Intervention

by Rob Mclean

  GOD’S OTHER CHILDREN

  Rob McLean

  Book 1

  INTERVENTION

  Copyright © 2013 by Rob McLean. All rights reserved. No part of this report may be reproduced, stored in a retrievable system, or transmitted by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without written permission from the publisher.

  Contents

  Contents

  Acknowledgements

  Chapter 1 JarredTrue Believers

  Chapter 2 John End of the World

  Chapter 3 JohnGoddamn Aliens

  Chapter 4 JohnPixelated Image

  Chapter 5 JohnSecond Signal

  Chapter 6 JohnNot Yours

  Chapter 7 JohnIs She Dead?

  Chapter 8 AngelaHave a Nice Day

  Chapter 9 AngelaAbove and Beyond

  Chapter 10 JohnSpooky Action

  Chapter 11 JohnGlove Puppet

  Chapter 12 AkilFear Fills My Soul

  Chapter 13 JohnBig Spike

  Chapter 14 JohnTicket to Ride

  Chapter 15 AngelaI Was Wrong

  Chapter 16 JohnA Kodak Moment

  Chapter 17 AngelaHe’s not a Christian

  Chapter 18 JohnCrisis Meetings

  Chapter 19 AkilFear Not

  Chapter 20 JohnA Good Man

  Chapter 21 AkilStep Into the Future

  Chapter 22 Admiral SchwartzPlausible Deniability

  Chapter 23 JohnCompany Drone

  Chapter 24 JohnLovesick Puppy

  Chapter 25 Admiral SchwartzLaunch Codes

  Chapter 26 AngelaThe Three F’s

  Chapter 27 JohnThe Vow

  Chapter 28 JohnThe Observatory

  Chapter 29 AngelaRapture Bombing

  Chapter 30 LingAll Except One

  Chapter 31 AngelaI Come In Peace

  Chapter 32 AkilMan Flu

  Chapter 33 Captain LauJesus Loves China

  Chapter 34 JohnNew Car

  Chapter 35 Admiral SchwartzSoftware

  Chapter 36 JohnPreferred Candidate

  Chapter 37 JohnA Business Proposal

  Chapter 38 AngelaUnevenly Yoked

  Chapter 39 JohnA Long Shower

  Chapter 40 JohnTo Live is to Dream

  Chapter 41 AngelaIncoming

  Chapter 42 Admiral SchwartzGod’s Will

  Copyright © 2013 by Rob McLean. All rights reserved. No part of this report may be reproduced, stored in a retrievable system, or transmitted by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without written permission from the publisher.

  Acknowledgements

  Writing a book is not, as I had originally imagined, a solo affair. One draws upon the experience of others whose perspectives on life are as refreshing as they are novel.

  Without the support and encouragement of the Mount Gambier Writers’ Group, in particular; Anelia Blackie, Julie Mattinson, Diana Wiseman and Ewan Grant - this project may have stalled long ago. I owe a debt of gratitude for their collective wisdom and kindness.

  I wish to profusely thank the people I imposed upon to read the original first drafts, especially those who got back to me with constructive criticism and Linda Burridge foremost for her advice and questions.

  An hour spent in a booth at Collars and Cuffs coffee shop, fuelled by the most excellent cappuccinos served by Rebecca and her wonderful staff, almost every weekday before starting my day job, was of immense help in getting my daily quota of words down. A big thanks and high recommendations go out to them.

  I mostly wish to thank my wife and children for their tolerance of the time I spent on this project, time that was not spent with them as ‘normal’ fathers and husbands do.

  Finally, I wish to advise you that all the people in our Mount Gambier Writers’ Group have books they are currently working on. Their works are diverse and varied and may be available one day soon. I urge you to make the effort to look them up.

  Chapter 1

  An automated AMBER alert flashed silently on the screen.

  With his feet up on the desk and his ears full of his iPod selections, the lanky, ginger-haired student was oblivious to the blinking icons. He was lost in an alternate reality of a fifty-year-old, pulp sci-fi novel.

