The Rise of the Speaker

by Pete Driscoll

  “Jesus…” Garfield muttered

  “What’s even more concerning…” Meisner continued, “is that all ballistic evidence recovered at the scene, came from the agents. This – along with the nature of the wounds – has led our team to discount the use of conventional weapons, it would be premature to assume they are using energy weapons...”

  “But it sure as shit sounds that way.” Garfield finished for him

  “How many of the enemy were killed?” The President asked, taking this information in

  “Well, that’s the next thing, sir…” Meisner continued. “As far as we can tell… none…”

  “None?” the President exclaimed, “Not one? 53 agents, ballistic evidence of a massive fire fight and not a single enemy killed?”

  “Well, sir, this does give some credence to the reports of almost indestructible robotic soldiers.” Meisner finished.

  “Jesus… robotic soldiers…” Conrad fields mused. “Can you imagine an army of them. Can dominate any conflict, no risking American lives when they are deployed, and they’d be free to maintain… These kinds of weapons would make all other armies obsolete, we haven’t been that far ahead, in terms of global power at least, since the end of the second world war.”

  “So, why haven’t we got them then?” Amanda Hollifield’s asked.

  “It’s not like you to be so interested in military matters, Amanda” The President smirked.

  “I’m not, sir. But the military budget takes up almost 40% of our national expenditure, if the Secretary of defence is right about the drop in cost per soldier - if we used these robots instead of service personnel - we could free up the budget to tackle other issues, maybe even get the whining liberals off our back. Not to mention the end of VA bills, no pensions, we would save trillions of dollars every year”

  “And…” Fields continued, “no American losses in military action? We could enforce our foreign policy without that bullshit backlash from the press about American lives being lost in pointless wars”

  “I see where you are going with this.” Turnbull agreed, “What do we need to make it happen?”

  “Well first we have to find him.” Meisner answered. “Langley is working on it and I’m told they’re making progress, but the question is – what do we do once he is located.”

  “I recommend a full military strike.” Admiral Garfield answered quickly

  “On American soil? Press will hang us.” Hollifield rebutted.

  “Not if we frame it as a pre-emptive strike on a domestic terrorist cell.” Meisner added, with Fields nodding in agreement. “Let the ATF and FBI hit it first, they will fall back under heavy fire – real or not - then we send in the National Guard, special forces and a few CIA units as back up… not many forces in the world can stand up to that kind of fire power. He’ll surrender…”

  “Then he needs to have an accident, either on site or in custody.” The President added. All three officials looked at him, none wanting to challenge his orders but all clearly asking the same question. “He had his chance to work with us and he refused. If we want this technology then we have to take it, there can be no loose ends. This ‘Marcus’ character is to be killed, nobody defies the office of the President and gets away with it!”

  “As soon as Langley pinpoints his location,” Meisner said after a long silence, “I will instruct the federal authorities to move in. If Marcus holds his ground, we can expect a high casualty rate among the civilian authorities – on the up side, this can be used a pretence to heightened security laws in the same ilk as the Patriot Act. If there are no casualties, there will either be a siege, which I will order the CIA to break, or he will surrender… and then commit suicide in custody. Either way, as soon as he is dealt with, the CIA and NSA will quarantine the area, confiscate any and all technologies and ship them to one of our research sites to be reverse engineered. Hopefully we will see some results sooner rather than later.”

  “That sounds like a plan” the President responded as the two other official nodded their heads in agreement. “Make it happen. And no fuck ups!”

  Alice and I watched the exchange unfold from the safety of the cabin. There was no hiding from it now, this wasn’t a rogue CIA operation or a corrupt General – this was the highest power in the land, ordering the death of a US citizen. This was the difference between fighting against an illegal order and fighting against the entire US government. I felt sick.

  “Well the good news,” Alice said as the meeting broke and the three officials left the oval office, “is that the Artisans have finished their survey on Maria’s hill, there is no geological reason why the hanger cannot be built. I have finished construction of 75 more Artisans making 90 in total. I estimate the hanger can be dug out and operational within 6 days.”

