Impact (Fuzed Trilogy Book 1)

by David E Stevens

  Cho said, “At this range, the beam will be incredibly tight. It’s powerful enough to vaporize a major divot out of it and create a decent jet plume.”

  Josh repeated, “Victoria, is it possible?” There was a longer pause. He knew she was running calculations on her laptop. It took 60 long seconds before she replied.

  “No, Josh, I’m sorry. We can’t. It’s just not physically possible this late. Even if everything worked perfectly, the impulse from the gas jet isn’t enough. It’s just too close and the earth’s too big to miss.”

  “It doesn’t have to miss the earth, just London.”

  She replied immediately with excitement in her voice, “You’re absolutely right! We only have to nudge it enough to get it over the ocean. If we can slow it down a tiny bit, we can shift its impact point a few hundred kilometers....” There was another pause and then, “Yes, there is a chance if we hit it with everything we’ve got as soon as possible. It all depends on the coordinates being accurate and the fragment being reflective enough we can find and track it. Don’t have time to talk, gotta run some calculations.”

  Katori jumped on the radio. “Josh, we just finished installing it. Haven’t checked out any of the circuits or even tried to charge the capacitors. If something goes wrong, it could destroy the Blaster, possibly blowing us up in the process.”

  Josh said softly, “I know, but there’s too much at stake. Even if we can get the word out, you know they can’t evacuate everyone from a city in eight hours.”

  He could actually hear Katori sigh over the radio.

  Josh added, “I have Greg Langlois with me for the software interface stuff.”

  Katori, sounding very tired, said, “Good, we’ll need him. Josh, I have to go. I need to find Bobinski and get the reactors online.”

  Josh said, “Major Crow, are you still there?”

  “Yes sir.”

  “Can you send a snowcat out about two miles due west of the base. We’re going to need a ride.”

  “Did you say two miles west of the base?”

  “Yes, and we’re not dressed appropriately.”

  Crow said, “I don’t understand.”

  “I’ll explain when we’re on the ground.”

  Washington, D.C.

  It was 9:30 pm. Davidson boarded the specially equipped Gulfstream G650 for the 12-hour flight from D.C. to the Falklands. It was the fastest, longest-range, executive jet on the market. They had also specially modified it with extensive satellite communication and defensive systems. He had only flown on it a few times, preferring to travel by more conventional and economical means. Buster had had no such reluctance and had often used it as his personal airliner.

  He began to have serious reservations about not being in the Ops Center when the SEAL team arrived at the South Pole. He suspected Buster wanted him out of the way. All he could do before he left was talk to a couple of the key team members. As concerned as he was, his job was to be the Director’s Deputy. As long as Buster was giving legal directives, Davidson would support him ... whether he agreed with him or not.

  47

  EJECT

  Greg asked, “Why aren’t they meeting us at the airfield?”

  Bitching Betty chose that time to say, “Fuel low. Fuel low.”

  Josh said, “That’s why.”

  “We’re out of gas?”

  “No, we have another 10 minutes.”

  “How far are we from the base?”

  Josh said, “About 20 minutes.”

  “Then how are we going to land?”

  “We’re not. Greg, trying to land a fighter with no engines is tough under the best of conditions. Add darkness, insufficient altitude and an unlit ice runway, it’s too risky.”

  “What are we going to do?”

  “We’re still at 37,000 feet. We can glide there, but eventually we’re going to have to step outside.”

  “We’re going to eject?”

  “Yup, just like in Top Gun.”

  Greg said, “But in Top Gun, the guy in the backseat dies.”

  “Sorry, bad example. Don’t worry; it’ll be a piece of cake.”

  “But I don’t know how to eject.”

  Josh speaking slowly and calmly, said, “Don’t have to. It’s set for Command Eject. When I go, you go. Listen carefully, Greg. We still have plenty of time, but when I say get ready, I want you to put your head back against the headrest with your chin slightly elevated. Put your hands in your lap and extend your feet so that your thighs are touching the seat cushion. I’ll do the rest.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me this earlier?”

