The larger alligators had reached the bank and were almost on the shore.
Parkowski squinted, but could barely make out what was happening. The lead gigantic reptile struck first. It grabbed the kneeling man by his arm and started dragging him down the bank into the dark water.
“Fuck!” Everson yelled. He aimed carefully and fired off a shot with his giant handgun while retreating.
The third man took off and ran back towards the van.
Everson took a few steps back and squeezed off another shot. The loud, large-caliber pistol hit something solid.
It looked to Parkowski like he had hit the lead alligator that had grabbed his subordinate. The alligator dropped the man, either from fear or from pain.
The other alligators kept coming towards them.
Everson pulled the fallen man, who screamed in an inhumane fashion, away from oncoming reptiles, as he fired a pair of shots.
“Fuck, let the gators have them,” the third man yelled as he ran away. “I’m getting out of here.”
Parkowski didn’t hear a response from Everson.
She and her boyfriend waited until they heard the van turn on and speed off towards the north side of Kennedy Space Center.
“Fuck,” Parkowski said softly.
DePresti didn’t respond. He grabbed her hand and led her toward the far side of the bank. He helped her up and out of the water.
Parkowski shivered. It was cold and her wet, dirty clothes didn’t help. “Did you know what was going to happen?” she asked her boyfriend.
He nodded.
“The NASA and Space Force guys are always talking about how big the wildlife is here,” DePresti said softly. “And also how docile the animals generally are.”
The Space Force captain paused, recollecting something.
“There’s a story from about five or ten years back about a Taiwanese guy who was visiting for a launch almost losing an arm,” he continued. “He was trying to take a selfie with a fourteen-foot ‘gator and got a bite taken out of his bicep. It was told to me as a true story, but I used to think it was an urban legend.
“When I was out here for my launch last year, a bunch of drunk lieutenants from some unit on the Space Force station went and did the same thing — and they got some amazing pictures. The alligator didn’t care at all that they were maybe two or three feet from them taking selfies. They got in trouble for messing with the wildlife, but no one got hurt.”
“So as long as we don’t bother them, we’re ok,” Parkowski said.
“Yup. They may be big — the area we were just in is called the ‘fishbowl’ because of the giant fish that live there — but they want nothing to do with us.”
She sighed, “What do we do now?”
DePresti didn’t have a response for her. “We failed,” he told her. “We never figured out what Bronze Knot was.”
“At least they think we’re dead,” Parkowski said quietly.
He laughed. “That’s true. It’ll be a big surprise for whoever is monitoring you at work when you show back up at Aering in a week or so.”
“You don’t think they’ll go after us again?”
“I’m not sure, but I don’t think they will,” he said. “We have nothing on them. Just bits and pieces. And, most importantly, they know what we know now — and it’s nothing, or next to nothing. We don’t have the big secret, whatever the fuck it is. We can’t prove anything, and I think we’re no longer a threat. They saw how far we could get, and then when we couldn’t pierce the Bronze Knot veil, we were no longer useful. With no evidence, no one is going to believe us.”
Parkowski’s eyes began to well up with tears.
There was something out there, a giant secret that a shadowy government agency was willing to kill over. So many people had already been impacted by it. But, thankfully, despite not coming away with a better understanding of what was behind the Bronze Knot curtain, Parkowski was happy that at the moment it looked like they were going to make it out of here alive.
She still wanted to know what it was. But, she wasn’t convinced about her boyfriend’s last statement. “They tried to kill us before. Hell, they were going to kill us just a few minutes ago,” Parkowski said as she wiped the tears away.
“I know, but they had us dead to rights,” her boyfriend retorted. “As long as we can get back to civilization, I think we’re safe. They aren’t going to try and kill us and shine more light on them when they know we know nothing.”
It made sense to her now.
“Do we have to walk all of the way back to our scuba gear?” Parkowski asked.
DePresti thought for a moment, then shook his head. “No, I know where they keep a bunch of GOVs,” he said, referring to government-owned vehicles. “There’s a small cluster of buildings maybe a mile south of here on this side of the estuary. I know for a fact that they never lock them because I used them repeatedly during my launch campaign.”
“So, we just drive back to where we left our gear, and then swim to our boat?” Parkowski asked. “We can’t just drive off base and get our boat another way?”
“No, they’re checking the exits, I saw it when we were at the gate,” he answered. “And, remember though, we have to swim back on the top of the water. Our air tanks are empty. That should be easier than coming in. Plus, I want to return all of our stuff — abandoning both the boat and scuba gear would draw a lot of unwanted attention.”
She sighed. “To the GOVs.”
CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
In the blackness of the humid Florida night, Parkowski and DePresti walked south along the side of the river.
Any joy that she had felt in escaping the harrowing situation had evaporated.
She couldn't shake the sinking feeling in her stomach. Parkowski knew that she would never understand why things had gone so wrong in the ILIAD environment, why Dr. Pham was murdered along with all of those innocent people at the pier, why Chang was kidnapped, and what the Bronze Knot program was protecting.
Her arms and legs ached. The constant activity, since they leaped backward off the boat, had depleted her stamina. She hoped that her boyfriend was right and they could get access to a vehicle.
Parkowski wasn’t sure she could swim to the anchored boat, let alone walk miles and miles to get their gear.
After a few minutes of walking, her eyes adjusted to the almost pitch-black environment. If she squinted just right, Parkowski could make out the outlines of a half-dozen buildings in front of them; their square, artificial shapes a sharp contrast to the trees and water behind them.
It only took them about twenty minutes of walking. Normally, that would be nothing for Parkowski, but she was exhausted. She stopped to catch her breath as her boyfriend kept walking.
There were about ten vehicles in a small parking lot with one entrance leading out to a rough, two-lane road headed south along the riverbank. Around the parking lot were five buildings — she had miscounted — two large, four-story tall high bays and two smaller, one-story buildings alongside one that didn’t look like much more than a garage. Strewn around the area were cinder blocks, pallets, and other construction-type garbage.
“What is this place?” she asked.
“It’s an old SMC processing area,” he answered. “It was used for processing of the old DSP — Defense Support Program — missile-warning satellites. But, when they went to SBIRS fifteen years ago, this whole area was abandoned. Or, at least that’s what they told me when we came to get the GOVs here to ferry around VIPs. That’s all this area is now, a parking lot,” he finished with a laugh.