The Oval Office ✓ (Book One)

Chapter Twenty Seven

                             Agent Hess's P.O.V

  Being on a ground team almost feels like being in the military. Almost- but sometimes it can be worse. Ground teams are a top secret division that you'd only know of if you were assigned to one, are a top government official, or live with one. Leaking our existence carries a heavy penalty, as it would be a national security threat, so nobody's ever dared to do it.

  When we're told to go somewhere, we do it. We don't get much of a choice after we sign the contracts, after all. We carry all of our possessions in thirty liter backpacks. Depending on where you're assigned to, the conditions can be rough, but here, in England, they're alright because we only get called on a couple times a day. In the Middle East, where we'd move around dozens of times a day, we barely had time to eat and only got a couple hours of sleep a day.

  We wear civilian clothes, but all have a tiny tattoo in between our middle and index finger to identify each other when getting a new member. The ink'll fade after a couple of years, so if we decide not to re-sign our contracts, we won't accidentally be identified as a serving member.

  Every morning, if I have the time, I go through each of my possessions. The backpack. Five shirts. Two bras. Five pairs of underwear and five pairs of pants. A bulletproof vest disguised as a jacket. A normal bulletproof vest. Three pairs of socks. A pair of sneakers. A small hygiene bag and menstrual cup. Nail clippers. A week's  supply of food. A beanie. A sleeping bag and tarp. A first aid kit. Hair bands. Throwing knives- my personal favorite, though I don't get to use them  often.A gun and ammo supply that could last years if it had to.

  We aren't allowed any electronic devices other than the ones provided, which can go up to three months without charging. We have bodycams that are only accessible from the White House's command opps, and a device that only works for FaceTiming and calling  the White House, or a pre approved list of family members, three at max. That's it. Not that I have any family to call anyways. No flappy bird or Minecraft.

  It's not like it ever gets boring, though. Each day is different. In the two years I've served, I've never, not once, been without something to do an entire day. It isn't for most, but the chances are if you're selected to serve, it's because they believe you can handle it. Our mandatory retirement age is forty five, if we even survive our service terms, but after that, we're paid six thousand a month. Relocation assistance if we want to retire to somewhere specific, diplomatic immunity in all thirty countries involved in this program for life, and free psychiatric counseling for life, though we get that during our service too.

We see the worst of the worse. We're trained for the worst situations possible, and are taught to expect that the worst could happen to us at any second. We're sent into highly dangerous, highly risky situations knowing full well that there's a high probability we won't make it out alive. Thank god there's always at least one medical doctor on every team, otherwise I'm sure half of us would be dead by now.

I sling my bag over my shoulders, throw my jacket on and position my gun in my hands, joining my team in the middle of our temporary campsite. "Any alerts last night?" I ask our medic, Troy.

"Nope- Complete silence. It was wonderful." He smiles, making sure his medical bag is in order, loading his gun up too. Technically, you're supposed to refer to captains  as "sir" or ma'm", but I don't see the point.

This is what most of our day's like here. We sit around, on edge, waiting for an alert from the headquarters at Area 51 or a call from the White House. Eating cold oatmeal out of the package- sometimes with freeze dried strawberries if we're lucky that week. Today's breakfast is a couple of bars and a multivitamin. Yummy.

The sudden vibrations from our devices let us know a call is incoming, which I instantly accept.

  "Agent Hess? I don't think I was aware that you were on a ground squad." The president says.

"Yes, well, it's been a while Mr.President. What am I gonna be doing today?" I reply.

"I'm sending you to a location suspected to have multiple armed and dangerous terrorists. Your mission, above anything else, is to get Lauren the hell out. However, if there are any other hostages, they are also a priority. If any of the terrorists surrender, do not shoot them- that is an order. They may have valuable information."

"Yes sir." I say, looking at the coordinates Ethan's pinged to my watch, one that only captain's have. "We're on our way."

  We were some of the very first to be notified of the first lady's disappearance, and were told to be on extra high alert. It would take a normal person about half an hour to get to the location they've sent us, but since we're trained to be able to run at top speed for over an hour, it takes us about five minutes.

"The fuck..." Troy mumbles under his breath as we reach the edge of a wide open field.

"Assume that all locations are booby trapped unless proven otherwise." My instructors voice plays over and over again in my heads.

"Stay a couple of yards behind me." I say. "Only steps where I step." They comply, Troy in the back, because if he dies, we'll most likely follow soon during the period of time it'll take to get a new medic. Sure, we all have basic medical training, but Troy is a doctor, equipped to perform minor surgeries in the field when necessary. I twist the pin on my jacket counterclockwise twice, bringing up the laser trip-wire scanner. Nothing. There's nothing.

Still, we have to assume, with the little information the White House has given us about this location, that it has measures in place to prevent us from getting in.

I carefully put a foot out, waiting a few seconds before moving again. Because landmines usually follow some sort of pattern, you'll usually be okay if nothing happens the first couple of steps. So after I've gotten about halfway through the field and haven't exploded yet, we can relax a tiny bit.

We're trained, for months, to be able to focus on detail quickly. Now, my eyes scan over every blade of grass, every dandelion, looking for any irregularities, and I don't find any, which is almost impossible, even if it was just mowed. The dandelions are almost the exact same length part, the blades of grass strangely uniform.

I hold my hand out to Troy, as we can almost read each other's minds by now, and he hands me his knife. I stab the ground, dragging it a couple of feet, and my suspicions are confirmed when I push it deeper and hit something hard and metal. Fake grass. Troy works on cutting one side while I do the other and the rest of them stand around us, covering us. We lift the sheet of grass up, and as Troy lightly knocks on the metal , our suspicions are confirmed. The sound it makes indicates that the metal is thick, and with how far it spans, there's almost certainly a bunker.

Now, the question remains: How the fuck do we get in?