It wasn’t until Captain Brinks returned to his microphone that Penn realized that he’d been holding his breath.

“You still there, sir?” The captain’s voice sounded shaky.

“We haven’t moved,” Penn said.

“Sir, I’m afraid the news is bad. We got an alert on a very low-frequency band, an encrypted one from Fort Hood in Texas. According to this, we lost big-time.”

Penn’s stomach tightened as emotion pressed on his eyes. He avoided eye contact with anyone as he asked, “Can you be more specific than that, son?”

“Okay, now remember that this is a dynamic situation, right? I don’t know how factual this is, or even if the sender is who he says he is. Though the fact of the encryption adds some credibility.”

“You’re talking to yourself, Captain,” Angela snapped. “You’re not making sense to the rest of us.”

“Sorry about that, ma’am. It’s just a lot to swallow. Okay, here goes. According to the report, the president, vice president and SECDEF are all dead. I don’t have the details on how they died, and, again, this is all officially unverified.”

Penn was on the edge of losing his temper. “This is critical information, Captain. I promise you that we understand that it is less than one hundred percent accurate, and that if every word of it proves to be incorrect, we will not hold you responsible. Please continue.”

“Yes, sir. At least thirteen major cities in the U.S. are just gone. They got hit with strategic nukes, and there’s nothing left. The list I have shows Washington, New York, Chicago, Omaha, Denver and Colorado Springs, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Atlanta, Nashville, Dallas and Houston. I don’t know whether or not that list is final. Our military facilities all took a hell of a hit, too, both here and in other countries. All the NATO countries got dragged in. I don’t have any statistics on anything outside the U.S.”

Penn lowered his forehead onto his folded arm atop his table. Tens of millions of people, all of them gone within the run time of a motion picture. “Jesus,” he said.

He raised his head again and settled himself with a breath. It was time to lead again.

New York’s Latasha Washington stood from the left side of the chamber and said, “Captain Brinks? Can you hear me?”

“Yes, ma’am, I can. It got real quiet there for a second.”

“What is left of your command structure? Where are your orders coming from?”

“I don’t have any orders, ma’am. And I don’t have any idea who’s in charge. I was hoping you could tell me.”