Blood and State

By Anne Callanan and Kathleen E. Lehew

Part 10/22

Seeing her enter the room, walking with a measured pace towards the podium, the eager crowd surged to its feet and began to shout at once. Hands were raised, microphones held up as the White House Press Secretary ignored the din and took her place. Individual voices merged into a singular roar. One word, one name became the fevered chant.

"C.J.!"

Leaning both arms against the podium, C.J. let the pack shout themselves out. Faces she'd come to know, people she'd learned to respect over the last three years, stared eagerly at her, demanding attention. Rabid was the only description she could come up with. Animals circling the kill, waiting for their chance at the blood.

Blood. Too much blood and the promise of more. The circus had just begun. C.J. drove the thought away, focusing on the moment. One last, feeble roar gave her the anchor she needed.

"C.J.!"

"That's my name, people. Glad to see some of you are on your toes." She smiled thinly, and then added with no little spite, "And taking your medication. And here I thought I might have to use a tranquilizer on some of you."

The chill in her voice silenced any other demands that might have been made. A few of the reporters exchanged curious, troubled glances. Others simply smiled, more familiar with C.J. Cregg's style. Either way, the Press Secretary's banter with the press was well known by all; treasured by most and reviled by others. Familiarity was a two-edged sword.

This time, they all recognized that she wasn't joking. Whatever sword was about to be swung, the keen edge was going to cut deeply into any preconceived notions they might have.

Egos were shelved and silence settled across the room.

C.J. let the moment stretch, giving them all a chance to settle. Putting on her spectacles, she glanced at her notes. "Okay, in case you haven't noticed, the lid is off. Shall we begin?" She made her choice and selected her first victim.

Standing up, the reporter began, "C.J., is the White House ready to confirm what happened in the Oval Office yesterday?"

The question was obvious. C.J. and her people had been dodging the issue for the last twenty-four hours, waiting for word from the Chief of Staff, the President and the Secret Service as to exactly what was going to be told to the world. The answer had pleased nobody, least of all C.J.

Staring the reporter down, C.J. paused. Gathering her thoughts, what she'd been briefed with and exactly how to say it, she took a deep breath.

Bread and circuses.

Used to a far more instant response, the reporter prompted impatiently, "C.J?"

"C.J...."

The day before

"C.J.?" McGarry's brows drew together uncertainly, watching the woman expectantly as she sat on his office couch and read the press briefing notes he'd given her for the umpteenth time. In no small way he was dreading her response. She was being far too contained and her body language was clearly indicative of an imminent eruption.

Giving McGarry no response to his prompt, the Press Secretary continued to stare at the briefing notes in her hand, no longer truly reading them, merely letting the words settle into her thoughts. Her face shifted rapidly from stunned disbelief to a focused anger that had no target.

McGarry settled heavily into his chair, putting his desk squarely between him and the uncharacteristically unpredictable Press Secretary. Then again, maybe he was just letting his tired mind free-associate. C.J. wasn't that predictable. Knowing what she'd been through the past few months, he should have expected it. "You can do this, right?" he asked carefully. "'Cause if you can't, I can get Toby or Sam to..."

"It's not a question of whether or not I can do this, Leo," C.J. snapped, struggling to maintain her equilibrium. She'd expected facts from Leo, information to feed to the press and keep them, if not her, happy. But this? "The question is whether or not I should."

The last twelve hours had been an exercise in communications juggling she hoped never to repeat. First told by Leo to find something, anything to keep the White House Press Corps from going ballistic, C.J. had then found herself ordered to take a low profile. Until told otherwise, she was to go nowhere near the Press Room, to pass off any and all briefings to the FBI, Secret Service and whatever minor communications flunkies she could get her hands on.

"Stay away from the Press Room, C.J. Low-ball 'em," Leo had told her. "Tell them nothing of any consequence till you hear from me."

She'd low-balled them, done everything in her power to stay out of their way short of hiding in her office closet. If the Chief of Staff hadn't summoned her into his office for this meeting, her closet would have become the sanctuary of choice.

