BeachHead: Special Missions – Epilogue: Something Like That

Epilogue – Something Like That

The official debrief consumed most of the following day.

Beachhead spent hours with the Buenos Aires police chief, investigators and, eventually, the nearest available CIA representative. The same questions came at him from different directions. Who was he? Why had he been armed? How had he known what to do? Who did he work for?

Some questions received answers. Others received carefully constructed versions of them.

By the time Washington quietly spoke with the appropriate people in Argentina, everyone understood there were certain details better left out of the official record. More importantly, Beachhead's face and real name had never reached the cameras.

The press had plenty of footage of him, though — a battered man in a green balaclava moving through smoke, directing the handful of surviving security personnel, carrying wounded spectators to safety and repeatedly disappearing back inside the stadium while everyone else was trying to get out.

Argentine television had given the unidentified American a name before sunset. El Fantasma Verde. The Green Ghost.

Argentine authorities were less theatrical. Publicly, they described the unidentified man as a hero and credited his actions with preventing an already horrific casualty count from becoming far worse. Privately, they knew considerably more — and had been strongly encouraged to keep it that way.

When the interviews were finally over, Wayne returned to his hotel. The Joe locator sat on the nightstand. He looked at it for a moment, opened the drawer, dropped it inside and closed it. For the remainder of his mandatory leave, it stayed there.

Carmen took vacation days from the hospital.

Whatever hesitation had existed between them before the attack didn't survive it. They had watched people die. They had spent hours trying to keep others alive. After something like that, neither of them seemed particularly interested in wasting time pretending they didn't know what they wanted.

Carmen showed him her version of Buenos Aires instead of the one in the guidebooks. Neighborhood restaurants. Quiet cafes. Places where nobody knew Wayne Sneeden and certainly nobody recognized the man Argentine television had turned into the Green Ghost.

They ate. They drank. They laughed. They slept late. Some days they barely left the hotel. For perhaps the first time in years, Wayne stopped looking for the next thing that needed to be done. He simply allowed himself to be there. With her.

* * *

Within one day of returning to the PIT, Beachhead was standing at attention in Hawk's office. Hawk sat behind his desk. Duke stood beside it. Neither man looked particularly amused.

"You were ordered to take leave," Hawk said.
"Yes, sir."
"You were specifically ordered to go somewhere where nothing was happening."
"Yes, sir."

Duke folded his arms. "And somehow you managed to involve yourself in the largest terrorist attack Argentina has seen in years."

Beachhead stared straight ahead. "Bad timing, First Sergeant."

Duke's expression didn't change.

Hawk opened the folder on his desk. "You engaged multiple armed terrorists on foreign soil. You assumed tactical control of local security personnel. You activated a Joe emergency transponder from inside another sovereign nation. You conducted casualty evacuation under fire and, somewhere along the way, Argentine television turned you into."

Hawk glanced at the report. "El Fantasma Verde."

Duke looked over. "The Green Ghost." Beachhead said nothing.

"The Argentine government has privately expressed its gratitude," Hawk continued. "Their police credit you with saving a significant number of lives. The State Department is relieved your face never appeared on television, and the Agency assures me your actual identity remains contained."

Hawk closed the folder. "Which makes chewing your ass considerably more difficult." Duke cleared his throat. "But not impossible."

"No, First Sergeant."

Hawk stared at him for another moment. "You're back on duty tomorrow morning."
"Yes, sir."

Beachhead turned toward the door.

"Hold up," Duke said. "One question." Beachhead stopped.
"You still had almost two weeks of leave after everything settled down. What the hell did you do with yourself?"

Something barely resembling a smile appeared on Beachhead's face. "I tried to keep busy." He reached into his pocket, removed a folded sheet of paper and dropped it onto Hawk's desk. Hawk unfolded it. Another leave request. The requested start date was exactly one month away.

Duke stared at the paper, then slowly looked at Beachhead. "That shooting school at Thunder Ranch, right?" Hawk looked sideways at Duke. A grin crept across the general's face. Beachhead headed for the door. "Something like that."

He was halfway down the corridor when his phone vibrated. He pulled it out.

CARMEN: How did the debrief go, babe?

Wayne typed without breaking stride.

WAYNE: About like I figured it would, Carm.

The response came almost immediately.

CARMEN: And the leave?

He stopped. For just a moment, Beachhead looked back toward Hawk's office. Then he typed.

WAYNE: All good. I'll be ready when you get here. Three dots appeared.

CARMEN: Good. I already bought my ticket.

Wayne smiled. He put the phone back in his pocket and continued down the corridor.

A month suddenly seemed like a long damn time.

THE END