The Trojan Horse (11 page)

“They want to invade,” the Colonel said, flatly.  “You don’t destroy an army unless you fear that it will be in a position to oppose you.”

“And the only way the army
could
oppose the aliens is if the aliens came down to Earth,” Toby finished.  “And I am telling you, right now, that the odds are seventy-thirty in favour of the aliens getting what they want, or claim to want.  The United States
will
sign the treaty forming a global government and we
will
lose ninety percent of our armed forces – and all the nukes will be gone.”

The Colonel nodded, slowly.  “And you want us to do
what
about it?”

Toby gathered himself, meeting his father’s eyes.  “They have access to all of our databases,” he said.  “I have a few allies working on options, but without the President’s authority there are limits to what we can do – and they’re keeping a
very
close eye on the President.  The NSA sent a team through the White House and there are at least seven tiny bugs monitoring the President.  And if we remove them, they’ll know that we found them.  And then God knows what will happen.

“I need – the country needs – someone off the grid,” he added.  The irony was almost killing him.  He’d called his father a nut more than once, a man convinced that the government was permanently on the verge of grabbing all the guns – just before returning the vast majority of the country’s population to debt-peonage.  And he wasn’t even the craziest of the bunch.  There was a guy who believed that driving licences were illegal and unconstitutional, as if the Constitution recognised a driver’s right to get others killed through bad driving.  “We need to prepare for the worst.”

“Invasion,” the Colonel said.

“More like a slow takeover,” Toby said.  “Each step will be presented as logical and reasonable; each step will be rewarded…but each reward will make us more dependent upon them.  And one day we will wake up and discover that we’re nothing more than slaves.”

One of the strangers leaned forward.  “But slavery is uneconomical for pretty much anything apart from sexual favours,” he said.  “Why would they want us ugly bastards as slaves?”

Toby had wondered about that himself.  If the aliens had merely wanted the Earth, exterminating the human races wouldn’t pose any problems for their advanced technology.  A handful of abductions would give them the knowledge required to tailor a virus to humanity’s DNA, which could then be dropped on the planet with a suitably long gestation period.  And then the entire human race would drop dead and the aliens would land, once the bodies had decayed and the stench became tolerable.  No; the only answer that made sense was that the aliens wanted slaves – and that suggested that they were interested in securing humanity’s industrial base.  But it was primitive compared to theirs…why would they want it?

“I wish I knew,” he admitted.  He looked up at his father.  “I won’t mince words; there is a very real danger that they might have followed me here.  I may have just put your lives in terrible danger.  And yet we have no reason to think that they might know about you.  Your country needs someone capable of resisting them when they take over…”

“Or someone capable of taking the fight to them now,” the Colonel said.

”Someone expendable,” Bob Packman said.  The former CIA officer met Toby’s eyes.  “And someone completely deniable…right?”

Toby didn’t attempt to lie to them.  “Yes,” he said.  “If something goes badly wrong and the whole plan is blown, the government will swear – largely truthfully – that it knew nothing about you.  We cannot risk tapping much in the way of available resources from the government or the CIA or anyone who might be watched by the aliens…”

“I understand,” the Colonel said.  He looked, just for a moment, as if he were proud of Toby.  Toby tried hard to conceal just how much that meant to him.  “I will speak to some of my friends and start putting a second network together.  You go back to Washington and keep us informed.”

“Yes, sir,” Toby said.  “And thank you for everything.”

Chapter Eleven

Washington DC

USA, Day 20

“I’m afraid I can’t let you go any further.”

Jayne nodded at the policeman as she halted in front of the tape someone had thoughtfully stretched across the doorway.  POLICE LINE – KEEP OUT it read, as if anyone would just run past the burly policeman and into the cramped apartment.  From her vantage point, she could see a handful of stuffed bookcases, a sofa that had clearly been dragged halfway across the room – and a chalk outline on the ground where the dead body had fallen.  A handful of police photographers were wandering around, taking photos with monotonous regularity, but little else seemed to be going on.  Washington had too many murders per month and not all of them, whatever the Washington PD claimed, were solved.

There was little spectacular about the death of Albert Grossman, honours student at Caltech and current wage slave in a company that cared more for brute labour than it did for the hopes and aspirations of the young men and women who were entering the job market.  Jayne was honest enough to admit that under ordinary circumstances, she would never have given the murder a second thought – but Albert Grossman was also Arnie Pie of the Blogger Association Network.  His murder was odd enough, but a handful of bloggers had checked the details and raised a disturbing question.  What were the odds of at least eight anti-alien personages being killed within the same few days?  Six bloggers, a newspaper reporter and a fact-finder for CNN’s website had all died within days of one another – and the only thing they had in common was that they had all raised concerns about the Snakes.

