by JK Franks
The land here was only slightly less swampy. Grasslands hanging on, inches above the water level were safe haven for birds, deer, and just about every other creature. The Everglades was one of the most diverse ecosystems in the world. What was not at home here should have been people. Cade heard a mic click from one of his men. The readout in his goggles identified it as Hammer. Switching over, he could see what the former SEAL was seeing. A low-slung cottage beneath a canopy of trees. They had painted the metal roof in a near-perfect camo-pattern. That has to be it. “Hold there,” he whispered. “McTee, move in slowly, watch for triggers.”
Director Stansfield didn’t have much on the man she only knew as Guardian, but one thing she was certain of was his training. He was paranoid, with good reason, and the best operator she’d ever seen. Cade had to assume he would have surveillance and probably counter-intrusion devices, traps designed to keep people like them far away. No one lived out here just for the hell of it. This man wanted his privacy, had earned it, in fact, serving his country, and now they were going to interrupt his morning coffee.
He felt more than saw that Cochise was back, up close, near Maratelli. The small house emerged from the surrounding forest like an apparition. At first glance, it showed no signs of life. Cycling through broad spectrum analysis, Cade saw no heat signatures, no comms equipment, no energy usage…nothing. Maratelli suddenly held up a palm, causing him to freeze mid-step. Since being fully read into the operations at The Cove, the lieutenant had gone through more of the enhanced training on espionage, counterintelligence, and all manner of spycraft than any of the rest of them. Cade began to speak, but a look from the woman silenced him.
Slowly, she crouched down in the tall grass. The road they’d followed earlier was merely a game trail here. Maratelli typed on the keyboard integrated into the sleeve of her tactical outfit. Cade read the message and understood. A sensor net was ahead, heat sensors, game cameras, and microphones. He saw nothing until she highlighted them on the head-up display goggles they all wore. He began typing in response, ‘Can you disable?’
She nodded and held up a finger, then typed a response, ‘Whoever is monitoring will know as soon as I do.’
That wouldn’t work, they needed Guardian to be cooperative. This meant no hostile encounters. If he shot or made any hostile move, Cade knew his team would return fire in an overwhelming fashion. He watched as Maratelli tapped her CommDot and was obviously subvocalizing a conversation with Dee. Soon, she nodded and tapped out something new. ‘Dee can lay down a dampening field. It will only work for about fifty meters, but we should be through by then.’
That would cut it close, but it would have to do. A silent countdown started in his visor. When it hit zero, he, Maratelli, and Cochise sprinted down the highlighted path. Once they were out of the net, the visors blinked green. “Any other surprises ahead, LT?” he asked using the common abbreviation for her rank.
“Wouldn’t be surprised, sir. Suggest we deploy a few micro drones.”
Cade knew the other two were outside the sensor net, so he gave McTee the job of the drones. “Hammer, you are overwatch, get somewhere with a view.”
“No threats detected, path to door looks clear,” Hammer said several minutes later.
Maratelli went to step onto the single plank step leading up to the rickety porch but froze mid-step. She slowly eased her foot back down to the dirt and crouched down looking under the gray, weathered boards. She sent the image to Cade’s goggles.
Pressure switch, no-doubt rigged to blow, he thought. Nodding, he motioned for her to go right while he and Cochise took the left. They could defeat the boobytrap, but he’d rather find another way in. Near the back of the cabin, he saw what he wanted, a door leading directly out to a well-used wood pile. His back against a rubble stone fireplace, he waited for Maratelli to join them. The door was slightly open, as if someone had recently used it or was inviting them to whatever awaited.
“Nomad to Hammer. Any signs of movement?” The call Cade made was barely a whisper, but the comms systems would compensate.
“Negative, Nomad. Scope looks clear,” came the reply.
