Struggle for a Small Blue Planet Page 2

Charlie was already walking out of the room, and he waved a dismissive hand over his shoulder. Ted knew he wouldn't put in for those expenses. He never did. A vast network of friends and tribal allegiances would have made him welcome throughout the nearby states, and deep into the Rockies.

  Ted looked at the cumbersome computer along the wall with a sense of mistrust. It whirred faintly for a moment, and he understood it somehow operated on rotating drums. The newly formed National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) had decided the University of Colorado would house the damned machine until something called the Mesa Laboratories could be built.

  The old man couldn't see a future in the newfangled things, mostly because they took up too much of his researchers' time coding information. Hell, on a good day he was faster calculating stochastic outcomes for atmospheric models than the machine was!

  Then he remembered what Charlie had said, "you forget, that thing be thinking on any problem we set it every damn minute of every day," and decided to suspend judgement. The one redeeming quality of machines was their sheer, dogged, persistance.

  The white-coated lab technician Pete Stewart, who looked after its needs, said there would be 'supercomputers' in ten years time, and they would be many times faster than this one and many times bigger – until at some stage in the future they suddenly got a lot smaller.

  Dr Ted was sceptical. The man was all glasses and ink-stained fingers, and full of far too much irrelevant information. He wished there was a word for people like that, but no doubt it would come. It had to, as these machines and their endless complexity, and their new breed of keepers, exploded across the planet.

  The professor knew that the data from Charlie's trip put them on the brink of proving something so outlandish they wouldn't be believed. He wondered if it would make him into one of the rogue thinkers of atmospheric research, maybe even a laughing stock.

  But he had no choice. All he really knew how to do was put his head down and keep going forward. He always had done, and always would. Just following where the research led him. He shrugged his shoulders. It looked like he was going to do the same thing this time too.

  Dr Ted put his feet up on his desk, something he never did. He wished he had a pipe, though he didn't smoke, but the situation seemed to demand it. He recapped what he knew so far.

  As he'd got to know Charlie better, the lean Cheyenne man had told him some of the stories his people had handed down through the generations. Stories relevant to the atmospheric research the two of them were doing at the time. Then Charlie had told him about a Siberian Raven cycle, a story that was adamant the current version of the world was due to end in one or two generations.

  How did the Siberian peoples know this? Because their ancestors had seen balls of fire turn into floating mountains, and disappear into lakes, and that had been predicted in their accounts of the end of the third Raven cycle.

  How did Charlie know this? Because his several greats grandfather had worked on whaling ships out of Nome, Alaska, and taken rich pickings out of the East Siberian sea during the short summers of the Artic. Once Alaska became part of the United States, the family moved south – along with many others looking for a better life – and settled in Colorado.

  At first, Ted had thought this could be a combination of anthropology and atmospheric research that might get Charlie his PhD. The problem, as they soon realised, was the academic establishment – which wasn't ready for that sort of combination of disciplines, or, if truth be told, a PhD application by a Native American. But Ted and Charlie had already found they were hooked on the project.

  The local tribes had rallied round this white man's interest in their creation myths, and reports on unusual atmospheric disturbances had come in quickly. Ted soon worked out parameters for the reports.

  'Incoming', as they jokingly called the meteors that weren't meteors, were characterised by three things. They came at night. A long flash of fire across the sky that seemed too large to be a meteor, followed by a sudden winking out as they hit land. There were also magnetic anomalies, such as compasses spinning back and forth. And they were always associated with medium to large lakes or swampy areas.

  When they had a hundred coloured pins stuck in a map of Colorado and the surrounding states, it became clear the pins were clustered almost entirely along predictable lines, and those lines ran predominantly through the Rockies. That revelation required some deep thinking, but in the end Ted developed a new hypothesis to test.

  Now the two of them were on the verge of proving that hypothesis: that atmospheric anomalies of considerable size were landing in lakes and swamps along fault lines. That they were doing so on a fairly regular basis, including landing repeatedly at the same sites.

  The problem was, no-one could say that with a straight face. Too many of the reports talked about the damn things slowing, for heaven's sake, and that couldn't be a natural phenomenon. It implied an advanced technology, something controlled by creatures intent on landing on Earth in one piece. In an age of bad movies about ships from outer space, he was going to be laughed off the planet.

  Well, to hell with them all, said the professor. He was doing this for Charlie, as much as for himself. So he would go ahead and publish the paper.

  But what was the best way to do that? He sat back in his chair and gave the problem some serious thought. Maybe they could jointly publish it, and then he could retire early?

  He would have to make the damn thing airtight – impeccable research and faultless logic – but it still wouldn't be enough for the scientific community. The results were simply too uncomfortable for his contemporaries to live with.

  "Ha!" he said aloud, thumping the desk. It was an uncommon action.

  So much for the scientific dictum of following the research wherever it led. Most of his colleagues weren't scientists in the true sense of the word. But yes, he would publish the paper and then retire. That would do. He could live with that.

  Professor Theodore Arms sat up in his chair and began to sort through the reports Charlie had brought in.