  “Would have ruined your nap.”

  “But how do I use the parachute?”

  “It’ll open by itself, and you’ll come down just fine. Just look at the horizon. Keep your feet together, knees slightly bent. When you hit the ground, just roll with it. Make sure your jacket’s zipped up and your helmet and gloves are on tight. The departure’s a bit of a rush.”

  “You’ve done this before?”

  “Yup.”

  “Did you get hurt?”

  Josh grimaced. “Uh, the important thing is that we’ll be ejecting under ideal conditions. You’ll be fine. This will be a great story to tell your kids and grandkids someday.”

  For the first time, Greg sounded plaintive and scared. “Commander Fuze, why is all this happening? It isn’t fair! They can’t be doing this to us. The government needs to do something about these people. Someone needs to sue someone!”

  Josh stifled a laugh. Greg had been a real trooper, but the pressure was catching up. He decided to try to take Greg’s mind off the ejection by engaging him in philosophical discussion. He knew where to start.

  “Greg, how do you think unfairness in our country and the world can be better addressed?”

  “What?”

  “Greg, if you were king, what would you do to fix things?”

  “Commander Fuze, you’re just trying to take my mind off ejecting.”

  “Yup.”

  There was a pause. “Good idea.” After another pause, Greg said, “I think too many people get to do anything they want and in the process hurt others. Everyone needs to operate under the same rules so no one has an unfair advantage.”

  Josh scanned his fuel gauge. It read zero. “Can you give me an example?”

  “Yeah, when I was going to high school and college, jocks were treated differently. The academic standards didn’t apply to them. Winning a stupid athletic event was more important than learning. Some slept through classes and flaunted it. No one should be able to do that.”

  Betty cheerfully said, “Engine left. Engine left.” Josh watched as the RPM on the left engine started to drop.

  Greg asked the obvious, “Are we out of gas now?”

  “No, still have the right engine.”

  Betty corrected him, “Engine right. Engine right.”

  Josh said, “Now we’re out of gas, but we’ll glide for another 10 minutes.” As the engines wound down, it was unnaturally quiet in the fighter’s cockpit.

  Greg, the consummate computer engineer, asked, “Will the flight control computers remain powered without the engines?”

  “No worries. The engines are still windmilling with the air running down their intakes. That’s enough to spin the generators and supply plenty of power, and we have backup batteries.” He shut down the radar and all unnecessary electronics to reduce the load on the generators.

  “Greg, do you understand that no matter how hard we try to make things fair ... the universe isn’t fair? It’s not fair that a comet is on a collision course with Earth. It’s not fair that we respond better to women’s voices than they do to ours. How do we regulate that?”

  “I understand, but we can control the unfair actions of people.”

  Passing 25,000 feet, he checked the navigation computer and refined their heading. “OK. As king, what would you do to make sure all students are treated fairly?”

  “I don�
��t know.” He paused. “I guess I’d have the teachers keep a closer watch on what was happening both in and out of the classroom and give them the power to take action.”

  “Let’s say they assign someone to every student. They could follow you all day and make sure no one broke any rules or did anything unfair.” Josh checked the distance to the base. With no drag-inducing tanks, they’d glide about seven feet forward for every foot they dropped, but they still had 50 miles to go. It would be very close.

  Greg finally said, “That would suck. You’d always have someone looking over your shoulder. You’d have no freedom.”

  Josh smiled. “Reducing unfairness requires more control. The way to eliminate all unfairness would be with total control. There’s your tradeoff — control and total fairness versus freedom.”

  Greg added, “Besides, what if the person following you didn’t like you?”

  “Good point. Who gets to decide what’s fair? Puts a lot of power in the hands of the regulators and enforcers, doesn’t it? That’s the paradox of government. If we seek security above all else, we achieve maximum security, which also happens to be the name for the tightest cell in a prison.”

  After a pause, Greg said, “Guess it has to be a balance.”

  “Governments have struggled with that since the beginning of time. Figure out that perfect balance and I’ll vote for you.”

