We All Fall Down
Whitehall.
The very name conjures up images of wealth and power. The Whitehalls have been bastions of New England society since the seventeenth century. They fought and died not only to create a nation but also to hold it together when it was in danger of splintering into two. No member of the clan ever shrunk from duty when his country called. The family fought alongside the British in the French and Indian War and against them in the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812. After losing two family members in the Mexican-American War, seven able-bodied Whitehalls heeded Lincoln's call to arms in support of the Union during the Civil War.
It was not only on American soil that the descendants of the proud family fought. The Spanish-American War took them to Cuba, World War I saw them in France and World War II found them in Europe and the Pacific. By the middle of the twentieth century, military service had become de rigueur. There were Whitehalls not just in the Army, but in the Navy, Marines and Air Force as well. Their service took them to Korea, Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan.
The Whitehalls' patriotic zeal extended beyond the battlefields. Ever since Giles Whitehall first served as a deputy in the Massachusetts Bay Colony's Great and General Court, the family was committed to serving the public. Thus, politics and military service went hand in hand with business and the pursuit of wealth. During the four centuries since the founder of the dynasty stepped foot in the New World, Whitehalls served as congressmen, ambassadors, mayors and even presidential cabinet members.
However, there had yet to be a Whitehall in the Oval Office. Stanford Whitehall, the current patriarch of the family, hoped to change that. While he did not seek the presidency himself, he was determined to secure it for his son and old child, Colby. He formulated his plan to achieve this goal when the boy was still in diapers, and every decision he made thereafter was with that objective in mind. He carefully groomed his progeny for greatness, encouraging him every step of the way.
His son put up no resistance. It would not have done the boy any good if he had. Stanford Whitehall was the proverbial unstoppable force while his son was far from an immovable object. Frankly, there was something lacking in young Colby. He was not quite Whitehall material. While the family prided itself on its strong-willed, forceful men, Stanford's child, from an early age, was more "sensitive" than his uncles and male cousins.
"He cares too much about what people think of him," Stanford complained to his wife.
"But the boys at school were making fun of him," Beverly Whitehall explained, sympathizing with her son.
"So? They're probably envious of his good fortune."
"He's lonely. He hasn't got a single friend."
"He's got money and the Whitehall name. They'll do more for him than any friendship."
"Didn't you have friends when you were ten? Someone your own age you could play ball with? Someone you could just pal around with?"
"Don't be ridiculous! I didn't waste my time playing ball when I was a kid. I spent my youth studying and learning the family business. Do you really think I got to be where I am by hanging around with a bunch of pimple-faced adolescents?"
"No, I don't suppose you did have any friends at that."
Beverly knew all too well that her husband was a son of a bitch. She had been Mrs. Stanford Whitehall for close to fifteen years already, and she had no illusions about him. Americans like to believe there are no arranged marriages in "the land of the free and the home of the brave." But while such unions may not be as overt as they are in other cultures, they still very much exist. The couple's engagement was not so much a declaration of love but a business merger of two powerful families.
Yet despite her lack of affection for her husband, Beverly would never seek a divorce. It was not the money or the prestige that kept her prisoner in a loveless marriage. It was her son. Colby was her world. If she were to walk out on Stanford, he would find some way to get custody of him.
I can't do that to my son, she decided long before the boy learned to walk. Without my influence, he might very well become a man like his father.
* * *
After graduating from Harvard with honors, Colby Whitehall headed to the United States Air Force Academy in Colorado. Both his parents saw him off at Logan Airport. His father, who was slated to become the secretary of state in the new president's administration, had flown up from Washington for the occasion.
"This is a great opportunity for you to make something of yourself, son," he announced. "I'm sure you'll do well. I fully expect you to graduate at the top of your class."
"Thank you, sir. I'll try my best."
Unlike her husband, Beverly was much more emotional. She threw her arms around Colby's neck and embraced him.
"I'm going to miss you," she cried, unmindful of the tears that slid down her cheeks.
"I'll stay in touch, Mom," he promised.
Beverly hugged him tightly, reluctant to let go. Her husband looked on with disgust but held his tongue. He was secretly glad to see the boy leave home.
It'll do him good to get away from my wife's influence. It's hard to become a man when you're bound up in your mother's apron strings.
Although Colby was much closer to Beverly, he cared deeply for both his parents. Throughout his childhood, mother and son formed a close, loving bond. What he felt for his father was more akin to hero worship. Stanford was a "man's man" who commanded respect rather than affection. His son strove to make him proud. Every "A" he got on his report card and every academic award he won at school was earned in an effort to please his father. His mother's love was unconditional, but he had to work hard to gain his father's approval.