  “6 days? Are you sure? That’s a lot of work to be done in such a short period of time.” I asked, the surprise of her estimate pulling me from my brooding and imminent panic.

  “The Artisans are incredibly efficient machines. Normal construction projects take workers – who can only work so many hours in a day, they need breaks, they need food, they need sleep – they also need building supplies, tools, training, inspections, certification… Artisans need none of that. They work 24 hours a day, the materials are sourced on site by using their scanners, their tools are built in. This is construction refined to an art form.” The pride in her voice made me smile, it reminded me of Maria – which in turn reminded me of her death, that made me think of the men who ordered her death and my mind ended up back on the meeting we had just witnessed… My smile faded.

  “Do we have 6 days?”

  “I don’t know, but if they attacked tomorrow, I’m confident that the Spartans can hold them off for that long. Besides, there is still no evidence that they have found us – if they had, we would be seeing increased radio traffic as they scouted the area, aircraft performing aerial reconnaissance, maybe even a few probes of the perimeter – so far there has been nothing.”

  “How many Spartans do we have?”

  “25 for now, but I can construct 8 more per day now that the Artisans are finished.”

  I paused to think for a while, my mind running through every possibility I could imagine. “Ok,” I said finally. “I want the hanger constructed first – the tunnel can wait. As soon as that is ready, I want all the forges and your memory core relocated inside, we need to maintain the carbonite construction and I can’t lose you to a stray bullet. Once you have doubled the number of Spartans, start working on transport aircraft to move us all to the new site – I don’t want anything left behind. Don’t worry about making the aircraft invisible to radar, just make them strong enough to survive ground and air attacks - maybe add some turrets to defend ourselves.”

  “My thinking exactly, 50 Spartans should easily be able to hold the perimeter.” Another smile from Alice before her face turned to one of concentration. I looked out of the window and watched a column of Artisans make their way up towards Maria’s hill. Alice spoke before I did. “What do we do about Maria?”

  I had to think about this for a while, I had no idea what to do with her, all I knew is that leaving her here was not an option. “If everything is completed and we aren’t under attack, exhume her remains and bring her with us.” I finally answered, “If not, we will come back for her.”

  The next few days were a whirlwind of activity. The construction sounds coming from the hill never stopped – day or night - as hundreds of tonnes of earth was spread into the valley below Maria’s grave. A rockface in the valley was carved out and replaced with a hologram – even from up close, you couldn’t tell where real cliff ended and the holographic hanger door began. Alice had a swarm of Nanites create magnetic shield emitters on every external wall of the cabin – if we were attacked then this would stop any rounds from compromising the cabin and doing any real damage to either me or Alice’s core, which still hadn’t been moved to the hanger.

  The forges were already
underground as the morning of the 4th day dawned. A damp and miserable day, the patter of raindrops penetrating the canopy with ominous foreboding. We were almost ready; the hanger was complete and everything except Alice’s core had been relocated inside, the Artisans had split into two teams, one working frantically to dig out the tunnel that would allow my escape and the other team constructing aircraft to Alice’s intricate and complicated designs. Things looked like they were finally coming together.

  “Marcus…” Alice said, as I packed the last of my clothes and personal belongings into a large, black kit bag.

  “Yes, Alice?”

  “They’ve found us…”

  My head shot towards Alice’s voice as her words registered in my mind, I vaulted the bed and ran into the living room; Alice’s screen had already changed to a radar map of the area. “I don’t see anything,” I panted as I looked at the empty circle intersected with the green circling line.

  “This system only has a range of 18 miles… Contacts should be appearing…. Now.”

