Authors: Daniel Suarez
McKinney could see a single security lamp in the distance.
“Porch light’s on, so the coast is clear.”
They drew closer to the light and finally pulled up to a rolltop door in a long white corrugated steel wall that rose from rock floor to rock ceiling. It stretched out into the darkness in both directions. Several cameras focused on the entrance. Foxy waved, and the rolltop door began to rise, clattering with an echoing racket amid all the exposed rock.
She could see a company logo for Ancile Services, text with a simple shield shape; the same logo emblazoned on her coat. There was a suite number next to the garage door, along with a mail drop and an intercom. It all looked quite innocuous. Underground buildings apparently had to be fashioned down here to make the spaces functional and comfortable. The perimeter wall looked similar to what other businesses had built, although there appeared to be domed security camera enclosures at intervals along the perimeter.
McKinney was surprised when what lay behind the rolltop gate was just more darkness.
Foxy nodded forward. “Buffer area—a hundred-foot-wide exterior perimeter to prevent anyone listening in on what we’re up to.” He pulled the van through the doorway, and the gate descended behind them.
As they drove ahead into the dark, something came swimming out the blackness. Literally swimming through the air was a small shark, replete with teeth and fins, its tail working furiously as it swam to investigate the incoming van.
McKinney peered closely at it. “What the hell . . . ?”
Moments later several more sharks “swam” out the darkness, converging on the van like a school of fish.
She laughed in confusion. “Okay . . . what are those things?”
“Air swimmers—cheap children’s toy that Expert Five converted for security purposes. It’s a neutral-buoyancy balloon with a power tail fin. I don’t know how many he’s got flying out here, but they patrol the buffer space for intruders.”
Sure enough, now dozens more of the things were sweeping in out of the dark all around them to investigate the lights and movement of the van, bumping up against the windows as though the van were a submarine.
McKinney couldn’t help but admire them. “They’re swarming.” She noticed also a little payload beneath the shark-shaped dirigibles, a rectangular piece of black plastic—and the reflection of a camera lens.
Foxy nodded. “Yeah, Five’s an AI expert. You’ll like him. From what I understand, his fish here explore a space, memorize the layout, and then they use some sort of routing algorithm to patrol.”
“A foraging pattern. Do you know what species they’re modeling?”
“I sure don’t. All I know is they explore the space and remember the layout. When they encounter something that wasn’t there before, they send up an alarm. Flying around independently makes it difficult to blind them with lasers or other countermeasures. They swim to a charging station too.” He chuckled. “Freaky how much it looks like fish feeding.”
“So an antidrone unit is being guarded by drones.”
“Fire with fire.”
“Oh, there’s a clown fish.” McKinney pointed.
“Yeah, it’s getting crowded. C’mon, move it.” Foxy tapped the horn as he nudged through the gathering wall of fish. “Everyone else is probably asleep, but I’ll get you squared away in your quarters.”
“We stay down here full-time?”
He shrugged. “It’s not so bad. Nothing’s more comfy than knowing you’re not gonna get blown up in your sleep.”
McKinney pondered that for a moment as she watched another flying shark “swim” past the right side of the van.
In a few moments they pulled up to another corrugated steel wall and a rolltop gate, this one unmarked. The gate rose automatically to reveal a brightly lit garage bay over a hundred feet long and half as wide, containing several large trucks, heavy equipment, and other gear. The floor was painted gray and marked with yellow parking and lane lines. Metalworking equipment, welding rigs, and workbenches were scattered about the place. Interior walls sectioned off the garage, and several doors led off into other areas of the complex.
Standing in the middle of the garage and pointing with two gloved hands to an open space was an athletic Latino in his twenties. He had tattoos of two different women on either bicep and small, pretzel-like ears that lay flush against his crew-cut head. He wore a blue Ancile Services polo shirt with jeans, and tan combat boots—as well as a small black submachine gun slung against his chest.
“Home sweet home.” Foxy pulled the van into a space and killed the engine.
The rolltop gate was still rumbling closed as the Latino came up to the van. McKinney nodded to him, and he nodded back. The air was about sixty-five degrees and smelled powerfully of cut stone.
Foxy exchanged a complex, full-body handshake with the man. “Smokey, how the hell are you, man?”
