“Are you cleared for Valiant Locksmith?”
“I have all the tickets for everything inside, sir, but my team is not cognizant of any of the SAPs.”
“Well, then,” he said, pulling Harris’s chair up to the desk. He felt so filthy, his hair clotted with dried dust, his clothes and skin flecked with remnants of sticky foam. “There will be security implications, Jennings, but first things first — once you get inside, you have to mitigate the danger. You’ll need full protective gear.” He briefed her on the halothane gas, the toppled spent fuel rods in the pool, the open vault that left nuclear devices exposed to the increased neutron flux, and the sticky foam barriers both in the inclined tunnel and the lower vault.
Without hesitating, the commander recited her prioritized actions for when she had access inside the facility. Wearing gas masks and protective clothing, her team would enter the lower level with the appropriate solvents and tools to remove the extensive blockage of hardened sticky foam at the guard portal. Once past that obstacle, they could get to the lower cavern and similarly clear the foam from the Velvet Hammer vault, after which they would seal the door and secure the clandestine nuclear warheads. Finally, in a more involved procedure, divers would rig up robotic lifts to restore the disrupted fuel rod array in the temporary pool, while industrial ventilation pumps would force any remnants of halothane up into the Mountain’s vertical exhaust shaft. Once exposed to the UV radiation in sunlight, the gas would quickly break down into harmless constituents.
The team’s last priority was to sweep for survivors.
As van Dyckman hung up the red phone, he settled back in the site manager’s chair. Once her team broke into the lower cavern, Commander Jennings would shoot a video feed to the office. That would let him watch the response in real time.
But he wasn’t through managing the crisis — this was only the beginning. He still had to prevent the existence of both SAPs from being revealed to the public. It was the only way to salvage Valiant Locksmith. If either unacknowledged program was revealed, the uproar would shut down Hydra Mountain, and he couldn’t allow that.
Once the nuclear response team mitigated the highest-priority dangers, special workers could perform a full cleanup, and no one would know any better. Harris would be locked away, held incommunicado, and no one could contradict van Dyckman… so long as there were no survivors in the lower cavern.
He couldn’t imagine how any of them might still be alive, but he had to close the loop, tie up the loose ends, and make sure nothing else went wrong.
That was what made him such an outstanding leader.
41
Climbing the crane’s high boom toward the cavern ceiling, Adonia gripped a horizontal strut as she paused to catch her breath. They were nearly to the end, high enough now that the elevated metal walkway ran ten feet below.
“We can lower ourselves and drop safely to the catwalk,” she said.
Garibaldi paused, looking down and breathing hard. “It’s a narrow target. If we miss, that’s a long way to fall.…”
Shawn sounded encouraging. “After what you’ve done today, Dr. Garibaldi, this will be a piece of cake.”
“Yes, piece of cake.” He sounded intensely weary. “I prefer cookies.”
Though he shouldn’t be feeling direct effects yet from the severe radiation exposure, he already looked weak. His red and blistered hands grew more inflamed by the minute, making the rigorous climb an excruciating activity. But the older scientist did not complain. He flexed his fingers and winced. “After all this effort, it would be embarrassing for us all if the pool wall failed and a random neutron set off one of those warheads anyway.”
Adonia forced a smile for his sake. “Are you suggesting we’re unlucky?”
“We’ve already used up all our bad luck for one day,” Shawn said. He looped the rope around the metal lattice, secured the line, and handed Adonia the doubled end. “Wrap it around your waist, and I can lower you to the catwalk.”
Adonia shook her head. “It’s not that far, and we don’t have time. I’ll just shimmy down the line, and then I can hold the rope steady from the catwalk. Dr. Garibaldi may need the help.”
The scientist heaved a deep breath and also waved the rope away. “If I fall, I fall. It’s only ten feet to the walkway — unless I miss. Then it’s a lot farther to the floor. I’ll take my chances.”
Grasping the rope, Adonia swung out above the catwalk and kept her focus on the corrugated steel walkway just below. She worked her way down the rope, and then let herself drop the last two feet, rattling the metal as she landed barefoot on the grid. She winced, but after climbing the crane’s boom for so long, it felt good to stand on a flat surface rather than trying to balance on metal struts. She held the end of the rope steady. “Come on, Dr. Garibaldi.”
He painstakingly lowered himself, finally sliding the rest of the way down. His knees buckled as he landed on the catwalk, but Adonia grabbed him, steadied him. He brushed himself off to recover his dignity.
Shawn followed, hand over hand, joining them on the metal grid, before he pulled the doubled rope down and coiled it over his shoulder. “Head for the ladder.”
Adonia used the diagonal catwalk as a switchback to move across the cavern, padding gingerly along. She did not look down through the open gridwork to see the empty gulf below them. Garibaldi plodded forward, keeping his head down, and she worried how he would be able to climb the vertical shaft into the ceiling once they got up the ladder. She hoped the actual exit from the cavern wasn’t too far above.…
If nothing else, Shawn could climb swiftly ahead, get out of the Mountain, and sound the alarm. Adonia doubted he would be willing to leave the two of them behind, but what mattered most was that someone managed to get out and alert the response teams to the looming disaster inside the massive grotto.
She reached an intersection with the next catwalk and climbed the connecting stairs, heading up toward the middle of the ceiling. Far below, she could see the half-finished in-ground cooling pools amid construction supplies, everything blanketed with a yellowish mist of knockout gas. She reassured herself that the above-ground pool remained plugged with its macabre patch.
Even though water was no longer draining out, the fallen and damaged fuel rods had substantially increased the ambient radiation levels in the chamber. Maybe their efforts minimized the possibility of setting off the Velvet Hammer warheads, but the risk still remained. It seemed like weeks ago that Mrs. Garcia had given her spontaneous tutorial of how neutrons could be reflected, absorbed, and re-radiated until they struck a critical target.
Adonia stopped at the ladder that hung down from an access hatch in the rock ceiling, the only way to reach the shaft drilled up toward the top of Hydra Mountain. They would have to climb the thirty feet on the open, unsupported metal steps. “I feel like we’ve all joined the circus. I knew I should have taken those trapeze lessons.”
Shawn grasped a rung at shoulder height and rattled the hanging ladder. “I’ll climb first and open the hatch. Adonia, help Dr. Garibaldi up the ladder.”
“I’m fine,” the scientist protested unconvincingly. “Don’t let me slow you down. This is too important.”
Adonia lifted her eyebrows. “Shawn, you know I don’t have the strength to haul him up, rung by rung, if he needs it. Let me open the access hatch while you secure him with the line. I’ll take the other end of the rope with me, as security.” She leaned over and gave him a quick kiss on the cheek. “You know I’m right.”
Shawn pushed her gently forward after handing her one end of the rope. “You usually are.”