so spooked.'
Mahjtic just continued to look at Gus, the thought of chicken soup all but gone. It slowly turned its attention and head toward the now covered window.
Gus paused while using the can opener on another can of soup, and he lowered his head and his shoulders slumped.
'I figured it was something like that.'
The old man was shaking as he opened the can of soup and poured it into the pot, sloshing more on the stove than he got in the dented pan.
'When I was a middlin' boy, my ma told me there weren't nothin' in the dark to be afraid of.' He stopped stirring and looked over at Matchstick, who had just turned away from the covered window. 'Guess she was wrong, huh?'
NINETEEN
Collins, Everett, and the newly briefed Jason Ryan, now wearing his new blue Group jumpsuit, anxiously watched the activity in the Computer Center while they waited for the Europa XP-7 technician to join them. Director Compton saw them and yawned. He turned from watching a search grid and walked up the stairs to see them. They were all looking at the large screen on the far wall, which was a real-time display of southeastern New Mexico that the Group's satellite was beaming to them. The computers here were programmed to pick up every minute detail on the ground and search for any anomalies with the use of magnetometers, infrared photography, Doppler radar, and terrain-anomaly mapping. Collins nodded at the director when he joined them.
The pictures that were being sent to the center by the KH-11 were in small, red-lined, highlighted squares, so they could be broken down even further by technicians at their individual consoles, hoping to pick up the slightest trace of metal where it shouldn't be, or an anomaly in the surrounding terrain. As they watched, they saw a tiny car speed down a road outside of Roswell, as the computer digitally added a small blue compass showing the direction of the automobile. Then the vehicle quickly disappeared as it didn't fit the programmed profile.
'I'm beginning to believe that damn thing didn't come down at all,' Everett said. 'They doubled the size of the search area to include most of western Texas now, and still nothing.'
Jason Ryan watched the view change from the advanced KH-11 satellite. 'From the view I had of the saucer it's my opinion'--he thought a moment, then corrected himself-- 'it's my guess, it wasn't going anywhere but down. It was damaged enough that it couldn't go back up, I'm sure of it.'
Collins looked at the navy pilot. 'The senator has a hunch that if it did, it would be here, and after what I heard, I tend to believe him. It's like whoever is piloting these things used a preset coordinate when traveling here that aligns their flight path to travel over lightly populated areas.' He turned and watched the screen roll as the bird turned its cameras to infrared for night vision to gather objects in by their ambient light as it traveled farther east.
'I agree,' Compton said.
'Just remember, it was too damaged, and after that second craft had shown up--'
'That's it!' Niles shouted. People at computer consoles frowned and looked up at the four men, annoyed at the noise. 'Mr. Ryan, how far would you say the damaged saucer was knocked off course after the second one made its appearance?'
'I think I know where you're going with this, Doc, but it wasn't knocked off that far, if at all. Ryan here said so earlier,' Everett said, looking at his boss.
Ryan shook his head. 'He's right, Dr. Compton, in the distance that these satellites have covered, it should have been close to the search area. Believe me, I would like to find out what's going on. I lost a good kid in the backseat of my fighter and two pretty good guys in another, but you're grasping at straws.' Ryan sighed and rubbed his eyes. Then he closed his eyes in thought. 'Sir, I was dangling in a parachute at the time, remember? I just don't know what to tell you.'
It dawned on Collins all at once.
'That's right; it won't be where it had been the first time in '47. In the past there was nothing but the second saucer that would have changed its course, unless you count the Cessna in '47, and that wouldn't have been enough of an impact to send a kite reeling. But this time there was actually one more event that occurred in its flight path that could have brought it down somewhere else,' Compton said, still looking at the picture being broadcast by Boris and Natasha.
Jack remembered the Incident Report Ryan had filed about the attack. He quickly opened it and scanned the pages.
'Mr. Ryan, you said in your report you actually fired on the second, attacking craft, is that right?'
Ryan turned pale for a moment and turned away; he slapped his forehead with his palm. 'My God, I fired a Phoenix at it. It was a snapshot and I know it hit, it must have. I had a solid tone and the Phoenix's warhead had locked hard on the target!'
'Damage to the attacker could have brought both ships down, not only the victim, but the aggressor also,' Jack said aloud.
'Okay, I see your point; a missile strike would have brought it and maybe the other down sooner, but maybe even later. It's such a long shot I wouldn't put five bucks on it. But giving you the benefit of the doubt, where?'
'It's a matter of elimination that has nothing to do with the crash. West Texas is lightly populated; it may be there.' Niles ran down to the large screen and slapped the monitor. 'But if it was damaged, Texas may have been out of reach of it, even New Mexico.' He walked down and plucked a digital plasma map from a desk and unrolled it. The map display automatically came to life, illuminating the sandwiched plastic pieces in a high-definition display. Niles, satisfied it was the right map, returned to the three men who were waiting. 'There. We know if it came down anywhere in Southern California, there would have been witnesses. Hell, a crash there would have killed hundreds, or even thousands.' He traced a line with his finger separating Southern California from the rest of the West. The spots where his finger ran changed color to an orange hue. 'Even the Mojave Desert there to the east has a whole lot of people in it.' Again he ran his finger in a circle around the desert area of California; again the digital picture changed the area to a soft orange hue. 'But look here.' He illuminated the eastern part of the Western states map to a pretty much blank area.
'Arizona?' Ryan asked.
'Why not?' Compton circled the map with his index finger, touching the plastic and changing the color of central Arizona to a bluish tint. 'You get east of Phoenix and what do you have? Nothing but scrub and desert spotted with little one-stop cafe-and-gas-station towns all the way into New Mexico.'
'I don't know, boss, that's awful thin,' Everett said. But he still scanned the map just a little closer than he had been before.
'Thin? Yes, but impossible, no. This time there was something else that knocked it further to the west, Ryan's missile strike. In here would be the most likely spot. It's so thinly populated, the
'You've sold me on the possibility, Niles, but what you're proposing is a complete shift of search priorities. That could be disastrous if you're wrong,' Jack said, looking closer at the director.
'Pete!' Niles shouted while holding Jack's eyes, then he turned and left and ran to the floor below. He found Pete Golding, his replacement long ago as department head of Computer Sciences. He had his feet propped up on his desk and was snoring. Niles hated to wake him because Pete had had even less sleep than himself. 'Goddammit, Pete, wake up. I need you, man!'
Pete Golding felt his feet slapped off the desk and he came immediately awake. It felt as if he had been
