“Yes,” Arnold said, “This is dramatic and overkill.”
The first soldier reached the house, stopped and saluted.
“Lieutenant Conteh! Corporal Syms reporting as ordered!”
“At ease, Corporal. Area is secure. Stow this gear on the porch and wait here for further instructions.”
The newly arrived soldiers, all Corporals, carried out their orders and took up positions around the house.
While this was happening, Corporal Makon and Colonel Balanik were checking out of their hotel in Arizona. Penny was worried. The Colonel had barely spoken to her since the night before. She guessed the Colonel was upset that Penny had not followed her order to retreat should the situation became dangerous. Now Penny’s arm was in a sling, and someone else would have to drive.
“Colonel Balanik, am I in trouble?” Penny finally worked up the nerve to ask as she gathered up the temporary sundries they had picked up the night before their unexpected overnight.
The Colonel rounded on Penny slowly, the cords of her neck stood out.
“Maybe you can tell me, Corporal Makon. Is your arm now in a sling?”
Penny flushed and sighed, said, “Yes ma’am it does appear I am in trouble then.”
The Colonel softened a bit, but she was still obviously upset.
“It would appear that way. I haven’t decided what I’ll do with you yet, and I’m down a driver. Finish gathering these things and meet me at the car. I will check us out.”
“Yes ma’am Colonel Balanik, ma’am,” Penny said crisply.
“The second ‘ma’am’ is ass-kissing. You’re better than that!” Rachel barked over her shoulder as she slammed the hotel room door. Penny hoped the Colonel didn’t hear her snorted laughter.
Rachel walked out of the ground-floor hotel room and across the parking lot to the office. She found Donna there, idly chatting with the Hotel’s owner who was a well-dressed man in his early sixties. The man stepped around the desk and extended his hand. She noticed a starched cuff extend from the sleeve of his light tweed sport coat. The tall and slender man gave her a warm smile as he shook her hand.
“It is always a pleasure to have members of the Armed Services stay with us,” he said graciously, “I hope you’ll visit us again.”
“Thank you, Mr. …”
“It’s Mackey, but everyone just calls me Mac,” he replied, still pumping her hand.
“Yes. Thank you, Mr. Mac.”
He laughed, said, “It’s just Mac, just Mac,” and released her hand. “But Donna tells me you’re taking her away from us.”
Rachel turned to Donna with a tight smile, said, “I’m afraid so. Just for a short while.”
“And she never told me she served, all, this time, I’ve known her. Modest as always,” and he patted Donna’s large hand as she leaned casually on the reception desk. “I served for six years myself in the Army as a young man.”
“I’m sure your service was excellent,” Rachel said.
“Well, I don’t know about all that,” he said, hitching up his slacks. His spine straightened with obvious pride.
“Well, sir I’m afraid we need to get going. Tight schedule we have, so If I might … “Rachel said, as she reached for her wallet.
“Of course,” Mac said, still smiling as he and Rachel settled the bill.
Penny showed up with their two grocery bags that served as luggage. Donna and Rachel said goodbye to Mac, and all three met at the car. Rachel was surprised that Donna had with her a large duffel bag that appeared full. It made the suspension sag a bit as Donna hauled it into the trunk.
“I can drive,” Donna said, looking at the wounded Penny, who looked away in her obvious guilt.
Rachel handed her the keys, said, “Good. I hate driving these things. You any good at it?”
“As a matter of fact, I am,” Donna said with no small amount of pride, “I do love driving.”
They piled into the car with Donna at the wheel. Penny sat in the back and tried to make herself comfortable. It wasn’t easy with the dull ache in her shoulder. She’d picked up some acetaminophen at the drugstore, but it didn’t help much. She would have to see a doctor at the earliest opportunity, which was another fact that Colonel Balanik had noted with displeasure. Donna hardly paid Penny any attention, which was just as well with Penny. The car swung out of the parking lot, rolled down a small stretch of the fabled Route 66, then onto the main superhighway towards New Mexico.
