Byrhthelm: …is there any possibility of you turning your attention to the tale and completing it? Sure... you could leave it as is... but somehow it just doesn't seem 'finished' to me. But maybe that's just me... – AN: will try to do so. It however may take some time as this particular muse doesn't seem to want to cooperate in any way shape or form. Will have to drag it kicking and screaming to the computer and beat it into submission.

To all readers: I apologize for the lateness of this update; however, my son just made rep hockey A2 (last pool tryouts) with his city hockey association and my family has to come first over fanfic-writing. He and the rest of my family are my focus mainly and fanfic writing is but a pleasant aside to my regular tasks of sports and nature photography.

In a cave within the Takht-e-Sulaiman, Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa, Pakistan Three days later

Ahmad Aziz Khoroushi was a patient man but Mahmud Said Fahd had tested his patience immensely, advocating for an attack against Americans on American soil to avenge his brother's death. Yes, the Americans needed to be punished for their actions against their people, but the time was not right for such an action. Actions involving acts of violence as prescribed under the Quran. "Soon shall We cast terror into the hearts of the Unbelievers, for that they joined companions with Allah, for which He had sent no authority" Khoroushi looked over at Fahd. Fahd's face was contorted in self-righteous anger which clearly read – Those who did this to my brother shall pay with their blood and the blood of all those connected with them.

Khoroushi looked at Fahd whose stony countenance spoke of deep-seeded pain…and loss "Peace…we shall strike at the time that Allah deems it worthy; when He feels that we can strike the hardest. And they will see that their twin towers destruction was not the worst punishment that Allah could mete out to them. Then we shall have justice for Sadik."

Abd al-Rashid Tamid Ali, one of the men who wielded a captured RPKS-74 machine gun captured during the 80s, nodded at Khoroushi's statement. He was Khoroushi's second-in-command. When Ahmad Khoroushi had heard of Sadik Fahd's death, he'd consolidated his leadership to those whom he'd trusted and the rest of Al Qaeda had fallen in line. Khoroushi had his detractors however and they were constantly breaking off and forming new short-lived revolutionary organizations, however they always came crawling back to the fold, Ali thought to himself. Ali was Al Almufawid – the Negotiator for Al Qaeda and was the one that Khoroushi turned to in order to bring new revolutionaries into the fold and he referred to himself as a revolutionary, not what the infidels referred to him as: a terrorist – one that wrought terror throughout the Middle East and beyond.

Some did not agree with Khoroushi's sit back and wait for the opportune moment to strike. They were the ones that felt that the terror inflicted on the infidels should be continuous in the Western World, that constant attacks were necessary to provide the right amount of retribution for the acts committed against them throughout the decades. There were times when he felt that Khoroushi was too cautious, however, Ali had seen the full might of the United States Navy, Air Force and Marine air units arrayed against them in Afghanistan and he had been a young boy; a mujahid, when the Russians had invaded Afghanistan in December of 1979 and he knew the discretion that Khoroushi displayed with picking and choosing attacks, versus all out war against an enemy that they had no hope of winning against in open combat. Al Qaeda did not have the weapons of war that the Shaytân-e Bozorg – Great Satan had. Ali knew this all too well and agreed with the hit and run attacks that Khoroushi adopted. It had worked well enough when the backwards Asians of a little country in the Far East had used them against the great American military and had fought them to the point where a assumed foregone conclusion of victory became stalemate and eventually defeat for the vaunted United States. It was a tactic that Ali took to heart and taught it to those who would join their revolutionary forces.

"So we will wait until my brother's memory is cold?" Mahmud Fahd spat venomously.

Ali hefted his machine gun and narrowed his eyes at Fahd. "Tread very carefully, Mahmud." He hissed at Fahd, slowly uncoiling from his mat on which he was sitting, the threat contained in his brief adjustment of his seated position not lost on the younger mujahid who promptly shut his mouth.

