Spin (Captain Chase) Page 2

  I’m craving Whoppers, sausage biscuits, Mom’s country-fried steak, fantasizing about food even as I watch the convenience store clerk in my rearview mirror. He gets up from his chair, opening the front door while lighting a cigarette. Stepping out into wind and snow to smoke, he stares after my truck with its lights and sirens, NASA Protective Services and our moon and stars logo in blue on the doors.

  Rocket cops, a lot of people call us. Only it’s not necessarily a compliment when someone jokes that people like me don’t build the rocket, we just protect it, suggesting we aren’t all that swift, another stereotype I can do without. That and spectrum-y, nerdy scientist, too dumb or smart to find your way out of the rain, and as is the case with most typecasts, there’s some truth but not much.

  Special agents, cyber ninjas like me, are required to have a graduate degree. Some of us have PhDs and are trained in multiple disciplines ranging from science and engineering to psychology and the arts. When I left the Air Force, I was hired to head cyber investigations at Langley Research Center, the oldest of NASA’s 10 centers nationwide. But I’m also an aerospace engineer and quantum physicist, a test pilot, and an astronaut in the making.

  Ever since I can remember, it’s been my dream to explore new worlds, and more to the point, to protect them and planet Earth. Whether it’s an orbiting laboratory, the moon or Mars, wherever humans go, they’ll cause trouble. Competing for power and resources, they’ll attempt to kill, steal and sabotage, which is what happened this morning on my watch.

  Outer space was attacked from the ground, and I access the live video feed streaming from security cameras on Wallops Island, 170.5 kilometers (106 miles) south of where I’m this minute driving. The Mission Elapsed Time (MET) is +05:01:51.1 and counting since the rocket exploded, and I suppose in all the pandemonium no one’s thought to turn off the clock.

  As I’ve continued monitoring the scene throughout the morning, I’ve realized the necessity of securing the blast site and keeping away the curious. But I’ve not understood why the cleanup and salvage operation couldn’t wait until daylight.

  The barrier islands weren’t in the direct path of the nor’easter, and didn’t get slammed the way Tidewater is. Even so, it’s got to be miserably cold and dangerously dark out there on the Atlantic Ocean. I’m suspicious that NASA is trying to recover debris we want out of sight by daylight, possibly pieces and parts of a spy satellite.

  Or we’re making sure that’s the appearance we give, and it wouldn’t be the first time there were surprises in a payload headed into orbit. Propaganda’s nothing new, either, and I wonder what other secrets Dick might be keeping from me as I monitor the live video playing silently on my phone’s display in a chiaroscuro of glare and deep shadows . . .

  Emergency crews in bright-orange chemical suits and respirators wade through a toxic stew of sooty water and debris inside the massive crater where the launch pad used to be . . .

  They poke and snag with long-handled probes and hooks like space travelers on a hostile planet . . .

  As covered dump trucks haul off mangled burnt metal, and blackened soggy fire-retardant Nomex cargo containers . . .

  The video playing on my phone is interrupted by an incoming call, the home landline this time. It’s the same number we’ve always had, the last 4 digits 1-9-9-1, the year Carme and I were born.

  “Calli, this is your mother on Space to Ground 1,” her mellow voice with its gentle southern cadence affectionately imitates what she heard me say earlier over the radio in Mission Control.

  More accurately, it’s what I almost said to the astronauts during a spacewalk. My NASA parents showed up while I was going through diagnostic procedures, checking out the top secret quantum node installed after the Space Station was sabotaged.

  “How’s it going?” Mom asks. “It must be awful out.”

  “Really, really slow. I should be there in 20 minutes hopefully,” I reply. “All good at home? You and Dad safe and sound?”

  “I can’t speak for George. As for me, I’m nice and cozy drinking cinnamon tea in front of the fire, waiting for you. Pondering what you might want to eat when you get here. Maybe waffles?” and what she’s telling me is that Dad’s not home.

