Aberrant: The Middle Children of History - Buried Treasure

[SalmonMax]

Theodore Berman was yanked out of a vaguely pleasant dream by a tinny reproduction of 'Ride of the Valkyries' emanating from the wireless phone on his bedside table. He scowled, but he reached for it.

Wagner ringtones weren't the sort of people you left to voicemail.

Twenty minutes later, he was sitting in a little dark briefing room at the Pentagon, at a too-small table ringed by humorless men; some in uniforms, some not. An overhead projector hooked up to a laptop splayed a picture onto a screen against the far wall. Of the men in the room, Ted only recognized the one holding the projector's remote. Lt General Austin Links, formerly commanding officer of NORAD...now he was one of the bigwigs on the nova watch agency titled, and Ted hated the title, 'The Directive.'

The picture on the wall was seemingly strange to attract a gathering like this. It was just a young woman's face. The picture was a bit grainy, probably electronically magnified from a relatively low-res image...traffic camera maybe, Ted thought. She was so-so pretty; high school sweetheart, not Hollywood celeb. Dark hair just past her shoulders. Sunglasses. Red and white striped blouse. In another five years, she'd be a cute young soccer mom. Right now, a cute young co-ed.

Then Ted blinked and looked again. Was that...?

So THAT'S what they wanted him here for.

"Mr. Berman," General Links said, breaking the uneasy silence. "Thank you for joining us. You're still with Project Utopia's Technology Division, I believe?"

Ted nodded. "I'm sure all the details are in your files on me, General. What's so important you had to drag me out of bed on a Saturday?"

Links cracked a smile, but it was a hard smile, with a sharp edge. "I'm still a military man at heart, Berman. We don't get weekends off." He gestured at the projection. "You know her, right?"

Ted felt a momentary wild urge to lie. Not out of massive loyalty to Alexandra, but just because he resented the strong-arm tactics. He couldn't have sent a memo? Even so, he was supposed to be a liason...and that meant putting up with more than his fair share of BS...especially from a government as suspicious of Utopia as the US. "She's a nova. Alexandra Davis. Goes by 'Genesis' since her eruption. Why?"

"You've worked with her in the past?" There was a predatory glint in the General's eye that Ted didn't think he liked.

"On two occasions," Ted lied. It was actually three, but the third was off the books.

"She's a person of interest," General Links said. "We need a briefing on her...whatever you know. What she likes, what she doesn't. What you think about her. What you think her goals are."

What was this? He decided to temporize. "You know, General, I could give a much better, clearer report with a bit more advance notice. I haven't heard from her in over a year, or worked with her in almost two. Even then, the relationship was purely professional. And what's this person of interest? Of interest why?"

"There's been some...developments in her case that some in authority find disturbing," Links informed him. "I'm one of them."

"Can you be a bit more specific?" Ted asked. "I still have clearance, I believe."

It was a huge bother coming here...but it was almost worth it seeing the Lt General stew a little. Links wanted something from him, but he'd have to give him something to get it...and he hated that. He was accustomed to getting what he wanted without question.

"Shortly after Miss Davis assisted Project Utopia nineteen months ago, she contacted the United States Government and entered into a working relationship with the Department of Defense, and by proxy The Directive. It was unorthodox, but she convinced who needed to be convinced. She was developing human augmentation technology, and so-called 'quantum technology' that could emulate nova-scale abilities, and manipulate quantum energy in much the same way as an MR node."

That was new. Ted nearly stood up in his seat. "Is she -insane-?" he demanded. "If that ever got out, Nova Vigilance and the Primacy would -crucify- her!"

"I'm not done yet." The General waited for Ted to sit grudgingly back down. "After six months, she withdrew from the agreement abruptly and severed contact." He clicked the remote, and the picture changed to a satellite image of what appeared to be some kind of scrubby desert floor. A single road made a pale winding strip out to some kind of fenced area with a single shed on it. Not far from the shed was a large concrete slab.

It took Ted a second to realize what he was looking at. "Is that a missile silo?"

The General nodded. "An old Atlas ICBM silo from the seventies. She's living in it now. Bought it from the US government directly during one of the 'cold war fire sales.' Cleaned it up, refurbished it...the whole bit."

"Okay...so..." Ted began, completely at a loss now. "Why is this important?"

"You don't think it's a bit...ominous? Cutting herself off like that? Holing up in some underground bunker? You know what she can do, Ted...she could have -anything- in there and we'd never know it until that launch cap opened."

Ted frowned. They wouldn't have called him if there hasn't been more. He waited.

General Links advanced the next slide. It now showed a gaggle of what looked like university students and an older man who was likely a professor. They had it all; dorky clothes, prescription sunglasses and dabs of sunscreen on their noses. "Students from Las Vegas were in the field doing gravimetric analysis for a geological survey three days ago. They recorded an anomaly that affected every device they had for a period just under two seconds. The full details are in the report in front of you."

There was a little manilla folder on the table, Ted realized. He didn't bother to look yet. Already his head was spinning. The pieces were there, and he already saw sort of where it was going, but...what the hell?

