Variations on Humanity (WorldWalker Trilogy Book 3)

by Paul Eslinger

  “It means that Abantu building codes apply rather than the county rules. At least it does when things are built on land the Abantu own. The embassy is the extended part of another nation.”

  The building inspector shook his head. “Our senator says the president doesn’t have the authority to make that decision.”

  “Do you think he is correct?” Rhona asked. “The Supreme Court agrees with him – with the president.”

  Cedric waved both hands, almost dropping his leather binder. His voice grew hard. “I’m not a lawyer, and I’ll let them fight over the nuances. My job description doesn’t change unless the president wins in court.”

  “The president has unambiguous authority on one point,” Rhona commented.

  “What’s that?” Cedric snarled.

  “Authority to grant diplomatic immunity to individuals who are not American citizens. Presidents have done that thousands of times in the last sixty years. President Leek also declared diplomatic immunity for all the Abantu.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “They can’t be arrested for most crimes. Anyone attempting to arrest them after learning of their diplomatic immunity can and will be arrested for harassing them.”

  Cedric swallowed. “Where does that leave me?”

  Rhona decided on a response matching the personality of the man facing her. “You’re up the creek without the proverbial paddle. You can’t issue any citations to Laura for performing construction without county building permits without ending up in court under a charge of unlawful harassment. Especially if the construction occurred on land owned by another nation.”

  “I’ll have to check on your claims,” Cedric replied.

  Keene’s voice whispered in Rhona’s earpiece and the smile on her face grew brighter. “Diplomatic immunity became international law following the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations in 1961. The delivery you witnessed, and the previous delivery, occurred on land owned by an Abantu.”

  “Yeah,” Cedric grunted and shook his head. “My boss and I did a search on land ownership this morning. Between them, forty-seven Abantu own about eighty percent of the county.”

  “With purchase options on another seventeen percent,” added Laura with a smile.

  “Including the purchase option Callie Smith has on my family farm, but not my house,” he said. “No one knew what you were up to.”

  “People are getting fair market value when they do sell,” Rhona replied. She had a few clues to what the Abantu were up to, but she didn’t know their end goals and strategies.

  She turned and gestured towards the place the freighter had buried the manufacturing complex. “We’ve established the fact that Abantu building rules apply. If your boss disagrees, he can call us.”

  “I’m sure he will.”

  Laura gestured in the same direction Rhona had pointed and looked at Cedric. “Would you like to take a tour of the facility?”

  He looked astonished and poked himself in the chest with his thumb. “Really, you’re inviting me?”

  Rhona was just as surprised, but she was learning to hide her emotions behind a poker face while interacting with people outside the facility. Keene had warned her Cedric had a below-average Karthi index score. Why would Laura take him to see the manufacturing facility?

  “You can tell your boss you looked around.” Laura continued. She beckoned with one hand. “Are you coming?”

  “Yeah,” he said with relish. He held up his leather notebook and looked at it. “I’ll just leave this in the pickup.”

  “Do you have a camera?”

  He nodded. “Of course.” He pulled it out of his coat pocket and placed it on top of the notebook.

  “That’s okay. Bring it along,” she invited.

  They moved up the walk together and entered the house. Laura gestured at a coat rack. “You can leave your coat, hat, and gloves here. We will be inside for the entire tour and we will exit through here.”

  Cedric watched the others hang up their coats and followed suit. He looked around. “The spaceship was a mile from here.”

  Rhona nodded and gestured towards the wide stairs leading to the basement. “Yep. The access is underground.”

  “There isn’t any underground access on the house plans we have,” he said as they walked down the stairs.

  “No,” Laura replied when they reached the large basement room. “The access isn’t an integral part of the house.”

  “Really?” Cedric raised his eyebrows.

  “Nope.” Laura closed the door at the bottom of the stairs before she fingered the control that activated the lift. The entire floor of the room sank over 100 feet and came to a stop.

  A section of the wall slid aside. Laura pointed, “This way.”

  They emerged in a tunnel carved from living limestone. The top of the arched ceiling was about twelve feet above the flat floor. It was wide enough for the two four-person electric carts sitting in an alcove to pass each other with ease.

  Rhona glance at Laura. “Do you want me to drive?”

  “Sure.” Laura unplugged the cart on the right from the charging station built into the end of the alcove and secured the dongle on a hook. “We can all ride on the same cart.”

  Cedric hopped into the rear of the cart and sat as his eyes studied the tunnel. “How long has this tunnel been here?”

  Laura turned and looked at the building inspector when Rhona backed the cart out into the tunnel. “We built this part of the tunnel back in 1905.”

  “Why?”

  “It is a secondary exit from the structure delivered that year.”

  “Oh.” Cedric nodded.

  They were making good time about halfway to the manufacturing complex when Laura looked at Rhona. “You need to slow down.”

  Rhona eased off the accelerator even though they were traveling less than twenty miles per hour. The request was unexpected, so she couldn’t resist a question. “Is something different than before?”

  “Yes.”

