Ark (32 page)

“I’ll let you know,” said General Wilcox.

#

Jim and Gene hit their room arguing. “Come on, Gene,” Jim said, “you must have some idea what’s on his mind.”

“I’m telling you, Jim, I don’t. Let’s leave it there, okay?”

“Okay, then tell me this whole day and night has been a paranoid dream,” said Jim as he collapsed on the bed.

“I wish I could.” Gene sat at his desk and opened a small book. He took a pen and made a few notations. Jim remembered seeing him do the same fairly regularly, always at the end of the day.

“What’s that, Gene?” asked Jim. “A diary?”

“Expenses,” said Gene. “Zero for the day.”

Jim smiled. “You know, Gene, you’re tough to figure out, but you’re steady state. I appreciate that.”

Gene smiled weakly, then frowned. “I’ll tell you one thing. This isn’t the end of it, Jim, if that’s what you’re thinking. The General has the bull by the tail. Everything’s ready for another go-round. I think he’ll do it. I also think he SHOULD do it. Nope, don’t pack up just yet, Jim. He’s going to set it up again. I’d bet a grand on it.”

“Why so sure?” asked Jim, propping himself up on an elbow.

“Well, just think about it, Jim. All the time and trouble recreating the Tabernacle; a potential career coup under his belt; maybe a chance at real fame. Who knows, he might even earn some overdue respect from his son.” Gene took a couple of sips of coffee then looked back at Jim. “Besides, on the chopper I heard him tell somebody on the radio that they were go for Phase Three.”

“Phase Three?” Jim sat bolt upright. “Hasn’t he seen enough to know that we shouldn’t fool with the ark?”

“What I told you is all I know,” said Gene. “Phase Three is news to me, too. I don’t remember it in any itinerary or on any TV scroll. Now that we have a body count. I mean, this is taking on military overtones.”

“You still think he’ll go for another shot? I don’t agree,” argued Jim. “The General was talking like he needed to get the gold back. Now that he’s got it, why risk losing it again? He was totally shaken by the whole affair. He was in a cold sweat when he thought he wouldn’t get back the gold.”

“I think he’s in this for the long haul. The money is really secondary,” said Gene, shaking his head. “Otherwise he wouldn’t have told us to stick around.”

“Okay,” said Jim, “so he decides to carry this thing on forever. I understand that he needs your science expertise but he doesn’t need ME! I’m the most nonessential part of this operation I can think of. Why hold me hostage?” He walked to the corner of their room and plugged in the coffee maker, fumbling with the filters and the grounds while his mind raced.

Gene stared at Jim. “This is a pointless discussion. We’re both here under orders. Signed the papers.”

“Under duress,” grumbled Jim, shoveling coffee into the filter cup.

Gene watched Jim with amusement. “As long as you’re making coffee for a regiment, there, I’ll have some too, I guess.”

Jim stopped spooning and stared blankly at the mess he’d made. “Sheesh.”

Once he concentrated on what he was doing, Jim was able to brew two decent cups of joe. Gene took one and thanked him.

Gene sipped the fresh cup thoughtfully. “We may as well admit that we’re here for the duration,” he said. “Time to think about what you’ll tell your family.”

“Awwww, shit,” groaned Jim. “I can’t keep telling her that it’ll be just a few more days. She’ll divorce me.”

“Kas knows how these graphic projects go, and as long as the checks are rolling in...”

Jim knew Gene was right. Kas had gotten used to arriving late for parties or without Jim at all. For a graphic artist and art director deadlines came first. Kas would be tolerant and understanding as usual.

After a few sips of coffee Jim put the cup on the night stand and fell back on his bed, and while Gene tried to find some world news on the TV, he fell asleep. He awoke after only half an hour, draped across the bed and sweating in his clothes. His back hurt. He remembered being knocked down by the lightning that hit the ark.

Lightning hit the ark?

The General was glaring at them on the wall TV.

“Sorry to eavesdrop, but there isn’t really time for amenities or apologies,” he began. “I guess your earlier conversation was a fairly good assessment of the current state of Thunderbolt, my personal motivations notwithstanding.”

“I thought we had some privacy in here,” Gene replied ruefully.

