Chapter 15: Final Plans, Final Messages

"Good afternoon, I don't need to tell you that this is a significant event," Martin Schmidt, the White House Press secretary announced, glancing around at the assembled press corps. "In order to determine what happened to unleash a mysterious unidentified plague at a classified military base a few days back, President Atkinson met with Colonel Whitacre. He was the officer in charge of the base who was en route to a briefing here when the plague spread, killing the remaining occupants of the base. We've initiated an official inquiry, but given the amount of attention this matter has attracted in the press, we've decided to make Col. Whitacre available for a brief statement.

"This will be brief and we won't be taking questions since this is still an active ongoing investigation. But the important thing is that the president had no knowledge of the operations at the base. It appears to have been initiated by a lower level CIA employee without approval of the upper echelon of the government. We're still trying to figure out exactly what went wrong, but Col. Whitacre can supply a general overview of what happened. Colonel, would you like to begin?" the Press Secretary asked, backing away from the podium.

"Thank you," Colonel Whitacre said, stepping around the Secretary. "As Mr. Schmidt said, I've met with the president. After a lengthy interrogation, he gave me the following notes to reveal to you," the officer dressed in the crisp uniform told the assembled reporters, picking up a sheaf of papers, holding it up for them to see. Without saying a word the Colonel released the pages, allowing them to fall from his hand to flutter, one by one, to the floor.

The Press Secretary leaned forward uneasily as the administration people behind Whitacre grew uneasy, but he resumed speaking.

"Every single man under my command died because of a series of irresponsible orders by President Atkinson, and I won't remain silent about it anymore."

The entire pressroom fell into a stunned silence. The members of the administration seemed to be equally as stunned, their mouths hanging open in shock. This is not what they expected. Before they could recover, Whitacre continued.

"The base was set up and equipped on an old storage facility on the direct orders of the president. I was informed this was strictly need-to-know and that I was prevented from revealing it under penalty of treason by a series of top-secret laws specifically written..." The Colonel stopped speaking as a commotion broke out off-screen as several members of the administration's staff started forward at the same time. But Whitacre was prepared for such an interruption.

"Mr. President," he responded, staring directly at the live cameras, "If you expect me to remain silent, then you'd best shoot me in the head right now, as I will not maintain your lies any lon—"

The national broadcast was cut off unexpectedly, leaving a black screen and dead air on every major station across the country. This was replaced shortly by a blue screen until finally an animation of a technician scratching his head holding cut wires appearing beside the words "We're experiencing a temporary technical issue. We'll be back online shortly."

Massive rioting broke out that night in major cities across the country, most notably Chicago, New York, and of course Washington D.C. The reporters attending the press conference reported that Col. Whitacre had been physically dragged from the room by armed Secret Security agents, but no one had any clue what had become of him. There were wild reports of shots being fired shortly after that, but there was no confirmation from the White House. The government struggled to maintain control, while several US Embassies across the world were attacked. Despite the unrest, the administration never issued another statement from Col. Whitacre to clarify what happened. In fact, nothing more was heard of him and nothing was released about him, which only fueled the protests.

The protests in Washington were the worst, with police cars overturned and burned, protesters gassed, pummeled and shot at. Massive crowds formed around the White House, which was officially placed under lockdown as hundreds of people threw garbage through the White House Gates. Despite repeated attempts to stifle the demonstrations, the protestors wouldn't back down. Since the police were unable to navigate the streets to respond after the protestors got increasingly aggressive, several Secret Service members appeared in a line along the gate. After their orders to disperse were ignored, they opened fire with live ammunition. When that news was broadcast on the various news stations—which cancelled their normal broadcast schedules to cover the event—the protests only intensified.

