by Bob Mayer
The lights dimmed, flickered, then came back at a subdued level.
"The power requirement is one issue we need to resolve," Souris said. "The field currently requires tremendous input. We use enough energy in one half-hour session to light a small city for twenty-four hours. When we use the portable Aura transmitter, we only have about three minutes of transmission time before we completely drain the batteries. We have several promising leads in research that we think will pay dividends in that area."
Valika shifted her feet as Cesar frowned. Souris had no idea how to work people. Valika had known scientists like her before; people who felt their research should be unfettered by such constraints as politics or funding.
Valika's skin tingled very briefly.
"Aura is now all around you," Souris said, her eyes closed. A slight smile twisted her lips.
"Will we have to put those things on our head to see it?" Naldo asked Cesar.
"No." Souris's voice was a whisper. "The connector that allows you to view Aura is built into the headrest of the chair. All we are doing is giving you a window into the virtual plane. You will not travel there as I do. Go to your chairs and you will see what I am seeing."
Reluctantly the surviving members of the Ring, led by Cesar, each took a chair. Souris indicated a different chair for Valika, one like her own. A technician attached leads to Valika's head. She had done this before and ranked it the equivalent of flying in terms of fondness. Valika leaned back, feeling her body sink into the leather. The tingling sensation, stronger this time, passed through her. The American's voice came out of small speakers built into the headrest.
"The chair is now beginning to transmit a frequency that will orient your mind to the Aura field. Close your eyes and relax."
Valika was overwhelmed by a sudden weariness as if all energy were being drained from her body. Her eyelids were like sheets of lead, clamped down, darkness encompassing her world. Souris's voice was very distant.
"You are now sliding into congruence with Aura. We’re going to give you a very simple demonstration of what the virtual plane is like."
Valika blinked as the room grew brighter. But she wasn't in the room. And her eyes, she could swear her eyes were still closed, but it was difficult to tell. The light took on form. Saba. But she was above it. At the very top of the volcano. She'd been here before, marching up with the island security chief to scout out the sniper positions. But how had she-
She turned but there was no sense of movement, just the panorama changing. There was no sense of her body. She looked down and saw a human form, but one without features, with flat white feet on the volcanic rock. No, check that, the feet were floating a couple of inches above the rock.
"Now let me give you an example of what Aura can do," Souris said.
A white plank appeared in front of Valika, extending about twenty feet into space and ending at nothing. Then a square shape came into being at the end of the plank, coalescing into a building, floating in space. The door swung open.
"Go ahead," Souris urged.
Valika tentatively took steps out toward the building. She had no sensation of moving but the door grew closer until she was inside. It looked exactly like the courtyard at Cesar's mansion.
Suddenly other shadowy figures, still in their chairs, flickered into view.
"You can now see each other in your virtual world," Souris said.
The avatars shifted form until Valika could recognize each. Cesar was to her right. The other members of the Ring appeared. Their faces were expressionless but identifiable.
"This is the safe mode of Aura," Souris continued. "With a little bit of experience we can get to the point where your body receives external feedback, so that your senses other than sight can function as if you are really there. Which would make this—“ the chamber flickered for a second, then a dozen naked women appeared, some lounging about next to the pool, others strolling provocatively- "more than just a show. It would be real to you."
There was a slight click, then Souris's voice came back. "I am sorry, Valika, about this display. Senor Cesar said I must do something his comrades would appreciate."
"Can I speak to you?" Valika felt herself say the words, but couldn't hear them.
"Yes. We are on a private link. This demonstration is designed to go for another ten minutes. Quite disgusting."
Valika could see that two of the women next to the pool were now kissing. The men's shadows were watching avidly. "Can I leave here?"
"Where would you like to go?" Souris asked.
"What are my options?"
"This Aura field covers a little over a mile in width. You can travel anywhere on Saba inside the field. I can also generate various scenarios from the database, much like this room, for you."
The courtyard flickered, then was gone. Valika stood in a room she immediately recognized. Her mother and father's apartment in Moscow. A dingy, two-room affair overlooking the square, across from the university where he was a guest lecturer.
"I designed it from photos Cesar gave me," Souris said.
Something came into being to Valika's left and she turned. Souris was there.
"Why this?" Valika asked.
"Cesar said it was the last time you were happy," Souris said.
Valika remembered talking to Cesar late one night, after she had foiled an attempt on his life by a rival gang. They'd both had too much too much and she'd said too much.
"The others are only able to see the display I put on," Souris said. "They would need the leads on their head, like you have, in order to have an avatar. I did not think them ready for that. The forms you saw in there were just projections."
The door started to swing open. Valika felt a surge of excitement anticipating her mother, immediately feeling foolish for such a thought.
"Who are you?" There was surprise and shock in Souris's voice as a strange man walked in. "How did you get here?"
The man was tall and thin, his form not quite solid. He looked at both of them and settled into the chair that had been her father's. "My name is Jonathan Raisor."
Valika was surprised to see his mouth move as he spoke. She turned to Souris. "What is this?"