Khoroushi looked over at the young upstart. Perhaps it was time to send this little one on his way. Perhaps he could make use of him in a manner befitting his late brother who Khoroushi felt was too violent and willing to take the attack to the enemy; and the infidels had targeted and eliminated him. Perhaps this task will give him patience. Allow him to plan out an attack, send him to Syria with their friends and allies within the Syrian community and allow him to ferment discontent with the Syrian government regime against the rule of Bashar al-Assad who had been in power for the past three years. Fahd would either learn patience, tact and strategy or he would die. Either way would suit Khoroushi's plans. To have a subordinate chomping at the bit would foster factions and he would end up either deposed and excommunicated or killed and Khoroushi planned to hold on to his power for a lot longer than Sadik Fahd.

Animal's Office, COMNAVAIRLANT, NAS Norfolk, Norfolk, VA, 1200hrs

The phone rang in his office and Animal growled, "COMNAVAIRLANT!" into the receiver as he gave it a glare. Unfortunately the phone didn't melt and he heard the voice of Director, Office of Naval Intelligence, Vice Admiral Leanna McMahon, utter. "Sorry to bother you, RADM."

Animal immediately winced, "No, ma'am. Not a bother at all. What can I do for you, ma'am."

"We need to go over intel that we've received. Can you make it into my office, sometime within the next two hours?"

"It's a three hour and a half drive, ma'am." Animal indicated that he wouldn't be able to reach the ONI Director in that amount of time.

"I'll send a helo. Be ready by 1300. We'll hold the meeting for you." Was VADM McMahon's response.

"Yes, Ma'am."

"…and your wingman that you did the last mission with, I need to see him here too. I'm sending a car to get him too; at least he can get there in 46 minutes." That tipped Animal off right away to the fact that ONI was involved with the mission.

"Yes, ma'am." VADM McMahon's voice was brusque and did not give any clue as to why she was calling. Animal knew that wasn't a good sign.

Harm's Apartment North of Union Station, Washington DC 1220hrs

Catherine Gale answered her ringing cell-phone. "Catherine." Director Kershaw asked, his voice inquisitive. "Something's come up…"

"What now?" Catherine asked.

"I can't talk about it here on an unsecured line. I need you to come into the office." Kershaw's urgent tone galvanized Catherine to alertness. Something had gone wrong, seriously wrong for Kershaw to use a tone like that.

"Be there in thirty five." Catherine replied. Her car was parked in the alley, a rather dangerous section of DC to be sure, but Kershaw had managed to finagle a concealed weapons permit to allow her to carry despite her status as an OGC Lawyer. Suitably dressed, she grabbed her purse from the kitchen table, locked the door on her way out and headed down to the vehicle.

As communicated to Kershaw, it did only take a half hour to reach the CIA Headquarters. Parking her car and walking into the building flashing her ID badge, she headed for the elevator to Harrison Kershaw's office. Reaching the office she tapped on the door.

"Come on in…" Kershaw's gruff voice emanated from his office. Catherine Gale stepped into the office and Kershaw motioned to her to sit down. "You are aware of the fact that we had to utilize Commander Rabb and RADM Nakamura to deal with the threat presented by Sadik Fahd. The threat happened to be a SS-21 intercontinental ballistic missile and a launcher capable of hitting Washington DC. The mission went off without a hitch, however, we have lost communication with the agent in charge of the operation. Webb was compromised and I have no doubt that he is dead."

Catherine nodded; she knew that Clayton Webb's missions always involved a JAG staff-member or two and that his missions always tended to go sideways. But somehow he'd always managed to get out of the situation, sometimes worse for wear, but always alive.

"I was informed by the RADM in charge of the Navy contingent that flew over to the Arab Peninsula that Webb was captured by Al Qaeda and was in the missile launcher vehicle at the time that the Navy contingent and their Royal Air Force allies hit the missile launcher and destroyed it." Kershaw said, soberly, scratching his chin in deep thought. "We have not had communication with Webb at all, so I have no doubt in my mind that Webb didn't make it out of the operation."

