by Bob Mayer
"What about his mind being frozen?" Sergeant Monroe asked. He was 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 damn 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 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’re under orders, Sergeant Major," Raisor said. "This mission has top priority."
Hammond stepped between them. “Was there anything different about Sergeant Stith?”
Barnes spoke up. “He was wounded by IED blasts. Twice, both times in the ‘Stan. Lacerations, broken bones and concussions.”
Hammond closed her eyes. “Brain damage. We should have picked it up on the scans.” She opened her eyes. “Anyone else on the team suffered a concussion?”
Barnes shook his head. “No. I went through everyone’s record.”
“It had to have been that,” Hammon said.
“But you don’t know,” Dalton said.
“I don’t,” Hammond allowed. “But no one really knows how much damage those IEDs are causing to the brain and nervous system. Even though it didn’t show up in the scans, there’s no doubt there was deep tissue damage in his brain.”
"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.
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 communiqué 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 unless it appears the warheads will be crossing borders."
"Do you know who’s 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’s the case, that most likely means 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."
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 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’m 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 we'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 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 hadn’t adjusted. It takes more than new technology," Dalton added.
"We’ve adjusted with Psychic Warrior," Raisor said. "For the first time, we’re 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 speak?"
"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’re 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’re 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’ve had our RVers approach the field and they report extreme discomfort when they come within a few meters of it."
"That's why we only have the one entrance to this base," Raisor said.
"One physical entrance," Hammond corrected him. "That's the door you came in through, off the hangar. We also have the entrance our RVers use. That's a narrow opening which we call the Bright Gate. It’s in the psychic wall that Sybyl controls. She can let you out Bright Gate to the initial jump point on top of the mountain and she can also let RVers in when they return to the initial jump point."
"What does this field do to other things?" Dalton asked. "Once it's running, do we have communications?"
"We're not the only place that uses this field," Raisor said. "Every top secret secure site our country has is surrounded by a psychic field just in case the Russians do have an RV capability. Once we developed the wall, our scientists were able to develop a special cable that can shield a link from inside to outside and allow uninterrupted communications. That's something we don't think the Russians have managed to do yet, so we have an advantage there."
"Let's get back to the other side's capabilities then," Dalton said. "If the Russians do have RVers," he asked, "wouldn't they know about this plot in their neck of the woods?"
"If they have remote viewers and if the remote viewers happened to catch this plot, yes, then they would know. But we were lucky; our RVer who picked this up literally stumbled across it checking on some other information on a different tasking. The odds that a Russian RVer found the same thing are pretty long."
"What about-" Dalton began, but the door swung open and a technician stuck her head in.
"Lieutenant Jackson is back."
Raisor and Hammond headed for the door.
"Who is Lieutenant Jackson?" Dalton asked, following them.
"One of the RVers you saw in a tank when you got here. She's been out on a mission."
They entered the main room. The last two Special Forces men, Barnes and Monroe, had gone into the tanks, leaving Dalton the only one out. At the far end, a woman was shivering, a blanket over her shoulder, wiping embryonic fluid off her face with a towel.
"Lieutenant Jackson," Raisor said as he came up to her. "Your report?"
Jackson didn't respond right away. She spit, none too elegantly, and coughed, a dribble of dark liquid rolling down her chin before she wiped it off. She was a tall, slight woman, in her mid-twenties, short blond hair plastered to her skull, her skin pale and covered with goosebumps.
"Is everything static?" Raisor asked.
Jackson coughed. "No, sir, it's not. They've changed the schedule." She looked at Dalton, then back to Raisor.
Dalton had seen that look before; she had information she wasn't sure she should share in front of people she had never seen before.
“You take care of your men," Raisor said to Dalton. He grabbed Jack
son's arm and helped her to her feet. "Come with me."
"Hold on!" Dalton put his hand up. "I want to talk to my commander. I have to inform him about what happened to Sergeant Stith."
Raisor stared at him for a few seconds, then nodded. "You can use the secure line down the hall. But make sure you don't say a word about the mission. Is that clear, Sergeant Major?"
"I hear you," Dalton said.
"You can inform Colonel Metter about Sergeant Stith, but he has to hold official notification until we can implement a cover story."
"I know the way this is played."
*********
The red light went out. General Rurik relaxed, knowing that Feteror was back inside his metal home and the window was shut.
"Report!" Rurik snapped into the microphone that linked him directly to Feteror's auditory center. There was no way Feteror could escape the noise, and Rurik relished that power.
"I've done as you requested. There has been no change." The tinny voice that came out of a speaker on the master console actually sounded tired.
"The Mafia?"
"They still plan to attack in seven days."
Rurik smiled. "What do you know of a Colonel Seogky of the GRU?"
"I've never heard of him."
"We believe he had a meeting with the same Mafia group. His body was found in a park near Kiev along with that of a member of the Mafia."
"I know nothing of this."
"Anything else?"
"No."
"Sleep well." Rurik threw a switch and the power to the cylinder went down to bare life-support levels. "Pleasant nightmares," Rurik whispered into the mike as he shut it off.
*****
Barsk stared out the window of the plane at the ocean twenty thousand feet below, where icebergs drifted in the Arctic Ocean.
"We drop at fifteen thousand." Leksi's voice was hoarse from too many cigarettes and too much vodka. The men gathered around him all had the same hard look; they were former Soviet Special Operations soldiers, searching for a better life outside of the military.
