AB (The Blake Reynolds Chronicles Book 1) (2 page)

Blake Reynolds was
having another restless night. He was fighting in some battle from one of his previous
four tours in the Middle East.

His sweet wife,
Tara, was used to his mumbling and twitching throughout the nights. It came
with the territory of being a soldier’s wife. As she lay there wondering what Blake
was dreaming about this time, her thoughts turned to her own tour of duty in
Afghanistan as a helicopter pilot. After a few minutes, she rolled over and glanced
at the clock.

Through blurry
eyes, she could barely make out zero-five-thirty. Tara knew she wouldn’t be
able to fall back asleep, so she slipped out of bed, being careful not to
disturb Blake. She softly walked to the kitchen to make some coffee.

Blake was drawn
out of his disturbing nightmare by the sweet smell of freshly brewed coffee filling
his nose. He sat up and thought, “I’m the luckiest guy in the world.”

Blake quickly
showered and ate breakfast. As he approached the front door, Tara was holding
their four-year-old daughter, Kaya. They were blocking his way out.

Tara smiled. “Someone
told me you can’t leave until she tells you something.”

Blake leaned
in. “So what do you want to say, Sweetie?”

Kaya rubbed her
barely open eyes. “Daddy, I love you. Come home safe!” she said in a soft tender
voice.

“I will, Sweetie.”

“OK, Marines. Today’s
operation is a test of teamwork and resourcefulness. It is a lesson to learn
how to overcome adversity and obstacles using whatever resources you have
available. We are going to carry these two large telephone poles three miles
down this trail. Once there, we will improvise with whatever materials we can
scavenge and build a bridge over the ravine. It should be strong enough to
support a Hummer driving over it.”

Blake knew it
would be hard on the new recruits, as it was already over eighty degrees. Some
of them were already sweating.

“And if we do
it fast enough, I will even let you eat lunch today. We don’t have all day, so pick
up those poles and get moving!”

Most of the
soldiers were completely exhausted by the time the two platoons reached the ravine.
Once the poles were placed on the ground, Blake gave orders to the two patrol
leaders to begin. He took a seat under the shade of a large Juniper tree and
logged the progress the groups made in the logbook that he had brought.

After an hour,
the two patrol leaders reported to Blake. “Sir, we have completed the bridge
and are ready for your inspection.”

Blake stood and
walked to the middle of the bridge. He bounced on it a few times and nodded his
head. He walked back to the patrol leaders, who stood in front of their
respective patrols.

Blake pointed
to the other side of a small hill. “Now for the real test... I want each of you
to choose a soldier from your patrol. They must each get in the Hummer and
drive it across the bridge you just constructed. Are you both still confident
in the results that you can risk one of your soldier’s lives?”

They both glanced
at each other nervously as if to say, “I think so.” All the soldiers in both
patrols stared at the ground as the patrol leaders looked for volunteers. When
none stepped forward, two were selected.

Two men
selected ran to where Blake had said the Hummer was hidden. What he didn’t tell
them was after his inspection of the bridge, he knew it would support the vehicle
without harming anyone.

As the two men
came around the bend in the Hummer, the other soldiers started to shout with their
arms raised. Some shouted, “You got this,” and “Piece of cake.”

The Hummer
crossed the bridge slowly. It creaked and sagged slightly. As the rear tires
cleared the end of the bridge, the whole group let out a shout in celebration.

Blake allowed
the soldiers to celebrate for a few minutes before he demanded their attention.
“Very good, Marines. It looks like you kept your fellow soldiers alive to fight
another day. Now, once you have disassembled the bridge and taken the poles
back to where you found them, you can take a break for some chow.”

Their jubilation
changed to grumbling as Blake climbed into the Hummer to drive back to the
base.

Once Blake
arrived back on base he headed to the mess hall for a quick lunch. As he ate he
absently listened to the afternoon news report. Suddenly, he heard something
that caught his attention.

