“You have got to be shittin’ me!” Emerson said, irked they were just now learning of vital operational information. “This setup stinks. It reminds me why I hate that son-of-a-bitch. We could’ve killed Rafie… and I’ll bet my last bullet he doesn’t know we’re out here, either.”
“Okay, ease down,” Henry coolly replied. While he agreed with Emerson’s sentiment about General Freeman, this was no time to rehash past misguided operations. “I agree this stinks, but as far as I’m concerned our job just got a lot easier knowing Rafie’s up front. I’ll bet anything his orders are to protect Conrad. That gives us way more latitude.”
“How so?” Palmer asked, peering through the scope, trying to determine Rafie’s role in the operation.
“If I’m right and Rafie’s there to protect Conrad, we can concentrate exclusively on the machine,” Henry replied. “Easy peezy, buddy.”
Henry started the car, preparing to advance their position. It was time to engage. “I’ve seen enough. To hell with Freeman…the machine works just fine. Let’s shut this down before someone gets hurt.”
Henry looked at Palmer with a Cheshire grin. “And I’ll tell you something else…I’ll stake you anything Morris has waylaid the Kenworth. These guys have no backup. We’ve got ’em… Rafie needs to know he’s got allies watching his back. He’s gonna be surprised to see us, too, pard’,” he said with delight.
As Henry was about to pull onto the roadway, a glance in his side mirror gave him a start and he slammed on the brake. Approaching at high speed was another vehicle. It was moving too fast to be the Kenworth. He figured base security was sending its first counterforce to investigate happenings at the depository. His speculation was short-lived, however, when the Lincoln Navigator came barreling by, making a beeline for the Peterbilt.
“What in the world?” Henry asked. “Who the hell would that be? Isn’t that one of the vehicles from the fish farm?”
“It is indeed,” Palmer replied. “Well, that’s some good news…it appears your Lieutenant Morris was as good as you claimed. But on the downside, it also looks like he’s lost control of one of the hostages,” he chuckled. “What’s your bet Marshall’s driving that car?”
Henry stomped on the gas and their vehicle spun gravel as he entered the roadway in fast pursuit of the Navigator. “Given Marshall’s unmanageability up to now, I wouldn’t dare take a bet against him. How he got past the MPs is a story worth hearing I’d wager, though. Christ…the guy never quits!”
Jarrod Conrad recognized from Kilmer’s body language that he’d just received unexpected news. He’d lost his swagger, and from the noticeable droop in his shoulders there was no doubt something had gone terribly wrong. It was time to make his move. It’s now or never.
“Mister, I don’t know what your game is,” Jarrod said, looking back toward Rafie, who was peering over his shoulder, “but I suggest you get as far away from this rig as possible.”
“Don’t, Professor,” Rafie yelled, lunging at Conrad, who was just entering some new command at the control consol. A red warning light began flashing and the antigravity machine shuddered.
Rafie’s admonition came too late. Jarrod had keyed his secret code to scram the machine. He called it the F-13 kill switch, an override that immediately shut down the machine in case of an unexpected malfunction. Jarrod had devised the code as a protective feature more than anything else. Because the machine used fissionable material in the generator’s core, the F-13 command could be used to bring it to an abrupt halt.
The problem with activating the scram switch was that it was another untested application of his technology; there was no research to support what would happen when the generator was immediately shut down. Gravitrons that were already flowing from the generator would need to be dissipated. If the flow was summarily disrupted, the reasonable speculation was they would implode back into the nuclear core. If this conclusion was correct, the gravitrons would cause the nuclear material to begin fusing, generating tremendous surplus energy. Uncontrolled nuclear fusion could precipitate a thermonuclear event. If that worst case came to pass, everyone near the generator was in peril.
“Too late, mister…get out now before the machine implodes,” he ordered.
A powerful vibration coming from the ground gave both men pause. Jarrod couldn’t be sure if the vibration was the result of the generator scram, or if the gravitrons were already backing up. Either way, it wasn’t a good sign.
“Move, Professor, you’re done here!” Rafie yelled, grabbing him by the collar and jerking him to his feet. “Jesus, what have you done?”
As Jarrod emerged from the command module, he couldn’t believe his eyes. The vibration wasn’t coming from the generator at all. Rather, a sortie of M1 Abrams tanks was rumbling on fast approach toward the depository. The roar of the M1 Honeywell aircraft engines propelled the sixty-ton tanks with incredible speed and precision. It was an ambush. Base Commander Brigadier General Sam Hershey had secretly deployed the Fort Knox 3rd Cavalry Tank Regiment to defend the Treasury Depository. Kilmer’s siege was over; his men were sitting ducks.
The scene unfolding before them was surrealistic. Sirens continued a relentless blaring and the night sky seemed brighter than a football stadium under lights. The hulking but agile tanks surrounded the perimeter of the depository within minutes of their arrival. With infrared night-vision, unparalleled firepower, and a top speed of thirty-five miles an hour, anything threatening the security of the vault was about to bear the brunt of the M1’s considerable resistance. The $7-million price of each tank made it an invincible adversary.
Jarrod saw one tank split off and quickly bear down on their location. The Abrams tank fired a 120-mm missile with a deafening roar, hitting the electrical pole adjacent to the Peterbilt. The direct hit from the cannon knocked out the power to the antigravity generator in a single blow. All hell was breaking loose below their feet.
Kilmer’s men used their automatic weapons to no avail. Lacking Army personnel to shoot, they directed their futile resistance at the tank, but the M1’s steel-encased depleted uranium mesh armor was impervious to their bullets. The tank’s gunner laid down suppressive fire with the onboard. 50mm-caliber machine-gun keeping the bullets low and focused at the wheels of the Peterbilt. It was rendered immobile in seconds, while the generator atop the trailer remained intact and unharmed.
Kilmer and Ventura recognized what was happening and hastily jumped onto the trailer, dodging the tank’s lethal strafing fire. Mills and Marlon were not as fortunate. Mills had been taking cover behind the tandem wheels of the trailer and the. 50mm rounds cut him in half. He never felt a thing. Marlon, too, made a bad choice. Rather than hop on the trailer, he chose to run and a round caught his upper left thigh, ripping the leg from his body. He lay about fifty yards from the trailer, his screams of agony barely discernable above the commotion of battle. Colt and Sully recognized the danger and fell face down, the bullets whizzing closely over their heads.
God have mercy, Jarrod thought. He was trembling from fear. While the heavy machine gun fire was unsettling, his greater concern was the state of the gravity machine. The trailer on which he stood was violently vibrating, much more than when the tanks first appeared. He looked at the microwave dish but saw that the waves of gravitrons were no longer spewing toward the depository. The generator housing containing the plutonium rocked back and forth, the bolts staining to keep it mounted to the trailer. The excess gravitrons predictably fought to reseat themselves within their previous physical construct. The nuclear core was being heavily bombarded.
“We’ve got to warn these people to get away,” Jarrod screamed over the relentless sirens. He grabbed Rafie’s arm. “It’s beginning to implode. If it reaches critical mass, it’ll go nuclear. Tell everyone to move back!”