“Something wrong, sir?”
“Hmm? Oh, no. Everything’s fine. Just fine.” The red dot moved silently closer to Las Vegas with every passing second. “What’s the status downrange?”
Colonel Waters glanced quickly at his console display. “All ten downrange transportable millimeter wave Doppler radar systems are deployed. All indicate they are performing normally, meaning they can each detect an aerosol mist cloud at a range of fifteen miles. All special agents are in assigned positions and will report what they see and feel, as well as any crowd reactions on the strip.”
“OK, OK.” He said, with a trace of impatience in his voice, and looked back toward the main display. The aircraft was approaching the city.
Having traveled at supersonic speeds at an altitude of 50,000 feet the Nightshade had now turned off its engines and was slowing while it glided downward. Its wings began to slide forward and extend in length at the same time. Ten minutes later it was at an altitude of 2,500 feet at the edge of Las Vegas. The co-pilot flipped the protective cover away from the master release switch and then flipped the switch up to the enable position.
“Ten seconds,” the pilot said.
“Roger.”
“Five, four, three, two, one.” The copilot flipped the switch marked dispense and a massive cloud of water droplets began silently flowing from the aircraft’s tail cone. The bright lights of the city silently glided by below, while the only noise within the plane was a slight swishing noise as the liquid flowed out and turned to mist. Within a few minutes the plane had completed its pass over the city.
Each of the special agents on the streets had momentarily glanced at the sky during this time and then turned to look at other people on the street. No one else had looked up. The droplet cloud spread invisibly and widened quickly as it softly fell to earth – a slight moisture in the air of this sleepless desert city. The Doppler radars tracked the cloud as it slowly descended in the darkness until it was at the level of the top of the buildings.
“Now, now, now.” The voice came into the earphones of each of the ground based agents on the streets of Las Vegas. Each agent nonchalantly held out his or her hand for a few moments as if they thought they had felt a rain drop, but none had felt a thing. Nor did anyone else, and the Nightshade soon restarted its engines over the Nevada desert. It began climbing rapidly and then made a wide turn back to its home at Edwards as its wings retracted to their swept back position.
“Omega, this is Edwards.” The voice came over the speaker system in the control room.
“Go ahead.”
“Initial report?”
“Doppler indications are that the cloud covered about half the city as expected,” General Baker said. “Ground agents experienced no sightings or mist sensation. No crowd reaction observed. Initial reports indicate complete success.”
“Roger. Thank you. Edwards out.”
Eight
Brigadier General John Baker sat impatiently in the front row of the subterranean conference room at Omega headquarters. A small visiting team of analysts was presenting the results of the Las Vegas flyover tests to the general and his staff that made up the core team of the Omega Command Center. He didn’t like visitors coming here. You never knew if you could trust them to keep the secrets of Omega. General Baker knew that there were many other locations in the Omega network besides this, but this was the primary command center.
“We should have these meetings via teleconference,” he had said during the planning stages, “there’s just no need for any of these people to see this.”
A civilian in the Pentagon had overruled him. He couldn’t believe it. Didn’t they know that it was he and his team who would be called up in the ultimate eventuality, in the event that the Omega system was put to use to defend the American way of life? He had wanted to say that, but he didn’t. He was a soldier and he followed orders, even when he didn’t agree with them. In his opinion, the fewer people who actually knew about this place, the better chance that they could perform their mission when the time came.
There was no doubt in his mind that this command center, buried below tons of rock and permafrost, and hidden in a no-man’s land of endless bleakness, broken only by the fiercest of blizzards in the long night of winter, would be – indeed, had to be, if needed – the calm eye of the most powerful storm ever unleashed by man.
“…and so in conclusion, it appears that the aerosol drop was a complete success. Are there any questions?” the lieutenant smiled briefly and looked confidently around the room and then directly at General Baker.
“How much did it cost?” General Baker asked. He had little use for lieutenants, especially smiling ones.
“I’m sorry, sir. How much did what cost?”
“The test, lieutenant, the whole test. What was the cost?”
“I…I have no idea, sir. I am only involved in the droplet data analysis, not the cost analysis.”
“You just said it was a complete success didn’t you?”
The lieutenant stood a bit straighter. He had heard about General Baker’s reputation for being tough. Some said he was just mean. “Technically it was. Yes, sir.”
“What was the overall objective of the test?”
“Sir, I haven’t been briefed at that level. My involvement was only to analyze the droplet dispersion, and as I have said, it went exactly as planned.”
“So you don’t know if the test met all of its other objectives then, do you?”
“No, sir.”
General Baker stared at him for several long seconds. With an obvious note of condescension in his voice, he simply said, “You can leave lieutenant.”
The lieutenant quickly gathered his briefing materials and left the room, closing the door behind him as quietly as possible.
“Colonel, you stay with me,” General Baker said to his aide, “the rest of you can go…now. We’re done here. You visitors, you’ll all need to catch your flights back to wherever you are going as quickly as possible. We’re expecting a major storm later today.” Almost as with a single motion the other dozen attendees of the briefing stood and gathered their belongings. Within a few minutes the briefing room was empty except for General Baker and Colonel Waters.