“…from the Near-Earth
Asteroid Tracking Agency of NASA. A meteor has recently been discovered heading
towards the vicinity of Earth. In the next thirty-six hours, it will pass
within proximity of our planet. Experts report that the Earth has nothing to
worry about, but it should be visible to some portions of the planet as it
passes by. Once again experts report the meteor poses no danger to our planet.”

Blake thought
to himself that ought to make for some excitement tomorrow.

Dr. Kun walked into the large
circular room. The sterile smell reminded him of the last time he had visited a
friend in the hospital. In the center of the room was a huge circular table. It
had a narrow path through the table, which led to the center. The center of the
table had been removed, and a podium was placed in the middle.

Already seated was President Fisher,
his security council and what Ottah thought must be the president’s chief
science officers.

The president stood as Ottah walked
into the room.

“Please join us.” The president
extended his arm and directed Ottah to stand at the podium in the center.

Ottah thought his knees would give
out before he reached the center. He had never been so scared in his life.

Once he reached the podium in the
center he grabbed it with both hands to help steady himself.

Ottah took a deep breath and scanned
the room. High on the walls all around the room were large video monitors. On
each was a different, very important-looking man. In the corner of each monitor
was a small flag to show which country he represented.

Once his nerves had calmed down he
began.

 
“My team and I have had a chance to analyze
the most current tracking data. We have also consulted with many of the lead
scientists around the world. We have some grim new to share with you: The meteor
will hit the Earth.”

His comments were met with silence
and blank stares. Ottah wasn’t sure that everybody present in the meeting had
heard him so he repeated his words again.

“The meteor that we have been
tracking for the last two days will hit the Earth!”

The representative on the screen
from Great Britain stood and spoke in a very loud voice. “I thought that you
told us yesterday that the meteor would pass harmlessly by at least 500 miles?”

“You are correct. The predictions
that you were all told should have been accurate, except for one thing…” Ottah
replied in an equally loud voice. “The meteor has started to slow down. We
don’t know how this is possible. Some of my colleagues are saying that this
suggests some form of intelligence is at work. We just don’t know! But we do
know what the effects are: The meteor will hit our planet.”

Everyone exchanged confused looks at
one another as they tried to take in what they had just heard.

 
“We have been able to narrow down where and
when we expect the meteor to hit. We expect it to come down out in the central Pacific,
somewhere in the vicinity of the small island nation of Niue. What we don’t
know is what impact this will have on the planet, if any.”

Ottah’s nerves had calmed now a bit,
and he continued with the report.

 
“With the little time we have had to gather
information, we first know that the meteor does not have a solid iron core like
most meteors. This is a very good thing because it lessens the impact. It has
an outer layer that could best be thought of as dirty ice. The center of the meteor
seems to be made up of a solid nonmetallic-type material that we have not yet
identified.

“From the trajectory and its
composition, we expect that most of it will burn up in the atmosphere. And the
rest, if any, will fall harmlessly into the ocean. There could be a small tsunami,
but it is estimated to be very small. Unless we have missed something, this
should not be a major incident. There may be a large explosion high in the
atmosphere, but not much else. We believe that this is how the Earth got all of
its water to begin with billions of years ago.”

Ottah could see some relief come on
the faces of some of the participants in the meeting.

Not knowing what else to say, Ottah
sat down on the small stool next to the podium, put his hands in his lap and
looked at the president.

President Fisher gave a nod back as
if to say, “Well done.”

He stood. “I recommended that any
nation with a scientific interest in the event sends ships to monitor the
impact and, if need be, to render aid.”

As the two men left the room,
President Fisher leaned over to Dr. Kuhn and whispered, “Well done, Doctor.”

After spending the night on the base,
Blake awoke at his normal 06:00. After a quick jog, he quickly showered and ate
breakfast. It had been a while since he had done any shooting, so he decided to
head to the gun range and get some practice in. Once he made it to the shooting
range, he started shooting in tight groups on the targets. After his second set,
something on the western horizon caught his eye. It was high in the sky, and he
had to squint to see it.

