by D F Capps
He had a good point, Sean thought.
“Okay, you’re right. We don’t know for sure. If he had been, Andrews would have him in handcuffs by now, which means they have the people responsible in custody. We can publish the article about Kaplan.”
Ed wasn’t buying it yet. He needed more reasons to publish the article.
“Look, all of the electronic media are releasing the assassination story today, right now. People will already know most of the details before our paper sees any ink. What the others don’t have are the photos of generals in handcuffs being taken out of the West Wing—and the Kaplan story. What do you want to do, run the Kaplan story some other time? This is the perfect timing. It makes us stand out above the other news outlets.”
There was the usual pause from Ed. “We’re creating guilt by association, you know that, right?”
Sean smiled. “It’s two different stories. People will see that. It’ll be fine.”
Another pause. “I don’t know why I let you talk me into these crazy ideas of yours.”
Sean chuckled. “Because my crazy ideas and articles sell a lot of papers, that’s why.”
Chapter 50
The violent pounding on his hotel door jarred Sean Wells from a deep sleep. He staggered over to the door and peered through the peephole.
“Charlie,” he said under his breath. He opened the door and let the strange kid in.
“You have to leave, right now.”
Sean glanced at the clock on the desk. “It’s a quarter to five. What do you mean I have to leave?”
Charlie pushed past him. “The paper with your article about Kaplan is hitting the street.”
The kid sure seems wound up, Sean thought.
Charlie turned to face him. “The story has been online for just over three hours. Kaplan has two men on their way over here to kill you.”
Sean’s mouth fell open and his eyebrows raised. “What? How do you know that?”
Charlie shook his head. “No time to explain. Throw on some clothes and grab your computer. We’ve got to go, now!”
Sean dressed quickly and started to pack his suitcase.
“Leave it!” Charlie said. “Let’s go!”
Sean grabbed his computer, cell phone, and camera as they ran for the door. Halfway down the hall Charlie grabbed his arm. “They’re in the elevator.”
Sean stopped and stared at Charlie. “Stairs?”
“No time,” Charlie said. They stood in a long hallway. The entrance to each room was set back about six inches from the main wall with the recess extending a foot on both sides of the door. Charlie guided him into a recess with his back to the wall.
“Stand here,” Charlie said. “Close your eyes and don’t move. Stay perfectly still.”
The bell dinged from the elevator and the door opened. Sean swallowed hard and tried not to think about what was about to happen. The sound of footsteps approached. He held his breath. He felt relieved as the footfalls continued past him down the hall. He breathed out slowly and opened his eyes. Two men in dark suits walked down the hall away from him. He glanced at Charlie then back at the two men as they stopped at Sean’s room. They each drew a weapon with a suppressor attached. One swiped a card in the door lock, opened the door, and both men entered the room.
“Let’s go,” Charlie whispered as he grabbed Sean’s arm.
“What the hell just happened?”
Later. It was something he heard in his mind, but not with his ears. He looked at Charlie as the strange kid guided him to the elevator. Charlie pushed the button for the main lobby and then the button to close the door.
“Why did they walk right past us? They had to see us standing there.”
Charlie shook his head. “It’s easier to let people see what they expect to see.”
What they expect to see? Sean thought.
Charlie looked at him and nodded.
“So you’re saying . . .”
Charlie held up his hand, glanced from left to right, and pushed the button for the second floor. The elevator slowed, stopped, and the door opened.
“This way,” Charlie said. He guided Sean out onto the second floor, down the long hall and into a stairwell. “There’s a man waiting in the lobby.”
Sean pulled back and stopped. “And you know that because?”
Charlie turned to face him. “I can hear their thoughts. It’s a four-man team: two shooters, a back-up man in the lobby, and a driver outside.”
This was just getting too strange. “You can hear their . . . What do you mean you can hear their thoughts?”
The kid looked frustrated. “I have to get you out of here first, and then I can explain.”
Charlie led him out the east door, across the grass, and over to a silver compact car parked on Nineteenth Street.
“Is my boss at the paper in danger?”
Charlie pulled out onto the empty street and headed northwest. “Call him. Tell him he needs police protection, now!”
Sean grabbed his cell phone and called Ed. Full-fledged panic was starting to set in. “Come on, come on, I know it’s early . . . just answer the damn phone.”
“Wells? What is it now? Do you know what time it is?”
Sean breathed a sigh of relief. “Yeah, I know exactly what time it is. Call 911. Get the police over to your house right away. I just missed two guys with guns who were sent to kill me. You could be next on the list.”
There was that irritating pause again. “The article?”
Sean glanced behind them to see if they were being followed.
“Yeah, I should have listened to you. Get the cops around you and your family. I’ll call you when I can.”
He disconnected and turned to Charlie.
“Now do you want to tell me what the hell is going on?”
