by T I WADE
“More of the Pakistani missiles?” asked General Patterson, his face slowly going white.
“Yes, he was sure that he had seen more than three of the smaller missiles go through his base, but he thought he could have counted the same load twice. Colonel Rhu remembers the 747 transporter bringing in two of the missiles on one flight. They were not unloaded while he was on duty; the aircraft just sat there and was refueled. It was gone the next day. The next week it arrived again with 2 missiles, maybe the same ones, as he did not see the first two off-loaded. He told me that this time he did watch them being removed from the aircraft. They weren’t very large, about 18 meters—50 feet—long, and in one piece. There was equipment inside the aircraft which helped roll the cigar shaped missiles forward out of the large nose door. It took less than two hours to have both missiles inside a hangar. A few weeks later he was in the control tower when the 747 transporter landed and this time there was only one missile aboard and off-loaded the same way, and the two first missiles had disappeared from inside the hangar. The guards from the other base had been in control of the missile movement.”
“Oh my God!” stated the general. “The enemy, whoever they are, could still have nuclear missiles aimed at the United States.” There was now total silence in the room.
Carlos was the first to speak. “The range from anywhere in Alaska won’t get to Washington D.C. The range of these missiles, you told me was what, 1,500 miles?”
“Correct,” replied the general. “Maximum 1,500 miles, but that is a big chunk of the United States. Let’s say they are in Anchorage Alaska, 1,500 miles would put…” And he studied the map again “would put the entire West Coast in range. Maybe the Russian multi-head was to terminate the East Coast and if Zedong Electronics had more of these Pakistani Shaheen II rockets, they were meant for the West Coast, or even Hawaii?”
The meeting ended with a plan, which was top secret, and nobody would be told outside of that room. Even the guards had been asked to leave once the meeting had begun.
Early the next morning, and having had very little sleep, Preston walked alone around the airport with the two dogs. The wedding was the main reason he hadn’t slept. It wasn’t that marrying Martie was a problem, but it was all happening a little too fast.
He did not have a nice, new suit to get married in, just the one and only suit he had worn to Capitol Hill for the meeting. Martie and Sally had not been seen for a day; they were with all the other girls, using Martie’s old sewing machine, he assumed, to make wedding dresses. While he was entertaining Little Beth and Clint the evening before, he noticed that the beige dining room curtains were missing. He didn’t say anything but Little Beth saw that he had noticed the missing curtains, and sternly asked Preston not to ask about them.
“All this happening in the world, and now he was about to get married!” he thought. The timing wasn’t perfect, but at least they had a church, friends and enough food and drink for the occasion. Even their old friends, the initial Air Force guards, including his friend the tech sergeant, who had worked on both his fighter aircraft, had flown in late the previous evening for the occasion.
Even with his unease, the day turned out to be a very good for Preston.
He and Clint chatted while he dressed, and then helped Carlos, who was getting stronger every day, into his one and only suit. The weather was hot and sticky, and for the first time, he felt he would rather be swimming in the cool water of the pool instead of walking to the church on a muggy morning. Clint had on one of Joe’s old suits, which was a size or two too large, but they made it work for him; he was wheeled to the church by Mike Mallory, who also had on an old suit. To Preston, they looked like a bunch of dressed-up gunslingers from the old days, or part of Al Capone’s mob with handkerchiefs hanging out of their breast pockets. All they needed were hats and Tommy guns.
Carlos and Preston, together at the front of the new church, waited with the Air Force minister from Seymour Johnson. He looked inside and noticed that everybody had managed to squeeze into its small interior. He could hardly recognize many of the guests, now all dressed up, and saw that the president, Will Smart and oddly, Mo Wang, were the best dressed men out of the civilian males, their suits stylish and well-made. Joe still looked like a farmer with a suit on, and David wore a sports jacket and khaki slacks. Maybe he didn’t own a suit? Joe’s boys looked like a bunch of youngsters suited up from the Bronx. Only the military men, all in their best dress uniforms, looked comfortable in their attire.
The French girls all looked gorgeous. They were tanned and dressed in the European clothes they had arrived with. The First Family and the Smart family were elegant. Lee, his wife and daughter, as well as Lu and her family also looked good, but Preston could see the difference between their best clothes and the European models. He was still wondering what had happened to the dining room curtains when both curtains suddenly shadowed the entrance to the church. An old record was put on the record player, which began playing an instrumental of the Wedding March, Martie’s favorite, and the only piece of wedding music they had. This got Preston all emotional as he had often listened to it with Martie.
Both men looked towards their brides and Preston, with damp eyes, realized that he had never seen his dining room curtains so beautiful. The newly designed curtains had been transformed into identical dresses, simple, strapless gowns and looked like they had been purchased in a fine dress shop. He realized that Marie and Beatrice had certainly helped in their design.
Martie with her father, and Sally with hers, walked up the aisle slowly; the two fathers kissed their daughters and left the girls with their grooms.
Preston recalled a myriad of hazy memories while the Minister spoke, of his parents, his childhood, when he first met Martie, and the times they had discussed their wedding in a big church somewhere. Now he was getting married in a make-shift air force church in North Carolina with old aircraft all around, and the best bunch of people anybody getting married could ask for.
