CHAPTER 20

It was an odd sort of place for something like this. When Bill Devon had first been briefed on this operation, something that he had personally overseen the final stages of, he had conjured up images of some hidden bunker deep in the Nevada hills, miles away from anything else. The last place he had expected to find himself was in the suburbs of Boston, in what was a very average looking office park full of non descript glass and concrete buildings. Most of those buildings only had numbers on them and one was hard to tell from the next if the digits were on the other side of the building. The landscaping looked nice enough but, still, the place looked just plain generic.

It was equally obvious that many legitimate businesses resided here as well. Bill noted the traffic as he drove around looking for his final destination. The drivers all looked like ordinary people with very ordinary concerns. Sometimes Bill longed for those headaches again and, as he reflected on his situation, he was currently having one of those. If it had not been for the GPS, in the rental car, he would have never figured out which building was his final destination.

Once Bill was parked, behind a secure gate, he saw Mary Isaacs waiting for him at the door next to the loading docks. Bill pushed a piece of gum in his mouth and shook her hand as he walked up. She was slightly surprised and finally just spilled it, “Bill, you might be the next commander and chief. You don’t think a Secret Service detail might not be a good idea?”

“What?” Bill shrugged it off, “I can’t enjoy my last few months of freedom? It’s bad enough being Secretary of State. Hell, I know what the President goes through, you think I’m looking forward to it?”

Mary led him in to the building and told him in a very biting way, “nobody put a gun to your head and told you to run, now did they?”

“Cut the crap Mary,” Bill replied as she swiped her card and opened up a security door, “you’re starting to sound like your husband now.” Just then Bill noticed the sign on a nearby wall. He commented, “so that’s why we’re here. This place is a wholly owned subsidiary of Tideman Industries. Why does that not surprise me.”

Mary stood there with the door opened, “what did you expect Bill?” As they walked in and began climbing some stairs, Mary went on, “he’s been very useful so far.”

That almost made Bill want to laugh, “and he’s certainly used us enough in return. How did the Navy let this guy get away with it? For that matter, how did all those administrations go by without somebody putting their foot down?”

They reached a room at the top of the stairs. It was big, open, and looked like a sloppy break room in some second rate factory. Bill had to reflect on that since, he realized, a second rate industrial building was exactly where he was standing at the moment. The only difference here was the big windows that made up the far wall. Bill walked up to them and looked down in the cavernous like room that was beneath this level.

Mary joined him and answered his question as they both watched the show going on down in the bay, “to be honest, I don’t think many people believed the guy.”

Without ever taking his eyes off the room behind the glass, Bill replied, “they believed him enough to shell out the money to run a small country with. When I look at Tideman’s assets I get the impression that’s exactly what Lasky is doing, too.”

“Bill,” Mary replied with a hint of resignation, “it was theoretical. It’s not any more. There’s your proof right in front of you.”

It was more than proof. Bill found it almost captivating despite the fact that it was, well, kind of grotesque. There were a dozen people down in that room, working around two big slabs, wearing self contained suits that were complete with their own oxygen supply. It was impossible to tell who any of these people were but, Bill could tell who was running things. There seemed to be two of them, one little short person, and another guy who was probably pretty burly. They always gave orders and only locked horns when they spoke to each other.

That was only a side observation, Bill could not take his eyes off the subjects of their work. There were two of them and he had brought both of them back from Coven Hill. “So that’s what I went out of my way to pick up. Those things are Orcs. They’re dead but, I mean, think about it. Living, sentient beings that aren’t human.”

“Monsters,” was all that Mary had to say to that.

“More like,” Bill replied, “expensive monsters. How much did we wind up paying that guy?”

Mary snarled every time she thought about it, “more than I care to admit. We’re just lucky we found somebody that would deal with us. It would seem that they have as many sleazy opportunists over there as we do here.”