* * *
Admiral Hollis greeted Captain Jakovic as he entered the newly finished master control room for Operation Planetary Shield, deep inside Peregrine Base. The OPS center was round, fifty feet across, with a domed ceiling. Around the perimeter large display screens showed space debris and functioning satellites in orbit around the planet. With the network of incoherent back scatter radar arrays and receivers, they could track objects as small as an inch in low earth orbit. The OPS center had operational control over the global network of ionospheric heaters, also known as over the horizon radar (OTH-R), or high frequency active auroral research projects (HAARP). The OPS center gave him command authority over the particle beam cannons put in place to protect the transmitters from a Zeta Grey attack.
A twelve-foot diameter, two-foot thick laminated blast door stood open. In the event of an attack, the blast door would close automatically and seal off the OPS center. The walls, floor, and ceiling had the same protection as the door: laminated layers of armored steel, depleted uranium, and high strength ceramic. The OPS center had its own air and water supply, originally developed for nuclear submarines. Below the floor of the OPS center was another floor for the main computer system, accessible by a spiral stairway.
“Captain Jakovic, how many facilities do we have online?”
Jakovic pointed to a large display.
“The incoherent back scatter radar facility in Shanghai has just joined us, bringing us up to fifteen receiving stations. That allows us to monitor the entire globe for saucer intrusions.”
Hollis scanned the displays. “And transmitters?”
Jakovic pointed to additional displays around the room. “Fourteen. Xinjiang, China has not joined the planetary shield network yet. Russia now has four facilities online. Novgorod and Nakhodka have been online and ready for the last two days. Irkutsk joined us late yesterday along with the Antarctic facility. Particle beam cannons are in place in Russia and currently under construction in China.”
“So we still have a hole in the shield.”
Jakovic nodded. “Yes, sir, over the Pacific Ocean, east of China.”
Hollis shook his head. “Let’s hope we can bring
that station online before the Zetas figure out we don’t have complete coverage.”
“Understood, sir,” Jakovic said, checking the displays one more time.
God, I hate rushing this, Hollis thought. But we’re out of time. “We’re seeing a significant surge in saucers entering the atmosphere. We have to put a stop to this before we get overwhelmed. This is where we draw the line. Activate the shield.”
“Aye, aye, sir.” Jakovic turned to the control center. “Initiate Operation Planetary Shield. No one in, no one out.”
Chapter 51
“I have notified key members of Congress that I am taking these extreme measures and defensive posture in the hope of discouraging a direct attack on the White House,” Andrews said.
He had moved his family and close staff members into the residential section of the underground bunker beneath the White House, along with his personal military unit and Secret Service detail. “We have a lot of very upset people out there and I want to minimize any bloodshed that might take place.”
Doug Franks frowned. “This seems extreme to me. You think someone would actually launch a direct attack on the White House?”
Andrews carried an armful of his most important files into the elevator. “If they thought it would succeed? Yes, I do.”
Franks stepped into the elevator. “The optics on this make you look paranoid. Shouldn’t we at least appear as though things are normal?”
The elevator door closed. “Residential bunker,” Andrews said. It felt as though the bottom fell out from under them.
Franks grabbed the handrail. “I’ll never get used to this thing dropping like that.”
“Get used to it. We’re going to be down here for a while.”
Franks held tight to the handrail. “You make it sound as if we are at war.”
Andrews looked over at him. “We are at war.”
* * *
“Where is Andrews?” Conrad Kaplan demanded.
“He’s moved his wife and close staff into the underground bunker,” Senator Whitcolm said.
Kaplan poured some bourbon into a glass from the minibar in the stretch limo. “Protection?”
Whitcolm handed him several sheets stapled together and took the glass.
“His Secret Service detail plus his personal military unit, all heavily armed.”
Kaplan scanned the pages. “So a direct assault isn’t likely to be successful. Andrews is a cagy adversary, I have to grant him that. I have a number of people currently in sensitive positions inside the military on retainer. One of them has some intel you may find useful. I’ll make him available to you. Does Andrews know about our association with the Zeta Greys?”
Whitcolm took a sip of the bourbon. “I think so. He hasn’t been officially read in, but he seems to know what’s going on.”
Kaplan scowled. “What proof or evidence does he have?”
Whitcolm shook his head. “Nothing. All of that material is very closely contained. We’d know if anything was missing.”
Kaplan looked out the side window of the limo momentarily, then turned to Whitcolm. “Okay, you can use the ‘UFO nut’ label to discredit whatever he has to say.”
Whitcolm grinned. “I know exactly how to handle that. He’ll look like a complete mental case by the time I’m done with him.”
Kaplan finished his own glass of bourbon. “Good. I want you to move quickly on this. I need Andrews removed as soon as possible, you understand me?”
Whitcolm raised his glass to Kaplan and smiled. “Consider it done.”
* * *
“Okay,” Charlie said. “About what happened in the hotel hallway: They didn’t expect to see anyone in the hallway, so I reinforced that expectation by projecting the image of an empty hall into their minds. That projection temporarily took the place of what their eyes were seeing, so our presence didn’t rise to the level of conscious recognition.”
Sean folded his arms over his chest and slid slightly away from Charlie.
