Foreign Embassy

By Jay Greenstein

Fifteen-year-old Ron Gibson was there when Talperno ship dropped from clouds to set up shop by the Washington Monument. In fact, they very nearly landed on Ron and his friends when their ship, an eighty story concrete office building, touched down. Stunned, but raised on a diet of science fiction and adventure movies, the boys marched through the front door and became the first humans to meet the Talperno.

A decade later, Ron is writing a book on the visitors. His quest leads him to South Florida, and to beautiful Patricia Scott, whose xenophobic father may have discovered the chilling secret of what the Talperno really have in mind for humanity.

Now Ron must convince the government that things are not as they seem. But to do that he has to survive, and that doesn’t seem terribly likely.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jay Greenstein
• Release date: Aug 13, 2020
• ISBN: 9781005535377

Jay Greenstein

I'm a storyteller. My skills at writing are subject to opinion, my punctuation has been called interesting, at best—but I am a storyteller. I am, of course, many other things. In seven decades of living, there are great numbers of things that have attracted my attention. I am, for example, an electrician. I can also design, build, and install a range of things from stairs and railings to flooring, and tile backsplashes. I can even giftwrap a box from the inside, so to speak, by wallpapering the house. I'm an engineer, one who has designed computers and computer systems; one of which—during the bad old days of the cold war—flew in the plane designated as the American President's Airborne Command Post: The Doomsday Jet. I've spent seven years as the chief-engineer of a company that built bar-code readers. I spent thirteen of the most enjoyable years of my life as a scoutmaster, and three, nearly as good, as a cubmaster. I joined the Air Force to learn jet engine mechanics, but ended up working in broadcast and closed circuit television, serving in such unlikely locations as the War Room of the Strategic Air Command, and a television station on the island of Okinawa. I have been involved in sports car racing, scuba diving, sailing, and anything else that sounded like fun. I can fix most things that break, sew a fairly neat seam, and have raised three pretty nice kids, all of who are smarter and prettier than I am—more talented, too, thanks to the genes my wife kindly provided. Once, while camping with a group of cubs and their families, one of the dads announced, "You guys better make up crosses to keep the Purple Bishop away." When I asked for more information, the man shrugged and said, "I don't really know much about the story. It's some kind of a local thing that was mentioned on my last camping trip." Intrigued, I wondered if I could come up with something to go with his comment about the crosses; something to provide a gentle terror-of-the-night to entertain the boys. The result was a virtual forest of crosses outside the boys' tents. That was the event that switched on something within me that, now, more than twenty-five years later, I can't seem to switch off. Stories came and came… so easily it was sometimes frightening. Stories so frightening that one boy swore he watched my eyes begin to glow with a dim red light as I told them (it was the campfire reflecting from my ...

Book preview

Jay Greenstein

All rights reserved

Copyright 2014 Jay Greenstein

Other Novels by Jay Greenstein

Science Fiction

Samantha and the Bear

Wizards

To Sing The Calu

Hero

Monkey Feet

An Accidental War

Samantha and the Bear

Starlight Dancing

As Falls an Angel

Sisterhood of the Ring Series

Water Dance

Jennie’s Song

A Change Of Heart

A Surfeit Of Dreams

Kyesha

Abode Of The Gods

Living Vampire

An Abiding Evil

Ties of Blood

Blood Lust

Modern Western

Posse

Romantic Suspense

A Chance Encounter

Kiss of Death

Intrigue/Crime

Necessity

Betrayal

Hostage

Young Adult

My Father My Friend

Romance

Zoe

Breaking the Pattern

Publication History

First edition release:

Double Dragon Press

5/2014

Second publication:

Smashwords Continuation Services

8/2020

This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. It may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

This novel is a work of fiction. All characters and events in this book are fictitious and created by the author for entertainment purposes. Any similarities between living and non-living persons are purely coincidental.

Table of Contents

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Author’s Note

Foreign Title

Prologue

The Talperno came in over the pole, dropped straight down to a height of seven thousand feet, then flew a line down the center of the Atlantic Ocean. They clearly showed on every missile-warning and defensive screen on the face of the planet but they were moving slowly enough and were on a course that triggered no attack by the military.

God alone knows how long they hung there above us—out of reach of our detection systems and studying us before coming into the atmosphere. When they finally did, though, they knew exactly what they were doing. They were cruising along at a high enough altitude to be seen on every radar set pointed in their direction. And believe me, there were plenty of those.

When they finally reached the equator they stopped, and just hung there, waiting. For what, no one could say, but plenty of people and a nice assortment of hardware were headed in for a look at what had come visiting. Satellite cameras were hastily diverted from programmed paths, and almost anyone who had aircraft capable of reaching the area launched them.

