Spheres of Influence

by Bob Mauldin

  “All the way up to the point where you think you can get away with pulling a fast one, Agent Wilson. Go ahead and deploy the chute.” She hadn’t realized how high her tension level was until the rear hatch popped open a crack and she jumped about three inches straight up.

  When her nervous system recovered from the adrenaline jolt, she realized that Bobby Lee was standing beside her, muttering into his headset. She pressed a button on her comm panel and listened as he gave instructions to his two teams. She felt his hand on her arm as he pulled her back and to one side.

  As she started to protest, he said, “From here on, you’re out of the line of fire from that hatch.” She watched as the two teams moved into positions, covering all possible exits from the plane, pistols constantly moving back and forth. Two members of A team stood ready to catch anyone coming down the still undeployed chute, weapons holstered.

  “Let’s just add a little intimidation to the mix, shall we?” Marsha muttered to herself. She ordered Cheetah One and Two to hover at hatch level and report on what they could see inside the plane once the hatch was fully opened. She had chosen Cheetah Flight for the express reason that each member knew both Simon and Daniels by sight, thereby staving off the possibility that Wilson would get away with trying to pull a fast one on them.

  Neither pilot reported anything untoward from their admittedly limited vantage points, and when nothing else happened, she called Wilson. “Having a change of heart in there, Agent?”

  “I just don’t want my people killed for no good reason.”

  “No more than I do mine, Agent. Which of my people is uninjured?”

  “That would be Agent Daniels.”

  “Well, let me make a suggestion. How about you have him open that rear hatch the rest of the way, and quickly? He knows us and knows we won’t hurt him. Let him lower Captain Hawke down the chute and then slide down himself. We go away; you go away. We get our people, you get all that information we mentioned earlier. Time’s almost up.” Twenty seconds went by, and just as she reached for her comm panel, Agent Wilson’s voice grated in her ear.

  “Okay, you’ve got a deal.” Marsha felt a bit irritated at the fact that even though she’d unfailingly used his title, he hadn’t had the courtesy to return the favor even once.

  “Two minutes and they’ll be coming out, Kane.”

  Bobby Lee had been listening from his own headset and began issuing orders to his teams. Her position, which had been dictated by Bobby Lee, may have restricted her vision of the interior of the plane, but she was able to see the hatch swing fully open and heard at the same time, “Mission Leader, Cheetah One. Confirm Agent Daniels aboard.” Immediately afterward, the blazing yellow emergency chute cascaded away from the body of the plane and hit the ground with a resounding smack.

  Glancing at her watch, Marsha said, “Nine minutes and counting, people.”

  Bobby Lee followed that with, “Heads up A team and B team. Things get tight from here. I don’t want the wrong people shot.”

  “Tick, tick, tick, Agent Wilson. I don’t pilot conventional aircraft. What’s that little thingee sticking off the wing there?” Marsha asked. When a pale and worried face appeared at the windshield, she pointed at a small protuberance on one wing.

  After a five-second pause, Agent Davis said, “that’s the airspeed indicator.”

  “Will the plane fly without it?”

  “Yes, but landing becomes harder when I don’t know my airspeed,” the pilot answered. “Why?”

  Marsha calmly pulled her pistol back out of the holster and, taking careful aim, neatly sliced the indicated piece off the wing. “Your time is up, Agent Wilson. Get my people off that plane, now!”

  “Mission Leader, Cheetah One. Confirm Simon! Repeat, confirm Simon! He is standing at the hatch. He appears to need the assistance of Agent Daniels to stand up.”

  “Very good, Agent Wilson. Now get them on the ground or I won’t ask before I slice something else off your plane. And have the decency to look me in the eye when you talk to me!”

  A total of ten minutes had passed. Simon and Daniels were at the hatch, and Agent Wilson glared out of the cockpit window at Marsha. “Don’t worry, Agent Wilson. I’m not going to shoot you. But I don’t want to deprive you of the pleasure of seeing what I do to your aircraft. That way you’ll be able to give a full report on the capabilities of my side arm. More information for your bosses, right?”

