In Situ (25 page)

“Very close to your current location
, Sir, with a plus or minus variance of only two or three degrees.” Jen paused.

Batter did not answer.
He was immediately busy trying to come up with a solution, any solution, but at the moment he couldn’t think of one. The Colorado and Kansas ARCs were already full and too far. Utah wasn’t finished. There was basically nowhere to go.

“I am sorry to say
, Sir, that with an impact so close the chances of survival are… uh, minimal.”

Batter tried to answer, but he suddenly found himself without words.

“Sir?”

“Oh, ah, yes
, Doctor?”

“Sir, will there be anything else?
I mean, we are all preparing and…,” the Doctor had just delivered a death sentence, and hers was on its way. She was finding it difficult to speak.

“No, Doctor, Jen is it?
Thank you, Jen. Good luck.”

“You too
, Sir.”

He held the phone to his ear and listened as the line clicked and the phone went dead.

They were almost late for the meeting. Alex and Tom had slept in and grabbed a quick breakfast at one of the commissaries, then stopped by the Primate Compound to check on Mot and Ara. They avoided direct contact, not wanting to speak to the Arzats until after they heard the official word from the President, and had met with Batter.

The meeting was
set for 1200 hours, Area 51 time, and when they finally arrived it was already 1154. The chamber was packed, with the House and the Senate on the lower floors and the rest of the attendees in the wings and on the balconies. The room very closely resembled the Congressional Chamber in Washington, with the exception that it was much more modern and had two very large screens right and left of the stage.

As they were seated, Alex looked around the room.
She guess-timated that it could probably accommodate a thousand, and the place was packed. She could see Batter, standing off to the side of the Vice President’s podium, watching everyone closely. By the doors, she noticed two or three dozen security personnel standing with their hands behind their backs wearing side arms. Batter’s riot police, she thought.

The mood in the chamber was anything but somber.
Old acquaintances met, and the room was a cacophony of happy chatter. Most were under the impression that immediately after the meeting, they would be heading back to Washington and home. When Alex glanced back towards Batter their eyes met for just a moment, then he looked away.

A large digital clock was displayed on one of the screens.
When it rolled to 1200, the VP rose and rapped his gavel on the podium.

“Good morning, ladies and gentlemen of the Congress
, the Court, and all. Let me be brief. We are about to hear from the President of the United States. After that, I will have a few comments and will be available for questions.” Just as the Vice President, stepped away from the podium, the giant screens flashed to the Oval Office. An aide was still fitting a microphone to the President’s lapel.

“Good morning
fellow Americans,” he said in a somber tone looking directly into the camera. “A few weeks ago, one of our most advanced telescopes, known as Pan-STARRS, identified what the astronomers refer to as an N-E-O, a near-earth-object. In less technical terms, it means an asteroid or meteor that will pass close to our planet. At first, there was little concern, but, as time passed, our computer system plotted a complete map of the arc of the object’s orbit that suggested a high probability of impact here on earth sometime 28 days from now.”

There were startled looks in the
Chamber, but no one moved, their eyes locked on the screen.

“
If that were not bad enough,” the President continued, “our astronomers have now determined that a ‘shadow asteroid,’ that could not at first be seen, is traveling right in front of the one first discovered. It will arrive much sooner.”

There was a gasp in the room.
Some people started moving in their seats, some tried to head for the doors. The security teams stopped them with weapons raised and waived them back to their seats.

“The exact scope of the damage these asteroids will inflict is not precisely known, but it will be substantial, and will affect the entire planet and the environment we live in.
Our scientists have been working around the clock, trying to find a solution, but so far they have found none. We simply do not have the resources to deal with this kind of situation,” the President paused and took a deep breath. “It is with great regret that I must announce that at approximately 9:17 pm Eastern Standard Time we anticipate an asteroid to strike the Pacific Ocean just off of the coast of South America. Other authorities, from around the world, are making similar announcements as I speak.” The President stopped looking at his notes, and took off his glasses. He had just lied. He knew the scope and the damage, and exactly where the asteroid was going to hit-and it wasn’t in the Pacific Ocean. “I wish there were something more to say, some thread of hope I could pass along, but the situation is dire. The future of mankind is in jeopardy, along with the lives of all living things on the planet. I hope you will all help each other. The government of the United States will do all that it can while it can. Since our communications system is likely to be a casualty, I wish to express my deepest regrets and concerns to all of you at this time. While they are able, every major radio and television station will be broadcasting the latest status. May God bless you, may God bless the United States of America, and may God bless this world.”

