After several hours in the air, John Owen’s helicopter landed on another ship where Gabriel was able to sleep comfortably and eat real food. Three days later, Gabriel, John and a small crew re-boarded the helicopter at night. Several more airborne hours passed and then the New Kona beach first appeared as a ghostly band of silver against the black ocean, then resolved as moonlit whitecaps striking black sand. Jungle passed underneath, then a clearing lit by a necklace of yellow lights as the helicopter descended. Gabriel could just make out a small group of figures standing next to a van.
“We’re home at last,” John said; his voice was distinct in the headphones over the whump-whump of the huge blades.
As the engine died and the blades slowed, Gabriel could see a familiar, but older, face. “Is that Elisabeth?” he asked.
“They do grow up,” Owen said thoughtfully. The door popped open and a rush of warm, moist air flooded in. It was one hour before dawn.
After Gabriel was shown his guest room, he was escorted to an early breakfast on a large verandah. The sky had just begun to glow over the small lava beach. Gabriel and John sat across from Colonel Bill Dornan, now Owen’s chief operating officer and security head. Dornan, having just turned sixty-nine, seemed to be aging in reverse.
“Where exactly is this place?” Gabriel asked.
“You’ve guessed we’re not in Hawaii. This island is way out in the Pacific Ocean,” Bill Dornan said.
“Not even on some charts,” John added. “We are about twelve hundred miles from any other significant land mass. “Best you not know the details.”
“Doesn’t the Commission have an air force?” Gabriel asked.
“They control the leadership in countries that do, whenever it comes within the scope of their jurisdiction,” Dornan said.
“Which gives them the power to strike us,” John said. He sipped his coffee for a moment. “Let me get right to it. A lot has happened since you escaped. They’ve made some arrests. And they have just made a mistake that will cost them dearly: Someone in the G-A-N has killed Bishop Allan Gardiner.”
Gabriel paused to take that in. “When?”
“I just heard about it when we left to pick you up at sea. The police were asked to cover it up while the Technology Licensing Commission staffers tried to figure out how to handle the spin.”
“So it’s going to be open war,” Gabriel said.
“It was inevitable. We couldn’t survive forever in the shadow of this new regulatory regime. If we don’t move soon, the Commission will eventually win.”
“You’re right about that,” Gabriel said. “So do you have a plan?”
“Things have moved very, very fast since you got aboard that ship, Gabriel. Let’s get some breakfast in you and we’ll catch you up.”
——
When the dawn had lit up the ocean like a glowing lava flow, and Gabriel had stopped drinking coffee and started on a cigar, he stood and stretched. “I’m ready for all your news,” he said. “And I haven’t forgotten that Snowfeather is in jail again.”
“Well, in no particular order, here it is.” John said. “They are using a combination of blackmail, extortion, biological warfare, and selective Stage Three confiscations. More clever than I anticipated.”
“TB 6 is showing up everywhere,” Dornan said, “and they are interdicting our antibiotic and vaccine shipments, and doling out the confiscated supplies to control key people.”
“Most people are still unaware we have cures for these diseases?”
Gabriel nodded. “What about Snowfeather? How will you get her out?”
“I’m working on it. I didn’t have all the details when I first told you that Snowfeather was under arrest. Here’s how it came down. Two weeks ago, I tried to get her a shipment of antibiotics. The handoff blew up, and she was arrested by NYPD. We do have friends on that force. So, for the time being, she is safe. Our lawyers have been trying to get her bailed out, but we are stalled temporarily.”
Gabriel carefully placed the cigar on an ashtray. “Where, exactly, is she is in jail?”
“In the Manhattan precinct where I have three personal friends, and you have one.”
“Sergeant Wilson Lean Wolf O’Shaunnesy?”
“The same. Only city custody for now, but bail was denied. They’re holding off the Commission for the time being.”
“I’ve got to go back and help her. You’d do the same, John.”
“Yes, I would. The good news is that we now have the security recording of the Bishop’s murder. This is leverage.”
“How did you get that?”
“Friends…”
“If it implicates the Directorate or the Commission, they will wet their panties, wondering when and how you will release it.”
“I’d like to threaten to release our recording in order to get Snowfeather out.”
“Thanks, John, but likely it won’t work that way. You’ll burn your law enforcement friends and give Longworthy and his crowd time to think of a way to discredit the recording. I say you hit ’em with it, and work hard to get Snowfeather out at the same time.”
“So we just run it?”