D.C. fell under complete chaos after that, with the police unable to respond. All military personal were ordered to base and forbidden to interact or call any civilians or civilian organization. Military members caught on the street trying to return to base were stopped, physically removed from their cars and beaten. The public, seeing men in Army uniforms at the base and unable to tell who was or wasn't operating the secret organizations, simply took their frustrations out on whomever they could find, be they low-level military grunts, cops or minor government workers. The organized efforts to improve the reputations of military personnel begun after 9/11 and continued for decades after were all negated in a single night. Despite the apparent complete breakdown of the government and repeated calls for impeachment, no official action or response by the administration was initiated, as the rioting, police shootings, tear gas attacks and other attempts to curtail the protests continued throughout the night.

About the only action the White House took was to convince a sympathetic judge to issue a suppression order against unsubstantiated reporting by the media. President Atkins used that as justification to declare a state of Emergency, his first act of which was to shut down the major news networks. However, that didn't quell the protests, and while the networks couldn't report what was happening, the various social media sites didn't hesitate to broadcast thousands of shots of the action.

"Hallo?" Peter asked in his usual affected inflection.

"Hey, Peter. It's Josh. I—"

"Josh? What the heck happened? We went out to visit and there was no one there. The whole place was empty."

"Whoa, hold on. Remember, I can say whatever I want, but anything you say can be overheard, so don't spill anything which would raise any red flags by some faceless computer. As far as this conversation is concerned, my family and I were out helping Janet with a difficult birthing."

"Yeah, I forgot about that. I can hear the echo. That farm must be a long ways away," Peter teased, only pausing when he realized he'd almost done what Josh just asked him not to. He remained silent, trying to think of a way of asking the most obvious questions, but none came to mind. "So when can we get together and ... uh, shoot the breeze?"

"That's why I was calling. Listen carefully. I'm a long ways away, think hundreds of miles above the Earth. When I come in, I need to get in and out quickly, so I need you to call everyone and get them to your Uncle Joseph's. It's time we got everyone home, and we'll need to take care of several things before we do."

"Uh, what ... oh yeah, I forgot about that damn time delay. OK, I'll call everyone. When should we be there?"

"The delay is only to send out the message that the phone company picks up, I can hear anything you say fine. I need to come in under cover of darkness, and I figure it'll take all of you a long time to get there with the road blocks. You'll also need to consolidate cars to attract less attention. A single car with a bunch of rowdy teenagers is easier to explain than a bunch of cars all heading to a single remote location. Figure 10:00 tonight. It should be dark enough by then for us to escape most casual observations."

"All right. I'm anxious to hear what's up. It sounds like you've been up to quite a bit."

"Yeah, you can certainly say that," Josh replied tersely, wanting to detail everything he'd seen but knowing he couldn't. "I'll try to bring you up to date when I see you. Now you'd better go, since they haven't caught us yet, they'll probably be flagging any phone calls over a certain length."

When he ended the call, Josh sat back. It would be a long time to wait with little to do other than practice his new language skills. There was a lot to do and figure out, and he also had to get individual votes from everyone involved. There was yet a lot to consider.

The descent, while quick, was agonizing as Josh kept expecting some passing plane, overhead satellite or telescope below they couldn't see would notice his reentry. If some individual saw them and called it in, it would take a while to make it up the chain of command, and if the call came from the reservation, Josh felt pretty secure it wouldn't get the same response, so that was a lesser though still serious concern.

Since he'd done it before, he knew where the cavern entrance was even though it was cleverly disguised with junk. It took a bit to maneuver past it, but since the shuttle handled that kind of thing on its own, it didn't take that much time. As soon as the craft settled on the ground Josh hurried out the door, stopping long enough to unfurl the cover that would further hide their presence, and then he sprinted for the house. His enthusiasm to recount what he'd experienced putting extra speed in his steps.

Despite knowing the shuttle made no noise and that Joseph kept his few lights off to avoid alerting anyone that anything was up, Josh was still surprised no one had noticed his arrival. It was amazing you could land a vessel that large besides a house and run across a yard that big and have no one notice. Still, it was better than the alternative, which would involve fighter jets descending on them.

Pausing to catch his breath on Joseph's porch, Josh straightened to knock on the door. It was snatched open almost immediately by Becky.

