Eternity Base

Chapter 33

Cordon looked up from the computer screen as his door banged open and Stu Fernandez stormed in. He quickly blanked the screen. “What’s wrong?”

Fernandez leaned forward, both hands on Cordon’s desk. “The tapes are gone.”

“Which tapes?”

“Conner’s Antarctica tapes. Both the original and the edited version. They’re gone and no one knows where they are.”

Cordon frowned. “They weren’t signed out?”

“No.”

“Well, don’t you have a backup?”

“No. If you remember, you told me not to make copies, for security reasons.”

Cordon rubbed his chin. “Hmm. OK. It’s not a big deal. We’ll have the originals from Conner as soon as she links up with the support team. Just have her retransmit.”

Fernandez shook his head. “That’s another problem. We’ve had no contact with her for twenty-four hours. And someone ordered the support team to stay at McMurdo Station and not go forward to Eternity Base.”

Cordon held up a hand. “Listen. Just calm down. Mr. Parker is handling this whole situation personally. I suggest you get back to work and don’t worry about Eternity Base. Everything is being taken care of there. It is no longer your concern.”

“That’s my story!” Fernandez fumed. “Conner’s mine. You can’t—”

“Go back to your office.” Cordon’s voice was ice cold. “If you want to continue working here, I suggest you drop this whole subject.”

Fernandez pulled his hands off the desk and regarded his boss for a few seconds, then he turned and left.

When the door slammed shut, Cordon turned off the computer. He took his briefcase and left the building, walked three blocks, and turned the corner. He had to wait only five seconds before a car with tinted windows pulled up to the curb and the back door opened. Cordon got in and the car pulled away.

“Do you have them?”

Cordon pulled out the two tapes and handed them over.

The Apache helicopter raced up on the Bell Jet Ranger and matched speed to the left of the smaller aircraft. The 30mm cannon that hung under the nose of the attack gunship turned until it was pointing directly at the Jet Ranger. The Apache pilot keyed his radio.

“Helicopter tail number four seven six, you are directed to assume a heading of one six five degrees. You are to make no radio transmissions. You have ten seconds to comply.”

The gunner in the front seat of the Apache nervously caressed his trigger and waited. The Jet Ranger made no change in course.

“You have five seconds.”

The gunner had destroyed numerous Iraqi tanks during the Gulf War and had no doubts about what his 30mm cannon could do. He couldn’t believe the other aircraft was ignoring them.

The pilot counted down. “Four. Three. Two. One.” The pilot switched to intercom. “What’s wrong with the guy?”

The gunner looked in his sight and zeroed in on the cockpit. The pilot was staring straight ahead, not even acknowledging their presence. There was someone in the backseat. ‘Try another frequency,” he suggested.

The Apache pilot did that, still getting no response. “Put some rounds across his front.”

The gunner let loose a five-round burst, the tracers flitting across the front of the Jet Ranger. Still nothing.

The Apache pilot keyed his radio to a different frequency. ‘Tango One Niner, this is Hawk. We are getting no response from the target. They are not acknowledging our warnings. Over.”

“This is Tango One Niner. Are you over open land? Over.”

The pilot glanced down. Nothing but open range land for miles, which was why they had picked this intercept point. “Roger. Clear as far as I can see. Over.”

“Put the target down. Over.”

“What!” the Apache pilot exclaimed, forgetting radio protocol.

“I say again. You are ordered to shoot down the target and give us the grid of the wreckage. We will take care of it from there. Over.”

The gunner looked over his shoulder at the pilot sitting behind him. “Are they serious?” he asked over the intercom.

“Fucking A, they’re serious. Put him down.”

The gunner shook his head. Orders were orders. They’d been told that this helicopter was being used by some drug smuggler. The gunner’s finger curled around the trigger, and he placed the crosshairs on the engine compartment. His finger twitched and 30mm bullets tore into the other aircraft, shredding metal.

The Jet Ranger plummeted straight down. The Apache pilot descended until they were at a hover over the smoldering wreckage. There was no way anyone could have survived the crash. He radioed in the site; within ten minutes an unmarked Blackhawk helicopter was on the scene, and they were ordered to depart.

“I told them about Devlin, but they insisted they had to take us directly back here,” Conner fumed. ‘They said they would send out some planes to recover his body.”

Sammy shrugged. She wasn’t as worried about the dead as the living. Riley was propped up on the bed, his chest swathed in bandages and an IV hooked into each arm. He’d been unconscious ever since they’d brought him in from surgery. The doctor had said his prognosis for recovery was good.

There was a marine guard outside the wardroom door, and Conner had been pacing back and forth ever since Riley had been wheeled in fifteen minutes ago. Sammy was too weary to discuss anything right now. No one would tell them anything; she had a feeling they were waiting for someone to arrive, someone who would give them the “word,” whatever it was.

“They wouldn’t even give me any paper to write on,” Conner complained as she finally sat down.

Sammy lay on the bed next to Riley, closed her eyes, and let sleep overtake her.

