He ran the numbers in his head. Without slowing, how many gravities would it have had to pull to make a 17-degree turn, at 10 miles per second, below where the radar had last detected it? He guesstimated it to be somewhere around 250 gravities.
This is not a meteor or fallen satellite, he decided. Pulling out his smartphone, he checked his email. It confirmed he had sent his message to Theodore at NASA, but showed Theodore had not received it. The message was sitting in a server somewhere, waiting for his old friend to realize someone had found his missing “asteroid.” He chewed his lip and considered for several long minutes.
Was anything made on Earth capable of what this machine had done, he wondered. No, of course not. Some missiles were capable of 20-g maneuvers, a turn no aircraft could match, but this thing had pulled at least 250. If that was the case, then what was the purpose of this machine?
He turned and looked back along the crash track. Toward the beginning of the skid mark, forgotten during the search, lay the crumpled body of the fox.
Everyone was busy examining the crashed machine, using smartphones to take pictures and tapping the metallic structure, their voices excited with supposition about what it might be.
“Do not upload so much as a selfie with that thing,” he warned them. One of the men snorted; they were miles from a cell signal.
Jeremiah pushed through the press of men and walked back to the body of the little fox, circling it and chewing on a fingernail. He’d thought it was a fox before, but now he shook his head silently. Its proportions were all wrong, he realized. The torso wasn’t long like a fox’s, it was more squat and fleshy. Its limbs were too long, and there appeared to be an extra joint on each leg. He knelt in the dirt, grimacing as some of the blast glass bit through his jeans. It has hands, he thought as he leaned still closer. Its forelimbs didn’t end in paws like a fox, it had hands! There were three fingers and what looked like a thumb on either side, and they had too many joints, but they were hands! And there was dirt under the nails.
“Holy fucking shit,” he barked as he stood up and looked from the body back to the machine. No, he corrected himself mentally, the spaceship. “Fuck me.”
“What’s that, Boss?” asked one of his men.
“Watch out for that dead thing,” another man said, “you don’t want to get maggots and shit all over your clothes.”
Jeremiah looked back at the body of the alien spaceship pilot. No, there were no maggots. In fact, it had been dead for days, in the Texas hill country April heat, and not only were there no maggots but there were no flies buzzing around. Careful not to touch it, he leaned down again and sniffed deeply. He smelled nothing but burned wood and scorched earth.
“Alex, give this thing a whiff with your toys, will you?”
The man walked over and glanced at the dead pilot with distaste, then used the probe. Don’t you see it? Jeremiah silently admonished the man.
“Some radiation,” Alex pronounced after a moment. “Less than the impact site. There are also traces of the gas it can’t make sense of.”
“Okay,” he said, “lose the gear and get the containment equipment. Have the men finish excavating the shi—” he stopped himself short, “that thing and get it into a carrying rig. Use the straps because it’s bigger than what we were expecting.”
“If we’re using the carry rig, why bother with containment?”
“For that,” he said and pointed at the alien pilot.
“Boss, you’re kidding, right?”
“I am not,” Jeremiah said emphatically. “Furthermore, you will exercise all caution to not damage the body, and if you find anything under it, be sure that goes into the containment pod as well.” Then he reconsidered. “On second thought, just dig up all the dirt under it and put the whole thing in as one piece, if you can.”
“That’s a lot of work!” Alex complained.
“Then you best get to it,” Jeremiah said and turned to head back to the helicopter. When he climbed in, the air conditioning was still running, so the interior was cool. He settled into his seat and checked the computer; it was already synched with his smartphone. There was no change in the email’s status. He’d quietly taken more than fifty pictures on his smartphone, and he uploaded them to a secure drop box on the Internet through a satellite connection none of the men had access to.
When that was complete, he leaned back and sighed. “I’m going to be famous,” he decided. His news feed had restored itself automatically when he’d linked with the satellite signal. He closed his eyes and considered his next move, not noticing the news reports of witnesses saying they’d seen convoys and trains loaded with tanks heading south across Texas.
* * * * *
Chapter 12
Friday, April 20
Lieutenant Andrew Tobin looked up from his pulp sci-fi paperback when the lock on the door clicked and opened. Two Security Forces troops stood there and came to cursory attention.
“Lieutenant,” the staff sergeant said and saluted. Embroidered on the front of his uniform was his last name, Ward.
Andrew came to his feet and returned the salute. “Men,” he said.
“We have orders to transport you stateside,” Ward said.
Andrew nodded. “C-130?”
“Commercial,” Airman First Class Prescott said with a wink. Andrew let a small grin escape. At least they’d popped for a decent ride. The trip from Saudi in a C-130 would have been long, arduous, and anything but comfortable. Flying commercially would be more comfortable, but was a bad sign. It meant that a trial awaited his return.
“What about Colonel Sommers?” Andrew asked.
“He left yesterday, jump seat in a C-17 heading for Andrews.”
“Ouch,” Andrew said. By now his former CO was standing in front of a board with shoulders covered in stars. He doubted he was in for such treatment.
“Come with us, sir?”