“Not lucky enough Mary,” Bill had been wanting to avoid this subject but, he finally realized he could not put it off for very long, “if that guy had really come through for us then your husband and our kids wouldn’t have to be out in that forest.” Bill bowed his head, “speaking of which.”

Mary held her breath for a moment and then, she thought about what she was seeing in Bills eyes. Mary then told him, “you know we’ve been separated so long we might as well not even be married. We raised our kids and, well, found out we didn’t have much use for each other.”

Bill nodded in an understanding way as he replied, “doesn’t mean you want to see him coming home in a body bag. Well, that much you don’t have to worry about right now. He’s doing well enough.”

Mary was still very nervous as she asked, “what happened?”

“The Pentagon got word to me,” Bill replied, “just before I left the airport. Task Force Toto just put boots on the ground in the Hurtegan Forest. One of their units got ambushed in the landing zone.”

That did not sound good so Mary cautiously asked, “how bad was it?”

Bill tried to remain business like as he said, “eighteen confirmed KIA’s, including a chopper crew of four. Five are still missing but, they did manage to extract most of the unit along with the advanced ground team.”

“Wait a minute Bill,” Mary saw the problem with the stats, “what about the damn wounded? There’s always more wounded.” Bill only shook his head and Mary nearly ripped in to him, “that’s impossible! How the hell did that happen?”

“You know what I know,” Bill told her. He then pointed to the room, “so who is in charge down there. I’m figuring it has to be that short one.”

Mary collected herself and pushed back a tear before she answered, “that’s Didi Compton. Yeah she’s calling the shots, sort of.”

That name sounded familiar and it did not take long before Bill realized why, “that woman from the CDC? The one that ran the teams in Feyland?” Mary nodded in the affirmative and Bill then told her, “call her out of the clean room. I want to hear what she has to say.”

A half hour later, the short little blond haired woman entered the conference room with a man who had to be the burly guy. He was something of a surprise. Bill would have pegged the man, with the wild and greasy hair, as a biker and not a scientist. He kind of acted like a Hell’s Angel too, and, that was only polished off by his gravely southern accent. While this Compton woman acted nervous, surprised, and thrilled at her guests, the burly guy acted like he was at best ambivalent and sometimes even a little annoyed at being interrupted.

The burly guy proved it after he sat down and said, “so what do you want?”

Mary cleared her throat and introduced the man to the Secretary of State, “this is Doctor Mike Green, from Duke University. He’s an anthropologist and, well, he’s definitely the man for this job.”

Bill only replied to that by saying, “I’ll take your word for it.” He then looked to Didi Compton and asked the jumpy little blond, “so doctor, you’ve been at this autopsy for a few weeks now. What do we know about these things?”

Compton almost squeaked as she said, “well sir, first let me say welcome and, if I had known you were coming…”

Green cut her off, “oh shut the hell up Didi. This man didn’t come here for all that crap.” Mike looked the Secretary of State in the eye and said, “they’re dinosaurs, plain and simple.”

Didi grunted and then snorted before telling her colleague, “that’s not confirmed, just yet, Mike.”

Bill leaned back in his chair, smiled, and then waived his hand between the two as he asked, “you two aren’t married by any chance?”

It was Green who replied, “hell no.”

Didi tried to stay on topic, “we have the X-Ray’s of their skeletal structure and, I admit that they share all kinds of similarities with the bird hip family of dinosaurs but…”

Mike butted in, “what do you mean similarities woman?”

“But…” Didi waited to make sure he had actually shut up before going on with, “there is a lot here we don’t know. I’d like to get into the DNA before we…”

Once again, Mike interrupted, “oh give me a break woman. What you going to compare it too?”

Didi snapped at him, “Max Planck has some verifiable fossilized samples and I would like permission to contact them so we can consult.”

Mary was very quick with her answer, “not at this time Doctor.”

Mike Green snickered quietly, “told you.” He then spoke up louder as he said, “wouldn’t do much good anyway. There were probably tens of thousands of different species of dinosaurs and we’ve never found anything like this in the fossil record on Earth.”

