Slip Sliding Away
A Work in Progress
The noonday sun shone down on the young man lying atop his body board.
He didn’t hear the sounds of children playing in the surf along the
shore. His thoughts had him wrapped
up in what had happened in the past sixteen hours. He was sure he had been dreaming when he read the numbers of
the weekly lottery drawing as they appeared on his television screen.
He had thought he was suffering from temporary dyslexia when he compared
his ticket with the numbers on the screen.
Then reality hit home, he had won one of the largest lottery jackpots in
the states’ history. He had won the better part of one hundred fifty million
dollars. Then the shock had hit and
he awoke two hours later.
He took the next wave in. It
was of an abnormal size for the time of day, but he took it in his usual manner,
not really caring if he wiped out or not. He
walked up to his car and toweled himself off.
He had only been a civilian for a week and a half, since leaving the Army
after eight years of service. That
thought alone made him laugh. What
a great way to start the next chapter in my life, he thought to himself. Maybe now he could pay back all of those student loans
he had accumulated while receiving various degrees from schools across the
country. He drove off to his
apartment with a smile on his face.
Edge looked at the clock on his nightstand.
He wasn’t exactly sure why he had decided to go back into the army
after three years of being a civilian. But,
he did have child support payments to make to a wife who was cheating on him and
for children he wasn’t even sure that were his.
He had hoped that his return to the army wouldn’t bring him back here.
Here was the U.S. Army’s National Training Center and Fort Irwin,
California. Edge rolled out of his
bed, and was thankful that he finally warranted his own room.
Years of having a roommate whom he didn’t always get along with made
the situation that much better.
He walked over to his bathroom, turned on the lights and looked at his
reflection in the mirror. He shaved
two days worth of growth from his face and took a shower to wake himself up.
He was never one to look forward to running six plus miles three times a
week. He tried to lie to himself
for some glimmer of motivation. He
couldn’t do it quite the way he did when he was in basic training.
At least it gives me a reason to cut back on my smoking, were the words
going through his mind as he lit a cigarette.
He went ahead and changed into his uniform.
He never did like having his uniform starched, but with making rank comes
more responsibility. He did look
good in it, at least that’s what his ex-wife always told him.
He made his way down to the motor pool for the work call formation.
He hated having his cellular phone with him in uniform, he thought it was
unprofessional, but it was the only phone he had at the time.
It rang on his way from the parking lot.
He wasn’t used to getting a call this early in the morning.
He checked the caller ID, it was Tech.
Edge thought that Tech had found a job by now and should be at work since
it was after noon on the east coast. He
answered it anyway, “Yo, what’s up?”
”Look, man. When was the
last time you checked your checking account?”
“Nice
to hear from you too. Why do you
ask?”
“Well,
last time I looked at your balance, it was looking a bit low.
So I made a deposit for you. I
hope you don’t mind.”
“Dog,
I told you I didn’t want you putting money in my account.
I’m getting my finances straight on my own.”
“So,
what you’re saying is is that you want me to take out what I put in?”
“Well,
how much did you put in?”
“I
only put in a little.”
“I
said, how much?” Edge told him quite sternly.
“Alright, no need to get all violent and shit. I put in two hundred and fifty.”
“Dollars?”
“Thousand.
Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars.”
Edge was beginning to go into shock and started to stammer nonsense,
“How…where…a lot…”
“Calm
down, I hit the hundred and fifty mill jackpot. I decided I really didn’t need that much, so I opted for
the seventy five mill after taxes quick pay off.”
“My
god, you really did it didn’t you?” Tech
tried to stifle a laugh, “Yeah, I really did.
By the way, I set up a different account than the one you have now.
I put in enough for you to ditch the Army under honorable conditions and
for you to not have to worry about child support payments again. Hey, I gotta bolt. I have an appointment with a broker this
morning. I figure I can turn fifty
mill into about two hundred and fifty in a month.”
“Cool. I guess I need to
go talk to the First Sergeant and C.O. this morning.
Talk to you later, yo.”
Edge hung up and went to the formation as usual.
Though he was grinning from ear to ear the entire time.
When the formation was over he asked to talk with the C.O. and the First
Sergeant. He explained to them what
had happened and how much money was sitting in his account.
They assured him that he would be out in less than a week.
Edge began out-processing that day.
That evening, he checked his e-mail only to discover a message from an
airline containing his itinerary a week from that day.
His trip included a limousine to pick him up the morning of his flight
and a chartered jet at the airport in San Francisco for a flight back to
Florida.
Tech decided it would be easier for him to keep a low profile for the
time being. His appointment with a broker went smoothly, however, his
challenge lay in trying to find enough land in the state to go about with his
grand plan and finding a contractor to build his compound in a month and keep
quiet about it. He figured that all
those years of learning how to be a hacker were going to pay off very soon by
devising a method of keeping the government off his back and his brother’s.
Edge arrived in Florida right on time.
Tech drove himself to the airport to pick him up.
Tech was thankful that Edge was too busy getting paperwork done to go out
shopping for any new clothes. Edge
was also surprised that Tech hadn’t gone out and bought himself a new car yet.
Though he was driving his “project” car.
Tech had enough time to go get himself a new car and some new clothes,
maybe he just didn’t want to draw attention to himself after all that money he
had won. Edge couldn’t take it any longer, “So, what’s up?
How come you don’t have a new set of wheels, new threads, or any of
that stuff that comes with wealth?”
“You
just have to trust me when I say we need to keep a low profile, alright?”
“Sure,
just fill me in on the whole ‘why’ part.”
“I’ll
explain everything when we get in the car.”