"It's time for you to go now, son," Stanford announced. "You don't want to miss your plane."
Beverly finally let go of her son.
"I love you," she cried and gave him one final kiss.
"I love you, too, Mom."
"Have a safe flight and be sure to call me when you get to Colorado."
"I will." He then turned toward his father and said, "Goodbye, sir."
Stanford shook his son's hand, reserving his comment that the boy's handshake lacked firmness.
After watching Colby until he vanished from her sight, Beverly wiped the tears from her eyes and asked her husband, "Are you stopping by the house?"
"No. I've got to head back to Washington right away. It'll probably be a few weeks until I can return to New England."
"I'll see you then."
There were no tender goodbyes when the couple parted. Instead, Beverly silently left the terminal and got inside the chauffeur-driven limo that was waiting to take her home. Stanford, on the other hand, went in search of a drink before catching his own flight to Dulles Airport. With Colby having flown the nest, husband and wife would see even less of each other in the future.
If Colby expected life at the Air Force Academy to be any better than it was at Harvard or any of the private schools he had attended, he was sadly mistaken. Once again, his family name had preceded him.
"So, you're Whitehall," his roommate said with a sneer when the young cadet put his bag on the bed.
"Please call me Colby."
"Whatever you say, your majesty."
I guess this is how it's going to be, the lonely young man thought with great disappointment but little surprise. Oh, well! I've dealt with this kind of thing my whole life. I can deal with it for another four years.
He dealt with it by burying his nose in his books, ignoring the resentful looks and snide remarks of his peers and concentrating on his studies. As his father had predicted, he would eventually graduate at the top of his class.
Meanwhile, during the four years that Colby was excelling at the Air Force Academy, the Whitehall family continued to garner honors and reap the rewards of their labors. His uncle, Arland Whitehall, was elected to the U.S. Senate. His cousin, Forbes Whitehall, was appointed to serve as an ambassador to the United Nations. Another cousin, Willard Whitehall, became a federal judge while Frances Whitehall-Brackett, his father's youngest sister and an acclaimed journalist for the Associated Press, was awarded the Pulitzer Prize.
"If your father has his way, which he probably will, you'll outshine them all," Beverly told her son during one of their frequent video chats. "President Colby Whitehall. Just imagine it."
"Is that what you want, too?"
Beverly thought about the Kennedy family. Joe Kennedy had been a man very much like her husband, always looking to climb higher and reach further. And what did it get him in the end? Three dead sons. Is that what she wanted for her family? Was Stanford to be cast as a modern Daedalus and Colby the ill-fated Icarus?
"Not necessarily," she replied. "I don't care what you do with your life as long as you're happy."
"Do you mean it wouldn't bother you if I were to quit the Academy, grow my hair long and run off to become a guitar player in a rock band?"
"Not in the least. More importantly, though, what do you want to do with your life?"
"Honestly? I never it gave it much thought. Dad always made the decisions for me. I suppose I'll continue to let him steer the ship. Or, since I'm headed for the Air Force and not the Navy, I ought to say let him fly the plane."
And let's hope he doesn't get too close to the sun, Beverly thought, feeling a sudden chilling sense of foreboding.
* * *
When the United States once again went to war in the Middle East, most Americans prayed the fighting would soon end. There were also people who viewed the latest conflict as a golden opportunity, though. Human lives mattered little to them in their pursuit of making money or gaining power. Stanford Whitehall was one of these individuals.
He realized the war would not help him advance personally; however, it could benefit his son immensely. War heroes always appealed to the voting public: Grant, Eisenhower, Teddy Roosevelt, Kennedy, Jackson, Taylor and, numero uno, America's first war hero and president, George Washington. Of course, Washington never had to run for office.
Imagine if Old George were to come down from Mt. Rushmore and announce his candidacy today, he thought with amusement. I wonder what mud his opponents would sling at him. What dirt would they dig up?
Scandal was something Stanford did not have to worry about. There were no skeletons in his son's closet. Although he often wished Colby were more "manly," he was glad the boy was more of a Boy Scout than a playboy and that he preferred reading to drinking and carousing. He supposed he ought to thank his wife for the way their son turned out. His mother's influence on him was obvious. He would use that when his son ran for president. He would have Beverly campaign for him just as Rose Kennedy had done for Jack.
