On Thursday, June 25, two Amtrak F40PH diesel locomotives rolled into the train station in Hialeah a few minutes before noon. Passengers of all shapes, sizes, and intentions disembarked, most having spent nearly two full days onboard during the journey south. At least they were not covered in soot like passengers riding the steam locomotives that handled the majority of rail travel.
A handful of the disembarking passengers wore shorts and wide-brimmed hats, hallmarks of northern tourists, a rare commodity in the post-Armageddon world.
Others dressed in short-sleeve shirts with colorful ties and briefcases. That breed might be representatives from food service companies looking to procure citrus crops, or industrial headhunters combing the survivor ranks to find those with specialized skills, or maybe even government census workers sent to register refugees. Of course, many of the arrivals were military personnel wearing BDUs.
Among the crowd walked Nina Forest in black tactical pants and a matching shirt with a duffle bag thrown over one shoulder, an M-4 assault rifle over the other, and a scabbard holding a sheathed sword tight to one leg.
Unlike the business men and tourists, Nina appeared completely unprepared for the South Florida heat. The humidity soaked into her cloths before she reached the shaded platform. The ceiling fans and the cover inside the station helped a little but by the time she hailed a taxi her face had turned red and she felt short of breath.
The driver provided her a complimentary bottle of water while Nina provided him with a destination: the Airport Hilton and Towers on Blue Lagoon drive. The rusting old Chevrolet Impala with a bobbing statue of Jesus on the dash and an older Hispanic male driver made its way south into the upper suburbs of Miami proper.
The Mediterranean and Spanish-style ranch houses of Hialeah and Miami's north side sat in tightly grouped neighborhoods, belying the dearth of citizens in that part of town. Nina knew from her experience fighting in Florida a few summers ago that Miami had turned itself into a fortress after the onslaught of Armageddon, holding out against swamp things and other nightmares as well as the organized forces of the Hivvan Republic. That defense caused an evacuation of the outer-lying areas in order to form lines along the Airport Expressway on the north side and the Palmetto Expressway to the west.
During those years of siege, the Miami population fed themselves with bounty from the sea and citrus while defending their city with a combination of police, National Guard, Cuban refugees, and armed citizens, until The Empire arrived and lifted the siege.
While she had helped clear the surrounding territory, this served as Nina's first visit to the city proper. Despite the town's struggle-or maybe because of it-Miami felt different from the scores of cities and metropolis' liberated by Trevor Stone's armies. Most of those other places had abandoned their core; chased away by the monsters and extraterrestrial militia. Those who survived did so by hiding at the fringes or forming small pockets of resistance in the wild.
Not Miami. The city's heart never stopped beating. As the car carried her deeper into town, she felt as if she traveled through time to the days before the gateways opened. The small family shops and barter centers, intact billboards advertising products long since run out of stock, and the new-world chain of "In and Out" convenience stores selling everything from bullets to bread: it seemed a page from yesterday except for the occasional bomb crater, the remains of sand bag and junk barricades, and hundreds of small crosses arranged in neat rows across Grapeland Heights Park in tribute to "those who stopped the breach."
She arrived at her hotel, a beautiful building constructed on a peninsula stretching into a small lagoon, all within sight of the airport to the north and downtown to the east. A large parrot sat on a perch outside the sliding doors of the entrance greeting each visitor-man or woman-with a boisterous, "Hello pretty lady, hello." Calming instrumental music piped over speakers in the large lobby decorated with ferns and wildflowers. Signs pointed to the 'lunch' buffet in one direction; to the 'lounge' in another.
She approached a well-groomed female desk clerk who had a complexion of cocoa and shiny black hair pulled tight. Nina paid for the first night of her room with two hundred Continental Dollars, some of which came from her own savings and some from Shepherd. The clerk-noting the pale-skinned blonde-woman's sweat-soaked clothing-referred Nina to the gift shop where sun screen and shorts could be purchased alongside hand guns and marijuana.
Nina followed that advice before lugging her bag to her tenth-floor room. There she showered, napped for half an hour, then changed into Khaki shorts, a white t-shirt, and a black baseball cap. She also rubbed on a generous portion of sun block before descending to the lobby and hailing yet another taxi. "The Orange Bowl." The driver-maybe all of fifteen years old-warned, "Only practice there today, lady." "The Orange Bowl."
Nina sat in the rear of the car, eyed the ticket voucher, and reflected on her brief meeting with Ashley, on her covert mission, and on Trevor Stone's assassination.
She was sure of only a few things. First, Trevor's murder made her ill to her stomach, despite the passing of more than a month since the deed. On several occasions in recent weeks she woke in her bed from some fading dream with a great pressure sitting on her chest.
