Close Up the Sky

by James L. Ferrell

  "Chuck, isn't it?" he asked Williams.

  "Yes sir."

  "Well, Chuck, I guess you've got yourself a job."

  "There's one other thing," Leahy said. "Edward's personal file made reference to other documents that weren't in the folder. Taylor tells me those documents are exploration files; trips he made into the past. I'd like to see them."

  "Taylor already mentioned it to me," Durant said. "You think there may be some clue in the files?"

  "Right now I'm just looking for a common denominator. Did he ever mention something called Babylon Station?"

  Durant stiffened, but maintained his composure. "I don't think so. What is it?"

  "I don't know, but it could be a starting place."

  Taylor came back into the room. "I have him on the phone, Matt," she said.

  Leahy went into the bedroom and held a brief conversation with Pierce. When he finished he came back into the sitting room and took a piece of blank paper from a desk. He wrote intently for a few minutes then sealed the paper in an envelope. He scribbled his initials across the flap to ensure against tampering and handed it to Williams.

  "Put that note and the rifle in Pierce's hand, Chuck."

  "You got it." He picked up the rifle from where Leahy had propped it against a wall and started to the door. "I'll be at the launch pad in fifteen minutes, Dr. Durant, if you’ll clear the chopper."

  "And watch yourself," Leahy said to him.

  Williams flashed them a toothy grin and disappeared into the night.

  Durant used the phone to arrange for the helicopter then walked over to the window. "Chuck seems like a fine young man," he said, looking out. "I hope he's careful."

  "He can take care of himself," Leahy responded with a knowing smile.

  "What do we do now?" asked Taylor.

  "What's our scheduled departure time, sir?" he asked Durant.

  "It's become critical. Except for a few periodic tweaks to the computers, we've been keeping the Chronocom shut down. The only problem is making the adjustments. While that’s going on we have to keep the machine activated. That's when we're completely vulnerable to one of the field agents using his return pager and consuming a portion of the remaining power. By now, many of them know something's wrong; they just don't know what. They're probably trying to activate their pagers almost continuously. While the power is on we have no way of stopping them from coming through. If you'll pardon the pun, that's why time is so important. Our best estimate is that we can operate the Chronocom three more times, four at the most, so we certainly don't need any accidental activation.” He pulled on the pipe a couple of times. "The computers have calculated the odds against someone activating the machine during one of our adjustment periods, and they don’t look good. At the projected rate of probability, you have to leave no later than thirty-six hours from now. After that there may not be another opportunity."

  Now he understood Durant's warning to Williams about not coming back. If the remaining power of the Chronocom was expended while they were searching for Edward, even if they were successful in finding him, they could not return to the present.

  "How do you plan to coordinate our return if the power has to stay off all the time?" he asked.

  “By gambling,” Durant responded. “We’ve worked out a time schedule that will have to be kept at both ends of the time warp. At the exact same moment, once each twenty-four hour period, we'll power up for exactly sixty seconds. We can't risk opening the window any more often than that. You'll have to activate your pagers during one of those time intervals. It will be up to you to keep your time coordinated with ours. It takes about ten seconds for the Chronocom to send or receive. That leaves a very narrow safety margin. If your timing gets out of sync by more than fifty seconds we'll miss you. For that reason, we’ll use atomic clocks already synchronized with each other. One of the clocks will be in your team leader’s equipment issue."

  Leahy considered that for a moment then said, "I assume you've also set a time limit for completing our mission."

  Durant glanced at Taylor then back to Leahy. It was apparent that he didn't like what he was about to say. "Twenty days. At the end of that time we'll surmise that you're either lost or dead. We'll then open the window for whoever can come through until the power is exhausted.” He paused for a few seconds, and said, “After that, we’ll close up the sky forever."

  His last sentence was almost a whisper. It had such an icy tone of finality that it created a nervous knot in Leahy’s stomach. His entire career had been filled with high-risk situations, but none had ever been so finely calculated as this one. The incident with the sniper had not been his first encounter with death; he had seen it before and knew it used many disguises. Now it wore a naked face and was giving him advance warning of its approach. It was riding the shoulders of time, and the end could be only twenty days away. But this time there were other factors in play. This time more lives were at stake than just his own. Over three hundred men and women were still in the field. If Durant was right, some of them were already aware that they were trapped. They had no way of knowing it, but their lives depended on the success or failure of the team he was about to lead into the world of an ancient king. With great effort he forced the enormous feeling of responsibility to the back of his mind and concentrated on immediate issues.

  "Can you make Edward's files available first thing tomorrow?" he inquired of Durant.

  "You mean today, don't you? It's already tomorrow."

  Leahy looked at his watch and was surprised to see that it was after midnight. "I had no idea it was so late. I guess time really does fly."

  Neither Taylor nor Durant responded to the attempted humor.

  "I suggest we all get some sleep," Durant said. He got up and stretched. "The next thirty-six hours are apt to be very busy. Coming, Taylor?"

  "I think I'll stay awhile longer." Her answer was directed at Durant, but her gaze was on Leahy. "If Matt doesn't mind," she added in a soft voice.

