Phobos

by Steve Alten

“In addition to weather-engineering and mind control, HAARP can generate focused impulses on tectonic plates, as we demonstrated back in 1996 with the earthquake in Nazca, Peru. I think you’ll all agree, the Canadian gold mining operation that subsequently took over the region has yielded some nice dividends.”

  Light applause fills the chamber.

  “Sir, would you mind stepping out into the corridor?” Chaney looks up at the flashlight’s blinding beacon, rough hands dragging him from his seat and into the bright hallway.

  Three security men wearing masks surround Kurtz, the bodyguard’s arms behind his back, his wrists bound in a plastic restraint.

  Ryan Beck seems dumbfounded by the turn of events, his eyes widening in disbelief as Chaney is placed in cuffs. “Hey, you can’t do that! He’s a United States senator.”

  “You’ve got a lot to learn, rookie.”

  “Where you taking them?”

  “Sit down, shut up, and mind your post.” The private militia men lead Chaney and Kurtz down the corridor and outside into the overcast morning, following a gravel path to the surrounding woods.

  “Are you people insane? My entire staff knows I’m here!”

  “Knows you’re where, Senator? According to our records, you never arrived.”

  Kurtz flips his legs over his head, breaking free of his guards’ grip, while kicking outward with both legs. One booted foot catches a militiaman in his face, the other strikes another in the throat—the third assailant bashing him across the top of his skull with the blunt end of his nightstick.

  The former CIA assassin goes down in a heap.

  The two wounded men regain their feet, one man bleeding profusely from his shattered nasal cavity. “Sonuva bitch broke my nose.”

  Whack! The third man crumbles, blood spurting from his head.

  His wounded companions look up—their faces pummeled by Ryan Beck’s fists. “Sit down and shut up, my ass.” Removing his Boker knife from the clip on his belt, he runs the fixed blade across Chaney’s cuffs, slicing through the plastic restraint.

  “What’s your name, son?”

  “Ryan Beck.”

  “You work for me now, Mr. Beck. Pick up Mr. Kurtz, we need to get him to a doctor.”

  “Or we could just leave him … kidding.”

  Beck cuts through the unconscious man’s restraints, then picks him up, following Senator Chaney to his limousine.

  TESTIMONIAL May 9, 2001: National Press Club, Washington, D.C.

  My name is John Callahan. I’m a retired FAA [Federal Aviation Administration] employee. I was the division manager for the Accidents Evaluation and Investigation Division in DC. About two years before I retired, I received a call from our Alaska region, where the region wanted to know what to tell the media. When I questioned, “Tell the media what?” he says, “About the UFO.” And it went downhill from there [ …].

  I had them send all that data to the FAA’s tech center in Atlantic City. The next day my immediate boss, Service Director Harvey Sophia, and I went to Atlantic City [ …]. We had them play back on the scope—you would call the scope a Plan View Display, PVD—exactly what the [ …] controller had seen, and we tied it in with the voice tapes so we could hear exactly what the controller said and what he heard.

  We taped it, and we came back the next day and briefed the administrator, Admiral Engen, on what happened. He wanted a five-minute briefing. After we started the briefing, he wanted to know if he could see the video. We put the video on; he watched the video, the whole video.

  The next day he [Admiral Engen] set up a meeting [ …]. That morning, in the FAA round room, [ …] three men from Reagan’s scientific staff, three CIA people, three FBI people, and I don’t remember who the other guys were, along with all the FAA experts that I had brought with me that [ …] could talk about the hardware and software and how it worked—we put on a “dog and pony show.” We let them watch the video, we had all the data there, we had all the printouts that the computer put out. They got all excited over it. When it was all done, one of the CIA men told the people they were now sworn to secrecy, that this meeting never happened, and this event never happened, when I asked him, “Why?” I thought it was probably just the stealth bomber at the time. He said, “Well, this is the first time that we have recorded radar data on a UFO [ …].” So I said, “Well, you’re gonna tell the public about it.” He said, “No. We don’t tell the public about this. It would panic the public.” He says, “We’re gonna go back and study this.”