Second, with the slow-down in operations the Dark Wolves had nothing to do. The rest of the team sat around Southern Command at the beach playing cards and watching TV. Godfrey's big announcement about the end of the war suggested even less work would come their way in the months ahead.
Finally, she knew her 'mission' lay outside the normal framework of her duties. Shep had contrived an assignment with no specific objective: go to south Florida and train. Only a high ranking General could get away with such drivel. However, that did not make her feel any better. Captain Nina Forest followed the rules, she followed protocol, she did not deviate from her role. She was a loyal soldier. Problem was, she no longer knew to whom that loyalty belonged.
Before that fateful day last month, she knew Trevor Stone to be her leader. All the orders that flowed to her flowed ultimately from him. Her latest 'orders' came in the form of a request from Trevor's widow and the blessing of Shepherd. No paperwork, no responsible party other than herself.
So why did she do this?
The idea of Centurians assassinating Trevor made sense. But a human conspiracy? Why would aliens do the bidding of human assassins? If someone other than the invaders bore responsibility for the act, then Trevor's death should have come from a modern Lee Harvey Oswald. Besides, the initial findings from the Internal Security investigation supported the facts as the country knew them.
None of it made much sense, but Nina knew that understanding the complexities of politics did not rank as one of her strong points. She preferred things more straight forward.
The taxi drove into the surprisingly well-populated neighborhoods of Little Havana. Children rode bicycles in celebration of summer school recess, street vendors sold newspapers and all manner of food from hot dogs (of questionable pedigree) to flavored ices; a man sat on his steps strumming a guitar while his daughter and boyfriend danced; another man leaned against a palm tree watching traffic go by with a cigar in his mouth.
There was one part of Miami Nina did not like at all: traffic. Under normal circumstances she did not like riding in cars. She liked it even less in this city where traffic seemed to nearly match pre-war levels. Taxis and delivery trucks, motorcycles and convertibles zipped along side streets, up and down boulevards, on to and off expressways.
Many of those cars ran on standard gasoline, some drove on hybrid systems using electric engines and batteries. She saw a few that even looked as if they were steam-powered.
In any case, her ride brought her to the stadium, a decaying horse-shoe shaped football arena built in the late 1930s. She paid the driver and exited, adjusting her rifle as she strolled toward the 'West Plaza' gate where big letters welcomed: Miami Orange Bowl.
Three older men and a younger one sat under an awning at a portable table playing a game Nina first mistook for cards before realizing it to be dominoes. They gave her a passing glance as she approached the ticket window, interested more in another round of 'muggins' than they were in the pale blond woman with the big gun and ponytail. A thin man with a gray mustache put aside a newspaper and grudgingly welcomed her at the ticket window. "I have this," she slipped the voucher under the security glass. "No game today. Practice," he returned the slip.
Nina did not know what to do other than retreat. She stepped backwards and nearly bumped into the chubby belly of one of the domino players who, apparently, had actually taken an interest in her after all.
The man's breath smelled of sweet liquor. Small beads of sweat peppered his forehead below the brim of a baseball cap. He eyed her but not in the way most men eyed her. She felt certain he did not inspect her form but, rather, her person; evaluating her on some level.
His tightly-pinched lips suggested he did not feel comfortable with his next move, but he held out his hand anyway. She gave him the voucher. He spoke to the ticket-taker behind the window in a fast voice and in a language beyond her comprehension, probably Spanish.
The man behind the glass acted surprised, shrugged his shoulders, said something defensive in the same language, and then sighed.
The chubby domino player ripped the stub on Nina's voucher and pointed toward the window again before returning to the table and the dominoes. Nina's second trip to the window resulted in a hand-written 'ticket' giving a row and seat number in 'Section C.'
She walked the empty halls of the stadium's infrastructure, watching the stenciled symbols until finding her section, then ascending the concrete vomitory into the late afternoon sunshine again.
Orange seats arranged in two tiers swept around a finely-trimmed football field, enclosing the stadium except for the east end. There stood bent and damaged support pillars that, she figured, once held a scoreboard. Further off through that opening she saw the relatively intact skyscrapers of downtown.
Nina found her seat and became the only spectator in the stands although several kids and coaches gathered on the far side line. The players-about thirty-wore white practice uniforms and helmets. Different coaches worked with different groups of players.
A kicker used a tee to boot a field goal through the east goal posts from the five yard line. A boy no more than eight retrieved the football for him. The kicker moved the tee to the fifteen yard line, and kicked again. The process repeated for several minutes as his field goal attempts grew more challenging. He missed from the twenty and the forty-five but hit everything else in between before beginning the process again from the five.
