87
   The fourth floor of NASA headquarters was less impressive than the lobby—long sterile corridors with office doors equally spaced along the walls. The corridor was deserted. Laminated signs pointed in all directions.

<LANDSAT7
TERRA>
<ACRIMSAT
<JASON1
AQUA>
PODS>

   Gabrielle followed the signs for PODS. Winding her way down a series of long corridors and intersections, she came to a set of heavy steel doors. The stencil read:

Polar Orbiting Density Scanner (PODS)
Section Manager, Chris Harper

   The doors were locked, secured both by key card and a PIN pad access. Gabrielle put her ear to the cold metal door. For a moment, she thought she heard talking. Arguing. Maybe not. She wondered if she should just bang on the door until someone inside let her in. Unfortunately, her plan for dealing with Chris Harper required a bit more subtlety than banging on doors. She looked around for another entrance but saw none. A custodial alcove stood adjacent to the door, and Gabrielle stepped in, searching the dimly lit niche for a janitor’s key ring or key card. Nothing. Just brooms and mops.
   Returning to the door, she put her ear to the metal again. This time she definitely heard voices. Getting louder. And footsteps. The latch engaged from inside.
   Gabrielle had no time to hide as the metal door burst open. She jumped to the side, plastering herself against the wall behind the door as a group of people hurried through, talking loudly. They sounded angry.
   “What the hell is Harper’s problem? I thought he’d be on cloud nine!”
   “On a night like tonight,” another said as the group passed by, “he wants to be alone? He should be celebrating!”
   As the group moved away from Gabrielle, the heavy door started swinging closed on pneumatic hinges, revealing her location. She remained rigid as the men continued down the hall. Waiting as long as she possibly could, until the door was only inches from closing, Gabrielle lunged forward and caught the door handle with just inches to spare. She stood motionless as the men turned the corner down the hall, too engaged in their conversation to look back.
   Heart pounding, Gabrielle pulled open the door and stepped into the dimly lit area beyond. She quietly closed the door.
   The space was a wide open work area that reminded her of a college physics laboratory: computers, work islands, electronic gear. As her eyes became accustomed to the darkness, Gabrielle could see blueprints and sheets of calculations scattered around. The entire area was dark except for an office on the far side of the lab, where a light shone under the door. Gabrielle walked over quietly. The door was closed, but through the window she could see a man sitting at a computer. She recognized the man from the NASA press conference. The nameplate on the door read:

Chris Harper
Section Manager, PODS

   Having come this far, Gabrielle suddenly felt apprehensive, wondering if she could actually pull this off. She reminded herself how certain Sexton was that Chris Harper had lied. I would bet my campaign on it, Sexton had said. Apparently there were others who felt the same, others who were waiting for Gabrielle to uncover the truth so they could close in on NASA, attempting to gain even a tiny foothold after tonight’s devastating developments. After the way Tench and the Herney administration had played Gabrielle this afternoon, she was eager to help.
   Gabrielle raised her hand to knock on the door but paused, Yolanda’s voice running through her mind. If Chris Harper lied to the world about PODS, what makes you think he’ll tell YOU the truth?
   Fear, Gabrielle told herself, having almost fallen victim to it herself today. She had a plan. It involved a tactic she’d seen the senator use on occasion to scare information out of political opponents. Gabrielle had absorbed a lot under Sexton’s tutelage, and not all of it attractive or ethical. But tonight she needed every advantage. If she could persuade Chris Harper to admit he had lied—for whatever reason—Gabrielle would open a small door of opportunity for the senator’s campaign. Beyond that, Sexton was a man who, if given an inch to maneuver, could wriggle his way out of almost any jam.
   Gabrielle’s plan for dealing with Harper was something Sexton called “overshooting”—an interrogation technique invented by the early Roman authorities to coax confessions from criminals they suspected were lying. The method was deceptively simple:
   Assert the information you want confessed.
   Then allege something far worse.
   The object was to give the opponent a chance to choose the lesser of two evils—in this case, the truth.
   The trick was exuding confidence, something Gabrielle was not feeling at the moment. Taking a deep breath, Gabrielle ran through the script in her mind, and then knocked firmly on the office door.
   “I told you I’m busy!” Harper called out, his English accent familiar.
   She knocked again. Louder.
   “I told you I’m not interested in coming down!”
   This time she banged on the door with her fist.
   Chris Harper came over and yanked open the door. “Bloody hell, do you—” He stopped short, clearly surprised to see Gabrielle.
   “Dr. Harper,” she said, infusing her voice with intensity.
   “How did you get up here?”
   Gabrielle’s face was stern. “Do you know who I am?”
   “Of course. Your boss has been slamming my project for months. How did you get in?”
   “Senator Sexton sent me.”
   Harper’s eyes scanned the lab behind Gabrielle. “Where is your staff escort?”
   “That’s not your concern. The senator has influential connections.”
   “In this building?” Harper looked dubious.
   “You’ve been dishonest, Dr. Harper. And I’m afraid the senator has called a special senatorial justice board to look into your lies.”
   A pall crossed Harper’s face. “What are you talking about?”
   “Smart people like yourself don’t have the luxury of playing stupid, Dr. Harper. You’re in trouble, and the senator sent me up here to offer you a deal. The senator’s campaign took a huge hit tonight. He’s got nothing left to lose, and he’s ready to take you down with him if he needs to.”
   “What the devil are you talking about?”
   Gabrielle took a deep breath and made her play. “You lied in your press conference about the PODS anomaly-detection software. We know that. A lot of people know that. That’s not the issue.” Before Harper could open his mouth to argue, Gabrielle steamed onward. “The senator could blow the whistle on your lies right now, but he’s not interested. He’s interested in the bigger story. I think you know what I’m talking about.”
   “No, I—”
   “Here’s the senator’s offer. He’ll keep his mouth shut about your software lies if you give him the name of the top NASA executive with whom you’re embezzling funds.”
   Chris Harper’s eyes seemed to cross for a moment. “What? I’m not embezzling!”
   “I suggest you watch what you say, sir. The senatorial committee has been collecting documentation for months now. Did you really think you two would slip by undetected? Doctoring PODS paperwork and redirecting allocated NASA funds to private accounts? Lying and embezzling can put you in jail, Dr. Harper.”
   “I did no such thing!”
   “You’re saying you didn’t lie about PODS?”
   “No, I’m saying I bloody well didn’t embezzle money!”
   “So, you’re saying you did lie about PODS.”
   Harper stared, clearly at a loss for words.
   “Forget about the lying,” Gabrielle said, waving it off. “Senator Sexton is not interested in the issue of your lying in a press conference. We’re used to that. You guys found a meteorite, nobody cares how you did it. The issue for him is the embezzlement. He needs to take down someone high in NASA. Just tell him who you’re working with, and he’ll steer the investigation clear of you entirely. You can make it easy and tell us who the other person is, or the senator will make it ugly and start talking about anomaly-detection software and phony work-arounds.”
   “You’re bluffing. There are no embezzled funds.”
   “You’re an awful liar, Dr. Harper. I’ve seen the documentation. Your name is on all the incriminating paperwork. Over and over.”
   “I swear I know nothing about any embezzlement!”
   Gabrielle let out a disappointed sigh. “Put yourself in my position, Dr. Harper. I can only draw two conclusions here. Either you’re lying to me, the same way you lied in that press conference. Or you’re telling the truth, and someone powerful in the agency is setting you up as a fall guy for his own misdealings.”
   The proposition seemed to give Harper pause.
   Gabrielle checked her watch. “The senator’s deal is on the table for an hour. You can save yourself by giving him the name of the NASA exec with whom you’re embezzling taxpayers’ money. He doesn’t care about you. He wants the big fish. Obviously the individual in question has some power here at NASA; he or she has managed to keep his or her identity off the paper trail, allowing you to be the fall guy.”
   Harper shook his head. “You’re lying.”
   “Would you like to tell that to a court?”
   “Sure. I’ll deny the whole thing.”
   “Under oath?” Gabrielle grunted in disgust. “Suppose you’ll also deny you lied about fixing the PODS software?” Gabrielle’s heart was pounding as she stared straight into the man’s eyes. “Think carefully about your options here, Dr. Harper. American prisons can be most unpleasant.”
   Harper glared back, and Gabrielle willed him to fold. For a moment she thought she saw a glimmer of surrender, but when Harper spoke, his voice was like steel.
   “Ms. Ashe,” he declared, anger simmering in his eyes, “you are clutching at thin air. You and I both know there is no embezzlement going on at NASA. The only liar in this room is you.”
   Gabrielle felt her muscles go rigid. The man’s gaze was angry and sharp. She wanted to turn and run. You tried to bluff a rocket scientist. What the hell did you expect? She forced herself to hold her head high. “All I know,” she said, feigning utter confidence and indifference to his position, “is the incriminating documents I’ve seen—conclusive evidence that you and another are embezzling NASA funds. The senator simply asked me to come here tonight and offer you the option of giving up your partner instead of facing the inquiry alone. I will tell the senator you prefer to take your chances with a judge. You can tell the court what you told me—you’re not embezzling funds and you didn’t lie about the PODS software.” She gave a grim smile. “But after that lame press conference you gave two weeks ago, somehow I doubt it.” Gabrielle spun on her heel and strode across the darkened PODS laboratory. She wondered if maybe she’d be seeing the inside of a prison instead of Harper.
   Gabrielle held her head high as she walked off, waiting for Harper to call her back. Silence. She pushed her way through the metal doors and strode out into the hallway, hoping the elevators up here were not key-card operated like the lobby. She’d lost. Despite her best efforts, Harper wasn’t biting. Maybe he was telling the truth in his PODS press conference, Gabrielle thought.
   A crash resounded down the hall as the metal doors behind her burst open. “Ms. Ashe,” Harper’s voice called out. “I swear I know nothing about any embezzlement. I’m an honest man!”
   Gabrielle felt her heart skip a beat. She forced herself to keep walking. She gave a casual shrug and called out over her shoulder. “And yet you lied in your press conference.”
   Silence. Gabrielle kept moving down the hallway.
   “Hold on!” Harper yelled. He came jogging up beside her, his face pale. “This embezzlement thing,” he said, lowering his voice. “I think I know who set me up.”
   Gabrielle stopped dead in her tracks, wondering if she had heard him correctly. She turned as slowly and casually as she could. “You expect me to believe someone is setting you up?”
   Harper sighed. “I swear I know nothing about embezzlement. But if there’s evidence against me...”
   “Mounds of it.”
   Harper sighed. “Then it’s all been planted. To discredit me if need be. And there’s only one person who would have done that.”
   “Who?”
   Harper looked her in the eye. “Lawrence Ekstrom hates me.”
   Gabrielle was stunned. “The administrator of NASA?”
   Harper gave a grim nod. “He’s the one who forced me to lie in that press conference.”

