A True History Book Three
StarFleet Carl
A True History
Book Three
By StarFleet Carl
What Came Before
Subtitled -
How to condense more than 861,500 words into less than a chapter!
Alternate universes exist. I know that, and some of our scientists have proven it beyond a shadow of a doubt. I know this because there are alternate versions of me out there, with variations on my powers and skills. Some of them are, politely, lame people. Some of them are megalomaniacs. I'm somewhere in between.
This is the third volume of my autobiography. If you haven't read the first two volumes, I highly recommend it. I think the author's a nice guy. But if you don't have time, not a problem. Here's the short and dirty.
A brief (!) synopsis of Book One:
I was born on a planet twenty-seven light years from Earth. I've tried to convert things into common Earth measurements, based upon the area of Earth where I … finished growing up, basically. So, inches, pounds, feet, miles. I screwed up several times in converting things, including my initial age. My planet had a year equivalent to 443 Earth days. So, when a rogue white dwarf star got too close to my home planet, and my parents stuffed me into an experimental rocket ship, I was fourteen years old at home. I spent some time in suspended animation, and was revived by the ship's computer just before my ship would have landed in Kansas.
The problem with that landing was radar saw my ship coming in, so I took over manual controls and ended up crashing in an abandoned salt mine shaft near Hutchinson, Kansas, in the United States of America. My ship was damaged, but I wasn't hurt. Actually, I ended up with a lot of abilities that no one ever had before, that I was aware of. Speed such that I can run a mile in less than a second, vision such that I could see a fly on a twig a mile away, strength such that I can pick up multiple tons, flight, laser and heat vision, and seemingly invulnerable skin.
Of course, I didn't know all of that at first, or how all of it worked. (Still working on how it works, actually.) I wanted to stay hidden. That didn't last long, when I kicked up a huge cloud of dust running, and was found by a widowed farmer and his daughter. Since I wasn't that tall, and obviously still young, they thought I fell off a circus train or something like that. I was trying to keep my abilities hidden, which also didn't last long when I screwed up and exposed my abilities to Harry and Beth.
Harry had one thing going for him. He'd been crapped on by the system after his wife died, so he had slightly ambiguous morals. Beth figured that I could become the big man at her school, and the kids there wouldn't treat her like they had been. Net result is I figured out how to find some buried Spanish treasure, and we sold some of it for a lot of money.
Enter Judge Elroy T. Bannister into my life.
I probably can't say enough good about Elroy. He and Harry's father had served in World War Two together. Elroy came home with a LOT of money, used it to help improve the city, and set himself up as the feudal baron of Reno County, Kansas. Over the thirty-nine years since the end of World War Two, Elroy had grown in power such that the Governor, both Senators, and all the representatives owed him their jobs.
Harry called Elroy, told him that I was the offspring of a deceased cousin of his, and all of my records were lost. Elroy is an honest politician. That means when he is bought, he stays bought. Bribing him with two pounds of gold didn't hurt things. Elroy made all of the documents that I'd need to enroll in school and get all of the identification I'd need. In doing so, he 'corrected' my age to sixteen. I should have been made seventeen, but I messed up the math.
Politely, I really am a super-genius, but with some of my screw-ups you'd wonder. I also am slightly faster than a page-at-a-glance reader, and I have a perfect memory. Harry had a large collection of science fiction books, plus the psychology books from his late wife. I also found out that power is an aphrodisiac, meaning that Beth and I found out that our species are physically compatible.
We also found out that my sperm can 'jump start' certain abilities in Earth girls, too, as Beth and I ended up mentally linked.
I started school and had my first run-in with an authority figure, the assistant principal. He ended up getting fired, then tried to attack Beth, Harry, and me. If a police officer hadn't had an emergency kit to do a tracheotomy, he would have died. That's when I found out I could move faster than a speeding bullet, because I caught the ones that had been fired at us in my bare hands.
Since I was coming into school late, the principal decided to see if I had any athletic abilities. The Hutchinson High School football team (the Salthawks) weren't that good. I'd never played before, but this was an opportunity for me to show off for my girlfriend. Turns out I qualified as the Varsity Quarterback. It also turned out from other testing that I was too smart for high school, but the law said I had to attend at least some classes. But I also could take classes at the local community college, at the same time.
Beth and her two lifelong friends, Dora and Eve, were outcasts at the school. I rather quickly ended up dating all of them, which irritated a few people. One of the football team decided he'd redecorate a wall with my face. I moved, and he broke his fist. A bit later, someone started a rumor that I was homosexual, so a former member of the football team decided to come out to Harry's house and attack us. I broke his arm, and was simply holding him when a police officer showed up. I may have pushed him at the police officer while waving a tire iron, so that took care of that issue permanently.
Harry ended up reconnecting with his old high school girlfriend, Emily Miller, who was vice-president of the local bank, when we started my checking and investment accounts. Due to some various things … like Emily ending up pregnant … I told her the truth about me. Since Dora, Eve, and Beth were all planning on moving into a modular home with me in the near future, we had to get parental permission.
Neither set of parents were happy, but the minor detail that I had also gone out and found another lost Spanish treasure, worth hundreds of millions of dollars, took care of most of their objections. It was now mid September, and I'd already played in and we'd won two football games. A lot of people were realizing that our Hutchinson Salthawk football team was going places. I also managed to salvage my spaceship and fix the computer that had safely brought me here.
Things changed for me on Earth shortly after that. Terrorists in Beirut blew up the US Embassy Annex building, and Eve's brother was injured in that attack. I grew up under a different moral and ethical code than Earth. I made sure that things were under control at home, then put together an outfit and flew to Beirut, destroying where the terrorists had trained, and also attacking their sponsor in Iran. My powers had increased considerably, so it was quite easy to blow up lots of their military gear and kill their soldiers.
Then I came home and we won the next football game. Harry and Emily had gone on their honeymoon, so Elroy tried to be sneaky and set me up with some investment people. That included his own niece, Margie. She had an MBA from Wharton and was 25 years old. She also had an issue, in that she was so smart, men didn't interest her. Until she met me. Literally two hours after meeting her, she was in the barn hayloft with me, fell in love with me, and was moving in with us that night.
We set up a company called CEDEM, Financial, because Elroy and his best friend from the war, Earl O'Connor, were planning on retiring. Elroy realized that with my money, I could help Reno County and Kansas like he had been doing. There was an incident at a Ponderosa restaurant, where Elroy's daughters found out they were bastards, because Elroy was rendered sterile in the war. He only had Margie and Emily as his family to inherit, and Earl had no one because his son had died in Vietnam. They dumped it all onto me.