  By this time, Rhona could see a small wheeled vehicle in the middle of the tunnel. Arms reached out from it towards the walls. The ceiling lights were not functioning in a small section ahead and behind the vehicle.

  Laura gestured at the strange-looking vehicle. “Construction delay. It will move out of the way in a few moments.”

  Cedric leaned forward, staring with impossibly wide eyes. “What are you building?” He brought up his camera and took a few pictures.

  “The aedificium is doing final shaping on the tunnel walls and installing metal lining for support. We haven’t had any significant rock fall but we want something more stable now that we are planning to stay a while.”

  “How long is while? Another two hundred years?” Cedric asked.

  Laura shook her head. “That’s just a short visit. We’re building permanent structures.”

  “How long will they last?”

  “A minimum of 10,000 years.”

  “Nah.” Cedric gestured at the metal lined walls they see behind the aedificium. “Metal corrodes long before that.”

  “Some metal does,” Laura agreed, “but not all. For example, gold nuggets have lasted for geologic ages.”

  Cedric sounded startled. “You’re not lining the tunnels with gold, are you?”

  “No. We’re using a corrosion resistant metal with good structural strength. The closest thing commercially available is a high titanium chromium alloy, but that isn’t nearly as good.”

  The building inspector leaned back and Rhona saw a sly gleam in his eyes. “Do you build spaceships with this metal?” he asked.

  “No,” Laura said with a little chuckle. “We have much better materials for spaceships.”

  “How fast does this thing work?” Cedric asked.

  “It is currently advancing abo
ut 200 yards in a day. It slows to about 20 yards a day if it is also digging the tunnel. Waste rock disposal becomes the limiting factor.”

  Moments later, the aedificium moved aside and let them pass. They soon reached the entrance to the manufacturing complex. Laura looked around at Cedric when Rhona brought the cart to a stop. “This manufacturing complex is totally automated. It is about 400 by 600 feet in lateral extent and 200 feet thick. We will be touring the top level where the control functions are located.”

  Cedric gestured back along the tunnel. “Where did you get all of the metal?”

  “We’ve been mining and stockpiling metal for over 200 years. We’ll start buying more for some of the things we have planned.”

  “What do you have planned?” Cedric leaned forward with anticipation on his face.

  Laura laughed. “That information is not part of this tour.”

  They had just entered the control room when Keene contacted both Laura and Rhona through their earpieces. “We may have a problem in Italy.”

  Chapter 5 – Looming Problems

  Rhona moved aside so she could talk quietly to Keene while Laura continued explaining the manufacturing functions to Cedric and Charles. “What kind of problem?” she asked.

  “We’ve been checking in with the Abantu living in Italy every day to make sure they are okay. Marlee just called and told us a quadcopter followed her when she was coming home from work.”

  “Does she live in an apartment or in a house? Was the quadcopter in public space or private space?”

  “She saw a big one in public space when she went out for lunch.”

  “Was that all?” Rhona asked.

  “She saw a small one when she got close to home. It probably had a maximum flight time of fewer than ten minutes.”

  “Where is home?”

  “They live in two compounds near the city of Brescia. One overlooks Lake d’Iseo and the other one overlooks Lake Garda.”

  Rhona persisted. “So, they live in private residences.”

  “Yes, and they own a moderate amount of land around each residence. It takes longer to acquire large tracts of land in Italy than it does in rural America.”

  “Hmm.” Rhona looked around and determined that Cedric and Charles were still busy with Laura. She continued talking to Keene. “I’m not sure I told you, but someone stole my clue notebook from my apartment the night before I went back to Jetmore to get you from the infirmary.”

  Keene responded after a short pause. “You mentioned it when you picked me up from my infirmary stay but I was too excited to think about it. After that, I forgot. What was in it?”

  A feeling of shame swept over Rhona. “I didn’t know anything about real espionage tactics when I started looking after you were kidnapped. I used a small notebook to record my observations, facts, and surmises.”

  “Not encrypted?”

  “No,” Rhona admitted. “I wrote things using shorthand. I remember you saying Mike’s analysis of social media suggested several Abantu were living in Italy. I recorded that as well.”

  “That was a vague clue and Italy is a big place.”

  A mixture of depression and irritation washed over Rhona and bled into her voice. “Don’t try to make light of my admission of stupidity. Someone could use the notebook along with new public knowledge of the Abantu to inform their social media search algorithms. It would be easier to find them than before.”

  “I think you’re right.”

  “I know I’m right. Very few people could resist texting, emailing, or calling someone if they thought they saw an Abantu. The search algorithms would be all over that like white on rice.”

  Keene cleared his throat. “Dulcis has been monitoring all of the government searchers, but we aren’t yet tied into all of the industrial or special interest groups.”

  “Have you found out anything more about Scott Rucker or Enzio Martin?” Rucker was Keene’s former boss in military intelligence. Years previously, Rucker and his younger sister Samantha vacationed together in France. His sister disappeared one evening and she was never seen again. Enzio Martin had been a suspect, but no police agency could prove he was involved. Rucker was pursuing a personal vendetta against Martin, and they had recently learned that side effects of Rucker’s approach had led to the murder of Keene’s first wife and Keene’s kidnapping a few months earlier.

