The Veiled Threat

by Alan Dean Foster

  Reaching a decision, he reached across to a panel of an entirely different nature and slapped his palm down on an oversized red button.

  The spy was trapped.

  Surprised by the ferocity of the alarms that were sounding and flashing all around him, he found himself caught in a corridor before he had managed to retrace his steps even halfway to the room where the water intake–discharge valve that he had employed to access the facility was located. The obscenely squishy sound of running human feet reached him and was growing rapidly louder.

  He commenced on a speedy survey of the immediate vicinity. There was a room off to his left. Penetration scanning revealed a chamber full of consoles and chairs. Doubtless the chairs would soon be occupied and the room packed with sensitive equipment—it would be among the first to be checked. On his right was a much smaller chamber containing batch chemicals and manual devices of the most basic kind. The door on his left was secured and locked. The one on his right did not boast a lock of any kind. His decision was a simple one.

  “Blue squad, deploy to the left,” the running warrant officer barked. “Green squad, to the right. Yellow, secure the hallway!”

  Several dozen grim-faced soldiers spread out. Locks were activated and doors wrenched open. Rifles and scopes swept room after room from ceiling to floor. The corridor itself was rapidly given the all-clear. While yellow squad moved on to the next building their comrades embarked on a more comprehensive security scan of the server complex.

  Nothing was left to chance. Ventilation ducts were investigated, air-conditioning pipes checked, every piece of furniture moved, turned over, and closely examined. Not a space was overlooked in which a cockroach could hide.

  Corporal Wallace stood back and raised his AR-15 while two privates advanced on the next door down the hallway. One grabbed the handle as his comrade prepared to fire on anything moving inside. At a nod from Wallace the soldier yanked the door open, stepped back, and raised his own gun. The muzzles of the three automatic weapons pointed at the interior of the room. As with the previous areas they had cleared, nothing stirred within this one.

  Stepping forward, one of the privates began to shove brooms, mops, big buckets of detergent, and packages of dry cleaner aside. He was down to the last one when something in the utility sink caught his attention.

  “Jeez, these things are everywhere. Did it crawl up the drain?”

  Gripping his rifle firmly, Corporal Wallace stepped past him. The muzzle wavered. “What the hell?” He shook his head in disgust. “Nasty things. They’re everywhere on this island. My wife found one in the toilet the other day. Damn thing wouldn’t flush, either.

  “All right, that’s enough, this room is clear.” Wallace shut the door to the janitorial closet. “Move on to the next!”

  Left behind in the closet, the spy remained immobile lest another chattering organic unexpectedly open the door. The babble of calling voices and pounding feet soon faded into the distance. Taking no chances, he remained inert and in camouflage mode all the next day.

  Late that afternoon a slow-moving unarmed man entered, removed some cleaning materials, and noticed the small red crab in the sink. Being a gentle soul, and not wanting to kill it, he scooped the crab up with his dustpan and dropped it outside.

  That night, after conducting a thorough scan, the spy carefully but quickly made his way back to the fence. Once outside the compound perimeter he worked his way silently and unseen back to the edge of the lagoon. Wholly submerged in the water, a dark shape was waiting to collect him.

  Greetings were heartfelt but kept to a minimum. The recent passing of Beachbreak had cast a pall over everyone at NEST. Conversation was low-key and formal—except between two of the soldiers, who hailed each other as effusively as soldiers who have recently survived combat always do. Their reunion was unreservedly informal despite the fact that one of them was an officer and the other a noncom. One of the two generals in the conference room frowned at the unbecoming fraternization but said nothing. As the men who had more experience than anyone else working with Autobots and fighting Decepticons, Lennox and Epps were immune from the typical petty annoyances that usually distinguished such protocol.

  As for the massive figure of Optimus Prime, he sat patiently in the much larger Autobot assembly chamber on the far side of the conference room and waited for the humans to conclude their customary salutation ceremonies. It was not necessary for any of the other Autobots to be present, as Optimus supplied them with a simultaneous real-time broadcast of what was taking place. As he waited for the conference to commence he shifted his position slightly, his immense metal feet grating softly on the concrete floor. Humans were adept at many things, he knew. Unfortunately, from an Autobot standpoint wasting time was one of them.

  “If you would all take your seats, please?”

  By now the woman standing to one side of the wall screen was familiar to everyone present. For her part Ariella regarded each of them silently until the conversation finally subsided. Responding to her gesture, the screen came to life and the lights in the room dimmed. On the screen a series of images began to flash by in rapid succession. Lennox recognized those that had been recorded by Optimus and the other Autobots who had been with him in Australia. Some of the pictures that documented the ferocious confrontation that had taken place in southeastern Peru were new to him. As these appeared, Epps emphasized several of them by flashing his fellow soldier an appropriate hand gesture.

  Stealing a glance at Kaminari, he saw that she was wholly intent on the information that was being displayed and commented upon by Ariella. In contrast with the Japanese scientist, Petr Andronov was looking down at his lap while he fiddled with a small but gaudy shell. Lennox shook his head in bemusement. He knew the Russian was hearing and absorbing everything Ariella was saying. It was well known by now among the staff at NEST that the Russian could effortlessly concentrate on more than one subject at the same time. But would it hurt the man to lift his head up and look up at the screen once in a while?

