Future Chron Universe Book 2 - From The Earth Series Book 2 - War Through The Pines - Chapters 6 - 10

 

Image: 3000ad - Spaceship wheel near Earth - dreamstime

Chapter 6

Donner's dad read the translated messages with increasing concern. When he finished reading, he looked at Donner and shook his head. 

“Well Donner, first I have to say that your work on this project is top-notch. What you have done here reminds me of my experiences in viral research years ago. But of course, you also did the hardware design. This is college-level if not graduate-level work.” Donner was silent but smiling.

“Anyway, you certainly have something here. If I read this correctly I think it has to do with a manned space platform. And I think it is not an authorized transmission.”

“What do you think it means dad?”

“I think it is a message from an embedded informant.”

“You mean a spy?”

“Yes, son. I think we have a spy. See here,” he said, pointing to one of the decrypted snippets. “This looks like a technical description of something, which I think is a weapons system. I doubt that the owners of this platform would be transmitting such technical details. I believe you've discovered a top-secret space platform Donner. Apparently undetectable if not for this unauthorized transmission.”

“Do you think it has something to do with Japan dad? I mean it is a dialect of Japanese.”

“Yes and it is an obscure dialect which would be difficult to interpret for most people, even other Japanese. But I don't think we can say who is behind it. The chosen language could just be a way to throw off someone who happened to decode the message. I think we are going to have to get some outside help Donner before we take our next step. I have a friend in Space Command I went to engineering school with, I think I'll give him a call. He might be able to offer us some advice on how to proceed.”

Colonel Reginald Allen listened to Donner’s father explain what his son had found. 

After listening to Jack Jackson, Colonel Allen said, “I’ll say one thing Jack that is quite an enterprising young man you have there, Space Command would be proud to have him someday.”

“Thank you Reg,” said Jack. “He certainly keeps himself busy with these little projects of his. So what do you think we should do now?”

“Could you and your son fly out to Colorado Springs and present your findings to a few people I believe may be able to help us?”

“I think we could arrange that, Donner is out of school for a few more weeks. When do you want to set this up?”

“Let me check everyone’s schedule Jack and I'll get back to you, okay?”

“Sure Reg, just let us know, goodbye,” said Jack.

When his dad told him Donner said, “That’s great dad, can we fly ourselves out or do we have to take a commercial airline?”

“You love to fly, don’t you son?”

“Sure, what do you think?”

“Okay we’ll see what Colonel Allen comes up with and if we can get your mother's approval, we’ll fly ourselves out there.”

“Thanks dad,” said Donner with a big grin.

Chapter 7

Emily was curious. Something was going on. The top brass on the island seemed to be scrambling. She had been told to make sure her fleet was ready at a moment's notice. There was nothing on the nets that seemed out of the ordinary. She would just have to wait until they believed she had a need to know.

In the meantime, she was arranging for the squadron to fly an evaluation mission. The objective would be to scout and find a target ship five hundred miles out from the base. The mission would depend heavily on Looker and Booker for real-time on-site target and threat determination. The other hypersonics would be evaluated on their flight performance over target as directed by the reconnaissance hypersonics.

Emily and her team had worked overtime since the readiness command to get the hypersonics in shape. Maintenance was always a concern but this mission had a profile that would stress the hypersonics far beyond any previous evaluation. Emily was particularly concerned with losing any telemetry data. She absolutely wanted to be aware of the hypersonics' flight status at all times. She drove her team to finish all the preventive maintenance possible that might ensure nothing would go wrong.

The day of the evaluation Emily was up at zero three hundred having only slept fitfully for some four hours. According to schedule, the flight would take off a half-hour after dawn. Looker and Booker would quickly accelerate to Mach 7, or over five-thousand miles-per-hour, arriving at the target site some six minutes later. The rest of the flight would boost to Mach 4, over three-thousand miles-per-hour, arriving at the target a few minutes after Looker and Booker. This would give the strike hypersonics the needed margin to adjust course if the reconnaissance hypersonics deemed it necessary.

Exactly at a half-hour after dawn, the flight began to take off. Because of their highly networked and autonomous operation, the entire flight of some thirty hypersonics was in the air in just over a minute. After watching the takeoff Emily headed for her monitoring post.

