All previous chapters - CHAPTER 1 - CHAPTER 2 - CHAPTER 3 - CHAPTER 4 - CHAPTER 5 - CHAPTER 6 - Chapter 7 - CHAPTER 8 - CHAPTER 9 - CHAPTER 10 - CHAPTER 11
Previously on “The bomb in the shed…”; Arthur, struggling with fatigue, finally meets Kinga and has to show his work to his old boss Fitzpatrick. A second therapy session highlights just how much Arthur is suffering, and then he discovers Elizabeth is working without him.
And here we go with CHAPTER 12…
Chapter 12
New Mexico Desert - 2003
“I need to see you now, about a security issue.”
It was a text from Elizabeth’s boss, Robert Fitzpatrick. He hardly ever messaged her, just waited for the next scheduled meeting to bring up whatever he wanted to discuss. Nothing was ever that urgent enough to break his routine. He spent most of his time writing reports or in meetings. Had he somehow found out what she and Arthur were up to? It seemed the most likely explanation for the text. But is that how he would tell her know something was up? Not very likely. Then again, who knew. He was a strange man.
Elizabeth took the elevator up to the surface level. They were hundreds of feet underground so she was in there for a good few minutes. The journey up always made her claustrophobic, more so than being in the lower levels where there was plenty of space and air. Today being confined within the narrow confines of the elevator felt even more oppressive than normal.
It was unlikely Robert would have found out what they were up to, she and Arthur had been so careful. They’d bought pagers to contact each other, developed secret codes and had clandestine meetings. The whole thing had been rather fun, and it felt low risk. In reality they were just doing their jobs and Elizabeth was in control of everything. But perhaps there was more risk than she realised.
Ground level was a radio observatory and astronomical research centre. It was still operational, but on a reduced staff now the true purpose of the facility had changed. Elizabeth emerged from the cluster of small concrete buildings into the hot dusty air. An array of twenty seven radio telescopes, each over fifty feet tall, stretched out before her. It was still an impressive sight, even after all this time. It looked other-worldy. Richard was stood under the nearest telescope. Elizabeth made her way over. He looked furtive. Oh God, he wasn’t going to make another pass at her was he?
“What’s this about?” asked Elizabeth as she approached.
Richard looked deeply uncomfortable. “We have a security breach. Classified information is making its way out to places it shouldn’t.”
Well that definitely wasn’t her and Arthur. Which was a relief. But then again, was it? Worries over security was only going to make what they were doing harder. And that meant someone on her team was a spy. How was that possible? She knew them all, treated them almost like family. This changed everything. Just having that shadow lurking over them. How could it not?
“What places?”
“The less I tell you the better. We have the NNSA doing some digging behind the scenes. I just thought you should know. And you can tell me if you see anything suspicious.”
Great, the NNSA. That could mean all manner of things. Background checks, investigations. Anyone might be monitored, followed, any privacy they had left would disapear. And now the cloud of suspicion would be tainting Elizabeth’s relationship with her whole team. What behaviour was suspicious enough to warrant reporting? The only truly suspicious behaviour she knew of was her own and Arthur’s.
“Ok, I’ll keep an eye out.”
“Thanks,” Robert turned to go.
Elizabeth said, “Why did you tell me? It’s going to make my job a hell of a lot harder.”
He turned back, “I can’t do this alone. And you’re the only one I really trust.”
---
Elizabeth and Marie were in their favourite roadside diner tucking into breakfast burritos with green chilli sauce. Like they’re monthly cheat days, Friday breakfast burritos were a regular tradition they rarely missed.
“What’s up with Arthur?” asked Marie. She was ladling on big dollops of hot sauce with each mouthful, she had a much higher tolerance for heat than Elizabeth.
Elizabeth paused with her fork halfway to her mouth. Marie seemed to be developing an unhealthy level of interest in Arthur. Was he suspicious? Or did she have a crush on him? Neither was good.
“What do you mean?” She tried to sound offhand. It didn’t sound too convincing.
“He seems even more furtive than normal,” said Marie. “He practically jumps out of his skin and runs away if I try to talk to him.”
“He’s just a bit different, that’s all.”
Marie leaned forward conspiratorially and whispered, “What if he’s the spy?”
Elizabeth had told Marie about the conversation with Robert straight right after it happened. No way was she going to try and deal with all this on her own. She hadn’t told Arthur though, it would have freaked him out even more than he was already. Marie was her best friend and Elizabeth trusted her completely. Anyway, she was discrete and knew everything about everybody. Which was great, apart from at moments like this when Elizabeth started to regret confiding in her friend.
