Fade to Grey (Book 2): Darkness Ascending (40 page)

“Specialist
Allied Operations.”

Estes frowned
at Oakley’s reply, and a shift of his eyes told him that even Thorn looked
confused at the specialist’s answer.

“What the crap
is a ‘Specialist Allied Operations?’”

Oakley said
nothing for a long ten count, and then his rich voice, hushed by his body
position relayed his answer. “It’s like the Sergeant said, part of the medical
specialist branch.”

Estes sighed
and shook his head, “Dennis, Ross, Calvin . . . will you please dog pile Mr.
Oakley?”

In a flash,
the three privates sprang from their seated position and swamped the cringing
specialist, knocking his glasses off in the process.

“Bring his ass
over here so I don’t get blood in the truck.”

Oakley was
struggling and yelling for all he was worth, but his thin frame was no match
for the three beefy E-3’s.

Estes shifted
down to lay on his side right next to Oakley, and when the young man stopped
his futile struggling, he slammed the knife into the wooden truck bed just
inches from Oakley’s nose.

“Let’s try
this one more time. No more games, no more bullshit, understand?”

From
underneath the pile, Oakley gave a quick nod.

“That’s
better. Now . . . who—and what—are you . . . exactly?”

“I told you,
Lieutenant Jacob Oakley, 65X, medical specialists branch.”

Estes swore
and grabbed the knife, jerking it out of the planking as he stood. “Not good
enough.” Gesturing to the three privates, he said, “Roll up his pant leg and
take off his shoe, I’m tired of pissing around.”

The three
burly soldiers easily overpowered the squirming lieutenant, and in the space of
a few seconds, had his right leg locked in an upright wrestling pretzel. With
as much ferocity as he could manage in his tired condition, Estes ripped off
the sock and grabbed the lieutenant’s foot. With his other hand he brought the
knife against the thick tendon just above the now exposed heel. “WHY WERE YOU
AT THE SCHOOL? WHO THE HELL ARE YOU?” He yelled as he pressed the knife hard
against the skin.

“OK-OK-OK . .
. I’M A TRANSLATOR.”

Estes crinkled
his nose and frowned in uncertainty at the answer. “What?”

“I’m a
translator, a specialist translator for medical units.”

His frown sank
lower, and another look at Sergeant Thorn earned him a shrug of her shoulders.
He pressed the knife harder, almost breaking the skin. “Keep talking.”

“Ow, that
hurts, Captain.”

“It’s going to
get a lot worse really fast if you don’t start talking.”

The lieutenant
let out a deep groan and stopped resisting. “OK, just let me up and I’ll tell
you what I can.”

After a moment
of indecision, Estes nosed his men away. “Fair enough, but if you screw with me
one more time, I’m going to stab you in the throat, understand?”

“Yes,” the
thin man replied as he got to his feet, “I understand. Do you know where my
glasses are?”

They located
the missing glasses in the back corner of the truck bed, and Oakley
repositioned them on his face as he sat down. “I’ll tell you what I can, but
like I’ve said, I don’t currently have access to the information you’re
probably going to want.”

“Start
talking.”

“How much do
you know about Major Larrabee?”

“Pretend I
don’t know anything.” It was close to the truth, anyhow, Estes thought.

The lieutenant
sighed again, “Major Larrabee was regular army, and to all inspection, classified
as 64D, a veterinary pathologist. His position and experience in that field
tracked him onto a specialty team as a 61G—an infectious disease specialist.
When . . . ‘events’ . . . began to unfold, and I might add this was substantially
before Korea, the Major’s team was activated.” He looked across the truck at
Estes, “Got any more peanut butter?”

Another grab
in the side pouch netted two packets, and they were tossed to the lieutenant.

“I’m part of
the Major’s team, but in a very limited capacity due to my unique specialty.”

“I thought you
said you’re a translator.”