“Sir, we have a reversal of several key indicators. Elements of the PKA I Corps are reported to be standing down. Three merchant ships that we have been tracking, ships that were suspected to have PKA Special Forces troops on board, have turned back.”

Patterson nodded. He knew that the message he had just received from the Pentagon had a lot to do with that. Apparently the Russians had talked to their former friends in the North and informed them that it would not be in their best interest to conduct offensive operations against the South. There had also been a veiled reference from General Morris that the Kitty Hawk battle group had been involved in a joint U.S.-Russian operation that had affected events here. The message between the lines to Patterson had been clear: don’t complain about the deployment of Seventh Fleet elements anymore.

For the time being, things on the peninsula would stay the same — a wary watching across barbed wire and antitank trenches. “Inform all units to reduce to a level four alert status.”

General Hodges impatiently tapped his fingers on the arm of the chair. “What about Kensington?”

The bald man raised his eyebrows. “What about him?”

“Why did he build Eternity Base?”

“You know why from the interrogation of Glaston and Woodson. Bomb shelter. Home away from home until the world cooled off enough for him to return. Because he wanted to and he could.”

“Why the bombs, though?”

The bald man steepled his fingers. “Because he had them. Because Kensington was a man of immense power and he wanted to maintain that power after money no longer mattered. There was a certain paranoiac logic to it all that I find quite fascinating.”

“Was?” Hodges inquired.

The bald man smiled. “Mr. Kensington had an unfortunate helicopter accident earlier today. The exact cause of the crash is still being investigated with the aid of some of the men from my office.”

Hodges ran a nervous tongue over his lips. “The president wants this whole thing buried deep. There can’t be a scandal.”

The bald man leaned back in his seat. “We’re holding Glaston for a while to see if we can find any other operations he may have been involved in. Then he will be terminated. General Woodson, most unfortunately, died of heart failure due to his recent cancer surgery. A terrible shame for a man who gave so much to this organization.”

“What about the reporter from SNN?”

“We’re handling it.”

“How did the North Koreans find out about the base?”

“That’s been taken care of also.”

Hodges stood. “It’s closed then?”

“It’s closed.”

The door swung open and a man in civilian clothes stepped through, immediately closing the door behind him. Conner reached over and tapped Sammy on the shoulder. “We’ve got company.”

Riley’s eyes flickered. Sammy gently shook Riley and he came awake with a grimace. The man stood there looking at the three of them for a little while, then spoke. “We’ve recovered Mr. Devlin’s body. Tentative cause of death is extreme hypothermia.”

The man pulled over one of the plastic chairs and sat down. “We have a problem here that also happens to be your problem. To put it bluntly, the words ‘Eternity Base’ must never be mentioned publicly.”

“What!” Conner exploded. “You’re crazy.”

The man didn’t even blink. “Let me explain the facts to you. First, Eternity Base no longer exists. We’ve landed men there to sterilize what little is left, including the reactor.

“Second, you have no record of the base. The pictures from the Records Center have been taken care of. By the way, I am sure you would not like to see any legal action taken against your sister for breaking her contract with the government by sending you copies of those pictures.” The man looked at Sammy with a cold grin.

“Your equipment disappeared in the explosion and you have nothing. The—”

“Atlanta has copies of my video,” Conner countered.

“As I was just about to say — your headquarters in Atlanta has somehow managed to misplace the two copies of your tape.”

Conner stared at the man and then turned to Sammy and Riley, who had yet to say a word.

The man wasn’t done yet. “As a matter of fact, you might say the circumstances surrounding the deaths of your crew and Mr. Devlin and Mr. Swenson are very murky. We have only your word on that issue. Some might suggest that the three of you had a hand in their deaths, especially Mr. Devlin’s. At the very least you might be found negligent in his death.”

Conner just continued to stare, holding back the angry words that wanted to spew forth. Now was not the time or place to fight.

Riley broke the silence, his voice barely more than a whisper. “What’s the deal?”

The man seemed to relax for the first time. “As I said — no word of Eternity Base.” He looked Conner in the eyes. “I believe you will find that your boss, Mr. Parker, has already agreed to that.”

Conner slumped in her chair. As if sensing that he had her on the ropes, the man offered a handout. “In exchange for your cooperation, we are willing to offer you an exclusive on the ‘real’ story: the dramatic rescue by a joint U.S.-Russian military task force of the survivors of your news team covering an ecological story. We have quite a bit of footage — including shots of the Russian submarine that helped rescue you — enough to make an interesting piece.”

The man stood. “Mr. Parker has also been informed of improved future cooperation between SNN and various agencies of the government. I am quite sure he is very satisfied with the possibility of several exclusive leaks of information. I am certain you will also see the advantages of your cooperation.”

He looked at Sammy. “And I even believe they still have your old

job waiting for you back at the Records Center, perhaps even a promotion.”

He walked to the door and stopped. “I will assume I have your agreement.” He stepped out.