The Rift

CHAPTER 11

Burns stared at the Tellico Dam while information on it poured into him from Neeley’s cell phone.

He shook his head at the human insanity the dam represented: people fighting to keep it from being built to save a tiny fish; sacred Indian land being submerged; land grabs by those in the know.

And it generated no power.

Not directly. Water from the Little Tennessee River was blocked by the dam, which had been built just above where the river had originally joined the Tennessee River. To get to the Tennessee, water flowed through a canal from Tellico Reservoir to Loudoun Lake and then went through the turbines of the Loudoun Dam, adding 23 megawatts of power.

Thus opening the gates of Tellico would reduce the water flow to Loudoun, thus reducing the power outage, which was barely enough at overpeak for what Burns needed.

Not acceptable.

Of course, the gates of Tellico Dam were opened only once a year for maintenance, but it was a loose end.

And one thing Burns had learned as a Nightstalker was to make sure there were no loose ends.

Plus, he still had some time for congruence at the Loudoun Dam to occur.

He looked around and picked up two brick-sized stones. He put them in his backpack. Then he threw the free end of the rope he had tied off down the face of the dam. He clipped the rope through the carabiner tied off to his harness and then launched himself down the dam.

Frasier was humming “I Wear My Sunglasses at Night” as he got off the elevator and walked down the corridor to the Can. His partner ignored him, as he always did when Frasier hummed the song en route to an interview. As he always did. Frasier, being schooled in psychology, knew it was OCD on his part, but he figured it was harmless, other than irritating his partner. Of course, his partner carried a big gun in his shoulder holster, and one day he might get irritated beyond the point of no return, but Frasier figured he had a ways to go before that particular incident occurred.

The man and woman who’d been in the Can when the power went out were seated away from the control consoles, looking decidedly unhappy. And well they should be, Frasier thought as he signaled for the single guard (they were scientists, one guard was all that was needed) to move away.

A new team was at the consoles, while several Support crews were going over every inch of the cavern, searching it. There were even two specially trained dive teams inside the stainless steel tank, working in relays, coming out of the water every five minutes to allow a muonic scan to be done, just in case another Rift occurred.

The two popped to their feet as Frasier and his partner approached.

“Sit,” Frasier ordered as he grabbed a folding chair, turned it around, interrogation style, and straddled it. His partner just stood there, looming.

He was a good loomer, which was why Frasier kept him around.

Frasier pulled his sunglasses off, his partner doing it in sync, like a dance team in step.

The two scientists did a double take, staring at Frasier’s left eye and then purposely forcing themselves not to stare at his left eye.

It was the usual reaction and the normal one.

Frasier had a solid black left eye. He’d never had the scar tissue around the socket fixed, since he figured that was like polishing the silver around the bullet hole. Or something like that. Of course, most assumed it was just a space filler, but the eye was actually a ridiculously expensive camera and microprocessor. Not Six Million Dollar Man stuff, where he could actually see, but rather a device that functioned as a sort of lie detector, tracking pulses in a person’s neck, perspiration, respiration rate, and so on.

The bottom line was it worked. Coupling the data from the eye with his own experience, his training in micro-expressions, and a natural ability, Frasier was pretty damn confident he could tell when someone was lying.

“It’s tough work in the field,” Frasier began. He reached across his body with his right hand and tapped his left arm, producing a metallic sound. “I got a deal on the prosthetics. Black was all they had in stock for the discounted eyes in the package deal.”

Was that a sigh he heard from the side and behind? Was his partner actually growing tired of his shtick? But he was doing his job, pulling out a notepad to ostensibly take notes, but the real purpose was to reveal the very large pistol resting in his shoulder holster, impressing on these two screen-watchers that this was a no-bullshit visit.

“It’s even tougher to work in the field when those we rely on for our data sabotage it.”

The woman responded first. “We didn’t sabotage the Can! The power went out!”

They didn’t exchange glances — one didn’t look at the other suspiciously — and his eye told him she wasn’t lying.

He shifted his gaze to the man. “And?”

“Hey, dude, I don’t know what happened. Some kind of power surge maybe? Talk to engineering. They’re the ones who run the power grid. Maybe the reactor burped?”

Unfortunately, he, too, was telling the truth. Frasier wished he wasn’t so he could turn him over to his partner; he hated being called dude. Frasier rubbed his scar tissue above the black eye with his artificial hand. He often got migraines, because no matter how good the gear was, his body was not intact and the body yearned for its missing pieces sometimes.

Sometimes Frasier missed them too.

