Red Dot: Contact. Will the gravest threat come from closer to home than we expect? (17 page)

The President maintained a stony look at the Defense Secretary, but inside, his mind churned as the old uncertainty returned full force. One strong response to Fitzgerald instantly collided with an equally powerful and opposite response, in a seemingly unending succession.

After a few awkward moments, he said, “So, you will support my administration and do nothing to undermine it?”

“I assure you of that,” Fitzgerald said with an air of impatience. After a couple more moments he stood and said, “Is there anything else?”

“Not at this time.”

“Thank you, Mr. President, and good day.”

After Fitzgerald left, Douthart slumped in his chair and muttered, “What the fuck just happened?”

S
TORMS

T
he President’s failure
to deal with Fitzgerald’s challenge left him even more demoralized as tensions climbed, with the aliens getting closer. On Saturday, October 8, NASA announced that D9 had started decelerating at a pace that would put it at the right speed to start orbiting Earth on Sunday, October 16. The report wasn’t a surprise. But confirmation that D9 might go into orbit around the Earth still made contact with the powerful aliens more real.

The tense confrontation Claire’s mother and father had with their neighbors on Friday underlined rising fear over the ETs. The cacophony of warnings of death, destruction, and Armageddon on the Internet grew more frenzied, although until that point there was little increase in violence.

But even though anxiety was mounting as D9 moved to within a week of orbiting Earth, the danger brought out a tolerant, positive side in many people, helping prevent a slide into chaos. Trusted leaders publicly urged people to be calm and work together. Representatives from the Tea Party and Democratic Party, and Christian and Muslim religions, appeared in public, often together, appealing for cooperation. Starting quarterbacks of the Chicago Bears and Green Bay Packers aired a video tossing a football around and pledging to be good friends—“for now.”

Claire decided to stop by her regular red dot on the way to Denver One on Sunday. She was confident the secluded site would be peaceful early on a Sunday morning, and looked forward to some quiet time, chatting with her friend Ray and resting her eyes on their mesmerizing dot. She left her place in
Ft. Meade without waking up her parents or Sammie, who were now crowded into her apartment. In addition to extra lodgers, Claire and her family had stocked up on canned goods and other non-perishable food and drink products, along with batteries and candles. Like many others, she feared there was a good chance that either the ETs or humans—maybe both—would cause a crisis if the D9 orbit started. She was also surprised and dismayed when some of her colleagues at Denver One either hinted or told her directly not to depend on them for help if things went bad. Especially disheartening, Blake—her cheerful friend and mentor—told her he had only enough supplies for his family. Feeling depressed, she looked forward even more to her visit to the red dot and her good friend.

On her way to her red dot, she saw that church parking lots were full, as usual, and noted signs outside churches with messages like,
The Lord is Our Shepherd
, and
Donations of Food and Clothing Welcomed
.

The site of the red dot on County Road 42 was peaceful and almost deserted, though Ray was sitting in his accustomed place, on a stool on the mound a few yards from the dot. The only thing different that Claire noticed was that there were no sheriff’s deputies or other law enforcement officers around. Apparently they were spread too thin.

Claire brushed away a layer of fallen leaves to sit next to Ray. They talked, gazed at the red dot, and watched the leaves fall for about five minutes before they heard several cars drive up and park. Two or three men got out of each car and headed toward the red dot. A couple carried some kind of instruments with them, and several put on surgical masks as they got near the dot.

Claire’s face and body tensed as she watched them approach. Ray said softly, “I don’t like this.”

“Sir, ma’am, good morning. I’m going to have to ask you leave this area,” said a short, stocky man of about thirty through his gauzy mask. “Some of these alien weapons are releasing viruses this morning, that have already killed a lot of people.”

As he spoke, the men with the instruments—some sort of Geiger counters or other measuring devices—put their masks on and turned on their instruments. Others took pictures of the site with their smart phones. Two
more cars drove up, and more men got out, several with rifles slung on their shoulders.

Claire’s fear mounted. She knew she should just leave, but she had to say something to appeal to reason. “You know, those devices over there—” she nodded to the rods sticking out of the ground on the other side of the red dot “—constantly monitor for viruses and radiation, and would immediately notify Homeland Security. And the light on top would start flashing. I think we’re safe.”

The man seemed peeved for a moment, but then said in an understanding tone, “I’m afraid you’ve been deceived, ma’am, by lying propaganda from the government. They’re trying to set us up to take our freedoms. I have to insist that you and this gentleman leave.”

“Could you help me to my car?” Ray asked Claire, looking intently into her eyes.

“Sure,” she said as she took his left arm.

They started walking to Ray’s car, and had just reached the edge of the parking lot when one of the men who had just arrived turned to Claire.

“Hey, I know you. You were on TV, telling everyone everything is OK and the aliens are our friends.”

“You’re mistaken,” said Ray. He pulled on Claire’s arm to keep them moving to his car. “I know this … is my niece, and she’s not who you think she is.”

“Yeah, you’re some big fancy NASA scientist, and you’re one of the leaders of the damned government conspiracy,” said the tall, athletic-looking man, spitting the word “NASA” contemptuously and taking a few steps to follow Claire and Ray.

“I told you, you’re wrong,” said Ray as he fumbled with his keys to open the passenger side door and let Claire get inside first.

“No. Sorry, Pops, this bitch is going to have to answer some questions and tell us the truth,” the young man said. He reached out and grabbed Claire’s forearm.