General Wilcox cut him off. “There isn’t time to banter. We are all in this together. Many years ago, when the post world war mandates were being handed out, Thunderbolt was put on a shelf. All black projects are ‘need to know’, but Thunderbolt was deemed especially sensitive.”

Jim and Gene stared at the color image of the General. He seemed to be in his bedroom like they were, sitting at a desk smoking a cigar. All he seemed to be wearing was a strap T-shirt and his Rolex. “All the bullshit aside, we are in this swamp together, gentlemen, and the reason I’m talking over this machine is because I’m more comfortable handing it out like this, I guess.” He flicked a large thick ash from his stogie. “Normally I hate the phone. I like scribbled communiques. You probably prefer that E-mail crap.”

“General ...” Gene tried again to speak but the General continued to ignore him.

Jim pointed to the SEND button. “He can’t hear you.”

Gene pushed the button. “General, there’s no need ...”

“I know your opinion, Henson. At the moment this is for Jim’s benefit.”

Jim checked if Gene’s finger was still on the button before he spoke. “You’re always welcome to come here and talk, General.”

“Thanks, Jim. There’s no need for that. For the moment I just have a few questions. Hardly worth the walk. What happened when you went into the Tabernacle all by yourself? I mean that night in the grotto. Did anything happen?”

“No,” said Jim.

“Did you look at the ark?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“What difference would it make? I just thought ...”

“And when you ran into the Tabernacle yesterday? What happened there?”

“I cried.”

“You cried for twenty minutes?”

Jim looked at Gene. “It didn’t seem that long,” he said. “How come nobody came in and got me?”

“We were busy with the rabbi,” Gene offered.

The General waved his cigar in the air. “It doesn’t matter,” he said. “What I want to know is did you look behind the curtain the second time, when it was working.”

“It wasn’t working when I was there. It came on, after.”

“Did you look?”

“No,” replied Jim sounding a bit annoyed. “Why is that so important?”

The General sat back in his chair and sucked on his cigar. “That’s what I thought.”

Then the screen went blank.

“Well, screw him,” said Gene. Then he looked at the camera above the screen. “And I hope he hears me.”

“Abandon hope, all ye who enter here,” said Jim. “We’re in the Army now.”

Jim Wilson’s life had become like a Fellini movie. Early Fellini, when he portrayed life as a serendipitous epic, the bizarre blending seamlessly with the mundane. The General was becoming a Sartrian hero.

“I’m beginning to think the man is ...” Jim began to say.

Gene raised a hand. “Enough frankness for one day, please.”

#

Early the next morning Jim called Kas with the sad news of a printer error, a redesign, but more dollars. He swore he’d be home in a couple of weeks and said something derogatory about celibacy. When he hung up the sound of Kas’ lips stayed close to his ear. That he had to lie to her when she voiced so much concern over his own homesickness made him feel terrible.

Jim had never been apart from Kas for this long. He told himself that if he learned anything at Los Alamos it was how much he truly loved her and their life together. The only solace he could find was in the fact that national security directives forced him to lie to her. Not his choice.

Soon he and Gene were called to coffee over at the General’s offices. When they arrived they found all the principal Thunderbolt personnel seated, with the General holding court behind his oversized desk. Wilcox said he wanted to review the events that had occurred the previous day. One of the General’s attaches handed out papers to everyone as they arrived. Jim found it strange to read a minute-by-minute transcription of the events that had affected him so profoundly.

Perhaps to ensure that everyone knew the contents of the brief, the General chose to read it aloud. He skipped the preliminary data and read only from the summary of events. It began with a description of the sacrifice, then the actions of the Levites and the subsequent whirlwind that had formed while Rabbi Levi chanted before the sanctuary.

At that point the General added a few details like the flaring of the altar fire, the mixing of dust and smoke, and, of course, the sudden death of the rabbi. Then he got to the part where Jim had inexplicably taken off his shoes and entered the Tabernacle for approximately nineteen and a half minutes. General Wilcox stopped reading for a moment and looked at Jim. “But you thought it was only a minute or so. I guess we’ll cover that in more depth later.”

