6.
Moonlight spilled across the array of radio telescope dishes. Shiri glanced out the window at them trying to contain her excitement. At any given moment, she could state precisely how many satellites orbited earth. Which was why she felt a rush of adrenaline now discovering one more than there should be.
Studying her bank of computer screens, Shiri began by moving backward in time to gauge the satellite's orbit. Three hours earlier, the satellite appeared to be in the same position in relation to earth. The images from six hours earlier gave similar results. Most surprising was the discovery that twelve hours ago, there was no sign of the satellite at all. There had to be some evidence of its launch and positioning. But it was as if the satellite had manifested exactly eleven hours and thirteen minutes ago. "Simon, anyone launch today?" Shiri said.
Simon Keyes, the only man in America who actually liked RC Cola, came over. He rubbed his thick beard, which did little to disguise the double chins beneath the fuzzy surface. "Don't think so," he said, peering over her shoulder.
"2271, that should be the count. But I get one more," Shiri said, enjoying the first rush of excitement in ages.
Simon went to another computer bank, scanning the data at inhuman speed. "Nothing from China or Japan. Europe hasn't launched anything in weeks."
"There's something else," Shiri called. "The satellite's in a geosynchronous orbit over the Pacific Northwest – and it's emitting an intermittent infrared flare."
Simon glanced up and blinked twice like an owl. "Move our nearest sat over to get a better look."
Everyone stared back as if this were a joke. Moving a satellite into a new orbit took time, logistics, careful study of what a change in trajectory might mean. One miscalculation and millions of dollars in technology could be lost. "What are you waiting for?" Simon turned back to Shiri. "Hell of a catch. Now figure out if there's any data in that infrared flare."
*
Lieutenant Kitamura hated gospel music. Sadly, Colonel Jasper, who sat beside him in the Taurus, felt differently. So gospel it was. Such was the life of a lieutenant.
He'd been working for Colonel Jasper, the NASA liaison, for nearly a year. He didn't like the man, but he couldn't question the Colonel's brilliance. He practically channeled Sun Tzu. Worse still, he beat Kitamura consistently in chess, which never ceased to amaze Minnesota's formerly third ranked junior champion.
Colonel Jasper would never make general. He preferred life looking for weaknesses out in the field, not weakness in the enemy but in the homeland. They had just come from a top-secret missile system capable of taking out North Korea in a pre-emptive strike should the time come. Or as Jasper put it – when the time came. Most people in the community never knew the weapons were hidden in the middle of a Kansas cornfield.
After spitting chewing tobacco into a Styrofoam cup, which disgusted Kitamura to no end, Colonel Jasper rubbed his red mustache. "I sense you have an issue with God's music."
Kitamura drove down the long stretch of road. Nothing but tall cornstalks as far as the eye could see. "What if it isn't God's music? What if they got it wrong and God finds it positively discordant?" He laughed, amused.
Colonel Jasper merely spit in his cup once more, and then picked up his cell phone the moment it buzzed. "Jasper ... I'll be there." He always said the same thing. "Plane's waiting. Wake me when we get there." In moments, the Colonel was snoring. They could be on the verge of WW III, but Jasper's expression wouldn't change.
Kitamura reached to turn off the music.
"Want to keep that hand, Lieutenant, I suggest you put it back on the wheel," Jasper said without opening his eyes ... quite possibly without even waking up.
*
A fog descended over Hanover. Vincent, Noah and Jamie eyed the gate from an old SUV Noah stole earlier that night. Stealing cars, or anything else for that matter appeared frighteningly simple for Noah, both on a mechanical and moral level.
"What do you think he's like? After all the zapping and drugs, you think he's all –" Noah made a face somewhere between crazy and a perplexed rubber chicken.
Jamie turned around and punched him in the leg. He gave her a look of mock indignation. "Could have happened to any of us."
"But it didn't happen to us," Noah said.
Vincent detected a hint of superiority in Noah's tone. He opted to let it go.
"You saying you don't want to get him?" Jamie asked.
Noah peered through the haze at the institution. "I'm saying our journey's hard enough without tying an anchor around our throats. Maybe he's one of us. If he is, great, I'm down with whatever. But if he loses his shit or gets in the way, then what? Are we just going to drag him along?"
"What if you were the one in there?" Jamie said.
Noah looked away. "We all went through the same thing. But he's in there and we're out here. Make of that what you want."