"Josh, it's about time!" she yelled, throwing herself at him, but Josh was quicker, sidestepping and holding her back with his hand.

"Sorry, but we only have so much time. Where's Barbara?"

"She's back here," Janet called from the door of a back bedroom. "She's been anxious to speak with you."

"Hold on a minute," Peter demanded. "You disappeared for several days and then suddenly show up in a big hurry. We were scared shitless someone had captured both you and your mother. What the hell's been happening?"

"Man, you won't believe it," Josh admitted, giving in to his desire to reveal what he'd been doing, despite knowing he had very specific priorities, "but I've now traveled farther into space than any other human. I went to the alien's ship and activated it so they can leave. Sorry about the confusion, though. When I left, Mom warned me she was going into hiding, afraid the government would see me leaving and descend on the farm, so I'd consider it somewhat unsafe at the moment."

"Damn, that's pretty extreme!" Fred swore, his eyes staring at Josh in fascination.

"You're right about that. He keeps doing the sexiest things," Becky purred, which caused the other women, particularly Cynthia and Molly, to look askance at her. But Josh didn't seem to pay her any mind.

"Now, as you can imagine, I need to talk to Barbara about what comes next," he said, moving towards the back room. "With any luck, we can get them on their way safely home before we're inevitably discovered. Once they're gone, the heat will be off the rest of us. We'll still be wanted, but the intense pressure to capture us will be diminished."

The others nodded at that as Josh entered Janet's cobbled together medical center to talk to Barbara. Stepping around his sister, he faced Barbara, who was sitting up on the room's bed—the only seat which would support her weight—and immediately started speaking to her in a poor imitation of her native tongue. Since he and the shuttle had been speaking a hybrid variation of both languages, based largely on what sounds he could reproduce, it was rough going. While the shuttle translated her words for him, it was rougher for her. As they struggled with their badly-shared languages the others clustered around the door, observing the scene as the other aliens each tried to help. They knew how important this was although they hadn't recovered quite as much as Barbara had.

"Geez!" Josh exclaimed, throwing both hands in the air and staring at the ceiling with little warning.

"What is it?" Cynthia asked from the corner of the room.

"Huh?" Josh asked, as if forgetting there was anyone else there. "Oh, I told them I activated their ship and they were free to take their shuttle and leave. Unfortunately, it's not quite that simple."

"Uh, exactly how 'unsimple' is it?" Jeffery asked, edging closer, his face a picture of worried expectation.

"Apparently having assigned the ship over to me, they no longer have control over it. What's more, since I can't give the proper command sequence, the shuttle can't transfer control. I'll have to return to the ship with them."

"Wait, I thought the whole idea was they'd take the ship and ... how the hell will you get back?" Fred asked.

"They can always bring him back," Peter suggested.

"Yeah, they need supplies," Josh admitted. "While we're gone, one of you will have to arrange to pick up a shitload of food."

"How the hell are we supposed to get that much food, water or whatever else they might need?" Frances asked.

"Actually, my father knows a lot of people. He could probably make a few phone calls," Becky offered, excited she could actually contribute for once. She recognized that Josh wasn't pleased with her crude attempts to win him over, valuing achievement over enthusiasm. If she could pull this off, this would improve his response to her, and at this point just about anything would help. "It would attract too much attention to deliver it here, but if they could meet you at another location."

Josh spoke to Barbara again and she reached into a pocket and handed him a small token. Josh took it and handed it to Becky. Barbara had substantially improved. Her voice, as it was, wasn't as shaky, and she spoke decisively for longer periods. She also looked much better, the feathers covering her skin beginning to regrow.

"Give him this. It will allow us to find wherever you take it to."

"Uh, it'll take quite a while to arrange and transport everything, especially if we're being watched," Becky pointed out. "It would be easier if we didn't have to drive there ourselves."

"I'm not sure if I can explain GPS coordinates to them with my limited language skills," Josh replied, spreading his hands wide.

