Chapter 23 - The Strike at Arlington
The dawn broke gray and unforgiving over Washington, D.C.
I took the redeye military transport straight into Andrews Air Force Base, leaving Rosalie under the ironclad protection of twenty active-duty Marines stationed at our fortified Maine compound. She had protested, wanting to fly beside me, but we both knew this war required two fronts: she had to dismantle the corporate takeover in Boston, while I dealt with the blood in the dirt.
Arlington National Cemetery was silent, save for the wet crunch of my combat boots against the dew-soaked grass.
Marcus Bishop stood by the tomb of General Marcus Sinclair, his arm bound in a black sling where a bullet had creased his tricep. At his feet lay four scorched craters where thermite charges had failed to detonate.
"Alexander," Bishop greeted me, gripping my hand with his uninjured left arm. "We held the line. The General's resting place remains untouched."
"Casualties?" I asked, looking at the stone cross bearing my father's name and the Medal of Honor insignia carved into the granite.
"Two of our perimeter guards took shrapnel, but they’ll live," Bishop reported, pulling a burned tactical tablet from his cargo pocket. "We recovered this from the point man. Victoria’s cell didn't just come to desecrate the tomb for psychological warfare. They were planting a digital scrambler on the cemetery’s central network. They wanted to mask a transport convoy leaving the Navy Yard."
"What was on that convoy?"
"Heavy military-grade munitions stolen from a decommissioned black site in Virginia," Bishop replied, his expression dark. "Five hundred pounds of C4, thermobaric charges, and twenty shoulder-mounted anti-armor rockets. Alexander, she’s not setting up an assassination. She’s setting up a slaughter."
I knelt beside my father's grave, brushing a dead leaf away from the engraved letters: *Duty. Honor. Unyielding Justice.*
My father had died when his helicopter was sabotaged twelve years ago—an "accident" orchestrated by Catherine Vance and Victor Kane to prevent him from exposing their military procurement fraud. Now, Catherine’s true monster was trying to finish the job by erasing everything he stood for.
"Bishop," I said, rising to my full height, my knuckles white. "Prep the old strike team. Echo Six. We’re reactivating the Black Dagger protocol."
Bishop’s eyes widened. "Alexander... Black Dagger hasn't been authorized since the Fallujah campaign. The Pentagon will flag every asset we touch."
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"Let them flag it," I replied, my voice echoing against the white headstones. "The Pentagon didn't protect my wife when she was thrown from a third-story balcony with twenty-seven broken bones. The law didn't stop Kane from poisoning our institutions. This ends the only way soldiers know how to end things."
I turned my back on the grave and walked toward the idling black SUV. "Get the weapons ready. We're hunting my sister-in-law."