 88
   Even with the Aurora aircraft’s misted-methane propulsion system at half power, the Delta Force was hurtling through the night at three times the speed of sound—over two thousand miles an hour. The repetitive throb of the Pulse Detonation Wave Engines behind them gave the ride a hypnotic rhythm. A hundred feet below, the ocean churned wildly, whipped up by the Aurora’s vacuum wake, which sucked fifty-foot rooster tails skyward in long parallel sheets behind the plane.
   This is the reason the SR-71 Blackbird was retired, Delta-One thought.
   The Aurora was one of those secret aircraft that nobody was supposed to know existed, but everyone did. Even the Discovery channel had covered Aurora and its testing out at Groom Lake in Nevada. Whether the security leaks had come from the repeated “skyquakes” heard as far away as Los Angeles, or the unfortunate eyewitness sighting by a North Sea oil-rig driller, or the administrative gaffe that left a description of Aurora in a public copy of the Pentagon budget, nobody would ever know. It hardly mattered. The word was out: The U.S. military had a plane capable of Mach 6 flight, and it was no longer on the drawing board. It was in the skies overhead.
   Built by Lockheed, the Aurora looked like a flattened American football. It was 110 feet long, sixty feet wide, smoothly contoured with a crystalline patina of thermal tiles much like the space shuttle. The speed was primarily the result of an exotic new propulsion system known as a Pulse Detonation Wave Engine, which burned a clean, misted, liquid hydrogen and left a telltale pulse contrail in the sky. For this reason, it only flew at night.
   Tonight, with the luxury of enormous speed, the Delta Force was taking the long way home, out across the open ocean. Even so, they were overtaking their quarry. At this rate, the Delta Force would be arriving on the eastern seaboard in under an hour, a good two hours before its prey. There had been discussion of tracking and shooting down the plane in question, but the controller rightly feared a radar capture of the incident or the burned wreckage might bring on a massive investigation. It was best to let the plane land as scheduled, the controller had decided. Once it became clear where their quarry intended to land, the Delta Force would move in.
   Now, as Aurora streaked over the desolate Labrador Sea, Delta-One’s CrypTalk indicated an incoming call. He answered.
   “The situation has changed,” the electronic voice informed them. “You have another mark before Rachel Sexton and the scientists land.”
   Another mark. Delta-One could feel it. Things were unraveling. The controller’s ship had sprung another leak, and the controller needed them to patch it as fast as possible. The ship would not be leaking, Delta-One reminded himself, if we had hit our marks successfully on the Milne Ice Shelf. Delta-One knew damn well he was cleaning up his own mess.
   “A fourth party has become involved,” the controller said.
   “Who?”
   The controller paused a moment—and then gave them a name.
   The three men exchanged startled looks. It was a name they knew well.
   No wonder the controller sounded reluctant! Delta-One thought. For an operation conceived as a “zero-casualty” venture, the body count and target profile was climbing fast. He felt his sinews tighten as the controller prepared to inform them exactly how and where they would eliminate this new individual.
   “The stakes have increased considerably,” the controller said. “Listen closely. I will give you these instructions only once.”