  “All right, I’m sending them down the chute now.” The anger in his voice was mirrored by the venomous look he gave her.

  She answered back, “Keep your microphone open. I want to hear the orders as they’re issued.”

  She watched his head turn toward the back of the plane. “Okay, Simkin. Let ‘em go.” Turning back to Marsha he asked, “Are you satisfied?”

  “I won’t be satisfied until they’re safely aboard my shuttle. But I’m getting there.”

  “Mission Leader, Cheetah Two. Daniels is helping Simon to sit down in the doorway of the plane. Looks like he’s getting ready to slide!”

  Simon, grinning broadly at the two Mambas in front of him, half-turned to Daniels, reached up, got a handful of orange jumpsuit, and kicked out, sliding out of the hatch and down the chute while dragging Daniels along with him.

  “Keep alert, people! Now’s the time for something to happen!” Bobby Lee said into his headset. “Patterson, Jordan, get Simon out of the line of fire!” Two members of the A team moved forward to help untangle the knot of arms and legs that had landed at the bottom of the chute, and the four men moved into the questionable refuge of the jet’s landing gear.

  “I heard ‘em just before they brought me to the door,” Simon said by way of explanation. “The plan was for you to push me out, and they were set to grab you and button up. I think Wilson planned to try to take off. Can’t guess what he’ll try now.”

  Simon slumped against one of his rescuers just as Bobby Lee yelled, “Gun!” and fired his laser through the rear hatch, raining molten metal down on an agent squirming his way into firing position. With a yell, the man jerked back into the darkened interior of the plane.

  Reacting to a noise behind him, Daniels grabbed the laser off the hip of the man in front of him and spun around on one knee, fell backwards, released the safety and fired in one motion. A nine-millimeter pistol and hand fell to the ground from an open belly hatch.

  “Captain!” Bobby Lee yelled loud enough to be heard inside the open hatch. “Two attempts to ambush us! All bets are off! A team, B team, if it moves, shoot it!”

  Daniels tapped the crewman he had relieved of his weapon on the shoulder. When the crewman turned to Daniels, he handed the man his pistol butt-first and said, “You provide cover. I’ll take Simon’s bad side. We should head for the shuttle.”

  The four men began to shuffle in the direction of the grounded shuttle.

  Bobby Lee, seeing the progress of the four men under the jet, said, “Prepare to pull back as soon as Simon is aboard.”

  Marsha said into her headset, “You want to play rough, Wilson? I can play rough. We can chop that plane up as easily as your agent. Fortunately, a laser cauterizes as it cuts.” Not sounding too concerned, she added, “Your agent should live.”

  Changing frequencies, Marsha said, “Thirteen minutes on the ground. All Mambas form up on the shuttle. Blockers break off and form up. We lift in two! Bobby Lee, Simon is on the ramp. Get your people aboard!”

  Trying to listen to all frequencies at once proved impossible, so Marsha finally cut out all but Recon One and Bobby Lee. Hearing her navigator report incoming aircraft arriving in three minutes, she laughed nervously and replied, “Commander Graham, I want this ship ready to lift on a five-second notice.”

  “Been there since we grounded, ma’am. Give the word and we’re airborne,” came the reply.

  Men began to run past her position on the ramp. “Loadmaster! What’s our status?”

  “We’re
at minus two, Captain,” Chief Hargrove told his niece. “As soon as you and Commander Remmick get off that damn ramp, we can button up and move.”

  As Bobby Lee backed up the ramp, pistol trained on the cockpit of the jet, Marsha called, “Cheetah One, prepare to launch special weapon.” Calling the jet, she said, “I told you that if you played nice, I’d let your people walk away from this. Well, you sure as hell didn’t play fair, but I’m going to let you walk away anyway. But only that, Wilson.” Leaving the perplexed agent in the circuit, she said, “Cheetah One, on my command you will fire on the jet.”

  Acknowledgment of orders and a shriek of protest hit her ears at the same instant. Bobby Lee backed across the threshold, and she hit the button that closed the ramps, calmly saying, “Fire.”

