"General Jacob Carter and Selmak of the Tok'ra, I presume?" the President asked.
Jacob dipped his head in acknowledgement. "Sorry for barging into your meeting like this, Mr. President" he said. "We'll be out of your hair as quickly as possible."
Ryan nodded just as his attention was drawn back to Jack O'Neill. The man had bent down and removed a knife from his boot identical to the one his wife wore. He could sense Agent Price tensing as O'Neill turned towards him, but the former Air Force officer merely cut away the zip tie securing the President's feet. He rose to do the same to each of the ties holding his arms to the chair. "It's time for you to go, Mr. President," he announced.
"You're letting me go? Why?" he questioned.
"Because America's had enough uncertainty about her leadership the last year," O'Neill explained. "We let you go now, you can explain this away to the public as a surprise drill for your protective detail."
"You'll also do us more good out there than in here," his wife added.
Jack Ryan nodded. "The women go with me," the President bargained.
"Agreed," O'Neill said.
"I know what I suspect about why you've done this, but I need to hear you say it," the President said. "The test subjects Mr. Maybourne spoke of?"
"Our children," Samantha O'Neill confirmed.
Ryan closed his eyes as if by closing them he could shut out what he'd just heard. Jack Ryan was never one to close his eyes and wish away a problem though. He bent forward picking the file and disks up off the table. He straightened, conscious of the strange alien weapons trained on him by the jaffa Teal'c and Dr. Jackson. "I'll be sending the FBI to your house and offices, Senator" he told the older man, "and they'll be waiting for you when you leave here."
Kinsey said nothing, but there was a resigned quality to his expression that the President had never seen before.
"I want Admiral Chegwidden as well. I want answers, and he has them." O'Neill nodded his agreement as he cut Bobbi Latham free. Ryan took Congresswoman Latham by the arm to help her rise. Ryan walked over to where Samantha O'Neill was using the knife from her boot to cut the zip ties from Andrea Price's feet. He helped his lead agent stand. "Do nothing, Andrea" he ordered in a nearly inaudible whisper. He knew Andrea and Mary Pat were both cowboy enough to try something now that they were no longer restrained, but he had slightly more faith in Mary Pat's restraint.
Jack kept a firm hand on Andrea's arm as he lead the way over to the door where General Carter waited. The former general nodded to him then held a hand up to the door. On his hand, the general wore a strange piece of gold jewelry almost like a gauntlet. The jewel in the palm of the device began to glow and at each of the four corners of the door a small golden device reflected that glow. Ryan surmised the thing on Carter's hand must hide some sort of technology. "You can open the door now," Carter told him.
"Coming out," Ryan shouted as he reached for the door handle. "We're coming out," he repeated.
"Keep your hands where we can see them," a voice outside shouted back.
Before he could open the door, General Carter's hand reached out and snagged his arm. Ryan turned his attention to the older man and waited. "I want my grandbabies back, Mr. President" Carter said in a voice rough with emotion. "They won't survive it if we don't. It'll break them."
President Ryan didn't trust himself to speak after hearing the anguish in the older man's voice. He turned to look at the man's daughter. O'Neill and his wife were once again wrapped in a loose embrace. They each had one arm wrapped around the other's waist. Their free arms hung at their sides free to draw their weapons should the need arise. Ryan squeezed General Carter's shoulder reassuringly then opened the door leading the other freed hostages from the Presidential Lodge. Even before Admiral Chegwidden, the last to leave, cleared the door the President was grabbed by two Secret Service agents and hurried away from the building. Andrea Price rushed after them pushing the President forward and away from danger.
As soon as the President saw where they were pushing him he dug in his heels. "No," he denied eyeing the waiting helicopter with disdain. "I'm staying here."
"Mr. President," Andrea protested.
"Andrea, if they'd wanted to kill me, I'd be dead" he pointed out knowing exactly what she was about to say.
"That doesn't mean they can't change their mind," she argued in return.
"And if they did, could you stop them?" he asked knowing the answer was no. The alien technology the O'Neill's had available to them made it nearly impossible to stop them should they indeed change their mind. "I'm going to see this through," Ryan said with finality. Over the past few months, the President and his lead agent had often argued over her need to protect the leader of the free world versus his need to be that leader. It had developed into a kind of dance between them. A dance in which the President had just stepped on her foot. Hard. "I need to do this," Jack told her trying to lessen the sting of his refusal. "Who's been in command?"
"Me, sir" a middle aged man in the requisite dark suit of an agent on the Presidential detail. The man stepped forward and gave President Ryan a quick run down of what had happened outside the Presidential Lodge in the past few minutes. Ryan nodded as he listened to the agent then rapidly began issuing orders. "Thank you, Mr. President," the agent said before he turned to carry out Ryan's wishes.
As soon as Ryan was sure his orders were being carried out he called, "Chegwidden!"
"Here, sir" the admiral immediately acknowledged jumping to his commander in chief's side as a lifetime in military service had trained him to do.
"Fill in the blanks," Ryan ordered.
The admiral nodded his understanding of what the President meant.
"I'd like to hear this as well, Mr. President" Congresswoman Latham informed him moving to stand between the two men. It was well known around the Capitol that Congresswoman Latham considered having Senator Kinsey involved with military oversight, especially with the NID, was akin to setting the fox to guarding the henhouse. Apparently she was right. It also wasn't hard to guess that Bobbi Latham had been waiting quite some time for her chance to say "I told you so." Unfortunately, she probably wouldn't get to say it publicly. Senator Kinsey was going to pay for his crimes, but just how that was going to happen without Ryan instigating yet another constitutional crisis was still to be decided.