Busy Skies: The Council Dissolution Read online

He started thinking about how to get to the other side, however, in his peripheral vision, in the direction of the room with the broken window, he noticed some movement. He looked closer and saw two suited up figures slowly moving to the outside. By the way, they were moving, it was clear that those aren’t supposed to be here, and he assumed that this must be related to him.

  He quickly went to suit up. With military efficiency, and in a weird way elegantly he incapacitated two guards at the exit and jumped outside. The two figures were approaching behind one of the stone walls and Hank also hid away in the shadow of the docks. Finally, Lee and Carlo came very closely, while Hank was right on their backsides. They weren't able to see him, and he approached them. He grabbed their shoulders and turned them around. He realized it was Lee and Carlo and managed to stretch a smile. He gave them a thumb up and showed them a number on his arm screen.

  Lee realized it was a communication channel and both he and Carlo punched in that number on their arm screens.

  “Hi Hank! Boy am I glad to see you”, said Lee.

  “Where is Dr. Quill?” - asked Hank.

  “He's dead”, said Carlo.

  Hank threw his hands in the air, and said, “fuck! Alright, let's save the chitchat for later, do you have any data or anything we can use?”

  “Yes!” - said Lee. “We've got plenty! When can we leave?”

  “Follow me”, said Hank.

  He started running towards his ship, and both Lee and Carlo followed. It was very tricky to run on the moon due to low gravity, but once you've figured out how not to fall, you can make progress very quickly. Hank took one of the mechanics by the arm and pulled him out of the ship. He punched his life support and threw him towards the two guards. On the moon, everything was much lighter and therefore was much easier to manipulate things. Lee and Carlo just stood by as Hank finally signaled them to run inside.

  By this time, from the Lunar observatory, several security officers were exiting in a rover, quickly approaching them, but Hank managed to close the door just in time. He pressed the decompression button and ran to the back to rewire his thrusters. The guards arrived and started pounding the ship, trying to break in.

  Hank then went to the cockpit and punched a button which released some air from their life support system. This made a huge cloud of dust, so the officers were forced to move back to see the ship emerging from the cloud and flying away.

  On the ship, Hank took his helmet off and shouted, “woohoo! That was close! We're off!”

  * * *

  “Alright, guys, we are almost halfway there”, said Hank. “Nobody is following us which is great news. We're leaving this ship at one of the space stations, and we are proceeding to Earth. What do you have for me?”

  After explaining how Dr. Quill died, and how the data from the Rock brings a new interpretation of the visitors to the table, Hank was bewildered.

  “So have data from the experiment which interprets the Rock not to be of any danger and the proof that our visitors have no hostile intentions.” - said Lee. “Also, we have footage of the conversation between Dr. Quill and councilor Krueger. The footage is damaged, however, but maybe it could be restored.”

  “This is very troubling”, said Hank. “This changes the game a bit, as the councilor now has no reason to continue with weapon development, nor a justification of his former actions. Those were clearly not in the name of saving Earth from an alien threat.”

  “Exactly”, said Lee.

  “I'm not sure how to proceed”, said Hank, “however, I will join Jess, while the two of you should go to see Mr. Holtzman and see if you can restore that footage. We need to know details about that conversation, and also, it is clear proof that the councilor is killing people.”

  “Where is Jess?” - asked Carlo.

  “She is with commander Hewitt at the Saharan military base”, replied Hank. “This evening, there should be a meeting of the council where we plan to expose the councilor Krueger. Jess is safe with Commander Hewitt and she will remotely enter the council session, while I will send the data you've collected from the base. By now, I hope that commander Hewitt learned that councilor Krueger doesn't have the council behind him, and I think that now there will be the end of the weapon development.”

  “Alright, we'll get to find Mr. Holtzman and see if we can find anything interesting in the footage”, said Carlo. “At least, we’ve got plenty of data.”

