Starfire Page 12

  “I don’t spend taxpayer dollars lightly,” Secretary Clayworth said. “Please understand that this is a stipend, an annual contractor’s fee to be paid pro-rata until the term is over.”

  “What term?”

  “Until the project is concluded, or you are no longer needed.”

  Detective Perez leaned forward, inserting himself into the conversation. He’d been quiet up until now.

  “If it influences your decision, I’ve already signed,” he said. “At a much lower rate, I might add.”

  Jackie looked at him, and he shrugged.

  “What did you sign for? What kind of job, I mean?”

  Clayworth answered her question. “Detective Perez is a new hire in our security division. He’s rather good at it, don’t you think?”

  “Yes.”

  Jackie stared at the tablet for a few minutes before putting it back on the table.

  “It’s not just about money,” she said. “I don’t like the idea of my government confiscating intellectual property. The company I worked for labored hard to develop the EM-Drive. Do you know that Blue-Sky applied for dozens of government grants and got nothing? There was no money to be had from you then unless they were willing to hand everything over to the feds at the end.”

  “Those decisions weren’t made by me.”

  “I understand,” Jackie said. “I didn’t mean to offend you.”

  “I’m difficult to offend,” said the director with a hint of a smile.

  “There’s something else,” Jackie said. “I don’t like getting involved with something I don’t understand. You’re doing some kind of nuclear science here. Something to do with radiation—right? But what exactly is it about?”

  The director nudged the tablet closer to Jackie and smiled indulgently. “That can be made clear within a matter of minutes.”

  Jackie shook her head and sat back. “I don’t want to work on a weapons system.”

  Clayworth looked slightly annoyed. “This is not about weapons development.”

  “But it is about the EM-Drive. A technology everyone is suddenly interested in. Something my government shunned for years until NASA finally tested it and found that it worked. Now, plenty of companies are trying to build a functioning prototype. Someone figured out that we were getting close and decided to take out my lab. I’m grateful for the help you’ve provided today, but I owe the stockholders of Blue-Sky more than I owe you.”

  Clayworth pursed her lips. “It’s more complex than that. Much more.”

  Jackie sat back and crossed her arms. “All right, then explain it to me.”

  “Dr. Linscott, no one is trying to steal your technology. You have to believe that.”

  “But I don’t believe it.”

  Secretary Clayworth was still smiling, but her smile looked strained now. “Let me try again. This time, I will appeal to your scientific, logical side. The only reason why Homeland would attempt to take your technology at this point would be to gain it without paying for it. Otherwise, we would simply wait until you’d finished the development, and buy it from you.”

  “Okay, fine. Just do that then.”

  “There are two problems with that approach,” Clayworth said. “First of all, we're running out of time. Secondly, Blue-Sky Labs, for all realistic intents and purposes, no longer exists.”

  “I’ve given you the disk,” Jackie said. “What more do you want?”

  “We need you to explain it to us. I would happily pay for that service. Will you let us make use of the work you’ve spent years developing? Or will you let the people who ordered your organization to be erased win this round?”

  Jackie looked troubled. She glanced at Detective Perez. He watched her quietly, frankly. She appreciated his neutrality. She could tell from the look in his eye that he was not judging her. It didn’t seem that he wanted her to choose one path or the other. He was waiting to see what she would do. She liked that about him. He was an excellent listener and observer. She was sure he had his own opinions, but he seemed not to let them get in the way of ferreting out the truth.

  “Okay,” she said at last, “I guess I can believe that you’re not simply trying to steal the technology. Because as you say, the lab would have been more than happy to license it to you when they were finished. So, please tell me what the big hurry is about? Why is this such an emergency? Why would anyone, the Russians, or anyone else, be willing to kill for a propulsion system that can place a satellite in a high orbit more cheaply?”

  “Because,” Clayworth said, “we want to power something much bigger than a satellite.”

  Jackie stared at her for several long seconds. Clayworth's piercing blue eyes stared back.

  “Bigger? How much bigger?”

  Clayworth’s smile returned. She nudged the tablet with the signature box still open and waiting.

  Jackie stared at it, sighed, and finally signed the damned thing with her finger.

  Chapter 17

  Barrow, Alaska

  Twilight

  Dr. Tanaka and Edwin had been trudging through the snow for what seemed like hours. The sky was perpetually gray. Wind gusts blew snow in small eddies around Yuki’s feet. Edwin had stripped off his parka, given her two layered garments from underneath it and put the parka back on. She thought this might have saved her life.

  “The sky looks the same,” she said. “I would’ve thought by now that it would’ve turned dark.”

  Edwin chuckled. She marveled that he still had a sense of humor after all that they'd been through. “I think you're a little confused,” he said. “It’s closer to morning than it is to evening. We’re pretty far up in latitude. Well up into the Arctic Circle. That means in the warmer months the sun doesn’t go down at all. It just sort of skims along the horizon, shrouded by clouds. That gives the daylight a muted gray effect all night long. They call it the white nights up here.”

  “Oh,” she said, “I guess that’s a good thing. Otherwise, we might have frozen to death by now.”

  “Maybe,” he admitted.

  “How much further?” she asked. “I can’t go on forever.”