  While he turned the yellowed pages of his book to keep up with the action, more alerts sprung to life. He kept reading, oblivious to the indicators showing that across the planet, more and more Random Number Generators were losing their randomness.

  Behind him, the door to the lab swung open. A thin, balding man with a thick moustache and a worn, tweed jacket strode over and tapped the student firmly on the back. He responded by pulling out his earpieces and swinging the chair around in one fluid, well-practiced motion.

  “Professor,” he said, trying not to look too guilty as he closed his book, using the iPod cord as a bookmark, “what’s up?”

  The Professor gave him a brief look of reproof. “Jarred, I had a call from a colleague at M.I.T. asking me to check on the results from our RNG,” he said. His expression was a mixture of concern and confusion.

  “Is there something wrong? Has the link dropped out again?” Jarred asked, mirroring the Professor’s tone.

  “No, but I told her that I was pretty sure that everything was okay,” he nodded as if confirming some inner logic, “because if it wasn’t, I was sure that my top post-grad student would have told me about it.”

  The Professor swung Jarred’s chair back to face the screen, where they both saw the screen full of yellow alerts.

  “Far out,” Jarred exclaimed. His fingers tapped quickly on the keyboard. He brought up several screens, all of which showed a similar picture.

  “It’s global,” said the Professor, absently smoothing down his moustache with the tips of his fingers.

  “It sure is.” Jarred scrolled through data from around the world. “Wow, look at Cairo.”

  “Yeah, big shift there.”

  “But Professor, what’s causing it?”

  “Nothing.” But Jarred could see that the Professor’s eyes took in the information with growing concern. “At least nothing we know of yet.”

  “But it’ll be something big.” Jarred’s eyes grew wide. “I mean, for such a solid shift.”

  “Certainly, that’s why everyone, including us, is being asked to check their data twice, before the project managers tell the Presidential advisors.”

  “But will they listen? Do they even know what this all means?” Jarred waved expansively at the walls of electronic equipment.

  “I think we got their attention after the 9/11 data, and if this pans out the way we think it will, they’ll be true believers forevermore.”

  Chapter 2

  John Hunter was sprawled on the sofa in front of the television with only his boxer shorts on. Powerful shoulders and defined arms framed a capable, muscular torso that still projected youthful energy despite his relaxed state.

  Last night working at the club had been a late one, so he had slept in until a bit after midday. He had just eaten a late breakfast at a time that would have been afternoon tea for normal working people. After a long shower, he had been lazing about, watching some sports reports, listening to music, checking his phone, anything to try to keep his mind occupied, to keep it from drifting back to ‘her.’

  “She’s been gone almost a year now,” he told himself. “Time to let her go.” He changed channels and tried to push the thoughts of his dead girlfriend from his mind, but the memories of their time together kept surfacing, unbidden, into his mind.

  He checked the time on his phone again, hoping it had been long enough to let his food digest before he went out for a swim. He found that physical exercise helped to take his mind off all his worries, even the ones about Nat. It took away
the anger, drained the futile rage and left him feeling relaxed and peaceful - at least for a while.

  Then his phone rang.

  After a brief internal debate, John turned down the television. He had been expecting some work problem, but when he checked who was calling, he was surprised to see his brother Jarred’s number.

  An avalanche of excited, garbled babble gushed from the phone. His words tumbled over themselves before John interrupted him.

  “Whoa, hang on. You want me to go shopping?” John’s jaw clenched. “Now?” He took a deep breath as he listened to the stream of meaningless tech talk; six SD variations, chi-squared analyses. It was all incomprehensible jabber to him, and it was only the excited and urgent tone in his brother’s voice that kept him from hanging up.

  “Look, I was planning to go for a swim …” He didn’t get to finish his sentence as another eruption of high-pitched techno-babble followed that distinctly ended with ‘end of the world’.

