The Gift (36 page)

Continuing to use the Worldnet, Web asked, “Okay, Captain. What have we got?”

“We detected an opening in a narrow crevice on the southeastern slope of Judith Peak, just under sixteen miles as the crow flies.”

“Why do you think it’s the subject’s location?”

“Primarily because we never would have found it without the new tech, Sir. Hell, we could have walked right by it and not noticed it. It has by far the best camouflage I’ve ever seen. The opening is completely hidden from view and its thermal signature is an exact match for the surroundings. So, when we saw a perfect eight foot square opening on radar and sonar where none appeared otherwise, we were pretty sure that was it.”

“Great work. Who found it?”

“Sergeant Hemmings, Sir.” Captain Johnson couldn’t keep the smile off his face as he said it, though there was no one there to see it.

“Sergeant Hemmings? The big guy I dropped in the gym?”

“The very same, Sir. We were all a bit surprised. Turns out he’s an avid hunter. Has been since he was a kid. He used all of the drones he was allowed to position himself to find crevices that provided as much protection from the sides as possible. Apparently, he’s found several animals he’s wounded hiding in places like that over the years. Says he figured we’re animals, too. So, that’s where he looked.”

“Can’t fault methods that work. Did you have the men start moving toward the target?”

“Yes, Sir. The first one will reach rally point Charlie in about five minutes. The last one will join them about six minutes later. Lieutenant Evans will then report to you directly for any frag orders before proceeding into the tunnel, per your orders.”

Earlier in the day, after each of the commandos had their replicators working and CGRs completed, Web had used the Worldnet to order them to deploy around the target areas. Each of them was now positioned within a few miles of Sam’s headquarters. Web kept Captain Johnson with him at the Armory to allay Sam’s suspicions. He wasn’t positive that Sam was watching them, but he wasn’t taking any chances, either.

The pandemonium surrounding Sam’s announcement was in full swing when Adia interrupted him. “We’ve just been probed, Sam.”

Sam raised a hand to stop the discussion. In surprisingly short order, the room was quiet. “What happened, Adia?”

“The entrance to this facility was just scanned on several spectra. I calculate with near certainty that the scans were conducted with the drone technology we observed them deploying and that they were effective.”

“Damn it! We’re not ready.” Sam thought for a moment. “Has there been any scanning inside the tunnel?”

“No, Sam.”

“Start closing the tunnel at the bend and tell Jordan that we need to get out of here now.” Having become confident in Adia’s ability to perform more tasks at once than he could assign her, Sam didn’t wait for an answer. Instead, he asked, “What is Web doing now?”

“He is siting at his desk inside the Armory. He just finished a phone conversation with Jack. Would you like me to show you?”

“No, but please inform me if he leaves the armory. Where’s the rest of his team?”

“Captain Johnson is standing outside the west wall of the armory. He is alone. The rest of Web’s team is outside of our sensor network at the armory.”

“Then it’s a safe bet they are on their way here. Have any vehicles departed their area in the past few minutes?”

“No, Sam.”

“Okay, expand our local sensor network as far as possible. Take what you need to from our aerial sensors. Focus on man-sized objects moving toward our location on the ground. Assume they’ll be camouflaged at least as well as we observed when they were practicing.”

“As you wish.”

Sam closed his connection with Adia and looked around at the rest of the team. “We’ve been found.” Sam gave them a moment to absorb that before he continued.

“As I told you I would earlier, I’ve requested Jordan’s assistance. He should be here in about nine minutes. Unless I’m missing something, we should be long gone before any of Web’s gifted soldiers can get here. However, given that Web is very good at what he does, I probably am missing something. So, I’ve asked Adia to seal the tunnel. She won’t be able to make the plug thick enough in the time we have to stop the soldiers. It will only slow them down. Does anyone have any other ideas for how we might improve our odds?”

George cleared his throat. Sam gestured for him to take the floor. “I’ve been thinking about this some and I believe I have an idea that might help a bit. Since we’re not going to be using the tunnel anymore, we could reduce its coefficient of friction as much as possible. I ran the idea by Dagny. She said it was possible, of course, but she came up with a way to move across such a surface depressingly quickly. It should still give us a bit more time.”

