by James, Mark
“God is in the details,” Osborne said quietly from the other end of the table. Several cabinet members looked up. “It’s a quote from Flaubert, or maybe Mies van der Rohe, the academics can’t decide. But I think Mr. Rendel, of all people, understands its meaning.”
Rendel nodded, “I certainly do, Mac. Evolution has been a hard taskmaster for us down at the lab on this one.”
“So why continue?” Getz asked. “Ten years, that seems like a long time to keep banging our heads against a wall. Especially considering the investment I see here.”
Palmer raised an eyebrow, preparing to make another point.
“Because, it’s the golden goose,” Osborne said. “Imagine the pay off: no more proxy wars, no more mental fencing. If the Russian premier doesn’t do what we want, he simply goes away – no evidence, no investigation, no blood on our hands. We become the invisible hand.”
The table became still.
“We have other such robotic kill-projects in the works,” Rendel continued, “and which the vice-president can later comment upon. But next let me bring your attention to the red folder, Project Charybdis.”
“As background, after the 9/11 event, the former President Bush – well, it was actually pushed by Dick Cheney’s office – initiated the Charybdis project, located in Gakuna, Alaska. At the time, the project was called, HAARP, for High Frequency Active Aural Research Program. It’s a scalar wave interferometry instrument that was sold to the public as a “space shield” device, a la “Star Wars,” but that description was not entirely accurate.”
“In simpler language, Project Charybdis consists of hundreds of twenty-four meter wide satellite dishes hidden in a remote forest location. These dishes emit high frequency waves that when focused on a single point below the ionosphere can lift that atmospheric layer with heat. When the instrument is deactivated, the layer slams down on the mesosphere and stratosphere, sending shockwaves downwards. The resulting tremors in the air mass create disruptions in our enemy’s communications and destabilizes climate in the target area. And, if properly focused, can even create oscillations in the Earth’s crust and tectonic plates…”
The Navy Secretary laughed, “You know, I once read some crazy conspiracy thread on a website, claiming that we’d used this HAARP thing to cause an earthquake in China back in 2007 or 2009, or about there, just to put the fear of God into ‘em! And then some other kook claimed that we used it to cause a typhoon. Jesus, people can really go nutty over this stuff.”
The president and Osborne remained silent. Osborne began leafing through his files.
Secretary of State Lewis squinted down the table, “Mac, please tell me that we aren’t actually screwing around with the world’s climate and the Earth’s crust just to get a few more yards down the field?”
Osborne looked to the president.
“Project Charybdis is inoperative,” the president said emphatically. “I ended it upon my taking office.”
“Sir, if I may,” Palmer began, “I feel it behooves us to revisit this matter, particularly given the grave threats to the American people from all sides. If nothing else, the theater bombings have shown us this. I mean, what will we do when one of these terrorists hides a suitcase nuke on a cargo barge and floats it into New York harbor? I mean, how many of those nuke suitcases are still floating around from the Soviet collapse? Ask the people of Dubrovnik, they’ll tell you, if you can find any. Sir, we must be ready for each and every contingency.”
They’d been through this before. The president paused. “It’s a Pandora’s Box, Mr. Vice-President. On Charybdis, my decision remains firm – it’s a closed matter. Mr. Rendel, continue.”
Rendel and the table noted the rebuke.
“Yes, sir,” Rendel said, pulling at another file. “I now bring your attention to Project Odin…”
At the far end of the table, Transportation Secretary Kilaney had stayed silent. Her father had been a history professor at Trinity College in Dublin and, as a child, had held her on his lap and told her tales of Berbers and Ginns, of lost and future empires. He’d died the year before. She drifted away from the others as Rendel’s voice faded to her mind. She recalled her father once saying: all empires rise and all empires fall, all eating themselves from within. They always believe it’s something from the outside, when all the while it was only themselves. “Mencken’s hobgoblins, don’t you know,” he’d smiled. She thought of her mother, still alive, and of the salted air and ancient Irish coast and clean blue skies.
At the other end of the table, Marine Corps General Joseph Brankowski tensed inside. His father, a Croat immigrant and butcher by trade, had told him that what was theirs needed to be tended, to be protected. Serbs at the gates! “Joey, listen to me, listen close, they’ll take everything if you let them. I’ve lived through it.” Tend to what is ours; keep the spear sharp. HAARP felt like a humming in the general’s mind and it felt warm.
“Just to be clear, Josh,” Osborne said, “Project Odin is in a permanent, de-commissioned state. No immediate chance of use, correct?”
“That’s right,” Rendel said. “We’ve had a long series of setbacks. Our only prototype was destroyed earlier this year. Just blew up, we still don’t know why. Technically, the project remains under the auspices of the VP’s office, but it’s essentially deactivated.”
Osborne looked over at Palmer.
Ignoring him, Palmer looked to the president, “Yes, basically in mothballs. A great disappointment.” He looked back at Osborne, “We’ll babysit it, or you can transfer it back to DOD, your call.”
“Just leave it,” Osborne responded. “I think we have enough to do for now.”
