by Terry James
“Just outside, sir. In the first chamber.”
“Bring him to me. I will hear of this escape,” bin Laden said, a slight, tight-lipped smile crossing his gaunt face.
Musahad Kahlied stood shaking, both from the near-zero-degree weather through which he had just come, and from the anticipation of seeing Osama bin Laden face to face. He was the great leader of the Jihad against all that was hated, the man who brought America to its infidel knees by crushing its towers of economic power. But, he was here to betray bin Laden to the great Satan, the Americans. When he grabbed the leader, they would both be…whatever would be done, and next appear in the American chamber. It was either Osama, or Musahad Kahlied’s entire male family. His fathers and brothers… All would be boiled in swine broth and blood, then wrapped for burial in the swine skins. All would be lost, for Allah would not bear swine within the rituals of Islam. It was his great hero, Osama, or his own father and his brothers in hell with all the infidels, forever…
When the messenger left the tunnel to follow the order given by bin Laden to bring the Afghani, the terrorist paced slowly, his 6’ 5”-inch frame moving in unsteady steps, his right hand again massaging his aching temples.
He stopped, and became rigid, his arms dropping stiffly to his sides, his fists clenched, while his face rose toward the cave’s ceiling. The two men walking nearby him lurched forward to catch him, should he weaken and begin to fall.
Bin Laden turned to face them, his face projecting his inner rage, his eyes black and glistening within their sockets.
“Leave me!” His command was deep and growling. The frightened men had seen the horrible eyes, the terrifying demeanor, many times before, and bowed quickly, hurrying through the tunnel exit the messenger had left moments before.
When the chamber was empty except for the al-Qaeda leader, a dark, boiling human-shaped figure stepped into the cave through a wall directly in front of the terrorist. Bin Laden said, while glaring through the shark-like eyes at the creature, “Yes, I understand.”
The thing moved into the tall Saudi’s body to assume his shape. Bin Laden walked to the cave’s back exit and left the chamber.
“He is in the cave, isn’t he?!”
George Jenkins was almost frantic, while he grabbed and shook the technician by the collar of his lab coat.
“Now, you tell me that stupid rag head has let him get away?!”
“Sir, the sensors, the audio –all indicators were that the operative was about to be issued into the target’s presence.”
“What happened? We had him in our sights, and you let him just…vanish?!”
The short, overweight scientist spoke calmly, clinically. “Sir, we feel he got wind that something was wrong with the operative’s showing up.”
Jenkins cursed, turning to the desk. He slammed the side of his fist against its top.
“What shall we do with the operative, sir?”
The question, offered by another of the scientists, brought the Black Ops director to his senses.
Jenkins said, without a hint of emotion in his voice, “Kill him.”
Mark was worried, and Lori, though troubled too, moved to ease his frustration.
“It doesn’t help to wear yourself out by not getting some rest,” Lori Lansing said, putting a hand on his shoulder, while her husband looked at the monitor screen.
She kissed him lightly on the top of his head, then hugged him. “Nothing from either of them?” she asked, looking at the screen and seeing the e-mail prompts through which he scrolled.
“About a hundred spam, but not a word from them. Where are those kids?”
“It’s getting late, sweetheart. Let’s get some sleep. We’ll find out something tomorrow morning first thing.”
“Yeah, okay. But, if we haven’t heard from them by tomorrow, I’m going looking for them.”
The phone rang, and Lori, startled, jumped. She unfurled her arms from around her husband’s neck and retrieved the receiver several feet away.
“Mrs. Lansing? Is this Clark Lansing’s parents’ home?”
The gruff male voice hurled troubling thoughts through Lori’s mind in an instant. Was it about the kids? Was one or both of them hurt? Was this one of those tragic calls every parent prays never comes?
“Yes, I’m Clark’s mother. I’m Lori Lansing.”
“Mrs. Lansing, I…I’m sorry for the late hour, and this call. I’m Clark’s editor at the New York Examiner. He’s doing a story for us.”