About mid-way through the kicker's second go-around and as the quarterbacks started throwing to receivers running out and up patterns, a man took the seat next to her. He wore rugged tan pants and a gray golf shirt. His eyes hid behind dark sun glasses and a white straw hat with a batik print band covered what she guessed to be a bald head. He spoke in a cheerful tone from a mouth partially hidden under a bushy mustache.
"Well hello, Ms. Forest."
"Captain Forest. Do you know me?"
He recited, "Nina Forest, born and raised in Kutztown, Pennsylvania. Entered the Army National Guard out of high school and trained as a Blackhawk pilot but also drew some juicy ferry missions for Apaches and Cobras. You joined the Philly police and quickly qualified for SWAT duty as well as air patrol. You may not know this, but records recovered at the Pentagon suggest you fired the first shots of this war when you killed what we now know to be a Jabberwock in the Kimmel Theater at the National Constitution Museum. Big attaboy for you."
He removed his sun glasses, turned to her and winked.
"Then it's true. Gordon Knox is still alive."
"I don't suppose you're here to catch practice, are you? The Hurricanes have a big game this week but not too many people have the time to come out. I guess college football just isn't what it used to be."
She said, "I didn't know they were still playing college football. I thought most of the college-aged kids were in the military."
"Well, it's not like it used to be," Knox admitted. "Faculty members and people from the community round out the roster. It's more like an amateur football club as opposed to old-world collegiate athletics. Not too many schools holding classes these days, either. Florida State is playing again. They've got the campus running up in Tallahassee. I hear they're trying to get the University of Florida going, but it seems no one wants to be in Gainesville these days; the smell from the Jaw-Wolf feces still hovers over the whole town."
Nina glanced around at the players, the stadium, and the skyline saying, "Well this place almost feels like the invasion never happened. Seriously, traffic? Football practice?"
"Miami held out," Gordon told her. "For all the fighting and suffering here, the city kept working. Not because of government, but because of the people. So they recovered faster here. Business, agriculture, industry…there's a sense of normalcy here, but if you look close you can see the scars. Still, no where I'd rather be."
"Listen, I didn't come here to talk about business or football, but you know that."
Knox smiled and pointed to the practice field where a receiver lay flat on the grass with a defensive back hovering overhead and the ball cascading away end over end across the turf.
"Did you see that hit? I don't think the receiver even saw it coming. Still, a good hit doesn’t mean much if you can't get the other guy to drop the ball."
"Is that what happened with you?" Nina asked in an effort to get to the point. She hated double speak and pretension. "Or did you just want to retire and faked your own house fire?"
He chuckled, stroked his mustache, and answered, "Let's just say I had a visit from some people who thought I was in the way of the changing of the guard. I had some fun, then decided to move on. I've always preferred Miami, anyhow. I consider this town my home." "So you gave Ashley a ticket voucher, so she could find you if she needed your help." "And here I find you sitting." "I guess that's a bit of a surprise," she said. "Not really."
"What do you mean? Look, no one is more surprised about me being here than I am. I'm just saying, I'm not sure how I'm mixed up in this."
"Is that so? Well, I guess it would be to you. But to me it fits. From what I understand, there's a whole year of surprises you can't remember. How strange is that?"
Nina sensed something in his tone akin to a cat playing with a mouse.
"W-what do you mean? What do you know?"
He shrugged. "No more than you, not really. I wasn't by Trevor's side in those days and no one kept really detailed records back then. It was all too small, I suppose. Still, I've got to give you credit. You all toughed it out when you could've just packed it in and played it safe. Guess that's what I always liked about Trevor."
Nina gazed down, her eyes looking not at her hands but at the dark spots in her mind where memories should have been.
He said, "I guess I don't know any more than you do. I know you had some sort of implant from The Order. The story goes that there were two implants and that they had to spirit you away from one of Voggoth's bases in order to save you."
She nodded absently. "Trevor led the rescue mission. At least that's what Shep told me."
Gordon pushed on, "Interesting, I've heard a couple of variations of that story, including Trevor being one of The Order's prisoners at the same facility, near Allentown. I wonder how he ended up there. And then I think of you, and how they had you under their control for a spell. Sometimes I wonder if, well, if they didn't use you to get to him."
Her eyes widened and she spat, "Are you suggesting I betrayed him? Is that it? That's not possible. I'm just saying, I could never have done that."
"Really?" He stroked his mustache again with the air of a scientist observing an experiment. "Now wouldn't that be something, if they got to you and made you give Stone up."
Nina wondered. She felt Shepherd kept information from her. Maybe to protect her. Maybe so she would never know that she once betrayed Trevor.
Her mind could not accept that. She refused to accept that.
"Look, I'm not here to play games. His wife said you would help."
"Help with what? What is there to do, Captain Forest?"
