Rain of Terror td-75

by Warren Murphy

  He wondered again what had happened to the President.

  The President was very much alive. He was doing his best to be presidential. It was very difficult. Especially when one was stuck under nearly a mile of rock in one's pajamas.

  "I'm the leader of the free world," the President said in anguish. "I should be up there leading."

  "I'm sorry, Mr. President," the senior Secret Service agent said. "We have to wait for the all-clear."

  "What if it doesn't come?"

  "Then we'd all better try to get along. Because we are stuck here until the fallout radiation drops to survivable levels."

  "That could take weeks."

  "Months, actually."

  "But no one has said anything about radiation. There hasn't even been an explosion."

  "Yet," the Secret Service agent pointed out.

  "I'm afraid I'm going to have to insist," the President said in a stern voice.

  "I'm sorry, Mr. President. I have my orders."

  "From whom? I'm the Commander in Chief!"

  "I know that, sir," the Secret Service man said politely, "but I do not take my orders from you, but rather from my superior. "

  "Since when?" the President barked.

  "It's our prime directive. Your security is more important than any other factor, including your demands and wishes. In short, the Secret Service will do everything in its power to safeguard your life, whether you want it or not. "

  The President looked at the Secret Service man in stunned silence.

  "I'm sorry, Mr. President," the man told him. "That's how it is. Don't you think you should be watching the tactical displays?"

  The President nodded numbly. Being President, he was discovering, wasn't all it was cracked up to be. For one thing, there wasn't anything near the absolute power he had envisioned. Everyone else seemed to have his own agenda.

  The President found a set and joined the grim-faced Secret Service agents as they watched the tactical feeds from NORAD. Every screen was on Threat Tube Display, searching for incoming unknowns.

  Not for the first time, the President wished the direct line to CURE had a duplicate down here. Right now, Dr. Harold W. Smith was the only person he trusted. Perhaps, the President hoped, Smith would set his own people into motion when he learned what was going on.

  Dr. Harold W. Smith could no longer delay his decision. It was growing dark. The evening news programs were leading with the vague but ominous story that on his first day in the Oval Office, the new President of the United States had not yet put in an appearance. The reporters claimed that a cloud of low-level apprehension had settled over the nation's capital.

  By the time the media were through, Smith realized grimly, the so-called low-level apprehension would be full-blown panic. Still, Smith had to admit, the press did have a story. They just didn't have any facts to back it up.

  It was time to bring in Remo and Chiun. He buzzed his secretary to have them summoned to his office.

  "I believe they've just left," Smith's secretary replied crisply.

  "Left! Left for where?"

  "I'm not certain, but they had me sign a requisition form for a truck rental."

  "Oh, God," Smith said in a husky voice. "That damned elephant."

  Chapter 6

  Remo backed the rental truck up to the shed. He got out and, undoing the restraining chains, let the steel ramp down.

  The black maw of the truck faced the shed. Only two feet of clearance stood between the open truck and the shed door. No way was Rambo going to squeeze past the truck. Once he opened the shed, Remo reasoned, it should be a breeze.

  Remo took off the padlock with a quick wrench of his hand. He knew Chiun had the key but he would be damned if he was going to ask the Master of Sinanju for any favors. Especially after this latest stunt.

  Remo opened the sliding door. Inside the shed, illuminated by a single bare lightbulb, Rambo the elephant sat on a pile of hay. His trunk lifted in greeting.

  "Up yours," Remo said back. He stepped in and walked around the elephant. Remo clapped his hands once sharply. The sound brought dust spilling off the rafters.

  "C'mon. Up! Let's go," Remo barked. Rambo fluttered his ears unconcernedly.

  "Before, I couldn't get you to stay still," Remo said accusingly.

  He tugged on the elephant's ropy tail, not hard, but enough to motivate the beast. Rambo's trunk curled around a swatch of hay and flung it back over his head.

  Remo's face wore an annoyed expression as hay fell all over him.

