Dalton turned his attention from the other men as the colonel and two civilians came in.
“All right,” Colonel Metter said as he walked to the end of the conference table. “Let’s get this going.” He pointed to his right. “This is Mr. Raisor, from the Central Intelligence Agency. He’s brought us a high-level tasking direct from Washington for one A-Team to participate in some rather unique training. Accompanying Mr. Raisor is Dr. Hammond.” Metter pointed to the woman. “Mr. Raisor, Dr. Hammond, this is Captain Anderson and Master Sergeant Trilly. As you’ve requested.”
That answered one of Dalton’s first questions.
Raisor and Hammond leaned across the conference table and shook each man’s hand. Raisor’s grip was strong, his body lean. He had thinning black hair and a thin face that was bland in a way that Dalton associated with bureaucratic spies. But the man’s eyes caught Dalton’s attention. They were flat and emotionless, almost bored. Dalton had seen that look before. Dead eyes, the sign of someone who had done dirty work in the covert world, and the only time eyes like that came alive was when someone’s life was on the line. Dalton had worked with men like that, who relished combat, not concerned about the cost in terms of human suffering and death. That put Dalton on alert, because it meant the CIA had assigned one of its few killers to this project. Raisor had something in his hand that he was fingering, but Dalton couldn’t make out exactly what it was, only catching a glint of gold.
“And this is Sergeant Major Dalton, my senior enlisted man.”
Raisor met his gaze briefly and Dalton swore there was the hint of a cold smile on the agent’s lips, as if recognizing a kindred spirit.
Raisor pulled a manila folder out of his briefcase. There was a red Top Secret cover stapled to it. “Gentlemen, what I’m going to brief you on is classified top secret, special compartmentalization. You may not discuss this with anyone, even if they have a top secret clearance.” Raisor’s voice was low and smooth, one used to speaking in dark rooms about secret material.
“The subject matter may seem a bit, shall we say, strange, outrageous even, but let me assure you that this is a very serious issue. First, though, let me make sure we can get the right people.” He slid a piece of paper to the colonel. “Besides the two men we requested be here, we need a complete team, drawn from those who participated in Trojan Warrior.”
“Trojan Warrior?” Metter asked. He had taken command a year and a half ago.
“It was a classified training program two of our teams— 054 and 055— participated in three years ago,” Dalton quickly told the colonel.
Metter didn’t even look at the list, passing it to Dalton. Raisor’s statement answered the question as to why 054’s team leader wasn’t here; he hadn’t been on the team when it had gone through the Trojan Warrior training program. Anderson had gone through the training as the team leader of 055. Dalton didn’t need to look at the list— he knew every man who had gone through that training and how many were left in the battalion from the twenty-five original members.
“It would be advantageous if you picked men from that list who did not have families,” Raisor added.
Dalton put the paper down in front of him. “Because you think men without families are expendable?”
“Because we think men without families are better security risks for the duration of the operation,” Raisor answered.
“Do you need a full team?” Dalton asked.
“Yes,” Raisor said.
“We can’t do that. Of the twenty-five names on this list,” Dalton said, still not looking at the paper, “there are only seven left in the battalion. The others have either left the service or moved to other assignments.”
“Then give me all seven.” Raisor sounded irritated.
Dalton held up the list. “What does Trojan Warrior have to do with this briefing? That program was dropped two years ago.”
“We’ll get to that later in the briefing,” Raisor said.
“Then why don’t we get started so we know what we’re getting these men into?” Colonel Metter suggested.
Raisor looked at the other three Special Forces men. “I assume those of you who were in Trojan Warrior heard of Operation Grill Flame?”
Dalton glanced at Captain Anderson, who returned the look with a roll of his eyes. Trilly looked like he was about to answer, but Dalton beat him to it. “That was the code name for a Defense Intelligence Agency operation using remote viewers.”
Raisor nodded. “That is correct.”
“Remote viewers?” Metter asked.
“Psychics,” Dalton said. “People who supposedly could see things at a distance just by using their minds.”
“Not supposedly,” Raisor said. “Grill Flame was real. And, contrary to what people believe, it still exists. We just renamed it. It’s called Bright Gate now and we’ve taken over operational control of it from the military.”
Dalton didn’t blink at the implied slam from the younger man. “Besides Trojan Warrior, I know about Grill Flame from an operational standpoint.”
That gave Raisor pause. “What was that?”
“When I was in Lebanon in the early eighties, your people brought in some Grill Flame operators to help search for the hostages in Beirut. We busted a few doors where they told us they ‘saw’ the hostages being held. We came up with nothing and almost got our asses shot off a few times.”
“The success rate has increased dramatically since then,” Raisor said. “So much so, that we’re ready to take the next step. Combine Trojan Warrior with Grill Flame for something completely new.”
The others in the room waited as Raisor stood. He walked to the podium in the front of the room. Using a remote, he turned down the lights. Dalton could see that the object Raisor had been playing with was a ring, which he had slipped over his left pinky. It looked like a college ring but it was much too small for Raisor. The slide projector came on.
Raisor’s voice came out of the darkness next to the screen. “Gentlemen, we are passing into a new age of warfare.
We are literally entering a new dimension. One where the commonly accepted limitations of physics and the way combat has been conducted no longer apply.”
Dalton sighed and leaned back in his seat. He could just see Raisor briefing the Select Intelligence Committee in Congress with the same words and the same slides. It was the same way the initial briefings for Trojan Warrior had been conducted. He knew the slides hadn’t been made up to impress a bunch of green beanies who were going to have to do what they were ordered.
“There has never been a jump in warfare such as the one we are making with Psychic Warrior. The commonly accepted nexus points of war technology— the use of iron, the invention of the firearm, the plane, the tank, even the atomic bomb— all pale against the radical nature of Psychic Warrior.”
A new slide came up with the words Grill Flame written in bold black, with red flames encircling the letters.
“A little background is necessary in order to understand where we are now,” Raisor said. “Operation Grill Flame was started in 1981 as a joint Army-CIA program to examine the potential of remote viewing, or RVing— the ability to psychically see objects or locations at a distance. The primary responsibility for the project lay with the Army and the unit was based at Fort Meade.
“As your sergeant major has noted, the project had some growing pains. In fact, to read open source material on the project, you would think that the Army disbanded it four years ago and that no government organization is currently conducting research into any form of psychic operation.
“However, I can assure you, gentlemen, that while our government has publicly disavowed any current psychic operation, four years ago Grill Flame, under the auspices of a group called Bright Gate, went deep underground at a very classified level.