  Right on cue, two white dots appeared to the east, moving at a steady pace towards the centre of the circle. “Predator drones.” Alice said, the calmness in her voice at odds with the panic in my chest. “unarmed, but equipped with advanced recon capabilities including thermal vision lenses. I need you to stay inside, you are the only heat signature above ground and this house has been shielded.” She ordered. I wasn’t about to argue. The situation reports kept coming thick and fast.

  “All Spartans on station and ready to repel borders.”

  “Vehicle convoy coming into camera range, they have left the highway… distance: 12 miles and closing.” The display of the radar vanished as a security feed showing a long line of black SUVs with sirens blaring filled the screen. I couldn’t even count how many there were.

  “ATF and FBI tags confirmed. Non-military – just as the President ordered.”

  “Drones have separated into a standard search pattern, currently covering an area of 65 square miles.”

  There was a pause, “I don’t think they know where we are.”

  “They’re right on top of us…” I almost screamed at her, the sounds from the drones now clearly audible above the tree canopy. “Why would you think they haven’t found us?!?”

  “Because they are still looking, those drones are sweeping every inch of the mountain. They wouldn’t both be on search patterns if they knew where we were, if one was doing that and the other was watching us, it would be a different story.” She answered. “Confirmed… convoy is setting up a command post 4 miles out, it is a completely inappropriate place to set up a forward base in preparation for an assault, it is more likely a centralised command post for conducting the search, if they had found us it would be much closer… I will maintain surveillance.”

  “Will they be able to find us? Before the Artisans finish the tunnel?”

  “they have two days… it is very likely we will be detected. You are the most obvious heat signature they can detect, but the buildings themselves will be warmer than the surrounding countryside due to the power being consumed here. My screen alone could be enough for them to find us.”

  “shit.”

  “You may as well sit down, Marcus, this is going to be a long 2 days.”

  8 Hours later, a drone passed directly overhead, turned and started circling our position. Alice looked me in the eyes, her face flushed with the computer equivalent of adrenaline as the engines of the predator droned through the trees “Ok,” she said, looking up into the canopy, “I guess its game time”

  A Spartan stepped into the clearing a few feet outside the front door. Retrieved his weapon from over his shoulder, aimed into the tree canopy and fired 2 bursts, turned about 45 degrees and fired again. The drone of the aircraft engines started to splutter as the sound of crunching metal echoed around the hills. A few seconds later a huge explosion could be heard from the East, followed by another from the south. “Both drones destroyed.” Alice announced. “But if they didn’t know where we are before, they certainly do now.”

  Chapter 19

  The siege begins

  Special Agent in charge Steve Burrows had been in the ATF for 12 years, having transferred from the Police Department in Charlotte after a 15-year long career with them. A stern and distinguished look belied a man of keen intellect and tactical mind. From his command post - 38 miles west of Harlan, Kentucky - he could easily see the genius of setting up a domestic terrorism cell in the hills infront of him; a single dirt track road led into the hills, obviously being watched, and beyond that, hundreds of square miles of mountain wilderness – in would take hundreds of agents and local law enforcement just to contain the compound, let alone launch an assault and they still had to find the damned thing.

  Under normal circumstances, he hated working with the FBI, but in this instance, he was grateful for the backup and numerical advantage they offered – the 4 full ERT teams they brought with them wouldn’t hurt either.

  The ERT teams – the FBI equivalent to SWAT – was almost a mini special forces team, trained in the use of military equipment and tactics, they were the main offensive force of the Federal government when standard trained agents were not enough. Having four full teams indicated beyond any measurable doubt that this situation was being taken very, very seriously.

  “Jesus Christ!” an agent manning the communications array uttered in surprise as Burrows passed through the main command tent. He turned to look at the man, ready to dish out an ass kicking if the younger agent was watching the game on his phone. “Sir, they shot down the drones…” he explained in shock “… both of them.”

  A hushed silence filled the room as all eyes fell on the ageing agent. “Do we have a location?” He asked, careful to keep his voice calm, the young agent turned back to his screen, replaying the last few seconds of drone footage before it turned to static. “Come on son, give me something we can use.” Burrows encouraged, now was not the time to be barking orders.

