Event: A Novel

by David L. Golemon

  The others chuckled.

  Farbeaux walked up to the passenger window and waited until the man lowered it. The Frenchman saw that the men were dressed in black T-shirts and black Windbreakers. He smiled.

  “You gentlemen really take this Black stuff seriously, don’t you?”

  “Now take it easy, we were told to make sure you come to no harm after your exploits this morning. All we want to know is where our other Black Team is.”

  The Frenchman looked at the man. The goatee must have been meant to scare those he was supposed to intimidate in his duties for Centaurus. The hireling never really looked at Farbeaux as he spoke. Henri smiled again and leaned forward, quickly examining the van’s interior walls. They were standard. No reinforcement, and that was a major mistake.

  “I guess Hendrix didn’t inform you,” he said.

  “Inform us of what?” the man asked, finally looking at Farbeaux.

  “That I am no longer in his employ,” he said as he quickly raised his Glock nine millimeter and fired four quick rounds into the cab of the van, two each for the passenger and the driver, catching each twice in the side of the head. He then calmly took a step back. “That’s for that old man this morning,” he said quietly. Then he tossed the grenade he had been holding into the van, then quickly stepped forward of the front wheel well and ducked behind the thickness of the engine compartment as it went off with a crump, blowing out a bulge in the thin wall of the van and punching a hundred small holes as shrapnel blew outward.

  Farbeaux quickly stood and made his way to the back of the van. The men who had driven up behind the vehicle sat and watched their boss at work. The Frenchman opened the back door without exposing himself to the open, smoky interior, and when no shots rang out, he deftly stepped up and started emptying his nine millimeter into the cargo compartment. The scene was one of shredded men who had not had the time to even start reaching for their weapons.

  He calmly closed the door to the van and turned away. An old lady standing on the sidewalk with her dog about forty feet away was looking on incredulously. Henri replaced the Glock in his shoulder holster, then smiled as he raised his right hand to his mouth and placed his index finger to his lips.

  “Shhhh.”

  The old woman turned her small dog with a hard yank and walked hurriedly in the opposite direction.

  The mirth went out of his eyes as he waved his men in the sedan on.

  He had just made a public statement against the secret Genesis Group and their Men in Black. Now Hendrix would realize that Farbeaux was someone who deserved respect.

  He pulled up to the second car at the stop sign a mile away and didn’t look over; they had their orders and no further discussion would be necessary. The men in the car and even more at another location had entered the country this morning through Québec and had flown to Las Vegas by charter jet. Now he had his own people on-site, men he had trained himself for black operations in the French army. The Event Group would have company when they went after that downed saucer and whatever riches it carried.

  “Now, to find out where it is,” he said as he whistled.

  TWENTY

  Nellis AFB, Nevada

  July 8, 2000 Hours

  Dr. Gene Robbins was patiently waiting beside the clean-room doors for the three military men to adjust the uncomfortable antistatic and hermetically sealed suits. He explained as best he could about the experimental Cray system known as Europa.

  “You see, gentlemen, the systems that came before the Europa XP-7 were good, fast, efficient, and reliable. The system that Director Compton and Senator Lee managed to procure has yet to be installed anywhere else in the world. Europa is made not only to compute its assigned tasks With lightning speed, but to compromise other systems. It’s just simply amazing.”

  “In my experience a system, be it for military use or civilian use, is only as good as the people operating it,” Jack said as he tied off his hood.

  “That may be true for most, but not Europa, Major,” Robbins said, shaking his head and gesturing for the others to step it up, seemingly hurt by the comment.

  “Fine, Doctor,” Jack said, patting the tech on the shoulder, “no offense, I’m sure Europa is everything you say it is. Now, can we cut the shit and get to it?”