  Now, I have told this story many times, and I sometimes get funny looks from people. I have with me the voice tapes of the controllers that were involved, the FAA original tapes. You see, after we handed this stuff off to the president’s staff, the FAA didn’t know what to do with it—we don’t separate UFOs from real traffic, so it’s not our problem. [Laughter]

  I have a copy of the original video that we took, which is rather interesting. And, once the thing was all over, the reports started coming into my office, but because it wasn’t an FAA air traffic problem, the FAA’s report ended up on a table in my office. It stayed there until I retired, when the staffers packed up all my gear and helped me move to my house. Also, in a box I found just a few days ago, with my 1992 tax returns, I have the target printouts from the computer data, and so if you want to look at every target that was up there at the time, you could now reproduce this from this piece of paper here. And it’s called the UFO Incident, Japan 1648, I believe the number was. It happened on November 18th, 1986.

  I am prepared to go before Congress—to swear before Congress—that everything I have told you people and that everything that is here is the truth. Thank you.

  —John Callahan,

  FAA Head of Accidents and Investigations

  Used by permission of the Disclosure Project

  23

  KABBALAH CENTRE

  MANHATTAN, NEW YORK

  AUGUST 18, 2001

  The sanctuary is called the “War Room,” a place where the forces of light engage in battle against darkness.

  Kabbalist Philip S. Berg, better known as the Rav, stands before his congregation at the lectern. “This morning’s Torah portion of Korach is found in Numbers 16 through 18. Back in Egypt, Korach had been a very powerful man; but in the desert he was forced to follow Moses and his brother, Aaron. This did not sit well with Korach’s wife, who was constantly nagging him about how Moses had everything that Korach deserved. But blaming Korach’s wife does not explain everything about Korach’s fall from grace.

  “Because he was rich, Korach believed he was better than everyone else, including Moses. Convinced he was the best man to lead the Israelites, he organized a rebellion, convening 250 members of the tribe of Reuben—elected men of the assembly, men of renown. Standing before these righteous men, Korach accused Moses of leading the Israelites out of Egypt, a land of milk and honey, into the hardship of wandering the desert. And Korach’s followers bought into this evil tongue and threatened to overthrow Moses and his brother. In response, Moses prayed to God to reveal to him his own negativity, seeking to transform his own behavior so he could grow.

  “Because of his knowledge, Korach had it in him to be a great leader. Where did he fail? A clue can be found in the first word of this portion—vayikach, which means, ‘and he took.’ For all his wealth, for all his wisdom and leadership ability, Korach was a taker, and that was his undoing, for when a person wishes only to receive, the outcome can only be negative.”

  Julius Gabriel glances at the dark-haired man seated next to him. Samuel Agler’s black eyes are intense as he absorbs the Rav’s words. Looking back over his shoulder, the archaeologist scans the back of the War Room for his son.

  “Korach possessed an evil eye. The first mention of the evil eye is in Genesis and is attributed to the serpent, who was envious of Adam because he had Eve. Remember, this was no ordinary snake, it could stand up and speak. It was cunning. The evil eye covets. What did Korach covet? He coveted Moses�
��s power, he sought recognition. Not so bad, except Korach was a taker. The lesson here is that, no matter what we have, we must transform ourselves from receivers to givers. Korach never achieved that vital inner transformation; in the end he paid for his lack of humility, as did his followers.”

  They are seated in the lobby—Sam, Laura, and Sophia. Julius is pacing, working his temper into a lather, when Mick finally walks in, a dark-haired Mexican beauty on his arm.

  “Hey, Pop.”

  “You’re late.”

  “Okay, no big deal. Adelina and I had an important errand to run. Go ahead, show them.”

  Adelina holds out her left hand, her fourth finger sporting a two-karat diamond ring. “Miguel asked me to marry him … we’re engaged!”

  Laura gives Adelina Botello a big hug. Sam slaps Michael across the shoulders.

