He kept his eyes closed all the way through the roll out and climb on the carrier jet. Even when it separated and they made the shaky transition to hypersonic flight, he was aware they could still abort. When the orbital started its final burn however he finally relaxed. He was free and relatively well to do, even by Home standards and had a whole new life in front of him.
Chapter 14
Headed south out of LA, State Highway Patrolman Jesus Rodriguez listened to the radio chatter about the situation unfolding around the President. Traffic was flowing nicely about four over the limit, the most the public auto setting would accept without scolding them. At ten over it refused the command unless they declared an emergency. He eased his cruiser along just a little bit faster, looking each car over as he passed. Quite a few people were uncomfortable under his gaze.
Not a few adjusted their settings guiltily and eased off back to the speed limit as he passed. It tended to slow traffic a bit, but not as badly as actually stopping someone. Then far too many stupidly kicked it off auto approaching his lights, as if the computers didn't see a traffic stop far ahead of them and adjust. The public safety spots always told them not to, but it never convinced all of them, especially the older drivers. That always slowed things down well below the limit.
He passed a car with three kids in the back seat. Kids were easy to read. These were belted in properly and you could tell from their open faces nothing bad was going down in the car. Their dad was not as easy to read. Who knows, maybe he had a history with the police. Not a few had grudges and sometimes they were reasonable grudges, Officer Rodriguez knew.
He passed a junky car with two young Hispanics. The glare he got from them didn't mean they were up to anything. Even though he was as Mexican looking as them, he saw that look on the face of a lot of immigrants, legal or otherwise. To them he was thick with La Migra, even if he didn't wear the same uniform. Mexicans were free to travel anywhere in North America, in theory. You never knew though, they might be Hondurans or Sud Americanos.
The next car he passed was two white guys. They were closer to the speed limit than the ones behind or ahead. A gap was opening up in front of them as the traffic ahead eased away. The ones behind wouldn't pass them while his cruiser was in sight. The passenger looked straight ahead, obviously aware of him, but refusing to look. The driver was sitting too straight, both hands on the wheel. He glanced at Jesus, trying to keep a neutral face, but his nostrils flared a little, giving his nervousness away. If Jesus had more probable cause than his expression, he'd pull that one over in a second. He was dirty about something Jesus was sure.
A half mile down the road his fax chattered and spat out a portrait of three men. The second he wasn't sure of, but the first one looked to be the driver he'd just passed.
"Station nine, this is JR solo in cruiser 316, southbound on 5 just past Garden Grove. I have a possible match on the drawing we were just faxed. Light blue full sized Chevy with a California plate, but I didn't save it. Driver is a possible match. There is a companion in the vehicle, but I can't make him. I'm about a half mile forward and will maintain spacing. Do you have a unit that can come up from behind and see if they flush?"
"316, we have a county sheriff on the ramp working traffic about a mile behind. He will catch up and flip the lights on them. Be prepared to block."
"Roger nine, thank them for the assist."
He watched in the mirror. A dark brown cruiser came up fast from the rear. The computer opened up the lane in front of him and he looked like he would pass the target car. Then he slowed and fell back slightly, before pulling in behind and turning his flashers on. The car immediately went manual, pulled on the shoulder and put its emergency flashers on, slowing. He pulled off too. They were stopping so easily he'd probably have to back up a ways to be of any help to the sheriff.
* * *
In a suburb of DC in Virginia, a fellow in faultless battle camo sat watching the plot of a GPS tracker superimposed on a satellite view. His golden plus pin was in violation of regulations worn on a duty uniform. Nobody however was going to say anything about it to Col. Allister. They were all his handpicked men. Not a few of them wore the emblem in private gatherings too.
He was disappointed to see his men pulled over. He was looking forward to having quite a discussion with them when they returned. Too bad that wasn't going to happen now. He typed in a code, swung open a safety cap off a switch and flipped it.
* * *
Jesus was backing up steadily on the paved shoulder, twisted around in his seat, looking out his rear window at the vehicle stopped in front of the sheriff's car. He'd backed maybe half way to them when the car vanished in a white flash, that left purple blobbies floating before his eyes. He ran off in the dirt a little, running down a reflector on a steel post and got stopped before he backed over a mile marker. His rear window was crazed and there was an immediate pile up beside the explosion as cars swerved or were pushed aside by the blast. There were at least a dozen cars and one big truck piled up in the first two lanes and he saw another big truck go sideways further back as the ripple of collisions traveled back up the road.
"Nine we have an explosion of some kind. Repeat - the vehicle stopped by the sheriff has exploded. I can't see what is happening at this time. The car pulled over was about a hundred meters behind me when it detonated. We have a chain reaction accident from the incident. It's an ongoing accident. I can hear vehicles impacting still. I have vehicles on the shoulder between me and the sheriffs car now. Please dispatch multiple emergency vehicles and back-up for an officer likely down. It's bad enough we may need a Life Flight. I will proceed back on foot to see if I can render aid to the sheriff."
