Power Supply
by Patric Quinn
part 1
“Mountains and rivers and endless forests. It took forever to get here, Colonel.”
“That’s what we’re dealing with, sir.”
“Well, bouncing around for hours on a rutty road in an SUV is not my way of getting to anywhere. Even in a luxury car. What’s wrong with a helicopter... .or even a landing strip?”
“Sorry, sir. The whole area is forested, no place for a copter to land or a plane. Finding the place at all was a project.”
Roger Crenshaw looked over the lustrous marble entry showing through the trees. “It doesn’t look very forested from here.”
“It is, sir. This is a huge building. A complex, really. Flat and spread out. With a flat roof.”
“Why not land a helicopter on the roof, then?”
The colonel held up his hands in the stop signal to Crenshaw. “I was about to explain that the roof has been planted, apparently a number of years ago, with pines that grow fast. And the earthen cover was planned and built up as part of this steep-sided valley. This place was clearly designed to stay hidden. And it is virtually invisible.”
“But we found it, Colonel.” Crenshaw looked at him thoughtfully, studied his rugged field uniform and the pistol belted at his waist. He glanced down at the mud on the colonel’s boots. His own shoes had come through his entrance still shining with polish, His dark gray suit was elegant and well pressed, his camel-lined trench coat hanging open just as luxurious. “The question is: what did we find? You have any trouble getting in here?”
“Not much trouble, sir. His security was loyal enough to make an argument. Even when he’s not in power anymore. That’s a pretty lasting influence. But my mountain guys made a quick job of it. We’ve collected his loyalists here in the building. Some were killed. The building has been cleared and secured, sir. Just waiting for your instructions.”
“Well, take me in, Colonel.” The colonel held open one of the tooled brass doors, and Crenshaw walked into the lobby. The lighting was low but enough to show the immensity of the space and the many framed documents that hung along the walls. In the center was a high marble base taller than the six-foot Crenshaw. It held the man’s larger-than-life statue, heroically posed. The total grandeur of the hall was stunning. Crenshaw pushed back his trench coat and slid his hands into his pockets while he contemplated the statue.
He shook his head slowly. “What an ego, Colonel, a massive ego. As he gained power, his ego ballooned. And it shows here. That kind of ego needs backing by talent and intelligence. Too bad he didn’t have them.”
“I’ll show you the rest, sir, and you’ll find the same kind of... this... all through.”
“What is this place? A library? A museum? What? And hidden out here in nowhere.”
“If you’ll come with me, I’ll explain what I can. But you may need to bring out experts from D.C. I’ll leave those decisions to you, sir.”
The corridors echoed the click of Crenshaw’s heels, the thump of Colonel Murray’s boots was more subdued. The marble walls glowed in the soft light and carefully lighted niches in the walls along their way were filled with mementos of him. Photos with important people, photos of him alone, busts in various angles of his profile and in varying materials. They stopped at a wide glass door in the long hall.
“I’m not a scientist, sir, but this looks like some kind of laboratory. Just the nature of the equipment. Some of it’s familiar to me, like the beakers and pipettes and the centrifuges, but a lot of it is new to me. Does it mean anything to you, sir?”
“No, it doesn’t, but it’s a big room or whatever it is. Is the rest of the place like this?”
“There are other spaces just as big and equipped with different instruments, but I don’t know what they are. I’ll take you to what I think are the most important.”
They walked in silence until they turned into another wing. “So, what do we have, do you think, Colonel? A school or a hospital?”
“Maybe something like that, sir. Sir, if you could you tell me why this mission was mounted in the first place, that would help me figure it out.”
“Things that leaked in D.C., Colonel.”
They stopped next to a niche that held a large, luxuriously framed picture of the man alone, smiling. Crenshaw flipped his thumb at the picture. “Look at that ego smiling through. He used everything but talent to claw his way up. He didn’t have that. He was a fraud, Colonel. But he played the Washington game like a banjo. Cheating, lying, blaming. Stepping on anyone smaller than he was to get an inch higher. His supporters loved that ruthless behavior... like we deserved it. They still have the same attitude.”