  No answer was required. It was obvious from the smile on his face that he did not mind at all.

  Durant cleared his throat and said, "Well then. I'll see you two in my office later today." He pulled the door shut behind him, leaving them alone. The night air was cold and clear, and he turned the collar of his lab coat up for warmth. He looked up at the sky as he walked. The Milky Way stretched across the heavens in a ghostly parade of thickly massed stars. He knew that on the clearest of nights the unaided eye could only resolve a few thousand of them, but it always looked like millions. It was one of nature's most beautiful visions. In the distance he heard the muffled sound of a helicopter as it lifted off. He watched it rise into the night, invisible except for its red and green navigation lights. The lights gained speed against the background of stars and disappeared into the southeast, toward Albuquerque.

  He stopped momentarily and tapped out the ashes of his pipe against the heel of his shoe. A light breeze came up and scattered the sparks in a miniature whirlwind across the concrete walkway. He watched them until they vanished into nothingness. It made him think of something Abraham Lincoln had once said when the country was dividing itself just before the Civil War: I know the storm is coming.

  "I understand what you meant, Mr. President," he said to the night. "I know the storm is coming, too."

  Chapter 9

  In another part of Apache Point, a storm that had been festering for hours was breaking. A powerful arm hurled a delicate clay image of Pharaoh Tutankhamen against a wall, shattering it to pieces. The anger behind the arm was not directed against the king, but the events that had occurred in the desert a few hours earlier. The destroyer of the priceless relic glared at the fragments scattered across the floor and trembled with rage. He snapped his head back and rolled his eyes upward until only the whites showed. The veins in his balled fists stood out like small blue ropes, leaving the knuckles pale and bloodless. Sweat trickled from his face and dripped onto his naked chest, but he did not fee
l it. He stood like a statue, his rasping breath the only outward sign that he was alive. Inside his skull a maelstrom of thought was taking place. His instincts had warned him not to trust such an important assignment to a fool like Osterman. The filthy slime had misled him into believing he was a professional, and then had failed in the simplest of tasks. He could not even kill one unarmed man. His rage intensified as he thought about the intricate maneuvering he had performed just to get the assassin into the secured area of the facility. And all for nothing!

  The radio monitor he kept in his apartment had alerted him that a helicopter bearing the remains of someone killed in the desert was approaching Apache Point, and he had rushed to the rooftop of the research building to watch it land. A feeling akin to ecstasy had flooded over him when they unloaded the body and laid it on the concrete landing pad. With the death of the man whose corpse lay before him, a major obstacle in bringing his plans to fruition had been eliminated. But his elation had turned to cold fury when he saw the detective emerge from the helicopter still alive. He knew then that Osterman had failed, and that it was his body they had brought back. The assassin's face materialized in his mind. The vision made him wish Osterman was still alive and within his reach. If he was, he would suffer a more painful death than all the demons of hell could devise. Those who served him always paid a high price for failure. It was obvious now that he would have to find another way to kill Leahy. Suddenly, the time and place to accomplish it occurred to him. It was just a matter of waiting for the right moment. The thought brought some reason back to him, and the rage began to subside. He pulled a great draught of air into his lungs and let it out slowly. Glistening sweat stood out on his upper body, and his eyes, bloodshot from strain, slowly began to clear.

  For a few seconds he looked around the room, trying to reorient himself to his surroundings. When he had regained full control, a smile spread across his face. All was not lost. Everything else was going according to plan. Osterman's failure was just a minor setback, a slight flaw in the fabric of a greater whole. In the final analysis it would make no difference. He looked at the clay shards scattered about the floor. A feeling of regret at the wanton act of destruction passed through him, but disappeared almost as quickly as it had come. Some things were ephemeral, just momentary sandbars in the relentless tide of history; but others lasted forever. A new plan of attack was beginning to form in his mind as he began picking up the shattered remains of the ancient king.

  Detective Sergeant Ryan Pierce pushed the up button on the elevator bank at Albuquerque General Hospital. The indicator above the doors showed the nearest one was on its way down from the seventh floor. It was still dark outside and the hospital lobby was almost deserted. It was too early for the day shift to begin making their rounds, so if he was going to pull off what Leahy wanted him to do, this was the best time. In another hour there would be too many eyes and ears around.

  While he waited he reached inside his coat pocket and pulled out the envelope given to him by the taciturn Marine officer an hour earlier. The pilot of the military helicopter had not even stopped his engine while the delivery was being made. The officer had simply asked for his identification, then handed him the envelope and a rifle. He was gone before he had a chance to ask any questions.

