Leap - 02 (37 page)

76

It was his fault.

Admiral Langford stared down at Krogstad’s headstone less than twenty feet away and struggled to maintain his composure.  Giving orders that cost lives was not for the faint of heart.  Nevertheless, no one could avoid the emotional agony when that person was a friend.

He had ordered Krogstad to stop the Chinese warship at all costs with a ship that had no ability to fight.  But after the Russian torpedo attack, Krogstad was left powerless to do anything but delay the inevitable.   He lost his life, along with several of his crew.  And for what?  The corvette had escaped with its cargo, protected by the Forel.  It appeared the Russians and Chinese had been aligned the entire time.

The response from the United States would come soon enough, and Langford was quickly growing wary as to where it would end.

The Chinese now possessed one of the greatest discoveries in history, and the U.S. had nothing.  The sample from aboard the Bowditch could not be found, which was not surprising considering the sheer damage to the ship and its science lab.

Langford glanced up forlornly at Krogstad’s wife and family, still huddled in front of the marker.  Commander Lawton stood next to her mother with an arm around her shoulders.  All they would know was that Roger Krogstad was innocently attacked and that he still managed to save most of the lives aboard his ship.  They didn’t know that their husband and father was dead for a very simple reason.  And that reason was standing only a few feet behind them.

Langford finally turned to go as the rain began to drizzle.  He looked solemnly at Clay, who was standing nearby, waiting.

“It was a nice service.”

Langford nodded.  “Did you know that Roger and I entered the academy together?”

“Yes, sir.”

“He was a hell of a captain.”

“He was indeed.”

Langford squinted up at the dark clouds and sighed.  “The Russians are denying everything.  Claiming they didn’t have any knowledge of the Forel or its mission.”  He scoffed.  “Next they’ll tell us someone stole the damn thing.”  He looked back at Clay.  “And Brazil is insisting that both the Forel and the Chinese corvette were sunk off their southern coast.  So it appears the Chinese now have their ‘deniability.’”

“Sunk by whom?”

“That’s a good question.”

“What happens now, sir?”

“Who knows?”  He looked at Clay.  “Go take some time off, John.  You’ve earned it.  I’ll do my best to leave you alone this time.”

EPILOGUE

Caesare was nearly finished typing his last report when Borger opened his office door and stepped inside.  He closed it quietly behind him and stood, waiting until Caesare was done.  While he waited, Borger scanned the room very carefully with his eyes.

“The room’s clean, Will,” Caesare said without looking up.

“Are you sure?”

“Would you like to bring your device back and scan it again?”  When Borger paused to consider the question, Caesare looked at him.  “What’s up?”

Borger spoke in a hushed tone.  “There’s something I wanted to talk to you about.  About…Guyana.”

Caesare saved and closed his document then leaned forward.  He watched as Borger grabbed the only other chair in the room and dragged it forward to the other side of the desk.  “What is it?”

Borger didn’t speak right away.  Instead, he blinked twice before inhaling and spoke barely above a whisper.

“I’ve been thinking…”

“That was my first guess.”

“About the mountain.  About what we found.”  He paused again.  “We both agree it came from somewhere else, right?”

“Right.”

“And ‘somewhere else’ means pretty far away.  Maybe
really
far.”

“Okay.”

“So…I’ve been thinking about something:
efficiency
.”

“Efficiency?”

“Traveling through space takes energy, right?  And if you want to do it quickly, it takes a lot of energy.  We already know this.  It’s why even our spacecraft and probes are as small as possible.”

“Correct.”

“Traveling to Mars or Jupiter takes a while.  And relatively speaking, they’re not really that far away, right?  So traveling a very long distance, like between stars, means you have to travel pretty fast if you want to arrive anytime in the foreseeable future.  I mean, who’s going to send something if they have to wait ten thousand years to get there?”

“Are we getting somewhere here, Will?”

“Yeah, sorry.  What I’m really getting at, is that someone had to build that place inside the cliff, right?”

“Clearly.”

“So, if they were going to travel here, to bring their tubes and DNA, they had to arrive in a relatively short amount of time.  I mean, even
they
would have a finite lifespan, right?”