Catherine remained silent as she pondered what Webb's last moments would have been like; possibly handcuffed to the vehicle itself, knowing that there was an attack enroute to obliterate the missile launcher and knowing that the minutes that he sat within the vehicle were ticking down to the last seconds on earth; his last moments pain-filled surrounded by fire, his body ripped apart by explosions.

"Looks like we have yet another Intelligence Star going up on the wall." Kershaw commented sombrely knowing that despite Webb's detractors, Webb had earned that star on the wall. With all of Webb's screw-ups, this one was the one that did him in, but he'd set it up that the mission had gotten accomplished. However Kershaw knew that the war against Al Qaeda was not over, not by a long shot and unless they were vigilant, more attacks were in the works, and Lord help them, Al Qaeda had expressed their interest in going nuclear, thus upping the ante. Would they go after new nuclear warheads mated to ICBMs to target US cities in hellfire? Or would they resort to dirty nukes or conventional bombs? Would they threaten airports and turn shopping malls into shooting galleries? That was the frightening aspect of unconventional warfare in the early turn of the century in the second millennia. There was no way of seeing the enemy on a battlefield as in the old days. The enemy were too adept at concealment and evasion. And the chaos that such war wrought played havoc with the security of the nation. "We need to meet over at the ONI" he said looking at Catherine. "Right now, VADM McMahon is meeting with the two aviators who went on the mission. We need feet on the ground in Saudi Arabia right now and RADM Nakamura and Commander Rabb are the only two who have been there recently. I'm also sending in Jack Keeter and Beth O'Neill, they'll be able to scout out the currents."

"Are you sure that they'll be able to determine who's asking who for what?"

Kershaw nodded. "If we don't get a handle on who's selling the weapons out of Russia's stockpiles, we won't know where to stop up the leaks. The SS-21 that we eliminated is only a symptom of the greater problem of missiles and warheads going missing and if we don't know where they're coming from, we're going to see a mushroom cloud over DC or Los Angeles." He dropped several files into his briefcase. "We're going to take a helicopter ride over to NRI." He said briefly as he stood up, grabbing his briefcase and motioning Catherine to follow.

Office of Naval Investigation, National Maritime Intelligence Center, Suitland, Maryland 1510hrs

Animal was ushered into a dark oak-lined room by an ONI agent. Sitting at an oak table was Harm who had a cup of coffee in front of him. Animal nodded quietly to his friend. "They got you too?" he asked.

"Yeah…I think the secret squirrels want to pick our brains as to what we know." Harm replied with a sober face. He shook his head. "I had to get a continuance on a court case because they wanted me here to spill my guts."

Animal snorted with derisive laughter. "Considering how much we were mushroomed from the get-go, are they serious? I have no idea other than what I saw with my eyes overflying that monstrosity they were going to lob over at us. So what do they want…me to say: Yup…saw it."

"If they wanted to know what was going on, why didn't they call in our GIBs?" Harm asked.

Animal shrugged his shoulders. He had no clue either. "But something tells me that they didn't invite us here for milk n' cookies and a friendly afternoon chat." And Harm figured that Animal had quite a prescient mind as the look on VADM McMahon's face was anything but cheerful when she and an aide walked in. "Well…well…good afternoon, gentlemen."

"Ma'am." They both stood at attention.

"It seems as though the CIA is interested in what you have to say about what went on." VADM McMahon intoned, her mood solemn and her countenance grave. "They should be here in about ten minutes. So how about we discuss your participation in these events that culminated in the destruction of a SS-21 targeted at Washington DC and the death of a CIA agent? Shall we?"

"Would you recommend that I get a JAG? Ma'am." Harm asked quietly.

