Set inside the Superbunker on the eve of global thermonuclear war… here’s another draft snippet of COG, from chapter 5:
Chapter 5
Major George Russell Kilgore had been a professional soldier for over half a century. He was just shy of seventy years old. Every morning, at four a.m., he would get out of his bunk, relieve himself, drink sixteen ounces of chocolate whey powder spiked with two raw eggs and two shots of Smirnoff, and then go for a seven mile run… shirtless... in January.
A graduate of West Point, Kilgore had the distinction of being the only member of the U.S. armed forces to have been in combat in twelve conflicts, those being: Lebanon, Grenada, Panama, Iraq War I, Somalia, Iraq War II, Afghanistan, Libya, Yemen, Syria, Niger, and Operation Restore Democracy in Puerto Rico. He was wounded six times and had a metal plate installed in his head to replace a chunk of his skull blasted away in a firing range accident. He was also kidnapped while in Pakistan, but managed to steal one of his captor’s cell phones and dial in a cruise missile strike onto his exact location using the phone's GPS. He was the only survivor of the blast. At fifty years old, he snuck into the West Point football locker room, put on a uniform, and inserted himself onto the kickoff team in a game against the hated rivals from Navy. He forced a fumble on his first special teams play and recorded two more unassisted tackles before the staff finally figured out who he was and took him out. Respected and revered, everyone, including his wife, children, and grandchildren, called him “Sir” or “Major”...
...Everyone, that is, except for the president who called him “Krusty”.
Kilgore was also currently known as “The Halfback,” not because of his football exploits, but rather because he carried the nuclear football— the leather satchel containing a mobile communications system and Denny's-menu-style, laminated protocols instructing the president on how to go about blowing up the earth.
Kilgore was presently seated in a leather recliner in the POTUS situation room of the Superbunker, looking terribly uncomfortable in is stretched, full dress uniform. There were seven recliners in the room, arranged in a circle. Fricke was there, as well as Haberdash who sat with his legs crossed scratching the arch of his foot with his pen. The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff was present as was the Deputy Secretary of Defense who was serving in Tibbles' stead. Two of the recliners were empty. One of those two empty recliners was raised onto a dais and was slightly larger than the others. It had the presidential seal emblazoned on the headrest.