Frasier stood. “All right. You can go.”

The two exchanged a glance now, shock and relief fighting for supremacy. They didn’t question their good fortune as they scurried toward the tunnel for the elevator.

This time his partner’s sigh was audible. “What now?”

“We—” Frasier didn’t finish his answer as a diver popped to the surface with a shout, hand held high. A black orb rested in it. “Check that thing for prints. It’ll have either Doc’s or Ivar’s.”

Scout had the right bank while Kirk took the left on their Sea-Doos. At Moms’s insistence, they stayed parallel to her Zodiac. Ivar was in the bow, the wand for his improvised detection device held over the water. Roland was next to him, M240 at the ready. Moms drove as she peered ahead through her night vision goggles.

Scout was not impressed with Ivar or his machine. She had a feeling whatever was going to happen wasn’t going to be subtle or require a special device. The gun Roland had given her seemed rather undersized considering what everyone else, except for Doc and Ivar, was packing. A pistol. With two extra magazines.

She felt totally inadequate, but the look in Moms’s eyes had indicated she should be happy to get anything lethal at all. The gun was stuck on a vest Nada had wrapped her in. It was not fashionable, was very heavy, and, according to Nada, helped stop bullets. Then he’d strapped a life vest on top of the bulletproof vest and Scout felt like she was auditioning for the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man. There was also a radio tucked in one of the many pockets on the vest and an earpiece stuffed in her right ear.

She didn’t feel as cool as those Secret Service guys with their dark sunglasses. But then again, how cool could they be? If they were so secret, why did everyone know about them? Sort of like why did the Lone Ranger have Tonto? What part of Lone didn’t he get? Scout shook these random but irritating thoughts out of her head and focused on the task at hand.

Literally.

Given the bulk surrounding her, she had to work to keep her hands in tight enough to her body to control the Sea-Doo. She scanned the dark shoreline as she drove along. They’d cleared Keller Bend a little while ago and the river turn left ahead. Scout spared a glance up, but there was no sign of Eagle and the Snake and the attack helicopters with him.

So far this was a lot less exciting than she’d imagined. She juiced the Sea-Doo as she reached the bend, slicing some water.

She knew Moms was glaring at her, wanting her to slow down and fall back into line. She wasn’t named Moms for nothing. Mother, Moms…what was with older women? Scout wondered. Be careful. Don’t do this. Don’t do that. As if their warnings could keep her safe from—

Scout blinked and stared ahead in the darkness. She could see white foam ahead, but there were no running lights.

Of course she didn’t have any lights on, nor did the two Zodiacs.

Scout slowed down, letting the Zodiacs take the lead because she had a feeling this wasn’t going to be subtle.

“I’ve got two boats and something bigger behind them,” Moms said, peering through her night vision goggles. “Eagle, hold until we get a clear picture of what we’re up against.”

“Roger. Holding at five klicks,” Eagle confirmed.

“You gotta be fraking me,” Roland muttered as the first target became clear in their night vision goggles. A fourteen-foot bass boat was racing toward the Nightstalker flotilla, no one at the helm.

“No one said Fireflies were brilliant,” Mac said over the team net.

“This one is mine,” Roland said, resting the bipod of the M240 on the armor plating and tucking the stock into his shoulder.

“Mac will help,” Moms said, looking past the bass boat, trying to determine what else was coming their way.

Roland fired, rounds easily punching through the thin aluminum hull of the boat. Mac’s first 40-mm grenade landed right in the center with a bright flash.

“Scratch one Firefly,” Roland announced, just as Scout screamed, “Watch out!” over the net.

The Splendor, racing out of the hidden cove on the north shore, didn’t run over Scout. It didn’t have to. Its bow wave knocked her off the Sea-Doo and into the river. Its dual engines were revving up to max speed as it roared toward the lead Zodiac.

Moms had a moment to see the blur of the yacht’s bow bearing down on her, and then it sliced through the Zodiac, throwing her, Ivar, and Roland into the river. They were tumbled about, nearly chewed up by the twin screws, and spit out into the churning wake.

All their gear that wasn’t tied to their bodies disappeared into the dark water, including Ivar’s detection wand.

Mac bounced a 40-mm grenade off the bow of the yacht, the steel plating used to protect it from the front anchors as they’re pulled up easily deflecting the round as the boat keeled hard toward their Zodiac. Nada twisted the throttle as he called out over the team net, “Eagle, we need firepower.”

“Inbound,” Eagle announced.

