Asteroid Discovery

by Bobby Akart

  Sparky had rambled continuously since they’d picked him up in Washington. His excited state rubbed off on Young’s producer, who found himself driving ninety miles an hour on Interstate 20 into Atlanta. At that hour, traffic was minimal, and except for the occasional Friday night drunk driver wandering into their path, the return to the CNN studios was uneventful.

  Sparky’s story, however, was not. As the backstory was relayed to Young, his mind tried to focus. There were so many factors to consider in dealing with this situation, including the safety of his source. If what Sparky assumed was true, the woman who discovered the video was stashed away in the dark recesses of a safe house maintained by the three-letter agencies of the U.S. government. She’d be released, of course, unharmed, once the administration was prepared to inform the public of the news.

  Her abduction would be another story to cover although, in Young’s experience, he’d learned that the carrot-and-stick tactics utilized by the feds generally worked in keeping someone like Jackie Holcomb in line.

  After they arrived at the studios in Atlanta, Young tucked Sparky away in his office together with a production assistant, who was instructed to remain with him at all times, even on bathroom breaks. If Sparky wanted something to eat or drink, the PA was told to have someone else get it. And under no circumstances was Sparky allowed to use the phone or access the internet. CNN was masterful at keeping the lid on big stories until the timing of the network’s release suited them.

  Plus, as Young suspected, there were national security concerns in play. If the Holcomb woman had disclosed what she knew, or if it was discerned from her computer or cell phone, then the administration was well aware of the threat and was most likely in crisis mode.

  The crisis, as Young and the CNN leadership team saw it, was twofold. First, if the calculations were correct, the planet faced an unprecedented threat from above. Second, once the news story broke, as Young had reported on in the past, society’s reaction to the threat would be the subhead.

  Young had covered the regime change in Venezuela and relayed the horrific living conditions the people suffered through. As desperation set in and the government clamped down on dissent, violence and lawlessness ruled the day. He often debated with his peers whether Americans would react in a similar manner should they face a profound crisis like the total collapse of the U.S. economy, as Venezuelans had experienced, or in this case, an incoming asteroid.

  There were those who firmly believed a spirit of cooperation would come over the nation’s people as both government and the governed worked together to overcome the crisis. Young disagreed and pointed to several examples of societal collapse over the past hundred years, including in Venezuela, Africa, and the Middle East.

  Young was a pessimist in this regard, but he was also a student of history. He would point out to his colleagues that most civilizations were responsible for their own demise, but on occasion, their destruction was assisted by others. Failing economies, war, and naturally occurring disasters all contributed to the collapse of the great empires, and, he pointed out, they all did.

  Collapse, that is. There had never been a great empire in the history of mankind that had not collapsed, either at the hand of a more powerful conquering nation, or because they spent themselves into extinction.

  He’d put off seeing Sparky as long as he could. It was now approaching noon, and his assistant told him that his guest had finally stretched out on the sofa at daybreak to sleep. When Sparky had awoken a few minutes ago, he was agitated and demanded to speak with Young.

  Young took a deep breath and entered his office, where Sparky was pacing the floor. The production assistant sat in a chair near the door and yawned as Young arrived. Young patted the young man on the shoulder and told him he could leave.

  “Jack, what’s happening? I mean, do they not realize how big a story this is, not to mention the threat our planet faces?”

  “They do, Sparky,” replied Young. “Listen, take a seat so I can explain where we are with all of this.”

  Sparky hesitated and then finally did as instructed. He gently massaged his banged-up legs, which were covered with bandages. “I’m sorry, Jack. It’s just, um, I’ve barely had any sleep and I’m worried about Mary. I wish there was—”

  Young cut him off. “There’s not, Sparky, as I will explain. But let me tell you what we’ve done to help in that regard.”

  “Okay, thanks.”

  “I want to tell you this is the most important news event that has been presented to us in my tenure at CNN, and possibly the biggest one in our lifetimes. The White House has put an unprecedented clampdown on any information. Our most trusted, loose-lipped sources within the administration know nothing, but they all have admitted that something big is happening in the West Wing.”

