Korean Intercept

by Mertz, Stephen

  Chapter Ten

  Washington, DC

  "So much for rehearsing tomorrow's press conference," grumbled the president. He eyed the street scene sailing past outside the limo's tinted windows. "There's no way we can contain what's happened. And with our nuclear forces at DefCon Three, it is time the people were told."

  Galt frowned from where he rode in a seat facing the president. "Sir, have you considered that going public will endanger our rescue and retrieval of the shuttle?" He had been summoned to join this motorcade en route from a scheduled media event where the president had addressed a national convention of high school honor students.

  The convention was only eight blocks from the White House, but moving POTUS (President of the United States, in White House-speak) always required a security package minimum of six black-windowed vans and SUV's to sandwich the limo as the motorcade traveled a cordoned-off route.

  Wil Fleming, the president's chief of staff, rode beside the president. He pocketed a cell phone, having fielded a call, and reinserted himself into the conversation as if he hadn't missed hearing a thing. The chief of staff runs the West Wing of the White House, and parcels out the president's personal time. Fleming was short, trim and dapper, age thirty-something. "I understand that you have a very personal stake in this, Galt, in that your wife is among the missing crew personnel. Believe me, we are utilizing every means necessary to—"

  "Save it for the sound bites," said Galt.

  He had never cared for Fleming. The president's fair-haired boy had political savvy and vision aplenty, but Galt had never trusted people, like Fleming, who reached maturity without any lines creasing their faces.

  The president made an irritated sound. "Knock it off, both of you. I know you don't like each other. No one said you had to. But we do have to work together on this. Trev, you've got to ratchet down. Wil is right on this one. We have every ball in play, and you know it."

  Galt nodded. "My people are monitoring every Liberty-related report as it comes in, sir. My wife and the crew could be just as dead as the crew aboard Challenger. Liberty could have smashed into those mountains and ended up in a million pieces."

  "Trev, don't do this to yourself."

  "I'm just being realistic." Galt turned to the chief of staff. "And yeah, Wil, you're right. It's personal with me, big time. But considering who I am and what I do, is that a bad thing?"

  Fleming bristled. "We've mobilized every resource available, as the president said. Why must we repeat ourselves?"

  The motorcade wheeled onto Pennsylvania Avenue.

  Galt returned his attention to the president. "Sir, there was a Defense System Satellite onboard Liberty. If there's any of it left intact, that satellite needs to be retrieved ASAP before the neighborhood bad boys over there get their hands on it. If North Korea or the Chinese gain possession of that technology, the world will become a different place. The potential is there to set back U.S. electronic warfare capabilities by a decade."

  Fleming's cell phone beeped. He reached for it, glaring at Galt angrily. "Do you think that we haven't considered that? Do you think we're not keeping every option on the table? Jesus, Galt, you're impossible." He shifted his focus to a muted telephone conversation without waiting for a response.

  The president reached over and placed a hand on Galt's arm. "Trev, I sent for you because I want you to get this not just as an order from your commander in chief." The president's eyes crinkled with the trace of a grin. "I know you well enough to know that you'd disobey even a direct order like that, if you felt strongly enough about something, as you do in this case."

  "Sir—"

  "Let me finish. So I'm not only issuing an order as your commander in chief. I'm telling you man-to-man. Fleming's right about us working all of the angles. We're leaving every option open. But I will not have you screwing things up with some cowboy play. You're right. Either Kate is dead or she's over there on the other side of the world, maybe in hostile hands. But you are not going to go off half-cocked. I will not have you disobey these orders the way you did that day when you saved my ass."

  Galt looked outside. The security gatehouse, then the grounds of the White House, rolled past beyond the limo's windows. "Uh, sir, I thought we weren't ever going to mention that."

  Fleming completed his telephone call. Again, he seemed not to have missed a word of their conversation. He eyed Galt with an openly bug-eyed surprise not generally associated with chiefs of staff. "You saved the president's life?!"

  Galt sighed. "I had to. He wasn't the president then, and he owed me forty bucks from a poker game the night before we went out on that patrol."

