by Mark Harritt
Captain Dickenson shook hands with each of the team members as they were introduced. He winced as he shook hands with Mickey, “Ah, excuse me, you don’t look like the typical infantryman that I’m used to. I was a combat engineer before I switched to the Air Force and became an officer.”
Rob nodded, “Yes sir, we’re too pretty to be your average infantryman, but they finished with the recruiting posters and TV spots so they decided to send us here.”
Mike smiled at the Captain’s confused look, “You can ignore him. I always do.” Mike continued, “We can discuss this later. One of my men needs to go with the pallet. We have weapons and munitions on it.”
“Don’t worry, Chief, We’ll be escorting it the entire way to Area 19. If you don’t mind, let’s go ahead and get in the van, and we’ll get off of the airfield.
“That’ll work,” Mike replied.
The team grabbed their backpacks and followed the Captain out of the plane. They climbed into the van and took seats.
“All right, the short bus,” Mickey observed.
“And so appropriate for this group,” Mike stated.
The driver was a Staff Sergeant, skinny, losing what little red hair he had. He had a face full of freckles, and an easy smile.His name was Staff Sergeant Drapier. The Captain gave him directions to follow the forklift, which was starting to pull away from the aircraft towards a gate that led off of the airfield. The fork lift and passenger van pulled through the gate and the fork lift approached a flatbed truck. As Mike watched, the fork lift pulled alongside the flat bed and started loading the pallet onto the truck. Two other Air Force personnel gave hand signals to the person on the fork lift so that the pallet was placed square onto the flatbed, the fork lift tines moving between the four by fours on the truck bed. As soon as the two Air Force personnel had the pallet loaded on the truck bed correctly, they waved off the fork lift, and strapped down the pallet to the truck bed for movement. They hopped into the cab of the truck.
Mike asked, “Are we going far from here?”
“What?”
“Are we moving far from here? You just strapped the pallet to a flat bed, so I’m assuming that we’retraveling.”
Captain Dickenson shook his head, “No, We’ll be leaving the base though. We’ll travel down highway 89. We have to travel to get to Area 19. It’s not too far. We’llfollow the flatbed, and they have orders not to lose sight of us. Not too much of a problem.”
Mike had to trust the captain. The team settled in, the flatbed pulled away from the loading zone, and the van fell in behind it.
“Where are you guys from?” the Captain Dickensonasked.
“We’re from Fort Carson.”
“I was station at Fort Bragg. I was with the 307th Engineer Battalion before they were deactivated in 2006.”
Everett told him, “Well, you’ll be glad to know that the unit has been reactivated and is now part of the 20th Engineer Brigade.”
“Yeah, I still have some friends in the Engineers at Bragg. My buddies from Operation Iraqi Freedom emailed me and told me that it had been reactivated.”
“So, who are you guys with?” Dickenson asked.
Mike replied, carefully, “Well, the requirements that you sent meant that a more specialized unit had to be called in for this mission.”
Captain Dickensonwaited, “What unit is that?”
Mike looked at him, “Maybe we can talk when we get to a secure area.”
Captain Dickenson looked at him a moment, and then suddenly the light went off. He grinned, “I’ll show you mine if you show me yours,” he said.
Mike grinned back at him, “Don’t you love special access programs?”
They exited Malmstrom Air Force Base and headed southon a road that swung to the southeast. Mike assumed it was highway 89. They were surrounded by farm land. They passed farm houses widely spaced from each other. The farms were covered in wheat fields, with the occasional soy bean farm. To the south and west they could see mountains rising off of the flat lands. To the east there was a small group of mountain peaks that sat by themselves away from any other mountains. They kept moving east on highway 87. The mountains to the east kept getting larger. The flatbed pulled off on a side road going north, and the shuttle bus followed.
As the shuttle bus traveled, Captain Dickenson talked about accommodations, “Gentlemen, we have two rental cars reserved for you at Enterprise on base, and rooms reserved for you at the base BOQ. Once we’re done here today, we’ll move you back to Malmstrom, and you can pick up your rental cars. Tomorrow, you can drive directly out here to Area 19. We greatly appreciate that you’re able to come out and help us with our project.”