Under my moral code, I realized that there was only one way to make sure that my kids, when they grew up, would have a safe world, and that was to end the war. I created the Messenger from Above, went to Iran and Iraq, and pretty much destroyed most of their air forces and navies. I also left a mark in Switzerland, in front of their embassies, to end the fighting.
The minor detail that I got caught on camera freaked out a lot of people. I finally told Elroy the truth about me, and we came up with a plan where I'd go to New York City and make a demonstration at the United Nations. I flew there, called the media that I was going to appear at the UN Building, picked up two cops that were just doing their jobs, and burned a lot of marks in front of the UN Building to 'End the Fighting'.
There was a networking company just getting started up out of Stanford University, called Cisco Systems. I wrote some software so they could be about ten years ahead of their competition. I also had millions of dollars sitting in the bank, so I invested in them. There was another company near Seattle, named Microsoft. I wrote a full spreadsheet program for them, and made it compatible with Macintosh products, not just regular IBM based PCs. And a young lady, Marcia, that was working for Microsoft has a similar response to me as Margie.
We figured that we'd need some security, and the head of Microsoft Security got us set up with the best in the business. How good they really were, I wouldn't know until much later.
Eve's father has a psychotic breakdown because he can't handle that I have this much money and power.
As the Messenger from Above, I flew to Afghanistan and destroyed their poppy fields, and told the Soviet Army it was time to take their toys and go home. I made a bit of a mark in Moscow by destroying Lenin's Tomb in about four seconds flat. I also told the head of the Soviet Union to tell Israel to plan for a meeting in Tel-Aviv between them and the leaders of the nations they were having issues with.
Syria decided they didn't want to play, so I pretty much took care of them, including their hidden poison gas factories. I showed them I wasn't playing around when someone tried to assassinate the leader of Lebanon. I think that crushing a rifle into a small cube, as well as throwing the assassin into the sea from ten miles away may have influenced their decision to believe in peace.
I'd also been busy buying land, because I'd taken some knowledge from my home planet and made two things. The first was a wind turbine that used magnetic bearings and would be more efficient than anything here on the planet, and the second was a chemical my Dad had created for his rocket science. I wanted to help Hutchinson and Reno County, since under my code of ethics, this was my home and as the leader of the home, it was my job to care for everyone.
I took a night off and flew to Pakistan, freeing Benazir Bhutto from captivity and making a bit of an impression that arguing with me would have fatal results. I used my heat vision and incinerated more than half the Pakistani government.
Our football team had continued the winning streak, and I was being considered possibly the best high school quarterback in the country. Some people in town weren't happy with our lifestyle. The Baptist Preacher had been against us for quite some time, and he ended up attacking the girls and me. When I broke their legs and otherwise unmanned them, in pain, the Preacher confessed he'd been running a child molesting ring. That brought all sorts of attention to the town, so to help keep the negative publicity out of the national news, I visited China, threatened them, and then destroyed the North Korean military.
Keep in mind that meant at one point, I picked up a Soviet destroyer from out of a North Korean Harbor where they'd been trying to refuel to comply with my orders, flew it through the air a few miles, then put it back down into the sea.
At this point, I figured it was time to deal with Washington, so I flew there as the Messenger. That's when I found out another reason Earth was so much like my former home. There was a memorial to those lost in Vietnam. I found that I could speak with the souls of the dead that were inhabiting that memorial. I went to the White House, picked up President Reagan, and brought him back to the Wall, so he would hear and hopefully beat some sense in to Congress.
Back at home, we met with people from Siemens AG, and they agreed to build a factory to make turbines in Hutchinson. I also got to meet Leon Hess and Lamar Hunt, and watch a professional football game.
Remember I said my semen helped improve Beth? It'd done the same with all of the girls, because we were having a good sex life. It also helped make all three of the younger girls much smarter, such that they were able to test out of the rest of high school, so they were starting community college as well. We all took the SAT and ACT tests, because I knew where I wanted to actually go to college.
Eve's brother, SJ (Stephen, Junior), had been home on medical leave. He'd figured out that I was the Messenger. He thought I would kill him to protect my secret. I told him what I felt. Cal was me, and the Messenger was the secret identity. We had more money coming in, so I put SJ in charge of finding us some airplanes.
China decided that since the Messenger had said that each nation was in charge of its own borders that Taiwan was part of them, so they attacked. I showed them the error of their ways, destroying some of their attacking forces, then laying waste to about a ten mile wide swath of the country, killing more than ten million Chinese in a few seconds. I also destroyed their government. That's when I flew to the Moon and sculpted the surface there with my mark to quit screwing around and listen to me.
After that, I talked to the government of Germany, briefly, then flew home. That was just in time to fly in an airplane to California, to meet with the people from Intel about their computer chips, and meet the people of Stanford. I took the MCAT and LSAT, passed both of those with perfect scores, and we made arrangements to live there.
We also met Marcia's attorney, Leonard Poulson. It turns out that he knew Elroy from after the war. And Marcia was already wealthy, because her father had been the best pyrotechnics man in Hollywood. Marcia had inherited his skills, too. After an evening dinner chatting with Charles Bronson, Jill Ireland, and Patrick Wayne, among others, we came back to Hutchinson. One of the things that Marcia had brought back to Kansas with her was some jewelry her father had found in a cave in Europe.
That jewelry contained gems from my home planet, and Dora's mother being of Romany heritage and blood knew about them. Dora's grandmother was reported to be a witch, so it was decided there'd be a meeting. I also revealed to Dora's parents, Roberto and Esmeralda, that I was the Messenger.
She called me the 'Guardian from Earth' and said I was the answer to a millennia old legend.
That’s the end of Book One. Pretty neat, huh? Don’t worry, it gets even more complex!
Now for the brief (!) synopsis of Book Two
So, I’m apparently the ‘Guardian of Earth’, which was some kind of Romany prophecy. At least they didn’t freak out about it.
The freak out came from everyone when Elroy explained the secret that John Ely, the head of the Law School at Stanford, had told us about Elroy. He and Earl had both been investigating attorneys for the Warren Commission in trying to find out the truth about the JFK assassination.
But the freaking out wasn’t over yet. Jennifer had recently found out that she had an aggressive form of breast cancer. She’d already sort of fallen for me, even more so once her husband went nuts and even better, she’d found out he was part of the child molester ring. She decided that it was time to have some fun in her life before cancer killed her. Things pretty well progressed like you think they did, but there was a bit of a difference this time. This time there were five girls who were enhanced by my semen that were also involved, and as we’d found out before, a prostrate massage really stimulated me.
