“That’s hilarious,” she said. “Really.”
When she reached the bridge she pulled off the ring and was about to hand it back to Mitch. What stopped her wasn’t the look on his face, but the picture on the viewport in front of him that was responsible for it. Floating in the blackness of space against the backdrop of Jupiter’s largest satellite was Origin herself, all twelve majestic miles of her in splendid detail.
“Is it…” Richelle began.
“I think so,” Mitch said.
Mitch turned his attention to the smaller screen in front of him and asked Watkins to join him.
“What does it say?” Mitch asked.
Watkins put on his glasses and peered at the Saishan text on the screen. As he read his eyes grew wider.
“Well?”
“Remote command access is now enabled,” Watkins said. “Confirm full system override.”
Mitch moved his hand over the controls in the arm rest, then pulled it back and looked at Richelle. “What do you say, boss?”
“What does it mean?” Richelle asked.
“I think daddy is finally handing us the keys to his car,” Mitch said.
Richelle studied the faces looking back at her. “Well?”
“I don’t think it’s even a question,” Heinz said. “It’s what we’ve been trying to do from day one.”
When no one else spoke, Richelle turned back to Mitch. “Then let’s do it.”
Mitch needed no urging. He confirmed the override and sat back.
Nothing happened.
Heinz let out a sigh of frustration. Naoko glanced at Mitch and offered him a sympathetic smile.
“I guess—” Francis started to say.
“Give me the ring,” Mitch said.
Richelle handed it to him and Mitch placed it on the middle finger of his right hand. When he moved it over the control panel the stones in the ring began to glow. A second later the screen was populated by a new menu. When Mitch turned to look at them the smile on his face ended just short of his earlobes. But none of them saw it. They were all looking at the viewport.
Origin was gone. In her place was an image that might well have been a still from an upcoming big budget sci-fi film. It was a hangar of some kind. Lined up in three rows, stretching as far as the eye could see, was a giant squadron of forward-swept winged craft that looked like something you might find on the drawing board at Lockheed Martin’s Skunk Works or the runway at Edwards Air Force Base in the Mohave Desert. There must have been at least five hundred of the craft in all, assuming the hanger didn’t simply stretch on for miles. As they watched an eight-wheeled crane drove into the picture with one of the craft suspended in front of it. It moved up the line to a gap, deposited the craft in its place, then proceeded to pick up the one next to it and return the way it had come.
Mitch took in the scene with a fascination few children could have matched and rolled the ball under his thumb forward a notch. What replaced the picture was an almost identical one, only in this one at least two dozen of the craft were missing. About halfway up the isle on the left of the screen one of the wheeled cranes was standing idle. The craft it had been carrying appeared to have fallen off and lay at an awkward angle on the deck in front of it.
Watkins leaned closer to the screen. “I don’t believe it.”
“What?” Mitch asked.
“According to the list this is only the second of fourteen hangars.”
As his words and their mind-boggling implications worked their way through the assembled watchers the silence on the bridge grew almost unbearable.
It was Mitch who brought them all back down to Earth.
“I don’t want to freak anyone out, but if these guys came in peace what’s the deal with the imperial fleet?”
To be continued…
Nathaniel Dean James
December 2014 – February 2015
Dear Reader
Now that you have finished this book, perhaps you would consider leaving a review. Reviews are a great way for readers to discover new books, as well as for authors to discover new readers. Most online retailers provide a facility for readers to write reviews. If you received this book through a giveaway or other promotion, you can always leave a review at Goodreads. It would be greatly appreciated.
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AFTERWORD
First of all, I would like to apologize to those readers who were promised this book would be available from November 2014. At the risk of alienating (pun not intended) your goodwill, I appeal to your understanding that life, an often tiresome and sometimes thankless distraction we must all endure, has a habit of getting in the way. That said, I am not entirely blameless. Season One has actually enjoyed a fairly decent run. It was my original intention that the proceeds from the first book would fund the publication of the second. Alas, I chose to forfeit any financial gains the book might have brought in order to make it as widely available as possible. This was a marketing decision, and while it has led to a delay of several months, I am confident that it will have the opposite effect on future volumes. I hope you can forgive me.
As you have no doubt concluded already, Season Two is a contrast to its predecessor in many ways. This is primarily because the first book was intended to serve both as a novel in its own right and an introduction to the series as a whole, while Season Two might be more accurately described as the first act in a series that will see Aurora and its members through to whatever fate awaits them in a future pregnant with peril and possibility. If you found this book less intense than the first, you have only me to blame. I admit (and some will surely make me pay for it) that we do not find ourselves being dragged along at quite the same pace. To tell the truth and shame the devil, I felt obliged to tip the scales a little in favor of the science fiction absent in so much of the first book. And now that we have achieved equilibrium, I think it will be easier to maintain it.
Season Three is scheduled for publication in early 2016.
Acknowledgments
As with the first volume, much of the work that has gone into bringing this one to fruition cannot be credited to the author alone. It may be that without the story, there would be little point in everything else, but the opposite is equally true. Thus I owe a great deal to the following people.
