by Peter Damon
He looked about him once more, then went to help the twins lift the fifty kilogram box from the back of the van. They had a heavy-duty plastic pallet for it to lie on while they prepared the final details, and Michael reflected for a few moments on how up-market they were becoming.
“We should have painted it silver or gold or something,” he remarked aloud.
“Pardon?” the twins chorused.
“Nothing,” he told them, and returned to looking through his binoculars. Either his humour was genuinely beyond their comprehension, or they were feigning ignorance. He wasn’t going to demean himself by asking.
“Alright?” they asked.
A last sweep of the terrain and the horizon line with the binoculars and Michael nodded before resuming his scrupulous examination of the surroundings. Behind him, the Alto University satellite lifted into the air.
There was no hesitation this time, just a gradual increase in speed as it moved further and further into the air.
“Good?” he asked.
“So far,” he was told, one twin on the control unit while the other stored the pallet back in the van for re-use. Michael hoped history would remember them kindly, in particular for their Green credentials, using second-hand equipment and recycling where possible.
“Ok, let’s get moving,” he told them, closing the back doors and hurrying round to the driver’s seat. He could feel the eyes of the authorities peering down at them, a mighty fist to one side ready to strike. They would have seen the satellite from about 50 metres outwards, and they could follow the trace downwards to within a metre of the launch site. He didn’t want to be there when they did that.
“Fewer bumps would be good!” Thomas shouted from the back where he was continuing to monitor the satellite’s ascent as Michael drove along the rough track towards the B road, somewhere up ahead.
“When are you going to put that stuff on the bottom of the van so we can just fly home?” he called over the noise of the van in first gear, bumping over the rough stones of an old quarry track.
“And while we’re on the subject, when are you going to give it a name?” he shouted.
+++++++++++++++++
“Sergeant, Sir!” Corporal Brad Weiss called from his brand-new screen at the Offutt Air Force Base as a flashing red dot appeared on it. Brad was one of six new operatives at the base, each one with a large flat monitor in front of them, powered by the latest Intel processors.
“Verify!” Sergeant Chuck Waters called.
“Verified, Sir! We have one unidentified satellite, Sir!” called another strident army voice from the other side of the room.
“Alright. Let’s get this Son-of-a-Bitch! Brad, email and voice call La Palma, Mount Graham and MMT Arizona; we are Code Red, I repeat; Code Red. We want images of this little fucker. ASAP!” he called, referring to the large optical imaging telescopes that had agreed to cooperate with Operation Demeter.
“Bill, make sure the others over on Recon Road have seen it. They’ve got to find the launch site.”
While Brad and Bill were busy making their calls, he phoned Captain Reynolds and gave him the news.
February 22nd
David checked his watch and nodded to himself as much as his twin brother. It had turned 11pm, an arbitrary time they had decided would be late enough to diminish the possibility of colliding with a plane.
They stood at the edge of Graham Water, a large reservoir a few miles to the west of Cambridge. There were few roads and even fewer properties in the immediate area, and with an overcast sky, the chosen place was very dark, hopefully dark enough to obscure the rise of one quite small black box.
Allan Blake stood to one side with a tablet in his hand, his attention divided between the display, and the box the twins were pulling out of the van and laying on a plastic pallet that had been placed onto the path beside the lake. He knew it was the latest package of tests that the lads in the Astrophysics Group at Cavendish Laboratory had put together, but he hadn’t expected it to be so small and, well, mundane looking.
“When you’re ready, Allan,” one of the twins told him, waking him from his revere.
“Oh, yes, sure,” he agreed. The tablet lit his face with an eerie glow as he pressed the appropriate App to watch his program unfurl, filling the screen with data.
The box rose smoothly into the air and quickly disappeared into the night sky. The twins were already looking at their monitor in the back of the van while Allan watched his tablet, nodding as his software monitored the launch, providing him with details, the text in green to signify it was within the working parameters.
“Smooth,” David said, nodding towards him. At least, Allan thought it was David.
Allan agreed, although he’d want to review the data later and see just how ‘smooth’ a lift it was.
They waited in silence, watching their respective displays until the satellite had obtained its desired orbit. They then packed their goods away and went home, thoroughly pleased with themselves.
+++++++++++++++++
Corporal Bill Hoffman sat in his chair at the Offutt Air Force Base in Omaha, Nebraska and dreamed of better, more exciting days. He had missed the previous appearance of a red dot a week before, much to his chagrin. Having found the first, he felt some ownership of the unknown phenomenon. In a way, they were his, his baby, his discovery. More importantly, finally, he was part of more than just an administrative role.
Operation Demeter. He rolled the words about in his brain. The operation was classified, and so Bill wasn’t able to tell his drinking pals. That wasn’t to say they didn’t know that Bill was involved in something big though. He may not be able to tell them of the operation, but he could refuse another round of drinks on the basis that it might affect his judgement, and his judgement was very important at that moment. And when they asked for more details, he just tossed his head and then ruefully admitted that he couldn’t tell them; national security after all.