  "I'm willing to do this the hard way," Remo said, leaning one shoulder into the elephant's rump. He pushed. The elephant's tail swiped at him without effect. Remo pushed harder. He felt the elephant move.

  Great, thought Remo, pushing some more. Slowly, inexorably, he shoved the large gray hulk out of the shed and to the ramp. The hay made it easier. Rambo slid on top of it like a sled.

  But when Remo stopped to figure out how to make the elephant mount the ramp, he saw that his problem was far from solved.

  Rambo climbed to his feet and walked back into the shed. He got down on his stomach again. His tiny piglike eyes regarded Remo with infinite sadness.

  "Ohhhh," a sgueaky voice said sorrowfully, "he knows what you intend."

  Remo turned. Chiun was standing there. He had changed into a severe gray kimono. His face was unhappy.

  "No, he doesn't," Remo snapped back. "If he knew what I was thinking right at this minute, he'd head for the hills."

  "You never liked him. He recognized that."

  "Tough. I've done enough for him."

  "Where do you intend to take him, assuming you succeed in tricking him into this conveyance?"

  "I was hoping a zoo would take him."

  "Ah," said Chiun. "A zoo. He would be happy in a zoo. There would be others of his kind in a zoo. Yes, I think a zoo would be an excellent place for him."

  "I wish someone would tell him that."

  "I will try."

  "Don't do me any favors," Remo said sourly.

  "Do not fear, I will not," said Chiun, marching up to the elephant. With delicate fingers he pulled back one of Rambo's fan-shaped ears and whispered softly. Remo strained to hear what was being said. Chiun's words seemed to be in Korean, but Remo couldn't make them out.

  Abruptly Rambo climbed to his feet. His trunk swaying from side to side, he stepped up to the ramp and walked into the truck's container section. He stood patiently, his tail hanging docilely.

  "What are you waiting for?" Chiun asked. "Close the door."

  Remo rushed to shove the ramp back into place. He slammed the doors shut and threw the locking lever. "Thanks, Little Father," Remo said grudgingly.

  "Thank me by allowing me to accompany you."

  "Why do you want to do that?"

  "So that I may say a proper good-bye to my faithful steed. "

  "Then let's go before Rambo changes his mind," Remo said, climbing behind the wheel. Chiun settled into the passenger seat and Remo got the truck in gear and headed for the Folcroft gate.

  "Oh, he will not change his mind. I explained everything to him."

  "You did, huh?" Remo said skeptically. "I didn't know you spoke elephant."

  "I do not. I spoke truth. Even elephants understand the truth."

  "Right," said Remo, and piloted the truck down the road. He wondered where the nearest zoo was. He would have to ask at the first gas station.

  As the gates of Folcroft Sanitarium receded in the rearview mirror, Remo noticed a frantic figure in gray running after them and waving his arms. Smith. He probably wanted to say good-bye to the elephant too. Remo decided to pretend he didn't see him. He hit the accelerator, knowing that Smith's ancient car would never catch up. No way was he going to stop until he found a zoo.

  Chapter 7

  General Martin S. Leiber was beginning to enjoy himself. He was senior officer at the Pentagon now. When he spoke, other officers jumped. Word had gotten around that the President had l
eft him in charge during the crisis. No one knew what the crisis was and General Leiber wasn't about to tell anyone, except to hint that it was very, very dire.

  When he realized how much power he wielded, he sent out for lobster. Might as well grab the perks while he could. He was cracking the last claw when the phone rang.

  "General Leiber," he said through a mouthful of lobster meat. Melted butter ran down his chin.

  "General, this is CINCNORAD."

  "Who?" asked Leiber. He fumbled through a Pentagon directory. He knew what NORAD was, sort of. But what the hell was a CINC?

  "I've been in touch with the joint Chiefs and they tell me you're in charge out there."

  "That's right. Who did you say you were again?"

  "Commander in chief of NORAD. You mean you don't recognize my designation?"

  "It's starting to come back to me," said General Leiber, who usually didn't associate with real military types. He was more at home among lobbyists and defense contractors. Where the true power lay.