  The television had a slow motion replay of a three-pointer that a Lakers Croatian import had shot from a couple of yards outside the line to grab the lead in extra time. The commentators, a pair of retired professional basketballers, were going wild. It was a replay of a match played last night and John knew the outcome already. He turned down the volume further and looked out of the seventh floor window of his apartment while his brother babbled on. The early afternoon sun hung in a near cloudless sky. The brilliant sunlight reflected off the vast vermillion green-deep blue Pacific Ocean and in through his west facing windows. White tipped breakers were rolling in relentlessly, unperturbed by the people riding on their backs. A variety of boats and yachts were scattered beyond, all basking in the sun. Surfers, sailors and swimmers were making the most of the mid-summer weather. It all seemed so far removed from the pre-apocalyptic picture his brother was painting.

  “So it’s the end of the world and you want me to go shopping?”

  “It definitely could be. The data says something big should happen real soon.”

  “Okay, you’ll have to explain it all again to me someday, like I’m a five year old.” John was used to his brother’s excitability when it came to things scientific and geeky, but today’s outburst did worry him more than a little. He had heard him rant about killer asteroids and peak-oil before, but this time there was an unfamiliar urgency in his brother’s voice.

  “It’s just that sometime real soon a large percentage of the whole human population will be focused on a single event. Whatever it is, it’ll capture the attention of almost everyone on the planet, and the single focus of so many minds is what is altering the randomness of our number generators.”

  “Before it’s even happened?”

  “Entanglement. It’s a quantum field effect,” Jarred said as if that explained everything. John knew that his brother was doing some high-level research project in addition to his normal studies. It had been explained to him countless times, but it never really got any clearer in his mind.

  “Whatever that means. I guess you’ll have lots of time to explain it all while we live on Oreos in a post-nuclear wasteland.” John knew his sarcasm would be wasted on his brother in his excited state.

  “No, just get bottles of water and tins of food. They keep for a long time.” John could hear the clacking of keyboard. “And peanut butter. This survival website says peanut butter keeps. And batteries…”

  John felt like hanging up on his manic brother. He would far prefer to go for a swim or surf, but a familiar voice spoke to him from inside his head and he knew better than to ignore it. ‘Listen to him,’ was all it said but John recognized his father’s voice as something distinct from his own internal thoughts and at once felt his resistance fade.

  “Okay, okay,” he said with a sigh, “I’ll get some things, but I’m not getting too much. We don’t have room to keep it.”

  “Oh, if you get baked beans, can you get the ones in ham sauce? They’re the best. I don’t like the chilli ones.”

  John growled as he hung up.

  Chapter 3

  An hour later, John found himself pushing a trolley laden with a selection of suggested survival groceries. He was still wondering how he had been convinced that stocking up for some theoretical future disaster based on incomprehensible pseudo-science was better than going for a swim. He took a deep breath and tried to lower his stress levels. He knew he would regret giving up his swim and promised himself that he would make up for it tomorrow, but Jarred had been pretty insistent.

  “Hey buddy, you gettin’ ready for the end of the world or what?” John turned to see a schlumped mountain of shower-phobic humanity, wearing a ‘God Save America’ singlet.

  “Sure,” said John. He couldn’t help but to feel that if Jarred’s warning turned out to be real, he was somehow cheating. “Can’t be too ready?” His trolley was overloaded with slabs of bottled water, batteries, matches, candles and boxes of tinned food. He had to admit they were a bit of a giveaway.

  “You with the C.I.A. or sumfink?” The patriot gave John a scrutinizing stare under his wild, bushy eyebrows.

  “No, it’s just my brother…” John paused, trying to think how to explain to himself how he had come to be loading up with supplies before he could hope to explain it to someone else.

  “You know sumfink, don’t ya?” He pointed his massive grubby finger at John.

  “No, no, my brother, he’s just…” John faltered, and then an idea popped into his head. “He’s just a bit paranoid. He feels safer if we have a bit in reserve.” John wondered where the lie came from. “Helps him sleep at night.”

