Lonely Heroes-Book 2

By Eddie Upnick

"Lonely Heroes is the fourth book in Eddie Upnick's series. However, some might call this book #2, as, chronologically, it fits between Time Will Tell ( book one ) and Future Tense ( book two). Lonely Heroes is another compelling, fast-paced, action-packed thriller that is impossible to put down. As was the case with the other volumns in the series, Lonely Heroes stands perfectly well on its own for first time readers.

"The main protagonist, Roger Taylor, the CIA's top agent, draws the most dangerous assignments from our government. Taylor teams up with Zera, an undercover Israeli agent. After working together in the Middle East, they are then charged with stopping an alien attack on Earth. Later, they join a cabal of aliens heading into space to try to save not only Earth, but two distant worlds from extinction.

"After reading all four books, it seems to this reviewer that these books would make a great continuing series for television. Each chapter in each book seems well suited to become a one hour episiode. Personally, I can't wait to see where this series goes next."

USA READER NEWS

• Language: English
• Publisher: Eddie Upnick
• Release date: Dec 30, 2014
• ISBN: 9781310843044

Eddie Upnick

Eddie Upnick’s Media Page Biography of Eddie Upnick, author of Time Will Tell, Lonely Heroes, Future Tense, and 2052 Eddie Upnick was born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1953. He graduated from Benjamin Cardozo High School in Bayside, New York in 1971. In 1976, he graduated from New Paltz State University of New York with a BA in Anthropology. He worked as a joke writer for Rodney Dangerfield, among others, and as a situation comedy writer off and on between the years 1975-1996. He invented Super Chess which Games Magazine declared one of the top ten strategy games of the year in 1987. He has been married since 1981 and also shares his home with two parrots. While on vacation in Antigua, in 1995, Upnick met Sidney Dowse, an Englishman who was one of the men who had escaped from Sagan, the prison camp portrayed in the 1963 movie, The Great Escape. Dowse had information regarding World War Two that was not in any history book. After days of prodding from Upnick, Dowse reluctantly related events from his own recollections, as well as those he himself had been told by his associate, Stewart Menzies. (Menzies, the head of MI-6 during World War II had daily meetings with Winston Churchill.) At Dowse’ request, Upnick promised that he would not repeat anything that had been revealed to him, until after Sidney’s death. Mr. Dowse died in 2008. Dowse’s incredible recollections inspired the writing of Time Will Tell, Future Tense and the final book in the trilogy, 2052. Facts, lost to history, are woven into these stories. Upnick reveals that Winston Churchill actually knew the date and time of the planned attack on Pearl Harbor and what he decided to tell Roosevelt. Did time travelers help the allies win the war? Menzies thought so. Future Tense, the sequel to Time Will Tell, takes place twenty years after TWT ends, during the years 2022-2028. In Future Tense, Putin’s assassination triggers the Russian mob’s takeover of the country. Meanwhile, in the United States, 50 trillion dollar deficits cause forty states to attempt to secede from the union. The heavy debt-load of the other ten states threatens to bring America to its knees economically. Yet, these stories are only a small part of Future Tense, as our planet is under threat from an impending Ice Age. Finally, aliens both friendly and deadly enter the picture as the story moves forward. The final book in the series, 2052, continues the adventure of the next generation players as Upnick delves deeper into Earth’s possible futures. Threads of truth can be found throughout all three of these reality-based science fiction books. Has future history already happened? 2052’s shocking ending may answer that question. Lonely Heroes the fourth book and the Time Will Tell screenplay are complete as well. Video Link to trailer: http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xq2cvj_time-will-tell-by-eddie-upnick_shortfilms http://www.eddieupnick.com/Reviews/Oracle%20Review.pdf audio link to an interview which explains everything about the author and his reasons for writing these books. http://www.spreaker.com/user/espenblog/time_will_tell_future_tense_by_upnick Eddie Upnick with Lennon

Book preview

LONELY HEROES

Eddie Upnick

Label Man Books

This book is dedicated to the brave men and women who work in covert operations. Their methods are often questioned. Still the ultimate goal is clear: do whatever it takes to keep our world a safer place.

PROLOGUE

How did we end up on a planet so far from home? The short answer is that when our missions were completed, we knew far too much about Earth’s near term future to be allowed to return. The Defender understood that if we were tempted to share our knowledge of what was to come…it could alter what had to be. So, by mutual agreement, we were marooned here.

