Scenes from a Preternatural Presidency -- 3. Out of the Office (E)
The Secret Service being the Secret Service, and Italy full of seismic stuff, we’d actually done Earthquake 101 during the flight from Spain, so we were safely on the far side of the terrace as dislodged roof-tiles dropped and broke. Parents were holding children, I had Jesse and Sally, and Adam was scanning the hillside above us, eyes wolf-yellow, Skuffles beside him, but though some rocks clattered down there was no bigger slide. and slowly tremors ebbed, aftershocks spiking among them. The senior agent came through the terrace doors with the head guy from the PM’s protection detail, both with small but powerful LED flashlights, plaster coating their heads and shoulders, and I offered reassurance that no-one had anything worse than smarting feet and bruised rears.
“Sure, Ma’am ?”
“Un huh. Any of your men hurt ?”
“No, Ma’am. We’re good.”
“Lucky. That felt 7 plus. Is there much damage inside ?”
“Ceilings all over, and windows, but who knows about structural integrity ? You should all stay outside for now, Ma’am."
The PM had been trying his phone while listening to his guard, and turned to me.
“There is no signal, so the mast on Monte Cerreto is either down or without power. The sergeant says the whole of Amalfi is dark. Do you have anything that’ll get me in touch with Rome ?”
Even as he spoke the lights flickered and came back on, though everywhere else I could see stayed dark.
“I do now.” I looked at my agent. “That’s our emergency generator ?”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
“Good work. Do you want me to stay outside badly enough to shift the com centre out here pronto ?”
“I do, Ma’am, and it’s on its way.”
Even if I was allowed to tell you whatall was in the com centre I couldn’t, its tech being well beyond me, but it came in its own armoured case, and we cleared one end of the table while two agents lugged it out and its tech guardian-guy set it up. The PM looked at me.
“You brought your own generator, in case ?”
“The Secret Service did. SOP, about which I am presently having warm thoughts.”
One satellite-bounce later I was talking to Frank, who promised to call Clay so he and Donna wouldn’t worry, then the USGS, followed by the Pentagon, while the PM had a separate line to someone in Rome, and things did not sound good. The USGS had the ’quake at 7.3, close to an Italian record, and worse, with a very shallow epicentre some 50km north-east of us, on the eastern side of the Monti Picentini. They thought Mercalli intensity would be extreme, which the Pentagon’s reports of power loss observed from space tended to confirm. It was out all round the epicentre, though that included a chunk of parkland and mountains, and in streaks and patches between Mondragone, Candela, and Agropoli, including bits of Naples as well as the peninsula - which the USGS said would be landslides taking out transmission towers, and resulting surges blowing sub-station circuit-breakers. The Pentagon had IR and other satellites that didn’t need daylight retargeting, and as feeds became available I authorised hooking them through to geophys and S&R people from the INGV, Vigili del Fuoco, and Soccorso Alpino that the PM was talking to. The Admiral who was Chair of the Joint Chiefs got points because he’d anticipated me in ordering both USN carrier-groups in the Mediterranean to head for Naples at top speed, and as the true scale of the damage began to become clear I asked him to get USAF and Army resources in Europe moving.
“Helicopters, medics, and engineers, please, Admiral. Give any Europeans who need it a lift as well.”
I called the German Chancellor, who knew it was bad but not how bad, and left her kicking their resources into higher gear, before repeating the process with other European leaders, including the Oaf. He was still an idiot, and had not yet been briefed, which spoke volumes, but the Brits have some first-rate S&R teams, as well as the assets to move them at high speed, and someone listening at his end knew enough that when I relayed the USGS modified-Richter and Mercalli estimates, with the depth, buttons were pushed and calls made. I also spoke to Bran and Asil, who would set Italian wolves in motion. Broader EU responses were kicking in, and despite a fish-eye from my senior agent I turned over extra lines to the PM so he could check on his parents, with whom he and his family were staying, and who were shaken but OK. He then set up a teleconference, and I joined the others, who’d been watching silently, nibbling cheese rescued from the table and drinking wine or bottled water someone had risked collecting from the kitchen. Adam held me for a moment, and when I sat Skuffles cocked her head.
Do we need trolls ?
