Greenflies Read online

  “Yes, ma’am,” he said.

  “Dismissed and good hunting, lieutenant.”

  Caufield waited, effectively in command of the war room of Utah base, watching the many monitors for any sign of alien incursion and possible interception. Technically, the flight officers were in command until an interception was performed, and then each individual incursion would fall to one of several tactical officers. It was the flight officer’s duty to monitor weather and direct B-1 flight paths accordingly, with the consideration that Greenflies would not teleport anywhere they could not see. Once a squad was dropped, it fell to the tactical officer to monitor them via satellite and live helmet feed and provide them real time intelligence.

  Currently, Caufield was better qualified for both of these duties, but the system was designed to accommodate the dozens of simultaneous interceptions that were part of the worldwide plan. Eventually, this room would be manned 24/7, and no single person would be able to monitor that kind of activity. So, Caufield left it to the underlings for now, knowing she could interrupt at any point.

  The room itself had once been a SAC secondary command installation, a backup facility should the Strategic Air Command fall in a massive nuclear attack of a Cold War turned hot. As such, the war room had the old school charm of air command centers of the seventies, be they NASA or military. There were five rows of terminals, each long enough for twenty individual personnel, all facing an array of back-projection screens the size of small billboards. A central aisle allowed for an authority figure such as Caufield to pace while the others performed their work. A glass enclosed booth stood behind the terminals, a place for VIPs to stand where they could not interfere.

  For the moment, Caufield stood at the rear of the central aisle as the flight officer sat at the central station immediately ahead of her. The screen just ahead of him showed a map of the US, with overlays for biodiversity and weather. The left screen displayed the western states with the positions and trajectories of the five B-1s in glowing white. Each plane was surrounded by a blue circle, the region it could be expected to intercept an incursion within. The right screen was a single clock counting down the seconds until the Greenflies might appear in the interception region.

  “Teleportation window intersecting patrol region in three minutes,” said the flight officer in charge, a CIA operations expert Caufield had worked with on many occasions. “Eastern seaboard and Midwest reported eight landings, individual craft, no missile shield interceptions. Aircraft status?”

  “All go, Flight,” said a young woman from the terminals.

  The minutes ticked by as minutiae were handled by the flight staff: the estimated refueling interval, the preparation of alien recovery teams throughout the region should they be needed, continual relay of weather conditions to the pilots, etc. In a way, it was make-work to alleviate tension. No doubt, there were similar maintenance procedures being conducted on the B-1 bombers up there. Eventually, without incident, the red line on the map indicating the teleportation window crossed the array of blue circles indicating the patrol zones. It might be as much as an hour before an alien incursion; they appeared at the leading edge of the window only rarely.

  “We have a satellite contact,” shouted someone from the terminals, “20 miles east of Abilene, Texas. Single craft. Missile shield is responding.”

  The red blip appeared on the map on the very edge of Zeta team’s potential interception radius. It would take them as much as fifteen minutes to respond, burning most of their fuel, to do so. Human interception would have been a poor call, in this case, even though the desert terrain may have mitigated some of the Greenfly’s advantages. The Flight Officer appeared to realize this, too, and ordered that the interception teams maintain their positions.

  The red line continued to move across the map, almost like a second terminator. The first delineated between day and night. The second, six hours later, delineated between a night that was safe from monsters and one that wasn’t. When the eastern side of Wyoming was well within the red line, a red dot popped into existence in the lower right corner.

  “Satellite contact. Single craft within the city limits of Cheyenne. Missile shield response canceled due to urban environment.” The Greenflies had learned to avoid cities, but Cheyenne wasn’t much of a city. It was just enough of a city to prevent the Pentagon from hurling missiles into it, though.

  “Cross-referencing for local targets of interest,” said someone else from the terminals. “Within two blocks of a pet store, Flight.”

  “Mobilize Epsilon,” said Flight. “Tactical, begin local geography briefing while en route.”

  The clock screen popped up a couple smaller clocks, displaying the ETA and mission clocks for Epsilon team. While the target was in the central part of Epsilon’s interception zone, the Greenflies might not take much time to find their targets and leave with the convenience of a pet shop. It would probably be a tight interception, if they managed it at all.

  “Satellite contact, western Colorado. Three craft…

  “Satellite contact, New Mexico…

  “Satellite contact…”

  Little red dots began appearing over the western United States, more than had been seen in the East. That was to be expected, as the area was inherently more rural. Very quickly, all five teams were committed, and the remainder of the incursions had to go unanswered. The duty of the Flight Officer was now to direct recovery aircraft, of which he had far more distributed around the country. Recovery wasn’t so much an issue tonight, as the goal of all teams was to plant a nuclear weapon aboard the returning craft, not to actually engage the enemy. Still, there was one incident when an alien craft appeared within a few miles of one of the aircraft used to form the missile shield. It had been struck by twin HARM rockets before it could even open its doors. The Flight Officer sent out a recovery team to pick up the pieces.