Jamie turned back to Vincent, perhaps waiting to see if he would jump in. He had more important activities transpiring in that moment. After another minute, he concluded his connection to the Eye. It had, at last, revealed itself. NASA and every other space agency knew about it. "We do only what we need to do to get him out. Last thing we need is for people to be talking about this."
"We're breaking someone out of a mental institution. You don't think someone's going to talk about it?" Noah said, chowing down on some corn nuts.
*
Kitamura and Jasper stood in the back of the Socorro telescope operations room. The chamber was abuzz with activity as a satellite telescope approached the unidentified object. Jasper hadn't spoken a word since their arrival. That was never a good a sign.
"Two minutes to visual," a tech called out from the front of the room.
Simon Keyes crosschecked flight data with each team as seconds ticked away.
The front monitors showed nothing but dark space on one side and the blue marble of earth on the other. Seeing it from that angle, it was hard to imagine that mankind had any place on something so beautiful. Conversely, it was mankind's enlightenment that allowed them to have this image as a result of their scientific advancements. They'd come a long way from cave paintings. The dichotomy of it would have occupied Kitamura's mind for some time were it not for the momentous event unfolding before him.
Simon and a younger woman approached. "Colonel Jasper, Lieutenant, this is Shiri –"
"What'd you find?" Jasper said, his eyes boring into Shiri.
She wilted like a sunflower suddenly finding itself in the arctic. Jasper had that effect on people.
"You know how the object's been intermittently sending infrared flares? They'd be easy to miss with all the solar radiation which has a similar wavelength," Shiri said. An oscillating infrared wave appeared on the screen after a few keystrokes. "The waves were woven together in a way that made it nearly impossible to decipher anything."
"Fifty seconds to visual contact," a tech called from the front.
On the laptop, one wave after another was stripped away. Soon just a single fluctuating wave remained. "So I used a quantum algorithm to decode the layers and get to the signal inside," Shiri said.
"I don't like frosting, just give me the cake," Jasper said.
"We translated the data to a two word message: Sequencing Complete ... Sequencing Complete. It's on a loop," Shiri said.
Simon looked expectantly at Colonel Jasper. "Mean anything to you?"
"Just that the sequencing appears to be complete," Jasper said as he reached in his pocket and pulled out a worn baseball. According to legend, that baseball had been a gift from Clayton Kershaw after his no hitter. Kitamura couldn't picture a scenario where their paths would have crossed, but the world was a curious place.
"Four seconds ... three ... two ..."
They caught a glimpse of a blurred gunmetal gray object. The form was indistinct, but it might have been a pyramid. Then the space around the object distorted. The image faltered as if engulfed by rippling waves. The waves came faster until the screens went to static.
"We've lost contact," from one side of the room. "All systems down," from another. The engineers were in overdrive trying to diagnose the issue.
Jasper stashed the baseball back into his pocket. "Your sat's dead," he said, and then walked out. Kitamura quickly followed.
Outside Jasper walked over to one of the satellite dishes and looked up at the stars. "Something up there does not want to be seen."
*
The hypodermic needle injected a sedative into Max's arm vein. Nurse Baker tightened his restraints before giving him a friendly pat on the shoulder. Max closed his eyes. When he opened them, his body felt warm. Anxiety welled up, but was subdued by the drug now engulfing him in a warm blanket. The dread of surging electric pulses receded like a distant memory.
He closed his eyes, waiting for the first shock. But nothing happened. He opened his eyes when an alarm rang out. Nurses and orderlies rushed out the doorway while Nurse Baker peered out the window into the fog.
Ghostly forms of orderlies appeared and then vanished in the haze. Then he heard someone outside scream. Nurse Baker backed away from the window, and then ran to the phone. Her responses were a quick and efficient. Max heard the words "police... how many... what do they -"
The window shattered inward as if an explosive had gone off right outside. Nurse Baker screamed, shielding her eyes.
Wraithlike forms moved closer and then dove through the open frame. Max couldn't move his head, but the figure rose and he saw Jamie. She looked at Nurse Baker, "Get out."
Nurse Baker looked at the phone as if she couldn't make sense of why she held it at all. The handset slipped from her limp fingers as she shuffled over the broken glass and departed.
Jamie came over, her long fingers removing the restraints. "We're getting you out."
"Black nail polish," was all Max could think to say while the sedative carried him toward unconsciousness.
"I have other shades of black if you don't like this one," Jamie said. Her grip was surprisingly strong.
Noah emerged through the fog. When Max blinked, Noah had somehow appeared in the room. The drugs must have kicked in pretty fast.