The screen went blank, and the room erupted in utter panic.
It was left to Batter to restore order. He calmly stepped up to the podium and fired several rounds from an assault rifle into the air. They were blank rounds-only Batter knew that-but they did the trick. He had a full clip of live ammunition in his pocket, just in case. The room went quiet immediately.

Alex noticed that Batter’s security guards had all magically been able to produce assault rifles of their own
, and were now very conspicuously blocking the exits.

Batter approached the front
of the stage and awkwardly lowered his head over the podium. “Aaahumm,” he cleared his throat directly into the microphone. “Ladies and gentlemen, my name is Batter and I am in charge of this facility. I work under the direct orders of the Commander and Chief. I know you must all be in quite a state of shock. I myself was when I heard the news that the President has just relayed, so I am quite empathetic to your situation. However,” he said, now looking around the room, “make no mistake, we must all maintain complete order for our own survival. On this, I must absolutely insist,” he finished. “Now please, ladies and gentlemen, the Vice President.” Batter stepped aside as if he had not spoken a word.

Alex looked down from the balcony.
There was something about Batter that commanded abeyance. Maybe it was just the way he wielded the semi-automatic. The room was silent.

The Vice President looked to Batter as if for permission
, then walked back to the podium.

“I would like to remind everyone of the oath you signed regardi
ng this unfortunate possibility,” the Vice President began again. “Never was it imagined that such an event could come to pass in our lifetimes, or the lifetimes of many generations. We are fortunate to have the protection of the ARC. For those of you who wish, we have arranged open phone banks so that you may speak with your loved ones. However, I would like to remind everyone that this location is still classified, so you are not at liberty to disclose that bit of information. For those of you who are not willing to comply with the rules of the ARC… well, as Mr. Batter has indicated, we must insist that you do. From this point on ladies and gentlemen, like it or not—and believe me I do not like it myself—this will be our new home,” he paused. “Now I will entertain some questions.”

Silence, as
if no one was even breathing. Many of the attendees were keeping a wary eye on the security forces at the doors. Then one of the Senators rose from his chair to be recognized. “Yes, Senator Bean,” said the Vice President.

Senator Bean
had been a member of Congress for thirty years. He was sixty five years old and past taking shit from anyone, but as an ex-military man he had learned decades ago to be careful around young men in uniform with guns. This was serious business. “Mr. Vice President, we were tricked. I’d never have come here if I had known this was happening. I wish to return home immediately.”

“
That makes two of us, Joseph,” the Vice President responded, dispensing with protocol and using the Senator’s first name. They had known each other for years, fished together, and dined together with their families. “And that is despite the oath I’ve taken to defend the Constitution and to do my duty to the best of my ability to preserve the Union,” he added. “There is no one in this room who hasn’t taken a similar oath as far as I know. Perhaps I should remind everyone that the main purpose of this facility is to preserve the Government of the United States in an emergency. I think the events that are about to transpire more than qualify.”

“So we’re trapped here?
” someone called out from the floor.

The Vice President looked out into the audience trying to find the culprit, and then to Batter, but the
crowd maintained order, so he decided to reply. “The asteroid is expected to create an explosion that is on the order of several hundred thousand nuclear bombs all detonating at once. I believe this has all been covered during earlier briefings with most of you,” he said wearily. “In a few hours, there will not be much to go home to. In fact, it might be impossible just to take a breath of air.” The Vice President had chosen to ignore the other possible interpretation of the question, the one that was likely intended. “Do you have enough men and guns to keep us here at all?”

There was another rumble in the room
, but it quieted.

