anybody else in the department.”
“Yeah. I’d already gotten that far, but I can just imagine my senior guys and gals chafing for trying to hide something from them. They’re smart enough that they don’t follow orders blindly.”
“Let them chafe. We’re talking terminal Cretaceous Event here, a change in ownership. If we don’t survive, it will just be the goddamn roaches and ants left. Besides you’ve got the easy job. When we start military redeployments, I’m going to have every agent of every major power, friendly and unfriendly, sniffing around to find out why. At least your people are under your orders.”
“This could be the world’s largest and last cluster fuck,” Jeffers said. “Jesus mother of God, I’ve never ordered someone killed.”
“Well Ted, come down to our range at Langley and we will show you how to kill with the best of them.”
Jeffers stopped. He was scared to death and Cray was joking about it all? Maybe that’s what he had to do to stay in his job. Maybe Jeffers should try it.
Chapter 3
Keepers of the Truth
FEMA Director Allen Haverty was busy compiling his punch list for the Mount Weather COP ramp up. His staff, already at work on details of the fictional one-year operational test, had less than twenty-four hours to get him their plans for the individual areas of responsibility. Keep them busy enough and they won’t have time to ask questions.
But in the back of his mind, he was sure there was something he was overlooking. Maybe it was just the rush making him think something was missing. But if there was something, he was hoping whatever it was would be revealed in the plans he would receive from his staff within the next day. In the meantime, he buzzed his secretary and asked her to contact the National Security Advisor’s office.
“Arlen, this is Haverty over at FEMA.”
“Good morning Allen.”
“It’s about money. Ramping up Mount Weather puts me beyond my budgetary guidelines by at least a factor of two. How will we explain that to the GAO?”
“We won’t have to because, we now have an off-budget fund we will be tapping as we go along, besides we got the GAO to buy in yesterday. They’re on the team.”
“This just keeps getting bigger by the minute. Have someone send me a list of the accounts to be charged?”
“Of course.”
Tim Greenberg, President Betts Chief of Staff was reviewing what might be the most frightening Power Point presentation he had seen in his life. It was prepared by the National Science Foundation Committee, which was comprised of some of the leading scientists in the nation. The purpose of the presentation was to advise the President and his cabinet of various impact scenarios of an incoming asteroid swarm. All hypothetical, but it was this presentation that most of their contingency planning would be based on.
Besides being frightening, Greenberg thought the report was too technical, entirely too many formulas, and not enough basic impact analysis. The scientists didn’t have to show their work, just give the President an insight into what to expect. He returned the presentation to the committee chair with a note suggesting that they downplay the technical side. Rather, provide more concrete input on potential damage to infrastructure, loss of life grids, and ongoing post event environmental issues. Greenberg went into the Oval Office and told the President he’d called for another draft.
“Tim,” the President said, “how are you feeling about all of this?”
The question touched him. With everything going on, the president was still concerned with him.
Or maybe he was making sure he was still sane.
“About like you might expect, sir,” Greenberg said. “I can’t sleep at night, I worry about my family, and I keep replaying scenes from the movies 2012, Armageddon, and Deep Impact. I just can’t believe this is happening.”
“I suppose that is the natural reaction. But imagine what happens when this finally goes public, not just here in America, but across the globe.”
Oh, that was it. The President just wanted to bounce ideas off of him.
“Tim, before we can attempt to convince the people that we can and will survive, we have to have a survival strategy in place that’s fair yet does what’s necessary. We don’t have the luxury of turning inward and thinking of how it will impact us personally, we have to think of our country and our citizens. I know you, we go way back together, you are tough as nails, and I’m going to need you now more than ever.”
“I know Mr. President; it’s just so hard to fathom this. But I’ll be here for you and as always we will get through this. Is there any hope that we can stop these things or divert them somehow?”
“I’ve got NASA and the DOD putting together several scenarios to present to me tomorrow, I think you have them on the agenda along with The JPL in Livermore. The JPL will outline potential defense scenarios for the incoming threat, so we’ll just have to wait and see.”
Louis Felson wanted a little more insight into an upcoming PBS special on the “Life of an Asteroid”. Felson had produced several award winning earth and the universe oriented specials over the years for PBS. That’s why he was contacting one of his subject matter experts at the National Science Foundation.
“Hi, Chris, it’s Louis Felson with PBS, I need to pick your brain again about an upcoming special. Guess what it’s called “The Life of an Asteroid”.
There was silence at the other end.
“Hello…Chris you there?”
“Louis is this some kind of joke?”
“What joke already?”
“I…listen——I can’t talk right now, no, I mean I can’t talk about this period.”
The line was silent. Felson hung up the phone. What could Chris be thinking they had worked together for years? Oh my God——
Felson sat at his bistro type table and munched on a sandwich contemplating how he could verify his suspicions. He finished eating, downed his pino grigio, and decided to call his buddy at the Washington Post, but before he could dial the number his doorbell rang. When Felson opened the door, he was confronted with two very official looking men.
“What’s going on here?” he said. Without a word they handcuffed him, put a black bag over his head, and took him away. What the hell…
It was because he knew. They were shutting him up because he knew. Felson didn’t know whether to be more scared of their silencing him or of what they were silencing him about.
They dragged him out to a car—an SUV from the height—and started driving. He could tell by the direction of the turns that they were not headed to FBI headquarters. The ride length convinced Felson he was being taken out of the DC area, maybe Baltimore, maybe Langley. He could hear other traffic now, trucks, air brakes, then an overhead door opening. He felt the attitude of the car change they were going up some kind of steep grade, and then the car stopped. Doors opened, someone grabbed him and pulled him out
