Free Shepherd One by Rick Jones

Mr. President.”
    “What have you found?”
     “Well, I will say this,” he began. “It’s quite a marvel of
engineering. The unit is totally computerized and the decoy system well masked,
making it nearly impossible to disarm.”
    “But is it doable? Can it be disarmed?”
    Simone looked unemotional. “I said nearly impossible,
Mr. President.”
    “Nearly or not, Ray, impossible to me means there is a high
degree that something cannot be done.”
    Simone leaned over the unit and examined the spheres
closely. “Actually, Mr. President, the word impossible doesn’t mean that
something cannot be done. It just implies the degree of difficulty involved in
the situation.”
    “Ray, can you disarm the damn thing or not?”
    “Impossible or not, Mr. President, and although challenging,
everything is achievable and attainable. I will find a way to disarm this
unit.”
    “How long will that take?”
    “That, I cannot give an answer to.”
    “Ray, this is imperative.”
    “I understand that. But this is something none of us has
ever seen before. The engineering by the Russians makes me ashamed that we
haven’t come up with this marvel sooner.”
    “You talk as if you admire the damn thing.”
    Simone was enamored in a scientific way.
    “It’s a bomb, Ray. Find out what makes it tick, then disarm
it. And I mean yesterday.”
    “I’ll do what can,” he offered.
    “Do it quickly. There’s a possibility that there may be more
units floating around on American soil.”
    “Again, Mr. President, I’ll do what I can. A unit such as
this will need to be approached with considerable caution.”
    “Ray, we don’t have much time.”
    “Mr. President, if we make a mistake—even a single and
minute miscalculation—Area Four will be nothing more than a dead landscape for thousands
of years and whatever answers you are seeking will never be learned. We have no
choice in the matter.”
    Over the speakers Ray Simone could hear President Burroughs
force a sigh of frustration.
    And then: “I’ll need your engineers on this twenty-four-seven,”
he said flatly.
    “Of course.”
    “And, Ray?”
    “Yes, Mr. President.”
    “Keep in mind that you’re on the clock. If a unit goes off
on American soil, then your answers won’t matter much. It’ll be too late.”
    “I understand.”
    And then a loud click sounded over the speakers, something
that was definite and audible as a flip of a switch, and then the sound of
white noise transitioned cleanly over to dead air.
    The president had made his statement.
    The clock was ticking.
     

 
     
     
    CHAPTER TEN
    Washington D.C.
    1345 hours Eastern Standard Time.
     
    Marine One is the presidential
helicopter transport to locations of close proximities with minimized landing
areas. The current version is the VH-71 Kestral, a state-of-the-line mobile air
unit that has a service ceiling of 15,000 feet, and travels at a speed of 192
miles per hour to a maximum distance of 863 miles.
    Its less than posh interior was simply rudimentary with
padded benches lining the interior walls and a small communications center with
fax and phone. The ceiling was low, the rotary system above them a semblance of
moving parts that aided in the muting of the continuous wop-wop-wop of the
helicopter’s blades. Nevertheless, and with much of the noise canceled out,
President Burroughs always had to speak louder than the norm, as did the
members of his team. 
    Inside, the bay that was cordoned off from the cockpit by a
wall of diamond-studded steel as President Burroughs, Chief Advisor Alan
Thornton, Attorney General Dean Hamilton and Chief CIA Analyst Doug Craner
gleaned through documents of newly gathered information from international
sources, as they waited for the rotors to pick up the maximum speed for
liftoff.
    Once Marine One airlifted and began its western trajectory
to Raven Rock, President Burroughs continued to read over the newly acquired
facts until he was well studied with the new