Falling Star (The Watchers)

by Philip Chen

  "Mister, I don't know who you are. I got me a Chinee boy on suspicion of espionage."

  Fighting back the rising anger in his voice, McHugh stated in measured tones, "Mr. Thompson, I am going to make this very clear. If you continue to hold Ensign Liu on any charge whatsoever, you are going to be in shit so deep that your red neck will be brown. Am I making myself clear? In addition, Ensign Liu is an Officer in the Navy and is not to be referred to as a 'Chinee boy' by you or anyone else is that also cl...." -- The line went dead.

  Furious, McHugh called Jeb Tillingham, a classmate of his from the Academy, assigned to the Office of Naval Operations in Washington, D.C.

  "Jeb, this is Bob McHugh."

  "Bob, long time no hear. Last I heard you were out west chasing porpoises and killer whales to make them into finny commandos."

  "Jeb, I wish I could chat but I've got some serious business."

  Tillingham quickly became quiet, "What's up, Bob?"

  "One of my officers, Mike, is in the Bay Area working with Tom Sevson of Western Light on that geomagnetic problem. I got a report that he was picked by the D.I.A. on some hoked up charge. I just spoke to a D.I.A. agent, John Thompson, who refuses to release my man. I have to tell you that this Thompson has a neck so red my telephone glowed."

  "Is this guy at the Presidio?"

  "Yes."

  "Great, the Commander of the Presidio, General Perry Williams, is an old friend of the CNO's. I'll give his Aide de Camp a call immediately."

  The receptionist at the D.I.A. office looked up to see a full bird Colonel in the Army, and six military police carrying M-1 Carbines burst into her office.

  "Can I help you?"

  "I'm Colonel Bradley Robertson, Executive Officer to the Commandant of the Presidio, General Perry Williams. Is a John Thompson present?"

  "Yes, I'll get him for you."

  A minute later, a large man in an ill fitting civilian suit walked through the doorway into the receptionist's area. "I'm John Thompson, Can I help you?"

  "I understand that you have a naval officer in custody by the name of Aloysius Liu. Is that correct?"

  "Do you mean that Chinaman I picked up this morning?"

  "Thompson, I'm not here to play games with you. I have it on good authority that you are holding an officer in the armed forces of the United States. If you have Ensign Liu in custody, you had better have one hell of a good reason."

  "That Chinaman is being held on suspicion of espionage."

  "On whose authority?"

  "On my authority!"

  Robertson, a former green beret and a holder of many decorations including the Silver Star, was not normally prone to excitement. However, before him stood the very reason he, at times, hated the service; it allowed racist creeps like John Thompson to hide in its crevices like so many cockroaches. Swiftly grabbing the labels of Thompson's cheap suit, Robertson pulled the face of John Thompson close to his. The intermingled smells of body odor of someone accustomed to drinking cheap wine, smoking cheap stale cigars, and even cheaper whiskey was overpowering.

  The urge to physically teach Thompson a valuable lesson in sensitivity was almost overwhelming, but Robertson spoke softly and deliberately.

  "Listen you dumb fuck, do you know who you are holding? Ensign Liu is a NAVFAC officer on special assignment to the Oceanographer of the Navy for a top secret project. Your little adventure has already brought discredit to my boss, the Commandant of the Presidio; the CNO's office called this morning and all hell is breaking loose. It would give me no small amount of pleasure to take that fucking red neck of yours and break it in two. Am I making myself sufficiently clear?"

  With that Robertson threw the portly 250 pound Thompson against the wall with a loud thud.

  Robertson thought to himself: shit, I didn't know I had that much strength.

  Dusting off his hands and straightening out his dress uniform, Robertson addressed the now cowed John Thompson, "Now will you please get Ensign Liu for me? Oh! By the way, don't ever use the term 'Chinaman' again. If I ever find out you have, I will find you and I won't be in my dress uniform."

  Just about this time, Clyde Hopkins, Thompson's partner burst into the room with his revolver drawn. As he looked up, he stared into the muzzles of six M-1 Carbines.

  "Drop your weapon," demanded Robertson. Hopkins complied with that request.

  With his hands in the air, Hopkins asked Thompson, "What the hell is happening?"