She looked up at the policeman.  He wasn't someone used to the streets, really; he’d admitted that he was more of a glorified dispatcher.  Someone who owed the BAN a favour had arranged for him to escort Jayne to the murder scene; Jayne had been privately amused to watch his eyes straying from her breasts to her rear end, as if he’d never been given any training in how to interact with the media.  Not that she cared, really; if he was attracted to her, he might be more willing to answer her questions.

“He didn’t deserve to die,” she said, bluntly.  It was easy to inject a note of sorrow into her voice.  Death was never amusing, even when the person in question deserved to die.  And who was she to make such a judgement anyway?  “Do you know who did it?”

She hoped that it would be taken for a naïve question.  “I’m afraid we have little to go on,” the policeman admitted, finally.  “No one saw anything; no one knows anything; no one is prepared to admit to anything without a lawyer.  This is one of the places where everyone minds their own business and doesn’t speak to the police, which turns it into a very satisfactory place for anyone engaged in criminal activity.  There are at least ten druggies in this area, along with five prostitutes and at least one suspected robber.  But we can’t pin anything on him and if we rounded up the prostitutes, they would be replaced within the day.”

Jayne nodded.  She’d covered human interest stories back in the days when she’d been a cub reporter.  Even the honest and decent folks living in poor areas tended to view the police as their natural enemy, tools of a shadowy government that was prepared to interfere in their lives, but not to do anything to actually help them.  There were a dozen theories as to why that was the case – Jayne believed that it had something to do with low sentences and lack of discipline – yet it hardly mattered.  The bottom line was that the murderer would probably go unnoticed.

“He worked for the BAN,” she said, changing the subject slightly.  Most policemen loved the BAN; hell, a number of bloggers were policemen.  That was technically a violation of their service agreements, but they’re done excellent work exposing the stupidities of rules and regulations imposed by men who never walked the streets while wearing their uniforms.  “Would we be able to get access to his computer files?”

“I’d have to check,” the policeman said.  Jayne moved, just slightly, to show him another centimetre of cleavage, but it didn’t change his mind.  “The stiff left behind no will; we wouldn’t even have known about his death if he hadn’t left a key with his former girlfriend.  She came to pick up some of her stuff from his flat and found his dead body.  I’m afraid that she had hysterics and we had to remove her to a hospital.  I think his parents will wind up with his gear; perhaps they could let you have access…”

Jayne thanked him and walked away, heading down the stairs to the streets below.  It was a blustery cold day in Washington, with hints of rain falling from the sky to the ground.  She shivered and pulled her coat around her as the wind blew stronger, pushing against her.  As a child, she’d feared the wind; now, she looked up into the gloomy sky and wondered what was lurking high overhead.  The observatories said that the alien starships could be seen with the naked eye, but Washington was too bright a city for anyone to have any hope of picking out a single light high overhead. 

Every reporter dreamed of stumbling onto a story that would make their names famous over the entire world.  Journalists still studied the Watergate story, where a team of journalists had discovered a trail that led all the way back to President Nixon himself.  America had lost her innocence that day, Jayne considered; the day when they’d discovered that even the highest in the land could be brought low by the media.  It had been the day when the media had started to shift from reporting the truth to scrutinising everything the government said, convinced that the government had to be lying to cover up dark intentions…

There was no conspiracy, she knew.  Nine times out of ten, there was no conspiracy; the government truly was as incompetent as it had seemed.  And yet people still believed in the most insane conspiracy theories, from the American government having known about the 9/11 plot and doing nothing to the American government actually carrying out the bombing itself.  It seemed to her that the people who chose to believe such insane theories were actually looking for a kind of reassurance, a sense that even if something had gone wrong, someone was still in control.  The idea that screw-ups happened anyway terrified them.

But maybe there
was
a conspiracy after all.  A number of people who happened to hold anti-alien views were dead – and no one had been arrested or seemed likely to be arrested for the crime.  And
that
suggested that the killers were professional assassins, trying to disguise the murders behind simple ‘robberies gone wrong.’  And who benefited from that?  Only one answer came to mind.

Stepping into a shop entrance to escape the wind, she pulled her cell phone out of her pocket and called an old friend.  He was curious, but agreed to meet her without asking any more questions.  If she was right – and if cell phone networks were being monitored – saying the words out loud might just make her the next statistic in a murder investigation.

***

They met at Kent’s Bar and Grill, a deafeningly loud eatery that catered to Washington’s students and junior workers.  It was difficult to hold any kind of civil conversation over the music, but it should have the effect of making it very difficult for anyone to overhear their words.  Besides, there were enough distractions in the crowded bar to make it very difficult for someone to peer into their corner without being blindingly obvious.