“What do you think?” the General asked once they were alone.
“It looks like the lieutenant was right, even though he didn’t know much. The test was a huge success. The ground based humidity detectors that were installed inside the special agent’s iPods all measured the expected increase in humidity for a few minutes at just the right time in all the planned locations. The water droplet dispersion went exactly as planned. And – no one, absolutely no one - from the public called any agency to report a low flying aircraft. Even the airport radars didn’t detect anything. It was the closest thing to a stealth bio-attack on a major city that could be done. Plus, and I am sure about this, it was all done under budget!”
“It was just one plane, Waters.”
“Yes, sir. I know.”
General Baker looked at him a long moment looking for an indication. He knows. He knows what kind of plane it was. They read him in – but not me, he said to himself. Then he took a deep breath. Of course they did. It won’t be long before I have to retire, but not him. No need to tell me about the next generation of stealth technology. Can’t agree more. But…I wonder what it was?
“How are we fixed for funding?” General Baker asked.
“The results of this test have already got back to the right people in Washington. I think we’ll do very well next year. However, there’s only about a month left in the current fiscal year and we still have quite a bit of money left in development funds. As you know, if we don’t spend it, it will have to go back into the general budget.”
“Not on my watch it won’t.” General Baker said, his eyes narrowing. “You don’t ever give money back. Ever. You know why?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Because next year they cut your budget, tha
t’s why,” the general said, not paying any attention to the colonel’s answer. “You always spend your money. Always. That’s the first rule of program management.”
“Yes, sir.”
“What can we buy fast to use it up and, of course, still benefit the project?”
“Sir, we only have one open ended purchase order at this time for Black Wind and that is for replacement of the liquid bladders for the aircraft, but I don’t think we need very many of those right now.”
“Colonel, you have to think ahead. Of course we don’t need them today, but someday we will. Think positive! Who knows how many aircraft we will eventually need to get outfitted with this capability. This will be a complete paradigm shift for the Department of Defense. Think. This will make nuclear weapons obsolete. If we buy additional bladders now we’ll have them later. Right? You have to think ahead. Just buy them and have them stored in a warehouse. How much money do we have left?”
“About ten million dollars.”
“Fine. Do it.”
“That’s a lot of bladders, sir.”
“To hell with it. Just buy them and get the money spent, OK? Just get the money spent!”
“Yes, sir,” Colonel Waters replied.
“OK… I guess we’re done. Right?” His tone had softened a bit. He knew he shouldn’t have raised his voice in that way.
Colonel Waters hesitated. There was something else, something that would likely upset the General much more than this. There was no avoiding it. He had to tell him, something had to be done and soon, and only General Baker had the authority to do it.
“Sir, there is one more thing.” He got up and walked over to the door, opened it, and looked down the corridor. It was empty. He closed the door and locked it.
“Sir, there is a problem with security. I found out just before the meeting started.”
General Baker’s eyes widened. “Security? Damn it! I knew it. It’s all these visitors, right? We have to put a stop to all these visits. I knew it would only be a matter of time before word leaked out. What happened? Who did it? When?”
“Sir, it’s not that. I think it might be much worse. We don’t have all the information yet.”
“What’s going on?”
Did you ever know or meet a scientist who worked on the project in the early days? His name was Timothy Harris. He goes way back to the beginning of Omega.”
General Baker took a moment to think and then shook his head. “No, no. I’m sure I didn’t. Why?”
“He died some time ago. He apparently lived alone and, as you know, it is customary in cases where people have had access to the most sensitive information, that a special team entered his home and retrieved his computer – just to make sure there wasn’t any classified material on it. It happens sometimes, you know?”
“Oh, yes. I know,” he replied thinking of his own PC. “Did they find anything?”
“Unfortunately, it looks like there was some sort of mix up. The computer sat in storage until recently. I’m afraid they found some top secret stuff. Quite a bit of it related to the old nuclear tests.”
“Damn.”
“There’s more. It looks like he knew quite a bit about the new stuff too. We’re not sure exactly how much.”
“He worked on the bio-warfare things? The recent stuff?”
“Perhaps…in the beginning, anyway.”
“And it was on his computer? They got all of it, right?”
“Oh, yes, they did. But, there’s something else. It also appears that he had become disenchanted with the direction things had taken.” Colonel Waters looked at General Baker but the general said nothing. “He arranged to have some of the most sensitive documents delivered to someone… after his death”
General Baker jumped up from his chair and shouted, “What the hell?”
“Yes, sir. The materials were probably delivered by secret courier; we don’t know who they went to.”
“You don’t know who? How about where?” General Baker’s face had turned bright red, and a small amount of white spittle had appeared in the corners of his mouth.
“The person’s name is Dan, sir. That’s all we found in his computer.”
“Do we know where he lives?”
“No, sir. Not yet. I’m sure they’re working on it.”
“We need to get this cleaned up, Waters, you know what I mean?”
“Yes, sir,” Colonel Waters replied.
“Do you know what would happen if word leaked out about this program?”
“Yes, sir. I’ll take care of it.”
“When you find out where he lives, you send the team. You know which one.” General Baker said.