We have been asked to give a detailed historical record of our lives. Here is our tale.

**

YURI ALCOV

As my graduation from Yale was nearly at hand, our family doctor gave me my first annual physical. My brain scan revealed what most of the male members of our family knew all too well: a non-malignant, inoperable tumor in the center of the brain. Very few of us on my father’s side of the family ever lived beyond the age of 60. Only my younger brother Peter had escaped this golf ball-sized tumor pressing on the language center of the Taylor family brains. When you are 22 years old, being told that you probably won’t live past the age of 60, doesn’t seem like too big of a deal. However, I was sure that if no cure had been found by the time I reached my fifties, I would feel quite differently.

I majored in linguistics and spoke fluently in over a dozen languages, including Russian, Farsi and Arabic. When the CIA found out that I had aced these language courses, particularly the ones spoken in countries that were potential threats to America, the alphabet agencies came calling. I was intrigued by the idea of becoming America’s James Bond, so I postponed my dream of dot com billions and joined the CIA.

My closest friend in college was Yuri, an exchange student from Russia. Taking as his role model Ensign Chekhov from the original Star Trek series, Yuri was determined to become the world’s leading astrophysicist. In his graduate work, Yuri worked 18-hour days using the Hubbel telescope and the latest technologies to chart every asteroid, meteor or comet he could locate. Yuri was able to correlate the path of every NEO (near earth object) in Earth’s vicinity. In the coming decade he would become the world’s leading authority on such matters. He championed the building of deflectors on Earth to protect the planet from meteors, comets, and asteroids. He repeatedly warned the world powers that NEOs would come dangerously close to the Earth in the years to come.

Unfortunately, Yuri’s suggestions, though sound and logical, were never acted upon. Military leaders in Russia, China and the United States all felt that asteroid deflectors could be turned into deadly satellite-killing weapons here on Earth, and could provoke a war if used for military purposes.

There was no denying that these fears were genuine. Cutting off communications and disrupting satellite-based wireless devices on Earth was indeed possible. Imagine the uproar of the masses if cell phones, televisions, and tablets all stopped working at once. The powers that be decided it was better to play Russian roulette with potential Earth-killers rather than risk imperiling our satellites, not to mention incurring the wrath of their wireless-loving people.

Until the world was more united and countries were willing to trust each other, we knew Yuri’s dream would never happen. He did have one powerful ally, however: Walter Krone, a former vice presidential candidate and a former secretary of state. Krone spoke often about the need for planetary asteroid deflectors. He befriended Yuri and advocated for his programs on the world’s stage.

Yuri married a beautiful but self-centered woman. One of my talents in life was being able to read people quickly and accurately. Unfortunately, I sensed that Yuri’s wife had divorce on her mind five minutes after saying, I do. The young Mrs. Alcov was under the delusion that astrophysicists made significant money. Six months after the birth of their child, a girl named Maria, she left both Yuri and Maria in search of a wealthier man. She found one - a high profile hockey player who drank as much as she did. That left Yuri to raise Maria alone.

**

I married my college sweetheart. An English major at Yale, Betty, went on to become a book editor after our college days were through. She didn’t want kids and, frankly, knowing the profession I was heading into, that was okay with me. Betty’s job was demanding and she worked many 16 hour days. The little free time she did have, she dedicated to her own writing. I’m sure Betty missed me when she was alone for months at a time while I was on an assignment, but she loved her job and the work kept her busy.

My move up the covert ladder at the agency was on a fast track. My training included the martial arts and escapism. Instruction in the art of getting out of handcuffs, and ropes, not to mention picking locks and using sleight of hand tricks seemed unusual, but turned out to be life-saving. Freddy Weiner was my teacher. He was a short, kind man, who had the unique ability to get out of anything from straight-jackets to handcuffs. He also could pick any lock in seconds. Freddy and I were not close at that time, yet I sensed he could be trusted with anything.

I was a tall Caucasian but my coloring was dark, making it possible for me to pass as Middle Eastern. My superiors at the agency were eager to deploy me to Iran or Syria as soon as my training was completed.

Postings in the Middle East, took me to Iran, Syria, and Iraq. Slowly and patiently I built contacts in Al Qaeda and the Taliban, gradually gaining jihadists’ trust. Since I also spoke Russian, I occasionally used a deep-cover identity as a Russian officer or nuclear scientist on certain assignments as well.