The general went on. "We checked with other labs, and recieved corroborating data. Three days ago, at just after 12:06pm Pacific time, for a period of just under two seconds, every gravitometer on Earth deflected slightly, depending on where they were. We had our engineers do some calculations, and the center of the anomaly that caused this..."

"Was the silo," Ted finished for him. Now he reached for the folder. What was she -doing- in there?

Links didn't bother telling him he was right. He watched the Utopia liason to the US Pentagon read the report. "They calculated the mass that must have caused it too," he added.

"A hundred million tons," Ted said quietly as he read.

"Contained in a space no larger than a missile silo...and probably quite a bit smaller," the general finished.

Ted looked up at the general, eyes wide. "I have to talk to her."

Links nodded. "We were hoping you'd see it our way."

[SalmonMax]

Five hours later, words were appearing on a small LCD screen.

'The so-called Nova Age will be remembered as one in which all the obstacles humankind ever faced to the total domination of their environment were conquered...except for one. Predictably, that one flaw exploded from a tiny blemish on an otherwise perfect surface into a massive crisis that would ultimately undo all the previous gains and threaten the survival of the species. Or, depending on who you ask, both species.'

Alexandra paused and re-read the email, then deleted the last sentence. She'd never bought into the two-species doctrine, and saw no reason to give it any space in the message.

She looked a bit different than the picture in the briefing room. A few years older, clad in an oversized plaid flannel shirt and loose drawstring pants with her hair pulled back into a little twist on the back of her head that would have been a bun if it had been longer. Strands stuck out haphazardly here and there. She couldn't do a thing with it sometimes.

The kitchen was warm, with creamy yellow paint and rich wooden cabinetage. It was an odd shape, being a semicircle around a central concrete shaft, like being inside half a donut. The small round kitchen table she was sitting at abutted that narrow central pillar, though it could be pushed around as needed. If it could be said to have a flaw, it's that the room was a bit claustrophobic. Plenty of open space, but no windows. It was kind of like sitting in a very nicely decorated bunker underground.

Which is precisely what it was.

Alexandra sent her email and closed the sleek black palmtop she'd composed it on. It was of her own design, of course. Encrypted and spoofed all to hell; not that she really thought it would stop someone from finding her. She hadn't really tried to conceal her actions here, on the grounds that the more furtively she did something, the more people would tend to think she was doing something awful. It was a gamble either way, of course...but she figured she'd be better off gambling that someone, somewhere could find her if they really wanted to.

The musical tone that sounded from a small black box up on the ceiling told her she was right. She glanced at her watch and headed over towards one of the doors. Through it was a small white room the shape of a slice of pie, with another door opposite the one she entered through. Where the central pillar had been in the kitchen there was a spiral stairway that went both up and down. Alex went into the staircase and jogged lightly up until it spilled out into the center of a large round room. All around were monitors and computer equipment and the light from the ceiling lamps was dimmed. There was a large round blast door at one end of the room. On the opposite end was a shielded booth, with yet more equipment inside it. She kept meaning to get more stuff in here...partitions and maybe some defenses. Oh well. Too late now.

A quick check at the screens showed the slightly grainy image of a car outside at the fence. Behind it was what looked like a military truck of some kind. Alex took it as a good sign they'd stopped at the gate rather than just crashing through. Also, the car in front of the heavier vehicles was civilian. Kind of a relief. Sometimes the dice came up seven.

Alexandra thumbed a button and spoke into the little callbox next to the security camera monitor.

"Yeah?"

There was a pause, during which she could vaguely see shapes in the car moving. Then the driver leaned out towards the mic at the gate.

Well, she thought. That's interesting.

"Genesis? Is that you?"

Alex smiled and tapped the screen gently. "Aren't we being formal. Is that a truck full of marines behind you, or are you just happy to see me?"

Ted's face had enough resolution for her to see him smile nervously back. "Look, uh, can we talk?"

She found herself wondering how hard they were going to push this time, and how hard she wanted to push back. Bringing Ted in was surprisingly diplomatic. How long would that last?

"Looks like we'd better. What's with the brute squad?" As if she didn't know.

Ted had the grace to look embarrassed. "They're for my protection, ostensibly. Can I come in?"

"Sure. Just you though. And not in the car."

Ted nodded, then pulled back in. More movement inside. Alex thought she could almost hear whoever was in there with him telling him it could be a trap. He'd never buy it though. Sure enough, the car door opened, and he got out. Shirt sleeves and a loosened tie flapping in the wind...it was hot out there, she reflected as she thumbed a rocker switch.

Another camera showed the heavy chainlink gate sliding open just wide enough to admit a person, then stop as she let up on it. She closed it after him and tracked his progress over the grounds as he headed for the thick concrete slab that marked the old ICBM launch cap. Not far away was a sloped ramp into the ground leading to a thick round blast door. It was there that he went, to the camera's eye seeming to vanish without a trace into the earth.