  “Not far,” he said. “But don’t worry about it. You’re on the small side. I can carry you if I have to.”

  Yuki glanced up at him appraisingly. He was at least a foot taller than she was. Although he didn’t seem to be a weightlifter, quite the opposite in fact, there was a certain toughness and competence about him. He probably could carry her for quite a while if it came down to that. It was the glasses that had thrown her off, she figured. As institutions like government labs tended to be full of nothing but nerds, she’d assumed that Edwin was one too.

  But he didn’t fit that classification. Edwin was unusually physical as nerds went. He’d shot Roy at a significant distance, and the experience hadn’t seemed to traumatize him. He hadn’t even expressed any regret about the fact he had killed the man. She had to wonder about his history. What made a man turn out like this?

  “Edwin?” she asked. “What’s your full name?”

  “Dr. Edwin Goody.”

  She looked at him for a moment. He had an odd sense of humor, and she wasn’t always sure when he was being funny. “Seriously?”

  “My name’s earned me that same look from girls ever since junior high,” he said.

  “It’s a fine name,” she said, quickly thinking of a way to change the topic. “You said you were from medical security? Does that mean that when we get to the labs, you’ll be a guard and a medic at the same time?”

  He smiled. “Not exactly. I do clearances on new people. The military paid for my schooling, and along the way I was trained to investigate people and give them clearances. Defense contractors, government labs and other organizations that want to do business on sensitive projects for the federal government have to have someone like me on staff when they bring in new employees. They wanted an educated person to clear top-level scientists. Someone who could tell if applicants were for real or not.” />
  “I see. Do you like that kind of work?”

  “The good side of my work is that it’s always in demand and pays better than running my practice did back in Idaho. The bad part is that since I’m expensive, as soon as a given organization has staffed up, they no longer need me. So they let me go. Then, I’m off to a new contract, a new job.”

  “That must be hard on your family.”

  “Nope. No trouble there. My wife got sick of it a decade ago.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” Yuki said, feeling a rush of embarrassment.

  “Don’t be. How about you?”

  It took Yuki a few seconds to realize what he meant. “I’m not married. Never have been. I guess you could say that I’ve been married to my work.”

  “So what do you do, exactly?”

  “I probably shouldn’t say. I mean, isn’t that the kind of loose talk a man like you is supposed to be preventing?”

  He glanced at her and saw she was smiling. He smiled back. “You’re right.”

  “Just kidding,” she said. “I’m a robot designer.”

  Edwin raised his eyebrows. “That’s a new one. Very interesting.”

  The conversation was helping to keep Yuki’s mind off the searing pain in her shoulder but that couldn’t last forever. The bitter cold stung her face with every gust of wind, and she wondered how long they might have to keep walking. Maybe that was Edwin’s real purpose in getting her to speak freely. She knew that shock was a very serious possibility under the circumstances, and Edwin clearly knew it too.

  Before she could ask him about that, she heard a sound from behind them. It was not a sound that she was familiar with, but it made the skin on the back of her neck crawl.

  They turned together and looked along the tracks of the snow cat they had been following. There was a shape, a dirty gray animal moving behind them. It gamboled over the snow, walking as easily as if it were on flat, open ground. She saw the black expressionless eyes then, and she knew the bear was hunting. It was hunting them.

  Edwin whirled around and unslung his rifle. Without thinking about it, Yuki moved to stand behind him.

  The polar bear seemed to know what was coming next. Maybe hunters had shot at it in the past. Whatever the case, it turned from its path and ran.

  Edwin shouldered his rifle, targeted the bear, and took a shot. The gun cracked, and the sound echoed strangely over the snow. It had almost muffled sound.

  “You missed,” Yuki said.

  “Nah,” he said. “I just wanted to scare her off. After all, she’s just hungry. A bear has to eat, same as the rest of us.”

  Yuki watched the bear gallop off and found herself wishing Edwin had killed it.

  Edwin knelt and examined the snow around the tracks where they’d been walking.

  “See this? Those drops are fresh blood. You must be bleeding again. The scent attracted the bear.”

  Yuki checked her injury with concern. It was true, the wound had reopened and was splattering the white snow with occasional bright red drops.

  Together, they worked to seal the wound again. When it no longer dribbled, they continued walking.

  What came next was, for Yuki, a bigger challenge than the bear itself had been. It was a rise in the land. The rocky hill went up and up. When they finally reached the top, she was gasping for breath. The land sloped down again, and she was grateful for that.

  “That’s got to be it. Those buildings down there. Tell me that’s the lab, Edwin.”

  “Yeah,” he said, “that’s it.”

  She looked at him, feeling both happy and concerned. Happy because they’d reached their destination, and concerned because Edwin was unslinging his rifle again.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked.

  “Something’s not right. I’ve been checking my cell every half-mile, and there’s never been any service. But that’s a cell tower right there on top of the main building. Check your phone.”

  Yuki did, and she shook her head. “I’m getting nothing. Zero bars. What do you think is wrong?”

  Edwin shrugged. “I don’t know, but I’m going to find out.”

