Black List VI From the AshesChapter 13
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The helicopter touches down on the deck of the USS Downley just as the sun is beginning to set on the horizon. The beauty of it is stolen by the battle waging over the ocean. Captain Briggs waves and wishes both the agents good luck as they exit the helicopter. The rotors never stop as the two dismount, and just as they step off onto the deck, the craft is already lifting off.
“Guess they are in a hurry,” Samantha comments, her voice barely audible over the roar of the helicopter.
Spencer is about to reply to that when Admiral Russel Pellington steps out onto the deck, making his way toward them. He is flanked by several heavily armed men, all with grim determination set in their expressions. The admiral reaches the two quickly with his escort on his heels. Once he reaches them, the escort spreads out in a circle, covering the group with a three-sixty degree of coverage. “I’m Admiral Russell Pellington,” the man says, extending his hand.
Spencer shakes it first, followed by his partner. They make their introductions. “Admiral, may I ask why we are here?” Spencer questions.
“I would gladly explain the situation once we are inside,” the Navy man answers, pointing toward the door he initially came from. “It is much safer this way.”
“Very well, Admiral,” Spencer says. “Lead the way.”
The two agents are taken below deck to a small conference room. The room itself is mostly taken up by the table, which is surrounded by six chairs. Pellington posts two of the guards in the room with the group, the remainder just outside the door.
“Are all the guards really necessary?” Samantha inquires.
“Believe it or not, it is,” Pellington says. “This ship has fallen under attack by someone or something. It may be a man or one of these Goji things you all hunt. All my efforts to find this saboteur have proved useless. Just before you arrived, I lost three squads.”
“So we were called in to take out the threat,” Spencer remarks, pointing out the obvious.
“You were the closet assets near to here that can handle a threat like this,” the man explains. “I have been through many battle situations and in my experience, whatever this is isn’t human. It can’t be.”
Samantha and Spencer look at each other, locking eyes briefly. Then she looks at the admiral. “Most likely it is a Goji. We’ll need you to recall your squads and get you someplace that can be defended without hindrance.”
“The best place will be the bridge then,” Pellington informs them.
“Good,” Spencer agrees, standing up. He walks over to the two guards at the door. “I need your headsets.”
The two guards look at Pellington for confirmation. “Go ahead.”
The two men pull their headsets off and hand them over to Spencer. “Here,” he says, handing Samantha a set. “I’ll track it down. You keep guard over the admiral.”
“Like hell I will,” she argues. “I’m the better armed one here.” She glares at Spencer, the look on her face saying that she isn’t going to take no for an answer.
“Alright,” he concedes. “You just be careful.”
“I will,” she promises. She heads for the door. But before she can reach it, Spencer reaches out and grabs her, spinning her around to face him. Their eyes lock with one another’s.
He reaches in and kisses her deeply. “You had better make it back alive,” he says pulling away before plunging back in again.
Then without another word, she leaves the room. “Women,” Pellington says.
“Sam, do you copy?” Spencer says into the headset. He is sitting on the bridge with Pellington, along with the almost every guard assigned to the admiral. Those that are not there are guarding the other important stations located at various parts of the ship.
“I copy.”
“Good,” he says letting his body relax. He isn’t sure why he is so apprehensive. Samantha can take care of herself. She certainly isn’t new to this and she has proven herself countless times before now. “Pellington pulled all the squads back and has a standing order for the crew to stay where they are, so the corridors should be clear.”
“All except for me and our special guest,” she says.
“Exactly,” he concurs. “The squads set up motion detectors throughout the ship and we are monitoring them. The moment something pops up, we’ll direct you to it.”
“Got ya,” she says. “Going silent.” She traverses lightly through the corridor, carrying only Kotetsu and her pistol. The ship is eerily quiet except for the miscellaneous sounds any ship this size makes. Her footfalls echo through the empty corridors. The sound carries softly, mixing with the rest of the sounds echoing throughout. She focuses on her breathing to control her emotion and to deepen her senses. Her focus takes her back to the years of learning martial arts. Endless drills and hours spent learning to hone her other senses, other than her eyes. She is glad to have had that training now.