Bill wondered what would come of it all. It sure sounded weird; satellites appearing in space without any warning.
He personally went for the alien option. Sure, the satellites looked to be made on earth, but that was because they were Spy satellites, so of course they were trying to mingle in among the real earth satellites; those there aliens just didn’t know that the USA was watching them.
Whatever it was, it had not only got them new PCs with large flat screen monitors, but a new coffee percolator , one of the bigger percolators too. Now, that had to prove how important the operation was.
A blinking red light appeared on his monitor, breaking into his revere.
“Sergeant, Sir!” Bill urgently cried, excitement rushing through him as the new red dot pulsed brightly among the other debris of space.
“Verify!” Sergeant Chuck Waters shouted, erupting from his seat as he turned his attention to the other side of the room. A well trained ex-combat soldier, the sergeant moved from boredom to alert in an instant, confirming visually what he was being told even as he checked that the phones were still to hand, waiting for him.
“Verified, Sir! We have one unidentified satellite, Sir!” called the other corporal from the other side of the room.
“Bill; get onto Las Palma. We need Intel ASAP!” he called, even as he picked up the phone to talk to the rest of Operation Demeter. He looked at his watch and grinned. It was night time in Europe, Asia and Africa. If anything showed a launch clearly, it was night.
“We’ll get the Son-of-a-Bitch this time,” he swore, grinning in anticipation.
February 23rd
Michael walked the two miles from the newspaper offices to the Cambridge University Particle Physics Laboratory on J.J. Thompson Avenue, the collar of his waxed jacket turned up against the light drizzle that looked set to remain for the whole day.
There was continuing interest in the CERN project from the British public, so what better cover for Michael than to obtain a story from the Particle Physics Laboratory while in reality
getting an update from the Howard twins on their preparations for a commercial launch.
His fears of an immediate tightening by the British Authorities seemed to be unfounded. It had been two months since the first launch in late November, and he had yet to see any evidence of additional intelligence gathering.
He should have been feeling better as a result of the silence, and yet it niggled him, right between the shoulder blades where he couldn’t reach. Something was wrong, he was sure of it. He just couldn’t say what.
It would do no good to share his conviction with the professor. It would just confirm his assessment that Michael was becoming paranoid. And so he took long walks and boring bus rides; they allowed him to think and question his tablet, continually moving from one news feed to another, all the while wanting to do a search on Google and knowing that, soon as he did, he’d proclaim himself to half a dozen authorities.
He entered the Particle Physics Laboratory and smiled pleasantly at the receptionist, his press card held where she could see it.
“Michael!” Professor Rolle called from 20 metres away, waving as he walked over with four unmatched books in danger of falling from under one arm. They shook hands and Rolle took him past reception and to the broad glass stairs, leading him to the upper floor where they could sit at the cafeteria with little risk of being overheard.
“Allan Blake will be joining us,” Rolle told him, breathless from the long climb. “He’s been working with the twins on improving the software interface,” he explained.
Michael grunted. “I don’t like people being brought in without my knowledge,” he told Rolle. “We have to be careful,” he stressed.
“Yes, well, Allan has been in Cambridge over five years now,” Rolle pointed out, clearly thinking Michael was being paranoid.
The twins were sitting at one of the tables with a long-bodied, bald and tanned young man who appeared engrossed in his tablet, one slightly thicker than most. They stood as Rolle and Michael approached and introductions were rapidly made before fresh teas were bought and the five of them settled down to talk.
“So, where are we with things?” Michael asked, the tea warming him after his walk.
“We’re good,” one of the two twins told him while they both nodded, pleased with themselves.
“Allan has written some brilliant software to improve our control over the payload during launch and positioning,” the other twin told them.
“Does it need testing?” Michael asked, his attention moving from one to the other as he attempted to find something that would distinguish them. The professor grinned towards him, knowing what he was doing, just as he knew the futility of it.
They shook their heads in unison, but it was Allan who replied. “We tested it last night. There’s some data I need to go over to see if there are any improvements that can be made, but all in all, the launch went without a glitch.”
Michael tensed and turned to Rolle. “We made a launch last night?” he asked.
“So it would seem,” Rolle murmured. “Care to tell us about this?” he asked of the twins, his expression stern.
The twins looked towards one another for a moment before returning their gaze to Michael and Rolle.
“It was a small package, only half a metre cubed.”
“30 kilograms.”
“Astrophysics put it together, so we thought you knew.”
“Launched last night over by Graham Water,” the twins said in their normally clipped voice.
“It allowed us to test the interface,” Allan broke in. “We would have needed to do that before any commercial launch, and this, so I’m told, was the best opportunity.”
The twins were nodding, their eyes fastened on Michael, clearly aware that they had upset him.
Michael breathed out. “I didn’t think I would need to say this,” he told them. “But if you want to live to see the year out, you do not do anything with your discovery unless you clear it with Rolle and me. Do you understand?”
They nodded sheepishly.
