Chapter 27

The flurry of activity deep inside the NORAD base under Cheyenne Mountain continued. Every image capturing the flights of the Dragons had been analyzed with meticulous care. General Grayson had an image analysis team reviewing the entire past year's worth of stored image data from the sectors where the Dragons had been spotted and was now quite certain that all of the observed activity was isolated to a single day. The General had assigned two other teams of analysts the task of scouring all intercepted intelligence transmissions and available news feeds for information concerning any sightings of the dragons.

"How in the hell am I going to explain this to the President?" the General wondered as he sat staring at the 'red' phone sitting on the corner of his desk. The only comforting piece of information he could offer the Commander In Chief was that none of the many reported dragon sightings indicated that the creatures were aggressive. Still, they appeared to be the mighty creatures spoken of in myth and they did breathe fire. On top of that, unless there was some error in the data, it appeared that the animals could travel several hundred miles an hour.

"I better not put it off," Grayson said aloud as he picked up the handset on the rarely used phone. The secure phone was linked to a very sophisticated transmission network with layers of encryption and intrusion detection systems. Grayson was part of the team that acted as the 'eyes and ears' of the most powerful military machine on earth. When something unusual turned up that required a decision from the man in the Oval Office the connection needed to be quick and it needed to be private.

It was just before six in the morning on the east coast, the teams of analysts had prepared their report and seeing no immediate threat, Grayson had waited until the President should be up. Depending on where the President was, and what he was doing at the time, Grayson knew he could expect to hear the voice of the President or the NSA officer assigned to monitor the link whenever the President was unavailable. The NSA officer utilized a portable "Phone" unit linked via satellite to the secure network. This officer stayed near the President at all times.

As it happened, the President was a very early riser and had already had his breakfast with the First Lady. He was just chuckling over the outrageous hoax of a story that had somehow made its way to the front page of the newspaper as he sat down at his desk. He hadn't even had time to finish reading the first paragraph when the secure line rang.

"Hatcher here," the President spoke in his precise and clipped fashion.

"Good Morning Mr. President. Grayson here. I'm sorry to be interrupting your routine this morning but since I'm certain you're going to be hearing about it anyway, you ought to know what our satellites have photographed."

The President had the ability of remembering literally thousands of names and faces and the details of peoples' lives and recalling them in a heartbeat. Though he'd only met General Grayson on one occasion he was able to remember the man quite well. As he pictured the tall distinguished looking military man he said "Wil, you aren't going to tell me that this crazy story of dragons is actually true are you?"

"To be quite honest with you Mr. President, this is one task I would have loved to delegate to one of my underlings so I wouldn't have to get involved with the whole crazy mess; but that wouldn't be fair to you sir. No, I'm afraid that everything so far points to the images being accurate - at least the ones from our birds anyway. If you would like to go over this in more detail we could initiate a SIC session," Grayson offered.

President Hatcher thought for a moment, if nothing else it might be an interesting diversion for the day. He knew that the Secure Intelligence Conference equipment would allow him to view whatever the General was seeing without the risk of anyone else intercepting the session. He quickly consulted the printed schedule his secretary had placed on his desk as he asked "How much time do you think you need General?"

"We can cover the information we have in thirty to forty-five minutes Mr. President," Grayson replied.

"Can you be ready to go at seven General?"

"We'll be ready Mr. President," Grayson replied.

Dale was out on his morning run when Vyagar told him about the news stories regarding the dragons. Apparently one of the two passenger flights they had come somewhat close to carried a passenger with a camera handy. There were several fairly clear pictures of the dragons soaring through the sky; fortunately this was before they had any riders.

"I was pretty certain this would get out Vyagar; I'm not very worried about it. It's sure to cause quite a stir but that's not necessarily a bad thing; especially since the published pictures don't show any of our faces."

"True. I just hoped that the military would have a chance to react first before it became public," Vyagar replied.

The two had already decided to make first contact with the existing governments of earth after the "magic" angle had been given some creditability.

"Don't worry about it too much Vyagar; but if you'd like to do some damage control, why not watch for any U.S. military planes or civilian craft that are in trouble. If you see what's happening in time, have the dragons show up and prevent it and then disappear again after delivering the aircraft that's in trouble safely back to earth."

"That's a very good idea Dale. It could gain the dragons some good will; particularly with the military and it is quite possible to accomplish. What about other types of situations where accidents could be prevented?" the AI asked to be certain that he was following the intent of Dale's directive and not just the letter.

