Oracle

by Douglas E. Richards

  The Albania contingent for the meeting consisted solely of Tom Vega and Anna Abbott.

  “Why is Kaitlyn bound?” asked the Vorian commander in dismay as soon as the holographic images materialized into place around the table.

  Anna sighed beside him. “She’s the traitor I spoke about, Tom.”

  “I don’t believe it,” said Vega.

  “I’m afraid Anna is right,” said Redford. “Kaitlyn is here so she can tell us why she betrayed her entire species. But that can come later. At the moment, I want her to remain quiet, which is why she has duct tape over her mouth. I had other Vorians here disable her comm, as well.”

  Vega opened his mouth to protest, but thought better of it.

  Anna turned to the colonel. “As you can tell from Tom’s reaction to Kaitlyn,” she said, “I’ve been waiting to fill him in on recent developments. I thought it would be better to discuss this all at once—and together.”

  She nodded toward the alien leader beside her. “Thank you again for your patience, Tom. After we trade some quick updates, we’ll tell you how, and why, events unfolded as they did.”

  Vega nodded, but looked decidedly unhappy.

  “Here’s where things stand on our end,” continued Anna. A sad expression came over her face, and she shook her head in disgust. “We lost two SEALs and three Vorians. Losing even one member of our team is too many, and unacceptable, and I take full responsibility.”

  “You can’t blame yourself,” insisted Vega. “In this same situation, under anyone else, all of us would have been killed. And most of the Tarts would have been left alive. With tens of thousands of random bullets being fired, even an Oracle can’t prevent a few unlucky hits.”

  Anna nodded, but it was clear that these words hadn’t helped. “On the positive side of the ledger,” she said, attempting to move beyond these losses, at least temporarily, “while we can’t be sure precisely, we believe we were able to kill all but thirty to forty of the Tart force.”

  “How many were there to begin with?” asked Redford.

  “Six hundred eighteen,” replied Anna. “The SEALs knew the precise number. My gut tells me that Frey also held two or three dozen Tarts back from Albania, so as not to put all of his eggs in one basket.”

  She gestured to Redford. “How many Tarts survived your attack?”

  The colonel blew out a long breath. “I don’t think more than a dozen or so,” he replied. “We were able to take out the majority, but suffered three casualties ourselves.”

  Redford was as horrified as Anna by these losses, but he knew that in the big picture, things couldn’t have gone much better. Losing only eight soldiers while taking out well over six hundred Tartarians, with the odds stacked against them, was a miracle. The kind of miracle that he couldn’t blame Vega for wanting Anna to produce in the center of the galaxy.

  “I also need to report that we didn’t get Shane Frey,” he added miserably. “Which was a key objective. And I’m guessing those who escaped with him were key lieutenants. Originally, I thought they had been killed in the explosion. Which in retrospect was a very stupid assumption. After the battle, I scrambled a specialized military team to the site to put out the fire and examine the wreckage. Just before I landed here, I was told that they had found the entrance to a tunnel inside the factory, leading away from it. Remarkably, the tunnel survived the explosion. I’m convinced that Frey and his top people used it to escape.”

  “Even so,” said Vega, “we’ve managed to knock the Tarts back down to parity with us.”

  “Almost,” said Anna. “My guess is that the Tarts are near eighty in number, and you’re at fifty-five. With both sides still having most of their leadership intact.”

  “But two more of our people can come here from Vor every forty hours,” noted Lisa Moore. “So if the portal stays open, we’ll exceed their numbers in a month or two.”

  “Assuming their portal doesn’t reopen as well and flood the zone a second time,” said Redford.

  “Regardless,” said Anna. “We’re in a hell of a lot better situation than we were yesterday.” She paused. “And speaking of that, how is Secretary Stinnett?”

  The colonel gestured at Lisa Moore to answer.

  “He seems to be fine,” said the genetic engineer and medic. “He’s still unconscious. But I’m confident he’ll make a full recovery. I patched up his bullet wound, and he’s receiving human blood in the infirmary right now. I also injected him with a second dose of the HCS antidote. So when he awakens he should be himself again.”

