BERNSTEIN, FRISCH, JODLE, AND WACHOWSKI
INVESTMENT GROUP, NEW YORK CITY
The Russian didn’t exactly feel out of place in the financial district as he rode the plastic-lined elevator on his way to the thirty-fifth floor of the Halas building, as money never, ever, frightened him, nor did the men and women who had it in droves. The fortress of glass, white marble, and steel ugliness set itself apart from the gleaming spires that replaced the old World Trade Center, which had come to an abrupt end on September 11, 2001. He looked at the three Wall Street types next to him as they stepped off on the floor below his destination. He knew very few people ever rode the elevator to the topmost floor. He smiled as the doors closed at the haughty mannerisms the departed men had about them, which he found distinctly funny. After all, he mused, we are practically in the same business—the procurement of money and the acquisition of power. He punched in the private code on the keypad and the elevator continued upward one more flight.
The doors opened and the small Russian stepped free of the richly paneled car and saw the two security guards flanking either side of the double glass doors. The first rose from his small desk and confronted the visitor. He held out his hand and the Russian smiled and held open his black coat and sport jacket to show the guards that he carried no firearms. He smirked at the naiveté of the investment firm. He lowered his hands and the second guard issued him a visitor’s pass. The small plastic card was computer coded and it allowed him access to the thirty-fifth floor of one of the most advanced and profitable investment firms in the financial world.
“Mr. Frisch is expecting you. His assistant will escort you. Sir, your visiting privileges extend only to the boardroom.”
The Russian smiled at the seriousness of the two guards. He had seen no less than three alternate ways of entering this so-called secure haven in less than the two minutes it took to ride the elevator to his richly appointed destination. But that was information he would file away for another day.
“Mr. Jones, please come with me,” said a matronly woman in a gray suit. He smiled at her overstated manliness and at the tie she wore. American women in their struggles to be competitive drove them to extremes, in his humble opinion.
The Russian saw the boardroom he had been in many times. He was the only person inside the vast organization to actually see and have an audience with the men behind the curtain, the wizards, as he liked to refer to them. He stepped inside and saw the lone figure of a man sitting at the head of one of the longer boardroom tables the immigrant Russian had ever seen. The gray-haired man looked up from the newspaper and nodded that the visitor should sit.
“Ask Mr. Jodle to join us please, Mrs. Abernathy.”
“He has been notified, sir.” The woman closed both doors as she backed out with a hard look at the man visiting her boss. She obviously knew of his special talents.
The older man, in his late fifties, looked up and then slapped the morning edition of The New York Times.
“Care to explain this failure?” the man asked as he stood and went to the sidebar and poured himself a cup of coffee. The Russian noticed the coffee service was probably worth all of the meager salary he ever made inside the Moscow Police Department. He also noticed coffee was not offered to him. The Russian sat down with a smirk. The chairman of the board noticed but chose not to say anything as he returned to his expensive high-backed chair that appeared to have been custom designed to look down at the other eighteen chairs around the table.
The door opened and a well-dressed man in an expensive three-piece suit strode in and without a greeting to the visitor sat down next to the chairman of the board. He folded his hands in front of him and then glared toward the small man at the end of the long table. Another sniff of humor from the small man as he noticed how much the well-appointed man acted like a schoolboy in front of the gray-haired chairman.
“Failure?” he asked, hinting at confusion.
“The police have already cleared the navy yard and proclaimed a major victory in the war on drugs inside the city. And yet, the building still stands. Madam is still breathing.”
The Russian stood and made his way to the coffee service and poured himself some coffee without invitation. The younger partner was about to say something but the older man placed a hand on his and stilled him from the complaint. The Russian went back to the far end of the expansive table after pouring an inordinate amount of sugar into the china cup.
The visitor sipped his coffee and then placed the cup down on the polished surface. He reached into his coat pocket and produced something he placed on a water tray after removing the empty carafe, and then slid the items and the tray down the long table where it came to rest in front of the two men.
