Overrun: Project Hideaway (19 page)

“We have become as awful as this
war,” the captain said quietly. There was no tone in his voice.

None of the men around him now
even pretended to work. All eyes focused on the captain and the man he
addressed on the faint blueness of the holovid screen.

"Program the navigation
computer for deep space once your mission on the Hideaway is complete,"
Faulken said his dark expression returning. "You’ll only need one of the
pilots to disengage the signaturization. However, you’ll need both palms for
the identification system to process entirely."

“Jesus,” the captain said softly
again.

"This is war, Captain.
After what has happened, this should be the least of the worries….of an
informant,” Faulken said this last part softly so that only the captain himself
was able to hear. “Causing the deaths of those on our side should no longer
cause you concern.”

The captain’s back stiffened in
his seat. His stomach and spirit felt instantly sick.

“Follow your orders and get this
done."

"Understood War
Minister," the captain’s eyes dropped from the holovid and settled across
the floor.

"Good. When you return to
Earth, I'll meet you personally at the landing coordinates and give you a
debrief. Until then, this will be your last outward ship communication."

"Yes, sir."

"Good luck to you and your crew,
Captain."

And with that the holovid
blinked out.

The captain of the Hideaway
retrieval mission rubbed his head and stared out the viewport. The ship they
were after still floated out there in the dark. Its hull was only a small
visible speck in the distance of space.

* * *

Back at the source of the
holovid transmission, War Minister Peter Faulken hurried around his personal
quarters and prepared to leave.

His time as a governmental
minister within the U.S. Dome of Administration had long since passed.

"Is there any chance those
pilots might be alive and able to bring that ship in?"

"Hard to tell, sir,"
Baldwin stepped away from the President's desk and took a seat on a large couch
in the middle of the presidential meeting room. "All information on
Project Hideaway has been kept secret within the confines of Science Dome 15
for more than fifty years. Only the personnel directly involved with the
project know much about it. For obvious reasons, the lid on it was kept
extremely tight."

"And right now you're
telling me most of those that were personally involved are now dead," the
President paced around the room.

“Science Dome 15 was reported
overrun about twelve hours ago,” Baldwin answered softly from the couch.

"Taken over and most everything
within destroyed. That’s what you’re telling me."

President Ford stopped along one
of the walls to stare at one of the rare instances of art that interrupted the
maddening drab of white encompassing the mostly barren room. There was never
the chance for his wife to help him improve the decor, and he had never felt
the need to appoint an aid to handle the responsibilities.

Right now, he wished he hadn't
let this type of thing go. Actually the President wished for a lot of things.
He looked for anything to occupy at least part of his mind while he dealt with
the crisis now at hand.

"The J.G.U. have been
pouring into the facility by the hundreds since that time," Baldwin spoke
stolidly again.

The President walked further
away from where Baldwin was seated and gazed down the length of the wall.

"And the Hideaway
Project?"

"Frankly, there isn’t much
we know, sir, at this time."

The President turned around and
gave Baldwin a look of almost helplessness at what he had just heard.

"So what do we know?"

"We know that so far planet
surface sensors have not picked up any indication of the Hideaway. They haven’t
initiated or acknowledged any attempts at contact. And neither have we."

"Which means that either it
has already been destroyed or it’s just floating up there without a command
crew. Up in the dark, in space, just waiting for someone to find it.”

"That is not necessarily
true. To avoid detection by the J.G.U., we haven’t initiated a full sensor or
communications burst. The pilots could be awake and deciding not to risk the
same. They could actually be sitting up there trying to figure out what the
hell to do."

"You know that ship is our
last chance don't you?" the President said tiredly pointing at Baldwin
while he spoke. He walked over and stood next to where Baldwin was seated at
the center of the room.

"I quite agree, sir,"
Baldwin replied softly. "Every update, every single scrap of information
relating to the beam cannons has been backed up and hidden aboard that ship.
There is a large amount of prototype technology that has already been
constructed and stored…”

“I’m not even talking about
that,” President Ford interrupted morosely with a wave of his hand. “I’m not
even talking about winning the war. Redemption is what we’re racing for now.”