Thirty streams of telemetry were coming into Emily and the other monitors. Emily herself was monitoring Looker, Booker and Supersonic. The data showed smooth acceleration as the jet engines took the flight up to almost Mach 4. Then the scramjets took over. For most of the hypersonics, their velocity settled at just over Mach 4. But for Looker and Booker, the velocity climbed almost exponentially to Mach 7 before settling. The scramjets were working flawlessly.

Because of the speed, it wasn't long until Looker and Booker were within sight of the target, an old navy ship that had been towed to the site and set adrift. Immediately telemetry from Looker increased.

Emily's Annie began to speak. “Looker to Sg, Looker to Sg”.

Surprised, Emily could only answer as she had many times before, “Sg here.”

“Sg we have found the target. Threat level is low. We are broadcasting location and speed data of target to flight. They should be making needed course corrections now.”

Emily saw this in Supersonic's telemetry as he corrected his preflight track. But Emily was more worried about the extra telemetry that Looker was sending, the audio link.

“Looker this is Sg,” she said into her Annie. “Please advise need for extra telemetry.”

“Looker to Sg, determination was made that this was most efficient comm link.”

Emily now remembered her conversation with Lieutenant Warner when he caught her talking to Looker. She had insisted that a direct audio link was most efficient. Looker had been listening and reached that conclusion also. 

But that was not under combat conditions, thought Emily.

“Understand Looker. But telemetry data may be compromised by added burden of . . .”

Just then the door to the monitoring room burst open. Lieutenant Warner was in the lead and behind him was the General and the rest of the brass.

“Sergeant Rosen!” Warner yelled. “What is the meaning of this additional telemetry from the reconnaissance craft?”

Before Emily could answer Looker said, “Sg this is Looker, flight has made its pass at the target. I estimate that there is one-hundred percent annihilation of target. Over.”

Emily turned from Warner and said to her Annie, “Looker this is Sg, that is affirmative, well done. Make course for home and return to base.”

“Understood.”

Emily turned to Warner. “Well?” he said.

“Sir, it was the determination of flight ops that this would enhance the mission. As the Lieutenant has just heard mission goals have been achieved thus far.”

“That is not the answer I was hoping for. Who was responsible for this 'enhancement'?”

Emily thought, she realized that an ANI making such a judgment could cost the whole squadron its readiness designation. It would be immediately taken offline until the brass understood how it could happen.

“I made the decision. But only because I thought it would be more efficient than the current procedure.”

The General spoke up, “Sergeant Rosen, you are not an engineer are you?”

“No sir.”

“You did not develop the software or hardware that, by the way, the military has spent billions of dollars on, did you?”

“No sir.”

“It's my understanding that your job is to keep the squadron in flight condition. Any changes or improvements to procedures should be made by authorized personnel only, don't you agree?”

Emily knew what was coming. “Yes sir.”

“Sergeant Rosen for your unauthorized change in procedures you are now on report. An inquiry will be made into this matter. You are relieved of duty.”

“Yes sir.” Emily saluted smartly and left the monitoring room.

Chapter 8

Colonel Allen came through with a meeting date, and Donner and his dad were on their way to the nearest airport a couple of counties over. Jack had already had his plane readied for the trip. Six hundred miles to Joplin, Missouri; refuel, and another six hundred miles to Colorado Springs Airport. The trip should take about eight hours in flight.

Donner was still too young for his student flight certificate but he knew his dad would let him do some of the flying. The flight was without incident with Donner flying while his dad navigated. Jack was old enough that he could still use the VOR stations (a type of radio ranging system used for aircraft navigation) that remained in operation to check their course. Donner thought that was pretty antiquated since their plane and each of their Annies had a GPS. Jack brought them into Colorado Springs with plenty of daylight left. They checked in to a motel and after a pizza for dinner, they turned in to get an early start the following morning.

The meeting with Colonel Allen and the others was scheduled for zero eight hundred. Jack and Donner were up by seven and had breakfast at a restaurant off Space Center Drive. They arrived at North American Aerospace Defense several minutes before their scheduled meeting.

They were shown to Colonel Allen's office where they waited. Reg Allen soon arrived and led them to a nearby conference room. There they were introduced to the other participants of the meeting. 

Colonel Allen began, “Jack and Donner, I would like you to meet my operations officer, Captain Deek Lang, our intelligence liaison, Captain Joyce Sargent, and my IT officer, Lieutenant Jim Mason. This will just be a low key inquiry. If we all agree that the information Donner has discovered warrants it, I plan to take it up with my boss Major General Longsteen. But for right now this is just an informal fact-finding discussion.