But first, Colby had to make a name for himself. The war would give him the perfect opportunity to do so. What Stanford never considered—nor did any other American, for that matter—was that the United States might lose the war. He had been so certain of his country's superiority that the idea never even occurred to him. The hubris of those running the war believed the fighting would continue as long as it remained profitable, after which there would be a swift, facile victory. However, eighteen months after the opening skirmish, it became apparent to the military leaders that things were not going as planned.
When President Marisol Cruz met with her top advisers in the White House Situation Room following the destruction of several oil fields in Alaska, a sense of gloom and doom pervaded the air.
"Please tell me this isn't going to be another goddamned Vietnam!" she shouted.
"I'm afraid it's worse than that," General Hannibal Otis, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, argued. "Vietnam was a stalemate. It was a proxy war that went on for nearly two decades, and it could have gone on for another two until we decided to finally put a stop to it. There was no possibility of our being defeated then. That's not the case here."
"You're suggesting we surrender?" Marisol asked, her face ashen. "That we crawl on our bellies, waving the white flag?"
"I'm saying we ought to enter into peace negotiations and be willing to make some concessions."
"Are there no other alternatives?"
No one immediately answered the president's question. The uncomfortable silence in the room was broken only by the sound of shuffling paper and the nervous movement of the attendees' hands and feet. It was Stanford Whitehall who finally spoke.
"There is one," he explained. "The joint chiefs and I know of a way to end the war quickly, but no one here wants to be the one to bring the subject up for discussion."
Surprisingly, the country's commander-in-chief had no idea what her secretary of state was alluding to. She had been kept in the dark about a research and development operation that surpassed the famed Manhattan Project in secrecy and importance to national security.
"Well? What is it?" she demanded to know.
"There's a weapon," Stanford replied. "It hasn't been tested yet, but there is virtually no doubt it will perform as expected."
"A bomb? I thought after that tragic mishap during my predecessor's administration that all nuclear weapons were destroyed worldwide."
"They were, but a group of American scientists stationed in a top-secret facility in North Dakota have been working on a new and improved bomb that is twice as powerful as the Tsar Bomba, the Soviet thermonuclear weapon that was detonated in 1961, which, as you may know, was more than fifteen hundred times as powerful as the bombs we dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki."
"Are you serious? Do we really have such a weapon?" President Cruz asked in horrified disbelief.
"Yes."
"Just because we have it," General Otis said, "doesn't mean we have to use it."
"I'll have to think about this," the first woman to sit in the Oval Office said. "This decision is not one to be made lightly."
The president then excused the men and women in the room, with the exception of her secretary of state.
"All my years in politics never prepared me for this," she said. "I always saw myself as an FDR or a JFK. Yet, thanks to the vagaries of fate, I find myself in Truman's shoes instead."
"At least you don't have to go through what Lincoln did: having the country split in two once you were in office."
"And yet Honest Abe is remembered as a great president. The history books credit him with freeing the slaves and holding the Union together. What will history remember me for?"
"Is that what's bothering you: your legacy?"
"Frankly, yes. But it's more than that. I'm the first woman to serve as President of the United States and a Latino woman, at that. If I screw things up, it may be another three hundred years before there's a second."
"If you don't make the right decision now, there may not be a United States at all."
"Surely, things can't be that bad! We can negotiate a peace, like Hannibal suggested."
"You know what a Bible-thumper Otis is!" Stanford cried in frustration. "He ought to have become a chaplain, not a general."
"You can't fault the man for having principals."
"Principals have no place in politics. Oh, yes, they come in handy on the campaign trail. You can use them to impress the voters, but once you're in office they become a detriment."
"I never knew you were such a cynic."
"As you pointed out, you're the first female president. Why do you suppose it took this country so long to elect a woman?"
"Because our society began with men going out hunting and warring, and women staying at home raising babies and taking care of domestic chores."
"It's more than that. Even after women gradually infiltrated positions traditionally held by men, there were doors that remained closed to them. Why do you think that even after women were allowed to serve in the military, they were forbidden to enter into combat?"
Stanford did not allow the president time to respond. Instead, he told her the answer—or at least his opinion.
"Because they were always seen as the weaker sex. If you fail to take action now, you'll only reinforce the idea that women are too soft for this job."
"And if I give the order to drop that bomb, millions of people will die."
"Have you ever visited Arlington National Cemetery?" Stanford asked, throwing the president off-guard by what appeared to be a sudden change of subject.