“Arthur? A spy? You must be joking.” Elizabeth didn’t have to feign incredulity on that one.
“I know you won’t see it,” said Marie, “because of the thing you have with him.”
“What do you mean?”
“Don’t be coy with me. You’re totally into him in some kind of weird ‘ooh I love you’re your brain’ geeked out way. You spend all that time in Lab C. You hate plasma reports. Or you used to.”
Marie was smiling at her mischievously, Elizabeth couldn’t help but smile back. But she wasn’t going to admit anything. “His work is important, you know that.”
“Course it is.” Marie took a big bite of burrito, her smile even wider.
God, she was annoying sometimes.
---
This time as the team gathered together and data scrolled down the screen hushed silence gave way to rapturous applause. There were plenty of handshakes, back slapping and high-fives. Much of it for Elizabeth. Even Arthur had a big smile on his face as he lurked at the back of the room doing his best to avoid anyone who might want to congratulate him. In fact everyone looked happy apart from Robert who had a pained smile on his face. He hung around for a few minutes but looked like he couldn’t wait to get away. Moments later he was gone.
Elizabeth said a few words to the team and stayed to be sociable. But after a respectable amount of time had passed she left to go look for Robert. He wasn’t in his office, so Elizabeth took the lift up to the surface. It was cooler today and overcast. There would probably be a storm later. She found him hiding out under the same antenna they’d met under before. He didn’t look like someone who’d just overseen a major scientific breakthrough. He looked like he’d had enough, of just about everything.
She said, “What’s the matter? You should be happy.”
“We still have a security breach,” he replied. “This technology is dangerous enough with us in control. Imagine if it got out there.”
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. It’s just a first step. There’s a long way to go.”
“We need to go down to a skeleton crew. Only people we know we can trust 100%. A handful of people.”
That was insane.
“It would slow us down by months, or years.”
All that time they were going nowhere Elizabeth seemed to get all the budget and people she needed. Now they had their breakthrough Robert was near enough shutting her down. It was madness. Most of the team were working on her project with Arthur one way or another, even if they didn’t know it. Cutting the team would kill their progress and make it harder for Elizabeth to hide what she was doing.
Robert said, “I don’t have a choice. It’s happening, now. I need you to write me a list tonight, the key people you think should stay. Everyone else goes, tomorrow.”
Oh God, what did that mean for Arthur?
---
Elizabeth was back under her desk with a towel on her head. Normally it meant she was resting. Tonight she was definitely hiding. She didn’t want to speak to or see anyone. A gentle kick in her side told her that wasn’t going to be possible.
“We need to talk.”
Elizabeth lifted a corner of her towel and peered out. All she could see was Marie’s feet and legs. Did the woman ever go home? “About what?”
“Not here.”
They went up and out to the carpark together. Marie didn’t say a word in the ride up. She looked really unsettled. Scared maybe. She was going to start talking in the car but Elizabeth insisted they drive to the nearest cafe. You couldn’t be too careful.
Once they’d settled in and got a coffee Marie said, “It’s the results of the test. I think they were faked.”
Oh God, not this.
“What do you mean, faked?”
“I mean the results we saw weren’t from our experiment. They were routed in to replace them. The real test results were another failure.”
Marie was right of course. Elizabeth and Arthur had set it up so the results everyone saw on the screen were coming from Lab C, not the old technology the team was still running in Lab A. It was a risk, but one worth taking to get the support needed to move the project on to the next stage. She’d been really careful to hide the data switch, obviously not careful enough.
“Who would fake the test results, and why?” Elizabeth had to find out how much Marie knew.
“I don’t know,” replied Marie. “Maybe Robert? You saw how he was after the test. Weird right? Maybe it has something to do with the spy hunt.”
Elizabeth knew what she had to do, but it broke her heart to even think about it. Marie was her best friend. Her only true friend really. But it was too dangerous having her around now.
She said, “Ok, leave it with me. I’ll look into it. Can you keep it to yourself, until I find out what’s going on?”
Marie smiled with relief, “Of course.”
She looked immediately reassured by her friend’s words, which only made what Elizabeth was about to do even worse.
—-
Robert scanned through the list Elizabeth handed her, his face impassive. There were eight names in total including herself. Her skeleton team. She didn’t know if it was anything like the list he was expecting.
“I see Marie isn’t on here.” He said. “I’m surprised, I thought your two were close.”
They were in Robert’s office, so they had to be careful about what they said.
“We are. But you said it only people we were 100% about. I guess there must be a seed of doubt somewhere.”
