A Glint In Time (History and Time) (22 page)

STEAK AND SILK

Monday, June 8, 2009 Noon Mountain 4B's Restaurant

Great Falls, Montana

Excerpt from the Personal diary of Montana State Senator William G. "Willy" Abrahamson.
Dated, June 8, 2009

... was that a setup? Why so clumsy?......
a warning?

illy was at his favorite table in the 4B's in Great Falls. The restaurant was over 50 years old and it had seen a lot of use, but they still served some of the best food and certainly had the best service in town. He was meeting a Japanese business woman registered as a lobbyist. His office administrator, Arlene Boyd, was with him to keep everything looking up and up. Perception meant a lot around Great Falls and gossip defied the speed of light.

Arlene had her back to the front window, but Willy was sitting with a good view of the parking lot and 10th Avenue South. A taxi pulled up to the front of the restaurant and a tall expensively dressed oriental woman emerged after paying the fare. "Arlene, she's coming. Would you please meet her at the door so we don't make a show."

Arlene turned to the window as she got to her feet. "She's a show all by herself, Boss."

"Miss Ito. "Willy said when she reached the table. The woman's entry had quieted the lunch crowd, but they buzzed all the more when they saw who she was meeting. He stood and the beautiful woman, standing six feet tall in three inch heels, towered over him as she offered a professional handshake. She was dressed in a silk blouse with a scarf at the neck, a short skirt, and a few pieces of jewelry. She looked like she has stepped off the front page of a fashion magazine. Her shoes and purse would probably take his entire legitimate annual salary as a Montana State Senator.

"Senator, so nice to meet you. Call me Kiko, please." She said. Her English sounded just like the news readers on CNN, but softer.

They spent the lunch discussing the desire of two Japanese financial groups to take a bigger share of some Montana chemical industries. Willy assured her that local and state regulators would look on the investments very favorably. Near the end of the meal, Arlene called her a cab to go back up the hill to the airport.

Kiko spoke to him directly, "Senator, Morita-San asked me to give you this." She removed an envelope from her purse and tried to hand it to Willy. He visibly flinched. Receiving a sealed envelope from a lobbyist, even in a very public place, was asking for trouble. In his mind he could immediately see the picture in the Great Falls Tribune.

"Would you open it, please?" he asked her.

She smiled, lifted the flap with her thumb, and poured the contents on the table. There were only two things inside, a glass bead and a coin. "I believe the coin is a special issue." she said. But I do not know the meaning of the piece of glass."

"Well, I'm sure it's a joke from Isho. I'll ask him about it the next time we speak."

That night, in his study at home, Willy used the tip of his pocket knife to pry open the gold foil covering the edge of the beautiful coin. Inside an opening was a tiny black chip with gold connectors gleaming on one end. He opened his desk drawer and retrieved a common looking USB "thumb drive" used for portable data transfers. This drive was a little different from normal in that it had a tiny compartment with a sliding door at one end. He opened the door and, using tweezers from his desk drawer, dropped the small chip into the drive and closed the door.

He attached the USB device to his computer, selected the correct drive letter, and saw that it contained a file. When he opened the file, it was a personal letter addressed to him, discussing the plans of a Japanese firm to acquire a mining company in Montana before the Chinese could buy it, and asking his personal opinion of the action.

Willy smiled. The content was just enough to justify the secrecy, but it wasn't enough to get him into big trouble if it was discovered. Secrets within secrets. Isho had finesse.

Willy read the letter over again. He would send word to his agent in the Cayman Islands to buy the stock. He had just

paid off his third wife and he lived pretty simply. None of the three wives even had a sniff of his offshore accounts.

Willy clicked on the thirteenth period in the letter, provided their shared password in response to the prompt appearing on the screen, and was rewarded with a pop up window showing a completely different letter.

In brief sentences, Isho wrote that the information Willy had provided two years ago had led to "important advances." He also told him that the best intelligence available confirmed that his brother was alive and was being held in captivity. Apparently the cause of this action was related to the Project to change time. In 2000, this mysterious Project was located at a military base in Homestead, Florida, but more current information had not been found. They were continuing to look for information while being careful not to raise any interest from US intelligence agencies.