“All right. All right.”
Foxy gestured to McKinney. “Smokey, this is—”
“I know who it is, dipshit.” He removed a shooting glove and extended his hand. “Professor. Pleasure. They call me Smokey. You didn’t see me in Africa, but I was on the ground. Glad to see you made it out okay.”
Foxy was busy grabbing gear. “You ever find that F50?”
“Naw, it was crazy back there, son. People with guns runnin’ around.”
McKinney felt her eyes drooping in exhaustion.
Foxy slapped Smokey on the shoulder. “Hey, looks like the professor needs some rack time. So do I.”
“All right, we’ll catch up later.”
They left Smokey behind and headed toward double doors. As McKinney padded across the floor, it occurred to her it wasn’t concrete. It was solid rock, probably hundreds of feet thick, ground flat by mining equipment and polished. Their shoes made almost no sound as they walked across it.
Looking around at the other vehicles in the large garage, McKinney noticed some were marked with the same Ancile Services shield logo she wore, while others were painted teal green and marked with U.S. Forest Service insignia. There were also a couple of four-wheel-drive Dodge Power Wagon crew-cab pickups in the process of being painted with Bureau of Land Management livery—the word
Ranger
partially stenciled and taped out along the side. All of the vehicles were rugged-looking; obviously made for off-road work, with the largest trucks being ten-ton, four-wheel-drive monstrosities. She’d seen similar Unimog trucks in Africa used by pricey European or South African tour groups. Apparently no expense had been spared on this place; there were three gleaming multi-ton Amerigo four-wheel-drive survey trucks with sensors and antennas sticking up from a windowed control room in their cargo area. They looked like oil company seismic trucks, but they were partially disassembled in places with welding equipment stored close by and modifications half-finished.
McKinney gestured to the vehicles and looked at Foxy quizzically.
“Need-to-know, Professor.”
“You realize that conducting covert military operations inside the United States is illegal.”
“Someone’s attacking us, Professor. When that happens we get to shoot back. No sense panicking everyone in the meantime.”
They pushed through the doors and entered a plain white hallway that smelled strongly of spackling, fresh paint, and adhesives. The whole place was brand-new. It had the look of a medical office building. Foxy brought her ahead and to the right, down a side corridor.
“Your hooch is this way. . . .”
McKinney’s head kept darting about. “This whole place was built just for this project?”
Foxy sighed. “Yeah, and let me tell you, top-secret general contractors don’t come cheap.”
They turned a corner to see a man with tightly curled gray hair standing with his back to them in the middle of the hallway; he was dressed in a sweater and slacks, holding a tablet computer in his hands while he watched a lawn mower–sized unmanned electric vehicle with large, off-road wheels weaving through doorways, following some sort of search pattern.
Foxy called out, “You’re up late.”
The man kept his eyes on the vehicle. “Tinkering is sleep for me.” He turned as they reached him.
He was balding, with an aquiline nose. A wiry, intense-looking sixty-year-old. He regarded McKinney with something like disdain.
Foxy gestured to McKinney. “Expert One, meet Expert Six.”
The man stared intently as he extended his hand. “Brian Singleton, Professor Emeritus, Computer Engineering and Robotics, Carnegie Mellon University.”
Foxy rolled his eyes. “Goddammit, Singleton, how many times do I have to tell you, no names?”
“I’ll be damned if I’m going to cower behind some puerile alias.”
“It could compromise your personal safety, not to mention—”
“Let these terrorists do their damnedest.” Singleton focused his gaze back on McKinney, but he addressed his talk to Foxy. “The report said she’s a myrmecologist. Don’t tell me this young woman was brought here because of Odin’s fixation on swarming again.”
“One, what Odin does or doesn’t do isn’t my—”
“Because it’s a waste of time.” Singleton’s eyes stayed on McKinney as she watched his vehicle whizzing around the hallways unattended behind him. “The drones we’re facing are premeditated hunters, not swarming hordes.” He gestured behind him at his nimble vehicle. “Hunting alone. We can’t waste time on conjecture.”
McKinney stared right back at him. “I’m not here by choice, and I have no intention of trying to push an agenda on you.”
“Good. Because I won’t allow us to be sidetracked.”
“Fine.”