"No…we're not here to castigate you." VADM McMahon sighed, as she rested her elbow on the table. , "We've been monitoring Sadik Fahd recently and mainly for connections to terrorist organizations such as Al Qaeda. We wanted to know his fellow terrorist connections, his sellers and what he's buying and the simple fact that an airstrike was able to eliminate him left us at loose ends."

"With all due respect, ma'am." Animal growled, "That's beyond our respective paygrades. The secret squirrels have that information all tied up and I don't think they'd be willing to let go of it."

VADM McMahon raised an eyebrow, responding tartly "Admiral, I'm well aware of that. I understand that kind of information is not within your purview, however, if there was anything you heard or saw while on the mission, ONI would like to hear about it."

"Other than the fact that Sadik Fahd wanted to turn Washington DC into radioactive rubble?"

"…perhaps."

Animal pointedly looked at her, "Ma'am, it was kind of hard to note anything of consequence at six hundred knots air-speed over the target area other than the target that we were acquiring: which happened to be a truck." That silenced most of the questions from the vice-admiral. "I have no idea who was in the truck, other than they got roundly toasted – I presume…they became crispy critters…" He jokingly commented. VADM McMahon did not look amused.

"I see…" A knock on the door interrupted the vice-admiral's train of thought and her response to Animal's statement. Her perfunctory "Enter!" caused the door to open and Harm looked over to see Catherine with Harrison Kershaw, the CIA's DDCIA. Animal looked over at Harm with a question in his eyes. Harm shrugged his shoulders – he had absolutely no idea.

"Good afternoon, Admirals, Commander." Harrison Kershaw stated as he gazed around the room, taking in little details and storing them away for future reference. He turned and shut the door and then proceeded to pull out a chair and sit down; as did Catherine to the right of Harm.

Harm looked at Animal with a worried expression on his face. The look on Kershaw's face was inscrutable; Harm couldn't read him one way or the other. Vice Admiral McMahon's countenance was irritated. Considering Animal looked annoyed, he was not certain how well this whole interview or debrief would go for the two of them.

Kershaw took a deep breath as he looked over at the two naval aviators in service dress blues who matched him stare for stare.

"Viper flight was over the ground target at 1502 hrs." Animal snapped out irritated and giving Kershaw a scathing look. "At that point I radioed confirmed visual on target at my one o'clock ground. Commander Rabb, Viper Two, acknowledged and confirmed that was our target at which point I gave the order to roll in. We opted to go twenty mike-mike on the truck since it was not considered a hardened target."

"And the reason behind that." Kershaw asked, walking right into it.

"Twenty mm bullets are cheaper than a JDAM." The sarcasm in Animal's voice was cutting. "We were limited ordnance and didn't have another option, two JDAMs per aircraft and I wasn't going to waste one on a Hajji truck."

"Perhaps, but you do realize that the most wanted terrorist in the world was in that truck at that time?" Kershaw replied, his tone infuriatingly pedantic. "That's an incredible risk to take…by not utilizing the most powerful weapon that you had on your aircraft at the time. Admiral."

Animal kicked his chair back, his face dark in anger, standing up and leaning over the table threateningly at Kershaw, hissed at the spook, "Listen, Kershaw, YOU weren't in the cockpit. I was tactical and I was the one making the decisions at the time. If you don't like it…"

"SIT DOWN! Admiral!" VADM McMahon snapped out, her command cracking like a whip as she cut Animal off. Animal subsided and did as requested; after all she did have one more stripe than he had. Harm noticed that Animal subsided, his face exhibiting a rather mutinous glare which he directed at Kershaw.

"And your position on the whole escapade? Commander?" Kershaw asked.

"Same as the admiral, sir." Harm said respectfully, yet backing up his operation commander. "We did what was asked, executed the operation and eliminated the targets. I'm not sure why we're getting grilled for this."