"Yes, you know I have."
"There's an inscription over the rear entrance to the Memorial Amphitheater. It's a line originally from the Roman poet Horace, which was quoted by the World War I poet, Wilfred Owen: dulce et decorum est pro patria mori. It means 'it is sweet and fitting to die for the homeland.' People die in war, Madam President. It's the very nature of the beast. It is your job to see that the enemy's numbers are greater than our own."
* * *
Creech Air Force Base near Indian Springs, Nevada, is home to the global Remotely Piloted Aircraft Enterprise. It is also where Colby Whitehall was stationed after graduating from the Air Force Academy. As usual, the young man made few friends there. The couple that he did make he lost once war was declared. The consensus among his fellow pilots was that, as the son of the secretary of state, he would never be sent on any combat missions, that he would remain stateside for the duration of the fighting while they might be deployed and called upon to risk their lives.
Colby was walking from his barracks to the fitness center, when he saw the limo approach.
"We've got company," one of the civilian personnel said. "And from the looks of that car, it must be someone high up on the food chain."
The car stopped, the chauffeur got out and opened the door for his passenger. Out of the back seat stepped Stanford Whitehall.
"Look. It's your old man," a former classmate from the academy teased. "It looks like he's come here to check up on you."
What does he want? Colby wondered, ignoring the other pilot's jibes. I hope nothing's wrong with my mother.
"Just the person I wanted to see," Stanford said when he saw his son. "I need to have a word with you—in private."
"Is it Mom? Has something happened to her?" the young man asked once the two of them were alone in the colonel's office.
"No. She's fine," the father assured his son, not that he would know because he had not seen his wife in six months.
"I've come to tell you that you've been selected to fly a top-secret mission, probably the most crucial one of the war."
Colby knew his father had been instrumental in his selection and correctly assumed the political advantages would outnumber the risks.
"If it's such an important mission, why not select a pilot with more experience?"
"You're more than capable of flying a plane and pressing a button."
"I'm to drop a bomb. Is that it?"
"Not just a bomb, the bomb: the Mater Omnium, the mother of all bombs."
"Why me?"
"Don't waste my time with stupid questions that you probably already know the answer to."
"Sorry, sir."
"Go pack your bag. You're coming back to Washington with me."
"Washington?"
"Yes. You're to meet with President Cruz and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. They want you to be aware of the enormity of this undertaking. Afterward, you'll be transported to a secret base where you will begin preparations for your mission."
Colby made it halfway to the door, before turning around and asking, "Sir, will there be time for me to say goodbye to Mom? If there's a chance I might not make it back alive ...."
"Don't be ridiculous! Of course, you'll survive the mission. I have plans for you, boy. I wouldn't needlessly risk your life. Besides, you wouldn't want to worry her. Would you?"
* * *
After three weeks of training to fly the one-of-a-kind aircraft, capable of flying at greater speeds and at higher altitudes than any fighter plane to date, Colby was ready to undertake Operation Thunderclap. Unlike the Enola Gay, the Boeing B-29 Superfortress that dropped the atomic bomb "Little Boy" on Hiroshima, a twelve-man crew was not necessary. Onboard computers did the work of eleven men, requiring only a single person to pilot the craft. Like Lindbergh, Colby was to be a lone eagle.
Even traveling at a record-breaking speed, it took close to four hours for the pilot to fly from the base to the target area. Those hours were spent in silence, with no communication with anyone on the ground. Surrounded by clouds for most of the journey, it was as though he were suspended, motionless, in a sea of white fog. The only sensory stimulation he experienced was the sight of the red digital numbers that kept track of his ETA.
I've never felt so alone in my life.
Eventually, an electronic voice began the final countdown.
"Sixty seconds until target."
He wondered why the voice was programmed to sound feminine. Why not masculine, like some ancient god of war?
Fifty seconds. Forty.
Colby's heart began to race. He was about to make history.
Thirty. Twenty.
His breathing became labored as though he had engaged in strenuous exercise.
Ten. Nine. Eight.
As his right index finger hovered over the red button, the pilot said a silent prayer, not for the many innocent victims that were soon to be wiped out but for himself.
Let me make my father proud.
Three. Two. One.
There was no hesitation. The button was pressed; the bomb was released. Colby's aircraft was already out of range when the detonation occurred. There was no flash of light, no sound. He wondered if something had gone wrong. Was the bomb nothing more than a multibillion-dollar dud?