  “Which is excellent news,” said the colonel. “He’s had a rough go of it lately. Knocked unconscious, gassed, drugged, and shot.”

  Anna cringed. “Actually, the first three of those things happened to him twice,” she pointed out.

  “At least this should finally be the end of it,” said Redford.

  “Anything else particularly noteworthy?” asked the clairvoyant detective. “I’d like to finally let Tom and Lisa know what’s been going on.”

  “Just one last thing,” said Redford. “I briefed the president on the way here. He’s well pleased by today’s success, and sends his congratulations to you and Tom. We’ve scheduled another meeting for late tomorrow afternoon, and we’d like both of you involved.”

  “We’ll be there,” said Vega. “We’ll be flying back to Utah right after this meeting ends. So we’ll be able to join you in person in the conference room there.”

  “Perfect,” said Redford. “With any luck, Secretary Stinnett will be able to join us also.”

  “Okay, then,” said Anna, locking her gaze on the alien leader. “Let’s get right to it. The million-dollar question. How did what happened today come about?”

  She blew out a long breath. “It all started when you contacted us on our way to Evie headquarters,” she began. “You told us your portal had reappeared, and asked if I would come to Vor to be the admiral of your allied fleet.

  “Until that instant, I was going to refuse, for reasons I’ll get to. But right when you asked me, my intuition told me to tell you yes, anyway. It demanded that I do so. I hated to lie to you, but my gut gave me no other choice. I had no idea why at the time.”

  “And now you do?” said Vega.

  Anna nodded. “Yes.”

  “Are you saying that you’ve been deceiving me from that point on?” asked the alien.

  “I’m afraid so,” replied Anna with a sigh. “But to continue, just after I agreed, I had two visions of the portal in Albania. Visions of two possible futures. I’m sure you remember that we were baffled as to how this could be. I should see one future at a time. This future should only change if I do something to change it, which couldn’t have happened in this case, since the visions were separated by seconds.”

  “How could I forget?” said Vega.

  “Well, I’ve come to understand how and why this happened,” said Anna. “Neither vision was real. At the time I thought they were, because my subconscious didn’t let me in on the lie. I’m now convinced that my hidden mind conjured up these false visions to set things up for an outcome like we achieved.”

  Vega’s eyes widened. “Incredible,” he said. “As if being able to see actual visions of the future isn’t powerful enough. Now you’re telling us that your subconscious mind can also slip you fake visions of the future. That it’s willing to fool even you to manipulate the universe into the shape it wants.”

  “Apparently, yes,” said Anna. “At least in this one instance. I’m not sure if something like this will ever happen again. But I’m convinced that those few minutes in the helicopter set in motion everything that followed. I didn’t have any idea at the time, but I was able to gradually connect many of the dots. You might say that I had to use logic and my detective skills to puzzle out my own actions. Steve helped a lot, too. But even if my hidden mind had been able to communicate with me perfectly, I’m not convinced it could have told me what it was doing. I don’t think that even it had everyt
hing worked out at that point. I think my subconscious mind just saw what it had to do to make a desired future come about, without understanding how or why.”

  “Which is truly extraordinary,” said Vega.

  “After I had the visions,” continued Anna, “we landed at Evie headquarters and had to deal with a possessed version of Secretary Stinnett, followed by a holographic version of Shane Frey. A Shane Frey who had recently gained full command of an AI named Nessie. I guessed right away that Frey had used Nessie to eavesdrop on us through Steve’s comm. And I had a hunch that when we were flying to Arizona, my clairvoyant subconscious knew we were being listened to. I had a feeling that my visions in the helicopter were actually for Frey’s benefit.”

  “Why would you keep this hunch to yourself?” asked Vega.