Streams of sweat were trailing down Cade’s shoulders and back. This man better fucking be worth it, he thought as he leaned in and pushed the door open with his rifle. The door, which was just a collection of planks nailed onto a cross board, swung in noiselessly on well-oiled hinges. Nothing happened. Cade made eye contact with Maratelli who nodded. He gave the signal to Cochise to stay, then he and the lieutenant both entered and swung to opposite sides of the opening.
The goggles compensated for the darkness but gave everything an amber hue. They swept their guns back and forth but found no target. The cabin was not large, just a few rooms, all of which they could see into from where they were standing. A compact kitchen with a table. A chair near a bookcase close to the fireplace. One room that was obviously the bedroom and another adjacent to the kitchen that appeared to be a pantry or storage alcove.
“Check the bedroom,” Cade said as he headed over to the small table which was stacked high with books and papers.
“Clear, Nomad.”
Cade was already shuffling through the papers and books. Most seemed to be related to UFOs, oceanography, and alternative power sources.
“Nomad, have you seen anything that sensor net would have fed into?” Riley asked from back at The Cove.
He’d flipped his goggles up to look through the papers, as the color was not helpful in picking out details in the low light. He now lowered them back down and activated them to look for power signatures. Cade and Maratelli scanned the interior but came up empty. He heard Cochise chuff from just outside the open door. Then he heard a sound that was totally familiar and completely out of place.
Maratelli began to speak, but he cut her off as the sound came again. It was a sound he heard every time he made himself a drink. Ice cubes clinking against the side of a glass tumbler. He looked again toward the small alcove, raised his assault rifle and selected infrared. This time he clearly saw a figure seated in a chair watching them with a drink in hand.
“Bourbon, the good stuff. Want one?” came the gravelly voice from the dark.
17
“What in the fuck?” Maratelli said as she snapped her rifle in the voice's direction.
The man responded in the same relaxed tone, “Easy there, soldier, no need to get yourself all excited.”
Bourbon would be good.
Quiet, Gus, Cade said sub-vocally, quieting his internal dialogue. He lowered his own weapon. “Are we in any danger?” he asked the man.
“Depends,” came the very slow and deliberate response. The voice had a southern drawl, maybe Texas, but could have also been intentional.
“Depends on what?” came the quick challenge from Maratelli. How in the hell had this man just been sitting there watching us? How did he know we were anywhere close, and why was he so fucking calm?
“Depends on what your intentions are. People around here usually knock when they want to come inside. A man’s home is his castle, you know.”
Cade watched the man in IR as he waved his empty hand in the air as if to magnify the grandiose surroundings.
“Besides, Florida has a ‘stand your ground’ law. If a man feels threatened on his own property, he can legally use lethal force to defend himself.”
“You intend to use lethal force?” Cade asked as the man took another sip of the drink.
“Hope not,” he said letting out a satisfying ‘ahhh.’ “That would ruin my entire day, not to mention what it might do to yours.”
“I think we have the advantage here,” Maratelli replied, still chaffing at being beaten at the game she was supposedly a master of now.
“Good, good,” the man said, rising slowly, both hands raised. “Works a lot better if you feel that way.” He eased out of the shadows and into the dim light of the main room. They could see now he was older, probably late sixties, maybe a bit younger if he�
��d led an unusually harsh life. He shuffled across the floor, his well-worn slippers making scuffing sounds as he moved. In some ways, the man looked a few days away from assisted living, but Cade felt that was all just illusion, subterfuge.
Not a single thing about the older man was memorable or threatening, yet Cade was borderline terrified. Deep in the darkened corners of his brain, he felt the Brutus slowly coming to life. Easy their, big fella. Cade reached some kind of mental checkpoint and decided a change in tactics was in order. He removed his assault rifle from around his neck and placed it on the table. “Bourbon sounds great. Where the hell do you keep it?” Maratelli looked at her leader in opened-mouthed disbelief.
The man seemed momentarily surprised by the change, but laughed and motioned to the cabinet over the small cookstove. “If you don’t like it neat, I keep a little ice in that cooler over there.”