It was not until he landed back at the base that he learned of the mission's success. His father had arranged for a select group of military photographers and video cameramen to document his arrival. Stanford was there himself to congratulate his son on a job well done.
"I'm proud of you, boy!" he exclaimed, hugging his child for the benefit of the cameras.
"Was the mission a success?"
"The war is over! While you were flying home, the enemy surrendered—unconditionally. You're a hero!"
After being debriefed by his commanding officer, Colby was given a leave of absence. During that time, his father handed him over to a public relations genius whose one goal was to turn the socially awkward young pilot into a combination Charles Lindbergh, John Glenn and Neil Armstrong. The next several weeks went by in a whirlwind of photo ops including one of his being decorated by the president.
"In another few years, you'll be the one handing out the medals," his father boasted.
"Are you so sure I can win?"
"Are you kidding? I could have you elected president tomorrow. Unfortunately, we have to wait until you're thirty-five."
When the hubbub began to die down and it was back to business as usual, Colby was reassigned to a position at Joint Base Andrews in Washington. It was a high-profile assignment in which he was sure to get a good deal of media coverage.
"We've got to keep you in the public eye," his father told him.
It was while he was stationed in Maryland that he met Sonya Vickery, a reporter with The Washington Post. An extremely attractive and persuasive young woman, she easily managed to worm her way into getting an exclusive interview with the hero pilot, one his father's PR consultant knew nothing about.
"What is it you wanted to ask me?" Colby inquired when the two were alone in her apartment, sharing a bottle of wine.
"I wanted to know what your reaction is to these photographs," she replied, as she placed a folder of eight-by-ten prints on the table in front of him.
When he opened the folder and viewed the first three pictures, he became physically ill. He barely made it to the bathroom before vomiting up his dinner.
"Is this the first time you've seen the destruction the Mater Omnium caused?"
"I've seen aerial photographs showing the damage to the countryside."
"But no one has ever showed you closeups of the victims who died, have they?"
The pilot shook his head, unable to answer.
"Of course, the majority of them were vaporized. There was nothing left of their bodies to photograph. These poor souls weren't as lucky. They were miles away from ground zero. I can only imagine how painful their deaths must have been."
One photograph in particular disturbed Colby: one of a little girl, roughly four or five years of age. More than eighty percent of her body had been severely burned.
"I did this," he said, the enormity of the deed finally hitting him. "I'm no hero. I'm a killer, a monster."
He was suddenly reminded of something he once read in a history book. When Robert Oppenheimer witnessed the first detonation of the nuclear weapon he helped create, he was recalled a quote from Hindu scripture: "Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds." Colby was so horrified by what he had done that he walked out of Sonya's apartment and out into the stormy night without another word, not bothering to put on his raincoat to protect him from the downpour.
* * *
Stanford Whitehall broke the news to his wife.
"What do you mean Colby is missing?" Beverly cried.
"No one has seen or heard from him these past two days."
"Isn't there some kind of tracking device on his phone?"
"Yes, but he left his phone in his raincoat pocket, which Sonya Vickery, a reporter from The Washington Post, returned to us."
"What was she doing with it?"
"Apparently, our son was at her apartment to give her an exclusive interview. He abruptly left there without his coat and phone."
"Did you call the hospitals?"
"Yes, and I've got dozens of people out looking for him."
Beverly had one more question for her husband before he left the house and returned to Washington.
"Do you think he was kidnapped?"
"It's possible," Stanford said truthfully. "But from what the reporter said, he was acting strangely when he left her place, like he was in shock or something. I'm thinking it might be some kind of posttraumatic reaction to his mission."
"Oh, my poor boy!"
"I'll be sure to call you when I hear anything."
It was a phone call Stanford never had to make. After a week of suffering the torments of the damned, Colby sought out the only person who had ever truly loved him: his mother. She had been nervously futzing around the garden, trying not to dwell on her son's disappearance when he unexpectedly came home.
"You're alive!" she screamed with joy and threw her arms around him.
"Am I? I don't deserve to be."
Beverly stepped back and took a good look him. She did not like what she saw.
"What's wrong?" she cried.
"She won't leave me alone," he sobbed. "I can't get rid of her no matter how hard I try."
"Who? That woman reporter?"
"I see her everywhere I go. I even tried shutting myself in a closet, but I could still hear her singing."
"The reporter sings to you?"
"No. The little girl. The one I killed when I dropped the bomb."
So, Stanford was right. Our son is suffering from some sort of posttraumatic episode.