  The president chuckled. "I was his commanding officer that day, too. A long time ago, eh, Trev?" The limo gracefully coasted to a stop beneath a portico at a side entrance of the White House. "First day of a big offensive," continued the president. "Things stabilized pretty fast, but at first it was nothing but bullets and blood and confusion out there in that desert. Me and Trev, our unit, was ambushed." The president grimaced. "My own damn fault, and I was the only one wounded, which was fitting enough. Still got a piece of shrapnel that almost put me away. Anyway, they had the unit pinned down pretty good for awhile, and I'm lying in the middle of a clearing between two sand dunes with my guts hanging out of the hole in my belly."

  In his time as chief of staff, this was obviously the first Fleming had heard of his boss's combat experience. Wil sat there as if seeing the chief executive for the first time.

  Galt felt acute embarrassment. "Uh, sir—"

  "Ah, let me finish, Trev. So I'm lying there, with bullets flying all around, and the rest of the guys are pinned down under heavy fire. In my mind there's no damn doubt whatsoever that I'm about to become a dead man. But I'm lucid enough to hear Galt yelling at the other guys to give him cover fire, that he's going to pull me in. About then I start to notice that I'm the only one who wasn't fast enough on his feet, or lucky enough. So I start shouting, or trying to shout, ordering Galt to stay put." A hint of humor touched the president's eyes. "Uh, I forget, Trev, what was it you yelled to me that time when I gave you that direct order?"

  Outside the limo, aides and staffers waited for the president and his party to emerge.

  "Uh, I'd rather not say, sir."

  The president chortled mildly. "Galt's response," he told Fleming, "was, and I quote: 'Fuck you, sir!'—whereupon he proceeded to make the crab-crawl out from under cover and pull me back out of the line of incoming fire." The president studied Galt. "You sustained a wound that day that put you out of action for eight weeks."

  Galt brought his attention back to the man across from him. "I was out eight weeks. You were six months on the mend, sir. And some orders are easier to follow than others."

  Fleming now regarded Galt as though through a new set of eyes. "You saved the president's life in combat? But your name doesn't appear in any of the files on the president's service. I mean everyone knows what happened to you, sir. I never knew that it was Galt who—"

  The corners of the president's eyes crinkled. "Sort of explains why I take so much crap from him, doesn't it?" Then he became serious again. "Trev, I believe you were disobeying orders that day because you had a vested interest in keeping me alive, namely that forty bucks. Well, you've got a vested interest with Liberty. You want to go over there and tear apart that countryside, looking for Kate. And because you're our top covert ops man, you've got the means to do it. But my direct order to you is this: don't. I don't need a wild card in this mix, screwing things up and maybe getting Kate and any other crew survivors killed in the process."

  Galt nodded glumly. "Sir, that consideration is the only thing keeping me out of it. Damn it, sir, they’ve got Kate! I've got to do something about that!"

  The president sent Galt a small, grim smile. "And I've got something for you to do. I've been saving the best for last. The FBI in Houston has detained a man. His name . . . uh, what's his name, Wil?"

  Fleming piped up
promptly, "Fraley, sir. Eliot Fraley." He added for Galt's benefit, "A scientist at Mission Control. Someone got to him. They used a woman. Got him to reprogram the computers, and that's what brought down the shuttle."

  Galt's eyes narrowed. "Who got to him?"

  The president muttered a very unpolitician-like curse. "That's still a blind alley. The woman says she took orders from, and got paid by, a contact that she never met and knew nothing about. She says the contact passed her the data that Fraley programmed into the computer to alter the shuttle's course. That contact has not as yet been traced."

  Galt tugged an earlobe. "What about Fraley?"

  The president sighed. "So far, our people on the scene—that is, the FBI—have not been able to get Fraley to confess to anything. We've got them both. We're keeping them separated, of course, but as long as he keeps mum, she can clam up while her contact wipes out the trail."

  "She's a pro," Fleming told Galt. "She's copped only to what she knows we've got on her. If we can get Fraley to crack, he'll give us the leverage to use, and we'll trace this contact."

  The president glanced up at the towering edifice of the White House beyond the limo's tinted windows. "You see where we're going with this, right, Trev? You've just been given your job: make Fraley talk."