"The reason is because we lost an operative on the mission. There was absolutely no way to get him out?" Kershaw looked pained. For all the pain in the ass that Webb caused every single one of them in that room with perhaps the exception of the vice-admiral, Harm thought; the man did not deserve the death that he had received. Mrs Webb would be dignified in her receipt of the news but inside, Harm had a feeling that she would be devastated to realize that there would probably never be a body that she could bury. She was ex-NSA, she knew that there was the distinct possibility that an agent's body was unable to be recovered.

"Sir," Harm said, stifling down the thoughts that went through his mind and tried to focus on the debrief from the CIA. "With all due respect, you weren't there. We had absolutely no time to get him out and if the ground spotters had tried, they would have been cut to pieces."

Harrison Kershaw did not seem satisfied with that explanation, however, he said gruffly. "I understand…it's a great loss to the intelligence community but it appears that you did your best under the circumstances." In fact, Kershaw seemed disgruntled that he couldn't pin the latest cluster-fuck on the two aviators, because they performed competently, in the eyes of the Navy, and there would be fall-out if he went after the admiral. He looked over at Catherine to see censure in her eyes at his attempt to smear the name of the man that she was now in a relationship with, the man who stepped up to be the father-figure to her yet unborn child. And he wondered if she would ever believe him again. A little demon on his shoulder laughed at him for that thought. Nobody in the intelligence community ever trusted anything, and if anything, Webb and he had taught her well. Catherine wasn't cut out for the intelligence community, her background was in the law and it was an opening that allowed her into the Central Intelligence Agency. Kershaw knew in the expression in her face, that when he had gone after the admiral and the commander, that she would never trust him again.

Catherine, who had remained silent throughout the meeting, or more like interrogation, looked over at the admiral who held a stony countenance, far different from the loving man who embraced his wife at the airfield and joyfully seized his child up in an embrace and gave him a piggy-back ride off the field. She looked over at Harm who held a look of betrayal in his eyes, and she knew that she would have to work with him on that to prove that she wasn't in league with Kershaw in his opinion of them. She knew that she would have to do a lot of soul-searching however she knew one thing was for certain, that she needed to apologize to Harm and the admiral for this; to let them know that she did not approve of Kershaw's attempt to discredit their actions. "I'll find my own way back…" she informed Kershaw as he got up out of his chair. His look of surprise made her explain. "I'm going to need to talk with Commander Rabb." She said formally.

"Very well…" he said resignedly, "I'll make sure and let the lot know that your car will be picked up late…" as he grabbed his leather conference bag and the pad of paper from the table on which he had scrawled the extremely brief notes from the intelligence debrief, headed to the door of the room and left.

VADM McMahon said to Catherine, "Ma'am, I will need you and Commander Rabb to step outside for a moment." Harm nodded, got up out of his seat moving to Catherine's side.

"Very well, Admiral…" Catherine replied as she looked over at Harm with a worried expression and headed out the door accompanied by Harm.

When the door closed behind them, they looked at each other as the door closing was punctuated by a resounding slap of palm of hand meeting table.

Office of Naval Investigation, National Maritime Intelligence Center, Suitland, Maryland 1600hrs

"Admiral, I really don't care if he was taking a pot-shot at your abilities!" Vice Admiral Leanna McMahon snapped, "he is the Deputy Director of the CIA. You will render him the respect accorded to his position. Am I clear?"

"Yes, ma'am!" Animal was braced at the position of attention.

"You are lucky that as an admiral you are not brought under courts-martial. I'm sure the Judge Advocate General would be highly interested in pursuing a case of disrespecting an official against you." VADM McMahon glared at him.

"Yes, ma'am."

"Understand that blue-button will not protect you if you step over the line with any elected or commissioned officials inside the United States Government. I don't care if the person is a blooming five-star idiot; you will respect him or her, do you understand?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"One of these days, your mouth will get you into more trouble than your award can get you out of. So curb that temper of yours and make sure that you engage your brain before your mouth the next time!"

"Yes, ma'am."

