Before long, I drifted in and out of sleep until the sound of landing gear releasing from the fuselage jolted me awake. I was slow to focus, my arms on fire. My eyes followed a distant white dot for a moment, then it faded. I faintly remembered the brilliance of the dot shortly after the dart had penetrated my leg. In contrast, what I was seeing now was something less stark, more of the starburst people see when they take a shot to the head and the optical nerve is rattled.

  When the plane landed, my body ached at every juncture. The entry wound seemed to explode with pain, and my eyes flashed with a galaxy of stars. Normal conversations, for a moment, sounded like people shouting directly in my ears.

  “The car is waiting for us!” one man said.

  “I’ll link up and then help you move them!”

  To my disappointment, the shrill voices dimmed as the first man said, “Take the captain and…”

  They were talking about McCool. While she could handle herself, I was paternally concerned for her. She was like family. Hell, she was family. I had spent more time with McCool and the others in my team than I had with Melissa, Brad, and Reagan. I assumed that “them” meant Hobart and me, since McCool had told me he was on another litter.

  When the airplane stopped taxiing, the engines wound down, the whine of the turbines was replaced by the loud rattle of a garage door.

  “I’m going with him!” McCool shouted. Then, “Don’t fucking touch me!”

  There was a struggle that I couldn’t see, but given the size of the two CIA men and even the doctor that I had seen, I wasn’t hopeful that McCool, as talented a fighter as she was, would be able to subdue them.

  Feet banged on the floor of the aircraft with loud slaps, as if she were being held by her upper body but not her legs. McCool had just been awarded her first-degree black belt in Brazilian jujitsu, and I interpreted the sounds as her fighting off two or three of the goons. While I had worked extensively with the CIA, including Director Owens, I was struggling to resolve why these men might be aggressive with McCool. Ostensibly, Hobart and I were being evacuated due to wounds received during an authorized combat mission, albeit one that had to be denied and hidden from the general public. We conducted these missions routinely, often with men and women getting wounded, and had protocols in place to evacuate, cover our tracks, and make our presence no more than a zephyr.

  After a minute, the sounds subsided, and the two hulking CIA men returned. They undid some latches and lifted the medical litter to carry me off the airplane. As they shuffled along, I caught glimpses of the Beast, riddled with gray bullet holes pockmarked along the exterior of the aircraft. The skin of the left engine housing was charred as if it had caught fire. Snippets of the exfiltration rocketed through my mind.

  I remembered Hobart shouting, “Go, go, go!” A bright burst followed by Van Dreeves saying, “I’m hit! Watch the boss!” The Beast yawing wildly in the sky.

  But I couldn’t replay the entire video in my head. I was only able to grab scenes for a microsecond here and there.

  As we descended the ramp, the ceiling of the large hangar came into view. A large black SUV was waiting with its hatch lifted. The two men slid me in the back before I could say anything, and then the man I presumed to be a doctor leaned in and punched another shot into my arm. The hatch closed, and I felt the weight shift twice on the SUV as we began rolling.

  I didn’t see McCool or Hobart and suddenly became concerned that my wounds were worse than I’d thought. I presumed that these men were whisking me to Walter Reed in Bethesda and that we had landed at Joint Base Andrews.

  I presumed wrong.

  14

  AS MY MIND WAS drifting into its fugue state, Brigadier General Dariush Parizad was finalizing Iran’s attack plans on the United States.

  Perhaps there was no better Iranian to lead the effort against the Great Satan than the Lion of Tabas, forged in the literal fires of Operation Eagle Claw. The United States had executed that mission at the peak of its military incompetence and simultaneously at the debut of the still-surviving theocracy that had propelled Iran to become a major geopolitical power and nevermore a puppet of the United States. Rising from the ashes of the global coronavirus pandemic, Iran—hit particularly hard because of its close ties to China—was following Parizad’s strategy of attacking an opponent on the ropes.