  “We’re finding a few new clues about Martin, but Rucker has totally disappeared.”

  Rhona brought her attention back to the Abantu living in Italy. “We need some eyes on the ground in Italy.”

  “I agree. Sam has offered to go and Trixie said she would go with him.”

  “Good–wait a minute, I thought they were going to try to track the people who ran Glenn Pratt off of the road. Have you talked to Laura?”

  “Not yet. Can you do it?”

  “Yes. But not until after we take Cedric back to his truck.”

  “Why is Laura showing him around?”

  “I’m not sure,” Rhona replied. “Let’s talk about that tonight in my apartment.”

  * * *

  They returned to the house about half an hour later. Cedric walked out to his pickup alone and Charles headed inside. Laura turned to Rhona while they were still on the porch. “I’ve been thinking about Helen Pratt.”

  “Yes?” Rhona responded.

  “We left a bug in her room and we heard her say someone ran them off the road. The police haven’t visited her yet and she hasn’t provided any more details. I think you should go talk to her.”

  “I’ll do it, but I don’t know her very well. We only met the one time when you were signing the papers to buy the store.”

  “I’d like for you to try. Damaris needs to visit again.”

  Rhona raised one eyebrow slightly. Laura must think Helen was a potential recruit. “Another shot?”

  “Yes.” Laura gestured over her shoulder. “They finished the new truck. Damaris is bringing it to the house. She should be here soon.”

  “Did you make a license plate?”

  “We moved the one from my old Ford truck over to the new vehicle.” Laura frowned. “What do you think we should do?”

  A wry smile crossed Rhona’s face. “Did you also change the information in the state database?”

  “Yes. Dulcis finished the changes this morning.”

  “What did you use for a VIN?”

  “Ah.” Laura swallowed. “We kept the existing one as well.”

  “You’re used to hiding but we may need to change several old practices. You want things you manufacture to be legitimate in the marketplace. Besides, we shouldn’t bring out the hammer of diplomatic immunity unless we really need it.”

  Laura pursed her lips and shook her head. Her words seemed at odds with her actions. “You’re right. We probably need to find someone to ask the pertinent questions and keep track of details. Do you have a suggestion?”

  Although Rhona hadn’t introduced the topic of conversation, she had been increasingly concerned about the welfare of the women working in her dental office in Rapid City, South Dakota. She no longer worked there, but she was still a seventy percent owner. “Diana Tate and Elaine Mayhorn are possibilities. They have organizational skills far beyond those needed by dental technicians.”

  “Hmm,” Laura said.

  “Aren’t you going to ask whether I checked their Karthi Index values?”

  “Did you?”

  “Of course. You don’t make any job assignments without checking it, do you?”

  Laura raised one eyebrow but she didn’t reject Rhona’s assertion. “Well?”

  Rhona rolled her eyes. “You’re just testing me. You compiled the initial index on Diana a day after I met Maria in Glacier National Park. You checked out Elaine while I was still interviewing her. They’re both abo
ve 9.5.”

  “They’re good people.”

  “Joan Webber and Kelly Strait are good people, too.” Rhona waved both hands as she brought up the names of the two dentists who were junior partners in her old practice.

  “They are, but…”

  “Okay, okay.” Rhona let irritation show in her voice. “Their index scores are in the top 20%, but not in the top 0.1%.”

  “You can invite Diana and Elaine to join us here. Diana’s husband and daughter are also welcome.”

  “Can I go in person?”

  Laura nodded. “You can take the new truck. We’ll have another one finished by tomorrow.”

  The sounds of gravel crunching under vehicle tires announced the arrival of the new pickup. Rhona finally remembered Keene’s earlier comment. “Keene says there are quadcopters flying in Italy. He thinks Sam and Trixie should go take a look in person.”

  “Aargh.” Laura ran her fingers through her hair. “You go on and talk to Helen. I’ll check in with Keene.”

  Rhona looked out at the street. At first glance, the pickup looked like a new Chevy Avalanche. However, differences became apparent as Rhona started along the path. The body shape was a little different. The side panel was seamless and there wasn’t a hint of a door handle. The windows merged into the rest of the body rather than being different materials butted up against each other.

  Damaris stepped out of the driver’s door and looked across the top of the pickup at Rhona. “Hop in,” she said with a beckoning gesture before sliding back inside and shutting the door.

  Rhona stared at the side of the pickup and the thought that Damaris was testing her flashed through her mind. She pushed back her curly auburn hair with both hands. How could she open the door without a handle? A moment later, the phrase she used to open her apartment door came to mind. She spoke two Abantu words, “aperi amicus.” The door opened and she slid onto the seat.

  “You figured it out,” Damaris commented with a sly grin.

  “You certainly are consistent in your approach,” Rhona replied. “But, can anyone open the door if they memorize the words meaning open friend?”

  “No,” Damaris commented as the vehicle started moving along the road towards Jetmore without any apparent action on her part. “The onboard AI only responds to people on a predefined list. We already added you, Keene, Sam and your parents to the list.”