EARTH PLAN

by David Sloma

  Chang descended in the elevator to his office in the lowest level of the mansion. It was seven stories below ground, on a floor carved out of solid rock. This was desirable as it was more secure against intrusion by both physical and electronic means.

  He swiped his key card over the reader, then entered a numeric code on the keypad—the keypad had been installed as an extra layer of security, and he would have done much more if it were up to him.

  He entered the room, and the overhead lights flickered on; spotlights, casting pools of light on the smooth, rock floor. The room was like a bunker, very secure. He sat down in front of a computer with several monitors suspended on the wall in front. He swiped the key card in a reader and the computer screens came to life. He was prompted to enter a password, then to insert his finger for a fingerprint reading.

  Once that all checked out the screens then displayed different camera views. Some were of the mansion he was in, showing all the corridors, doorways, and entrances/exits. Then there were the views of the cameras outside the mansion, seeing into the dark with night vision and also infrared. These cameras ranged out into the forest and along the dirt road. Some were very small and mounted high in trees where no one would detect them.

  He switched the camera views to another set of cameras, this time at the professor's house. He had his men set up small cameras in various locations outside and inside the prof's place, in hopes that those who had tried to kill him and steal his work would return. So far, there was nothing much to see, just an abandoned house.

  But he had a hunch, so he played back the recordings that had been made since they had left the house. He had the foresight, or maybe it was just experience, to place a camera facing out to the street, to catch any traffic going by. This camera was, of course, very small and undetectable, hidden in a bush. He moved the video back and forth, looking for anything unusual.

  There was a lot of video to go through, so he clicked on the program that he had custom designed to look for patterns in the video. The program took a moment to load, then it scanned the footage. Surprisingly, it displayed a message that there was something for him to take a look at.

  He opened the link the program had made, and a section of the video played over in a loop, showing the same car driving by several times in a row. “What do we have here...?”

  Zooming in on the video in freeze-frame, he noticed the tires on the car were not ones that would be common on such a vehicle. They were flat-run tires, very expensive, that were usually only acquired by law enforcement and those very rich who wanted to outfit their amour-plated cars. Also, there were some strange antennas on the back of the car. He made a note of this and printed out some hard copies to show Mr. Lang.

  The software flagged a second pattern. This time it was a jeep outside the prof's house. It had circled a couple of times and had been sitting in one spot for a long time. Chang recognized the driver as the security chief from Charles's old employer. “Sneaky...” He made a printout of this as well and sat staring at the screen for some time.

  He found it strange that both these vehicles would be prowling around outside the house right after the incident. Where they looking for results or were they not involved in the hit, just watching? Chang scratched the stubble on his chin and realized he'd been up for a long time.

  He knew he should take a nap, but he had to show the printouts to Mr. Lang; there was clearly more than one party interested in what the professor and Charles had discovered, and he had to find out who they were before an attack came to the mansion. Without knowing who the enemy was there would be little chance to defend against them.

  He walked over to his fancy espresso machine and hit the button for auto. It kicked out a perfect double shot of espresso, just like he'd programmed it to do, into a small, white ceramic cup. Flicking on the CD player, some smooth jazz filled the room. He sipped the coffee while he waited for the high-resolution images to finish printing.

  After, he shut down the computer and went to the washroom in his office. There was a shower there, and he stripped off his clothes quickly, putting them, and his gun and holster on the bench. He took a fast, hot shower, then got dressed again in fresh clothes from the cabinet.

  Then he gathered the images he'd printed out into a folder and went to meet the others for dinner, locking the security room tightly behind him.

  As he walked, he called up his security team of ten men on the radio and made sure they were at their posts and that everything was fine. He was still expecting another attack.

  CHAPTER 30

  Mr. Lang stood up at the table and raised his glass of wine. The dining table had been set in the underground guest chambers where Charles, the prof, and his wife were staying. “Welcome everyone to the headquarters of the Guild of the Watchers. I trust you will be safe here. I'm sure all of us wish our gathering together was under different circumstances, but nevertheless, let us enjoy what is to be enjoyed!” Lang swept his hand over the table laden with delicacies.

  A murmur went through those around the table. The professor spoke up, “Thank you, Mr. Lang, for taking us in here.”

  “Of course,” Mr. Lang said. “It was my responsibility to do so, as I am quite sure it was due to the work you were doing for us that you were targeted.”

  The professor nodded. “Still, thank you, just the same.”

  “I consider you all as partners in our quest to bring truth to the world. What happens to you, happens to me, happens to our Guild. And we do protect our own. But let's enjoy our meal prepared by our fine chef and we'll discuss our business plans after dessert. Yes?” Lang said, then looked over those at the table. There was nodding of heads, and then the food was passed around.

  After dinner, they sat around the table sipping coffee and tea while Chang told them about his findings. “It appears there are two suspects for the hit on the professor's lab.” He passed around the printouts. “One is the company Charles used to work for, and that would be my first bet. But, there could have been others who would benefit from stealing their work, of course. Second, we have these unknown men in the car, who were likely part of it as well.”