  "Shut your fuckin' mouth, Clyde. These fellas want that Chinese guy, now!" sputtered a defiant Thompson.

  "What is your name?" asked Robertson.

  "Clyde Hopkins, Sergeant First Class, United States Army," replied Hopkins.

  "What is your rank and service, Thompson?"

  "Master Sergeant, U.S. Army."

  "Sergeant Wills, please take Hopkins and go look for Ensign Liu."

  "Hopkins, before you go, both you and Thompson are hereby relieved of your duties as agents of the Defense Intelligence Agency and are remanded to the custody of the Provost Marshal. I'll have formal charges as soon as possible, probably something like federal kidnapping or disrespect of a commissioned officer, if I can't think of any legit charges I'll make up some. Take this shit away, Sergeant it's beginning to smell in here."

  In a few minutes, a disheveled, unshaven and visibly irritated Mike was brought into the receptionist office.

  Robertson greeted him in Mandarin, "Nee how mah, Liu shan sen?"

  "Hey, that's pretty good," said Mike, caught unawares by this Caucasian speaking his mother tongue. "Where did you learn to speak like that?"

  "I learned it at the U.S. Army language school in Monterey, California. I'm Brad Robertson, Executive Officer at the Presidio, sorry about your rather unfortunate welcome to the Presidio, Mister Liu."

  "I gotta tell you that was something I expected in the deepest part of the South, not in California. Who turned these apes on?"

  "As far as we have been able to determine, someone overheard you asking directions to MacAlear Aviation where they are working on a super secret system of some sort. That someone - maybe the motel clerk - called Thompson and his sidekick. Thompson followed you and Sevson for a couple of hours, saw you go into the Oasis, where anti-war activists hang out and decided that you were a spy. With the Viet Nam war raging on, everyone thinks every oriental is a Viet Cong. It's stupid, but it happens. I'll have one of my men take you back to your motel so you can change and then down to Sunnyvale. Tom Sevson is waiting for you at MacAlear."

  "Thanks for your help, Colonel. What's going to happen to these two creeps?"

  "Unfortunately, there isn't much we can do since their defense will be they were just doing their job. However, I'll see to it that they are relieved of their assignment with the D.I.A. They'll probably go back to some military police assignment somewhere. With a little bit of help, I'm sure we will be able to find a suitable next post for them. Maybe Thule, Greenland. That sounds good."

  "Thanks again."

  1600 Hours: Tuesday, November 2, 1967, Sunnyvale, California

  The green Army sedan turned into the guard gate at the MacAlear Aviation facility in Sunnyvale, California, not too far from the Ames Naval Air Station at Moffett Field. Like the Ames facility, the MacAlear compound consisted of several buildings and two large hangers. The guard at the gate, a young civilian in a white shirt and blue trousers, examined the identification cards of all the occupants of the sedan. He then directed the sedan to Building A2, a barracks like building constructed of white clapboard with a grayish composite slate roof. The three story building was labeled, "Project Squid."

  Mike got out of the Army sedan and thanked the two Sergeants who had assured his safe arrival and walked up the concrete steps to the door of the reception area.

  Inside in contrast to its drab exterior, the reception area was brightly decorated in earth tones, sand colored walls and maple stained wood work. The receptionist's desk was blond teak wood, as were the Danish style sofa
and chairs. Contrasting with the blond teak wood were royal blue sack cloth cushions and backs.

  On the coffee table were magazines and other reading material such as Sunset, technical journals, the San Francisco Chronicle, and the Alumni Weekly from Stanford University. Hanging from pots in macramé pot hangers were several plants. On the walls were colorful posters of the Redwoods in Muir Woods, Earth Day - 1967 showing the rising earth from moon orbit, and a poster displaying fish of the Pacific Ocean.

  The pleasant atmosphere of the office was completed by a potpourri of spices and other fragrances sitting in an open bowl on the credenza.

  "Hello, I'm Mike Liu. I'm here to see Ed Robison."

  The receptionist, a California girl with honey blond hair pulled back in a ponytail and bright blue eyes took Mike's name and called Ed Robison's secretary. "Janey, there's a Mike Liu here to see Ed."

  Both Robison and Sevson, who had been anxiously waiting by the telephone for news of Mike, came down to the reception area to welcome the newly released Ensign.