 89
   High above northern Maine, a G4 jet continued speeding toward Washington. Onboard, Michael Tolland and Corky Marlinson looked on as Rachel Sexton began to explain her theory for why there might be increased hydrogen ions in the fusion crust of the meteorite.
   “NASA has a private test facility called Plum Brook Station,” Rachel explained, hardly able to believe she was going to talk about this. Sharing classified information out of protocol was not something she had ever done, but considering the circumstances, Tolland and Corky had a right to know this. “Plum Brook is essentially a test chamber for NASA’s most radical new engine systems. Two years ago I wrote a gist about a new design NASA was testing there—something called an expander cycle engine.”
   Corky eyed her suspiciously. “Expander cycle engines are still in the theoretical stage. On paper. Nobody’s actually testing. That’s decades away.”
   Rachel shook her head. “Sorry, Corky. NASA has prototypes. They’re testing.”
   “What?” Corky looked skeptical. “ECE’s run on liquid oxygen-hydrogen, which freezes in space, making the engine worthless to NASA. They said they were not even going to try to build an ECE until they overcame the freezing fuel problem.”
   “They overcame it. They got rid of the oxygen and turned the fuel into a ‘slush-hydrogen’ mixture, which is some kind of cryogenic fuel consisting of pure hydrogen in a semifrozen state. It’s very powerful and very clean burning. It’s also a contender for the propulsion system if NASA runs missions to Mars.”
   Corky looked amazed. “This can’t be true.”
   “It better be true,” Rachel said. “I wrote a brief about it for the President. My boss was up in arms because NASA wanted to publicly announce slush-hydrogen as a big success, and Pickering wanted the White House to force NASA to keep slush-hydrogen classified.”
   “Why?”
   “Not important,” Rachel said, having no intention of sharing more secrets than she had to. The truth was that Pickering’s desire to classify slush-hydrogen’s success was to fight a growing national security concern few knew existed—the alarming expansion of China’s space technology. The Chinese were currently developing a deadly “for-hire” launch platform, which they intended to rent out to high bidders, most of whom would be U.S. enemies. The implications for U.S. security were devastating. Fortunately, the NRO knew China was pursuing a doomed propulsion-fuel model for their launch platform, and Pickering saw no reason to tip them off about NASA’s more promising slush-hydrogen propellant.
   “So,” Tolland said, looking uneasy, “you’re saying NASA has a clean-burning propulsion system that runs on pure hydrogen?”
   Rachel nodded. “I don’t have figures, but the exhaust temperatures of these engines are apparently several times hotter than anything ever before developed. They’re requiring NASA to develop all kinds of new nozzle materials.” She paused. “A large rock, placed behind one of these slush-hydrogen engines, would be scalded by a hydrogen-rich blast of exhaust fire coming out at an unprecedented temperature. You’d get quite a fusion crust.”
   “Come on now!” Corky said. “Are we back to the fake meteorite scenario?”
   Tolland seemed suddenly intrigued. “Actually, that’s quite an idea. The setup would be more or less like leaving a boulder on the launchpad under the space shuttle during liftoff.”
   “God save me,” Corky muttered. “I’m airborne with idiots.”
   “Corky,” Tolland said. “Hypothetically speaking, a rock placed in an exhaust field would exhibit similar burn features to one that fell through the atmosphere, wouldn’t it? You’d have the same directional striations and backflow of the melting material.”
   Corky grunted. “I suppose.”
   “And Rachel’s clean-burning hydrogen fuel would leave no chemical residue. Only hydrogen. Increased levels of hydrogen ions in the fusion pocking.”
   Corky rolled his eyes. “Look, if one of these ECE engines actually exists, and runs on slush-hydrogen, I suppose what you’re talking about is possible. But it’s extremely far-fetched.”
   “Why?” Tolland asked. “The process seems fairly simple.”
   Rachel nodded. “All you need is a 190-million-year-old fossilized rock. Blast it in a slush-hydrogen-engine exhaust fire, and bury it in the ice. Instant meteorite.”
   “To a tourist, maybe,” Corky said, “but not to a NASA scientist! You still haven’t explained the chondrules!”
   Rachel tried to recall Corky’s explanation of how chondrules formed. “You said chondrules are caused by rapid heating and cooling events in space, right?”
   Corky sighed. “Chondrules form when a rock, chilled in space, suddenly becomes superheated to a partial-melt stage—somewhere near 1550 Celsius. Then the rock must cool again, extremely rapidly, hardening the liquid pockets into chondrules.”
   Tolland studied his friend. “And this process can’t happen on earth?”
   “Impossible,” Corky said. “This planet does not have the temperature variance to cause that kind of rapid shift. You’re talking here about nuclear heat and the absolute zero of space. Those extremes simply don’t exist on earth.”
   Rachel considered it. “At least not naturally.”
   Corky turned. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
   “Why couldn’t the heating and cooling event have occurred here on earth artificially?” Rachel asked. “The rock could have been blasted by a slush-hydrogen engine and then rapidly cooled in a cryogenic freezer.”
   Corky stared. “Manufactured chondrules?”
   “It’s an idea.”
   “A ridiculous one,” Corky replied, flashing his meteorite sample. “Perhaps you forget? These chondrules were irrefutably dated at 190 million years.” His tone grew patronizing. “To the best of my knowledge, Ms. Sexton, 190 million years ago, nobody was running slush-hydrogen engines and cryogenic coolers.”

* * *

   Chondrules or not, Tolland thought, the evidence is piling up. He had been silent now for several minutes, deeply troubled by Rachel’s newest revelation about the fusion crust. Her hypothesis, though staggeringly bold, had opened all kinds of new doors and gotten Tolland thinking in new directions. If the fusion crust is explainable... what other possibilities does that present?
   “You’re quiet,” Rachel said, beside him.
   Tolland glanced over. For an instant, in the muted lighting of the plane, he saw a softness in Rachel’s eyes that reminded him of Celia. Shaking off the memories, he gave her a tired sigh. “Oh, I was just thinking...”
   She smiled. “About meteorites?”
   “What else?”
   “Running through all the evidence, trying to figure out what’s left?”
   “Something like that.”
   “Any thoughts?”
   “Not really. I’m troubled by how much of the data has collapsed in light of discovering that insertion shaft beneath the ice.”
   “Hierarchical evidence is a house of cards,” Rachel said. “Pull out your primary assumption, and everything gets shaky. The location of the meteorite find was a primary assumption.”
   I’ll say. “When I arrived at Milne, the administrator told me the meteorite had been found inside a pristine matrix of three-hundred-year-old ice and was more dense than any rock found anywhere in the area, which I took as logical proof that the rock had to fall from space.”
   “You and the rest of us.”
   “The midrange nickel content, though persuasive, is apparently not conclusive.”
   “It’s close,” Corky said nearby, apparently listening in.
   “But not exact.”
   Corky acquiesced with a reluctant nod.
   “And,” Tolland said, “this never before seen species of space bug, though shockingly bizarre, in reality could be nothing more than a very old, deepwater crustacean.”
   Rachel nodded. “And now the fusion crust...”
   “I hate to say it,” Tolland said, glancing at Corky, “but it’s starting to feel like there’s more negative evidence than positive.”
   “Science is not about hunches,” Corky said. “It’s about evidence. The chondrules in this rock are decidedly meteoric. I agree with you both that everything we’ve seen is deeply disturbing, but we cannot ignore these chondrules. The evidence in favor is conclusive, while the evidence against is circumstantial.”
   Rachel frowned. “So where does that leave us?”
   “Nowhere,” Corky said. “The chondrules prove we are dealing with a meteorite. The only question is why someone stuck it under the ice.”
   Tolland wanted to believe his friend’s sound logic, but something just felt wrong.
   “You don’t look convinced, Mike,” Corky said.
   Tolland gave his friend a bewildered sigh. “I don’t know. Two out of three wasn’t bad, Corky. But we’re down to one out of three. I just feel like we’re missing something.”