The line of cars that made it off on the shoulder were not in very bad shape. He could see in passing that some out in the second lane were crushed badly. There was no hazard to walk back on the shoulder. Just a dribble of cars on manual kept moving past the pile-up over on the inside lane. When he got back to the site of the explosion the crater extended half way into the first lane. There were only a few massive pieces of the vehicle left. He could see the engine block with the transmission still attached. On the embankment was what he thought were a couple wheels.
The Sheriff's cruiser had the front windshield blown out. The hood was gone too, peeled back and blown away. Fortunately the deputy was wearing a full face helmet with a ballistic shield. That had become standard for pursuit runs, the helmet attached to the seat back almost like a race car driver's. The man had followed correct procedure and put it on before coming down the ramp onto the expressway. His vest stopped most of the rest, but he had lots of small lacerations on his hands and forearms, nothing life threatening though. Simple concussion had apparently knocked him out. That could be a problem. He might still have brain damage or hearing loss if he wasn't treated quickly.
The deputy stirred while Jesus was still calling a continuing report in on his hand-held and started screaming. He grabbed something off his lap and heaved it out the window like a live grenade. It seemed an unreasonable reaction, until Jesus looked closer at what he'd thrown. It was a very nice cowboy boot, with a foot still in it.
Chapter 15
The table sat them all without putting the center leaf in. Heather had pulled out all the stops and put on a linen table cloth, the good china and real silver. Heather stealthily dropped the lighting slightly too. If Papa-san wasn't impressed his wife was, looking very happy.
The meal was beef shawarma, rich with baharat spice, ringed with grilled carrot and zucchini, Syrian rice, diced tomatoes and onions and slices of pickled turnips. A rose wine in a carafe was pretty and a large plate of hummus was formed in a ring with a pool of pistachio tinted olive oil in the center. Barak was working away to one side, grilling fresh pita and piling the little footballs in two baskets.
"We usually have Fattouch with this, but I ran out of time," Heather apologized.
"I hardly think we'll go hungry," Papa-san appraised the table
, eyes big.
"We do have dessert," Barak assured them brightly.
"Are you going to stay on Home?" April asked. Hoping to steer talk away from business at the dinner table. Jeff would continue nonstop if you let him.
"Yes, we are going to be neighbors actually. We'll be in the new ring," he told them, making a sort of general wave of his hand towards the view ports. "Part of what we attempted this morning was encouraging the construction people to give priority to those who are already owners and waiting to move in."
"I was speaking with a lady recently who brokers cubic. She didn't hold out much hope for the construction to move along, what with the material shortages," April said.
"No, even when you try to throw money at it, they just laugh and tell you it doesn't make any difference," he admitted. "I'm afraid we are resigned to staying in the Holiday Inn for about two months."
"That seems a terrible waste of money. The Holiday Inn is expensive, way beyond how nice it is," Heather told them. "We had a safe-house there for awhile and nobody was happy being cooped up in it for very long."
April had to give Papa-san credit. He only twitched slightly when she said safe-house.
"You might even do better staying at New Las Vegas for awhile," Jeff suggested. "They keep the rates down and offer incentives to keep folks in the casinos," he explained.
"Unfortunately I'm not far enough along establishing my retirement that I'd be comfortable staying on a hab under total USNA control," Papa-san admitted.
"Oh," Jeff said, cluing up slightly.
"Gunny, I need to speak with you," April said, getting up and walking back to the far end of the living area. He followed along without argument. "Would you be willing to stay in my brother's old room for a while longer?"
"Sure, that's easier than splitting a bath with you actually. I even wondered if I could just rent from your folks instead. I hardly ever see them after all and I have no need to eat there."
"It never occurred to me to ask. I just figured if I was moving out my bodyguard would too. I'm thinking to rent out my place to the Santos until their cubic is ready. The bath there is ugly, but it's functional. We can find enough second hand stuff to outfit the place temporarily. It saves them a ton of money and gains me a few points with them. I'm part of the reason they aren't happily at home in Hawaii."
"I agree, if we can do them a favor they are fine people to have owe you one, but will your mom mind us staying longer?"
"I had no move out date with my mom and we had no set arrangement for you past the end of the month. But I'd kind of like to keep that open too. Let me call her and ask."
Gunny didn't want to talk about his own employment as just a side issue. He kept quiet.
April got her mom directly instead of her voicemail and had a short earnest conversation. "She says we're golden to stay as long as we want, both or either. She said you are polite, quiet and don't leave a mess."
"Good, let's see what the Santos say."
Everybody knew they were up to something and looked at them expectantly when they came back in.
"Papa-san, Mother, I have some cubic that is sitting empty. It has a bath, ugly, but clean and functional. If we found some furnishings to fill it temporarily, you are welcome to stay there until your property is ready."
"What did you intend to do with it?" Mama-san asked. "I don't want to interfere if you had other plans."
"Not to mention any cubic has great value up here," Papa-san added. "If you had a sale pending or other renters lined up, I don't want to rob you of income."
"I just bought it, closed on it two days ago. I hadn't even told Heather and Jeff yet," she hurried to add, because Heather was looking so surprised. "It's been a long term goal to move out of my parents' place, so I was going to remodel it and move into it. However, Gunny and I are still comfortable at my folks and I just confirmed with my mom we're welcome to continue to stay there."