“Yes. And we hurry,” Gabriel said. “You saw what they were willing to do to stop my webcasts.”
“Gabriel has a point. They are cutting the fiber op cables,” Bill said. “They hope to squeeze web access to the point where only the compliant media is left.”
“Of course, web access uses multiple sources, including satellite, and the old style phone lines. Some of the backbone cables are intact,” John said.
“That will only get worse,” Gabriel said. “What could they do to hurt satellite television and internet?”
“They seem to have a staged plan to close the whole thing down bit by bit. People are losing bandwidth every day.”
“But, good for us, they are in a self-made bind,” Dornan said. “The Commission still needs at least one working path for its propaganda campaign—so they can’t give up the basic com-infrastructure. But they desperately need to control the content.”
“While they are trying to silence talk of the pandemic, they’ve started confiscating some satellite receivers and dishes in the old Stage Three areas,” Owen said.
“If the scope and pace of those seizures expand rapidly,” Dornan added, “they are triggering information access panic.”
“I agree with Bill. They are moving too damn fast, Gabriel. Even since you escaped, there were seizures in the Salt Lake area, Portland, Seattle, Chicago, as well as Manhattan.”
“Yes,” Gabriel said. “That will work against them. People won’t put up with this. It is stupid of them, moving so fast…unless they have an end-game plan. So, about my earlier question. Do we have a plan?”
“Yes…an evolving one. I have a safe house in DC from which you can carry on a lobbying campaign,” Owen replied. “Meantime, you have my word we’ll get Snowfeather out. Even if I personally have to break her out.”
“The goal is Treaty de-ratification,” Dornan said. “Thurston Smith, Junior, the new Speaker of the House, has been talking it up.”
“So this presents a new problem,” John said. “Thurston Smith Senior is now in federal jail. With Snowfeather also in Manhattan jail, the G-A-N has two hostages.”
Gabriel pursed his lips. “When can you get them out?”
“Not sure…yet.”
“So we are stuck for the moment, Senator,” Dornan said. “By the way, no one seems to know where your wife is.”
“Which is good news. Trust me, Alice will be very hard to find.” Gabriel looked out over the railing at the distant waves. “Does the Senate have the power to cancel any treaty ratification?” he asked. “I mean, without the president’s agreement?”
“My lawyers looked into that. It probably can be done, but not without the House,” John said. “Something like that was first done in July 1789, by Joint Resolution, repudiating the existing treaties with France. My people warn that it will probably take two thirds of the entire Senate, declared privately, before anyone will have the guts to stand up and be counted. And even with the House on board, we will need at least the passive support of the Administration.”
Gabriel frowned. “That’s a hard, hard sell. President Baxter would have been an impossible sell because the original treaty was his baby. …And President Chandler? He’s an heir to Baxter’s legacy.”
“That SOB is a wimp, never known for courage, political or any other,” Dornan growled.
“Ah, but a very egotistical wimp,” Gabriel said.
“I agree,” John said. “His ego is on our side. We have heard that President Chandler resents Longworthy’s arrogance and interference.”
“He might enjoy taking a shot at the Commission just to get back at Rex?” Bill asked.
“Maybe so,” Gabriel said, warming to the idea. “Can Thurston Junior deliver the House? Gabriel asked.
“The Speaker can deliver,” John said. “But not while the Speaker’s father is in jail.”
“So is this checkmate?” Gabriel asked.
“We can’t allow it,” John said quietly, “we will not allow it.”
Gabriel stood, taking his coffee cup to the railing. “What do we have to work with?” he asked somewhat to himself. Surf foamed against the beach, while a soft breeze stirred the orchid plants below. White clouds drifted in the brilliant blue sky. He took it all in and said softly, “We have reality on our side. The survival instinct.”
John regarded his friend. “The new pandemics will kill people, potentially in the hundreds of millions. I can’t make enough drugs fast enough in one plant, even if I could deliver them. But the other pharmaceutical plants in the US were just locked up when the early retro orders were served. The research facilities padlocked but not decommissioned. Most of them could be brought on line as soon the Commission is out of business.”
“Unless the G-A-N blows them up,” Dornan said gravely.
“How long do we have?” Gabriel asked. There was a long pause. “I am in for the duration. I don’t need any rest. Just send me back in the field as soon as you need to.”
“Good,” John said, letting go of his breath. “Good,” he repeated. “I’ll figure something out today. We have no time to lose. No time at all.”
Part Three: The Trial
“Never yield to force; never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.”
Winston Churchill