I sighed. “Maybe, Skuffles. There are going to be villages that have been flattened and cut off. I feel it too, but if we do it here, how do we say no to whoever gets the next bad one ? So also maybe not. But as the PM needs the lines just now, go find out how Irpa feels about any request, and Gwyn ap Lugh’s opinion ?”
Will do, Mercy. Back in a few.
Skuffles went, and I fielded questions from the musicologist while she held her kiddos, Adam held Jesse, Jude held Jenna, and Leslie held Sally.
“US military assets aren’t a problem - they serve, by definition - but with the Fae there is the question of debt. Trolls are pretty easy-going, by fae standards, but Gray Lords aren’t, and one misplaced word in a request to Gwyn ap Lugh could leave Italy owing a great deal it couldn’t pay. And I’m sorry to be blunt, but while a discovery of trapped living might be enough to warrant fae help, recovering dead isn’t. I know it seems cold, but sometimes I have to be, and so do the Fae.” I borrowed Adam’s bottle of water for a moment. “This is big enough and almost certainly bad enough to ask the question, hard, but any answer still has to wait for specific targets.”
“Si. That I understand.” She sighed, waving a hand. “And I have thought before that when you have produced a most surprising magical answer to some problem, the response is not a well-earned thank-you but a calculating question about another problem.”
“That’s the one, Signora. And finding those lost tourists in the Sierra makes this harder now. I’ve been having to restrain myself from whacking more things with big magical sticks anyway.”
“You’re whacking this with big mundane sticks, love.” Adam loosened one arm from Jesse to rest a hand on my shoulder. “And however inappropriate, I’ll confess to getting a kick out of seeing you redeploy carrier-groups and every US chopper in Germany.”
I gave Adam a look that made him and Jude grin.
“Forget it. Carrier-group foreplay is so not going to happen.”
The laughter had too much edge, and though no-one lost it, it was close-run. A word with the senior agent, hovering equally about me and the com centre, generated hot drinks from the kitchen, with bread and salami to give stomachs something more to occupy them, and as the night cooled we acquired blankets and jackets. Skuffles returned, telling me Irpa and a dozen trolls would come if asked, but Gwyn ap Lugh was, while sympathetic and concerned, very cautious about large scale provision of aid. Within moments she, Jesse, Jenna, and Sally were arguing advantages and pitfalls of fae assistance in natural disasters, all making sharp points, and with the distinction of rescuing the living and recovering the dead snagged Adam and a couple of agents on wolf willingness to deploy to scent the difference. The listening kiddos were fascinated, and the boy asked me how one could tell.
“The living breathe, meaning water vapour, heat, and CO2. The dead don’t, plus they cool, and start to smell different very swiftly. Scent’s not easy, and debris-fields are complicated, but any consistent source of warmer, wetter, and CO2-heavier air can be found by a trained wolf. Trained dogs, too, but they can’t talk.”
Further questions had me trying to explain how complex picking scents apart could be, a welcome distraction that didn’t last as the PM came across, his face white and strained, and let his wife hold him.
“It is terrible. Avellino is rubble, and Solofra with most of Nola and everything between. We will be lucky if the death-toll stays under six figures.” He rubbed his eyes. “The only good thing is that schools and offices were empty. Power to the Sorrentine Peninsula is out because a big landslide south of Cava de’ Terreni took down two pylons, but they are on it as a priority. I must get to Rome, but the coast road is cut at Vietri sul Mare, as are at least two of the roads over the Monti Latteri, so the army is sending a helicopter for us, to the ferry car park. The police say the road is clear that far at least.”
“And you take what good news you can get. God be with you, sir, and don’t hesitate to ask for anything US forces can provide.”
He said he wouldn’t, offered tired thanks for food and aid, and they all made swift farewells. It was a sorry end to what had been a pleasant evening, and with guests gone the Secret Service wanted us out of there too - even if the palazzo remained structurally safe it was going to need a great deal of cleaning and redecorating, and staying would use resources the Italians were going to need, so I didn’t argue in principle but did nix diverting a chopper when we had time to use the coast road around the peninsula. As the clattering of the PM’s chopper came and went some checking via DC told us the coast road was cut only between Vietri sul Mare and Cetara, though all three roads across the spine of the peninsula were out, so after some cautious packing, with way too much plaster dust involved, we went.
