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Sample: First Three Chapters

Chapter 1

“Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men.”

John Emerich Edward Dalberg Acton (1834-1902)

Curtis fought back a surge of nausea and stared out the side window as the chopper began a bumpy descent. Damn motion sickness. “That it?”

“Yes, sir.” The pilot barked a military response, the first words out of his mouth since they took flight. “Mojave Air and Space Port, sir, welcome, sir.”

“Not where I’d expect to find the General.”

The pilot banked to the left, and Curtis watched as the dun- colored fields rolled and a long black runway and service roads suddenly rotated and veered to the right. His guts lurched. He closed his eyes and breathed through his mouth until he gained control of his queasiness. When he looked again, he was staring at a field full of parked airplanes. Not a military marking in sight. “Definitely not.”

The pilot touched a button on his earpiece. “Didn’t catch that, sir.”

“This is a civilian base.” Straight rows of hangers, squat white rectangles against a dusty backdrop, grew ever larger. “And this is a civilian aircraft.”

“Yes, sir. It is, sir.” The pilot’s mouth closed in a tight line; he had nothing more to say on the subject.

Curtis stifled a sigh of irritation. “I’m not an officer, don’t wear a uniform, and you needn’t call me sir.”

“Sorry, sir,” the young Lieutenant answered with no trace of humor. He turned his full attention to the dials and controls, speaking into his mouthpiece. “Flight Beta Tango Four to helipad four. Permission to land?”

A tinny voice emanated from the pilot’s headset, just loud enough to register to Curtis as a scratchy unintelligible whisper. The approaching buildings commanded all his attention. Once again, the gyroscope in his belly shuddered in outrage as the horizon zoomed out of sight. The craft turned to the west and the flat roofs lined up by some engineer’s delight in precision slid under him. When they straightened up again, his eyes caught the yellow circle of a helipad close by one of the larger buildings, still aligned with the others, but distanced, set apart.

As the craft approached roof level, Curtis noted the separate fence around this building and helipad. Though several of the other buildings had also been fenced – nothing unusual in that. To the rear and previously unnoticed, three silver Quonsets shimmered like a liquid mirage in the midday heat.

No visible activity on the surface gave any hint they approached a multi-billion dollar, recently completed military base. That is if the rumors are true, Curtis corrected himself.

A heavy thump jolted the craft and sent a twinge of pain up the length of his spine, rendering unnecessary the pilot’s announcement. “Sir, we’ve landed, sir.”

“Thank you, Lieutenant. What did you say your name was?” Curtis stretched his back, sure the descending whine from the recently killed motor and slowing rotors actually emanated from his cramped muscles.

“I didn’t, sir.” The pilot busied himself with post landing activity and muttered, “Check, check, roger that, check,” into his mouthpiece. He looked up. “Yes, sir, here they come.”

Curtis followed the pilot’s gaze as a silver overhead door slid up on the corner of the building and a normal civilian Chevy Silverado crew cab, driven by one uniformed military police officer and carrying another, drove out, kicking up yellow dust in its wake.

“Your escort, sir,” said the Lieutenant. He slid out, ducked under the still revolving blades, came around to Curtis’s side, and offered a hand down.

Curtis jumped down, ignored the younger man’s assistance, and steeled himself not to wince at the impact. “Pass me my case, will you?” He tucked his computer case under his arm. “Thanks, and for the ride, too.” When the MP’s arrived he turned to face them. “Curtis Reid.”

“Sir.” The well-muscled officer barely restrained a salute. “General Armstrong is waiting for you. This way, sir.”

Curtis climbed into the back seat, cradling his computer case beside him. The desert breeze scraped his cheek like a dull razor – hot, dry, and dusty. “Hope the General has a drink waiting for me,” he muttered to himself.

“Sir?” The second MP turned.

“Nothing.” He was flung forcefully back against the seat as the truck leapt into motion. Just what my back needs next, he grumbled internally, and dismissed the thought. He needed to focus, to prepare himself for what was to come: his meeting with the General.

               Chapter Two

“And when we think we lead, we are most led.” Lord Byron

The overhead door clanged shut behind them, blocking the bright desert sun and leaving him blinking in a cool, blue fluorescent glare. He looked around. Engines suspended on block and tackle dangled over a half-dozen workstations. Clusters of men, none of them in military uniform, worked as industriously as termites: tinkering, welding, measuring, and speaking to their computers. To the casual observer, this was nothing more than a mechanics’ repair shop.