Nada managed to get enough horsepower, and the Zodiac was maneuverable enough, to escape being plowed under by the yacht.

This time.

Kirk jetted his Sea-Doo to the far shore, into water shallow enough that the yacht couldn’t get him, and grabbed the laser designator out of the bag strapped to the side of his craft. He zeroed it in as the yacht turned hard.

Out of the frying pan…

Nada was so focused on avoiding the rampaging yacht that the crane on the barge only caught his attention when the cable swung by, missing him by inches, the metal claw on the end of it taking a chunk out of the armor plating and ripping gaping holes into two compartments of the Zodiac.

“Mother-fraker!” Mac exclaimed, staring up at the barge as they raced by, the large tracked crane on board the barge rotating to follow.

“That is interesting,” Doc said. “It appears the Firefly is inhabiting both the barge and the crane. I’ve never seen that kind of continuity before.”

“Or it’s two fraking Fireflies,” Mac said. “Does it really matter?”

“Eagle?” Nada said.

“We’re coming in hot,” Eagle said. “I’ve got four in the water, three on your boat, and one on a Sea-Doo near southern shoreline. I assume all are friendlies.”

At the Tellico Dam, Burns put a stone into the gears of each of the gate mechanisms.

Mission accomplished, he began the much more difficult task of climbing his way back up the side of the dam, to get ready for the final phase of his mission.

A quarter mile away, in the midst of Loudoun Lake, the golden glow was now coalesced into what was almost a solid ball, twenty meters wide, lying just below the dark surface of the water. It was being drawn toward the intakes for the water turbines.

Neeley dove out of the door of the Learjet, got stable, and then pulled her rip cord.

After making sure she had a good canopy overhead, she scanned the terrain below. It wasn’t hard to get oriented on Loudoun Dam. The straight line cutting across the edge of the lake was easily recognizable from ten thousand feet.

Neeley had never been a fan of jumping out of a perfectly good airplane. Parachuting was something she’d learned because Gant had insisted. A mission-essential skill, according to him. Considering the fact that when they first met he was on the run from the Cellar and every other government organization, Neeley had to wonder in retrospect (as she was wondering about a lot of things) how parachuting was a mission-essential skill in accomplishing that.

Adjusting her toggles, Neeley aimed for the power station.

The helicopter on the back deck of the Splendor lifted off and raced upriver.

With no one at the controls.

It flew directly at Eagle in the Snake and the Apaches on his flanks. Eagle had flipped down the display for the Integrated Helmet and Display Sighting System (IHADSS), and the 30-mm guns underneath each Apache were slaved to whatever he targeted.

He was targeting the yacht when a proximity alert went off. Shifting from focusing on the IHADSS to the outside world took a moment, a delay that almost cost Eagle his life as the Splendor’s helicopter was on a collision course.

Eagle dove and the chopper passed overhead, barely missing him.

It didn’t miss the Apache to Eagle’s left.

A fireball lit up the sky.

“One Apache down,” Eagle announced. “And another Firefly.”

Nada stood in the front of his Zodiac, two compartments losing air and the boat sluggish to the helm. The yacht was completing its turn, but he estimated he had about a minute and a half before it could bear down on his boat again. The crane on the barge was just out of range, although the tug pushing the barge was in full reverse, trying to correct that.

The Fireflies had managed to gather a lot of power, but none of it was very agile other than the helicopter, which was now in the river along with the Apache it had taken out.

It was a delaying tactic.

Nada began issuing orders:

“Kirk, put a fire mission on that yacht. Eagle, use the second Apache and take out the barge. Moms, you there?”

“Roger. We’re in the water but all right. We’ll break a chem light once our little problems are dealt with.”

“Scout?” Nada asked last, but not least importantly.

“I’m back on my Sea-Doo,” Scout reported.

“Stay out of trouble until we deal with this,” Nada ordered.

“Oh, right,” Scout said. “I’d forgotten about that part.”

“Lion Six,” Mac said. “Fire mission! Over.”

The crew for one of the M177’s replied immediately. “Roger. Over.”

“Lion Six. Fire for effect on laser. Danger close. Over.”

There was a short pause; then the officer in charge of the M777, 155-mm howitzer responded. “Shot over.”

“Shot out,” Mac said, keeping the laser steady on the yacht. It was picking up speed, twin turbines planing it out, heading directly for Nada’s Zodiac. While the rubber boat might be more agile, it wasn’t faster and with two compartments flooding, it was moving slow.

“Splash over,” Lion Six warned, indicating the Excalibur round was five seconds from impact.

