The situation when they arrived in the lobby was chaotic, with a frantic manager trying to deal with guests unable to get credit card verification, as well as a swarm of unexpected arrivals who seemed to be under the impression that rooms should be available to anyone on demand. Having reservations from JPL helped, and Keene and the others obtained two connecting rooms. For safety, they decided to have Gordon take one of the beds in the double room allocated to Barbara, and keep the connecting door open. When he showered before turning in, Keene found that he had to scrub thoroughly to shift the sticky orange dust from his skin and hair. People he’d heard in the lobby had been talking about rivers and reservoirs from Arizona to Illinois turning red.
Despite his fatigue, he slept sporadically and uneasily. He was awakened before dawn by Charlie Hu hammering on the door. Keene’s personal phone was dead like everyone else’s, and the hotel switchboard hadn’t answered. Roy Sloane had called from Washington and needed to talk to Keene immediately. Leaving Colby Greene in charge at the hotel, Keene drove back with Hu beneath a luridly flaming sky along roads already beginning to fill with loaded-down vehicles. He found Sloane in a highly agitated state. The entire Kronian delegation had vanished from the Engleton. It appeared they had been kidnapped.
30
It had been done smoothly, quietly, and without fuss; so smoothly that it was almost an hour later before anyone realized the Kronians were missing. Transportation to take them to Andrews had been expected, although without an exact time being specified since the shuttle arrangements were uncertain. Not trusting Terran arrangements, Idorf had stated that he would send down a surface lander from the Osiris for them; but with the increasing meteorite influx he was also taking the ship out to a more distant orbit. According to the security officer in charge at the Engleton, an Air Force major with escort had arrived and presented papers that appeared in order, the authorizing officer at the Pentagon had confirmed, and the party departed fifteen minutes later in an official bus. That was the last that had been seen of them.
Keene, using the same office that he had talked with Cavan from the day before, asked Sloane if the Pentagon contact given to confirm the order had by any chance been a Colonel Winter. Sloane had to ask Keene to hold while he checked, and then came back astonished a couple of minutes later to announce that yes, it was. How in hell had Keene known? Keene hesitated. He didn’t want to compromise Cavan’s position; on the other hand, this could be the moment for getting Cavan some official help, which would probably be the biggest favor that Keene could do for him right now. In the end, he summarized the parts of the story that he was reasonably sure of, making it sound like an offshoot of his own scientific investigating and mentioning Cavan as an old friend that he’d involved to check some references. His biggest dilemma was over the Vice President, Beckerson, whose connection so far was purely circumstantial. If Beckerson was a part of whatever was going on, as Cavan suspected, then obviously it should be said; but if the suspicion was wrong, then the whole operation to set up a shadow government on the West Coast could be impaired. As a feeler, Keene slipped in a casual question as to whether Beckerson and his party were still due to follow on to California as planned. Sloane replied that they were and should be leaving late that day. So Beckerson hadn’t vanished; nothing had changed. Keene decided to hold off on that issue until there was more to go on.
“It’s starting to make sense now,” Keene said. “Voler and his group knew early on how bad this could get. The confusion was to gain them some time before controls really start tightening up. Their aim all along has been to get themselves out, and safely to Kronia with the Osiris. That’s what it’s all been about.”
Sloane stared, silently assessing the pattern for himself. “They’ve grabbed the Kronians as bargaining chips,” he said finally.
“That was the line he tried to push at the White House meeting,” Keene said. “You were there, Roy. You heard him. But Hayer shot him down. Then, when it was clear that he wasn’t going to get any help officially, he tried selling me on the idea at Goddard the next morning, hoping I’d be willing to bargain with the Kronians to take them. That didn’t work, so now they’ve taken matters into their own hands and seized the delegation as hostages. . . .”
Sloane had followed it through and nodded slowly. “To force their way aboard the lander that Idorf is sending down to Andrews,” he completed.
A brief silence ensued while they thought over the various angles and options.