The drive was eery, lack of power making darkness palpable, though surf gleamed and some houses clearly had emergency generators. The SUVs had a satellite link so I was monitoring the emergency response, and if the occasion was grim there was a certain satisfaction in military efficiency. Once we crossed the spine of the peninsula, descending towards Montechiaro, a signal returned and Sally promptly called her parents, while everyone’s phones bleeped with incoming messages of concerned enquiry. That kept us busy until the still patchy lights of Naples came into view, but damage assessments kept getting worse - the first isoseismal maps of Mercalli intensity were showing a maximum XII within a 15-km radius of the epicentre, and swathes of X and XI around that, where buildings of all ages and designs would have been sheared at ground level and come straight down. Beyond that damage was still severe, but far more people had been able to get out of buildings, though there had been a lot of injuries and deaths from falling tiles and glass. There was also a red-flagged USGS report, saying the epicentre was further south, the magnitude greater, than anyone would have predicted, and they suspected a new extensional fault, meaning major aftershocks and further events were more likely than not so S&R should be cautious. It had already gone to the authorities who needed it, but meant the Secret Service wanted us in the air as soon as we reached Air Force One, and I had to put my foot down. When the Director grudgingly agreed being onboard away from any buildings was adequately safe and rang off, I gave the senior agent a look.
“Did they pick up my cheese … yesterday?”
He gave me a look back, but checked, and they had, as well as my new Imperias, so it was only waiting for whatever daylight revealed. No-one was sleepy, so though I kept an eye on military sitreps we watched on Jude’s recommendation a Brit movie from 1946, called A Matter of Life and Death, that was clever and funny. Around 4 a.m. Bran called, relaying a request from the Neapolitan Alpha, and I cloaked him and four of his pack to a small village close to the epicentre which was cut off and had nowhere a chopper could land. Satellite imagery suggested devastation, and was right - every house and the small church were rubble, and there was no-one alive any of us could smell, though plenty of death. We did collect two traumatised dogs and an injured cat, but that was as much rescuing as we could manage, and I took the wolves back to the S&R centre that knew where they could most help before returning to Air Force One.
The news imagery at dawn was just as bad as expected, but though tens of thousands had died rescues were happening, and the influx of military and police choppers and pan-European S&R squads meant there were now teams working everywhere that had been razed, however they weren’t finding many survivors. The media had discovered where I was, and as no-one doing S&R was remotely interested in talking to them they were cluttering up terminals and irritating people. Stifling annoyance, I spoke to the PM, who’d added red-eyed to white and strained, then the airport boss, and a press conference was set up outside the admin block.
I made a simple statement of sorrow for deaths and destruction, and enforced a moment’s silence before giving them what I had on NATO, US, and Italian resources, including wolves. That generated sensible questions and appreciation, but they wanted personal stories, so yes the PM and his family had come to dinner, and it had been fine, until. What had been served they could work out from ingredients I’d bought, if they really thought that today’s burning question. And no, we wouldn’t be staying, as Italians had better things to do than worry about our presence. There were also questions about preternatural aid, and as someone brought up the troll clearance in SF after Cascadia I took that bull by the horns, shuffling points Jesse, Jenna, and Sally had made.
“That was collapsed freeway, without bodies, in a city Congresstroll Thorsden calls home and now represents. And it wasn’t magic, it was strength, for which trolls have to be full-size. Sure, if trolls have solid footing, they can clear a debris pile quicker than anything except heavy machinery, but trolls are heavy machinery, and the same cautions about triggering further collapses applies, as well as aftershocks or a further event. If we knew of trapped people Fae might be willing to assist, and that’s one reason I’ve waited here, monitoring rescue work, but they are not an emergency service and lack the numbers to deal on this scale, let alone worldwide. Italian and other wolves are already helping, with scenting and strength, which is a boon, but as I once told ED Westfield you can’t shoot an earthquake, and you can’t magic it away either. Period.”
I’d had enough, and refused a follow-up.
“No. I’m tired, upset, and getting cranky, so you can all go do something more useful somewhere else.”
I waited another few hours, taking calls from the German Chancellor and French President, appreciative of US aid, but by late morning no-one knew of anything that might need preternatural intervention, so at noon I gave the OK, we took off for Andrews AFB, and everyone went to bed. We were awake for the second leg, to the Tri-Cities, and over the Mid-West I was watching Irpa, already wearing a tee that said Trolls are heavy machinery, being interviewed about the bridge in Detroit when Jesse ended a call with Tad and flopped down opposite me and Adam.
