Prologue

      The future belonged to the sociopath.

      Spoken by his predecessor—before the black magic baton for head of Special Action Division was passed on to him—Richard Grogen recalled the statement for reasons that pertained to more than his own world. Cradling his HK MP-5 subgun with laser sight and sound suppressor, he believed there was no hidden meaning in the cryptic statement, no warning prophecy. Aware his hold on power was tenuous, at best, he knew both professional and personal fate hedged on the whims and paranoid myopia of faceless powerful shadow men, any of whom called the shots from about three thousand miles east. And, like him, they had more to lose than just careers, if the truth about their black project leaked out for public devouring or congressional cannibalizing. No crystal ball gazing was needed for Grogen to know phantoms would arise in the middle of some future midnight. They would come, shipped out of nowhere to make sure he, too, took all his secrets with him to an unmarked desert grave.

      Given what he knew about Project Light Year, aware of the nature of the beast he was chained to, Grogen supposed they believed his fate was inevitable. But, where there was a will to fight, nothing was ever carved in stone. If he was going to retire, it would be on his terms.

      Starting now.

      He peered ahead into the darkness, absorbing the jounce and pitch of the Hummer from the shotgun seat as it rolled along at a scorpion’s pace, wheels catching ruts and furrows, here and there, in the dirt track. The future was somewhere ahead in the utter blackness, but he’d be damned if he could find any sign of life, beyond the combined fanning glow of headlights from the trailing vehicles. The travel brochures claimed Nevada trooped in some thirty million visitors a year, ranking it ahead of Orlando, Florida, as the country’s number-one tourist mecca. Naturally, Vegas, Reno and Tahoe gobbled up the lion’s share of human life. But out here, Grogen thought, pushing for the Arizona border, where giant prehistoric reptiles, mastodons and woolly mammoths once trod, he might as well be on another planet.

      This turf was rumored to have seen more visitors of extraterrestrial origin than human. A younger Grogen, he thought, the Green Beret with a wife and kids to consider—all of whom had abandoned his ship in recent years—would have scoffed it off as so much fantastic rubbish fabricated by local desert rats and freelancing journalists broke, hungry and eager for a sensational story.

      He’d heard the wild tales from Area 51—recently emptied of men and material. But, relocated to his new classified base of operations, these days he could be sure they were building—and hiding—more than just the prototype fighter jet for the next generation. And after bearing recent eyewitness to an event he could not comprehend in earthly terms, he began to believe the truth was, indeed, stranger than any fiction.

      Grogen felt his driver, Conklin, tensing up, then saw the ex-Delta commando throw him a look. The hero’s lips were parting to fire off questions. He could almost read the man’s thoughts, the mind rife with curiosity about why they were veering from the quarry.

      “Stay the course, son. Hold her nice and easy.” It was a shame, Grogen decided, the veteran fighter didn’t deserve what was coming, but he wasn’t part of the team. Or the future.

      Wondering briefly how it had all come to this, the SAD commander looked into the sideglass. One black GMC and one custom-built canvas-covered transport truck with government plates picked up the rear. It might be a strange and crazy world, one that was ruled by those sociopaths, but the cargo they carried—and that would stamp a gold seal on his own future—was something he could barely fathom.

      Who could?

      When first assigned to Area Zero he’d been briefed on what to believe. His Defense contract underscored the penalty for loose lips. They told him he would be burying nuclear waste and other toxins in the desert. They told him they were brewing a cutting edge rocket fuel in the underground labyrinth of the compound. Whatever spent toxins resulted would be his task to secure and dispose of. They said they were creating nuclear propulsion from a toxin of unknown origin, rumored to be capable of delivering man into deep space at light speed. The source of the first batch of the mystery toxin was so jealously guarded by Washington that he was authorized to use deadly force if there was even a whisper of a rumor that an employee at the compound even speculated about its origins.

      The trouble was, no human tongue could ever really keep a secret. Worse, when the hidden truth was sought for personal gain, the future had a way of taking on a life of its own, an angry leviathan boiling up from the deep, ready to eat or be slain.

      Another bounce through a deeper rut and Grogen checked on the transport, his heart skipping a beat. Eight fifty-five-gallon drums were encased in lead shields, wrapped together with wire. The cargo was on steel pallets strapped to the walls. But he’d seen human flesh melt inside HAZMAT suits from a spoonful’s splash of the mystery toxin. No way in hell did he want to be anywhere near those drums when they were transferred. If it could eat its way through material designed to see a man safely through a few thousand degrees of nuclear fallout.

      Grogen was shuddering at the image of the human puddle when he spotted the behemoth parked on the rise. Conklin looked at him when he said, “Flash your lights, twice.”

      “Sir, I don’t understand.”

      “You don’t need to understand, soldier! Just do it.”

      Grogen felt the heat rise from his driver, but Conklin followed the order. The headlights on the eighteen-wheeler blinked in response. Grogen sighted two shadows on the port side.

      “Park it, lights on. Fall out,” Grogen ordered, slipping on his com link.

      The driver was questioning the moment, reaching to open the door, when Grogen jammed the subgun’s muzzled snout in his ribs. Hitting the trigger, Grogen blew him out of the vehicle and into the night.

      Grogen saw armed shadows flapping their arms. They were shouting at one another in their guttural Brooklyn tongue, flinging around a variety of curses. He was out the door, subgun up, the transport rumbling up on his right flank when he spotted the red eyes dancing over his chest.

      “Get those off me now, or the deal dies here!” he shouted. Another red dragon’s eye stabbed the blackness from a jagged perch beyond the transport’s cab. He marched on through the light, drawing a bead on the capo. “Do it!”

      Advancing, Grogen felt his finger taking up slack on the trigger. His soldiers fell out, black-clad shadows taking cover behind the GMC and the transport. A quick count of hostiles, spotting two with AR-15 assault rifles hunkered behind the doors of an SUV, and he figured seven goons to his seasoned foursome.

      “Everybody, cool it! Lose the light show!”

      When the laser beams died, Grogen keyed his com link. “Road Warrior to Dragonship, come in.”

      “Dragonship