"STAY BACK! STAY BACK!" Mac hollered, motioning for them to keep their distance. But the man waved back as the boat came to within thirty feet.

"Rick, PUNCH IT!" Matt barked, giving Rick all of the incentive he needed. He pushed the throttle forward and the deep, powerful roar of the engine hummed throughout the boat as the larger craft surged ahead. Immediately the man stopped waving and raised his gun, took aim and squeezed of two wild shots that slapped harmlessly into the water twenty yards ahead.

"Take cover!" Mac yelled, crouching behind his seat while raising his weapon to return fire. His M-16 fire selector was set to single shot but he thumbed it forward to 3-round burst, sending a quick spray that chipped the bow point of the pursuing craft.

Matt followed Susan to cover behind the deck seats just as incoming fire zipped over their heads. Matt laid his weapon across the back of the cushioned seat, hastily aimed at the pursuing craft and fired a 3-round burst.

Rick pushed the throttle further while snatching quick looks over his shoulder at their attackers. The powerful engines on his own vessel were quickly outdistancing the smaller boat and they pulled directly behind him to avoid his large wake. A bullet whizzed past him and the windshield in front of him shattered.

Susan squeezed off another burst from her M-16, keeping her head as low as possible yet still high enough to see what she was aiming at. To her surprise she was rewarded to see one of the white robed men jerk with the impact of a bullet and fall back with his hands clutching at his throat. Her celebration was cut short, as the top of the seat she crouched behind was ripped apart with gunfire. She flattened herself to the deck as shredded wood and foam cushion settled around her.

"Susan! Are you OK?" Matt looked to his fallen wife.

"I'm OK!" she called back.

Just then, an odd tingling sensation filled Matt's head, and his ears began to ring. He turned back to the battle, and as if in slow motion he could see something tiny, like a bug, rapidly approaching his head.

It's a bullet!

But even as the thought was registering he saw a brilliant flash and a white-hot explosion of pain gonged through his skull...

"MATT! OH MY GOD NO! MATT!" Susan screamed as her husbands limp form crumpled to the deck beside her. She rolled him onto his back, screaming again when she saw the stream of blood running down his forehead and smearing his face. But then she saw the mangled dent at the bottom edge of his helmet. It had deflected the bullet, but the impact had caused it to cut his head open. "Matt?" she shook him, her eyes blurring with tears. He let out a painful groan in response, his hands automatically reaching for his blood covered face.

"How bad is it?" Mac crouched down beside her. Susan pushed the helmet back from his forehead to expose the deep cut caused from the indented helmet.

"The bullet ricocheted off the helmet." She said, a smile of joy coming to her face. "He'll need a few stitches."

"The lucky bastard! I bet it rang his bell pretty damn good. He's probably got a concussion." A sly grin crossed Mac's face.

Across from him another bullet chewed into the padded seat cushion with a spray of debris. Susan instinctively lowered herself to cover Matt while Mac raised and fired back, squeezing off half a dozen 3-round bursts. One of the bursts caught the second gunman square in the chest, sending him sprawling back and tumbling out of the boat into the water.

"I GOT YOU! YOU SON OF A BITCH!" Mac hollered at the top of his lungs. The smaller pursuing craft immediately began to slow down and bank away hard towards the eastern shore.

They were near the center of the lake and Rick slowly began to turn back toward home, easing back on the throttle. He looked back over his shoulder at the other craft, now over half a mile behind them. The driver was standing, searching the water for his fallen comrade.

The radio crackled with David's voice. "Is everybody ok?"

Rick took his radio from the dash. "Copy, David. Everyone is ok."

Mac had turned his attention to the house the attackers had come from. Now that they were in the middle of the lake he could easily see into the large yard and the mansion set back in the forest.

At first he couldn't believe what he was seeing. He blinked and did a double take, but nothing had changed. He looked down to Rick and saw that he had lowered the radio and was staring with a tense, wide-eyed look on his stubbly face. He killed the throttle but kept the motor running and the boat eased to a halt.

"Why did you stop?" Susan asked from the floor. She had removed Matt's helmet and wiped the blood from his eyes with a hand towel from her pocket and was now compressing it against the wound. Matt was wincing in pain.

"My God..." She heard Rick gasp in a horrified voice.

"What is it?" She put Matt's hand on the compress and peered towards shoor.

What she saw staggered her.