My semen definitely enhanced Jennifer. It did a DNA cleanse of her, so no more cancer. It fixed her tubal ligation, so she could (and did) get pregnant. And it also genetically reverted her back to about seventeen, so that other than a difference in freckle pattern, she and Eve were now identical twins. With relatively little trouble, since pretty much everyone in Hutchinson knew how smart I was, we got Jennifer released from her contract to teach, got her a new driver’s license, and picked up Toby, who recognized her immediately, even though Eve was with us.
That was when we found out that Staff Sergeant Tobias Kennedy, USMC, and deceased for the last four years, was living on in Toby and helping his otherwise mentally challenged grandson. So pretty much anything we did was known to Tobias, and he helped Toby understand things.
When we’d gone to New York to deal with Siemens, one of the things the girls had done was take me to a professional football game. That gave me contacts with Leon Hess, of Hess Oil, and owner of the New York Jets, and Lamar Hunt, owner of the Kansas City Chiefs and also an oilman. We’d managed to help Hunt’s brothers out of their monetary crunch they’d gotten into trying to corner the silver market by purchasing two jets from them, so they could take the loss. We started plans on getting refinery equipment for commercial production of the Ice-X.
I’d already visited Pakistan and dealt with their government, putting Benazir Bhutto back in charge after I incinerated most of the existing assholes. I made a trip to India, because they were acting up, and didn’t believe I was real. Saving Indira Gandhi from being assassinated by her own guards changed her mind about me, and also about working to peacefully resolve issues with Pakistan.
Once I was done with that, I stopped in and said hi to the Soviets. They surprised me by completely agreeing with me, as well as working to help the Orthodox Church. After that, I flew to Washington and destroyed the CIA. I’m not cruel if I don’t need to be. I let most of the people out before I melted the entire complex into slag. After that, I came back to Kansas and went trick or treating with Toby.
Seems I made a bit of an impression. The US Army and Soviet Army started working together to remove the Berlin Wall and remove the border minefields between East and West Germany. Walter Mondale effectively withdrew from the presidential election. And with me being dressed not just in a costume, but in the actual outfit that Ricardo Montalbán wore as Khan in the Star Trek movie, Toby got a lot of candy.
SJ and Elroy had gone to the Boeing factory to look at a 737-200 that they had available for sale because the government dictator that had ordered it wasn’t alive any longer. They’d also taken some Ice-X for Boeing to play with, and to see if they liked it. Remember I said I’d goofed with some measurements when I landed here? This was another one of those times. It worked, preventing freezing and icing, and acting like a coat of painted on insulating material down to about 11 degrees. Kelvin. That meant that a simple coat of Ice-X on the inside of a container was enough to hold either liquid oxygen or liquid hydrogen. That meant a lot of weight savings for rockets, which was probably why my Dad had invented the stuff in the first place.
I hadn’t actually considered the other applications, such as simply painting the buildings at the South Pole, so they’d become a lot more livable. Or anything in northern Alaska or Canada or Russia. We suddenly had orders for tens of thousands of gallons, and didn’t even have the factory built yet. Our test wind turbine exceeded expectations, so Siemens was happy, too.
Dora’s grandmother showed up from Mexico. She’d been known as a witch. We found out why. As the ‘Queen of the Gypsies’, she had some powers of her own. She also had a devices that helped enhance her power, that was similar in properties to the devices we’d found in Marcia’s parents basement. Upon analysis, my computer found out they were from my home world, and I quickly collected the total of six of them that I could detect.
They were medical devices, solid state computers designed to heal people from my home world. Upon testing them, we found out that they could also ‘enhance’ people here that were already ahead of the game by having been exposed to my semen. That meant Beth got powers like I have, just not as strong. The other thing that we found was that there were some coincidences happening, such as my name matching the name of the language of the Romany. I’d made things up when I was talking to people about the Messenger from Above. Turns out I wasn’t, because the Indian god Shiva was from my home planet.
Toby, or Tobias, told me there were other stones out there, but they wouldn’t be available for a couple of years. My three youngest started taking classes at HCC because they’d been enhanced intellectually enough they were passing out of their own high school classes. We won another football game, which meant we’d play in the post-season, and I found a girlfriend for SJ.
We had the official groundbreaking ceremonies for all the facilities, plus a museum of Hollywood memorabilia in honor of Marcia's parents, and then a big presentation at the HCC sports arena afterwards. We passed out a bunch of gold coins as souvenirs for those who showed up, and I gave an interview with the Wall Street Journal that would later on open a lot of doors for me. Something that was happening behind the scenes that I didn’t know a lot about were that the donations we’d made to the Marines Toys for Tots Program had impressed a lot of people. Some of these people were the same ones that were trying to figure out what to do with military equipment and bases they weren’t going to need anymore, due to the breakout of peace throughout most of the world.
Net result of that was we started getting ‘toys’. Excess military hardware, like armored personnel carriers, jeeps, construction equipment, airplanes, helicopters, and both Fort Riley and Vance Air Force Base.
We had a nice party at our house to celebrate our winning season, and our security got to scare two would-be kidnappers and rapists that tried to sneak past them into confessing to all their crimes. Marcia decided that she wanted to have my baby, to join Margie and Jennifer, so she stopped her pills and things worked out quickly for her that way. We also had an IRS field agent show up that we ended up hiring as our chief accountant.
I had a bit of a shit-fit when my business partners tried to put some restrictions on me, which almost caused one of my security guards to get fired. But that ended up working out okay, because Elroy had a bigger one than I did. Also, it seemed that my message to the people while I was in my uniform about their representatives not helping Reagan didn’t deserve re-election hit home. I started helping train Beth with her powers as best I could, since I was still learning about my own.
Our football team won our first post-season game without me playing, and I got to learn how to drive a Marine LAV – light amphibious vehicle afterwards. The next day, there was a party where I got introduced to what people here called spicy food. We found another coincidence, when Dora’s grandmother made some salsa using a pepper that was from India, where the Romany originated, that had the same name as one my mother used to use. That helped confirm something my computer had told me, about our planet being the one that colonized this planet more than two hundred thousand years ago.
I trained Beth a little more, then we both flew south, to Cancun, Mexico. We weren’t in our uniforms, so we ate a meal locally and made a great impression on the locals. When we were leaving, some local gang members decided to rob us. That didn’t work well for them. Beth ran out of power on the way home, and we found that I could use the medical devices to transfer some of my power to her.
