Читать книгу New Earth: Project O.N.E. - R.D. Ph.D. Pittman - Страница 7

“Gentleman, please be seated.” The President waved his people back into their seats. Around the situation room table were the best and brightest minds in the country. If anyone could do anything about this threat, it would be them.

“Gentleman, we are here today to discuss strategies on how best to defend this world against what appears to be a potential catastrophic event coming this way in the summer of 2017. I now open the meeting by having Professor Conley discuss the threat we face.”

“Thank you Mr. President.” Professor Andrew Conley, MIT and Cal State, rose and cleared his throat. Our latest data show the mass of asteroids still on track for an orbital coincidence in July 2017. Here is the main issue that you need to consider. Imagine if you will a 3-D image of a box drawn into outer space, this box is approximately 22,000 by 16,000 miles in cross section and 1.9 million miles long. Asteroids of varying sizes are dispersed throughout this box. Some are tumbling at a slow rate and others at a high rate of speed. Many are in free spin with no discernible orbit structure around any of the other asteroids.”

Conley discussed trajectory analysis, asteroid composition, and impact scenarios both in space and on earth. It was frightening stuff, but the most frightening thing was that, given the number of asteroids and their motion relative to one another, it was impossible to predict precisely where any one of them would hit.

Eric Karinsky, head of new technology development at JPL then rose.

“Mr. President, let me get to my points right away. Our strategies must fall into two categories, delaying and object destruction. Destruction, despite what you’ve seen in the movies, is not practical, as it leaves a debris cloud still heading toward earth. A delaying strategy relies on the fact that the earth moves one planetary diameter every seven minutes. If we can delay, or alter an object’s trajectory slightly, we could cause it to miss the earth entirely. The vector and the velocity of the incoming object must be calculated correctly to implement such a strategy, which is within our capabilities. But the action to be taken must be done far enough away from the earth for the effect to be realized. On this question, I defer to my colleague.

NASA Chief Tom Benson stood and addressed the group, whose anxiety seemed to grow by the minute.

“Our part of this mission is to provide the delivery platform to implement whatever strategy is finally agreed upon. Mr. President, with the global financial meltdown and our own economy under such duress these past years, our new orbital and deep space craft development programs were left unfunded and essentially mothballed. For us to resurrect this program and bring it to fruition would take three years at a minimum, well past the event date. We are therefore left with the three space shuttles that are currently in storage. Crew must be trained, the shuttles themselves, the Atlantis, Discovery, and Endeavor, must be thoroughly gone through, new systems and any modifications necessary will take us perilously close to impact time. We must develop the strategy quickly and adopt an aggressive timeline; otherwise we are courting disaster before the impact itself.”

“If I may, Mr. President,” Ted Jeffers said. “If we were to ramp up our space program that aggressively while pleading poverty as the reason for pulling our troops back, there would be no way to maintain secrecy, the media would be all over us.”

“Good point Ted; let’s say we have decided to embark on a commercial endeavor that will drive revenue to the treasury, instead of draining it. How’s that sound?”

“Well, Mr. President if you can sell it we can protect it from early disclosure.”

“Good man.”

“General Pontius,” Admiral Torrance asked. “How’s the rail-gun project progressed?”

“We have had success in disabling satellites; the system itself is reliable and accurate. The problem Admiral is that these are smaller objects than the majority of the asteroids coming in at us. They weren’t moving at a high rate of speed and none of them were tumbling as many of the asteroids are.”

“Mr. President,” Karinsky spoke up. “Redstone Arsenal has an inventory of around one hundred twenty high explosive bombs called MOAB’s. They can produce a non-nuclear explosion, that, if it were close enough to an object, could alter even the largest of the asteroids vector and/or velocity,”

“Professor Conley,” the President asked. “How far out would we have to go to lay a minefield for this box you described?”

“At a minimum you would want to start at least a half a million miles from the moon, so around seven hundred fifty thousand to a million miles out.”

“Tom, can the shuttles go that far out into space and return safely?”

“Yes and no. We would have to place fuel depots along the path that far out. We would not return the shuttles to earth but keep them docked at the space station, which means outfitting the station with supplies and personnel to service the shuttles. We would have to start that almost immediately upon the shuttle’s readiness to fly. We have to get the ordinance up to a storage location near the space station and then, begin sorties to the box and deploy the bombs with remote detonation capability. That could be done, but, I can’t guarantee complete safety given the time frames we will be operating under.”