He continued reading the report dryly. Jim had the impression that the process of recounting the sequence of events was cathartic for the old war horse. Perhaps he felt that recounting the events helped demystify them.

“He’s doing the best he can,” thought Jim as he listened.

No one interrupted the reading. The General continued until he’d finished the brief.

One section caught Jim’s notice particularly. “... at approximately 1531 hours, an energy flux was detected and measured, centering on the resonator. This resulted in a cloud of plasma combined with electrostatically charged dust particles ...”

Jim’s ears perked up again when the report mentioned the explosive sheet lightning that seemed associated with or attracted to the ark, causing a plasma phenomenon apparently trapped between the twin gold parabola above the resonator. The report concluded that no coherent resonance was detected originating from within the ark itself, as suggested in preliminary D.O.D. computer simulations.

“Then what caused it to stop?” blurted out John Wilcox, to everyone’s surprise. “It just snuffed itself out like a candle?”

The General ignored his son completely. “Now that the technical stuff is out of the way, we can discuss the matter of Phase Three. The Tabernacle is still out there in the desert. I want to continue testing it. Without further testing Thunderbolt is a meaningless exercise.”

“If it’s not already,” declared Marta in a clear but quiet voice. “We have killed things, you know. For what? I do not understand it.”

“That’s one for the archbishop,” replied the General coldly, “but, if it matters, I have asked the same question. The answer is -- all material considerations aside -- we are doing this because we simply wanted to know. And everyone wanted to do it by the book. That’s reason enough. Personally I think we also owe it to the casualties, and the suffering endured by our men. I think now that we have to proceed.

“Remember we have a test model in Chicago. So we know there is something going on, and I am not going to try to fool anyone by saying that what we all saw was normal lightning. This report, I guess, is for the books. It’s what the techies wrote. Sounds good. But, speaking frankly, there’s some weird-ass shit going on and we should get to the bottom of it if we can.”

The General paused and looked at Jim, then he scanned the entire group. The archbishop from New York was wearing fatigues like everyone else. He’d even dispensed with his clerical hat, although he kept the collar and the rosary. General Wilcox nodded to the archbishop who immediately rose to address the group.

“In our faith, the Christian faith, we see the ark as the repository of the Law and the symbol of the covenant between man and God. Christians believe that Christ was the covenant renewed, replacing the ark. I needn’t elaborate on our Lord’s supreme sacrifice for us all.” The archbishop looked down at a piece of paper he’d been holding, then he folded it and looked again at the General. “Please understand that I have considered what I’m about to say very carefully, General Wilcox.” Frazetti cleared his throat then continued. “I have decided that I must not remain here. If my government needed me on the battlefield or anywhere our soldiers are called to service, I’d follow that call of duty. But here I am useless. You asked me to witness a research process without – in my opinion – any real regard for what it, the ark, represents. I cannot condone by my participation in what I am now feel is a mockery of one of the church’s primary cornerstones. If you insist that I remain, I will certainly do so, but I have duties in the real world.”

With that, Frazetti turned and left the room. His two aides smiled in embarrassment, then turned and followed the archbishop through the still open door. One of them closed it politely with a courteous bow.

Every eye that had followed the archbishop out of the room now returned to the General.

Wilcox smiled. “You have my permission to leave, Sir,” said the General, removing his cap. He stared at the door for a moment, still smiling, then took a cigar from his shirt pocket, put it in his mouth and lit it.

A few members of his audience seemed offended and he grinned. “Sorry ladies,” he mused. But in this office, like it or not, the smoking lamp is lit.” He blew a smoke ring in the direction of his audience, picked up a piece of paper from the stack and announced the events planned for the afternoon. They were, as everyone expected, a replay of the previous day.

#

The General had ordered some changes. He described them to Gene and Jim as the four helicopters containing the rest of the staff circled the Tabernacle site. But Jim had already noticed that there were poles every thirty feet or so along the perimeter. He guessed they were cameras, sensors and other monitoring equipment.

The response by the military to the previous day’s surprises had been more hardware, more technology and, judging from the greater number of tents that Jim could see, more manpower. The armored truck was already there, parked not far from the landing zone in a clearing about five hundred yards from the rear of the camp.