“Again I agree, sir,” Baldwin
answered more strongly back. “Be that as it may and regardless of how it came
about, morally or ethically, that doesn’t matter now. We are at war. It is
here. And we mustn’t lose sight of that.

“Anything of importance the
J.G.U. may have obtained in the SD15 overrun is not completely lost,” Baldwin
continued. “Most likely there are data backups or partially or fully
constructed prototypes onboard that ship. The only thing we may have lost is
exclusive rights to this information.

“The hardware could take decades
for the J.G.U. to figure out how to build and utilize should they come to
possess any of the technical information. And the technology already
constructed and sitting up there, they won’t know how to operate it or even
really know what it’s for. And least not at first.”

"We think everything is
still up there?" The President brushed past Baldwin without looking at him
and addressed his thoughts into the air.

"There’s no reason for the
J.G.U. to even begin looking up there. If they had, we would have known by now.
Their armies seem content with merely pillaging the countryside to find the
technology they need. Their thinking has not always been grand in scope. And I
think that is the case here. They haven’t given us any reason to suspect that
they have even remotely considered the possibility of us storing assets up in
space."

"Let's not dismiss this so
soon as such a serious threat. Our defense plan has been hardly effective
against their armies," the President sneered while dropping heavily into
the cushioned seat behind his desk. “They’ve easily made their way into almost
every part of this country. The Vulture detonations did little to thwart their
overall attack.”

A quiet tone of rage and
bitterness colored the President’s voice. He pulled a worn set of glasses from
his sweaty face and rubbed between his eyes.

"I don't think we should be
as confident in the security of the Hideaway as you think. They could be
heading there right now for all we know. A lot of information may also have
been compromised via traitorous informants and the brutal interrogations being
inflicted on our men. These stories are starting to come in.”

"I know that, Frank. I’ve
heard the same things. But let's say they did successfully obtain Hideaway
location information and did find it. They could bring the entire ship back to
Earth, but they still wouldn't know how to use it.

“And if all this happened or was
about to, don’t you think they would be in contact? It’s why they are here. If
they possessed it and were able to understand and operate the technology, this
war would be over. And they would be gone. It’s what they’re looking for. If
they had it, there would be no more reason for them to be tearing up the
countryside and wasting more of their men and resources. Their country is not
healthy enough to afford it.”

"And we would have
surrendered by now."

"Sir, with the losses we
have sustained in terms of manpower, facilities and ruined land territory, as
your chief advisor, yes, I would have advised a surrender a long time ago. The
Hideaway is the only reason that we should continue to hang on and put this
country through this."

Ford did not acknowledge this
comment. He stared into the air past Baldwin’s shoulder and for the moment
remained silent.

“There’s actually still more,
Mr. President.”

The President’s eyes centered
again on Baldwin.

“Vulture explosive teams are
reporting civilian survivors. Some of them are getting out. Some have witnessed
the actions of the teams.”

The President turned abruptly to
fully face him. For the first time in the meeting, his face showed absolute
attention and utmost concern.

"Outsiders?"

"Yes, sir."

"From what I understand,
there shouldn't be any outsiders. They should all be dead."

"That is correct sir. Their
elimination was a necessary element of the plan," Baldwin said dropping
his gaze. "But teams are reporting them, sir. Actually, some have been
brought out."

"Some have been brought
out? What?”

The President walked to the
front of his desk. He leaned against it and folded his arms across his chest.
He looked incredulously at his minister of state and chief advisor. "Who
brought them out?"

"The J.G.U. have been
rolling us pretty fast in certain cities. Civilians have been assisting and
even rescuing injured or trapped Vulture squad members. And some of the squads
have been bringing them out with the retreat."

Sweat beaded across the
President's brow, and his tongue felt dry. The back of his body was also
freshly damp with sweat. "Do they know by whose authority those men have
been setting up and bombing their cities and towns?"

"How can they not,
Frank?"

The President reached his arms
out to his sides and gripped the edge of his desk tightly within his fists.

"A domestic revolt at this
stage would most certainly cost us this war," he said unevenly.

"Reports of this type of
thing are few at this moment, but more are bound to appear."

“God help us,” the President
said while standing and dragging his sagging frame away from Baldwin to the
other side of the room.