“Then so be it. Start getting the shuttles back to readiness and laying out what you need from DOD. Ted do the best you can with regards to security. I know there are other scenarios that could be considered, but time and technology are our constraints. As you work on this plan, think about a backup plan. Does everyone understand?”

All of them nodded.

“Then get to it and God help us all.”

While the rest filed out, Admiral Torrance stayed in his seat.

“Mr. President,” he said, “you know as well as I do that something on this scale has never been attempted before. It will not work. There are too many moving parts.”

“Don’t you think I know that?” President Betts got himself under control. There was no reason to get mad at Torrance over this. “We can’t possibly hope to deflect them all, that’s why you have to step up the redeployment and survival plans. But if we can stop some of them, it may make a difference. Where are you on planning?”

“Arlen and I are meeting Monday. We’ll be ready to kick it off when you give the go ahead.”

“Don’t wait for my go ahead, just get it done. We have a little less than eighteen months to get all our troops back here on American soil, devise and construct sufficient survival sites, all the while keeping it under wraps from the world until we are ready…Lord give us the strength!”

Alex was typing out detailed instructions for the data clerks on how to input the data into the format he wanted. Once he had that in place, the computers would take over and Alex could get some much needed sleep. It was going on a day and half without sleep. He had been moved to a more spacious office with windows and a couch that had been calling to him for hours.

Howard Carney, the Deputy Defense Secretary, knocked twice.

“General Hanken I see you have been busy for last few days, can I have a word with you.”

“Of course and call me Alex.”

Carney came in and dropped into Alex’s couch. “Alex, when you have finished with the redeployment plans, we need to get to work on the survival facilities and the post event preparedness plans. Our friends at Homeland Security have punch lists of things to consider in surviving a catastrophic event. There are also military considerations we must take into account, troop concentrations, equipment relocation, air and sea power restructuring, our nuclear forces disposition. They tell me that you are a genius at this. Well we’re going to need all the genius you can muster to prepare for the stateside influx of troops and equipment, while preparing suitable survival shelters nationwide. Now I know I’ve said a lot, but I wanted to put you on notice that Admiral Torrance and the President are going to put you in charge and I’m to be your liaison to the Admiral.”

“Howard you weren’t kidding…that is a lot.”

“We’d bring someone else in, but you can appreciate—“

“Yes, need-to-know. I’ll need funding and all military echelons have got to respect any requests I make of them.”

“Funding’s unlimited. You want it; just tell me when and where. As far as the echelons go, Admiral Torrance will be sending out a wire to all commands worldwide that you act and speak for the him and under no circumstances is anyone to question your authority.”

“That sounds perfect Howard. Now if you don’t mind I haven’t slept in thirty-six hours and you’re sitting on my bed. I have a long presentation to give tomorrow for the President, Admiral Torrance, and his Chiefs of Staff, and it would be a good idea not to nod off in the middle of it.”

Carney stood up and brushed off the cushion. “I will be there myself, so sleep well Alex.”

Alex had been asleep for about five hours when Howard Carney shook him awake.

“Alex, I’m sorry to wake you but we’ve got a problem. Your son Curt has put out an all points missing persons report on you. He thinks you’ve been kidnapped or something worse.”

Alex scrubbed his hands over his face and tried to think. “Jeez that’s my fault. He has called several times on my cell and left voicemails, I was just too busy to respond. How do you want to handle this?

“Call your son and tell him you are okay. You are in Washington D.C. doing some consulting work for a defense contractor.”

“That won’t fly. We always let each other know where we are at all times. But didn’t someone say at some point that our immediate families would be brought into the shelters?”

“That’s right.”

“Well, my son is a telecommunications and data transmission wizard. I am going to need an industry expert like him. Can we bring him on board early?”

“Sure, but he has to abide by the US Secrets Act.”

“Go get him Howard and bring him here. Be sure to tell the person that talks to him that I said ‘Now is not the time for questions, just get on the plane.’ He’ll know it’s me.”

“Okay Alex go back to sleep.”

Curt was talking on the phone with his fiancée, Cynthia, when a knock came at his condo’s door. “Call you back, love.”

When he opened the door there stood two extremely large men in Marine fatigues.

“Are you Curt Hanken?”

“Yes. What’s this about?”