To Mel and Dawn, two tireless women of unshakable character who are both the editors of this work and my partners in crime at Millennium Birdhouse. Without their hard work, enthusiasm, and dedication, this book would not have seen the light of day.
To my employer, Martin Brower UK, who has provided the steady income without which my writing would become an unbearable economic burden rather than a labor of love. It stands to reason that well-paid work can be hard to find in the current climate, and I am grateful for the opportunity.
To my good friends Eddie and Mac, whose continued friendship and charity have made short shrift of many of the obstacles that might otherwise have delayed this project by many more months.
To my friends and colleagues who have taken the time to review this book prior to publication. As any avid reader will know, even the might of an established publisher, much less a start-up pocket Indie-press, is not always enough to iron out every kink in a large body of work.
To my loving family, both at home and abroad, who continue to support me as I make my way down that well-traveled and hallowed road to what I hope will someday be a full-time pursuit. I owe a great deal to your patience and endurance, and I am well aware of it.
And finally, to you, the reader. I have heard it said that some write only for the love of it, and I don’t deny that I take a great deal of pleasure in the act itself. But I do not primarily write for my own gratification, I write for yours, and I can only hope that I have done right by you with this book.
About the Author
I’m a Swede, born in England and rais
ed in the United States. In many ways I was a Caucasian gypsy for the first twenty-five years of my life, settling in Sweden, Denmark, Florida, California (Hollywood, Palmdale and San Francisco), Curacao, Mexico, Hungary, and finally the United Kingdom, where I reside today. I was a soldier for ten years in the British Army, first in the Parachute Regiment, and later in the Royal Military Police. I think the only thing that really strings all these things together is that I never stopped reading. Now a family man, I live with my wife and our twins in the south of England.
APPENDIX A
—
Cast
(in alphabetical order)
Brendan Fisher – (aka. The Chief)—Former head of Security at Aurora. Brendan was originally recruited out of the US Army in Berlin to serve as the personal bodyguard of Peter Bershadsky. Brendan was killed at the end of Season One following his failed attempt to take over Aurora.
Captain Almila – Captain of the Pandora.
Captain Baraghani – Iranian army captain sent to pick up Francis Moore and Titov Kargin and ferry them to the Pakistani border.
Captain David Williams – Captain of the Callisto.
Captain MacDonald – Captain of the Karl Gustav, the pocket freighter used to supply Aurora.
Caroline de Villepin – Eldest daughter of Peter Bershadsky and chairman of the Karl Gustav Foundation.
Charles Wentworth – Owner and senior partner at the law firm Ritter, Wentworth and Low in Washington DC. Charles was originally Peter Bershadsky’s lawyer and now works exclusively for the Karl Gustav Foundation.
Colonel Ji – Foreman of the Jangdan-myeon mine.
Commander Shen Duan – Commanding Officer, Special Intelligence Directorate of the People’s Liberation Navy (China). Duan is also the operational head of Project 38 for the Chinese.
Erik Breland – Chief of Construction at Aurora and Sarah Breland’s father.
Francis Moore – Former US Marine recruited by the CIA into Operation Princip before it was taken over by Norton Weaver. Now a permanent member of the team, Francis is in the process of taking over as head of security at Aurora. During his antics in Wisconsin at the beginning of this book he is using the alias Mathew Landen.
General Seo-jun Rhee – Head of Project 38 within the Korean People’s Army (North Korea).
Heinz Gerber – Chief Scientist at Aurora.
Jack Fielding – Former member of Aurora and Head of Corporate Security for Skyline Defense in New York. He was also previously Richelle’s fiancé. Jack was killed at the end of Season One as a result of his collaboration with Brendan Fisher in his attempt to take over Aurora.
Jasper Klein – Geological engineer at the Telford Research Center in Madison, Wisconsin.
Kim Jong-sul – Illegitimate son of North Korea’s dear leader.
Mike Banner – A close ally of Francis Moore in Season One, Mike is now the Special Agent In Charge of the FBI Field Office in Phoenix, Arizona.
Mitch Rainey – Former technician at the FBI’s Office of System Development in Washington DC. Mitch arrived at Aurora in Season One and is now the leading authority on the computer system onboard RP One. Mitch is married to Sarah, Erik Breland’s daughter.
Mohindar Bhatti – Former Indian intelligence officer and now a freelance security consultant who does occasional work for Skyline Defense.
Naoko Misora – Student of Prof. Christopher Watkins and Mitch Rainey’s assistant onboard RP One.
Peter Bershadsky – First chairman of the Karl Gustav Foundation, the founder of Aurora and father of Caroline and Richelle de Villepin. For an account of how Peter discovered Origin, see appendix C.
Prof. Christopher Watkins – Former head of the linguistics department at Ohio State University. Watkins was recruited to Aurora to decipher the language native to the crew of Origin, which he has named Saishan.
Reginald Styles – (aka. Colonel Styles)—Retired US Army colonel and long-time colleague and friend of Francis Moore. Reginald was the Pentagon project leader of Operation Princip before it was brought under the stewardship of Norton Weaver at the CIA.