  "A jet will have me to Houston inside the hour," replied Galt.

  "Break Fraley." The president's statement was as cold as ice. "Get him to tell us everything he knows. This is top priority on the home front, Trev. And the job is yours alone. See that it gets done."

  "Yes, sir."

  Johnson Space Center, Houston, Texas

  Galt stood amid a cluster of FBI personnel outside the nine-by-ten room, observing Fraley's interrogation through one-way glass. The bombardment of questions from the pair of interrogators was drawing repeated, robotic denials.

  Fraley's bow tie was askew. His physique was diminutive, but his expression was defiant. He sat on a metal chair at a metal table, the only pieces of furniture in the room that was walled on one side by the pane of glass.

  "There's no way you can make me confess to anything," he told the FBI agents who were questioning him. "I see no reason to implicate my wife. You know very well that she's an invalid in need of constant care. I have placed her in an assisted living facility that will provide her with the best treatment." Fraley smiled smugly. "You gentlemen might as well give up."

  Galt had arrived minutes earlier, attired in sharply-pressed army green fatigues and spit-shined combat boots. He was armed with the 9mm Beretta pistol in an unconcealed shoulder holster. He broke away from the cluster of agents in the hallway, and stormed into the interrogation room.

  The men in the room wheeled around in surprise. Galt knew the agents, but they didn't know him. Leaving the door open behind him, he said, "Mr. Fraley, the FBI giving up is not an option."

  The agent named Jackson strode over to stand toe-to-toe with Galt, radiating displeasure. He was Galt's height and size, every ounce of it solid black muscle.

  "And who the hell might you be?"

  The other agent, Chalmers, patted his partner on the shoulder. "Slow down, Claude. We've been trying to crack this nut for hours. Let's give someone else a chance."

  Galt returned Jackson's stare without blinking. "I'm cleared. Check with your supervisor. I'm taking custody of this man." Galt turned to Fraley. "On your feet. We're out of here."

  Fraley became animated, leaping up out of his chair. "About fucking time." He did not sound at all like a space scientist. He sounded like a snide little man.

  A four-lane highway, designated NASA Road 1, links the space center to Interstate 45 and a twenty-five-mile drive to downtown Houston. Road 1 is lined with strip malls, condominium developments, car dealerships, fast food outlets, motels, even a dog track. Beyond this, unbridled suburban sprawl stretches south to the Gulf of Mexico.

  Galt drove wordlessly, both of his hands on the steering wheel, eyes staring straight ahead as he piloted the Jeep Cherokee through moderate traffic. He kept to the slow lane, holding the speed steady at five miles over the posted limit.

  Fraley rode beside him. The cherubic face, beneath the balding thatch of untamed curls, shone with agitation. Though he wore a seat belt, Fraley had positioned himself sideways in his bucket seat, the better to observe Galt through his thick, rimless glasses.

  "I don't know who you are, but thank you for coming to get me out of there."

  Galt didn't take his eyes off the road. When he saw what he was looking for, he began braking the Jeep. "Don't thank me, little man."

  "I, uh, don't believe I caught your name."

  "I didn't give it. It doesn't matter."

  The Cherokee turned off the main road, onto and following a gravel road to behind a strip mall, where the ground dropped slightly beneath a row of Dumpsters, removing them from sight of anyone in the strip mall stores or behind the mall, and from sight of the traffic passing by on the busy interstate.

  Fraley stammered briefly, then said, "Uh, I don't mean to be unappreciative or anything but, uh, would you mind if I asked to see some identification?"

  Galt braked the Cherokee to a stop. He shut off the engine. The air became very quiet. The hiss of tires from the highway was barely audible. A bird chirped from a treetop.

  Galt turned to face Fraley. His eyes were chips of ice. "Get out."

  Fraley's eyes became round. "Now wait a minute, mister—"

  Galt unhoistered the 9mm pistol. He reached across and almost idly swatted Fraley across the face with the gun barrel. "I said get the fuck out."

  Fraley squealed. The swipe had laid open a gash along the top of his balding pate. He scrambled, tumbling out from his side of the vehicle.