For me, the key to being a successful mole was patience. My superiors continually pressed me for information, pushing me to question my contacts before I deemed they were ready. So, I ignored them. After all, it was my life that was on the line, not theirs. My station chief in Kabul once called me into his office to inform me that he was going to put something negative into my permanent record file, if I didn’t gain more intelligence from one of my contacts, by the following Thursday.

I had to laugh. You sound like my junior high school principal with this nonsense. My permanent record file? Okay, you want some big news for the boys in Langley? Tell ‘em that Al Qaeda thinks our president, senators and congressmen are overpaid egotistical morons.

Thankfully that station chief was reassigned, so I never had to have dealings with him again. When I found out that he was transferred to the Guam office, where the humidity and temperature both had 90 handles, and their air-conditioning was often broken, I felt true justice had been served.

**

Many months later, when I was in DC doing a debriefing, Yuri got word to me, out of the blue. It had been years since we had been in contact. He was in a complete panic. He rambled incoherently about his five year-old daughter having been kidnapped. I told him to give me his address and I’d come to see him. I took the next plane out of DC. Arriving in Moscow, I went directly to Yuri’s apartment.

When Yuri told me what the Russians were attempting to do, I found their plan frightening, yet brilliant. He was now the world’s leading astrophysicist, specializing in finding, tagging and cataloguing the paths and trajectories of all NEOs. Yuri explained that he had informed his superiors about a particular NEO the size of Delaware passing within 20,000 miles of the Earth, in 88 days’ time. Weeks later, Russian agents had come to his home and escorted Yuri to see Putin. Yuri was asked to address the world at a press conference, announcing that this particular NEO was not going to miss the planet but would collide with the Earth. Yuri was to add that this giant space rock would kill all life on Earth shortly after impact. Yuri, being the honest scientist that he was, refused. Days later, his daughter had been abducted.

Yuri hadn’t fully thought through the Russians’ plan, but I did.

I didn’t know if Putin was the creator of this deception or not, but this false information would allow insiders to make hundreds of billions of dollars by shorting all the world’s stock markets right before Yuri’s speech. All they had to do was to buy put options against any stock or market.

Then, four hours later, Yuri would announce to the world that he had made a terrible mistake. The asteroid would indeed miss the Earth by 20,000 miles. Of course, the insiders would have already reversed their positions, buying call options, before the second speech. As the stock markets regained their losses, these investors would more than double their profits from four hours earlier. When the smoke cleared, billions, perhaps even trillions of dollars would be in the hands of those in the know.

Russia’s economy was stagnant. If successful, this plan would make Russia a financial superpower in the span of four hours’ time. Whoever was behind this scheme didn’t care how many people would commit suicide or have heart attacks once they thought the end of the world was near. The West’s only true weapon against Putin’s dream of reestablishing the old Soviet Union was economic sanctions. If this scheme worked, Russia would have so much capital in its hands, that future economic sanctions would have little impact.

I reported this information back to the deputy director of the CIA, Frank Tomlin.

His instructions were to find out exactly when the first speech is to be made.

Yuri’s star chart calculations had a series of forty digit numbers which determined the paths of the near earth objects. He admitted, You know, it would be remarkably simple. Just changing a 1 into a 7 on the 28th line of code would indicate a devastating impact here on the Earth.

The plan was flawless. We both realized that it would take days – if not weeks – for other astrophysicists to find Yuri’s mistake. My finances weren’t in the greatest shape at that time so, for a fleeting second or two, I too was tempted to profit from the scheme.

Yuri told me that they wanted him to speak at a press conference in Geneva, scheduled for 10 AM EST, 48 hours later. Putin was insistent that Yuri’s address take place in a neutral country so that finger-pointing would be more difficult. And it had to occur when the United States and the European stock markets were open. The Russians particularly wanted to tank the US markets, to weaken our economy. But Putin was not the only political leader who couldn’t resist a chance to make countless billions in just a few hours. To be fair, few people anywhere in the world would be able to resist investing in this deception, if they knew about it.

