A New World: Conspiracy (5 page)

“We can’t really tell too much from a single
pass over, it appears they are branching out. We took video as long
as we were able. It looks like they may be searching for other
survivors, but they are definitely gathering supplies. They travel
in armed convoys whenever they send parties, those armed escorts
being Humvees. They have a ready supply of arms and equipment from
Fort Lewis to the north. The work groups we identified also have a
guard of armed people. We can’t be sure with the one day
observation, but there could be up to one hundred and fifty within
the camp. Of those, it appears that approximately thirty of them
are carrying arms. We also observed military-style training in
progress. I’m not hazarding a guess at this point, that’s above my
expertise, but if I were to lay money on it, I would say a good
majority of those who are armed are, or were, either currently or
prior military. This is only my opinion based on the footage we
captured,” the supervisor briefs.

Gav only listens. She learned long ago that
other’s opinions and thoughts were important. She has already
reached the same conclusions merely by looking at the photographs.
There is a definite military precision to the camp and in the way
they conduct business. It’s what she would be doing.

“Very well. Good job. I want a satellite
keyed to that camp. Can we do that?” she asks.

“We can, Nahmer. It will cost some fuel
burn, but we can put one of the satellites we aren’t currently
using to the task. It’s an older Keyhole satellite. The resolution
of the pictures and video won’t be as sharp, but we won’t use up
the fuel reserves in our newer ones. With your approval of course,”
the supervisor answers.

“Do it. And I want that aircraft kept under
constant surveillance as well. I want to know what they’re up to.
Any news?”

“They took off early this morning and set
down at Cannon AFB. They offloaded two Humvees and set out for the
town of Clovis. I might add that they left the D-camp in place at
Albuquerque. They met with another group we hadn’t identified and
returned to the aircraft. They are still there,” he responds.

“Keep an eye on them. I want to know their
every move.” Gav rises to leave.

Walking down the hall to her quarters, she
ponders this new group. They have all of the intentions of
gathering survivors, or at least meeting with them. She wonders
whether these meetings are coincidental or if they have been
communicating in some fashion. The airwaves have remained clear, so
she isn’t sure. A part of her knows this is what her group should
be doing, gathering others, but the secretive nature of her
employers has made them overly cautious and paranoid.

However, she does have command of a
battalion, complete with armored vehicles, and they aren’t limited
to the diesel fuel sources, having been converted to bio-fuels. The
vehicles may not have the power they once did, but they’ll function
for as long as they have replacement parts and can manufacture the
bio-fuel. There is no one who can challenge them, but this camp,
C-US-4, has her worried. They have a range and ability she can’t
match with regards to aircraft. And, they are at Cannon AFB which
houses the fearsome AC-130 aircraft. If they can fly a C-130, they
can fly those.

In the privacy of her own suite, Gav reviews
the captured video of the C-130 group in the Southwest. Watching
the enhanced surveillance video, she observes the dusk flight and
subsequent HALO jump. Viewing the footage, she makes up her mind.
She has been thinking about it for a day but, after looking at the
replay, she is spurred into action. She calls the command center on
her private line.

“Yes, Nahmer. How can I help you?” the
supervisor asks, picking up on the second ring.

“I want camp C-US-4 upgraded to a ‘B’
category designation,” Gav states.

“Very well. I’ll make the change
immediately. It will be renamed B-US-1,” the supervisor
replies.

“You know what that entails?”

“I do, Nahmer. I’ll get on it right
away.”

“Very well. Update me if anything
substantial occurs,” Gav says, hanging up before eliciting a
response.

The more she has observed the actions of
this new group, the more worried she has become. While she has a
secure facility, it’s the other group’s abilities that have her
concerned. Neither side has the ability to take the other out, but
she isn’t comfortable having a group out there that can rival her
own. She has the secure location, the troops, and equipment, in
addition to their ability to implement satellite control –
information is everything, but they apparently have an aerial
gunship that they can utilize. As yet, the observations indicate
they haven’t picked one up, but she knows deep down that they will
leave Cannon AFB with one. That aerial platform more than
counteracts the troops and equipment she has at her disposal.

While upgrading the camp category level may
not seem like much, it does mean additional surveillance and an
operation to identify key leaders within the group. The command
control supervisors will call additional operators into action and
dedicate teams solely to the camp. One of the latest Keyhole
satellites will be parked in a synchronous orbit for the time
being. The high-definition images will be analyzed and the group’s
structure examined. Over the next few days, she will have a clearer
picture of their organization, and, more importantly, who is
leading the group.

Information on the camp pours in. Gav pays
attention to the C-130 group and, as she guessed, they pick up an
AC-130. From the photographs, she observes that they have the
Spooky II variant. She also notes they have picked up the other “D”
category group located at Albuquerque.

Sitting in the control center, the room now
more crowded than before with additional console operators, Gav
pours through the file and information gathered on Camp B-US-1. The
C-130 and accompanying gunship having already made it back to the
Northwest and parked on the ramp at McChord AFB. High-definition
photographs of all kinds fill the file she is leafing through. The
ones she is currently interested in are the close up pictures of
individuals.

After hours of watching video on the camp’s
actions, she and the team dedicated to observing the camp have
compiled an accurate assessment of the leadership. Seeing the
satellite image she was looking for, she pulls it from the stack.
It’s a picture of an armed man in black fatigues standing in the
parking lot outside of the sporting goods warehouse, staring up at
the early morning sky. He appears to be an older man, Gav guesses
somewhere in his forties, and is the one that the overall consensus
identifies as the leader.