"Come inside the house and sit down," she said in a soothing voice. "I can make you something to eat."
"I'm not hungry."
"Let's go inside anyway. I want to call your father and tell him you're all right. He's been worried sick about you."
Colby took two steps in the direction of the house before stopping. An angelic-looking little girl was blocking his path.
"Ring around the rosie, a pocket full of posies. Ashes. Ashes. We all fall down."
As she sang the last word of her rhyme, she fell to the floor, screaming in agony as her skin and hair burned.
"What is it?" Beverly asked her son, unable to see the horrific sight herself.
"I ... I killed her."
"Let's go inside and call Dr. Noakes," his mother urged. "I'm sure he can give you something to make her go away."
"But she'll only come back again. And again. And again."
"She isn't real. You must realize that. She's just a figment of your imagination."
Beverly might just as well have saved her breath. There was no getting through to Colby in his present state.
"Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds," he announced in a frightening monotone.
Not one, not two, not three, but dozens of little girls suddenly appeared in his mother's garden, sprouting from the ground like plants. They were all of the same age, four or five years old, but they all looked different. Some were fair; others were dark. But they all had that quality of angelic innocence. When they sang in harmony, it was like a heavenly choir.
"Ring around the rosie, a pocket full of posies. Ashes. Ashes. We all fall down."
Colby's anguished scream pierced the air, causing his mother to cringe in fear.
"Please, PLEASE come inside," she begged.
The thin, petite woman lacked the strength to restrain her son. He broke free from her grasp and fled the garden. She called his name and tried to run after him but soon fell far behind.
I've got to phone Stanford, she thought, turning around and heading back toward the house. He'll know what to do.
* * *
Whitehall.
Long after Beverly was laid to rest in the family vault, the name was still a prominent one in the worlds of politics and big business. The tightknit clan counted among its members a supreme court justice, three CEOs of Fortune 100 companies, three senators, two governors and a Nobel Prize-winning economist.
At the age of eighty-one, Stanford Whitehall had outlived his late wife by ten years—and counting. Physically, he was beginning to show the signs of age. His doctor had him on five medications, and he suffered from various aches and pains. However, at an age when many people were tottering on the edge of dementia, his memories were intact.
Using a cane for support, he walked into the Oval Office. Blue drapes framed the three floor-to-ceiling mullioned windows behind the Resolute desk. The Stars and Stripes and the President's flag bookended the middle window, and a round rug made to look like the presidential seal was placed on the gold carpet.
Stanford sat none-too-gracefully on one of the two chairs that flanked the desk. He remained there, looking at a portrait of George Washington, waiting for his son. When Colby entered the room, his father rose from the chair and leaned on his cane.
"Mr. President," he said.
The former war hero, wearing a bathrobe over his pajamas and slippers on his feet, shuffled across the room and sat down at the Resolute desk—or, rather, an expensive replica of the one that appeared in the actual Oval Office.
"How are you feeling today, Mr. President?" the elderly man asked, taking his seat again once his son was seated.
Colby seemed not to hear him. He stared at nothing in particular, seemingly unaware of his father's presence. His son's behavior did not alarm the former secretary of state, for it was nothing out-of-the-ordinary. In fact, it had not changed in more than thirty years. It had not varied since Stanford answered his wife's frantic call and found Colby running down the road in front of the family home, trying to escape from a mob of singing children that pursued him.
"Are you ready to deliver your State of the Union Address, Mr. President?" he asked, keeping up the charade more for his own benefit than his son's. "I know it's not common for a secretary of state to assist the commander-in-chief with writing speeches, but if I can be of any help ...."
Colby got up from his chair, leaned forward and put his hands on the desk.
"Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds," he intoned.
For more than thirty years, he had repeated that sentence over and over again. It was one of the few things the mentally ill man did say.
Stanford knew what would come next. As I already said, his son's behavior never varied. Colby's eyes widened and he recoiled with terror. An army of sweet, innocent-looking little girls piled into the imitation Oval Office his father had created in the family home. More and more of them came through the door, all singing as they entered.
"Ring around the rosie, a pocket full of posies. Ashes. Ashes. We all fall down."
"Ashes. Ashes," Colby echoed, looking at the burned bodies of the children he had killed when he flew in a cloud-covered sky more than thirty years earlier and pressed a button in response to a computer's command, hoping to make his father proud. "We all fall down."
You don't have to be afraid of falling down, Salem. Cats always land on their feet (or so it is said).