"Don't give me that," she scolded. "I know about you, Knox. I know you had your fingers in everything. If Trevor's assassination was more than it's been made out to be, then you'd have some place to start."
He answered, "I've been making a few phone calls, visiting with some old friends, and reading the newspapers. I particularly like this morning's edition. The front page story is about our President's peace deal. Isn't that wonderful? Nothing like blaming the victim. A great way to dampen the anti-alien feelings and an even better way to turn a nice chunk of the population into gutless sheep. Our new President's big revelation is that mankind brought this upon ourselves. The only way we can have peace, of course, is if we show how non-violent we are."
Nina broke in, "Seems to me like being violent was winning this war."
Gordon smiled; it seemed he absolutely loved her response. "So the politicians get everything they wanted and can make at least some of the people distrustful of the only group that might replace all these new-age sleaze-balls, the military."
"So you think he's lying? You think there's another reason for this whole invasion."
Gordon nodded and said, "Only people who want to believe that it's our fault are going to believe that. I doubt Godfrey even believes it himself, but it gives him what he always wanted, a chance to turn back the clock and make America what it used to be."
She narrowed her eyes and said, "Tell me something, Mr. Director of Intelligence. If this was a conspiracy within our own government, how come you didn't see it coming?"
Something flashed over Gordon's face, some mix of sadness and regret; her question had stung. He took a moment to compose himself and then spoke slowly, measuring each word.
"That's a good question, one that has kept me up at nights. The truth is, Imperial Intelligence isn't as big as people think and those assets are deployed behind enemy lines, or scouring the planet looking for other survivors. I can tell you about the resistance in Europe or the southern hemisphere, but not much about what was going on in our territories. We were more like the C.I.A., not the F.B.I."
He paused for a moment. Just when Nina started to speak, Gordon turned to her and his demeanor changed from something sad to something mad.
"But let me tell you this. Even with those excuses, there should have been hints coming through, reports that never made it to my desk. Of all the people who might have been involved in this, at least a couple had to have top clearance and access to the flow of information to Trevor, to me. I have my suspicions."
She felt his eyes nearly burn through her. Gordon made his point; he had a score to settle.
A series of whistles from the practice field signaled the end of the work out. The players hustled toward water coolers, pulling off their helmets along the way. Nina wondered how they kept from passing out in this heat. "So what about it? Are you going to help me?" "Help you with what?" She grunted, "To do what Ashley Stone asked me to do. To find out the truth about the assassination."
"But here's the thing, Captain. I'm quite happy watching football, lying on the beach, and sipping cold drinks. I'm thinking that if I'm lucky, the bad guys or old age will put me out of my misery before all the mistakes our President is making causes everything to collapse."
"I don't believe you. Besides, Ashley thinks that you'll help, even if just for her sake."
He turned to her as if ready to speak, but held his tongue. His eyes studied her for a moment then he asked, "You are a very interesting person, Captain Forest."
"Stop wasting time."
"Take your hair, for instance. You have very nice blond hair, with some soft natural curls in it. From what I can see, it easily lays on your shoulders, yet for almost all your life you've taken that hair and bundled it up into a ponytail. The question is, why bother? Why not just cut your hair short? Have you ever let it fall loose to your shoulders? If not, why do you hide it? I'm thinking there's more than just your hair hidden. I'm thinking there's a lot more to you that maybe you don’t even understand."
"Look, I'm not in the mood for games. I'll ask again. Are you going to help me?"
Gordon paused and watched the players file toward the locker room. After several seconds of consideration, he warned, "There's nothing half way about me. If I'm going to help, I'm going to bring it full bore. All out, do you understand?" "I understand. I think." "But it's not me I'm worried about," he cautioned. "It's you." "Me?" "Yes. Tell me, Nina, are you willing to do whatever it takes to find out the truth of Trevor's assassination?" She answered, "Yes." His words grew rougher, "Will you keep pushing, even when people start pushing back?" To ask a second time annoyed her. She snipped, "Yes."
Gordon's voice growled and grew to shout, "I'm talking about kicking over every rock to see what slithers out. I'm talking about biting into this thing with your teeth and not letting go until we know what really happened. Are you willing to do that? Will you? Even if it tears The Empire apart?" Nina answered so loud and forceful her voice echoed across the stadium. "Yes, damn it! Yes!" Gordon's eyes widened, his head tilted, and his voice softened. "Why?" Nina felt her breath heave in and out. But as for her motivation, she did not really know. — Director of Internal Security Ray Roos glided down the stairs and onto the tarmac of Miami International Airport. Behind him the whine of a Learjet's engines slowed from a roar to a hum.