Donna flipped open her encrypted cell phone and reached General Breslin on the second ring.
“On our way back now,” she announced in the way of greeting.
“OK,” came the reply, and the call ended. Their phone calls were always clipped.
Because of the delay in recruiting Donna, Chase had arranged a helicopter flight from a nearby Army National Guard base back to White Sands. It would draw a bit more attention internally, but it was a much better alternative than the eight-hour drive. The base was only a half-hour away.
Back at White Sands, the photon envelope surrounding the spacecraft had finally dissipated. The crews were able to approach Ray’s spacecraft around two that afternoon. They received positive contact from Ray inside the craft in the form of a brief radio transmission. His status was good, and everything was OK with the craft.
Two Humvees rolled slowly towards the spaceship, and Chase rode shotgun in the trailing vehicle. They rolled over a dish-shaped area of black glass created by the heat of the ship’s descent. The material crackled like mid-winter lake ice. The technicians measured the heat levels and declared them safe. The heat did not feel safe to Major Spivey.
Chase was always felt amused looking at this type of spacecraft. It appeared exactly like the storied UFOs from the nineteen fifties because that is precisely what it was. The craft consisted of a disc-shaped body that was concave on both sides and about ten meters in diameter. The main dome, about five meters in diameter, sat atop the disc dead center. Three other domes of about one and a half meters in diameter each were arranged in a triangle pattern underneath. These domes were set back about a meter from the disc edge.
The ship hovered about sixty centimeters above the desert floor. It hovered perfectly still. One of the earliest sightings of this craft was a very clear photo taken in the early nineteen sixties by an elderly man standing with his wife in the front yard of their farm house. The farmer sent his picture of the low-flying craft to the newspapers and shared the story with anyone who would listen. It was one of the most widely recognized UFO photos. It was also one of the first and most successful denials in the Unit’s history. The man and his photo were discredited. It was a sometimes nasty fact of life that the Unit used ridicule, shame and derision to achieve its aims in obscuring the truth. Chase firmly believed that disclosure would not be a freeing event for humanity. He believed that the truth would be pain. The longer the work of the Unit could prevent that pain, the better he considered the quality of his work. He also knew it could not stay this way forever. They were always one undeniable event away from disclosure.
The Humvees stopped short a few meters from the craft, and Chase stepped out. Major Spivey stepped from the back seat of the other Humvee. Three technicians approached the craft with broom handles. They slowly swung the handles back and forth as they approached the craft while another technician viewed the craft through a thermal camera. The sound of wood snapping raised an alarm.
“Got one!” the technician with the broken broom handle held it up while another technician sprayed white paint on the ground. This was the place where the gravity field was unstable. The handle had passed through two opposing planes of gravity.
“Hold!” their lead sergeant called, and waved over the man with the thermal camera, “Can you tell anything?”
“Not this time. It’s hard to see with all the background heat.”
If read carefully enough and under the right conditions, the thermal camera could give a rough indicator of where the dangerous shifts
in gravity might be. It was not effective this time. Taking no chances, the lead sergeant had the broomstick carriers check the area carefully and mark off a wide area. They circled the craft until they found a wide, safe area to approach. The broom handles grew much shorter as they went. They marked a clear path to the safe spot and Major Spivey, and General Breslin followed it to stand at the very edge of the disc. Then they waited.
Major Spivey was pleased. This procedure gathered more of the valuable data he craved. More technicians approached the ship with instruments. The Kapteyns did not share their technology with other species, but they did not mind the humans trying to figure out their machinery.
“He should come out at any minute,” Major Spivey said. It was about fifteen minutes before the dome atop the disc began to quiver and shift like mercury.