  He rubbed the envelope between his fingers and thumb a few times then took out the paper and read it for the third time. The instructions were strange, even for someone connected with Apache Point. He turned his back to the elevators and looked around to check if anyone was standing nearby. He glanced down at the note. It was handwritten and terse:

  Ryan - The man delivering this note is Captain Charles Williams. A lot of lives may depend on this. Colonel Robert Pope from Apache Point was admitted to Albuquerque General in the last few days as a stroke victim. Imperative to get blood and urine samples from him and process through crime lab toxicology. Look for poison or chemicals of some type. If anything found ask forensic if it could induce coma. No time to process this through official channels, results needed by tonight. Also important you tell no one. Will explain details later. Rifle used by sniper last night in attempt to kill me. Sniper dead and had no ID. See if lab can raise any numbers and trace if possible. Will contact you at your office by telephone later today. Phones here not secure so use caution. Can meet in person if necessary. Taylor and I are depending on you. I owe you one. Matt Leahy

  He bit his lower lip and frowned at the note. The reference to Taylor disturbed him. Besides his wife, there were only two women in his life who really mattered. One of them had been his sister; Taylor was the other. Kathy was dead, supposedly in a plane crash at sea. Now the mysterious research facility was threatening Taylor in some unexplained way. He remembered the night she had told him about Kathy's death. The pain she felt from the personal loss, and her remorse from having to fabricate a clumsy lie, had shown in her face like a beacon. She was not the type to invent such a story without overwhelming reasons. He knew that if he had pressed her for details she would have broken easily, so he had simply acted as though he accepted the story at face value. Her sincerity and tender heart were among the qualities that made him love her so much. For those reasons he had asked no questions, later conducting his own investigation into the matter.

  Anyone who had been in police work for any length of time always knew a few ranking officers in sister law enforcement agencies. Methodically, he began contacting each of them. Neither the Coast Guard nor the National Transportation Safety Board had any record of a plane crash at sea during the time Kathy had supposedly been killed. A contact inside Interpol made inquiries for him with foreign police and military agencies, all with negative results. The FBI knew about Apache Point, yet they didn't really know about it. A friend inside the Bureau tried to get some information on what kind of research was done there, but came up with nothing. All information about the facility was officially blocked to those without a top-secret clearance. Inquiries inside the Secret Service met with the same response. He tried going through the military police and hit a block wall. They suggested he drop the matter. As a last resort he rented a jeep and tried gaining access to the facility by driving through the desert. Less than a mile inside its security zone he had been stopped by a military helicopter and forced to turn back. He never got close enough to actually see the buildings. Within twenty-four hours his captain had called him in and ordered him to stay away from the place.

  For the first time in his fifteen-year police career, Ryan Pierce was completely stymied. Now, after so many weeks of frustration, the door was being opened by the most unlikely of sources: An Atlanta police detective. Leahy's note contained just enough information to be tantalizing. It was like being given a few pieces of a puzzle and trying to put them together without knowing what the finished picture was supposed to look like. But it was more than he had before, and he expected to get the rest of the pieces very soon.

  The elevator doors slid open with a musical tone. A dark haired female technician carrying a tray of test tubes stepped out and smiled tiredly as she swept passed him. He got on and punched a button. When he reached the fifth floor he exited and took the dimly lit hallway to the nurse's station. An attractive blonde in her late thirties sat inside the glass cubical thumbing through the pages of a medical chart. He had checked earlier to make sure that this particular nurse was on duty. He slipped through the door and sat down on the edge of the desk before she looked up.

  "Mornin', sweet thing," he said cheerfully.

  "Ryan!" Her face showed surprise, obviously glad to see him. "What are you doing here this time of the morning?" Her name was Carla Toole. He had known her since he had been a rookie patrolman and she had been a student nurse just starting her training in the emergency room. Over the years they had become good friends, and together they had seen more than their share of blood and death.

  "I got to thinking about you and just couldn't sleep," he joked, leaning over and kissing her on the cheek.

  "You
're the worst liar I ever saw," she said with a grin. "What are you up to?"

  "How come you're always so suspicious?"

  "You can ask me that, knowing how well I know you?"

  He laughed. "You really know how to hurt a guy, don't you, Toole?"

  "Only in self defense," she responded with a playful jab to his stomach. "Where've you been keeping yourself lately? How are Jenny and the kids?"

  "Fat and sassy as ever." He leaned back and looked both ways along the deserted hallway. "Where is everybody, or do you have the night duty all alone?" He knew the answer before she responded. The fifth floor was the hospital's intensive care unit. It never had less than three or four nurses on duty, even at night.

  "Taking vitals and checking monitors. You looking for someone in particular?"

  "Just you, babe. I need some help."

  "You can say that again," she said, still joking with him.

  "You've got a patient here by the name of Robert Pope?"

  She looked pensive for a couple of seconds, and then said, "Yeah, the army guy. You know him?"

  "Marine," he corrected her. "How is he?"

  "In a coma." She fished one of the metal-bound charts out of a file holder on the desk and flipped it open. "Been that way since he was admitted. Has he done something wrong?"

  "It may be a question of what's been done to him. What's the prognosis?"

  "He's right on the brink. His vital signs are just high enough for him to be alive. I doubt he'll last much longer."

  "Has anybody been around to see him?"

  "Like who?"

  "Friends, relatives, anybody like that?"

  "Just a couple of military doctors."

  "From where?"

  "I don't know, Ryan,” she answered shaking her head. “What are you looking for?"

  He picked up a loose paper clip from the desk and began bending it at odd angles. She waited patiently while he played with it. He seemed to be weighing whether or not he was going to tell her anything. The clip finally broke in half and he tossed the pieces into a trashcan beside her desk.