  “I told you! What happened to Jackie, and their pursuit of me, probably goes all the way to the top.”

  “Yes, you’re right, but that has hamstrung us somewhat, but I’ll get to that. Let me explain what we’ve done to help your wife.”

  “Yes, please,” said Sparky, who scooted up on the edge of the couch.

  “We had to be careful not to disclose that you were in our studios, much less contacted us directly. They’d be here with emergency-issued warrants in a heartbeat.”

  “So what did you do?”

  “Our team placed several anonymous calls to the Wilkes County Sheriff’s Department and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, reporting that you were missing. There were also reports of unusual activity at your home initiated via anonymous calls from our production team. Now, we know that all of these law enforcements are searching for you, but by filing a missing persons report, coupled with the strange activity, we’ve brought the feds’ activity into the light of day.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Well, acting on yet another anonymous tip, the CBS affiliate in Augusta has sent a news crew to Washington, to your home, which I imagine will stir the curiosity of everyone in town. That puts more eyes on the feds who are holding your wife and will minimize the possibility that she’ll be moved. Basically, we’ve set the wheels in motion to protect you and force their hand to allow us to go public with the story.”

  Sparky had a puzzled look on his face. “What do you mean by allow?”

  “Just before I came in to see you, Jeff Zucker, who, by the way, has taken complete control over all decision-making on this story, received a phone call from the president’s chief of staff. She’d been informed that we were pressing all of our sources within the administration for information on something big. Of course, she denied that there was anything, but then she asked, no, actually, she begged us to lay off in exchange for an exclusive breaking-news opportunity.”

  “Do you believe her?” asked Sparky.

  “Mr. Zucker does and that’s all that matters. So, for now, we’re standing down.”

  Sparky shot up off the sofa and began to pace the floor again. “You can’t do that! Somebody will scoop us. Jack, you know how this works. Whoever gets the story out there first will benefit, you know …” Sparky’s voice trailed off as he became somewhat emotional. The events of the last seventy-two hours were clearly taking their toll on the old-school newsman.

  “Sparky, please sit down,” said Young, who reached out for his old acquaintance and led him back to the couch. “I know exactly where you’re coming from, and let me assure you, this will be handled in a way that will please you both professionally and financially. I promise.”

  Sparky managed a smile and nodded. He fell back against the sofa and sighed. “So what do we do now?”

  “Well, several things. First, we need to get you cleaned up and into some new clothes. Second, you and I are going to do several taped interviews that will become part of an extensive news story to be aired on 60 Minutes tomorrow night.”

  “Really?”

  “That’s right. Anderson Cooper will actually present the piece, but I’ll take the interviewer role, a
nd with your help, we’ll fill in the blanks on what happened from the night the young man discovered the asteroid up until today. How’s that sound?”

  “Well, um, what about Jackie? She actually discovered the asteroid. I mean, the young man must’ve seen it first because he set his camera to record it, but it was Jackie who pored through the video.”

  “That’s true, and we’ll mention that, but it makes for a better story that the last thing this teenage boy did before he died was discover the greatest threat to modern mankind in history.”

  Sparky frowned, but nodded his head in agreement.

  Chapter 34

  Sunday, April 8

  Amur Oblast

  Russian Far East

  The AV-280 Valor screamed across the Sea of Okhotsk as Bear guided it through the Tatar Strait, the northernmost reaches of the Sea of Japan. He banked hard left as the advanced avionics responded on command, leading them just above an evening sea fog that customarily surrounded the Shantar Islands off the coast of the Russian Far East.

  “Hey, at least the weatherman was spot on,” said Bear cheerily as he picked up speed. He hadn’t flown the AV-280 in about a year and had forgotten about its incredible handling capability. “This baby’s half-plane, half-chopper. I want one!”

  “Kinda like you,” grumbled Cam as she checked her gear. “Half-man, half-child, half-beast.”