“It seems I was not told the exact situation by your young colleague.”
The older man picked up the photos from the tray. His eyes went from the Russian to the photos. They were in night-vision format and the man could see that the photographer had used a long-range camera to take the shots. They showed three men in civilian dress as they fired upon the van as it hurtled toward building 117. The other men and women in the photo all wore the distinctive FBI Windbreakers that were so recognizable to the world.
“You were told enough to complete the contract you agreed to. Now, what is so amazing about these photos?” The older man passed them to his younger partner, who had been at the attack at its outset.
“Who are those men?” he asked as he lifted the china cup to his lips and blew lightly to cool the liquid. He sipped and waited.
“FBI? How in the hell are we to know?” the younger man named Jodle said with indignity as he tossed the photos back onto the silver tray.
The Russian laughed as he set the cup back onto the table. “No, I’m afraid all of the local field agents within the five boroughs have been tagged by my people. These men are not agents of that particular law enforcement group.”
“Local police, possibly agents from Washington, who in the hell cares? Your job was to permanently shut that building down and to eliminate any possible contact between Madam and the federal authorities.”
The Russian was growing weary of the answers he was receiving. “Your man inside Miss Mendelsohn’s sphere of influence, this Julien, says that these strangers are military.”
“So, what does that have to do with this?” the older man asked as he leaned back to hear the answer. “And where is Julien? We wish to speak to him at the soonest opportunity.”
“He was rather shocked at the extreme measures for which I was contracted.” He sipped coffee and then smiled. “He’s what you would call ‘disillusioned’ at your harsh tactics. He and his men are currently under my care.”
“Bring him and the others to us. We would like to question them ourselves,” Jodle said as he tried to look intimidating but failed miserably.
Silence.
The two investments men exchanged worried looks when the Russian said nothing. But his grin said everything.
“Secrets, secrets, secrets. Some are good at keeping them, others good at learning them.”
Both men got the same gut-wrenching feeling in their stomachs at the exact same moment. The visitor pushed the coffee cup aside and then leaned forward in his chair. He fixed the two men with a knowing look.
“I guess it was divine providence that these men you so casually shrug off as FBI field agents shot the tires out of that van, otherwise we might have destroyed one of the most valuable pieces of equipment in the history of the world, and the person responsible for its construction in the same process. Leaving us poor working peasants wondering just why you gentlemen wanted to permanently stop the advancement of science. Could it be for other than humanitarian purposes? Shame on you.”
“You have been contracted to complete a job, this was not done,” the older man Frisch said with as much indignity as he could foster.
“The conditions settled upon in our previous agreement will have to be reworded, I’m afraid.”
The statement was met with shocked silence.
“My organization has decided to wait and see just what is planned for that old building.” He stood from his chair and then buttoned his thick coat over the sport jacket. He smiled at the two men who sat looking white-faced. “Oh, and we have decided that it would be far more beneficial to speak with Madam Mendelsohn ourselves to understand better just what an amazing piece of equipment she has in her control.”
“Look, we can work out a much better and safer conclusion to this small problem.”
The small Russian fixed Jodle and Frisch with a look that now lacked the good humor of his smile.
“Safer for whom?” The look was one filled with disgust at the two very rich men. “Betrayal of one’s savior, it seemed worth far more than forty pieces of silver for some.”
The two men watched the Russian mobster leave the boardroom. The older man closed his eyes as he was seeing the secrets that drove his world come crashing back into his life. He turned to the younger man.
“You brought this man to our attention, and now he threatens blackmail at the very least, and what is far more terrifying is that now, thanks to that fool Julien, he has knowledge of the one thing that cannot ever be brought to the attention of the authorities.”
The younger man felt his prestige within this firm being driven from him.
“I will—”
“Fix this, Jodle, fix it or we all go down, and we cannot allow that.”
The young partner watched the chairman angrily rise and leave him sitting there. He looked up as the senior partner turned and faced him.
