The Milestone Protocol, Ernest Dempsey [100 best novels of all time txt] 📗

the world almost seemed untouched by the madness unfolding everywhere else.

Still, he felt like he was on a babysitting assignment—not his idea of how best to use his talents. Not that the paperwork he did before was either.

He watched as the teams of scientists entered and left the airlock connected to the cave. When he initially arrived on the scene, the area was teeming with archaeologists performing a thorough investigation of the site, carefully working through earth and rock to reveal the tiniest scraps of ancient evidence.

They were less than thrilled when Sandstrom and his team arrived on site to take over operations, effectively forcing the archaeologists off the scene.

The International Archaeological Agency, headed by its founder, Tommy Schultz, had filed several injunctions and appeals against the FBI and its actions, but Sandstrom knew none of them would do any good. And they hadn’t.

Schultz, from what Sandstrom heard, had pulled every string he could. Even his connection to the president hadn't helped, and she’d been forced to explain that her hands were tied concerning the matter.

To be fair, Sandstrom didn’t see why the team of archaeologists couldn’t work in tandem with the scientific group. They were all working toward the same end, as far as he knew. He’d heard about the mysterious occurrences at this place, with lights hovering in midair in the evening, just before dusk. So far, he’d seen nothing of the sort, and had written it off as local folklore or legend. Nothing more.

He stood, watching for the lead scientist—a woman with the first name of Gertrude and a last name that he, to this day, couldn’t pronounce—to appear from the cave’s airlock. The white tunnel that extended away from the mountain entrance curved over to where he stood as the rest of the scientists entered and exited the quarantined zone.

He chortled at the notion of quarantining a cave. Much of the world had gone into real quarantine during the last few months, though many were emerging and resuming their day-to-day activities in an effort to jumpstart local economies. Here, in the mountains of North Carolina, they were quarantining a cave.

Sandstrom didn’t understand, but it wasn’t his job to understand. He was here to gather information. Whatever the science team discovered was to be sent back to his new boss, a man named Martin Forrester, who’d only been in the position of Sandstrom’s division for the last six weeks.

It was Forrester who’d called Sandstrom in for the fieldwork. And Sandstrom knew better than to make a bad impression with the new boss. He’d survived enough turnover in the Bureau to know how it worked. Whenever a new guy or gal took over, they liked to make waves, splash around in the agency pool a little. Moving folks around gave the impression that they were making changes, and change—in the eyes of the administration—was always positive. Even when it wasn’t.

So, Sandstrom had said yes to the assignment, but with every passing second and every gnat that tickled his skin, he regretted his acceptance more and more. The truth was, though, he didn’t have much choice in the matter. When told to jump, Sandstrom had to ask how high on the way up. He hated that he’d become a yes man, but he was a survivor—a team player. With every passing day, he neared retirement and a life of leisure—somewhere warm and sunny, with plenty of cheap, strong drinks.

Despite his resentment or regret toward the current assignment, the thing that truly dug at his nerves was the supervisor overseeing everything. He’d taken the gig under the assumption that he would be in control, not that there was much to do anyway. Still, he’d agreed to come out to the mountains in North Carolina, in part, because Sandstrom hoped it would get him a little pay bump or maybe a promotion that didn’t require much responsibility.

He glanced over his shoulder at the supervisor. He couldn’t think of anything better to call her. The second he’d agreed to come here, his boss told him that he would be working directly under a specialist in this field, someone who would have total command of the day-to-day operations. From what Sandstrom knew, the woman—who went by the name Darcy Friedman—wasn’t with the Bureau. He’d never seen her before, never even heard of her. Then she appeared out of nowhere to oversee an FBI investigation?

When Sandstrom met her, she looked the part of a Washington power player, with dirty blonde hair pulled back in a tight bun, white blouse, and black suit pressed smooth. Now, though, her shell jacket and water-resistant khaki pants and hiking boots contrasted with his original vision of her.

Sandstrom sighed, turned around, and sipped his cup of lousy coffee. That was one thing he missed about being in a city more than anything else. The coffee around these parts was pretty awful, and he’d resorted to driving an extra twenty minutes to the local Walmart just to get decent coffee for his motel room.

She barely acknowledged him when he looked back at her, as was customary. She was supposedly a scientist, but why would a scientist have this kind of power over him, or over his boss back at the Bureau? When the director introduced her, Sandstrom detected a hint of fear in his voice. Sandstrom had shrugged it off as reading too much into things, but the woman had barely said ten words to him since they’d met more than a month before.

In most cases, she went over Sandstrom to speak to the people working in the cave, meticulously collecting information and noting which person delivered it.

Why all the fuss over this weird cave?

Sandstrom didn’t get it, other than the supposedly bizarre things that happened prior to his arrival.

An excited voice interrupted his thoughts, cutting through the earpiece he kept in his right ear.

Other voices joined in the cacophony, and Sandstrom was forced to turn down the volume on the radio, wincing in agitation.

Friedman strode by him to the