  "Under orders from the joint Chiefs, we've completed our tactical search. I thought you should have the results as soon as possible."

  "Shoot," said General Leiber, wondering what the heck he was talking about.

  "We've been over our logs and satellite reconnaissance photos a dozen times. We find no evidence of any hotspots or launch blowoffs."

  "Is that good or bad?" asked General Leiber, wondering what a blowoff was.

  "I'm not sure," said the other man. "It's very strange. We've been assuming a ground launch, but our recon photos show that all Soviet missile silos are on standdown. So are the Chinese launch sites. There have been no ground launches from any known missile sites we monitor."

  "Then it's a submarine launch, right?"

  "That would be a logical guess, but Spacetrack would have detected it before PAVE PAWS. They didn't. In fact, Spacetrack inventory lists nothing going up. Nothing at all."

  "Well, it didn't drop out of deep space."

  "I don't think we should discount that possibility," said CINCNORAD.

  "Correct me if I'm off base here, but we don't currently have a defense against extraterrestrial hostiles, do we?"

  "No, General, we do not."

  "What do I tell the President?"

  "If I were you, I'd advise him to lie low until we have the straight skinny on this incident."

  General Leiber hung up the phone, trying to decide if it would be better to call the President now or after he heard back from Andrews. He decided to polish off the last lobster claw first. If he ended up in the stockcade, it would be a long time before he tasted hot melted butter again. Maybe never.

  But the last lobster claw went uncracked. The phone rang again. Leiber picked it up. It was Major Cheek. "What have you got for me?" he barked.

  "Progress, sir," Major Cheek said crisply.

  "I don't give a hang about progress. Can you identify the hostile?"

  "We can narrow it down to a limited number of possibilities."

  "Good. Then it's a known threat."

  "Well, yes and no," the major said unhappily.

  "What do you mean-yes and no?"

  "Well, sir, I think we can determine exactly what the object is, but the threat factor may be up to others to evaluate. We may know more after we go through some reference books. I've sent a man out to buy some."

  "Buy? You don't have one lousy copy of Jane's at Andrews?"

  "Jane's Aircraft won't help us here, sir. The object is definitely-repeat-definitely not found in Jane's."

  "Goddammit, man, stop talking in circles. Spit it out."

  "It's like this, sir. Once we had the brick ovens-"

  "High-Temperature Organic Kiln Constructs. Remember that if we're questioned later. No way will the taxpayers pay three hundred and fifty thousand dollars for ordinary brick ovens."

  "Yessir. In any case, we isolated the pieces and restored what we could to their original shapes. A lot of it was slag, of course, from reentry heat, but we estimate only the leading third of the object was incinerated. The back two-thirds was intact right up until impact."

  "Go on, man."

  "Well," the major said hesitantly, "fortunately, several sections of what I guess you'd call the propulsion system survived. I had the smiths-excuse me, the Metallurgical Consultants-I had them try to weld what they could of it together. The propulsion system told us a lot."

  "Look, I don't care about how it got here. I want to know about its offensive system. How many kilotons? What's the yield, man, what's the yield?"

  "It doesn't have a yield. Exactly."

  "Exactly what does it have?" the general asked, touching the remaining lobster claw with his thumb. It felt cool. He couldn't eat it now.

  "Um, as I was saying, General, when we put together the propulsion system, we were able to measure one of the rods. By that time we had a fair idea of what we were dealing with. The gauge turned out to be four feet, eight and a half inches. That's very important. It told us right away the object was American-made. Because the rods in the European versions are usually three feet, six inches."

  "It's American-made," General Leiber said angrily. "What kind of traitor would sell out his own government?" Then he wondered if he had sold any nuclear missiles lately. He couldn't remember having sold anything that big. "Give me specifics, will you? I'm writing this down."

  Major Cheek vented a hot sigh. "We estimate the object to weigh approximately five hundred tons at ... er ... launch."

  "God, I've never heard of a missile with that kind of throw weight. Thank God it didn't detonate."