  The record shows that Parizad spoke calmly with the ayatollah and President Rouhani in the humble confines of the Office of the Supreme Leader, which was appointed with a mahogany desk, four wooden chairs with bad white-and-gold-flecked upholstery, and an oversize chair covered with the likes of a bedsheet. Parizad and the president sat in the wooden chairs facing the ayatollah in the oversized chair. A large brown hutch with assorted gifts from Chinese, Russian, Syrian, German, French, and other world leaders stood above them along the wall.

  “The submarines are free. The commander reported that he escaped the Persian Gulf and is now following our plan,” Parizad said.

  The grand ayatollah nodded. “Detected?”

  Parizad shrugged. “We think so, but now they are deep and alone making their way to their targets.”

  The ayatollah nodded and spoke. He made subtle motions with his hands and spoke softly through thin lips covered with wisps of his gray-and-black beard.

  “When my mentor and predecessor, Grand Ayatollah Khomeini, named you the Lion of Tabas, he placed great responsibility on your shoulders. He foresaw that one day our people would require visiting the shores of the United States and collapsing the evil empire from within. The Americans came to your village and killed your father. Everything that has happened until now has been in preparation for this, setting the stage for your action. With the cowardly strike on Soleimani, our preparations have not been in vain. Now we must show strength after this plague.”

  “We will achieve the complete revenge and more,” Parizad said. “The plan is fully in motion. We are wounded, but a wounded animal is to be feared.”

  The ayatollah was the head of the Iranian state and commander of all military forces, not unlike the American president is the commander in chief in addition to the country’s highest executive. Parizad’s rise to power was accelerated by the American drone strike that killed Major General Soleimani, the former leader of the Quds Force and Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps.

  The ayatollah nodded and asked, “The American?”

  Parizad remained silent for a moment, then said, “The American is reliable.”

  “The Jew?”

  “The spy escaped. We should have contact with him soon.”

  “The testing?”

  “Complete. Everything works as our doctors said it would.”

  “The electronics?”

  “The application works. Everything will come together at the right time.”

  The ayatollah spread his arms in welcoming satisfaction.

  “I will leave these matters to you, General. While I am your commander, I do not pretend to have the battlefield skill that you possess. Since you were a young lieutenant, you have succeeded in bringing honor to your homeland, and I am convinced you will continue to do so.”

  “Thank you, Supreme Leader,” Parizad said.

  “Your travels will take you abroad for a long time. We will await your return and provide for you a fitting hero’s reception.”

  “Supreme Leader, I am not one for recognition. Everything I do is for my country and my mother and sister. Please,” Parizad demurred.

  The ayatollah looked at the president, a small man in an oversize suit, and said, “Very well. Provide General Parizad all the support he requests, nothing less.”

  With that, the meeting adjourned, and Parizad visited the technical services department of the Ministry of Intelligence where he was outfitted with the necessary equipment. He then departed Tehran on an Iranian jet to France, where he changed planes at Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport and was lost in the crowd.

  It wasn’t long before I saw him again.

  15

  I AWOKE IN A sterile room still strapped down, but this time fastened to a large metal gurney that was fixed in the middle of the floor.

  A bank of fluorescent lights screwed into the ceiling shined down on me. The intensity of the light was not as severe as I had expected, given my last several memories. While the skin on my arms tingled, it did not seem to be on fire as I had experienced in the airplane.

  I lifted my head and felt a mild ache, but not the throbbing pain I had previously experienced. Whatever medicine the doctors were giving me seemed to be working. Water was dripping somewhere behind me, but the plink, plink, plink was muted, not harsh.

  My immediate concern was for McCool, Hobart, and Van Dreeves, as well as the rest of my crew. Two men stood outside the door, half of which was a wire-mesh window. I appreciated their concern for my safety and welfare, but honestly, I thought this level of protection was beyond what I needed or deserved.

  “Hello,” I called out.

  A voice came over the intercom speakers above me.