  Robbins looked hard at Jack, then turned and ran his key card through the door lock. The group of four had traveled down to level seventeen from the upper clean room in an airtight, separate pneumatic elevator, to an area known as the Clean Level. The entire center had its computing mainframes located here along with biological testing labs. The level was always sixty-eight degrees and the humidity was also a constant. As the door hissed open, they were surprised by the simple room the Europa XP-7 was housed in. A twenty-foot acrylic desk lined one wall, with seven chairs with bendable microphones in front of them. A ten-foot-by-five-foot monitor was attached. A simple keyboard was in place on the desk. In front of this was a glass wall, which had what looked like a metal curtain hiding what was beyond. Robbins gestured for the men to take seats at the seven chairs that were aligned in front of the clear desk.

  “I expected something out of a science fiction movie,” Ryan said.

  Robbins looked at him and pushed his glasses back up onto his nose. He sniffed and took his place opposite the keyboard. He tapped a single key and the monitor above came to life. The view was of all four of them sitting and looking at themselves.

  Suddenly the high-definition monitor separated the picture of them and slid it to the right side. On the left, words started to appear in rapid succession. Under each picture was their name and date of recruitment and below that their department.

  “It knows who I am, but I just came in today,” Ryan said.

  “Save it, we can wow ourselves another time. Doc, let’s get on with it.”

  The doctor worked the keyboard and the metal wall started sliding into the sill; behind it was a triple pane of bulletproof glass. And beyond that was Europa. The system was a marvel to behold. There was cylinder upon ten-foot cylinder of programs that were stored. There were four sets of Honda Corporation robotic arms installed for placing and removing those programs.

  “This is the automatic program loading system, or APLS. It will use the different programs for lightning-fast calculations and research.” Robbins used the keyboard and ordered up a still picture the men had recovered that morning from the lounge. It was the man Gunny had identified as possibly being Farbeaux.

  “Thank you for dumbing it down for our benefit, Doctor,” Jack said, looking at the picture. “Let’s save some time here and say Gunny was right, it’s the Frenchman at the club. That means he and whomever he works for more than likely broke Reese and they know what we’re after. That means we can expect a visit from either our French friend, or whomever he works for, or maybe the assholes that tried to kill him outside the club.”

  Jack watched as file after file, hacked system after hacked system, swam before his eyes. The three officers and Robbins had been into every hard drive and networking system they could think of trying to uncover anything that would lead them to Farbeaux’s employers. It seemed that every computer manufacturer the world over was supplied with almost identical parts, and a few of those highly technical components had been hybrids substituted by the NSA and CIA. These reengineered microchips allowed a back door into every system using the components. That included almost every agency in every government and every system that was networked in every university in the world. Europa tapped into these deep-cover “spies” and activated them for piggybacking onto their host security programs and culled them for information, covering her tracks as she went. In other words, Europa would create a back door with the help of the magic chips, then cover that hole on her way out of the system, thus leaving no trace.

  They had discovered that Farbeaux had started with the Antiquities Bureau after his discharge from the French army. That was obviously where he had acquired his taste for antiques and artifacts
. Europa had discovered offshore accounts in the Caymans; the Swiss deposits they had uncovered were shallow to their prying eyes. It was Robbins who came up with an idea that none of them had caught.

  “Maybe the guy isn’t paid in money, maybe he’s paid some other way,” Robbins said as he looked at Jack and the others.

  “You mean like artifacts and antiquities?” Everett asked.

  “Why not? It’s the hot investment of the last hundred years, safer than cash and easier to get rid of… or to hide,” the doctor said. “Plus it would explain his high interest in our Group.”

  “Okay, where does that leave us?” Jack asked.

  “Nowhere. We just may have figured out that however he’s paid, we won’t be able to trace it back to those people who are rewarding him with these items,” Ryan answered.

  Jack stood and stretched, then turned and walked to the glass wall and looked in at the now still robotic loading system that fed programs into Europa.

  “Doc,” Jack said while he was still looking at the interior of the clean room, “can you bring up his military record again and see if he had any service time at an embassy or consulate in the States?”

