Carson looked to Chang, his face a mixture of apprehension and pure fear. Just twenty minutes ago, they’d been stopped at the major road checkpoint ten kilometers south of the dam, and she had managed to talk the Indian military sentries into letting her speak to the U.S. marine colonel, a man who now stood looking forward through the shoulders of the pilots.

“Wiki, are we in range yet?” Carson asked.

Chang shook his head and turned a new shade of sick, swallowed some vomit that rose up his throat. She put an arm around his shoulders. Saving not only their president, but also this region from a potential nuclear war . . . Yeah, that would do it to you.

The Secret Service had the president behind a tall wall of bulletproof glass that deployed whenever the commander-in-chief was giving a public speech. The protective detail, all with service firearms drawn, were scanning the crowd, some looking up at the sound of Marine One, the big Sikorsky VH-3D Sea King coming in fast toward the landing zone.

Middleton ran hard, carving a path through anyone in his way. Weren’t for the flare in his knees he could have been back 35 years, a wide receiver at West Point. A gap in the crowd, another gunshot behind him, he didn’t flinch, eyes searching, sucking in air.

There. Dead ahead.

Near where the base of the dam met the stairs up to the raised VIP platform, Archer turned to face him. Arm tight around Charley’s waist, bloody stump of a hand to the front of her, his other hand out of sight behind her back. Could be a gun, could be a knife.

Middleton looked to his daughter. All thoughts of the running crowd left his mind. The bombs too. It was like he was in the eye of the storm, even the sound of the helicopter was silenced in this moment. People ran screaming all around them as he stood still and faced her. Charley’s eyes pleaded with him. This wasn’t her fight. His work had again put her into jeopardy. No way.

A guy, one of Chernayev’s BlueWatch operators, had his pistol drawn and was coming at him—his head snapped back and he fell to the ground. Secret Service or marine sharpshooter. Middleton almost wished he’d ditched the Beretta but he’d instinctively tucked it into the back of his belt as he’d stood. Hopefully it wouldn’t be clocked and seen as a threat.

“The controller, Middleton, or she dies.”

Charley screamed as Archer pushed something into her back.

They were ten yards away. Middleton closed the gap to five. Stopped. Held the controller loose in his right hand, visible to Archer.

“You want this?”

“This ends here, you know it.”

“Maybe for me and you,” Middleton replied. “It’s not going to end for her.”