It has been almost two hours now and three deck levels and she has found no evidence of a saboteur or a Goji. The motion detectors set up throughout the ship haven’t picked up anything, but that doesn’t mean much. Such devices can malfunction or be disabled or if one knows what to look for, avoided. Samantha pushes the thoughts to the back of her mind. Worrying about such trivial things is irrelevant to her mission and her focus has to be centers on her task.
She suddenly finds herself standing before a doorway leading to the final set of stairs that leads down further into the ship.
The sign labeled Deck Four looms above her head. The only parts of the ship that lay below are the most vital parts: the engine and pump rooms and the ship’s gunnery storage. She stops to think her next steps. Why stay on the lower deck? Why disable the engines but not do anything else? Then it hits her like a ton of bricks. “You’re going to blow up the ship,” she whispers out loud. Tapping the headset, she speaks into it. “Spence, I know what he has planned. The ship needs to be evacuated.” She now knows where to look, and it becomes a race against time.
“Sam? What’s going on? Sam?” Dead silence is all of a sudden all he hears.
“Sir,” a crewman says to Spencer. “Her comm link has been cut off.”
“Damn!” Spencer yells throwing the headset off onto the console in front of him.
“We can’t evacuate this ship,” Pellington protests. “There’s a battle going on out there.”
Spencer turns toward the admiral. The battle or the crew isn’t on his mind. The situation with his partner is now his focus. “What’s on the lowest deck?”
“The engine room, gunnery storage...”
“That explains why the ship needs evacuation,” Spencer says looking down at the deck. He looks up abruptly catching Pellington’s eye. “The ship is going to be blown up. Get it evacuated.”
Spencer picks up the headset and puts it on as he runs to the door where the guards are standing. “I’m going to need this,” he says grabbing the assault rifle from the guard’s hands and heads out the door.
“Hey!” the guard yells after him.
“It’s fine,” Pellington says. “Agent Reeds, what are you planning to do?”
“Save this ship and my partner,” he yells over his shoulder. And with that he is out the door.
Pellington turns to his communications officer. “Open a line to the rest of the crew.”
“Yes sir.” The officer pushes several buttons then turns back to the admiral. “It’s ready sir.”
Pellington picks up the microphone and speaks into it, “Attention crew, this is Admiral Pellington. I am addressing you this evening because of an important matter that has come up. Right now as I speak two special agents are hunting down the saboteur. However, this ship is in danger of being sent to the bottom of the sea. That is if these two agents are not successful. Now I am not asking any of you to stay, you are more than welcome to evacuate the ship. I plan to stay with any of you that wish to also. We are at war gentlemen and if this ship falls it could mean the loss of this battle. We may be crippled but we are the lifeblood, the heart of the fleet and I will not give up. Let your immediate commander know your intentions so that we can secure your evacuation.” Pellington sets down the microphone and waits. Within just a few minutes the commanders of each crew throughout the ship replies that none of the men are going to leave and plan to see the battle to its end. No matter how the end comes. He smiles at the bravery and loyalty of the men and women to both him and their country. “God help us all,” he says low under his breath. “God help us all.”
“Sam? Do you copy?” he says into the headset. “Damn it. Sam if you hear me, I’m headed your way.” Spencer races through the ship as fast as his legs will carry him. Each footfall rings through the corridor almost as loudly as the motion detectors. The noise doesn’t concern him at the moment. If anything he hopes the noise will draw the Goji to him rather than Samantha. It is now just a matter of getting to her before the Goji does.
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At that point, Sarah and I had scheduled seven days off to recharge and refresh in Dallas, only three hours away at the Cooper Hotel & Conference Center. The place was awesome. I even scheduled a Swedish Massage for everybody in our group - each in their own rooms, which costs extra, but we’re all worth it. While in Dallas, we went off to Six Flags Over Texas, only thirty minutes away from our hotel. We even got Annie and Sarah to go on some of the rides. The place was pretty cool. While...