  Galt came around the front, chambering a round into the pistol.

  Fraley had landed on his knees in the brown clay. When Galt walked up to him, Fraley made no attempt to rise, or to straighten the eyeglasses that had nearly slipped from his nose. He was shuddering with fear, and tried twice to speak before he managed to croak pathetically, "Please. . . ."

  Galt extended his arm so that the muzzle of the 9mm was drawing a bead on the bridge of Fraley's nose. "Beg if you want to. I don't give a shit, if that's how you want to check out."

  Fraley's Adam's apple bobbed. "But the government would never sanction this!"

  Galt chucked, a low and nasty sound. "You don't think so? You don't think this doesn't happen any damn time someone important enough wants it to happen? Think again, chump! A traitor like you, bought off this high in the space program, that's a major embarrassment. Did you think the powers that be were just going to sit around with egg on their face?"

  The gash in Fraley's scalp leaked a rivulet of blood that dripped into his eyes. Being this close to death seemed to inspire bravado from his humbled kneeling position in the dirt. "Go ahead. Pull the goddamn trigger. Damn your eyes. You've got Connie. Go on, mister executioner. You'll be doing me a favor. I'm confessing nothing."

  Galt laughed, but the stony lines of his face did not change. "Good for you, Doc. I like a guy who can check out in style. Thanks for making it easy. I've got a busy night. We're wiping the slate on you. The spin will be that the shuttle went down because of a mechanical failure, not because they let a rotten apple in NASA who sabotaged it. It's going to be like you and your wife never existed."

  Fraley blinked, and it wasn't because there was blood dripping into his eye. The bravado vanished. "My wife? Nora?"

  Galt started to ever-so-slightly tighten his finger around the trigger, and he knew that Fraley would clearly see the whitening of the knuckle. "Yeah, that'd be her, unless of course you've got more than one wife. They're erasing every trace of you, Doc, and of course that includes the missus. Oh, yeah, I forgot. You thought you had her hidden away someplace, all nice and safe where we couldn't find her." Galt snickered. "You pathetic shit. It took five minutes to pin the health care dump where you stashed her. Doc. Haven't you heard of Big Brother? He knows everythin
g, Fraley. Say goodbye, chump. And when you get to the other side, just wait up. The missus will be right along. They tell me that the old bag is three-quarters dead anyway."

  Fraley appeared numbed by this new twist, as Galt meant him to be. "No, wait. Nora had nothing to do with this!"

  "She had the misfortune of marrying a dipshit like you," said Galt coldly, "before she ended up a paraplegic in that accident. And you were running out on her for a slant hooch who showed you some new positions. So why the fuck should you care about your wife now?"

  The fact of the matter was that no one, including Galt, had a clue as to Nora Fraley's whereabouts. Fraley had done a good job of hiding her.

  Tears began pouring down his cheeks, tears becoming pink when mingling with the blood flowing across his face from his scalp wound. "God, no. Please. I love Nora. I just—wasn't strong enough to resist, God forgive me." Galt's gun was forgotten. Fraley sobbed, blubbering, his head hanging. "Please don't kill Nora, I beg of you! I'll do anything. Anything." He brought his face up to meet Galt's eyes. "You want me to confess."

  Galt stared unflinchingly along the length of his arm and the gun barrel. "Well?"

  "Yes!" The kneeling man spread his arms and wailed. "Yes, yes, yes! For godsakes yes, if it means saving Nora!"

  "And what are you confessing to, exactly?"

  "You know what I did." Fraley's words cut through his crying. "God help me, I altered the computer guidance data, the way Connie asked me to. Oh, God . . . God help me." His sobbing increased, and no further discernable words were forthcoming.

  Galt remained where he stood over the kneeling, weeping man. He lowered the pistol to his side. He spoke into the microphone taped under his shirt. "Get that?"

  "Got it," Jackson's reply came through the mini-receiver that was invisible to the naked eye, in Galt's left ear.

  Galt was mildly irritated at having to converse with a voice inside his head. "Get yourselves over here. I've got some garbage for you to pick up." He tugged the transceiver out of his ear and dropped it into a pocket.