"Maybe you don't need to," Cynthia offered. "Try moving to a few different locations and show them the coordinates. Maybe they can compute it."

Josh stopped to consider it. "I don't know. I don't like the idea of flying around, waiting for military jets to find us. We've escaped detection so far, but there's no telling how long our luck will hold out."

"See what Barbara thinks," Frances suggested.

Josh took her advice, turning and speaking briefly with Barbara before turning back to the room. "She says it shouldn't be a problem, but I'm still not sure it'll be that easy to figure out without knowing where the Greenwich meridian line lies, or where the equator is."

"But it's not a precise point, instead it's a starting point that's easy to calculate," Frances pointed out. "What's more, the equator is easily determined by the spin of the Earth."

"Maybe," Josh admitted. "But it still requires us to expose ourselves."

"Hopefully not for long, though," Molly said, "and then you can simply take off for the ship, out of the government's reach. They'd never know where we'd agreed to meet afterwards."

"That makes sense," Josh agreed. "OK, we'll do it. If I take them back and reassign command of the ship, then they can bring me back when they restock the ship. Everything works out."

"Not quite," Jeffery reminded him with a worried frown. "Both you and all of us will be wanted, not only by our government but by every government on Earth. They still don't know who most of you are, but enough people have seen you, so it's only a matter of time until someone identifies you. The rest of you can simply fade away and will probably never attract any attention, but the same isn't true for Josh or the three of us," he said, indicating Molly, Phillip and himself.

"Well, I chose this for myself," Josh insisted. "If that's the price I pay for their freedom and for keeping this much power out of a few corrupt hands, then it's a price that I'm willing to pay. However, I certainly didn't mean to screw the rest of you over. I'd prefer if this didn't impact the rest of you, but I'm not sure we can do anything about it now."

Barbara interrupted, after a hurried whispered conversation with one of the other aliens. She and Josh spoke privately for a while, with Barbara becoming quite animated and the other aliens weighing in on the discussion. The others in the room let them thrash it out, interested in what they were debating but not wanting to interrupt. Finally Josh turned back to them.

"Barbara's got an interesting proposal. She explained that with the losses they suffered, they're really severely understaffed. They need more bodies to operate the various services required to return. She's suggesting that some of us could join them. We'd essentially become space travelers. She tells me that they're already a multi-species society and that we'd be accepted simply for the help we offered and for allowing them to warn the other members of their society about what happened."

"Uh, what exactly happened?" Frances asked. So Josh took some time to explain how the aliens had come to be stranded on Earth. The aliens were now actively participating, having somehow overcome many of their problems comprehending what Josh was expressing. When he stopped, Fred asked the question on everyone's mind.

"How the hell can you pick up all of this information? I thought you only knew a little of their language?"

"Ah, it was a fairly simple problem," Josh explained. "While I know a fair amount, I can only approximate a few of their sounds, so the shuttle and I have been mangling the language. When Barbara speaks, the shuttle translates what she says into something I can understand, but since I have her authorization for access here on my arm, it won't update her. That's why the others have been getting involved. Along with voicing their own opinions, they're getting updates from the shuttle and passing it on to Barbara, allowing us to communicate much more quickly."

"So what's the end result?" Jeffery pressed. "What's Barbara's proposal?"

"It seems they faced the same kind of problems we are with corrupt governments and people split between being basically good and bad and sniping at each other. They had to reform their society before they could join the broader spacefaring races. By showing that we are more interested in helping people, regardless of background, we've proven ourselves to them, whereas no one else here has."

"So you're suggesting we all leave everything we know behind?" Becky asked. "Abandon our family and friends to join a society we know nothing about and where we'll be the dumb barbarians who can't keep up with anyone else?"

"Still, he's got a point," Phillip said, one of the few times he ever volunteered anything. "The government knows who we are, and if we ever show our faces again we'll be instantly arrested and either jailed, or more likely heavily interrogated. They will parade us in front of the public in an effort to prove what a danger these aliens are and how the government needs to protect everyone from them."