Chapter 1

Bob Jeffers leaned back in his comfortable desk chair and stretched. His eyes flitted from screen to screen as he reviewed the sixteen oversized monitors arrayed in a semi-circle around his work station. A desk resembling a recording studio mixer took up the space in front of him, with instruments also embedded in a curved structure.

His hand went without looking to find the coffee cup to his right. It was in its normal place, but was light enough that he knew instantly it was empty. He set the cup down as his eyes zeroed in on a blur of green on one monitor. Casually, he reached forward and manipulated a mouse, clicking once on the blob of green that his experience told him might be interesting. Tapping a button and turning two knobs caused the little green blob to swell on the screen, until he could see the serrated leaves of cannabis sativa. His eyes told him the plants were in rows, which meant they were cultivated, rather than wild. Instruments told him the plants were less than a meter tall, and he changed his initial opinion, deciding these plants were of the cannabis indica species. Rather than leaning forward, he twisted a dial and the image grew even larger. Yes, very dense, wide leaves, probably from some variety grown from seeds brought back by veterans of the Afghanistan war.

He punched another button and typed a short message. Clicking the mouse on a small icon in the lower right corner of the screen, he pinned the latitude and longitude of the marijuana growing operation to the message and hit the send button. The screen automatically returned to its former size.

Within sixty seconds, he had noticed the anomaly, identified the issue, and sent it to the appropriate agency, in this case, the DEA. They now had all the information necessary, including close-ups of the plants, which would generate a search and seizure warrant, as well as the identification of every structure within ten miles of the site, and clear views of all the avenues of entry and egress. Including game trails.

Bob worked for one government agency, but his output went to dozens of others. He had an ultra-secret clearance, which sounded more impressive than it was. He had no access to classified materials, unless you included visual information relating to every highly classified "industrial location" in the country. In the entire world, for that matter, though those other countries had no idea Bob could examine their facilities closely enough to read the headlines of the newspaper lying on the hood of a car, while they perused the same words from only a foot away.

Because his work was so secret, almost nobody knew that he did it. He wasn't married, and wasn't dating. Even if he had been, he couldn't tell his spouse or girlfriend anything about his job. He had a cover story as a systems analyst who did trouble shooting for government computer systems, but he'd never had to use it. He worked seventy-two hours on, and forty-eight off, in a rotating shift. Within his seventy-two hour shift, he worked eight hours on and eight hours off. In that way, when his seventy-two hours were finished, he would have peered down from space at every visible spot on the Earth's surface, at all hours of the day and night.

Not that he was in space. He wasn't. But his eyes were.

Bob Jeffers controlled sixteen satellites, half of which were in geosynchronous orbit around the Earth, and the other half of which crisscrossed the globe in orbits that, over time, would cover every square inch of the planet. He was good at his job, which was spotting irregularities made visible by the satellites. In addition, if some federal agency needed intelligence on a particular spot, anywhere in the world, a request to him, with sufficient detail in it as to what was required, almost always generated a report that solved whatever problem existed. He had even tracked a carload of bank robbers/kidnappers for the FBI, watching the getaway vehicle in real time, and pinpointing its location so the feds could raid the compound where the criminals were hiding. Such use of satellite time was rare, because it took a pretty important crime to be worth the expense, but it happened sometimes. In the case of the bank robbery, the hostages were two children taken from their mother in the bank, and the FBI knew how dangerous the robbers were because they had already killed three people during the commission of the crime.

Generally, though, Bob's life on the job was pretty boring. One of the natural assets he brought to the job was a photographic memory, and he could tell you, without looking at the previous day's pictures, how many cars in a particular mall parking lot had not been moved since the day before. As such, his primary responsibility was to simply look at as many of the feeds as possible during his shift, and then look at the same areas of interest the next day. The differences could be valuable.

On this particular day, the marihuana field had been the only thing of interest he'd noticed. The National Hurricane Center had asked for some shots from two of his birds, but that had been routine, taking only a minute or two. In fact, he had programmed the satellite to send the agency a new photograph every fifteen minutes, which exceeded their request. He knew they'd be happy, though. It wasn't the first time they had needed satellites other than those under their own control.

When his shift was over, he retired to the living quarters on site. He would relax for eight hours, and then start all over again, reviewing any particular areas of interest, and processing new requests as they came in, based on their priority.

He fist bumped Jerry Springman, who was relieving him, and opened the fridge, peering inside to see what leftovers there might be. He preferred to heat something up, rather than actually cook. He had a new book to read, and would rather do that than spend time at the stove. In any case, reading usually put him to sleep.

Twenty minutes later, he was dreaming.

The next time Bob happened to be in a position to survey Wyoming was at 1315 the next afternoon. Out of curiosity, he input the latitude and longitude of the marijuana field he had seen the previous day. It popped up on the screen, still verdant and green. Apparently the DEA hadn't given it a high priority.

