and a half long struggle that was at its end. With the conspiracy at least partly exposed, the future of the Unit was safe, and they could go back to their at least partly normal lives.
But there were some things that were unresolved. Some had found happiness, like Mack and Michaela, or Brandon and Bridget. Others, however, had been hurt, or had moved on. And some, like Katie Ryan, were seriously thinking about moving on.
The more Katie thought about it, the more she couldn't go through with it.
Retirement had sounded so appealing. Never having to fight again, never having to go through the stress again. She and her husband could have the normal life they longed for, someplace quiet. But she knew, her eyes red from the sting of tears as she sat on their front porch, that she couldn't do it. No matter how much she wanted to. After what she had seen, she just couldn't wipe that away.
The last year and a half had turned the world upside down. All she and Tom had done over their first year and a half of marriage was wage this war. She had seen loved ones nearly killed or nearly quit. A man who had been their enemy had risked his life for theirs. Her team, her friends, deserved stability and peace. That which could not be brought by losing their commanding officers, and having to install a new team, new people to take orders from, to trust with their lives.
But all she could see was Baker's face: knowing he could die, willing to give his life for hers. He had no reason to, no stake in it, but he had done it. For her, for Tom, for all of them. How many other people had this hurt? How many other hearts were broken? How many other lives were now twisted around because of these last eighteen months?
Maybe the campaign was over, but the rebuilding had just begun. She couldn't turn her back on that. That was her responsibility too.
Tears in her eyes, she looked up into the night sky, and this time appreciated the silence. It was definitely not too quiet anymore.
Tactical Operations Center
Fort Griffith
Missouri
"Are we sure?"
Tom glanced over at Katie as the two of them walked down the hall toward the forward TOC. Though the two of them maintained a brisk pace, they may as well have been talking about whose turn it was to do the laundry. "As sure as we're gonna be," he said. "You think it's bad intel?" His eyebrow arched as he reminded himself that she was one of the foremost intelligence experts in the country (at least, if you asked anyone that had actually worked with her, which was a small and generally ignored minority of rank and file INSCOM staffers).
"If we're talking about a major city blowing up, I'd like to double-check my sources," she replied with a shrug of the shoulders.
"Your sources are a guy at SecDef who tried to leave Mack for dead and a guy who keeps appearing and disappearing more than David Copperfield," Tom pointed out. This got him a mildly irritated look from Katie, but she couldn't argue either point. "We'll check it again," he said to appease her as they walked through the door directly into the front of the main room.
"Katie," Brian Falkenborg called the moment he laid eyes on her. "Something's off."
She moved immediately to join him, tuning out the sound of her husband ordering the final countdown and discussing with several of the analysts the local response from the Atlanta police and the mayor. It wasn't her concern at the moment. "What do you mean?" she asked. Brian didn't have her field experience, but he was very smart, and he was a hell of an analyst. She peered over the big man's shoulder as he pinched the bridge of his nose.
"I just don't like this," he admitted. "I keep looking for a sign, but...why Atlanta? What the hell is even there? If this is what we've been waiting for, if Drake only gets one shot, why Atlanta?"
Katie glanced up at the back of her husband's head. Tom was also from Georgia, and she wasn't about to ask him if he could think of anything, but she had to admit that Brian had a good point. "Okay," she said, nodding a little. "If it's not Atlanta, then where is it?" she asked, knowing she only had a few moments to run with this - they were already committing their resources to Georgia and she couldn't just turn the whole operation around on a whim. "Where would you pick?"
"He's been operating a lot out of California. Maybe Los Angeles," Brian theorized. "Then there's the obvious. New York or D.C." He looked pained, obviously trying to conjure up a miracle answer for her when there wasn't one, "But if it was New York or D.C., why did he waste all his time in California?"