"What is this place like?" Mama-san asked. "Compared to our hotel room, or to this cubic," she said with a sweep of her hand.
"Way bigger than any hotel room. It's on the same half G level as this apartment. About half as long, but just as wide like this with a tapered overhead. It's about a third of the way against spin," she said, pointing which way that was with her hand. "It has covers on two of the view ports right now, but I think you could probably see it from here."
"Show us in the morning," Papa-san suggested. "And find out what rent is normally for a place of that sort. I'd love to rent it, but insist on paying you a fair price. We inquired for a rental, but none were to be had, private or from Mitsubishi."
"OK, meet you for breakfast at 0900," April offered and got a nod.
"I can tell you what that sort of place rents for," Barak offered. "It should go for ten-thousand dollars USNA a month, or a little bit more," he said confidently.
"How would you know rents?" Heather asked, not so much doubting as surprised.
"People talk around kids and say stuff they won't around other adults."
"Yeah, I used to get a lot of good information that way," April remembered.
"You still look young, but you convinced everybody to treat you like an adult," Barak accused her, as if it were an error. "I'm going to milk it for all it's worth."
"That would indicate a capitalization of about three million," Papa-san declared.
"Yeah, that's about right," April agreed.
"Does anyone want dessert?" Barak asked.
"I'm all talked out, tired," Papa-san told them. "Let's do that dessert and we'll go off to our hotel room. We have more bank business to iron out, but let's do it fresh, another day soon. What are you serving up?" he asked Barak.
"Rum cookies and ginger ice cream. Do you want coffee with that?"
The answer was yes – all around.
"This is as fine a cup of coffee as I've had," Papa-san announced in a bit. "Certainly the equal of any we bought in the islands."
"It's a Kona-Jamaican blend," Heather admitted.
"My newsreader pushed a priority call through," Jeff announced, surprised, looking at his com. "Wow, somebody tried to shoot Wiggen this morning in L.A. and they have been sitting on the story hard until she was safely in the air. She was doing a factory opening show and tell and they tried to get her with a rifle going in the back door. They did a fake hospital run like she was hit hard and took her back to her plane instead. What a mess again," he said. Gunny certainly agreed with that. He still identified with his old service and immediately wondered who was at her elbow and who drove her away. Somebody he'd helped train likely.
"Well at least we know where April is," Barak noted. "They can't blame it on her!"
April looked at him horrified, but everybody else cracked up.
* * *
"What is it?" President Wiggen asked. The chain was the flat smoothed out links of a curb chain, like jewelry but stainless steel. The plastic badge had a poor quality photo so average it might have been a computer composite. The head of her personal security, Wainwright, dangled it invitingly, but she refused to reach for it.
"This was rolled up and hidden in the stem of a floor lamp in the room our suspect occupied. There were also a master-pass and key card hidden in the room service folder. We believe the key was used to enter the room where the breaching charge broke the window."
"Is that the room the shot came from?"
"President Wiggen, there was no shot."
"Well there was one hell of a bang!"
"Yes and it was all from the window having a hole blown in it. It's a very advanced technique to keep the bullet from acquiring a slight deflection piercing the glass. Frankly at two-hundred meters with a .416 it wouldn't be necessary. But the weapon found in the room had a bullet lodged in the barrel. It was deliberately sabotaged, so if someone tried to use it there would be a nasty explosion and a burst barrel."
"Perhaps it was intended for me, but it was a bad round and lodged in the barrel?"
"There
was no empty brass cartridge in the chamber. Nor ejected in the room. There were two magazines of ten shots each in the case, not even inserted in the rifle. They were fully loaded with Hornady Match ammunition. If I had to bet between a round of Match ammo failing to ignite, or Air Force One failing to deliver you safely to your next stop, I'd bet on the Hornady round working every time," he told her.
"Oh."
"However that is not a factor, because the bullet was from an entirely different manufacturer. It was military/police ammo and far too common and widespread to track. That just affirms it was lodged there deliberately. There was also no hole or impact crater anywhere near where you were entering the rear of that building. and just to frost the cake, the computer which directs the advanced sight on the weapon had extractable memory. It was altered to make the weapon shoot wildly off target from the previous unrecoverable settings. Someone left the weapon there, only after making very sure it couldn't be used to harm you."
"So who was this man?"
"We are 99% sure this it was this fellow," he produced a photo of Otis Dugan dressed as a Chief Warrant Officer. He had an impressive rack of citations on his chest, a big smile and he was holding an elaborate silver loving cup in the crook of one arm and a target in the other hand, with a group of holes that were all in the smallest circle.
"Just out of curiosity, how far away was he to shoot that target?"
"A thousand meters. That man didn't miss you at two hundred meters."
"So why him?" Wiggen asked, bewildered.
"Otis Dugan flew into LA on the same flight from Atlanta as this fellow," he produced a photo of Polzinsky. "This fellow was deemed so dangerous he was not allowed off the same flight. We are still holding him in connection with a number of possible crimes under a half dozen names. He seems to have a fondness for Polish names though."
April 4: A Different Perspective Page 7