“A message from your father. ‘Now is not the time for questions just get on the plane.’”

It took a moment to sink in. That was what his father said to him when they were leaving for a surprise trip to Disneyland when he was eight. It had become a running joke between them over the years. His father needed him, and needed him now.

“Let me get a few clothes and my laptop and I’ll be right with you.”

When Curt arrived at Andrews AFB a few hours later he was met by Howard Carney, who explained that his dad had been tapped to oversee a worldwide troop redeployment. Astonishing. But then, his dad had been a whiz at deployment.

Howard took Curt to the Pentagon’s dignitary guest quarters and told him to be patient that Alex was giving a very lengthy debrief to the President at this very moment, and he would tell Alex that he had arrived safely.

Fifteen minutes later, Carney arrived at the briefing and nodded briefly to Alex. Curt had arrived with no problems. Good. Alex nodded back without breaking stride.

“As you can see we don’t have sufficient naval transports to hit a twelve month timeframe for men and equipment, though we can get all of our Air Force planes back to the US. What I recommend is that we concentrate on the Korea’s, Japan, and the Philippines first, then start on the Middle East moving most of the land based equipment that you see on the legend to Germany, Italy and France, where we have the installations in place and the room to store them. We can leave a token security force behind at each installation, much as we are going to do at the limited number of embassies we will maintain. I have intentionally placed most of the redeployed Air Force and Army personnel at US facilities away from the coasts for obvious reasons. Under this scenario we can accomplish all of this in seven months. That’s all gentlemen.”

There was the contemplative silence, then suddenly questions began to fly back and forth among the Chiefs of Staff and for a good hour they exchanged concerns with Alex, Admiral Torrance, and the President. Finally the President stood up and walked to the screen where Alex’s plans were displayed.

“Gentleman, remember this is survival. This is about ensuring the US is still around after July, 2017, so let’s get it done.”

The President left the secure debriefing room as Torrance stood up along with all the others in the room. Torrance then addressed the group.

“Men, we’ve got our marching orders. There is zero tolerance for missed deadlines. General Hanken has absolute authority from the President and me to accomplish the intended outcomes. Nearly eighty percent of the armed forces will come under his control including the land based nuclear forces along with the air wings that have nuclear capabilities. The sea based naval forces will remain under my control. You Chiefs of Staff are there to ensure your line people are cooperating fully with General Hanken. That concludes this meeting, now get to work.”

As Alex waited for his superiors to file out of the oval office first, Admiral Torrance buttonholed him.

“Well done, Alex. I’m sure you need to get some rest, so I won’t hold you long. Howard told me about your son. If you think he can add value to your efforts then bring him on board.”

“Thank you sir.”

“We’ve already run a background on him. He is everything you said.”

“But.”

“His fiancé’s parents seem to be…on the seamier side of society. We wouldn’t want your son, or Cynthia—is it? To be compromised in any way.”

Of course. He should have warned them. “Admiral I’ll handle it, don’t worry. They’re both good kids and very talented.”

‘I know you will, Alex. Now go to your son and get some rest. That’s an order.”

“Yes, sir.”

Ten minutes later Alex was flying back to the Pentagon on the President’s chopper. God, had it only been three weeks since he’d invited Curt and Cynthia over for the celebration dinner?

“Hey, there’s the new graduate.” He kissed Cynthia’s cheek. She’d just received her Master’s degree in mathematics from Cal State Sacramento. Curt had asked him to make a big deal out of it since her parents had hardly paid any attention to her for years—not since Curt told him that Cynthia had returned from a family visit sporting a bruise. Alex had visited Cynthia’s father, who was drunk at the time, to make sure that bruise was the last. Since then Cynthia had hardly seen her parents. But he was happy to pick up the slack.

“You know,” Cynthia said after diner. “I think you would really like this lady at school. She is 44, a widow, one grown daughter, pretty as a picture.”

“Cynthia I—“

“I told her about you, and she said she would be interested in meeting you. How about it Dad, I’ll give her your phone number?”

Alex’s stomach had tightened. He just wasn’t up for this. He was perfectly comfortable living alone and why rock the boat?

“Cynthia she sounds very nice and under normal circumstances…I’d be interested. But right now I have a lot of things on my plate that I’m dealing with—and, no, Curt, it’s not about your mom. I am over Ellen’s passing…I’m just very busy right now.”