Willy removed the chip from the drive, took it out to the garage, and smashed the chip to bits with a hammer on the garage floor. Although he was not a violent person, using the hammer to smash the chip into powder made him feel a tiny bit better.

TD

Monday, June 6, 2011

1300 Eastern

Homestead, Florida USA

Excerpt from the Personal Narrative
of Colonel Jose Valenzuela

Recorded July 2015
UNCLASSIFIED

". . . . .
when I reported in I didn't know what to expect and whatever I might have expected wasn't what I found!"

Major Jose Valenzuela, United States Air Force, wasn't sure who he had pissed off. He looked at himself as a fast burner. He had made major "below the zone" or ahead of others with the same date of rank and he was a brand new honor graduate of the Air Force's Command and Staff College -a year long course that was the equivalent of an MBA to an Air Force officer. He was in the top 5% ... and he realistically thought it was probably the top
2%
of his peer group. Then what in the name of all that was holy was he driving through Alabama on his way to an assignment in nowhere Florida?

He was born in the US while his parents were conveniently vacationing in Miami from their home in Cuba. They wanted him to have the benefits of US

citizenship. He had parlayed his good looks, intelligence, and drive into graduation from the Air Force Academy with honors, flight school, 200 combat missions in Iraq flying F-16s, and a master's degree in international relations. With a wiry 180 pounds on a six foot frame, dark eyes, and good hair, he had known many women along the way, in every sense of the term. But, women he was serious about already had careers that weren't compatible with his. So, he was single, casually involved with several women, but not serious about any of them.

Jose's contact at the USAF Officer Personnel Center could only tell him that this was a joint assignment with great responsibility and that he had been hand-selected. Jose didn't believe a word of it. Nobody at the Air University at Maxwell Air Force Base had even heard of the Technical Defense Agency.The only thing he could find on the Internet was some mundane blurb about protecting the Nation's technical resources. He couldn't even find out what kind of technical resources they were defending. As far as he could tell they didn't have any airplanes and they were in a place he despised, Homestead Florida.

Jose knew that it was time in his career for a tour of duty with other military services, a "joint" tour. He knew that he was too young for command of a flying squadron. He knew that he had to put time into a staff job to prove his capabilities. But Homestead?He had gone to high school in Miami and he knew that Homestead was a mix of migrant pickers and NASCAR fans. He wanted to have nothing to do with any of them.

Seven hours later, driving south of Miami, he was still angry, but he had convinced himself that he wasn't going to show it. Maybe this was his time to boondoggle for a while and spend some time commuting up Florida's Turnpike to civilization in Miami. Or, he could hop a plane and fly to Havana on extended weekends. At least he was sure of getting a good meal anytime he wanted it with any of the five cousins he had in Miami and his network of relations in Cuba. Although any time any of them heard he wasn't married at 32 they rolled their eyes and dialed friends with eligible daughters on their cell phones.

As he left Florida's Turnpike, he had to admit that this wasn't the Homestead Florida he remembered. Major shopping centers filled every corner and new housing crowded every block. The fields of palm trees, sugar cane, and ornamental plant nurseries he knew from the 1990s had vanished.

The security guard at the gate of Homestead Air Reserve base checked his ID card, gave him instructions in the form of right, left, left, and he started looking for the headquarters of the Technical Defense Agency. Near the end of the runway he saw a building painted a brilliant white that looked like a miniature nuclear power plant complete with a containment dome. It covered half a block, sat next to a power substation, and had only one standard size doorway in the front. Sure enough, the plain sign, unadorned by any crests or logos, said TECHNICAL DEFENSE AGENCY. The parking lot held about twenty cars, but he didn't see a sign of life. After he parked, he walked to the door and saw a sign "Visitors Ring Here" under a speaker and button set next to the door. He pushed the button, the door

clicked, and a voice in the speaker said, "Please come in, major."

The room he entered reminded him as much of an air lock as a reception area. It was white, windowless, bare of any furniture, and featured only two doors on the far wall in addition to the entry door that was now behind him. In a moment the door on the right opened and a beefy guy wearing a gun at his waist politely said, "Sir, will you come in here please?"