  The last time I saw or communicated with my NASA-employed parents was several hours ago when they showed up to check on me and the disasters going on. Then they headed back to the farm. Or that’s what I was led to believe when they left with Dick, who I’m betting has conscripted my eccentric genius father (as usual) to assist in something.

  I’m not sure what because I don’t believe it’s to hunt down Carme. Dad wouldn’t help with that even if he could. Whatever he’s doing, I’m betting he’s with the same Secret Service cybercrimes detail from earlier when I spotted him inside the NASA Langley aviation hangar. He’s with Dick, in other words, and it wouldn’t surprise me if Dad was on that CIA call a little while ago.

  “Where are you?” Mom asks. “A waypoint, dear.”

  “I’m coming up on Walgreens,” I add that I can’t see the pharmacy, just snow everywhere.

  “I thought you should know Mason Dixon has been filming nonstop at Wallops ever since the explosion,” she gets to the reason for calling. “They’re filming inside the flight facility, right there in the VIP room, talking about everything on the air.”

  “Who is besides Mason?”

  “Take three guesses and the first two don’t count,” and she means Neva Rong. “Even more outrageous, she’s talking about her sister’s death yesterday, her so-called suicide. She’s implying that Vera Young was of keen interest to their aerospace competitors, especially to the Chinese, obviously insinuating that they may have taken her out.”

  “Predictable,” I reply. “If all else fails, blame it on a spook, a spy, especially a Chinese one.”

  “When we know who the real culprit is,” Mom says like a hanging judge. “Well, pay attention to your driving, dear, and don’t forget I love you,” ending the call.

  00:00:00:00:0

  I PASS family landmarks that I can barely make out in the storm . . .

  The Century Lanes Bowling Center with its game arcade and big video screens, a special family treat on Saturdays and birthdays . . .

  The Plaza Roller Rink where my sister was a speed demon on wheels, wiping out, skinning her knees and losing ball bearings . . .

  I’m aware of icy flakes click-click-clicking against my windshield, what I imagine it sounds like when a swarm of miniscule debris or micrometeorites hits your spaceship. Not that I’ve been flying the genuine article through the ether yet, only mock-ups, test models and full-motion simulators that I can see and feel in my sleep.

  “Jeez Louise!” as I fiddle with the radio. “Do I freakin’ have to . . . ?” tuning in The Mason Dixon Line, I catch the show’s self-absorbed host in the midst of gushing about his new favorite rocket scientist.

  “. . . Dr. Rong is the CEO of Pandora Space Systems, a giant in the field,” Mason says over the air. “And for those just joining us, we’re off the coast of Virginia on Wallops Island at NASA’s Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport, filming live from MARS. As in M-A-R-S . . .”

  “NASA and their acronyms,” Neva’s sultry voice invades my truck.

  “They have acronyms for acronyms,” Mason quips with one of his signature giddyap tongue clicks. “And Dr. Rong, I bet you have a few acronyms at Pandora.”

  “We’ve got a book of them.”

  “Fire off one of your favs.”

  “How about an F-L-U-B?” she says without pause.

  “A flub?”

  “As in ‘Finding Little Utilized Benefit,’ which applies to so many things, Mason. Sadly, people most of all. I can say that with authority since I run a company with more than 10,000 employees, and exponentially m
ore private contractors, researchers and interns from all over the world.”

  “Speaking of flubs. How about when you have to blow up your own rocket? Because oops! Something went bonkers. They’re estimating the loss at about 200 mil,” Mason’s most cited source is they, never saying who, and I’ve reached Bloxoms Corner.

  Across the street is the garden center with its marquee where the locals post personal greetings and announcements for all the world to see. I can’t make out anything but vague shapes in the milky turbulence as I creep onward.

  “. . . The loss could be substantially more depending on what was in the payload,” Neva says in her vaguely British accent, supposedly left over from living in England the years she attended Cambridge. “And they’re not going to tell us if a multibillion-dollar spacecraft or spy satellite was a casualty.”