The president stood, pushing the stiffness from his knees. “Well everyone, it’s late and judging by this stack it’s probably a good place to call it a night. Tomorrow at 9:00 a.m. Let Mac know if that becomes a conflict.”
The president, followed by Osborne and Lewis, exited the room. The rest lined out behind them.
As Osborne and the president broke from the others and entered the West Wing hallway, Osborne said, “You know, it might be a good idea if we came up with an overarching name for all of this. A name for all of these projects put together. Maybe something innocuous this time around.”
The president smiled, “How about Project Cerberus?”
“Cerberus?”
“In Greek mythology, Cerberus was the giant, three-headed dog that guarded the Gates of Hades. The Hell Hound. What people don’t always know is that while the beast kept unwanted visitors out, it was also there to keep the wickedness in.”
“Great, “Osborne laughed, “to hell in a hand basket!”
The president shot back his famous smile, “Not if I can help it.”
5
She walked without knowing where she was.
Images came into her mind – blurs of green, a red barn, a rusted pickup truck speeding past, its dust plume thrown high into the air.
She saw faces, past faces.
Who was she if she was not one of them?
Aisha had walked through the night and took another step and then another, the gravel wearing her feet raw and down to blood on her heels. Her mother had once told her that the faithful turned their knees to red on their pilgrimages to Mecca. Rising, kneeling, praying and then two steps more, and again.
Had she lost her faith? Or, had she found something else in this strange land of trees?
Who was she?
Heat began rising from the road, causing her sight to waver. It had drizzled before dawn and her hair was just drying in this Indian summer heat. A lock fell over her eye, swaying with her steps. Perspiration beaded on her fake, white forehead.
She didn’t hear them come up from behind.
“Who’s that?” Keytesville Police Officer Brad Owens said to his partner, Jed Hanks, who was also his brother-in-law. They’d decided to head over to the Tasty Freeze in Brunswick for a vanilla cone in the sudden heat before the drive-in closed up
for the winter. They’d been raised on these fields and this was one of their old shortcuts.
“There’s something odd here, Brad. Get up behind her.”
The squad car pulled up ten feet behind, pacing her, the gravel under the tires slowly crunching.
“You know,” Jed observed, “I gotta say, she don’t look like anyone from around here.”
Aisha kept walking.
Jed began to laugh, “Now, what in the hell is that crazy woman doing? Give her a toot, Brad.”
No reaction.
“Ah hell!” Jed cursed. “I guess we’re gonna have to go out and get her.”
They both exited the squad car.
Owens leaned on the doorframe and took off his hat. He squinted up and wiped the sweat off his forehead.
He yelled down the road, “Miss, you alright?”
Aisha kept walking, the images in her mind wavering with the heat from the road.
“Yo, lady!” Jed yelled.
She stumbled.
The village at dawn, fires across the sky, her mother…
Owens looked down, seeing pale streaks of red on the gravel. He came up five feet behind her. “Miss, are you in trouble?”
He lunged, barely catching her as she collapsed. He pulled her off of the hot gravel and onto the grass.
“Jed, get some water!”
He turned her over, “Miss, wake up now. Come on...”
He patted at her cheeks, “You can do it. Just try a little bit.”
Her lips parted before her mind fell down into that dark raft of memories she no longer understood.
Owens looked closer. She was beautiful, almost an ancient face. There was something to her skin…
“Who are you?” Owens asked, nearly a whisper.
Her mind reeled.
Who am I?
Who am I?
†
A matte black helicopter sans markings lifted off from the tarmac of a classified U.S. military base. It skipped low across the Iowa countryside, hugging the fields of wheat and dried brush. Halfway, off in the distance, one could see the small town of Macomb and its black scar.
The helicopter passed one town and then another until it came to its target.
The citizens of Keytesville, established c. 1856, population 2,618, were just heading to lunch and the small downtown was full with cars. No one was ever in a hurry in Keytesville; all of them, for all of their lives, had waited at stoplights and never honked. At the house across from the police station, where Aisha remained huddled in the corner of her cell, an elderly lady pruned wild roses from around her mailbox.
The helicopter banked over the tree line and its angry rush flooded the street in front of the station. The elderly lady shielded her eyes as the alien craft set down in the middle of the street. The lady’s dog barked wildly and jumped at the front window.
Two men in dark suits exited the helicopter, ducked and ran towards the police station. The rotor blades continued unabated, throwing a wash of cinders against the station windows.
Inside, Jed Hanks recoiled and spilled coffee on his front. “What the hell?”
Hanks and Owens quickly moved to the front door as the men from the helicopter came up the steps. Chief Myers bolted from his back office.
Hanks rested his hand on his holstered weapon, “That’s far enough!”
The chief yelled, “Back off, Jed! Really, just let ‘em in.”
Hanks and Owens turned, dismayed.
The two men in suits entered the station, removed their sunglasses and closed the door behind them.
“Are you Chief Romey Meyers?” one of them asked.
“That’s right. Someone called me, but do you gentlemen mind the formalities. Identifications, please.”
The two men held up their badges. The chief removed his glasses and leaned forwards.