  “My intuition said that I should,” replied Anna. “But to continue, I realized that if Frey had listened in, I had given him a lot to think about. If I was able to escape from Evie headquarters, he’d worry that my first vision would come true. And because of this fear, he’d be willing to do anything to make the second come true instead, regardless of the cost. Including putting nearly all of his forces in the woods to kill me, since that’s how I saw it unfold.”

  “So your subconscious faked these visions to force him to do what he did,” said Vega.

  “Exactly. Without the second vision, he’d never have put so many of his people in one place and allowed them to be as vulnerable as they were. He’d have kept them spread out and hidden. He’d continue building more, and ever more impregnable, fortresses. He threatened that the added six hundred of his people would give him the luxury of pushing Tartarian tech to the point that he could wipe us out with ease, and we couldn’t touch him. And I’m sure he was right.”

  “But instead,” said Vega, “he sent a huge force to the slaughter, thinking he was fulfilling your vision.”

  “That’s right,” said Anna.

  “Which allowed us to achieve a rebalancing of the scales,” said Redford. “Now the Tarts are relatively shorthanded once again. So we and the US military, or perhaps the world military, have a chance of destroying them before they do the same to us. I believe that if not for Anna’s fake visions, the Tarts would have been able to carry out their threat and drive humanity into extinction.”

  “There’s more to it than just the visions, of course,” said Anna. “Apparently, we also needed the help of two hundred Navy SEALs to make this happen. Not just two hundred SEALs, but two hundred SEALs that the Tarts would think were working with them. So their guard would be down.”

  “Right,” said Vega. “Which is why your subconscious included hostile US forces in your fake vision.”

  Anna nodded. “Fake or real, either way, it made no sense that the US military would be on Frey’s side. When the president revoked Frey’s authority, we all thought this was no longer possible. But then, later, my gut told me two things. One, that Kaitlyn was a traitor. And two, if she thought I’d make it through the portal, she’d betray us and bring Secretary Stinnett to Frey’s stronghold.”

  “Did you see its location?” asked Lisa.

  Anna shook her head. “No. And I didn’t see anything else, or have any additional hunches. Not why she would betray the Vors, why she would deliver Stinnett, or where they would be. But my intuition insisted that I let her do her thing. And much of what this was leading to became obvious to me. The conscious me. The visions had been intended to lead Frey’s forces into a massacre. But for him to be comfortable sending so many of his people into the Albanian forest, he had to become convinced he had the upper hand. And being able to add two hundred SEALs to his side—especially since my vision had indicated one of them had killed me—was the tipping point.”

  “And he needed to have control of Stinnett again to make this happen,” said Vega. “Which Kaitlyn kindly made possible.”

  “Yes. And not to brag about my subconscious, but as a bonus, this would potentially allow us to eliminate even more Tarts and destroy their US stronghold.”

  “I had Kaitlyn followed,” said Redford, “but she managed to lose the tail. Fortunately, Anna had a vision, about three hours before your battle in the woods. She saw Frey making Stinnett kill himself in a factory outside of Bakersfield. And she somehow knew its exact location.”

  Vega’s mouth dropped open and he stared at Anna in disbelief. “But that means you can see a future that you were never part of.”

  Anna nodded. “Apparently,” she said. “At least this once. I don’t know if this is an anomaly or not. It may be that my subconscious needs ridiculously high stakes to do tricks like this.”

  “In any event,” said the colonel, “I rushed to Bakersfield, activated a number of US commandos, and attacked, as you know.”

  “So when you were giving orders to us in Albania,” said Vega, “when we thought you were in Utah, you were really in Bakersfield?”

  “That’s right,” said Redford.

  Vega frowned deeply and turned to Anna. “So you knew that the colonel wasn’t where we thought he was. You knew that Kaitlyn was a traitor. You figured out that your visions were false, and why, and set things up to turn the tables on the Tarts in Albania. You even had Ansel Cartwright make more than forty-two invisibility units. And yet you chose to keep all of this from me,” he finished, clearly hurt. “Why?”