“I've explained to everyone some of what Donner has discovered. But I wonder Donner if you would like to give some background into how you made the discovery, and the details of what you've learned?”

“Okay,” said Donner somewhat nervously. “As far as the background to my discovery I was attempting to establish a reliable internet connection after my family moved to a rural location.”

Donner then described his antenna setup and the mechanism he designed to achieve and maintain satellite lock which interested the operations officer quite a bit and he asked a few questions.

Next, he turned to the signal he found and how he had set up the wide-area network that decrypted it. The IT officer then became curious. Finally, Donner told them about how he had discovered the Japanese dialect the messages used. The intelligence officer nodded approvingly.

Donner finished his review in about ten minutes and then passed out copies of the decrypted and translated messages he had intercepted. The three officers and Colonel Allen seemed to be suitably impressed. Jack was smiling.

Colonel Allen spoke up, “Thank you Donner. I think I speak for all of us when I say that your work is quite impressive. Now, I’ve arranged for you and your dad to tour our facilities as well as the airbase and the Space Museum. My staff and I will discuss your findings, and I will meet with you and your father for dinner at seven tonight. Okay with you Donner?”

“Sure Colonel Allen and thank you for arranging all this.”

“Your welcome Donner.”

Colonel Allen’s adjutant came in to escort Donner and his dad on the tour.

After a long day of touring the facilities and the museums, Donner and his dad met Colonel Allen at the Peterson AFB Club for dinner. Colonel Allen ordered a drink for Jack and himself and a soft drink for Donner before beginning the discussion.

“Well Donner,” said the Colonel. “How was the tour?”

“Excellent sir. The facilities and space museum tours were awesome. And I really liked eating lunch in the airplane restaurant, the old KC-135 fuselage.”

“I’m glad to hear it Donner, it is quite an antique. Now I want to talk to you and your dad about the meetings I’ve had today. I have to say again that everyone was very impressed with your work. I think that some of my staff would like for you to instruct them in some of your techniques.”

Donner smiled from behind his soft drink.

“Jack what I would like to do is place a mobile listening post on your property. Would that be okay?”

“Of course Reg, if you think that is for the best.”

“I think so. Donner, once we get the mobile post setup, I’m going to ask you to shut down your operation. I don’t want you involved in what could be an international incident. I’m afraid we are going to keep your work top secret for now.”

“I understand sir.”

“Good, then let’s eat,” said the Colonel. “The meal is on Space Command.”

Chapter 9

Something was definitely up, thought Jason Bigley. Suddenly all his sources in the military had clammed up. He had been on to something important, something to do with orbital space. He was preparing an in-depth report for the website he worked for. Such a coup was needed as the site was in danger of shutting down.

Jason wasn't going to let that happen. He would go with what he had even though he knew his information was incomplete. He would do a write-up of the story that he had and fill in the gaps with reasonable conjecture. He would send the finished story to his military sources. If there were no objections he would put it on the website.

Jason knew the military had embarked on a program to get all its hypersonic squadrons on high alert, that he was sure of. The order had seemingly come because of an investigation being conducted by Space Command. That was the space connection. But exactly why the military was worried about space he didn't know. 

He did know that the Chinese were planning massive war games and that they had space assets as well as a base on the moon. But China was technically still an ally of the United States so why this should cause an alert was unclear. That and a few other minor points was all he had so he wrote up the story and sent it to his contacts. 

He waited three days.

One of his contacts, a former Colonel in Space Command called.

“You can't put out this drivel,” said Colonel Sloan.

“What do you mean,” said Jason. “It's all the truth, and accurate as far as I know.”

“But that is the point, you don't know enough. You are jumping to conclusions. You insinuate that the Chinese are planning something that will affect the United States' 

access to space. But the link is not direct it's purely circumstantial.”

“Well,” said Jason. “If you would like to fill me in on what I don't know I'll change the story.”

“You know I can't do that. I told you when I stopped passing information that a direct request had come down.”

“Your a civilian now Colonel, you don't have to follow orders.”

“That's where we part company Jason. I may be a private citizen but when I believe that something I do can bring more harm than good to the country then that is where I draw the line.”

“Okay. Basically, you are telling me that I don't have the whole truth, but you and the rest of your kind aren't willing to fill me in. So there you have it. I also have a duty to publish the truth as I know it. Maybe once it's out there the military or others like you will correct me and we, that is citizens of the country, can know what our government is up to.”