Michael grunted and looked towards Rolle. “I think we better have a meeting of all those involved,” he said. “We need to take this to the next level,” he concluded.
“What else have we?” he asked of the table.
March 4th
Michael pulled a small black box from his jacket and thumbed the switch to ‘on’ before sliding it into the middle of the table. The table had seen better days, but then, so had the room. It was situated above the Eagle, one of the larger pubs in Cambridge, on Benet Street and directly across the street from St Benet’s church. At that time of day, the main bar downstairs was filled with students. Allan had some of his friends strategically placed close to the stairs to help ensure no one attempted to eavesdrop on them, but the main defence was the little box.
“It’s working, is it?” Rolle asked.
“Try your tablet or your mobile,” David said while he and Thomas shrugged.
Michael was already doing so, nodding when he saw he had lost all signal. “Any device within 50 yards has suddenly lost its signal,” he told them.
Michael looked around the table. Apart from the twins now patiently waiting for him, there was Allan Blake, the Mathematics PhD and electronics student who had been developing a soft interface for better control and reporting on launches and orbital positioning. Shaven haired and bronzed from his frequent trips to any beach that had surf, he frowned as he too found his link to the Internet was lost.
Between him and Michael sat Professor Rolle who nursed his cider and tried not to look too inquisitively at the details on Allan’s tablet, a hand combing back his unruly hair.
Seated on Allan’s other side was Cheryl Hall who drummed her fingers on the table top, impatient to begin. A small and short haired woman, she had become their Business and Logistics Manager, liaising with prospective clients in order to obtain business from European universities, all of whom shared the same problem; cost effective launches into space.
“We’ve done tremendously well,” Michael told them. “We’ve now done four launches and not had one failure. Our net profits stand at just over 300,000 Euros. But frankly, we can’t really take this any further,” he told them.
“Why not, Michael? I thought we were doing very well,” Cheryl pointed out.
Michael shook his head. “Each launch creates an occurrence on some authority’s visibility map. One or two, and they’re likely to ignore it and carry on. More than that, and they’ll start to investigate. Sooner or later, a person from one area of authority is going to talk to someone from another, and the penny will drop.
“Just because the payloads are not communication satellites, does not mean that those looking up there haven’t seen them,” Michael stressed. “It helps that one of the items we launched was not destined for orbit but has been boosted outward, towards the sun. But none the less, each launch increases our risk, and inevitable discovery.”
“Yes. Dr Cannon tells me that Liam Strouder of NASA has already questioned her as to why Cambridge University is no longer clamouring for space on the next lift to the International Space Station,” Professor Rolle pointed out. “I have to admit, I didn’t see that coming.”
“Frankly, it worries me that things are so quiet. I would have much preferred to be hearing of our exploits in the papers. Hearing nothing makes me suspicious. It can only mean that the authorities already know, and that they are stalking us, purposefully preventing the information from getting into the media,” Michael murmured.
“Surely that helps us,” Thomas said with a shrug, but Michael was shaking his head.
“We’ve done what we can to minimise the risk,” the professor explained. “We’ve asked the students working on the project not to talk to anyone about how their equipment suddenly appeared in Low Earth Orbit, but every additional experiment increases the likelihood of a student somewhere saying too much,” he admitted.
“The authorities know. They must do. The only reason to keep
it from the media is to take covert action against us,” Michael was emphatic.
“That doesn’t sound too healthy,” Cheryl murmured nervously.
Michael nodded while looking into the eyes of all those around the table. “One slip and the whole thing will unravel. The consequences are huge. You know what any authority that finds out about us will do, don’t you?”
“I don’t think I want to,” Cheryl told him dryly.
“This is the world we live in. The potential of this chemical is just too great for anyone to ignore, or to be bound by any rules. Any number of people would give their right arm to have and control this chemical, so we should act accordingly.
“That means not using the chemical without the professor or me knowing of it before hand,” he stressed, and was glad to see the twins wince.
“We need to come up with a strategy that will keep them at arms’ length from us, and the chemical,” Michael finished explaining.
That brought a moments silence as those around the table absorbed the risks they were taking.
“So, what do you suggest?” Thomas asked of Michael.
Michael took a deep breath and looked fleetingly towards Professor Rolle. They had discussed this several times, and never reached agreement. “We need to put this technology out of reach, at least for the foreseeable future, a year or two perhaps,” he stated.
Cheryl frowned. “Like move to a Scottish island perhaps?” she queried. “From a transport point of view, that will only make our shipments more prominent.”
“What about one of those old forts in the Thames Estuary?” Allan suggested, smiling at the thought of all the diving he’d be able to enjoy.
“Too fixed and too small. We need space and good facilities to develop this substance. What about moving onto a large ship, say a container ship or oil tanker?” David suggested.
“A life on the ocean waves?” Cheryl asked, even as Michael was shaking his head again.
“Putting us on a ship is just inviting the authorities to take us out. There won’t be anyone to notice our disappearance,” he pointed out.