  “Let me say,” the woman with the steel spine was telling those who had assembled in the conference room, “that I and everyone else at NEST is relieved and delighted that all of you have returned safely, and that the Decepticon threat has been further diminished through your stalwart actions. But while the danger has been reduced, it has certainly not been eliminated.”

  “Indeed.” Optimus’s deep voice boomed from where he sat in the expansive chamber off to their left. “So long as Starscream remains at large neither Autobots nor humans can ever rest or be completely at peace. While we have dealt most satisfactorily with a number of his followers, there may be others here on Earth whose presence has yet to be revealed.”

  Ariella nodded and turned back to the wall screen. Employing supple hand gestures, she called up a new series of images. Lennox leaned forward intently. While the subject matter was immediately recognizable, all but a few locations were not. Ariella continued.

  “Your recent encounters have led to the assumption that a rogue element of Decepticons, working independently of Starscream, have been trying to acquire extensive terrestrial sources of energy. In keeping with an understandable desire to carry out their activities outside the view of NEST, the locations of these sources have become more and more obscure. The Decepticons sought to make use of unexploited hydrocarbon power in the deep Amazon and potential nuclear energy in remote northwest Australia.”

  “That won’t happen anymore.” Kaminari sounded completely confident. “Now that we know what they’re after, we can anticipate their next move.” She looked over at Lennox, who nodded back politely.

  “To a certain extent that is true,” Ariella agreed. “While our network of surveillance satellites keyed to detecting Decepticon transmissions continues to expand its coverage with each new launch, there are still gaps and interrupts in our coverage. There are many hiding places on the Earth’s surface, and we cannot keep a satellite above every potential energy source.�
� As she spoke, the screen behind her supplied images that underscored her words.

  “But we can maintain a watch on the sites most likely to tempt them. Unlike Kariba–Cahorra Bassa, hydroelectric sources like Itaipu or Grand Coulee draw hundreds or thousands of onlookers daily. Those large dams that do not receive such large numbers of visitors are now under constant scrutiny. Oil and gas facilities such as those in the Middle East, Siberia, and even offshore Brazil are the focus of several of our satellites as well as on-site attention. Needless to say, every operating nuclear plant on the planet is already equipped with an extensive security system. In addition, undeveloped uranium deposits are now subject to regular checks.” She looked around the room as the screen dimmed.

  “This meeting has been called to discuss and evaluate the possibility that there might be other terrestrial energy sources we are overlooking that could be exploited by the Decepticons.” The screen behind her dimmed but did not go out. “The floor is open for general discussion.” Her gaze flicked to her left. “Your input is of course desired, Optimus.”

  The leader of the Autobots could not smile, but his eyes flickered. “Ironhide says that I do not speak as often or as forcefully as I should. If it seems so, it is only because as leader I am aware that my words carry added weight. Therefore I consider them carefully before I speak.”

  Leaning toward Lennox, Epps whispered. “Wonder if we could change the Constitution so that Autobots could run for president?”

  The captain shook his head. “Wouldn’t matter. He’s not US-born.”

  As the two soldiers exchanged casual banter, the others seated around the conference table were doing their best to respond thoughtfully to Ariella’s query.

  “Solar,” the senior general ventured straightaway.

  The notion was immediately shot down by one of NEST’s civilian specialists. “Even if they could manufacture and set up panels with a hundred percent conversion efficiency, they’d never be able to hide the facility. They would have to cover thousands of acres with such panels to come anywhere near generating the kind of power they seem to be looking for.”

  “That’s right,” agreed the civilian woman seated next to him. “To acquire that amount of energy before they were exposed they’d pretty much have to access a chunk of the sun directly.” Turning in her chair, she looked over at Optimus Prime. “I’m assuming that neither you nor the Decepticons can do that.”

  “Not to my knowledge,” the leader of the Autobots replied. “I should think that tapping stellar fusion directly would mean approaching a star far too close for safety.”

  Lennox nodded to himself. While he didn’t know much about solar energy or fusion power, neither did he see Decepticons who could be injured by sabot rounds zooming through and around solar flares.

  “Wave power.” The remaining civilian specialist looked around the table. “Unlimited energy and plenty of open, uninhabited ocean to hide in. They could build a generating plant in the middle of the Pacific or the South Indian Ocean and our satellites would probably never pick it up.”

  This possibility provoked a brief burst of intense conversation among those present, until Petr finally looked up from his eReader. In the course of the preceding discussion no one had noticed that he had set aside his shell in favor of the device.

  “I don’t know amount of energy the Decepticons are after, but calculations say it is possible to acquire a quantity that has been speculated upon through the utilization of wave action.” He tapped his reader.

  “Then how the blazes are we going to look out for this?” The general who spoke was clearly perturbed at the prospect. “No matter how many satellites we put up we can’t maintain a continuous watch on every square mile of every ocean.”