“Urk. So Spain was good, and Amalfi was lovely, until. Where are we going next year?”
Adam and I exchanged a long look.
“Camp David”, I told her, “and no-one is going outside the compound.”
“Sure, Ma’am ?”
“Un huh. Any of your men hurt ?”
“No, Ma’am. We’re good.”
“Lucky. That felt 7 plus. Is there much damage inside ?”
“Ceilings all over, and windows, but who knows about structural integrity ? You should all stay outside for now, Ma’am."
The PM had been trying his phone while listening to his guard, and turned to me.
“There is no signal, so the mast on Monte Cerreto is either down or without power. The sergeant says the whole of Amalfi is dark. Do you have anything that’ll get me in touch with Rome ?”
Even as he spoke the lights flickered and came back on, though everywhere else I could see stayed dark.
“I do now.” I looked at my agent. “That’s our emergency generator ?”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
“Good work. Do you want me to stay outside badly enough to shift the com centre out here pronto ?”
“I do, Ma’am, and it’s on its way.”
Even if I was allowed to tell you whatall was in the com centre I couldn’t, its tech being well beyond me, but it came in its own armoured case, and we cleared one end of the table while two agents lugged it out and its tech guardian-guy set it up. The PM looked at me.
“You brought your own generator, in case ?”
“The Secret Service did. SOP, about which I am presently having warm thoughts.”
One satellite-bounce later I was talking to Frank, who promised to call Clay so he and Donna wouldn’t worry, then the USGS, followed by the Pentagon, while the PM had a separate line to someone in Rome, and things did not sound good. The USGS had the ’quake at 7.3, close to an Italian record, and worse, with a very shallow epicentre some 50km north-east of us, on the eastern side of the Monti Picentini. They thought Mercalli intensity would be extreme, which the Pentagon’s reports of power loss observed from space tended to confirm. It was out all round the epicentre, though that included a chunk of parkland and mountains, and in streaks and patches between Mondragone, Candela, and Agropoli, including bits of Naples as well as the peninsula - which the USGS said would be landslides taking out transmission towers, and resulting surges blowing sub-station circuit-breakers. The Pentagon had IR and other satellites that didn’t need daylight retargeting, and as feeds became available I authorised hooking them through to geophys and S&R people from the INGV, Vigili del Fuoco, and Soccorso Alpino that the PM was talking to. The Admiral who was Chair of the Joint Chiefs got points because he’d anticipated me in ordering both USN carrier-groups in the Mediterranean to head for Naples at top speed, and as the true scale of the damage began to become clear I asked him to get USAF and Army resources in Europe moving.
“Helicopters, medics, and engineers, please, Admiral. Give any Europeans who need it a lift as well.”
I called the German Chancellor, who knew it was bad but not how bad, and left her kicking their resources into higher gear, before repeating the process with other European leaders, including the Oaf. He was still an idiot, and had not yet been briefed, which spoke volumes, but the Brits have some first-rate S&R teams, as well as the assets to move them at high speed, and someone listening at his end knew enough that when I relayed the USGS modified-Richter and Mercalli estimates, with the depth, buttons were pushed and calls made. I also spoke to Bran and Asil, who would set Italian wolves in motion. Broader EU responses were kicking in, and despite a fish-eye from my senior agent I turned over extra lines to the PM so he could check on his parents, with whom he and his family were staying, and who were shaken but OK. He then set up a teleconference, and I joined the others, who’d been watching silently, nibbling cheese rescued from the table and drinking wine or bottled water someone had risked collecting from the kitchen. Adam held me for a moment, and when I sat Skuffles cocked her head.
Do we need trolls ?
I sighed. “Maybe, Skuffles. There are going to be villages that have been flattened and cut off. I feel it too, but if we do it here, how do we say no to whoever gets the next bad one ? So also maybe not. But as the PM needs the lines just now, go find out how Irpa feels about any request, and Gwyn ap Lugh’s opinion ?”
Will do, Mercy. Back in a few.
Skuffles went, and I fielded questions from the musicologist while she held her kiddos, Adam held Jesse, Jude held Jenna, and Leslie held Sally.