  Chapter 26

  Hank dropped off Carlo and Lee and proceeded towards the Saharan military base to meet up with Jess. They took the stairs down towards the underwater city. For the first time, not in the rush and on a sunny day they have been walking around the underwater city. They were amazed by it in every sense of the way. They almost got distracted by it but somehow, managed to find Mrs. Potts’s house.

  Mr. Holtzman opened the door.

  “Hello Mr. Holtzman, unfortunately we didn’t have much time to chat”, said Lee. “I'm a big fan of your work!”

  “Hello Dr. Xi, how was the Moon?” - he asked. “Please, come in, we have some news, and I hope you also do.”

  They had a brief talk over some coffee where Carlo and Lee learned that Cox is in the basement, while Mr. Holtzman and Mrs. Potts found out the details about the Rock and how Dr. Quill died on the Moon.

  “Remarkable, simply remarkable. This developed in ways I couldn't have imagined”, said Dr. Quill stroking his beard. “It seems that the councilor stops at nothing, even facing overwhelming evidence that he is wrong. This was clearly not an accident.”

  “Indeed”, said Mrs. Potts. ”Does Hank have all the data?”

  “Yes”, answered Carlo. “We gave him all the technical details about the Rock and Luyten B. There is no way that the Rock represents any kind of alien threat for us, although we do indeed might have visitors. In about 80 years.”

  “OK, OK, that part we knew from before”, said Mrs. Potts. “Good. Tonight, the council has a closed session where Councilor Frost will present her information on the recent Antarctica tsunami. She will also present the research that has been going on at the Lunar observatory, the weapon development, and finally, she will accuse councilor Krueger of hiding all the data, and killing people. Jess will remotely appear from the Saharan desert, along with the rockets that have been tested and developed there.”

  “So we know that no one else from the council is in on this?” - asked Lee.

  “Actually, it's a closed session and it doesn't matter”, said Mr. Holtzman. ”The council will have all the cards and they will have full disclosure on how to proceed. At that point, we have done everything we could.”

  Carlo continued, “We also have a memory unit here we found on Dr. Quill. While he was at the meeting, with the councilor he was recording everything. He had a small camera on him, and a microphone, however, when we tried to play the video, there was an error message.”

  “This seems like a perfect job for us”, said Mr. Holtzman looking at Lee. “Do you have the drive?”

  “Yes”, said Lee delightedly.

  “OK, let's get on it.” - said Mr. Holtzman. “Maybe before the council session starts we will have some new insight into the data.”

  * * *

  After several hours of Mr. Holtzman cursing and walking around the room, he finally took apart the memory unit and noticed that there was a broken chip on it. “Dr. Xi?” - he called, you're an electronics engineer. “Would you care to look at this?”

  Lee came a bit closer and realized that this could be easily fixed. It seems that this is after all not a problem for data recovery, but just replacing a single chip. “Alright, Carlo? - give me your watch”, said Lee.

  “What? Why do you need my watch?” - asked Carlo.

  “You'll see”, answered Lee, who as soon as he got the watch, took a kitchen knife and opened up the backside.

  “What are you doing?” - asked Carlo.

  “I'm repairing the memory device”, replied Lee, “and the chip that went dead is
a very common chip that can be found in watches. It seems that you will be able to live without it. Plus, it's ugly as hell.”

  “Well screw you too”, said Carlo and left the room.

  It just so happened that Mrs. Potts had a soldering iron, which allowed Lee to put the chip back, and as he did it, Mr. Holtzman came closer and took the memory unit. He took the device very close to his eyes and performed an inspection.

  “Good work young man.” - he said. “Now, let's see what's on there.”

  He placed the memory device on his tablet and the data started downloading.

  “OK, let's see it”, said Mr. Holtzman and quickly browsed the video just to check whether everything was alright, he randomly clicked on several scenes. On the first one, there was an empty room, then there was commander Hewitt, then there was just an empty blank moon surface.