It was a complete betrayal. Nothing less. The dark cloud of doubt would linger over her friend’s career for years. She certainly wouldn’t get any kind of work that required security clearance.
“Yet Arthur Price makes the cut. He’s the Brit engineer on the plasma monitoring, right?”
“It’s his work that’s made all of this possible.”
“Which is why he’s getting well rewarded for his contribution. The rest of the list is fine, it checks out with the NNSA report. Arthur is a no I’m afraid.”
But without him there was no point to it all.
“He’s a great mind, Robert. What if we still need him. There’s so much still to do. I don’t know if I can do it without him.”
She’d meant to say ‘we’. The word ‘I’ slipped out by accident. Robert shot her a look and she could feel herself blush. She never did that.
“It’s a deal breaker for me. I’m sorry,” she added, doubling down was all she could think to do now.
Robert stared at her thoughtfully. Was he deciding whether to call her bluff. She couldn’t back down now, she’d have to walk if she couldn’t keep Arthur.
“I can’t have him at the facility,” Robert said at last. “It’s too much of a risk. But we can set him up in a lab at Los Alamos. Does that work?”
Hardly a great result. It was over an hour’s drive away. And it was going to make it even harder to spend time together. But clearly it was the best she was going to get.
“Yes, I guess we can make that work.”
---
Elizabeth didn’t get to see any of the team that were sent home. It was heart-breaking. They were notified that night, debriefed first thing in the morning and then sent on their way. She couldn’t bring herself to message Marie. What could she say? She checked her own messages in the vague hope that Marie might have got in touch, but she hadn’t. Who could blame her? If she didn’t know exactly what was going on she’d have her suspicions.
Arthur had been renting an apartment not far from the facility but had been moved to a hotel in Santa Fe to be nearer Los Alamos, and to cut his ties with the project. Arthur wouldn’t want to move, it would unsettle him. But Robert had insisted. The NNSA were probably watching Arthur too. Elizabeth tried calling him and got no reply so she drove over to see him at the hotel.
When she got there the receptionist told her he had checked out. He’d booked a cab to Santa Fe airport. Elizabeth checked the flights. There was one to Dallas in ninety minutes. With a connection on to Madrid and then London. Jesus Christ, he’d be back home in twenty four hours. Once he was there she’d never see him again. What did that mean for their project? It was a forty minute drive to the airport. Elizabeth got a taxi so she could buy a ticket to Dallas on the way and jump straight out of the car when she got there. She ran inside, picked up her ticket and carried on running to security and then on to the gate.
She was going to make it.
The last of the passengers were lining up to board but she couldn’t see Arthur among them. She joined the queue and waited impatiently to board the plane. Once onboard she pushed past the fellow stragglers trying to stash away their carry-ons and get settled in their seats. But no Arthur, in coach or business. Where the hell was she? Was he on a different flight after all? She had to get off the plane, she couldn’t go to Dallas.
“Madam, please take your seat, we’re closing the doors.”
The steward was giving Elizabeth a big beaming smile but his feet were planted firmly between her and the exit.
“I need to get off.”
“I’m afraid it’s not possible, please take your seat.” The smile was still there
“The door’s still open, I can get off.”
Elizabeth took out her wallet and showed her credentials. She wasn’t law enforcement or anything vaguely like it. But she was a high ranking government employee in a military facility, and her pass did look formidable. Perhaps not as formidable as the expression on her face though. Maybe that was what finally persuaded the steward to step aside. Elizabeth left the plane and without knowing what to do next stopped off at the airport bar for a drink. That was where she found Arthur, nursing a large glass of wine.
Thank God.
She could feel much of the tension and angst that had built up over the last couple of hours float away.
“What are you doing here?” he said as she sat on a stool beside him.
“Looking for you,” she replied.
He said, “I’m not doing shots with you,” and smiled.
Elizabeth smiled too, ordered a beer and clinked it against Arthur’s glass. She felt a sudden surge of emotion and struggled to hold back tears.
She said, “How could you leave me here on my own?”
“I couldn’t. That’s why I didn’t get on the plane.”
Arthur had a family back home. A wife and two teenage children. Elizabeth knew from his file. He must miss them terribly. Arthur never talked about them with Elizabeth and she never asked. It just wasn’t something they’d discussed. It just happened that way. Or maybe that was just how Arthur was. But he had every reason to go home. What was keeping him here. Her? The work?
She leant over and kissed him gently on the mouth.
He kissed her back.
She said, “There’s something important I need to tell you.”
That’s it for Chapter 12, I hope you enjoyed it and are looking forward to more. Chapter 13will be out the same time next week, Friday at 4:00pm UK time.
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