“Yes. Have you heard from Clark?” Her question was animated, with hope. Mark turned from the computer and stood, then walked to her side.
“Actually, Mrs. Lansing, I was going to ask you the same thing. I haven’t heard from Clark in several days. That’s not like him, when he’s checking in while on assignment and so forth.”
“You haven’t heard from him?”
The angst in Lori’s voice prompted Mark to reach toward the phone. “Let me talk to--whoever that is,” he said.
“Mr. Wilson isn’t it?”
“Yes. Bruce Wilson.”
“Mr. Wilson, my husband, Mark, wants to talk with you.”
Lori handed the phone to Mark. “Mr. Wilson, You haven’t heard from our son? How long has it been?”
“About three days now. It’s quite unusual of him to not call in, Mr. Lansing, and I just wondered if you knew how to contact him.”
“We haven’t heard from him and can’t reach him by his cell phone. We haven’t gotten any e-mails, either. What kind of assignment is he working on?”
“I’m sure you know he’s been researching the Bigfoot sightings, and so forth.”
“Yes. That’s been something he’s been into for several years now.”
“Exactly. Well, he was contacted by this woman who is connected to the Department of Defense in some way. They flew to Colorado, to some secret-type operations they have out there in the Rockies. Not too far from Denver, I think.”
“It has something to do with the Bigfoot question?”
“Yeah. But, it’s involved--I don’t really understand it all--something about a thingamajig that has to do with teletransportation. You know, like that device in ‘Star Trek,’ the Transporter, or whatever it was called. The thing takes things apart at the atomic, or molecular level, or something, then reassembles them somewhere else.”
Mark’s mind raced with the disappearance and reappearance of Colonel James Morgan –Lori’s father--then his reappearance in the underground chamber near Taos. He also thought of his own father’s disappearance in 1947 from the airplane…
“Defense Department, huh?” Mark asked after several seconds of analyzing the newspaper man’s words.
“There’s more… involving the treatment of the terrorists who are held in Guantanimo, in Cuba. This broad…this woman… he’s with wants him to investigate the matter of the way those Arab-Islamic types are being treated. Says it has something to do with their use in these teletransportation experiments.”
Both men were silent for a moment, each assessing things before Mark spoke.
“Look, Mr. Wilson, we haven’t heard from him, either. When we do, I’ll make sure he gets in contact.”
“You think something’s wrong?” Wilson said, his tone becoming softer in his concern.
“I don’t know. I really don’t know.”
Randall Prouse punched in the numbers of his cell phone the moment the 737 shut down at the gate. The first two attempts failed to find a connection, but the third try netted success.
“This you, Chris?” Prouse said, putting his left hand over his left ear to hear his partner in the conversation in his right ear.
“Yes, Randy. It’s me,” Banyon said while sitting in his study, glancing at the French doors 10 feet in front of his desk, seeing Klaus looking longingly at him through the glass.
He walked and opened one of the doors, allowing the dog into the room.
“Chris. There are some strange things going on again,” Prouse sa
id, glancing at the passengers who continued to stream past him in the aisle, heading for the exits.
“Oh? What happened?”
“Wish I knew. Remember the trip back in ‘67 over the Atlantic? That storm?”
“Very vividly, my friend,” Banyon said, his interest piqued.
“We didn’t have a storm. But, there were things going on outside the window.”
“Things? What kind of things?” Banyon said, before Prouse could get it out.
“UFOs. They were lights, and they were craft –or appeared to be craft. They moved close enough for me to get a clear look.”
“UFOs? What happened?”
“The things just came in close, and then moved away, before vanishing,” Prouse said. “And, get this. I’m the only one who saw it, apparently. Nobody else seemed to notice!”
There was silence for a moment, both men analyzing Prouse’s revelations.
“But this is even stranger. I looked at my laptop screen, and it was dead. The power was off. Yet, there were these words in red that glowed within the darkened screen. The words were ‘Beware the Sons of God, daughters of men.’”