The entire back yard of the estate was full of zombies. There were literally hundreds of them packed to the back walls of the mansion itself, the only exception being the bonfire that burned in the center of the yard, which all the zombies avoided. Along the roof, set at ten-foot intervals and running parallel to the ground were six long posts extending twenty feet out over the horde of zombies. Hanging by chains from each post were crucifixes with naked human beings attached to each side, a man and a woman per crucifix. They were held to the crucifix by what appeared to be a large stakes driven through the center of the wrists, forearm and bicep. It was impossible to determine how the feet were attached because the crucifixes hung low enough that the zombies were able to reach the victim's bottom half with outstretched arms. The zombies swarmed around the crucifixes in a feeding frenzy, ripping and tearing at the lower torso and legs of the victims. All of those on the crucifixes were now dead, but the zombies continued to devour their still warm flesh.

Now they knew the source of the screams echoing across the lake earlier.

"There are people out on the balconies." Mac blurted, finally reaching for his field glasses.

"Rick what going on?" David asked over the radio again. "Why have you stopped?"

"What the... What the..." was all Susan could mumble, unable to take her eyes from the carnage.

"More of those white robed bastards." Mac said, looking through his binoculars. There were five of them wielding AK-47 assault rifles on the second floor balcony and five more on the third floor balcony. Also on the third floor balcony was another man wearing a red robe. Tied down on a platform before him was a naked woman. From here Mac could see her disemboweled stomach, the splayed, gutted rib cage. The man in the red robes raised his blood-splattered arms and pulled back his cowl. He was Caucasian, his head bald and his face and mouth smeared with blood. Mac couldn't make out his facial features to well, but the man seemed to be staring right back at him. Then, ever so slowly, he raised his arm and pointed straight at them.

"Holy fucking shit." Rick was looking through his own binoculars. "Holy FUCKING SHIT!" There was no hiding the shock in his voice.

"That's not...what?" Susan mumbled, the true weight of the... Unholy thing she was beholding smashing her like a sledgehammer. At the same time a small, rational part of her brain was thankful that she was not looking through binoculars like Rick and Mac; what her naked eye could discern from half a mile away was more than enough to scar her forever.

"Rick, baby? Why have you stopped?" Jennifer's voice crackled over the radio.

The sound of his wife's voice pulled Rick from his daze and he lowered the glasses and took the radio.

"Get in the house! Right now! If anyone but us returns you kill them!" Rick said over the radio.

"What?" Jennifer sounded confused.

"Get into the house! We are on our way back!" He dropped the radio and returned to the wheel.

"What's going on?" Matt tried to sit up but his head exploded with white-hot pain and he slumped back to the deck with a moan. Seeing Matt try to sit up gave Susan's rational mind a reason to look away from the carnage that had captured her attention. She knelt down beside Matt, taking the bloody rag and wiping the fresh blood from his face. "What's going on?" he managed to get out between clenched teeth.

"I'll tell you later." She said, more for her own sake than his. The scene was still imprinted on her mind, replaying over and over but the worst part was that a sick and twisted part of her wanted to stand back up and look some more.

As the boat sped for home, Mac looked back to the other boat, which had stopped near the far eastern shore. The sole remaining white robed man was bent down, probably examining his fallen companion who lay in the back of the boat. Susan had nailed that one through the throat. There was no way he could still be alive. It was only a matter of time before his corpse arose as a zombie. The one that Mac had shot in the chest and fell in the water would become a zombie as well, bobbing in the water until his torso split from the foul gasses in his guts and he sunk to the bottom, wandering about underneath the water. Mac wondered if fishes eating from the zombie's corpse would be affected by the plague, becoming zombie fish? That was something he didn't want to think about. Just as he was turning his eyes away from the other boat he saw something large and dark flash out of the water on the lakeside of the boat. It was on the back of the boat and tackling the robed man into the water on the far side before Mac could look back and focus properly.

"Did any of you see that?" he asked, raising his binoculars to his eyes for a better look.

"See what?" Susan asked from the floor where she was still ministering to Matt.

"The other boat. Something came out of the water and took the last guy under." All Mac could see now was the small boat bobbing gently on the waves near shore. But it didn't matter. He had a hunch he knew exactly what, or more precisely who had attacked the man.

"What?" Susan sat up on her knees and peered over the edge. Mac was right. The boat was empty. "Was it Zack?"

"I'd be willing to bet on it." Mac said.