The
Vice President recognized a raised hand. It was a freshman Congresswoman that he did not know. “Sandy Miller from Mississippi, Mr. Vice President,” she said with a heavy southern accent. “I have two questions, Mr. Vice President. How long will we have to stay down here, and how long for goodness sake can you keep us? I mean, there are an awful lot of folks here,” she said, looking around the room.

“I wish I could answer the first question
, but, we do not know. There are monitors on the surface and we have the ability to send out teams in special gear to report on conditions. Regarding the second question, we are provisioned for twenty five years, but we also have the ability to produce our own food supply and we have power for, well, let’s just say well beyond anyone’s lifetime. So the answer really is ‘indefinitely.’”

The room erupted in conversation and chatter
, and the Vice President was forced to rap the gavel again to restore order. “We will have another meeting at 1730 hours to inform you further of the situation. Until then, we are adjourned.”

The doors to the chamber were opened and people scrambled to get out. Alex and Tom watched from the balcony, afraid to move lest they be trampled. The fear was so thick it would have taken a diamond blade to cut through it. She looked down towards Batter and their eyes met again. He gestured, indicating that he was ready to meet. She could see Pete was already standing near Batter.

“Thanks
, Batter,” the Vice President said as he was leaving the room, “that was close.”

“You’re welcome.
I’m surprised no one asked the most obvious question,” Batter said.

“Oh yeah, what’s that?”

“Why the hell the President isn’t here?”

Alex and Tom located Batter and Pete, and the four of them pulled off into a small conference room that was near the main chamber.

“Well,
Dr. Moss,” Batter said as they sat down, “what did you think about the meeting we just had with those people?”

Alex knew that she had pretty much lost the argument of trying to save the Arzats based on the behavior she had just witnessed.
Batter was correct, the Arzats didn’t stand a chance in this environment, probably not in the short term, certainly not in the long term. “Scary,” was all she could think to say.

“Exactly,” said Batter, looking at all of them, “and they haven’t even gotten started.
I predict that before the end of the day we will already have some of them incarcerated. Hell, we might even have to shoot someone, who knows?” he continued, quite clearly not entirely kidding. “Honestly, Alex, Pete, I wish there were something I could do but the situation…,” he stopped himself, raising his hands off the table in a gesture of hopelessness. Batter had thought about just conceding after the news last night. What did it really matter? In a few hours it would probably be all over for all of them. But, there was still a chance the asteroid might miss. Then what? He knew he was grasping at straws, but it was still
his
responsibility.

“Well, regardless,” Alex fought back, “I am not leaving them.”
She turned to Tom, “Tom, I’m not leaving them. I’m sorry. I love you, but I’m not leaving them, whatever happens.”

“I know,” Tom said, looking lovingly into to her fiery green eyes.
He turned back toward Batter. “You
can
help us.”

Batter craned his neck
and looked back at Tom, sizing him up. “I don’t see how Tom,” he replied, obviously annoyed. Before this morning’s call, Batter had no intention of letting Alex or Tom stay out of the ARC. He would have drugged them, or shot them, or beat the crap out of them, but he had not been about to leave them outside.

“You can let us go,” Tom said, looking Batter directly in the eye.

“Hah,” Batter responded, surprised. “Look it, Tom, there is no place to go!
Haven’t you heard
?” he said, not able to completely hide his total frustration. Be careful, he thought, you are losing it old boy. Batter found it to be an interesting self-admission. He could not remember ever experiencing such a loss of control before. “Might I also remind you, there is not just one asteroid on the way. There are two.”

“Utah,” Tom said.

“Utah,” Batter repeated, still irritated, and waved his hand. “I shut the whole thing down Tom. It’s not finished. It’s a lost cause. There is nothing there. You, of all people, should know that.” Batter was still smarting from his utter failure at the Utah site, and a part of him considered Tom as the reason.

Tom looked over at Alex and Pete
, and then back to Batter. “Batter, I know the place like a book. It is already provisioned and it’s almost ready to go. Hell, we could live for years. The place is stocked with supplies for hundreds of people.”

“Of course!” Alex chimed in.
“Utah!” She squeezed Tom’s arm. Why the heck hadn’t he just told me?