  “Got it, sir! grid 093…” both men squinted at the screen as a hail of red dots erupted from the trees and the camera went dead. “I… I can’t tell you what brought them down though. I’ve never seen weapon fire like that before.”

  ‘Shit, neither have I’ the Special agent thought to himself. ‘but at least it confirms the presence of advanced weaponry.”

  There was a flurry of movement as the flap to the comms tent swung open and in strode Special Agent Parker Kincaid, his FBI counterpart. Burrows had worked with Kincaid in the past and the two had developed a pretty decent working relationship. The FBI were the lead here so technically Burrows answered to Kincaid, but illegal weaponry was firmly within the remit of the ATF, it was only the terrorism aspect that warranted the involvement of the FBI, both men understood this and an inter-agency pissing contest wouldn’t help anyone. Burrows would let Kincaid take command, and Kincaid would hand the whole thing over once the terrorism element was solved.

  “Burrows…” Kincaid greeted him with a smile as he strode confidently into the tent. “Did the drones pinpoint the compound before they went down?”

  “They did, sir.” Burrows confirmed as the two men shook hands, “Sector 093, heavily wooded but not too far from the dirt road.”

  “At least they are not right out in the sticks” Kincaid nodded as the two men turned and walked back through the comms area, through the opposite flap the FBI agent had entered from and into the privacy of the command tent. “Alright, I’m gonna be straight with you here Steve” Kincaid quickly said as each man took up opposite sides of the map that had been laid out on the simple foldable plastic table in the middle of the room. “Something about the op stinks!”

  Burrows arched an eyebrow at him. “In what way?”

  “I am the lead agent for counter terrorism for the entire East Coast, as far inland as St Louis, do you know how much chatter we’ve had about this cell?” Burrows said nothing. “None, Zero… fucking squat!”

  “M
aybe they’re just good at keeping a low profile.” Burrows offered, both men know that he agreed with Kincaid but their relationship was based on questioning each other’s thinking, it was the best way to keep them honest. Nobody wanted another Wako.

  “No, you don’t get it” Kincaid said as he stared pacing back and forth on his side of the map. “It isn’t just a lack of chatter on extremist websites and so on, there is nothing from anywhere. I can’t even tell you who ordered this op or where the intel came from. It’s like someone just pointed at a map and said ‘there’s a terrorism cell there, go get ‘em’… this case has literally appeared from nowhere.”

  Burrows frowned, “the case had to have been passed on to you by someone, there had to be an investigation from somewhere or someone that got passed up the ladder. These ops don’t come out of thin air, Parker”

  “You’d think, wouldn’t you?” Kincaid retorted in frustration, “you tell me, Steve. Why is the ATF here? Are there any reports – anywhere – of illegal arms in the area?”

  “Well, this is Kentucky…”

  “no, I don’t mean the usual hillbilly shit! That wouldn’t even register on the FBI radar, I mean enough to justify an op of this scale. There is enough firepower here to invade Mexico and I have absolutely no idea where it came from or who sent us here.”

  Burrows sighed, “Ok…No, there was nothing in the ATF records that would suggest anything more than the usual number of illegal arms in this area. Certainly nothing that would require a joint op. And now that I think about it, I haven’t seen any evidence which says that anything shady is going on in those hills before we got here… but then those drones were shot down…”

  “Ok, yeah… that was pretty compelling.” Kincaid conceded, “Advanced weaponry being used by a domestic terrorism cell is still pretty implausible though.”

  “To be honest with you, Parker, that footage from the drones would be enough to get the ATF interested on its own. I don’t know who sent us here, or why, but there is something going on up there. Maybe we arrest these guys and the investigation goes south because of the origins of the op… maybe this whole thing gets tossed out as fruit of the poisonous tree. But we’re here and we have a job to do, we’ve got to get up that hill and find out what the fuck is going on.”