Caesare shook his head thoughtfully.  “Presumably.”

“Even if your body stopped aging, it doesn’t mean you would survive forever.  So, regardless, whoever brought those tubes here had to do it in a short enough timeframe that they could still finish the job.”

“Which means fast travel.”

“Exactly.  And fast travel means a lot of power required.  And that means efficiency.”

“I see.  In other words, you don’t take what you don’t need,” Caesare said.

“Yes!  You don’t take what you don’t need, so you can get here faster.  It’s no different from any other form of transportation.”

“Very true.”

“So whoever it was would have needed their cargo, food, and a host of other things.  And the further away they came from, the more fuel they would need to achieve velocity.  So my point is…that they would not only need all of this to get here, but they would need almost twice as much to get back!”

Caesare stared at him thoughtfully.  “Which means if they had to get here and back within a lifespan, they would have to go even faster.”

Borger nodded.  “And that means doubling again the amount of fuel, and if you start nearing light speed, the energy needed begins to approach
infinite
.”

Caesare leaned back in his chair and put two hands together in front of his mouth.  “So, it was a one-way trip.”

“It was a one-way trip,” Borger repeated triumphantly.  “It’s possible it was round trip, but the probabilities and physics are hugely against it.  Regardless of what kind of propulsion system they used.  That’s assuming we’re not talking about some make-believe technology like on TV.  No energy source is free from mathematics or economics.”

Borger continued.  “And since they clearly had cargo to transport, they had to use some kind of vessel or ship.  So my question is this…
where’s the
ship?
!”

Caesare was looking at him over the top of his hands now.  “Well, if they hid their cargo, they could certainly hide a ship too.”

Borger nodded agreement.

“So…I guess either they bury it or ditch it.”

“That’s basically what it boils down to.”

“So where is it?” asked Caesare.

Borger took another deep breath.  “I have absolutely no idea.”

Caesare remained in his chair, thinking about it for a long time.  Finally, he shook his head and stood up.  “That’s a damn good point, Will.”

Once he was standing, Borger noticed a large black bag sitting on the floor behind Caesare.  “Are you going somewhere?”

“I am.”  Caesare picked up the bag and winced from the pain in his side.

“But you’re not even healed yet.”

“I know, but I can’t wait.”

“Where are you going?”

Caesare grinned subtly.  “To find Miguel Blanco.”

“Does Clay know?”

“Clay’s busy.”

The Hercules C-130 transport plane was waiting for Caesare on the tarmac at Andrews Air Force Base.  Its four turboprop engines were already idling smoothly when he climbed aboard.  He smiled immediately, seeing the faces of a Ranger team lining each side of the fuselage. 

The door was closed behind him as he sat down onto the metal bench next to one of the soldiers.  He peered down the line with a look of admiration before leaning back carefully against the metal wall behind him. 

It was Caesare’s favorite way to fly.  And his flight to Brazil would give him plenty of time to think about Borger’s lingering question.

Where was the ship?

_____

Clay dropped the main sheet, letting it slide down to the boom where he began folding it accordion style.  He then quickly wrapped the straps around, securing it in place.  He paused and laid an arm over the folded sail, looking out over the horizon again with amazement.

“I’ve never seen anything like this.”

Alison grinned, wrapping the last strap around the smaller end of the boom, and gazed out with him.  “I doubt many have.”

He turned to her as Alison suddenly cleared her throat.

“Can I…ask you something?”

“Of course.”

“Okay.”  Alison tilted her head nervously.  “So, I know this might not be the ideal time and place, but…it’s been a year now.  And I know we haven’t exactly been able to spend a lot of time together over the last three or four months.” 

Clay listened as she continued.

“I mean, not as much as maybe we’d like.”  She stopped herself.  “Not that I’m assuming how much time you want to spend with me…”  She rolled her eyes.  “This isn’t coming out right.”

She looked into Clay’s blue eyes and quickly glanced away.  “It’s just that…I want to, um…spend more time together.  And I don’t know if you’re seeing anyone else.  I mean, why wouldn’t you be?  You’re amazing.  It’s just that I really like you and I don’t know-”

“Alison,” Clay said calmly, cutting her off.  She stopped with raised eyebrows.  He smiled warmly at her and walked the length of the boom until he was just on the other side from her.  “Alison, I need to be honest with you.”