Batter sat and carefully considered what Tom had said.
Actually, it wasn’t a bad idea. Maybe Tom wasn’t such a dumb shit after all—except. “Interesting idea Tom, but there is a problem,” he said.

“What’s that?” Tom said, suddenly worried that Batter was not going to give them permission to go.
He immediately started to consider how they could fight their way out.

“The breach
? Your little paleontological hole in the wall? I don’t think they contained it. The place is not airtight Tom,” Batter said testing him, having already thought of a solution.

“I’ll fix it if it’s not,” was all Tom could come up with.

Bingo, thought Batter. Maybe you weren’t my worst mistake after all Tom. He glanced at Alex who had been watching Tom as he spoke, the look of absolute love in her eyes unmistakable. Tom had definitely gotten one thing right, Batter thought, with no small amount of envy.

“Look
, Batter, I know Alex, and when she says she is not leaving the Arzats, she means it. And I am not leaving her. So we are both dead, anyway, if we stay here. At least give us a chance.”

No, we are
all
dead if we stay here, Batter thought. He began to think of who he could send with them. Was there any point? Send them with a few pissed off politicians? Himself? No. He checked his watch. It was past 1300 hours. Just over four hours to go. The ARC was going to begin the three-hour process of lock down at 1400. Regardless, they barely had enough time to make it themselves. Decide Batter, decide, he told himself. He looked at Alex and Tom and then turned to Pete Wilson. “Pete?” he inquired, obviously asking if he wanted to go with them.

Pete had already considered that option as he sat and listened, but his family would be gone soon and his only point in living past that was his duty to Batter and his own staff at the ARC.
“No, I’m staying. Too much to do here,” he said with a fake smile. He knew Batter would have already considered going as well, but would be staying for the same reasons.

Batter checked his watch again.
“Well then,” he finally said, rising up, “I guess if you are going to go, then you’d better get on it.” Batter found himself suddenly liking Tom very much, although he still was not exactly sure why. “I’ll go see about getting that Chinook warmed up for you, the one you chased down earlier. I’d give you something faster but I evacuated all of the other aircraft to the East Coast. You’d better hurry—you only have 49 minutes,” he said, checking his watch.

*

They were racing down the hall.
Pete was with them guiding them back to the enclosure.

“Pete, did you say you thought that you had the cryo problem worked out?”
Alex asked, out of breath from running.

“Yes, as a matter fact, I just met with the lab techs working on it.
That glycerin we identified is fantastic. It seems to perfectly preserve cell tissue with absolutely no crystallization. We think it must be from a now extinct plant species, but the good news is that it was fairly easy to synthesize. We just prepared a large batch of it to experiment with on some primates, but I’m almost certain it’s going to work. Too bad, though.”

“
Why’s that?” asked Alex.

“The main bank of cryo units
is in…,” he stopped himself and looked at Alex. “Utah,” Pete said, surprised at his own answer.

“I love you
, Alex, but I’m not going to go in any cryo unit with you,” Tom said, overhearing the conversation as they rushed down the corridors.

“It’s always good to have a
Plan B, Tom,” she said to him over her shoulder. “Pete, think you can get me enough for four units before we get out of here?”

“I’ll do my best.”

*

Mot and Ara were sitting together in silent conversation when the three of them arrived.

Alex looked at both of them and knew instantly what had gone on the night before.
The Arzats were beaming, but there was no time to talk. “We’re leaving,” she blurted out, still gasping from the trip over.

Mot and Ara instantly got up.

“Where are we going
, Alex?” Mot asked.

“Somewhere we can all be safe.
Very near the caves where I found you.”

Ara was unaccustomed to any female exerting so much authority and her defenses were immediately raised.
Mot had explained everything about Alex to her, and it was clear that this little female, human or not, was potential competition for his affections, species differences notwithstanding. She relaxed when she searched Alex for any ulterior motives, and could find none. “Why will Pete not join us?” she said, realizing she had given away the fact that she had probed Alex’s mind. Alex had said nothing about Pete not going.

Alex simply looked at her.
She knew she could not afford a confrontation with a jealous teenager at this point, especially one three times her size.