  4

  Present day

  Grey ops training

  Petersburg, Virginia

  The tall man shuffled his way along the pavement. The few people he met were informal to the point of randomly recycled clothing. He made a point of stumbling into the wall beside him, as if he had trouble with his coordination. The sun was low over his shoulder in a neighbourhood that had seen better days.

  Some of the shops were boarded over, and others were closing for the day – heavy steel shutters lowering into place. The tall man with the long limbs and smooth, almost baby-like face looked down the street and saw an industrial area coming up. Old warehouses and small trades' units by the look of it, and some used car lots. He needed a place where he could go to ground for the night, and he needed to find it while there was still light in the sky.

  The tall man looked down at his long, tattered 'op shop' overcoat in annoyance. It was too clean. He would have to work a few stains into it, make his life on the streets look longstanding. He ran a hand over his face, and felt the uneven tufts of beard. He had deliberately attacked his beard with scissors to make himself look unkempt. At least he didn't have to shave.

  At the end of the street an alleyway opened up on his left, a narrow canyon between two warehouses. He saw the cardboard boxes and fire drums of the homeless. It would do nicely.

  He dropped his head lower, and a small nervous tic started in his left cheek. He thought it was a nice touch, evidence of some unspecified trauma that had lowered him to his homeless state. Then he pushed on into the alley.

  Two of the inhabitants were poking at a drum in the shadows, trying to get a fire going. Two others were sitting with their backs against the opposite wall, soaking up the last of the sun's rays. They'd been drinking hard, but the tall man didn't judge them for that. Some of the men living like this had been warriors like himself once, and simply fallen through the cracks in the system.

>   He nodded to the two at the drum.

  "Mind if I crash here tonight?" he said quietly, sounding uncertain, sounding like he was no threat to anyone.

  The two men shrugged, as if such things were beyond their control. The visitor drifted nearer, and they made space for him round the drum. There wasn't much warmth to it, not yet anyway.

  "Some cartons over there," said one of the men, pointing to the front of the alley. The tall man saw what he meant, and nodded. Cartons were something to keep the cold from under you, and the rain off.

  Then he looked at the pile of cardboard boxes again, and decided something wasn't right. They looked too new, and they looked too recent. What local business with that amount of waste dumped it in an alleyway entrance?

  He shrugged, and turned back to the drum. After a while he did a slow circuit of his new surroundings, considering everything he saw with lowered eyes and a gently swaying head. Old habits died hard, and recon was an essential part of any new location.

  The smell of urine was strongest at the back of the alley, and he figured the disused loading bay was the communal toilet.

  "Don't really need a fire," said one of the men when he got back, "but the flames touch something inside you, a simpler existence. Somewhere that's not this sucking life."

  The man dropped part of an old pallet into the drum, and the tall man nodded. It was a thought provoking – and unexpectedly philosophical – comment.

  "The cops come around later, when the bars close," said the other man. "Give us hell if we got a fire going then, but it's okay at the moment."

  The tall man grunted. Then he made himself comfortable against the wall, and settled in to wait. He was good at waiting. It was a large part of what he did. Later he would find an isolated spot and phone each member of his team. At least, that was his intention. He didn't know it yet, but his plans were about to be seriously disrupted.

  At 9.52pm a slim figure strolled across the end of the alley, then slipped in behind the cartons under cover of dusk. A few minutes later the street lights came on. The tall man smiled to himself. That had been a smoothly executed move.

  Curiosity got the better of the two men at the drum. There were few women where the homeless congregated, women were more likely to stake out a solitary patch. There was the chance of begging for a dollar or two, and maybe a woman from a good neighbourhood was lost in this part of town. That was open to interpretation as either saviour or villain.

  The figure stepped out from behind the pile of cartons as they approached.

  "I need you gentlemen to stay down that end of the alley, and out of my hair. Am I clear on that?" she said briskly, waving a badge.

  Both men stopped in their tracks, trying to process this new information. The one furtherest away from her was the first to recover his equilibrium.

  "I were called a gentleman at a whorehouse once," he said. He looked speculative, as if the woman was some kind of whorehouse outreach to the homeless. She was casually dressed, as if she was out for an evening run.

  "Richmond PD," she said sharply. "Don't make me run you boys in!"

  They backed off, mumbling a sudden aversion to the woman, the cartons, that end of the alleyway, and anything do with the world of streetlights.

  The tall man smiled to himself. Richmond was the capital of Virginia, and many times the size of Petersburg. This woman was no 'on the beat' cop, and the reasons why she was in the alley had just got a whole lot higher. She looked his way and he dropped his head, shrinking in on himself.

  Content the men weren't going to be a problem, the woman turned and strode back to the shadows behind the cartons. Once there she settled in to wait. The question was, thought the tall man, for what?

  At 11.27pm, a black car cruised past the end of the alley, and turned a nearby corner. Something about the car didn't fit the neighbourhood. The tall man figured the car was there for a reason, and it would be parking close by.