The I.S. jet parked away from the public terminals but a reception committee waited, led by a portly mustached-man dressed in a short-sleeved police uniform with a shiny gold star. Sweat stains radiated from the man’s armpits and along his back.
Two associates stood on either side of the policeman. The silver of their armor reflected the setting sun in sharp glints. Despite their heavy gear, the two Witiko Skytroops did not appear uncomfortable in the humidity.
Roos slipped out of his black sport jacket as he approached the gathering, revealing both a white dress shirt and a nine millimeter handgun. He casually hooked the jacket with one finger and carried it over his shoulder.
"How you boys doin’? You must be Chief Hobbs. Yes, I’ll bet you are."
Roos extended a hand and cocked his head in a cheesy grin.
"That’s right…uh…Mister Director," Hobbs’ hand felt slippery and sticky all at once. "This here’s K’Beel and M’Pwitt, they’re my liaison officers down here." Roos eyed the two aliens. Their pupils glowed yellow. "Hmm…okay. That my ride?" Roos referred to a white and gold Bell LongRanger helicopter in front of the hangar. Hobbs nodded.
Roos walked toward the chopper. The two aliens and Hobbs followed. Roos stopped. He wagged his finger first at Hobbs then the two Witiko. He spoke in a voice that sounded one part friendly, one part friendly warning.
"I’m in charge down here, just so there’s no misunderstandings, see?" He focused on the Witiko. "Besides, you guys do things too subtle-like. Yes you do."
The Witiko glanced at one another. Roos started toward the chopper again, still talking. The Witiko hovered behind, unsure what to do. "I’m gunna show you my idea of subtle. Yessir." Roos held one finger up and moved it in a circle. "Okay now, let’s get this whirlybird in the air, we got work to do." The sun set over Miami. — Gordon finished the top button on a blue silk shirt, thought better, and unclasped it again in deference to June in Miami; despite nightfall the heat showed no sign of abating.
He found a snub-nose. 38 revolver in the top drawer of a white oak dresser, thumbed open the chamber, confirmed a round in every hole, and flipped it into place again with a flick of his wrist. The. 38 slipped nicely into a small holder at the base of his back.
Gordon stroked his mustache and checked for gray. Nothing but black there.
Satisfied with his appearance, Gordon walked from his master bedroom to the wide and bright white living room. Along the way he wrapped two knuckles on the guest room door.
On the other side of that door Nina finished preparations of her own. As Gordon had suggested, she stowed her combat fatigues to better blend with the night crowd on South Beach. So she traded her combat gear for a basic white sun dress with spaghetti straps.
Nina placed one short-heeled shoe on the bed, grabbed a. 380 automatic from atop the mattress, pulled the dress high on her leg revealing a thigh band holster, and eased the pistol into place…
…Gordon’s black BMW 540i sedan made its way through Coral Gables and turned north on Route 1. Nina fidgeted pensively in the passenger’s seat as Gordon pushed hard on the gas pedal, rocketing along the boulevard, switching and swerving between lanes as if purposely adding to her discomfort.
Scattered lights bounced off the windshield, mainly from isolated street lamps, some burning electricity, others from oil. Periodic splashes of pink, yellow, or blue came from neon lights outside trading posts and gathering spots. Of all the cities reborn after Armageddon, Miami felt the most unchanged yet it still seemed strange to her. Yes, mainly empty streets but pockets bursting with color and energy. She wondered, would the old Miami have been even more alien to her?
Prior to the end-of-the-world, the gold coast hosted an eclectic collection of ethnic groups, religions, traditions, and races. The invading aliens turned Miami into a fortress city, in which all those different groups came together for the common defense, joined in that defense by boatloads of Cuban refugees as well as a sizable portion of the Cuban coast guard. The sheer determination of the city’s well-armed residents held the invaders at bay for years until The Empire relieved the pressure.
The gallant fighters of Miami not only embraced The Empire with open arms, they turned their city into one of the largest and most productive in the nation.
Much to her chagrin, Miami also had the distinction of being one of the few metropolitan areas with lots of traffic, a fact emphasized as Gordon swerved along Route 1 at a rapid clip. Not nearly at pre-war levels, of course, but after all the emptiness she had seen around the country, it seemed surreal to pass seven cars in a row.
Truth was, Nina did not like sitting in a car's passenger seat. She could jump out of airplanes, ride in choppers, and fight monsters yet Nina Forest never felt comfortable in a ground vehicle, at least not as a passenger.
The 540i left behind Coral Gables and headed toward Miami proper. As had been the case before Armageddon, the Miami skyline glowed with color; its remaining skyscrapers shined like beacons of steel and light but instead of calling out to tourists and immigrants those lights called out in defiance. This city would not only survive; it refused to lose its identity. But the reminders of battles fought remained.