He got his words right; Clint gave him the ring and Little Beth gave Carlos Sally’s ring, both donated by the French girls.
And then he was married. Both he and Carlos to kissed their brides and the church was totally silent.
Together the four newly-weds walked down the aisle and into the heat, where two soldiers, each driving one of Joe’s rat patrol jeeps all dressed out with flowers and greenery, took them the short fifty yards to the house porch.
It was a party to remember. The day blew passed in a crazy ensemble of happy, smiling people, beer, and BBQ, and the four newly-weds were thrown, fully dressed, into the swimming pool.
Chapter 5
Who are these guys?
Three days later, and with the weddings and festivities over, many of the attendees were heading back home. The latest information shared by the president the day before the wedding, was discussed at the airfield between Preston and Carlos. They had already discussed married life over a beer, and both agreed that a good escape, if ever needed, was to get invited aboard Mo’s boat to go fishing.
“So, we now have three days before we go hunting for these guys. Where do you think they are, Carlos?”
“I’m siding with the president and saying somewhere in Alaska,” replied Carlos, enjoying a second, ice-cold beer. Canada doesn’t have many airfields long enough for a 747-ERF (extended range freighter). Russia, I’m sure does, but the area around the Bering Sea, and where General Allen flew over on his flight to Japan would be my bet.”
“Does Alaska have many long runways?” asked Martie coming up with some freshly-made snacks with Sally a few steps behind.
“I’m not sure, but I did hear about several extended runways prepared for the old NASA program years ago.”
“I’d sit on your lap, lover boy, but you are so fragile in your old age!” added Sally sitting down next to her husband.
“Yes, how are your wounds doing Carlos?” Martie asked.
“A couple of flesh wounds and h
e thinks he needs an army of pretty Colombian nurses to look after him,” added Sally punching him on the shoulder, although not as hard as she normally did.
“I think our secret escape location is getting more important,” stated Carlos to Preston smiling innocently.
“We have only been married a couple of days and now you guys already want to get away?” asked Sally looking at Carlos sternly. “I assume you want to go fishing or something?”
Preston laughed. “Sal, you are so on the button every time!”
“Why are you guys talking about Alaska anyway?” Martie asked, sitting on the stairs in front of Preston and grabbing two beers from an ice bucket next to her husband. She handed one to Sally.
Preston, who had been given clearance over his satellite phone to bring Sally and Martie into the picture by the general earlier that morning, told the two girls the next problem facing America.
“That’s a load of crap!” asserted Martie, hearing about the drug companies. “Why so many people were on these drugs, I will never know. I think that most of these new drugs invented by these horrible drug companies were designed to “cure” diseases that didn’t even exist until the drug companies invented them as well! I don’t have bad gas, constipation, bad bones, stomach problems, or suffer from any of the things they always advertised on television, and I don’t know anybody who has!
“I can understand diabetes, or cancer, or heart disease, but within the last couple of decades they promoted bodily problems I never heard of; and they always used an acronym to name the disease like IFD, APR, or…”
“A four-hour erection?” added Carlos.
“Oh, shut up!” exclaimed Preston.
“Yeah! Just let me know when you have one of those, lover boy, and I’ll give you some tablets for it!” laughed Sally nudging Martie.
They then discussed how many people did not like Westbrook, head of MonteDiablo and how that company always seemed to be bullying small farmers.
“Now that’s all we have, small farmers growing natural crops, and he wants to stop that and get the big GMO-supplied farms running again. I think I know where to put some of those bullets you got for me last year, Preston!” added Martie. “Up his Alpha Sierra Sierra!”
The girls were shocked when Carlos told them about their possible link to Zedong Electronics, and Martie replied that life in America would have been hell if the other side had won.
“Carlos, can you ever get the Navistar low enough for its cameras to actually get a visual on an aircraft?” Preston asked.
“The more modern models, which are now useless scrap metal up there, yes, but remember this was an experimental model and the first of its kind. Lee Wang and I have tried to define all the ways we could enhance the satellite’s viewing capabilities: infra-red, heat sourcing, X-Ray, but this old girl just doesn’t have the technology; plus, the screens we view the information on would have black and white dots bigger than any aircraft, even if we lowered her to within 70 to 80 miles above earth. One hope for the distant future is to rebuild more advanced technology into the three satellites aboard the second Russian rocket we found in Harbin, and get that up into space ASAP. I reckon that is up to Martie’s father to come up with new electronic marvels and not Mr. Westbrook getting all the people in the world to fix his agricultural company.”
For the rest of the day they sat and enjoyed each other’s company, and discussed the world as they now knew it. All four understood that these CEOs lacked integrity; they had no interest in the common good or for the United States; their only goal was to rebuild their own personal fortunes and the power that went with it.
Three days later and fully relaxed, the four headed up to Andrews for the scheduled meeting on Capitol Hill with the corporate CEOs. All of those staying at Preston’s airfield had been invited to the meeting as potential new members of Congress. Buck and Barbara were doing the flying this day for the first group and left separately.