And then he had to lay this on her. Raising her eyes and meeting his gaze, C.J. let him know exactly what she thought about this.

To his credit, McGarry didn't flinch from the silent accusation being tossed his way. Tiredly rubbing his eyes, he sighed, "C.J...."

"Are you insane?!" There, she'd finally said it.

McGarry's jaw clenched and his eyes narrowed. She was close to the line. "An interesting question."

"Well somebody is!" Snapping the folder closed on the notes, she surged to her feet. Waving the file like a banner, she advanced on the desk and the man seated behind it. "This is a slap in the face!"

"To whom?"

"You know damn well to whom, Leo. And don't start going all grammatically correct on me. It won't work."

"My grammar? Or that?" McGarry asked in as reasonable a tone of voice as he could manage, indicating with a wave of his hand the briefing notes and folder she was about to crumple into an unrecognizable wad.

"This!" The folder had become a weapon. Only the desk kept her from using it like one. "You can take your grammar and stick it..."

"C.J...."

"Don't patronize me, Leo. I've read John Douglas, too. I know what this means, what you're trying to do. I'm not stupid."

"I never said you were."

"But you think he is?" There was no mistaking who she meant by he. She couldn't believe the stakes Leo has set up; the bluff, counter-bluff and awful possibilities of the game he was beginning. "I give the press this profile and it sets off the timer on the bomb. How do you expect him to react?"

McGarry smiled thinly. "Badly."

Taken aback by that simple statement, C.J. tried coming at him from another direction. "Whose idea was this?"

"Mine."

Big surprise there. "The President agrees?"

McGarry simply stared her down.

Refusing to be intimidated, C.J. pushed again. "And the FBI? CIA? They're going along with it? What about Toby?"

"They'll do what they're told."

Maybe they would, maybe they wouldn't. C.J. wasn't taking any bets. And she had her doubts about Toby. The Communications Director had known this was coming, of that she was in absolutely no doubt. Being conspicuously absent from this meeting, she figured he hadn't wanted to get caught in the crossfire. Her verbal crossfire.

Everyone was doing what they were told. There was no way C.J. could argue with that, not when she knew damn well that Leo had the President backing him up on this. Men! "I know this isn't the original FBI profile, Leo. I've seen it, remember? Oh, sure. You can spin the facts in any direction you want, create whatever picture suits you. But you add in what happened to Marine One, and this picture," she held up the folder, "skews in a whole other direction."

"The press doesn't know what really happened on Marine One."

"But our UNSUB does." C.J. scowled. UNSUB - unknown subject. Unconsciously, she fell into the terms and acronyms used by law enforcement. It provided distance, if not protection from brutal reality. She took a step back, putting a tighter rein on her emotions. Histrionics weren't getting her anywhere. "And you think he doesn't know that we know?"

"Probably."

"Probably?" C.J. stared at him, stunned by his cool response. It wasn't right. "You're stretching the bounds of credulity here. The press aren't idiots. A few are going to at least figure out that we're not telling them the whole truth, bending if not breaking the facts over our knees. The UNSUB may buy it, but some of them won't."

McGarry eyed her speculatively. "If you've got a problem lying to the press..."

"Don't go there, Leo." She wasn't about to let him finish that sentence. "I swear to God, you open up that can again and I'll scream. I'm not lying to them this time. You are lying to them. It's your game. You're pushing the buttons on this guy and I don't think you know exactly what's going to happen."

McGarry's face darkened and he leaned forward. His voice, low and grating, had an ominous tone when he answered, "Oh, I know exactly what's going to happen, C.J."

"Do you really? I'm the one who's going out there and painting a big target on the President and basically inviting the bad guy to come take his best shot." She'd wanted those words to pierce the shell Leo had built around himself, to shatter his cold complacency. Her only reward was a brief flash of intense pain, quickly shuttered. Softening her voice, she asked, "Are you sure you want to do this?"