  In the end, the interception missions were mixed. Epsilon and Eta each failed to arrive before the Greenflies departed. Zeta landed in time, but they had a hard impact in rocky terrain, two members of the team suffering major fractures despite the reinforced armor. Gamma and Delta were the most successful, having arrived undetected and planted the baited nuclear weapon within the Greenfly’s target zone. Apparently, the air-dropped bait had been counterproductive for Gamma Team, as the Greenflies expressed no interest in the bomb after they had already collected the genetic material of the air-dropped bait. Delta, on the other hand, witnessed Greenflies collect the bomb, place it in their recovery transport, and teleport away.

  While the flight personnel arranged pickups for the five ground teams, Caufield and the remainder of the audience focused upon a new clock that had been added to the now very busy screen on the right. This clock offered a countdown from the moment of the alien transport’s departure to the anticipated arrival at Troy. Once set, the bomb would explode the moment it appeared outside of the GPS system around Earth. Due to the speed of light limitation, both for the alien teleportation technology and human technology for observing the explosion in space, it was anticipated to be a half hour before the explosion took place and another half hour after that before the explosion could be observed. The Aricebo radio telescope was well-positioned to monitor the region, and several dozen other optical and radio observatories around the world were joining them in the search.

  The countdown clock had hit the supposed explosion point some time ago. They were awaiting observation of the blast at this point. Caufield had moved from the operations floor to the glass-enclosed antechamber to discuss results with the other brass present. Lassiter stood next to her, apparently ready to either share the credit or hang a scapegoat depending on the outcome in a few minutes. There were refreshments in here, but the only thing that had really been touched was the coffee.

  “Arecibo detects detonation at 0332,” said the voice.

  There were a couple shouts of triumph, but these people quickly looked embarrassed and confused. The clock was still counti
ng down on the screen. Detonation shouldn’t have been detected for another minute. The only conclusion was that the explosion had not taken place anywhere near Troy, though apparently along the same line of sight, just short by twice the distance between Earth and the moon. The neutrino data had always been sketchy at best. Evidently, the aliens weren’t returning to Troy, or, at least, not directly.

  “They have a quarantine,” deduced Caufield. “The same as we do. They don’t trust anything they bring back.”

  “Or they return directly to their ship, which we would have just destroyed, but the ship is not located at Troy,” replied Lassiter, acidly.

  Caufield touched a switch at her lapel, activating a microphone channel to the Flight Officer. “Flight, contact optical observatories and have them focus on the region where the explosion took place. You can use the Hubble authorization code if needed.”

  It took several more minutes, but eventually a hazy image of small dots appeared on the central screen. There were many of them, and they appeared to be moving with a slight velocity to each other, spreading slowly. While there were those in the audience who felt sure this was debris from a destroyed alien ship, Caufield had another theory which would soon be borne out. She believed each of those specs represented a hemispherical piece of terrain fifty-odd meters across. They had found an alien quarantine, and it was also where the teleportation bombs sent their debris. Amidst those floating asteroids were pieces of the Sydney Zoo.

  Chapter 11: Steady State

  Over the next two and a half months, the Utah base spread like a moss across the prairie.

  During the Cold War, the base had been constructed as a secret launching facility for nuclear-capable bombers, and from the air it might have appeared to be a nature preserve, an untouched region of prairie. Now, with the understanding that the new enemy had no understanding or interest in military infrastructure, the base’s presence was glaringly obvious. New runways had been laid, allowing for the simultaneous launch or landing of five bombers simultaneously. The outdoor hangars had long since been completed, allowing for complete conversion of the original base to research purposes.

  Across the runways from the central mound which had been the original base, the shanty-town-like training facility had expanded its perimeter significantly. While it still possessed the same number of hastily constructed wooden buildings, they now surrounded a core of a dozen solider buildings looking much like concrete slabs. The perimeter of the base was now stationed with tanks and armored vehicles capable of repelling a good-sized alien force, should their tactics change. Anti-aircraft batteries stood waiting to fill the sky with flak. A minefield with bombs sensitive enough to detonate in the presence of levitating intruders surrounded the entire compound. The only safe way in was a four lane road that led eastward.

  The larger training installation had been necessary to meet the continual demand for field personnel. In addition to the meeting the one squad per week training quota, the installation was now responsible for countering the attrition rate of the interception teams. In addition to casualties, which ran as high as 30% for most teams, there was a high incidence of injury in landing. The small chutes used for rapid descent left very little margin for error in touching ground. The infirmary was treating twenty soldiers for leg or ankle fractures since the interception shield was implemented. It had reached a point where every team had its six primary personnel and two alternates ready to spring into action.

