by RJ Johnson
“Commercial aviation, and they’re expensive birds.” Alex said as he handed his father the binoculars and considered their options. They were on National Park land, so they weren’t trespassing or doing anything wrong. They hadn’t started any fires or even seen another soul for the entire day they had been out there. Whatever the men in the helicopters wanted, Alex and his father had about thirty seconds before they found out.
Chapter Five
The expensive helicopter banked sharply, circling the mesa below and righting itself as the pilot looked for a landing spot large enough for the enormous craft. The shadows shifted inside the luxurious cabin where two men sat. One, larger and more intimidating in stature, stared out the window watching the two men below scramble for cover as the approaching helicopter’s prop wash blew dirt and debris all around the open and exposed mesa top.
The other man adjusted his sunglasses slightly to block the light now streaming from the window opposite him. He adjusted some ancient looking papers in front of him, placing them in the Italian leather briefcase beside him. His suit, obviously tailored in some of the finest London shops, screamed refined business and taste. It was expensive, designer cloth, sewn together in a practical fashion.
But it was his ring that caught everyone's eye when he entered the room. It was the only piece of jewelry he wore, and a curious archetype for a man so wealthy. Blood red, and fastened in a flexible silver coating that ran the length from his knuckle to the tip of the finger, the stone sat on his skin, as if the hand had begun to grow around the jewelry. It was not meant to be a distraction, and yet, those who found themselves staring at the ring found themselves brutally removed from the situation quickly. It was those situations that his right hand man Geoffrey Tate had been hired for.
Like his ornate jewelry, there were many things about Rupert Kline that made you want to stare in wonder. Appearing out of nowhere in the bull markets of the 1980’s, Kline had created a financial empire unlike any that Wall Street had seen before. Billions ran through Kline’s firm every day, and billions more appeared like magic. Kline had the Midas touch, and his experience and ruthlessness on the Street had become legendary. Kline was the master at creating something out of nothing, squeezing every bit of blood out of each company he invested in.
In 1992, in response to the growing global demands on his business, Kline announced an entirely new venture, dedicated to the global security needs of American businesses and their employees across the world. Kline’s oft-stated goal was to become the “big box store” of protection, offering tools and weapons to American companies who did business overseas in dangerous places. On paper, and its website, the company was full of happy people, returning safe from dark and distant destinations. Smiling faces, and reunited families, safe back where they belonged.
It was better than getting a Proof of Life photo instead.
Kline’s MARS Security Corp was his greatest asset. Named for the Greek God of War, his company was responsible for the successful rescue of over thirty-five businessmen and women over the last fifteen years. With those kinds of favors owed to him, Kline used his company to forge new alliances and deep ties with businessmen all over the world. There was little going on in the world that the “richest man you never heard of” didn’t know about.
The helicopter pilot pressed the intercom button to speak directly to his employer.
“We’ll be landing in two minutes Mr. Kline.”
Watching the helicopter approach, Alex felt a small gnawing fear that somehow, they had managed to track him down and were now going to kill him and his father. However, the helicopter had already settled into a landing hover; it was too late to get away from them now.
Alex glanced to the east, to the road leading into this particular campground. He cursed his stupidity for coming up to the Mesa top unarmed. Out in the middle of nowhere, he had felt the weapon was unnecessary, and so he had left the .45 behind in the Jeep. Now, he felt himself wishing for the familiar weight hanging from his arm.
Alex looked to the west and saw a group of approaching vehicles. Several large 18 wheelers hauling heavy digging equipment were rolling down the desert road, kicking up an incredible plume of dust. Alex realized that the helicopters were only the advance group of a much larger operation.
Ted glanced over at his son, whose eyes were darting around, looking for his exits and anything that could become a weapon in case of emergency. Ted looked at his son in the eyes and shook his head.
“Let’s play this out a bit. I think you’re OK.”
