“Amazing. I’d heard of them but….”
“Anyhow,” Tom continued, “we hit an old lava tube, Alex, and I mean old, millions of years old. Somehow we completely missed it before in the surveys. But what is really interesting about it is what they found in it.”
Alex felt the hair on the back of her neck rising again, her paleontologist radar was pinging. What who found, she thought.
“Anyway, we just had an entire team down here for the last few days clearing it out so that we can get going again and…,” Tom paused.
“Clearing it out, clearing it out, what did they find Tom—tell me?” she asked, grasping his arm.
Tom looked suddenly uncomfortable. “Well, I spoke to one of the paleontologists….”
“Paleontologists!” she squeezed him harder.
“Come on Alex,” he looked at her sheepishly, “there was nothing I could do. I couldn’t tell you. I would have been fired immediately. Hell, I might have been shot. He brought in his own people.”
“He? He who? Batter?”
“Yes, Batter. He has total authority here, if you couldn’t tell. I think he answers directly to the President.”
“The President,” she said, remembering Batter’s phone call. “OK, OK, you were saying….”
“They found some stuff Alex. One of the scientists told me it might be pre K-T.”
“Pre-K-T! Pre-K-T!” she was beside herself. “Take me down there, Tom.”
“I knew you were gonna be pissed at me.”
“No, Tom, I’m not,” Alex gulped, pissed off at him, but trying to control her excitement. “Please, just take me down there.”
Tom was not about to argue. Winning an argument with Alex was next to impossible. He checked his watch and noted that it was getting late, and he would have loved to propose getting some dinner instead, but he knew better than to try to talk Alex out of going down to the caves now that he had opened his big mouth. Besides, he was still confused by Batter allowing Alex down in the first place. No telling if he would change his mind, if he did, Tom knew Alex would go nuts.
*
Tom had been totally astonished by her appearance this afternoon. He had no idea that she had been working so close by, not that it should have really surprised him. Alex was always poking around someplace in that damn desert.
He had been trying to work out a problem with a reactor location with one of his engineers in his office when they heard all of the commotion at the gate, but at first he hadn’t really paid attention. There was always some group of curious hunters or hikers that the security guys were chasing off.
When the commotion had continued, Tom had finally glanced up at the security monitor and seen Alex, instantly recognizing her signature stance and her unbelievable body even on the lousy screen. She was crazy, that is what he loved about her, and she was beautiful. The fact that she had no idea just how beautiful made her even more attractive. Why, he wondered, had he ever allowed himself to screw up their relationship? She was perfect, he thought now, looking at her.
*
They got back in the ATV and he wheeled them down to an area just a few hundred feet past the main entry ramp and parked. A dozen or so workers were focused on positioning the last nuclear cylinder in place on a cement foundation next to five others that had already been installed. Tom noticed that their attention was totally diverted to Alex when she got out of the cart. He signaled to one of the foreman who immediately dropped what he was doing and walked their way.
Alex, on the other hand, was staring at a large gash in the side of the wall, where another crew of equipment operators were at work removing what appeared to be the last of some rubble, loading it into one of the massive dump trucks with an equally massive skip loader. In the center of the gash, a rough opening ten or twelve feet wide and equally as tall, dropped into total darkness.
“What can I do for you, Tom?” the foreman offered helpfully, trying not to stare at Alex and failing.
“Andy, meet Alex Moss. We are going to take a short trip down into the cave. Do you guys still have some gear around?”
“Sure Tom, but…,” Andy hesitated, “isn’t it a little late to be spelunking?” Andy gave Tom a sly grin.
“Never mind Andy,” Tom said. “Just help us get the gear, and remind your guys that they are installing a nuclear reactor, not a ping pong table.”
“Yes, Boss,” Andy said, suddenly embarrassed. “I have a bunch of stuff in my truck. Come on, I’ll get you set up.”
