The ELI Event B007R5LTNS

“It’s like resetting your Windows password, sir. You can’t set a new one unless you know the old one. We can’t reset the satellite’s command-entry protocols to new ones because we can’t give it the old ones for verification.”
    Holt nodded. “Yes, so that it would know it’s us sending new commands and not China, or India, or friggin’ Mars,” he offered.
    “Exactly, sir. We’re effectively locked out of the entire system by our own protection protocols, with no way around them.”
    “Well, at least we know the security is solid,” Holt said humorlessly. “Andrew!” he called at the exact instant his aide burst through the office door, visibly startling Holt. Bernardo looked at the aide and wondered how he did that.
    Andrew was young, sharp, crisp, neat in the extreme. Bernardo scanned him bottom to top: shine, crease, Windsor, buzz, all perfect. Bernardo frowned. Two in the afternoon, and this nozzle looks like he just left a One-Hour Martinizing. He looked down at his own wrinkled, disheveled clothing, then back at Andrew, wondering how he did that, too.
    Andrew smiled at him brightly, a little too brightly, it seemed to Bernardo. Oh. Right.
    “What have you got?” Holt asked impatiently.
    “Not much, I’m afraid, sir,” Andrew said, quietly closing the door behind him. He spoke very rapidly, very precisely. “As you expected, Major Pettis isn’t in his office, nor is he answering his cell phone. His aide, Corporal Chuck Wright, was instructed not to give out any official information. Even to your office, sir,” he added indignantly.
    Holt was fuming. “Insolent prick,” he muttered to himself.
    “However,” Andrew continued, “I know Corporal Wright, um, socially, and he did give me one pertinent fact. A non-com who often accompanies Major Pettis, one Sergeant Anton Grochonski, called Chuck, er, Corporal Wright at home very late last night to get the phone number for a chopper jockey, a second looey named Davies, which of course Chuck gave to me on condition of anonymity.” The meaning of that sentence suddenly struck him, amusingly so. “Oh dear,” he said, “I’ve just given that away, haven’t I?”
    “Then call Da—” Holt began.
    “I called Davies’s residence,” Andrew said simultaneously, “and spoke to his wife. His freshly-minted, very brand-new wife, as it turns out. They were married only yesterday, and were about to leave on their honeymoon this morning. Niagara Falls, apparently. So cliché, but beautiful.”
    Holt opened his mouth to speak again, but wasn’t fast enough.
    “Anyhoo,” Andrew continued, “Susie—that’s his new bride’s name, Susie—was all crying and upset, and who wouldn’t be? Their leave was summarily canceled by Sergeant Grochonski, on Major Pettis’s orders of course, and Lieutenant Davies was ordered to report immediately to base.”
    “Aha,” said Holt. “All right, then, is Davies here? Grochonski?”
    Andrew shook his head. “No, sir, they’re gone. Davies himself either didn’t know where they were going, or he couldn’t say. All he told Susie was that he was being called away on an emergency mission. Those were his exact words, ‘emergency mission.’ Hmph, and the day after his wedding, too. Must be some emergency.”
    Holt sighed. “All right. Well, there must be some paper trail somewhere. Check—”
    “Got it,” Andrew interrupted. “Check the motor pool, flight plans, armory logs, map depository, anything they might have needed to view, use, or acquire prior to their emergency mission. Yes sir, got it sir.”
    Andrew gave Holt the most blazingly fast yet perfectly executed salute Bernardo had ever seen, and silently disappeared before you could say fabulous . Bernardo looked at the closed door bemusedly long after Andrew was gone.
    Hold smiled. “Most efficient goddamn aide I’ve ever had,” he said. “Look, if Pettis has left any clues to his whereabouts, Andrew will find them, guaranteed.” He stood to shake hands with Bernardo. “Thanks for the honest report, son. I know you’re just the messenger—sorry if I was rough on you there at first.”
    Bernardo shrugged. “No worries, General. You can’t hurt me; I’ve been married.”

    * * *

    In the noisy chopper, Pettis felt his cell phone vibrate yet again. Certain that it was Holt’s office calling for the tenth time, he checked it anyway. It wasn’t. It was a text message from Jan Ellis, his informant in the tech group. Her