She stood beside him and saw the obvious pain and frustration on his face. They had been workmates for two years now, but it was a glimpse into how much weight he took on and how it wore on him. She understood now why he'd questioned his commitment, why he hurt so badly. Awkwardly, not sure how to comfort him, she put a hand on his shoulder. "Just try to see what you can do," she said softly. "I'll see what I can do for you." And she left him be, uncomfortable and as usual bad at comforting anyone.
That suspicion now in her mind, the first thing she did was come up behind her husband and put a hand on his back. Gently, she pulled him aside. "Tom," she said quietly. "Brian's not sure it's Atlanta. I'd hold something back if I were you."
He arched an eyebrow, clearly tired of running in circles for what was now something like a year and a half. "What is he thinking?"
"That big statements are not made in the state that gave us Krispy Kreme donuts and your arrogant ass." She didn't laugh at her own joke. It wasn't that time. "He's looking at other options. I need bodies."
"We're stretched thin already." His lips were pressed in a thin line as he considered all the implications. "I'll give you what I can, but it won't be much. Can you reach your people?"
"I can try."
"Do it."
Katie grabbed the nearest phone she could get her hands on and dialed two numbers. The first only required her to wait for a tone before she hung up. The second had a Washington area code. She didn't wait for Baker to greet her before she started talking. "Richard," she said. "I need you to confirm where this bomb is headed, because I sure as hell don't think that it's Atlanta. Is there anything you can do?"
On the other end of the line, there was a long pause and then: "I can think of one thing." And the line clicked dead.
She was about to write him off as turning tail on her, until half an hour later when she received another call. This time, it was Baker who was talking first, and he sounded urgent. "It's not Atlanta," he said brusquely. "He's got three of them. He says it's St. Louis, Philadelphia, and Dallas." And he ran off three license plate numbers that she hurriedly wrote down and passed to Michaela Gerhardt, who was standing by to process any and all incoming information.
"Where are you?" she asked, confused as to how he could get that information.
"I don't know yet. I've got to go, he's coming." And he hung up on her again. Katie stared at the phone for a second, in shock, as all the pieces clicked together. Ignoring Michaela running license plates, ignoring Tom giving new orders to the team to get them reassigned, ignoring everything until everyone was looking at her.
Then she looked up and met her husband's eyes. "He's in the car with Drake," she said, still in disbelief.
Tom stared back at her, his eyes widening a little as he was equally shocked by the news. He wasn't a fan of Richard Baker by any means, but even he knew being in the car with Leon Drake was practical suicide. It certainly surprised him that the SecDef bureaucrat would go that far, and he saw the fear for the man in his wife's eyes.
That was when Kayla patched a phone call through from the President. Forced to take the call despite seeing her in pain, he listened for a long moment before he hung up. Reluctantly, he broke the silence: "Washington wants a briefing. Katie, you're coming with me. Brian, you have the wheel. Let's go, people."
But as he moved by his wife, he squeezed her shoulder gently, letting her know that he understood her discomfort.
****
Washington, D.C.
She spent the whole flight over and walk through the White House doing two things: ignoring how uncomfortable she felt in full dress uniform, and continuing to try and get through to Stephen Brennan. She wasn't stupid enough to try Baker and risk him getting caught, but maybe her old friend could get to him before she could.
When they stepped into the Situation Room, however, she snapped to complete attention. The two of them briefed the President on what they had, and in return they got briefed on what Washington had. Namely, that they had collared a known ex-KGB officer that Tom had dealt with in the past. They had tracked him down using the intelligence Bob had passed on from his Russian source the week before.
"I want you two to talk to him," the President said, giving the two of them an even look. "And find out how far this goes. Do I make myself clear?"
"Yes, sir." Katie nodded slightly. Something about his tone, the arrogance of it, rubbed her the wrong way. "But all due respect, sir, I'd hold my tongue before making demands of the people who saved your life."