Richelle de Villepin – Youngest daughter of Peter Bershadsky and the head of Aurora.
Richard Fairchild – Former Director of Central Intelligence. Fairchild turned out to be an ally of Francis Moore in Season One and has since retired.
Sarah Breland (Rainey) – Employee at Aurora, Mitch Rainey’s wife, and daughter of Erik Breland.
Song Chun – Realtor for the Pyongyang elite and all-round go-to guy.
Titov Kargin – Former Russian army officer, one of the original members of Aurora and Richelle de Villepin’s right-hand man.
Tsung Kuan Yew – Chinese Deputy Defense Minister and chairman of the council set up to supervise China’s end of Project 38.
Vice-marshal Gil-su Hwang – Chief of the North Korean foreign intelligence directorate.
Yeon Pok – Technical head of Project 38.
Yoshi Nakamura – Helicopter pilot and crew member of Aurora.
APPENDIX B
—
Names, Places and Objects of Significance
(in alphabetical order)
Amity – The small township built on the shore of the underground bay inside Aurora.
Arman Tenner – An engineering company based in Berlin and owned by the Karl Gustav Foundation.
Aurora – Secret operational headquarters of Project Origin based beneath the Isle of Dragons in the Baltic Sea.
Darkstar – Communications satellite owned by Skyline Defense. Darkstar, while officially decommission, remains in orbit and in use.
Gandalf – The nickname given by Mitch Rainey to the computer system onboard RP One.
Isle of Dragons – A small, rocky island thirty miles off the coast of Estonia in the Baltic Sea.
Jangdan-myeon mine – Disguised as a copper mine, the facility is the launch point for the operational phase of Project 38 located near the 38th parallel in North Korea.
Operation Princip – A clandestine assassination program begun under the Nixon administration and run out of the Pentagon by army colonel Reginald Styles. Following 9/11 the program was moved to the CIA and placed under the control of Norton Weaver.
Origin – A derelict space craft over twelve miles in length trapped in orbit around Ganymede, Jupiter’s largest moon. Origin is the prime focus of Aurora and the reason for its existence. For more background on its discovery by Peter Bershadsky, see Appendix C.
Project 38 – Originally an exclusively North Korean affair named Red Storm, Project 38 is now a joint venture between Beijing and Pyongyang whose ultimate goal is the elimination of US Forces from the Korean peninsula and the introduction of a permanent Chinese military presence on the border.
RP One – A Saishan surface reconnaissance platform launched from Origin by the crew of Aurora and now housed inside the Pandora.
Skyline Defense – A satellite and space exploration research company based in New York with connections to the Pentagon. Skyline is a subsidiary of the Karl Gustav Foundation.
Saisha – Home planet of the Saishans, the race who built Origin. Also the language of the Saishans. The word was coined by Professor Christopher Watkins as an English approximation of the original word as pronounced in that language.
The Callisto – A retrofitted Soviet Victor-Class submarine operated by Aurora. Originally the facility’s only lifeline, the submarine has since been made redundant with the construction of the research center and its docking facility, which can take on supplies directly from the freighter Karl Gustav.
The Karl Gustav – A small freighter operating out of Stockholm whose primary purpose is the re-supply of Aurora.
The Karl Gustav Foundation – A private fund headquartered in Zurich, Switzerland, established by the last will and testament of Swedish steel magnate Karl Ludvig Gustav. Originally run by Peter Bershadsky, the stewardship of the foundation has since been handed to his eldest daughter, Caroline de Villepin. The foundation owns a number o
f companies, including Skyline Defense and Arman Tenner.
The Pandora – A research vessel commissioned by Skyline Defense and built at the South Korean port of Busan. The Pandora is now home to RP One.
APPENDIX C
An Account from the Origin Files
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
1986
Professor Peter Bershadsky watched the students leave from his perch behind the lectern. His eyes fell on a stocky boy in jeans and a fading college football T-shirt busy shuffling his way through the narrow aisle at the top of the lecture hall. Peter watched him, amused by the awkward way the boy avoided looking at him, as if not seeing might somehow mean he couldn’t be seen himself.
“Kevin, can I speak to you for a moment, please?” Peter said, raising his voice to be heard above the din.
The boy’s shoulders slumped in resignation, but he obeyed.
“There’s no football practice today,” Peter said. “I checked.”
Kevin looked away and murmured something unintelligible.
“What’s that?” Peter said.
“I said I need to practice my throw.”
“And this class? I was under the impression you and I had made an arrangement. Don’t get me wrong, you can fail. That’s all you. But this isn’t high school, Kevin. When you leave here, it won’t be with a scholarship. This is the end of the line.”
“I know,” Kevin said, glancing over at the computer sitting on a table in the middle of the stage. “But I don’t think I can do this. All these ones and zeros. I get a headache just thinking about it.”
Peter laughed. “Do you?”
When he saw Kevin wasn’t smiling, he said, “I’ll tell you what. You go do what you have to for the next hour, then I want you showered, changed and back in here for another hour of tutoring. Can you do that?”
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