  To observers on the ground, the black apparition called a Mamba was seen to hover a moment longer than its companions, lazily turn away, point its nose at the sky and accelerate with heart-stopping suddenness. What those observers also saw was the jet begin to sparkle, apparently of its own accord. Then a series of electrical discharges began flowing down the length of the plane from nose to tail, until, after about thirty seconds, they faded into nothingness.

  “Commander Graham, you are on notice!” She began a five-second countdown, with the ramps closing off the outside light on “three,” sealing tight on “two,” status lights turning green on “one,” and the world seeming to back away from the viewport on “zero.”

  Marsha looked at the group of people surrounding Simon and hit her all-ships frequency. “Tiger and Cheetah Flights, thank you for your help, and my compliments to Captain Chapman. You are cleared to return to base.” Two more calls to make. “Kane to Flight Operations. Mission accomplished. Recon One returning to base.” One more call. “Commander Graham, the ship is yours. Please take us home.”

  Barely listening to the responses from her calls, she stood behind the two medics checking Simon over. Out of the frying pan and into the fire! she thought. Taking a deep breath, she placed a hand on the shoulder of the nearest medic. She caught the motion of the man looking up at the edge of her vision, but her attention was drawn to Simon, sitting so unnaturally still in the chair.

  Clad in a blaze-orange jumpsuit, he was at least twenty pounds thinner and, obvious even to her, near the edge of exhaustion. His left wrist injury, in a cast and strapped to his chest, was apparent. Not so apparent was the hair growing back on the left side of his head just over the ear. Closer examination under the lowered lights of the passenger compartment showed a livid, razor-thin scar trying to hide among the regrowth. And if memory served her, he’d come aboard limping with the assistance of two men, one of whom was Daniels.

  With images of Kitty’s automated crypt in her mind, Marsha asked quietly, “How is he? Will he be all right?”

  Simon sighed, rolled his head with great effort in the direction of Marsha’s voice, and opened his eyes. “I’ll be fine. Thanks for the lift.”

  “Well, I won’t say ‘it was nothing, Captain, but at least no one got killed this time.” Realizing her mistake, she reddened in embarrassment. “I’m sorry, Simon. I didn’t mean to imply...”

  Simon raised his right hand a fraction, and a small smile lifted one corner of his mouth. “I know exactly what you meant, Marsha. No offense taken. And you and your team deserve applause for what appeared from my position to be a relatively flawless operation. Take it from me—when you do let the shit hit the fan, and you will eventually, you’ll be your own worst critic.” His voice trailed off for a moment. “There’s only one way to live with your mistakes, Captain, and that is to learn something from them. To let it have been for nothing, there is the crime.”

  Simon’s eyes closed and Marsha had to lean closer to hear his next words. “And if no one got killed, you’re going to have to explain your use of the words ‘special weapon’ and ‘fire.’ But let’s do that later. Tell me how bad she’s hurt, Marsha.” The request seemed to come from a different man—one so devoid of hope that she had to look into his eyes to reassure herself that it was still him.

  “Uh, it was my understanding that you’d been out of touch since Camp David, Simon,” she stalled. “How did you know…?”

  “You can’t love and live with someone for almost seventeen years and not get to know them, Marsha,” Simon cajoled. “That woman would have moved heaven and earth for me, just as I would for her. If she’s not here, it means she can’t be here. It’s married logic. And since you won’t look me in the eyes or talk about it, it must be bad.”

  Marsha took a deep breath and fought the panic that threatened to silence her. “I really wanted to be a coward and pass this off onto somebody else, Simon, but you need to know before you get back. You must have seen the news footage of what happened at Camp David...”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  It would be four more days before the Galileo left orbit. Simon’s collapse upon entering the sickbay and finally finding out the true extent of Kitty’s injuries was just one of the many things Lucy had to confront. In this, at least, she wasn’t alone. Gayle and Stephen flanked her during an arduous hour that couldn’t be allowed to wait for him to recover. She came away from the session drained, relieved, and at the same time, frustrated.