Bill had to get that cleared up and he asked point blank, “so you’re saying they’ve never been to Earth before, even in the Jurassic or, whatever, age the dinosaurs lived in.”

“No,” Green replied short and too the point.

Bill asked for a little clarity here, “to which part?”

Green easily replied, “no way to know if they’ve been here or not. The fossils we’ve found, they’re probably only from a fraction of the species that actually existed. For that matter, we’re not even really sure if most of the ones we know about are right. I mean, you’ve seen the nature channel and shit. They show you the museum stuff that’s put together after years of figuring out a sixty five million year old jigsaw puzzle. They don’t show you how broken up all that stuff is when we first find it.”

“Okay,” Bill said thoughtfully, “point made doctor. It also leads me to this question. If all that’s true then how do you know they’re dinosaurs?”

Didi answered for him, “he doesn’t.”

Green also answered for himself, “what else could they be?” When it was clear everyone wanted him to explain further he did, “look, you got to remember that all this stuff are the classifications we made up. Nature just don’t plain give a shit.”

Bill nodded to the colorful synopsis and said, “granted.”

Mike went on, “so we know that one of the tell tale signs of dinosaurs is three digits on each limb.”

Didi rolled her eyes, “and the problem with your theory is that our test subjects down there have four.”

“Yeah,” Green admitted, “on their hands but, in reality they got three fingers and one opposable digit like our thumb. Their feet only have three digits period.” Mike saw the look he was getting from Didi so, he admitted, “well there is a possible fourth digit on their feet but, it’s so damn small you would never even notice it unless somebody pointed it out. I’m guessing it’s an evolutionary dead end.”

Before another fight broke out, Bill raised his hand and said, “all right, this is fascinating but, lets get to the relevant stuff here. This isn’t an academic debate about a long dead species. We’re talking clear and present danger here. What do we know that’s useful?”

Didi cheerfully volunteered, “they’re hermaphrodites!” When she got a strange look from the Secretary of State she sullenly explained, “they don’t have genders.”

Bill shrugged, “so they don’t have sex? How do they reproduce? I’ve been told they lay eggs. Do they come, what, pre-fertilized?”

Mike Green chuckled, “oh hell no. They definitely bump some uglies. Glad I haven’t seen them do it. Got to be gross as shit.”

Didi tried putting that into English for her guests, “they have sexual organs but they’re identical. At first we thought that we just had two of the same gender but…”

Mike partially covered his face and mumbled, “I ain’t admitting to doing none of that. You can if you want too.”

Didi was even rumpled as she tried to continue, “well, after, um, some extensive testing we realized that these organs were made too, um.” When Didi couldn’t think of anyway else to say it she just meekly came out with, “bump some uglies?”

Bill did not flinch. He did not move. He did not even make a funny face. He simply asked, “is that important?”

“I’ll say it is,” Mike replied.

Again, Didi protested, “that’s only a theory Mike.”

“It’s close enough for government work Didi,” he replied pointing to the government official. He then said, “this is what we think happens. When they have sex, both partners get pregnant, and then they lay two fertilized eggs each.”

Now Bill did raise up, just like the hairs on the back of his neck, “that’s four eggs from one mating. Do they get pregnant every time they have sex?”

Mike looked to Didi who’s face turned red. She looked away so Mike admitted, “yeah we think so. I mean, I don’t see how it could go down any other way. Course, there’s no way we could know for sure unless we had some live ones to find out.”

Bill felt his stomach turning over. He looked away from their medical team and then he exchanged glances with Mary. She had obviously understood the implications of this, even if their scientists apparently did not. She also knew how it would effect her personally. She was not surprised when Bill told her, “I’m sorry Mary. You know we’re not going to have any other choice now. No matter what, Bob’s got to pull off Yellow Brick. I can’t see any other way.”

Mary remained subdued, “I know Bill, I know.”