The Shimmer (38 page)

Looking down, he noticed a steady stream of headlights moving toward the blocked-off observation area. The vehicles were parking along the road in a line much longer than the one the evening before.

The viewing area had floodlights pointed toward the concrete barriers, presumably to emphasize that the place was off-limits. The lights from three helicopters showed where they hovered, keeping a safe distance from one another. Listening to their radio communications, Page learned that they were television news choppers.

"A wonderful clear sky," Tori said. "Look at the glow from the streets and houses in Rostov. And there--headlights from cars driving in from Mexico. I can actually count six pairs."

Page banked the Cessna in a slow, gentle circle, using the floodlights at the observation area as a reference.

"How high do you plan to go?" Tori asked.

"Enough to get above everything," he answered.

"Sounds like the way to run a life."

Chapter 66.

The concrete barriers were wide enough for Medrano to stand on.

Raising his left hand to shield his eyes from the glaring floodlights, he watched in dismay as the crowd got larger.

"This area's closed!" he shouted through a bullhorn. "Turn around!

Drive back to town!"

Amid the clamor of the crowd, someone yelled back at him, "This road's public property! My taxes paid for it! I've got a right to stay here as long as I want!"

"It isn't safe!" Medrano responded. "I'm telling you, go back to town!"

"You know where you can go?" somebody shouted. "To hell!"

People stretched to grip the top of the barriers and climb over.

"What is it you don't want us to see?" a woman demanded. "What are you hiding?"

"Turn off those damned floodlights!" a man complained. "They hurt my eyes!"

"Yeah, those aren't the kind of lights we came for!"

No sooner did police officers pull one group of people off the barricades than another group tried to climb them.

Three helicopters roared above the viewing area, keeping a distance from one another, aiming their landing lights and exterior television cameras toward the commotion.

I don't have anywhere near enough officers, Medrano thought, surveying the chaos.

Somebody yelled, "If you won't let us over those barricades, we'll go around them! My wife's got Alzheimer's! We're here for the miracle!"

Medrano watched helplessly as hundreds of people headed down the road and veered toward a field on the right. But some went in the opposite direction, toward the abandoned military airfield, and that was one place Medrano definitely couldn't let anyone go.

"Stop them from getting onto that airbase!" he shouted to his officers. "They'll blow themselves up!"

Jumping from the barricade, Medrano bent his knees as he landed on the road's gravel shoulder. Breathless, he straightened and ran toward the base. There, a man and a furiously barking German shepherd warned people not to climb the barbed-wire fence.

Suddenly the floodlights failed. People shouted in alarm. As darkness enveloped him, all Medrano saw were the residual images of the glaring lights imprinted on his eyes.

Somebody must have sabotaged the generator! he thought.

But it wasn't only the generator. Automobile engines and headlights suddenly failed. In place of the helicopters' hectic thumping, the only sound from the air was the whistle of slowing rotors.

Medrano flinched from the sound of a massive crash. It took him a stunned moment to realize that one of the helicopters had plummeted to the ground. The impact echoed from the field on the opposite side of the road, accompanied by a soaring fireball.

A second crash reverberated from the same direction. Medrano crouched sightlessly, worried about where the third crash would occur.

On the road. There wasn't one impact but several as the final helicopter dropped onto cars, crumpling and shredding metal as rotors tore into asphalt. An explosion knocked him backward.

Chapter 67.

Raleigh watched the chaos on the monitors. The night-vision capability of the outside cameras made the panicked crowd have a surreal greenish glow.

Did that cop really believe all he needed to do was put up concrete barriers and everyone would stay away?

Floodlights had gone dark. Cars and their headlights had become inoperative. Helicopters had fallen from the sky. Just one explanation could account for all that--a massive electromagnetic pulse, similar to one from a nuclear blast, had sent a power surge through all the electronic equipment in the viewing area, destroying it.

Exactly as predicted, Raleigh thought. He'd reinforced the outside cameras and the entire underground facility with multiple layers of electromagnetic shielding. The office behind him had three times the amount that the rest of the building had.

"Sir, the readings are becoming more intense," a member of his team said, watching a computer screen.

Despite his earplugs, Raleigh thought he felt a slight vibration. Or was he imagining it?

He glanced toward the shielded door to the command center.

"You're channeling the signal through the dish above us?" he asked.

"Yes, sir. The signal's being relayed to the observatory and then up to a satellite. The satellite is beaming the signal to the White Sands Missile Range. But I don't know if the circuits can handle this much power. We've never tested them at this level before."

Chapter 68.

July 23, 1942.

"Anybody here know what nuclear fission is?" the general in charge of the emergency intelligence meeting asked.

Like the other officers at the long metal table, Capt. Edward Raleigh did not.

"I'm not sure I do, either," the general admitted. "Apparently if you smash two sections of uranium together, and you do it with enough force, you can create a bomb with more power than anybody's ever imagined. Some scientists argue that the explosion could set off a chain reaction that would destroy the world, but most conclude that it could be controlled to the extent of vaporizing a city."

"General, with all due respect," a colonel asked, "you're serious about this?"

"Three years ago, Einstein wrote a letter to the president alerting him that tests had validated the theory. Apparently Einstein's contacts in the European scientific community warned him that the Germans were stockpiling uranium, and moving aggressively forward with nuclear-fission research. At that time, of course, we weren't in the war, but now we are, and the president's about to order a topsecret program to create a nuclear weapon as soon as possible.