Once I knew she was fine, I made a visit to the Vatican. I was sort of rude to the Pope, but I made up for that later. I also confirmed to him that Jesus existed, rose from the dead, but the reason he did so wasn’t because of miracles. It was because he’d been genetically modified by one of my healing stones. After giving him a mission, I flew up to London. While there, I found they had a place with thousands of souls from soldiers that’d died serving King and Country.
I decided it was time to shake their cabinet up, so I busted in on their Parliament, threw their Mace into the head of one of their members that happened to be a child molester, and basically told them to get their shit together. I thought I’d give the American Congress the same message. Apparently, they decided that with the elections over, it was time to go home. I was a bit upset about that and made a televised broadcast that got their attention. I did get to meet Walter Mondale, and since he’d volunteered on the night before the election, I officially made him my Ambassador and gave him the Mace I’d taken from England.
Jennifer’s doctor was amazed by her changes, since he’d planned on cancer treatments in the very near future. Beth and I went for a trip, ending up in Australia, where we found Helen Awarai. Uluru, or as the White Man called it, Ayers Rock, was also a place where souls resided. They knew about Shiva, and were descended from people that had fought against him. We made arrangements to meet them at Disney World, after our state championship game. After quite a bit of discussion, we gave the same upgrades to Eve and Dora that Beth had.
Some countries started withdrawing from the United Nations, citing the Messenger. The US Congress called a special session to start hearings against President Reagan. Beth and I flew to Washington, met up with Ronald and Walter, and took a trip to the Capitol. Walter got to use his new mace a couple of times, I literally bashed some heads in, and using evidence that Mike (the computer) had found, showed there was a conspiracy to take over the country using assassinations and certain Congressional leaders knew about it. That engendered even more trust and cooperation between the Soviet Union and the United States.
Beth and I went back to Kansas, we won the state championship football game, and then the family went to Disney World. We spent two weeks in Florida, officially met Helen and her family, and she ended up in a family way. I got to visit NASA, and the scientists there were glad to meet me and learn about Ice-X.
I took Dora and Eve on a training mission like I had with Beth, but they were stronger than she was at this point. We found a few thousand pounds of Nazi gold, which made Marcia upset, for obvious reasons. Earl and Elroy ended up marrying Helen’s mother, Gloria, in a native ceremony, then brought Gloria’s youngest daughter, Holly, back from Australia. Turns out that Holly naturally has some of my powers.
We had a nice Christmas celebration, and I flew back to Vatican City and apologized to the Pope for being an ass.
Jennifer and I went back to Florida, for the Wackenhut Security Christmas party. We met a lot of important people, including some of the people behind the conspiracy to kill the President. Our plan to take the person that they were trying to insert into our party and turn her into our agent worked too well, and Hannah Rothschild ended up falling in love with me. I ended up fighting against some assassins hired by an Arab banking sheikh to get out of paying off his son’s wager. I won, but I got injured myself.
The sheikh tried to poison us all, which turned out to be a fatal mistake for him, as the Saudi Crown Prince was eating with us as well. After that, Hannah’s father showed up and after an interesting confrontation with Elroy, Jennifer shot and killed him. The next day, we got to meet the King of Saudi Arabia, and then returned to Kansas.
Where we immediately left for the US – Mexican border. I’d sensed trouble on Christmas, regarding our family that lived in Mexico. Something had been set into motion while Jennifer and I were in Florida, and we ended up rescuing about four thousand people. Hannah had not been made aware of the truth about me until that night. When she found out, she declared that I was her God.
Whew! Obviously, there’s a LOT of things I left out. Like meeting Arnold Palmer, killing some Ku Klux Klan members, and such.
Again, 861,500 words, into 5,290. Drum roll, please! And now, without further ado, book three of my autobiography.
A True History
Book Three
By StarFleet Carl
Chapter 1
That could have gone better.
“What did Elroy tell you about the whole zealot thing?” I asked.
With an almost child-like voice, Hannah said, “Too much?”
Beth smiled. “Yeah, just a little. I think it would have been very possible for me to have gone that way, too.” She held her hand out, to help Hannah up.
Hannah took it and stood up, but Beth didn’t let go. She pulled Hannah over, wrapped her arms around her and bent down, giving Hannah a deep and lasting kiss.
When they stepped apart, Hannah winced. “Not so loud, you don’t have to shout!”
I said, “Um, I didn’t say anything.”
“Not you. Wait, what’s going …” She quit talking, then looked around. Then she grinned and nodded.
Beth said, “We had a bit of a discussion about this, once we saw and heard her readings. Even though Jennifer had obviously kissed and … otherwise engaged her, I’m the catalyst. And I have to be physically present.”
“If nothing else, this pretty much takes care of everything else we were concerned about, regarding her possible disloyalty. And no, we're not apologizing about that, because it really was a possibility,” Eve said out loud. “Now, the only thing we have to worry about is the same as before, people who don’t know.”
“That, and keeping mi Abuela away.”
I shook my head. “What’s up with her? I saw her get off a bus, and purposely avoided her.”
Dora shook her head in embarrassment. “Of course, we’ve been sending people up as we could from the Valley. Apparently, with this, she considers you somewhat more elevated in status.”
“More along the lines of what I was saying, eh? From what Beth just told me, it’s a good thing that I’m not the one that found you first. At least not with that attitude.” Hannah sighed. “It’ll take me a little while, but I understand. And no apology needed, Eve. I understand, because it was how things were being set up. I just simply didn't know any better. I’m sorry.”
“Come on, let’s get back over there, so we can load up and get up to Tucson with everyone. I’d like to know what the hell was going on in the Valley that had you grounded.”
The five of us walked back over to the main area. Chuck saw us coming in. “Ah, there you all are. I was wondering if you’d run off for a little personal tension relief.”
“Just making sure that some introductions were a bit more private, Chuck. What’s up?”
He shook his head. “Nothing that the locals can’t handle. The Colonel has three ambulances that will take the people from the triage unit here up to Tucson, and other than that, he’ll have everything finished, with the last few people out of here no later than eight. They’ll break things down here, and head up to Tucson to continue providing support there.”
“Then, I think let’s make sure we have enough planes for our personal team, plus the immediate family, and get back to Hutchinson,” I said.
“That works for me, boss.”
It still took us until almost nine thirty to be on the road to Tucson, simply due to going around, thanking everyone for a job well done. Hannah wasn’t quite as clingy as she had been, but I saw her and Helen exchanging a lot of glances.