Jim couldn’t help himself. “That’s slick.”

“Oh for the love of…” Esther muttered just loud enough for everyone at the table to hear. Despite the circumstances, nearly everyone smiled.

“Great idea. I’ll ask Adia to get started immediately. Anything else?”

“We could move the furniture in front of the door.” Jing-Wei offered.

“Another good idea. Let’s do it,” Sam said as he stood to begin doing so.

The ring of the secure phone surprised Web. There were only two people who had the number and one of them should be in the air right now with nothing new to discuss. The other was his CO, who almost never called him. Expecting bad news, Web picked up the receiver. “Colonel Web.”

As he suspected, it was the latter. General Campbell skipped the preamble. “We’ve got a situation, Eric. I’ve just received satellite telemetry indicating that one of the Maker’s ships rose from the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Washington 90 seconds ago. It's headed toward your location, ETA: 8 minutes. What's going on?”

“Wait one, Sir.”

Web connected with Captain Johnson. “Johnson, have every member of the team move to the subject’s location immediately. Forget the rally point and cammo, just get them there ASAP, and get some drones in that tunnel. I don’t want our men facing any surprises if we can help it.” Web waited for acknowledgement before he disconnected.

“Sorry about that, Sir. I just ordered the team to close on Sam’s location.”

“Will they get there in time?”

“At least one of them should, Sir, with a couple of minutes to spare.”

Sergeant Hemmings received his orders to close immediately at the same moment as every other member of the team, but he was the closest, and he vowed to be the first to arrive. Knowing he was going to get a commission, something he’d struggle to explain the significance of to his largely uneducated family, spurred him on. He’d beaten some of the best of the best and now he had the chance to be the one to capture the most important subject in the country. Just a few days ago, he’d imagined being part of a team that brought down part of Al-Qaeda’s leadership team. Now, he felt he was doing even more. Under no circumstances would he fail. Pushing his enhanced body to its absolute limits, he charged towards the tunnel entrance he’d found. He was sure would lead him to their subject.

In less than four minutes he reached the entrance to the tunnel. Having received updated intel from the drones inside the tunnel while en route, he knew there was an obstruction a few yards in. Slowing his pace to a fast walk, he found the point at which it had been sealed within seconds. Without hesitating, he began unpacking and applying Primasheet to the center of the barrier. His practiced hands covered a six-by-three foot area in less than a minute. He then attached a primer and began moving rapidly back out of the tunnel with the firing device. After clearing the entrance and taking cover, he compressed the clicker and was rewarded with a satisfying explosion. He could tell by its sound that the charge had succeeded in creating an opening to the rest of the tunnel. As he re-entered it, he directed drones ahead of him. They couldn’t move much faster than he could, but they would keep him from running headlong into another impediment.

Running forward, he leapt through the small debris field and into the tunnel proper. Without warning, he found himself falling backward. Landing painfully on his ass, he broke discipline and said a few words his mother would not be proud of. The fact that he also slid forward a few feet told him all he needed to know. Making the floor of the tunnel into a slide had not been one of the possibilities the team had prepared for, but this wasn’t his first op. The real world always included surprises. Working with his gift, he rapidly found a a response to the new challenge. By keeping the his weight on his back foot and allowing his front foot to gently touch the ground in front of him for a moment, just long enough for his nanites to rough the surface enough for traction, he could make progress. It would slow him down, but according to his drones, he was only about eighty steps away.

On his fourth awkward step, Lieutenant Evans contacted him to let him know he had reached the entrance. Rather than answer, Sergeant Hemmings told his gift to get the LT up to speed and keep him informed of what he was doing. He continued walking. His appreciation for the backup was insufficient to beat out his desire to be the first to get to the prize.

When he reached the makeshift barrier of furniture, he briefly thought about using another breaching charge just to scare the shit out of them. The thought passed quickly when he considered what would happen to him if he killed the principle. Instead, holding his CGR in his right hand, he firmly planted his feet and pushed against what looked like the top of a table with his left. He had been a large, strong man before accepting a gift. He was now a larger, much stronger man. Everything moved. Taking a step forward, he repeated the exercise and slipped around the right hand side of the newly created opening. Leading with his CGR, he stepped into the surprisingly well-lit room. Standing in the middle of it was a group of ten people. In front of them was the subject.

