“I’ve heard that before. Just don’t ask questions.”
“Everything will be answered in time, or so they say. Finish up your coffee,” he said and drained the last of his cup. “We’ve got lunch to put on.”
“They said they wanted to interview us.”
“Don’t worry; they probably won’t get to you until after dinner.”
Cookie had been right. About the time he had cleaned up after dinner Willie came looking for him. “Hey Denver, you’re wanted in the interview room.”
Word gets around.
* * * *
“Please sit down Mr. Smith,” said Fitz politely.
“But, I’m not…”
Fitz held up a hand. “None of them are. Please, sit. I hear you are working in the kitchen; do you like it?”
“Yes, it’s all right, keeps me busy.”
“First, your pay,” he said, passing him an envelope. Smith took it without looking at the contents.
“Don’t you wish to check the amount?”
“Why bother, what would be my recourse?”
“Good point. Besides, my employer is most scrupulous about such things.” He turned to his computer and a spotlight fell on the wall.
“Well, we have the results of your preliminary tests,” he said as he broadcast them on the screen. “Let’s see, IQ in excess of 140, hiatal hernia, we can fix that. Blood pressure is getting to be a problem; that too can be repaired.”
Repaired, fixed, what is this guy talking about?
“College, Mr. Smith, or you don’t mind if I call you Denver, do you?”
“No, and yes. I mean yes I went to college.”
“Military experience?”
“Yes, in the army.”
“Why didn’t you stay?”
“Didn’t like it.”
“Can you be more complete in your answer?”
“The boot licking and backstabbing wasn’t for me. People spent more time managing their careers than taking care of the troops.”
“Wasn’t too tough for you?”
“No, that wasn’t a problem.”
“Combat experience?”
“Afraid not.”
“No problem killing, not a conscientious objector or anything?”
“I’m not a bloodthirsty murderer if that’s what you’re asking. Nor do I have a death wish.”
“But you are a strong proponent of the republic aren’t you?”
“Yes.”
“In fact, that’s why they picked you up, wasn’t it professor?”
These guys are good. “Are you going to turn me in?”
“No.”
“You people must be pretty good.”
“We are pretty good, but that has nothing to do with it. You are all over the news, look.” Fitz handed him a newspaper.
“Didn’t make the front page?”
“A3.”
Denver flipped back to page A3. There he was. Mug shots are never flattering.
“You’ve made the talk shows. Dangerous terrorist escapes from work detail. You are a very popular guy.”
“Not funny. How do you know I’m not really a terrorist?”
“Actually, I was sort of hoping you were.”
“Well, apparently I was terrorizing somebody in Washington.”
“No car bombs, no mass casualties of innocent people, no efforts to use fourth generation warfare to destabilize the government?”
“Afraid not, just telling my students the truth as I’ve been able to see it.”
“Radicalizing the youth, eh? The system has not cared for that sort of thing going all the way back to ancient Athens. At least, they didn’t give you hemlock to drink.”
“Yeah, what about the Bill of Rights?”
“Hey professor, you’re preaching to the choir.”
“Sorry, occupational hazard.” Denver looked away for a moment. “Okay, are you going to turn me in?”
“No.”
“No? Then what are you going to do?”
“Make the same offer I make everyone else who gets this far. You have been paid. We can put you on the bus if you like. Remember, you are only protected until you get off the van. I don’t mean to inappropriately influence you, but they are looking for you.”
“And the other option?”
“If you agree to go to the next level, we will pay you $500 once the level is finished.”
“And then what?”
“That depends on what happens at the conclusion of the next level. If you have the qualities my employer is looking for, we will offer you a contract. If not you will be bused to another location far from here.”
“Why another location, why not just bring me back here?”
“If you are made an offer, after the next levels, you will know things we had rather not become common knowledge around here.”
“Yeah, I remember something like that from around the beginning of World War II.”
“Yes?”
“There was a Chinese crew on a freighter, and there was some sort of problem with the entire crew. Once in the Panama Canal, they put the Chinese crew off one side of the ship and brought a completely new crew up the other side.”
“Yes, that way there is no cross contamination,” added Fitz.
“Okay, since we are having this conversation, are you prepared to offer me the next level?”
“Yes, do you think you might be interested?”
“Yes, but what kind of tests are you planning next? You’ve already poked and prodded in all sorts of unmentionable places.”
“There are more involved tests that have to be completed. Those can’t be done here.”
“Okay, this isn’t a hospital, but why?”
“We have the technology available to us that isn’t available to the usual medical establishment. We do not wish to take any chance that it will fall into the wrong hands. Therefore, you will be transported to another location.”
“When?”
“Tonight.”
“Cookie isn’t going to like that.”