“Correct. And we have to let it land, just as Idorf has to send it, even though we know,” Keene said. “There’s no way we can afford to hold off.”
“How come?” Sloane asked.
“Because we don’t know how much time there is. Put yourself in Idorf’s place. Those are your people down there, and conditions are worsening. Even if they’ve got guys holding guns to their heads, you have to bring them up because if you don’t do it now you might never get to bring them up at all. If you refuse, who would be holding them hostage then? And the same applies to us. That’s what Voler and his people are banking on. Idorf has to provide the lander, and unless we can separate Voler’s group from the Kronians, we have to let it go. It’s out-and-out blackmail, Roy, I know, but we’re stuck.”
Sloane glowered from the screen, but there could be no serious argument. Keene was right. “Well, at least we know they’re still in the area somewhere,” he said tightly. “Probably they’ll be gearing toward all the action happening around the pad. If we can locate them it might be possible to go in with a CT team sooner, when they’re not expecting it.”
“Be careful. They’ve got Air Force FAST guys there,” Keene cautioned.
“I’m aware of that,” Sloane said. “At least we have foreknowledge now of where they’ll show up and when. One thing you can be sure of, Lan, is that from now on they won’t be able to afford one false move. We’ll have our best people in on this. Andrews will be covered tighter than a presidential parade.”
“Well, I’m not going to pretend to be an expert in that department,” Keene said. “You’ve got them all there. I’ll go with whatever you and they come up with.” He left Sloane still frowning and looking thoughtful, glad it wasn’t a decision he was going to have to make.
Further news since the previous night was that, with the failure of several more satellites and increasingly capricious atmospheric conditions, the world’s communications were beginning to falter. Domestic broadcasting cut back to reserve capacity for official traffic. Although the communications difficulties made it impossible to know the exact number and doubtless caused exaggerations, more aircraft had been lost, with the result that some airlines had grounded while others were attempting to maintain a reduced level of lower-altitude services for vital needs—in some instances against the opposition of rebellious crews. On the other hand, many among the public had taken the message of the U.S. President and other leaders who had spoken in similar vein to mean that airlines were now public property and descended on the already beleaguered airports in droves. Amsterdam, a vital European hub, was closed after a panicking crowd numbering thousands, who had been arriving throughout the night, started a rampage that led to riot police being called in with water cannon and tear gas. In JPL’s vicinity, police checkpoints had been set up to control access to both John Wayne and Burbank airports, while LAX reported traffic at a standstill on all approaches. Despite the appeals for dedication and nobility of spirit in the common cause, marauding and looting mobs had taken to the streets in several cities. Violent incidents were occurring already. People had been shot.
When people are afraid, they stop talking about individual rights and freedoms, and draw together under authorities that promise protection. The JPL employees turned spontaneously to its administration for organization and guidance, and to Charlie Hu’s admitted surprise, began showing up more or less on time, many of them bringing children that they were unwilling or unable to entrust to any other care, or simply too fearful to let out of their sight.
Obviously, there was little thought of carrying on business as usual—most of which had ceased to mean very much, anyway. The Medical Department was busy treating cases of skin and eye irritation from the falling dust. A bulletin was circulated around the departments advising people to stay inside as much as possible, cover up when outside, bathe the eyes every hour in a weak alkaline solution, and avoid drinking any water tainted red. Keene was only able to catch Hu sporadically, hurrying between offices and phone calls as the Laboratory’s directors tried to formulate some kind of plan and coordinate with institutions such as UCLA. A Pasadena police guard had been added to the regular security force at the main gate after a gang tried forcing its way in the previous night—nobody knew why. Police were trying to keep the populations static in places farther inland like Pasadena so that the evacuation of areas closest to the ocean could be got under way first, but not everyone was heeding. The National Guard was already deploying in the LA basin districts, where hoarding had been declared illegal and food stocks beyond a stated limit per person or family were being requisitioned for official redistribution. There were rumors that an incoming widebody, damaged in flight, had crashed on approach somewhere in Inglewood.
