The speech went on for ten minutes but the summation was simple: join Artad or be his enemy. And Artad’s Shadow had been Shi Huangdi, the Yellow Emperor, the founder of China as they knew it. They had less than one hour to vote and make their decision.
When the screen went blank the hall exploded in pandemonium.
Turcotte cursed. A buzzing noise had been sounding for the last minute. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his SATPhone. He cocked his arm back to throw it away. He was about a hundred meters away from the runway, a kilometer away from Area 51 and still walking into the desert.
Turcotte sat down in the sand. The phone continued to ring. Decades of training fought with his emotions. Discipline versus feeling. He flipped the phone open. “What?”
“It’s Quinn. The Chinese have been issued an ultimatum by Artad. Join him or fight him. The Stennis and the Washington along with the Jahre Viking are headed toward Hawaii and the ships are shielded. The Navy’s tried attacking the Alien Fleet — as they’re calling it — and lost an attack sub in the process.”
Turcotte lay on his back, staring up at the blue sky. His anger was gone. He felt so tired all he wanted to do was close his eyes and sleep. To forget about it all. “And? Nothing I can do about any of that.”
“Kelly Reynolds has sent us a message. Text. Forwarded through Pearl to us.” Turcotte sat up straight. “Kelly?” The thought of the reporter stranded on Easter Island stirred him. She’d hoped the aliens could bring good to the human race and he knew that her current situation made him seem like a whining child. “Yes.”
“How did she get it out?”
“She piggybacked it via the guardian SAT-link to the fleet they’ve captured. I can display it on your phone.”
“Do it.” Turcotte pulled the phone away and read the lines on the small screen.
THE GRAIL IS HERE
ASPASIA’S SHADOW HAS PARTAKEN
HIS FLEET WILL ATTACK HAWAII CONSOLIDATE, THEN ASSAULT US WEST COAST
THEN WORLD
FLEET IS PROTECTED WITH SHIELD EASTER ISLAND PROTECTED WITH SHIELD FIND MASTER GUARDIAN TO DROP ALL SHIELDS AND DEPROGRAM NANOVIRUS LOCATION MASTER GUARDIAN LOCATION MASTER GUARDIAN IN MOTHERSHIP IN MOTHERSHIP
BUT MASTER GUARDIAN NEEDS KEY TO BE FREED TO WORK BUT MASTER GUARDIAN NEEDS KEY TO BE FREED TO WORK
KEY IS EXCALIBUR, MUST BE FREED FROM SCABBARD KEY IS EXCALIBUR, MUST BE FREED FROM SCABBARD
ASPASIA’S SHADOW SEEKS EXCALIBUR ASPASIA’S SHADOW SEEKS EXCALIBUR ON SAGAMARTHA ON SAGAMARTHA
Turcotte read the message one more time, then put the phone back to his ear as he got to his feet. “What else?”
“Mualama has something on the second mothership. Also, Yakov’s been going through the German archives and has found some interesting stuff.” “What about Excalibur?”
“Mualama thinks the Watchers had it but then it disappeared.” Quinn paused. “I don’t know, sir, but I think this is all connected. The second mothership, the Master Guardian, Excalibur, and the shields.”
“What is Sagamartha?” “I’m checking on that.”
There was a lot in the message that Turcotte turned over in his mind. “What else?”
“Someone else must think we know something, too,” Quinn said. “Who?”
“I’ve got the CINC-PAC on the line. He wants to talk to you.”
“Why?”
“How the hell should I know?”
The explosion from the usually mild and meek Major Quinn caused Turcotte to smile for the first time in a long while.
“I think he wants your advice about the Alien Fleet, considering you had me send the warning about the shield,” Quinn added in a milder tone. “Given that we’re the ‘experts’ on the Airlia.”
“Put him through,” Turcotte said.
The entire Alien Fleet slowed to a halt. The maneuver took a while as the mass of the three capital ships was enormous and, even with their screws turning at full-thrust reverse, it was over twenty minutes before they became still. The massive doors the nanomachines had built into the bow of the Jahre Viking slowly swung open.
Inside, two submarines, identical in appearance down to the name stenciled on the sail — USS Springfield—floated side by side. One was the original, captured by Aspasia’s Shadow’s forces off the shore of Easter Island. The other was the copy, made by the nanomachines.
Both powered up and sailed out of the bow, slipping below the waves, taking their place in the fleet. All the ships began moving again, picking up speed. Inside the massive open area in the front of the Jahre Viking, two more copies of the attack submarine Springfield began to materialize molecule by molecule. The two in the water were different from the original Springfield, Los Angeles class, though. Near the bow on either side were newly constructed intakes. As the two submarines cleared the Viking, water was sucked in, passed along a series of baffles that increased the pressure and speed of the flow, then ejected it through two openings just in front of the rear fins.
A standard LA class sub was rated at almost thirty-five knots, very fast indeed for a submarine. With the added propulsion system, the two subs began accelerating away until they were slicing through the water at over sixty knots.
The F-14 carrying McGraw and Olivetti edged behind the S-3 Viking airborne tanker. A refueling probe extended downward and latched onto the intake on the F-14. Fuel from the large pods underneath the wings of the Viking flowed through the probe and into the nearly empty tanks of the F-14. The transfer continued for over two minutes until both pods were empty, then fuel from the rest of the Viking’s tanks were tapped until they were drained and the F-14’s full.
The probe disconnected. The Viking’s engines coughed, sputtered, then died. The plane nosed over and fell toward the ocean. The infected crew made no attempt to make an emergency water landing. It smashed into the ocean killing all on board and shattering into pieces.
In the sky above, the F-14 continued on its way across the Pacific on the mission assigned by Aspasia’s Shadow. Inside the cockpit, the nanovirus was at work on both men’s lungs, rearranging cells.
“Popeye” McGraw stirred in his machine-induced coma, crying out, almost like a dog having a bad dream, his hands weakly reaching out and pawing for the ejection seat handle. The cry turned to a yelp of pain as the Guide imprinting took charge, and punished the part of his brain that was still “free.” McGraw’s body was silent once more.
The vote in the Chinese Assembly in Beijing was swift and overwhelmingly in favor of siding with Artad. Several factors weighed in that decision.
First, was the fact that Artad’s Shadow had been Shi Huangdi. The first emperor in a country that, despite almost a half century of Communist rule, still revered the days when it was the Middle Kingdom and the center of the world. Here was an opportunity for China to return to its place as the leader of the world with the alien’s help. This was the deciding factor for the more emotional of the Chinese legislators.
Second, was the fact that the nuclear strike on Qian-Ling had been defeated. The more practical legislators saw it as a case of it you can’t beat him, join him. Even if the “him” was an alien.
Third, were the reports of what had happened to the American ships around Easter Island. A war was shaping up between the alien factions and there had been no offer of alliance from Aspasia’s Shadow on Easter Island. While the Chinese cheered the defeat of the Americans fleets, they also realized that the United States might just be the first domino to fall before Aspasia’s Shadow’s forces. Fourth, Chinese forces were already massing on the coast across from Taiwan and along the borders with North Korea and Vietnam. The world was in turmoil, the dreaded American fleet in the Pacific was for the moment not a factor, and the Chinese military was clamoring that it was time for China to strike. An alliance with Artad would undoubtedly help all their planned moves.