Matthew Reilly - Area 7

He pulled out a printout of Area 7's source power history,

pointed to one entry.

07:37:b6

WARNING:

Auxiliary

power

malfunction

bystein

Malfunction

located at

terminal

1A2

Receiving no

response

from

systems:

TRACS;AUX

SYS-1; RAD

COM

SPHERE;

MBN;

FXT FAN

The President said, "Remember you said that you blew

up a junction box on one of the underground hangar levels

earlier this morning? Sometime around 7:37."

Matthew Reilly

"Yeah ..."

"Well, it seems that that junction box was kind of important.

Among other things, it housed the controls for the

base's auxiliary power system and its radiosphere. It also

housed a system called the MBN. You know what 'MBN'

stands for?"

"No ..."

"Stands for the Military Broadcast Network, the previous

name for the Emergency Broadcast System. Seems the

MBN's outgoing transmission cable was destroyed in that

blast. And because the LBJ Protocol was never initiated this

morning, Caesar's transmissions over the Emergency

Broadcast System were delayed by forty-five minutes."

"But the system was destroyed at 7:37 ..." Schofield

said.

The President smiled.

"Correct," he said, "which means that every time Caesar

Russell spoke into his digital camera this morning, he

wasn't transmitting at all. He was speaking to no one but the

people at Area 7."

Schofield blinked, trying to comprehend it all.

Then he said: "So the country doesn't know this happened ..."

The President nodded ruefully.

"It seems," he said, "that the people of America have

been preoccupied all day with another drama, an accident

involving Hollywood's highest paid actress and her actor fiance".

"It appears that the unlucky couple have been trapped in

the Swiss Alps all day, cut off by an avalanche while hiking

illegally on Swiss military property. Sadly, their unscrupulous

guide was killed, but I believe that just in the last hour

our two superstars have been found safe and well.

"As I understand it, CNN has been covering the whole

drama all day, updating the public every hour, recycling

some amateur footage of the area, giving updates. Biggest

news event since Diana's car crash, they tell me."

Area 7 477

Schofield almost laughed.

"So they really don't know," he said.

"That's right," the President said. "And that, Captain, is

the way it will stay."

exactly six hours later, the second X-38 space shuttle

from Area 8 was launched off the back of a high-flying 747.

Its mission: the destruction of a rogue Air Force reconnaissance

satellite hovering in a geosynchronous orbit above

southern Utah.

So far as the shuttle's pilots could tell, it appeared that

the satellite in question had been sending and receiving a peculiar

microwave signal down into the Utah desert.

In the end, the pilots didn't care what it was doing. They

had orders, which they followed to the letter.

And so they blasted the satellite out of the sky.

WITH THE CONTROLLING SATELLITE DESTROYED, THE TYPE 240

plasma explosives in the airports were rendered useless,

apart from their proximity sensors, which would take a little

more time to disable.

Over the next few hours, all fourteen bombs would be

disarmed and dismantled, and then taken away for analysis.

IN ADDITION TO THE DISARMING OF THE PLASMA BOMBS, THE

destruction of the satellite also allowed for the removal of

the radio transmitter attached to the President's heart.

The procedure was conducted by a renowned civilian

heart surgeon from Johns Hopkins University Hospital under

the watchful eye of three other cardiac surgeons and

armed supervision by the United States Secret Service and

the United States Marine Corps.

Never was a surgeon more careful--or more nervous-- during an operation.

Area 7 479

Limited anaesthesia was used. Although the public was

never notified of it, for twenty-eight minutes, the Vice

President was in charge of the United States of America.

AN INVESTIGATORY COMMITTEE WOULD LATER BE FORMED TO

conduct an inquiry into the Air Force's role in the Area 7 incident.

As a result of that inquiry, no less than eighteen high

ranking Air Force officers in charge of a dozen bases across

the southwestern United States and ninety-nine junior officers

and enlisted men stationed at those bases were tried for

treason in closed session.

It appeared that all of the men linked to the day's events

were either currently serving, or had once served, at either

the Air Force Special Operations Command, based at Hurlbut Field, Florida, or with the 14th and 20th Air Forces at

Warren and Falcon Air Force Bases in Wyoming and Colorado.

All, at one time or another, had been under the direct

command of Charles "Caesar" Russell.

Overall, in a service of nearly 400,000 men and women,

one hundred and seventeen traitors was not a very large

group, barely a dozen to each tainted base. But considering

the aircraft and ordnance at those bases, it was more than

enough to carry out Caesar's plan.

It further emerged at the trials that five of the USAF

personnel involved in the plot were Air Force surgeons who

at various times had performed procedures on congressional

members, including the United States senator and onetime

presidential hopeful, Jeremiah K. Woolf.

Circumstantial evidence presented at all the trials also

suggested that every Air Force man involved in the incident

was a member of an informal racist society within the

United States Air Force known as the Brotherhood.

All were sentenced to life imprisonment at an undisclosed

military prison, with no hope of parole. Unfortunately,

the plane delivering them to the secret prison

inexplicably crashed during flight. There were no survivors.

In the investigatory committee's final report to the Joint

480

Matthew Reilly

Chiefs of Staff, the subject of "informal antisocial interest

groups" within the armed forces was raised. While it was acknowledged

in the report that most such societies had been

removed from the military during a purge in the 1980's, the

report recommended that a new investigation be initiated

into their continued presence.

The Joint Chiefs, however, did not accept that such societies

existed, and therefore rejected the recommendations

of the investigatory committee on this point.

OVER THE NEXT SIX MONTHS, THERE WOULD BE A NUMBER OF

unconfirmed reports from tourists in the Lake Powell area

concerning the sighting of a family of Kodiak bears around

the northeastern portion of the lake.

Officers of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service investigated

the reports, but no bears were ever found.

A COUPLE OF WEEKS LATER, A QUIET CEREMONY WAS HELD IN A

dark underground meeting room beneath the White House.

Inside the room were nine people.

The President of the United States.

Captain Shane Schofield--with his arm in a sling.

Staff Sergeant Elizabeth Gant--with crutches on account

of her broken ankle.

Gunnery Sergeant Gena "Mother" Newman--with her small bald-headed trucker husband, Ralph.

Sergeant Buck Riley Junior--with sling.

United States Secret Service Agent Juliet Janson--with

sling.

David Fairfax, of the Defense Intelligence Agency-- wearing his good sneakers.

And a small boy named Kevin.