Christopher said nothing, the words ricocheting in his mind.
“You there?” Prouse asked, thinking he might have lost the cell connection.
“Yes…Yes, Randy. I’m here.”
“What do you think it means?”
“We’ve got to talk to those kids, Randy. This all revolves around them.”
Nigel Saxton shrugged the backpack and let its canvas straps slide down his arms. He knelt beneath the overhanging ledge, then removed the mittens and unsnapped one of the many pockets of the backpack. He found the binoculars, popped the caps from each lens, then cleaned the glass with a soft cloth.
The coordinates were confirmed by the Global Positioning Satellite that maintained constant vigilance from its geosynchronous assignment more than 600 kilometers above the western United States. His GPS receiver marked the spot as located in the valley between the mountains below.
He put the binoculars to his eyes and zeroed in on the mass of green, the evergreen forest that spread from near the center of the valley, to the highest of the peaks to the west.
They had been tracking them for months, the things—whatever they were. His government, although a United States ally, wanted to know what kind of technology was being hidden from them. Nigel Saxton was a mountain climber par excellence –the best among all the agents at MI-7, the newest, and most secretive of British Intelligence Services. He, a young mountain climber training for an assault on one of the Himalayan peaks, would attract little attention in this region famous for helping prepare climbers.
Climbing to this spot to do the observation necessary to his mission was a piece of cake. He chuckled, amused at his use of American slang even in his thinking. Maybe he had been here too long already. Although only six weeks in America, it felt like an eternity, and he longed for the rainy skies and gales of bonny England.
The powerful glasses drew the scene closer while he pushed the automatic zoom button. Nothing. Just a thick forest of many varieties of evergreens that dominated the hardwoods that were bare of leaves. The GPS showed this to be the precise spot where the things had landed on numerous occasions.
He would pitch his lean-to of miracle fiber that the M-7 eccentrics promised would raise the temperature, once he was ensconced within, by at least 30 degrees. One’s body heat, deflecting off the inner-material’s special composition, would, he was promised, keep him cozy, even in sub-zero weather.
Although the overhang and the surrounding rocky perimeter inhibited some wind from invading, it was already near zero, and would, when nightfall came, go well below. He would soon know if the brand-new technology –the material stretched around collapsible fiberglass framework—was as good as the MI-7 geniuses promised.
There were enough of their high-energy foods, packaged in dense, 6-inch bars, to last a week, if necessary. The mini-water filter, another creation of the MI-7 scientists, could give him an unlimited amount of drinking water, so long as the snow held out.
The high observation perch was well-hidden. “Bring on the UFOs,” Saxton said with a grin of satisfaction, while scanning the terrain below with the binoculars.
“You got it ready?”
The man gripped the door knob to the cabin and glanced apprehensively at the shorter man, who held the long-barreled pistol at the ready.
“Yeah. Ready as I’ll ever be,” he said.
The snarling on the other side of the door made both men know they were in for a battle. The shot had to be on target. Tom Johnson would have to be quick with the netting.
“Okay, Willie. When I open, you better be quick, Johnson said,” gripping the knob tighter and twisting it slowly.
Jeddy growled a guttural anger while he heard the men outside the door. He stood bowed between the bed and the dresser, ready to launch forward when the intruders entered.
When the door inched open, the rottweiler expelled a vicious, powerful growl that caused Johnson to hesitate.
“That’s a bad dog in there, Willie. You sure you’re ready?”
“Yeah. I’m ready, but I wish they’d a let us shoot the thing for real. You be ready with that net, Tommy.”
“Don’t know why they want the thing alive and unhurt. I’m with you; I’d rather plug it for real. Guess they don’t want the place messed up with blood,” Johnson said, opening the door again, but only a crack, through which he then peered with one eye, trying to locate the dog.
“He’s there beside the bed, Willie. Think you can hit him from here?”