I found Michael already there getting ready to begin his physical routine. “Michael, the day you spent with Rose ‘talking’ what did you talk about? Did the subject of me come up?” “Why?” he asked. “Just had a problem with Kallie, involving Rose ... so?” “She asked me if she thought you would ... no ... dad, I can’t say those words out loud!” “Come on Michael, we have always been upfront with each other.” “She’s still a virgin, dad!” “Really? I thought you two had at least, attempted...
“Kallie?” I said pulling her to where we could talk and not be heard. “Yes dear,” she replied giving me again that smile that radiates love. “I found an ALS Research Center in San Francisco. They are expecting records from your doctor regarding your preliminary diagnosis. I have emailed you their information and would love it if you took care of doing that in the next 24 to 48 hours,” I asked. “It isn’t that important, Charles,” she said. “It is to me, please, Special K, do it for me,...
Calista Four, Kaidran Quadrant 2 By: Malissa Madison We made our way back to what I was referring to as Unicorn's Maternity hold. Allie lay there on very comfortable looking shelf next to the clear window watching Princess as she grew slowly. The fetal, Bio-ship was about two feet long now, her outer hull-skin coalescing with changing colors like the party strobe in the Equinox' Ball room. Watching I could see her outer hull flexing like a heartbeat, as she floated in the...
“As you can see behind me,” the reporter says, waving her hand at the scene. “Tanks, helicopters and ground troops are invading South Africa. I have received confirmed reports of battleships off the coast. This looks like a full scale invasion with both Russian and Chinese militaries in the mix. The entire country is in an uproar with locals trying to get out of the country. This just coming in...” she pauses to put a hand to her ear and listens for a few moments. “I have just received word...
Washington D.C. two hours ago... Sitting in a black Range Rover in President’s Park, Delgrious and Detective Angela Veris waited as the clock ticked down for their time to strike. Positioned in various spots around the White House and within a five block radius sat squads of Sanguine Consortium soldiers. When the clock struck zero, no amount of preparation or guard would be able to repel a strike on the president. Angela strummed her fingers against the outside of the Range Rover’s door as...
The rest of the day was a blast, the farthest thing from dancing we could do. Occasionally, Sarah grabbed my hand as we walked to the things we wanted to see and accomplish. We’d gotten tired, and let our guide give us a mini-tour, while we stayed in the cart. We weren’t being bothered for autographs that much, but if someone asked, we’d stop and gladly do it. We were all dried out now. I’d seen a place on the Park Map I wanted to go to, so I asked to go to Topper’s Hat Shop. I got a light...
The next couple of days were something of a haze, with the practices, the new routines and such. Mom repeated that the musical guidelines for time are, to avoid a penalty, between 150 and 210 seconds. “Annie’s Song” was 180 seconds, but a song that goes 223 seconds, like “Footloose” does, might be stretching it just too much. Claire told me that Josiah could trim music from the front or the end of the song to make it fit the 210 maximum. So, I asked her to have him cut the opening eight...
Annie responded, “Sure thing. Charles — you can let Sarah go now.” This caused a great deal of laughter at our table. Sarah, still in my arms, said somewhat wistfully, “Thank you Charles ... for everything.” We walked to our vehicle and we quietly all got back in. Claire and K leaned their heads on me for the short trip back to the hotel. I walked the girls to their room and told them to be ready by ten am. I apologized to them for the cursing I did, at the Tavern. I got a nice kiss from...
I blushed deeply as we started to dance using our classic routine we’d made so long ago, to this—her favorite song. She glowed as we danced close enough together to push the ‘girls’ up and against my chest. I glanced quickly down at them, but I just as quickly, returned to the beautiful face of my future mother-in-law as we danced alone on the dance floor. The music ended as I rolled her out and in, ending with my arms completely surrounding her from behind. The audience had been as...
We landed in Fairbanks, Alaska, for the first of four performances in the 49th state. Fans in Fairbanks, Anchorage, and Juneau all loved our Next Generation Tour. Our hop from there to Hawaii was wonderful. Our Tour of Pearl Harbor was amazing. Michael explained it to his ‘girls’, causing all three of them to cry a little. Sammi did the same with Lily. My Great-great grandfather, Richard Noble Newman, was shipped to Pearl Harbor during the late summer of 1941. By the grace of God, he...