فصل چهاردهم

Chapter 14: C10 Information

After the board members had been removed, Hatch walked to the head of the conference room table. He pulled out Schema’s former seat, pausing before sitting. “You have no idea how long I’ve waited for this. Please allow me the pleasure of savoring this moment.” Hatch took a deep breath, then slowly sat in the chair. A dark smile crossed his face. “It’s about time.” Seven began clapping, and she was quickly joined by the others still in the room.

“Thank you,” Hatch said. “You may sit. Quentin and Torstyn, let me have you up here next to me. Quentin at my right, Torstyn at my left.” Everyone sat, the former board members in their assigned seats, the teens taking the empty seats closest to Hatch.

Hatch stood and walked up to the cabinet against the port wall and opened it, exposing a whiteboard. “The information I am about to share is C10.” The teens’ expressions turned more somber.

“Is that understood?”

“Yes, Admiral,” the teens replied.

“Call me sentimental, but you, my electric eagles, may still call me ‘sir.’ ”

“Yes, sir.”

The board members looked at one another. Eleven raised his hand.

“Yes?” Hatch said.

“I’m sorry to interrupt, Admiral. But what is C10?”

“Explain C10, Quentin.”

“Yes, sir. C10 is the highest level of Elgen confidentiality. It means that what we are about to be told may not be repeated outside of Admiral Hatch’s presence, even with one another. The penalty for divulging C10 information is death by torture.” “Is that clear enough?” Hatch asked.

“Yes,” Eleven said. “Thank you.”

“Let me see the Elgen salute,” Hatch said.

The youth raised their left hands to their temples. The other board members watched, then imitated.

“Very well. What I’m about to share with you is called Operation Luau.” Hatch wrote the words on the whiteboard: OPERATION LUAU.

He turned back around and tossed the pen on the table. “We need a land base. We need a place to carry out our experiments and build larger EMP weapons—a base far away from prying eyes, and invisible to the CIA, KGB, MI5, Mossad, or even any local government. A place with political autonomy. I have found just the place in the South Pacific, midway between Hawaii and Australia, near the islands of Samoa and Fiji—the Polynesian island nation of Tuvalu.” “Tuvalu?” Bryan said.

“If you’ve never heard of Tuvalu, don’t worry, neither has anyone else—which is precisely why it is of interest to us. It is the world’s fourth smallest country, behind Vatican City, Nauru, and Monaco, and consists of three reef islands and six atolls.

“Unfortunately for them, the islanders declared independence from Britain in the 1970s. This was highly unwise, as they are little more than an island of hula dancers and fish spearers. They have no military, spend no money on defense, and have no means of defending themselves outside of a puny, impotent police force. Their navy consists of a single Pacific-class patrol boat provided by the Australian government for maritime surveillance and fishery patrol. Even the Tesla could blow it out of the water.

“Tuvalu is facing an energy crisis. Rising ocean levels have damaged two of their diesel-motor power plants. Unfortunately for them, their third stopped working two months ago.” “Fate has been kind,” Six said.

Hatch looked at her. “Fate is an excuse for people who are too stupid or too weak to make their own future,” he said. “We sabotaged the plant. Then three weeks later we engaged our Starxource plant, operating on Funafuti atoll, in Vaiaku,the capital of the island nation. We are now in complete control of the country’s energy.

“In preparation of our arrival, we have, as we did in Peru, built a rehabilitation camp for the reeducation of the natives.

“This is my plan: We will gather the Elgen fleet at the Peruvian Port of Callao, where we will load up with supplies and evacuate our troops from our Peruvian Starxource plant, leaving behind a squad of soldiers to guard what’s left of the plant. From there it will take us two weeks to reach Tuvalu.” “How will we reach the island without them knowing?” Quentin asked.

Hatch put both hands on the table and leaned forward. “Oh, they know we’re coming. But we won’t encounter resistance. In fact, they plan to greet us with flowered leis and luaus. This is a diplomatic visit to celebrate the opening of our Starxource plant.

“We have invited the Tuvalu prime minister, governor general, and entire parliament to a celebratory feast. I am assured by our local Elgen administration that they are most eager to demonstrate to us their gratitude.

“As we feast, the Faraday will move into place outside the capital city. Our troops will disembark, while the Watt patrols the surrounding oceans. Any vessel trying to enter or leave the islands will be sunk.

“When our troops are in position, power will be shut off throughout the island so there will be no communication on the island or to those outside of it. Only our facility will be powered. The government will be put under arrest and imprisoned while our troops move in and capture the whole of their puny police force. They will be locked in their own jail with the men they have arrested, which should make for some entertaining moments.

“One of our advance groups will seize the country’s sole radio station, from which I will, the next morning, address the people and introduce them to their new state of affairs. Every citizen will be required to register with our internal police board. Those who resist will be locked into our prison and sent through our reeducation process.

“In the meantime, the Ohm and the Volta, with a contingent of two hundred guards, will dock on the island of Nanumanga, which will be cleared out of all inhabitants. This is where we will build our new laboratories and weapons-production facilities.” Hatch looked around the room. “Are there any questions?” No one spoke.

“All right then. Quentin and Torstyn with me. The rest of you may retire for the evening. It’s been a long day. Get some rest. We have much to do over the next five weeks.” While the rest of the youth and board retired to their rooms, Hatch, accompanied by two guards, led Quentin and Torstyn to the chairman’s suite. The guards opened the door, and once inside, Hatch picked up the room phone. “Send housekeeping to the admiral’s suite immediately.” Pause. “Yes, the chairman’s suite. Thank you.” He set down the phone, then lifted a crystal decanter of Scotch, poured three glasses, then brought them over to the table on a silver platter. He offered the glasses to the teens, and they each took one. Quentin started to raise it to his lips, but Hatch stopped him.

“Just a moment, Quentin. Have I taught you nothing? Never imbibe before you know what you are about to imbibe. This pretentious little draught is the Balvenie Fifty, a rare fifty-year-old specimen of one of the finest single-malt Scotches ever distilled. A single bottle retails at more than thirty thousand dollars. So what I poured you there is a three-thousand-dollar taste. Therefore, it behooves us, out of decency and respect for the beverage, that we should thank former Chairman Schema for his fine taste in Scotch.” Hatch lifted his glass. “To Schema. A buffoon who knew his drink.” They all raised their shots. Hatch closed his eyes as he drank, then set the glass down. “Worth every penny.” Quentin choked a little on the drink, which made Torstyn smile.

Hatch looked at the teens. “I invited you here to mark this occasion,” he said. “A day which will live in infamy. Today marks the beginning of a new world order. The world is changing, my friends. The autonomy of nations is already slipping from their citizens’ grasps and they don’t even know it.

“It is self-evident that the supranational sovereignty of an intellectual elite is preferable to the archaic and outdated design of democracy. The belief that the average human, steeped in superstition and religious conditioning, has the ability to make rational decisions for society’s governance is beyond ridiculous, it is unabashed stupidity.

“Today we have taken the conclusive step toward world government. I don’t mean in the pantomime, impotent sense of a league of nations, rather an elite overclass prepared to rescue the dumb masses from themselves.

“You, my two apprentices, will someday take this gauntlet from me. You shall rule the world and the world will be better for it. So let us mark this momentous occasion with a toast.” Hatch again filled their glasses. “To the Elgen elite.” “To the Elgen elite,” they echoed.

All three downed their drinks.