There would be several of the former House and Senate members in attendance and, overall, the president wanted the meeting to look like an official meeting of the new U.S. legislative and executive branches.
Lady Dandy, now fitted with several military-issue arm chairs and a couple of other luxuries, like an old refrigerator and coffee machine, was the transportation of choice. Buck had been hard at work with Michael Roebels; he had taken Grandpa Roebels’ place and had flown across the country with Martie’s dad for the wedding and then the meeting.
They arrived at Andrews and met Lee and Mo Wang in an empty hangar. The two Wangs had a couple of the best Chinese engineers with them and were trying to get a modern FBI tracking device, the size of a box of cigarettes to work. They didn’t have replacement parts for such a modern device and were trying to improvise.
“That’s a one in a million chance,” stated Michael Roebels once he was shown what they were trying to achieve in the empty hangar the CEOs had demanded. “I thought of this when General Patterson explained the situation to me; it will take months to get any tracking device working. The only idea I’ve come up with to track an aircraft is to by-pass the aircraft’s own transponder on/off switch and make sure that it is beeping away to us when they leave. That won’t show up on their radar and if the “on” light is disconnected, then the pilots shouldn’t notice it giving us a position every few seconds.
“Great idea!” exclaimed Carlos. “I wish I had thought of that. We just need to get into their aircraft, but they want this hangar sealed and they are bringing in armed guards to make sure nobody gets in. Can they do that?”
“I doubt it,” added Preston. “This is an American Air Force base for heaven’s sake, they don’t have diplomatic immunity and I’m sure someone will get into their aircraft somehow.”
“They are even getting mobile fuel trucks in here, so they can refuel themselves,” Lee Wang added.
“Mo, are there any parts we got out of Harbin that could help us with a tracking device, or this FBI bug to follow these guys? We have two massive warehouses full of your Chinese replacements,” Michael asked.
“Those types of replacement parts, as far as the Chairman was concerned, would no longer be necessary in his new world,” Mo Wang replied. “Remember the several Zedong Electronics open-door bugs the Cambridge University engineers found and studied back in England in May 2012, I think the month was?” Everybody nodded. “Once that news hit the papers, he decided that the only parts needed in his new world would be to get the infrastructure of the country going again, everything but devices for military software, aviation and nautical electronics. With his own fleet of Jumbo Jets and ten massive container ships, he would have the only import/export transportation fleet worldwide, and it would be sufficient to transport everything he would need in his new country. He wasn’t at all interested in the rest of the world and they could all go and live in caves again for all he cared.”
General Patterson walked in with a couple of men behind him.
“Good morning,” he stated shaking everybody’s hand. “Got any ideas on how we can track these guys? They are due to land in two hours and so far we have seen nothing on any radar screens.”
“Nothing much so far,” replied Martie’s father. “It’s a sort of impossible task. These guys, their pilots, and their connections would have had time to think out these problems months, or even years ahead as a possible scenario. Somehow we need to get one person in here to play with their transponders and hopefully get them working. Are you going to adhere to their demands of privacy while their aircraft sit here? Why don’t you just take them into custody and make them tell you where they are based? Guantanamo is still open, as of December last year.”
A soldier ran into the empty hangar. “Radar connection with one aircraft, over Newfoundland and approximately twelve hundred miles out, sir! The Hurricane Hunter noticed her several seconds ago.”
“So they are not coming in together,” stated the general “Excuse me, I want to check all our radar aircraft out th
ere,” and he left the hangar at a rapid walk.
Carlos and Preston followed him at a slower pace. They knew where his command center would be, in the Andrews’ main communications room.
“I think we have something,” General Patterson said to them as they entered a few minutes later. “The Canadian Hurricane Hunter over the U.S./Canadian border thought they saw an extremely faint blip of an aircraft over an hour ago on the extreme edge of their screen in the western area of the Labrador Sea; it was so faint that they didn’t think to report it. It couldn’t have been an aircraft, unless it was flying less than 2,000 feet above the terrain.
“At that low a cruise altitude, any jet will be literally burning through its fuel, even at slower cruise speeds,” stated Carlos. “A Gulfstream could lose a third of its range.”
“Correctly stated,” replied General Patterson. “Even if they stayed over water, which they would have to do at that altitude, it would cause havoc to the jets flying conditions, not to mention the dense sea air going through the engines.”
“Maybe they didn’t fly the whole trip at that altitude, but just the last part,” suggested Carlos looking at the extra-large map General Patterson was studying on a massive map table. “The other Hurricane Hunter hasn’t reported anything?”
“One virtually unnoticeable blip, three hours ago, about 300 miles north of Alaska, well over the Beaufort Sea. One millisecond blip and it was gone,” General Patterson replied.
“Sir, we have a new contact from the gunship over Seattle,” stated a female air force soldier listening on a satellite phone. “Unidentified aircraft incoming from the direction of Hawaii, 200 miles from San Francisco, at 49,000 feet and at a fast cruise.”
“It’s weird that Hawaii didn’t pick her up, or tell us of any aircraft movements in their area,” stated Preston