Echo (The Remote Traveler Series Book 3)

by Finian Blake

  The Director waved Boris over to the bar presenting him with a glass of Scotch. “Your lovely wife Rhonda invited me to your little dinner. You are going to have to tell me how you keep both Cherry and Rhonda content.”

  “I don’t keep them content,” Boris smiled broadly. “I just try to survive.” Both men broke out into a raucous laugh. Cherry and Rhonda walked up to the bar with each woman giving Boris a warm kiss and kissing the Director lightly on the cheek.

  “What was all of that sinister laughter about,” Rhonda asked as she grabbed a handful of Boris’s inner thigh.

  “The director was just asking how I keep both of you content,” Boris said trying to keep the pain out of his voice, “and I explained to the director that the opposite was true.” The director lifted his glass and salute.

  “Ladies, since you are no longer in my employ I can say this without fear of being charged with sexual harassment.” The director lifted his glass and salute to the two ladies once again. “I would like to see if I could pass your survival course.”

  “Anything is possible,” Rhonda said as the director spit his drink back in the glass. An extremely attractive woman slipped in between Rhonda and Boris putting her arm around his waist. She was extremely well-dressed and in excellent shape. It was obvious that she was older than Boris but from the director’s observation she was not much older. The director looked her up and down appraising her looks not caring that he was being obvious. Boris coughed loudly to get the director’s attention.

  “Director Valiant I would like to introduce my mother Tamar,” Boris said loudly trying to break the director’s leering gaze. “Mother, Director Valiant is my former boss.”

  “Mother,” the director said smoothly, “you must have been a child bride because there is no way that you are old enough to be his mother.”

  “Director since Tamar is the only unescorted woman here perhaps you would like to be seated together?” Rhonda said staring directly into Boris’s eyes with an impish grin. The maître d’ approached Cherry.

  “The rest of your party is being seated if you would care to join them.”

  With thirty people it was decided that the party would use five circular tables. Colleen and Adam were seated at one table with Tom, Helen, Sue, and Cher. Rhonda artfully made sure that Tamar and Director Valiant were not seated at the same table as Boris, Cherry, and herself. Boris tried to go over and talk to his mother. Every time that he tried to leave, both Cherry and Rhonda would grab a handful of his inner thigh to keep him in place.

  Colleen walked up to Cherry placing a hand on her shoulder calling her attention to Cher, Sue and Adam sitting at the next table. Adam was waving his hand somewhere in a wide circle illustrating his story with Cher and Sue giggling uncontrollably at the tale.

  “Cherry this is what I was hoping for,” Colleen bubbled. “I wanted to thank you for bringing the girls to the dinner. I was looking for something that would help Adam snap out of this depression and the girls are that perfect something.”

  “I told Nadia to bring Cher with her whenever she comes out to visit after all I am her second mother." Cherry laughed adding, “I hope this means that you are picking up the check.”

  “I will absolutely pick up the check,” Colleen said without hesitation.

  “Nonsense,” Cherry protested, “we have already discussed business with Director Valiant and everybody here is either an investor or employee of the computer service, so Four Diamonds Security will pick up the tab and we will call this a business meeting. Why don’t you rejoin Adam and the girls while I discuss one more piece of business with Director Valiant?” Cherry, Rhonda, and Boris walked over to the table where the Director and Tamar were having an after dinner drink.

  “Paul, are you trying to get my mother drunk,” Boris asked trying his best to sound serious.

  “I am not trying to get her drunk,” the Director said happily slurring his words. “She is drunk.”

  “Paul is too drunk to drive so I am having Xavier drive us back to my place in one of the limousines and if you knock on my door before noon I shall be very cross.” Tamar held out her hand to Paul giggling as she did, “Let’s go before my son says something that I will have to spank him for.” Cherry decided to shelve her business until tomorrow when the Director would be more coherent. She quickly grabbed Boris and Rhonda dragging them over to the table where Adam, Colleen and the girls were laughing heartily. Adam was leaning back in his chair with his hands behind his head singing a silly song that he had learned in school as a child. Cherry noticed that the top three buttons of his shirt were undone and slid her hand in quickly giving one of his nipples a firm twist. He jerked forward quickly trapping Cherry’s arm pulling her half over the back of his chair.