  Julius looks horrified. “What are you doing? What did I tell you?”

  “Easy, Pop.”

  “She’s not the one, Michael, I told you that! What’s wrong with you? Are you willing to throw your entire future away—mankind’s future—on this … this whore?”

  Heads turn.

  Sophia smirks.

  Laura’s jaw drops. “Julius—”

  “Stay out of this, Laura. Michael knows I’m speaking for your family as much as anyone.”

  Adelina turns to Mick, tears of anger in her eyes. “Are you going to let him insult me like this?”

  “No, babe. Come on, we’re history.” Casting a look of hatred at his father, Michael Gabriel takes his fiancée by the hand and leads her out of the Centre.

  PENTAGON

  WASHINGTON, D.C.

  “The deputy secretary will see you now.” The petite blond office manager leads Senator Ennis Chaney down a short hall to the double-door chamber of the deputy under secretary of defense.

  Pierre Borgia never looks up from a stack of files spread across his oak desk. “Senator Chaney, what a pleasant surprise.”

  “This meeting is six months overdue, and the only reason we’re speaking now is because Senator Maller owed me a favor. As chairman of the Appropriations Committee—”

  “Vice chairman.”

  “You want to keep playing games? I can play, too. How ’bout I start with a press conference announcing the Pentagon misplaced $2.3 trillion of taxpayer dollars?”

  “Secretary Rumsfeld is already investigating the matter.”

  “That’s reassuring. Sorta like asking the fox to investigate a bunch of missing chickens at the henhouse.”

  “I’m sure whatever funds you’re alluding to were earmarked for projects outside the jurisdiction of Congressional oversight. That’s the nature of the military.”

  “My ass. For two trillion, you could send the entire Marine Corps to the moon. What the hell are you people up to?”

  “We’re safeguarding democracy, Senator. It’s an expensive process.”

  “And how exactly is that little power plant you got zapping the atmosphere up in Alaska safeguarding democracy?”

  “HAARP is nothing more than an aurora research program.”

  “Mind control? Earthquakes in Peru?”

  Borgia grins. “You surf too many conspiracy theory Web sites.”

  “Save it for the Congressional hearing.”

  “Crawl out on that limb, Senator, and you crawl out alone. The GOP will leave you tossing in the wind.”

  “Been there, done that. How do you think I managed to stay in office? On my good looks?”

  “There’s a war going on, Senator. You may not see it or understand it, but it’s a war, nonetheless.”

  “A war?”

  “A war that will determine which nation will govern the planet in the decades to come.”

  “Nation or class?”

  Borgia returns to his work. “This conversation is over.”

  “Fine by me. Guess I’ll have to subpoena your Uncle Joe, seeing as he was playing the role of Grand Wizard at the Star Trek convention your black op geeks were holding up in Alaska. Funny thing about your uncle—even though he’s listed as a military contractor, over a trillion dollars in Pentagon funds are quietly being funneled through his offshore companies into Skunk Works programs in the Nevada desert.”

  The smile on the deputy secretary’s face disappears. “What is it you want?”

  “Accountability, for starters. I want to hear your boss explain to the American people how $2.3 trillion somehow got ‘misplaced.’ Then I want the money accounted for.”

  “Why? You trying to be a hero? Maybe take a run for the Oval Office in 2008?”

  “No, Mr. Borgia. I’m just trying to keep assholes like you from destroying the world.”

  The Final Papers of Julius Gabriel, PhD

  Cambridge University archives

  Few men are willing to brave the disapproval of their fellows, the censure of their colleagues, the wrath of their society. Moral courage is a rarer commodity than bravery in battle or great intelligence. Yet it is the one essential, vital quality for those who seek to change a world which yields most painfully to change.

  —ROBERT F. KENNEDY,

  DAY OF AFFIRMATION ADDRESS,

  UNIVERSITY OF CAPETOWN,

  JUNE 6, 1966

  AUGUST 23, 2001

  Phobos: A Greek term meaning “morbid fear.”

  Fear: A state of mind, inducing anxiety.