  “You don’t need to shout, General. We can hear you.”

  I swallowed and said, “Okay, thank you. Is there anyone who can tell me the status of my team?”

  A long moment ensued before a different voice said, “Someone will come in to speak with you shortly.”

  I listened carefully to the inflection in the voice, the words, the tone, and something gave me pause. I wasn’t sure just yet. I’d been wounded and obviously drugged both with some kind of poison dart in Japan and then an antidote—a simple EpiPen—that Van Dreeves had injected followed by whatever the doctors were giving me. My senses had been impacted in a way that distorted reality, or maybe I was experiencing actual reality without the filters our bodies provided us.

  The door opened, and a tall man walked in. He had shaggy brown hair that fell over his ears, a hawkish nose, and narrow eyes. His forehead was pinched tightly as he looked at a tablet and then at me over wire-rim glasses.

  “General Sinclair, how are you feeling today?”

  “Better, I think. Can you tell me about my team? Their status?”

  He pursed his lips and said, “We are still researching that. You have people spread out everywhere.”

  “Randy Van Dreeves is who I’m most concerned about. He and Sally McCool and Joe Hobart. I think Rogers, Jackson, and Brown are okay.” But something clawed at the back of my mind about Jackson.

  “What makes you think that?” he asked.

  I was annoyed he wasn’t directly answering my questions. I never pretended to be entitled to respect or information at any rank, though as a commander of soldiers, I had a responsibility to my troops, and I needed answers to make decisions about their welfare.

  “Let’s try answering my questions, and then I’ll consider answering yours,” I said.

  His lips turned up in an arrogant self-assured way that reinforced the scratching in the back of my mind.

  “Yes, well, I’ll see if I can get some information for you, but first I need to diagnose you.”

  “You’re a doctor?”

  “Yes, I’m a doctor.”

  “Am I at Walter Reed?”

  “Again, I’ll answer your questions in due time. It’s important that I speak with you while your mind is fresh so that we can help you and your team.”

  “Who is ‘we’?”

  He huffed and smiled as he smoothed his pant legs and sat in a chair next to the gurney. “We’re going to start with you telling me about what you saw in Japan, then in Heidelberg, and then in Tabas, where it all began. Now who authorized your mission in Yokkaichi?”

  “Why don’t you tell me who the fuck you are,” I said. I couldn’t imagine too many people that had the authorizations, clearances, and contacts that I did, though I was sure they existed. “But first, unstrap me from this gurney.”

  “You’re not leaving the gurney, General, until you answer my questions.”

  He sat patiently, waiting.

  “I doubt you’re cleared to know who authorizes me to take a piss,” I said. “Get me out of here.”

  “I’m sure it is uncomfortable for you to not be in control—we’ve heard this about you—but you either trust me or it’s going to be a difficult road for you, I’m afraid.”

  “What are you talking about?” I was incredulous. “I just got wounded on a mission of the highest importance to national security. Why are you treating me like the enemy?”

  The penny dropped into the cone of my mind and began circling around slowly toward the center.

  Why are you treating me like the enemy?

  I always operated by the principle of Occam’s razor, the simplest explanation being true, which in this case meant that if they were treating me like a prisoner, then they most certainly viewed me as one.

  But why? I wondered. What had I done to deserve this type of confinement and questioning? I reviewed the pieces of my shattered memory as best I could. Japan, Germany, Iran, other missions. Nothing seemed to resonate. All of it was executed with professionalism and as much precision as humanly possible.

  Iranian helicopters chased us from Yazd Province, but casualties were minimal, and it had never been mentioned in the news. In Heidelberg, we killed four guards outside and had some scrapes inside but found a computer and confirmed Parizad’s location. In Yokkaichi, well, everything went to shit when we were in the basement. I was unsure if we retrieved anything of value, but I sure wasn’t going to reveal anything to this stranger, who may or may not be CIA.

  “I’ll ask you again: What happened in Japan?” the man said.