  “You are such a wanton witch,” Adam exclaimed loudly. “I have half a mind to take you over my knee.”

  “Well you are right about one thing. You have half a mind, but you are never going to get me over your knee. Cherry spun to get away, but Adam held on and the chair tipped over heavily dropping both people to the floor. The loud commotion caused the manager to come by the table.

  “We can’t have this going on here. The restaurant is full.”

  “Yes I think it is time for us to go home we have all had too much to drink,” Adam quickly answered before Cherry could say anything.

  “Yes, my brother is right everybody has had too much to drink.” Cherry looked at the manager, “bring me the check and we will be on our way.” When the check arrived Cherry reviewed the charges paying the $4800 bill adding in a $1000 gratuity offering the manager a quick apology before leaving. After everybody left the manager leaned heavily on the bar downing the double whiskey that the bartender had placed on the bar knowing that it would be ordered.

  “That really could have been messy,” the manager said with a sigh of relief. “They drop at least six grand a month in here.”

  As everybody was loading in the limousines for the short ride back, Cherry pushed her way in to the limousine with Adam and Colleen.

  “Is my big bad brother over his sorry ass depression or are you still sulking,” Cherry said wrapping her hand tightly in the hair at the back of his head.

  “Bitch…!” Colleen shrieked at Cherry. Adam squeezed Colleen’s hand tightly trying to block off any further comment.

  “You got shot, and they carted your ass off. There was not one damn thing that you could have done to prevent what happened to your team,” Cherry snarled unsympathetically.

  “It isn’t that,” Adam protested weakly. “For the last six months I have been arguing with the base commander to let Noah be a team leader with me. That could have been my brother that died for the team,” Adam said with his voice on the edge of tears.

  “And if it was either you or Noah the whole thing may never have happened, or maybe Noah could have died with the team. No one will ever know. Boo-hoo, boo-hoo, square your ass away and get over it. You chose his line of work.” Cherry jumped out of the back seat signaling the driver to move out before either Adam or Colleen said a word. Cherry stormed back in the bar for another drink and was surprised to find Ted and Nadia quietly sipping a beer at the bar.

  “Damn candy ass, he shoots people for a living,” Cherry was seething with rage. “I have too many friends that aren’t on oxygen anymore to feel sorry for somebody the collected one miserable bullet hole. They tortured, raped and killed thirty people that I knew and candy ass is crying about a couple soldiers that were equipped to fight. Am I wrong?”

  “Yes you are wrong,” Ted said quietly as both women looked at him in shock. “You waited too long to jump his ass. I think that you should have gotten after him as soon as he started his whining. Taking chances is what we do, and sometimes it turns out poorly, but we know about the chances we are taking.” The manager was about to say something about the coarse loud talk, but there were only two other people left in the bar and they didn’t seem to mind, so he closed off the bar and left them to thei
r evening.

  The sun was well up when the smell of coffee awakened Cherry. She stumbled downstairs naked not bothering to dress finding Adam pouring himself a cup of coffee.

  “You really do have a nasty edge. Colleen really wanted to kick your ass all the way home,” Adam laughed. “Somehow I found myself defending you and in the process I realized that you are right.”

  “I’m glad to hear that, because Ted thought I was right on target and Nadia wanted a conversation with you too,” Cherry sighed. “You’re my brother and I love you but wake the fuck up.”

  “You’re right,” Adam said quietly. “The coffee is strong would you care for cream in it.”