“Yes, he likes the way you work, very conscientious.”
“Well, it’s good to know people like your work.”
“Yes, it is. Your students like your work as well.”
“My students. What did they tell them?”
“I don’t know, but with people disappearing for just criticizing the government, it’s only a matter of time till it blows up. In a way, you’ve become something of a martyr.”
“And you can’t kill a martyr.”
“No.”
“Will there be anything else?”
“Get some sleep. We will be waking up the next set of recruits about 3:00 AM.”
“Why such an hour?”
“We don’t want to attract attention.”
Back in the kitchen, Denver Smith said his goodbyes to Cookie.
“Looks like they’re getting you out o’ here quick,” Cookie commented.
“Yeah, don’t know why.”
“It’s been all over the news. I’m afraid you’ve fooled exactly nobody.”
“Fantastic.”
“You better get cleaned up and get some sleep,” he said extending his hand.
“Yes, thanks. See you around.”
“We’ll see.”
Denver fell into a deep sleep, the first he had in a long time, and dreamed the dreams of the reprieved.
* * * *
It took a while for the knocks at the door to stir him. “Yes?”
“Come on trooper, time to move out.”
Trooper? “Yeah, I’m coming.” He opened the door. It was Juan.
“Come on get dressed. Put your things in this.” Juan handed him a small backpack. There
was room for his extra outfit and his toothbrush. Packing did not take long.
Much to his surprise, they ushered him out the back door. It had turned cold and rainy, and there was the oddest-looking bus he had ever seen. It was almost a short tube with a ramp. He could not see any windows.
Fitz was there along with five men and two women. They waited for two more men to arrive. “Okay everyone,” he said looking over the small group. “Follow me.”
Without further discussion the group filed out single file, up the ramp, and onto the bus, and into what? While there were no windows visible from the outside, the whole wall was a window from the inside. There were no seats, just bars to hold onto around the sides.
“What tha’?” The ramp folded up, and the bus rose straight up. There was very little sound and the wind buffeted it much less than he thought it should. Quietly they rose above the town and into the wisps of clouds.
Fitz reached up, adjusted a control, and a section of the wall/window became as clear as day. Several others reached up and with practice were able to make the same adjustment.
Denver tried his hand and moved the scene back and forth from clear daylight to stormy night. You could see police cars down by the donut shop. Who is protecting the town?
Okay, classify this under totally weird, he thought. He looked up at Fitz, who was looking over the recruits. Denver caught his eye.
“To borrow a phrase, ‘you got some splaining to do’,” said Denver.
“Yes, depending on your test results, everything will be explained to you.”
“And if you don’t like the test results?” It was one of the women. This one was not too old or unattractive.
“You will be paid and then placed on a bus out of town.”
“What’s to keep us from spilling the beans on the whole thing?” asked another.
“Who would you tell? What would you tell them? Where would you take them, to show them what?” responded Fitz in his quiet, reassuring way.
The bus stopped over the facility Denver had stumbled on outside of town. He had been right, there was no drive up to the facility, nor was there a parking lot for employees, nothing, just this unusual thing with lots of round structures and roofs apparently growing out of the cliff.
No one spoke as it gently settled down into the middle of the complex. After they had landed, the wall slid out to become a ramp again. They filed off in single file.
To his amazement, they were no longer outside, but inside some sort of hangar. The roof must have opened and let us in, he thought. Now it has closed up again and shut them in.
“All right, briefing’s this way,” said Fitz and quickly led them into the building. Once seated, Fitz began, “I’m sure you have a million questions. It should be obvious by now that this is no ordinary outfit. We are not worried about people telling on us. As for telling people, what would you tell them? You have been in a flying bus. They will ask where. Who knows where they are?”
“Some town near Reno,” said one.
“No, it’s near Albuquerque, Santa something or the other.”
“No, it’s somewhere in southern Arizona,” another recruit chimed in.
It quickly became apparent that no one had any idea where he was, and when the rejects get off a real bus in some far away town, no one will know where he has been. Cute, thought Denver.
“I guess the company thought of everything,” said Denver.
“Just about, they worked it all out, and we run it for them.”
“Run it for them?” It was the woman again; Lupe was her name. “I thought you were a company employee.”
“No, my organization fronts for the company.”
“So, when will you tell us the whole truth?” asked another.
“If we make you an offer, and you accept, you will be told everything.”
“And if we don’t get an offer or don’t accept it?” queried Lupe.
Denver spoke up. “Then we are just put on a bus to nowhere from nowhere with our pay in our pockets and a crazy story told by indigents.”
“In your case, the cops will not wait to ask questions,” said Lupe.
Boy, word gets around!
“Is that it, Mr. Fitzpatrick? Is that how the game is played?” asked Denver.