"I'm beginning to think coming up to this goddamned lake was a bad idea." Rick muttered from the pilot's chair.

"If we'd have stayed back at the U we would all be dead and you know that." Mac retorted lowering the binoculars and turning his focus towards home...

Chapter 47.

Tuesday, June 26, 2001 Rainbow Lake, UT 3:01 PM.

Last night in the forest, while feeding on the snipers brains, Zack's feeding proboscis had come upon something unexpected; a small object nestled in the center of the brain, hard and metallic and no larger than a kernel of corn. He extracted it, sucking it clean of blood and scraps of brain before holding it out on the palm of his slimy, mottled hand. He instantly recognized it as a microchip. As he watched, it appeared to erode away into nothing and within twenty seconds his hand was empty. While his hungry, always so hungry, alien metabolism returned to fulfilling its need, the human part of his brain couldn't help but speculate about the nature of the chip and why it had been implanted in the mans brain. But the cranial cavity was soon empty and Zack's mind had returned to his hunger.

But now he had come upon an identical microchip while feeding on the white robed man who had been shot from the smaller boat, and his analytical human mind tried to make some sense out of the connection. He swished it through the water to clean it of blood and brain matter and as replayed the last fifteen hours over in his mind...

After tossing the empty head into the yard he had watched from his perch in a tree thirty yards back from the edge of the trees. He could see the large black dog jumping back and forth and barking. He could also feel its psychic presence; carnal, primal, its hatred for him and desire to kill him was driven by pure instinct. It could sense his unnatural state, his disharmony with nature. But even its instinct to kill was not stronger than its will to survive, and the dog stayed at the tree line. There was no sign of his former companions and after several minutes the dog finally retreated to the perceived safety of the lighted house and out of Zack's sight. Zack turned and with the ease of a monkey sped through the lower tree boughs.

He emerged several hundred yards to the south onto the lakeshore, leaping from the last tree, twisting and flipping his body with the skill of a trained acrobat...landing in a perfect crouch at the waters edge, ready to pounce on the nearest threat...

But there was nothing. He did a quick mental scan...Half a dozen drones fifty yards north, stumbling his way. Another dozen, one hundred yards south up the beach. He closed his eyes and widened his scan, feeling for Krylok or Superzombies...

There!

There!

There!

Three spread out around the lake, the nearest one less than half a mile away, putting it near the estate where he had fed upon the man in the boathouse earlier today. The superzombies could also feel his mental touch, and knew at once that he was not their master but in fact he was the one they were sent here to kill! He got the last in the faintest of psychic impressions, but there was no mistaking what he had sensed. He could also sense over a thousand drones, the majority also less than half a mile away, in the vicinity of the superzombie. His first instinct was to seek out the superzombies and kill them, his monstrous bloodlust flaring red hot, but once again his rational mind won out and he quietly slipped into the water. He swam one hundred yards along the bottom before surfacing for air and to observe the superzombies location.

There were hundreds of drones wandering about the estate grounds; dozens down by the boathouse and water but most near the mansion. A bonfire still burned in the center of the yard and there were electric lights on in the house. Burning torches set into the balcony rails provided light outside and in the firelight he could see several white robed, AK-47 wielding men standing out on the second and third floor balconies, looking down at the zombie horde below. He scanned their minds lightly, but was met with the same static, white noise resistance as the man he had killed the night before, just as he had expected.

He turned his attention along the length of the roof where six large wooden posts had been erected, spaced twenty feet apart and wrapped in chains. A naked man and woman were crucified to either side of each one. He looked closer and indeed they were truly crucified with spikes driven through both wrists as well as one through their crossed ankles. Plastic bindings at the wrist and ankles kept the victims from pulling the limbs loose. Zack also noticed that each side of the crucifixes had small seats, which the victims sat on to prevent asphyxiation and keep the victim alive as long as possible under excruciating agony.

Fixing his gaze on one pair, he narrowed his mind scan to them...No static interference, only mind numbing pain. All twelve were still alive and most were in the same state of mind. They were facing east so they could look down on the hungry drone horde below. When Zack had passed by this house yesterday there had only been a few dozen drones wandering in the forest nearby, and there had been no crucifixes. Had a superzombie come and summoned the drones? Had they set up the crucifixes and tortured the inhabitants of the house?