“Yes, sir.”
Without another word they quickly left the conference room. Behind them the overhead lights automatically turned off, and the metal door swished closed and, with a barely audible click, locked itself secure.
Nine
Life is precarious, Stephen Itagaki thought to himself as he drove past the traffic accident. He was late, about fifteen minutes late, for his morning visit to the Tokyo Zoo. He glanced quickly at the mangled car and the unconscious woman pinned behind the steering wheel. The fire department had just arrived and a rescue crew was trying to free her. A tow truck was attaching a cable to the concrete delivery truck that had run the red light. Could have been me, he thought as he maneuvered his car over one lane and into moving traffic. A few minutes later he was on the highway and accelerating to his usual ten miles an hour over the speed limit.
As he drove toward the zoo he cleared his mind of the images he had just seen. “What a glorious day!” he said aloud. “Glorious.” He was right. It was late summer without a cloud in the sky. A mild breeze rippled the leaves on the trees and the water birds had not yet departed on their winter migrations. He pressed the electric window control on his armrest and his window quietly glided down. Sweet, fresh air poured in.
Stephen hadn’t meant that the weather or the scenery was glorious. No, it was something entirely different. He was reveling in his remembrance of the events of last night and his expectation of what he would see at the zoo this morning.
I wonder what Dan has been doing? He thought for a moment as he glanced in his rear view mirror for possible police cars. It’s been – what, two years now since we met in Siberia? Not a lot I’ll bet. He doesn’t understand life. It’s a competition, that’s all it is. It’s a struggle. You have to be first – you have to be the best. That’s all that matters in the end. Dan’s a nice guy, of course, but everyone knows where they finish. He will be absolutely shocked. Ha! So will everyone else... He allowed himself a smile.
It was, indeed, almost two years since Stephen and Dan had participated in the mammoth expedition to Siberia. Stephen had started work extracting the mammoth DNA as soon as he had returned to Tokyo. Like Dan, he had been astounded at the quality of the samples he had obtained; however, while Dan preferred to find a grad student to perform the research, Stephen had begun work immediately - alone and in complete secrecy with only the help of his lab assistant Shaylin Nakamura.
His DNA extraction results had gone well and within two months he had inserted mammoth DNA into the nucleus of an Asian elephant egg in his laboratory and then he had inserted the egg into the elephant’s womb at the Tokyo Zoo. There was nothing revolutionary about that. Cloning methods had been well established for years. But, last night had been spectacular. Shortly after 10 PM the female elephant had given birth to a baby mammoth. From a distance the baby looked very much like a baby elephant; however, upon a closer look it was immediately obvious that it was covered with long, fine brown hairs. Within minutes of birth it had sought its mother’s teat and she willingly obliged, accepting the baby as her own.
It had been an almost overwhelming experience for Stephen. First, just conceiving of the idea had been a masterstroke, and then the careful DNA extraction and implantation, the long gestation period where so much could have gone wrong, and then the birth
and the female elephant actually nursing the mammoth.
The risk, the odds, the complete improbability of it all, he gloated. So many things that might have gone wrong… But they didn’t! He clenched a fist in victory. Just think how many female elephants refuse to nurse even their own offspring that are born in zoos. This is so incredible. This is where I will make my mark in history. Amazing. You never know about life. He couldn’t stop grinning as he drove.
A few minutes later, Stephen turned into the Zoo entrance. Only the director of the Zoo and the head of the Zoo’s mammal section had known the truth about the cloning of the baby mammoth. Stephen had bought their secrecy with a promise to give them a percentage of the money that could be earned from the mammoth. The potential was seemingly unlimited. Not only would there be worldwide interest in visiting the zoo to see the mammoth but there were the possibilities of an entire industry based upon this one animal.
Thoughts of movie rights, toys, clothing lines, and more came to them immediately, but Stephen also told them there was great potential for biological products derived from mammoths. Herds of mammoths could be raised for meat of course, but there might well be other products that would be much more lucrative such as medicines, tissue and serum products for biological experiments, and of course the vast Asian market for aphrodisiacs. Each of them could earn fortunes from the mammoth. All they had to do was to take good care of the animal.
They had transferred a gifted young elephant handler, the best they had, to be the primary caretaker of the newborn animal for the first few days of its life. “Sam”, as he was called, was twenty years old and had completed only three years of school, but he had a way with animals. He had been judged by the school system as being marginally capable of reading and writing and virtually incapable of mathematics. Years of remedial efforts had failed to teach him anything more than what he had learned in his three years of school. He had never heard of mammoths. For him this baby would only be a slightly unusual elephant, nothing worth mentioning to anyone. Stephen had insisted on meeting Sam to make sure he could be trusted not to tell anyone about the mammoth. His doubts were allayed almost immediately. Sam didn’t have much to say in their meeting and spent most of the time looking at the floor or his feet. It was clear to Stephen that Sam was trying hard to be friendly, but at the same time he was extremely shy – a young man lost in a world of men like Stephen that was too confusing, too fast. Stephen almost felt sorry for him, but he didn’t. Sam was just what they needed.
The Viral Epiphany Page 5