When they got to Tech’s car, Tech pulled out a small PDA looking device
and punched in a few commands. “What
are you doing, checking your e-mail?” Tech
just grinned. Edge was getting
concerned, “Damn it, you said you were going to tell me what the hell is going
on when we got in the car?”
“OK,
we’re clean.”
“What
do you mean we’re clean?”
“I
was checking the car for any bugs. I
had to make sure no one was snooping on us.”
“Now,
why would anyone want to be snooping in on us?
What the hell did you do?”
“Well,
it’s nothing criminal per se. I
just don’t want the feds catching wind of what I’m doing.”
“Just
what is it that you are doing?”
“Remember
when I drew up those plans for a faster than light propulsion system?”
“See,
first you start talking James Bond shit and now you’re Talking about Star Trek
shit. Quit being so evasive and
just tell me straight.”
“Alright,
I’ll tell you.” Tech started
the car and drove through the parking garage to get out of the airport area.
“I bought about 20 acres of land right outside of Melbourne, about ten
miles west of the interstate. I had
a house built. Most of it is
underground, or will be. They
should have it done in about a week. It’s
big enough for what I have planned. And
what I have planned is big. I also
had to have a runway built. It’s
not that long, only about 50% longer than a carrier deck.
In two weeks, I should have enough cash to buy two fighters and make all
the necessary modifications.”
Edge looked stunned. It took
fifteen minutes for Edge to come to grips with what he had just heard.
Is it actually possible that Tech can pull this off? Of course he can, he’s crazy, but he’s not stupid.
But why the hell does he want me involved in this?
I mean, yeah, I picked up two degrees, but I don’t know anything about
what he’s trying to do. I just
like to design stuff. But he still
hasn’t explained why he wants to keep the government out of this.
I think there is more going on than he’s letting on to.
“You seem troubled. All
right, the reason for all the secrecy is that I don’t want ANYONE finding out
what I’m doing. I’d hate to think of what could happen if any of this
should fall into the wrong hands. Actually
it would be bad if it fell into anyone’s hands.
So, what I plan on doing is to make it public after I perfect the
procedure. That way no one
government can claim it for themselves. But
I need YOU along for the ride to give me inspiration when I’m dealing with
this shit. Otherwise, I know for a
fact that I’ll never get a damned thing accomplished.”
“Sure.
So what kinds of fighters are you planning on getting?
And what do you mean by mods?”
“I’ll
SHOW you the rest of it when the house gets finished. Cool?”
“Cool.”
They pulled up to a fairly ritzy hotel on the ocean side of the state.
Edge was certain that Tech had said he wanted to keep a low profile.
He couldn’t resist asking, “So, what’re we doing here?
Picking up a friend?”
“Not quite. I’m using a
false ID. But since I’m paying
with cash, they don’t care. Besides,
why can’t we have a little luxury with our fun?”
They walked through the lobby. No
one paid them any mind. They got
onto the elevator. Edge thought
they were going to just another room, perhaps even a suite.
That is, until Tech inserted a key into the elevator’s panel and turned
it to the penthouse selection. When
they got into their room, Edge was abashed.
He had never seen such blatant waste of money with his own, but that’s
not to say that he didn’t like it. Quite
the contrary, he was beginning to have thoughts that maybe this whole game plan
of his brother’s wasn’t that bad.
The week went by before they knew it.
They packed up all their things and made sure they had at least three
alternate identities from three separate states.
The drive out to the lot in the middle of the state was uneventful.
Tech didn’t want to draw any attention from the police.
The estate was exactly the way he had envisioned it to be.
He had enough commercial power for the living area of the estate;
everything else was on generator power. Tech
had only to wait until the end of the month to draw his money out of the stock
market. Hopefully he won’t lose
his shirt in the whole deal. He
already had the fighters on their way. Four
of them. FA-18 Hornets should make
for a great shell and airframe.
Edge spent a majority of his time in the flight simulator and in the
miniature wind tunnel working with different designs for the fighters’
exteriors. Though he wasn’t
certain why Tech would want him to play around with such drastic changes in the
aerodynamics in mid flight. Then
Tech called him into the computer room. Edge
had only seen some of the hardware Tech now had at his disposal in magazines. He was certain Tech had paid a good sum of money on these
machines; they were definitely not for gaming. “I was thinking that we could actually get away with making
the jets transform. You know, like
in those anime videos. But only if
we can build a compact yet powerful enough power plant for them. I need you to use these to make models for the wind tunnel
and run them through the Sims.” Edge
looked at his brother, “You really have lost your mind. How long do you think this will take? The money won’t last forever, you know.”
“Well, the money might if I keep reinvesting a small portion of it.
As for the timetable, it depends on whether we can make that power plant
a reality. If we can make it in a
month, I think we can have a workable prototype within a month after.”
“What
about pilot’s licenses? I think
we would need to be inspected by the FAA in order to do this legally.
I don’t think even you and all your secrets have enough stealth
technology to get by radar. If you don’t have it, we’ll be having to fly them too
close to the surface to perform any real tests.”
“I
think we could make it invisible enough to stay off of a civilian radar if we
fly on the outer fringe of their coverage.
That’s the other reason I picked here.
I figure that no real terrain to speak of should make things easier.
My real concern is the Coast Guard boats working off the coast; their
radars are focused along the ocean surface.
They could pick us up and have the Air Force on us in minutes as some
kind of drug runners.”
Edge was getting concerned. But
he wasn’t going to let a few technicalities ruin this.
He was now aboard with his brother all the way.
Edge thought he could come up with a carbon based compound that would
absorb radar and heat. He wasn’t
well versed in chemical engineering, but he could learn enough of it to work on
this new project.