  “OK, that's too far”, said Mr. Holtzman. “Also, I didn’t know that commander Hewitt was also at this meeting. That should mean that he must be up to speed with everything. I suppose that's good, now, let's start from the beginning.”

  Somewhere around the middle of the video, Carlo came in and joined them in watching the video.

  “Wait a minute. Can you pause?” - sure, said Mr. Holtzman. “Can you zoom in on this part of the video, and play it a bit slower?”

  Mr. Holtzman did it, and then after playing it, all of them were speechless. “We are fucked!” - said Lee in disbelief.

  “Indeed we are, Dr. Xi”, said Mr. Holtzman calmly. “Call Jess immediately!”

  * * *

  Hank landed in the parking of the Saharan military base. It was a particularly warm and sunny day. A hot wind was blowing and he started sweating even from a short walk to the entry. After being identified, he was sent to the small electric monorail heading towards commander Hewitt's office.

  Jess was already there, talking to commander Hewitt, and on his screen, there was a countdown till the closed session of the council.

  “So you see commander”, she said, “that really is a revolutionary discovery. Such chemistry wasn't observed on Earth before. And, as I imagine, Dr. Quill told you that the conditions for such life are impossible on Earth.”

  “Commander Hewitt, Jess”, greeted Hank, entering the room, and interrupting Jess.

  Commander Hewitt nodded approvingly, while Jess said, “it's great to see you in one piece Hank!”

  “Do you have any new information?” - she asked.

  “Hearing what you're talking about, it seems you already know everything.” - replied Hank.

  “I was at the meeting with Dr. Quill, and I think that is great news”, said Commander Hewitt. “It's always good to be cautious but, in this case, we were a bit ahead of ourselves.”

  “O, and we still are, command Hewitt”, said Hank. “I don't think that you have also been fully briefed on everything that's happened. Did you know that Dr. Quill is dead? There was an accident just after your meeting?”

  “What?” - Jess asked in surprise, covering her mouth.

  “How did that happen?” - asked commander Hewitt.

  “It happened the same way that Jess’s brothers were killed, almost her family, neighbors, and me.” - said Hank.

  “I'm not following what you are saying, and I would remind you that commanders aren't the fans of suspense, captain!” - said commander Hewitt with a bit of anger.

  “Councilor Krueger is acting on his own, and all of this here what you have been supporting was his, and only his act. I'm just giving you a heads up because, at this call that you are about to remotely join in, all hell will break loose.” - said Hank.

  “Continue, captain.” - said commander Hewitt, and he did so. “I don't want you to get surprised too much, but Jess here was working on the Antarctic research facility. That is the part you know, but then, her brother accidentally recorded a compromising talk that involved councilor Krueger. His brother was killed for this, his girlfriend was killed for these recordings, Jess was tracked down and her family was almost killed. You didn't read about this in the media, because Krueger covered everything up. And the DNA of personal killer, Ryad Cox was just delivered for checking of the bad-code issue.”

  “This is a very interesting development captain. Hmm, I was under the full assurance that the council is fully aware of this. I'm very confused by the entire situation.” - said commander Hewitt, and continued. “I don't think there is plenty to talk about, but you don't need to worry. You don't have a commanding responsibility, and lucky for you Jess is living evidence, while we also have someone on the Council to help us present all the evidence.”

  On the holo-display behind them, the timer was counting down seconds to the meeting of the Council of Earth. There was a minute left, and commander Hewitt took a deep breath and said, “alright, I hope you know what you're doing Jess. Going for a councilor is unprecedented.”

  There was now about ten seconds to go, and soon enough the timer was now in the negative numbers but the session wasn’t starting. A minute passed, then two, then five.

  “I'm getting worried”, said Jess. “What's happening?”

  Suddenly, an image from the Lunar observatory 9 appeared. There was some movement on the ground and then, it became apparent that those are hatches from missile silos. They were perfectly camouflaged in the lunar surroundings, invisible to any kind of scan, and no one could ever know they were there.

