Robert Williams: Ice Fortress

Alarms sounded. Lights flashed.

Leah almost lost her footing as the submarine went into a sharp dive, empty soda cans on Juan’s workstation slide every which way and Dave struggled to keep Leah from falling.

All three of them looked to the captain for reassurance that everything was all under control. The whole ‘torpedoes in the water’ thing had yet to register in their civilian brains.

Strobing emergency lights limned the captain’s face. Gone were the GQ Magazine dimples and smile, replaced instead by the firm, angular lines of a battle ready submarine captain. With no countermeasures and no weapons with which to launch an attack, the U.S. Navy’s Silent Assassin had just become someone’s idea of target practice.

“Who said science missions were boring,” whispered the captain as he strapped himself into his seat.

Jack Coulson hated the heat. He hated the buzzing flies that swarmed around him. He hated swallowing mouthfuls of desert sand each time he opened his mouth. In short, he hated Australia, or more accurately, he hated the Central Australian desert. It made sense that the NSA chose to build its strategic spy satellite base there in the 1960’s at the height of the Cold War. It was in the middle of, quite literally, nowhere and far away from prying eyes and ears especially those of the Russian and Chinese spy ships that were routinely and openly intercepting transmissions.

The sprawling facility looked as if a family of giants had abandoned a game of mini golf with its collection of mammoth golf ball like structures shielding the top secret satellite dishes within from view. Overhead spy satellites couldn’t even see in which direction the dishes were aimed thanks to the golf balls or Radomes as they were more correctly known. The highly unorthodox appearance of the remote facility gives no clue as to its true purpose. It is well documented that Pine Gap, the CIA’s largest and most important intelligence facility, provides intelligence gathering capability with eyes over North Korea, China, Russia and the Middle East. The original intent was that Pine Gap be part of an early warning system should a foreign power launch a nuclear strike against the United States, but over time morphed into the largest intelligence listening post on earth.

In recent years, despite the thawing of the Cold War, counter terrorism operations have greatly enhanced the operational and tactical role of the Pine Gap facility within the U.S. intelligence community while it still maintains its original surveillance monitoring function.

“Pine Gap… where careers go to die.” Jack, one of the most experienced intelligence operatives in the Security and Intelligence Directorate and he could feel the long arm of DARPA behind his rushed posting to the middle of nowhere.

Jack stood outside in the stifling heat wondering for the hundredth time that day who it was that he’d had pissed off so much. He might not be at the ass end of the world, but he sure as hell didn’t need an oversized radar dish to see it from where he stood. Someone above his paygrade had to have laughed his ass off when he signed Jack’s orders for transfer. He was convinced it was an administrative screw up. A typical military FUBAR screw up.

His mood wasn’t helped any by the change of time zones together with the lack of sleep in the cold, utilitarian cabin of the C-130 that delivered him to his final destination.

“Time to hit the chow hall, Jack?” Sam Krupsky slapped him on the back as he came up behind.

Suddenly Jack was in the shade. Sam was a big unit. So big he blocked out the hot Australian sun as he stood beside Jack in his rumpled, sweat stained fatigues.

“Good call. God knows how many time zones I’ve crossed in the past 48 hours. I can’t remember the last time I ate or slept. The way I’m feeling right now I’m not sure if I want a shit or a haircut. What day is it here, anyway?”

“It’s Wednesday, one of the security detail who showed me around told me they have pork sausages and eggs benedict with bacon on Wednesdays.” Sam licked his lips at the thought.

“Is that all you think about, Sam? Your stomach?” Jack asked lightheartedly.

“Thinking about food is probably better than wasting time trying to figure out what the hell I’m doing here. I never thought I’d say this, but this place has to be a hundred times more boring than GITMO.” To emphasize his loathing of his current posting, he spat on the path between his feet.

Jack crinkled his nose in disgust as the pavement oyster sizzled on the hot concrete.

“I’m a navy man, I should be able to at least smell the ocean. What am I doing in the middle of the desert?”

Sam had been based at Guantanamo Bay but Jack was there only briefly to make the connection to his Australian assignment. During the long haul flight from GITMO, when Sam’s head wasn’t buried in an airsickness bag, the two men learned a few things about each other. They had two things in common. Neither knew what they’d done to deserve the Pine Gap punishment. Secondly, they both hated the heat. Sam said it was because it reminded him of The Gulf. Jack just plain hated it. Period.

Other than that, the two men were a study in contrasts. Jack was regarded by most women as ruggedly handsome and with his abundance of well groomed, jet black hair he looked more like a corporate executive than an intelligence operative. Lithe, narrow-waisted and broad shouldered, Jack had an athletic look about him, a look that was partly a function of the genes he’d been born with and partly the many hours of disciplined work in the gym. He took pride in his appearance and to the casual observer he appeared to be a man who could look after himself. Jack exuded an aura of proficiency and self-assurance that only those familiar with the rigorous training regime of an elite Special Forces unit would recognize.

Krupsky was just a hulk of a genetic anomaly. He was huge and powerfully built, despite doing only as much PT work as the Navy required. He’d joined the Navy as soon as he was legally able with the notion that he’d like to become a Navy diver. He soon learned they didn’t make diving suits his size and had to settle for an assortment of duties over time before finding his true talent, which also happened to be his passion.

By his own admission, Sam had a face ‘like a bashed crab’ and often joked that he ended up in a foster home because his own parents couldn’t stand to look at him. The shock of red hair that crowned the menacing lines of his face didn’t do him any favors, either, buzz cut on the sides and flat across the top.

Ironically, the ubiquitous red dust that seemed to stretch endlessly in every direction covered Sam’s boots so they almost matched his hair, making him look like some kind of demented burger clown.

“And if this place isn’t strange enough, everyone here calls me ‘Bluey’. What’s that about?” Sam asked although it was clear he didn’t expect Jack to have any more idea than he did.

Jack shrugged. “Maybe it’s some weird Aussie humor? Either way, my care factor is zero. I don’t plan on being here long enough to learn the local customs. Or the language.”

“Well, it’s a stupid name. I hate it.”

After looking down at Sam’s red, dusty boots Jack craned his neck to look him in the eyes. “Are you planning to go to the colonel’s office looking like that?” Jack’s boots, like his well-fitted uniform were spotless, despite mileage they had endured.

“Looking like what?” Sam looked confused as he gave himself a quick once-over before making his way to the main administration building.