He was sure about the summoned drones. He had seen thousands in the forest outside Park City, controlled by the Krylok and their Sentinels, just as he could control them. As for capturing and torturing the occupants of the house, the white robed men were definitely human. The static interference blocking their minds from being scanned was most likely caused by the microchip, but what else was it for? It had to have a deeper purpose than a mental defense. The mind could defend itself without such an implant. But before he could ponder the puzzle any further he felt the psychic sweep of a superzombie. Zack quickly shielded his mind, and lowered himself into the water and tilted back so that the slope of his forehead, his eyes and his nostrils were the only thing protruding from the water and watched...

A superzombie stepped out onto the third floor balcony. It stood well over six feet tall and wore camouflaged heavy military battle armor with helmet, web gear laden with grenades and extra ammunition and carried a military assault rifle with an attached grenade launcher. Its skin was visible in the light, dark and wrinkled like old leather, the frame gaunt and skeletal. He couldn't make out its face but he could feel its eyes scanning the lake and sense its psychic probe sweeping the dark water.

And so Zack sat for the rest of the night, his gnawing hunger tamed into submission by his human mind. And the superzombie also stood watch through the remainder of the night. At one point it was even joined by another, dressed and equipped identically. The white robed men, who changed guard shift every couple hours, paid no attention as they searched the water together. He dared not use his own mental probes for fear they would lock onto him and fire their grenade launchers.

At any point during the night he could have easily ducked beneath the water and swam away, but he chose to stay and observe, confident he would go undetected as long as he kept his mind block up and refrained from using his own telepathy. All throughout the night more drones had continued to come out of the forest and congregate at the mansion until there were well over one thousand gathered. Also, during various stages of the night, some of the crucified victims would come awake, screaming for God, their mothers, death, anything to take away the pain. Their cries would in turn excite the zombies below, who would take up a gurgled moan of their own that would echo across the water. And when dawn cracked over the eastern mountains peaks, Zack still floated in his same place, and the original superzombie still stood there, a silent, unmoving sentinel to the gathering army of zombies over whose chorus of moans a few wailing sobs could still be heard from the crucifixes above.

During the night his hunger had grown exponentially and was now a seething, molten ball of pain that needed to be dealt with. His could feel his human mind losing control, bit by tiny bit and decided to accept his metabolism's needs rather than continue to fight them. He took a deep breath and sank into the depths of the lake. He powered for the bottom scanning for prey. Although human brains were the favored and most nutritious food of choice, it wasn't the only one. He knew that if necessary he could feast upon the brains and blood of animals. He hadn't done it yet, but he could instinctively sense it was possible. He turned and moved toward shore, knowing that large fish were to be found near the wooden docks, where they in turn preyed upon smaller schools of fish. Just in front of him a large suckerfish detached from a large rock it had been clinging to and tried to swim away, but Zack was too fast and he snatched the fish before it moved a foot. It tried to wriggle away but he clutched it with both hands, digging his claws into its flesh. He plunged his feeding proboscis into its small brain cavity, slurping it clear in a single gulp. It was not more than a tease, bitter and sour at that, and he turned the fish over and sank his feeding proboscis its heart, getting three large gulps before the carcass was bled out. He dropped the empty husk, searching for another one. How many fish he hunted and drained and how long it took him to do so was lost to him, but when his human mind was finally able to regain total control he could tell by the position of the sun rippling above the surface of the water that several hours had passed.

He surfaced directly underneath the wooden dock, keeping his head low and huddling near one of the wooden legs. He had no recollection of surfacing for air during his feeding frenzy but he knew he must have several times. Luckily the superzombie hadn't spotted him. Taking a gamble, he did a low frequency scan, searching only for drones...their hollow psychic vacuums echoing back at him by the hundreds. He could hear them as well, their low moans combined into a cacophony that drowned out all other sounds. He sniffed the air, their sour, putrid stench thick and musky, overlaid by the smell of the bonfire.

The base of his neck began to tingle with what he now recognized as his sixth sense and he turned to look out over the lake...On the far side in the northeast corner, at the same cabin he had encountered Matt and his friends yesterday, he caught a glint of sunlight off metal or glass. He looked closer, narrowing his eyes for binocular vision...he could see a boat tied to that dock and two men with binoculars looking in this direction. Hopefully the shadows would obscure him. Filling his lungs with fresh air he sank below the surface.