Even though it was a short ride, a lot of the family fell asleep on the trip. I was so proud of them, everything they’d done.
There were representatives from the Tucson School District waiting for us. Margie had the checks ready for them. We owed rental on ninety school buses for one full week, plus full maintenance costs for the entire fleet. In addition, there was a second check for replacement of the buses damaged or destroyed, and a third check that would allow them to purchase forty new buses. The last had basically been the bribe needed to use the other buses in the first place, because that got them out of the budget hole they were in.
It was, finally, just after noon local time when we got to the airport. Our 737 and three of the smaller planes were sitting on the tarmac, waiting for us. The pilots were all gathered by the nose gear of Salthawk One when we pulled up, and it looked like they had a folding table with something opened on it.
That was unusual enough that Mike was instantly on high alert. When our vehicles stopped, all of our personal guards immediately went into defensive positions outside the vehicles, with weapons out, while keeping us inside, with the engines running, just in case.
Mike spent a couple of minutes talking to the pilots, then nodded. He signaled an all clear, but expedite. I walked over to him with Elroy tagging along.
“What’s going on, Mike?”
“You’re a fucking psychic is what’s going on. Sorry, I’m a little stressed, I apologize for the language. It’s not World War Three. It’s more like the Messenger War is about ready to kick off.”
“WHAT?”
“Let’s load up and I’ll tell you.”
“No, Mike, you’ll tell me, now!”
“There was a NOTAM issued, at noon local time. Effective at 6 pm Central, so 5 pm here, all US airspace within 100 miles of the border between the US and Mexico is closed until further notice. So is the actual US border, and all border crossings, with Mexico.”
I was shocked. “What the hell?”
Elroy frowned. “Who issued the NOTAM?”
“We did. The United States government. Let’s get in the air, and headed home,” Mike said.
Elroy nodded. “Damned straight!” He looked at me. “Get on the plane, son, and we’ll tell you what’s going on.”
I think Mike was a little surprised when Dora, Beth, and Eve each went to one of the smaller jets. But he didn’t say anything, just frowned a little. It took fifteen minutes for everyone to get loaded and all of the engines spooled up and ready. Once that was done, the three small planes taxied out just ahead of us, so they could take off first.
I don’t think Tucson air traffic control was expecting all three of them to go at the same time, taking up nearly the entire width of the runway, but that’s exactly what happened, with us right behind them. Instead of immediately flying northeast, we headed straight north for a good fifteen minutes, before we began to turn.
“Dad, I thought we had three planes with us. Why are there six of them out there?”
I looked out the window. “Mike!”
“It’s okay, Cal. They’re only with us until we’re past New Mexico. As soon as the NOTAM came out, they started preventative sorties. Those are Arizona Air National Guard F-16s, not regular Air Force, and they’re making sure that we’re actually going home, and not taking a bunch of people into Mexico, since we just had our little adventure getting people OUT of Mexico.”
“And we’d do that why?” I asked.
“Because you’re very high on the Federal Government watch over list,” someone else said. “I never introduced myself. I’m Deputy US Marshal Jeremy Gage. What that list means is that you get a minder. We’re quite well aware that you have possibly the best private security group in the world working for you. I’m not talking Wackenhut, I’m talking Major Douglas and his merry band.”
Gage held up his hands. “I know, you’re not in the military any more. Your last mission, you ended up pulling my father out of a shithole, along with forty other men.”
“That’s why that was my last mission. Fuckers told me to ignore the POW's. That wasn’t going to happen,” Mike said. “I thought that was still classified.”
“In case you didn’t notice, there isn’t a CIA anymore to bitch about things like that.”
“Point taken. So, since I actually thought you were here because of Elroy and Earl, I take it I was a little mistaken.”
Gage said, “Not really. As soon as word hit what you … or rather, what he was doing, and the connection got made that Judge O’Connor was related, there was a loud word passed down from Washington to make sure someone was down here with a real badge. It’s all well and good for you to have your Wackenhut ID. That still means you could end up in jail.”
I frowned. “So, that’s where you come in?”
“Politely … and I’m saying that totally non-sarcastically … that’s right. There’s several reasons why I say politely. The easiest is because of my orders. Handle with velvet gloves. But make sure nothing … and they mean nothing … happens to you, or to anyone in your family. Again, I know that’s what you pay him for. Someone comes along and tries to shoot you, great, he can kill ‘em all and let God sort them out. My job is to make sure that when the local police show up and have a shit fit, or if the FBI gets involved, to simply tell them to have a nice day and go fuck themselves.”
I crossed my arms, leaning back. “Okay, what’s one of the tougher reasons you’re being non-sarcastic?”
“Because at my level, we all know who the Thug was. I have no desire to find out if you could rip my beating heart from my chest and show it to me before I died if I did do anything to irritate you.”
Elroy frowned. “I thought US Marshals were like Texas Rangers. No fear.”
That made Mike chuckle. “Elroy, there’s such a thing as no fear, and then there’s the sense of pure self-preservation that kicks in when you realize that the most dangerous man in the world is sitting across from you.”
Elroy looked at me, puzzled. “The kid with eight women? That’s a lover, not a fighter.”
“I almost wish we’d filmed the two fights. I know why we didn’t, of course. That way there’s no evidence. But yeah, I always knew Cal was good. I just didn’t know he was that good.”
“Speaking of me, I think I asked a question before we took off.”
Mike nodded. “Destroy the drugs. And the drug cartels. I didn’t think they’d start quite this soon, but I knew it was coming.”
Gage said, “It’s about to become a very bad time to be a drug dealer or grower in Mexico. We’re shutting the border down completely. With Cuba out of the picture, and our military cooperating with everyone else, and vice-versa, we now have several carrier groups available.”
From the other side of the plane, Chuck said, “Oh, crap. That means they’ve done the same thing for Florida and the Gulf Coast, too. That means anything trying to come in through a closed border isn’t going to get a friendly greeting.”
“Nope. I’m not sure what the ROE are in total, but they’re going to be pretty simple. You might get a warning shot, and then again, you might not,” Gage said.
“What about civilian air traffic?” Margie wondered.
Chuck shook his head. “If they’re doing this, then until we’re done with military operations, there won’t BE any civilian air traffic coming from Central or South America. I’d bet that the no-fly zone is going to keep moving south, as the military advances. And make no mistake. They WILL advance.”