 90
   I got caught, Chris Harper thought, feeling a chill as he pictured an American prison cell. Senator Sexton knows I lied about the PODS software.
   As the PODS section manager escorted Gabrielle Ashe back into his office and closed the door, he felt his hatred of the NASA administrator grow deeper by the instant. Tonight Harper had learned just how deep the administrator’s lies truly ran. In addition to forcing Harper to lie about having fixed PODS’s software, the administrator had apparently set up some insurance just in case Harper got cold feet and decided not to be a team player.
   Evidence of embezzlement, Harper thought. Blackmail. Very sly. After all, who would believe an embezzler trying to discredit the single greatest moment in American space history? Harper had already witnessed to what lengths the NASA administrator would go to save America’s space agency, and now with the announcement of a meteorite with fossils, the stakes had skyrocketed.
   Harper paced for several seconds around the widetable on which sat a scale model of the PODS satellite—a cylindrical prism with multiple antennae and lenses behind reflective shields. Gabrielle sat down, her dark eyes watching, waiting. The nausea in Harper’s gut reminded him of how he had felt during the infamous press conference. He’d put on a lousy show that night, and everyone had questioned him about it. He’d had to lie again and say he was feeling ill that night and was not himself. His colleagues and the press shrugged off his lackluster performance and quickly forgot about it.
   Now the lie had come back to haunt him.
   Gabrielle Ashe’s expression softened. “Mr. Harper, with the administrator as an enemy, you will need a powerful ally. Senator Sexton could well be your only friend at this point. Let’s start with the PODS software lie. Tell me what happened.”
   Harper sighed. He knew it was time to tell the truth. I bloody well should have told the truth in the first place! “The PODS launch went smoothly,” he began. “The satellite settled into a perfect polar orbit just as planned.”
   Gabrielle Ashe looked bored. She apparently knew all this. “Go on.”
   “Then came the trouble. When we geared up to start searching the ice for density anomalies, the onboard anomaly-detection software failed.”
   “Uh... huh.”
   Harper’s words came faster now. “The software was supposed to be able to rapidly examine thousands of acres of data and find parts of the ice that fell outside the range of normal ice density. Primarily the software was looking for soft spots in the ice—global warming indicators—but if it stumbled across other density incongruities, it was programmed to flag those as well. The plan was for PODS to scan the Arctic Circle over several weeks and identify any anomalies that we could use to measure global warming.”
   “But without functioning software,” Gabrielle said, “PODS was no good. NASA would have had to examine images of every square inch of the Arctic by hand, looking for trouble spots.”
   Harper nodded, reliving the nightmare of his programming gaffe. “It would take decades. The situation was terrible. Because of a flaw in my programming, PODS was essentially worthless. With the election coming up and Senator Sexton being so critical of NASA...” He sighed.
   “Your mistake was devastating to NASA and the President.”
   “It couldn’t have come at a worse time. The administrator was livid. I promised him I could fix the problem during the next shuttle mission—a simple matter of swapping out the chip that held the PODS software system. But it was too little too late. He sent me home on leave—but essentially I was fired. That was a month ago.”
   “And yet you were back on television two weeks ago announcing you’d found a work-around.”
   Harper slumped. “A terrible mistake. That was the day I got a desperate call from the administrator. He told me something had come up, a possible way to redeem myself. I came into the office immediately and met with him. He asked me to hold a press conference and tell everyone I’d found a work-around for the PODS software and that we would have data in a few weeks. He said he’d explain it to me later.”
   “And you agreed.”
   “No, I refused! But an hour later, the administrator was back in my office—with the White House senior adviser!”
   “What!” Gabrielle looked astounded by this. “Marjorie Tench?”
   An awful creature, Harper thought, nodding. “She and the administrator sat me down and told me my mistake had quite literally put NASA and the President on the brink of total collapse. Ms. Tench told me about the senator’s plans to privatize NASA. She told me I owed it to the President and space agency to make it all right. Then she told me how.”
   Gabrielle leaned forward. “Go on.”
   “Marjorie Tench informed me that the White House, by sheer good fortune, had intercepted strong geologic evidence that an enormous meteorite was buried in the Milne Ice Shelf. One of the biggest ever. A meteorite of that size would be a major find for NASA.”
   Gabrielle looked stunned. “Hold on, so you’re saying someone already knew the meteorite was there before PODS discovered it?”
   “Yes. PODS had nothing to do with the discovery. The administrator knew the meteorite existed. He simply gave me the coordinates and told me to re-position PODS over the ice shelf and pretend PODS made the discovery.”
   “You’re kidding me.”
   “That was my reaction when they asked me to participate in the sham. They refused to tell me how they’d found out the meteorite was there, but Ms. Tench insisted it didn’t matter and that this was the ideal opportunity to salvage my PODS fiasco. If I could pretend the PODS satellite located the meteorite, then NASA could praise PODS as a much needed success and boost the President before the election.”
   Gabrielle was awestruck. “And of course you couldn’t claim PODS had detected a meteorite until you’d announced that the PODS anomaly-detection software was up and running.”
   Harper nodded. “Hence the press conference lie. I was forced into it. Tench and the administrator were ruthless. They reminded me I’d let everyone down—the President had funded my PODS project, NASA had spent years on it, and now I’d ruined the whole thing with a programming blunder.”
   “So you agreed to help.”
   “I didn’t have a choice. My career was essentially over if I didn’t. And the reality was that if I hadn’t muffed the software, PODS would have found that meteorite on its own. So, it seemed a small lie at the time. I rationalized it by telling myself that the software would be fixed in a few months when the space shuttle went up, so I would simply be announcing the fix a little early.”
   Gabrielle let out a whistle. “A tiny lie to take advantage of a meteoric opportunity.”
   Harper was feeling ill just talking about it. “So... I did it. Following the administrator’s orders, I held a press conference announcing that I’d found a work-around for my anomaly-detection software, I waited a few days, and then I repositioned PODS over the administrator’s meteorite coordinates. Then, following the proper chain of command, I phoned the EOS director and reported that PODS had located a hard density anomaly in the Milne Ice Shelf. I gave him the coordinates and told him the anomaly appeared to be dense enough to be a meteorite. Excitedly, NASA sent a small team up to Milne to take some drill cores. That’s when the operation got very hush-hush.”
   “So, you had no idea the meteorite had fossils until tonight?”
   “Nobody here did. We’re all in shock. Now everyone is calling me a hero for finding proof of extraterrestrial bioforms, and I don’t know what to say.”
   Gabrielle was silent a long moment, studying Harper with firm black eyes. “But if PODS didn’t locate the meteorite in the ice, how did the administrator know the meteorite was there?”
   “Someone else found it first.”
   “Someone else? Who?”
   Harper sighed. “A Canadian geologist named Charles Brophy—a researcher on Ellesmere Island. Apparently he was doing geologic ice soundings on the Milne Ice Shelf when he by chance discovered the presence of what appeared to be a huge meteorite in the ice. He radioed it in, and NASA happened to intercept the transmission.”
   Gabrielle stared. “But isn’t this Canadian furious that NASA is taking all the credit for the find?”
   “No,” Harper said, feeling a chill. “Conveniently, he’s dead.”

