“Oh, shit,” Barnes exclaimed as a sliver of white poked out of Stith’s forearm. “His muscle spasms are breaking his bones! He’s got a compound fracture.” A slow swirl of red spread into the embryonic solution.
“Get him out of there now!” Dalton slammed his fist on top of the console.
“We just can’t pull him out,” Hammond said. “He’s breathing the liquid mixture and his body has been cooled. He’ll die if we just pull him out,” she said, her focus still on her console.
“He’ll die if he stays in there,” Dalton said as Stith spasmed again, this time the uncontrolled force of the muscles breaking his left leg, the misshapen shape of the thigh indicating the damage.
“Damn it,” Hammond said, reading something on her screen. “He’s vomiting the breathing mixture. Some of it must have gotten into his stomach.”
“Sergeant Major!” Sergeant Monroe had grabbed a fire ax. He stood ready next to the isolation tube with his teammate, the ax looking like a toy in his massive hands.
Dalton turned to Barnes. “What do you think?”
“Breathing, bleeding, and broken,” Barnes said succinctly.
Dalton knew exactly what he meant. The three priorities when treating a wounded man. And Stith was in bad shape on all three.
“Get him out now or we will,” he told Hammond.
“All right, all right.” Hammond shoved her keyboard back. She threw several switches. “I’m warming the embryonic solution as fast as possible and extracting the liquid mixture from his lungs.”
Dalton stood in front of the isolation tube, next to Monroe. “Take it easy, Pete,” Dalton said to Monroe in a low voice.
Dalton reached up with his hands and placed them on the glass, feeling the cold stab into his palms. “Hang in there, Louis. Hang in there.”
“His lungs are clear, but he’s not breathing oxygen,” Hammond said. “His nervous system isn’t responding. I’m forcing oxygen in and keeping his heart pumping with the microprobe.”
“Too slow,” Monroe muttered, lifting the ax.
Dalton reached under his fatigue shirt and pulled out his nine-millimeter pistol. He stepped back from the isolation tube, aiming.
“What the hell do you people think you’re doing?” Raisor was running down from behind the console.
“I’m going to break this goddamn thing!” Dalton yelled. “Pull him out or we get him out our way. Now!”
“He’s still too cold!” Hammond protested.
“He’s not breathing!” Dalton yelled. He shifted his aim from the glass to Raisor.
The CIA agent stared at Dalton’s eyes for a second. Raisor wheeled toward Hammond. “Do it.”
Hammond slammed her fist down on a lever. With a hum of motors, the winch began reeling in the nylon strap that was attached to Stith’s harness. The body came up out of the tube, dripping embryonic solution. Hammond pushed on the lever and Stith swung over the ground, his body twitching.
Dalton holstered his pistol and had his arms up. With Monroe, he caught Stith’s body as it came down. Dalton could feel the chill. “Get this thing off him,” he said, pointing at the TACPAD.
Hammond was kneeling over the body. She spoke to herself as she worked. “Extracting cryoprobes.” She pressed a small button set on the outside of the TACPAD.
“Hurry!” Dalton yelled.
“You can’t take it off until they’ve fully retracted. You’ll break them off.” Her hands kept moving, hitting another button. “Extracting thermocouples.”
Hammond reached down and slid the microprobe out of Stith’s chest. With Barnes’s help, she pulled the TACPAD off his head.
Dalton leaned over and ran his fingers through the sergeant’s mouth. They came out dripping blue fluid.
“Shit,” Dalton muttered. He leaned over, locked his mouth onto Stith’s, and blew. Nothing. He threw Stith over his knee, face-down. He slammed into the man’s back with both fists. A large pile of embryonic fluid gushed out of Stith’s mouth onto the floor. Dalton hit him again, then put him on the floor on his back. He breathed into his mouth; this time the sergeant’s lungs came up.
Barnes was across from Dalton, feeling for a pulse. “Nothing,” he said, then slammed his fist down onto Stith’s chest. He began compressions in ratio to Dalton’s breathing.
