Fade to Grey (Book 2): Darkness Ascending (85 page)

“Arrrrr . . . uhhhh . . .”

The stainless steel dental pliers filled Oakley’s
mouth as Doc Collins gripped the lower left molar and began to rock it back and
forth. The lieutenant’s head was tilted back over the arm of the couch in
Walter’s basement, and several flashlights were substituting for the typical
swing-arm, tilting head procedure light found in most orthodontists’ offices.

“Remember Doc,” Uncle Andy said from a chair on the
opposite side of the room, “once the tooth comes out, you’ve got less than
fifteen seconds to drop it in the alcohol.”

“I’m aware of the time constraints Andy, especially
since this is about the eighth time you’ve told me in the last two minutes.”
Doc’s mumbled voice bounced over top of Oakley’s discomfort.

I stood in the corner and watched the extraction taking
place in front of me. The heavy duty curved forceps held in Doc’s gloved hands
were barely visible from my angle, but the white plastic cup filled with
rubbing alcohol and sitting on the end table was fully in view. It was the
second half of the equation—the important half, according to Oakley.

“I have an implant . . . a modified molar on the lower
left side. It contains a micro USB drive. I honestly don’t know what’s on it
right now. I never do until I look at it. It gets loaded with information
before each presentation that I make, and I normally have access to the data
for only about twelve hours before I’m expected to break it down into a format
that’s more easily understood by my audience.”

“What about levels of security . . . how many are
there?”

“Three of them,” Oakley responded, “although I’m not
sure if we’ll be able to overcome the third level. It will depend on whether
Major Larrabee changed his code.”

“Clarify that for me,” Uncle Andy said.

Oakley exhaled deeply and rubbed his eyes with weary
fingers. “Aside from the concealed nature of my implant, there are three
additional security precautions. The first one is a caustic coating that’s
triggered by exposure to oxygen. When you pull my implant out of the socket,
you’ll have less than fifteen seconds to submerge it in rubbing alcohol. If you
don’t, the coating will rapidly acidify and destroy the data on the drive. The
alcohol will safely dissolve the chemical and prevent that from happening. The
second problem that we’ll have is that any data contained on the drive cannot
be copied. There’s a very ‘black-ops, secret squirrel’ program embedded in the
drive that will instantly and securely delete every kilobyte of data if you
attempt, even accidentally, to copy, move, or modify any of the files. That
same program apparently contains an internal ‘data bomb’ that will render the drive
useless after a certain amount of time has passed once the tooth has been
removed. I don’t know what that time frame is, but like I said, they normally
gave me twelve hours to assemble a presentation, so I can assume it’s at least
that long.”

“And the third obstacle?”

“Encryption. I only have half of the encryption key
required to access the data. You have to understand, the information I worked
with came through people who don’t exist. These people could, and frequently
did, make liabilities—real or imagined—disappear. I’m talking with the touch of
a button or the nod of the head, and you’re gone. And these people that don’t
exist, they don’t trust anybody. If you saw some of the technology that I’ve
seen just in the last year, it would blow you away. Anyhow, what I’m getting at
is that the encryption key to access the data is 208 characters long. I’ve
memorized the first half—104 of them. The second half was supplied by my
handler . . . Major Larrabee. Here’s where our glitch may reveal itself. Major
Larrabee used the same 104 character code for the last two presentations I’ve
done. He dictated it to me and I entered it after my own. With that said, he
could have changed his code. If that happened, there’s no way we can get the
information contained on the drive. But there’s another problem.”

“And that is . . .?”

“You only get two chances to enter the code correctly.
If you fail, all of the data goes bye-bye, and therein lies our problem.”

“Explain.”

“Well, the reality of the situation is that you’re
asking me to remember the exact sequence of characters—104 of them consisting
of upper and lowercase letters, numbers, and special characters—that I’ve only
heard twice before.”

“Can you do it?”

Oakley looked around the room at the assembly. Every
eye was watching, and every breath was held awaiting his response. “I don’t
know . . . maybe.”

“Ouch!” Oakley yelped as the artificial, USB drive
containing tooth was released from the dental cement that held it in place.
With the smoothness born of countless repetitions in the surgical ward, Doc
Collins swiveled on the chair and
plunked
the tooth into the waiting cup
of alcohol.

“OK, that should do it,” Oakley mouthed as he rubbed
the side of his cheek. “Give it about five minutes to dissolve the chemical,
and then we’ll pull it out and let it dry for about thirty minutes.”

“Why can’t we hit it with some compressed air to speed
up the process?” Walter asked.

“I don’t know. That might work, but I’m just telling
you the way they’ve always done it before.”

“Well then,” my uncle replied, “what say we just keep
it that way. Besides, if were gonna be working all night, I’d like to get a
little bit of food in my belly.”

Walter picked up the radio.
“Bernie, I can hear a
lot of commotion up there . . . how soon until supper is ready?”