At the rear, about three quarters down, judging by the proportions of the building as seen from the air, a wall separated the open garage setup from the rest of the building. It was toward this wall his escorts marched him, one on each side. Not one of the thirty or so workers so much as glanced up, going about their business as though the sight of a soft, slight, obviously non-military middle-aged man under armed escort was nothing new.

Curtis kept his mouth shut and his eyes open, soaking up details and committing them to memory. A sense of dread took root in his chest. Could the rumors be true? Could they? As one muscle-bound MP opened the mystery door and gestured for Curtis to enter and the other stood stolidly, blocking any chance of exit, his heart rate accelerated. What the hell am I doing playing spy? Me: an aging, out-of-shape geneticist, whose greatest call to adventure to date has been crossing a picket line of religious zealots opposed to DNA research. I must have been out of my mind to go along with this.

He silenced the loudspeaker in his head, took a deep breath, hoped none of his fears showed on the surface, and stepped through the door, giving the first MP a grin of bravado. Once inside, he stopped short.

The white room held one circular desk surrounded by screens displaying various vantage points of the Mojave Air and Space Port; they covered every major building, as every possible approach to the building they were now in, and views of corridors and doors of some interior-scape unknown. A burly MP manned the desk. “This Reid?”

Escort number one answered. “Yes, sir.”

“General’s waiting,” the sir-behind-the-desk grunted and jerked a thumb at another double door on the rear wall. With one hand on Curtis’s elbow, the MP walked Curtis in that direction.

The double doors sprang open revealing an elevator car. We must be going down, Curtis thought, as there is no up. He stepped in; once again praying his outer calm belied his growing inner anxiety. Down underground. It’s all starting to make sense. What was it he had said when he called asking for this appointment, using their ‘good-old-boy’ school history and long-ago friendship as an excuse. “Been a long time, Daemon, and I wanted to catch up. Been doing some fascinating work, things that might interest you.” He’d laughed. “And so have you, I hear.” That had caught the General’s attention.

Perhaps that wasn’t so smart, Curtis thought as the car dropped with heart wrenching force. Perhaps he’d walked right into the spider’s lair. Daemon had always been the smarter of the two; no doubt he’d already figured out Curtis had been sent, a dull witted messenger boy on a mission. I’m a dead man, were the last words to flash through his mind as the doors sprang open.

“Curtis!” The heavyset bald man stood waiting, his arms held wide in welcome. “Good God, man, but you’ve let yourself go. Shame on you.” Daemon’s muscular body shook with laughter.

Curtis found himself wrapped in a pair of thick arms and crushed against Daemon’s barrel chest. Middle age sat well on the man, enhancing his aura of physical power, and Curtis felt like the proverbial ninety-pound weakling in his embrace. “You look well, Daemon.”

Daemon held Curtis out at arms-length, studying him, his dark eyes so intense they seemed to bore a hole into Curtis’s mind. “Your message came as a great surprise, my old friend. What drove you to call me now after all these years?”

Curtis forced himself to meet the General’s gaze. “Curiosity, perhaps. I don’t know. You’ve been on my mind a lot, lately.” He laughed uneasily, caught between the hard, cold disbelief of Daemon’s eyes and the warmth of his smile. “And more. You want the truth?”

“That would be refreshing,” Daemon responded. “I thought perhaps you could help me get some funding for a research project…”

Curtis stopped speaking abruptly, watching the smile fade from the General’s face.

“Curtis,” Daemon said sadly, shaking his head.

A bolt of pain shot through Curtis’ left temple, exploded in his mid-forehead, then slowly faded. “Mynatt sent me,” he said in a flat voice. Dazed, he touched his upper lip and stared at his fingertips in surprise. They were smeared with blood. “What?”

“My poor man. Your nose is bleeding.” Daemon handed him a cotton handkerchief and  put his arm around Curtis’s shoulders. “A combination of dry desert air and the quick descent in the elevator. Happens to many of our visitors.” He guided him down the wide corridor. “What were you saying?”

“Uh… I don’t know.” Curtis dabbed at his nose. “Couldn’t have been important.”

“Perhaps it will come back to you,” the General said, placing his hand on a Plexiglas panel. A sliding door swept open. “Come inside and sit down. You’ll feel better in a moment.”

Curtis stepped through the door. What had he been saying? What was the last thing he was thinking? Ah, yes. It all came back to him now. “You look well, Daemon.”