  Chapter 18

  Deep in the Arctic Ocean

  Darkness

  Burkov was not the kind of man who was going to let a little ice get him down. To his mind, his body was like a machine—something to be used to achieve a purpose.

  He felt pain, but not the way that other people felt it. He perceived pain as an obstacle. It was something he needed to push through. Most people thought of pain as a danger sign, as a warning to proceed no further. When they felt the sensation, they changed their behavior.

  But not Burkov. His mind was focused solely on his current goal. If there was pain in between him and his goal, it was to be forgotten, conquered—or simply endured.

  And so, when near-freezing water began to fill up the submarine’s lower decks, and he needed to wade into those dark, cold places, Burkov ignored the pain.

  Cold water, beyond a certain point, burns those who come into contact with it. The sensation is more or less indistinguishable from that of touching a source of heat. Burkov experienced this unpleasantness stoically. He didn’t cry out. He didn’t lament. He grimaced and soldiered on.

  “We’re not moving, Lev,” Director Norin said, a disembodied voice in his headset. “Did you get to the actuators yet?”

  It took a moment for Lev to answer. When he keyed his microphone, his breath blew over it in gasps.

  “We have a problem. We have a leak in the bow. We’re listing more every minute. We might invert if we don’t break free soon.”

  “I’m not blowing the ballast tanks without knowing what’s around us.”

  “That’s not your decision,” Lev said. “I’m in command here. Technically, you’re still my prisoner.”

  “Absurd,” she complained.

  “Blow the tanks.”

  “That’s not a wise move.”

  “I’m freezing and losing patience. I can’t get the wrench to grab. I—we’re going to lose the sub, Director Norin. Blow the tanks.”

  “Come up here, and we’ll talk about it.”

  Burkov was good at ignoring pain, but he had a harder time quelling his rising anger. “If I come up there, Kira, I will chain you to a pipe and stuff a dead man’s sock into your mouth. You will remain that way until we reach the docks at Vladivostok!”

  There was a quiet moment, then Burkov thought he heard a grinding sound. He turned and waded to the door, which was closing behind him. He placed his wrench in the gap, stopping it.

  The bitch had decided to drown him. He felt a fresh fury growing within.

  “I’m coming up,” he said, squeezing through the door.

  “Wait,” the Director said.

  Her voice had shifted in tone. Could she suspect her plans had failed?

  “Have you blocked the door? I have to secure the lower bulkheads to blow all the ballast from here.”

  He paused, panting. “Do it anyway.”

  The boat groaned and shifted. The weight of the water and the changing pressures inside were causing the deck to move under his feet.

  “Where are you?” she asked.

  “I’ve—I’ve got the door closed,” he said after he’d pried his tool loose and shut the door. He spun a wheel and panted. It was relatively dry and warm in this chamber.

  She didn’t bother to speak further. She’d finally done as he asked.

  A gushing blast of air roared outside the hull, and a thumping sound rang through the boat. They were dropping ballast and forcing water out of exterior tanks to provide more lift.

  The sub shifted again, dramatically so. Like a dying fish, it wallowed from side to side. Burkov had to grab onto handholds to keep on his feet. The forward wall became the floor for a moment—the stern was going up, but not the bow.

  “We’re stuck on something!” he shouted.

  “I told you that!”

  “Can we turn the screws? Back us out
.”

  “I can hardly move.”

  “Just do it.”

  He heard her grunting. She had to be crawling over the bridge equipment to reach the engine controls. Finally, he saw the lights dim as the batteries spun the aft screws. The power level they had left wasn’t much, but it was enough. The boat backed up and floated free.

  With a sickening heave the bow came up, and he was almost thrown onto the deck. He had the sensation of rising quickly—too quickly.

  “Taking on ballast, slowly,” Kira said. “I need another pair of hands up here, Lev.”

  Straining, he used all four limbs to make it back to the bridge. When he reached it at last, he followed her directions, although he thought she barely knew more about what she was doing than he did. This was no bathysphere. This was a warship, and they were at a deadly depth.

  After rising a few hundred meters at too fast a rate, they managed to control the sub and level her out. They were soon moving slowly, limping along on a southerly course.

  Despite everything, Lev smiled at Director Norin.

  “We did it,” he said.

  “So far, so good. But we’re far from home. There’s an ice cap above and a ridge below. We could slam aground again at any time. We’re still blind.”

  “Do you know how to listen for obstacles?” asked Lev. “If we can get the hydrophone working, we should get some warning at least.”

  She shook her head. “I’m not that good on a hydrophone. I could tell you if a whale starts singing within a hundred miles. I might even be able to identify the species—but that’s it.”

  He nodded. “We’ll have to play it as best we can. We’ll chart our position every minute and go slowly. We know our heading, and we know our speed. Using the old charts we can estimate our position with a fair level of accuracy.”

  She scoffed. “We’ll be risking our lives every kilometer.”

  “Do you have a better plan?”

  “No,” she admitted.

  They worked to set up a makeshift system of navigating the sub. It took hours, but they had time. When they were done, the first threads of exhaustion crept up on Lev. He looked at Director Norin, knowing he would have to trust her in order to sleep. They couldn’t afford to stop the boat for a rest. The batteries were low as it was.