"You guys having a tea party? Come on, let's move." Noah took Max beneath the shoulder and carried him through the window.
Max tripped over an orderly on the ground. "Is he -"
"Just resting," Noah said, pulling Max along.
Max turned to see another familiar face rush over. "Are you OK? Can you walk?" Vincent said as sirens pierced the night, coming closer.
"I've got him. Best rescue ever," Noah said.
Through lidded eyes, Max saw the gate of Hanover on its side as they marched closer. Something had torn it free. He looked back at Vincent.
"It was in the way," Vincent said.
"Max!" a voice called through the fog.
The others dragged Max on, but he looked back to see Doctor Garner. "Wait," Max said, trying to maintain a grip on lucidity.
It took Garner a moment before he could catch his breath. "Max, I don't know what's happening or who they are, but -"
"Yes, you do," Max said. "They came down from Olympus." He waved, and then allowed himself to be carried off in the fog.
*
Kitamura walked briskly behind his superior. Soldiers saluted Colonel Jasper with perfect form. None of them wanted to end up in a post in Greenland for a finger just slightly askew. Colonel Jasper had a short fuse when it came to lapses in discipline. Right now, that fuse was non-existent.
Jasper shoved the conference room's double doors open. Eight screens displayed military leaders from Germany, Japan, Russia, Brazil, China, Great Britain, France and Australia. Accusations flew across the screens.
"How do we know this isn't a Russian weapon?" the German General yelled at his Russian counterpart.
"Evidence suggests Japan is developing a star wars defense system –" The Chinese General shouted at the Japanese General as the Japanese officer returned charges of Chinese aggression.
It was like the Hollywood Squares Global Domination version. Kitamura concealed his disappointment as his cell phone buzzed - the latest transmission location from the satellite flashed. Shiri had stepped up her game and been able to pinpoint the exact longitude and latitude.
"Gentlemen, am I to understand that each of you has lost contact with at least one of your satellites for some reason other than mechanical malfunction?"
A series of affirmations followed across the screens.
"Thank you, gentlemen." Jasper shut down the video call amidst a series of surprised and affronted squawks.
Kitamura considered the black screens, "I don't think they were done with their accusations yet."
"Let the hens peck each other. All I care about is that we're all in the same boat." He took out his baseball, tossing it back and forth.
"What boat is that, Sir?"
"The one with a bird of prey circling over it." He stopped after the last toss. "What have you got?"
Kitamura's cell phone rang. "Kitamura," he said. Then he listened with growing dismay. "Understood." He clicked off and looked at Jasper. "You're not going to like this.
"I never do," Jasper said. "I truly never like it."
Kitamura brought up the location of the last signal from the satellite. "We tracked the last transmission to this region. It's remote except for one facility."
"Secret underground arms dealers?"
"Shockingly, no. A mental institute for troubled teens."
"Color me surprised," Jasper said. "Tell me the part that makes it even more interesting."
"Two hours after the last transmission, police reported a... I suppose you'd call it a jailbreak. A seventeen-year-old patient escaped." A picture of Max appeared, along with all the other salient information about the boy.
"How many broke him out?"
"Still up in the air. Cameras were disabled, police are taking statements." Kitamura said.
Jasper nodded, interest piqued. "What's his story?"
Kitamura sifted through the Intel. "Mother deceased, father unknown ... yada yada yada ... Lived in several foster homes; none showed any real care for the boy. He attempted suicide recently," Kitamura said.
"So the kid has issues. Maybe someone took him under their wing, made him feel like he matters. Maybe he's a courier for them, easily susceptible to manipulation," Jasper said.
"Maybe. Here's the thing – kid's a genius. IQ off the charts," Kitamura said, concealing his amazement.
Jasper stepped closer, studying the image. "So we've got a teenage mental patient associated with persons unknown receiving messages from an unidentified satellite. And his mind is light years ahead of yours?"
"Ours," Kitamura said. "Yes, Sir."
"You ever play baseball?" Jasper asked, throwing Kitamura off with the non sequitur.
Kitamura considered his words carefully, searching for where his answer might be used against him. "I was a relief pitcher on my high school team."
"So you just watched most of the time. That's fine," Jasper said. "Here's the thing about baseball. You can analyze it all day long, but in the end, it's a game of instinct. Mine tells me this kid is searching for a connection. And if whoever he hooks up with taps into that before we do, we've got a problem. Think we need to get to know as much we can about Max sooner than later. Set up a meeting at Hanover."
"I was All-State," Kitamura said.
"Super," Jasper called.