Falling Star (14 page)

"Hello, Margaret.  How have you been?"

She pointed to the leather suitcase sitting on the seat between them.  "Commander, the suitcase contains your summer tans and other items.  Your Walther PP and holster are in there as well."

Mike did not own a firearm.  However, Margaret was able to get his favorite Walther any time the need arose, despite Mike's absence from the agency of over fifteen years.

The Walther fit easily in his hand.  Even after so many years, it felt as comfortable as a well worn glove or shoe.  Someone had kept it in mint condition and Mike wondered if Margaret did that herself.

Mike took the small .38 caliber, seven-shot auto pistol out of the suitcase and smiled.

"You know I hate guns.  Besides there's no need for them on this trip."

"Standard procedure," Margaret said, without a smile.  "You have to carry it whether you like it or not."

The holster presented a problem, since he was wearing braces and no belt.  Mike opened the suitcase, rummaged through the neatly packed garments and found a standard issue khaki web belt with brass buckle.  Threading the end of the belt through the empty belt loops of his expensive, tailored suit pants, Mike positioned the holster in the small of his back.  Strangely, Mike felt comfortable with the Walther in this familiar location.

I'd better remember to keep my jacket buttoned, thought Mike, realizing how odd the khaki web belt and brass buckle would look with his gray, pinstriped suit.

Mike wondered what his tailor would think about this discordant note to his carefully picked wardrobe.  If he had time, Mike was sure that his tailor could find a tasteful way to carry a personal sidearm.  However, since very few Wall Street bankers carried a personal sidearm (things were rough on the Street, but not that rough) there were no guidelines on how the well-dressed and well-armed banker should look.

I'll just have to wing it, he thought.

The sedan turned right on to West Street and headed north toward the Holland Tunnel, past the now-controlled access to the office tower's parking garage.  As the sedan turned right on to West Street, a similar sedan slipped in front of Mike's sedan.  At the same time, a dark gray GMC Suburban with smoked gray windows slipped behind Mike's car.  Casually looking back at his protectors in the Suburban, Mike wondered why he was required to carry the Walther when the firepower contained in both the lead and the follow vehicles could have easily outfitted several small island armies.

Unbeknownst to Mike and the others, a late model, tan-colored Toyota sedan with four white male passengers slipped into the stream of traffic behind the Suburban.  The occupants of the tan-colored sedan sat with quiet intensity.  They uttered nothing as their driver expertly followed the three-vehicle caravan north on West Street over the pot-holed roadway.

Mike's caravan, followed by its uninvited hanger-on, rolled into the Holland Tunnel, still in its perennial repair and reconstruction phase, the missing ceiling tiles looking for all the world like an elongated crossword puzzle. Minutes later the caravan emerged in New Jersey and then connected to the New Jersey Turnpike extension.

After they passed Newark Airport, Mike settled back for the drive to the Naval Facilities Command in the southern part of New Jersey.

From the briefcase lying on her lap, Margaret took out a red metallic folder with diagonal stripes of yellow and black.  The top of the folder was marked: "Level One -- Top Secret; Project Watch."

Before handing the folder to Mike, Margaret took out a gray metallic box from her briefcase.  The box, about the size of a cigar box, was activated when Margaret encoded a short alphanumeric sequence on the keypad.  She handed the box to Mike as she quietly slipped her other hand underneath the briefcase.  Mike looked into the glass eyepiece on the box; a quick burst of white light startled him, causing him to blink once.  Instantaneously, the circuitry in the gray metal box had compared at least thirty reference points in a library identification file against the image of the blood vessels lining Mike's retina.

Mike then took his right thumb and pressed it onto the glass plate next to the eyepiece.  In a similar fashion, the image of Mike's thumb was electronically compared to approximately two dozen reference points on file copies of Mike's fingerprints.

Finally, Margaret asked Mike to repeat: "Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country," into the microphone of the gray box.  Mike's voice was compared to file copies of his voiceprint registered in the machine.  The phrase randomly selected by Margaret was one of several contained in her duty instructions.