  St. Louis

  Elizabeth sat on the cot, head in hands, replaying every conversation she’d ever had with Josh. She maintained her position throughout the interrogation but it took a toll. They couldn’t be right ... could they? She wasn’t just some gullible mark. She couldn’t, she wouldn’t, believe that, but it was so hard to hear what they kept saying about Josh.

  She heard the door open and looked up. The female FBI agent who’d handcuffed her introduced herself politely and asked Elizabeth to accompany her. Still holding onto her blanket, she followed mutely.

  They went up in an elevator to what looked like a hotel suite. Inside, she was surprised to see they had a nice dinner waiting for her. She saw they also had her purse, makeup bag, toiletries and clothes from Josh’s apartment.

  As she was eating the food, the female agent surprised her by asking if she would accompany them on a flight to the Falklands.

  She dropped her fork, and without hesitation, pulled her pajamas off and grabbed her clothes.

  Ten minutes later, she was on her way to the airport. They rode in another black, unmarked SUV with a police escort. It took them right onto the airport tarmac where she saw a large, sleek business jet with subdued U.S. government markings. Climbing the stairs and entering the executive jet, she realized it was several steps up from first class. In addition to her FBI escort, who followed her inside, there were two people already onboard. One was obviously a flight attendant, who welcomed her and asked her what she would like to drink. The attendant also told her there was a bed and bathroom in the back she could use after they were airborne.

  The other individual was a tall, dark, serious-looking man. He wasn’t wearing an FBI windbreaker, but she could see a holster under his sports jacket. He introduced himself and called her ma’am but never smiled. She really wasn’t sure if they were escorts or guards. She didn’t care. She was going to see Josh.

  After they took off, Elizabeth tried to stay awake, but the combination of emotion, no sleep and hours of interrogation took their toll. No matter how hard she fought it, the drone of the jet engines lulled her into a deep sleep torn by nightmares.

  Langley

  The Prophet Operation team started to assemble in the Operations Center. Carl knew nothing would happen until the SEAL team arrived at the pole.

  By 10:00 pm, the entire team was present, minus Deputy Director Davidson. Carl initiated an encrypted call from the Ops Center to Davidson, who was now over the Atlantic.

  “Thanks, Carl. I’d like to stay on the line during the entire operation if possible. Is Lafferty there?”

  “Yes sir.”

  “Can you have him pickup, but stay on the line.”

  Carl brought Lafferty over and gave him another phone.

  Davidson asked, “Bart, anything useful from Edvardsen?”

  Lafferty said, “Just got off the phone with the interrogation team. Not much we didn’t already know.” He paused. “Brian, I have to tell you, my guys are some of the best. Edvardsen made a strong case for this crazy comet thing. My lead interrogator said, and I quote, ‘She’s not just the Prophet’s play toy. She’s very intelligent and made compelling arguments we’re messing with something we don’t understand. She even suggested the agency running this is beyond our security clearance.’”

  “Dang it, Bart, I’ve felt the same, but as much as I hate to admit it, Buster’s right. If the Prophet was for real, the responsible agency would have come forward and slapped our hand by now.”

  Lafferty sighed. “I know, just wanted to pass that on for what it’s worth.”

  “Thanks, Bart. Carl, you still there?”

  “Yes sir?”

  “What have you found out about the observatory’s claim?”

  “As suspected, they were given the tip on where to look by Dr. Chandra.”

  “Figures.”

  Carl continued, “We squelched the information and put FBI personnel at the observatory to ensure it isn’t leaked. However, the astrophysicist I talked to really thought they might have found something out there. He admitted, however, that the signal was barely detectable above background noise.” He paused. “I hope you don’t mind; I allowed them to pass the raw data to the IR observatory in Chile.”

  Someone handed Carl a paper. “Sir, hang on, I just got something in.” After reading it, he said, “This is interesting. Even though we cut off the satellite communication to the Pole, Dr. Chandra is trying to transmit coordinates for that smaller meteoroid. She’s claiming it’s going to hit London in about eight hours with catastrophic consequences.”

