Stormhaven Rising (Atlas and the Winds Book 1) (16 page)

“Yeah, but until someone has an elevator to orbit I’m stuck on the ground,” he said

“Third floor, ladies ware. Fourth floor, LEO. Fifth floor, the moon,” Cole said.

“I wish,” Dave said, biting down on a wave of bitterness.

They’d managed to float past the end of the ship before Dave realized there was another one behind it. Looking further up the cavernous room he could see several more under construction. “Holy shit. You’re serious?”

“Yes sir, I am,” Cole grinned. “So, do you want to be an astronaut again or not?”

“You really expect me to fly one of those?” Dave shook his head trying to clear the confusion that threatened to overwhelm him.

“Sure. I’m offering you a chance to get back into space. Do you want it or not?”

“Are you kidding?” His enthusiasm almost making him giggle. This was a chance to recapture his dream, and he wasn’t about to let it slip away. He’d already done that too many times to have it happen once more. “So when do we launch?” he asked.

“How does next week sound?” Cole said.

“Like maybe you’re nuts,” Dave said, questioning his reality again.

***

Lompoc, California:

Sarah Mobley sat on her porch watching the TV, same as she did every afternoon. The dry desert breeze rustled the papers on her table. Fortunately she had them pinned down with the remote control. The table on the other side of her chair was set up with her cup of tea. Her oxygen concentrator hummed in the other room and the clear tube lay in a tangled mess on the floor in front of her.

Anna, the woman the state paid to come and take care of her, was just about to leave for the day, but that was ok. She wasn’t going to be alone, Nathaniel Sommerset was about to come on.

She looked down at her hands, twisted by arthritis, but instead of feeling sorry for herself, she felt a wave of hope. She knew they were getting better, and that it was because of the power of God. Nathaniel Sommerset was truly a chosen man of God.

She’d tried to tell the doctor how the pain was getting less, how she could move her hands better. But he’d explained that it was just the nerves in her fingers giving up, and that it was natural at her age to start losing feeling.

She’d been so angry. She knew it was because of the preacher and because she believed in God, she was going to be cured. She stormed out of his office, well, as much as a woman in a walker can storm anywhere. The squeaking of the wheels and the dragging of the brake the only indication that she was angry.

She was still mad at her doctor, but Anna had managed to calm her down. They’d even played a hand of cards this morning while she told her caregiver all about how the doctor was a fool because he didn’t believe in God. Anna was a good girl and she smiled and nodded a lot, letting Sarah blow off steam.

“I’m all done for the day,” Anna called from inside the house. She came out onto the porch carrying a bag of trash in one hand and her purse in the other.

“Shhh,” Sarah said, pointing at the TV. “He’s about to start.”

“Ok.” Anna smiled, kissing the old woman on the forehead. “Your dinner is on the top shelf in the fridge, all you have to do is pop it in the micro. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“I know, I know,” Sarah whispered, putting her finger to her lips, never taking her eyes off the television.

“Oh, there he is!” she breathed, not seeing Anna shaking her head, as she slipped out the door.

“Welcome to the healing ministries of Nathaniel Sommerset and the Faith Unlimited Network,” the rich voice of the narrator said.

“Welcome to today’s healing service brothers and sisters,” Nathaniel said, his voice smooth and flowing.

His handsome face filled the screen.
And he is handsome,
Sarah thought,
but any true man of God would be.
Handsome and rich too. Her mind stumbled along, watching him and wishing that she were forty-five years younger.

“Put your trust in the Lord and he shall give you everlasting life. He has promised us that we shall not be made to suffer. That each and every one of us shall be whole in the Lord.”

“Amen,” Sarah whispered, holding her hands up in front of the television. “Please let me be whole again,” she asked, closing her eyes in prayer.

Then came the thunder. Distant and rolling. Building until it drowned out the TV and rattled the teacup beside her. Sarah reached for the remote, and with fumbling, awkward fingers, turned it up, but the rumbling grew louder and louder until the television could not keep up. Nathaniel’s face was still talking, but she couldn’t hear his prayers.

“No,” she cried. “Not today. He promised that today I would be healed.”

The sound faded, leaving Sarah’s ears ringing, or maybe it was her hearing aids whistling. Even though Nathaniel was still talking, she’d missed the prayer. She knew it with all her heart.

Anna came rushing back onto the porch. She’d only gone a few blocks when the missile had been launched. She knew how much they upset Sarah. “Are you ok?” she asked, kneeling down beside the old woman. “I’m so sorry, Vandenberg usually sends out a notice beforehand.”

Tears were running down Sarah’s cheeks.

“What’s wrong, dear?” Anna leaned closer, putting herself into the old woman’s line of sight.

“I missed it,” she said, her voice cracking in misery.

“You missed what?” Anna said, touching the woman’s arm compassionately, and checking her pulse at the same time.

The TV was still screaming loud. Anna pulled the remote out of her fingers and turned the volume down. “What did you miss?” she said again.

“The healing prayer,” she sobbed. “I missed it.”

Anna glanced at the TV, the screen showed a phone number for the Faith Unlimited Network. “Well then, why don’t we just call that minister on the phone and see when he’s going to do it again.” She stood up and walked over to the phone to start dialing.

***

Outside Stormhaven:

Sleep had done Shapiro good, even if it had been across the seat of his SUV. At least it had been some uninterrupted shut-eye. He sat up, trying to remember where he was. The smell of wood smoke filled the cab of his truck. He shoved the door open and slid out into the cold air.

Since it was pointless to hide, the other agents had set up a small campfire while he slept. An enameled pot had hot water boiling in it. “Where’d you find wood?” he asked, looking at the small pile sitting near the fire.

