Margaritifer Basin (Margaritifer Trilogy Book 1)

by Gregory Gates

  “Beats the shit out of me.”

  “Why’d you do it?”

  “Beats the shit out of me.”

  “You’re just full of useful information.”

  Ralph chuckled. “Just trying to give the taxpayers their money’s worth.”

  “Yeah, good luck with that.”

  “What have you been up to? Haven’t seen you in a while.”

  “Same old shit. Just gettin’ by. How are Marilyn and the kids?”

  “Just fine.”

  “Yeah, well, give her my best.”

  “Sure will. She mentions you and Marsha now and then. Damn, those were the good old days.”

  “Good old days? Shit, Ralph, in case you’ve forgotten, we were in the sandbox gettin’ shot at.”

  “Hey, it’s not just a job, it’s an adventure.”

  “Yeah, right.” Jeff pointed at the BUDS class on the beach. “You think they’re buyin’ that right now?”

  Ralph shook his head. “Probably not.”

  “How much longer you gonna be here?”

  “Eh, just a couple months, then you can color me gone. Gonna find me a little farm in New Hampshire and a new line of work.”

  “Damn, that sounds sweet. You find a place yet?”

  “No, but Marilyn and I are looking.” Ralph turned to Jeff. “Gettin’ tired man. I’m just gettin’ tired.”

  “I here ya pal.”

  “Hey, why don’t you come over to the house tonight for dinner? Let Marilyn put some real food in you for once.”

  “Oh man, I am sorely tempted but, uh, I’ve been bad and have to go home tonight.”

  Ralph laughed. “You lazy bastard. You don’t have your taxes done, do you?”

  “Nope.”

  “You’re a piss-poor example for your men, Captain.”

  Jeff chuckled. “Shit. I won’t tell ‘em if you won’t. Anyway, if I can have a raincheck, I’d sure love to join you both next month.”

  “You’re on.”

  Jeff looked at his watch. “Oh crap, I gotta run. Somebody showed up this week with a new high-tech bomb disposal bot and I want to take a look at it before they pack it up and go home.” The two men stood and shook hands. “You take care of yourself, hear? And give my best to Marilyn.”

  “You too, and I will.”

  Jeff took one last look across the beach. “Fine looking bunch, Ralph. Put ‘em to good use.”

  “I will. Take care.”

  “See ya.”

  Jeff hurried back to his car and drove to a warehouse in the EODGRU complex. At the door he was met by Master Chief Stewart. “Nice of you to make it, sir.”

  “Sorry, I was having lunch with Captain Dillard.”

  “Ah. Well, that sounds a lot more interesting than this.”

  “Okay, what have we got?”

  “It’s out back. Cute little gizmo.” They walked through the building to the open lot in back. “Captain Grey, this is Ian McDonald of EUA Robotics. And this is Irving.”

  “Glad to meet you Mr. McDonald.”

  “The pleasure is all mine,” McDonald said with a thick Irish brogue.

  “So, what’s Irving’s claim to fame?”

  “Captain, Irving is designed to disarm unexploded conventional military ordinance. IEDs and land mines are one thing but, as you well know, conventional ordinance, owing to potentially great explosive yields, can present different problems for EOD personnel. Specifically, detonating the ordinance is not always practical. Irving’s ‘claim to fame,’ as you put it, is its ability to disarm military ordinance – bombs, rockets, missiles, and the like – in the same manner that you would. It has all the necessary tools and a highly sophisticated database and algorithm that allows it to identify ordinance, determine the best approach for disarming it and proceed to do so, entirely on its own.”

  “I’ll be damned, that’s pretty slick. Bet you could have made a fortune with this in London in the 1940s. It doesn’t look like anything I’ve seen before, but there’s something familiar about it.”

  “Indeed there is sir. As such an instrument would likely be deployed in a range of inhospitable environments, we borrowed from NASA technology and designed the system based upon the Mars Exploration Rovers, Opportunity and Spirit. Completely self-contained, intelligent, able to identify objects and navigate on its own, and able to traverse rugged terrain.”

  “That’s a novel approach. Show me.”