  Davidson said, “Yeah right. It’s more of the same, intended to cause panic and confusion.” There was a long pause. Then Davidson said, “Carl, just to be on the safe side, go ahead and pass those coordinates to the Keck and Chilean observatories.”

  Mount Howe

  It had been six months since Josh had been to Mount Howe on the survey visit. Instead of spring with perpetual sunrise, it was now fall with perpetual sunset. The sun had set three weeks earlier making it very dark with only a little twilight in one corner of the sky.

  With a few thousand feet of altitude to spare, they were going to make it. He could see the lights of the base camp with the mountain range silhouetted behind it. He put the Hornet into a gentle turn that would fly them right over the top of the mountain and then outbound over the base.

  As they descended, he clearly saw a faint light on the mountaintop. With no engines, those on the mountain would be unaware of the Hornet gliding overhead. He looked at the outside temperature indicator. They weren’t dressed for 30 degrees below zero. To keep them from freezing, he needed to get as close to the base and ground as possible, but far enough that the jet wouldn’t hit anything.

  “Greg, it’s almost time. Remember what I told you. Make sure your coat, gloves, oxygen mask and helmet are on tight. Put your head back, chin up, hands in your lap. I’ll tell you before we eject.”

  Crossing the mountaintop, the radar altimeter indicated 2,000 feet above the ground. He pushed the fighter’s nose down. When they were about a mile west of the base, he leveled off, slowing the jet into the heart of the ejection envelope. He set the autopilot, told Greg, “Here we go,” and pulled the handle.

  The Plexiglas canopy instantly blew off the jet as the back seat, with Greg, fired first. Josh didn’t realize how loud it would be, but didn’t have time to think about it as his seat followed a fraction of a second later. The ejection charge slapped him hard into the seat as the rocket motor ignited and blew him into the frigid night. Hitting 140 mph, subzero air was beyond cold. It was like a
belly flop off a high-dive into ice water. At the apex of the seat’s trajectory, the parachute deployed, ripping him out of the seat. What a rush! It was a new experience, since he remembered nothing of his last rocket ride.

  He checked his parachute canopy, but had to lift his visor, which was rapidly fogging with ice. He looked around for Greg’s chute in the weak twilight, but couldn’t see him anywhere. Looking to his right, he saw the Hornet’s faint green formation lights. The autopilot was still trying to carry out his last command and maintain altitude, but as the airspeed decayed, the fighter stalled and rolled over like a submissive dog. The beautiful jet quickly became nothing more than 20 tons of tumbling alloys and composites. It hit the ground with a bright flash. A delayed screeching boom echoed off the ice as residual fuel vapor in the tanks created a small orange fireball, punctuated by the detonation of the air-to-air missiles. Reflecting beautifully off the icy white plain, it provided enough illumination to locate Greg’s parachute just below him.

  Drifting in the cold still air, he looked up at Mount Howe. The twilight-illuminated mountain looked like a breathtaking but underexposed postcard. On the very top, he saw the silver dome that housed the Blaster. Looking at the bottom of the mountain, he could clearly see the lights of the base camp. There were two large Quonset huts and a snowcat garage. A half mile away, nestled at the foot of the mountain, a boxy building housed the nuclear reactors. He also saw headlights a mile off, headed their way. He decided to enjoy the few seconds of solitude, knowing they might be his last.

  Landing on the hard ice pack jolted him back to reality. He popped his parachute release fittings and jogged toward Greg’s chute about a quarter mile away. From his survival vest, he pulled out a Velcro-wrapped, emergency strobe light. Switching it on, he stuck it to a matching Velcro patch on the top of his helmet. It would make it easy for the snowcat to see them in the dark.

  In the eerie strobe illumination, he saw Greg’s shape buried under his chute. Josh clawed through the canopy. Uncovering him, he saw that Greg had gotten his oxygen mask off and was smiling. All he said when he saw Josh was, “Wwwwait ‘til the other gamers hear about this. But I fffforgot to look at the horizon and roll. I think I bbbbroke my ankle.”