Cade fixed himself a drink, no ice, pulled out one of the three chairs, and sat. He looked up at his partner who was still fuming, her rifle held in a low ready position. “Stand down, HiLo,” using Maratelli’s combat call sign. “Pretty sure this is what we came for.” Turning to the man, he asked, “Is that true?”
“Depends,” the old man said again, in the same confoundingly relaxed tone. “Who were you looking for?”
“Guardian,” Cade replied using the codename the director had supplied. He sipped the bourbon while eyeing the man closely. He watched for any sign that he’d struck a nerve, the heat of the liquor burning its way down his throat. The man’s expression never wavered.
“You want to call your other two men down? That one must be getting cramps by now up in that cottonnwood tree. Just have your dog go lead them in. He knows where the safe path is.”
Cade smiled and shook his head. “Team, stand down, approach with caution. Cochise, you are on point,” he whispered.
The man’s eyebrow raised. “Comms on the dog as well? Must be microscopic. Margaret has access to some pretty sophisticated toys these days.”
This was a man who could not be trusted, but someone they needed. He knew that they were with the director, probably just because of the code name he’d given. So far, he’d outplayed them at every turn, but now it was time to get down to business. “Look, um…you have a name? Something we can call you? I’m Rearden,” Cade said, hoping to build some level of trust.
“You can call me Samuel.”
“Okay, Samuel. I apologize for sneaking in on you, but we think you maybe could help us with a little problem.”
“I’m just a crazy, old swamp rat, Mister Rearden. What the hell would I know?” He slung back the final slug of bourbon and placed the heavy tumbler down in front of him with a solid thump.
“Drop the act. We have some of your background,” Maratelli said. “You were on a mission several years ago, and we’d like to ask you a few questions about it.”
“I had lots of little jobs back then,” the man said. “Just kind of a handyman. Lots of work if you didn’t mind getting a little dirty.”
“Just a regular ole Mister Fixit, huh?” Cade said.
The man nodded and grinned. “You could damn sure say that. What job in particular?”
Maratelli started to speak, but Cade cut her off again. Doris had quietly suggested that he question Guardian first about the missing scientist. Cade took another pull on his drink. “One in which a team of research scientists went missing for several weeks. Maybe something to do with Marie Byrd. We need to know what happened.” He did not understand which scientist, or who Marie was, but assumed Samuel did.
“Doesn’t ring a bell,” the man said, beginning to clean a bit of grime from beneath a fingernail.
Maratelli, who’d been knocked off her game slightly by Cade’s change, had refocused her attention. She now looked over at her commander, exasperated. “Can I just shoot him?”
Cade just shrugged,“Your call. I’m not the primary here. My job was to get you two together.” He saw Cochise quickly glance in the still open door; subdued voices could be heard just beyond. Cade signaled the dog to stay and guard. “Samuel, I have no doubt you have some surprises for us if this little talk goes sideways, but trust me when I say this, if you don’t answer the questions, you will not be the one walking out of here.”
Nothing about the threat seemed to bother the older man. Somehow, despite all he saw, Cade still felt they were not the ones in control here.
“Guardian was a long time ago. I’ve done my best to move on and stay out of sight. Margaret has no right trying to drag me back in.”
“No one is dragging you back, sir. We just need a little intel, and then we can be out of each other’s way.” Maratelli was trying a softer approach now as well. “What do you know about the missing scientists?”
The man sighed. “Tell you what, I’ll answer any question you want for say…ten minutes, then we are done. I leave, you leave, and this meeting never happened.” Slowly removing an odd looking phone, he set a countdown timer for ten minutes, then waited for Cade and Maratelli to agree. The lieutenant made a questioning look in Cade’s direction before nodding her head.
“Ah, yes,” the man began. “The polar missions back in the eighties. Supposedly very routine, mapping geomagnetic anomalies and taking ice cores and measuring ozone, air samples, and such. On the surface it seemed like one of a hundred other boring-ass field surveys, but then why would I have been embedded on the team if that was all there was to it?
