Stormhaven Rising (Atlas and the Winds Book 1) (11 page)

Somehow the decades of tradition assured that things were never missed, that nothing ever slipped through the cracks and fell into the dusty mote of time. Even if it took a while to find its way through the system.

When the report came in, it was transcribed, printed and carried directly to the man who could make a decision, the American Division Administrator.
Hard copy to hard reality.

Administrator Liu sat in his office studying one of the scraps of information already part of his awareness, when his assistant slipped the paper on top of the stack beside his right hand. “What is it?” he asked,without looking up at the young woman.

“Our operative with Secretary Herman has informed us that the Secretary was called away from his diplomatic mission by direct order of President Hutton.”

“This is interesting, because?” he asked, still not diverting his attention from the file in front of him.

“Because his plane was held by military force on the tarmac at Andrews Air Force Base,” she said, fading toward the door and hoping to get away without having to answer another question. “He was aboard the aircraft when it was surrounded by a squad of infantry. He was escorted directly back to the White House."

“By military force?” he asked, looking up. “Has he been detained, or has he arrived at the Damascus conference yet?”

“Neither,” she said, withering under the intense scrutiny of the Administrator's gaze. “There was no explanation offered, however they removed the press contingent from the plane.”

“This is indeed interesting,” he said, pushing the paper he’d been studying back from the front of his desk. “I have only one other minor unexplained incident in the entirety of America that is worthy of my attention, but I am sure the military incident at the Kitt Peak Observatory has nothing to do with this matter."

“I would not know sir.” The assistant nodded, backing out the door and out of the presence of Administrator Liu.

“Perhaps I should assign the Observatory Incident to General Jiang at the Space Directorate,” he said out loud, glad for an excuse to be rid of the boring scientific work.

***

Outside Stormhaven:

Just before sunset, a small group of people stood staring out the only window Shapiro could see from his vantage point. From this distance he couldn’t be sure, but one of them might have been Colton Taylor. Watching them through the binoculars, he realized they were looking at him. After several minutes the one who might have been Taylor waved before he walked away.

About three hours into the night, with the temperature dropping toward arctic conditions, Doug was starting to consider whether he’d survive until morning. The heater in his truck worked well enough, but every time he started the engine to warm up, the thermal vision on his binoculars quit working. He fell into the pattern of running the engine for a few minutes, then sitting until he’d shivered for as long as he could stand it.

During one of his shivering fits, his satellite phone beeped. “Shapiro here,” he said, trying to keep his chattering teeth from being audible.

“Agent Shapiro, this is Tom Stevens,” the voice on the phone said. “You don’t know me, but if you look out your windshield you’ll see me in the windows.” Doug wiped a hole in the condensation and stared across the dark landscape.

“How did you get my number?” Shapiro asked, pulling the binoculars up to his eyes to see the ghostly shape of a man standing there.

“Actually we didn’t, we’re accessing your phone directly.” Doug jerked the phone away from his head and looked at it. The display showed the phone was inactive.

“Neat trick,” he said, almost putting it back to his ear. “I assume this isn’t a social call.”

“No. It’s a humanitarian gesture,” Tom replied. “It’s supposed to get down to minus-six Fahrenheit out there tonight. We want to make sure you don’t freeze to death.”

“Your concern is appreciated, but I’ll be fine,” Shapiro said, hoping he wasn’t being optimistic.

“Look,” he said, “I know you need to play the tough guy, but we don’t want to see you die. That’s a real possibility. The desert at this altitude is unforgiving. The dry air loses heat very efficiently, and it pulls the moisture out of you with it.

“You only have a couple options,” Tom went on. “You can come inside as our guest, which is probably too much of a risk for you, or you can head back to civilization, but your truck looks to be pretty well stuck in that mud bank."

“I appreciate your concern, but that’s not your problem,” he said, realizing that Stevens had summed it up precisely. He had no choices that he wanted to consider.

“What we’re going to do is drop you some supplies.” The image of Tom through his glasses turned and gestured to someone standing out of sight. “We’ll be there in a minute or two. How do you like your coffee?”

“I’m fine,” Doug insisted.

“Ok, it’ll be black. We’re also sending you a meal and a couple blankets.” He paused for a moment and added, “They’re on their way.”

Doug looked for some sign of a vehicle coming across the prairie but saw nothing. “I don’t suppose you’d just send Dr. Cavanaugh out?”

Tom chuckled. “We’ll talk about that later, but for now the answer is no.”

“That’s what I figured,” he said.

“Have a good night Douglas."

The line went dead, leaving the agent replaying the conversation in his mind. “I never gave him my name,” he said. “If they hacked the DHS just for that, then they’re not afraid of consequences."

He was scanning the terrain in front of the building when a blinding light flashed on, illuminating everything like a midday sun. His binoculars polarized, but he was left blinking for several seconds. When his eyes adjusted, he could see shadows crawling across the ground and he knew from their angle that the light source was hovering overhead.

His training kicked in and he started cataloging details: No sound? Obviously it wasn’t a helicopter, unless it was at high altitude. Two shadows? Two lights, at a wide angle to each other. Either it had to be huge, or those lights were very close to the ground. Which confirmed it wasn’t a chopper. The angles on the shadows were changing, so whatever it was, it was descending.

He reached for his pistol, settling instead for making sure it was unsnapped. Bracing himself for the cold, he pushed the door open. Still there was no sound, and no rotor-wash.

The vehicle settled toward the ground about thirty feet away. As it did, the lights shifted, keeping him centered in their beams. Doug stood beside his truck wondering if he should reach for his gun, but he held back, his hand twitching and not quite moving of its own volition.

