The two of them were planning an April wedding in D.C., and Crocker wondered after they were married how much longer a strong-willed, financially independent woman like Monica would want Ritchie to continue in SEAL teams. She’d want to have him around to travel with her, ski, play, have fun. Even though the pay was decent (around $100,000 a year, including his E-6 base pay, special skills pay, imminent danger pay, special assignment pay, and reenlistment installments), the hours sucked. It was the most exciting and challenging work Crocker could imagine. But the many days away from home wreaked havoc on relationships and families.
He was more aware of this than ever as he watched people pass by on their way to spend the Christmas holidays with loved ones. They had a right to be happy, especially this time of year. And a right to be protected, too, which is where he and his team fit in—to guard the sheep from the wolves.
Across the table he saw Mancini tearing into a huge mound of salad.
“You become a vegetarian?” Crocker asked.
“Teresa put me on a diet,” the big man said, raising his thick eyebrows. “All the fresh veggies you can eat. A prescribed amount of protein. No rice, pasta, bread, cookies, or cake.”
“Good luck.” He had watched Mancini adopt and slip off numerous food regimens in the past. Not only was his wife an amazing cook, but the guy loved to eat.
“How many years you been on the teams?” Crocker asked him.
“Four years with Team Two. Eight fun-filled years now with Six—excuse me, DEVGRU. How about you?”
“Two years with Team One, three with Two, and twelve now with DEVGRU.”
“We’re the old-timers,” Mancini said, glancing at Ritchie, Cal, Davis, and Akil sitting next to them, ribbing each other and cracking jokes. “Why’d you ask? You thinking of retiring?”
“Hell no,” Crocker groaned. The idea repulsed him. Even though he was in his early forties, he had no plans for slowing down.
“Me neither,” Mancini said, wiping salad dressing off his lips and beard. “And soon we’re going to have some new toys to play with.”
“What do you mean?”
“I spent a day last week with the people of DARPA.” The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), headquartered in Arlington, Virginia, was the most active and experimental military technology research facility on the planet.
“Yeah? What’d you see?” Part of DEVGRU’s mission was to test the latest weapons and gear. For his part, Crocker tended to put more stock in the value of training and preparing first-class operators than in technology.
“They showed me some wicked cool new gadgets,” Mancini said, grinning like a kid on Christmas morning. “I got to fire a BAE laser cannon, which shoots a laser blast as far as a mile and a half. They’re developing a version of it to deploy on navy ships, to temporarily blind pirates and other terrorists. I fired a handheld version that shoots out this green beam of light like something out of Star Wars.”
“No shit.”
“But the most radical thing by far was the invisibility cloak they’re developing.”
“Invisibility? Really?” It sounded like something out of one of the Harry Potter movies he’d watched with his daughter.
Mancini said, “A couple years from now, you’ll be able to wrap this cloak around you and walk into a building or enemy encampment completely unseen.”
“Are you serious?” Crocker asked, checking the score on the TV beyond Manny’s shoulder. The Heat were ahead by seven points with four minutes to play.
“It only works for a fraction of a second now, but the engineers at DARPA expect to improve it soon,” Mancini explained.
Crocker feigned interest; his mind was elsewhere. “How’s it work?”
“It’s made of sheets of carbon wrapped up into tubes. Each page is barely the size of a single molecule, but it’s hard as steel. The sheets are heated electronically, which causes light to bend away from the carbon nanotube sheet. It’s basically the same as creating the pool-of-water effect you see when you’re driving on a desert highway. They’re also experimenting with metamaterials, natural materials that have a positive refractive index, to make tanks and ships invisible.”
“Amazing,” Crocker said, signaling the waitress.
“Isn’t it?” Mancini leaned across the table and whispered in Crocker’s ear. “And they gave me something for us to try out.”
“What?”
“You’ll see. They’re tiny little drones, the size of my thumbnail. I’ve got two of them taped into the lining of my suitcase.”