Tom didn't have to look at her for her to know that he thought she was crazy for saying that (then again he shouldn't have been that surprised considering she'd also confronted Naval admirals, Congresswomen, and other Army officials). The President just looked at her for a moment, taking pause, before he said, "My apologies, Colonel. Let me know as soon as you two have anything."
"Yes, sir." She nodded and satisfied, walked out of the room.
While they waited for the Russian to be brought up from custody, Tom briefed her on his dealings with the man, something about a failed assassination attempt in Venezuela that seemed only tangentially related. Still, Katie filed it all away. She had no idea what might be useful in her interrogation. She let Tom take the lead - it was his mark and he had the background.
When the man started trying to goad Tom and then met the business end of a phone, Katie wasn't really all that surprised. She just folded her arms over her chest and let it happen. The bastard deserved after eighteen months.
While Tom was interrogating the Russian, she watched every move, contemplating everything that had come before. She still remembered seeing all those red tracker dots on that TOC monitor. It didn't end with Drake, or with this guy. This organization had people around the world, and they couldn't stop them all. Even if they finished this, here, now, it would never be completely over, not unless they stormed half the world - which was implausible. That last hope she had of complete peace slipped away, and that made her angry.
"You're not getting a deal," she said, pushing up off the wall while the Russian was still nursing the new facial wound from the phone. "The only deal you're getting is that if we don't stop these bombs? You're going to burn in hell with the rest of us."
"You don't even know where to start."
"We know exactly where to start." Tom smirked at that. "You tipped your hand. You wouldn't be so desperate to get out of here if you didn't know these bombs were somewhere here. So: tell us where the hell they are, and then you save your own ass. Otherwise we all go down."
Katie, behind him, was already dialing, calling the Situation Room and then calling the TOC to reassign her people. This was Tom showing why he'd made CO of the Unit in the first place. She was ignorant to her husband grabbing the bastard by the throat and demanding the location of the bombs.
"It's at the National Cemetery. Singular," he told her, dropping the Russian to the floor as the man held his trachea and tried to catch his breath. "Get someone to deal with him," was his only instruction to the officer posted at the door as the two of them left him lying there. He had no doubt that the man would get what he deserved.
Ten minutes after they left, Stephen Brennan came walking up to the door, flashing an FBI badge. "I'll take it from here," he said.
****
Arlington National Cemetery
Arlington, Virginia
They were already too late. By the time they got there, Richard Baker had Leon Drake tackled to the ground and was beating the daylights out of him. Not a bad right hook for an office lackey, Katie thought to herself, jumping out of the car. What happened next happened so fast she didn't even have time to react to it.
"Baker, get clear!" Tom barked, pulling the service weapon he kept under the seat of the Mercedes. In one fluid motion, he was barely out of the car before he clicked back the safety. Baker instinctively glanced up and let go of Drake, barely getting out of the way before two shots slammed into Drake's center mass and dropped him. Perhaps letting it all boil over, Tom didn't even stop, advancing on the prone form of the man who had been responsible for all the havoc his team and their families had endured over eighteen months. He stood over Drake and without even looking, pumped two more shots into him, killing him instantly. He then turned and looked at Baker. "Where's the bomb?"
"I don't know. He didn't say," Baker admitted, still breathless as he flexed a sore hand. "All he did was make a phone call to some contact who didn't show."
"His Russian minder says it's here somewhere." Tom glanced around. "Katie. Call Bridget and see if the team learned anything that can help us," he said, as he went with Baker to start looking for the bomb.
Katie nodded, dialing back to the TOC. "Katie, we've got you on speaker," Bridget said, "Tell us what we can do."
"There's only one bomb. Here at the National Cemetery," Katie explained. "The other locations have to be decoys. They only mentioned one bomb."
"The others were all decoys." That was Charles, who moved to stand beside Bridget. As the team's resident bomb expert, he was the best person to help her. "There was no uranium in any of them."
"Tell me everything you know, Charles. We're running blind here."