 91
   Michael Tolland closed his eyes and listened to the drone of the G4 jet engine. He had given up trying to think anymore about the meteorite until they got back to Washington. The chondrules, according to Corky, were conclusive; the rock in the Milne Ice Shelf could only be a meteorite. Rachel had hoped to have a conclusive answer for William Pickering by the time they landed, but her thought experiments had run into a dead end with the chondrules. As suspicious as the meteorite evidence was, the meteorite appeared to be authentic.
   So be it.
   Rachel had obviously been shaken by the trauma in the ocean. Tolland was amazed, though, by her resilience. She was focused now on the issue at hand—trying to find a way to debunk or authenticate the meteorite, and trying to assess who had tried to kill them.
   For most of the trip, Rachel had been in the seat beside Tolland. He’d enjoyed talking to her, despite the trying circumstances. Several minutes ago, she’d headed back to the restroom, and now Tolland was surprised to find himself missing her beside him. He wondered how long it had been since he’d missed a woman’s presence—a woman other than Celia.
   “Mr. Tolland?”
   Tolland glanced up.
   The pilot was sticking his head into the cabin. “You asked me to tell you when we were in telephone range of your ship? I can get you that connection if you want.”
   “Thanks.” Tolland made his way up the aisle.
   Inside the cockpit, Tolland placed a call to his crew. He wanted to let them know he would not be back for another day or two. Of course, he had no intention of telling them what trouble he’d run into.
   The phone rang several times, and Tolland was surprised to hear the ship’s SHINCOM 2100 communications system pick up. The outgoing message was not the usual professional-sounding greeting but rather the rowdy voice of one of Tolland’s crew, the onboard joker.
   “Hiya, hiya, this is the Goya,” the voice announced. “We’re sorry nobody’s here right now, but we’ve all been abducted by very large lice! Actually, we’ve taken temporary shore leave to celebrate Mike’s huge night. Gosh, are we proud! You can leave your name and number, and maybe we’ll be back tomorrow when we’re sober. Ciao! Go, ET!”
   Tolland laughed, missing his crew already. Obviously they’d seen the press conference. He was glad they’d gone ashore; he’d abandoned them rather abruptly when the President called, and their sitting idle at sea was crazy. Although the message said everyone had gone ashore, Tolland had to assume they would not have left his ship unattended, particularly in the strong currents where it was now anchored.
   Tolland pressed the numeric code to play any internal voice mail messages they’d left for him. The line beeped once. One message. The voice was the same rowdy crewmember.
   “Hi Mike, hell of a show! If you’re hearing this, you’re probably checking your messages from some swanky White House party and wondering where the hell we are. Sorry we abandoned ship, buddy, but this was not a dry-celebration kind of night. Don’t worry, we anchored her really good and left the porch light on. We’re secretly hoping she gets pirated so you’ll let NBC buy you that new boat! Just kidding, man. Don’t worry, Xavia agreed to stay onboard and mind the fort. She said she preferred time alone to partying with a bunch of drunken fishmongers? Can you believe that?”
   Tolland chuckled, relieved to hear someone was aboard watching the ship. Xavia was responsible, definitely not the partying type. A respected marine geologist, Xavia had the reputation for speaking her mind with a caustic honesty.
   “Anyhow, Mike,” the message went on, “tonight was incredible. Kind of makes you proud to be a scientist, doesn’t it? Everyone’s talking about how good this looks for NASA. Screw NASA, I say! This looks even better for us! Amazing Seas ratings must have gone up a few million points tonight. You’re a star, man. A real one. Congrats. Excellent job.”
   There was hushed talking on the line, and the voice came back. “Oh, yeah, and speaking of Xavia, just so you don’t get too big a head, she wants to razz you about something. Here she is.”
   Xavia’s razor voice came on the machine. “Mike, Xavia, you’re a God, yada yada. And because I love you so much, I’ve agreed to baby-sit this antediluvian wreck of yours. Frankly, it will be nice to be away from these hoodlums you call scientists. Anyhow, in addition to baby-sitting the ship, the crew has asked me, in my role as onboard bitch, to do everything in my power to keep you from turning into a conceited bastard, which after tonight I realize is going to be difficult, but I had to be the first to tell you that you made a boo-boo in your documentary. Yes, you heard me. A rare Michael Tolland brain fart. Don’t worry, there are only about three people on earth who will notice, and they’re all anal-retentive marine geologists with no sense of humor. A lot like me. But you know what they say about us geologists—always looking for faults!” She laughed. “Anyhow, it’s nothing, a minuscule point about meteorite petrology. I only mention it to ruin your night. You might get a call or two about it, so I thought I’d give you the heads-up so you don’t end up sounding like the moron we all know you really are.” She laughed again. “Anyhow, I’m not much of a party animal, so I’m staying onboard. Don’t bother calling me; I had to turn on the machine because the goddamned press have been calling all night. You’re a real star tonight, despite your screwup. Anyhow, I’ll fill you in on it when you get back. Ciao.”
   The line went dead.
   Michael Tolland frowned. A mistake in my documentary?
   Rachel Sexton stood in the restroom of the G4 and looked at herself in the mirror. She looked pale, she thought, and more frail than she’d imagined. Tonight’s scare had taken a lot out of her. She wondered how long it would be before she would stop shivering, or before she would go near an ocean. Removing her U.S.S. Charlotte cap, she let her hair down. Better, she thought, feeling more like herself.
   Looking into her eyes, Rachel sensed a deep weariness. Beneath it, though, she saw the resolve. She knew that was her mother’s gift. Nobody tells you what you can and can’t do. Rachel wondered if her mother had seen what happened tonight. Someone tried to kill me, Mom. Someone tried to kill all of us...
   Rachel’s mind, as it had for several hours now, scrolled through the list of names.
   Lawrence Ekstrom... Marjorie Tench... President Zach Herney. All had motives. And, more chillingly, all had means. The President is not involved, Rachel told herself, clinging to her hope that the President she respected so much more than her own father was an innocent bystander in this mysterious incident.
   We still know nothing.
   Not who... not if... not why.
   Rachel had wanted to have answers for William Pickering but, so far, all she’d managed to do was raise more questions.
   When Rachel left the restroom, she was surprised to see Michael Tolland was not in his seat. Corky was dozing nearby. As Rachel looked around, Mike stepped out of the cockpit as the pilot hung up a radiophone. His eyes were wide with concern.
   “What is it?” Rachel asked.
   Tolland’s voice was heavy as he told her about the phone message.
   A mistake in his presentation? Rachel thought Tolland was overreacting. “It’s probably nothing. She didn’t tell you specifically what the error was?”
   “Something to do with meteorite petrology.”
   “Rock structure?”
   “Yeah. She said the only people who would notice the mistake were a few other geologists. It sounds like whatever error I made was related to the composition of the meteorite itself.”
   Rachel drew a quick breath, understanding now. “Chondrules?”
   “I don’t know, but it seems pretty coincidental.”
   Rachel agreed. The chondrules were the one remaining shred of evidence that categorically supported NASA’s claim that this was indeed a meteorite.
   Corky came over, rubbing his eyes. “What’s going on?”
   Tolland filled him in.
   Corky scowled, shaking his head. “It’s not a problem with the chondrules, Mike. No way. All of your data came from NASA. And from me. It was flawless.”
   “What other petrologic error could I have made?”
   “Who the hell knows? Besides, what do marine geologists know about chondrules?”
   “I have no idea, but she’s damned sharp.”
   “Considering the circumstances,” Rachel said, “I think we should talk to this woman before we talk to Director Pickering.”
   Tolland shrugged. “I called her four times and got the machine. She’s probably in the hydrolab and can’t hear a damn thing anyway. She won’t get my messages until morning at the earliest.” Tolland paused, checking his watch. “Although...”
   “Although what?”
   Tolland eyed her intensely. “How important do you think it is that we talk to Xavia before we talk to your boss?”
   “If she has something to say about chondrules? I’d say it’s critical. Mike,” Rachel said, “at the moment, we’ve got all kinds of contradictory data. William Pickering is a man accustomed to having clear answers. When we meet him, I’d love to have something substantial for him to act on.”
   “Then we should make a stop.”
   Rachel did a double take. “On your ship?”
   “It’s off the coast of New Jersey. Almost directly on our way to Washington. We can talk to Xavia, find out what she knows. Corky still has the meteorite sample, and if Xavia wants to run some geologic tests on it, the ship has a fairly well-equipped lab. I can’t imagine it would take us more than an hour to get some conclusive answers.”
   Rachel felt a pulse of anxiety. The thought of having to face the ocean again so soon was unnerving. Conclusive answers, she told herself, tempted by the possibility. Pickering will definitely want answers.