Dalton fell into the rhythm. In between Barnes’s compressions, someone draped a blanket over the body. Dalton pulled up for a second and looked into Stith’s face. It was blue. He slid the eyebrows up. The eyes were open and vacant, the pupils dilated. He bent back down and continued.
“He’s gone, Sergeant Major. He’s gone.” Barnes had his hand on Stith’s neck. “He’s gone.”
The words were a litany, slowly sinking into Dalton’s consciousness. Finally he paused in his breathing and looked up. Barnes shook his head.
“He’s gone. Fifteen minutes and no oxygen. Even if we brought him back, he’d be a vegetable.”
Dalton’s head snapped back and he glared at the younger medic, causing him to step back in surprise.
“What about his mind being frozen?” Sergeant Monroe asked. He was now on his knees, cradling the body in his large arms. “Like someone who falls into freezing water.”
“His mind wasn’t frozen,” Hammond said. She was standing over them, her face tight. “Just his body. The TACPAD and helmet kept the brain at normal temperature.”
Barnes slid a poncho liner over the body.
Dalton stood. There were the three other men still in the isolation tubes. “I want to know what happened. What killed him?”
Hammond was back behind her console. “I’m not sure.”
“Take a goddamn guess!” Dalton snapped.
Hammond stepped back. “As nearly as I can tell, his psyche got lost going from our world to the virtual world. I lost contact and Sybyl never established contact. That affected his entire brain and his autonomic nervous system went nuts. That’s what caused his death.”
“Are you certain of that?” Dalton asked.
Raisor stepped between the two of them. “We don’t have the time to stand around and argue. We— ”
“We’d damn well better know what killed Sergeant Stith before we go any further,” Dalton said. “Or we’re not going any further.”
“Don’t you threaten me or this project,” Raisor said.
“Is this what happened to the man you lost?” Dalton ignored the CIA man and focused on the doctor.
“No,” Hammond said. She seemed more sure of herself. “ His death was caused by mechanical failure. This was different. This happened on the line between the physical and psychic planes.” She shook her head. “We’re moving too fast. We should have had— ”
“We have to move fast,” Raisor said. He moved to a position between her and the Special Forces men.
Dalton pointed at the other isolation tanks. “We need to get those other men out.”
Raisor shook his head. “I’m afraid we don’t have time for that.”
Dalton glared at Raisor. “You’d better make time.”
“It’s not up to me,” Raisor said. “We’re on a tight time schedule dictated by others. It was a training accident. You have them all the time. A parachute fails to open. A man is knocked unconscious during scuba training and loses his mouthpiece and drowns.”
“We have training accidents,” Dalton acknowledged, “but we work hard to make sure they don’t happen after we figure out what went wrong. We don’t know what went wrong here.”
“You are under orders, Sergeant Major,” Raisor said. “This mission has top priority.”
“I think it’s time to let us in on the secret,” Dalton said. He walked over and stood by Stith’s body. “Seeing as we’re putting our lives on the line for this. I want to know why this man had to die. Why we’re in such a damn rush.”
Raisor met Dalton’s glare, then nodded. “All right. I’ll tell you. Because one of our RVers has discovered that someone is going to try to steal twenty nuclear
warheads in eight”— Raisor looked up at the large clock— “make that seven days.”
* * *
Feteror was tired, but he had one more place to check before going back. He felt the link to SD8-FFEU, a line growing more tenuous the longer he was out. It was a flow of power and information into his psyche, without which he was impotent.
Feteror accessed the satellite imagery of the area he wanted. He centered it in his “vision” and then, with a burst of energy, he was there, looking down on a railyard.
He paused, feeling the vision fade with a loss of power. He had prioritized his missions, knowing this would happen. Damn Rurik and his leashes and limitations.