Tom put his hand up.
Captain Dickenson smiled, “And if you could hold your questions until we get to a secure area, I would greatly appreciate it.”
Tom’s hand slowly went down.
Mickey looked at him, “Dude, you should have gone before we got on the bus.”
Rob spoke, “Are we there yet?”
Finally, they rolled up to their destination. The flatbed turned onto a small access road barely large enough for the truck. The access road led to a large metal building that sat out in a field. The area around the building had a chain link fence topped by razor wire. There were large cement security barriers around the perimeter that butted up to the fence to prevent any vehicle from driving through the chain link. Alarge parking lot on the side of the building had a vehicles parked in it.From where he was, Mike could see a security checkpoint at the front doors of the building. The flatbed truck pulled up to a gate, and an Air Force security guard walked over to the flatbed. He checked the Air Force ID cards and security badges of the driver and his assistant. He pulled a handset and started speaking into it. The gate rolled back to admit the flatbed.
Mike and the team were doing what they were trained to do. They were checking out the security of the site. Mike saw a CCTV system, with a CCTV camera that was capable of infrared and starlight. There were eight inch metal stanchions in the ground at the gate. If there was a problem, the guard in the guard house would hit a button, and hydraulics would send the metal stanchions up so that no vehicle would be able to breech the gate. Mike saw security lights with sensors to trigger the lights if movement was detected. The place was well defended.
The shuttle bus parked. Captain Dickenson spoke, “Gentlemen, we’ll have to give you guest passes until we get you processed, and the rules are such that you’re not allowed to bring electronics into Area 19. You can check your pistols at Security.”
“Uh, we have some expensive electronics here,” Everett said.
“You can leave your bags in my office, if that’s good enough for you. Otherwise, you’ll have to leave them in the van.”
Mike looked around at his team. Nobody seemed to be upset about leaving their packs in the captain’s office, “Sure, no problem, lead on.”
The security building had two sides, one for people going in, and one for people coming out. Captain Dickenson walked into Security and everybody walked in behind him. The Captain started talking to the Tech Sergeant behind the desk. The Tech Sergeant was an Asian named Yee, with an athletic build. Captain Dickenson turned to Mike and his team and asked for their military ID cards. He handed their IDs to Tech Sergeant Yee. He sat down at a computer and started typing. The Tech Sergeant ran a check to verify that they were who they said they were, secured the IDs, and replaced them with security badges. There were two other security guards present, a female Senior Airman, named Trevino, athletic, brown hair, and a gangly, pasty white Staff Sergeant named O’Neill that looked like he spent too much time playing games online. There was a clearing barrel outside, so they went out and cleared the weapons, then brought them back and handed them to O’Neill. The gangly Staff Sergeant gave them chits for their weapons, and secured them behind the desk. After this, Captain Dickenson walked them through security to the building behind.
Captain Dickenson swiped his bad
ge, “Please swipe as you go through so that security knows where you’re at. Everybody swipes their IDs, no free riders through secure areas.”
They walked through the front door. As soon as they stepped inside, there was another security desk. The guards there were back up for the guards in the security building out front. The desk was immediately to the right. Behind it were two more Air Force security guards. He couldn’t see their name tags. One was a black female, short hair, curvy, attractive. The other was a very large Samoan, with huge arms. Mike could see that there was an office behind the desk, so there were probably more security guards present.
Straight ahead was a long hall that led to a large door at the end. Captain Dickenson walked down the hall. The team followed through the building. The building was big, and the front area was filled with offices. On the walls was the typical detritus that washes up on military installations. Mike could see the chain of command in pictures, all the way up to the president. There was also the NCO chain of support on the walls. Further down, there were photos of squadron personnel engaged in family gatherings and sporting events. Commander’s policy letters were displayed.