Mike nodded. “Probably about like shit through a goose. I’m making a guess right now, but I’d say the Marines will advance south from California, secure the Baja, and then stage an amphibious assault on the west coast of Mexico … right about where we got these people from. First Armored will just cross the border, and with the First Cav in support. The Mexican military will either simply move out of their way or join in, because they sure as hell don’t want to go up against us. The Air Force will have plenty of snake and nape available for the druggies.”
Earl said, “I think it also helps that the Soviet Navy will be right there supporting operations as well. They sent over two brigades of blue beret Spetznaz, and everything they have that can fly is coming this way, too.”
“Um, why?”
“Cal, you’re not that naïve,” Mike said. “The Soviet Union rather quickly figured out that, yes, there’s going to be a world government. Sure, all nations are equal. But some nations are still going to be more equal than others. At the same time, they’re pragmatists. They’ve got this great big, beautiful military. Well, it’s that way in their eyes, anyway. Now, suddenly, no worries about the Fulda Gap. No worries about Afghanistan, or China, or anything. There’ll probably … maybe … need to be some kind of planetary defense program, just in case the aliens aren’t all friendly. Otherwise, what’s the point?”
Marcia spoke up. “That’s got to be why we’re getting the bases now. No need to have a full base set aside just to train military pilots. Go clean up the drugs, then cut the size of your military to what you need for border defense, or more precisely, border patrol.”
That caused Margie to nod. “So much for the argument about ‘guns versus butter.’ This is going to make all of the economic theory guy’s heads explode.”
“So, what’s the deal with Cain and Abel? Good guys, bad guys, a little of both?”
Gage laughed. “I like that. A little bit of both. Keep in mind that normally the State Department runs our diplomatic affairs according to how they want to do things, not necessarily how whoever happens to occupy the Oval Office wants them run. Here’s the thing. They’re not stupid, they just act that way sometimes.” He paused, then said, “Okay, maybe a lot of the time. I think it’s the nature of Foggy Bottom. But they do have people that can read the tea leaves. Who was the biggest and most influential name in the private sector, from before World War Two up until, oh, say, ten years ago?”
“Howard Hughes,” Margie said instantly.
“Exactly. Now, who’s making Howard Hughes look like he didn’t have a clue, in less than six months?”
That caused Margie to frown. “These comments don’t sound like what I’d expect from a US Marshal.”
“That’s because you’re not the only one with an MBA, although I joke that I got mine out of a cereal box,” he said.
“Kellogg School of Management,” she said. “I would have thought that you’d have gone into a different branch of government service with that.”
“G.I. Bill. I got out in ’73, got the degree because it was about as far from humping a pig as I could get, and then found out I still wanted to hump the pig instead of count beans.”
Mike said, “Hang on. Where were you in country, hauling an M-60?”
“Garryowen! There’s a reason I pulled a few strings to get this posting. I was the door gunner on one of the choppers that flew top cover for you coming back across the border into South Vietnam. I didn’t know you were carrying my Dad on your back, just you were bringing back some of our boys.”
“He sure seemed like the oldest Sergeant First Class I’d ever seen,” Mike said.
“That’s because he was a fucking bird colonel, that knew if they thought he was an officer, they would have separated him from his men. He’s in the Veteran's Home in Quincy now. He still lost the leg, but other than that, he's fine. Mom died a couple of years ago and he couldn't handle the house by himself any longer.”
“Damn.” Mike blinked rapidly a couple of times, turned towards the window for a couple of seconds, then turned back.
“So, you’re saying that our Cal here has caught some attention in Washington?”
“Christ, yes. Let’s put it … hang on … I have to think of how I can diplomatically phrase this, because again, polite. VERY polite. Most of the time, a quiet word gets passed along, to keep an eye on things. Contrary to popular belief, there actually are people in Washington who can put two and two together and not come up with mangoes as the answer. Remember I said I’m just here as a minder, and it was a loud word? That’s because, briefly … very briefly, as in less than five seconds … there was a consideration to give you a lot more protection. Then, saner heads prevailed, and so I’m here to be your ‘get out of jail free’ card.”
Chuck looked puzzled. “Um, how the hell are you going to get more protection than what we already give Cal, unless you … oh, hell, not that!” He looked horrified.
“Yes. That’s why saner heads prevailed.”
I shook my head. “It wouldn’t have worked. They could invoke the National Secrets Act all they wanted. I’m still a minor, and really? Trying to actually FORCE me to create things just for them? The lid is off the bottle; you can’t put the Djinni back in, any more than Oppenheimer could undo things in New Mexico.”
“Damn. I was told you’re smart. That’s exactly the line of reasoning that was reached. Far better to simply … go with the flow. And let’s be realistic. We hire Wackenhut to guard nuclear weapons, for God’s sake. You’re more important than they are. Nukes, I mean, since we’re going to start destroying those in the spring.”
I looked out the window of the plane myself for almost a minute, then I turned back in. “Thank you,” I said to Hannah, who had brought me a cold iced tea. “Marshal Gage, just so you know and can plan accordingly, here's what's going to happen over the next few days.”
“We're going home tonight, and I suspect that even though it's New Year's Eve, there's not going to be a lot of people staying up late. Tomorrow being New Year's Day, we're going to get things organized. Wednesday is January 2nd. I'm not exactly sure what time they're going to arrive in Hutchinson – that's something we'll find out tomorrow – but I'm going to have two Japanese engineers show up with some plans. Once they arrive, we'll be taking this plane on a long great circle route.
“Hutchinson to Seattle to Adak to Narita. I anticipate being on the ground in Tokyo for no more than twelve hours. Tokyo to Hong Kong for fuel, then to New Delhi, India. Two days there, maximum, and that includes half a day travel time to and from the area we need to visit. New Delhi to Riyadh, simply as a courtesy to King Fahd. A quick stop in Munich so I can visit Siemens, then hop up to Heathrow, so we can swing by Hannah's house and get some more of her personal items, then to Gander for fuel and finally back home.
“I figure three pilots, plus one mechanic. It'll be me, Hannah, Margie, and Helen. Chuck, Angela, Wendy, and Sharon for protection. Fourteen people on board for the first part of the flight, so that'll put us well below ten thousand pounds of weight, even with carrying half a pallet of cash, and enough clothing for almost a week in the plane. No leg will be so long that we won't have at least four hundred miles of extra range. And yes, I'm well aware that I'm talking about nearly twenty thousand miles, and what would normally take a lot more than a week.