  “Yeah, I hear ya buddy.” The huge, hairy-shouldered primate appeared satisfied with the exchange and continued down the candy aisle. John headed in the other direction, picked up a few batteries and made for the checkout.

  John lined up behind an elderly pensioner. Everyone with better checkout karma had avoided her, for good reason. He waited behind the pensioner and idly listened to her life story as she related it to the checkout girl. A look of utter boredom and a total lack of response failed to deter the old woman, who appeared both determined and desperate to tell her tale to someone. Anyone, it seemed.

  Above the checkout, fixed to a wall, hung a flat-screen television that had a daytime soapie playing. The volume was barely audible, but the captions were on. John felt certain that it was supposed to be showing some in-house advertising, not keeping the checkout staff amused.

  John was interrupted from his thoughts by his new friend. “Hey buddy, I got me a few things too,” he said, indicating a packet of shotgun shells and a carton of soft drink.

  “Good for you,” John gave him a knowing smile that he hoped would convey understanding without too much familiarity. He didn’t want any trouble with this guy. He wasn’t on duty and wouldn’t get paid for any hassles. The redneck nodded and grinned his satisfaction.

  The old lady had evidently never heard of credit cards or any form of electronic banking and had slowly progressed to fumbling in her purse for the exact money. John hoped to move things along by starting to load his stuff onto the conveyor belt.

  After much dithering and fussing and long after John had paid for his things, the old lady gathered up her things and gave him a sour look; one that said that she didn’t like being hurried, let alone having to pack her own groceries. John just smiled sweetly back at her and was loading Jarred’s survival suggestions into his own trolley when the redneck behind him swore.

  “Goddam you boy, lookit dis,” he said pointing to the flat screen.

  The soapie had disappeared. In its place, a news announcer had appeared. ‘Breaking News’ was splashed across the top of the screen with the words ‘Alien contact’ scrolling along the bottom. His attention had been caught by the urgent tone in the announcer’s voice.

  “Turn it up, will ya?” the redneck bellowed.

  The checkout girl aimed the remote at the screen and everyone watched as a banner headline scrolled the words ‘a
lien contact’ beneath a solemn-faced newsreader as she revealed in an awestruck voice that a light and radio source had been detected by amateur Russian astronomers on the fringe of our solar system.

  “Goddamn aliens,” the redneck boomed.

  “No way!” said someone further back in the line.

  “It’s gotta be a fake,” said another.

  A buzzing excitement rose from the people waiting in line. Most stood mesmerised in front of the television, slack-jawed and wide eyed, but some became agitated and went back into the store, presumably to stock up on exactly the sort of items that John had already loaded up on. With the redneck glaring at him, John decided now would be a good time to leave and get back to his relative safety of his apartment.

  “Looks like your day just got a lot busier,” John said to the checkout girl before he left. She gave him a worried, bewildered look in return. He felt privileged to have had his brother’s forewarning, but also guilty. He felt sorry for the girl, but he couldn’t get involved.

  “Better call your manager,” John said. He knew he couldn’t shoulder everyone’s problems, so he shrugged and left.

  An eerie chill crept up his spine as he made his way back to his car. This was what Jarred had been on about. He found it incredible that Jarred could have known that something like this was going to happen.

  Chapter 4

  Safely back at his apartment, John, like hundreds of millions of others around the world, silently watched the coverage of this incredible event. He skipped from channel to channel, struggling to imagine what contact with an alien race would mean for humanity and although the same story was featured on every station, the content was frustratingly limited to the same photo and peppered with lots of wild speculation.

  With newfound retrospective wisdom, all the commentators agreed that given such an immense universe, there always had to have been life out there. Many were claiming that this discovery was just confirmation or vindication of their allegedly long-held beliefs. Encountering an alien intelligence was now being recognized by the astute commentators as having always been only a matter of when.