Nina spied the remains of what a partly shattered sign identified as the "American Airlines Center". While palm trees still lined the sidewalk in front of the modern arena, the circular structure had been torn in two, the front half peeled away like a child’s doll house. The debris from whatever calamity had shredded the facility had long since been hauled away, but squatters lived inside, probably figuring half a house better than none.
Gordon navigated the sedan through a concrete maze of ramps and merges, leaving behind the mainland and rocketing out across Biscayne Bay via the MacArthur Causeway. The lights from downtown shimmied off the water revealing silhouettes of cigarette boats, yachts, and military patrol craft cruising the calm seas.
The causeway ran parallel to the Port of Miami. Most of the port glowed with activity as ships both large and small either arrived from points north or departed from the port to trace the inter-coastal waterway up and down the eastern seaboard.
However, the part of the port that had once been the heart of the cruise industry lay dormant, like a graveyard. The stern of the Norwegian Sun stood in the waters there, its silent turbines pointing toward the stars. The rest of its 78,000 tonnage had long ago splintered and jammed into the harbor depths. The even-larger Royal Caribbean Navigator of the Seas listed to port further long, its windows and hull burnt black.
Nina gaped at the massive ships, once mighty symbols of man’s power to sail the seas, now sitting idle as symbols of the limits to that power.
The 540i followed the causeway as it swooped into Miami Beach…
…High above downtown, a white and gold LongRanger police helicopter flew amidst the skyscrapers unaware of the sedan below.
Ray Roos sat alongside the pilot holding a pen light. He lifted his eyes from a clipboard to survey the city. It felt good to be out on the streets. He had spent too much of his post-Armageddon time listening, snooping, playacting, and waiting. He wanted to be doing; getting things done more directly. And now he had the power to do things how he saw fit.
Being his first visit to Miami, Roos intended to get a feel of the city from above. It did not take him long to dislike the place. Too many people-more so than even post-Armageddon New York or Boston-and they were too laid back. Roos did not like laid back. Laid back people were harder to motivate, even with threats.
Too many lights, too. What were these people thinking? Why not put a big sign out front that said, "Come squash us!"
Roos shook his head disapprovingly.
This city needs an attitude adjustment. "Uh, Chopper 1 this is downtown, you copy?" Ray clicked the button on his transmitter. "Yeah, Hobbs, what you got for me?"
The helicopter banked right and headed east, following the same circle pattern for the last half hour. The entire bird vibrated with the running of the rotors. "I’ve got Ernie Cordera." Roos’ discomfort with the city surfaced as agitation in his voice. "Yeah? So what? What’s his connection to Forest?" "No connection to Forest." Ray shook his head in even greater agitation and tapped his thumb impatiently on his leg. "You know I don’t like to waste time. Yes, you know that." "The connection is to Gordon Knox. Cordera is an I.S. officer supervising a tambourine monitoring station down here."
Roos stiffened in his seat and growled into the microphone, "Knox has a connection to an I.S. officer and this is the first I’m hearing about it?"
"The connection goes back to before everything went to Hell. In the old world, Knox and Cordera worked CIA Cuban operations out of Miami."
"So what," Roos spat. "Half the folks in Dade County used to spook Castro back then."
"Yeah," Hobbs’ voice carried an edge of its own that came through over the crackles of the radio. "Well half of Dade County didn’t get a phone call tonight from an old friend then go running off without telling the wife where he was going. At least, that’s according to the misses. You’d like her, she talks a lot."
Roos chewed on that then transmitted, "Sounds like I would. Yes, I think I’d like to meet her, too. I think I’d like to be there when Ernie gets home tonight. What’s the address?" "Miami Shores." Roos turned to the pilot and waved his hand north. "Miami Shores." The LongRanger changed course, this time banking hard left and swooping lower as it gained speed…
…The black 540i inched along Ocean Drive carefully picking its way through the throngs of party goers and sight seers who crossed the street between the beach and the strip with drinks in hand and arms around waists. Had it not been for so many holsters and the occasional police officer with battle armor and automatic weapons, it might just be another pre-Armageddon night on Miami Beach.
Music drifted from the glitzy fascias of night clubs, playing an eclectic mix of Latin, Caribbean, Reggae, rock and pop, most from the old world but a few tunes composed in recent times.
Gordon responded to the wave of a young, white-dressed male attendant who wore gold chains that glimmered against his tanned chest. That attendant guarded a prime parking spot.
Knox eased the car into place and killed the engine. The attendant hurried to the passenger side and held the door open with one hand while offering the other to the lady inside. Nina ignored the assistance, swung her legs onto the pavement and stood. She further ignored the young attendant’s leers.