“January 2nd is Wednesday. January 7th, the following Monday, is the last day to register for classes without paying a late fee. I don't have an issue paying those for me, but there's no reason for everyone else to do so. Classes start the Monday after that, on the 14th. I hadn't realized we were cutting things this close, but we have the smaller jets, we have the buses that can drive there, and we've already got our housing situation taken care of, as well as ground transportation. There is a lot of pre-enrollment testing needing completion for most of us.”
Gage nodded. “I'm specifically assigned to you. I know you have a shower in the back of this bird. Realistically, that's your personal domain, for you and the ladies. I'm used to operating on spit baths as needed. I've got luggage and a credit card, and in those spots where there's more than a thirty minute refueling stop, I have access to airport lounges with showers so you won't have to smell me.”
“That's good. I don't think I'd like it, if your body odor was offensive. Wouldn't bother me, of course, but I'm going to have three pregnant women along. Can't have their delicate stomachs upset. Otherwise, you'd find out … very briefly … that I really can.”
Elroy looked at me, puzzled. “Can what?”
“Rip his beating heart out and show it to him before he died,” I said, totally deadpan.
Mike sighed. “No, you wouldn't. Oh, I mean, you could. But we all know better. Even more so now, since you know he's former US Military. Christ, you would have offered the Thug a job if you hadn't had to kill him.”
Gage nodded. “I appreciate that. But net result is, you need some modified visas for your ladies to attend school here? Cain and Abel will get those issued. You need some paperwork expedited because Gloria is now married to two men under, and no insult intended here, tribal law, then Cain and Abel will get that issued. You need all the papers done for the people who just got rescued expedited? Cain and Abel. Of course, they're not necessarily doing this out of the goodness of their hearts. The US State Department freaked out when Ambassador Mondale walked in and told a bunch of them to hit the road, that they weren't helping advance the cause of creating a unified world government.”
I frowned. “I thought I remember reading that they work for the Secretary of State.”
“They do. Technically, so does he. Thing is, the Senate unanimously rubber-stamped his appointment in what was probably the shortest session ever in history. But under the Foreign Service Act of 1980 and the President's letter of instruction, he can pretty well tell everyone what is going to happen, and the only one who can tell him ‘no’ is the President. Now, Mondale is the US Ambassador to the Messenger, and we're the only nation with one of those. As far as every other country is concerned, until or unless the Messenger overrides him, Ambassador Mondale is speaking for the Messenger. That includes speaking to our government.”
I smirked and snorted. I'll be damned. He did figure it out. “That doesn't explain why Cain and Abel showed up, though.”
“They showed up because of you. And I mean you, specifically, Cal Lewis. I wasn't kidding in the least when I said that you make Howard Hughes look like a preschooler playing with Lincoln Logs. Perception is reality, and the perception is that you're on pace to be the most influential man on the planet … not just in the United States, but so far as every other government in the world is concerned … within the next decade. Especially in light of the way the world is changing due to the Messenger. The only thing Foggy Bottom is trying to figure out is your evil plan for world domination.”
I rolled my eyes and shook my head. “Good grief!”
That got everyone that heard what Gage had said to laugh, some with a bit more hilarity than others.
He looked around. “Heard that one before, eh?”
I waved at the girls in general, for someone to answer. Margie picked up the gauntlet.
“Marshal Gage … as you're no doubt well aware, Cal turned sixteen this past August. It's completely and utterly ridiculous for him to have any kind of evil plan for global domination. That's why he doesn't have one.” She smiled at the look of relief on Gage's face, then twisted the blade. “Of course, that doesn't mean he doesn't have a good plan for global domination. One that we're ALL helping him with.”
I nodded. “That's been a point of discussion at home for quite some time. The minor detail that things are going … faster … a lot faster than I anticipated is a good thing, I think. I've had this idea kicking around that I could help get power to the world, cheaper and easier than anyone else; and with what my Dad created, I could help make more of the planet inhabitable. Turns out that I'm not the only one who likes that idea.”
“I can imagine. There's also probably a few people who don't like that idea, too. All those people that mine coal for a living, for one,” Gage said.
“I actually understand that. At the same time, if they don't have to risk their lives underground, and I can create another job for them, well, that ought to make things even out. Let's face it, if we can get into space, there's going to be lots of mining needing done on asteroids.”
Gage blinked. “Rock hounds, like in 'The Rolling Stones'.”
I paused, my mouth half open, looking at Gage with a new interest in my eyes.
“What? I grew up on his juveniles. 'Have Space Suit, Will Travel', 'Citizen of the Galaxy', 'Red Planet' … that's the whole point of science fiction, to expand the mind so that when you run into something that doesn't fit into the nice, square box, you don't freeze up. Before I shipped out, my old man made me read 'Starship Troopers' three times. Once for pleasure, then twice more to understand what he meant.”
That made Mike laugh. “I can see that. Your dad made me promise before I ever strapped him to my back that if it looked like we were going to get captured, that we'd do a Kipling in Afghanistan.”
Gage nodded. “Of course. 'When you're wounded and left on Afghanistan's plains, and the women come out to cut up what remains, just roll to your rifle and blow out your brains, and go to your God like a Soldier, a Soldier of the Queen!'”
Mike said something very quietly, then. “Absent companions.”
“Absent companions,” Gage replied.
Mike looked at me. “He's in. If it's an act, we've got plenty of tunnels and pig farms. I don't think it is. Use him, take him with you. He knows too much of the good stuff to be on the wrong side.”
“If Mike says you're in, that's good enough for me. That's why I pay him, to deal with security. If he gives me advice, then it behooves me to take it, because he's the expert.”
Gage shook his head. “That's … different.”
That made Chuck laugh. “Tell me about it. Oh, and Cal? Please don't try to catch any cobras when we're in India, unless you feel like you need to do so, to make a point. It's bad enough sitting back and watching you catch rattlesnakes.”
I laughed at that, then Chuck and Hannah spent the rest of the flight home telling the story of the great golf outing.
It was just after dark when we landed in Hutchinson. Both of the big buses were waiting for us, since we had so many of our security team along. After a relatively quick ride home, I walked in and collapsed into my recliner.
“Girls, thanks for riding in the other planes, just in case there were issues.”
“Of course. It made sense, as you haven't created something in case one of them has problems,” Beth said.
“Working on it. Mike, how are you doing on the material replacements?” I asked.
“I need to discuss some metallurgy with you, probably a couple of hours’ worth. I think it's possible, I'm just not sure how well we'd be able to conceal it as being something that could have been made on this planet.”