Vincent Felt had shared a journalism class with her, back before they’d both graduated and he’d gone to work for the
New York Times
.  He’d always had a little crush on her, which Jayne had exploited ruthlessly from time to time.  The BAN might be growing, but it didn't have the same level of access possessed by the Grey Lady – and besides, many people thought that the internet wasn't quite real.  He was a tall man tending towards obesity, a trend encouraged by the large plate of nachos and salsa he was devouring while talking to her.

“The word’s come down from on high,” he said, as he held out a dripping nacho for her.  Jayne took one look at the cheese oozing off it and shook her head.  She’d contented herself with fries and a coke.  “The aliens are friendly and the human race should commit themselves to the Galactic Federation.”

Jayne scowled as she took a sip of coke.  Most of the deaths also had one other thing in common; almost all of the victims used modern media like the internet, rather than old-fashioned print media or even television.  She’d expected more interest from the newspapers, but it seemed as if the fix was in already.  Reporters didn't get anything like as much freedom of action as the public generally assumed.  Only a complete fool of a reporter would push a story forward knowing that his editor – or senior management – would disapprove.  The stories the public were told might bear only a slight resemblance to the truth, or might ignore the truth altogether.  It was very rare for a story to be reported with the emotional detachment that was the key to true reporting.

“I see,” she said.  “And who issued the order?”

“It came down from senior management,” Felt explained.  He swallowed another nacho and burped contently.  “The editing staff weren't too chuffed about it, I can tell you.  They normally get to decide how to slant the story themselves.”

Jayne nodded.  “Is there anyone in the political field being pushed forward?”

“Not as far as we can tell,” Felt admitted.  “We have orders to promote the causes of politicians who have verbally committed themselves to supporting the Galactics – and mankind’s efforts to get into their Federation.  Those who refuse to support the Galactics...”

He didn't need to finish the sentence.  They both knew that a carefully-placed story, just one hair short of libel, could destroy a political career.  There were plenty of politicians whose only fault had been irritating the media – and discovered that their side of the story was being presented with a magnifying glass held over his flaws.  A written story always had more influence than the internet, although that might be changing.  The newer generations were far more comfortable with the internet than their parents – and why should they allow editing staff to decide what they wanted to watch?

“Clever,” Jayne said.  She was starting to have a very bad feeling about the whole thing.  Part of her was tempted to bring Felt into her confidence, but one of the reasons he would never make it into the BAN was because he hated to question authority.  Anything she gave him would end up in front of his superiors – where, if she were lucky, it would merely be dumped in the waste paper bin.  “Thank you for your help.”

She spent just long enough with him to allay any suspicions that all she’d been interested in was knowing who might be trying to shape public opinion, and then escaped the racket.  Walking down the streets towards her apartment, she made a handful of phone calls to a number of trustworthy bloggers.  Two of them were her mortal enemies online, but she knew that they could be trusted to stand up for themselves.  The truth was out there and – these days – bloggers did more for exposing it than any other part of the media.  She was still smiling at the thought when she froze.  An alien was standing at the bottom of the street.

They
did
look like humanoid snakes, she realised, as she found her legs shaking with tension.  The alien moved on as if he hadn't seen her, accompanied by a pair of uniformed soldiers and someone wearing a nondescript suit.  He was smoking like a chimney, despite the health risks – or had the aliens promised a cure for cancer among their other miracles?  And what were they doing near her apartment?  Terrified, she spent nearly twenty minutes – after the alien had gone – telling herself that it would be safe to return home, before she headed to a nearby guesthouse and paid cash for a single night’s stay.  Cold logic told her that the aliens wouldn't have shown their hand so blatantly if they wanted to assassinate her – and they might not even have realised that she was on to them – but cold logic provided very little reassurance.  As soon as she was in the rented room, she lay down on the bed and found herself shaking helplessly.  She had never felt so
threatened
in her entire life.

It almost made her want to give up and vanish into the country, but the thought of the great reporters like Woodward and Bernstein forced her to carry on.  Somehow, she managed to take a shower and head back outside towards her destination, the Spandrel Caravan.  It had been founded as a place for bloggers to meet in person – an experience that was often disappointing – and served as neutral ground for the BAN.  Jayne admired the idea behind the eatery, not least the meeting rooms, which had been secured with the most advanced technology in the public domain.  Rumour had it that the CIA had sealed a lock on a story by outfitting the meeting rooms themselves and ensuring that
no one
could spy on the bloggers.  She’d asked twelve of her comrades to meet with her; not entirely to her surprise, only eight turned up.