“
I cannot go with you, Ara,” Pete said, trying to save the situation. “My duty is to this place. But Tom and Alex will take good care of you.”

Ara looked at Alex, then Tom, and finally
back to Pete. “This makes me sad, Pete son of Robert. But we certainly understand duty.”

“When are we leaving Alex?” Mot asked.

“Right now, we only have a few minutes,” she answered, looking at Ara, directly in her golden eyes. I must have Mot teach me how to block, she thought.

“I will teach
you, Alex daughter of Simon,” Ara said, a smile in her voice. “This, I think, will be very necessary for us to survive each other.”

“How will we get there?” Mot asked.

“I’m going to fly you,” Tom answered.

“But that is
not possible,” Mot said, obviously having no recollection of his earlier experience in the Chinook.

Tom looked at his
65-million-year-old new-found friend and almost burst into laughter. “You’re right,” was all he could come up with.

*

The ARC was in the process of staged final lockdown. Personnel were rushing down corridors, checking last minute details, as they had in hundreds of drills, the look on their faces somber and determined. This, they now knew, was no drill.

Pete
stepped out of the enclosure first, with Alex and Tom behind him, followed by Mot and Ara and two of Pete’s own security personnel bearing assault rifles. Batter said he would do his best to clear the corridors, but there was simply too much activity for this to have really happened. They had considered trying to disguise the two Arzats, but their enormous size made it impossible, and, there was no time.

As the seven of them made their way down the through the long corridors people were stopping in their tracks and hugging the walls, some in curiosity and some in total fear.
Who could blame them, Alex thought, smiling inside as she pictured what they must look like to the uninitiated, as they hurried for the elevators. When they neared the labs, Pete peeled off from the group and disappeared.

“T minus 30 minutes to
perimeter lockdown,” a synthetic voice announced over the loud speakers as they boarded the elevator. It was an automated ARC shut down warning.

*

As Batter had promised, the Chinook’s blades were already rotating when they finally made the surface. Mot and Ara were petrified when they first saw the giant helicopter, but Alex talked them through their fear enough to get them on board and buckled in. Tom was in the cockpit, strapping on a helmet and getting some last minute instructions from another pilot.

Pete approached the helicopter door and held up a bag.
“Here it is Alex. Guard it with your life. There is a disc in there with instructions, and a full program for the cryo computer.”

“Thanks
, Pete,” she said gratefully. “How confident are you this stuff will work?”

“See those two?” he said, indicating Mot and Ara.
“It’s their recipe.” Pete smiled at Alex and winked.

Ara sat watching.
She was sorry she had not had time to say a more formal goodbye.

Pete looked up at her and smiled.
“I hear you, Ara daughter of the great Hunter Zan. I will miss you.”

“And I, you, Peter son of Robert,” she replied with great respect.
Ara was suddenly aware of the fact that this was the last time she would ever see him. He was a good hu-man, this Pete.

Alex really didn’t know why, but she was surprised when she saw Batter appear on the tarmac.
He was standing at a distance, watching. “I’ll be right back,” she said to Mot and Ara. She jumped off the helicopter and rushed over to him, embracing him. “You know what, for a complete and total asshole, you turned out to be a pretty nice guy,” she said directly into his ear.

Batter stood there, stunned, his hands to his sides.
Then finally, he lifted his arms and hugged her back. It was for him, one of the most pleasurable moments of his life. “Good luck Alex,” was all he could manage.

“You too
, ‘Mister’ Batter. Don’t worry about me. I am a very lucky girl,” she said, winking at him and holding up the crossed fingers of her right hand. Alex started back toward the helicopter and then turned. “Hey, I don’t think you ever told me your first name,” she screamed over the roar of the chopper blades.

“Don’t worry about it
, Doctor,” Batter said, screaming back, smiling at her, “no one ever uses it anyway.”

Alex climbed back aboard and shut the door.
Tom gave Batter a thumbs up from the cockpit and expertly lifted the Chinook off the ground, spinning it to the northeast. Batter stood and watched as the helicopter gained altitude and eventually disappeared over the horizon. He felt a tug on his shoulder.

“Come on,” said Pete, “we’ve got to go before we’re locked out.”