“I am, but not
like you’re thinking. I don’t speak any foreign languages. Well, that’s not
exactly true. I know a little German from my grandfather.” His attempt at
lightening the conversation fell on deaf ears, so he continued with a shake of
his head. “Captain, I seem to have a unique ‘gift’ that was useful to certain .
. .” he paused as he searched for the correct word, “‘programs’ if you will.”

“I’m losing
patience, lieutenant.”

“Sorry, sir,”
Oakley said with a dry snort, “it’s just that I can’t believe I’m having
trouble communicating with you, especially since it has a lot to do with the
question you’re asking me.”

“Which I’m
still waiting for the answer to . . .”

Oakley stood
and gripped one of the tubular aluminum cover supports, and then locked eyes
with Estes. “I’m a science geek, sir. Since I was a kid I’ve been interested in
everything scientific—technological, biomedical, astronomy, robotics, quantum
physics—you name it, and there were tons of books on that subject in my room.
I’m an only child, sir, and where most kids would have a bedroom and maybe a
playroom, I had a bedroom and a library. You probably played football or
baseball every waking hour that you weren’t in school. I was sitting in front
of a computer or staying after school in the chemistry lab until the janitor
kicked me out.”

“I get it,
you’re a nerd. That means that one day you’ll be a billionaire with a private
jet in an airport somewhere, and a supermodel in your bed. I’ll probably be working
at a car wash. What’s your point?”

Oakley managed
a weak smile, “I graduated college with a degree in Chemical Engineering when I
was fourteen years old. I spent the next five years practically locked in the
R&D department of a major military contractor. It was my dream come true,
really, and my research team made a lot of advances—most of which are still
highly classified. Anyway, one of the last projects we were working on was what
we jokingly called ‘Robodog.’ Essentially, it was a self contained ‘sniffer’
unit about the size of a cell phone.” He looked around the truck at the cluster
of faces, “Has anybody here worked with a military canine unit?”

Nobody had.

“OK, well I’m
sure that you can imagine they can be invaluable for a lot of dangerous tasks. We
use them for everything from narcotics interdiction to explosive ordnance
detection  . . . all the way up to search and rescue and scouting missions
behind enemy lines.” Oakley laughed and shook his head again, “Seriously, we
actually parachute dogs behind enemy lines. Anyway, as valuable as the canine
soldiers are, they’re also extremely difficult to produce in both quality and
quantity. We could throw thousands of dogs into service, but highly trained
dogs are another matter. It takes a lot of time and a lot of money to end up
with something that might get turned into a furry gut pile the first time it got
distracted and stepped on a land mine. Our project was working on a highly
advanced chemical sensor that could take the place of a canine bio-unit.”

“I’ve seen
some of those bomb sniffer boxes in use by an EOD team before,” Estes said.

“Ours was a
million times more sensitive. Actually, it benchmarked at 1.377 million times
more sensitive, and that was just the prototype.”

A hand rose
next to Thorn; it was the only civilian that had made it out with them and
survived. Oakley nodded at the nondescript, thirty-something lady, “Miss Veil,
correct?”

“Nora,” she
replied.

“Nora, do you
have a question?”

“More of a
statement. Last year I was working as a civilian contractor at a medical
facility in Dallas. I got to watch a demonstration where they brought in a dog
. . . some kind of spaniel, I think . . . and it walked by a row of patients
and picked out which ones had cancer. One of our attending physicians was
watching the test as well, and at the end of the line, the dog keyed in on him.
It turns out that he had an undiagnosed case of stage three pancreatic cancer.”

Oakley smiled,
“The repercussions of our Robodog technology have the potential to affect a
wide spectrum of applications. Imagine how it would revolutionize our medical system
if a doctor could simply walk into a room full of patients and, with a few
adjustments on a device small enough to fit in his hand, he could tell who had
diabetes, or cancer, or heart disease, or even the flu.”

“Or whatever
is turning us into red-eyed, homicidal maniacs,” Estes shot back. “Is that what
this is about? Are you about to tell me that this dog sniffer gizmo is somehow
related to what’s going on?”