Mike would not, as a matter of security, know beforehand what he would have to repeat.  By having Mike repeat the randomly selected phrase, which itself was specifically encoded at the moment of the test to the reference points in the voiceprint analysis algorithm, Margaret could be certain within a probability of one in sixteen billion that a proper identification had been made.

In less than one moment, the digital readout, seen only by Margaret, flashed the following: "Liu, Aloysius Xavier Kang Sheng, Commander U.S.N.R., DOB 12-20-43, Level One - XR2907.33."

Without a change in facial expression, Margaret removed her hand from underneath the briefcase, leaving the Glock semi-automatic pistol on her lap -- the pistol she would have had to use if any of the measurements had gone wrong.

When the voiceprint analysis was completed and proper identification established, the security box activated the folder release sequence.

Margaret ran the top edge of the red folder through the slot on the side of the gray box, rendering the folder's explosive mechanism inoperative, and handed the folder to Mike, who put on his reading glasses and broke the metallic seal.  The message:

NAVOPSCOM

CSAC

DIVCONOOD

Top Secret - Project Watch - CSAC Category XX

10 June 1993

To: Liu, A.X.K.S., Com., U.S.N.R.

From: McHugh, R.M., RADM, U.S.N., CO - CSAC

Activity noted Watch Stations 1, 2, 4.  Time of activities CSAC Classified CSAC Category Need Only -- Oral Only.  Suspect messages being transmitted.  Encoding in progress.  No activity Watch Station 3.  Watch Officer activating RECOM procedure.

You have been activated pursuant to CSAC Directive Number 1.  TDY Newport News, Virginia.  Report immediately to Watch Station 1.  Advise CSAC CNet ETA.

1200 Hours: Friday, June 11, 1993: Naval Facilities Command, New Jersey

Situated just west of Interstate Route 95, the United States Naval Facilities Command looked like a battleship that had stranded itself in a cornfield.  The superstructure of the building was designed to resemble the command deck of a naval vessel.  Despite the rather open nature of its outward appearance, observable daily by thousands of commuters going south on I-95, the building was a highly secure facility.  McHugh designated the facility as a safe point to pick up Mike.

The gray caravan turned off I-95 and turned on to State Route 1 and proceeded north.  Finally, the cars reached the rather nondescript access road to the facility.  A prominent sign by the side of the road stated simply, "Private Road -- Do Not Enter."

The three vehicle caravan sped down the dirt road, a traveling dust cloud following each car.  Mike was glad the air-conditioning in the Lincoln Town Car enabled him to keep the car window shut and spare him from having to breathe the gritty air.

The car radio crackled.

"Sir, a strange car followed us onto the access road."

"Unit Three, check out the car and report back immediately.  Probably some dumb tourist," said the Marine Lieutenant in the lead sedan.  "NAVFAC security, we have uninvited guests."

"Roger.  Intercept and identify."

The dark metallic gray Suburban slowed to a stop, blocking the Toyota sedan that had turned onto the private road.

A Marine private got out of the Suburban and walked cautiously back to the strange sedan.  A second Marine stood at the right rear corner of the Suburban with his AR-15 assault rifle at the ready.  As the first Marine approached the driver's side of the sedan, the driver rolled down the window.

The Marine said, "Sir, can I help you?  This is a private road."

The driver of the car stared at the young Marine and without a comment took out his Colt auto pistol and held it to the face of the Marine.  "Get that truck out of my way, asshole."

He pulled the trigger, its loud report heard by the occupants of the two sedans already far down the private road.  The young Marine took the full force of the .45 caliber slug in his face.  The power of the bullet flung his body into the underbrush lining the road.  Softened by his years on Wall Street, Mike flinched visibly at the clatter of gunfire.  However, he quickly recovered his composure, hoping for the world that Margaret had not noticed.

The second Marine instinctively aimed his AR-15 assault rifle at the occupants of the sedan and opened fire, as did the Marines inside the Suburban.  The four occupants of the sedan jumped out as the fuel tank exploded, engulfing the car in flames.  They dove into the brush, returning small arms fire with an assortment of Uzi's and other automatic rifles.