  “I’m hearing rumors of that very thing. Whatever it was, I can’t imagine there’s much left of it now. That was one humongous Molotov cocktail,” Mason carries on in his sexy croon.

  No doubt he’s staring dreamily into the camera with those bedroom baby blues (as he’s described in the news). Believing he’s God’s gift, and I suppose he is when you consider all he’s got going for him that he probably didn’t earn or if nothing else, got way too easily. His looks, for example. And extreme success at my same age of 28.

  While I live in a barn on a government salary, he drives an Audi R8 supercar, has a Hollywood agent and a penthouse, the last I heard. Fake news and narcissism pay, and it also doesn’t hurt if you’re the nephew of our current governor. Willard “Willie” Dixon is golfing buddies with the president of the United States, explaining how it is that Mason comes by his tips and leaks, his big stories and secret informants.

  “. . . Make a right turn in 100 feet,” the GPS announces, the snow so thick I can barely see the Welcome to Fox Hill sign ahead.

  I slow down at the intersection of Beach and Hall when the engine switches off for seemingly no reason.

  “What the . . . ?”

  I’m sitting dead as a doornail in the middle of the road, the snow swirling around my white Silverado. When just as inexplicably, my truck turns back on with a roar.

  “Holy shhhhh . . . !”

  The doors relock, the heat and defrost resuming as the radio is muted, and the satellite map fills the display on the dash. The GPS tracking app announces that I can begin my route, showing me the address of the final destination, one I didn’t enter and haven’t visited forever.

  My police truck has been hacked, the navigation controlled remotely. But that doesn’t mean I have to do as it says. I don’t have to follow the highlighted route. But there’s no way I won’t when it might be an illuminated tether that connects to my sister. What we called a mirror flash, a signal between us when we were kids, only we used radio transmitters and antennas, nothing visible.

  It’s also possible that someone else is sending me a message, setting up a trap. My years of training, my instincts dictate that I should head directly back to NASA. I should call for help along the way, reaching out to my mother, to Fran, to Dick, to someone.

  But nothing’s going to stop me from driving as directed, the app’s female voice heading me south toward the Chesapeake Bay on Old Buckroe Road, a stretch that means something to my sister and me.

  On my right, the Hampton Soccer Park is blanketed white like a Christmas card, undisturbed by the usual kids on sleds and folks walking their dogs. No one is around to sully or churn things up as I drive faster, more urgently than before, now passing Buckroe Bait & Tackle & Seafood, an awkward name for a favorite haunt. The Open sign is turned off in the window, the huge white-painted fish on red brick almost invisible in the blizzard.

  There’s nothing going on at the Brass Lantern where Carme was fearless at karaoke and I cleaned up at darts, every business closed and dark.

  Hijacked by suggestion is the way I’d describe it as I follow the route back to our old beachfront hangout. The closer I get, the more memories flash like crazy . . .

  The office with its rattling air conditioner fogging up the plate glass window . . .

  The pink check-in counter with its locked cash drawer . . .

  The ice machine, rusty steel ash can and blue-painted bench out front where Mrs. Skidmore would sit and smoke, keeping an eagle eye on our activities . . .

  She was always in the area when we swam in the overchlorinated pool, roasted hot dogs and marshmallows in the cookout area with its picnic tables and rusting grills, or horsed around on the tawny strip of beach that vanishes at high tide. There wasn’t much for parents to worry about when high school friends rented a room for the day, rather much like a cabana.

  Nothing scandalous went on, no sneaking off with your latest crush, nipping alcohol or stealing a smoke. We weren’t going to get away with much with Mrs. Skidmore on the prowl. We also never knew when Mom herself might show up with Bojangles’ biscuits and Hardee’s hamburgers or Krispy Kreme doughnuts.

  “You’ve reached your destination,” the GPS announces, the Point Comfort Inn dark and deserted up ahead, no sign of recent habitation, snow and ice everywhere.