I nodded. “Thanks.” I realized then that William Dangu had come into the house with us. “Have a seat, William. You're family. That voice you heard from the speaker, that's my created intelligence, Mycroft Holmes. Mike, this is William Dangu.”
Mike said, “Hello, William. From your name, and my analysis of you, it appears that you are also a member of the indigenous group from Uluru. Hopefully, you won't find too many strange things around here, if you stay.”
William laughed. “It wouldn't matter whether I found them strange or not. He is my King, and I am sworn to protect him.”
I nodded. “Then I guess you better get in touch with Leah Duwai and have her catch the next plane to California. Once I'm back from the trip, that's going to be my home for the next couple of years.” I looked at Helen. “Unless you have anything to say that's going to change that?”
“I'm just the High Priestess. And one of your wives, of course.” She walked over to the kitchen counter, opened a plastic container, and tossed me a chunk of gold. “At least you already know how to make the letters fit.”
I glanced over to where Hannah was sitting on the couch, talking to Dora. I zoomed in on her hand, then quickly fashioned the ring and started working on the pendant.
Marcia picked up the tub and carried it over to Hannah. “Here, you need to pick your stone.”
“Oh, that's a pretty emerald,” Hannah said.
Marcia nodded. “Of course. Redheads and green stones, go figure. Here you go!” She picked it up out of the bin and tossed it to me. I reached up without looking and caught it. Marcia then said, “I'm sure somewhere in your jewelry collection you have a plain, gold necklace, right?”
“Of course. Just a second.” Hannah got up, went to one of her travel cases, opened it, then spent a couple of moments finding a necklace. “Here, Marcia.”
“Not for me. Take it over to the jewelry maker.”
She walked over. “Cal?”
“Thank you.” I took the necklace from her, then attached the pendant I'd just made to it. “Here you go, Dear. If you'd give me your left hand, I think this ring should fit quite nicely. And here's your necklace, too.”
I didn't realize I had a bit of an audience, until there was some applause. “Oh, I guess I've never really done that in front of people, before.”
Andrew frowned a little. “Does that … I don't know, hurt at all? When you shoot those beams out of your eyes, to heat up the gold?”
The girls all shook their heads. Eve said, “It hurt when we were first learning how to do it, like when I first started doing a lot of running for basketball. I was using muscle groups that I'd never used in the past. But, with properly working our way up to it, it's no harder now to melt gold than it was before to shoot some hoops. You just concentrate, and you do it.”
“Holly!” She stopped what she was doing and looked at me, surprised at my yelling at her. “Not here, not now, and something you're just not ready for. If it'd worked, you might have just killed Mahlee.”
It really wasn't possible for her to go pale, but other than that, her reaction was the same.
“Oh. Oh! I'm sorry, I was just watching you, and how easy it looked, then when Eve was talking about it …”
I said, “Lara, don't help her. I suspect that you can, because you used to have that skill when you were alive.”
Holly looked startled. “Lara says, 'Yes, my King. I'll make sure she doesn't do things that would hurt others that don't need hurting.' I didn't realize that she was helping me with those abilities.”
“It's like I said, I'm the wild-card that no one saw coming. You were being prepared to do battle with whatever is in the comet, whether it's actually Shiva, or his AI.”
That made William chuckle a little. Holly shot daggers at him with her eyes. He held up a hand. “Sorry, little one, it's just I remember the day you were born. It's hard for me to distinguish the little girl that skinned her knees running from a grasshopper from a warrior like our King.”
“No,” I said, flatly.
“No, what?” Holly asked.
“No, you may not take William out to the garage and show him how fast and strong you really are. Not tonight, anyway. Tomorrow, William, you'll go out with Holly and start working on her training. She's a LOT faster than you think, and a lot stronger, too. She needs to know how to temper her power, especially since she's going to be the starting JV Quarterback for the Salthawk Football team this next season.”
William raised an eyebrow. “Standard American high school tackle football?” He tilted his head and looked at Holly, nodding. “I'm looking forward to it.”
Beth stood up. “Come on, Cal. We're got a long night ahead of us.” She looked at Eve and Dora. “Be ready, but I don't think we'll need you.”
“Well, I was wondering if we were going to make a little trip. I guess that answered that question for me, didn't it?”
Beth smiled. “You were already planning on it. It's already almost ten at night in Washington, and you know they're not getting any sleep.”
Earl nodded. “On that note, I think we'll see what we see on the news tomorrow morning.”
Over the next ten minutes, everyone that was leaving, did so. Beth and I put our uniforms on, then went out through the garage. I made sure to leave the ring from King Fahd behind, because I'd really hate to have to explain that.
After our leisurely five minute flight to Washington, Beth and I landed just outside the White House. There was a Secret Service agent walking the perimeter.
“Wow, you look like you're a little cold. Maybe you ought to come in with us and have some of that … what's it called, oh, yes, hot chocolate,” I said.
“Holy … sorry, you scared me. Um, is there a reason why you're here so late on New Year's Eve?”
Beth laughed. “We heard there were going to be fireworks, so we thought we'd stop in and see if we could watch them with Ronald, Nancy, and the rest of the situation team.”
I'd used my vision to look into the ground and saw that there were several people already in the bunker, waiting for things to kick off. “Would you please go ahead and announce us? We'll find our way down into the basement.”
I heard him get onto his radio as I walked over and opened the door to the Oval Office. Beth followed me into the White House and down a corridor. There were the sounds of running feet, then two agents came around a corner. One of them was startled and started to reach for his gun, which the other saw and held his arm out, blocking him.
“Hello, again,” I said. “We're just going over to the hidden stairs behind that bookshelf, so we can go to the situation room. You don't need to escort us, I know the way.”
“Sorry, Sir, Ma'am, but we do need to escort you. We're not going to stop you, but we do need to be with you,” the agent I'd recognized said.
“Oh, okay. Far be it from me to break protocol, right?”
That made Beth laugh, as I hit the hidden switch that opened the door to the stairs. She was still chuckling when we got down to the door of the situation room.
I opened it and walked in. “Hello, Ronald. George. Good to see both of you. I thought that since we were in the vicinity, we'd stop in to watch the fireworks with you. Tonight is the night you celebrate your New Year, isn't it?”
Reagan said, “Yes, it is. But I'm guessing you're here not to watch the fireworks that we set off here over the National Mall, are you?”
“Amazing how smart you are. Obviously, other than a few, relatively minor incidents, we've been pretty much sitting back and seeing how you'd handle things. Just so I'm clear, what exactly are you planning on doing tonight?” I asked.