This room looked like an interview room straight out of the old Law and Order TV shows. A plain table, clean white walls, lightweight chairs, and a wall mounted TV camera defined the whole room. "Sir, I need a saliva sample please."was his greeting from the guard. The guard used a swab to take some saliva, and probably skin cells, from inside his cheek and said, "Someone will be with you shortly."

This was unlike the in-processing at any military facility he had ever experienced. But, he sat in the chair, stared at the walls, and waited. The walls were obviously very thick or very well insulated, because he couldn't hear a voice, a footstep, or a vibration. He waited in total silence.

About fifteen minutes later the door opened and his jaw dropped as a strikingly beautiful woman walked in. He sprang to his feet. In a split second, a microsecond, Jose recorded that she had great legs, a thin waist, tremendous grace, and a beautiful face. She was also married and had about ten years on him, but they were good years. Her dark hair was shiny, just touching her shoulders, and she

smelled great. Her impact in the sterile room simultaneously left him subjectively rocked and objectively amused at himself.

"Hello, Major Valenzuela, I'm Sally Arthurs. It's a pleasure to meet you."

"How do you do, Ma'am."he replied.

"I'm sorry for the delay, but we had to make sure you are who you say you are. I'd like to spend a few minutes with you to find out a little more than what's in your personnel file. I'm the Deputy Director Administration for the TDA. Since you're a fighter pilot, I'll put it this way. This is the verbal part of a pass or fail check ride. If you pass, you go inside the building and get to work. If you fail, you go back out to the parking lot and we give your name back to the military personnel center."

"That's pretty straightforward, Ma'am. "Jose replied after a moment. "I'll admit that I know nothing about what you do or what you're looking for. So, I don't really know how to respond."

"Let me ask some questions," she said.You majored in computer science at the Air Force Academy. What's your experience with database integration?"

For the next forty five minutes Jose found himself answeringtheoretical questions aboutdatabase programming, probing questions about his career plans, intrusive questions

about his social life, and interesting questions about his knowledge of history, literature, and social science.

At one point she repeated an answer back to him. "You read science fiction for relaxation?"

"Well yes," he admitted."! also like historical fiction and military fiction. I like WEB Griffin, H.Jay Riker, and lately I've been reading some stuff by Ian Douglas."He saw her eyes move to the TV camera as if telegraphing something to an audience, but he wasn't sure what. She smiled slightly. "It's possible that someday you'll meet them." She left it at that.

It was only a few moments later when the door was opened by a tall man wearing the informal open collar version of the Air Force uniform with a light blue shirt and darker blue pants. Each epaulet of the shirt had the two stars of a major general. Jose wasn't sure of the protocol, but he pushed back his chair and popped to attention.

"Stand easy, Major," the general said with a wave of his hand. I'm Ted Arthurs. Sally, what do you think?"

"I think that once we tell him what we do, he'll be a keeper."she replied firmly.

" Okay, Jose, come with us."Almost subconsciously Jose noticed that the general had pronounced his name almost like a native Cuban. He also noticed command pilot wings on the general's shirt. At least they had something in common. He followed the two of them out of the interview room, through the bare reception area, and when it buzzed open, through the other door.The final door was like a bank

vault. It was heavy with locking bars and swung silently and effortlessly on its hinges. As they entered the hallway, a soft chime sounded musically three times. The few open doors along the hallway were quickly closed by the occupants of the offices.

As he led them down the hallway, Jose sensed that they were in a building that was compartmentalized. It was like a building inside a building and they were walking around a center core. "Jose, I'm going to sit you in an office and let you work your own way through a briefing package. I've got to start out by saying that anything and everything within these walls is Top Secret code word TD. At this point we hope that there are only about a dozen people in the world who will know what you will know in a couple of hours. Our first job is to keep it that way.This is the biggest and baddest secret you'll ever know. And, there are people still sitting in dark cages in foreign countries who didn't quite understand that. If you screw up this secret in any way you'll disappear into one of those cages forever. You still ready?"