  Grandly named for what it is, the 1950s stucco motel is white with pink trim, a front office and a cellblock of 11 small rooms in a row. Rates are cheap, and as is often true, you get what you pay for. In other words, not much, at least that was the case in the good ole days when Carme and I were regulars.

  Maintenance was the owner (Mrs. Skidmore) showing up with her tackle box of tools. Security was the piece she carried (a .357 Magnum that she could shoot like Annie Oakley). Housekeeping was local kids on summer break who didn’t exactly take pride in their work, and there was no laundry service or amenities, only the smallest bar of soap.

  Forget a restaurant or gift shop, although in the early years there were vending machines and a pay phone out front near the electric bug zapper. Nothing much has changed except for the wear and tear of time and coastal weather.

  The bulky ice machine has been there forever, white with Ice in tall frosted blue letters, and as I turn into the parking lot, I barely make out the big boxy shape on the patio to the left of the office.

  3

  THE AWNING that runs the length of the building flaps in the wind like mad, the blue canvas more faded and tattered. Plywood has been nailed over the windows, the place buttoned up for the winter.

  But someone was here recently based on tire tracks in and out, and I release the thumb lock on my holster. I’m sliding out my Glock when suddenly headlights swing in behind me. A huge SUV guns into the parking lot, after me like a shark.

  “WHAT THE F . . . !” and I can’t believe I let this happen.

  Hitting the brakes, throwing my truck into park and ducking down in the seat, I could radio for backup but no one will respond in time as I find myself trapped between the SUV and the motel. Unless I can take off into a hover, I’m not going anywhere. Letting my guard down, I’m cornered with no backup plan, and pistol in hand, I inchworm over the console as fast as I can into the passenger’s seat.

  Barely opening the door, I’m slithering out when BANG! BANG! and ejected cartridge cases clink-clink against pavement or concrete. Followed by nothing, the wind blowing, the snow stinging my face as I crouch behind the rear right tire of my truck. Listening. Watching. Waiting for the slightest sound or stirring.

  My heart hammers, my pistol aimed, finger on the trigger, ready to double tap, two rounds center mass . . .

  “Sisto?” the familiar voice is dampened by the wind, close by at 2 o’clock.

  I don’t move.

  “Sisto, it’s me!” sounding closer . . . closer . . . Calling out my childhood pet name that almost no one knows.

  Gun rock steady. I barely breathe.

  “Cal
li? It’s Carme, your better half ! Who else would say that, right?” her alto voice with a Virginia lilt, the same as mine.

  I don’t answer, not ready to trust anything or anyone. So much can be faked these days with voice cloning and other software I know more about than most.

  “Calli?” nearing the back of my truck.

  “STOP!” I warn at the top of my lungs. “NO SUDDEN MOVES!”

  “Okay. Not moving suddenly or otherwise. Put down your gun and walk out from behind your truck, Sisto.”

  Wiping my watery eyes on my sleeve, I’m blinking hard, trying to see, my heart drumming in my throat.

  “What’s happened?” I shout. “Who got shot?”

  “The guy that’s parked on your ass. Stand up slowly,” she demands, and I can tell she’s not moving anymore. “For God’s sake don’t shoot me. You don’t want to explain that to Mom. And Dad doesn’t need any more bad news either . . .”

  “All right! All right!” I answer over the rumble of engines, the rushing of the wind. “I’m coming out slowly! There, I’m lowering my gun down by my side,” standing up, I halfway expect it to be the last thing I ever do.

  Squinting in the glare of headlights, I don’t see her at first. Then I see her in swirling snow not even 3 meters (10 feet) away, waiting by the open driver’s door of the SUV hemming me in, a silver Yukon Denali driven by whoever my sister just killed. She watches me, standing as still as a living statue, phantomlike in a peculiar hooded ultrablack bodysuit, booties and gloves.