The man looked about. "Not bad, but couldn't you have come up with something a little fancier? Your comrades viewing the women by the pool are enjoying themselves. I did not think it wise to interfere in that presentation. Still, I can't complain. This is the first chance I've had to sit down in quite a while." He laughed, a manic edge to it. "As a matter of fact this is the first time I’ve had a body in quite a while."
"Who are you?" Valika asked, sensing that Souris was at a loss for the strange apparition.
"I told you my name."
"That means nothing to me," Valika said.
"I am, was, part of an American experiment like this." Raisor waved an arm about. "A bit different though." He looked at Souris. "You know what I’m speaking about. What you're doing here is very interesting. You're opening a window between the virtual and the real worlds. Straddling it so to speak."
"You're from Bright Gate," Souris said.
"Very good. You get the prize. The key thing is tense, though. I was from Bright Gate."
"They’ve progressed far in the last two years since I left HAARP,” Souris said. “Jenkins ran Bright Gate while I was running HAARP."
"He knew much but he was just a pawn," Raisor said. "He’s no longer with us."
"What happened to him?" Souris asked.
"I killed him."
Souris did not seem surprised. "Why?"
"He betrayed me."
"What should we do?" Valika's voice echoed inside Souris's mind on the private link.
The man smiled. "I can hear you. I’m far more in the virtual plane than either of you. And you are far more in the real than I am. I saw what you did to that man in the courtyard. And I know who Cesar is. And I've heard of the Ring."
"How?" Valika demanded.
"I worked for the
CIA."
"Who do you work for now?" Valika asked, noting the tense. She felt exposed, with no weapons or body to fight with.
"Me. I believe we have common enemies." Raisor got up and went over to the bureau. He picked up the wedding picture of Valika's parents. "Interesting. You've done a good job." He closed his eyes.
Valika felt pain in her head and she involuntarily gasped. Raisor's right hand was at her head, unnaturally extended. The fingers were in her skull. She jerked back.
Raisor opened his eyes and looked at Valika "Your parents. This was their apartment. They are both dead now."
"How do you know that?" Valika demanded.
"As I said, I have more power than you do. I can reach--" he put a hand out toward her once more and she took another step back-- "places you know nothing of.”
"How did you do that?" Souris asked, indicating the picture in his hand and then Valika. "We're not on a level to interact with the projection or each other. I've been working on getting to that point, but it's eluded me."
"You may not be at that level, but I am."
"Tell me how?" Souris was excited. "How are you being projected? What did Jenkins change in the program?"
"'Projected'?" Raisor mused. "Interesting choice of words." He tapped his chest. “This is me."
The room faded for a second. "It's too soon for the energy to be this low," Souris said.
"I'm drawing quite a bit of your power," Raisor said. "I assume you don't mind. What is HAARP?"
"We have to return," Valika told Souris. She considered what he had just said and realized the only control they had over this man was turning off the Aura transmitter. He may have talents on the virtual plane, but he needed their power to exercise them.
Raisor put his hand up, indicating they should wait a moment. "What is HAARP?" he repeated. His arm extended, as if it was made of rubber, toward Souris, reaching for her head.
"A projector like this," Souris said quickly, moving back. "Developed by the Americans. I'm surprised you never heard of it. Or saw it if you were with Bright Gate and operated on the virtual plane."
Raisor was nodding as if something finally made sense to him. "Now I know what she saw that she wasn't supposed to."
"Who are you talking about?" Valika demanded.
Raisor ignored her. "I think we can help each other." He looked at Valika. "Talk to Cesar. Tell him I can take Aura to the next level."
"In exchange for what?" Valika demanded.
"I will tell you next time we meet. But I assure you that we can be very useful to each other. You've seen some of my powers. I have others you haven't even thought of." He looked at Souris. "Or perhaps you have thought of but haven't been able to accomplish yet. I have some things to check on. I’ll be back here in thirty minutes."
The room snapped out of existence. Valika felt her body seem to fade, then come back, stronger than before. She felt the seat, could hear the sound of others stirring, smell the feint odor of the leather. She blinked, eyes adjusting to the dim lighting in the room. She ripped the leads off of her skull, not caring about the hair that got torn out with them.
She swung her legs over the side and stood, feeling dizzy. She could hear the members of the Ring exulting over the experience, congratulating Cesar. She walked to the rear of the room where Souris was peeling one of the leads off her skull.
She kept her voice low so the others wouldn't hear. "Was that man part of your program?"
Souris shook her head. "No."
"Don't lie to me."
"Why would I invent something like that?"
"I don't know, but you need to understand what we're doing here is very serious."
"I've spent the last twenty years of my life on this," Souris said. "I know it's serious. Far more than you could imagine."
"The man said he was drawing power from Aura. How can that be if he didn't come from here?"
"I’ll have to check my data," Souris said.
Valika glanced over her shoulder. The men were still marveling about the women and what they had just experienced.
"He said he was American," Valika said. "From this Bright Gate. You never told us of such a thing."
"It was experimental," Souris said.
"It doesn't look experimental any more," Valika noted. "If he's still working for the Americans, it means they've penetrated us."