He pushed a button near another
table desk making two clear cabinets appear from the wall. The President turned
the handle on one of their small doors and pulled out what was stored inside.
He didn’t say anything or even look at Baldwin as he poured the dark liquid
into a glass.

Baldwin blew out a loud breath
and shifted his hands in his lap. He pushed away the papers on the desk in
front of him.

The President remained on the
other side of the room.

"Are there factions forming
then? Underground movements? Anything that will further heed us along the
way?"

"It doesn’t even matter,
sir. If we did detect such occurrences, we don't have any manpower available to
put them down. Not anymore."

"Who said anything about
putting them down? I just might go out and find one to join."

Baldwin set his jaw and
straightened his back. He stared at the President as he now again walked
towards him from across the room.

"The blame. For all of
this. It’s going to fall on me. I’m the one the world is going to come after.
I’m the one that’s going to be held ultimately responsible for what has been
done here.”

"Yes, Mr. President. It
will fall to you. It’s not something now possible to avoid."

Baldwin’s response brought a
surprised look from the President silencing him for a moment.

"I swear, I’ve never known
much about this. What I did, was shared only after I took office. Before then,
I’d never heard of anything like Plan Zero or the Vulture program. And I was a
commander in special operations military. Three tours of active intelligence gatherings
overseas. Foreign dome espionage. Nothing during that time ever caused me to
think anything like this existed.

“After the election, I was
briefed by an outgoing advisor. Nothing formal ever came across this table,”
the President said pointing his drink at his desk. “Nothing describing the
planned scenario we’ve set in motion.”

"No, nothing ever did,”
Baldwin confirmed.

The President sat back down,
closed his eyes, and took another long sip of his drink.

"Presidents aren't what
they used to be, Frank. Be glad you haven’t known much until now. It’s been
kept at a distance from you on purpose. It was the only way this would have
been able to happen.

“Once you retired from special
operations military and decided to run for political office, you were
identified as an extremely viable candidate. Not to be the President per se,
but to be the President that would lead us into a new age.

“You were perfect. Pure, just,
strong and clean. It was decided almost immediately that you were ‘the one’,
and the plan could begin seriously moving beyond just being hushed whispers in
the dark. You were primed and all but placed into this office by the real
‘powers that be’. They are the same powers that finance and operate facilities
like Science Dome 15 and sent up the Hideaway Project.

“You were the perfect family
man. Seeker of truth. Someone innocent and ideal to run the country. A perfect
front for the underground powers that were plotting questionable and immoral
national policy and illegal antagonistic global strategies."

"And when my family was
dead?"

"There was still no reason
to bring you in. Not even after the assassination attempt. If anything, that
diverted the public eye. With national attention focused on you, everything
else was able to keep moving forward without scrutiny.

“When dealing with an enemy
suspecting the worst from us, we needed to keep the person dealing with that
enemy from knowing that the worst from us actually does exist. We needed to
keep you innocent and ignorant. You would have been a victim of your own
conscience. It would have been the first thing to betray."

Ford walked behind his desk. He
sat down again and swirled his drink around in his glass. He turned in his
chair and stared out the large window behind him.

"After that day, my image
changed. I changed. The whole world knew that. And I didn't try to deny or stop
it. Why not then? Why was it not brought to my attention then? My ‘innocence
and ignorance’ so to speak was lost. The person that I used to be died that day
with my family."

"In regards to your
presidency…,” Baldwin started to speak carefully. “The attempt on your life and
the death of your family made you appear stronger. You say the person you were
was lost. I’m sure you felt that to be true. I cannot begin to comprehend the
severity of your loss.

“However, the strength of your
Presidency was elevated beyond belief. Your grief brought you closer to the
people. They mourned with you. They prayed for you. They embraced you as a
leader and as one of their own.”

The President stared down into
his glass. His gaze was so intense, Baldwin thought that it might actually
break.

“Your presence at the execution
showed you were not afraid to use every means at your disposal to get what you
wanted done. You showed defiance to the world. You demonstrated your strength,
and you established dominance over death.

You couldn’t change what had
already been done. But you brought swift inescapable justice to those that you
felt deserved it. You became a strong leader of a nation and a man of great
power in the world. You became someone to be feared.

“No one wanted to disturb that.
It was perfect."