Chapter 3

“Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man’s character, give him power.” Abraham Lincoln

They sat in a comfortably appointed room, clearly Daemon’s private office, still discussing old times; laughing over a certain spring break spent on Padre Island and a wild night they’d shared, when the MP’s approached. Curtis stopped laughing, strained by his nervous state. Aside from certain facial characteristics, they could have been clones to the pair that had marched him into this underground empire hidden in plain sight. Unbelievable! He watched as the two men drew the General aside to discuss something in growling, unintelligible undertones.

Daemon bowed his head while one officer spoke, looked up, rotated his chin toward Curtis, and like some news announcer listening to a breaking story, looked interested and focused. “A disturbance at the gate,” nodding to one of the MPs, he said, “let’s take a look.”

“Yes, sir.” The officer touched his headset. “Display front gate.”

An octagonal platform in the floor lit up, hummed an electronic note, a life-sized, three-dimensional projection formed slowly, sizzling, and snapping until the figure of a clearly emotionally distraught man, gesticulated wildly as he argued with two burly guards.

“What you’re watching is happening in real time.” Daemon put his hand on Curtis’s shoulder.  “No more than a half second delay in transmission.” He barked at the officer, clearly annoyed. “Where’s the sound?”

“Sorry, sir, coming, sir.” He listened to something in his head set. “Small technical problem – corrected now – any second…”

Hands on hips, the civilian demanded, “I ain’t movin’ until you answer my questions,” The detail of the projection was so precise; Curtis could see the man’s thumbs tucked into the belt loops of his worn and oil-stained jeans. “So one more time: where is my brother, Reimer, Ron Reimer?”

“There’s no one of that name here.” Pushing the man, one of the guards said, “Now go.”

Reimer stood his ground. His hands pulled free of his jeans, he pushed back, and then stood with clenched fists ready to defend himself. “Look buddy,” he snarled. “I’ve been watching this place. All these comin’s and goin’s, uniformed men in jeeps, big trucks, somethin’ ain’t right here. Now, I know my brother’s in this place. I know it – understand?”

“You’re misinformed,” said the second guard, stepping up to stand next to the first.

“Uh-uh. He’s here. I drove down from Monterrey, looking for him. His wife is sittin’ at home waitin’ for news. She ain’t heard a word from him in eight months, and my brother wouldn’t leave her like that. Not that kind of man, no sir. Her cousin says he saw him in this town just last week, and the only military people I saw are right here.

Now – you either get him, or I start makin’ phone calls.”

Daemon shook his head. “We can’t have this. You,” he said to one of the MP’s. “Check this Reimer’s file. Find out about his wife. And why didn’t we know about her before now?” He turned to Curtis. “Excuse me. I have to deal with this small problem.” He walked over to his desk and sat before what appeared to be a computer.

Curtis watched the three men on the holograph display.

Reimer raised his fists. “I ain’t budging.”

“You are misinformed.” Neither of the guards showed any anger.

“Stop sayin’ that,” Reimer shouted. “Just stop –” His hands dropped down to his sides. He blinked rapidly for a few seconds. “What? Where am I?” His eyelids fluttered again. “Oh, thanks fellas. So I just take a right on the highway and I’m on route to Bakersfield. Great. Thanks.”

“No problem,” said one guard.

“Drive safely,” said the other.

Reimer got in his battered pick-up truck, and drove off.

The holograph showed the two guards watching his departure, their faces blank. With a soft hum, the projection was gone.

“What the hell?” Curtis turned to Daemon. “Did you’re men do something to him?”

The General gave him an understanding smile. “With you in a minute.” He turned to the two officers, both of whom were busy speaking to others through their headsets. “Report.”

“Situation controlled, sir. Found the wife’s address. Follow-up team preparing for memory scrub.”

“Good. Make her a widow, long past the time for grieving and ready to move on.” The General winked at Curtis. “I do have my kind side.”

“Daemon,” Curtis began, full of horror and questions but stopped. Once again, a stab of intense pain shot across his forehead. He gasped. Daemon’s thoughts filled his mind. I could have killed him. I didn’t. I only wiped out any memory of his brother, this place or why he came here. Curtis groaned and brought his hands up to cradle his head. It hurts you. I’m sorry. I could wipe out any memory of what you’ve seen, but I won’t. I will answer your questions, all of them, as soon as we are alone. The pressure ceased leaving a throbbing dull ache.

“Return to the control room and active duty.” Daemon offered both the MP’s a congratulatory nod. “Dismissed.” He stood silent as the two men snapped a salute and left.

“So,” he said, turning on Curtis, “now you’ve seen, and experienced for yourself. Isn’t that what you came for?” He poured them each a shot of Scotch – clear amber on a bed of ice – and handed Curtis one of the glasses. Eyes glittering, smiling coldly, his domed skull glistened under the fluorescent light and there was a hard glitter in his eyes.