“Hey,” said Claire sharply, “we’ve got laws in this country, and rights. You’re not taking me anywhere.”

“Don’t you have to get back there and look for Big Foot or whatever?” said Ray angrily.

Briefly taken aback, the man loosened his grip, and Claire jerked her arm free. Throughout the frightening encounter, she couldn’t help but notice that, unnervingly, one of the men with a rifle couldn’t take his eyes off her. Suddenly, with a shock of recognition, she thought,
that’s Scott!

The driver from her first few days at Denver One had shown her an angry demonstration and a looted gun store on one trip. He’d been friendly to her, but sick with worry about his family’s safety with the approach of D9, and deeply suspicious of the government. A sinking feeling gripped her stomach when she saw him walking toward her.
Now what?
she thought.

“Hey, Scott, I caught one of those fancy NASA liars,” said the man, who was still just a step away from Claire.

“I’ll take care of her, Rick,” Scott said. “Go ahead and help get set up.”

“We’re gonna get the truth now,” the man said with a menacing smile as he turned to walk toward the red dot.

Scott waited a few seconds as the man walked away. “Go, Claire, now,” he said in a quiet tone. “I’ll tell them I checked your ID and that you’re not with the government after all.”

Ray had already gotten into the driver’s seat and started his car. Claire was getting into the passenger’s front seat as she looked up and said, “Thank you, Scott.”

“He’s not a bad person,” Scott said hurriedly, referring to the man who’d confronted Claire. “He’s just scared and mad.”

Once Ray got out on the highway, he turned to Claire and said, “Thank God for your friend—Scott, right?” Claire, her heart still pounding, nodded in agreement.

“I was afraid I might have to threaten the other guy with this,” Ray said as he unzipped his windbreaker to show a handgun in a shoulder holster.

“Holy crap, Ray, you have a gun?” Claire exclaimed in shock.

“Yeah,” he said. “I didn’t want to show it unless I had to, because we were outnumbered and outgunned. Who knows what they would have done?”

As Claire continued to look at him with astonishment, Ray said, “My family always had guns around—hunting, protection, for sport. I got a concealed carry permit right after they came out.”

Claire arrived shaken, but safe, at Denver One. She arranged for security guards there to pick her car up from the red dot site later. She also asked them to check to make sure there was no damage to Homeland Security sensors and cameras there. She wasn’t worried about Forty-Two itself, because as she’d learned on her first day at Denver One, red dots contained no detectable solids, liquids, or gases. Which meant there was nothing those men could do.

Rising passions played out with more violence in other parts of the country that Sunday morning.

Just after 1:00 a.m. in Chicago, three members of the extremist group Storm pulled up in an SUV in front of a bank in the financial district, where solid rows of buildings towered so high above LaSalle Street on each side that the small gap between them seemed less like a canyon and more like an insignificant crack in a solid concrete block. A small woman in a dark running suit and stocking cap swiftly got out of the vehicle with a package in her right hand. In two steps, she was at the front door of one of the imposing buildings, and set the package just inside the doorframe. She hovered over the package for a few seconds, then ran back and got into the SUV, which instantly pulled away. The whole action took less than fifteen seconds.

Tonya took her seat in the SUV, breathing hard, and looked up to see Quinn smiling at her. “What?” she asked.

“You were the one we had doubts about, Ms. Class President,” Quinn said, still looking at her with a smile. “But you are a warrior.”

“Fuck you,” said Tonya. After a few seconds, she said, “You think I want to live under a bunch of fascist billionaires? Nothing else worked.”

“OK, you love birds,” said Martin, an African-American who looked like he couldn’t be more than seventeen. He had slowed the SUV almost to a stop about three blocks from their target. “If there’s no one around to get hurt, do it.”

Quinn looked down the street for a few seconds, and then for a few more seconds.

“Do it!” shouted Martin and Tonya, almost in unison.

Quinn clicked a switch on the small device in his hand. A gust of debris blew out from the bank doorway, and for an instant the three rebels looked on, almost in disbelief. Then a deep rumble reached the SUV.

Moments later, Quinn exclaimed, “Shit! I didn’t see that guy across the street.”

“He’s getting up,” said Tonya. “He must be all right.”

Martin sped up again to get to the rendezvous point while Quinn stared back the way they’d come. “He got up pretty fast, maybe he’s not hurt,” he said.

“Hey, man, this is a revolution,” said Martin quietly. “Someone’s gonna get hurt.”

Sarge and Vander got out of their jeep, surveyed the miles of empty scrub and grassland around them, and breathed the cool, crisp New Mexico morning air.

“This is a land for free men,” said Vander, a bear of a man with a full, dark brown beard streaked with gray. “No government is gonna send someone two thousand miles to tell us what to do.”

“It’s gonna hit the fan,” said Sarge, a tall, lean man of thirty. He had been a captain in the Army, but got the name “Sarge” because rather than acting through his non-coms, he took a rough, hands-on approach. “The Feds will use this D9 thing as an excuse any day now, to move in with martial law. We’ve got to protect our liberty.”

Sarge and Vander turned and began a short walk to a small ridgeline. Both carried hunting rifles with scopes on them.

Crouching and moving slowly the last few yards, they settled down behind the ridge and carefully raised their heads to look over it. They saw a dark green government car parked a little more than four hundred yards away, on a dirt road. Two Bureau of Land Management rangers, from the law
enforcement sector of the agency, sat on the hood facing the ridge, apparently drinking coffee.