Delta Green - [8]
She was tiny at five-feet, four-inches and gave the impression of atomic particles on the move. McKenna sometimes called her hyperactive. Her dark red hair was cut somewhat longer than the Air Force cared for, and in zero-gravity, she kept it in place with a denim headband. She had pale green eyes that seemed constantly in search of clues, reasons, and solutions. The light blue, zippered jumpsuits favored by station personnel didn’t disguise much of her lush figure.
Floating into the command center, she found several technicians manning monitoring stations and Overton at the main console near the port. The view through the porthole was currently centered on the Caribbean Sea, glowing with hazy greens and blues. An eruption of Mauna Loa the week before had sprinkled ash in the atmosphere, resulting in a diminished clarity.
The space station’s commander had gray overtones — hair and eyes, but he was slim and fit and long at six-four. He was forty-four years old. Aggressive and ambitious, Overton was also loyal to his subordinates, and his decisioning was always weighted with a concern for their welfare.
As Overton turned his head to look for her, she saw that the creases in his forehead had deepened.
Pearson glided across the center, pulled her knees down to assume a head-up position similar to Overton’s, and took hold of a grab bar on the side of the main console.
“Problem, General?”
“Damned big one, Amy. Delta Green’s been hijacked.”
That had to be impossible. “How?”
“We don’t know, yet. Brackman said it was on the ground at Wet Country”
“Dimatta and Williams?”
“They’re all right, but I understand there are some other fatalities. Damn!”
Overton didn’t usually display much emotion. Part of his job was to observe the attitudes and behavior of his subordinates and transfer them off the station if it appeared that the delicate balances in human relationships were in jeopardy.
“Brackman wants to keep a lid on this for as long as possible,” Overton continued.
“Where’s McKenna?”
“On the way to Wet Country. And I’ve scrambled Delta Yellow out of Jack Andrews. For the time being, we’ll keep Delta Red in reserve here.”
“Space Command is handling it?” she asked.
“At least until the Joint Chiefs say otherwise. Thorpe will be putting out a silent alert, and you’re to check in with him if you have any ideas. Right now, I want you to get hold of Dimatta and get the details”
“Right away, General”
Pearson pushed off from the console, headed for the communications compartment. She used the doorjamb to stop her momentum.
Tech Sergeant Donna Amber, a bright but mousy woman with close-cropped brown hair from Birmingham, Alabama, looked up from her console. “I heard, Colonel.”
“Let’s see if we can run Major Dimatta down, Donna.”
“Will do.”
Milt Avery shot by in the corridor as Pearson positioned herself behind Amber. The crisis team was moving into action, and it was a good team. Pearson was proud of being a part of it.
The communications console was a complex piece of equipment, incorporating the latest technologies in multiband and microwave voice and data transmission. A confusing array of touch-sensitive pads, light-emitting diode indicators, quartz digital readouts, and display terminals was spread over a five-foot span. Donna Amber was as skilled with its concept and operation as any surgeon.
She first checked the readout that gave her Themis’s celestial coordinates. Because of the satellite’s orbital characteristics, it was not always in contact with various communications networks, such as the Air Force Communications System (AFSATCOM) or the Critical Communications Net.
“I can get a link through CRITICOM,” she said, and did. “We’re scrambling both ends, Colonel.”
Dimatta was in the control tower. “Alpha, Delta Green One.”
Pearson, who was the intelligence officer, was actually Alpha Three, after Overton and Avery. “Brief me, Green”
“There were two of them, Alpha. Intruders. They came in by hang glider over the north boundary… “
“Did you backtrack the radar tapes?”
“Affirmative. No radar contacts. The hang glider structural members are fiberglass. Both were abandoned two hundred yards north of the main hangar. They took out the two guards in the hangar… “
“Took out?”
“Killed them, goddamn it! Airman Vrdlka and army buck sergeant Aaron Stein.” Dimatta’s tone carried his rage. “The fatalities in the control tower were Lieutenant Ellen Powers and a civilian contract employee named Jay Guidon.”
Pearson was absorbing some of Dimatta’s anger, but managed to keep it out of her voice. “Weapons used?”
“Blunt instrument on one of the guards. The other three were shot. Silenced, I’d guess, and probably about nine millimeter. One slug each. This guy was a pro, Am… Alpha.”
“All right. Now, Delta Green. She was fueled?”
“Full load, topped off right after we landed. That’s SOP.”
“No radar track on the departure?”
“Radars were shut down.”
“No one heard the takeoff?”
“The ship was towed about a third of the way down the runway. We found a tractor in the drainage ditch off the runway. If anyone heard the start-up or the takeoff, it was subconsciously.”