“Or should I say, isn’t that why Professor Myatt sent you?”

 “Yes.” Curtis accepted the drink, hoping it would dull the throbbing in his head, and swallowed the fiery liquid in one gulp. What’s the point of denial? He’d already accepted his position as a dead man – twice today. Why did he now feel this overwhelming desire to live? “Our dear Professor did send me, as you apparently already know. He’s heard things, disturbing things about you and what you’ve been up to.”

Daemon raised his face to the lights and gave a huge belly laugh, but when he faced Curtis again, there was no trace of humor in his expression. “Of course he’s heard things. I sent him the message.”

“Come on now,” Curtis argued, heating up in spite of his resolve to remain calm. “If he’d been in touch with you, the professor would tell me so, not send me off on this idiotic spy mission. Me, of all people.”

“He did exactly what I instructed him to do,” the General said smoothly, completely unruffled in the face of Curtis’s anger. “Only he didn’t know it was me speaking. He thought it was his own idea, come to him in a sudden burst of understanding.”

“I see.” Curtis rubbed at his temples, wanting time to arrange his scattered, panicky thoughts. What had Daemon done to him? “I suppose you’re going to tell me all that mind control you used to prattle on about back then has come to pass.”

“Of course it has,” Daemon’s unpleasant smile grew broader. “Surely even you, closeted in your genetics lab as you are, have heard of remote neural monitoring.”

“All that conspiracy theory bunk – thought control, sleep deprivation – paranoid ranting of the lunatic fringe on some of the stranger sites on the Internet. Yes, which I’ve heard of. But can you do whatever it is you just did to me to anyone anywhere? Even at a distance?”

“Oh I can and I do, my old friend.” The General sat opposite him, watching him as a cat does a bird, entirely focused on his reactions. “We can track any of our targets by their thought patterns and brain waves; talk to them directly by accessing their speech centers; convince them of their own insanity.” He moved in closer, staring into Curtis’s eyes. “Or snuff out their miserable lives as one would a candle, in any number of ways.” His voice dropped to a soft drone. “Set up a car accident; affect the brain stem and increase the heart rate to a heart attack, or slow it till it stops; cause a stroke; tell the target to jump off the nearest bridge, or blow his brains out. Yes, Curtis, any number of ways.” He smiled. “Would you like a demonstration? I’m sure I can find any number of people the world would be better off without. Shall I put an end to some low life to ensure your complete understanding?”

“No. I believe.” A flicker of fear tingled the base of Curtis’ spine. Daemon belonged in an asylum. Curtis felt another pulsing pain above his right eye, followed by a persistent ringing in his ear. What?

“Yes, it’s uncomfortable for you.” Daemon shook his head and pursed his mouth in a moue of sympathy. “Poor man. There are those individuals who are difficult to reach unless we are right next to them, so to speak, and you’re one of them. That’s why we had to go through Professor Myatt to get you here. Our reading of your thought patterns causes you pain.” He placed a hand on Curtis’s arm. “Sorry, but you see, I’m not a mad man, and I don’t belong in an asylum.” He laughed as Curtis’s eyes widened.

“Why did you bring me here?” Curtis spoke sluggishly. He thought only of how his head ached. “And whatever you’re doing to me, stop it.”

“Already stopped, my friend. Unpleasant, but necessary to break through your wall of denial.” Daemon spoke softly into his microphone. “Hawkins, send them in now.”

With a slight whoosh of air, the door slid noiselessly open. Sealed. Air tight, I wonder why. Curtis tried to shush his thoughts, but no one paid attention. Perhaps he spoke the truth when he said it has stopped. But how would I know; how can I trust?

The two officers who’d escorted him to the office appeared at the doorway and saluted. “Sir?”

“Take my friend to his quarters. He needs rest and time to think.” The General smiled that unpleasant, neutral smile. “Go, Curtis. Rest and let your headache go. I’ve left reading material there for you. Your question – why I brought you here – will be answered, with many others, later over dinner.”

“This way, sir.” The officer gestured to the doorway.

What if I were to refuse? What if I just ran past them and tried to get out of here? No one in the room responded. If they were still monitoring his thoughts, they offered no reaction. He walked toward the guards. Might as well do as they ask. As if I have a choice.

“See you later.” Daemon smiled. “I look forward to our next meeting. I know I can count on you. You’ll come round.”

End of First Three Chapters…