“There is no telling what that Russian is thinking. Blackmail may be the least. He may try for something that may be far more profitable than that.”
Joshua Jodle felt his heart fall to his gut as he turned for the double doors of the boardroom as the old man angrily called after him.
“He’s going after the doorway.”
BROOKLYN NAVY YARD
Jack saw the last of the FBI close up shop and leave. Special Agent-in-Charge Williamson apologized to Collins, but there was nothing he could do since the locals claimed jurisdiction when it was proven that drug manufacturing was not the reason behind the FBI involvement. The remains of the van, very little to speak of, were raised by the NYPD and FDNY just as dawn broke over the city. Jack watched it all from the privacy of the office windows. The last of the police also finally finished after a brief inspection of the surrounding buildings. The PIT inside building 117 was closed and the fire department skimmed right over it in their perusal of the building. A sigh of relief could be had by all.
An hour after the overcast skies allowed enough light in to see, Collins saw the long line of vans as it progressed through the spot where the stolen van had crashed through the FBI barricade the night before. Jack walked down the steps and waited.
Niles Compton was assisted from the lead van and Jack moved to meet him.
“Quite a night in old Brooklyn, I understand?” he asked as he settled the crutch under his arm. Collins took him by the elbow for added support.
“More than we ever bargained for.”
“How bad is it?” Niles asked briefly, stopping as the other white vans pulled in behind the first.
“The explosive, an exotic one at that, took out the electrical lines under the river. No power to six of the seven buildings, including ours. But that’s the better part of the news,” Jack said as he shook his head at the devastation of learning what he had in the hours leading to Niles and the Event Group technical team’s arrival. “The attack also took out the base foundation of the building, flooding the PIT where the doorway was secured. Virginia said it looks hopeless, at least until she can get her full nuclear forensics and Jenks’s engineering teams in there.”
“Well, maybe I can help with that part at least.”
Jack saw the technicians as they started unloading material and boxes from the inside. That was when he saw Sarah and Anya. His eyes went wider when he saw Alice Hamilton giving instructions to the more than seventy engineers. He looked questioningly at Compton, who smiled and shook his head. Jack knew Niles would be inundated with the requests of at least two people who wanted to be included on the field teams and he knew they had forwarded those requests through the office of one Alice Hamilton. Jack knew without being told that Niles had held his ground but caved in at least allowing the two women on site during the mission.
“I knew you were afraid of Alice. You traded her their mission status to be on the home team in Brooklyn, didn’t you?” Jack said as Niles turned and started for the door.
“Yep.”
* * *
An old meeting room originally intended for naval engineers in the previous century had been cleaned and a dozen large monitors installed. Three of these monitors had a view of the PIT, which had been opened since the all-clear was given by the FDNY. The silent men and women sat around the elongated and very chipped-up Formica table and stared at the water-damaged devastation below their feet. Men and women technicians had pumped the remaining water from the PIT but most could see that the doorway would never function again in the shape it was in.
“First order of business,” Niles said as he rapped his knuckles on the table to get everyone’s attention. “Securing this site, Jack?”
“I assigned Colonel Farbeaux to that task.” Jack looked across the table at the Frenchman, who had conveniently arranged his seating assignment to sit between Anya and Sarah. He smiled at Jack for only a brief moment. He pulled up his notes on the electronic pad. “Henri?” Collins looked questioningly at Sarah, who shrugged her shoulders and then winked at Jack, which got her a return frown.
“With the assistance of Dr. Morales, I have learned that we may have a break in who was responsible.” Henri tapped another button on his pad and a monitor came to life. “This is a Russian immigrant whose real name is a mystery, but the NYPD has dubbed him the ‘Bolshevik.’ Goes by the name of Jones. Not very original, but most Russian mob types aren’t known for their originality in any areas except murder. That is this man’s specialty.”
The picture on the monitor was of a man with a black beard and one who seemed very jovial in the surveillance clip stolen by Europa from the NYPD.