Hu sent a technician with two security guards to collect the other three from the hotel. They arrived with their belongings packed, including Keene’s. It seemed there was no manager, and the few staff that had shown up were letting friends from the neighborhood help themselves to bedding, linen, and the contents of vending machines, and selling off the kitchen stores. With credit cards already as good as useless, cash was becoming suspect. Preferred currencies were nonperishable foods, any kind of drink, drugs, and gasoline. After Keene left the hotel, there had been trouble with people siphoning gas from cars in the parking lot, and somebody had been shot. Gordon, still incredulous, described the scene to Keene. “The cops were there, but then they got called away on some higher priority. Can you believe that? There’s a guy lying dead in the parking lot, and they have to leave! I mean, I know this is LA, but I thought it was only like that in the movies.”
Gordon was concerned for his folks and his fiancée back in Washington. Barbara was worried about the help who was supposed to be taking care of her mother. Keene agreed that their work here was done and asked Colby Greene to talk to the local command about getting them back before things got any worse. Colby himself offered to stay on and help Keene with the task of briefing Beckerson’s West Coast administration. “It might be safer here,” he remarked, eyeing Keene indecipherably through his huge spectacles. “From what we’ve been hearing, everything the other side of the fault might just as likely fall into the Atlantic. I always wanted a beachfront pad.”
Wally Lomack got through to Keene on the Washington line around lunchtime. He was still at the White House but due to leave that evening on an official plane going to Houston. His job with the Kronians was done, and whatever happened when they reappeared would no longer involve him. The lander from the Osiris was on the ground at Andrews; the next move was up to Voler’s group. It was time for Lomack to get back to Emma and his family in Texas.
“I don’t know that there’s much a fellow of my age can do, but what else is there?” he said from the screen. Keene couldn’t help thinking that he seemed to have aged another ten years. “At least whatever happens, we’ll all be together. I just wanted to say so long and all that while there’s still the chance. It’s been great working with a guy like you, Lan. It’s a pity we won’t be doing too much more of it for a while. What about you?”
“I don’t know. There’s more to be doing here for a while,” Keene said.
“Will you be heading back afterward?”
“Right now, Wally, it’s impossible to say. In case that turns out not to be practicable, I talked to Marvin about including my people there in whatever plans the firm works out—you know, Vicki and the others.”
Lomack nodded. “I talked to Marvin too. Look, there’s something you ought to know about. He’s arranging for that minishuttle that’s at Montemorelos to be fueled and kept at launch readiness. There’s no hard and fast plan as to how it’s to be used or when. Just a precaution. It seems like everybody in the world with access to launch capability is trying to take insurance. Everything that will move is coming back from the Moon. There’s fighting going on for possession of some of the European bases. Apparently there have been some unscheduled launchings from Eastern Siberia and China.”
Keene’s eyebrows rose in surprise. “Already?”
Lomack nodded wearily. “Nobody’s sure exactly why. But then, a lot of people aren’t reacting exactly rationally, anyway.”
There wasn’t a lot else to say. Keene showed his hands and sighed. “Well, Wally, what can I tell you? It was good, as you say. We sure ran some rings around those guys, didn’t we? I guess the Kronians have the ball for a while now. . . .”
Lomack looked away as a voice shouted something from the background. “Yes, it’s him now,” he called offscreen. Then, turning back to Keene, “Roy Sloane says he wants a word. Sounds urgent.”
“Okay. Try and take care, Wally.”
“Good-bye, Lan.”
Sloane’s features replaced Lomack’s on the screen. “Lan,” he said without preliminaries. “They picked up Hixson. He was shacked up in a motel twenty miles outside the city with another Goddard name who must have been on the list.”
“You got the son of a bitch!” Keene exclaimed.
“Damn right. The FBI are interrogating them now.”
“Are they getting anywhere?”