“Truth was, I had spent years developing my cover as a fixer, as you say, a go between for the scientific community. That’s really where I ran into your boss. On this particular one, I was to provide basic security teams and logistics. We were near the South Pole. Cold as a mother-fucker down there.” Samuel briefly glanced at the lieutenant and feigned apologies before continuing.
“If you read the briefing, you know the pilots dropped us off at the target location. Team was mostly Russian, a few Kazaks, couple of Aussies, and one Brit. I’d been placed there to keep an eye on the russkies, of course. The goal was to drill down some 13,000 feet to an actual lake below the ice. Lake Vostok, perhaps you’ve heard of it. Enormous freshwater lake under the ice, never freezes. They don’t know why. Incredible place, teaming with bizarre life forms where none should be. Stuff none of these guys had ever seen before.”
A small chirp notified Cade that Dee was online. “Nomad, my sensors show a significant probability of deceit in what the man is saying.”
He didn’t need a computer to tell him that. “Come on, Samuel, don’t waste the little time you have offered. Stop with the bullshit and get to it. The scientists were mostly American, we know that much already. Also, all of this shit,” he motioned to the stack of books and papers, “doesn’t concern crypto-zoology.”
Samuel smiled, “What can I say? I am a bit of a Renaissance man. My interest is quite….well, varied. Also, the best way to tell a lie is to tell the truth, unconvincingly. But yes, you probably don’t want the cover story. That came years later anyway. The creature from Lake Vostok.” He made wavy motions with his fingers to dramatize how spooky and fake it was.
“Late 90s, another group of scientists, all from the national science foundation, was also working in the area of the South Pole. I was again embedded with the Navy, VXE—6. They had forward operating bases at Christchurch, New Zealand, and McMurdo Station, Antarctica.
“Those Navy flyboys are hotshots, not just the fighter jocks, but all of ‘em. Hell, just keep in mind that jet fuel freezes at temperatures routinely found down there at the end of the earth. One thing I was already aware of was that our aircraft was not allowed to fly over a certain area designated as Roundtop. It was only five miles from the station. They said it was because of air sampling contamination, but that was total bullshit. But, whatever, I learned from one pilot that they’d actually flown over it once due to an emergency medical evac at the Australian camp. The only thing they saw going over to that other camp was a very big-ass hole going down into th
e ice. The man said he could have flown his LC130 into this thing and back out again with no problem.
“Anyway,” he continued, “I accompanied this group from the States to an outlying camp, not too far from that no-fly area. They dropped us with everything we’d need, equipment and food for several weeks. Now I assume you know the official story.”
Maratelli shook her head no, but Cade nodded. Ace had dredged up the reports from somewhere. “You were supposed to check-in by radio with McMurdo station every day, but that never happened. They ordered the original flight crew to fly back to the camp to find out if the scientists were ok. They found the camp abandoned, none of you were there, and most of the equipment was missing. No evidence of foul play, no bodies, nothing. They checked that the radio was working. Even called back to McMurdo from the camp to verify comms wasn’t the issue.”
Cade went on, “They eventually returned to base, where they filed their reports. The weather turned nasty, so several follow-up missions were scrubbed. Everyone assumed the team was dead, frozen solid in a ravine somewhere. Then, two weeks later, they received a radio call from the missing scientists requesting pickup from the same base as if nothing weird had occurred.”
The man calling himself Samuel nodded and looked down at his timer. “Did it say what condition the scientists were in? Did it mention that none of them would speak to any of the flight crew nor let the EMTs examine them? Did it also say that within minutes of the flight landing back at McMurdo, an unscheduled and unmarked jet landed with a team that escorted the scientists and all of their gear on board and departed within the hour?”
Cade shook his head. “No, none of that was in the official report.”
“Yeah, because that’s where the spooks got involved,” the man said. “I am one…was one, and those guys scared the shit out of me.”