Andrew nodded and submitted to the obligatory search as if he could have procured a shiv or other weapon in the sterilized cell. The earlier assholes had even confiscated his shoelaces and made sure all the cutlery provided with his chow was plastic.
Confident he hadn’t somehow armed himself, they returned his laces and belt. Andrew quickly re-laced his boots, and then they handcuffed him, lightly, arms in front in violation of regulations. These men knew enough to be silently protesting his treatment. He thanked them silently when the sergeant draped his off-duty jacket over Andrew’s hands, hiding the handcuffs and preserving some of his dignity.
He squinted against the glaring Riyadh sun as he walked outside, his personal effects in a yellow-lined plastic duffel carried by the corporal. They climbed into a commercial cab and, without fanfare, rode down the road and off the base.
They checked in at the special military customs desk, where the two security force personnel gave his prisoner transfer papers to the officer in charge. He looked from the paperwork to Andrew and back to the paperwork, then sneered at him. The man, a tech sergeant, shook his head and punched keys on his computer. “Take him over there and search him,” he said and gestured with his head to a room nearby. Andrew sighed, knowing in his gut he was in for a bad time.
“Not necessary, Tech Sergeant,” Staff Sergeant Ward said.
“I don’t agree,” the other man said, his eyes narrowing suspiciously.
“Well, I’m sorry to say you don’t get to agree or disagree. This is our prisoner, and unless you are willing to take full responsibility for him and explain to my CO why you relieved me of him, and then because you took responsibility, needed to take a surprise trip to Texas, you will sign off that this man is secure and let us catch our flight which leaves in less than an hour.”
The tech sergeant puffed out his cheeks and glared at the three of them. Airman First Class Prescott grinned and shrugged while Ward maintained a poker face. “You need to sign off,” the tech sergeant said.
“I’m aware of that,” Ward said, producing a pen. Twenty minutes later the
y were at the gate. Andrew sat in the plastic seats drinking a Coke, courtesy of Staff Sergeant Ward, as they waited for their flight.
“You didn’t need to do that, Sergeant,” Andrew said, gesturing with the can back toward the security checkpoint. He imagined the stiff-necked tech sergeant making life miserable for anyone of lower rank who came through.
“Yes I did, sir,” Ward said. “He’s an asshole.” He added a wink, and Andrew chuckled.
Andrew wasn’t looking forward to the flight, 17 hours in coach, direct to George Bush International in Houston. At least there wouldn’t be any transfers. The food in coach would be the typical exotic stuff they tended to serve on Saudi Air. “Say, you guys want a sub or something? On me.” He pointed to his personal effects bag.
“We shouldn’t let you do that,” A1C Prescott said, then promptly disregarded his own proclamation and opened the bag, fished around and produced Andrew’s wallet. As the man was rummaging around, he heard the telltale sound of a loaded M9 magazine. They’d even put his sidearm in the damned bag. He thought about mentioning it for stateside customs, then remembered that he was a high value prisoner and wouldn’t be going through customs.
“What do you want?” he asked.
“I’ll pass,” Ward said, “I’m looking forward to some native food.”
“I guess I am too,” Prescott said. “We’re not usually over here, so it’s still exotic for us.”
“It gets old fast,” Andrew admitted and got up. He was 50 yards away and approaching the Subway before he realized they’d just let him walk away. He had his wallet, and he knew there was at least a thousand dollars in it. He could walk out of the terminal and disappear into the sprawling city. And then what? Go native? His Arabic was pathetic, and his grand wouldn’t go far in Riyadh. He was sure they’d frozen his personal accounts by now; it was standard operating procedure.
Ten minutes later, he walked back carrying a foot-long meatball sub, with extra sauce and hot peppers, and two bags of good old-fashioned Lay’s barbecue potato chips. Staff Sergeant Ward looked up and nodded. As Andrew sat down and dug into the sub, he wondered if the look on the sergeant’s face at seeing him return was just a little bit surprised.
They boarded shortly after he finished the sub, which wasn’t quite as good as he’d hoped. There were some seasonings in it that one wouldn’t find in a stateside sub. Still, it was close, and the peppers delighted his tongue long after the Coke was gone.
He’d always wanted to fly in an A380. It was a massive plane, a double decker from nose to tail, serviced with not just one jet bridge, but four, two for each deck. All but the forward quarter of the lower deck was coach. It was as massive inside as it was outside, with three aisles down the length. Seating in their section was three on each side by the windows and two sets of four in the center. They had a window section, seats A, B, and C on Row 62, first deck. The airmen gave him the window seat, and he knew that was protocol they weren’t willing to ignore. There would be security force personnel coming on board to meet them in Houston.
They boarded at the same time as First Class for security purposes, so they sat and waited for almost an hour as hundreds of other passengers crowded onboard. Innumerable carry-on bags jostled for space, kids fussed, and people complained. Loading a plane was always the same, regardless of its size or destination, or even the nationality of the passengers.
As the plane loaded, Andrew kept his boredom at bay by observing the operations of the massive plane. There were three galleys on the main deck, one of which was two rows forward of his seat, and all were bustling with activity. There was a service door through which he could see a truck, and men in traditional Arab garb busy moving crate after crate of food, drinks, ice, and who knew what else. A few restless passengers rang the button for the flight attendant asking for this or that before settling in.