Ray stepped through the wall of the pilot dome slowly as ever. His gray body revealed itself right-foot first, followed by his right hand, then by that massive forehead and tiny vestigial, ski-slope of a nose. His glossy, redundant eyelids were up to shield his eyes from the desert sun. As he stepped down the curve of the main disc, its surface formed shallow stairs before each footstep. By the time he reached the disc edge, a full staircase had slowly drooped down from the disk to the ground as if made from silvery wax. Some of the newer techs, who had never experienced either Ray or a spacecraft, stared in utter amazement that was impossible to conceal. Chase understood those looks himself. No matter how many times he saw Ray or something like his ship, there was always a moment when he found himself holding his breath from some form of amazement.
Ray held out both long, four-fingered hands to Major Spivey and bowed his head slightly. Each nearby soldier briefly grasped Ray’s hands in greeting as was their ritual. Ray wasn’t wearing his voice box yet, so they couldn’t speak verbally, but those nearby felt that Ray was glad to see them. At least, whatever passed with Ray as ‘gladness’ could be experienced by those close enough. Ray progressed towards the open door of a Humvee. He was moving about half the average human walking speed. He moved his large, bulbous head slowly as he went, taking note of his surroundings. Some of the newer soldiers backed away nervously.
Once Ray was on board, everyone piled back into the vehicles and the Humvees turned back toward the bunker. The driver of the trailing Humvee glanced in his mirror just in time to see the spacecraft disappear as its skin bent light around itself. From a distance, the ship would barely be detectable as a mirage in the daylight. Once the vessel was fully cloaked, one would have to be centimeters from the ship to tell that something was there. It would appear to the observer like a vaguely shifting refraction. They covered the half-kilometer quickly to meet up with the rest of their convoy.
The incursion team had cleared out the trailer and the bunker hours before. All their instruments and gear were stored in two trailers hitched up to Humvees, and each vehicle was filled with personnel. It would be a short but sweaty ride across the desert to the Unit’s two waiting C-130 cargo planes. The Unit Staff Sergeant on duty made a final check of people, gear, and vehicles, gave instructions to the drivers and a quick report to Major Spivey. Everything checked out.
The desert air strip was nothing more than a small, ancient lake bed tucked behind some low desert hills, and just large and flat enough to accommodate their planes. The convoy rolled up in tight formation. The Humvee with Ray and General Breslin backed in first behind a white van already on the plane. The other two Humvees drove up the cargo ramp of the other plane and parked end-to-end, trailers and all. There was just enough room for everyone to open the Humvee doors. It is a tight fit. Once the Staff Sergeant is satisfied all the vehicles were stowed, and the loadmaster signed off on the loading, the ramp was raised, and the engines started.
They helped Ray buckle into a specially-constructed jump seat bolted to the wall of a special compartment between the cargo bay and the front bulkhead. The small area formed a separate passenger compartment for six people. General Breslin and Major Spivey sat down and waited. The General looked at his watch, then called out into the cargo bay.
“Staff Sergeant Roja!” the General bellowed.
“General Breslin!” Roja said, appearing seconds later in the compartment doorway.
“Do we have ETA on Colonel Balanik?”
“General Breslin, we are looking at a half hour, Sir!”
“When was the last report on that ETA, Sergeant Roja?”
“One hour prior, General Breslin.”
“Tell me when they get here,” the General ordered.
“Yes sir, General Breslin!”
The General nodded his head in dismissal, and the Sergeant disappeared back into the cargo bay. The helicopter Chase arranged to ferry Rachel and company to White Sands would land at the main base for security reasons. They didn’t want eyes on their little landing strip. It wasn’t all that secret; it was just good operating procedure not to have their movements and methods known.
It was fairly unusual to have two C130s sitting out in the desert loaded down with equipment. A direct helicopter flight to this location would raise eyebrows. They didn’t need idle talk at the bar from some pilot telling his buddies, "Guess where I flew today, it was the strangest thing." Laying a heavy hand on a National Guard Pilot to discourage loose talk would only increase the temptation and likelihood of someone running his or her mouth. So the reported ETA meant Rachel, Penny and Donna were on their way to the strip right now via Unit Humvee. He thought about trying to Reach Rachel on encrypted cell, but there were no signals this far out in the desert. He’d just have to wait.