He surfaced in the boathouse just as the screaming started. It was the agonized wails of the crucifixion victims. He swam to the front of the boathouse and pulled himself onto the inner dock. Staying low to the floor he edged up to the main door, raised his mind block, and slowly lifted his head to peer out the small window.

The zombie horde had begun to press toward the house, a wave of agitation now spreading through the crowd. The bonfire still burned in the center of the yard, distorting part of his view with heat but his other senses more than compensated as he absorbed what was happening. The six large, chain wrapped posts that held the crucifixes and their victims were mounted on some kind of winch and were now tilting slowly out over the edge of the roof, already at a forty-five degree angle. The six large posts continued lowering until they ran parallel with the ground. The top ends were still secured by chains but the bottom of each crucifix had been unchained from the posts, allowing them to dangle about twenty feet above the outstretched arms of the horde, which was now roused to a fever pitch. As the crucifixes slowly spun on the chains Zack could the faces of all twelve victims were writhing masks of pain and suffering as they thrashed against the spikes that impaled them and the bindings that held them to the crosses. Zack's human brain noted with some interest that most if not all of the six women might have indeed been attractive at one time, but now their naked bodies bore the signs of savage torture and sexual mutilation, which in turn appealed to the Beast.

He pushed such thoughts from his mind and concentrated on what was transpiring.

One the second floor balcony five armed, white robed men stood at attention. On the third floor five more also stood at attention. Another unarmed man in red robes stood near the center of the balcony. He was taller than the others and although Zack couldn't hear him over the zombies wailing and the victim's pleas, by the motions of his hands and the bobbing of his head he was giving a fiery sermon.

Secured to a platform at the edge of the balcony in front of him was another naked woman. To either side of him, cloaked in black hooded robes stood...Zack's sixth sense fired again, all of his instincts telling him what he dared not confirm with a mind scan. The short figures in black robes that stood on either side of the man were Krylok Aliens!

Every danger sense in Zack was telling him to flee before he was discovered, to slip back into the water and swim to the far side of the lake and hide, but his human mind was once again in control and he was able to tame the urges of the beast and hold his position at the window. His mind was shielded and he was well hidden. The two Krylok would not detect him.

The preacher was working up to a climax, his gestures broad and sweeping. Zack could see only the lower half of his face in the cowls of his robe, but could tell by the wrinkled pale skin and thin lips that it was an older man, well into his senior years. He reached his right hand into the folds of his robes and came out with a long, thin dagger. As if on cue, the chains began to lower the crucifixes down to the hungry horde. The victim's screams reached a petrifying crescendo as the tips of their feet reached the hundreds of clawing hands. Zack could smell the sharp, coppery scent of fresh blood over the thick blanket of zombie stench as their claws tore into the lower legs of the victim's. Zack's blood began to run hot and a flame of hunger crept into his mind once again. Up on the third floor balcony, the preacher held the dagger high, his head thrown back as he screamed out the last passage of the ritual and plunged the dagger down into the woman's abdomen. Her body arched and her face contorted with pain, but the preacher leaned over her, using the dagger to saw up the length of her belly and up into her chest. Her screams trailed into choking gasps as blood flooded her lungs. Thick blood was spurting across the preachers robe, covering his arms, torso and face, but he continued to saw through bone until the knife came out the hollow of her throat. The Preacher used both of his hands to pry the woman's chest cavity open. With a look of mad glee on his blood splattered face he plunged both hands dagger first into the ragged hole, the geyser of blood finally ceasing. A moment later his pulled back, the knife in his right hand and the woman's heart in the other. The blood covering his arm was so thick and dark that it looked like oil from this distance. He held the heart high, tilting his head back and letting the thick blood run down onto his face and into his open mouth just as the feet of the crucifix victims came into reach of the zombies biting mouths.

There was movement at the back of the horde and three white robed men carrying assault rifles came into the clearing at the back of the yard, headed for the boathouse. Even more incredible than their foolish bravery at walking through the zombies was the fact that three hot blooded, living human beings simply pushed their way past hundreds of zombies and not a single one attempted to attack them. In fact the zombies had paid them no attention whatsoever!

But there would be time to ponder that later. Right now evasion was the priority. He crouched low to the floor, speeding across the dock and slipping into the water, powering underneath the door and out into the lake. The water carried the sound of the small boats engine coming to life inside the garage and Zack put even more power into his stroke, staying near the bottom and heading for the center of the lake. He surfaced several hundred feet out, looking back to the boathouse. The door was raised and the small boat was coming out with all three men aboard. He looked back to the northeast, where he had spotted his old companions a little while back. Their boat was also moving out into the lake, and he could spot the familiar shape of Matt and the long blond hair of Susan as well.