  “My pleasure. So as not to prejudice the test, I’ve asked your Master Chief to pull something out of your warehouse at random.”

  Jeff looked over at the bomb sitting in a cradle. “Soviet FAB-500. Okay, we’ve seen plenty of those in Afghanistan. Have at it.”

  Ian keyed Irving’s remote control and the robot immediately trundled over to the bomb and stopped about ten feet from it. A tilt and pan head began surveying the bomb; the robot, at intervals, moving in a circle around it. “Irving is using visual recognition techniques and laser measurements to identify the weapon,” Ian said.

  After a few minutes, Irving rolled around to the bomb’s nose, again carefully surveyed it with its cameras, then extended a robotic arm, grasped the dummy fuse and deftly removed it.

  Jeff nodded. “Impressive Mr. McDonald. You trying to put us out of a job?”

  “No, sir, just make your job safer.”

  Jeff walked over to Irving, squatted on the ground and looked it over for a minute. “Hmmm. I wonder if we might have one more demonstration?”

  “Of course.”

  “Master Chief, screw the fuse back in this thing, then,” pointing in back of the building’s concrete slab, “haul it out to that sandpile.”

  The Master Chief replaced the fuse then picked up the bomb with a backhoe and dropped it some ten meters into a soft sandy area. “How’s that?”

  “That’s fine.” Jeff turned back to Ian, “One more time?”

  “Certainly.”

  Irving rolled off toward the bomb, made it about two meters into the sand and promptly got stuck, unable to move forward or backward.

  Ian frowned. “Bloody hell.”

  Jeff sighed. “Mr. McDonald, that sand is from the Iraqi desert. It’s not like this sunny southern California beach sand we have here. That is some nasty shit. Mars may not be the most inhospitable place in the solar system. Master Chief, you want to help get Irving unstuck?”

  The Master Chief grinned. “Aye, sir.”

  “Mr. McDonald, thanks for the demonstration. I like your idea but it may not be quite ready for prime time.” Jeff turned and headed toward his car. “By the way Mr. McDonald, didn’t those rovers get stuck in the sand on Mars?”

  Jeff drove back to Long Beach Saturday evening and managed to finish his tax returns and get them in the mail. Sunday was again spent at EODGRUONE, where he and the Master Chief amused themselves with jokes about Irving and drafted a few sketches of how they thought it might be improved.

  “It’s not an altogether bad idea,” Jeff said. “Why don’t you fax this stuff off to McDonald, just to let him know that we’re not entirely cruel and heartless.”

  “Aye, sir. And my complements on that brilliant example of your devious nature, it was funny as hell.”

  Jeff grinned. “All you had to do was look at the wheels on that thing and, given its mass, you just knew it would get stuck.”

  #

  After stopping for dinner at a small Italian restaurant in San Clemente that he liked, Jeff finally arrived home around 9:00 Sunday evening – another weekend of service to God and country crossed off the calendar. He poured himself a scotch, dropped into the sofa and turned on the news, thinking he might catch the baseball scores before bed.

  “The big news of the weekend is still Friday’s Mega Millions lottery drawing. $750 million, the largest lottery purse in history. And, according to the California Lottery office, just one winning ticket that was sold in a convenience store in Long Beach, California and has so far gone unclaimed.”

  Jeff hit t
he mute button on the remote and looked at the numbers on the screen. “No way.” Then turned the sound back on.

  “Tomorrow should be another nice Spring day in Southern Califor…”

  Jeff hit the mute button again. “No fuckin’ way.” He dropped the remote on the coffee table, trotted out to his car, grabbed the tickets out of the glove box, went back inside, sat down at his computer and went to the California Lottery website.

  Draw Results on 4/13/12: 53 28 51 7 22 and MEGA# 30

  Jeff started down his list of numbers, comparing them with those on the screen.

  “Nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope…” and he suddenly froze. His heart began to pound and he found himself short of breath as he nervously glanced back and forth between the lottery ticket and the computer screen. After checking the numbers about thirty times, Jeff sat back and stared at the ticket, gasping for air.

  “Oh, mother of God.”