“It looks like it. Hixson’s cooperating and agreed to carry on normally so as not to give away that he’s blown—I guess, trying to work a deal that’ll get him out. Seems we’re talking about an H-hour just before dawn tomorrow. We know the times, their movement plan, how they’ll be coming in. With that information, our CT guys can have their units right there—plus the surprise. They say they’ve got all the odds.”
Keene frowned as he thought about it.
“You don’t look too pleased,” Sloane commented.
“The intention must be for Hixson and this other guy to be collected sometime. Obviously you’re going to have to let them go. They have to be there.”
“That’s true,” Sloane agreed. “But for my money we can trust him. He’s got no future with Voler now, and he’s desperate. I can smell the sweat from here. With us he might have an out. That’ll be enough to turn him. I know the type.”
“Let’s hope you’re right,” Keene said. He was still uneasy. Why wait that long if the lander from the Osiris was already down? Maybe they had a larger party to collect together than had been realized. “Are Beckerson and his party still coming as planned?” he asked curiously.
“Leaving tonight on schedule,” Sloane answered. “No changes. Why?”
“Oh, just checking. I’ve got my own plans to think about too,” Keene said vaguely. So Cavan’s suspicions in that regard seemed to have been misplaced. Keene was glad that he had held back before making insinuations. He just hoped that when the showdown came at Andrews, nobody would lose their head or start overreacting in the ways that get people killed. Too many people would be there that he cared about.
An hour after Keene talked to Sloane, reports started coming in over the channels that JPL was linked into that a meteorite carpet had unrolled in a thousand-mile hail, which was falling from Minneapolis to Ottawa. Aerial shots showed parts of Detroit on fire and miles of suburbs with houses demolished, roads blocked by stricken vehicles, and in low passes, people frantically waving at the camera aircraft to send help. Footage from the ground in Chicago looked like the aftermath of an air raid: fire trucks and ambulances in smoke-filled streets littered with rubble; mangled cars; rescuers digging into piles of glass and debris fallen from shattered high-rises. A dazed woman talked incoherently about “a river of stones that came down out of the sky. They just kept falling and falling. . . .” Nobody knew the extent of the damage among th
e smaller townships and rural dwellings spread across such a huge area. The police commissioner in Toronto was filmed as saying, “There have to be thousands dead out there. . . . We’ve no way of telling. Communications are out. Everything’s out. Jesus, and this is only the beginning!”
And then Charlie Hu told Keene that he was wanted at the Tracking Center in one of the other buildings, which was still managing to maintain a link to the Osiris by juggling with the surviving relay satellites. Idorf was asking for him, and the President in Washington was also on the circuit. Four craft that had failed to identify themselves were approaching the Osiris and had ignored attempts to communicate. Idorf wanted to remind whoever had dispatched them that one of the Osiris’s laser bombs was armed and ready to launch. Until the Kronian delegation was returned safely to the ship, the hundred-mile limit that he had declared previously still stood.
31
Keene, Colby, and Charlie Hu stood in a semicircle of tense-faced controllers and technicians, facing an array of consoles. The screens showed Idorf on the Control Deck of the Osiris, President Hayer with several aides and service chiefs in Washington, and various data plots. All that could be ascertained of the approaching vessels were their positions, courses, and estimates of their likely sizes from radar echoes. They still hadn’t responded to signals. Nobody knew where they were from, or even if they were crewed or being remotely operated. The only observation satellite in a position to make a visual identification had been malfunctioning for several hours and couldn’t be oriented in the right direction. Suspicion was that they were the launches detected earlier in eastern Asia, but attempts to contact the authorities in those regions had so far elicited either no response or denials. Colby Greene’s guess was that Voler and Company—hardly surprisingly—had not been the only ones to think of escaping to Kronia by commandeering the Osiris. While Keene and the others had been on their way across from the other building, the Osiris had launched its bomb. The weapon was now sitting in a parallel orbit a little over fifty miles off, ready to fire.
Worlds in Chaos Page 27