  Bear chortled. “Hey, that’s three halves!”

  “Yeah, well, in case you haven’t looked in the mirror, you look like three halves,” Cam shot back. When Bear turned to flip her off, she shouted, “Eyes on the road, big guy. I see trees.”

  The landscape quickly changed from a rocky beach with a gradual slope inland to stands of Siberian pine trees and cavernous valleys that split the jagged mountains. Bear dropped his airspeed to three hundred miles per hour as he settled into a river-filled gorge surrounded on two sides by rocky, partially snow-covered peaks. This part of Russia was beautiful and resembled the Western Canadian province of Vancouver.

  “I see gold,” he joked as he tipped the wings slightly to turn in a more westerly direction. Their intelligence briefing had discussed how the Amur Oblast was known to have the largest reserves of gold in Russia, with an estimated value of four hundred billion dollars.

  Most of the region was desolate, especially around the newly expanded Cosmodrome. Sparsely populated with very little military activity, according to the National Reconnaissance Office, it was more likely that visual contact with the AV-280 would be made, although its stealth technology would effectively mask their approach from Russian radar.

  To aid in their approach to the Cosmodrome under darkened conditions, the AV-280 was equipped with an integrated aperture system that allowed the aircrew a three-hundred-sixty-degree view through the skin of the aircraft. This multifunctional sensor system would assist Bear in finding a suitable place to touch down, while providing Gunner and Cam the ability to make a threat assessment before exiting the aircraft.

  Bear checked his global positioning system. They were less than thirty minutes from their landing zone. Again, the recon images provided by the NatRecon Office were spot-on, taking the guesswork out of their approach.

  “So far, so good,” muttered Bear into the in-flight communications system.

  “Yeah, this was the easy part,” replied Gunner, not intending to dampen the team’s spirits, but simply reminding them that getting the heck out of dodge might not be so smooth. He turned to Cam. “Do a final check with Fort Belvoir. What’s her name? Lucy?”

  Cam rolled her eyes and chuckled. “No, maybe it’s Teddy, but she wants to be called the Jackal.”

  “Come on, Cam. Don’t you think that’s a little, you know, off?”

  “She can call herself whatever she wants as long as she’s there for us when we need her,” Cam replied. “If she can hack into things as she claims, then we stand a better chance of knowing if we’ve been discovered or if our ride outta here has been compromised.”

  Gunner gave her a thumbs-up and turned his attention back to Bear. “Okay, big guy, find us a spot, then drop her down nice and easy. Cam and I’ll monitor this fancy visual system, but to be honest, I want to clear the LZ the old-fashioned way.”

  “Roger that, Major,” said Bear, who was preparing his mindset for battle. “We don’t have a quarrel with the locals, but we certainly don’t need them scurrying off to report us to the FSB.” The Federal Security Service, or FSB, was the successor to the famed KGB. The Police of Russia, which was responsible for day-to-day law enforcement actions, was known to be filled with drunks and officers on the take of local Russian criminal organizations. If someone had a genuine threat to report, they’d go to the FSB, who had a direct pipeline to the Kremlin.

  Cam and the Jackal performed their radio checks. The Jackal was monitoring a bank of satellite feeds from all the U.S. intelligence agencies with eyes in the sky. Thus far, there was no unusual activity that would suggest the team had been discovered.

  “Five minutes to drop!” Bear announced over the comms.

  Gunner adjusted his tactical throat microphone, a hands-free device that allowed the team to communicate on the fly. “Acknowledged.” He checked his watch. It was three in the morning local time. They would have just over three hours to hike through the Russian forest and make their way to the Vostochny Cosmodrome.

  He wasn’t sure what they were looking for, as there had been no specific directives by the briefing team at Fort Belvoir. It was supposed to be a simple recon mission. Take some photos, record their findings, and transmit them back to the Jackal in real time.

  Simple, Gunner thought to himself as Bear made a perfect landing in a small clearing surrounded by a rocky cliff on one side and dense forest on the others. Nothing’s ever simple in this business.