"The scientist in charge will be Robert Oppenheimer. He was a Red sympathizer during the '30s, so the FBI's doing a thorough background check. Our job will be to maintain security at a place called Los Alamos in New Mexico. It's marked on the map behind me."

A major went to the map and indicated the exact spot. "Santa Fe and a few other towns are a half-day's drive away. Otherwise there's nothing but ranches in the area."

"Which we're confiscating," the general said. "Los Alamos is a boy's camp in the middle of nowhere. Oppenheimer went there when he was a kid. It's on top of a mesa, with one road up and one road down, easily contained. Oppenheimer's thinking about using that mesa as the principal site for designing the bomb. We're going to make sure nobody eavesdrops."

"Sir, there might be another out-of-the-way place that's equally suitable," Edward took the opportunity to say.

The general looked unhappy about being interrupted. "And where would that place be?" he asked impatiently.

"West Texas. Outside a town called Rostov. Nothing's there except millions of acres of ranchland. We built an airstrip there before we entered the last war. It was a good place to hide the pilots we were training so the Germans wouldn't suspect how actively we were preparing to help the Allies."

"Oppenheimer's got his mind set on Los Alamos."

"Rostov may offer another advantage," Edward pressed. "There might be fission already occurring there."

The general began to look interested. "Continue, Captain."

Edward focused his remarks so that they related exclusively to nuclear fission. He described his father's reports and concluded by saying, "There's no doubt the lights are powerful. Ultimately my mother died from the skin cancer they gave her. One theory is that they're caused by radioactive elements in the soil. If the rays can be channeled, and used as a weapon . . ."

The general held up a hand, cutting him off. "Put it in writing. I'll submit it to Oppenheimer."

"Yes, sir."

But Edward knew what happened to reports.

A week later, during the next meeting, the general announced that Los Alamos would be the primary site for designing the atomic bomb.

Edward contained his disappointment.

Then the general surprised him by adding, "The Germans are pursuing the development of a second major weapon."

The room became silent.

"It may be related to nuclear fission, or possibly it's based on a totally different principle. All we know is that since Germany invaded Norway in 1940, they've sent a disproportionate number of soldiers there--a half-million occupiers in a country of two million people.

Many of those soldiers are in a position that strategically makes no sense--surrounding a small valley in the middle of Norway. The valley's called Hessdalen."

The general looked directly at Edward. "Reports indicate that those soldiers are providing security for scientists investigating strange lights that appear there."

"Lights, sir?" Edward tried not to show the emotion building inside him.

"With effects that apparently range from mass hallucination to religious rapture. Some people went blind from looking at them.

Others became violent--even murderous. Still others developed cancerous lesions. There's no telling if any of it is real, but Germany's committed to exploring those lights as a possible weapon, and once they get interested in something, you know damned well we need to do the same. Even if the lights are bogus, all Hitler needs to do is start the rumor that he's figured out how to use them as a weapon and deploy it anywhere he wants. Sometimes psychological warfare can win more battles than tanks."

A colonel spoke up: "Sir, are these lights similar to the west Texas phenomena that Captain Raleigh was talking about?"

"That's the conclusion the president came to. If Hitler's using them as smoke and mirrors to distract us from his nuclear-fission program, we can do the same thing. Captain Raleigh, you're ordered to take an exploratory team to whatever this town is in west Texas."

"It's called Rostov, sir."

"To prove how apparently serious we are, two of Oppenheimer's researchers will accompany you. They'll send equipment from the University of Chicago. The Army Corps of Engineers--which is building the Los Alamos facility--will contribute a dozen men.

There'll also be a rifle platoon to make a show of providing security.

If it turns out there is something useful about these lights, so much the better, but I'm willing to bet that the main thing we'll accomplish is to drive Hitler crazy by making him think we're not only committed to this project but actually making progress. As a bonus, you'll act as a diversion from what's happening at Los Alamos."

Before the end of the month, Edward's team flew on a C-47 military transport plane to Fort Bliss, then drove ten trucks of men and equipment to Rostov. As soon as they reached the old airfield, they set up tents and unpacked electronic instruments, activating a generator to provide an independent source of power.

Oppenheimer's researchers scanned the ground with Geiger counters but couldn't find any trace of radioactivity.

"You'll need to scan a lot more ground than that." Edward pointed past the Badlands. "The lights come from way over there."

"I hope we made a big enough fuss about getting here," one of the researchers said. "German spies keep watch on Oppenheimer and anybody associated with him. Since we're here, word is bound to get back to Germany." The gangly, bespectacled man scanned the featureless horizon. The only things in sight were two jackrabbits and five scattered cows trying to eat the meager grass. "Hell, nobody would bother to come here if it wasn't desperately important."

The sunset was spectacular. As darkness thickened, the air cooled, making them cross their arms across their chests.

"So, where are the lights?" a soldier asked.

"They don't always come out. Give them time," Edward answered.

"Anybody got a smoke?"

An engineer went into the sizable main tent and leaned his watch toward one of the glowing instruments. "It's 9:20. This has been a long day. If something doesn't happen by 10 o'clock, I'm heading for my cot."

"You might need to give the lights more time than that," Edward said. "They don't exactly appear on a schedule."

"Well, wake me if you see Hitler's new secret weapon. Not that it'll be easy to sleep with that generator droning."