  There were also teams from other nations being trained at the facility. Japan, which had already covered its islands with a missile shield more effective than that over the US due to the smaller geographic area to cover, was now in the process of creating a duplicate interception program. Five teams of Japanese interceptors were being trained alongside the Americans while the Japanese training facility was being completed on Hokkaido. Europeans were also a common sight here on-base. The European Union, while unable to field a missile shield of its own without NATO’s support, was interested in directly reaping the technological benefits of recovering alien equipment through interception. Even the Russians had a handful of people here, more for the sake of learning about the training techniques than fielding a high speed interception force; they simply had too great a territory to cover and no economy with which to pay for such a program. It was not uncommon to find a table in the training ground mess hall where the occupants were all but incomprehensible to each other.

  The research compound was even more eclectic, and just as noisy. The last of the underground hangars had been converted to research and engineering space. Some of the physicists’ earliest findings were finding their way into application in tremendous underground workshops. Some of the new technologies were being outsourced, such as a highly conductive material found in Greenfly nervous tissue with potential applications in computer chips, but for the most part, technologies went from recovery to theory to application all under the same roof. There was some political friction about keeping these technologies out of the public domain, but it could not be denied that teleportation and plasma weapon technology was a security threat to every nation on Earth.

  In fact, they were a very immediate threat, as used by the Greenflies. The incursions had not slowed in the slightest, although their tactics had evolved to consider the possibility of encountering an interception team with every landing. Every Greenfly encountered these days was a Silverfly, covered in the alien armor bugs thickly enough to turn all but the heaviest armor-piercing rounds. The bug-guns had given way to plasma cannons in every engagement and there was a tendency to shoot any human encountered, whether military or civilian. The alien transport deployment adapted to the war footing by appearing at decoy locations to overwhelm the missile shield or misdirect the interception shield.

  They were still avoiding cities, but they had developed an affinity for appearing in suburbs. As a result, radiation-related casualties were increasing. More accurate numbers were only just beginning to come in, and there were around a thousand deaths every day. All it took was a scene from a Connecticut housing development with dozens of ambulances carting away radiation victims to make the interception program, the only effective counter-offensive technique, a very popular program indeed.

  The Xenosociology department normally took lunch together, and they were a very animated lot. The conversations always concerned minutiae of the Greenfly languages or how best to adapt the Greenfly-computer interface that had been developing over the last month, but they were also always enthusiastic. By contrast, the biologists were fairly subdued, and the physicists mostly ate at their desks or forgot to eat entirely.

  Today, though, Butler couldn’t bring himself to engage with his team and their geeky banter. He sat at the end of their table in the giant cafeteria (half of what had once been a B-52 hangar) in quiet contemplation of one of the things Greenbeard had said. The Greenfly spoke in terms of inevitabilities and unpleasant ones at that. For instance, this morning, he asked what humans would do when Earth was no longer habitable. When, not if, and no explanation as to why the Greenfly had asked the question in the first place. He was still the only Greenfly to survive in captivity (no explanation for that, either), so Butler had to resist his occasional urge to throttle an answer out of him.

  Butler barely noticed as Franz took the seat opposite him. The gangly physicist frequently took his meals with the linguists, probably because there were no other physicists about.

  “No Meg today?” asked the German.

  “Hmmm,” Butler said, taking notice of his new companion, “Oh, not today. The army took her to see her brother and mother as soon as the Window passed this morning.”

  People had begun to refer to the teleportation window in that form, almost as a proper person. As time went by, the Window had moved later through the day. At this point, over Utah, the Window lasted until nearly 11:30. That was about the furthest it would progress into the day, due to orbital mechanics. It would now start moving the other way, until
eventually transports would start appearing in the early afternoon in about six months.

  “A lot of special treatment for that girl,” commented Franz, “Special trips, probably by military aircraft. We rarely see her without one of those Gamma soldiers around. It’s… odd. They give me the… what is the word… willies. They seem to change when they don’t think they are being watched. As if, they pretend to be human only when people are watching.”

  “She appears on the alien sensors,” replied Butler, having seen topics far more worthy of conspiracy theories recently, “They’re probably just protecting an asset. She tells me they still take blood from her once a month to use in special operations. I wouldn’t read too much into it.”

  “You seem down,” said Franz, after tasting his beef stew and grimacing. “Work not going well?”

  “As well as can be expected. Greenbeard just can’t seem to understand so many fundamental aspects of human society, and he’s so indoctrinated in his own culture that he has no idea how to explain aspects of it. He appears to have hit a rut in his vocabulary, as well, but he makes no effort to explain around his deficiencies. His conversations are just filled with this symbol I taught him for ‘do not know word.’ I have a two-page transcript of just that symbol over and over again. The image processing group is having better luck.”

  “Image processing? I thought you had good enough resolution on your cameras, now,”said Franz.

  Butler began to show a little interest in his subject, “It turns out Greenflies can display entire pictures on their skin as a means of conveying complex information about target species or geography. They have a natural compression codec, which the image processing group is learning to convert directly to image files. The pictures may fill in the gaps he leaves through his limited vocabulary.”