  “Yes, I think we still have it out, let me see.” Robbins typed in a command. “Yeah, the program’s still up.

  “Europa,” Jack said.

  Yes, Major Collins. The screen flashed the words in blue script.

  “File, Farbeaux, Henri, Colonel. Question, any correlation between his duties in the French army and visits or duty in the United States?” Jack looked at the others, who were watching the screen.

  The screen went blank.

  “That would be too easy, Jack,” Everett said.

  “Maybe, but it’s worth a try.” Robbins looked at Everett. “I think the major may have asked something we just assumed would be covered up, but something like that could easily be overlooked.”

  The screen flashed back to life.

  Five clandestine visits, 2002-2005. Discovered by FBI file examination of United States Customs videotape. One military assignment February-December 1996, Europa typed out in blue letters.

  “I’ll be damned,” Carl said as he leaned over the desk and wrote down the dates.

  “Question. Duties involved with military assignment in 1996?” Jack asked before Robbins could.

  Military Attaché, French Embassy, Washington, D.C., then assigned to French Consulate, New York, New York, September-November 1996.

  “Question. Available diplomatic or public record photographs or reports filed by Colonel Farbeaux while conducting diplomatic business in Washington and New York?” Dr. Robbins asked.

  Suddenly the robotic loading system sprang to life behind the glass, and the arms loaded at least eight new programs in a matter of a few seconds that would dig into every newspaper account, pilfered report, or tapped phone call the U.S. government had recorded on the Frenchman.

  The screen went blank and then almost as fast came back on.

  All NSA reports classified security sensitive and destroyed. All CIA reports classified security sensitive and destroyed.

  “Now that’s covering your tracks. Think he had friends somewhere?” Robbins asked, looking at the military men around him.

  Jack looked at the screen but remained silent. The loading system placed one more program, then came to a stop.

  Several pictures started to show up on the large screen. They looked as if they had mostly been gleaned from newspapers and looked to be coverage of the same event. They were pictures of Farbeaux, not dressed in a military uniform but in a tuxedo, but he was obviously not the subject of the photographer’s lens. In almost every picture there was a dark-haired man, smiling almost arrogantly into the cameras lens; the Frenchman was always nearby.

  Coverage is copyrighted material of the Washington Post.

  “Question. Subject matter of the article?” Jack asked Europa.

  Reception for the newly installed Centaurus Corporation CEO, in thanks for two-hundred-million-dollar endowment for the arts in Washington, D.C.

  “Question. Name of Centaurus Corporation CEO, please?” Robbins jumped in.

  Charles Phillip Hendrix II, Europa answered.

  Jack was thinking back to the story the senator had told of the crash in 1947 in Roswell.

  “Europa, any information on the Genesis Group, and what is the business of the Centaurus Corporation?” Jack asked.

  Genesis Group, Strategic Military and Corporate Technologies Advisory Group to the United States Intelligence Community, United States Armed Forces. Centaurus Corporation, Advanced Electronics and Optics, Divisions in Aerospace, Communications, Genetics, and Optics. Current contractual obligations with NASA, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Bell Laboratories—

  “Europa, date of the founding of Centaurus Corporation?” Jack asked, interrupting the lengthy response of the computer.

  Corporate papers filed in New York, New York, February 3, 1948.

  “With contracts with companies like that, why haven’t we ever heard about Centaurus? And I’ve never heard of a think tank called Genesis,” Robbins said aloud.

  “I don’t know why—,” Jack started to say.

  “Europa, is there any listing for board of directors, Centaurus Corporation?” Everett asked.

  The monitor cleared all the previous answers from the screen, and the system started reacting to the question, flashing newspaper filings and corporate reports.

  No information filed publicly on sixteen-member board of directors, Centaurus Corporation.

  “We need access to the Centaurus mainframe. Think you can do it, Doc?” Jack asked.

