Runaway Heart (20 page)

     
Everyone in the room nodded.

     
"Okay. Get going. We're going to have twelve-hour debriefs in
this room at oh-seven-hundred and fourteen-hundred hours. Everybody, except
people assigned to location field ops, will be in attendance. No
exceptions." General Buzz Turpin stood and exited the room with long
strides and a face that looked like it had been hacked out of granite. Once he
was gone Vincent Valdez turned to the room.

     
"Okay, organize into subgroups. Operations on the right side
and Lo-Recon on the left."

     
Operations was headed by the two Marine and Navy captains. They
were joined by the information officer, the defense weapons specialist, and the
captain from the Special Projects office. Lo-Recon was Logistical
Reconnaissance, and that was everybody else.

In his office at the end of the
sixth-floor corridor, General Turpin slumped behind his desk and looked out
through his large picture window at the mall parking lot. A light mist was
falling. He glowered down at the slick pavement, feeling a surge of impotent
fury.

     
He had fought for DARPA, defended its projects on the Hill in
front of the Armed Services Committee, fended off a liberal congress that
questioned not only the military applications of their research, but even
DARPA's very usefulness to the country's defense. He had artfully steered huge
sums of money from Pentagon research accounts into DARPA's coffers. He found
promising research at various aviation companies and science labs, then
proceeded to funnel DARPA money into those private programs that he controlled.
He hired leading scientists and formed think tanks to conceptualize the weapons
of the future. The Stealth Bomber was the brainchild of a Northrop engineer, picked
up by one of Turpin's science advisers. The project, financed by DARPA,
eventually produced a new generation of attack aircraft.

     
Now, the Chimera Project, his most innovative accomplishment, was
in mortal jeopardy, and with it the entire agency. The concept and execution of
the project was brilliant—a chance to create test-tube soldiers, better by far
than their human counterparts, with abilities far superior to any grunt who
ever wore the uniform or fought and died for his flag. Never again would
General Turpin be forced to stand at a military funeral and engage the tearful
eyes of a dead soldier's parent, wife, or child.

     
Buzz Turpin had found the ultimate solution to ground warfare. He
was about to rewrite the book on military effectiveness. With these chimeras,
never again would even one American GI be forced to go into battle or be sent
home inside a flag-draped coffin.

     
But, because of Stockmire's silly lawsuit to protect a bunch of
damn butterflies, this legal joke, this accident in a three-piece suit was
threatening to destroy everything. The lawyer had compromised the security of
the Gen-A-Tec computer system. With this security breach, General Turpin's
crowning career achievement was in jeopardy of being exposed before he had his
public-relations plan in order.

     
Turpin was well aware of how the liberal media would portray this
scientific adventure. They would see only the science-fiction horror movie
aspects of the program:
"Genetic Monsters Created in Government
Labs."

    
 
They would
attack the program as evil or perhaps even criminal. They would come after
Turpin with a vengeance, forcing him to defend his program in a peacetime
vacuum. From the beginning he had known that the only way to introduce
disposable soldiers was in the field. If the Development Units had been ready
during Kosovo he would
have used them there. Then, after they had been victorious—after
no American soldier had been lost on the ground—Turpin would reveal them to the
world. Under that scenario he could verify their military superiority. He would
have results to parade before the press, pictures of the DUs in action. He
would be able to show their overpowering effectiveness, their courage and
strength in battle. But this—this discovery, these so-called dirty secrets
stolen from a secure computer would make all his efforts appear nefarious,
evil, and illegal.

     
Turpin sat in his office and studied the mist-wet tops of cars six
stories below. He steepled his fingers under his chin and his mind went back to
the snow-blown fields of North Korea—thousands of miles and fifty years behind
him. He was nineteen, on the ground behind enemy lines, his jet shot down by
ground fire. He wandered in desperation, cold and weak, until he finally hooked
up with a forward-area communications battalion. It was the same day the
Chinese under the command of General Chai Ung Jun attacked the DMZ, swarming
down from the north under leaden skies filled with shrieking artillery.

     
He remembered the horde of screaming North Koreans, their heads
and feet wrapped in rags for warmth, charging insanely while vicious artillery
barrages exploded around him, the concussions rupturing his eardrums. He saw
American GIs being blown to bits by incendiary grenades, some shredded above ground
by Chinese Bouncing Bettys. He could smell brave American flesh burning, the
odor choking him. Even now he could hear the GIs screaming, see their blood
spurting from open wounds, splashing in ugly patterns on the frozen snow.

     
And then his mind bolted, and with a fast-beating heart and
shortness of breath, he escaped this nightmare and was back in the safety of
his office in the Virginia shopping mall. "He hasn't been there," he
whispered, thinking of Herman Strockmire. "He hasn't heard the screaming.
He doesn't know what he's trying to destroy."

T
he Jet Propulsion Laboratory was nestled
in the foothills of Pasadena at the head of the Arroyo Canyon, near Devil's
Gate Dam. The buildings were a mixture of styles, from Old California Mission
architecture to a collection of two-story, no-frills additions that resembled
giant air-conditioning units because of their boxy shapes and huge
perpendicular louvered windows. The complex sat protected in the shade of a
hundred oak trees, under the looming San Gabriel Mountains.