Andy led them over to a pickup truck and pulled down the tail gate. It was heaped with all kinds of brand new gear; heavy jackets, helmets, ropes, flashlights, and tools of all kinds. “They were in such a hurry to get out of here they just left all of this,” Andy said, waving his hand over the equipment.
Tom fitted Alex and himself with thick coats and grabbed two flashlights.
“OK. Andy, we aren’t going to be long. Alex, you can leave your back pack here if you want.”
Alex gulped. There was no way was she going to leave it, especially now that she had her father’s favorite gun back. “Sorry, Tom, what little is left of me after today is in this damn bag, so I think I will just take it along if you don’t mind.”
“That’s fine, Alex. Here, let me help you.” Tom helped Alex zip up her jacket and to strap on her backpack. He handed her a flashlight and smiled. “Ready?”
Alex nodded. “Why the heavy jackets Tom?” she asked, giving hers a final adjustment.
Tom began to head toward the opening. “It is very cold in the cave, Alex, in fact, so cold that geologically it doesn’t really make sense. The tunnels somehow have acted like their own refrigeration system. The temperature is very constant at around zero-to-one degree Celsius. It’s as if they are connected to a bed of ice. Really, I haven’t had time to try to totally figure it out.”
“How did you find it?”
Tom shrugged. “More like it found us. We were blasting the very last part of the south wall, and when the dust cleared, there it was. Somehow we missed it on all of the surveys. Until that happened, we were right on schedule. We had to shut down for almost a week just to decide what to do about it. The entire facility is almost done, apart from that little delay.” He motioned toward the hole they were approaching. “But I have to tell you Alex, no one was more astonished than I was at what they found down there. I mean, I am no paleontologist, but even I got excited when I heard about it.”
Chapter 7
Buck It
They were finally heading home.
Pete Wilson rubbed his eyes to clear the glare from the lights of some oncoming traffic and fought to stay awake. He was seated high up in the cab of a Peterbilt semi with possibly the most important scientific discovery in all of human history trailing along behind in a refrigerated container. He could only remember a few other times in his life when he had been as excited and dead tired at the same time: his wedding day, the individual births of his three children, surviving boot camp, and finishing his doctorate in physics at UCLA. Oh, and of course, the day he had been appointed Chief Scientist for all of Area 51.
He glanced over at the driver, a man who went by the moniker of ‘Buck,’ but whose real name was Don Mills, a fact Pete had uncovered when carefully reviewing the man’s file prior to departure from the Utah site. Buck was not on Pete’s official team. He had been forced to use Buck at the last minute, when they had discovered the full extent of the unexpected find in the caves and realized that a refrigerated tractor trailer would be necessary to transport the specimen they had unearthed. But Pete had found nothing in Buck’s file that would preclude a Class A security clearance—nor had Batter. So here he was, somewhere off Highway 191, heading for one of the most top secret locations on the planet carrying one of the most important finds in history, with some relatively unknown cowboy at the wheel.
“How ya doin’, Buck?” Pete asked in his best attempt at a western drawl, as much to be friendly as a test to see how awake his unk
nown driver was. These were the first real words Pete could remember speaking to the man since they’d left the site.
Buck calmly spit out a pistachio shell he’d been chewing on and flicked it to the floorboards. He reached into a bag he had by his side and placed another large load of nuts in his mouth. “Doin’ fine, Doc,” he replied, spitting. “Be doin’ better if your boys up front would speed up a bit.” Buck punched the clutch, grabbed the gear shift and downshifted. “How’d ya sleep?”
Pete glanced at Bucks’ speedometer then looked out and spotted one of their escort vehicles a few hundred feet ahead of them. He had given the lead driver specific instructions that they were not to exceed fifty miles an hour, and he was happy to see that the driver was following his orders. Pete had to admit, from his vantage point in the cab of the semi, it did seem like they were only going twenty. He leaned forward so he could get a look out of Buck’s side view mirror to make sure the second vehicle was still following. “Sleep? What do you mean sleep?” he asked, preoccupied with his effort to see what was going on behind them.
