Mine: The Arrival Read Online Free PDF Page A

Durant has arrived…yes, sir…yes…. Yes, sir. Right away, sir.”
    The guard returned and handed back the identification. “Thank you for your patience, Doctor.” He pointed past the guardhouse. “Stay on this road and in a quarter mile you’ll come to an intersection. Turn left. Take the new road for another two hundred twenty-five yards. Then turn right. You’ll see several long gray buildings ahead of you. The one you want is the farthest to the left. Captain Reece will meet you there. Would you like me to repeat that? Or, if you prefer, I could arrange for someone to escort you.”
    “No, I’ve got it.”
    “Very good, sir.”
    Durant found his destination exactly where the soldier had said it would be. He parked the government sedan that had been waiting for him at the airport and then rubbed his eyes as he let out a long, loud yawn.
    When the call requesting his presence came, he’d been in London, consulting with his English counterparts on the designs of several secret underground fortifications the British Army felt it needed for what it saw as the inevitable war with Germany. It wasn’t an official visit, of course, not with Prime Minister Chamberlain doing all he could to appease the Nazis. Just a “chance” meeting of “mid-level” government employees, a discussion of “purely academic” issues.
    Subsurface facilities were only one of Durant’s many specialties. He was an expert in several different scientific and engineering fields, which was why he’d been recruited to join M-Tech—the Military Technology Division. Publicly the division was tasked with confirming that weapons and vehicle specifications were being maintained by designers and manufacturers. Dull stuff. Paperwork. In reality,  M-Tech was a small group of highly educated scientists whose job was to monitor the latest technological advances, and to funnel information on promising discoveries to wherever it might serve the United States best. Each member was assigned several areas to oversee, such as ballistics, materials development, and, of course, underground structures.
    It took two plane flights and an hour’s drive for Durant to reach Fort Leavenworth. But the travel wasn’t the only thing sapping his strength. It was the nature of the visit itself. It concerned one of his other assigned areas, one that had turned into more of a joke than a source of anything useful. He was essentially the clearinghouse on unidentified items believed to have fallen through the atmosphere. Meteorites and “other things.” His job was to assess the finds and, if necessary, make sure they were put into the hands of the appropriate researcher.
    The problem came with those “other things.” A sampling of the items he’d been shown included a collection of scorched bones and torn metal that turned out to be part of a practical joke played on amateur astronomers in rural Ohio, a mechanical lever that was subsequently matched to a plane that had flown over the area, and several metal balls that had “crashed” through a thin roof and killed the occupant inside. It took Durant less than five minutes to prove this last was an elaborate ruse meant to disguise a murder.
    Today’s assignment would certainly be added to this ridiculous list. The only detail he knew was that the item in question was somehow connected to the sighting of a meteor burning up in the atmosphere. Why it had necessitated him cutting his meetings in London short and returning in a hurry, he had no idea. Surely it could have waited another day or two.
    He rolled his head across his shoulders and allowed himself a final yawn before finally climbing out of the car. As he approached the main building’s entrance, the door opened and a uniformed man about Durant’s age stepped out.
    “Dr. Durant, I’m so glad you could come.” The man held out his hand. “I’m Captain Reece.”
    Durant forced a smile as they shook. “Pleasure to meet you, Captain.”
    “I hope you