It was a long half-hour. It would also be a long flight from White Sands to Joint Base Andrews, followed by another flight via silenced Blackhawk from there to their station in Maryland. By the time Rachel finally showed up, the General was good and agitated. He looked at Ray and shook his head. The intuitive Ray caught the gist of the General’s thoughts without relying on higher forms of communication. Ray had learned to shrug his shoulders to communicate “what are we to do.” The General smiled at his old friend and jumped up from his seat to greet Rachel.
He squeezed past the rest of the team who were already uncomfortably strapped into their jump seats along the walls of the plane like so much cargo. He was surprised to see the little corporal with her arm in a sling. He focused on her first and squinted. The normally brash soldier looked sheepish and right away, the General realized she must have done something stupid. Young soldiers were almost always the same, he thought.
“Reporting for duty, General Breslin,” Rachel said formally. The General gave her a curt nod in return, which was pretty much his standard greeting on duty.
“General Breslin, Sir!” Corporal Makon shot to her best version of attention with her wounded arm and couldn’t hide her wince from the pain. It was lucky for her she was in civilian clothes and wasn’t required to salute. He wouldn’t have forced her to salute, but he would have made it awkward for her. He looked forward to the story of her arm.
“Very good, Corporal. Get yourself strapped in so we can go,” General Breslin said. The Corporal scurried away.
Getting strapped into the jump seat was hellish on her shoulder. Penny settled in for a long, painful flight. The solder beside her was about to make a comment on her arm. Her glare dared him to try. He turned away and pretended something else was more interesting.
Donna stood looking bulky and awkward in her loose-fitting blue sweatpants and gray sweatshirt. There wasn’t a bead of sweat on her, even in the desert heat. Chase turned to her and reached out his hand with a grave smile.
“Donna, I am very glad to see you. You are looking very well.”
The two shook hands and Donna smiled in spite of herself. She was dreading what she had to do, but it was good to see this old human. She remembered his kindness and believed she would never forget it.
“General Breslin, it is also good to see you. You also look fine.”
“Well, you still haven’t le
arned how to lie effectively,” the General said, and Donna couldn’t help laugh. She always found the General Disarming.
“You got me, sir. It’s hard for me to get used to humans aging,” Donna said.
“It’s OK, Donna. I’m not sure I’m used to it either,” he said, and took her cordially by the arm and led her through the cargo bay like an old man escorting his daughter to dance.
“I know this is hard for you,” Chase said, “but I want you to know how much this means to us. To me.”
Donna couldn’t look him in the eye, but she understood. She was still processing the painful goodbye from her partner. The three squeezed back into the special passenger compartment. Donna was surprised to see Ray. They looked at each other but Donna said nothing. The Staff Sergeant made a final check, of plane, cargo and passengers. The engines started and soon they were roaring across the desert floor and into the air.
Chapter 16: Homesphere, Assignment
The Queen left them sitting on the stone chairs in uncomfortable silence for a long while after the rest of the soldiers dispersed. It was hard to tell the passage of time in the cold chamber that seemed to have no end. Nina was barely aware of her own thoughts when the Queen finally spoke.
“You will stand,” The Queen said. They all stood.
“General Olthan, I asked you to stay so you can hear this. Your Commander Azin will stay with me. I am sending Nina, Azin, Nayar and Osae to Earth on the Seed Mission. Captain Nina will lead this mission.”
The General said nothing. She stood perfectly still and held her breath.
“I know that you object to this, but you are too loyal a daughter to voice it. This is my decision and it is final.
You will tell no one of this. You will stay in Central District Command. Your Queen finds your service indispensable.” The Queen pointed Talin’s face at Nina again to make sure Nina understood the endorsement. “You may go now, General Olthan.”
The Genetic Imerative Page 24