“US military assets aren’t a problem - they serve, by definition - but with the Fae there is the question of debt. Trolls are pretty easy-going, by fae standards, but Gray Lords aren’t, and one misplaced word in a request to Gwyn ap Lugh could leave Italy owing a great deal it couldn’t pay. And I’m sorry to be blunt, but while a discovery of trapped living might be enough to warrant fae help, recovering dead isn’t. I know it seems cold, but sometimes I have to be, and so do the Fae.” I borrowed Adam’s bottle of water for a moment. “This is big enough and almost certainly bad enough to ask the question, hard, but any answer still has to wait for specific targets.”
“Si. That I understand.” She sighed, waving a hand. “And I have thought before that when you have produced a most surprising magical answer to some problem, the response is not a well-earned thank-you but a calculating question about another problem.”
“That’s the one, Signora. And finding those lost tourists in the Sierra makes this harder now. I’ve been having to restrain myself from whacking more things with big magical sticks anyway.”
“You’re whacking this with big mundane sticks, love.” Adam loosened one arm from Jesse to rest a hand on my shoulder. “And however inappropriate, I’ll confess to getting a kick out of seeing you redeploy carrier-groups and every US chopper in Germany.”
I gave Adam a look that made him and Jude grin.
“Forget it. Carrier-group foreplay is so not going to happen.”
The laughter had too much edge, and though no-one lost it, it was close-run. A word with the senior agent, hovering equally about me and the com centre, generated hot drinks from the kitchen, with bread and salami to give stomachs something more to occupy them, and as the night cooled we acquired blankets and jackets. Skuffles returned, telling me Irpa and a dozen trolls would come if asked, but Gwyn ap Lugh was, while sympathetic and concerned, very cautious about large scale provision of aid. Within moments she, Jesse, Jenna, and Sally were arguing advantages and pitfalls of fae assistance in natural disasters, all making sharp points, and with the distinction of rescuing the living and recovering the dead snagged Adam and a couple of agents on wolf willingness to deploy to scent the difference. The listening kiddos were fascinated, and the boy asked me how one could tell.
“The living breathe, meaning water vapour, heat, and CO2. The dead don’t, plus they cool, and start to smell different very swiftly. Scent’s not easy, and debris-fields are complicated, but any consistent source of warmer, wetter, and CO2-heavier air can be found by a trained wolf. Trained dogs, too, but they can’t talk.”
Further questions had me trying to explain how complex picking scents apart could be, a welcome distraction that didn’t last as the PM came across, his face white and strained, and let his wife hold him.
“It is terrible. Avellino is rubble, and Solofra with most of Nola and everything between. We will be lucky if the death-toll stays under six figures.” He rubbed his eyes. “The only good thing is that schools and offices were empty. Power to the Sorrentine Peninsula is out because a big landslide south of Cava de’ Terreni took down two pylons, but they are on it as a priority. I must get to Rome, but the coast road is cut at Vietri sul Mare, as are at least two of the roads over the Monti Latteri, so the army is sending a helicopter for us, to the ferry car park. The police say the road is clear that far at least.”
“And you take what good news you can get. God be with you, sir, and don’t hesitate to ask for anything US forces can provide.”
He said he wouldn’t, offered tired thanks for food and aid, and they all made swift farewells. It was a sorry end to what had been a pleasant evening, and with guests gone the Secret Service wanted us out of there too - even if the palazzo remained structurally safe it was going to need a great deal of cleaning and redecorating, and staying would use resources the Italians were going to need, so I didn’t argue in principle but did nix diverting a chopper when we had time to use the coast road around the peninsula. As the clattering of the PM’s chopper came and went some checking via DC told us the coast road was cut only between Vietri sul Mare and Cetara, though all three roads across the spine of the peninsula were out, so after some cautious packing, with way too much plaster dust involved, we went.