 92
   Delta-One was glad to be back on solid ground.
   The Aurora aircraft, despite running at only one-half power and taking a circuitous ocean route, had completed its journey in under two hours and afforded the Delta Force a healthy head start to take up position and prepare themselves for the additional kill the controller had requested.
   Now, on a private military runway outside D.C., the Delta Force left the Aurora behind and boarded their new transport—a waiting OH-58D Kiowa Warrior helicopter.
   Yet again, the controller has arranged for the best, Delta-One thought.
   The Kiowa Warrior, originally designed as a light observation helicopter, had been “expanded and improved” to create the military’s newest breed of attack helicopter. The Kiowa boasted infrared thermal imaging capability enabling its designator/laser range finder to provide autonomous designation for laser-guided precision weapons like Air-to-Air Stinger missiles and the AGM-1148 Hellfire Missile System. A high-speed digital signal processor provided simultaneous multitarget tracking of up to six targets. Few enemies had ever seen a Kiowa up close and survived to tell the tale.
   Delta-One felt a familiar rush of power as he climbed into the Kiowa pilot’s seat and strapped himself in. He had trained on this craft and flown it in covert ops three times. Of course, never before had he been gunning for a prominent American official. The Kiowa, he had to admit, was the perfect aircraft for the job. Its Rolls-Royce Allison engine and twin semirigid blades were “silent running,” which essentially meant targets on the ground could not hear the chopper until it was directly over them. And because the aircraft was capable of flying blind without lights and was painted flat black with no reflective tail numbers, it was essentially invisible unless the target had radar.
   Silent black helicopters.
   The conspiracy theorists were going nuts over these. Some claimed the invasion of silent black helicopters was proof of “New World Order storm troopers” under the authority of the United Nations. Others claimed the choppers were silent alien probes. Still others who saw the Kiowas in tight formation at night were deceived into thinking they were looking at fixed running lights on a much larger craft—a single flying saucer that was apparently capable of vertical flight.
   Wrong again. But the military loved the diversion.
   During a recent covert mission, Delta-One had flown a Kiowa armed with the most secretive new U.S. military technology—an ingenious holographic weapon nicknamed S&M. Despite conjuring associations with sadomasochism, S&M stood for “smoke and mirrors”—holographic images “projected” into the sky over enemy territory. The Kiowa had used S&M technology to project holograms of U.S. aircraft over an enemy anti-aircraft installation. The panicked anti-aircraft gunners fired maniacally at the circling ghosts. When all of their ammunition was gone, the United States sent in the real thing.
   As Delta-One and his men lifted off the runway, Delta-One could still hear the words of his controller. You have another mark. It seemed an egregious under-statement considering their new target’s identity. Delta-One reminded himself, however, that it was not his place to question. His team had been given an order, and they would carry it out in the exact method instructed—as shocking as that method was.
   I hope to hell the controller is certain this is the right move.
   As the Kiowa lifted off the runway, Delta-One headed southwest. He had seen the FDR Memorial twice, but tonight would be his first time from the air.

 93
   “This meteorite was originally discovered by a Canadian geologist?” Gabrielle Ashe stared in astonishment at the young programmer, Chris Harper. “And this Canadian is now dead?”
   Harper gave a grim nod.
   “How long have you known this?” she demanded.
   “A couple of weeks. After the administrator and Marjorie Tench forced me to perjure myself in the press conference, they knew I couldn’t go back on my word. They told me the truth about how the meteorite was really discovered.”
   PODS is not responsible for finding the meteorite! Gabrielle had no idea where all of this information would lead, but clearly it was scandalous. Bad news for Tench. Great news for the senator.
   “As I mentioned,” Harper said, looking somber now, “the true way the meteorite was discovered was through an intercepted radio transmission. Are you familiar with a program called INSPIRE? The Interactive NASA Space Physics Ionosphere Radio Experiment.”
   Gabrielle had heard of it only vaguely.
   “Essentially,” Harper said, “it’s a series of very low frequency radio receivers near the North Pole that listen to the sounds of the earth—plasma wave emissions from the northern lights, broadband pulses from lightning storms, that sort of thing.”
   “Okay.”
   “A few weeks ago, one of INSPIRE’s radio receivers picked up a stray transmission from Ellesmere Island. A Canadian geologist was calling for help at an exceptionally low frequency.” Harper paused. “In fact, the frequency was so low that nobody other than NASA’s VLF receivers could possibly have heard it. We assumed the Canadian was long-waving.”
   “I’m sorry?”
   “Broadcasting at the lowest possible frequency to get maximum distance on his transmission. He was in the middle of nowhere, remember; a standard frequency transmission probably would not have made it far enough to be heard.”
   “What did his message say?”
   “The transmission was short. The Canadian said he had been out doing ice soundings on the Milne Ice Shelf, had detected an ultradense anomaly buried in the ice, suspected it was a giant meteorite, and while taking measurements had become trapped in a storm. He gave his coordinates, asked for rescue from the storm, and signed off. The NASA listening post sent a plane from Thule to rescue him. They searched for hours and finally discovered him, miles off course, dead at the bottom of a crevasse with his sled and dogs. Apparently he tried to outrun the storm, got blinded, went off course, and fell into a crevasse.”
   Gabrielle considered the information, intrigued. “So suddenly NASA knew about a meteorite that nobody else knew about?”
   “Exactly. And ironically, if my software had been working properly, the PODS satellite would have spotted that same meteorite—a week before the Canadian did.”
   The coincidence gave Gabrielle pause. “A meteorite buried for three hundred years was almost discovered twice in the same week?”
   “I know. A little bizarre, but science can be like that. Feast or famine. The point is that the administrator felt like the meteorite should have been our discovery anyway—if I had done my job correctly. He told me that because the Canadian was dead, nobody would be the wiser if I simply redirected PODS to the coordinates the Canadian had transmitted in his SOS. Then I could pretend to discover the meteorite from scratch, and we could salvage some respect from an embarrassing failure.”
   “And that’s what you did.”
   “As I said, I had no choice. I had let down the mission.” He paused. “Tonight, though, when I heard the President’s press conference and found out the meteorite I’d pretended to discover contained fossils...”
   “You were stunned.”
   “Bloody well floored, I’d say!”
   “Do you think the administrator knew the meteorite contained fossils before he asked you to pretend PODS found it?”
   “I can’t imagine how. That meteorite was buried and untouched until the first NASA team got there. My best guess is that NASA had no idea what they’d really found until they got a team up there to drill cores and x-ray. They asked me to lie about PODS, thinking they’d have a moderate victory with a big meteorite. Then when they got there, they realized just how big a find it really was.”
   Gabrielle’s breath was shallow with excitement. “Dr. Harper, will you testify that NASA and the White House forced you to lie about the PODS software?”
   “I don’t know.” Harper looked frightened. “I can’t imagine what kind of damage that would do to the agency... to this discovery.”
   “Dr. Harper, you and I both know this meteorite remains a wonderful discovery, regardless of how it came about. The point here is that you lied to the American people. They have a right to know that PODS is not everything NASA says it is.”
   “I don’t know. I despise the administrator, but my coworkers... they are good people.”
   “And they deserve to know they are being deceived.”
   “And this evidence against me of embezzlement?”
   “You can erase that from your mind,” Gabrielle said, having almost forgotten her con. “I will tell the senator you know nothing of the embezzlement. It is simply a frame job—insurance set up by the administrator to keep you quiet about PODS.”
   “Can the senator protect me?”
   “Fully. You’ve done nothing wrong. You were simply following orders. Besides, with the information you’ve just given me about this Canadian geologist, I can’t imagine the senator will even need to raise the issue of embezzlement at all. We can focus entirely on NASA’s misinformation regarding PODS and the meteorite. Once the senator breaks the information about the Canadian, the administrator won’t be able to risk trying to discredit you with lies.”
   Harper still looked worried. He fell silent, somber as he pondered his options. Gabrielle gave him a moment. She’d realized earlier that there was another troubling coincidence to this story. She wasn’t going to mention it, but she could see Dr. Harper needed a final push.
   “Do you have dogs, Dr. Harper?”
   He glanced up. “I’m sorry?”
   “I just thought it was odd. You told me that shortly after this Canadian geologist radioed in the meteorite coordinates, his sled dogs ran blindly into a crevasse?”
   “There was a storm. They were off course.”
   Gabrielle shrugged, letting her skepticism show. “Yeah... okay.”
   Harper clearly sensed her hesitation. “What are you saying?”
   “I don’t know. There’s just a lot of coincidence surrounding this discovery. A Canadian geologist transmits meteorite coordinates on a frequency that only NASA can hear? And then his sled dogs run blindly off a cliff?” She paused. “You obviously understand that this geologist’s death paved the way for this entire NASA triumph.”
   The color drained from Harper’s face. “You think the administrator would kill over this meteorite.”
   Big politics. Big money, Gabrielle thought. “Let me talk to the senator and we’ll be in touch. Is there a back way out of here?”

