Independence Day: Silent Zone by Stephen Molstad Page A

hand grenade for a
second
time.
    He'd
gone
down to the director's office to nose around in his new digs and found
something that made him very, very unhappy. In fact, after a few
minutes of
examining the lab's accounting ledgers, he was furious. Everyone in the
kitchen
stopped what they were doing and listened to the shouts bouncing off
the walls.
He came storming down the hallway and stopped in the doorway. In his
hand he
had a stack of receipts. On his face he had an indignant expression,
which he
focused on Dworkin. "Were you guys thinking I wouldn't turn you in when
I
found out about this? Have you all gone crazy from living down here so
long?"
    I can't really believe Spelman has
given this barbarous hothead any real power, Dworkin thought, knowing he would
have to defend
himself against this uppity technocrat.
    It
hadn't
taken Radecker very long to discover some of the creative bookkeeping
procedures the scientists had developed to help them through the lean
years of
underfunding. Among other things, he'd checked the active personnel
roster.
According to this document, there were supposedly nine old men working
at the
below-ground facility—one of them 103 years old. Every month, a
government
paycheck came in for every name on that list, Radecker wanted an
explanation.
"What happens to the extra paychecks?" he demanded. Cibatutto suddenly
remembered an urgent errand over near the oven, so the task of
explaining fell
to Dworkin.
    "We
cash them," he explained.
    The scheme had been
in operation for several years. When it became clear that the flow of
money for
the project was slowly being choked down to a trickle, the staff had
either
resigned in protest or received transfers to other places. A hard-core
group of
twelve refused to leave. They all felt the questions surrounding these
visitors
were too urgent, too important, to let the lab die. So they dedicated
not only
their energy, but very often their personal savings as well to the
effort. They
had pooled their money to pay for new equipment and services such as
the
chemical tests they'd had done on several alien materials. When the
members of
this fraternity began to die off, their purchasing power declined as
well. They
couldn't get at the money in their retirement accounts, so they created
a new one.
They'd found a small bank in Las Vegas, Parducci Savings, that was
known for
asking very few questions, and they opened a joint account. Every month
the
checks were endorsed and deposited.
    "I
knew something was wrong when I saw all that new equipment in the other
room."
    "Sam,"
Freiling whispered loudly across the table, "this young man is angry
with
us. Who is he?"
    "And
this is ridiculous!" Radecker blew up again, pointing at Freiling.
"The man is senile, totally unfit to be working here. The only reason
you're keeping him down here is so you can collect his money. He's
leaving on
the next cargo plane."
    "Mr.
Radecker, please. We have maintained very detailed records, which I
would be
glad to have you examine. They show how every penny of the money was
used to
further our research efforts. Take a look around the labs, and you'll
see we
haven't used these funds on any extravagances for ourselves. We have
dedicated
our entire lives to the task of repairing and studying this vehicle.
Area 51 is
our home. It's been Dr. Freiling's home since 1951. He has nowhere else
to go.
We are his family now."
    Radecker stood in
the doorway, shaking his head at the ceiling. Dworkin's speech seemed
to soften
his stance, but only slightly. "Do you understand how much trouble you
could get into for this? How am I going to explain this to Spelman? I
suppose you
want me to hide it from him and hang my own ass out on the line." He
waved
the papers in the air once more. "This is corruption, gentlemen. This
is theft,
this is tax fraud, this is…" An idea suddenly occurred to him. With a
sickened
expression on his face, he gazed at Dworkin. "Tell me these dead guys
aren't buried down