  On this, the eve of my symposium, my mind is consumed with anxiety, for the final piece of the Mayan Doomsday puzzle has now been laid into place, perhaps for the first time since the cursed priests of the Spanish Inquisition burned the Mayan codices left behind by Chilam Balam. Five centuries after the Jaguar Prophet attempted to warn us of things to come I am fearful whether my own words will make a difference.

  They must. Our existence depends upon it.

  The Mayan calendar is composed of five great cycles, subdivided into repeating twenty-year epochs, known as katums. According to Chilam Balam, the final katum of cycle five began in 1992 and ends on December 21, 2012. During that time, Balam predicts a decade of peace and prosperity will end when a charismatic leader shall be felled by his own growing ego, his fall from grace beckoning the forces of darkness.

  A great deception shall follow, designed to unite the masses behind new false prophets. War will ensue, propelled by an agenda ripe with corruption, resulting in an imbalance that uproots morality and radicalizes the king-makers.

  Divided into the powerful and the oppressed, the fabric of society shall unravel. And in the melee that ensues, Nature shall cause the planet to tremble.

  Five great cycles. According to the surviving codices, each of the previous four had been terminated by earthquake, wind, fire, then water—the four sacred elements. According to Balam, it is during the last cycle that a fifth element shall come into play—an element responsible for the creation of the physical universe and ultimately its destruction:

  The atom.

  Desiring to know the Creator, man had studied the atom.

  Desiring to kill his brother, man had split the atom.

  Desiring to be the Creator, man was now colliding the atom, re-creating the Big Bang, ignoring the inherent dangers. The strangelet was man’s unbridled ego run amok, a fourth-dimensional cancer cell of gravity hellbent on consuming anything in its path.

  It was simple cause and effect. Chilam Balam had understood it, and had painstakingly left us many clues—including one I had long ignored.

  Archaeologists had unearthed more than a dozen crystal skulls over the last century, though only a few had traced back to Chilam Balam. Both Michael and I had dismissed these quartz artifacts after learning that the mineral was not unique to Mesoamerica, its shallow deposits spread beneath twelve percent of the Earth’s crust.

  And yet it is quartz that finally connected the dots.

  Ironically, it was my own great-grandchild, Sophia, disguised by a hiccup of time as my niece, who recently forced me to reexamine the skulls. After I gave the child
a quartz skull for her last birthday, she presented me with a mind-boggling theory.

  “Did you know, Uncle Julius, that quartz can resonate with brain waves, that it can even affect the creative process? The skull you gave me has given me vivid dreams—nightmares of the Doomsday still to come. It is as if I have been channeling Chilam Balam himself.”

  “Tell me about the dreams.”

  “Each begins with a volcanic eruption. This is followed by an earthquake, which releases a tsunami. Fire, wind, earth, and water—the four elements tied together by the presence of quartz. I think that is the meaning of the crystal skulls, that they trigger the relationship.”

  “I see the relationship between fire and wind, earth and water, but nothing more. Nor do I see how quartz can trigger these violent acts of nature.”

  Sophia then presented me with a geological map detailing the world’s known quartz deposits. “Do you recognize a pattern, Uncle Julius?”

  “Nothing stands out.”

  “Look closely. The quartz deposits match the planet’s seismic fault lines.”

  The child was right, they did match. The question was—what did it mean?

  I consulted a geologist, who found the idea intriguing, concurring that fault lines in California, Utah, Nevada, and Idaho could be identified by the states’ quartz deposits. He informed me that the mineral contained water, which when heated under pressure could indeed serve as a geological lubricant for rocks to slide and grinding tectonic plates to flow. He promised to research the theory further when he returned from a three-year field trip to Indonesia, though I wondered how Sophia’s revelation would help resolve the Doomsday prophecy.

  And then I thought about the strangelet.

  According to physicists, these theoretical miniature black holes, created when atoms were deliberately collided at near-light speed, could escape their manmade boundaries and pass through the planet’s core, seeking protons upon which to feed.