At the time, it had been a lie. He still couldn’t see himself with another woman, not after he’d botched things so thoroughly with Ellen. All those years she’d hinted, then suggested, then demanded, and finally almost begged that he spend more time with her and Curt. And he’d always intended to, but something always seemed to come up. Until it was too late.

He hoped he’d changed since then. After Ellen’s death, he’d retired and spent as much time with Curt as he could. But he still had his doubts.

Of course, now it was all moot. Like it or not, he was going to be phenomenally busy right up until the moment of impact. And then, the real work would begin. He realized the chopper was hovering above the Pentagon landing pad, too pressed for time, he leapt the few feet to the ground and hurried to meet Curt. He found him.

“No, sweetheart, there’s nothing to worry about. I was told Dad was summoned to a special meeting of former Air Force generals to discuss better retirement options for the military, and his cell phone went on the blink. That’s why I couldn’t get a hold of him. Listen, here he is. I’ll call you back later…I love you too….Yes I will, talk to you later, bye.”

Alex gave Curt a brief man hug, careful not to make it longer or harder than usual.

“How was the trip?”

“Good…Dad what the hell is going on?”

“Hey, let’s go have dinner some place special, like the War Room. I’ll call the cafeteria and they will send us a feast. How’s that sound?”

“It sounds like you’re stalling me. What are you involved in? It’s more than just this—

“Not now son, let’s go eat and enjoy our dinner okay? Give me fifteen to clean up and we’ll head down to the big room.”

When they arrived at the War Room, cafeteria personnel were hurriedly setting up a table in an adjacent room for them. A half hour later a five course meal was delivered with steak and lobster—Curt’s favorites—as entrees. Alex dismissed the attendant so he and Curt could speak privately.

“Curt you know I love you don’t you?”

“Okay, you’re not making me any calmer.”

“And you know I would never intentionally hurt you.”

“Dad—“

“Let me finish. Do you trust me?”

“I have always trusted you.”

“Well, then listen to me when I tell you that I am involved in something, if I were to tell you more, I would violate the US Secrets Act.”

Curt stared for a moment, then took a gulp of his wine.

“Dad what the hell have they got you doing?”

“Curt it’s the biggest thing since God created the earth.”

“Okay, let me put it right back on you. Do you trust me?”

“That’s dirty pool, Curt.”

“And that’s not an answer. Do you trust me to keep something secret?”

“Yes.”

“Then tell your only living son what his father is involved in, so I don’t have to worry about you disappearing into the night.”

Alex realized Curt was not going to let up. He was his father’s son.

“Okay,” he said, “sit back and let me tell you the tale. It’s a shame to waste all that good food though. You’re not going to want to eat when I’m done.”

He told Curt the events of the last few days, giving things in order in which he’d found them out. As he did Curt went from stunned to, visibly shaking to, holding his hand to his mouth to keep from retching.

Alex finished and waited for Curt to respond. Curt sat there for a moment then recovered and looked his dad straight in the eye.

“Dad, if there is a chance the world is going to end, I want to spend every last day with you.”

And after everything else, that was the one thing Alex couldn’t handle. The tears began to roll down his cheeks, visions of Ellen and Curt together tore at his heart…He stammered, trying to compose himself…eventually he felt he could safely speak. “Okay, then, I’ve already gotten clearance for you and Cynthia. You will be on my team. Do you think…can…would Cynthia want to be involved in this?”

“Dad how could…We may all turn into dust molecules in two years, but we could push up our wedding date, and work as a married couple until the end or the new beginning, whichever. At least we would all be together as a family.”

“This is a big step. You can’t turn back once you go on that list, do you understand that?”

“Sure.”

“This is not going to be a vacation; we are in a race to save as much as we can from total annihilation. What we do will form the foundation of a new America. There will be some very difficult decisions that have to be made about who gets to survive in a shelter and who will be left exposed to…whatever may come. And before then, there is no way to make this public without massive outbreaks of lawlessness. That’s why they need extreme secrecy and why I’m bringing the armed forces home. Nationwide civil unrest could very well doom all of us before the event even occurs. And that is why you and Cynthia cannot under any circumstances discuss this with anyone other than designated personnel. No friends, not her family, no one.”

“You’re right Dad,” he said. People will go absolutely over the edge when this comes out. So what can I do?”