  There was an old three-story building opposite the alley, and he saw movement on the roof of the building next door. He figured the movement was backup. The woman had a perfect view of the front of the building, and the tall man figured she was a spotter. She would have an open comms line to an assault force that couldn't be far away.

  By 11.42pm the Richmond PD operation had gone south rather badly. The backup on the roof was engaged in a fierce firefight with several shooters on the third floor, and a break and enter squad was still trying to get through the front door. More police were doubtless on the way, but the tall man figured anyone inside the building with gang connections would have phoned for assistance as well.

  Two minutes later a heavily customised car with four occupants slowed down as it went past the end of the alley. The assault squad at the front door scattered as they started taking hits. None of them went down, and the tall man figured they were wearing body armour.

  The woman behind the cartons opened up on the car with what sounded like a standard issue Glock, and the tall man swore harshly under his breath. Cartons were camouflage, they weren't bullet-proof. She was going to get herself killed.

  Seconds later he was beside her, forcing his edged fingers down one side of the Glock to free her double-handed stance. Then he hit the opposing wrist hard, jerking her remaining fingers open.

  She was still turning toward him in amazement when he triple-tapped the driver's side window of the customised car. The vehicle slewed away from the alley until it rammed a vehicle parked on the other side of the street.

  "Shooter, third floor, far window," he said, as he slapped the Glock back into her hand. A figure was hanging out of the window and lining up the police squad below. The tall man waited until he heard her first shot, and then he hit the pavement running.

  5

  Richmond PD stakeout

  Petersburg

  Virginia, USA

  The tall man man arrived at the crashed car as one of the occupants stumbled out of a rear door, but it was hardly a fair fight. He knew this game. The man emerging from the car would go left or right, trying to bring his handgun to bear once he had a stable position for his feet.

  Going right was no problem. It was an awkward back-hand shot and the tall man would be past the weapon before it was a danger. Left was more difficult, but a roundhouse with his legs, coming well before the shooter expected it, would remove the pistol as a threat.

  Early in his career he had trained religiously with left and right versions of every possible move. Nowadays he picked what was most efficient for his long body, and most useful in the situation. It was called experience.

  In the end he needn't have bothered to plan ahead. The man stumbled, disoriented by the crash. The tall man dropped him with a hard edge to the back of his neck, then kicked the pistol across the street.

  The remaining back-seat occupant turned, startled, as a weight settled on the seat beside him. Despite his surprise the lean, Hispanic man was fast. He brought a pistol round in one quick, left-handed movement. Adjusting in a split-second to the threat, the tall man blocked right, slamming the pistol against the back of the front seat. The palm of his left hand came in fast for a knockout strike, but he didn't see the knife slide discreetly from the shooter's back pocket.

  His strike snapped the man's head sideways, just as the knife sliced across his extended forearm. Then the tall man registered movement in the front seat, and realised the passenger there was turning toward him. Knowing he had run out of soft options, he twisted the gun out of the shooter's trapped hand and fired twice into the man's chest. Then he dropped back, lying as flat as he could.

  Three shots ripped through from the front seat, peppering the back of the car. When the shooter paused, considering his next move, an arm snaked between the seats and hooked around his head and under his chin. A moment later it was pulling him sideways. His neck snapped before he crashed into the inert body of the driver.

  Swearing to himself about idiots with knives, the tall man exited the car and took a pla
stic wrist tie from a back pocket. He pulled the tie to its limits on the man out cold on the pavement, and hog-tied one foot to the wrist tie with a similar tie. Then he took the man's belt.

  Since the three-story building now seemed safe – the door was hanging open and the assault squad were shouting commands from inside – he wandered back toward the alleyway entrance. He was improvising a tourniquet from the belt as he walked, wrapping it several times around his arm just below the elbow. When he got to the alleyway the woman was scanning the windows of the building for signs of activity.

  "Who the hell are you," she said aggressively. The tall man didn't blame her. Her wrist would be hurting like hell, and he had taken her weapon. He hadn't had time to explain, or ask politely.

  "A 'thank you' would be nice," he said, finishing off the tourniquet and flexing his fingers.

  "You what?" she said ominously, still scanning the building opposite.

  "That lot in the car would have figured out where you were firing from eventually, and cardboard isn't body armour."

  She grimaced. "My choice. It's what you do when members of your squad start taking heat."

  The tall man looked at her appraisingly. There were better ways. He figured she was new to the job, and her decision had been due to a lack of experience. She must have read some of his thoughts in his look.

  "I'll say 'thank you' once you make a full statement down at the station," she ground out. The tall man sighed. This one had attitude.

  "Sorry, can't do that," he said. "I'm not officially here. I broke the rules by helping you, and I shouldn't have done that. Best I'm on my way as soon as possible."

  This time she snapped the Glock across until she was covering him.

  "Wrong answer, mister," she said flatly, annoyance showing in her voice.

  The tall man's eyes flicked up to the third story windows, as if he'd seen movement. She started to turn toward the building, thinking her fellow officers might be in danger. By the time she had completed the turn, her hands were empty. She looked back, and saw the tall man pocketing her pistol.