Armageddon - By James Patterson Page 0,19

neurons. Sort of like a tiny tympani drum with nerves.”

“Oh,” said Joe. “Eardrums.”

“We humans can’t hear sounds pitched higher than twenty thousand hertz,” Mel continued, “but locusts can detect frequencies up to one hundred thousand hertz.”

“They teach you this at horse school, Mel?” Dana said, somewhat snidely.

“Nope. Middle school.”

“Uh-oh,” Joe said, gesturing toward the monitor mounted above the truck’s blinking control panel. “Here comes something else humans are gonna wish they couldn’t hear.”

He amped up the master volume knob, and we heard the final trumpet strains of “Hail to the Chief.”

Every flat-screen TV was now filled with the official seal of the President of the United States.

“Pull over,” Agent Judge said to the driver. “We probably need to watch this. Looks like President McManus has activated the Emergency Broadcast System.”

The driver crunched over to what remained of the curb. According to a sign I saw lying in the wreckage, we were on Constitution Avenue, right in front of the ruins of the National Archives Building, which had once looked like the Parthenon in Athens.

Now it looked more or less like the scrap pile behind Granite ’R’ Us.

“Here we go,” said Willy as the presidential seal faded away.

A very nervous President John McManus—who hailed from Tennessee and had snowy-white hair—sat behind a military-issue steel desk with his hands folded, trying to look calm and presidential. There were no American flags on the desk, no family photographs.

“He must be in the bunker,” said Agent Judge. “The secure underground location where they’d take the president if we ever had a nuclear attack.”

“Ladies and gentlemen,” cooed an off-camera voice, which I immediately recognized as belonging to Number 2, “the President of the United States.”

“My fellow Americans,” said President McManus, “I come to you this evening with a heavy heart. For many years, we, your leaders in the United States government, have dreaded the day when alien beings from planets unknown would land on Earth and, with their superior weaponry, conquer us. Well, as you have undoubtedly heard, that day has arrived. Today, our nation’s capital was taken over by an invading army of technologically advanced alien invaders.”

“What?” said Willy. “He’s already surrendered?”

“Sure sounds like it,” said Joe.

“To those of you currently residing outside of Washington, D.C., be advised: your own Armageddon is rapidly approaching.”

“Tomorrow,” said the off-screen voice.

“That voice. That’s him, right, Daniel?” said Mel. “Number 2?”

“Yeah.”

The camera pushed in tighter on the president’s very worried face. “My fellow Americans, I urge you all to lay down your weapons. Do not fight back. Our victorious visitors have promised me that no American citizens will be harmed as long as we all do as we are told.”

“Man,” said Willy, “how much mistletoe is hanging off Number 2’s coattails? The president is kissing his butt, big-time.”

“This is bad,” said Emma. “I mean, I’m all for peace, but not without justice….”

Me? I figured it was the same-old, same-old:

Politicians selling their souls to the highest bidder.

Chapter 27

“IN CONCLUSION,” SAID President McManus, “rest assured that the government of the United States is still quite functional, here in our secure underground facility.”

The camera widened out to show a cluster of very important-looking men and women in business suits, plus a couple of guys in military uniforms.

“The Speaker of the House, the vice president, the secretaries of state and defense, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Supreme Court agree that it is in our nation’s best interest for all of you to surrender peaceably and seek safety in the vast network of shelters our conquerors have established underground.”

“Number 2 is a slaver,” blurted Emma.

“Maybe that’s why there haven’t been any casualties,” added Agent Judge.

“Right,” said Mel. “He doesn’t want to kill humans; he wants to sell them into slavery!”

“He probably sails around the galaxy, enslaving entire planets,” said Dana. “When he has a fresh load of laborers, he holds an interstellar auction and ships the slaves off to the highest bidder!”

Yes, sick as it may sound, there are still some planets—particularly mining colonies and farming worlds—where slavery not only exists but thrives as it did on this planet from the time of Hammurabi’s Code (around 1760 BC) until 1981, when the country of Mauritania became the last nation on Earth to finally outlaw the twisted system.

And, for the record, intergalactic slaves fare no better than those formerly oppressed on Earth. They are forced to do hard labor against their will; their children become their master’s property the instant they’re born, and can be sold or traded at his whim; and