“We’ll need redundant data and telecommunications capabilities among the survival facilities. The military has their interfacing systems already in place throughout the various commands. I’m going to need a stand-alone system that can interface with the defense systems.”

“Okay. But you’re talking about some serious money. And what kind of timeframe are you looking at?”

“I gave them a seven month pipeline on the redeployment plan. It probably needs to coincide with that as well.”

“And the money?”

“Money is no object.”

Eventually, they ate, rather quietly, since most of the obvious questions didn’t have answers. They were just finishing when Alex got a call that Howard Carney wanted to meet him. He sent Curt off to start looking over briefing books then went to his office to meet Carney.

Carney was on the couch working on a tablet, but he put it away when Alex walked in.

“Alex. I just heard from the joint chiefs. They’ve accepted your redeployment plan with no major modifications, and the troop movements are already underway. Now we need to start on the survival shelters.”

Alex nodded. A week of nearly nonstop work resulting in one of the largest, most complex, yet cleanest and most efficient redeployment plans ever developed, and not even an “attaboy.” This brave new world had a pace all its own, and he was going to have to adjust.

Carney was still talking. “I have a contact that you should bring in on your team; Dr. Sandra Chenowith. She’s at UC Davis and is recognized as one of the foremost experts on crop cultivation and ecosystems, especially as it relates to disaster recovery methodology.”

“UC Davis? That’s just west of where we all live.”

“Is it? Good. Your first assignment?”

“Sorry. Go ahead.”

“BLM has control of some 600,000 acres in five western states. The Homeland security people targeted several abandoned mines around Coeur d’ Alene, Idaho, as ideal for survival shelters and military depots. Until we can determine a good headquarters for you why don’t you operate out of Sacramento. Our contact at the BLM in Coeur d’ Alene is Pete Cernak. He’s a mining engineer with thirty years of experience.”

“Yes that sounds like a good plan. You’ll get me the contact numbers before Curt and I leave?”

“They’re already in your phone. Start packing. Oh, by the way, I’ve already set up a contract for your Lear.” He consulted his tablet. It’s at the Sacramento Executive Airport, which is where your private plane is hangered, right? I’m also going to have a team of tech people meet you at your house to install secure telephone and fax transmission equipment. All communications about Project One must be done by secured and encrypted means.”

And the pace seemed to quicken.

“Yes, sir.”

“Now remember Alex, we have billions to spend, it’s off budget, if you need something just get me the wiring instructions. We know you had a sizable inheritance from your father in 2005, and you haven’t blown it, so we’re assuming your character is beyond reproach. There will be no audits. Credit cards are on the way for you and Curt, they have six figure credit lines, pay for nothing out of your pocket. Any questions?”

“Not at the moment.”

“If any come up, you know where to find me.” Carney stood and stuck out his hand. “I can’t tell you how fortunate we are to have you heading this up, good luck and have a safe trip back home.”

So there was a little bit of an “attaboy.”

“Thanks Howard.”

Curt and Alex next made their way to Admiral Torrance’s office, threading their way through a building so large and overwhelming that Curt was beginning to wonder if they would ever get there. But it was only the latest surreal moment in a long, surreal day.

“Alex come in and this must be Curt.”

Torrance shook Curt’s hand. For someone who spent most of his days in an office, he looked like he could still convincingly order Curt to drop and give him fifty. So Curt made sure his grip was substantial.

“So are you two off to Sacramento, did you get enough stick time in that Lear to get comfortable with it?”

“It’s a piece of cake, after an A-10, it’s like driving a Cadillac.”

“Alex this redeployment plan is invaluable. Now can you give us one for survival shelters? I don’t have to tell you that once this gets out all hell will break loose. We have to be finished or nearly finished if we’re going to have any chance at climbing back out of our holes and restarting our country.”

“What’s the current time frame?”

“The President has scheduled a news conference for two weeks from tomorrow to announce a major shift in foreign policy and the redeployment plan. That gives us time to contact all the division commanders as you suggested so they won’t be blindsided. After redeployment starts, the probability of a leak increases, probably geometrically. There is literally nothing you can’t ask for, just get it to Howard and it is done. You have my office number and my Land/Sat number, and I’m available to you twenty-four seven.”

Curt was feeling light-headed, both at the amount of work to be done and what was riding on it. But his father just nodded.

“God speed, Alex,” the Admiral said. “And Curt——take care of your old man.”

“Always sir.”