“I know, you don’t believe me, which is fine. I don’t have to prove anything to you one way or the other. What I have to do is try to keep you alive.”
Sean’s heart was already racing with adrenaline. Now it was pounding.
“Why would you care?”
Charlie glanced at him and then back to the road ahead.
“Bottom line? I need to use you as leverage against the political system. I need to expose certain things and you are in a unique position to make that revelation believable.”
So he’s keeping me alive so he can use me, Sean thought. How refreshing.
Charlie looked at him and laughed out loud.
“So you . . .”
Charlie nodded. “Of course.”
Sean had never encountered anyone like Charlie before. He found it nerve-wracking and intimidating.
“Relax,” Charlie said. “What I need is actually right up your ally.”
Sean’s curiosity took over. “So you want me to do what, exactly?”
Charlie glanced at him then looked back at the road. “I want you to write about the crooked and corrupt dealings between corporations and politicians.”
Sean nodded slowly. “Like Conrad Kaplan and the Africa thing?”
“Yes, you did well with that. You were willing to risk your life to tell the truth to the public. By doing that, you earned my trust. Those code name operations you wanted to see? The files are in the trunk. When I get you settled in for the night, they’re yours.”
* * *
Conrad Kaplan’s special phone buzzed. It was an encrypted message from USAP317. The FBI had an arrest warrant for him. They were also tracking his private jet. They would be waiting for him when he landed. The message ended with a single word: EVADE. He stood, walked forward, and leaned into the cockpit.
“We need to make a change in airports. Use Paine Field instead.”
Nick Chambers nodded. “I’ll notify ATC of the change.”
Kaplan reached out and grabbed Chambers’s shoulder. “No. Don’t do that. Just change course and land at Paine Field.”
Chambers shook his head. “I can’t do that. We won’t have clearance to land. We could collide with another aircraft.”
Kaplan dug his thumb into Chambers’s shoulder. “It’s not a request; it’s an order. Take the risk.”
Chambers winced in pain, then nodded. “As soon as we divert from the flight path, they’re going to send pursuit aircraft after us.”
Kaplan released Chambers’s shoulder. “So what else is new?”
Chambers didn’t say anything else. During the approach he banked to the north and lined up on Paine Field.
Kaplan texted his helicopter pilot with instructions, returned to his seat, and buckled in. Alarms started going off in the cockpit as the jet nosed down for a landing.
“They’re not going to like this,” Chambers said.
They already don’t like it, Kaplan thought. And they’re going to like it even less before I’m done with them.
Kaplan’s private executive jet landed at Paine Field in Snohomish County north of Seattle just missing a Cessna taxiing onto the runway. The Cessna had quickly turned onto the grass in order to avoid a collision with the jet. Kaplan exited the jet and ran for his helicopter as it swooped in from the south. He climbed in and put on the earphones as his pilot lifted off and headed east for home.
“Stay low and turn off all tracking devices.”
His pilot looked over at him. “Copy that, boss. Going dark.”
Kaplan looked down through the clear bubble of the helicopter as six black SUVs rushed into Paine Field and surrounded his jet. They’ll be at my home and business, too.
“Follow the terrain, head north, then swing across the water north of Friday Harbor, got it?”
His pilot scanned the air around them, dropped to just above tree level, then said, “Got it, boss.”
Kaplan took the battery out of his phone and settled in for the rough flight as the helo swoope
d and lifted just over the treetops. Forty-five minutes later his helicopter skimmed above the water and landed momentarily on Point Caution, in the San Juan Islands Marine Preserve. He hopped out onto the gray rocks as the helo lifted off, banked back over the water, and disappeared back toward the mainland.
He walked to the edge of the stone point, removed the SIM card from his phone and tossed the card into the waves. He watched it disappear into the churning gray-green water before he turned south and walked into the dense forest of the preserve.
* * *
Sean and Charlie took turns driving. By early evening they were in Nashville, Tennessee. Charlie drove to the airport and parked in the short term lot.
“Wait here.”
He got out, pulled a carry-on case from the trunk of his car, and walked through the arrivals door. Thirty minutes later he pulled up in a rental car.
“Let’s find you a hotel room.”
Sean followed him to a big chain hotel near the airport. Charlie went in, registered, and led him to the room.
“Isn’t a hotel next to an airport a little obvious?” Sean asked.
“Not really. They will know you didn’t travel by air, so hotels by an airport will have a very low priority in their search for you. You’ll need to use cash for food, gas, and lodging—no cards, no checks—so pick places carefully. You can use the same fake ID you have for undercover investigations. How much cash do you have?”
Sean felt uncertain about everything that was happening, but Charlie did prevent him from being shot. That counted for something. “Roughly? Around four hundred.”
Charlie dug into his pocket. “I’ve got about three hundred. This should get you through the next three to four days.”
Sean pocketed the cash. “And how do you know what ID I use for investigations?”
Charlie looked at him. “How do you think I know?”
Sean closed his eyes. “You hear my thoughts.” He looked at Charlie again.