She stopped and surveyed her surroundings. People packed the street, shoulder to shoulder. Nina had not seen so many people so closely grouped outside of military camp.
Gordon motioned toward the brightest and loudest building on the block. Nina furled her brow in displeasure at Gordon’s choice of rendezvous’. She did not understand why a public spot would be preferable to a quiet alleyway or empty parking lot.
She sighed and brushed passed the attendant. As she moved, Nina became aware of eyes studying her.
Her shy temperament surfaced for the first time in years and she felt out of place. She hurried next to Gordon and the two entered a doorway below a logo sporting a red and blue parrot sitting on a green palm tree under the name "Mango’s."
The entrance opened to a rectangular club stretching deep across a two-story hall with banisters and spectators gazing down from above. On the far side a band strummed a methodical Latin beat that made for slow but sharp sways on a dance floor situated between clusters of round-top tables.
The crowded complex bathed in electric blue and pink amidst palm trees, ceiling fans, and walls painted with land and seascapes. Scantily clad waitresses with flowers in their hair shuttled trays of exotic concoctions, somehow managing to balance the glassware while pushing through the gulf of humanity.
Nina found herself drifting in the tide of people. Her eyes darted back and forth. The music drummed in her ears like a hypnotist’s watch, the aroma of cigarettes and perfume and cologne and fading coconut-scented sun lotion swirled together and tickled her nose. The tapestry of people rolled and twisted around her.
She saw a dark black man with three gold loops in each ear swaying alone at the end of the bar; a Hispanic woman with a necklace made from seashells mixed with rubies smiling and talking to a red headed girl sporting a tattoo of a screaming eagle above well-displayed cleavage; a boisterous, sun-burned fat man dancing fluidly with a pair of oriental women hanging on his wide arms who slipped sips from margarita glasses in his mouth one after another; a cluster of young women posed like mannequins eying the dance floor while holding techno-colored drinks to their lips.
Armageddon brought monsters to Earth, yet this room of people felt far more alien to her than anything she had faced on the battlefield.
Suddenly, Gordon’s hand pulled her between dancers and servers and voyeurs. He led her to a table in a shadow below a palm tree. There waited a man with bushy eyebrows and a tight-fitting white shirt over a hairy chest. In one hand he held a short glass with something green inside. The man eyed Gordon until Nina entered his range of vision. Then his eyes switched.
Gordon spoke first, "Ernie, mi amigo, demasiado largo puesto que hablamos."
The man with the bushy eyebrows put aside his drink, rose to his feet, and shook Knox’s outstretched hand while flashing a genuine grin. "Soy donde he vivido siempre. Usted, Gordon, movido a cosas mas grandes." Gordon’s response came in a grin. Ernie, motioned for the two to join him. His eyes held on Nina for a long second. "Usted trae un presente hermoso para mi." Gordon warned Ernie, "Cuidadoso. La senora rompe mas que corazones." Nina sat and grunted at Gordon. "It would be best, my friend, if we spoke in English, for the sake of my companion." The man nodded. "Si. Oh. That means ‘yes.’" Nina frowned in Ernie’s direction. The men found that funny. Ernie’s good humor lasted only a moment. "Tell me Gordo, are you serious?" "Very serious." "Then what do we know? Hmm? What do we know about the assassination?"
Nina felt uncomfortable discussing the matter in such a public place. However, as she glanced around she realized that the sound of the band and the crowd meant that the only persons in earshot sat at the table.
Gordon stated what he knew: "One ship. A Redcoat shuttle landed at the meeting site, killed Trevor and his bodyguards, wounded Evan and others, then took off. It got blasted out of the air an hour later." "Yes." Gordon nodded, "And then our Witiko ‘friends’ gave us the location of the Redcoat base. So we could wipe them out." "Damn straight," Nina murmured. Ernie said, "That leaves a lot of questions no one has been asking."
Nina agreed. "Listen, the big question is how they got all the way from Mexico to D.C., without being spotted at one of the radar stations. Especially since the D.C. station is supposed to have all that area covered."
Gordon shook his head.
Nina reacted, "What? I’m just saying, how the Hell did they get all the way up there?"
Ernie offered, "Their ship was painted white, like our Eagles. To most people, it just looked like another one of our shuttles. But the radar stations, your friend is right Gordon, they control air traffic at the Mexican border and in key spots along the way. They should have spotted the flight and known it was unscheduled."
"It’s almost like they had stealth capability, don’t you think?" Gordon considered his words and added, "Wonder who else we know has that kind of ability?" Nina connected the dots but her conclusion did not come as a shock to the two men. "The Witiko. I mean, what if they gave the Redcoats a stealth field generator. Something like their Stingrays have?" "Or what if the Redcoats stole one? You know, the way we stole their shuttles?"