“Jason I will tell you one last time. You print this mashup of yours and you will lose all your contacts in the military. Now and in the future. We just won't trust you anymore.”

“Colonel, that is your prerogative. But I have news and I will publish it.”

“Goodbye Jason.”

“Goodbye Colonel.”

Jason was shaking when he closed his Annie. They'll see, he thought. I've got enough to publish and they know it. We'll see who becomes the pariah.

Jason's boss had read the copy. He put down his Annie and turned to Jason.

“Jason,” said Max Cleveland. “You are sure of this story. This is the truth isn't it? The whole truth.”

“Yes Max. Everything I got came from a trusted source. The linkages in the information are obvious to everyone that has read the piece. I think there is enough in there to force the military out into the open about what is going on in space. The Chinese have some kind of weapons platform up there and the US military is worried enough to put our top assets on alert.”

“The Chinese haven't been particularly aggressive in their space program in recent years Jason. Besides the moon base they haven't conducted any unusual tests, no secret satellites, nothing. You are accusing them, indirectly to be sure, of militarizing space. Jason that is a big, blaring headline that will be around the world in seconds. You have to guarantee me that at least that part of the story is based on solid evidence.”

“I guarantee that the Chinese are up to something. I found out that much before everyone clammed up.”

“Okay, it's going online tomorrow. The biggest headline we've ever run. We will either be lauded or driven out of business.”

Back at his desk, Jason felt relief. He was sure he was right. The fact that no one actually confirmed it made him even more sure. The US military had been caught flat-footed, and they were trying to correct the mistake before anyone found out. Only now they wouldn't have the chance. He smiled.

Chapter 10

Jack and Donner spent the day after the meeting driving to nearby Cascade to take the toll road up Pikes Peak. Jack took the wheel manually once they started up the mountain. The drive up was a leisurely tour through a thick forest for the first twenty-five minutes then, almost immediately, the trees retreated from the roadside and the view became spectacular.

The road fell away on one side or the other, sometimes with just a foot or so of rocky curb. The ground was a light green for another five or ten minutes until it turned into a dirt and rock-strewn landscape. The side of the road disappeared into empty space. 

Pike's Peak is a lonely mountain with no companion mountains to disguise its sheer height of fourteen thousand feet or block the tremendous views. After almost forty-five minutes they pulled into the parking lot at the peak. Patches of snow were on the ground and there were flurries, it was summer. The temperature was in the thirties, some fifty degrees colder than at the base of the mountain. Donner was glad his dad had brought him a coat.

The snow was not continuous and sometimes the sun would break through the clouds to light the view. Donner and his dad found a spot where they could eat the lunch they had packed. 

After his dad distributed the food Donner said, “Dad can I ask you something?”

“What is it son?”

“Well Colonel Allen said what I had found was important and that they would follow up on it right?”

“That's right son.”

“But after all the praise he gave me, he still didn't tell me what he thought it meant. Do you have any idea?”

“I think that Colonel Allen wasn't at liberty to tell us what he was thinking Donner.”

“Oh I know that. But I still wonder why it is so important, don't you?”

“Yes I do. I will tell you what I think but it may not turn out to be right. I think that the message you intercepted came from a geosynchronous space platform that Space Command is responsible for.”

“But there isn't any evidence for that.”

“I know. That's why I said I could be wrong. But I think this is a platform that became operational very recently and it may be that Space Command just wants to get it set up and working before announcing anything to the public. That would be the smart way to militarize space, a fait accompli.”

“Militarize space!” exclaimed Donner. “I thought there were international agreements against that.”

“No, nothing binding, just some understandings. That's what makes it imperative to Space Command that the platform be operational and permanent before the public is told.”

“So one day there isn't and then the next day there is a military space platform, get used to it,” said Donner.

“That's the way they hoped to do it. But I think what you discovered is that it is not as secret a plan as Space Command thought.”

“You mean the spy on the platform.”

“That's right. Well let's finish eating and get some photos for mom, then we start back down. The trip down may be even more interesting than the trip up.”

“Okay,” said Donner. “One more thing dad.”

“Yes?”

“This kind of thing is why you moved us to the mountains isn't it?”

“Yes, it is Donner,” said Jack. “I don't like surprises.”

Chapters 11 - 15