  “I’m really sorry, Tom,” she replied. “But I knew you’d be interacting with Kaitlyn. Quite a lot. And I don’t know how good Vors are at acting. I couldn’t trust you not to accidentally give it away. I had to be sure your reactions to events, and your interactions with her, came across as genuine. I hope you can understand.”

  Vega paused in thought. “Actually, I do,” he said, surprised she had come up with such a compelling rationale. “And this explains why you waited to take over the operation until the moment after learning I had spoken with Kaitlyn.”

  “Right. She had to think everything was going exactly the way she and Frey wanted. If you didn’t know otherwise, you couldn’t inadvertently give it away.”

  “And because you knew Frey would use the secretary of defense to deploy US commandos,” said Vega, “you were able to use them in the perfect double-cross.”

  “Steve and I discussed how this might unfold,” said Anna. “My hunches combined with his knowledge of the military. He knew exactly what steps Stinnett would have to take to get Special Ops forces into Albania. And Steve was in frequent contact with President McNally. The president put out an order to all Spec Ops commanders. He told them that if they were contacted by Secretary Stinnett, they should pretend to follow his orders without question, but then immediately notify the president for further instructions.”

  Redford smiled. “These guys aren’t used to hearing from the president, or speaking with him, so this really got their attention.”

  “Just remarkable, Anna,” said Vega in awe. “The machinations of your subconscious were extraordinary. Far beyond what could be expected given the sporadic knowledge of the future that you actually had. Interlocking deceptions in ten dimensions. It’s possible that you and Steve really did just save your entire species.”

  “Secretary Stinnett played a key role as well,” said Redford. “Anna couldn’t have done it without his willingness to sacrifice himself for the cause.”

  “I don’t understand,” said Vega. “I thought he didn’t have any choice in the matter.”

  “Not so,” said Anna. “Steve and I knew that if we let him be taken to Frey, he was facing almost certain torture and death. Especially if we were successful in Albania, and Frey’s people were massacred. Frey was sure to take this out on Stinnett. And we couldn’t just let this happen without the secretary’s permission.”

  Redford nodded. “So I went to him after he was cured,” he added, “and explained the situation. I told him what I thought was at stake, and that I was convinced we could turn the tide. But only if he let himself be possessed for a second time. I told him I expecte
d that he would be tortured and killed, and that while I would do my best to rescue him, I wasn’t sure if this would be possible.”

  “And he volunteered anyway,” said Vega, properly impressed.

  “Yes,” said the colonel. “Which is one of the reasons I risked so much to save him. We owe him a huge debt of gratitude. ”

  “But it still doesn’t make sense to me,” said Vega. “HCS is also a perfect truth serum. It’s hard for me to believe that Frey wouldn’t suspect deception. And the moment he asked Stinnett if this was part of a trick, the secretary would tell him your plan. Would tell him that you wanted him to be turned over to the Tarts. There’s no way Stinnett could keep that a secret.”

  Redford smiled. “Turns out there is a way,” he said. “That supply of memory-erasing drug you have on hand in your lab. After he volunteered, I erased his memory of everything having to do with our real plans. Everything having to do with any kind of deception. In short, he didn’t just volunteer to put himself in great peril, but to have many of his memories stripped away as well. I videoed my meeting with him, so at least I can show him how he came to volunteer.”

  “Absolutely brilliant,” said Vega. “You two really thought of everything.”

  “We were mostly lucky,” said Anna humbly. “But thank you.”

  She paused. “And I hated keeping you in the dark, Tom. But look what we accomplished by all this craziness. We killed off most of the Tarts on Earth and leveled the playing field once again. By dramatically reducing their numbers, we crippled their ability to produce large supplies of HCS and develop unstoppable technologies. We destroyed their base outside of Bakersfield. A large number of America’s most elite soldiers not only know about the Tart threat—the very soldiers who will help us hunt them down—but have firsthand experience with them. We’ve now had the chance to work closely with the president and the US military on a joint operation that went nearly flawlessly, which will give all sides more confidence going forward. Vors and humans fought together, and, unfortunately, died together.”