Her heart sank.

“I haven’t been interested in anyone else since our first date.”

Alison’s expression melted.  “Really?”

“Really.”  He wrapped his hand over hers.  “You’re the one who’s amazing.  You’re incredibly intelligent, beautiful, and compassionate.  There are so many wonderful things about you that it’s hard to even count them all.  Not to mention, you’re awfully cute when you’re nervous.”

Her eyes softened and she pursed her lips.  He suddenly ducked under the boom and came up close to her.  From there, Clay wasted no time, squeezing Alison’s shoulders and kissing her deeply.

Come now
,
Come now.

“Just a minute!” Alison sighed, then turned and frowned at Dirk’s head, bobbing out of the water, excitedly.

In the cockpit, she took the face mask from Chris and pulled the straps carefully over her ponytail.

Chris waited a moment then asked, “Air?”

Alison gave him a thumbs-up.”

Next to them, Lee was helping with the second mask.  “How’s that, Mr. Clay?”

Clay grinned.  He’d given up trying to get Lee to call him by his first name.  He wiggled the outside of the mask to make sure it had a secure seal.  “Good.” 

He then added the waterproof earplugs and turned to look at Alison.  “Can you hear me?”

“Loud and clear.”

Together they wriggled the BCDs and tanks onto their shoulders.  They slipped their arms through and then clipped the wide straps together.

Through her mask, Alison motioned to Clay.  “You’re going to love this.”

“I’m sure I will.” 

As he followed Alison to the stern of the boat, Clay stopped and gazed out again over the ocean.  He was still amazed.  Tens of thousands of dolphins together at once and surrounding the boat for miles.  What
was
this place?

Clay watched Alison jump into the water with a scissor kick, keeping her head above the surface.  She rotated herself around and waited for him.

He hadn’t worn this exact kind of a system before, but Clay was almost as comfortable in diving gear as he was in his own skin.  He fell smoothly into the warm Caribbean water and popped up a few feet away.

Dirk and Sally both circled around from behind and popped their beaks out of the water.

We go now.  We go now.

She looked at John.  “Are you ready?”

“Yep.”

With that, the dolphins disappeared below, and Alison and Clay rolled forward, kicking their fins. 

It was a clear day which provided the most sunlight and brilliantly lit up the beautiful coral below them.  They hadn’t gone very far before Clay’s voice came over the speaker.

“Wow, Alison!”

She turned her head as they descended.  “I know, right?!”

He stared, transfixed on the scene below them.  The deep colors and vibrancy of the coral were almost unimaginable.  “I’ve never seen anything like this.”

“Me either.  This is what they pilgrimage to every year.”

Clay remained in awe as they drifted lower still.  The amount and the variety of sea life were incredible, and he’d never seen underwater vegetation so encompassing.  “I’ve never even seen this on a postcard before.”

Alison laughed.

Above them, Lee and Chris leaned over the small table together, trying to block enough sunshine to view the monitor clearly.  The area was much tighter than their Prowler, but it was still a nice boat.

While they listened to Clay and Alison’s exchange over the speakers, Lee turned to Chris.  “Are you going down again?”

“Heck, yeah!”

Lee laughed and looked around the white fiberglass cockpit of the catamaran.  “Mr. Clay has a nice sailboat, eh?”

“He sure does.  He needs a coffee machine though.”

Below the boat, Clay reached out and grabbed Alison’s hand.  He kicked hard and accelerated, pulling her along with him.  Still following Dirk and Sally, they glided over a small falloff in the coral, giving them a brief sensation of flying.

Several hundred yards behind them, the largest plants swayed rhythmically in the gentle current.  Beneath the vegetation was a small crack in the coral.  Very gradually, and almost imperceptibly, something small emerged from the crack barely a millimeter across.  It slowly floated free and rose just a few inches before the bright, glowing green bubble popped and dissolved into the swirling water.

  And if Clay and Alison had been able to view the reef from the air, the two would have noticed a strangely symmetrical shape.  As though something large were buried beneath it.