° ° °

Okay, Poppa Bear, we have the target in sight. It’s big, whatever it is, and there appears to be nothing holding the damn thing up. Mel Kominsky squinted through the fighter’s canopy as he tried to make out visual details on the object, still several miles away. No wings, no visible engine structure, and no exhaust plume that I can make out. He glanced at his display panel before adding, The camera view isn’t much better.

Other than acknowledgement of his transmission there was no response.

Now that they were within striking range he signaled his wing mates to reduce speed, and reminded them not to make their weapon systems active. Whatever it was would probably detect the targeting radar and might not view being painted with a targeting beam a friendly thing to do. He also altered course a bit to pass close, but not close enough to be seen as a threat.

Studying the thing from a half-mile distance wasn’t much better, so far as understanding what he was looking at. He needed to get closer, an idea that brought mixed feelings. Curiosity and orders from the carrier dictated he take the next step, but mental images suggested by late-night horror films urged him to power-up his weapons—something out of the question, and probably futile, in any case. The beings in the ship he was circling could apparently ignore the effects of gravity, and not worry about the cost, or amount, of fuel required. And even were he to shoot at the damn thing he hadn’t a clue as to what he might target.

Unhappily, he studied the thing as he circled, trying to make sense of what he saw. The urge to just wait a bit was strong. But the top brass were in charge, and they said, Get closer.

Reflecting that nothing is impossible to the man who doesn’t have to do the work he pushed his doubts aside and said, Okay guys, they don’t seem to mind being circled at this distance, so do some sightseeing from here, while I make Poppa-Bear happy by moving in for a closer look. Trusting the other pilots to hold station, Mel switched to the Carrier’s com channel. The odds said that whatever he might say would be on loudspeaker through the ship, and if it wasn’t being heard throughout the world, too, it was being recorded for rebroadcast. So whatever he said, for good or evil, would go down in the history books—a pleasant thought.

Okay, he said, as he banked toward the visitors, reducing speed to little more than enough to remain airborne. You can see it on camera view, but I’ll give my own impressions as I close with the ship.

Do that, Snowbird, and remember, we can only see what’s in the field of the gun-camera. Then dropping formality he added, And Mel? Good luck. There’s no one on board who wouldn’t change places with you. But still, be careful.

Roger that, and thanks. He took a steadying breath and eased into a closing spiral around the thing to get a view from all directions. It was big—far bigger than anything Earth’s engineers had ever gotten into the air. The temptation to play tourist and just circle it, watching, was strong, but people were waiting for him to report on what he saw.

Okay, from what I can tell the ship’s outer shell isn’t metal, it has more of a…well, a masonry look, like weathered granite, though that might be the effect of collisions with micrometeorites, over a long period of time.

Now within a few thousand feet of it, he turned almost directly toward the ship, to bring it fully into his camera view for a moment, then resumed his slow spiral inward, dropping a bit to verify that the bottom surface matched the side in appearance.

It’s hovering with its long axis parallel to the sea, as you probably saw, and I’d guess the length at about…twelve hundred feet? It has no visible engines, and the fuselage—if you can call it that—appears to be rectangular, and maybe two-five-oh feet per side.

Are those ports lining the walls? The view wasn’t clear. That was a new voice, someone of a much higher rank, he suspected.

Yes. They appear to be…well, windows, and— Holy shit! For the moment he was speechless.

Say again, Snowbird. What were you reacting to?

He banked heavily, pulling back on the stick and goosing the throttle for enough power to keep from falling out of the sky. For a moment he was pointing directly toward the ship, engines screaming, virtually hanging motionless in the air, before he resumed his course around the thing. The primary result was a video of the ship for the benefit of those viewing the feed from his gun-camera. The secondary was that he now held a position closer to the ship, one that placed him only a football field’s distance from the visitors. He hadn’t mistaken what he was seeing, and he devoutly hoped the people watching the view from his camera saw what he did. But in case they missed it he said, "Those are windows, all right, with people watching from them. They’re waving, but…well, they either have some sort of artificial gravity or those people walk on their walls, because every one of them is sideways to what I call up and down."

° ° °

Snowbird, what’s your fuel status? We show you as about ready to head home.

Roger that. The guys are taking turns playing tourist, and as soon as the last one does a flyby we’ll have to head in…unless you want to send a fill-up?

That brought a chuckle, and, Refuel you? No chance of that. Anyone who can wangle a seat is suited up and pacing by their ride. Your relief is already in the air, and should be arriving about the time you leave.

Disappointing, but not unexpected, so reluctantly, he keyed the com channel. Okay Guys, Poppa Bear says we head home, so form up on me and lock in. When that completed he took a last look at the ship, then turned his plane’s nose toward the carrier and keyed in the course instructions. It was five minutes later, and he was reviewing what he’d say at the debriefing, when a voice from the carrier brought him back into the world.