He assumed it was the meteor that he
had heard about the day before because it had an exceedingly long contrail and
seemed to be on fire on its leading edge. All the men on the range were now
looking to the sky, following the streak with their eyes. It was nearly a
minute before it disappeared below the western horizon.

Blake ran to stow his rifle then headed
to the mess hall. When he walked inside, he noticed several Marines gathered
around the TV watching a news report.

“What’s going on?” he asked the
nearest Marine.

“They are saying something about a
meteor that they have been tracking for the last several days. It has just
entered the Earth’s atmosphere.”

“I just saw that thing fly overhead
a few minutes ago. It was huge! Did they say anything about it doing any
damage?”

“They didn’t say. They think it is
just going to burn up in the high atmosphere.”

Blake stood there watching the news
reports for a few minutes then shrugged and walked out of the room. “Well, at
least it won’t interfere with the days activities,” he thought to himself.

The sunlight felt warm on his face
as he strolled across the base to a building on the far side where he needed to
turn in his reports. Halfway across the grounds, he crossed paths with a young female
Marine who looked similar to Tara. She gave a quick salute and continued on.

Once she was out of sight, his
thoughts wandered to Tara and their brief life together. How she wanted to
follow in her family’s footsteps, become a Marine and be one of the first
female helicopter pilots allowed to fly into a combat zone. How they had met
when Blake had sent out a call for an extraction when his platoon had come
under fire. They had wounded soldiers who needed to be picked up, including himself.
Even though he had been hit and was bleeding excessively, he was instantly
attracted to her appearance and courage.

Early in the afternoon, Blake was
assigned to teach a class in hand-to-hand combat with his high school friend,
Stetson Baxter.

Blake thought to himself, “This
class will probably go as it does with most new recruits. They all think they are
tough as nails and ready to handle anything.”

Blake called the recruits to
attention and walked up and down the line, staring at each of them in the eye. He
stopped in front of the largest recruit, about six foot three and all muscle, and
scanned him with his eyes from head to foot. He looked him straight in the eyes
for several seconds.

Blake glanced over at Stetson, and they
both exchanged quick grins.

“Soldier, do you think you have what
it takes to throw me to the ground?” Blake barked.

“Yes sir. I believe so, sir,” the
private shouted back, still staring straight ahead.

Even though the private had three
inches and thirty pounds on him, Blake knew what would happen before they even
started. Almost every time, the new recruit would throw the first punch to his
head, trying to go for the knockout blow. This time was no different. Blake watched
the recruit’s muscles tighten, and when he started to bring his right arm back,
Blake knew that he had guess correctly. When the recruit’s arm came forward,
Blake grabbed his wrist. With one fluid motion and before the private could
react, Blake twisted his body and flung the soldier over his shoulder. As the
private hit the ground hard, the air was forced out of his lungs. Instead of letting
it end there, Blake twisted the man’s arm until his face showed how much pain
he was in. Blake could tell from the private’s eyes that he had surrendered so
he released his arm and removed his boot from the private’s neck. The rest of
the recruits had the look of “Holy shit” on their faces.

Blake introduced Stetson, and they
spent the rest of the afternoon drilling the recruits on proper hand-to-hand combat
techniques.

After their class, Blake invited Stetson
to eat a quick snack in the mess hall. Both of them grabbed some fruit and they
sat at the table closest to the TV.

“So did you see the look on that big
guy’s face after he hit the ground? It was all I could do to keep from breaking
out in laughter in front of the recruits,” Stetson said as he slapped the table
with laughter. Blake just smiled as he chewed on his apple.

The story on the news caught both of
their attentions. “
…
The meteor that was reported on earlier today and seen by
many has exploded high in the atmosphere above the small Pacific island of Niue.
At this point there are few details available. We will bring you more details as
they become available.”

For a moment Blake stopped chewing
so that he could focus his attention on the news report. Then Stetson had to
break the silence.

“I bet those islanders had to clean
out their pants when that thing exploded,” Stetson joked.

“Maybe so,” Blake replied.