  “What is this?” - asked commander Hewitt in confusion.

  “What does it look like as a commander?” - asked Hank in disbelief and anger. “Did you order this?”

  “What? No! Those shouldn't exist.” - said commander Hewitt. “We were only in the preparatory phase for the assembly of those kinds of rockets. Until last week we were waiting for all the necessary approvals, and just now we found out that for the rock we don't need to develop anything new.”

  “Approval?” - asked Hank. ”From whom?”

  “The Council, of course”, said commander Hewitt. He started rubbing his forehead realizing he had been played. “And for those types of rockets, or missiles, we sent them blueprints almost a half a year ago for final evaluation, but we didn’t get anything back. It seems they have actually produced them”

  “But we now know that this is completely unnecessary, why is this happening?” - asked Jess. “We cannot attack an innocent species!”

  As Jess finished, a countdown timer appeared on the holo display was reset, and it started counting down from 5 minutes.

  Commander Hewitt raised his head and saw an approaching councilor Krueger. The door opened, and Krueger entered. The glass suddenly went blurry, as he was clearly controlling it with his implant. “Well, well, an interesting company we have here”, he said.

  “What is this? - said commander Hewitt and stood up from his chair.

  “Shush soldier”, said the councilor, he took something from his pocket and pointed it towards commander Hewitt . As he fired it became clear it was some kind of a weapon, and commander Hewitt was thrown in the air hitting the wall, and falling down unconscious.

  Jess’s phone started ringing and by the sound, she realized it was Lee. It was a funny musical piece that he placed himself on one of their many overnighters working at the Antarctic research facility.

  “A-a-a,” said councilor Krueger. I will be taking this.

  Jess gave him his phone, and he threw it on the floor and stepped on it. “Now, I would like to invite you to watch the launch of six highly powerful antimatter missiles towards Luyten 8”.

  “What about the council meeting?” - asked Jess.

  “Ha-ha, there is no meeting, there never was a meeting.” - answered councilor Krueger.

  “What did you do to councilor Frost?” - she asked.

  “Councilor Frost is safe, I assure you”, replied councilor Krueger bursting into a smug laughter.

  “You see, people are very, very easy to manipulate. You just need to know which buttons to press”, said the councilor. “See here
commander Hewitt for instance, you just need to give him a bit of MKU-X, and he doesn't question anything.”

  “What's MKU-X?” - asked Jess.

  The councilor angrily looked at Jess and shouted, “you don’t ask questions here!”

  “Why are you doing this?” - asked Hank.

  “It should be obvious, to anyone, but apparently not for a stupid soldier, or his girlfriend”, replied the councilor. “Don’t you get it? This so called civilization we have created? We are on the decline, our society is collapsing. I’ve been watching the council for decades. We are harvesting rocks from the nearby planets, establishing colonies. We are not making any progress, we are just as primitive as we were several centuries ago, just harvesting resources, like locusts. We have become a race of soft, irresponsible, and selfish fools. We make false pretenses, that we are getting smarter and better but the truth is far away.”

  The councilor paused for a moment, looked around and continued. “You see, we can only progress through disruption, through chaos. That is the only way to create the new order, to restart and to push us further than this meaningless day to day existence. The discovery of the new intelligent life in our neighborhood is the answer the universe has given us, another chance to escape insignificance and to create new meaning. And, if history has taught anything, a conflict is inevitable and someone will draw the first blood sooner or later. It might as well be us”

  Hank was carefully listening to councilor Krueger’s monologue, while Jess didn’t care at all what he had to say. She was looking at the councilor’s hand and the weapon he was holding. Councilor Krueger noticed this and asked, “What? You want to steal my weapon?” - he started laughing and then suddenly clenched his teeth in anger. “I dare you”, he said, “you have been an annoying pain in the ass this whole time. Would you also like my councilors chip to stop the launch?”