“No, not at all
. . . that’s just some background so you can understand the answer to your
question.”

Estes glowered
at the man and tapped his watch.

“Yes sir, I’m
trying. Where was I?”

“Working in
the research and development lab making artificial dog noses,” PFC Spurlock
answered.

“Yes, that’s
correct. When our project—our initial prototype that is—was showing promise, we
had to put together a demonstration for the powers that be that controlled the
finances. No matter what you hear about national security, the bottom line is that
it’s always about the money. I was in charge of that demonstration. Now, you
have to understand something. My background in science is highly varied. Yes, I
specialized in chemical engineering, but in reality I’m kind of a ‘jack of all
trades’ geek.” The lieutenant looked around the room again, stopping at the
scowling captain. “Many of the people, the ‘big fish’ in the decision-making,
money appropriating, ‘go or no go’ echelon are not scientists. They don’t speak
the same language. Most of them are intelligent, driven, and successful people
who wield vast amounts of power in our government, but the facts are that they
just don’t understand all the terms and technology on the same level that the
people who developed whatever project or gizmo they’re trying to get funded do.
That’s where I come in. My background, combined with my apparently natural gift
for gab, allowed me to explain Robodog on a level that the backers could both
understand and relate to. It’s almost laughable to me when I think about it
now, but someone at that meeting—I don’t know who—recognized the apparent
proficiency I had in explaining technical ‘geeky-nerdy’ ideas and projects to
others who may not share the same background.”

He ripped open
one of the peanut butter packets and spooned some out with his finger before
continuing. “A few weeks later I found myself in the military and transferred
to the Pentagon. Since then, my job has been to review different projects and
come up with ways to convey the technological vocabulary or concepts to those
who may otherwise not understand. In other words, like I said, I’m a
translator. Only now it’s not as a salesman for biotechnology firms or robotics
companies. I’m on the other side now. The military has me working in the
capacity to help them understand the technology that companies are trying to
get them to invest in, and . . .,” he added with emphasis, “also to explain to
the generals, admirals, and all the way up to the joint chiefs, any project
that was deemed ‘likely to be misunderstood’ that came out of their own
bunkers, so to speak.”

His words
ended with another slurp at the peanut butter as he sat down. Estes’s tired
brain tried to digest the information as the Lieutenant’s lips smacked
together, forcing the sticky brown substance into his mouth.

“It sounds to
me like you’d be a very valuable person with all that cutting edge technology
floating around in your head. Not that it matters now, but why aren’t you kept
under lock and key?”

“Normally I am.
When I traveled it was with a contingent of guards that were assigned to protect
me, or if that failed, eliminate me. It truly sucked, but for a geek like me,
the tradeoff in access to advanced technology was worth it. You seriously would
not believe what’s coming down the pipe in the next few years. That is,” he
added quietly, “if we’re still around then.”

“Where is your
security detail now?”

“They never
made it to my staging area, so the decision was made to disguise me and send me
on anyway.”

“As an E-4?”

“Short notice
. . . best they could do under the circumstances.”

“So, all of this has something to do with why you were
at the school, and what’s happening in the world?”

“Yes, it’s all related, although I’m mostly in the
dark as to the specifics.”

“I thought you said that your job was to review all
the tech stuff before you had to translate it into something that General So
and So could understand?”

“Yes sir, but like I also said, I haven’t yet been
able to access the information to review. Major Larrabee was flying in—not to
take over command of the school—but to pick me up. All I know is that we were
heading to Canada for some emergency biomedical conference. I was supposed to
be on the same chopper with him when he flew out of Bismarck, but in all the
confusion, I got shifted onto a flight that landed at the school. Colonel
Jordan didn’t like the fact that I wouldn’t answer his questions, and when the
orders came directly from central command for Major Larrabee to make a priority
one stop to pick up a lowly E-4, the Colonel must have decided that he could
score a few brownie points with somebody by finding out what I knew. The only
problem was I hadn’t reviewed anything yet. I was supposed to do it on the
flight in to the conference.”