“But we’re treating every illegal migrant the same when we throw them into facilities like this, aren’t we?” Ari asked. “The vast majority of migrants are peaceful, God-fearing, law-abiding persons…”
“But they’re not ‘law-abiding’—the reason we’re out here is because they’re breaking the law!” Gray argued. “They’re crossing our borders without permission, which in the United States is against the law. I’m a soldier, Ari. I swore to defend my country against all enemies, foreign or domestic…”
“They are not the enemy, Ben—the terrorists and murderers are.”
“But the terrorists, murderers, and the migrants looking for work are all doing the same thing: crossing the borders of the United States without regard for the law or of national sovereignty,” Gray interjected. “The migrants may not be a threat to the United States, but until we get a crystal ball that can tell us which ones are the workers and which ones are the terrorists, we need to stop all of them before the bad guys kill again.”
Gray stopped and turned to Ariadna. “You say I might have doubts about this mission, Ari, but you sure as hell do!” he said. “If you’re so bugged about doing this job, why don’t you just resign? It’s as if you’re trying to soothe your own conscience by indicting everyone else around you.”
Vega didn’t answer—which gave Jason Richter a chance to step over to the two and interject: “Is there an issue here, kids? If there is, let’s lay it out right now.” Neither of them said a word. “I promise, if either of you has a problem accomplishing this mission, I’ll see to it you’re reassigned, and there will be no repercussions whatsoever.”
“No problem here, sir,” Gray said flatly.
“I’m fine, J,” Ari said in a low voice.
Jason looked at them both carefully, then clasped them both on their shoulders. “Be thankful Ray Jefferson isn’t out here—he’d have you both for breakfast. Let’s go.”
The landing pad was simply a circular patch of desert about a half mile in diameter that had been cleared away, leveled, and covered with fiberglass mats to keep down blowing dust and debris. In the center of the circle was a retractable aluminum tower about fifty feet high, secured in place with guy wires. Off to the side of the dirt circle was a Humvee with a small satellite dish and various other antennae on top. Nearby was a transportable helicopter hangar constructed of tubular aluminum trusses and covered with thin, lightweight Kevlar; another slightly smaller hangar served as a maintenance and storage facility. The tanker with supplies of jet fuel and diesel were parked nearby, along with banks of wheeled generators.
A few minutes later both Gray and Ariadna received a message from the security patrols that their Condor aircraft was inbound, and they watched the task force’s surveillance aircraft come in for its approach. From a distance it looked like a huge bird of prey coming in at them, and even up close it resembled an enormous seagull or eagle. It approached very quickly, a lot faster than Gray had ever seen a blimp travel. The thing was immense, with over a 120-foot wingspan. The wings curved upward from the body at least twenty feet, then curved downward again to the wingtips, then upward again at the very tip. It had a large propeller engine under each wing but was whisper-quiet, again unlike any blimp Gray had ever encountered. It had a long forward fuselage section, like a goose’s outstretched neck, and a broad flat tail with long angled winglets at the tips. The fuselage was smooth, but as it got closer several camera ports and doors could clearly be seen.
But the most amazing thing was not the Condor’s size or shape but its maneuverability. It came from the north-northwest at around sixty miles an hour, but as it approached the landing pad it made a tight, steeply banked turn to the west, directly into the wind, and all of its forward velocity seemed to disappear in the blink of an eye. When it was heading west right at the telescoping docking mast, it was going barely two miles an hour, and it nosed in precisely on a large electromagnetic docking attach point on the mast. Hovering overhead, the immense craft looked like a cross between a graceful seagull drifting on an ocean breeze…and a Klingon battle cruiser.
“That thing is just amazing,” Gray exclaimed as he watched the immense airship dock itself. “Did you guys invent it?”
“It’s been around for a few years as an experimental FEBA cruise missile radar platform,” Ariadna said.
“Why not just use a regular blimp?” he asked.
“With carbon-fiber skin and structures, the Army was able to create an airship that did away with the typical blimp shape body,” Ari replied. “Regular blimps are very susceptible to winds and have a huge frontal area, making them slow and not very stealthy. The shape of the Condor allows it to use air currents for propulsion, much like a sailboat sails against the wind—in fact, the stronger the winds aloft, the faster she flies. The Condor is almost twice as fast as any other blimp, its radar cross-section is a thousand times less than a blimp, it’s far more maneuverable, and its payload is just as much as a large blimp while using less helium. This baby can carry almost two thousand pounds of sensors or personnel, fly as high as ten thousand feet aboveground, and stay aloft for almost two days.”
“It was originally designed to carry infrared sensors and an airborne radar to detect low-flying aircraft like cruise missiles,” Jason went on. “It’s even fairly safe from small-arms ground fire—you might be able to take out an engine, but the Condor would probably survive the hit. It can fly just fine on one engine and return itself back to base with communications severed.”
“Well, it’s very cool,” Gray said. He looked up, studying the immense underside of the huge airship. “It provides great shade too. It…”
At that moment, a hatch opened up on the belly of the center fuselage of the Condor airship…and a figure dropped through it. Before Gray could do anything but gasp in surprise, the figure hit the dusty ground…still standing, as if it had stepped off a porch step instead of jumping out of an airship hovering fifty feet overhead. The CID unit stepped over to Jason Richter and saluted. “CID One reporting in, sir,” an electronic voice said.
“You like making an entrance in that thing, don’t you, Falcon?” Richter commented, returning the robot’s salute.
“Yes, sir, I do,” Falcone replied. “It’s the only time these days that I feel like I’ve got a working body.” He stepped over to the Humvee at the edge of the landing area, dismounted from the CID unit, plugged it into the diagnostics and repair computers on the Humvee, and walked back to the others. “What’s the latest on the incident last night, sir?” he asked Richter.
“Director DeLaine will be in later on today with whoever Justice, State, and the Pentagon chose to be on the board,” Jason replied. “You’ll be grounded from now on until the investigation board kicks you free. Don’t talk to anyone except Ari and me about the incident until the board tells you differently. Understand?”
“Yes, sir.”
They walked away from the landing zone as the retractable docking mast lowered the Condor airship to ground level and maintenance crews began converging on it to do checks and refuel it. Falcone accepted a bottle of cold water from Jason and drained it in one chug. “How are you holding up, Falcon?”
“Okay, I guess,” Falcone replied. “I appreciate the opportunity to go back out in the field after what happened—I’d hate to be cooped up in my rack just lying there thinking about it.” He looked at Gray and added, “I know they’re probably going to say it wasn’t a good idea, me going back out on patrol.”