"Okay." He nodded a little. "The two we found were in cars. They were all remote activated by cell phone..."
"Shit."
"What?"
"Baker said all Drake did was make one phone call to somebody who didn't show..."
"He activated the bomb." Charles swallowed. "It's probably in a car. Tell me when you find it."
But Katie wasn't listening beyond that first sentence. She was already sprinting to find her husband and Baker. "He's already activated the bomb," she said, breathless. "The phone call. It activated the bomb. They're cell phone activated." She looked between the two men, knowing they were already running out of time. "Charles says the other two were in cars."
The three of them turned and ran back toward the BMW that Drake had driven there, ignoring his corpse on the ground. A search of the car yielded nothing. "It has to be part of the car," Tom said. "We're going to have to roll it."
"How the hell are we going to do that?" Katie asked, looking incredulous.
In one of possibly the most bizarre instances in her entire military career, they ended up using a recently dug burial plot, parking the car over it, and stealing an electric handsaw from a nearby construction truck. The question remained which of them was going down to take care of the bomb. Surprisingly, it was Baker who pushed her husband back, tossed his jacket and tie to the grass, and stepped into the hole.
"What the hell are you doing?" Tom asked, staring at him.
"Last I checked, I'm not the one with a wife of twenty-six years and an urge for a baby," Baker replied, ignoring his confused look.
"You're not qualified to..."
"Then make me qualified." Baker gave him a hard look. "You're still judging the man I used to be. It's impossible to you that I could change. If you want to hate my guts, fine, but I'm here to help whether you like it or not, so give me the goddamn phone." That momentarily silenced Tom, and Katie was even startled, just handing him the phone so Charles could walk him through the procedure.
The last eighteen months all boiled down to ninety seconds as the two of them watched the former bureaucrat disassemble the bomb, while they did their best to keep the car from falling on his head. When he was done, breathing hard, scared out of his mind, it was Tom who reached down a hand to help him up.
After all that work, all that time, it was finally over.
Except for that it wasn't.
****
Fort Griffith
Missouri
Everyone had come home alive. Everyone had been reunited. Both Leon Drake and the Russian who had backed him were both in body bags. Unsurprisingly, Stephen Brennan had disappeared, and Richard Baker had tendered his resignation before he, too, had vanished from view. The members of the 303rd had convened for an all-hands meeting, where they had comforted and congratulated each other over a year and a half long struggle that was at its end. With the conspiracy at least partly exposed, the future of the Unit was safe, and they could go back to their at least partly normal lives.
But there were some things that were unresolved. Some had found happiness, like Mack and Michaela, or Brandon and Bridget. Others, however, had been hurt, or had moved on. And some, like Katie Ryan, were seriously thinking about moving on.
The more Katie thought about it, the more she couldn't go through with it.
Retirement had sounded so appealing. Never having to fight again, never having to go through the stress again. She and her husband could have the normal life they longed for, someplace quiet. But she knew, her eyes red from the sting of tears as she sat on their front porch, that she couldn't do it. No matter how much she wanted to. After what she had seen, she just couldn't wipe that away.
The last year and a half had turned the world upside down. All she and Tom had done over their first year and a half of marriage was wage this war. She had seen loved ones nearly killed or nearly quit. A man who had been their enemy had risked his life for theirs. Her team, her friends, deserved stability and peace. That which could not be brought by losing their commanding officers, and having to install a new team, new people to take orders from, to trust with their lives.
But all she could see was Baker's face: knowing he could die, willing to give his life for hers. He had no reason to, no stake in it, but he had done it. For her, for Tom, for all of them. How many other people had this hurt? How many other hearts were broken? How many other lives were now twisted around because of these last eighteen months?
Maybe the campaign was over, but the rebuilding had just begun. She couldn't turn her back on that. That was her responsibility too.
Tears in her eyes, she looked up into the night sky, and this time appreciated the silence. It was definitely not too quiet anymore.