  “Let’s start with my questions. I can do this all day. I’m the one who has been locked down here. Haven’t you read anything about prisoners? They have all the time in the world,” I said.

  In Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria, I had interacted with more than my fair share of detainees—enemy prisoners of war—captured on the battlefield. Once they knew they were locked down, they tried to escape, settled in for the long haul, or did both.

  “What makes you think you’re a prisoner?” he asked.

  I got the impression he might be a psychiatrist of some type. He kept asking questions in a patient and practiced manner with the underlying threat of harm just beneath the surface. My protestations were BBs bouncing off a tank. He didn’t care. He had an objective in mind and multiple strategies to achieve his desired outcome. On the other hand, I had little reliable information other than what my drug-induced mind could absorb. The gurney to which I was still strapped. The isolated room. The guards. The binds across my legs and arms.

  I recalled when we had captured Abu al-Ghazni, a Haqqani affiliate in Afghanistan. He had been wounded in the kill/capture mission, and we had secured him in almost precisely the same fashion as I was bound.

  “Well, I’m strapped to this gurney, that door is locked, and there are two armed goons on the outside guarding the door.”

  “Is that what you think? They’re guarding the door?”

  “Why don’t you tell me, Doc?”

  “Do you believe I’m a doctor?”

  I changed my mind. “With all these questions, I think you’re probably just some jerk-off sent in here to fuck with me.”

  The arrogant smirk returned, as if he were a tolerant parent enduring a petulant child’s tantrum. Granted, these emotionally driven outbursts were not my typical style. While entirely reasonable, I was more prone to retreat inward and silently outmaneuver whoever this might be. The thoughts and memories came fluttering to my consciousness like a flock of sparrows from a barn, darting in every direction. Hobart, Van Dreeves, McCool, the Beast, Japan, Germany, Iran, al-Baghdadi … and Melissa.

  “Melissa,” I whispered.

  Her face hovered in front of me as I willed myself to retreat inward, riddled with pain. At her graveside I had been stoic, strong for my children and those that loved her. While Reagan and Brad had wept in my chest with my arms around them, I’d stood there like the rock that they had needed. A tear never found its way onto my face. The pain was swallowed inside my soul, now an underground lake of sorrow and guilt.

  But now, in front of this nameless man with no title, I felt tears stream across my cheeks.

  “Melissa,” I whispered again. “I’m so sorry.”

  The image of her being interrogated by Parizad flittered through my mind, one of the darting sparrows from the barn. What had happened? How?

  “Tell me about Melissa,” the man said quickly, sensing an opening, I presumed.

  I turned my head away. I would rather share state secrets with this man than divulge the sorrow and guilt I felt for Melissa to him.

  “Fuck you,” I said instead.

  “Why are you sorry?”

  “Because I’m in here with you and not with her,” I unwittingly said. I was off my game. Something had unhinged my normal thought process. For a brief second, I’d thought a snarky reply actually made sense. A moment later, I realized it came off as petulant.

  He seized the opportunity.

  “You’d rather be dead? Your wife is dead, and you’d rather be with her, correct?”

  I turned and looked at him. “Yes.”

  “Is there anyone else you want to kill other than yourself?”

  It was a bold leap to go from assessing that I wanted an afterlife with my wife to believing I wanted to kill someone, even myself, but it gave me insight into what he was thinking. I could see the chart now: Suicidal ideations, possibly homicidal.

  When I least expected it, Melissa’s face hovered in my mind, penetrating through the swarm of sparrows—no, becoming the swarm, the whole of my existence, all the memories captured in one place. This flock formed into Melissa’s loving face. Her soft smile with the barely discernable dimple. Radiant green eyes. Smooth skin. Wisps of reddish-brown hair over her forehead. She did what she always did. She gathered the scattered, harrowing memories and absorbed them as if she were a black hole, her love capable of devouring evil and producing good.

  Good wins.