  Cam exited the AV-280 first, leading the way with her newly upgraded version of the M4, except it was chambered with 6.8 mm rounds. The round fell between the old M4 standard 5.56 mm round, and the more powerful 7.62 mm round used in the military-issue Mk 14 battle rifles. The new bullet had been designed from collaborative research at Colt and FN America, the Columbia, South Carolina, manufacturer of the M249 SAW, a mainstay within law enforcement and military ranks for decades.

  The 6.8 mm round was created as an answer to improved body armor worn by the enemy, giving soldiers and law enforcement better barrier penetration as near-peer encounters escalated. The new round had superior accuracy and lethality to the M4 rounds, while providing similar ranges to the M16.

  Gunner followed her out and surveyed the heavily wooded area through his night-vision goggles. Cam had already circled around the AV-280 and, within thirty seconds, declared her side of the aircraft to be clear.

  “Clear,” Gunner added, allowing himself to exhale for the first time. With their major challenges lying ahead of them, his heightened state of awareness would not relax until he was back on American soil.

  Bear emerged from the AV-280, wearing his full kit and carrying the camera gear. He slammed the door shut and approached Gunner. “Um, do you think I should lock her up? I’d hate for someone to steal my new ride.”

  Gunner laughed and slapped his friend on the back. “Let’s go, Bear. And you can’t keep the Valor.”

  Cam, who could hear the conversation through her comms, added some brevity in the form of a cheesy joke. “Yeah, then it would be stolen valor. Get it?”

  “Hardee-har-har,” bellowed Bear. “Aren’t you the funny one today?”

  Cam joined them as they started through the Siberian forest, with Bear leading the way. “I’m always the funny one.”

  They walked for another half minute, and then the sheepish voice of the Jackal came through the comms. “You know, I can hear everything you say, and actually, none of you are funny.”

  “Really?” moaned Bear. “You’re listening to every word?”

  “I am,” she responded. “I would like to mention that you guys are going in the wrong direction
. You need to veer left or you’ll be in the middle of a coal-mining operation.”

  “Gold?” asked Bear.

  “No, you dope, coal!” admonished Cam. She then directed her remarks to the Jackal. “Jackal, why don’t you guide us so Bear doesn’t get us lost?”

  “With pleasure,” she replied. “It’s ten klicks to the overlook. It’s gonna be over the river and through the woods, and there’s no grandmother’s house at the end of the hike.” The Jackal could be heard laughing through the comms.

  “Everybody’s a comedian,” moaned Gunner.

  Chapter 35

  Sunday, April 8

  The Vostochny Cosmodrome

  Amur Oblast

  Russian Far East

  “It looks like the kind of shiny new gadget a gal could pick up at the local adult toy store,” Cam observed dryly. “Whadya think, Jackal?”

  “I wouldn’t know, ma’am,” she replied, her voice sounding somewhat hollow, as if she were in a barrel.

  Cam persisted. “Oh, come on, Jackal. You mean you’ve never picked up something like this, you know, for a little—”

  The Jackal cut her off. “No, Major! I have not.”

  Gunner interrupted the discussion. “Let’s keep the chatter to a minimum. Don’t forget where we are.”

  Cam couldn’t resist. “You will, Jackal. Trust me, there will come a day when—”

  Gunner, who was positioned above and slightly behind Cam, tossed a pine cone and bounced it off her shoulder. “Seriously, enough, you two.”

  “She started it, sir,” said the Jackal.

  Gunner shook his head. He stared down the cliff overlooking the new spaceport developed by the Russians in the last decade. Vladimir Putin’s dream of having a new launch site in this remote area of Russia had been realized. There were only a few locations on the planet where space-bound rockets lifted off from, and the Vostochny Cosmodrome was one of them. With its first launch of a Soyuz rocket a dozen year ago, Moscow had sent a message to the world that it would have complete control over its space program, dropping its reliance on the US and the French.