"He said he wasn't," Souris said.
"'Said'?" Valika shook her head. "And because he said this, we should believe him? And even if he has been cut off by the Americans, if they could put him on the virtual plane, couldn't they put others there too? This is a threat!"
"It is also an opportunity," Souris said.
Valika was going to ask her what she meant when she was distracted.
"Gentlemen!" Cesar's voice cut through the excitement "Gentlemen!" When he had everyone's attention, he continued. "What you saw today was only level two. There is much more that Aura can do.
"Please enjoy my hospitality. I assure you that you will find the young women I have waiting above much more real."
Valika gave a hand signal to Cesar that she needed to speak to him. After the others left, the leader of the Ring came over to the Russian.
"What is it?"
"We were contacted on the virtual plane," Valika said.
Cesar frowned. "What do you mean?"
"Someone met us on the virtual plane."
"Who?"
"Someone named Raisor," Valika said. "He said he could help us. I believe he's an American."
Cesar's face tightened. "Come to my office."
*****
Raisor jumped from the Aura control center to the north. Then twice more, until he was above the glass-walled building that housed the headquarters of the National Security Agency. It was shielded on the virtual plane. He knew he could wait until the bitch got off work, if she ever did, as he had seen her spend the night quite often, but then what could he do? He was in the virtual plane, without the power or programming of Sybyl to enter the real. He could watch, but that was all. And watching was not enough.
He felt rejuvenated, full of energy. Aura had recharged him, but he knew that the effect would not last.
Raisor jumped west to a spot he knew well.
He was above the Mount of the Holy Cross, where Bright Gate was headquartered. He could sense the psychic shield that surrounded the place and knew he could not enter here either. But someone was out. Raisor knew it from the line of virtual power that came from of the mountain and arced southward, a connection from Sybyl to wherever the Psychic Warriors were.
And HAARP? Wherever it was, the information had been compartmentalized from him. He had no doubt though, that his sister had discovered the existence of HAARP or something about HAARP and because of that she and the rest of her team had been cut off. But why had McFairn done that if HAARP was just another program like Bright Gate? Wheels turning within wheels, Raisor realized.
Raisor jumped, following the line south. Until he arrived above the villa in Colombia.
*****
The bodies were in the walk-in freezer in the basement of the villa. Separated from the meat by a thick plastic sheet hung across the middle of the freezer, the three dead Special Forces men were hung on hooks. One's head was half missing; another was lacking the lower half of his body-- which Dalton had seen back at the ambush site. The other had taken several rounds, including many, which Dalton knew from the lack of blood, were inflicted postmortem, especially to his face. What remained of their uniforms had no markings.
“Jackson," he relayed through Sybyl.
"Yes?"
"I've found three bodies."
"Damn.
“You find anything?"
"Not yet."
"Continue searching."
Dalton came out of the virtual plane, into the real, assuming the form of his avatar.
"What are you doing?" Kirtley's voice echoed inside his head. “This is a reconnaissance mission only.”
<
br /> Dalton ignored him. He went up to the first body and lifted it off the hook, laying it down on the ground. He took a long strip of brown paper and covered the dead man. He did the same with the other two.
Then he knelt next to them silently for a minute. He was startled when Jackson contacted him.
"I've found the others. Alive."
Dalton went back on the virtual plane and moved toward her essence until he arrived in a dark room. Several men lay about in the dark, some of them wounded. Jackson was a glowing form in the corner.
"Should we show ourselves?" Jackson asked.
Dalton considered that. Disclosing themselves could compromise the rescue mission. He'd done what he had with the bodies to cause confusion among the ranks of the guards. No, check that he realized, he had done it out of respect for the men who had died.
"Sergeant Major!" Kirtley's voice was on a power setting unnecessarily loud and shook him out of his thoughts. "You will return immediately. You will not disclose yourself to those men."
"A little hope wouldn't hurt them," Dalton argued, more for the sake of disagreeing with Kirtley than anything else. "To let them know they aren't abandoned."
"You've done what you were tasked to do," Kirtley said. "I'm ordering you to return immediately."
Dalton reached out to Jackson directly, touching her avatar on the shoulder. "Let's go back. We'd have to explain who we are and then we really couldn't do anything to help them right now."
Jackson turned toward him in surprise. Dalton put a finger over his lip, indicating for her to be silent. He counted: seven men. "Straight jump to the rally point." He let the real world fade from view until he was completely in the virtual and prepared to jump.
Jackson reached out and grabbed his arm. “Jim."
Dalton caught himself just as he was ready to jump. "What?"
"Someone's here-in the virtual plane. Watching us."
Dalton felt foolish as he craned his head and looked about. He saw nothing but featureless gray. "Who? This Droza?"
"I don't know. Maybe."
"Go. Now."
Jackson jumped.
*****
Raisor caught their virtual essence as they snapped by, like a bird looking in the window of a supersonic jet as it flew past, catching just the tiniest of glimpses. He was pretty certain they hadn't seen him because he had no avatar, just a presence. He headed back to Saba.