* * *

   Gabrielle Ashe left a pale Chris Harper and descended a fire stairwell into a deserted alley behind NASA. She flagged down a taxi that had just dropped off more NASA celebrators.
   “Westbrooke Place Luxury Apartments,” she told the driver. She was about to make Senator Sexton a much happier man.

 94
   Wondering what she had agreed to, Rachel stood near the entrance of the G4 cockpit, stretching a radio transceiver cable into the cabin so she could place her call out of earshot of the pilot. Corky and Tolland looked on. Although Rachel and NRO director William Pickering had planned to maintain radio silence until her arrival at Bollings Air Force Base outside of D.C., Rachel now had information she was certain Pickering would want to hear immediately. She had phoned his secure cellular, which he carried at all times.
   When William Pickering came on the line, he was all business. “Speak with care, please. I cannot guarantee this connection.”
   Rachel understood. Pickering’s cellular, like most NRO field phones, had an indicator that detected unsecured incoming calls. Because Rachel was on a radiophone, one of the least secure communication modes available, Pickering’s phone had warned him. This conversation would need to be vague. No names. No locations.
   “My voice is my identity,” Rachel said, using the standard field greeting in this situation. She had expected the director’s response would be displeasure that she had risked contacting him, but Pickering’s reaction sounded positive.
   “Yes, I was about to make contact with you myself. We need to redirect. I’m concerned you may have a welcoming party.”
   Rachel felt a sudden trepidation. Someone is watching us. She could hear the danger in Pickering’s tone. Redirect. He would be pleased to know she had called to make that exact request, albeit for entirely different reasons.
   “The issue of authenticity,” Rachel said. “We’ve been discussing it. We may have a way to confirm or deny categorically.”
   “Excellent. There have been developments, and at least then I would have solid ground on which to proceed.”
   “The proof involves our making a quick stop. One of us has access to a laboratory facility—”
   “No exact locations, please. For your own safety.”
   Rachel had no intention of broadcasting her plans over this line. “Can you get us clearance to land at GAS-AC?”
   Pickering was silent a moment. Rachel sensed he was trying to process the word. GAS-AC was an obscure NRO gisting shorthand for the Coast Guard’s Group Air Station Atlantic City. Rachel hoped the director would know it.
   “Yes,” he finally said. “I can arrange that. Is that your final destination?”
   “No. We will require further helicopter transport.”
   “An aircraft will be waiting.”
   “Thank you.”
   “I recommend you exercise extreme caution until we know more. Speak to no one. Your suspicions have drawn deep concern among powerful parties.”
   Tench, Rachel thought, wishing she had managed to make contact with the President directly.
   “I am currently in my car, en route to meet the woman in question. She has requested a private meeting in a neutral location. It should reveal much.”
   Pickering is driving somewhere to meet Tench? Whatever Tench was going to tell him must be important if she refused to tell him on the phone.
   Pickering said, “Do not discuss your final coordinates with anyone. And no more radio contact. Is that clear?”
   “Yes, sir. We’ll be at GAS-AC in an hour.”
   “Transport will be arranged. When you reach your ultimate destination, you can call me via more secure channels.” He paused. “I cannot overstate the importance of secrecy to your safety. You have made powerful enemies tonight. Take appropriate caution.” Pickering was gone.
   Rachel felt tense as she closed the connection and turned to Tolland and Corky.
   “Change of destination?” Tolland said, looking eager for answers.
   Rachel nodded, feeling reluctant. “The Goya.”
   Corky sighed, glancing down at the meteorite sample in his hand. “I still can’t imagine NASA could possibly have...” He faded off, looking more worried with every passing minute.
   We’ll know soon enough, Rachel thought.
   She went into the cockpit and returned the radio transceiver. Glancing out the windscreen at the rolling plateau of moonlit clouds racing beneath them, she had the unsettling feeling they were not going to like what they found onboard Tolland’s ship.