“Go ahead and call me Fitz. I’ve grown used to it, and yes, that is how the ‘game is played’ as you put it. Now, your quarters are this way.” The wall turned into a screen and they could see their quarters.
“Get some sleep. We will begin the medical exam after breakfast. You will find the galley over here and everything you need to feed yourselves.”
“No Cookie?” asked Denver.
“Afraid not, we are on our own here. Now get some sleep.” With that, he walked out.
Chapter 5: The Strange Facility
They looked around and at each other for a moment, then filed out together. To everyone’s surprise, the doors already had their names on them; even the couple already had both names on their door, Mr. and Mrs. John Doe. Now that’s original.
He came to the door labeled Denver Smith. There looked like a place for his index finger, so he placed it on the spot and the door unlocked. He pushed it open before stepping inside. The door went all the way back to the wall, no one behind it.
There was a simple bunk with linen neatly folded, a chest of drawers, and its own bath. Not a five-star hotel but better than prison. Stepping back into the hall, he saw the last of the doors close. He threw his backpack on the bed, pulled the door closed, and ventured quietly down the hall.
The door in that direction was locked, no surprise. Okay, try the other way back to where they got their goodnight briefing. He entered the empty room and noticed there was coffee on a table with a white tablecloth, against the wall. There were also pastries under glass.
They were not as good as Cookie’s, but what did one expect? He took his coffee and wandered back to the hangar. There was the flying bus. The ramp was up and it blended perfectly into the fuselage. Above, the hangar ceiling remained closed. There was another door in the hangar he had not noticed before.
He took it, went up a long ramp, and stepped out into a large round room with control panels all lit up. There were chairs, but no one was on duty. He could see out. He recognized it. It was the large round dome that towered over the rest of the building at the bottom of the cliff.
They could have seen him coming for miles, but there was no one to do the seeing. He was standing near the window finishing the last of his coffee when the door opened again. It was Fitz.
“Thought your coffee might use some warming.” He held the pot out to Denver.
“Thanks. Hope I’m not breaking some kind of rule.”
“I don’t know if it’s a rule or anything. I sort of suspected you would react this way instead of meekly going off to bed like a good, little boy.”
“Quite a place you have here. Is it specifically for recruiting your ‘security guards’, I believe you called them?”
“Yes. This is ours.”
“Now I see why you don’t need a driveway.”
“Helps keep the locals away. When we first built it, the curious would come by to watch. Some even wanted to work here.”
“And now?”
“They’ve gotten so used to it; most don’t bother. Occasionally a kid will come up and graffiti the place. We just take the vid to his parents, and after a thrashing, they come up here and clean it off. Even that doesn’t happen often anymore.”
“Cameras, the place is full of cameras.”
“I see I can’t fool you. I knew you would figure everything out quickly.”
“Not everything. Who are you people? This is really a weird way to recruit security guards,” said Smith.
“Therefore the supposition is …?”
“You are not recruit
ing security guards.”
“Very good. What else?”
“You can treat the ailments; that’s no big deal. However, you said ‘fix’ which implies a cure. Can you cure high blood pressure?”
“Yes, that and many other things.”
“Why don’t you just offer this to the world?”
Fitz thought for a pregnant moment. “Well, we’ve had many years of experience, and as of late, outside help with much of it.”
“We? Outside help? Who is ‘we’ and who is supplying this outside help?”
“Well I can’t tell you about them until we make you an offer, if we make you an offer, and you accept it.”
“What would keep you from making the aforementioned offer?”
“A fair question. We will put you and the others through a new series of tests. When we get through with you, we will know everything about you, physically and mentally as well.”
“We already went through a physical.”
“Nothing compared to this. We have the technology here that we don’t dare leave at the shelter.”
“Can’t the government just break in here and take what they want?”
“Ah yes, the government. You see we don’t bother them, and they don’t bother us. Besides, we pay them, and now they really need the money.”
“They have their own printing presses.”
“Paper is not money and money is not wealth.”
“As a poor academic, I wouldn’t know.”
“They are paid for every recruit who accepts our offer, in gold.” He turned away from the window and looked at Denver. “Literaaly, their weight in gold.”
“That’s insane.”
“Perhaps, but they leave our facility alone; that and the fact that the walls are made with a particularly powerful explosive.” He smiled.
“I almost didn’t want to know that. Okay, so the feds and the locals leave you alone because you’ve paid them both off. I’m cool with that. It’s not my problem, and there is nothing I can do about it even if I wanted to, which I don’t.”
“And you are safe here from the constabulary.”
“So, every step we go down the rabbit hole, the more you let us know.”
“Information about our operation is compartmentalized, just like every other military organization.”
Hell Fighters from Earth Page 4