Free The Second Ship by Richard Phillips Page A

advancement.”
    But Robert Caine did not sit down. Instead he leaned forward, scribbling a single sentence on a yellow pad before him.
    Pushing the pad over in front of the president, he said, “Mr. President, I cannot, in good conscience, continue serving an administration that would share critical national technologies with the world at large. You believe your job, as president, is to make the world a better place. I believe your sole responsibility is securing the future of the American people. Please consider this my formal resignation.” With that, Robert Caine turned and strode from the room.
    Absolute silence settled over those assembled in the cabinet room as all eyes watched the president. After several seconds, he turned toward his chief of staff.
    “Andy, I want that list of potential replacements for sec. def. on my desk by six. Get the vetting process rolling. Get the press secretary briefed right away because there is going to be a firestorm she will need to handle very shortly.”
    “Yes, Mr. President.” The chief stood and departed through the doorway into the office of the president’s secretary.
    Turning back toward the energy secretary, President Harris removed his reading glasses. “Porter, the ball is in your court. Get that publication finalized if it isn’t already. I’ll make the announcement from the Oval Office in the morning. Gentlemen, get ready. Tomorrow we will let the world know that a brand new future, independent of fossil fuels, is at hand.”
    All members of the cabinet stood as the president of the United States left the room, and then they filed out behind him. Vice President George Gordon waited several moments, carefully returning his Montblanc pen to his daily planner. He looked around the empty room where once again history had been made, a thin, tight smile on his lips as he rubbed the soft leather on the back of his chair.
     

Chapter 12
     
    “Dad! You’ve got to be kidding me. Why do we have to go? Mark, Jen, and I haven’t had our own day in weeks.”
    “Heather, it’s Family Day, remember? We’ll be grilling burgers and dogs with the other lab families. It’ll be fun. I’m sure your plans aren’t of such earthshaking importance they warrant skipping the annual picnic.”
    “But we planned on biking and rock climbing today.”
    Her mother glanced up from the afghan she was knitting for the church raffle. “Heather. Discussion over. We’re going, and I’m sure the Smythes are too. Besides, you loved it last year.”
    With a resigned sigh, Heather nodded, kissed her folks good night, and headed upstairs to bed. Frustration gnawed at her gut, knowing she would once again be denied a visit to the starship.
    Events this past week made returning to the ship all the more imperative. They needed to discover how to access more information in those computer banks.
    The news media was in a frenzy. First there had been the shocking resignation of the secretary of defense, followed almost immediately by the president’s announcement that the first of the alien technologies to be publicly released was cold fusion.
    Then the scientific papers on the production of controllable cold fusion were published, sending every scientific laboratory in the world scrambling to independently reproduce the results. Confirmation had come flooding in, numerous universities announcing the results almost simultaneously, while major companies scrambled to commercialize the applications.
    As if that weren’t enough, the stock market stumbled into another black October decline with two days of record sell-off. That then reversed when several energy companies appeared able to adapt parts of their infrastructure to support some of the anticipated automobile technologies.
    Outcries from oil-producing countries were largely ignored by industrialized countries, including emerging economies like China and India. Clearly the perceived benefits of the release were winning widespread support around