“Hello, Agent Shapiro,” a man’s voice said, through what sounded like speakers. “I’d like to come out and introduce myself, but you’re looking a bit nervous so it might be best for me to stay inside.”

Doug moved his hands away from his body and nodded, realizing that he probably looked like he felt. “Maybe if this were a little less like an alien abduction scene?” The lights dimmed, still not enough to let him see more than a vague outline of the vehicle, but it did make him feel less like a deer on the highway. “Thank you,” he said, watching a silhouette come toward him.

At least it felt less like a close encounter. In fact it almost seemed comical.
Jesse James and his flying saucer?
He recognized instantly from the shadow of the Stetson and duster that the man approaching him was Colton Taylor. About half the pictures ever taken of the odd inventor had him wearing that outfit.

“Mr. Taylor,” Shapiro said, playing the odds.

“Tonight I’m here under a flag of truce,” the shadow of Cole said, “but I think soon enough you’ll understand we’re on the same side.”

“I’d say that’s unlikely,” Shapiro said.

“That’s because your orders constrain your freedom of thought,” Cole said. He walked forward and set a bundle of things on the hood of the stranded truck. “There’s a hot meal and a thermopot of coffee. I also threw in one of our heated jumpsuits, just in case the blankets aren’t enough.”

“I can’t accept them,” Doug said, trying to stand firm.

“Sure you can,” he said. “It beats freezing to death, and if nothing else, there are a couple things there that your lab boys would love to take apart.”

Cole stepped toward Shapiro and he jumped back. “Easy there, I just wanted to be polite and introduce myself, but if you want to keep your distance that’s fine too.”

“Sorry.” Doug felt foolish, but the way this whole situation had played out, set him on edge in a primal way. No wonder people freaked when they thought they’d had an alien contact. It was intimidating as hell to stand in the presence of supreme confidence, especially when they were so casual about it.

“Cole, we need to get back.” A woman’s voice came through the speakers. He nodded in reply.

“We’ll talk again, but for now please accept our gift, and stay warm tonight.” He turned and walked back to the light, leaving Doug standing motionless and hoping the Department was sending enough support.

***

Chapter Seven:

The Stone Walls and a Declining Empire

Washington:

President Hutton sat in the wingback chair staring at the men facing her. They were waiting for Al Stanley to arrive so they could begin the briefing.

It had been almost two days since she’d pulled Secretary of State John Herman off his plane to Damascus, and he was still fuming. He’d read the Situational Report, but he wasn’t part of the tech or security considerations. In fact, he had almost no part in this since it had to be a military operation.

Damascus was where he needed to be at this moment, stringing threads of diplomatic action into a tapestry of peace. Even though Syria had mostly patched itself back together after its decade of war, the rest of the Middle-East still continued to unravel. It was a place where power was created, and where a well-orchestrated peace deal could launch him into a headlong charge to the White House. The elections were still twenty-one months away but there was no time to waste. Yet here he was, twiddling his thumbs and wasting his shot at destiny.

Secretary Anderson sat beside him, while the Secretary of Defense and Dick Rogers sat across from them on the opposite ends of the other couch. Dick was comfortably large, but sitting beside Secretary Reynolds he looked positively miniscule.

Command presence was a phrase that fell far short of Reynolds’ real personality. Downright terrifying was more accurate. The Secretary of Defense was a career military man and even though he now wore a civilian suit and tie, there was no doubt that he was still The Admiral.

The President had never been intimidated by the Defense Secretary and that was something that had amazed everyone. Political cartoons often showed him as a huge bulldog, wearing a spiked collar, and being held on a leash by Hutton. It wasn’t a particularly amusing image, especially when it often resembled the truth.

Al Stanley burst into the room. “It’s about time,” President Hutton said, smiling at his harried appearance.

“Sorry I’m late,” he said, “I wanted to have a final copy for everyone.” He handed each of them a red bound folder before he sat in the one remaining chair.

“So where are we today?” she asked.

“Up and running,” he announced. “I’ve transferred Carter Anthony to NASA, and Marquez is on track to start launching generic components to LEO immediately.”

“Back up a minute,” Sylvia said, thumbing through the document.

“Oh, sorry,” he said. “In order to get around the limited capability of the military boosters, we’re setting up to assemble the Hammerthrow missiles at the ISS. We’re going to launch components to Alpha and we’ll be putting a crew to build them up on the next shuttle flight.”

“So you’ve already got a design?” she asked.

“No, not at all,” Al said. “But there are things we’ll need regardless of the design. We can launch those while the engineers work out the details."

“So what have I got to do with this?” John interrupted.

“We’re taking the Space Station offline to use for this,” Al said.

John shook his head, still not following.

“The
International
Space Station,” Al said. “Lange pointed out there are over a hundred agreements that we’re shredding to take over the station.”

“Ok?” the Secretary of State said. “So we tell them what’s going on. End of problem”

“How long would it take to tell ninety-six ISS participants what’s coming?” Al said. “Some of them are small enough countries that they don’t have full-time ambassadors here.”

“A few weeks?” John shrugged.

“We haven’t got weeks,” the President said.

“I’d also like to point out that some of the smaller countries involved might not be willing to keep the situation a secret,” Secretary Anderson said. “What then?"

“That could be bad,” Dick Rogers said.

“We’ve already taken over some of the ISS communications,” Dr. Stanley said, “Though we’re still trying to come up with an excuse to lock it down completely."