“People are dying.”
“I got it. Okay? Let it go.”
Foxy interceded. “Stop busting balls.” He gestured to the hallway. “You wanna call off your premeditated hunter?”
Singleton kept his gaze on McKinney for a second more, and then nodded. He clapped his hands sharply, and the unmanned vehicle stopped in its tracks.
Foxy pushed past with McKinney. “Thank you. See you in the morning.”
“Good night.”
After they rounded the corner McKinney shook her head ruefully. “I knew there was a reason I liked fieldwork.”
Foxy chuckled. “Oh, he’s all right once you get to know him. Just been here a while, that’s all.” Foxy led her to a row of blond-wood doors. They stopped at one with the number six engraved on a plastic plaque. “Here we are.”
McKinney narrowed her eyes to see that someone had even printed the number in raised Braille letters underneath. She ran her finger along the dots.
Foxy opened the door. “Yes, we are ADA compliant.” He turned on the lights. They buzzed on to illuminate a Spartan dormitory-style room with sturdy, brand-new furniture. A bed, dresser, and a desk with a laptop already sitting on it—hardwired with a CAT-5 cable to a jack in the wall. A flat-panel television hung opposite the bed. It was a room she’d never in a million years conceived she’d be in. She was still trying to grasp the surreality of all this and half expected to hear the night sounds of the jungle. Here there was only the sterile buzzing of lights.
Foxy walked to the desk and opened the laptop. “Yours for the duration. It has most of the software that was on your old laptop.”
“Do I even want to ask how you know what was on my old laptop?”
“You can ask Hoov tomorrow. He might have some firewall advice.” He gestured to the laptop again. “There’s a team wiki on our intranet that’ll tell you everything you need to know about the mission. Welcome to government service.”
“A covert military operation with a wiki.”
Foxy headed to the door. “It’s only going to get stranger from here on, Professor. So I suggest you get some sleep. Your bathroom’s over there. Toiletries too. Clothes and shoes in the bureau and closet. The alarm clock will sound at oh six hundred hours. Everyone gathers in the team room at seven. You can grab breakfast before then—I’ll send someone around. If you need sleeping aids or anything else, ring this button by the door.” He regarded her tired eyes. “Any questions?”
She shook her head wearily.
“Super . . .” He gave her a two-finger salute. “See you in about five hours, then.” And closed the door behind him.
She stared at the dead bolt, and then walked over to turn it with a satisfying
clack
. Just the sight of the slug of steel entering the frame, sealing her off, brought her stress level down by half.
McKinney then sat on the edge of the bed and put her hands to her face. This was insanity.
She noticed the remote control for the television on the nightstand. She grabbed it and clicked the power button. The television blinked to life on the Weather Channel. A meteorologist was waving her hands above the northeast, showing a high-pressure system moving in from the Great Lakes. It was a window of normalcy viewed from inside a loony bin.
She clicked the channel button and cable news came up. Video of a burning office building, windows blackened and blasted out. The chyron scrolling on the bottom read, “.
. . attack in D.C. Six dead. Twelve injured . . .”
McKinney felt it almost personally.
The anchorwoman spoke over the video: “.
. . time in the heart of America’s defense sector close by the Pentagon. The bomb claimed the lives of Alerion Aerospace CEO Brad Oliphant Jr. along with several board members and executives. As a parts supplier for several Pentagon drone aircraft programs, security analysts speculate that Alerion was targeted by extremists intent on exacting revenge for the recent Karbala shrine attack, despite new evidence supporting an American denial of responsibility. Although al-Qaeda and other terror organizations have voiced support for today’s attack, authorities confirm that no credible group has yet to claim responsibility for—”
Click
.
Another cable news station. An inset photo of the same burning office building next to the anchorman, who was in midstory. “. . .
explosion could be heard throughout the capital city and, for some, brought back awful memories of 9/11. It is a city under siege this hour, as residents cope with the realization that they now live in a combat zone.”
Click
.
Another news channel. Images of the injured being rolled on gurneys to waiting ambulances. Fire trucks. The anchorman’s voice authoritative:
“Parts of D.C. are in lockdown as investigators comb through the scene, reviewing surveillance videos for some clue as to how the bombers were able to bypass security.”