 95
   William Pickering felt an unusual solitude as he drove his sedan down the Leesburg Highway. It was almost 2:00 a.m., and the road was empty. It had been years since he’d been driving this late.
   Marjorie Tench’s raspy voice still grated on his mind. Meet me at the FDR Memorial.
   Pickering tried to recall the last time he had seen Marjorie Tench face-to-face—never a pleasant experience. It had been two months ago. At the White House. Tench was seated opposite Pickering at a long oak table surrounded by members of the National Security Council, Joint Chiefs, CIA, President Herney, and the administrator of NASA.
   “Gentlemen,” the head of the CIA had said, looking directly at Marjorie Tench. “Yet again, I am before you to urge this administration to confront the ongoing security crisis of NASA.”
   The declaration took no one in the room by surprise. NASA’s security woes had become a tired issue in the intelligence community. Two days previously, more than three hundred high-resolution satellite photos from one of NASA’s earth-observing satellites had been stolen by hackers out of a NASA database. The photos—inadvertently revealing a classified U.S. military training facility in North Africa—had turned up on the black market, where they had been purchased by hostile intelligence agencies in the Middle East.
   “Despite the best of intentions,” the CIA director said with a weary voice, “NASA continues to be a threat to national security. Simply put, our space agency is not equipped to protect the data and technologies they develop.”
   “I realize,” the President replied, “that there have been indiscretions. Damaging leaks. And it troubles me deeply.” He motioned across the table to the stern face of NASA administrator Lawrence Ekstrom. “We are yet again looking into ways to tighten NASA’s security.”
   “With due respect,” the CIA director said, “whatever security changes NASA implements will be ineffective as long as NASA operations remain outside the umbrella of the United States intelligence community.”
   The statement brought an uneasy rustle from those assembled. Everyone knew where this was headed.
   “As you know,” the CIA director went on, his tone sharpening, “all U.S. government entities who deal with sensitive intelligence information are governed by strict rules of secrecy—military, CIA, NSA, NRO—all of them must abide by stringent laws regarding the concealment of the data they glean and the technologies they develop. I ask you all, yet again, why NASA—the agency currently producing the largest portion of cutting-edge aerospace, imaging, flight, software, reconnaissance, and telecom technologies used by the military and intelligence community—exists outside this umbrella of secrecy.”
   The President heaved a weighty sigh. The proposal was clear. Restructure NASA to become part of the U.S. military intelligence community. Although similar restructurings had happened with other agencies in the past, Herney refused to entertain the idea of placing NASA under the auspices of the Pentagon, the CIA, the NRO, or any other military directive. The National Security Council was starting to splinter on the issue, many siding with the intelligence community.
   Lawrence Ekstrom never looked pleased at these meetings, and this was no exception. He shot an acrimonious glare toward the CIA director. “At the risk of repeating myself, sir, the technologies NASA develops are for nonmilitary, academic applications. If your intelligence community wants to turn one of our space telescopes around and look at China, that’s your choice.”
   The CIA director looked like he was about to boil over.
   Pickering caught his eye and stepped in. “Larry,” he said, careful to keep an even tone, “every year NASA kneels before Congress and begs for money. You’re running operations with too little funding, and you’re paying the price in failed missions. If we incorporate NASA into the intelligence community, NASA will no longer need to ask Congress for help. You would be funded by the black budget at significantly higher levels. It’s a win-win. NASA will have the money it needs to run itself properly, and the intelligence community will have peace of mind that NASA technologies are protected.”
   Ekstrom shook his head. “On principle, I cannot endorse painting NASA with that brush. NASA is about space science; we have nothing to do with national security.”
   The CIA director stood up, something never done when the President was seated. Nobody stopped him. He glared down at the administrator of NASA. “Are you telling me you think science has nothing to do with national security? Larry, they are synonymous, for God’s sake! It is only this country’s scientific and technological edge that keeps us secure, and whether we like it or not, NASA is playing a bigger and bigger part in developing those technologies. Unfortunately, your agency leaks like a sieve and has proven time and again that its security is a liability!”
   The room fell silent.
   Now the administrator of NASA stood up and locked eyes with his attacker. “So you suggest locking twenty thousand NASA scientists in airtight military labs and making them work for you? Do you really think NASA’s newest space telescopes would have been conceived had it not been for our scientists’ personal desire to see deeper into space? NASA makes astonishing breakthroughs for one reason only—our employees want to understand the cosmos more deeply. They are a community of dreamers who grew up staring at starry skies and asking themselves what was up there. Passion and curiosity are what drive NASA’s innovation, not the promise of military superiority.”
   Pickering cleared his throat, speaking softly, trying to lower the temperatures around the table. “Larry, I’m certain the director is not talking about recruiting NASA scientists to build military satellites. Your NASA mission statement would not change. NASA would carry on business as usual, except you would have increased funding and increased security.” Pickering turned now to the President. “Security is expensive. Everyone in this room certainly realizes that NASA’s security leaks are a result of underfunding. NASA has to toot its own horn, cut corners on security measures, run joint projects with other countries so they can share the price tag. I am proposing that NASA remain the superb, scientific, nonmilitary entity it currently is, but with a bigger budget, and some discretion.”
   Several members of the security council nodded in quiet agreement.
   President Herney stood slowly, staring directly at William Pickering, clearly not at all amused with the way Pickering had just taken over. “Bill, let me ask you this: NASA is hoping to go to Mars in the next decade. How will the intelligence community feel about spending a hefty portion of the black budget running a mission to Mars—a mission that has no immediate national security benefits?”
   “NASA will be able to do as they please.”
   “Bullshit,” Herney replied flatly.
   Everyone’s eyes shot up. President Herney seldom used profanity.
   “If there is one thing I’ve learned as president,” Herney declared, “it’s that those who control the dollars control the direction. I refuse to put NASA’s purse strings in the hands of those who do not share the objectives for which the agency was founded. I can only imagine how much pure science would get done with the military deciding which NASA missions are viable.”
   Herney’s eyes scanned the room. Slowly, purposefully, he returned his rigid gaze to William Pickering.
   “Bill,” Herney sighed, “your displeasure that NASA is engaged in joint projects with foreign space agencies is painfully shortsighted. At least someone is working constructively with the Chinese and Russians. Peace on this planet will not be forged by military strength. It will be forged by those who come together despite their governments’ differences. If you ask me, NASA’s joint missions do more to promote national security than any billion-dollar spy satellite, and with a hell of a lot better hope for the future.”
   Pickering felt an anger welling deep within him. How dare a politician talk down to me this way! Herney’s idealism played fine in a boardroom, but in the real world, it got people killed.
   “Bill,” Marjorie Tench interrupted, as if sensing Pickering was about to explode, “we know you lost a child. We know this is a personal issue for you.”
   Pickering heard nothing but condescension in her tone.
   “But please remember,” Tench said, “that the White House is currently holding back a floodgate of investors who want us to open space to the private sector. If you ask me, for all its mistakes, NASA has been one hell of a friend to the intel community. You all might just want to count your blessings.”

* * *

   A rumble strip on the shoulder of the highway jolted Pickering’s mind back to the present. His exit was coming up. As he approached the exit for D.C., he passed a bloody deer lying dead by the side of the road. He felt an odd hesitation... but he kept driving.
   He had a rendezvous to keep.

 96
   The Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial is one of the largest memorials in the nation. With a park, waterfalls, statuary, alcoves, and basin, the memorial is divided into four outdoor galleries, one for each of FDR’s terms in office.
   A mile from the memorial, a lone Kiowa Warrior coasted in, high over the city, its running lights dimmed. In a town boasting as many VIPs and media crews as D.C., helicopters in the skies were as common as birds flying south. Delta-One knew that as long as he stayed well outside what was known as “the dome”—a bubble of protected airspace around the White House—he should draw little attention. They would not be here long.
   The Kiowa was at twenty-one hundred feet when it slowed adjacent to, but not directly over, the darkened FDR Memorial. Delta-One hovered, checking his position. He looked to his left, where Delta-Two was manning the night vision telescopic viewing system. The video feed showed a greenish image of the entry drive of the memorial. The area was deserted.
   Now they would wait.
   This would not be a quiet kill. There were some people you simply did not kill quietly. Regardless of the method, there would be repercussions. Investigations. Inquiries. In these cases, the best cover was to make a lot of noise. Explosions, fire, and smoke made it appear you were making a statement, and the first thought would be foreign terrorism. Especially when the target was a high-profile official.
   Delta-One scanned the night-vision transmission of the tree-shrouded memorial below. The parking lot and entry road were empty. Soon, he thought. The location of this private meeting, though in an urban area, was fortuitously desolate at this hour. Delta-One turned his eyes from the screen to his own weapons controls.
   The Hellfire system would be the weapon of choice tonight. A laser-guided, anti-armor missile, the Hellfire provided fire-and-forget capability. The projectile could home in on a laser spot that was projected from ground observers, other aircraft, or the launching aircraft itself. Tonight, the missile would be guided autonomously through the laser designator in a mast-mounted sight. Once the Kiowa’s designator had”painted” the target with a laser beam, the Hellfire missile would be self-directing. Because the Hellfire could be fired either from the air or ground, its employment here tonight would not necessarily imply an aircraft’s involvement. In addition, the Hellfire was a popular munition among black-market arms dealers, so terrorist activity could certainly be blamed.
   “Sedan,” Delta-Two said.
   Delta-One glanced at the transmission screen. A nondescript, black luxury sedan was approaching on the access road exactly on schedule. This was the typical motor pool car of large government agencies. The driver dimmed the car’s headlights on entering the memorial. The car circled several times and then parked near a grove of trees. Delta-One watched the screen as his partner trained the telescopic night vision on the driver’s side window. After a moment, the person’s face came into view.
   Delta-One drew a quick breath.
   “Target confirmed,” his partner said.
   Delta-One looked at the night-vision screen—with its deadly crucifix of cross-hairs—and he felt like a sniper aiming at royalty. Target confirmed.
   Delta-Two turned to the left side avionics compartment and activated the laser designator. He aimed, and two thousand feet below, a pinpoint of light appeared on the roof of the sedan, invisible to the occupant. “Target painted,” he said.
   Delta-One took a deep breath. He fired.
   A sharp hissing sound sizzled beneath the fuselage, followed by a remarkably dim trail of light streaking toward the earth. One second later, the car in the parking lot blew apart in a blinding eruption of flames. Twisted metal flew everywhere. Burning tires rolled into the woods.
   “Kill complete,” Delta-One said, already accelerating the helicopter away from the area. “Call the controller.”

* * *

   Less than two miles away, President Zach Herney was preparing for bed. The Lexan bullet-proof windows of “the residence” were an inch thick. Herney never heard the blast.