Buck smiled and spit another pistachio shell. “Hell, Doc, you been snorin’ like a steam engine since we pulled out of Vernal.”
“Really?” Pete had no recollection of dozing. He checked his watch and yawned. “Where are we?”
“Just a few miles out of Green River. Another twenty minutes or so and we’ll be on the 70. Then we can start making some real time.”
Buck was about to be very disappointed, thought Pete, looking out at the stars through the passenger window. There were some low mountains off to the right, but the rest of the land was flat, barren desert. Over towards the east, a quarter moon was rising. He looked back at the road, a long straightaway of two lane highway that looked like it went on forever.
“Don’t worry about it Doc,” Buck laughed. “That’s why I’m drivin’ and you’re the Doc.” Buck could see the black Suburban suddenly slowing in front of him. He downshifted and hit the brakes. The SUV’s red lights flashed off, and the vehicle appeared to pick up speed again. Buck banged the semi back into a higher gear and hit the throttle. “Probably just seen a rabbit,” he said, a little exasperated. “Really, Doc, these guys are driving slow as molasses. Can’t you call ‘em an’ tell ‘em to pick up the pace just a notch?” he pleaded.
Pete looked out at the long dark highway ahead of them and weighed Buck’s request. He was just as anxious to get this trip over with as Buck so he could get back to the labs and begin work on the twelve blocks of ice that they had recovered from the site. Each one of them, he already knew from radiological testing, contained the nearly complete remains of a never before discovered species of dinosaur that had lived sometime just before the great extinction. Twelve of them! On top of that, it was pretty clear from the way the specimens had been mummified and buried that they were sentient, with a level of intelligence that had never before been imagined. He couldn’t wait to get started.
It was a miracle that they had even been given time to exhume them. Batter had been insistent from the start that Pete’s scientific team would have only seventy-two hours to complete their examination of the site and get out. Despite Pete’s plea for an extra day, Batter had stuck to the timeline. At one point, Pete had been so frustrated that he had actually considered trying to go over Batter’s head until he realized he couldn’t imagine who that would be other than the President himself. Besides, Pete was a military man at heart, and Batter had issued an order not a request, and Batter, as far as Pete knew, was one of the highest ranking “unofficial” officers in the United States government, not to mention the fact that he was completely in charge of Area 51 and, therefore, Pete’s boss.
So Pete had immediately pulled in his best people, and they had begun to carefully remove all twelve specimens as quickly as possible. But the working conditions in the caves had been difficult, complicated by the extreme cold. Pete had been forced to bend almost every rule he had ever been taught for the proper collection of scientific evidence in order to get the job done in the short time he had been given, much to the chagrin of his staff of paleontologists.
It had taken all seventy-two hours to cut the stone around the specimens with diamond blade saws so they could take each sarcophagus out more-or-less intact. The resultant cubes were approximately four-by-four-by-eight feet, and each weighed over a ton. One of the ARC foremen had loaned them a skip loader and an operator to pull each piece out and had helped them to devise a winch and a makeshift skid pad to get the blocks up the long cave corridor and loaded onto the refrigerated truck. Pete had been offered a C-130 from the military to transport them, but the thought of any kind of aviation disaster with such a precious cargo was too much for him to bear, and personally, he was not fond of flying, so he had turned the offer down. Now, as he looked over at Buck, loudly snacking on his beloved pistachios and spitting them on the floorboards, Pete began to have second thoughts about that decision.
He picked up his phone and dialed the lead SUV. “How’s everyone doing up there?” Pete asked when one of his team picked up.
“We’re fine, Doc. Our driver says we are just about at the junction. Everyone else is passed out.”
“Well, I have a request back here that we pick up the pace, and I am inclined to agree with my driver. Can you tell your man up there the new limit is…,” Pete hesitated, looking over at Buck and then at the straight highway in front of them, “…sixty? Let’s get home.”
“You got it Boss, six-zero it is,” Pete heard the happy reply from the other end. “See you in a few.” The phone went dead and the SUV accelerated.