Reassured, but still wary, Alex reached towards his backpack, grasping it tightly, rummaging inside. As Alex’s heart raced, the stone that he had forgotten about lay underneath his shirt and glowed faintly.
The helicopter settled down gently on the dusty mesa mountaintop. Tate opened the door and stepped out, ducking his head away from the prop wash above. Folding down the stairs, Kline posed at the door of the helicopter and examined the two climbers. Rage flashed up from deep in his gut, and the stone on his finger flashed red.
Kline, rubbing the stone on his ring as he exited the chopper, charged towards the father and son, berating them at the top of his lungs.
“Just what the hell do you think you’re doing on my property?” Kline roared in a clipped English accent as other helicopters began to land on the mesa, their engines giving a high-pitched whine as they slowed to a stop.
Ted squinted as Kline approached the two of them. “I think you're lost,” Ted took a map out of his back pocket. “This is all national forest land we’re standing on right now.”
“Not anymore,” Kline snapped, “I bought it three hours ago.”
Ted’s right eyebrow rose. “You can’t just ‘buy’ national forest land! It takes an…”
“Act of Congress, I know. I have one.” Kline snapped his fingers and a large bald man, wearing a leather jacket that didn’t quite hide the pistol he was packing, handed Kline a thick folder of papers. Kline waved them in front of Ted’s face. “Satisfied? Get off my property, or I will have my associate remove you.”
Unimpressed Ted cocked his head, “You should know I’m not someone that’s easily impressed or intimidated by a man who obviously goes through life blustering his way through other people, like you’re doing. If you like, we can always call the sheriff and let him settle...”
Bored with Ted’s speech, Kline didn’t wait for another word. Instead, he grabbed the sizable pistol out of his large assistant’s holster and shot Ted point blank in the chest.
Ted looked down at the expanding pool of blood on his chest. He stumbled backwards only to find air behind him. Horrified, Alex watched as his father’s body slowly tumbled over the side of the cliff and down two hundred feet to the ground below.
Alex felt his body go completely numb. All the years of training, all the discipline the Army had taught him went straight out the window. He turned, screaming at Kline, “You son of a bitch!!” as he rushed him attempting, something, anything to strike back at the man who had just so casually killed his father like he would a fly who had offended him by landing on his soup.
Kline didn’t even blink as the former football star charged him. As Alex approached, Kline calmly swatted Alex away with his forearm. Alex felt as if he were hit by a tree trunk. His body flew off towards the edge of the mesa, as if slammed out of the park by the great Bambino himself.
Landing a few feet from the edge of the cliff, his body skidded on the ground. Alex desperately tried to grab hold of any rock, any root, anything that would stop his trajectory towards the edge and beyond that a quick route to the ground five hundred feet below. At the last moment, Alex saw a shrub growing out of the side of the mountain. He grabbed onto the leaves and coarse bark in a last-ditch effort to stay alive. His body swung precariously from the edge of the cliff, and Kline approached with his bodyguard.
Alex struggled to hang on. His toes searched the granite wall, like his father had taught him, for any sort o
f hold that might relieve the pressure building up on his fingertips. But it was unfamiliar territory, and he couldn’t find any place to support his body with. Kline looked down in contempt at the dangling young man.
“Get off my property.” Kline calmly said as he smashed his heels into Alex’s fingertips. Howling in pain, Alex let go of the edge of the cliff and began to fall to the ground below. Satisfied, Kline turned back to his bodyguard, who was just catching up to him.
“I was under the impression that we had this area watched.”
Ice filled Geoffrey’ veins. The sentries on duty that Geoffrey had assigned had obviously missed these two tourists, and his employer was looking for someone to blame. Better a sacrificial lamb than his own neck.
Geoffrey checked the PDA in his hand.
“The men we had posted here yesterday failed to appear today.”
Kline sniffed the air, not looking at his assistant, surveying the desert floor below him. “They took their seed money and ran?”