  “Son of a bitch!” Charles said, as he saw the security chief from his old job in the picture.

  Lang looked over the pictures. “This is most alarming. Do either of you have any idea who the men in the car are, or who they could be working for?”

  “No, not a clue,” the prof said.

  “Me either,” Charles shrugged.

  “Hmm. Well, Chang, see what you can find out?” Lang said.

  Chang nodded. “Already on it. I'm putting some feelers out, now.”

  “Good.” Lang sighed. He looked over Charles, the prof, and his wife. “This business can be complicated and dangerous, there's no doubt about that. I'm just glad we got you here safely.”

  “Our poor house!” Wendy said.

  “Yes. That is unfortunate,” Lang said.

  “We'll get another one. I don't imagine we'd want to live in it again, after what happened there,” the prof said. Wendy shook her head, no.

  “When you feel up to it, you can pick up your work again,” Lang said.

  “I'd like that,” the prof said.

  “Yes. Me, too. It'll take my mind off things. I'm not used to being hunted down,” Charles said.

  “You're in good hands, here. Chang hasn't lost one, yet!” Lang looked at his security man, Chang.

  “That's right.” Chang said and smiled. “We've got the bases covered here and then some.”

  A blast thudded through the walls and shook the room slightly, making the liquids in the cups and glasses shake.

  “What's that?” Charles said, gripping the table. “Feels like an earthquake!”

  “In this region? Highly unlikely,” Lang said, looking around the room wildly.

  Chang pulled out his walkie-talkie and called one of his men, “We just heard a blast down here and felt it, too. What's going on?”

  “Not sure
, chief. There appears to have been an explosion in the woods. I'm sending out a couple of men to check it out,” said a voice from the speaker.

  “Good, be careful. I'm on my way up.” Chang got up.

  Lang was up and moving to the door with Chang. “You folks stay here; this is the safest place in the complex. There are guns in the closet, just push the bottom shelves to the left and a compartment will open. I'll send some guards down here to be stationed outside your door,” Lang said.

  Charles, the prof, and Wendy watched them leave and the door close over.

  “This is getting more and more serious all the time!” Charles said.

  “Think we'll ever get out of this?” Wendy hugged her husband.

  “You bet we will,” he said and held her tight.

  “I'll go get us those guns.” Charles went to the closet. He pushed the clothes aside and moved the shelf as he'd been told. It slid out of place and exposed a hidden compartment in the back of the closet with the guns. “Wow!” he whispered. He took out the guns; two handguns and two machine guns, and went back to join the others.

  When he got back there were a couple of armed guards standing by the doors. He put the guns down on the dining table.

  “Those look familiar,” the prof said, looking over the guns. They were the same kind of guns they had at the lab, which had been put on the moving truck.

  “I guess they must get a volume discount.” Charles smirked. He made sure they were loaded, but left them on the table. He sat down at the table looking at them. Wendy was wary of the guns, but she didn't want to be alone and felt safer near her husband, so she busied herself with clearing off the table, careful to avoid the guns.

  “What do you think that was out there?” Charles said.

  “No idea. But sounded like a bomb to me.” The prof turned to the men at the door. “Any word on what happened?”

  “Nothing yet,” one of the men said.

  Lang and his security chief took the elevator to the parking garage. Chatter came over the walkie-talkie in Chang's hand, as some of his men fought their way through the dense forest in search of the source of the blast.

  “None of the proximity alarms were tripped?” Lang asked.

  “No. I'd have been alerted.” Chang showed him a hand-held screen. “The alarms around the property are intact.”

  “It must have come from above then, flown in.”

  “That's what I'm thinking.”

  The elevator stopped at the garage level and Chang ran out.

  “Don't take any chances. I'll be watching,” Lang yelled after him, before the doors closed. He continued up to the high tower.

  Lang entered his office and went up the spiral staircase to the observation tower that gave a 360-degree view of the land below. It was night, so there was not a lot to see beyond the lights around the property. The city shimmered in the distance. There was a fire in the corner of the property, but it was not that large. Whatever it was, it would have been the source of the explosion, he knew.

  Why it hadn't come closer and done its job, he didn't know. He just hoped Chang would get to the bottom of it before whoever sent it tried again.

  He left the tower and went to his desk, opening up his secured, military-grade laptop, with even more special modifications; there were strange symbols on it and small pieces of what looked like transistors, even crystals. He called up a live view of all the cameras outside the mansion and zoomed in on the fire. There was not much he could see, even with the night-vision cameras.

  He replayed the footage of the explosion, looking for clues, as he dialed a number.

  “Moore here,” the sleepy female voice on the other end said.

  “This is Lang. Sorry to bother you so late, but this is important.”

  “Not a problem. What is it?”

  “There was an attempted attack on the mansion. Some kind of bomb exploded in the forest, on the property. Chang is checking it out now.”

  “Any idea who sent it?”

  “We have a couple of ideas, but nothing solid yet. Will you take a look?”

