in this room, Gil.”
Gil smiled. “I realize that, Mister President. It’s a matter of respect, sir.”
Arthur Evans shook his head. “Just for that you can pour yourself a triple. Me too. One page into this, and I’m already irritated.”
Gil went to the bar and made their drinks while his President read. When he returned with the drinks he found Evans frowning at the open file in front of him.
“It gets worse and worse. Now the Green Party is pissed at us. That makes it unanimous. The Reds and the Blues have opposed cooperation from the get-go. Nothing they do surprises me, but I’ve never heard such strong language from the Greens. We can’t let their military be involved, Gil. It’s an open invitation to anarchy.”
“I realize that, sir. I see it as a security issue, and some sloppy leadership. There’s pressure for quick results, and testing has not been either safe or secure. There was another civilian sighting last week. The fringe folks are on to it, and it’ll be on the web any day. Security is a shambles, sir, and our colleagues are only pointing this out.”
“But they’re asking for a change of command, Gil, and I’m not going to authorize it. We have too many insiders as it is. NSA should be putting pressure on Davis to tighten security, not me. Officially I don’t know anything about this operation, remember?”
“Yes, sir. We have a man in place, but Davis has the authority and is pushing hard. The Pentagon is pleased with that, and has not been sympathetic to my complaints.”
“Bradley and his OSS mentality again,” said the President. “I’ll give him a personal call in the morning. This operation will be secure, or the leadership moves to Langley.”
“I appreciate that, Mister President. I think we’re better trained to run operations this deep, anyway, but we’re always ready to give advice if the military is willing to listen to us. There’s another concern, sir, if you’ll read further.”
Arthur Evans scowled at him, but read on rapidly, riffling pages. He raised an eyebrow, tapped the file with a finger. “So, when did these little ‘accidents’ begin?”
“Two months ago, maybe earlier. Little things at first: parts missing, inventory errors, some backup disks mysteriously erased. Lately it’s more serious: mislabeled fuel lines, weld breaks in a sodium loop, and then a broken cable nearly lost a lift pod for us in the main bay. It’s more than circumstance, sir. I think it’s planned, and so do our allies. the Reds in particular have denied any efforts to block technology transfer, even though they’ve vocally opposed it. The Blues say they won’t dignify such an insulting accusation with an answer.”
“Personal opinion, Gil,” said Evans.
“I think one or both groups are lying, sir, though I can’t see them working together on something like this. It could also be a few people in their ranks. I think the incidents are planned, and project Shooting Star is in danger. We can’t afford delays of any length, and if the Greens feel their interests are threatened our window of opportunity could be closed in an instant. Even your good will won’t be able to prevent it, Mister President.”
“There was a time when I could talk to them,” said Evans.
“That was when you had my job, sir, before the senate years and the presidency. These aren’t the same people you were dealing with then. You’re a stranger to them.”
“That’s why I have people like you around me, Gil. I can squeeze the Pentagon to tighten base security, but these other things take a different kind of fix. I see a lot of finger pointing in this report. This has to stop. We need to restore the Greens’ confidence and excise the bad guys if there’s active sabotage going on. Give me some ideas on how to do it.” Evans steepled his fingers in front of his face, awaiting an immediate answer from the man he had trained two decades before in a previous life.
“I want to send in a new field operative, sir. He’s very deep in our structure, one of five men who’ve worked indirectly with the Greens in East Europe. Our people know him as an outstanding data analyst, but he’s killed for us on two occasions. I want to send him into the base as a support analyst to speed up tech-transfer, but his parallel mission will be to find out who our enemies are in Shooting Star and to neutralize them.”
“You think one man can do this?”
“It’s pretty much a closed shop, sir. Any more than one new person could be suspicious. And the man I’m considering is a lone wolf at his best.”
“You don’t need my authorization, Gil. Do what you think is necessary, but get us that technology, the plane, the generator, the whole package intact. I don’t have to tell you how much we need it.”
“I understand, Mister President. My operative will be on his way by tomorrow evening. I’m seeing him in the morning.”
Evans smiled, and downed the last half of his drink in a gulp. “Anything I can do, Gil. Keep me in the loop.”
“I will, sir.”
“I miss it, you know. The challenges, action, even the fear. But I was a lot younger, then.”
“I know the feeling, sir. All I fly now is a desk, but I have good people to do the work and I try to stay out of their way. A good man once taught me that.”
Evans smiled again. “Finnish that scotch, then, and join me for a sandwich and coffee before you have to leave. It’s been a while, Gil. I want to hear all about those grandkids.”
They retired to a dining room with a long oaken table lit by candles, and a military chef served them slices of rye bread and a plate heaped with pastrami. They talked until midnight, renewing a friendship going back three decades, a common heritage going back to childhood in the desert country of the southwest. And when the helicopter lifted off, Gil looked outside, saw the silhouette of his president and friend standing behind the dimly lit window, and he contemplated the loneliness of great power.
The helicopter sped him to the base where he would don pressure suit and helmet for the Mach 4 flight back to Langley. Gil only glanced at the bright stars in a clear Arizona sky, then took the file of Eric Price out of his briefcase and began to read. It was a thick file, full of a rich history of both brilliance and violence, the history of a complex man with multiple personalities living together under an uneasy truce.
Gil needed all of those personalities to work together this time. He searched for a way to encourage it. By the time he got back to Langley, he actually thought he’d found the answer.
* * * * * * *
The ceiling of the cavern was a hundred feet above the red-rock floor, and two cranes moved along hanging tracks there, preparing to move cargo. The port wall itself was now darkened and transparent, and the lights behind it flickered like distant stars. It was already cold, and the men waiting in front of the wall hugged thick parkas to stay warm.
The cranes were dropping their great hooks toward the floor when a baffled door screeched upwards in a far wall of the cavern, and an electric switch engine pushed two flat cars inside on another set of tracks to receive cargo. As they came to a stop, the port wall suddenly turned green, then blue with flashes of red, and rolled upwards like another great door. Behind it was pitch-blackness, then sudden movement. Packing crates eight feet wide and equally high came out of the darkness, each carried on a hydraulic lifter operated by a single