There were smaller corridors that ran off of the main corridor to the left and right. Keeping in tradition with all secure buildings around the world, there were no windows. There were civilians and military alike in the offices. There were some that were open, and there were also secure areas with heavy doors andcypher locks. Need to know and all that; can’t have just anybody wandering through secure areas.
They walked through the administration offices, straight back through the hallway, then stepped through the door at the end of the hallway, a door that led into the back of the building. This area was a supply area, with locked cages spread throughout. There was also a large rolling shutter door that was slowly coiling up into a metal container at the top of the door. Outside, Mike could see the flatbed truck. A forklift was picking up the pallet from the flatbed.
Rob was looking around and something caught his eye.
“Is that a . . . ,” and he trailed off.
Captain Dickenson grinned, “Yep. That’s a refurbished missile launch tube, for a Minuteman two missile. We repurposed it, and the area under it, for our uses.”
The forklift lifted the pallet off the flatbed. Once the forklift and pallet came through the door, a large man, a Tech Sergeant, clicked the button and the door started closing. The Tech Sergeant was medium height, stocky with muscle and a little fat, light blond hair, cut extremely short. You had to look closely to see the hair. Mike looked at him, and for some reason, while looking at the Tech Sergeant’s head, thought of a big potato.
As the pallet came in, an Air Force 2nd Lieutenant walked up. An older man was with her. Captain Dickenson introduced her as 2nd Lieutenant Pang, and Mike would find out later that she was Hmong. Her smile made her look like a teenager in junior high. She was about five feet tall, maybe shorter, and very petite, which added to her youthful look. She was very pretty though, with nice curves. Next to her stood an older man, mid-forties, whose hair reminded Mike of a picture of Einstein, though the hair was shorter, salt and pepper. Still the hair looked like it was trying to escape from the top of his head. He was wearing a lab coat. He was introduced as Dr. Humphreys.
“Ah, we can’t just leave the pallet in a loading bay. It has munitions and weapons on it.” Mike said.
The forklift moved into the building and over to a service elevator for which the missile tube had been repurposed. Lieutenant Pang smiled at Mike. “Don’t worry, we have a very safe place for it.” The forklift placed the pallet in the middle of the service elevator. The Tech Sergeant stepped into the elevator and walked to a small control panel. There was no door on the front of the elevator. The Tech Sergeant pressed another button and the platform started moving down. The civilian in the forklift drove away.
Captain Dickenson explained, “We have a secure area below. Your pallet will be there, and I’ll take to you to it tomorrow. We have to get you read on to our program, before I can allow you to go below.”
Mike nodded, “Not a problem, just let us strip the pallet. Don’t let anybody else touch it until we do. We have everything balanced and know where the explosives are. Plus, we have a few expensive toys on there that don’t need to be knocked around.”
Captain Dickenson nodded, “We can do that.” Then the meaning of Mike’s words reached him, “You mean you have explosives on that pallet? Why do you have explosives?”
Mike looked at him and then pulled out a manila envelope. The envelope had orders, emails, and the list of requested items, “Because somebody in your command asked us to bring our standard combat load. In our standard combat load, we carry hand grenades of various types, and explosives.”
“Well, we weren’t expecting that. I’ll make sure that everybody understands that you’re the only ones that touch your pallet.”
Mike nodded, “Thanks.”
Lieutenant Pang took over. “Gentlemen, please follow me and we’ll go to the SAP custodian.” The Special Access Program custodian would have non-disclosure agreements for them to sign so that they could have access to classified information.
The team had no arguments with this. They were all very happy to follow the attractive Lieutenant to the SAP Custodian. They followed Lieutenant Pang to Captain Dickenson’s office first, where they left their backpacks. Then they followed her to the Special Security Office, where the SSO would read them on to the program. The SSO’s office was behind a stout metal, cypher locked door. When they got there, Mr. Landberg, the SSO, took them back into his office and gave them paperwork to fill out. Mr. Landberg was about thirty years old, medium height, brown hair with bangs that almost were long enough to fall into his eyes. He was dressed in business casual.