The vision came back and Feteror scanned the railyard. There were troops all over the place, armed with automatic weapons. He could see the national insignia of the Kazakhstan army on their lapels, but the uniforms were still the dull color of the former Soviet Union.
Feteror swooped down to the railmaster’s shack on the edge of one of the sidings. The wall was just a brief blip and then he was inside. There were two soldiers in the room, but he ignored them. A routing schedule lay open on the desk. Feteror checked it and got the information he needed. The two soldiers looked about, disturbed by something they could sense but not see, since Feteror was staying invisible in the virtual plane. He had no need to do anything on the real plane here.
He paused. There was another presence in the room. Another being on the virtual plane. Feteror reached out and probed the presence. He hit a protective psychic wall, but he knew he could break through. He gathered his strength to— Feteror froze as darkness closed on his consciousness. A dark tide swept in, then back out. Damn General Rurik, Feteror thought. The old fox was cutting his power to bring him back.
The other presence was gone.
Feteror let the dwindling power link to SD8-FFEU draw him home.
Chapter Nine
“Why don’t you just tell the Russians about the threat?” Dalton asked.
He was in a conference room, just off the main experimental chamber, with Raisor and Hammond. The other members of the team who had not yet gone into the isolation tubes had carried Stith’s body to the dispensary. So far none of the other three still under had experienced any problems, and Hammond had told him that all had successfully integrated with Sybyl and that they were developing their virtual programs.
Raisor shook his head. “We can’t. It’s the classic problem of sharing intelligence— by doing so you disclose your capabilities. You know about Coventry, don’t you?”
Dalton had read extensively in the area of military history, and he knew exactly what Raisor was referring to. During World War II, the Allies had broken the German Enigma code with their Ultra machine. Doing so had given them access to all German transmissions and a wealth of information. However, to make sure that the Germans didn’t realize that they had broken the code, the Allies had to be very careful what they did with the intelligence. When the Ultra scientists had decrypted a communique indicating that the city of Coventry was going to be heavily bombed, they had passed that warning on to Churchill. Who had done nothing with it. The city wasn’t evacuated and hundreds lost their lives and the six-hundred-year-old cathedral in the center of town burned to the ground. But the secret of Ultra was maintained.
“We’re not at war with the Russians,” Dalton said.
“We’re always at war,” Raisor said. “That’s the only way to look at the world in the spectrum of intelligence operations.”
“Bullshit,” was Dalton’s take on that.
“We’re in a double bind,” Raisor continued as if nothing had been said. “We can’t pass the intelligence to the Russians. And we can’t act overtly. Both would disclose too much of our capabilities.”
“So let’s keep a secret and get nuked?” Dalton said.
“It won’t come to that,” Raisor said. “Even if the warheads are stolen, they’ll still be in Russia. We would prefer not to have the first event happen, but push comes to shove, it’s not worth disclosing our capabilities for unless it appears the warheads will be crossing borders.”
“Do you know who is going to try to steal the warheads?” Dalton asked.
“We’re not certain,” Raisor said. “We suspect it might be the Russian Mafia, but if that is the case, that most likely means that they are just middlemen and will be passing the warheads on.” Raisor leaned across the conference table. “Just imagine twenty nukes being on the open market, going to the highest bidder.”
“I am imagining it,” Dalton said, “and it seems that this would be worth disclosing your Bright Gate capability in order to stop.”
Raisor shook his head once more. “Which brings us to the other problem with passing the information to Russian intelligence. The Russian military is heavily compromised by the Mafia. For all we know, we might tip our hand to those who are going to do the attack.”
Dalton rubbed his forehead. “So we’re going to descend on this attack out of the virtual plane and stop it?”
“That’s the idea. It’s more secure than trying a conventional assault which could cause a war to break out. If there’s one thing the Russians will not tolerate, it’s American soldiers on their soil. We have to avoid that at all costs. That’s why the President— and the Pentagon— has chosen to use this option.”