“Need him turned sideways. Need a shot at his flank, if we can get it,” the man with the dart pistol said, moving to look through the crack between the open door and the door-facing.
“Don’t think he’ll turn from that position. He’s just got room to face us head-on. Man! He’s a big’un!” Johnson said, readying the heavy netting, while again peering through the opening.
Jeddy backed slightly, his 115-pound, muscular body tensing for the attack, the black hair standing rigidly from just behind his massive head to near his docked tail.
“If you can get the net over him, that should stop him, Tommy,” Willie Fletcher said. “Then, I’ll plug him through the net.”
“Sounds good. I don’t think he can get outta between the bed and that dresser. I’ll just fling it over the whole area. It will get him tangled up, I think,” Johnson said. “Ready? Here we go!”
Johnson opened the door fully, Fletcher to his right as they entered. Jeddy leaped forward, snapping and growling, while Johnson flung the netting at the canine.
The dog leaped upward toward the bed’s top, his head and front paws ducking past the edge of the net, which fell to the space where the dog had been.
“Watch it” Johnson screamed, cursing. “He’s loose!”
The rottweiler leaped from the bed to near the door opening. The man with the dart gun swung to his left, trying to get a bead on the moving target. He fired at the dog, but the dart pierced the wall and stuck there. Jeddy escaped into the snow-cloud filled, winter morning.
His morning was off to an atrocious start. George Jenkins swore, while reading on the computer screen, the latest coded security message from the Pentagon.
“The president and the secretary are most disappointed that you failed to get the target. We’ve put a tremendous amount of time and funding into making his capture a success. You are to meet with us in D.C. tomorrow at 0800 hours –the Pentagon. –W. Snidely, Ops chief liaison, DOD”
“Pimply-faced punk,” he seethed. Jenkins grumbled another obscenity, then pushed back from the computer. The instructions meant he would have to leave by early evening at the latest. The Gulfstream-5 wouldn’t be available, which meant a charter. Arrangements, timing, rushing around like someone ordered to mop the floors. Treated like a janitor by Snidely and the others.
What did they want? To fire him? Not likely. H
e was the only person with the total picture of things. They knew it, too. He had seen to that little detail –deliberately keeping some things totally under lock and key, others locked securely in his brain. He had studied Hoover. J. Edgar had it figured –the way to make himself indispensable. Hoover was there until they took him out, toes-up…
His bitter ruminations were interrupted by the door swinging open after a light knock.
“Sir. He’s signed, sealed, and delivered.”
Jenkins watched April Warmath stride into the room. At least something had gone right, he thought.
“Where is he?”
“I don’t know, sir. I thought you knew where he’s being held,” April said, perplexity in her voice.
“They’ve got him…” Jenkins left the rest of his thought unspoken.
“Who has him?”
“It’s not for us to know, Miss Warmath,” he said. “Get me a flight on a charter for D.C. I’ve got to leave by no later than 1700 hours.”
New York City, 2 a.m.
The nurse moved about the room, but Casandra Lincoln didn’t appear to pay attention to her. Mary Bridges, a veteran of 15 years at St. Bartholomew Rehabilitation Center, was most always in good humor. This early morning was no different. She hummed “Amazing Grace” while straightening around the bed, beside which Cassie sat in a wheelchair, staring, as she always did, toward the door.
Mary walked to the patient, bent to look into the girl’s eyes, and smiled. “You feeling okay this morning, honey?” Her words were cheerful. She really wanted the girl to be asleep at this hour but had come to grips with the fact that Cassie always wanted to sit and stare at that door in the early morning hours. Maybe this was as good as any other therapy. Nothing else seemed to help, that was for sure.
The young woman’s brain activity seemed normal on every technological gadget they had used to test her. The nurse had heard the neurologists talking. They were baffled about what was wrong. There wasn’t a sign of stroke, of cerebral/vascular accident of any sort. No signs of any kind of poisoning. She had just suddenly, at 25, ceased to do anything but stare, when awake, with no signs she understood anything, or knew anybody.