Geoffrey shifted his weight. The question was a double-edged sword, and Kline could react one of two ways. Either it would be Geoffrey’ fault for recruiting two unreliable men, or Kline would rain down hellfire on the people who were supposed to have been watching the Mesa. Hesitating, Geoffrey decided the truth was probably most appropriate. “It would appear so, sir.”
Smirking, Kline turned towards Geoffrey. “My guess, Mr. Tate, is that they have not gotten farther than Mexico. We have a branch in San Diego, do we not?”
Geoffrey nodded quickly, relieved. It was looking likely that Kline was going to let him off the hook for this one.
“Then have them take care of it. And when they find them, Mr. Tate...”
Geoffrey looked up from the message he was writing on his PDA and into his boss’s cold blue eyes.
“Have our team take them for a plane ride and throw them out at 40,000 feet.”
Geoffrey nodded and entered Kline’s special instructions.
Kline brushed his black suit with his right hand, attempting to remove some of the dust and dirt the landing helicopter had blown up around him. He looked up at his assistant and clapped his hands.
“Tut tut, Mr. Tate. Time is wasting away. Make certain those two bodies are found and buried deep in the desert. I don’t want any problems over the next few days. Understand?”
“Sir.” Geoffrey Tate nodded and moved off towards the two other helicopters which had just finished their landings on the mesa. As several men emerged from each, Geoffrey shouted orders at all of them. Kline turned back to the gorgeous brown, green, and red scene in front of him, watching as the setting sun disappeared behind the horizon. Inhaling the dry desert air, he smiled as he rubbed the stone in his ring. Today was going to be a great day.
Chapter Six
The dream always began the same way.
It was ten years ago, when he was still in college. Scott had convinced him to attend a Greek fundraiser for Scott’s fraternity. Scott had pressured Alex many times to get involved in the Greek system at Stanford, but Alex had never developed any interest in it. The parties were legendary, but Alex wasn’t in college to party hard. He had a goal, a place he wanted to be in ten years, and with only a year left for his studies, he was nearly getting away with it.
The images were flashing faster in front of him. For an instant, Alex awoke, moaning in immense pain. He slowly became aware of his surroundings, the light from a distant sunset trickling between his battered eyelids. The effort to stay awake was too much, and he felt himself slipping back into unconsciousness. As a last ditch effort, he struggled to try and become aware within his dream in attempt to control it, pushing himself away from the painful memory.
His subconscious overpowered his will to stay aware. Slowly, he melted back in time, falling deeper back into his troubled subconscious.
He was back at Stanford. Tonight was different. Tonight, he finally agreed to go out with his friend to his fraternity’s end-of-the-year Casino Party. Through the years, Alex had an active social life at college, but he wasn't the party type, preferring instead to concentrate on his studies.
His goal in coming to Stanford was to major in Engineering and Architecture. The hours spent working with his father building the house in Onyx back home had influenced him to pursue a career working with his hands, hopefully someday designing homes that were completely self-sufficient, without any need for outside energy. The grad school applications were now beginning to flow in, but Alex wasn’t sure about where that would lead him.
Alex swallowed the remaining beer in his cup and debated whether he should have another or return home to the apartment Scott and he shared just outside of campus. Scott had disappeared earlier in the evening with a sorority girl on each arm, and that meant that Alex, like a good roommate, probably shouldn’t return to his apartment for another couple of hours. Alex sighed, deciding to have another beer. However long that took would be however long Scott had.
Alex walked back to the center of the room, where a keg was standing in a tub full of melting ice. He pushed the pump at the top of the silver keg, holding his cup under the spigot. As he depressed the end, the cheap beer sprayed out all over his cup and hand, leaving most of his beverage on the floor.
“Need some help with that?”
Alex looked up and saw an angel. She stood, her arms, folded across her chest as a smile spread over her full, pouty lips. She looked at the keg and stepped forward, grabbing the spigot out of Alex’s hands. She began to pump the top of the keg, and took Alex’s cup.