In the middle section, an enormously fat man in an expensive Italian suit wedged himself into two seats. The flight attendant hooked two seatbelt extenders together and still barely managed to buckle his bulk in place. Further on, a woman with at least six children was trying to corral them…and failing badly. The flight attendant went from securing the corpulent traveler to pursuing an infant without missing a beat. Amazingly, the doors closed, and the preflight announcements began right on time.
The tugs pushed the A380 back from the gate, the engines started, and they taxied away. Owing to the plane’s huge size, it got special clearance for takeoff, and in minutes they were roaring down the runway. Andrew caught himself subconsciously reviewing the procedures the captain and his first officer would be going through.
RPMs at maximum. Flaps verified. Airspeed climbing. Runway clear. Airspeed 100 knots. Airspeed 180 knots. Rotate! The huge plane angled nose up and, through the force imparted by four Rolls Royce turbojet engines, clawed its way into the afternoon sky. Clear and gear up. He felt the floor thump as the huge quad sets of rear gear retracted, and the doors closed. The plane climbed up and away, turned west, and headed toward home and Andrew’s fate.
* * *
The huge sprawling chicken farm named Pollo Bueno, south of Mexico City, was now a wasteland. Once over 200 acres, including four massive brooding buildings, a hatchery, and ostensibly the largest grow shed in the country, the farm now looked like a scene from a war-torn Middle Eastern village. The bodies of the staff were sprawled in various poses all over the property, many near the main gates where a pair of M-1 Abrams tanks idled, along with a squad of Stryker armored vehicles and dozens of Humvees.
“Looks clear,” the American advisor said from his perch in the command seat of one of the M-1 tanks. His gunner’s head poked up through the other hatch, binoculars pressed to his eyes, surveying the carnage with professional detachment. He suddenly pointed.
“There, sir!”
Several sets of eyes followed his arm and saw a group of five men running low and fast toward the east perimeter fence. The commander whistled to get the attention of the ranking Mexican soldier, a captain in the Federales. The man looked at him and the commander pointed, made a twirling gesture in the air with his index finger, then pointed at the runners again. The Mexican captain nodded and barked orders in Spanish.
Two Humvees detached and raced off at high speed, flying through the air as they vaulted a culvert to pinch the runners. Several of the soldiers in the Humvees fired assault rifles in the air, bringing the runners to a quick stop, their hands in the air.
The American commander ordered his troops to cordon off the farm, then jumped down to the ground, grunting at the two-meter fall. His knees weren’t what they used to be. He’d spent too long warming a chair with his ass instead of pushing steel. He strode to the command truck, a huge trailer towed behind a Humvee, and went inside. A few minutes later, a squad of Federales escorted the prisoners inside.
His Spanish was awful, so his translator was waiting to help.
“Why did the others attack us?” he asked through the translator.
“They were possessed by the devil,” said one of the detainees, a man in his sixties with skin so tan it almost looked black.
“Bullshit,” the commander said, then shook his head so the translator didn’t communicate that part. “What makes him think that?”
The man went on in rapid fire Spanish for almost a minute before he trailed off, mouth open, eyes unfocused. “He says they all became sick. The Patron took them back to the bunks and put them to bed. Then, suddenly, they came rushing out of the bunkhouse and attacked everyone. They were biting and clawing at them. Some,” the translator said with difficulty, “were eating other people.”
“What the fuck?” the commander asked. “Are you sure that’s what he said?”
“Absolutely, sir. No doubt about it. He said eating.”
“Fucking cannibals?” The translator nodded. The commander got up and looked out the thin armored window. Some of his men were having an impromptu get together with the Federales. It looked like they’d caught
some of the thousands of chickens that were wandering around and were going to roast a few. He didn’t say anything. Esprit de corps was a good idea when you had a force of mixed nationalities. Since it appeared that the cannibals ate the owner, he doubted there would be any complaints if the men consumed a few dozen chickens.
The older man who’d been talking moaned and looked at a wound on his arm he’d wrapped with a handkerchief. Blood dripped onto the rubber-coated floor.
“Have a corpsman tend to them,” he said to his aide. “All of them have injuries of one degree or another. Have the old man stay, I want to ask a few more questions.”
They took the others outside to the aid station while a corpsman, a female Federale, came in and checked the old man’s wound. Removing the handkerchief revealed the half-moon circle of a bloody bite. The commander started by asking him how long he’d worked at Pollo Bueno, what the owners were like, and things like that. At first, the old man was eager to answer, glad to be alive, and no longer hiding from the possessed. Then his speech started to slur, and he became slow to answer.
“Get the man something to drink,” the commander ordered.
A Federale private brought a water bottle. When he leaned over to put it in front of the old guy, the man snarled and bit him in the neck.
“Ay!” the private screamed and tried to pull away, but the old man yanked his hand away from the medic, grabbed the private’s head and started tearing at his flesh. The screams became visceral.
Turning Point (Book 1): A Time To Die Page 9