Mine: The Arrival by Brett Battles Read Free Book Online

came.
    “The president would like to see you at his home,” a woman who identified herself as FDR’s secretary said.
    “Of course. When?”
    “Now.”
    The five-minute private meeting extended to well over an hour. When Durant departed, he had exactly what he’d come for, a mandate to put together whatever resources—human and physical—he needed to learn everything he could about Titan. Roosevelt, for his part, vowed not to share the information with anyone.
    Durant’s first order of business was to confirm with Captain Reece that the Titan machine had been crated and was awaiting transfer. Next, he contacted the owner of a Denver-area construction company and arranged for it to pick up a “custom-made pump system” from Fort Leavenworth, then take it back to its storage facility in Colorado and hold until contacted again.
    Durant set about recruiting people for his team. Secrecy would be of utmost importance. He wanted nothing less than first-class researchers and technicians, but candidates had to be free of personal entanglements and able to commit to complete isolation until the time came when their discoveries could be shared. These parameters made the task difficult but not impossible.
    The next job was getting the facility operational and stocking it with supplies. The president assigned a platoon of elite soldiers to assist Durant. After move-in day, they would take on the role of facility security, but in the months prior they proved useful in clearing the roads of snow and helping to make the base ready.
    Keeping Titan in a non-governmentally secured facility might have seemed foolish, but Durant believed doing so would lessen any interest in what was inside. His gamble paid off, as the box sat unmolested from December until just that morning, when members of the security team, dressed in civilian clothing, loaded the large crate onto a truck and drove it to the Project Titan facility.
    The entrance to the underground base was hidden within a plain-looking, one-story building constructed under a natural rock overhang that prevented it from being seen by aircraft. The main ways down were a set of stairs and a passenger elevator, both reached via a false wall in the middle room of the building. There was a freight elevator that was accessed outside the structure, at a section of rock underneath the overhang that had been carved away to serve as the top end of the elevator shaft. When the elevator was not in use, a meticulously crafted panel that looked and felt like the surrounding rock would be attached to the front of the doors to conceal their existence.
    At the moment, the panel was set to the side and the freight elevator doors were wide open. Eight soldiers removed the crate and carried it across the soggy ground into the lift. The crate wasn’t particularly heavy—most of the weight came from the wooden box—but it was bulky and required many hands to steady it.
    “Cargo secure, sir,” the lieutenant in charge said to Durant once the crate had been lowered to the elevator’s floor.
    Durant pushed the down button and the doors closed.
    The excitement of the moment was nearly overwhelming. Five months he’d been planning for this day. Five months of thinking about the Titan craft sitting in its box, its secrets yet to be discovered. Five months of being unable to touch it and pry into its mysteries.
    Five long months.
    But now the wait was over.
    It was only by sheer will power that he wasn’t smiling like a kid on Christmas morning.
    When he’d pictured this moment, he thought the ride down would feel like it was taking forever. But in reality, the car stopped and the doors opened before he knew it.
    Durant stepped outside, waited for the soldiers to pick up the crate again, and then led them down the wide, brightly lit corridor. Like most of the base, the walls were covered in concrete, hiding the fact they were under tons of rock and earth.
    When the group reached the first of the blast