“Never heard of it,” he said, shouting over the helicopter’s continued roar. “Directorate of the GMA? What?”
“We’re new,” the agent replied evenly, his tone conveying that no further information would be forthcoming.
A phone rang, barely audible. A secretary from the back ran into the front room. “Chief!”
“Not now, Maggie!”
“Chief, you really need to take this one!”
The chief paused, spun on his heels and headed back to his office. “Everyone stay put!” he yelled back.
The two men in black suits held still.
The chief picked up the line. Before he could protest, the governor ordered, “Just do it, Romey. You hear me? You don’t want to fuck around with this one.”
The chief and the governor had never been friends and the governor had no jurisdiction to tell him what to do. He paused.
“Alright, governor. No problems here.”
He returned to the front room and looked over at Owens. “Get her, Brad.”
“Who?”
“You know who. Move!”
Owens found Aisha in the same corner of her cell. She’d refused to eat or drink.
For some reason, Owens felt protective over her. She looked like a waif, a war child.
“Come on, honeybee. Looks like your ride’s here.”
He looked deeply into her blue, too-blue eyes. Who are you?
He pulled her to her feet and guided her from the jail quarters and into the station’s front room. They hadn’t had time to outfit her in the jail’s orange jumpsuit and she still wore the torn blouse she’d been found in. Across her cheeks were mud smears from the fields.
The agents quickly placed her in a restraint suit. In a macabre dance, one of the agents applied a chemical cloth to her nose as the other spun her into place. She passed out in mid-spin as they expertly slid her into a silver body bag, a mesh front allowing her to breathe.
Owens flinched. The chief reached out and held him at his arm.
One of the agents threw Aisha’s dead weight over his shoulder and sped her to the waiting helicopter.
The other agent followed, closing the door behind him in an odd courtesy. They entered the helicopter and it rose into the air, banked and swept out of sight.
The chief unclenched his jaw and stared at the floor. The elderly lady peeked out from her door as her dog whimpered. The petals at the mailbox returned to their stillness.
6
Palmer looked up to the portrait of the former vice-president that, to the consternation of many, he’d been allowed to display. There were many things, ideas, futures that people did not understand.
The now-deceased vice-president, Richard Chelsey, had understood.
Chelsey had understood when he, alone, ordered the AIM-7T air-to-air missiles fired upon domestic Flight 188 after the Yucca Mountain attacks; he’d understood the need for renewed renditions and the Moroccan yellow cake ruse towards a further good; and, he’d understood that after the CIA had flinched, a Black Ops “wet works” capability would be required inside the vice-president’s office.
They both understood that, in making history, there were things that needed to be done.
The phone buzzed.
“Sir, Mr. Présage is here.”
“Thank you, Rita. Send him in.”
Mikhael Présage, European ex-patriot and Oxford graduate, moved through the door, scanned the familiar surroundings and sat in a leather chair across from Palmer.
Palmer noticed it again – that certain lithe quality about his aide. It was a cheetah-like manner of movement, difficult to describe – at once, both coiled and calm.
“Let’s see that chart you mentioned,” Palmer motioned.
Présage handed him the sheet.
The vice-president stared at the paper, “Do you really think we can control this?”
Présage crossed his legs. “I believe so.”
Palmer looked through his reading glasses again. It looked too simple.
“I’m not so sure. You know, our old pal Rendel has held on to some of the surveillance ops. Those are required pieces of the puzzle.
”
“It will be fine.”
“Oh yeah, and how’s that?”
“I’ll develop a work-around.”
“Another work-around, huh? You know, Mikhael, if it was anyone else, I’d tell them to go screw themselves.” Palmer chuckled and leaned back, “Sometimes, you crack me up. Alright, I’m not even going to ask.”
“Okay, next. What’s our resident boy scout, Mr. Osborne, up to today? Do we still have his chirpy intern in our pocket?”
“I’ll only be using her a while longer. She’s starting to feel the guilt. I haven’t decided whether to show her husband the pictures. Probably not.”
Palmer looked over his glasses, “Just a fucking saint, eh?”
Présage looked at his watch, “So I’ve been told…”
“And Osborne?”
Présage noted Palmer’s focus on Osborne. Palmer didn’t like people who weren’t afraid of him. It made him feel nervous, threatened. Ultimately, it was a weakness.
“He’s trying to be the hero again. He wants to interrogate the Arab girl.”
“That girl is a dead end. Jesus, just take a look at those empty transcripts.” He mulled it over, “Okay, good enough. Let Osborne run after her – he’ll chase his tail playing Big-FBI-Man and stay out of our hair. Good.”
“Probably.”
“Alright,” Palmer continued, looking through his notes, “do we have any sort of scent on this GMA?”
The GMA Agents were the “black suits” who’d retrieved Aisha from Iowa. Pursuant to the Yucca Mountain protocols triggered by the theater bombings, they’d been automatically re-formed from elite units of the military and the CIA. Some were even assets brought out of retirement, or had been working freelance as mercenaries in other conflicts. They were fluid from their too-quick birth, operating without oversight; like the Kraken, brought out to guard the gates of the empire.