"We have no choice." McGarry let out a long breath and leaned back in his chair. "We didn't start this."

"But you're determined to finish it."

"By whatever means necessary."

"Whatever means necessary," C.J. repeated softly, sounding out the words like a curse. "Who did this..." she brandished the briefing notes, stopping herself short of sneering, "... profile? It's a great piece of fiction and I'd love to congratulate the author." She couldn't help the sarcasm in her voice. It was all she had left.

"He did." McGarry inclined his head towards the far corner of his office, indicating the quiet figure that had been standing silently in the shadows, observing the argument. "You got issues, take them up with him."

C.J. started, glancing furtively toward the other occupant of the office. She'd forgotten he was there. Not for the first time, she wondered at the man's ability to fade so completely into the background.

Expressionless, Ron Butterfield stepped out of the shadows, offering himself up for any further arguments the Press Secretary might want to make. Being a target wasn't exactly new to him. McGarry had warned him she'd take this road. Hell, he'd half expected it himself.

Taking a deep breath, C.J. proceeded to give the Chief of White House Security a further piece of her mind. "You did this?"

Butterfield shrugged dismissively. "Yes."

"And you're cool with it?"

There was a long pause, then Butterfield shook his head and replied softly, "No."

"Then why?" C.J. fought to keep the desperation from her voice. She wanted to understand the reasons they were taking this path, and neither man was helping. She expected better from Ron. "You've already got me telling the press part of the truth, what happened yesterday in the Oval. Why not blow the whole thing open, let them know what's really going on?"

"Leo's right. We have no choice."

"There's always a choice."

"Not this time, C.J." For the first time, some of the emotion Butterfield had been holding under tight control broke through the cracks. His temper flared and his voice, though still even, burned with anger. "We tell the whole truth, and the line between crime and politics disappears. This isn't a terrorist making a statement, however empty or desperate. This is a criminal, a thug, someone with nothing more than an eye to his organization's profits. The President has set events in motion that threatens these people's precious status quo. It has become a moral absolute..."

Neither Butterfield nor C.J. saw an unusually quiet McGarry wince at that last phrase. Moral absolutes. He remembered the aftermath the last time those words were uttered. Black and white had become a murky gray.

"... order versus chaos," Butterfield was saying, focused solely on how his words were being received by C.J. and not the Chief of Staff. "Stop or die. That is this man's statement. That is his only goal. We even acknowledge that the threat has been made, who made it and why, and they win. We give them legitimacy and the protection racket goes fully global. Any criminal with a grudge or a dented bank account will feel emboldened to throw their demands into the ring. The art of government is difficult enough as it is in this world of terrorists and madmen without giving common criminals a chance at the plate."

"Wow." The force of his seething reply had taken C.J. off her guard. It was the most words she'd ever heard the taciturn agent string together, even when he had tried to convince her of the danger presented by a single, mentally unbalanced stalker. She hadn't believed him then but now, frighteningly, his argument made a horrible sense.

Still, she had to comment dryly, "You've been hanging around Leo too much there, Ron."

Butterfield's lips twisted, but didn't quite make it to a smile. "Yeah, I know."

McGarry waved his hand. "I'm over here, Ron."

Butterfield huffed softly, one corner of his mouth lifting. Anyone who didn't know the man would have suspected a sneer of disdain.

McGarry knew better.

So did C.J. She turned back to McGarry. "You really want me to do this?"

"Yes."

"I don't like it."

"Neither do I." McGarry's voice was bleak, but determined.

C.J. jumped as she felt a hand on her shoulder. She turned, finding that Butterfield had moved up silently beside her. There was sympathy in his steady gaze, and something else. "Ron?"

"It has to be done," he told her softly, perhaps trying to convince both her and himself.

Hearing that from anyone else, C.J. would have snapped. From Ron? The choice was made. She nodded. "Okay."

Satisfied, Butterfield squeezed her shoulder gently and stepped back.

McGarry glanced at his watch. "C.J...."

To be continued…