I can’t see the damn thing with my naked eyes from five hundred feet away! How can any satellite — even the most advanced — spot it from Earth’s orbit? Dr. Reed mused, convinced this was another futile exercise. Another way for Air Force Security personnel to justify their pointless existence!
With an impatient gesture she turned her back on the desert, scanned the interior of Hangar Six. Her team of technicians, researchers, and support personnel — numbering seventeen in all — lolled casually on packing crates or in folding chairs. The air conditioning inside the hangar was inadequate and many had succumbed to the sleepy warmth.
For an instant, Dr. Reed locked eyes with Beverly Chang, who was fully alert and fidgeting with a plastic cup of tea. The thirty-something cyber specialist appeared as tense and nervous as Megan Reed felt.
At least one other person is taking this demonstration seriously.
“Ninety seconds and we’re in the clear. The satellite will be out of range,” the corporal announced — a statement that elicited a groan from Dr. Reed.
“Why did this have to happen today, of all days. Just hours before a critical test in front of a VIP from the Senate Defense Appropriations Committee?” she complained.
“Actually, you should be flattered, Dr. Reed. You got their attention,” Stratowski replied.
“Who? The Chinese? Are you telling me they’re interested in my demonstration? How do they even know about it? This project is top secret. Or did you security boys drop the ball again?”
Scratching his nose, Corporal Stratowski peered at the tracking screen. The young man’s pale pink complexion had been cooked lobster red in places by the desert sun. His hair had been cropped so short it was hard to tell whether the color was blond or brown.
“This is no coincidence, Ma’am,” the Corporal explained patiently. “Something piqued their interest.
The Chicoms went to a lot of trouble to stage this fly over. They have a whole bunch of photo reconnaissance satellites that pass over this facility on regularly scheduled visits. We know their trajectory and adjust our schedules accordingly.”
“Yeah,” said Dr. Phillip Bascomb. “But those are old fashioned film-return satellites using technology that’s twenty years out of date. By the time the payload is dropped back to earth, the film recovered by the Communist Chinese military and evaluated by their intelligence ser vice, the information is twelve hours old and likely obsolete.”
A microwave specialist and a critical member of Dr. Reed’s team, Bascomb often displayed a wide range of knowledge that reached beyond his academic field of study. Under his lab coat, he was a stylish dresser, but his affection for the latest designer casual was belied by his refusal to part with a ponytail and walrus moustache — both streaked with gray, both holdovers from his late ’60s Berkeley days.
“If these satellites are so outmoded, then why all the paranoia?” Dr. Reed demanded.
“Ask Big Brother,” Dr. Bascomb quipped, jerking his head in the Corporal’s direction.
“This fly over was unscheduled, Dr. Reed,” the man explained. “US Space Command only warned us it was being repositioned two hours ago. And this satellite is a Jian Bing ZY–5, the Chicoms’ most advanced space based photo reconnaissance vehicle launched to date.”
Stratowski tapped the blip on his screen with his finger. “The ZY–5 has real time capabilities. That means some technician at the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center in Shanxi Province is watching this hangar right now.”
“Smile. You’re on Candid Camera!” Dr. Alvin Toth grinned. A retired physician and pathologist, the sixty-four year old was the oldest member of Dr. Reed’s team. Portly and bald with bushy eyebrows that matched his worn lab smock, Toth leaned against the tow tractor, arms folded across his paunchy torso.
“Careful, Alvin. You’re showing your age. Nobody under sixty ever heard of Candid Camera,” Phil Bas-comb called.
“I’m not showing my age,” Toth countered with a wink. “What I’m demonstrating is my vast range of knowledge, experience, and expertise.”
Dr. Dani Welles snorted. “Candid Camera was a TV show, not a breakthrough discovery in particle physics. But you know I love you, Doc!” She threw a dazzling smile at Toth. “’Cause, I think older men are hot.”
Not yet thirty, Welles was down-to-earth friendly. No one who met her ever guessed that the breezy young woman graduated with honors from MIT. In fact, most of her MySpace friends thought “Ms. Cocoa Quark” was just another girl from South Central.
Steve Sable laughed. “So that’s why you won’t go out with me? You’re waiting for me to get an AARP card?”
He’d been observing the conversation from a folding chair, munching a donut and sipping coffee from a Styrofoam cup. A cyber engineer and software designer, Dr. Sable was a relative newcomer to the project — only their newest technician, Antonio Alvarez, had less tenure since he’d joined them nearly three months earlier. But Sable had proven himself invaluable in the fourteen months since he joined them. Malignant Wave was Sable’s second project at Groom Lake. The previous program had been cancelled.
“I never went out with you because you never asked,” Dani replied with a sly smile.
The banter was interrupted when the airman’s laptop beeped three times in quick succession. Dr. Reed watched over the Corporal’s shoulder as the blip drifted off the grid map and vanished from the screen. A moment later Stratowski tapped a key and shut down the computer.
“All clear, Dr. Reed. Your team can proceed.”
Dr. Reed sighed. “Finally.”
Heels clicking on the concrete, she strutted across the hangar and punched a red button on the doorjamb. A warning siren wailed, reverberating deafeningly throughout the massive hangar — the signal that nap time was over. With a metallic clatter, the massive steel door began to rise, filling the dim interior of the hangar with bright sunlight and waves of oppressive heat.
After ten seconds, the warning siren went mute. Several young airmen, yawning and stretching, emerged from a tangle of packing crates. A young Hispanic woman in overalls climbed aboard the tow tractor, and the engine roared to life in a cloud of blue smoke. Rumbling, the tractor lurched forward, dragging an aluminum tow platform containing the microwave emissions array.
A split-second later, the tow tractor abruptly braked, tires squealing. Carried by momentum, the tow platform continued forward, colliding with the rear of the tow vehicle. The jolt rattled the sensitive microwave emitter strapped to the platform. Cries of alarm erupted from the research team and Dr. Bas-comb cursed. Sable threw his Styrofoam cup to the ground and Beverly Chang took a step backwards, blinking in surprise.
Dr. Megan Reed went ballistic.
“What the hell is that… that thing blocking the door?” she cried. Reed pointed to a ten foot steel pole set in a concrete filled tire. A volleyball dangled from a long rope hooked to the top.
“It’s a tetherball post,” Corporal Stratowski declared.
“I know what it is,” Dr. Reed said. “I want to know who owns it.”
“It belongs to Antonio — I mean, Dr. Alvarez.” Dani Welles regretted speaking before the words were out of her mouth.
“I should have known,” muttered Dr. Reed. She looked around for the guilty party, but saw no sign of the project’s energy system programmer. She shouted out in a voice that rivaled the decibel level of the warning siren.