  "Mike, so glad you could finally make it. Hope you aren't the worse for wear given your morning's activities. This is Ed Robison. Ed manages the Squid program for MacAlear Aviation. Ed just got back last night from the East Coast where he had been begging for funds, time honored tradition, eh, Ed? Ed, this is Mike Liu. Mike works for McHugh," said Sevson.

  "You mean 'First to Lunch' McHugh?" asked Robison. Robison was bald, but deeply tanned from his almost daily avocation of SCUBA diving. Dressed in a red checkered shirt, blue jeans, and work boots, you could almost mistake Robison for one of the mechanics working at MacAlear. In truth, Robison preferred to spend his time working on machines, but with a Doctorate in Mechanical Engineering from Stanford University and as the Project Manager for the Squid program, Robison had few chances to "get dirty" as he called it.

  Robison also had a picture of the R/V Wayward Wind hanging on his wall, above his credenza. Unlike Sevson's and McHugh's photos, Robison's showed a younger Ed Robison, sitting on a rock in ankle deep water, his head held up by his right hand, his right elbow resting on his knee. His left arm was draped over his knees. The R/V Wayward Wind was sitting in the near background, listing heavily to the right - obviously grounded. Robison did not look happy in this photograph; he looked dejected.

  Robison had joined MacAlear Aviation in the late fifties as a systems engineer. In the intervening years, he had advanced within the company and was now responsible for the Squid Project. It was in this position that Robison began to shine. Completing the Squid had become an obsession to Robison; the Holy Grail.

  What the Squid didn't have was a sugar daddy.

  Although the major components of the Squid had been assembled and pressure tested, government funding for the project had dropped off as the Viet Nam conflict intensified.

  In order to keep the Squid Project alive, Robison had developed into quite the consummate grants player and office politician. By hook or crook, Robison had scraped together enough money year-by-year to keep his baby alive and on life support. However, at age forty five, Robison feared that he was coming to the end of the trail as far as the Squid was concerned.

  One can just imagine his elation to hear from his old friend, Tom Sevson, who expressed an interest in the Squid. This joy was compounded when he heard that NAVFAC was sending a young officer to interview him about the project. A faint glimmer of hope sparked in Robison's heart that maybe, just maybe, there was going to be a reprieve for the Squid.

  Cruel fate intervened, he thought, when some dumb red necked commie catchers took this young fellow into custody on some trumped up charge. Robison was greatly relieved to hear that Mike had survived the inquisition and was now safely in his office.

  "Why don'cha guys pull up a chair," said Robison. "I've got some sodas in the fridge. What's your pleasure?" as he went to the small refrigerator in the corner of his office. Opening the door of the refrigerator, Robison reached in and took out an assortment of sodas.

  "I'll have a Coke," said Mike.

  "I'll take the NeHi orange," was Sevson's response.

  Handing Mike a Coke, Robison said, "I hope you don't hold what the D.I.A. did against all Californians."

  "Don't worry, Ed. Those assholes were no more Californian than George Wallace. You've probably heard from Tom that I went to Stanford, didn't you get your doctorate there?"

  "Sure did, although Stanford in the early fifties was a heck of a smaller place."

  "Tell me about the Squid," said Mike.

  "From the specifications book that we sent you and Tom, you have a good idea about its operational profile. The Squid has an operating depth of over 20,000 feet. It can carry a crew of three: a pilot, an assistant, and one observer; four if everyone sucks in their tummies and is real friendly. The pressure sphere is constructed of titanium and had three small portholes for the crew. It can be on its own for up to forty eight hours, although it gets pretty rank by that time. We have attachment plates for scientific equipment, including high resolution television cameras, and strobe lights. It can also be equipped with an articulated mechanical arm for picking up samples."

  "How soon can we get her operational," asked Sevson. He had been sitting quietly in the background.

  "That's the catch. I ran out of funds for anything more than component testing. The components are ready to go but I need about a year of system testing and operational phase testing before we can get to the at-sea trials. I would say if we could get the funding, I could be ready to go in eighteen months," replied Robison.

  "How much would that take and is there any way to expedite the process?" asked Mike.