The drive was eery, lack of power making darkness palpable, though surf gleamed and some houses clearly had emergency generators. The SUVs had a satellite link so I was monitoring the emergency response, and if the occasion was grim there was a certain satisfaction in military efficiency. Once we crossed the spine of the peninsula, descending towards Montechiaro, a signal returned and Sally promptly called her parents, while everyone’s phones bleeped with incoming messages of concerned enquiry. That kept us busy until the still patchy lights of Naples came into view, but damage assessments kept getting worse - the first isoseismal maps of Mercalli intensity were showing a maximum XII within a 15-km radius of the epicentre, and swathes of X and XI around that, where buildings of all ages and designs would have been sheared at ground level and come straight down. Beyond that damage was still severe, but far more people had been able to get out of buildings, though there had been a lot of injuries and deaths from falling tiles and glass. There was also a red-flagged USGS report, saying the epicentre was further south, the magnitude greater, than anyone would have predicted, and they suspected a new extensional fault, meaning major aftershocks and further events were more likely than not so S&R should be cautious. It had already gone to the authorities who needed it, but meant the Secret Service wanted us in the air as soon as we reached Air Force One, and I had to put my foot down. When the Director grudgingly agreed being onboard away from any buildings was adequately safe and rang off, I gave the senior agent a look.
“Did they pick up my cheese … yesterday?”
He gave me a look back, but checked, and they had, as well as my new Imperias, so it was only waiting for whatever daylight revealed. No-one was sleepy, so though I kept an eye on military sitreps we watched on Jude’s recommendation a Brit movie from 1946, called A Matter of Life and Death, that was clever and funny. Around 4 a.m. Bran called, relaying a request from the Neapolitan Alpha, and I cloaked him and four of his pack to a small village close to the epicentre which was cut off and had nowhere a chopper could land. Satellite imagery suggested devastation, and was right - every house and the small church were rubble, and there was no-one alive any of us could smell, though plenty of death. We did collect two traumatised dogs and an injured cat, but that was as much rescuing as we could manage, and I took the wolves back to the S&R centre that knew where they could most help before returning to Air Force One.
The news imagery at dawn was just as bad as expected, but though tens of thousands had died rescues were happening, and the influx of military and police choppers and pan-European S&R squads meant there were now teams working everywhere that had been razed, however they weren’t finding many survivors. The media had discovered where I was, and as no-one doing S&R was remotely interested in talking to them they were cluttering up terminals and irritating people. Stifling annoyance, I spoke to the PM, who’d added red-eyed to white and strained, then the airport boss, and a press conference was set up outside the admin block.
I made a simple statement of sorrow for deaths and destruction, and enforced a moment’s silence before giving them what I had on NATO, US, and Italian resources, including wolves. That generated sensible questions and appreciation, but they wanted personal stories, so yes the PM and his family had come to dinner, and it had been fine, until. What had been served they could work out from ingredients I’d bought, if they really thought that today’s burning question. And no, we wouldn’t be staying, as Italians had better things to do than worry about our presence. There were also questions about preternatural aid, and as someone brought up the troll clearance in SF after Cascadia I took that bull by the horns, shuffling points Jesse, Jenna, and Sally had made.
“That was collapsed freeway, without bodies, in a city Congresstroll Thorsden calls home and now represents. And it wasn’t magic, it was strength, for which trolls have to be full-size. Sure, if trolls have solid footing, they can clear a debris pile quicker than anything except heavy machinery, but trolls are heavy machinery, and the same cautions about triggering further collapses applies, as well as aftershocks or a further event. If we knew of trapped people Fae might be willing to assist, and that’s one reason I’ve waited here, monitoring rescue work, but they are not an emergency service and lack the numbers to deal on this scale, let alone worldwide. Italian and other wolves are already helping, with scenting and strength, which is a boon, but as I once told ED Westfield you can’t shoot an earthquake, and you can’t magic it away either. Period.”
I’d had enough, and refused a follow-up.
“No. I’m tired, upset, and getting cranky, so you can all go do something more useful somewhere else.”
I waited another few hours, taking calls from the German Chancellor and French President, appreciative of US aid, but by late morning no-one knew of anything that might need preternatural intervention, so at noon I gave the OK, we took off for Andrews AFB, and everyone went to bed. We were awake for the second leg, to the Tri-Cities, and over the Mid-West I was watching Irpa, already wearing a tee that said Trolls are heavy machinery, being interviewed about the bridge in Detroit when Jesse ended a call with Tad and flopped down opposite me and Adam.
“Urk. So Spain was good, and Amalfi was lovely, until. Where are we going next year?”
Adam and I exchanged a long look.
“Camp David”, I told her, “and no-one is going outside the compound.”