“What led you to him?” Niles asked the Frenchman.
“Probability. Nothing happens in Brooklyn without this man knowing or being responsible for it. He is a former police captain with the Moscow Metropolitan Police. Very skilled. I once read a dossier on him back in the good old days when intelligence services could track him. As corrupt a lawman as there ever was. The man is a killer and is known to use nothing but military-grade weaponry and explosives.”
“But you’re not a hundred percent sure that he’s responsible?” Compton persisted.
“I know you people would like absolutes, but you’ll have to trust my instinct on this. This was well planned and very nearly flawlessly executed. Yes, I’m sure he at least knows about it and who did it.”
“I concur with the colonel,” Jack said as he studied the face on the monitor.
“Why?” Virginia asked out of curiosity.
“Let’s just say I believe he has insight to men like this, at least from Henri’s unique perspective.”
Chuckles sounded from around the table.
“Okay, get our friend here a link with Europa and get this man found and out of our way. I don’t give a damn about his reasoning for now. I just need this project secured. Needless to say the president was briefed this morning on what happened here last night and knows we are involved. He is still allowing us his new leeway time for oversight, so let’s not waste it. The directors of the FBI and CIA will soon start adding the two plus two here and begin asking questions the president could never begin to answer.”
Henri nodded and then shut off the program from his electronic pad.
At that moment the door opened and a Marine allowed Moira Mendelsohn into the room. The motorized chair stopped just inside the door. Niles, with difficulty, limped over and stood in front of her and introduced himself. Jack and the others were clearly seeing the respect Niles had for the Traveler. When Niles moved back to allow the Traveler inside several others, including Anya, stood to greet the great mind in the room. Moira’s inquisitive brown eyes went to Jason Ryan and she had to hang on to his hand a moment longer to examine his tattoo better. He half smiled and then pulled his hand away and sat next to Mendenhall, who held back a snicker at Jason’s facial design.
“What do you have, Virginia?” Niles asked as he watched Moira move in next to Jack and Charlie Ellenshaw.
“Professor Mendelsohn inspected what’s left and even with Europa’s help, as it was explained by our host, it would take at least seven months for her to reprogram the system and repair the water damage.”
“Not knowing just what this Europa is and its limitations, I would have to stick to my estimate,” Moira said as she took in the people around the table.
Virginia lowered her head and Jenks patted her leg, which elicited a kind look. The room was silent. Jenks slid his estimate for the loss of power lines and other damage to the local grid supplying power to the building as also a cause for concern, but now it seemed a moot point so he remained silent.
“Even if the doorway were operational and the power supply problem sorted out, we have no connecting doorway for our signal to lock on to,” Virginia said with a nod toward the Traveler.
“If I may ask a question that I am sure is readily known by most in this room,” Moira said as she faced the Group, “but if you had a repaired doorway, or maybe even a duplicate, second doorway, how far back, dimensionally speaking, are we talking about?”
Looks were exchanged and the room became just as silent as before. Niles cleared his throat and then nodded for Virginia to answer the question.
“Approximately two hundred and sixty-five thousand years. Exact location, unknown, the location we have—Antarctica.”
Moira was silent as the outrageous answer stunned her. She did notice the young dark-haired woman lower her head and then the smaller woman saying something to her softly, both expressing the bad news on their faces.
“Considerably further back than I have traveled, my dear. The astronomy calculations alone would take a supercomputer a full three years to even get a bearing on a location that far back.” She shook her head and then used her wheelchair’s toggle to turn away from the group of curious eyes as she thought about the difficulties involved in a dimensional transfer that far back.
As for the group, none wanted to say they had the most powerful supercomputer ever devised at their disposal, but what would that serve? What the Traveler was trying to explain went over the heads of most everyone in the room. “I hope someday you will allow me to know how the subject of this far-flung dimensional jump managed to achieve this.”
“It happened during the recent war.”
She turned in her chair and looked at Compton with excitement on her face.