In a cave within the Takht-e-Sulaiman, Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa, Pakistan

Ahmad Aziz Khoroushi and Abd al-Rashid Tamid Ali pored for hours over maps of Washington DC that they had obtained directly from the internet. "The White House is a tempting but too heavily defended target. If we can keep the infidels occupied until such time that we have another contact that can get us the weapon we need." Ali said.

"That Russian weapon had taken thirty five million out of our coffers and it was destroyed by the Americans." Khoroushi replied. "Perhaps such a weapon is overkill for what we intend to achieve."

"Fahd always was a fool." Ali snorted, with no small amount of derision towards the dead man. "He wanted to make the biggest splash when we were trying to remain stealthy under the Americans' radar." He looked directly at Khoroushi, "And all he did was attract their attention and look at what it cost him?"

"So shall we send Mahmud into the Great Satan's den and allow him to create havoc and while the Americans' attention is on him, we shall send yet another team into Washington to deliver a crippling blow to the Great Satan where he is not looking?" Khoroushi snickered noting that the diversion would create a perfect opportunity to deliver what he called strike at the heart of the United States.

Office of Naval Investigation, National Maritime Intelligence Center, Suitland, Maryland 1600hrs

Harm looked over at Catherine who gazed at him in return. "Were you there because of him?" The unspoken inference was that Catherine had come because she was aware of Kershaw's intention. She shook her head.

"No, I wasn't aware that he was going to jump you until we sat down in the office…" she said gesturing to the closed door. "…and it didn't sit well with me after all you two did." Harm snorted.

"Well, it seemed like he was already to throw us to the wolves." Catherine couldn't object to that. That was the way it looked to her from where she had been sitting as well.

"Were you going to say anything?" Harm sounded hurt.

"What could I say, in support of you, Harm? Everything was black. I had no idea of what went on. I haven't even been able to read the operation briefings. All I did while you were gone was to lay there on your bed and eat ice-cream to soothe my nerves about you being gone?" Catherine was right; Harm looked over at her to see the anguish written all over her face and realized that he was being unfair to her for just accompanying Kershaw to the meeting. The other thought in his mind was that potentially Kershaw was trying to use this opportunity to drive a wedge between Catherine and him. And he would be damned if he let that happen.

"Look, Cath, I don't know what to think right now; we did what we thought was right and now we're getting grilled for it. But I know that I don't want it to affect us…" he looked over at her and Catherine nodded. "All we have is us."

"Harm…I have to think about some stuff tonight…I need to be able to bounce this plan of mine off you." Catherine asked him, hoping his response was positive.

"You have to pick up your car at Langley." Harm noted.

Catherine nodded. "But then I'll follow you home. Because my decision of what I plan to do is going to hinge upon us and will involve some big changes." Harm started to look worried. "No, Harm it's not us breaking up…just trust me on this, OK?"

Harm calmed himself before he nodded. He was about to say something when the door to the room they were in opened and Animal casually sauntered out of the ONI CO's office as Catherine and Harm looked up at him in question. "You alright? Sir?" Harm asked as Animal walked over to them.

"I'm perfectly fine, just my ass-end got a little toasted, but I'm perfectly good." Animal grinned at him. "So you two get a chance to talk things over?" He sensed that there was a little bit of friction between the two of them that had just been smoothed over.

"Yes, we're good now." Catherine replied, relieved that Animal hadn't retained any bit of animosity towards her.

"Good…because I'm now hungry…" Animal grinned. "I'm in the mood for a nice deliciously juicy steak, provided my helo pilot destined to get me back to Norfolk isn't hot to trot."

"If it's got a heaping pile of mashed potatoes slathered in gravy beside it…I'm game, Admiral." Catherine grinned as Harm held his head in his hands groaning.

"UGH!" He said, looking up at the sky with a pathetic air of entreaty towards the Almighty to lend a hand, "Meat eaters, why did I have to fall in with a group of meat-eaters."

"Hey, Harm…" Animal grinned evilly. "I'm sure we can get some Brussels sprouts for ya."