Say Snowbird, have you looked at your readouts lately? In truth, he hadn’t. Busy with his musings he’d kept the plane locked on course and flying itself. Now, a glance showed that while five aircraft left the carrier on his trip out, on the trip home there were now six.

Well I’ll be damned.

° ° °

The carrier and its attendant warships turned in the direction of the Visitors, as they were christened. Their ship obligingly followed the returning observers, and ended up hovering over the carrier, bobbing gently in the breeze some two hundred feet over the flight deck.

The situation remained stable for a time, with the visitors ignoring attempts to establish communications but following every course change the carrier made. Finally someone got the bright idea of sending a long-range reconnaissance aircraft toward Washington D.C.. That worked, and was the reason the world’s first extraterrestrial visitors landed on the Capitol Mall by the reflecting pool for the Washington Monument—though set up an embassy there might be a better description. When they were safely down, it became apparent that the thing was more building than spacecraft. Except for the lack of a sidewalk—which they quickly corrected—once the sealing blocks moved out of position, and the entryway deployed, it looked as though it’d always been there.

° ° ° °

Chapter 1

The first ones to knock on the front door were supposed to be a hand picked group of diplomats and language experts. At least those were the plans, hurriedly made as the visitors cruised toward Washington. It was expected that they’d touch down in the vicinity of Dulles airport, where the guiding aircraft would land. In actuality, it was a group of Boy Scouts visiting the capitol while on their way to the National Jamboree at Fort Sam Hill, in Virginia, who had the pleasure of greeting them. I know, because I was part of that troop.

Because of a screw-up in our itinerary, our Scoutmaster and the other adult leader were off making arrangements for our overnight stay at a local youth hostel. The rest of the troop, eighteen boys, ranging in age from twelve to seventeen, and led by the senior boys, were left to laze on the grass of the mall. It was a weekday, with a heavily overcast sky threatening to rain at any minute, so the mall wasn’t crowded. Most of us were involved in a game of Frisbee football when the ship arrived.

It would’ve been difficult for us not to notice the Visitors landing, because they chose the spot on which we were playing as their parking lot. The low-hanging clouds prevented us from seeing the ship approach, and we were too engrossed in our playing to notice them break through the clouds. Since they came straight down from the cruising altitude of the plane that guided them toward the city, we learned it was there when we found ourselves in deep shadow, with what looked like a huge square of blackness above us, blocking out most of the sky.

It seemed only a few feet over my head, though in reality, was probably much higher. Still, looking up to find a huge black square above you, and growing closer, is guaranteed to attract your attention.

The bottom of the ship was featureless, except for the disconcerting fact that it absorbed light so completely that it was like looking into a black pit that extended into infinity. It was hard to focus on, and the lack of detail made my eyes tear as they tried to find something on which to center.

We were stunned into motionless gaping, mouths hanging slackly open, frozen until we noticed that it seemed to be growing larger, the result of dropping toward its landing spot—our playing spot. Noticing that got us moving toward the street in a hurry, even before we realized what was truly happening. When it became apparent we wouldn’t make it, and that we’d be crushed under the thing, most of the boys dropped to the ground crying, and cowered there, uselessly covering the back of their heads with their hands. Maybe it’s foolish of me, but I’ve always been proud that although I dropped to my knees to stave off disaster for as long as possible, I found myself studying both the dropping blackness and the reactions of my friends, wishing I’d have the chance to tell someone about what it was like to have been eaten by a free roving blackness. Perhaps that was the moment when my destiny became that of the journalist. In any case, that was the reason I was the one who noticed that it’d stopped some three feet over our standing height, to allow us to move out from under it.

Grabbing one of the smaller boys, who was frozen in fear, and shouting for the rest to get moving, I hurried out from under the thing. The rest of the boys wasted no time in following, so some of us were standing only a few feet away when it touched down. Some may still be running.

Seconds after we were clear of the bottom it began to lower once more. It silently and gently contacted the grass, then settled, pressing itself into the ground, to come to rest about a foot lower. Those of us who hadn’t continued running after we were clear, nine of us, stood like a row of statues, mouths foolishly hanging open, unable to reconcile what happened with anything that made sense to our numbed minds. It was, by far, the strangest feeling I’ve ever had, and I can still see the events of the day, razor sharp in my mind, as though they happened yesterday. I remember sniffing, expecting something unusual, perhaps an electrical smell, but there was only the odor of crushed grass and wet earth.