  CHAPTER 2

  Monday, April 16, 2012 (T minus 1436 days)

  Jeff walked out of the lottery office and stopped in the parking lot. He felt lost and in desperate need of talking to someone, anyone. Seeing no one around, he started talking to himself. “I have $405 million dollars in my bank account. Okay, now what? What do you do with four-tenths of a billion dollars? Get an accountant? A lawyer? A stockbroker? Buy a new car? A new house? A small Latin American nation? Start a foundation? Finance world peace? I wonder what kind of American Express Card you can get with that kind of money? The AMEX Plutonium Card? I wonder if I can buy a $20 million dollar yacht… with my debit card? I have no idea.”

  He had to think and, looking around, quickly concluded a parking lot in Santa Ana probably wasn’t the ideal spot to do it. He slowly walked back to his car, stopped short and just stood there staring at the old Camry. “Hmmm, maybe I should get a new car. That would be a start.” He tilted his head and continued to stare at the Camry with a puzzled expression. “But what kind of car?” Slowly a broad smile came across his face, “Maybe one of each. I’ll need a bigger garage.”

  Jeff got into the Toyota and headed south toward the freeway. As he approached the onramp he pulled to the side and stopped. He suddenly remembered once seeing a giant Mercedes dealership in Newport Beach, just past the airport. It was just a couple miles down the road, “What the hell, let’s go have a look.” He headed south on the freeway, getting off at Jamboree Road and pulled into the parking lot of Fletcher Jones Motorcars. He sat in the Camry for a minute looking around. There were Mercedes in front of the building, in the building, on top of the building, hundreds of them, every direction he looked. The odds seemed good they would have something he’d like.

  Jeff walked across the lot, looking at this and that, and into the showroom. Glancing around, he noticed a big sleek white sedan and walked straight up to it. He walked around it and peered through the windows. White leather, nice. This would do.

  “Nice car, isn’t it?”

  Jeff turned around to find a salesman hovering right behind him. “Yeah, beautiful.”

  “Top of the line, S65 AMG. Fully equipped. Every option. Just arrived.”

  “May I sit in it?”

  “Sure, let me unlock it for you.”

  Jeff slid in behind the steering wheel and looked around the interior. He felt numb. Not like he was drunk, but maybe like he’d taken one too many Vicodin. His whole world was suddenly a bit… surreal. His eyes settled on the speedometer. He stared at it for a bit, then pointed, “Is that right? 220 miles per hour?”

  “It won’t go quite that fast, but pretty close.”

  “Amazing,” Jeff responded with more indifference than astonishment. “What’s this?”

  “That’s your GPS navigation and rear view camera.”

  “Rear view camera?”

  “Yes. When you shift into reverse a camera in back shows you where you’re going.”

  “Really. Huh.”

  Jeff sat quietly for some time, gazing around the interior, but not really looking. It was all just too unreal.

  The salesman, perhaps thinking Jeff might just be some nut case off the street, started shifting anxiously. “Sir, were you thinking of making a purchase today?”

  “Uh, yeah. I guess so.”

  “Alright. Perhaps I might show you something else?”

  Jeff placed his hands on the steering wheel and turned it ever so slightly. “No. This is nice.” He took a deep breath, trying to draw himself out of the mental fog, and slid out of the car. He stood for a minute with crossed arms and pursed lips, slowly shaking his head back and forth. “It’s a lot bigger than my Toyota.”

  “Than your… Toyota?”

  “Uh huh. It’s parked outside.” Jeff took another deep breath and nodded to himself. “Okay. I’ll take it.”

  The salesman coughed and cleared his throat, “Sir, do you know how much this automobile costs?”

  Jeff shook his head, “No.”

  “Sir, this car is two hundred thousand dollars.”

  “Okay.”

  The salesman, still unconvinced of Jeff’s sanity said, “Alright, sir. I’m Richard, if you’d care to accompany me to my office, we’ll draw up the paperwork.”

  Jeff turned and offered his hand. “Okay, Richard. I’m Jeffrey Grey. Lead on.”

  They walked across the showroom and Jeff took a seat opposite Richard’s desk.

  “Alright Mr. Grey, and, uh, how did you plan on paying for this?”

  Jeff pulled out his wallet and handed Richard his debit card.