Keeping his head low to the water he watched the chase and subsequent firefight play out, his emotions churning for him to do something to help his friends. He saw the first white robed man go down, blood spraying between his fingers as he clutched his ruined throat. The two boats passed between him and the eastern shore just as the bullet ricocheted off Matt's helmet. Zack saw the helmet take the hit but still his gut clenched with fear for his friend's safety. A few moments later another white robed man was hit, tumbling out of the boat and into the water. The Beast took instant control. He slipped under the water and swam toward the sinking corpse as fast as he could. From underneath the water he could hear the smaller boat turn toward shore and begin to double back, no doubt searching for the man overboard.

But Zack reached him first. The man had been shot in the chest and bloody air bubbles were still emerging from his wound, his arms and legs flailing feebly as he struggled with his final moments of life. Zack came up from behind, tilting the man's head back. His eyes were rolled up into their sockets. Zack opened his mouth, sliding the feeding proboscis from underneath his tongue and plunging it through the man's right eye into his brain...

The Microchip dissolved into nothing as Zack's thoughts returned to the present. He let the corpse fall away from him, its internal caverns filled with water, settling to the bottom. Nearby, the small boat had come to a halt just a few dozen feet from the shore. Zack slowly began to rise, his eyes breaking the surface just a few feet from the boat. The white robed man was bent over the deck, examining something, most likely the man shot through the throat. Zack turned slowly and looked to the northwest, where his friends boat was quickly heading for they're own estate.

Turning back to the smaller boat, Zack let the boiling hunger fill his gut once again and with a surge of strength, he charged the boat, leapt from the water onto the back of the boat. He could see the white robed mans eyes widen with fear as they saw him, the mouth opening to scream, but Zack wrapped his arms around the mans chest, squeezing off any scream and tackling him over the other side into the water. The man was struggling for his life, but Zack put a quick end to that when his feeding proboscis slipped through the man's left eye into his brain. And just as Zack thought, there was a microchip in the center of this mans brain. And just like the other two he had found it dissolved into nothing less than a minute after being removed from the brain. The Beast subsided, going back into its dark place at the back of his mind, and his human side began to wrestle with everything he had saw and learned since last night, trying to find a connection between the insane, apparently cannibal cultists, the microchips implanted in their brains and the presence of the Krylok Aliens...

Chapter 48.

Tuesday, June 26, 2001 Park City, UT 3:35 PM.

A pretty young nurse was waiting for them in the hospital lobby. She was wearing a light blue jump suit and a white lab coat.

"Dr. Cooper has everything prepared. If you will just follow me." She gave them both a smile and led them to the security elevator on the far end of the lobby. Nobody spoke as the elevator car descended two floors and opened onto the laboratory level. Two armed soldiers stood in front of the door, M-16's pointed into the elevator car.

"Romero." The General gave the password and the two guards stepped aside. The nurse led them down the hall to the control room. On the way they passed half a dozen heavy steel doors that opened onto rooms containing zombies for the doctors to experiment on. Inside the control room there were three technicians on duty, each at a different station.

Jenkins and the General stepped up to the observation window. The bloated pod was still in the center of the quarantine room, unmoved. The bloody, oozing cracks on the sides of its swollen stomach had grown longer, until they now stretched nearly ten inches.

The airlock next to the quarantine room could also be seen through the observation window and inside were three people suited up in bright orange Nuclear Biological and Chemical Environmental suits. One of them turned and walked up to the window. Jenkins could see through the bulbous helmets face guard that it was Dr. Cooper. The Dr. smiled at them.

"At last we can begin." The Doctors voice came impatiently over the intercom. The vivisection wasn't scheduled until sixteen hundred hours, and he made no mention of their arrival an hour early, appearing disgruntled that they hadn't arrived sooner.

"Can you hear us Dr. Cooper?" the General said aloud.

"Of course I can." The Dr. answered and turned away from the window. He walked over to what appeared to be a large toolbox on wheels. The other two NBC suited figures joined him.

"The moment is upon us Dr. Wilcox. Is everything ready?" They both knew it was. They had gone over the instruments, analysis and diagnosis equipment half a dozen times in the past three hours.