  “I think she can, yes,” Robbins answered.

  “Hurry, Doc, things are moving too fast around us and we’re running out of time, we need to catch up. I think the senator’s right, I’m getting bad vibes about this encounter, and now we have these bastards to contend with.”

  “Europa, access Centaurus database,” Robbins ordered.

  Accessing, she said, then the screen went blank. Unable to comply. Security system is unknown at this time, Centaurus mainframe inaccessible.

  “Incredible,” Robbins said. “Europa, access Genesis Group, either mainframe or personal computer.”

  Accessing, Europa said, and then the screen suddenly came alive.

  “Excellent, they have all that security for the corporate end, but they either didn’t care or omitted the same standards for their think tank,” Robbins said.

  Ten personal hard drives found.

  “Access Hendrix, Charles,” Jack asked.

  Hendrix, Charles. Program headings:

  Defense at Sea.

  Air Defense.

  Subsurface—Offensive.

  Viable Hybrid Aluminum.

  Biowarfare—Altered Human Species.

  Optical Warfare—Particle Simulations.

  Wormhole—Opening the Gate—1947.

  International Space Station Defense Platform.

  Plastic Aluminum Composite Armor Pla—

  “Stop!” Jack said, making the others jump. “Access Wormhole Program.” He leaned over and watched the screen intently. “Synopsis of study?”

  Evidence of wormhole travel, Southern Hemispheric Gate. Study indicates all UFO activity originates at 90 degrees south, 0.00 degrees east. Project Genesis confirms craft of same type as 1947 Incident. Photographic proof indicates use of wormhole corridor by enemy for planetary access, project code-named Crossroads. Air Defense Study, offensive operations by United States against attacking force.

  “Good God, the bastards found out how they’re getting here,” Jack said. “They’re actually formulating a plan for attacking them at this gate they’ve discovered.”

  “Just where in the hell are these coordinates?” Everett asked. “They sound familiar.”

  Robbins asked, “Europa, identify coordinates ninety degrees south, zero degrees east as noted in study file Crossroads.”

  Antarctica, pol
ar south.

  “The south pole,” Ryan said.

  “I guess that’s why both incidents have them arriving from the south on the same track,” Carl said, looking at Jack.

  Collins patted the back of Dr. Robbins and nodded. “Make this program secure, Doc.”

  “Thank you, Europa, this search program is now coded level one security,” Robbins said aloud, “director and his advisory staff Eyes Only. Personnel cleared for further research on”—Robbins looked up at Jack and he gestured at the three of them—“Genesis and Centaurus file are presently logged on to Europa, is this understood?”

  File, new—coded level one, Eyes Only: Director Compton, Senior Adviser G. Lee, Special Assistant A. Hamilton; file research security clearance: Robbins, Everett, Ryan, and Collins.

  “What do we do about this Centaurus Corporation?” Carl asked.

  “I don’t know yet, I’ve got to think. You guys get me some stills of that get-together in Washington and have them blown up and enhanced. I need clear shots of Hendrix,” Jack said, then he used his key card to exit the clean room.

  Ten Miles South of Chatos Crawl, Arizona

  July 8, 2130 Hours

  The Talkhan sat aboveground and seemed to study the desert surrounding its still form. There was no movement. The scurrying of the smaller animals had ceased and now they either sat still or had fled before the onslaught of slaughter. The beast was storing food, and her instincts dictated she needed even more. Every pore of its alien skin pulled in the aroma of protein near and far.

  It moved its tail with a swish of air as it brought the stinger down with a thousand pounds of pressure to impact the cooling desert sand. It used the large stinger and flipped the now wet, cooling particles up and onto its distended belly, then repeated the motion, tossing venom-soaked dirt and sand into the still night air and allowing the cool soil to regulate its 180-degree skin and armor. The small movements inside her belly and increasing core temperature were indications that the nesting cycle would soon begin.