  Richard sat for a moment staring at the card then looked askance at Jeff, “Mr. Grey, this is a debit card!”

  “Uh huh. There’s plenty of money. Call my bank.”

  About an hour later Jeff found himself back on the San Diego Freeway, heading for Long Beach in his brand new Mercedes. He didn’t know what the bank had said to Richard, or whoever called, but when Richard returned to the office he had half a dozen people in tow, issuing orders to get Jeff whatever he wanted to drink, appraise his old Camry, fill out paperwork for him… everything but a manicurist. All Jeff had to do was sign his name in a couple places, wait for them to shuffle some cars in the showroom to get his out, and he was on his way.

  He liked the smell of the new car. He was also beginning to like the idea of having a great deal of money.

  As Jeff drove past Long Beach Airport, he suddenly had a thought and turned off at Cherry Avenue. Two miles up the road he turned in to Forest Lawn Memorial Park, parked the car, walked down the long path to a familiar spot, sat down on the lawn at the foot of the grave and stared at the marker.

  Marsha Marie Grey

  August 14, 1964

  November 4, 2009

  “Hey babe. Been keeping up with current events? Wow, what a day. I’ll tell you, somebody sure has a cruel sense of irony, that’s for sure. All the money in the world and too late to do anything for you.”

  Jeff closed his eyes, bowed his head and sat quietly for a time, not knowing what to say or even what to think. After a while he looked around the park and shook his head, “Any idea what I should do now? I could sure use your help, ‘cause I have no clue. It’s an awful lot of money, but not enough to cure all the world’s woes. What do you think? Maybe some kind of philanthropic foundation? Take a shot at curing… something? Maybe scholarships for a gazillion kids to go to college? Or, I could buy an island in Greece. I’ll name it Isle de Marsha and retire in seclusion.” Jeff grinned, “You’d haunt me if I did that, wouldn’t you? There’d be chains rattling in the halls at night. Okay, scratch the Greek island. I don’t know. Heck, I don’t even have anyone to leave it to.”

  He stood up and walked around the grave, glancing down at it from time to time. “You’re not helping. How about a sign?” He paused, pointed his finger at the grave and grinned, “And not like those pigeons last year after I told you I bought a new bed. That wasn’t kind.” He resumed his circular pacing, “The obvious choices would be cancer research or education… or bot
h. But there’s already so much money going into that, and so much being wasted by politicians and bureaucrats building monuments and edifices to themselves. Would a couple hundred million more help? Would the Marsha Grey Memorial Cancer wing at some hospital really make a difference? Twenty years from now would it be renamed after some philanthropist that came along with a bigger wheelbarrow full of money?”

  Jeff stopped and stared off into the distance, “You know honey, I’d like to do something, something… different. Something… profound. Something that would really make a difference. Something that would be remembered forever.” He paused and bit his lip, “But not because I did it, but because… somebody did it. Something that no one else has done because no one has been willing to stand up, raise their hand and say, ‘Okay, I’ll do it.’ Any ideas? There has to be something, probably a lot of things. But what? What can one man do that would change the course of history?”

  He started walking again, “Hmmm, I could run for president. I can see the headlines now, ‘Lottery winner has eyes on White House.’” He laughed, “No, I don’t think so. Come on, help me out here. There has to be some examples to emulate, who? Edison invented the light bulb. That would be a biggie. Einstein gave us an understanding of how the universe works. IBM invented the personal computer and Bill Gates gave us Windows. Hmmm, still not sure those are good things. Hillary went to the top of the world and Piccard and Walsh to the bottom. And Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon.”

  Jeff stopped and rubbed his chin. “Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon. Hmmm, that did change things, didn’t it? All of a sudden we were no longer prisoners of this third rock from the sun. That was a biggie. But after Apollo, we never took the next step. In fact, we took a couple steps backwards, got complacent and called it ‘good enough.’ What’s the next step? How do we expand our horizon? By the time NASA gets off its ass and launches a manned mission to Mars I’ll probably being laying there beside you. Nobody wants to explore anymore. Seems like everyone just wants cradle-to-grave security, and somebody else to pay for it.