  “Not necessary to do so.” Looking past the general, the Russian eyed the leader of the Autobots. “Optimus, to accumulate and store decent amount of energy, how long you think Decepticons would have to work at it? They would need to build many stations linked together to avoid detection.”

  Optimus had already considered the prospect. “Not too long.”

  The second general snapped at the Autobot behind him. “How long is ‘not too long’?”

  Optimus regarded the senior officer. “A thousand of your years, perhaps. Possibly two.”

  “Isn’t it likely that by then we will have found and dealt with the last of the Decepticons on Earth?” The other general struggled to mask his exasperation.

  Optimus switched his attention to him. “Of course. But that is not the question that was asked.”

  Several muted groans echoed around the room. In front, Ariella licked her lips and asked firmly, “Any other thoughts on this matter?” She glanced in Optimus’s direction. “Preferably those that do not involve such far-reaching, at least in human terms, time frames?”

  “Just one.”

  All eyes turned to Kaminari. “I grew up in a country where a kind of energy the Decepticons are apparently trying to make use of is commonplace. Where people are exposed to it every day. They don’t dwell on the forces that are represented by what they’re seeing. They take pictures of its effects and try to avoid thinking about the enormous energies that are boiling beneath their feet.” Her expression tightened. “That is, unless those forces are unleashed.”

  At the far end of the table, Andronov was nodding sagely. “Part of my country is also same. The part, interestingly, that faces yours: Kamchatka. But I doubt that the Decepticons would try to carry out such work on the peninsula. There have been big military bases there for many decades. So much so that satellite surveillance of area is not even necessary because so many locations on the ground already under close military watch.”

  Lennox leaned toward Epps and whispered. “What are they talking about?”

  “Beats me.” Straightening in his chair, the tech sought an explanation with his usual subtlety. “Hey! What are you eggheads blabbering about?”

  Taking no offense, Kaminari turned to him. “Volcanoes, Sergeant. We’re talking about volcanoes.”

  Lennox knew as much about geology as he did about numerology, but in this case detailed knowledge was unnecessary. Everyone knew the power of volcanoes. Back home, even small kids could tell you about Hawaii or Mount St. Helens.

  Andronov lent emphasis to the point Kaminari was making. “Is estimated that when the Indonesian volcanic island of Krakatoa blew itself up in 1883, the energy released was equivalent to about two hundred megatons.” He glanced over at Optimus. “I am assuming that is kind of energy that would be adequate to satisfy even Decepticon needs.”

  “Your units of measurement are comparatively feeble when translated into Cybertronian terms,” the leader of the Autobots responded, “but yes, that would be enough even when one is speaking in terms of hypothetically renewing a Spark. Again, finding a way to store such energy until it can be used presents a serious problem. But if such power could be accessed, stored, and then delivered elsewhere, it might be enough to revive an extinguished Spark. Or,” he added ominously, “create a great deal of destruction.”

  “As did Krakatoa,” Andronov concluded somberly.

  Further discussion ensued. One of the generals demanded attention.

  “We don’t have to put a satellite over every active or dormant volcano on the planet. A lot of them, like Vesuvius or—what’s that one in southern Italy?”

  “Etna,” Andronov supplied helpfully.

  “Yes, Etna.” The senior officer’s attention switched to Kaminari. “Or Fuji. Or any volcano in Japan, or the US, or anyplace where there’s a reasonable human population. They won’t require satellite surveillance.” He looked satisfied. “We just have to periodically check out those that lie in obscure places. Africa, I expect, and the Andes, and Siberia.”

  Andronov took immediate, if quiet, exception. “No part of my country is obscure. Well,” he corrected himself, “maybe some parts. Is big place. But local watches can be put into effect on ground there also.”

/>   Ariella regarded the assembled. “Anyone else? Any other obvious terrestrial energy sources we’re overlooking?”

  “Probably,” Andronov declared, “but if Decepticons could do something like clap hands and generate controlled fusion on a large scale, we would not be having this discussion.”

  She nodded. “That’s it, then. In addition to the areas and sources of potential and existing energy we are already monitoring, NEST will coordinate surveillance of all active and dormant volcanoes across the planet.” She looked a last time in Optimus’s direction. “I see only one possible snag. If the Decepticons were inclined to try to make use of volcanic energy, could they do so at depth? Earth has many active volcanoes located in the deep ocean.”

  “Especially where continental plates are subducting,” Andronov added as a dazed Lennox could only sit and wonder what the hell the scientists were talking about.

  Optimus pondered before replying. “I think it unlikely. While our bodies are strong enough to survive the pressures encountered at considerable depths, even with the aid of artificial illumination perpetual darkness would make such complex work difficult. Not impossible, but difficult. What would inhibit development of such an energy source would be the constant presence of water, which would make welding and other industrial processes difficult. It could be done, but the time and resources required would tax the efforts of a considerable number of Cybertronians.”

  Ariella looked satisfied. “I’ll see to it that some existing satellites are reprogrammed to check on the most likely oceanic locations first. And our patrolling submarines can monitor the most likely locations for evidence of unusual activity. Eventually we’ll have every major active volcanic area checked for suspicious activity, including those in the sea.”