Read Nebula for Free Online

what your role will be.”
    “I didn’t join you,” Harry replied, breaking his silence. “Joining implies willingness. I was shanghaied.”
    “Whatever,” Brad said. “The fact is that you’re now one of us, so try to make the best of it, and have a bit of patience. You’ll soon be eager to be part of this project.”
    “If you say so.”
    At that moment, Charlie’s cell phone rang.
    Harry was surprised. “How come he has cell coverage in here? I thought that you secured this place. Don’t you block RF transmissions?”
    Walt answered. “We have our own network, and there’s a secure transceiver embedded in the roof of the building and a covert link from it, through the walls of the room to a cellular repeater over there, on that wall.”
    Harry looked where Walt pointed and saw the small box.
    Charlie ended his brief conversation and was visibly disturbed. “We need to get Professor Ambrose out of here. Forget the plan. Let’s go.”
    “What happened,” Walt asked before anyone else could.
    “Someone broke into his house, and we got word that the police and FBI are scouring the area looking for him. We have to get out of here now.”
    Harry didn’t understand what was happening, but the others obviously did. Brad grabbed him by the arm and hurried him out the door, to a car that was waiting nearby. They all jumped in and drove off like a bat out of hell. It was pretty clear that whatever was happening was something that they all feared a lot more than getting a traffic ticket.
    When they were about twenty kilometers away from the university, they pulled off onto a small side street. There they met some people in another car, and they switched and drove off separately. The whole thing was like something out of a grade-B spy movie again. This time there were no blindfolds, but the quick switch of cars and the overall sequence of events from the time that Charlie got the call was unreal. Harry had no choice but to go along.
    It took about three hours, with the last hour through some back roads somewhere near the region where West Virginia and Pennsylvania meet with Ohio. Harry wasn’t sure which state they were in, but the countryside was rural, and the last few kilometers of road were definitely country back roads. They stopped at an old farm house and got out.
    “This is one of our safe houses,” Brad explained. “From here, we can get safe transportation to the next stop. It looks like we evaded any tail that they were going to put on us at the university. We probably got out just in time.”
    “What the hell is going on,” Harry demanded. “What the hell have you got me into, and why are you running from the police. Did you get me dragged into some sort of criminal enterprise?”
    “It’s nothing like that,” Walt replied. “I told you that we’re not a government sponsored operation, but there are several governments that have their suspicions that we exist and are up to no good. The US government has a small task force from CIA and FBI trying to find us, but we’ve managed to use our connections in the government to keep steering them away, and we keep very tight security, as you already know. Unfortunately, it looks like our presence at the university has been compromised. They seem to know that you’re involved somehow with us. We probably overdid it with the pressure on you, and they could see that something strange was happening. We’ll have to destroy the small conference room that we first met in, but that’s not a big problem. We have other ways to meet nearby. Let’s get into the house. You’ll have to leave pretty soon to get to the other location for your briefings, and I have to get back to the university. I just hope that they haven’t connected me with this.”
    “Why are you going back while I go on? Aren’t you in this as much, or more, than I am?”
    “It’s different for you and me,” Walt replied. “I’m one of the outside men. I have a family and can’t