Dalton rolled his eyes. “We’ve lost one man and we haven’t done jack yet. You think we’re going to be able to do something no one’s ever done before in seven days? You’re gambling everything on that?”
“It wasn’t my decision,” Raisor said. “I can assure you that this was discussed at the highest levels, and the decision was made to move up the timetable on Psychic Warrior to deal with this threat. I am just implementing that decision.”
“Why can’t the RVers here do it?”
“Several reasons,” Raisor said. “First, they’re not trained soldiers. They’re intelligence gatherers. Second, and more importantly, this Psychic Warrior technology, the cyberlink in conjunction with Sybyl, is new.”
“Have you ever sent somebody into the virtual plane and then have them come out in the real at a remote location and conduct a mission?” Dalton asked.
“Not conduct a mission,” Raisor said, “but as Dr. Hammond told you, we have successfully tested it.”
“Yeah, by playing with blocks. I’m sure that will scare the crap out of the Mafia guys trying to take down these nukes.”
“You’ll be able to do more than that,” Dr. Hammond said.
“I’m a little fuzzy on that,” Dalton said. “So far I don’t feel like I’ve accomplished much of anything other than having one of my men die.”
“You’ll be working on your virtual forms next,” Raisor said. “From what Dr. Hammond has told me, that will give you something to conduct your mission with.”
“How does that work exactly?” Dalton asked.
“I don’t know exactly’,’ Raisor’s voice was taking on an edge. “All I know is that it does work.”
“We’re gambling lives on untested tactics.”
“Isn’t every war a trial of untested tactics?” Raisor said.
“Yes,” Dalton agreed, “and they’re usually big screwups. Millions of men dead and the generals in the First World War never really adjusted to the fact that machine guns made frontal assaults obsolete. They were still ordering cavalry charges in the early days of World War II.”
Raisor slapped the tabletop. “That’s why we want to use the technology we have here correctly! To move us into the modern age.”
“When they introduced the tank in the First World War, the generals still never really adjusted. It takes more than new technology,” Dalton added.
“We have adjusted with Psychic Warrior,” Raisor said. “For the first time, we are ahead of the technological-tactical interface.”
“It sounds like we’re too far ahead and it killed Stith.” Dalton stared at the CIA representative. “Do you believe the bull you spe
ak?”
“It’s the way the world is,” Raisor said.
Hammond had been watching the heated exchange. She leaned forward between the two men. “It works, Sergeant Major Dalton. We know it works.”
“It didn’t work with Sergeant Stith!” Dalton yelled.
“Every new technology has its dangers,” Raisor said. “Do you know how many test pilots have died testing new aircraft? This is new and— ”
“Don’t give me bullshit,” Dalton snapped.
“Sergeant Major, this is going forward whether you are on board or not,” Raisor said.
“Do the Russians have remote viewers?” Dalton asked.
“We don’t know,” Hammond said.
“You don’t know?” Dalton didn’t buy that. “Come on. Seems like that’s the first thing your RVers would check on.”
Raisor answered. “We have checked. And we don’t know. We suspect they do.” Seeing Dalton’s look, he amplified his answer. “Dr. Hammond believes it’s possible to block psychic viewing with either technology or with other psychic viewers putting up a wall. So if the Russians do have psychic viewers, they’re blocking us from being able to see that capability. As we are blocking our own capability from them, if they have it.” Raisor waved his hand about. “This entire facility is shielded on the virtual plane from intrusion.”
Dalton remembered the black metal on the vault door and along the walls. “How do you do that?”
Raisor looked at Hammond, who answered.
“We have Sybyl generate a virtual field and run it through specially adapted lines. The parameters of the field are disharmonic to the human mind’s psychometric rhythms, so any RVers trying to get through would— ” She shrugged. “Well, we’ve never tested it on an actual person, but I would assume it would cause severe if not fatal damage to a person’s psyche. Even a person trying to walk through the field would be affected in the same manner. We have had our RVers approach the field and they report extreme discomfort when they come within a few meters of it.”
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