Nina did not get Gordon’s point. Ernie extrapolated: "That could be a believable cover story if they were ever caught. But, their ship was blown from the sky into pieces."
"Leaving no evidence," she finished.
Gordon, however, made a more important point. "You’re both missing the big question. The big question is not how did the Redcoats get all the way from Mexico to D.C., without being spotted. The question is why did they get spotted when they made their getaway? How did the Excalibur catch a sniff of them during their escape?" Nina tried to follow, "Maybe their stealth field failed?" "Or maybe," Gordon nearly growled, "they wanted to be found." The conversation paused for a moment. Music filled the gap.
Gordon continued with a question for Ernie, "And what have you found?"
The man smiled as he answered not to Gordon but to Nina, "Tell me, miss, are you aware of the ‘tambourine’ fence along the eastern seaboard? Hmm?"
Nina took pleasure in showing the scope of her knowledge.
"An early warning system of radar and sonar designed to spot and track anything in the air or sea that gets close to the Atlantic coast. It’s managed by Internal Security."
Ernie leaned forward, took a sip of his drink, and shared much more.
"I am one of the tambourine…drummers, I suppose. Our station in Miami oversees the coastline here, so as to keep us safe from all the bad things in that great big world out there. I have a friend. The way Gordon has me as a friend. You’ll find that we all have many friends in this business, yes, Gordo? This friend of mine works in tambourine central control outside of D.C., where all the data from all the stations is collected and analyzed."
Gordon added, "To coordinate response."
"Si. Oh, um, yes. Anyway, I did what you asked, Gordon. This friend of mine, he is certain-he swears — that a station on Long Island identified an inbound air ship of unknown origin penetrate the tambourine line off the coast of New Jersey, heading southwest."
Nina perked. Gordon kept a poker face and asked, "How long?"
"Less than an hour before the assassination. But there is more, Gordo. Another ship-this time outbound-tripped the electronic fence in the same area not long after." "The same ship?" Ernie answered, "This is unknown. But the size of the vessels was similar." Nina pounced, "Did they raise the alert? I mean, what did they do?"
"This is just the thing, miss. They did nothing. On that day, they had a very important visitor who was overseeing operations."
Gordon knew the answer before Ernie could speak: "Dante Jones."
Knox’s tone suggested satisfaction, not surprise. Nina’s head swiveled fast between the two men. She noted how their eyes seemed to speak without words.
"You knew? You knew, didn’t you?"
Ernie explained, "Gordo had me check the D.C., center first. He knew Mr. Jones to be there that day."
"A hunch," Gordon admitted. "As soon as I heard what happened, I wanted to know where all of Trevor’s people were. Jones was in an important place. I had my friend here ask questions."
"And that’s when my friend told me about the air space…hmmm…violations." Gordon spoke fast, "And the data tapes aren’t around anymore, are they?" Ernie nodded his head and sipped the last drops of his drink. Nina said, "So there’s no record? Only your friend’s word that he saw something. I mean, no evidence."
"Si. He went back to check the center’s logs for that time and found no warnings, no sightings. As far as Internal Security is concerned, all was quiet on the…hmmm… eastern front." Again Nina spotted a silent conversation between the two old comrades. Ernie smiled. "What? What is it?" Nina’s voice carried the slightest hint of a pout. Gordon said, "The buoys. The network. You have someone on it already, don’t you?" "Another one of our friends, Gordo."
Ernie pulled a folded paper from his pocket and stretched to hand it to Knox who examined the contents and nodded. He spoke when he noticed Nina glaring at him, "The tambourine line is a series not only of monitoring stations but computers. Networked computers. Some on land, some on buoys in the Atlantic Ocean. With the right encryption codes, someone could access the backup information on the hard drives on those computers. Assuming they haven’t been erased."
Ernie laughed, "These amateurs? Half of the I.S. officers I work with don’t even know how the tambourine line works. Our friend is going to the buoy off Abaco Island tonight. He will meet you in the morning."
"Wait a sec," Nina’s voice wavered. "You said the fence was tripped near New Jersey. Why would that info be down here?"
"It’s a network," Gordon answered. "Someone with the right skills can hack into the whole system from one terminal." "Yes," Ernie laughed. "Someone I know made sure this to be the case, did you not?" Nina glared at Gordon yet again. "You? You built this into the tambourine line?" He answered, "Always have a backup plan, Captain." Ernie quipped, "And oh yes, hmmm, never trust anyone." "What matters," Gordon insisted, "is that we’ll have some answers tomorrow."
"No, Gordo. What did you always tell me? You’ll have more information. Answers are the stories you tell from that information and stories can be told a lot of different ways."