     
Herman thought Dr. Gino Zimbaldi was too lean, too intense, and,
okay, too geeky. He stood in front of his tiny office in a white JPL lab coat,
complete with plastic penholder. He was a "buzzword" specialist, and
Herman had to constantly interrupt him to find out what the hell he was talking
about. Example: "Sorry I kept you waiting, but the BDB working our APOGY
program was bit-busting and came up with garden salad."

     
"Huh?" Herman said. Gino gave him a tight little grin
before translating.

     
"The brain-dead bozo who wrote the program we're running on
the satellite screwed up and wrote some bad code."

     
"Oh." Herman handed him a disk containing fifty pages of
encryption. "Roland asked if you would decode this for him, Dr.
Zimbaldi."

     
"Everybody calls me Zimmy," the nervous little man said,
then smiled. "So how
is
that ol’ placenta head?"

     
"Not very good," Herman said sadly. "He was
murdered in San Francisco while he was retrieving this. I guess I
should warn
you—it may be dangerous for you to even work on it."

     
"Murdered?" Zimmy repeated. His expression caved in. His
cheeks and eyes went hollow.

     
"It happened yesterday morning."

     
"How? How did he. . ." Now blood drained. His face
went as white as
his lab coat.

     
"He was attacked in his hotel room and was sort of. .
 
."
Shit,
Herman thought. He
didn't want to tell him this, didn't want to scare him off. But he owed it to
the doctor to at least give him the scope of the problem. "He was
mutilated," Herman continued. "More or less shredded. The police up
there don't know what could've done it. It was something with superhuman
strength."

     
"Shredded?"
The buzzwords were gone. Panic hovered.
And then, while Herman watched, Dr. Zimbaldi visibly pulled himself back
together. "Fucking unbelievable," he wheezed, color slowly returning.

     
Then Zimmy surprised him. He squared his scrawny shoulders and
said, "If Rollie died getting this, then we damn sure gotta find out what
it means. I'll get rid of the NCG who's on the workstations right now and get
going on it myself."

     
"The who?"

     
"New college grad. He's the one who snarled up the system by
writing all those spaghetti codes." He flipped open the sheaf of paper,
and began riffling through the fifty pages packed with encryptions. "It's
a lot, but if I get lucky I'll have it done by tomorrow night."

     
"Here's my new number and a private e-mail address."
Herman handed him one of his cheap Institute cards.

     
Zimmy shook Herman's hand. "You know what I always liked most
about Roland?" he said unexpectedly.

     
Herman waited.

     
"Absolutely no phase-jitter, y'know? He was never afraid to
throw it over the wall."

     
But that was Zimmy.

W
hen Jack Wirta finally met Herman
Strockmire Jr. he was disappointed. After hearing Susan talk about her father
he was expecting a cross between Clint Eastwood and Clarence Darrow. What he
got was a short, squat man who looked like he was in his fourth week of chemo.
The only encouraging thing was the pad he was living in. It was a beautiful
guest house that fronted a French Provincial mansion, with an Olympic-size pool
on one side, and the rolling blue Pacific on the other.

     
The pool house decor was modern—lots of beige leather and polished
chrome furniture. Small, round glass-topped tables were sprinkled here and
there like art-nouveau mushrooms. A billiard table with a red-felt playing
surface dominated the main room, squatting amidst the chrome and glass like a carved
oak mistake. There was also a state-of-the-art entertainment center that put
most studios' screening rooms to shame. Susan had mentioned that Whoopi
Goldberg and Steven Spielberg were Institute friends, and that this was Barbra
Streisand and Jim Brolin's house—so, if it was true, it seemed Herman
Strockmire was in a high-celebrity orbit.

     
After the introductions they went out onto the back porch—or was
it the front? Anyway, the one overlooking the ocean. They sat on Brown Jordan
deck furniture watching the afternoon sun sparkle off the windblown surf. Jack
took out the copy of the San Francisco ME's report and handed it to Susan's
father, then watched his face while he
read it. Herman didn't screw up his features or grimace
like most civilians as he went through the gruesome passages detailing the
mutilation of his friend.

     
When he got to the stomach contents and the note, Jack could see a
puzzled look cross Herman's face.

     
"You know what that could stand for?" Jack asked.

     
"Octopus," Herman said. Not a question, just a
statement. Then he shook his head.

     
"It's probably some kinda acronym. The government loves
acronyms," Jack theorized. "Operational Center to Protect the U.S. or
something."

     
Herman leaned back and sipped on his Diet Coke. "What if it
stands for exactly what it is?" he finally said. "Octopus: an
eight-legged creature with tentacles."

     
"Why put that in code, Dad, if that's all it is?"

"Because it doesn't stand for a
real octopus, but for something with the same properties: eight legs,
tentacles, uses ink to camouflage itself—like a spy apparatus of some kind.
Lemme get on my computer, maybe it's listed on one of my favorite conspiracy
sites."

     
Jesus,
Jack thought.
This guy has "favorite"
conspiracy sites.

     
"Those domains get lots of classified stuff. They have great
antennae." Herman wandered into the house.

     
"Sounds like a great idea," Jack said to Strockmire's
back as he left. Then Jack looked over and saw Susan glaring at him.

     
"Don't patronize him." There were sparks in her eyes.

     
Shit,
Jack thought.
She's reading me. I used to be better than
this.