They started walking again. The colonel was quiet, listening for signals of activity. Crenshaw continued like he was telling a story. “Now, Washington is a dirty place, Colonel. Lots of wheeling and dealing and slicing and dicing. So many of us are there for ourselves, not for our people, really. And, yes, we have a lot of big egos in town.”
“He’s out of power now, sir. How can he create any problems?”
“He’s out of power, but he’s still in Washington. When he lost his power, he was devastated. Devastated and very angry. But the facts were that he lost because he was incompetent. That ego would never admit that, he believed in himself as a man with a mission, his personal mission, but everyone else knew he was a screw-up, a big mistake, but not his rabid supporters. And there are those.”
“Are?”
“Yes, Colonel, are.”
“Where am I in handling this, sir?”
“About at the end.”
“But what’s it all about?”
“You know how secret your mission is, right?”
“Yes, sir.”
“So is mine. You finish, Colonel. I take it from there.”
“You have to tell me more, sir, if I’m to wrap this mission up. If I’m to finish it, I have to know what the mission is. What the objective is. Men have been killed over this. Theirs, not mine, but there has been combat to account for, sir.”
“Account for?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Account for. I wish I could tell you everything, Colonel, but I can’t and won’t. The group that sent me wouldn’t even know how to account for this... whatever you found. Or who should be accountable. There are so many forks in this T-bone that it’s uncertain where this is going, who is for what, and where all the steak knives will wind up. I’m trying to guide off the Constitution.”
They had stopped walking and stood in the glowing light of the wide hall when their talk became intense. The colonel looked at Crenshaw and waited, but Crenshaw said nothing more. Two women dressed in blue and white striped smocks walked toward them with swift steps.
“Who are these women, Colonel?”
“Part of the staff, sir.”
“They look like nurses. Shouldn’t they be your prisoners?”
“They are, sir. Nurses, sort of, and prisoners, sort of.”
“Explain that for me, Colonel.”
“That’s what I’m doing, sir. If you’ll follow me.”
At the end of the next long hall was a pair of large metal doors and no other halls or outlets. The colonel stopped at the doors and peered into Crenshaw’s eyes and waited. Crenshaw looked back and his mouth moved to a frown.
“What, Colonel?”
“I want your complete attention, sir.”
“You’ve got it. So?”
“So, this is where your decision ends my mission. The military action will be finished. In a word, sir, I’ll be dropping this baby right in your governmental lap.” Murray pulled open a door and ushered Crenshaw into the sprawling space.
The space resembled an aircraft hangar in length and width, but the roof was lower, flat and spotted with many fixtures that illuminated the activity below. Large boards with rows of blinking lights covered the walls over what looked like work desks running the great length of the room.
Unlike the dim, quiet passageways, the air was alive with quiet hums and the tick-ticks of operating machines. Part of the hum was movement and soft conversation among the nurses who moved up and down the long aisles and stood at machines reading gauges and making adjustments. Some made notes on touch-screens attached to the machines.
The machines were shining chrome and glass about the size of a large outdoor barbecue grill. Screens and instruments were attached to each one. Crenshaw stared at the machines arrayed in five rows of about fifty machines each. The colonel watched Crenshaw absorbing what he was looking at.
“Okay, Colonel, what is it that we have here?”
“You mentioned the T-bone steak and all the forks digging at it. You mentioned standing by the Constitution. My intelligence source — military intelligence — tells me what we’re discovering here.
“True, I’m not in regular political briefings, but I am fairly high up in military ranks. I hear things, get pieces and parts. Military men know how to improvise parts to make something work. So, sir, actually I’m stationed not really very far from this area, and somebody always knows something, and somebody may be gabbing too close to someone else, or getting too drunk at an officers’ club.”
“I know what you’re saying, Colonel. And understand. If it’s not leaks, it’s ooze.”
The colonel waved his hand around the space indicating all around them. “This man had years to infiltrate government and the personnel that runs it, and he did it steadily and heavily and quietly. You did know this, sir?”
“Not the extent. We don’t know that.”
“So, you have a ‘we’?”
“Yes.”
“That’s good because I think his crew’s penetration and operational influence is strong and deep. A place like this is not easy to slide under the radar.”
Copyright © 2018 by Patric Quinn