He zoomed in again, and his sharp eyes caught blobs of color moving off to one side, where there was an old shack of some kind. Toggling the camera, he moved it and zoomed again. There were three people on the screen. Something looked wrong about them. Two were standing side by side, facing the third, but it just didn't look natural. He hit a button that began recording what he was seeing.

He zoomed again, and saw the forearm of the lone person, the one wearing a black hoody, sticking out in front of the body. Experience told him the elbow was against that person's side. He zoomed yet again, and saw the black glint of a handgun in the hand on the end of that forearm.

Just as he identified it was a gun, the business end spat yellow flames ... twice ... and then twice more. He zoomed back out automatically. The two who had been standing side by side were down, lying with arms and legs akimbo.

He had just witnessed a double homicide.

He tagged the black hoody and instructed the computer to follow that signature. Touching his earpiece, he called the switchboard and asked for 911 for Riverton, Wyoming, or the county that serviced that location. He waited fifteen seconds, and heard a double ring that was picked up almost immediately.

"Nine-one-one, what is your emergency?"

"I need to report a shooting. Two people were shot, actually, at a remote pot growing site ten miles southwest of Riverton on state road 137. From there, the location is exactly 1,235 meters south. It's on the upper bend of a logging road west of Arapahoe."

"Who is this?" asked the disembodied voice.

Bob ignored the question, looking at the feed, which was faithfully following black hoody. The computer was smart enough that, when black hoody entered a vehicle, it self tagged the vehicle and followed it. He zoomed, trying to gather data on the vehicle. It was an SUV, but moving like it was, he couldn't tell what brand. It was dark green, though, and it was driving east on the logging road.

"Hello?" came the 911 operator. Bob watched the vehicle as he spoke.

"I can't tell if the victims are dead, but the shooter is in a dark green SUV headed eastbound on that logging road I told you about. By my guess, he'll be in Arapahoe within ten minutes. The driver is wearing a black hoody. I don't know if anybody else is in the vehicle."

"What is your name, sir?" asked the operator.

"I can't tell you that," said Bob. "And don't bother trying to trace the number, because you can't. Just trust me and get law enforcement after that SUV. You should probably get an ambulance out to that pot field too, though I doubt those people are alive."

"Where are you?" asked the 911 operator. "Who are you?"

"You're wasting time," said Bob. "Do you really think finding out who I am is more important than catching a murderer, or saving a couple of lives?" He checked the feed again. "Okay, your perp is driving through Arapahoe now. Not much there, is there? Looks like he's going to keep going over to a road marked 138 on my screen. I can't tell if it's gravel or paved."

"We have someone on the way, Sir. Can I get your name, please?"

"No, you may not," said Bob, patiently. He was used to this. They never were. But he only called if it was life or death, so he tried to be patient. "Look, I can't spend much more time on this. I have other things to do. If you want to hold the line open, I can check my screen and give you updates on where the bad guy is."

He didn't wait to see what they were going to do. He'd already spent almost ten minutes on this, and it wasn't on his list of tasks to complete. He swiveled his head and checked the screens he'd been ignoring. His last assignment had been to check a particular building and document what cars and trucks were parked outside it. He had planned to use RL384, a vehicle in low synchronous orbit, but it was already moving out of the target area. Quickly he cross haired the site from memory and hit the button that would take a high quality photograph. He should be able to blow that up and get the needed data. If not, he'd have to use a different bird. That would put him behind schedule. A quick glance at his job sheet showed he had no more specific tasks for twenty-four minutes. He touched his earpiece again, taking it off hold.

"You still there?" he asked.

"Sir, I really must know who you are, and how you know all this information," said the obviously harried 911 operator.

"No you don't. All you have to know is how to catch the son of a bitch who's shooting people, and find their bodies. Hang on."

"Sir! -"

Bob put them on hold again and checked the monitor that displayed Wyoming. The computer was still happily pinned on the green SUV, but it wasn't moving any more. It was sitting outside what looked like a farm house, maybe. Bob could still see the haze of dust left by the vehicle's tires as it arrived. Unconsicouly he reflected on how it must not be a windy day, there. He clicked on the house to get the latitude and longitude, and then noticed flashing lights off to the side. He panned over and saw a patrol car turning off of 138 onto Little Wind River Bottom Road, headed for the crime scene. He touched the hold button again.

"You there?"

"I'm here." It was a different voice. They'd probably called for a supervisor. That was the usual drill.

"Can you patch me through to your car that's approaching Arapahoe? After he checks the victims, I can tell him how to get to where the shooter is. He's no longer mobile. He's in a farm house not all that far away."

"Are you in a helicopter, Sir?" asked the operator, trying one more time. "You need to land, Sir. You're a material witness in a felony. If you fail to cooperate you can be arrested and put in jail."

Chapter 2 »