  "Actually, there was no danger of that, General."

  "Why not?"

  "It couldn't. I mean, it's not possible."

  "It wasn't armed?"

  "No, sir. I can safely say that it was not armed."

  "If it wasn't armed, then what the hell was it supposed to do?"

  "As near as I can tell, sir, it was meant to impact with maximum damage."

  "Well, of course, you idiot."

  "But it's neither explosive, nor nuclear, nor chemical in nature."

  "I'm not following you."

  "Sir, perhaps you should come down here yourself. I don't think trying to explain this over the phone can really do the situation justice."

  "I'll be right over," said General Martin S. Leiber. General Leiber was allowed through the Andrews gates only after he shouted down the guards. They tried to tell him the base had been declared off limits except to cleared personnel.

  "I know, you noncommissioned jerk," Leiber shouted, flashing his Pentagon ID. "I'm the man who ordered it." They waved him through.

  General Leiber drove to the hangar. He hadn't been there before. It was simple prudence. No way was he going near that thing. It might go off. But the major had assured him the device was no longer a threat. On the other hand, the major was stupid enough to raise his bid and then lay down a royal flush in the face of a superior officer. A man that foolhardy was capable of any imbecility.

  As he was let in through a side door, the general thought the major had just better be correct. If anything happened to him, the President would be stuck underground for a long, long time.

  Inside the cavernous hangar, light was furnished by banks of fluorescent tubes. It was hot. At one end, the orange glow of the kilns flared angrily. They were surrounded by an assortment of heavy anvils. Tools lay on the concrete floor. But there was no sign of the blacksmiths.

  Major Cheek came running up. He was in his shirtsleeves and sweating.

  "Where are my blacksmiths?" General Leiber snapped. "I hope they're not goofing off. They cost the government plenty."

  "I sent them to a secure area, General. Their job is done and I thought it was better that they not be privy to the evaluation process."

  "Harumph. Good thinking. Now, let's have the poop on this thing."

  "This way, General."

  General Leiber followed as he unknotted his tie. "Blasted hot in her
e," he muttered.

  "It takes a lot of heat to make iron malleable," the major said. "That's why your barbecue grills weren't enough. We needed extremely high temperatures."

  "Blacksmiths on TV westerns always used stuff that looked like barbecue grills to me. How was I to know the difference?"

  At the far end of the hangar there were no lights. Major Cheek started speaking as he began hitting switches, illuminating one section of the floor at a time.

  "In a way, you were right, General," he said. "The bell was a good starting point. But even so, we would have had a hard time working from there. It was really superfluous."

  As the general watched, piles of twisted metal came into view. Closest to him were simple jumbles of blackened slag. Beyond them were the unfused pieces. They lay about in neat groups. It reminded General Leiber of photos of the destroyed space shuttle Challenger after the pieces had been recovered and laid out for inspection. There were a lot of pieces. Leiber saw bent metal bars, strange constructs, and in a corner pile, huge round flat things that reminded him of impossibly large gears.

  "As I said," the major went on, "when we assembled one of the propulsion units, it dawned on us what this thing was. But even then, I doubt if I would have recognized what we had if my son hadn't been into HO models."

  "HO?" asked General Leiber clutching at his cigar for support. "My God, are we talking about hydrogen ordnance?"

  "Why, no. I've never heard of hydrogen ordnance."

  "Never mind," said Leiber. "I thought you said this thing was safe."

  "It is. Now. Please come with me."

  General Leiber followed the major through the aisles between the debris. Although many of the pieces had been restored from their impact-mangled states, they were not perfect. Exteriors were blackened and pitted and many of the pieces only approximated the original parts. They had been too badly compressed to be completely reconstructed.

  "This is the heart of it," Major Cheek said, gesturing to a huge black cylinder set on a wooden frame. It lay open and half-melted at one end.

  The general poked his head in. The open end was easily seven feet in diameter and very black both inside and out. It smelled of scorched metal--like an old cast-iron stove. He ran his fingers along the outer skin, which was still warm from being welded.