The Black Knight Read Free Page B

same.
    ‘It’s like music,’ Fuller finally managed to say, his jaw hanging open in shock.
    Duvall recovered her senses and turned to the deck officer.
    ‘Get a linguistics team down here as fast as you can, and open a channel to the Joint Chiefs of Staff. We may have initiated first contact!’
    As the team scattered to perform their duties, Duvalls’ own words echoed in her ears. First contact , the first verifiable signal from an alien species sent from an alien craft in orbit around the planet. She didn’t have long to dwell on the gravity of the subject as Fuller spoke from beside her.
    ‘Its orbital velocity is decaying,’ he said, his features stricken and his skin pale as he stared at her. ‘Whatever it is, it’s coming down.’
    ***

III
    Logan Circle,
    Washington DC
    The sound of incessant banging reverberated through the apartment and jerked Ethan Warner out of his slumber, dreams of helicopter blades and blazing guns vanishing as he opened his eyes and saw the feint light of pre-dawn glowing lethargically through the blinds of his bedroom window.
    Ethan sat upright, unsure of whether he had actually heard something, and moments later he leaped out of his bed as he heard the front door of his apartment suddenly open despite the three sets of locks securing it in place. One hand reached for the Beretta M9 pistol he kept under his pillow and he whirled as two figures appeared to fill the bedroom doorway in the dull morning light.
    ‘Ethan Warner? Defense Intelligence Agency.’
    The brief, clipped tones imparted the information necessary for Ethan not to open fire on the armed intruders even as behind them another figure appeared in the doorway and hit the lights. Ethan squinted as he stood naked in front of the intruders, shielding his eyes with one hand as he stared at a tall woman with long auburn hair who smirked as she looked him up and down appraisingly.
    ‘You didn’t have to get your weapon out for me, Warner.’
    Ethan turned away from former FBI Agent Hannah Ford and tossed his pistol onto the bed.
    ‘False alarm,’ he replied. ‘I thought something exciting was about to happen. Don’t you know how to knock?’
    ‘We’ve been knocking for five minutes,’ Ford replied as her two armed escorts moved to guard the apartment’s door as Ethan dressed. ‘You sleep soundly, which is something I wouldn’t have expected.’
    ‘I’ve learned not to give a damn any more,’ Ethan retaliated. ‘Where’s the fire?’
    Hannah leaned on the doorframe and watched as Ethan pulled on a pair of jeans.
    ‘Doug Jarvis has called us in. I don’t know why, but they’re in one hell of a hurry so let’s get moving.’
    Ethan scowled as he glanced at a digital clock beside his bed. 5.26am.
    ‘Jesus, can’t they have a crisis at a normal time for a change?’
    Hannah didn’t reply as Ethan padded into the bathroom and stood in front of a sink, yanking the faucet to let warm water fill it. A mirror reflected his wide jaw, gray eyes and scruffy light brown hair as he splashed the water across his face and tried to shake off the lethargy slowing his movements.
    In recent years Ethan and his partner Nicola Lopez had been fortunate enough, or unfortunate enough depending on how he looked at it, to have been contracted by the Defense Intelligence Agency to investigate cases the rest of the intelligence community had rejected as unworkable. The connection to a high level agency like the DIA had come from a former colleague of Ethan’s named Douglas Jarvis. The old man had once been captain of a United States Marines Rifle Platoon and Ethan’s senior officer during his time with the Corps in Iraq and Afghanistan. Their friendship, cemented during Operation Iraqi Freedom and later, when Ethan had resigned his commission and been embedded with Jarvis’s men as a journalist, had continued into their unusual and discreet accord with the DIA where Jarvis continued to serve his country.
    Throughout this time he