  “Well that was the easy part of my day,” Cherry laughed pointing to the guest house out the back door. “Queen Tamar took Paul Valiant home to bed over there and now I have to convince Boris that she is his mother and not his daughter. She is almost sixty.”

  “Is she sexually active,” Adam asked.

  “That is putting it mildly,” Cherry laughed. “Boris brought her over from Batumi Georgia because he thought that she was terminally ill. Let me tell you brother, she is anything but terminally ill.”

  “Aren’t you cold,” Adam laughed. “You’ve got gorgeous tits and I enjoyed looking at them but you are my sister, so at least grab a towel.” Cherry ran upstairs into the bedroom yanking the covers off of Boris and Rhonda.

  “Get your asses out of bed my brother stopped by for breakfast.” Cherry ran over to the phone calling Colleen. “My sorry ass brother stopped down for coffee drag your butt down here and I will make it a breakfast.” Cherry hung up the phone before Colleen it a chance to reply. She jumped in the shower doing a record-breaking two-minute wash. Cherry threw on her normal robe which was very thin silk and clung to every inch of her damp body before running downstairs to start cooking breakfast. Suddenly there was a knock at the back door Cherry looked out the back window to see Paul standing at the door with a Russian tea glass in his hand. She waved him in with a smile.

  “I see that you have discovered Tamar does not drink coffee,” Paul just stood there with his mouth open staring at Cherry. She waved her hand in front of his face, “it’s easier to talk if you just move your jaw.” Cherry’s thin robe did little to hide her chiseled body.

  “Tamar only has tea,” Paul said holding up an empty Russian tea glass.

  “Adam was kind enough to make a pot of coffee help yourself the fixings are next to the pot.”

  “You’ll have to excuse my stare I have never seen you so informally dressed,” Paul stammered.

  “Let’s get it over with,” Cherry said undoing the belt of her robe, opening the robe wide so that Paul could see her. “Now you don’t have to imagine what I look like naked. I do have one piece of business that I missed last night and if you could just give me an answer I think we can get on with our day. What do you want to use as a designator for a little operation?”

  “I have given it some thought and I believe that I would like to call your operation ‘Echo’. You are a remote backup and can perform most of the things that we do out of the building.” The Director gave them a warm smile.

  “Yes I believe that ‘Echo’ is the perfect name,” Cherry smiled. I was hoping that you wouldn’t want Shadow. It is over used.”

  “That is absolutely the perfect name for our operation,” Boris said as he walked into the kitchen. “You have two mainframes and the associated server banks are located in their own room with a totally independent connection to the outside world. Our commercial mainframes and their servers are also completely independent of yours. We have independent diesel generators in case of a power failure and we have a direct link to all the communication satellites so this will be a completely independent backup.”

  “And how much are you going to bill the NSA for this little setup?”

  “We will bury the expenses for this in with our contract for other services to the NSA, so there will be no record of your little backup system.” Rhonda let her voice assume a formal tone pointing at Adam, “are you really going to discuss this in front of a foreign national.” The director looked questioningly at Adam.

  “I am not really here. I am in Manchester on convalescent leave.” Adam laughed.

  “The secret that I would really like to find out is what does a guy have to do around here to get some breakfast?” The director pleaded with a laugh. Rhonda put on a fresh pot of coffee while Cherry put the frying pan on the stove to begin breakfast.

  After breakfast Cherry decided to have Tamar do the tour of the facility for Paul. She started with a residential area pointing to the last house on the road. “That is where our architect Morris Feynman lives.”

  “Your architect lives on the property,” Paul exclaimed.

  “The reason that I mentioned it was that he designed the entire complex and the reason he stays here is because Cherry allows him to build things his way with the materials that he envisions. He used Disney, NASA and EPA engineers to get things exactly right. They loved doing the project since they could do it with an unlimited budget, without any interference. This property is as much a work of art as it is a facility.” Tamar drove down to the very end of the road pointing to the middle of the property. “Look up the hill and tell me what you see. Then look down the street and tell me what you see.” Paul looked up the hill.