  Like a kid who had just been given a sack full of money in a candy store, Robison's face lit up, "I think that we would need about ten million dollars to meet an eighteen month schedule. If we put some system tests on parallel test schedules, we might be able to shave a maximum of three months to the schedule."

  Mike and Sevson exchanged wary glances.

  Finally, Mike said, "We can do that."

  1969: Face to Face

  0800 Hours: Tuesday, February 26, 1969, Aboard the USS Marysville Over the Hatteras Abyssal Plain

  Mike stood on the deck of the USS Marysville, looking out over the vast expanse of blue water. There were a few waves, but generally the ocean surface was calm, perfect conditions for launching the Squid, which was aboard its own tender, the R/V Falling Star. The Marysville would serve as a support vessel for this trip. The only sound Mike could hear was the slap of the waves against the hull of the Marysville.

  These last fifteen months had been exciting ones for Mike. Living and working in the Bay area was a nostalgia trip for Mike. During off days he would walk around the Stanford University campus basking in the northern California sun, watching the bronzed coeds scurrying between classes and Meyer Memorial Library, dodging the bike traffic that seemed to flow endlessly, and occasionally, official business would bring him on campus to consult with one of his professors.

  One of the best times to walk around the campus was in the late afternoon and early evening, particularly along the paths through fragrant groves of eucalyptus trees with their Vicks vapor rub smell that proliferated throughout the campus.

  Mike considered it a personal victory when Sevson began suggesting they go to the Oasis for a hamburger. Mike had learned his lesson well and always wore dungarees and polo shirts whenever they went to the off campus restaurant.

  As he stared out at the gentle swells of the ocean surface, the newly minted Lieutenant (j.g.), U.S.N.R., chuckled to himself as he remembered McHugh's reaction when he and Sevson had reported back on the cost of deploying the Squid.

  McHugh had blurted, "YOU DID WHAT?!!" as his cigar dropped from his open mouth.

  Now that the Squid was ready for its first deep mission over the Hatteras Abyssal Plain, McHugh was all over the place like a mother hen watching over her brood. McHugh was fascinated by the prospect of actually going to the bottom of the ocean
in a free swimming submersible. At times it was difficult to discern whether his excitement was directed toward the prospect of finding out once and for all what secrets lay 18,000 feet below or in riding this magnificent machine. Robison and Sevson ruthlessly kidded their old friend, McHugh, about being a kid with a new toy. McHugh's reply each time was, "But What a Toy!"

  0800 Hours: Friday, March 15, 1969, Aboard the R/V Falling Star

  Even though Mike was not scheduled for a dive until later in the operational phase of the mission, he had plenty to do. Standing on the deck of the R/V Falling Star, Mike had responsibility for checking out the instrumentation package prior to any operation. To do this effectively, Mike had to don a wet suit and SCUBA apparatus. Mike enjoyed this assignment because it allowed him to be close to the Squid and to be part of history.

  The initial operational dive would be conducted by the Squid's regular crew of two: the pilot, Jim Anderson, and his crew chief, Walt Carver. Anderson was an old hand in the submersible business, having trained on such vessels as the Deepstar 2000, Alvin, and Aluminaut. Anderson had been stricken with deep-sea fever at an early age and like most pilots of commercial submersibles had spent his entire career chasing that dream.

  When Robison figured that the Squid was going to become reality, he put out the call to his old friend who at that time was at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute near Falmouth, Massachusetts, running its small fleet of submersibles, including the Alvin, which having a dive depth of 8,000 feet was one of the deepest diving free swimming vessels available. When Anderson heard 20,000 feet he didn't need much persuasion and was in Sunnyvale within a week.

  Anderson was just over six feet tall and had the leathery brown tan of someone who probably spent too much time in the sun. His brown hair was thinning and his blue eyes had a penetrating hardness tinged with the crinkles of a smile. He wore dungarees and white tee shirts, on his right forearm was a tattoo of a porpoise diving into the waves, if you looked hard you could still see the heart with the name "Louise" that the porpoise was supposed to hide. On his belt, he always carried a stainless steel sailing knife in a leather case, the kind that has a five inch blade on one end and a five inch marlin spike on the other. Anderson's reputation was hard work, hard play, joker when things went well and deadly, deadly serious about the dives.