95. The Warning
Morrison bursts in at the signaller’s office. Heinrich is sitting with his laptop at the table next to Rougi listening intently.
“Pigeon, come in, over.”
Heinrich nods at Morrison, “Good morning, Colonel, the same message is repeating itself with monotony from early this morning. Paola will make contact at any moment. We follow her by the tracking device we planted in her golden wristwatch. She is in the woods behind the barn where she hid her radio and will answer their call soon.”
He has scarcely uttered the words when she answers: “Pigeon, Ant Heap here, over.”
“Pigeon, is our contact still secure, over?”
“We are secure, over.”
“Extremely important! Have there been recent activities on which you can report, over?”
“When Captain Dexter’s group didn’t return with the guests with the Puma, Captain Haasbroek and two operational soldiers departed the next morning with the private helicopter to find out what is the trouble, but they also have never returned. The task team is in the dark about what happened and the colonel must still make a decision on the best way to handle the situation. He is worried because both helicopters are gone and he is unsure how big the force should be that he must send out to investigate. He can’t afford to lose more soldiers. If the force is too weak, they might not return either. If he sends too many soldiers, he will weaken his home force too much to defend the camp against a possible onslaught. It’s all I can tell you now, over.”
“Thanks, this is good information, but have there been no further developments, over?”
“Developments? Over.”
“Army vehicles that left your base recently or new arrivals? Have no one joined you at your base or visited you or contacted you? Over.”
“No, should there? I really haven’t noticed anything and my contact surely would have informed me. I keep my ears open in the community and no one informed me of any strange occurrence. Over.”
“Are you sure no one has joined you? Over.”
“Dead sure! My contact tells me regularly that his task force is waiting for the colonel to decide which way forward. They are very worried that both groups haven’t returned. We also now sit with the disadvantage of the two helicopters which disappeared. Over.”
“Very interesting. That’s all, Pigeon. Be available frequently. We will contact you regularly. Over and out.”
“Wait, Ant Heap. Come in.”
“Ant Heap listens, over.”
“I hear it is a different person than my usual contact. Is all well, over?”
“All is okay. Your previous contact is busy with another task. That is all. Over and out.”
“Over and out.”
Morrison nods at Heinrich. “Marvellous! We have not in vain hid our sensitive information from her. It seems that she convinced him. Now their heads are going to spin about the unknown third force that terrorizes them. We planted some landmines under the gate and would have heard the intense explosions from here. Thus, their contact reached this farm by foot or used an alternative route to come into radio contact.”
“I agree, Colonel.”
“Now, give this rubbish an hour to get away and then inconspicuously get together a team of trackers to find his tracks along the eastern fence. We don’t want to catch him or alert him, because we are going to feed him misinformation but it would be handy to know where he enters and makes contact. When the day comes when we arrest him, it will be easy.”
“You are taking the words out of my mouth, Colonel. I will do so immediately.”
The colonel looks at Rougi. “Troop, I hope you are still searching for that shortwave signal that we are looking for.”
“We do, Colonel. This radio is permanently searching. I was busy monitoring the signals with this one next to him when I made contact with the one you have listened to. Do you want to listen to this one, Colonel? Most of the time it is just cosmic noise, but you are welcome.”
The colonel nods and looks at him emotionless as if he doesn’t want to believe him and Rougi takes off his earpieces and the cosmic noise reverberates annoyingly through the room.
Morrison frowns and asks worriedly: “And you run through all the frequencies the whole time? I don’t understand that we don’t find anything. We have built this mast fucking high. How far will we be able to reach signals, Heinrich?”
“It depends on many things. The most important is the broadcast tower but anywhere on the globe is a strong possibility, Colonel.”
Suddenly all heads twitch when a faint crackle is heard and Rougi tune in to the frequency that he has just passed. The crackle is back and carefully he fine-tunes in the crackle searching for a signal that makes sense.
Suddenly a typical shortwave signal can be heard through the background noise so that you can just make out someone calling in English: “Survivors, come in … any survivors, talk to me … survivors come in … any survivors talk to me …”
Excitedly Rougi answers: “Survivor here. Who are you and from where, over?”
Faintly but just audible the voice comes again: “Kamala here, New York, over.”
Excitedly Morrison and Heinrich look at each other and Morrison shoots like lightning forward and grabs the microphone: “Give me the sticks, troop. Just keep the frequency healthy. I will hit you to the ground if you lose this. I hope you have already noted the precise frequency.”
Morrison talks: “Morrison, South Africa here. Are we your first contact, over?”
“Take this frequency for contact with Claus Germany …” The signaller gives the frequency and Rougi pens it down meticulously. “It is the only contact that we know of that still exists. Over.”
“Why did we have to wait this long? Over.”
“Kamala and Claus both have survival problems and we had problems to send out a strong enough signal. How are you over there?”
“We have our own problems but we are dug in quite well. What are your problems? Over.”
“Kamala and Claus had contact with bases in their vicinity but after the neighbors reported attacks, all went quiet. We suppose the enemy annihilated all of them.” Over.”
“Who is this enemy, over?”
“We all have this one enemy who brought the plague and demolished our New World Order initiative. We have, in the meantime, found out that they called themselves ‘The Saviors’ and we will have to act very carefully because they aim to track down all our Elite bases and demolish it. This, unluckily, will be our last conversation. Take this code down now before the enemy traces us and eavesdrops.”
The signaller briefly explains to Rougi how to jot down the code and then Morse code follows until the signaller is satisfied Rougi can handle it perfectly before he talks normally again.
“I’m not broadcasting from our hidden base but works through a relay from the nearest big tower and Claus’ signaller must do the same because the enemy is very dangerous. We suggest that you, like us, move from your original position and go into hiding because the only reason the enemy doesn’t demolish a base is that they use that base to discover other bases. That is why our communication will have to be through the code in the future. Over and out.”
Suddenly a Morse code signal follows and Morrison ascertains: “You are taping it, right?”
Rougi nods earnestly. “For sure, Colonel.”
Heinrich pacifies Morrison: “Don’t worry, Colonel. I will immediately with Rougi analyze the code and start to develop a user-friendly application that will record the code and broadcast it. This application learns a voice and when that voice speaks, the app will broadcast the code. When the signaller reacts from the other side in code, the app will broadcast it on this side with a tin voice in English. We then can communicate as if are having a slow-motion conversation.”
“Brilliant Heinrich, it is not by chance that you are my Heaven Broom genie. When will it be completed?”
“Later today or tomorrow morning it will work, Colonel.”
“Fantastic!” He looks at Rougi. “What is your name, troop?”
“Rougi Karelse, Colonel.”
“From this moment on you are Lieutenant Rougi Karelse and all signallers must report directly to you. You only allow them to tape and broadcast the signals. No word to anyone. They don’t have to know what it is. It is classified information that stays between the three of us and when the application talks to them directly in English, only you will be present.”