  “Looking up the hill I can see two small buildings and a whole bunch of trees. Looking down the street I can see a curving tree lined Suburban Street with ten houses on one side of it.” Tamar drove down the full length of the street driving in between Cherry’s house and the house next door.

  “Each house is 5,000 square feet with a 900 square foot guesthouse and a six horse barn sitting on ten acres. All of the key personnel live here.” Tamar took the aboveground route, “Our recreation center is also a training facility and the way it is built in the hillside nobody would ever guess that there is 66,000 square feet of space inside, or that it is actually four levels. Our ‘Disney Boys’ did an amazing job. We let their imagination fly.” They were almost on top of the building before Paul realized that it was dug into the slope. Tamar continued driving up the tree lined curving road that switch backed at the area containing the backup generators, and cooling system for the complex. “Our NASA engineers did this section. Water, sewage and backup power are literally ‘space age’. The whole project is self-contained.”

  “Up ahead is a dual landing helicopter pad and if you use both landing pads we can land something as large as an Osprey with room to spare. We have poles that retract hydraulically that are designed to look like pine trees to prevent unwanted helicopter landings and once the rotors of stop spinning we can raise the polls to prevent an unwanted takeoff. When we get to the top of the hill I will turn you over to Boris who will finish the tour.” Tamar pulled up to Boris who was standing by a down ramp. Tamar gave Paul a warm kiss, “I hope I have been able to show you something you will be interested in.”

  “You most certainly have,” Paul said giving her a warm kiss before climbing off the cart. Tamar threw the cart in gear driving down the down ramp.

  Paul smiled sheepishly at Boris, “Boris I didn’t mean to…”

  “Paul, she is not my daughter and Tamar is old enough to know better,” Boris interrupted. “I will show you the extra areas that we use for a cover and then will take you down to the computer area. The building is one hundred and fifty feet on a side for a foot print of twenty-two thousand square feet and then we have three levels which totals 66,000 square feet. The top floor which holds Cherry’s fashion label and spa has ten foot ceilings, the middle floor which acts as a sound stage has thirty foot ceilings, finally the basement which holds the computers is completely underground having ten feet of compacted earth before you get to the twenty foot ceilings. The total footprint of the building is half an acre, but from the top of the ridge only the top floor is aboveground, and we are far enough off the road that anybody looking in from outside
the security fence will only see trees. There are several large boulders left over from the glacial period that the drive threads between creating a natural barrier that we have fortified to prevent a direct assault from gate crashers.”

  “I am completely impressed,” Paul said, “but can we get down to the computer level?” Boris waved Paul in the building guiding him to the elevator which was just off the front door in the center of the building. When they got in the elevator Boris opened a special panel located underneath the controls for the normal operation inserting a circular key in the panel giving it a quarter turn. When they got down to the subbasement Paul was disappointed to see a small lobby. After going through Boris’s lab he found that only half the basement was in use. There was a wide open area 150-feet by 75-feet and 75-feet back in the cavern were two roll up doors that were about twenty feet apart. Boris selected the right roll up door which when opened exposed several racks of the electronic components.

  “Director, in this room there are two mainframe computers and associated servers. These will be the backup that we discussed. In the other room are two other mainframe computers and associated servers which are the ones that we will be using for our purposes. You will notice that only half the room is being used so we can double the capacity and still keep the computers completely independent of each other. On the other side we have an identical set up plus in the vacant area that we just walked through there is room for an additional eight mainframes which I am planning on installing.”

  “Shit, what about cooling and power,” the director asked in disbelief.

  “We have made a provision for all of that when we designed this area. The good news is this entire lower level is hardened against magnetic pulse.” Boris bragged.

  “And you can bury this in other contracts,” the director asked cautiously.

  “Absolutely you and whoever you choose will be the only ones that know about your ‘Echo’.” Boris said resolutely.