Buck threw down the clutch and changed gears. “Thanks, Doc. Maybe we’ll even get there now,” he said, obviously much happier about the new pace. “Ya know, Doc, you got real lucky snagging me for this run.”
“Oh yeah, how’s that?” Pete asked, not all that interested.
“I was just fixin’ to load up with about five thousand pounds of fresh bison for a run up to Salt Lake when I got the call. You know they actually farm those things now? Anyhow, there is a huge ranch up near Vernal where they grow ‘em, slaughter ‘em, butcher ‘em, and package them all in one fell swoop. Quite an operation. Big money in it too. Did you know that shit is three times as expensive as beef? Can’t really tell the difference myself. Leave it to the heath nuts,” Buck said, fishing in his bag for more pistachios. “Buffalo,” he said disdainfully, shaking his head.
“Well, I guess we just got lucky,” Pete said absently, already creating a mental list of things to do the minute they arrived.
“Yep, you sure did. Did you know I’m ex-military, as well?”
“Is that so?” Of course, Pete knew everything about Buck’s service record from his file.
“Yep. Drove convoy in the first Gulf War, you know, the war we actually won. Dangerous stuff though. Got blown up a time or two, but here I am.” Buck was frowning into his rear view mirror. “Now what the hell….”
“What’s going on Buck?” Pete leaned forward to try to get a glimpse into his mirror, but could see nothing but the glare of headlights.
“That knuckle head, he’s not… Yep, here he goes….”
“Buck, what’s happening?”
“This asshole behind us is trying to pass,” Buck said, one eye on the road and one in the mirror. “And here he comes.” Buck watched as a semi behind them passed the rear SUV escort and was moving up beside them. In the distance, he could see the oncoming headlights of another tractor trailer, plenty of room if the guy didn’t hesitate. “Do it if you going to do it boy!” Buck pulled his foot off the gas, willing the other driver to hurry.
As the semi pulled by, all Pete could see was a series of running lights and the huge fuel tank they were attached to. When he looked forward again he knew they were in trouble.
“Ah shit,” Buck said, as he watched the fuel truck try to cut back in early. Buck downshifted and hit the brakes hard, swerving off to the right of the road, but he was too la
te. The nose of the Peterbilt dove under the rear of the passing truck, and all Buck could see was an enormous mass of stainless steel heading for the cab.
Pete watched as the fuel truck lifted and came right toward the windshield, smashing the glass as both trucks ran off the road and plowed into the soft embankment. When they finally stopped moving, Pete looked over to find Buck but there was nothing but fuel tank occupying the driver’s side of the rig where he had been sitting. Buck was gone. Pete reached up and touched his forehead, and his hand came back red with blood. Apart from that, he found it to be a miracle that he was still alive and the truck still upright. He unbuckled his seat belt, pushed the door open, and slid down to the ground, the smell of fuel almost overwhelming him.
*
“Doc. Doc, are you all right?” he could hear Paula, one of his team yelling as she ran to assist him from the SUV that had been following.
“Yeah, I think so,” Pete replied, still in a daze.
“Let me see that,” Paula said, gently removing Pete’s hand from his head. She scrutinized the wound, and then miraculously produced a Kleenex from her pocket to try to staunch the flow of blood. “Doesn’t look too bad, right in the eyebrow—nothing five or six stitches won’t fix. Where’s your driver?”
“Well…,” Pete started to reply.
“Hey, you guys gotta get outta here,” an unfamiliar voice said coming around the truck. Pete assumed that it had to be the fuel truck driver who had apparently escaped the accident unharmed. “This thing might blow any second,” the man was shouting as he emerged around the side of the wreck carrying a large chrome fire extinguisher.
Pete looked down at his feet and noticed that the ground around them was already becoming saturated with fuel. He ran for the rear of the truck, pulling Paula along with him. As Pete reached the back of the tractor trailer, he realized the rest of his team had already converged there with the same thought: the specimens!
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