In a few seconds the reply came back, but not through
the radio. Bernice’s scratchy voice echoed down the stairway. “If you’re too
lazy to walk up a dozen steps and ask me about supper instead of just
exercising your thumb and calling on the radio, then I don’t believe I got any
food for you. For the rest of you, supper’s ready.”

Walter grinned and gestured toward the stairs. “You
heard the lady . . . go eat.”

We ate quickly—more rice, mixed vegetables that had
been home canned by Bernice, and a cup of thick, fish chowder with a tomato
base. It was hot and tasty, but I could see several grumbling faces as it was
portioned out. Most of those faces reversed course when Amy stood and made an
announcement.

“As you know, we’re trying to hold on to who we are—to
what
we are—in the midst of this crisis. Tomorrow night if everything
goes well, we’re going to show a movie. Everybody who’s not assigned some type
of duty that takes them elsewhere is welcome to attend. For those who miss the
movie, it will be shown again the following afternoon.”

A round of cheers echoed in the room.

“Oh, but it gets better,” Amy beamed. She reached into
a large shoulder bag that dangled under her arm. “Through a monumental effort
of coordination, scavenging, and electronic wizardry— courtesy of Bucky, C.J.,
and your ever humble and slightly fantastic Jane of all trades . . . me—we now
have a few partially charged cell phones.”

Another cry of elation sounded in the living room as
Amy called out the owner’s name for each of the charged devices.

“We’ll try to finish the rest of them this evening.
Remember though, you’ll still need to conserve your battery.”

Amy sat down to another round of applause, and then
Walter took the floor. “As you’ve probably heard, there’s a chance that we
might be able to obtain some much needed information about the nature of what’s
happening to our world. Andy, Lieutenant Oakley, Captain Estes, Doc Collins,
and Sam Ironfeather are going to be sequestered in the basement overnight, so
we’re going to make temporary sleeping arrangements to keep that area clear.
The information that we might gain access to is time sensitive, and the
security on the data drive we’ve obtained prevents us from saving or copying
it. Even now the clock is ticking.”

I finished my fish chowder and sat quietly in the
corner. My internal clock was telling me that it would be dark soon, and I
closed my eyes and made a halfhearted attempt to sort through the jumble of
thoughts that ricocheted back and forth in my head. I wasn’t having much
success, and for a brief moment I considered trying to catch a little nap right
there in the corner. That thought was interrupted by a tiny bundle of curly red
hair that wormed her way against my chest.

“Hey tiger . . . did you get enough to eat?”

Faith nodded and pushed her cheek against mine. Her
arms wrapped around my neck and squeezed, and I returned the favor immediately.
Through the explosion of curls that half blocked my vision I caught a glimpse
of Michelle on the other side of the room. She had been talking to Sergeant
Keene and one of the other soldiers—Perkins I think—but now her attention was
directed straight towards me. The smile on her face was coming from more than
just her lips, and after nodding several times towards the soldiers, she turned
and stepped my way.

“Mind if I join?” Michelle whispered loudly as she
scooted down next to us.

“Well, I don’t know,” I said as I spun Faith around to
face Michelle, “you have to be pretty brave to be a member of our tiger club.”

Faith reached out her arms toward Michelle. “Mommy is
brave,” she said.

My eyes widened and locked onto Michelle’s face as I
silently mouthed the word, “mommy?” For a moment, the thought that the two of
them had set this up as a joke crossed my mind, but the look on Michelle’s face
was both real and priceless. I returned her gesture from Devils Lake and mimicked
snapping a picture.

“Well thank you, Faith. I happen to think that you’re
just as brave as me,” Michelle managed to stumble out.

The little girl squirmed in Michelle’s arms until she
was facing me again. “When can I play with the puppy?”

“Hopefully in the next couple of days. Max isn’t
really a puppy anymore, and we have to let him get used to you, but right now
he needs some time away from all these people.”

“Doesn’t he like people?” she asked innocently.

“Sometimes, but he likes to make sure that the people
he’s with will be his friends, so it takes a while for Max to get to know you.”

“I can be his friend.” The cherubic smile that
accompanied her statement beamed up at me.

“Well I’ll bet he’d like to be your friend too. We’ll
see what we can do about it in the next few days, OK?”

Faith nodded, and then chased her nod with a wide
mouthed yawn.

“Someone is getting sleepy,” Michelle said.

“Is Leah still OK with taking her until we can figure
out something else?” I asked.

“She said she’ll keep her for as long as we need.”

“Are you going to join me?”

“Where?” Michelle answered.

“I need to get Max away from the crowd. He’s been good
so far, but I can tell that he’s getting real antsy.”

“The cabin?”

I nodded. “Yeah, maybe for a few days. We can drive
back and forth if we need to, but if I don’t get him away, something bad might
happen.”

“OK, that actually sounds nice. I’ve got a couple of
things that I need to do before we go, though.”

“Me too, and I also want to see if they can get into that
drive before we leave.”

Michelle looked at her watch. “Say about 8:00 PM?”

“We can shoot for that,” I grumbled as I pushed my
still aching body into a standing position.

She nodded and stood up with Faith still wrapped in
her arms. “I’ll find you.”