Rainbow Over Sunnydale Chapter 3
Disclaimer: Red Storm and Tom Clancy own Rainbow and characters. Joss Whedon owns Buffy and characters. Anyone else belongs to me. I make no profit off of the following except to have a little fun.
Spoilers: Buffy to present Rainbow up to Bear and the Dragon.
Authors note: I am adjusting the Buffy time line slightly, moving things that have happened in Season Seven back about a month.
Thanks for all that have reviewed. Constructive criticisms always welcome, flames cheerfully ignored.
Sir John Patrick Ryan, President of the United States, KCVO, Ph.D., and holder of 2 intelligence stars almost came out of his seat. "What???" He yelled. Every one else in the room was also making angry noises, this time including the secret service agent.
"Mr. President, please I was not saying that I thought you were, only what General Billingsly believed," Colonel Joshua McCloud said. "In the generals defense, however, you do have to look at how you became President with a little suspicion."
"What do you mean Colonel? I never asked for this job. Ask anyone in this room how many times I wished I could just walk away from it. This is a prison, people out there want to hurt my family just to get at me, or have you forgotten the terrorist attack against my youngest daughter right after I became president?" Ryan returned with more than a little heat.
"I understand sir, but consider. For the last 12 or so years you have been at exactly the right spot at exactly the right time over and over again. You have done stuff that is straight out of the movies. You helped steal a Russian nuclear submarine, and caused the head of the KGB to defect to our country. After that you managed to lay the ground work that has led to peace in the Middle East, and stop a nuclear war with the Soviet Union."
"Also consider how you became President. Vice President Kealty's proclivities have been an open secret for decades around D.C. Then just after you are back into the picture as Presidents Durling's National Security Advisor a close personal friend of yours starts a rape investigation on him."
"Hey I did not instigate that investigation, the victims psychologist came to me after she found out about it from the victim!" Dan Murray said.
"As you say sir, but it was not exactly a bolt out of the blue, after all you have had a long professional relationship with Dr. Golden, have you not?" The Colonel replied. "And please sir I am just reporting what the general believed, not what I do," Attempting to forestall an argument with the head of the FBI.
"Dan, relax okay? No one here thinks you acted improperly," Jack said to his friend. "Continue," He directed the Colonel.
"Yes sir. Then the US finds itself in a shooting war with Japan where the initiating event was a car wreck. Again you and your friends are in exactly the right place at the right time to solve the problem. Finally President Durling offers you the Vice Presidency. No sooner are you sworn in than not only is President Durling dead, but most of the rest of the government is gone and you are suddenly in the position of not only running the government, but of actually being most of it as well. Personally at the time Sir, I thought the General might just have a point"
Ryan had no response to that. He forced himself to look at his ascension to the presidency from the standpoint of someone that dealt with magic and demons on a daily basis and he could, almost, see Billingsly's point. Remembering the wall of fire that had come at him and his family in the tunnel under the Capitol and how it suddenly stopped and withdrew. Maybe the General might not have been so wrong after all.
"Bunk!" Snorted Robby Jackson the VP and the son of a Baptist minister. "Your good general missed something didn't he? For Jack to be the Anti-Christ the Rapture would have had to happen, right?"
"The General thought that nuclear attack on Denver qualified as that event."
"HUH?" POTUS exclaimed! He knew some of the people who had been killed in Denver, and if they counted as the faithful then he had been going at his whole life the wrong way for awhile.
"General Billingsly believed that with the number of times that the Bible has been translated that it was not the most accurate source for prophecy. We have been trying to get a hold of The Pergramum Codex but so far no luck. And before you ask The Codex is the only known book of prophecy that has never been wrong. Makes Nostradamos look like Miss Cleo."
"Better not let my Pappy hear you say that about the bible," The VP growled.
"Or anyone else," Said Arnie Van Damm. "Jack I didn't know about any of this."
"He didn't Sir," Colonel McCloud agreed. "He was kept completely out of the loop."
"Why?" POTUS asked.
"Because when Elizabeth Elliott helped put the Initiative together it was felt that there should be several high ranking members of the administration that could be used for plausible deniability. Mr. Van Damm was at the top of the list as he is someone the press contacts to both confirm stories and to see what the administration's position is on stories. It was felt that if he did not know of the Initiative and what they were fighting then he would be that much more believable."
"Liz Elliot was the founder of this Initiative?" Ryan asked.
"She was the contact in the Fowler administration, but the President okayed everything that was done. General Billingsly was her liaison with the Pentagon during her stint as National Security Advisor. This may have something to do with his antipathy toward you."
"Okay do we have any idea what he might be up to," Ryan asked.
"We found some files in his office," The SecDef said. "There was one op that we found that was an outline only, and a broad one at that. It was called Operation Gotterdamerung."
"That's the Germanic version of Ragnerok isn't it?" Van Damm asked.
"Yes Arnie it is," Tony Said. "He took everything else on this op with him. He must of smelled what was coming after China and got it out."
"So you think he is going to try to end the world?" Mary Pat Foley asked. "If you can't save it blow it up? What's he going to do steal a nuke?"
"No MP," Tony answered. "He is going to try to open the Gates of Hell."