‘It’s a solar tower,’ Reed said. ‘That’s the kind of technology we’d expect to find in an installation like that, right? Green stuff, no pollutants?’
Grady nodded, still thinking. Their orders were to search and destroy, but he was also aware that the Crescent Dunes solar array was quite a famous installation. Built using government money and costing billions of dollars, dropping a few thousand pounds of high — explosive ordnance on such an installation would create political devastation in so many ways that Grady could not begin to calculate the consequences of such an action. The fall — out would be incalculable, and if covered by a story of an explosion or similar could render the solar industry redundant and perhaps even bring down the administration that funded the projects.
The perfect place, then, to hide a weapon from aerial bombardment.
‘Search for another solar tower and use the spectrograph again,’ Grady ordered. ‘I want to compare the data and see if what we’ve got here isn’t being used to hide something.’
‘I’ve already got one in the data set,’ Reed replied. ‘Ivanpah, down in the Mojave desert. We flew overhead on the way to Groom Lake yesterday.’
Reed got to work immediately, pulling out the relevant data sets and comparing them to the crescent dunes signal from far below. Reed studied them for a moment and then looked at his pilot.
‘No palladium,’ he said. ‘According to our data file the Ivanpah site uses much the same tower technology as Crescent Dunes, but no salts — it heats water directly.’
Grady looked at the displays and the sensors for a moment longer.
‘Call it in,’ he said finally. ‘We can’t bomb the damned tower, but somebody needs to get down there and check it out real fast.’
As Reed called their findings in to Groom Lake on a secure channel, Grady wondered just what the hell these terrorists had down there, and what on earth they were doing putting it up on top of a three hundred foot solar tower.
‘All units, stand by.’
Special Agent Hannah Ford gripped her vehicle’s radio switch tighter than was necessary as she watched her rear view mirror. Bright lights illuminated the huge pipes, conduits and towers that made up Las Vegas’s Edward Clark Generating Station, the sky beyond deep black.
The vehicles were concealed behind a slip road onto the I65, looking north east over wire fences at transformers and power cables strung from metal towers that hummed in the warm night air.
‘Why would Assim come here?’ Mickey asked.
‘His vehicle turned up here an hour ago,’ Hannah replied. ‘All we can do is try to figure out what his game plan is and hope we can intercept him.’
‘We’ve got movement.’
Agent Vaughn nodded discreetly to Hannah’s left, and she slowly turned her head to see several figures skulking along the fences outside the plant, hugging the shadows, crouched low and carrying bags.
‘This is it,’ she whispered once more into her microphone. ‘Be ready to move on my mark.’
Ten agents from the Las Vegas Field Office were positioned around the plant, each in vehicles parked discreetly in side alleys and nearby roads, concealed by shadows. As Hannah watched the half — dozen figures skirting the edge of the power plant, she saw them stop and produce a large pair of bolt — croppers. Within moments, they were through the fence and inside the plant.
‘They’re going for it,’ Mickey said urgently.
‘Units one through three, take the front entrance,’ Hannah ordered. ‘The rest of you, with me! They’ll go for the towers. Go now!’
Hannah shoved her door open and dashed out across the street to where the figures had sliced open the fences and slipped inside. The ground was dusty and hard, baked for decades by the fearsome desert sun as Hannah ran hard in pursuit of the figures she could see ahead of her, their shadows cast long by the powerful lighting of the station. She could hear Agent Vaughn right behind her, sprinting to keep up.
‘They’re going to drop the towers,’ he gasped, ‘the ones leading into Vegas.’
Hannah ran harder, saw the figures huddle around the base of the first tower they reached and begin unpacking their bags. Visions of high explosives shattering the legs of the towers and bringing Las Vegas to its knees raced through Hannah’s mind as she ran and drew her pistol from its holster beneath her left arm.
‘FBI! Freeze!’
The figures looked up at her, faces concealed by bandanas, but to her amazement they continued unpacking their bags and hurrying to secure something to the legs of the tower. Hannah heard the hum of the power lines as she dashed beneath them, saw other agents converging on her position through the plant.
‘On your knees, hands where I can see them!’
Hannah skidded to a halt before the terrorists, her pistol held in both hands and pointed at them. Mickey Vaughn dashed to her side, covering her with his own weapon as from their right more agents rushed in, all armed.
The terrorists looked at the agents and as one they stood up and raised their hands.
Hannah checked that she was covered and then she strode forward to the nearest of the terrorists and yanked the bandana from his face. To her amazement, instead of Assim Khan’ rugged features a young girl stared back at her, fresh faced like she was just out of college.
‘Hello,’ the girl said.
As Hannah watched, one by one every single one of the terrorists removed their bandanas to reveal young, college — aged faces. Hannah had never seen a more innocent looking bunch of kids, pinned down as they were now before a dozen armed federal agents.
‘What’s in the bag?’ Hannah demanded, fearful of some kind of suicidal cult.
The girl’s smile broadened.
‘Nothing but banners protesting against our abuse of the planet’s limited resources,’ she replied softly. ‘You can check the bags if you want.’
Hannah’s mind whirled as she tried to figure out just what the hell was going on.
‘Banners?’
‘Banners,’ the girl repeated. ‘I was told to give you a message.’ Hannah stared at the girl, speechless, as she went on. ‘Wrong place, wrong people, wrong time.’
Hannah stared at the bags, at the supposed terrorists before them, and a creeping fear swelled inside her.
‘Oh no,’ was all that she could utter.
‘What the hell’s going on?’ Vaughn demanded.
‘This doesn’t make any sense,’ Hannah gasped, then whirled and shouted at the FBI team.
‘Arrest them all and get us out of here! Assim’s target is not in Las Vegas!’
Hannah stormed back the way she had come, Vaughn at her side.
‘What do we do now?’
‘How the hell am I supposed to know?!’ Hannah snarled back.
Vaughn slowed, and Hannah forced herself to take a breath and stop walking. She closed her eyes for a moment and turned to face him. ‘I’m sorry, I don’t know what to do next, okay?’
Vaughn sighed but he offered her a faint smile. ‘It’s not an easy case.’
They both turned as they heard boots approaching, and saw Valery Jenkins striding toward them, flanked by two senior agents from the Las Vegas field office.
‘Ford!’
Hannah felt her shoulders sink as she turned to face Jenkins. ‘I can explain.’
‘You can explain all you want! You’re off the case, and suspended until further notice, is that clear?!’
Vaughn stepped forward. ‘This was a legitimate lead. Hannah had good intel that could have led us to … ’
‘To what?!’ Jenkins demanded. ‘A different career?! You disobeyed a direct order, subverted the chain of command and caused a major operation out here for nothing, all in one evening! You’re both done, understood? Now get out of here before I have you arrested!’