“I never thought I’d have to teach a frat guy how to pour a beer out of a keg.” She stopped pumping and let the beer flow out of the spigot. Tilting the cup back up, she handed it to Alex, who had yet to say anything clever at all.
“See how easy it is when you follow directions?” She was being a smart ass, but Alex didn’t care. All he could see was her jet black hair, the ringlets of her curls falling across her face and back. She was five feet, seven inches of beauty, unlike anyone Alex had ever seen before.
She paused, uncertain what to make of Alex’s gaping jaw.
“I know we’re the big city and everything, but you’ve had to have seen a beer keg before right?” Emily asked, trying to make Alex laugh.
“I ahh, yeah, of course I have.” Alex stammered. “It’s been awhile since I’ve been to a party that had a keg in the middle of the room. Most of the parties I’ve gone to, all we do is bring computers, and a two liter of our favorite soda.” He swallowed, suddenly aware of how nerdy he was sounding. “Mine’s Mountain Dew.”
She laughed. Alex had never heard anything sweeter.
“Of course it is.” She began filling up her own cup. Once finished, she turned to Alex, nibbling on the top of the red plastic cup.
“I’m Emily,” she said sweetly, extending her right hand. Her eyes were the deepest blue Alex had ever seen. He realized after a moment that she had just introduced herself and he should respond before the moment got too long. Alex grasped her hand and awkwardly shook it.
“Alex.” Alex replied, finding more confidence. “I’m an architecture major.”
“Architecture, huh?” She chewed the top of her cup some more and smiled. “Here I was thinking I was wasting my money at Stanford, then you come along and tell me you’re an architect.”
“Why?” Alex began feeling flush under his collar. Who was she to attack his career choice? “What are you gonna do with yourself?”
“Oh, only answer mankind’s longest-living question.”
“How’s that?” Alex challenged. “What, you curing cancer?”
“I listen for radio signals from outer space. ET phoning home and all that.” Emily’s eyes flashed, daring Alex to mock her. She was used to being made fun of for her choice of major. The idea there was intelligent life out in the cosmos had fascinated her for a long time. There was nothing like a big unanswered question to Emily, and whether there was alien life among the stars ranked as the big
gest to her.
Her parents had been disappointed, but supportive. Her friends from high school, who didn’t understand it, laughed at her, and most men she met were put off by the combination of her brains and the fact she believed in extraterrestrial life. So it was a pleasant surprise when she saw his face light up.
“Like Jodie Foster in Contact?” Alex asked excitedly.
“Yeah, but without the whole lesbian vibe.” She said smiling, “Not that there’s…”
“…Anything wrong with that.” Alex finished.
They smiled, Alex extended his cup, and they clinked them together.
“You know, without a foot in my mouth, I promise, I’m much more debonair and charming.”
“Is that so?” Emily asked a glint in her eye. “What sort of debonair are we talking? Should I be expecting Cary Grant status or George Clooney?”
“George Clooney is a hack TV doctor that won’t last the decade.” Alex proclaimed. “He’s a pale imitation of Cary Grant.”
Emily shrieked and slapped Alex on the arm, “Are you crazy? Clooney kills it every time he gets on screen.”
“Are you insane? I’ll put North by Northwest up against any Clooney movie anytime.”
“You have obviously never seen Ocean’s 11.” Emily said, fuming. “I have a copy back at my dorm. Come on.” She grabbed Alex’s coat and began dragging him out of the party. “You’re watching Ocean’s 11, and afterwards, you’ll have some delicious words to eat.”
Alex, bemused at her energy, allowed himself to be dragged out of the room.
They had returned to her dorm where they hadn’t lasted fifteen minutes. By the time Brad Pitt and George Clooney met up for the first time in the flick, the two of them were too busy making out with each other to watch the movie.
They lay in each other’s arms, exhausted from their youthful vigor. He played with stray bits of her curly brunette hair, moving them each one at a time.