I couldn’t help myself, and put out a hand to touch the bulk of it, for assurance that it really was there. That, too, was a disappointment. All I felt was the familiar roughness of what appeared to be stone, lightly pitted, as though by the action of weather, and cool to the touch. I remember sighing then, and feeling sadness. I knew it hadn’t been there only moments before. I knew the thing had been hovering above us, all eighty floors of it. I also knew what my eyes told me: that I was standing next to a tall building. And of course, buildings can’t fly.

Once on the ground it lost the strangeness it possessed in flight, and seemed no more than what it appeared to be: an office building. Still, that in itself made it unusual. Office buildings don’t belong in the middle of the Capitol Mall. Frowning, I stepped back to get a better look. On the one hand, my eyes said I was standing next to a typical Washington DC office building, albeit unusual in architectural detail, and taller than most. My memory, however, kept insisting the thing hadn’t been there a few seconds before—that it had very nearly crushed me in landing. Looking back, I suppose the visitors must have been partially supporting the weight of the thing in some manner, because it sank only inches into the ground, rather than several feet, as a building of that size, resting without a foundation, must do. I was fifteen, though, knew little about such things, and didn’t think that odd, though you can be sure there were others who would, and who’d spend a great deal of time trying to puzzle out how it was done.

We were still within fifteen feet of the building, trying to figure out what to do, when a loud hissing attracted our confused attention. It sounded like air venting, and came from the very center of the building’s ground floor. As though on strings, I, and everyone else, turned in that direction, as did the rapidly growing crowd, gathered some distance from the building. The hissing stopped, and we were treated to the sight of the building’s entrance seal moving into its retracted position. At the time, I had no idea of what was happening. All I knew was that it was another bizarre happening on a day already overloaded with bizarre happenings. If I had any sense I’d have run, just as the others on the mall, and many of the troop had. Those of us who remained, however, were too numb, too dumb, or too interested in what was happening to run. With me, it was a bit of all three.

For whatever reason, though, Boy Scout Troop 970, of Philadelphia, watched from a first row position.

A section of the front wall, a fifty-foot square block of stone, perhaps three feet thick, quietly moved straight out from the front wall, without the slightest sign of support! For a moment, the block remained suspended, as the building had, only moments before. While my mind attempted to digest that, it split into two blocks, each of which turned ninety degrees to the side, and then retracted most of the way into slots in the building. The blocks remained slightly offset from the building, protruding enough to provide a bit of decoration to the entranceway, which now moved forward to take the place of the block.

Again, good sense said: Wait. Unfortunately, good sense and fifteen year old boys are often strangers. Unafraid now, and curious, we walked closer for a better look, and found nothing more than the lobby of an office building, complete with revolving doors, which, I suppose, are another form of air-lock. A sign over the door said: Talperno Embassy. Under that was something that probably said the same thing in their alphabet. Above it a stylized crown of twinkling stars flickered prettily.

Next to me, someone softly breathed a single word: Wow.

I looked over at Sam Todmann, the Senior Patrol leader of the troop. Sam was seventeen, and both a neighbor and a friend. In fact, Sam was the reason I joined the scouts. I respected his judgment, so I looked over to see if he was thinking the same thing I was.

There was no doubt in my mind that we were viewing something that came from off our world. In seconds, the area would be filled with police, military, and God alone knew what else. The only thing that wouldn’t be there was Philadelphia Troop 970 of the Boy Scouts. We’d be hustled out of there first thing. In fact, shouts of Get away from there, boys, were already coming from the sidewalk, some fifty feet away.

I could see in Sam’s eyes that his reasoning matched mine: No one would travel though space for an untold distance, study the Earth for long enough to learn the written language, and then set up shop in such a location simply to have roasted people for lunch. I bowed him forward, smiling.

Sam gathered up the rest of the troop—at least those of us who were still there. He gave the hand signal to form two lines, and mouthed, Look sharp. He called us to attention, and we marched the few feet to the nearest door. Not a boy hesitated. We’d been raised on science fiction movies and comics. I don’t think it even occurred to us that we might be in danger.

The revolving door gave us a momentary problem, as it’s somewhat difficult to march through one, but with as much dignity as we could muster, we passed through, and became the first Earth people to contact the Talperno embassy. At the time, I thought it an honor.

° ° °

The moment I passed through the doorway I knew I was in an alien environment. Chill air, barely over sixty degrees carried an odd scent—nothing I could put my finger on, but still, it was one that made me frown and try to decide what it reminded me of. The revolving doors truly were an air lock, keeping the heat and smells of my planet out of their home.

We’d walked nearly across the lobby, searching for someone, or for a building directory of some kind. I suspect we arrived more quickly than anticipated, or they would’ve greeted us at the door. Given that there was no one in evidence, what to do next was uncertain.

Before that became a problem, from behind us, came, Can I help you? Apparently, someone had arrived through