  Taking advantage of the fact that all ships’ captains were in orbit, Lucy said, “Rukia, please let the other captains know that they’re expected at a Captain’s Call. My quarters, one hour. Stephen, you’re invited to attend as well. Might as well get the show on the road, I’d say.”

  With none of the three base captains able to give any input on such short notice, Lucy felt a little less sure of herself as she spoke to the assembled group. Gayle was there, sitting with Stephen, a little apart from Marsha, Robert Greene, Jerry Chapman, and Mustafa Morgan, still new to his position as Captain of the Galileo. Noticeably absent was Simon since he was undergoing psychiatric evaluation. Each captain had his or her second in command along, except Mustafa, who’d brought his weapons officer. Lucy had Commander Kimura seconding her.

  “I want to thank you all for coming,” Lucy said as she paced the length of her briefing room. “It’s going to get harder to have a full Captain’s Call without really good scheduling after this, I think,” she said lightly, then turned serious. “Before the virus wiped the Galileo’s memory, Stephen and some of his people were able to figure out that it would be at least five years, if we were lucky, before the Builders would come looking for their ship. Four of those years are gone, and we still need to build the fourth base. I’m glad Simon got back when he did, but he’s not in any shape to turn this zoo back over to him, so I’ll still have to make the hard choices. The timetable says we can dispense with the Galileo’s presence long enough for her to get the fourth base built. And I have to decide what to do with a certain FBI agent, as well as Simon and Kitty.

  “Kitty stays aboard the Galileo,” she stated flatly, “for obvious reasons. Dr. Penn isn’t willing to try to remove her from the chamber at this time. Simon will go along, of course, and recuperate, hopefully regaining his former... spirit.

  “Mustafa, you will have two new members added to your permanent staff. Father Jeffers and Dr. Jeffers. Lack of current medical credentials notwithstanding, Dr. Penn has signed off on Dr. Jeffers’ ability to do his job. Speaking of doing a job, how long will it take you to get crewed and under way?”

  “Three days if we do the job right,” Mustafa said, glancing down at the stack of papers in front of him. “Still want us to make the rounds?”

  “Definitely,” Lucy said “Here’s a list of personnel. Get with Brandt and Collier on who to pick up. After you get the specifics out of the way, fill out the rest of your roster with regular volunteers. Just figuring out who to send where and who you need to pick up was a nightmare! We’ll be opening a new department very soon. We need a personnel department desperately. Keeping track of who’s who and where they are is going to be a full-time job for several somebodies.”r />
  While Commander Kimura murmured a note into a small recorder, Mustafa scribbled a note on the back of the papers Lucy handed him, turned to his weapons officer, and said, “Get these to the Exec.” Grinning at the faces staring at him as he turned back to the group, ‘Stafa said, “Expected the order to load up, but I didn’t expect the lists.” He glanced at his watch dramatically. “Your orders should be going into effect as we speak, First Captain. My Exec can get things started.”

  Hearing the military nickname for a second in command brought Lucy up short. The increasingly martial attitude of the infant culture that was growing up around the Galileo had little to do with starting off using rank to denote degrees of position. That was only a simple way to tell who was in charge. Nor was it a matter of “let’s all pull together in a dangerous environment.”

  She recognized it for what it was, for it affected her, too. It was pride. It was the little kid inside saying, “See what I can do!” It was us against them. It was the same thing that had affected the young United States over two hundred years before. It was nationalism. There were some who didn’t like that aspect of the Alliance and wanted to go home—one of the reasons the Galileo was going to make all the stops on the way out.

  Lucy said, “Good.” She stopped pacing and looked at the group. “Mustafa already knows about item one, so this is for the rest of you. The Galileo’s engineers have documented a very slight but disturbing fluctuation in her power output, and peak demand times are being met with increasing difficulty. Apparently, this is normal with matter/antimatter power generation. The supply isn’t endless, and we’re fortunate to find out the easy way. I’d hate to have a ship run out of gas out in the middle of a big, empty… someplace. Have your chief engineers implement programs to monitor the situation on each ship and integrate them into normal watch rotations. The Galileo will have a three-day layover at Orion to have her monopoles replaced and then continue on to Gemini and Libra.”