“Abrams found it somewhere over there,” Agent Watkins said, pointing further down the ravine that he’d tried to use as a road. “He was doing recon and came back with an armload. Supposedly there’s more out there, but you’d never know it looking around.”

She handed him a cup of coffee. It was instant, but hot and strong, so it was a welcome defense against the chilling breeze. “So what do we know?” he asked.

“Not much,” she said, looking through the tripod-mounted scope near the front of the EM truck. “They’re damned casual though.”

“That they are.” Joining her, he picked up a set of binoculars and scanned the front of the building.

“Have you seen their flying saucer yet?” He glanced at the sky.

“I haven’t seen anything other than a low-flying Cessna a bit ago,” she said. “And I wouldn’t have seen that except that it’s so damn quiet out here that the engine noise carried a long way. I think it landed at their airstrip over the ridge.”

“Any idea what it was doing?” he asked.

“Flying in circles,” she shrugged. “Ask DeMarko, he’s the expert on making that kind of guess.”

“Geek questions for you then,” he said, forcing down another sip of coffee. “How about their network? Have you managed to get in?” He walked back over to the fire and stood staring at the small flames.

“We sent out the RPV to drop repeaters. It helped improve the signal sensitivity, but even so they’re unbelievably tight.” She pulled out her handheld datacom and scanned her notes. “They’re using some unknown form of encryption. I put the department on it, and all we’re getting is a bunch of blind ends. What they’re telling me is that they’re up against an adaptive defense strategy,”

“What does that mean?” he asked.

“It’s like we’re playing against a live opponent and not a software based system,” she said.

“So they’ve got someone closing doors as fast as we can kick them open?”

“Faster,” she said, turning away from the fire. “We’ve got twenty techs and two Gensixes on it. There’s no possible way they can re-encrypt as fast as we can adapt and penetrate.”

“If we can’t get in, then they’re obviously doing it.” He glanced back over at the top of the building and shook his head. “They’re proving to be a handful, aren’t they?”

“Yes, sir. They sure are,” Schimmel said, stepping up and pouring himself a cup of boiling water. “We just lost seven repeaters. Everything we’ve got on the other side of the compound just went dead.”

“How the hell did they do that?” Watkins asked.

“Looks like they spiked them, but I don’t know for sure. We picked up a 1.6 gigahertz signal and then all the units blew out.”

“Intentionally?” Shapiro asked.

“Most likely,” Schimmel shrugged. “It’d be damned hard to do too. Those units are EMP hardened and nearly microscopic. They’d have to be standing right on top of them and know what they were aiming at.”

“So, where’s DeMarko?” Shapiro tossed the last of his coffee onto the edge of the fire and listened to it sizzle. “I want to know if he thinks we’re ready to do this.”

“He’s sitting on a rock somewhere trying to figure out what’s next,” she said. “Paul’s scouting for a place to set up a forward post to provide cover when you go in.” It was obvious that Watkins and Abrams had a history even without her use of his first name, and it was equally apparent from her tone that it wasn’t a pleasant one.

“Hey DeMarko,” Shapiro hollered into the wind. “Time to earn your keep.”

“Right boss. On my way,” the agent yelled from somewhere. “By the way, are you seeing that thing doing the aerobatics over there? Looks like someone’s out for a joyride in one of your flying machines.”

***

Roll Out the Barrels

Space Command, Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado:

Victor Marquez sat at the large console that doubled as his desk and a conference table. Several of his officers joked that he’d converted the flight deck of a retired navy carrier for his personal use. Most of them simply referred to it as the Nimitz.

The control room that spread out below his office was dedicated to watching everything in North American airspace and Earth orbit, with banks of small screens showing aspects of the tactical environment. The huge displays on the wall represented a real-time strategic summation of the world.

From his vantage point behind the Nimitz, he could oversee everything without moving, but at this moment he was focused on the small flush-mounted LCD screens in his desktop. He had a live feed of the launches from Vandenberg and White Sands. Both facilities were into their second launch for the day.

So far, Project Hammerthrow had been nothing more than launching oxidizer and storage tanks. Though it was something, it frustrated him that there wasn’t more that could be done.

The engineers hadn’t started to debate the design of the missile system, let alone fabricate any of the components, and he’d already received two emails from Danielson campaigning to abandon the deflection plan. Marquez could tell he was going to have to ride the Doctor at every step. It wasn’t something he would tolerate for long. He’d filed the emails in his
trouble waiting
email box and pushed the arrogant scientist to the back of his mind.

The orbit of the initial fuel shipment was approaching Russian territory for the first time and he knew that if there was going to be a response, it’d happen soon. At the very least, the Russians and Chinese would be screaming about the unannounced launches.

His intercom beeped. Snapping his headset on, he flipped to wireless mode. “Marquez. Go.”

“Sir, we show two launches from Western Russia. Profile indicates that they’re MiG-LF 2600 TAV. Trajectory resolution shows they are accelerating toward Hammerthrow One.” The voice of the tech sounded tight, but controlled.

“Do we have an ETA?” Marquez sat forward tapping out the command to bring up the orbital display on his desktop.

“Yes sir. Twelve minutes, fifteen seconds,” he replied.

“What’s our intercept if we scrambled the 152nd?” the General asked, already knowing the answer would be too long to be useful.

“About forty-six to fifty minutes,” the voice in his ear responded.

“Keep an eye on it and let me know if anything changes.” He flipped off the wireless and patched into the external com system.

“Switchboard,” the operator answered.

“Marquez. Get me Secretary Reynolds,” he said, waiting for several seconds before the Secretary came online.