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<span class="mu-s"><span class="mu-r">THE FINAL HOUR</span></span>
Your mouth is suddenly dry. Is there anything you can say that will convince these men? Once they have received their orders, that’s it, they can no longer be altered by anyone. The final argument of kings. Can you really turn back this last bomber? You look around at the rest of the table, solemn and pale like statues above old graves. You don’t know what to say. Then Kate Bishop nods her head.
“You can do it, Mr. President. We believe in you. You are the President of the United States.”
There rest of the table murmur their agreement. Sweat rolls down your cheeks. This is it. You have to do it. You drink a glass of water, and reach for the phone…
<span class="mu-r">[POV SHIFT]</span>
They know they are alone. All the rest are gone. They are the final arrow launched from the hunter’s bow. Their comrades lie ruined miles and miles behind them. The air is clear, the night just settling in as the stars begin to shine. The old girl is battered and bent, burnt from radioactive flash, but still she flies, still alive. The men within her are tired. They have been flying a mission none of them ever hoped to fly. But soon it will be over. Soon the bird will be spent, and they will be the same as their friends, broken on the ground. Soon they will be no more. They will not go where their friends have gone. No matter the faith of these men, each one knows there is no room in whatever place men go at death for those who will do what they are about to do. And yet they carry on. They are close to their target.
The radio begins to beep. They do not notice it at first, until Cpt. Blakely nudges his pilot. His pilot blinks, then turns and says something to the navigator. The navigator says it shouldn’t be working. All the other planes went down. The pilot says something again. The navigator swears he saw each one go. Cpt. Blakely raises his voice and tells his navigator to pick it up. The navigator obeys. And then a voice that every man never thought or hoped to hear again rings throughout the cockpit.
>Good evening gentlemen. I know my voice is the last thing you expect to hear right now. Because you presume me dead, and because there is no way to for me to reach you. If, and only if, what you know is true. That our contry, your country, is gone, and that you fly now for vengeance, and duty.
“Is that?”
“How?”
“It can’t be.”
>But you know my voice. You know these codes. And you know damn well I'd have never given them up to the enemy. With me are members of my cabinet, Albert West the National Security Advisor, Frank Dunnegan the Secretary of Defense, Dan Schultz the Attorney-General, and others. We have been watching you since you took off ten hours ago. I am alive. I am well. America lives. And you, my fellow Americans, have been lied to.