Looking at the lower corner of the picture
for the file designation, she pulls it up on the console she is
working at. Opening the face recognition software used by the FBI
and NSA, she crops the picture and feeds it into the software.
Images whir on her screen as the software takes the image and
begins its attempt to match it with the databases they downloaded
from both institutions. She then rises and leaves in search of
something to eat, allowing the software to do its thing.

Taking an extended break, she returns to her
workstation, puts in her password, and finds a file waiting on her
screen – Walker, Jack, Captain, United States Air Force.

That would explain the C-130
, Gav
thinks, beginning to dive into the file.

Scrolling through the various records, she
sees his transition into special operations. Some of the records
have been partially redacted, but most of the early ones are fairly
clear. His discharge papers come up. Her eyes narrows as the
discharge date doesn’t exactly match his records. Some of the later
reports, these heavily redacted, have recording dates after his
release date. She tries pulling up some of the later files but is
unsuccessful. She has the highest clearance on this system and
should be able to read any military file.

She attempts several times and through
different avenues but is still denied access. This intrigues her as
she knows her own file is very similar to this one, although her
official one lists her as deceased. The only information she can
glean on this Captain Walker is from the file dates. They extend
years after his “official” discharge and then abruptly stop. Yes,
this one is very close to her own. She knows an intelligence
profile when she sees one. Her eyes narrow further and thoughts
race through her mind.

Yeah, this one is going to bear watching
closer…an intelligence operator in charge of a post-apocalyptic
group. That sounds familiar, and she’s not happy about it. She
almost promotes the camp category to an “A” status but holds back.
She knows his type, and there may be very little chance of them
joining forces with her supervisor’s attitude toward maintaining
power, especially after observing the other group’s activities and
dedication to finding survivors to bring into their fold. If she
and her group are going to have a chance in the long run, this one
may have to go. She becomes excited with the challenge
presented.

Later that evening, sitting around a large,
redwood conference table, with her face reflected in its mirror
polish, she looks at the other five around the table with her. The
opulence of the room, from the heavy cherry wood book shelves
lining the walls, to the thick, rich cream-colored carpet, define
the men who are sitting with her. They are the ones who had
controlled the world from the background and wished to control it
from the forefront…the ones who formulated the plan and initiated
its action. They had converted all of their vast fortunes into
precious metals and other resources prior to initiating Phase One.
The preparations for this undertaking had taken many, many years to
bring to fruition…gathering the needed people, upgrading sites,
bringing in equipment – military and electronic – gaining access to
files on the upper echelons. They co-opted people in all of the top
levels of government, and they did this all under the radar.

The elder men sit around the table and
listen as Gav informs them about the monitoring activities as a
whole. She gives them training updates, briefs them on their supply
situation, which should last them for another year, and a myriad of
other details which entail the functioning of the facility.

“Gavriella, tell us more about this camp you
upgraded to category B,” one of the men states.

They are the only ones who call her by her
name, and frankly, the only ones who have in a long, long time. She
hates the name as she associates it with the girl who lost her
parents. Every time she hears it, she feels a small part of her cry
out for her loss. During many of her downtimes, when she was alone,
she would pull out the only picture she has of her parents…the one
she pulled from the wreckage of her house. Her cold heart would
melt and hot tears would flow in streams down her cheeks. She feels
a momentary pang of grief every time she hears her full name
uttered.

Gav updates them on the camp’s activities to
include, according to her findings and assessments, that they are
being led by a former intelligence asset.

“So what do you propose to do about it?”
another of the men asks.

“Monitor it for now. There’s not too much
more we can do at the moment. We can’t attack them and, even if
they were to find out about our existence, they can’t attack us, so
it’s mostly a standoff. I think it’s in our best interest to leave
them for the moment. However, I will reiterate this once again, and
I know you may be tired of hearing it, but we need to start
integrating some of the other camps we identify for possible
inclusion if we are going to, as you quote, rise from the ashes,”
Gav answers.

“You know the answer to this, Gavriella. Any
integration will spoil the purity of our group and mission. We
can’t have that. If we integrate other camps, we will then be
required to share in the resources,” the first man states.

“You brought me on to be honest with you,
and that’s what I’m going to do now,” Gav starts, feeling
frustrated at their “purity of mission” and overly cautious nature.
No, it isn’t being overly cautious, it’s called greed. “This rising
from the ashes, as you think of it, and controlling resources is
gone. It was a great idea, but that plan went by the wayside the
moment the other sites failed to come online. We have had zero
response from them, and the teams we sent to some of the sites show
that they were never occupied. We can only assume that is the same
for every other location. The personnel never arrived.

“Hear me when I say this. There is nothing,
and I mean nothing, except what we have here. This facility was
only meant to be a command and control center. We don’t have the
resources to rise from anything. We don’t have the expertise or
manpower. Satellite readings confirm that the Eastern United
States, most of Europe, and Asia are wastelands, due to radioactive
contamination. The small groups we have identified there are
growing smaller by the day as the radiation levels kill them. The
only places that appear to have escaped so far are Africa, although
the states around the Mediterranean are risky, part of South
America, Australia, the western United States, and Canada. There
are a couple of minor South Pacific islands that appear habitable
as well. However, you will note that we have only identified “D”
category camps in those places, and very few of them at that. The
infected created by the vaccine have taken their toll. Of those,
there are plenty,” Gav asserts.

“Regarding that, have you had any success
with satellite communications?”

“Not at this time. We are working on that
night and day but it appears that any transmissions we send are not
being received. We are still receiving telemetry data, but we have
lost all ability to communicate with the satellite itself,” Gav
answers, hating to utter those words as it feels like her failure,
even though she knows it isn’t.