Frank Tomlin phoned and ordered me to monitor the situation. Monitor the situation? What the fuck did that mean? As I pondered Tomlin’s do-nothing statement, I drove over to visit an Interpol agent (and friend) who had downloaded internal diagrams of the Kremlin, where I suspected Yuri’s daughter was being held.

**

Hours later, when I returned to Yuri’s building, two goons were guarding the front door. After parking the car, I took two syringes from the glove compartment and filled them with a knockout potion that was standard issue for people in my line of work. Holding a bottle of vodka and acting drunk, I stumbled toward them as I climbed the steps. I tripped into both men, dropping the bottle of vodka which shattered. Once they had dragged me inside, I reached into my pockets, grabbed a syringe in each hand, and simultaneously injected both of them in the arm. They fell harmlessly to the floor.

My next miracle to perform was to get past the guard at Yuri’s front door. This man carried an Uzi and was at least six feet-six inches tall. Peeking around the corner of Yuri’s hallway, I considered my few options, but soon realized that I had to kill him. So, I attached the silencer to my PPK and shot him in the chest as I walked toward him. Hearing the thud, Yuri opened the door and I dragged the guard’s body inside.

Speaking frantically, Yuri said, My daughter was taken after school let out. If I don’t go through with this speech, they say they will kill her!

It was too dangerous to leave Yuri alone with a dead GRU agent in his apartment. First, we dragged the dead agent into the bathtub and closed the curtain. Then, we concocted a disguise for Yuri, dressing him in a raincoat and a hat, with a scarf covering half his face, so we could try to slip past the police watching the security cameras on the street. We drove to the school where Maria had been abducted. I left Yuri in the car while I interviewed a few eye witnesses from the school.

One woman reported, I saw Yuri’s daughter being forced into a black SUV, by two very large men. I think I got three letters of the license plate.

With the help of the Interpol agent’s computer and a license plate software program, we narrowed the list down to 11 possible vehicles. I methodically drove to each address, eliminating one vehicle at a time from consideration. I asked each black SUV owner the whereabouts of their car at the time of the abduction. Those with solid alibis as to their cars location were eliminated from my list.

My biggest problem now was Yuri. He wouldn’t stop kvetching and worrying as I tried to do my job and investigate his daughter’s kidnapping. Understandably, he was a nervous wreck, but we had bigger problems with every Russian security officer looking for us. Having Putin’s golden goose with me, moving freely around Moscow was going to be next to impossible. Thankfully, it was getting dark, so we could travel around more easily. I decided to check the parking lots within walking distance of the Kremlin.

Car #9 on my list instantly became my top suspect. It was a Russian government vehicle. I found it parked in an outdoor lot a few hundred yards from the Kremlin. I waited until it got a little darker out and then picked the lock to the car, looking for any evidence that a young girl had been in it. I found a broken hair-clip. I went back to see Yuri, and he confirmed it was his daughter’s.

Yes, I bought several of them while shopping with her recently.

The good news was that now we knew which car had abducted her. It was the Russian government, which left no doubt where Yuri’s daughter was being held. She could be under Putin’s desk in the Kremlin for all we knew.

Meanwhile, I got another text message from Frank Tomlin: I just got a call from the Russians; they say you killed one of their agents and kidnapped the astrophysicist. I am ordering you to release him to the Russian authorities at once. If you do, they will allow you to leave the country. It was the best deal I could make.

Reading between the lines, I was now convinced that Tomlin wanted to profit from the misinformation campaign as much as the Russians did. That text message from Tomlin only made me work harder to find Yuri’s little girl and keep these opportunistic assholes off the Forbes 400 list. Hey, don’t get me wrong, I am a believer in capitalism, it’s the best house in a bad neighborhood. But I just didn’t want its principles perverted in the worst possible way. This was insider trading on steroids.

After considering my options, I decided to give the appearance of playing along with Tomlin.

I said, Yuri, I am going to do my best to get your daughter out safe and sound, but for me to have any chance to pull this off, you will have to give yourself up. Once the Russians have you, they will relax their security protocols which will give me a better opportunity to do what I have to do. Do you have your cell phone with you?

Yes. But how are you going to get inside the Kremlin?

Let me worry about that. Listen to me carefully: if I text you the letter F it means your daughter is free. If you don’t hear from me within 16 hours, you will have to go through with the speech.

Please, don’t let anything happen to my little girl.

We hugged in the car. I’ll do what I can.

Yuri left my car and walked two