The four attackers succumbed quickly to the superior firepower of the Marines in the Suburban and the attack was over before it had even begun in earnest.  The Marine guards checked the four bullet-ridden bodies in the brush alongside the narrow dirt road.  They found no identification.  The sedan would later prove to have been stolen.

As the drivers of the other two vehicles accelerated down the road, the Marine Lieutenant radioed the Navy installation that the Suburban was under attack.  Mike sat quietly in the second car, knowing that there was little that he could do at the moment.  Mike had been an agent of CSAC long enough to know that in this shadowy world anything could happen.  What was troubling was that the Sentinels were a closely guarded secret at CSAC and no one should have known why Mike was being taken to NAVFAC, or even, for that matter that he was being taken anywhere.  The entire episode was illogical.

He turned to Margaret.  "What do you make of that, Chief?"

"Don't know, Commander.  Certainly wasn't in the operational plan for this trip."  Margaret's face remained completely devoid of emotion.  This was just business as usual for this veteran of CSAC.

She held a small Uzi automatic pistol with the safety off, just in case other attackers were about.  The Uzi had been secreted in a panel in the rear door.

Mike sat back in the leather seat, chastised not by Margaret's remarks but by his asking in the first place.  How unsophisticated; how unprofessional.  Of course, Margaret was right; it wasn't his job to worry about why they were under attack no matter how unexpected or strange.  Asking such questions might be expected of a rookie.  Mike was not a rookie and he should not have asked.  His only assignment was to get to Newport News.

Being a civilian for so long had made him weak.  Notwithstanding that fact, he couldn't get the notion out of his head that the attack was irrational.  Mike had no room for irrational behavior, especially where CSAC was involved.  He sat silently and looked out the side window.

Entering the facility, the two cars stopped at the small heliport where a Navy UH-1N Huey helicopter waited.  The NAVFAC facility was on a high state of alert occasioned by the unexpected attack on Mike's caravan.

The rotors of the helicopter were already turning.  Mike and Margaret quickly exited the sedan and climbed into the back bench covered in khaki canvas.  The Marine guards took the two vehicles over to base security to investigate the attack.  Sliding on to the seats behind the pilot and co-pilot, Mike and Margaret buckled themselves into the harness restraints and put on the earphones that were hanging on the bulkhead.

The pilot, a young Navy Lieutenant, spoke over the intercom.  "Commander, we should be in Newport News within two hours."

Mike nodded.  "Can you scramble our ETA to the Shipyard and advise them that we came under attack?"

"Roger."

I wonder what that was all about, thought Mike still unable to shake the attack from his mind, as the thumping of turning rotors accelerated into a high-pitched whine.  As the helicopter lifted off and reached its cruising altitude, it was joined by three Sikorsky HH-53H helicopters that had been circling over the heliport.  The Sikorsky helicopters, fondly called the Jolly Green Giants or Giants for short, flew in formation with Mike's helicopter.  One lagged behind and above the other three aircraft.

As the green and gray of New Jersey flashed below him, Mike settled back for the ride comforted by the fact that the Giants would assure his safe arrival.  Even as he mulled over the strange attack, which had been a nuisance at best, Mike began to reflect on what he needed to do when he reached Newport News.  His thoughts raced through all the options, all the contingency planning, the endless scenarios and gaming that CSAC had gone through in anticipation of this day's arrival.

The apparent lack of activity at Watch Station Three was puzzling.  Whatever form it took, this was the only activity in over twenty years of watching.  Logic dictated that all four sites should have behaved in a similar fashion.  Mike wondered which system detected the activity first, hoping that the form of measurement, in and of itself, could shed some light on the mystery.

Over the intercom, Mike could hear the pilot and co-pilot communicating with each other and with the pilots of the Giants.  The attack on the access road to NAVFAC was enough to put the pilots on heightened alert.  However, the flight was uneventful and everyone relaxed.

After awhile, a scratchy voice blared out over the intercom, "Commander, there are some sandwiches and pop in the cooler on the deck in front of you.  Help yourself to lunch."

From the pilot's speech, Mike guessed that he was from the Midwest -- the use of "pop" for soft drinks had been a dead giveaway.