"What did you have in mind?" Dale asked in response.

"The dragons could help put out dangerous forest fires, or help with search and rescue missions. I'm not precisely certain what types of situations or opportunities for interaction will present themselves."

"I trust you Vyagar. Just use your best judgment." Dale told him.

President Hatcher, Vice President Hilliard, the Secretary of Defense, and several others the President felt should be aware of the details General Grayson was prepared to brief them on were gathered in one of the secure conference rooms that had been placed in one of the sub basements under the White House.

"Alright Wil," President Hatcher said while gazing towards the large flat screen monitors and camera equipment that were part of the SIC hardware, "I think you probably at least know who everyone in the room is and most may know you so why don't you get started."

General Grayson walked everyone through the image data the satellites had captured. He used one monitor to display the images captured by the three satellites and another to display a map of Central America and the southernmost region of Mexico. As each image was displayed a blinking red dot appeared indicating the GPS coordinates represented by the center of the image. When the General switched to the next image, the dot would turn solid red, as a new blinking dot appeared for the new image. The map was sprinkled with red dots spread throughout Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras, Guatemala, Belize, and as far north as the Isle of Cozumel in Mexico.

Next, the General gave a brief synopsis of each civilian reported sighting. As he mentioned each eye witness account a blue pin would appear on the map to indicate where the sighting had been made. The blue dots seemed to follow the general path of the red dots.

General Grayson concluded his presentation and began fielding questions.

"You say all of the sightings occurred yesterday. Nothing before?" the Defense Secretary inquired.

"That is correct Mr. Secretary."

"Do you have any reason to believe there might be more than six of the creatures?" the VP asked as she looked down at the notes she had been making.

"I'm afraid we don't really know Madam Vice President."

"Were you able to identify any of the individuals riding the dragons?" the President wondered.

"No Mr. President. The angle the images present is roughly straight down to the extent that little profile or facial information is discernable. The only thing I can tell you is that the riders include both male and female - and that they seem to be unclothed," Grayson answered.

"Any idea on the size of those creatures?" Vice President Hilliard asked.

"Assuming that the riders are humans of average size our analysts estimate that the dragons are roughly one hundred and twenty feet from nose to tail."

There was a collective gasp from the group in the White House.

The President had served as a fighter pilot before entering the political arena. "How can something that large fly?" he wanted to know.

"I don't have any real answers there I'm afraid," General Grayson responded.

The questions began to spiral down a bit as everyone tried to digest what they'd just seen and heard. Eventually the President asked the General to keep them informed on any new developments and ended the SIC session.

"Pete," the President said to the Secretary of Defense as they left the SIC room, "stay on top of this."

"Amanda," he said to the Vice President, "get with Ron and Paula and try to determine if we need to make any kind of public statement."

Major Ben Hursley was currently in his third tour with the U.S. Air Force. This was his second longest assignment during that period of time and except for the infrequent excitement from the occasional shoulder fired missile, enforcing no fly zones was becoming pretty routine. This morning things would prove a bit different as the Major was soon to find out.

There were three men intent on bringing an abrupt end to the Major's morning flight. At three different locations they each had setup their missile launcher's to target a common point along the route the flight generally took. This morning, as their target crossed overhead, they fired the three heat seeking missiles almost simultaneously.

Suddenly Ben heard his computer's alarm signals drawing his attention to the display showing the incoming missile's relative to his position. Telemetry fed from several outside sources confirmed the three missile locks! Major Hursley frantically tried to outrun and out maneuver the missile's but couldn't seem to shake them. The automated systems on his plane had reported his situation within milliseconds after the first missile lock had been detected and two other planes were diverted his way to assist him; but they likely wouldn't arrive in time. The Major was on his own and he knew it; but then, almost as quickly as it had started, it was over.

The two fighters that had screamed through the sky to his location arrived on a scene their pilots could not initially comprehend. There were dragons flying through the air and three of them were clutching missiles in their talons. The dragons were flying at high speed back along the route Major Hursley had taken. When they reached the launch points for the missiles, the dragons hurled their explosive cargo back towards the bastards that had launched them. The explosions were close enough to their intended targets to have the desired effect. As they rose back into the sky the three fighter pilots flew after them and easily caught up with the magnificent creatures being careful to leave enough room to avoid any mishap.