He showed them a short film. “Welcome to DARPA project Rossum,” the video stated. They watched the video. As the video continued, their mouths opened in wonder at what they were looking at.
Everett was the first to speak, “Mech, freaking, Armor. I think I have wood.”
Mickey replied, “That is the sexiest thing I think I have ever seen.”
Rob added, “I wonder if the basic model comes in another color.”
Mike threw in, “Screw color, I want mine painted up like a bad ass ninja with pirate flags.” Captain Dickenson, Lieutenant Pang, and Mr. Landberg started laughing.
Captain Dickenson spoke to Mr. Landberg. “Mr. Jamison and ColonelMitchem will want to talk to the team now.”
Captain Dickenson looked over at the team, “Director Jamison is the director, a civilian GS-15 in charge of the program, and Lieutenant Colonel Mitchem is our commanding officer.”
Mike nodded, and filed the information away. Since Jamison was a GS-15, technically he outranked the Lieutenant Colonel.
Landberg spoke, “Well, I’m finished, so you can call them now.” He grabbed all of the files and signed forms, and left the room.
Captain Dickenson got up from his chair, and left the room. After the phone call, he came back, and took a seat. He, Lieutenant Pang, and the team sat around, making small talk until the director and lieutenant colonel came into the room. Captain Dickenson stood as they entered the room. The team and Lieutenant Pang also stood. Mike held out his hand, which was ignored.
Colonel Mitchem took in their civilian attire with aplomb, but the civilian was taken aback. Colonel Mitchem was trim in his uniform, graying hair around the temple, average height. Jamison was completely different. The guy was twitchy. Mike was uncomfortable looking at the guy. Jamison definitely had anervous vibe coming from him. He was dressed completely in black; black jacket, black turtle neck, and black slacks. He had a shock of white hair, and stood about five foot five, shorter than everybody in the room except for Lieutenant Pang. The shock of white hair made Mike think of a cotton swab. Jamison was slightly hunched over, making him look smaller. A perpetual sneer seemed etched into his face. The guy didn’t look happy. Mike immediately
detested him. “Who the hell wears turtlenecks anymore?” Mike thought to himself.
“Who are you? We asked for military, not civilians.”
Mike started to reply to Jamison. “Sir, . . . “
Jamison ignored him and turned to the Lieutenant Colonel. “I thought you said they were infantry soldiers.”
LTC Mitchem turned to them, “Are you infantry soldiers?”
Mike nodded, “We are all combat soldiers. We all have infantry experience.”
Jamison still didn’t acknowledge him, “Why are they dressed in civilian clothes? They should be in uniform.” Mike noticed that Jamison didn’t look anybody in the eye as he was talking to them.
Mike started to speak, “Sir, . . . “
Jamison looked towards Mike, but didn’t look directly at him, his eyes not meeting Mike’s. He snarled a reply, “I wasn’t talking to you.”
Mike tried again, “Sir . . .”
Jamison slammed his hand on the wood of the table, then pointed at Mike, his face red with anger. Hissing, he said, “I told you to shut up.”
The entire team grew quiet and still. This was a major breach in decorum. They didn’t like the way Jamison was treating Mike.What made it worse was that Colonel Mitchem didn’t seem like he was going to step in to defuse the situation. Dickenson and Pang looked embarrassed. Mike could feel the blood creeping up his neck and into his face.Mike could see the wariness in Mitchem’s face. He didn’t know if it was because of his team or because of Jamison.
Mitchem spoke, “Why are you in civilian clothes?”
Mike answered, “This is our uniform, unless we’re directed to wear something else.”
He reached into his back pocket and pulled out his wallet. Inside, he had a memorandum indicating that he and his team were allowed relaxed grooming standards, based on the mission. There was no end date on the memorandum. The memorandum included civilian clothes. He pulled out the memorandum and slid it over to the Colonel. The Colonel started to reach for it, but Jamison got to it first. He snatched up the paper, hands jerking slightly as he read it.He passed the paper to Mitchem. Mitchem took a look at the paper and then passed it back to Mike.