“Nobody move!” He shouted, more than a little surprised at how calm they all were.

“There’s no need for violence,” Sam replied.

“That includes your lips. So, shut them and keep them shut unless I ask you a question. In a few seconds, my LT is going to come in here. When he does, you are all going to file peacefully through the opening I just created in your pile of crap. If none of you get out of line, then no one will get hurt. If any of you twitch funny, I will shoot you. Do you understand?”

“We understand,” Sam replied. At the same time, he received notice from Jordan that he was thirty seconds away.

Sam connected with everyone on his team, “We need to stall for another thirty seconds. No matter what happens, we must all be in this room when Jordan arrives. So long as there’s one of us capable of resisting, we must not let them take any of us out of here.”

A moment later, Lieutenant Evans entered the room. He immediately took charge. Following his psychological operations training, he quickly identified the most vulnerable member of the group. Taking the young or weak first tended to make the rest more compliant. Pointing to Matt with his CGR he said, “We’ll start with you. Step over her and into the tunnel.”

Lisa grabbed Matt and said, “You can’t take my boy. He’s just a kid.”

“Ma’am, he’s older than some of the kids I fought in Afghanistan. You will let him go or I will shoot you and take him. Now let him go!” Evans replied.

Jim stepped between Evans and Lisa. Without a word, Evans shot him. Jim fell to the ground without a sound. Esther began to rush toward Jim. She was stopped by another shot from Evans.

“Have I made my point or do I have to shoot all of you and drag you out of here?” Evans asked.

“You’ve made your point. Just one thing, tell Web I’m doing it my way this time,” Sam replied.

“Enough of this shit. Sergeant, grab the kid,” Evans said.

Hemmings got close enough to put his meaty hands on Matt before the floor opened up and the eleven of them fell into Jordan. The floor was restored to its previous condition almost instantly.

“How the fuck and I going to explain this?” Evans asked the empty room.

C
HAPTER
F
ORTY

Web severed the connection with Lieutenant Evans, grabbed his secure satellite phone from one of the desk drawers and headed outside. There was no way Sam’s response to being found could have been coincidence. He was sure the armory was being monitored somehow. He didn’t know if getting away from it would stop Sam from hearing the conversation he was about to have, or if Sam could somehow tap into supposedly secure communications, but he wasn’t going to make it any easier on him than he had to.

He activated his camouflage and started a fast run as soon as he reached the front steps. He took a left onto the service road, followed by a right onto Airport Road. Two minutes and one mile later, he stopped at Fred Robinson Park, selected a secluded area out of sight from the road and called General Campbell. He wasn’t surprised when the general himself answered on the first ring.

“You better be calling to tell me you have him in custody.”

“No, Sir. We do not…”

Campbell cut him off. “What the fuck happened?”

“We believe the ship helped him somehow. As my men were about to take Sam and his team into custody, it hit the mountain and seemed to just disappear. There was nothing we could do about it, and we had no idea it would do what it appears to have done.”

“And what, exactly, did it do that prevented you, a company of military police and a gifted squad of some of the most highly trained soldiers in the army from capturing one former soldier and a group of unarmed civilians?”

Web had never heard his boss so pissed off. “Sir, with all due respect, Sam is not just a former soldier. He’s demonstrated at least twice now that he can control the alien ships. We aren’t just fighting him. We’re fighting them.”

“Tell me what happened.”

“Yes, Sir. Sergeant Hemmings, the soldier who found Sam’s headquarters, was the first to arrive at its location. After negotiating some obstacles, he managed to reach a small room with ten occupants. He secured them for a few moments until Lieutenant Evans arrived to back him up. Evans immediately started the process of evacuating them, but they resisted. He incapacitated two of them in the first few seconds and ordered Sergeant Hemmings to begin physically removing them. Sergeant Hemmings approached the group and started to do as ordered. Before he could do so, the floor ceased to exist. Along with all ten members of Sam’s team, he fell into the newly created void. A second later, Evans was the only one in the room. The hole was gone, along with the people.”