Major Hursley dipped his wing in salute to the dragons and later swore that the one closest to him winked at him. Then the dragons were gone. One moment they were flying in formation with the fighters and the next they had completely vanished.

"General Grayson!" Major Hampton called out as he attempted to catch up with the fast pace of the General.

General Grayson slowed down a bit to allow the Major to pull along side of him as he ran laps around the small track in the Officer's health club. "What's up Major?" he asked.

"We've got more interesting news like what we had four days ago General," the Major replied.

"Well at least today won't be boring," the General replied as he headed towards the showers. "Be in my office in fifteen minutes Major."

Reported incidents of dragons began popping up from various locations around the globe. The "Dragon Rescues" as the media took to calling them came in many forms like the rescue of a trapped firefighter from the top floor of a building that was burning out of control, the digging out of earthquake victims, or the rescue of a party of mountain climbers caught in a severe winter storm. Perhaps the most spectacular story that was actually recorded and shown repeatedly on news programs around the globe involved the police chase of two armed robbers who had killed four people during the robbery of a bank in Los Angeles.

The Police were desperately trying to apprehend the two murderers without endangering other lives. The getaway car was heading down the freeway at tremendous speed when it was suddenly snatched up in the powerful talons of a dragon. One of the robbers got a shot off that hit the dragon's sturdy hide and while the layered scales stopped the worst affects of the blast it did infuriate the dragon. He shook the robbers around in their vehicle like a baby shakes a rattle before he touched down in front of a police station to deliver his prisoners. The news helicopters that had been filming the high speed chase had substantial footage that clearly showed the dragon taking care not to harm any innocent bystanders, the robber shooting at the dragon, and the dragon's subsequent handling of the criminals.

Another novel aspect of this encounter with the dragons was that at no other point had they elected to speak. Eldritch, the dragon that the robber fired upon, whirled to face the vehicle the moment he had released it in front of the police station and spoke in a terribly loud, low, and rumbling voice unlike any ever heard on the planet, "Listen to me scum! Put down your paltry weapon or I'll roast you alive!"

At this pronouncement the driver of the car decided to prove just how stupid he could be as he put the car into reverse and tried to drive off again! Jezzanthul, the female dragon mated to Eldritch, slammed her foot down on the tail end of the car causing it to flip in the air like a piece in a game of tiddlywinks. Eldritch had had enough of their shenanigans. He turned the car back upright and ripped the roof off of it. He plucked the guns from the hands of the dazed and injured criminals, pinched the barrels shut with his powerful jaws, and then tossed them on the ground at the feet of a nearby policeman. Then with his calm visibly restored, Eldritch turned towards the policeman and lowered his head until he was close enough to read the startled officer's badge and name pin.

"Officer Montgomery, would you care to take these two murdering thieves into custody?" Eldritch inquired in a perfectly civil voice that was at a reasonably comfortable though somewhat loud volume. "Or would you rather that my mate and I dispose of them and save the precious time and resources of the courts?"

Officer Montgomery overcame his shock at meeting one of the enormous and powerful dragons and pulled himself together long enough to respond. "We can take it from here. Thanks for nailing these two scumbags!"

"You are quite welcome Officer Montgomery," Eldritch replied as several policemen rushed forward to cuff the two robbers.

Instead of immediately flying away, the dragon continued to speak to Officer Montgomery. "I'm sorry about the damage to the pavement here and right in front of your station at that; but Jezzanthul my mate believed it necessary to stop their attempt to flee yet again before anyone else was hurt.

Are you and your fellow officers quite alright? The pieces of pavement didn't hit any of you did they?"

Officer Montgomery looked around at his fellow officers and seeing that everyone was alright replied "I think everyone is just fine and we do appreciate your concern. What about you? I can't imagine they didn't try to shoot at you."

"Actually one did shoot at me, and though it certainly has done me no great harm, it does hurt just a bit. Would you do me the kindness of looking at it for me? I can't quite see it," Eldritch stated as he carefully rolled to his side being certain not to damage any of the cars parked along the street. "It hit just behind my right foreleg Officer."

No longer fearing the intentions of the dragons, the police officer strode forward and looked closely at the slightly darkened area just behind the great dragon's foreleg. "What do you wish me to call you Sir Dragon?"

"My name is Eldritch."

"Well Eldritch, I can see where the bullet struck, it appears to be trapped between two of your scales. Will it hurt you more for us to pull it out or to leave it?" Officer Montgomery inquired.