“The wormholes?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“I knew that would be the only way they could get here from such a distance. They actually time-warped here?”
“Yes,” Niles said. “Is that helpful to you?”
They all saw the sadness in the Traveler’s face. She shook her head. She looked at the fallen face of the woman with jet-black hair as she swallowed hard and then held the smaller woman’s hand tighter. Moira wanted to reach out to the young woman but held back as she knew she had not delivered the news that was so badly needed to be heard.
“We did uncover something concerning our Traveler friend here,” Master Chief Jenks said, shrugging off the warning elbow poke he received from Virginia.
“What is that?” Niles asked, not wanting any more bad news at the moment.
Jenks tossed a small device onto the table with a clang. The wires leading from it looked like it was attached to a bomb, but then most saw the old clock face and digital readout were blank. Jenks quickly connected the wires to an adapter and then plugged the device in and the clock face flared to red and blue brightness. Moira was the only person in the room besides Jenks and Virginia to know what it was.
“The time stamp,” Moira said as she eased in closer to the table as Jenks picked up the small timepiece.
“Time stamp?” Niles asked.
“Yes,” answered the Traveler. “It records the date and time of the displacement jump.”
“Do you remember the very last date of your final dimensional shift?” Virginia asked, now curious to hear her explanation.
“Of course, September 25, 1973. The time should be frozen at zero three forty-five hundred hours and fifty-one seconds on that date.”
Jenks held the recorder up so all could see: 05/17/1987 0120 hours and 22 seconds.
All eyes went to the Traveler, who was in deep thought as she read and then reread the numerical display.
“That cannot be correct. Maybe the water damage?”
“It’s a sealed unit, ma’am, you know that,” Jenks said as he sat back in his chair, not feeling too good about confronting the Traveler with a false statement on her last use of the Wellsian Doorway.
“I have no explanation for that.”
They could all see the consternation that Jenks and Virginia’s revelation had caused the old woman. She lowered her head in thought.
Niles was about to speak when the main monitor that had been installed flared to life. On the screen was Xavier Morales as he sat in the clean room in Nevada.
“What have you got, Doctor?” Compton asked, knowing nothing could assuage the news they had already received.
“Europa may have something, a little out of the ordinary, but you may wish to investigate on your end.”
Moira looked up into the young face of the man she had met earlier.
“We were poring over the original blueprints for the Brooklyn Navy Yard buildings. It took Europa to uncover the original specs for the renovations made during the sixties and seventies. It seems in late 1985 building number one-fourteen was purchased. No design specs were ever turned in by the contractor other than a sprucing up of the building. Janitorial reports mostly and some asbestos removal, nothing major.”
“What has that to do with this building?” Jack asked.
Xavier looked sad for a moment as he looked at the people gathered in Brooklyn. “It seems the building was purchased by Grenada Holdings.”
Everyone looked over at a stunned Moira Mendelsohn.
“Ms. Mendelsohn’s own corporation,” Morales finished.
“I don’t have a second property here,” she said in her defense.
“Signed by your corporate board, a Mr. Joaquim Wachowski. Europa says he is a former associate of yours, ma’am,” Xavier added, still not feeling good about placing the old woman in a corner.
Moira Mendelsohn felt physically ill.
“My God, they constructed a second doorway.”
“Who?” Niles asked as he was sorely tempted to stand and shout the question.
“Some very unscrupulous men with whom I once trusted with far too many secrets”—she looked away—“and lives.”
Questions stirred and hopes were raised, for how long this saving grace would exist, none of the Event Group knew.
“May I suggest you get someone over to building one-fourteen?” Morales said as he watched the stunned inactivity on his own monitor from Nellis.
Before anyone could issue orders, Jack had assisted Henri from his chair and along with Will and Jason, hurriedly left the room.
“Now, perhaps we better go into a little more depth on your past financial partners.” Niles was watching her as Jack and his men exited the makeshift conference room.
An angry look crossed the Traveler’s countenance. “Yes, let’s do that.”