Pericles One Launched — Lockdown, Optics, and a Staff Fraying
Plot Beats
The narrative micro-steps within this event
Leo confirms the military operation Pericles One is underway, targeting four military locations, and instructs the team to prepare for a presidential address without any leaks.
Toby and Josh exchange brief words amid the chaos, with Toby dismissing Josh's offer for help as he focuses on the bombing operation.
Who Was There
Characters present in this moment
Grimly controlled — outwardly authoritative while internally carrying the weight of an irreversible executive action and the duty to 'set the President down.'
As Chief of Staff, Leo announces the Pericles One timing, imposes an operational lockdown (no calls, no press), schedules briefings and the President's address, moderates C.J.'s requests, and courts counsel from Fitzwallace while handling Josh's hiring concern.
- • Enforce information discipline and operational secrecy around the strike.
- • Prepare and protect the President for the televised address.
- • Minimize media disruption and prevent premature leaks.
- • Keep staff focused on roles rather than spectacle.
- • Operational secrecy and chain-of-command discipline are essential to mission success.
- • Media optics must be subordinated to national security imperatives.
- • The President will need careful guidance to perform effectively under strain.
Alert and ready — prepared to follow orders and help with speech preparation.
Sam appears briefly, present for instructions about the President's appearance and the briefing schedule; he accepts Leo's orders and exits to execute assigned tasks.
- • Assist in preparing the President's address.
- • Carry out Leo's scheduling and briefing instructions.
- • Support communications and factual accuracy.
- • Clear delegation speeds crisis response.
- • He must be responsive and available for immediate tasks.
- • Teamwork mitigates the weight of executive responsibility.
Controlled anxiety — she is professionally alert about press consequences and eager to manage access and messaging tightly.
C.J. presses for access to the President (requests minutes) and is told emphatically by Leo that she will be present; she is tasked implicitly with holding the line until the high sign and managing press readiness.
- • Be available to coach and manage the President during the address.
- • Prevent premature or unauthorized press engagement.
- • Ensure the administration speaks with clarity and authority.
- • Timing and coordination with the press are crucial for message control.
- • Direct access to the President at critical moments matters for shaping public perception.
- • She must defend institutional discipline even under pressure.
Calm, pragmatic, and quietly insistent — comfortable delivering blunt truth and redirecting attention to consequential battles rather than cosmetic concerns.
Admiral Fitzwallace arrives, moves into the intimate counsel role: he briefly summarizes the stakes, advises Leo on how to 'set the President down' for the public address, and rebuts Leo's and Josh's racial-optics anxiety with a personal, disarming anecdote.
- • Reassure and steady Leo so the President can perform under pressure.
- • Refocus leadership on substantive duties rather than superficial anxieties.
- • Signal that military counsel supports measured civilian decision-making.
- • Presidents don't get new friends quickly; experience settles them into the role.
- • There are real, worthy fights to pick — less important symbolic worries shouldn't distract from the mission.
- • Respect and fair treatment at work trump performative concerns about optics.
Tight, near-panicked composure — panic channeled into work and language, masking private alarm with brittle professionalism.
Toby arrives overloaded with briefing papers, withdraws into technical work — insisting he doesn't need help and snapping at Josh — indicating he chooses procedural focus over emotional support as a coping strategy.
- • Prepare accurate briefing material and narrow talking points for the President's address.
- • Preserve operational secrecy and prevent uncontrolled leaks.
- • Control the narrative through precise messaging rather than sloppy collaboration.
- • Information control and message discipline are essential to avoid operational and political catastrophe.
- • The press and premature involvement will compromise mission integrity.
- • He must shoulder the burden of words because sloppy language can have moral and political consequences.
Calmly competent — functioning as steady administrative ballast amid heightened staff tension.
Margaret performs her backstage role: she announces the Admiral's arrival and executes Leo's instruction to send him in, quietly facilitating the operational tempo and logistics of the meeting.
- • Ensure key people enter and exit on schedule.
- • Maintain operational order in Leo's office.
- • Prevent procedural missteps that could escalate confusion.
- • Small, exact administrative acts sustain larger institutional functions.
- • Discretion and punctuality matter most in crises.
- • Her role is to facilitate, not to be seen.
Restless and conflicted — wants to do right by the kid and be seen as competent, while internalizing anxiety about how the administration will look under media scrutiny.
Josh oscillates between being a political operator and a nervous advocate: he presses Leo about hiring a promising young black aide, worries about the visual optics of the President's staff, offers to help Toby, and stands awkwardly in the room as decisions are announced.
- • Get the young man hired for the aide job.
- • Avoid a damaging visual/optics problem for the administration.
- • Find a way to contribute practically (offer help to Toby).
- • Protect the political standing of the staff in the eyes of the press.
- • Visual optics matter politically and can undermine otherwise sound decisions.
- • Hiring should be merit-based, but politics and optics can trump merit in public perception.
- • Being seen as helpful or competent in crisis matters to his career and the administration.
Sheila is referenced by Josh as someone he could rely on; later she is offered as a contact point while …
Objects Involved
Significant items in this scene
The IHQ is explicitly enumerated by Leo as one of the four military targets of Pericles One; it functions rhetorically to legitimate the strike as focused on military command infrastructure rather than civilian centers, shaping staff and public framing.
The Southian Bridge is named by Leo as a planned strike target; its inclusion elevates the moral and political stakes by implying civilian infrastructure consequences and forces staff to confront optics and diplomatic fallout as they prepare messaging.
Location Details
Places and their significance in this event
The Roosevelt Room operates as the operational bullpen where Toby, Ginger and other staffers gather to prepare the President's speech and monitor military updates — it is the practical engine-room translating orders into briefings and copy.
The West Wing Hallway serves as the transit and circulation space through which Fitzwallace exits with an officer and Toby passes by; it visually compresses the movement between private counsel and operational rooms.
Leo's Office is the command center where the Pericles One order is announced, where access is controlled and where Leo converts presidential outrage into operational discipline; it sets the moral and procedural tone for the entire response.
Northern Rishan is named as the location of two munitions dumps targeted in Pericles One and functions as the distant geographic object of military action; it converts abstract policy into coordinates with human and diplomatic consequences.
The Southian Bridge as a mapped location anchors the moral ambiguity of the strike by implying civilian infrastructure impact; its mention forces communications and policy teams to weigh collateral consequences in real time.
Narrative Connections
How this event relates to others in the story
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Key Dialogue
"LEO: "The order was given at 16:27, codename Pericles One. Four targets, all military. Two munitions dumps in Northern Rishan, Southian bridge and an IHQ.""
"LEO: "Hey guys, no phone calls in or out. C.J., nothing to the press until you get the high sign from me. No head starts.""
"FITZWALLACE: "I'm an old black man and I wait on the President.""