  “Sure thing. I'll get back to you as soon as I'm done.”

  “Thank you, that and who may be after our guests. I will talk to you soon.” Lang hung up and let his thoughts unravel. Barbara Moore was one of the gifted psychics of the Guild who were able to gather intelligence for them via a variety of methods, using their ESP gifts. She was the lead remote viewer and would run a session to see what could be gathered about the attack. If anyone could pick up any valuable information from the ether, it was Moore, he knew.

  He turned back to the screen, watching the cameras, and the progress of Chang and his men. He pulled a walkie-talkie out of his desk and turned it on so he could listen to them. Even though he was in his high perch, he still felt a bit blind. The attack had taken them completely by surprise, and he hated being taken by surprise.

  This will not do, he thought. I thought we were implementing better psychic scanning than this? We'll have to step up our scans and divination, he resolved. The psychics did scans from time-to-time, whenever the Guild was going to undertake a major move or project, but now Lang saw that there was a need to have remote-viewing scans done on a regular basis. “Dammit,” he cursed, hating his lack of foresight. He thought, We should have been doing this all along...

  Chang and five of his men walked through the dark woods with their night vision goggles on. It was far too dense bush to use an ATV or motorcycle, so they walked—plus walking would be the most quiet method to approach whatever it was the blew up in the far end of the property.

  Chang could see flames flickering through the trees and black smoke rising in the air. He wanted to get to whatever the object was and put it out before any planes noticed and reported it. Depending on what it was, a downed aircraft, or a missile, or even a dropped bomb, there was a chance that it hadn't yet been detected by the air-traffic control system or passing aircraft.

  Since it was late fall, the trees were bare and Chang and his team could see a long way. Chang stopped and gave the hand signal for his men to halt. They stopped, scattered along behind him to either side, looking in every direction for any threats.

  Once the coast seemed clear they crept towards the flames, keeping trees in front of them for cover. The flames were dying down and had only taken out a few trees. There was a deep depression in the ground, at least fifteen feet wide and ten feet down. The dirt was all blown away, and there were some debris in it, likely metal but nothing else.

  “Diversion,” Chang said to his man near him.

  The man nodded. “Looks like it, chief.”

  An alarm went off in the mansion and Lang checked the screens.

  Chang pulled the vibrating screen out of his pocket, warning him.

  There was a big, black SUV with blacked out windows at the front gate. Two men in green camouflage unmarked uniforms got out of the back and were setting something on the gate.

  Lang picked up the walkie-talkie, “Chang. We've got a situation here! There's someone at the gate, and I think they're going to blow it. Looks like they're setting charges.”

  “Roger that,” Chang whispered into the walkie-talkie. “I see it. We're heading back.” He gave the signal, and they started to run back to the mansion. “We checked the explosion and it was as I thought, a diversion. Be careful. We'll be there as soon as we can. B team, stay with the guests.”

  Lang watched helplessly as the vehicle backed away and went down the road. Seconds later, the gate did blow up. “Dammit,” Lang hissed.

  “We heard that,” Chang said over the radio.

  “I think we should get out of here,” said Lang.

  “Do it. We're on our way. Out,” Chang said.

  Lang shut down his computer, grabbed a thumb drive from it, then went to the closet and took out a big machine gun. He clicked on a walkie-talkie as he ran to the elevator. “B team, I'm coming down. Have the guests ready to depart.”

  “Roger that,�
�� one of the guards said from the living quarters.

  Lang pushed the button for the elevator. “Come on, come on!”

  The black SUV pushed through the damaged gate and sped up the driveway to the mansion. It was followed by three other black SUVs full of armed men in green camouflage uniforms.

  Two of the vehicles stopped by the garage door, and the men jumped out. They placed explosives on the garage door.

  The third SUV went to the far side of the house, where the men got out and started into the woods in the direction of the explosion.

  The explosives blew a hole through the garage door, and the vehicles were able to enter it. They raced through the garage, straight to the second garage door.

  At the door, they used a key card to gain access and went deep into the second garage. They opened the access door to the mansion with the key card and stormed through the hallway towards the living quarters.

  Chang and his men moved through the woods, running. They went as fast as the terrain would allow in the darkness, but it was tough going even with their night vision goggles.

  “Chief, I see them!” one of Chang's men said.

  “Hold it!” Chang whispered and came to halt. His men did the same. He got behind a tree, and his men followed suit. Peering into the darkness, he could make out several figures moving his way.

  Then the figures opened fire.

  “Shit!” Chang said, hitting the dirt.

  His men got down too, getting as low as they could to increase their cover. The men firing on them had high-powered guns, and the bullets took chunks out of the trees. Bark and branches fell over Chang and his men.

  Chang fired back a few times, but he knew he was out of range; so did his men. Their guns just couldn't match those of their assailants. All they could do was wait until they got close enough to get a decent shot.

  But then another group of assailants came upon Chang and his men from the side. “Drop your weapons!” a man shouted to Chang's side.