“Splash out!” Kirk said over the team net.

The round tore through the deck plating and exploded inside the Splendor. Curiously, the armor plating layered on the boat contained the explosion to an extent.

Which meant the interior of the boat was shredded, along with the lone man left behind for guard duty, who’d been running around throwing every switch he could trying to regain control.

The explosion did make enough holes in the hull, though, that the yacht quickly began to settle.

Another Firefly down.

Eagle had the crane barge in his IHADSS. The crane was rotating, the steel claw swinging, but once more it was short of Nada’s Zodiac.

So far, in Eagle’s convoluted media way of thinking, they’d gone through PT-109 with Moms’s Zodiac being plowed under and cut in half and the sinking of the HMS Hood with the M177 taking out the yacht. He couldn’t come up with a parallel for the barge, so he just said, “Frak it,” and relayed the firing command to the surviving Apache.

The 30-mm chain gun fired, but more importantly, one Hellfire missile launched from the pod on the left side of the attack helicopter. Eagle adjusted slightly and a second Hellfire came off the right side.

The first Hellfire hit the crane, blowing it to pieces. The second hit the barge, ripping out the front right portion. Given the weight on board, it did a mini-Titanic as the crane slid off and into the water, and the barge went vertical and then down.

Two Fireflies dissipated.

And then there was silence.

Burns stood on the roadway that crossed the Loudoun Dam, above the intakes for the turbines. He could see the golden glow approaching in the water. He checked his watch. He’d heard explosions in the distance and knew the Nightstalkers were coming. They were nothing if not persistent.

Something to count on. As regular as time.

“Armorflate?” Roland said. “Really? False advertising, I say.”

“Keep pumping,” Nada ordered Roland. “It’s for bullets, not cranes.” He had Moms, Ivar, and Roland on board, along with his original crew of Mac and Doc. The barge had sliced open two of the air compartments on the Zodiac and damaged two others. Roland was battling the leaks using the foot pump, while Doc worked on bandaging the boat.

Scout and Kirk were on their Sea-Doos, now in tight formation, less than five feet off to each side, their engines almost idling as they kept pace. The flotilla, not even close to being an armada, came around a curve in the river and the waterway widened. A couple of miles ahead, lights glowed in an even line, slicing across the river: the Loudoun Dam.

Moms spoke over the team net. “Eagle?”

“Roger?”

“Get an uplink to FPF.”

There was a short silence. “Roger.”

The B-52 was lazily circling at forty thousand feet when the alert light flashed on the pilots’ control panel and in the lower deck battle station.

Lazy became focused as the crew readied all weapons systems.

Neeley touched down on the road above the dam. Support had already sealed off the road, Route 321, with roadblocks, far enough away from the dam to keep civilians out of eyesight. As she unbuckled her harness, Neeley looked about. It was eerily quiet other than the roar of the water pouring through the spillways, tumbling down to the continuation of the Tennessee River below, to the west.

That roar began to decrease and Neeley readied her MP5 as she walked over and peered down.

Someone was closing the spillways, forcing more water into the intakes for the three generators. She headed for the powerhouse.

A Firefly was inside the control for the gate mechanisms, closing them off. Burns was inside the power station on the northern end of the dam, watching the power levels begin to spike while the outtakes from the powerhouse gained force.

The entire dam vibrated for a moment as the golden glow reached it, being forced through the intakes and then wrapping itself around the three generators, eating the energy they produced.

Inside the Can, there was no power outage this time as the clicking alert sounded and the lights flashed.

“We have pre-Rift!”

Alarms went off in power stations all over TVA as the power output from Loudoun Dam suddenly ceased. Relays were automatically thrown, power was diverted, but blackouts rippled across the Tennessee countryside.

At the Ranch outside Area 51 and in the Cellar underneath the NSA, both Ms. Jones and Hannah watched the developing situation on their computer displays. The pre-Rift warnings came in from Russia and Japan, but it was no surprise that they pinpointed the location at the power station on Loudoun Dam.

They were helpless at the moment to do anything other than observe. Their forces were in place and this was going to play out on the ground, as combat always had since the first caveman picked up a club.

The lights on the roadway along the top of the dam went out. In fact, the lights all around the lake went out.

“That’s not good,” Roland said.

“No shit,” Mac muttered.

“Someone is stealing the dam’s power,” Doc said.

The Zodiac was now less than a half-mile from the dam. Nada powered down on the throttle slightly.

“Burns,” Moms said.

Everyone’s phone began playing “Lawyers, Guns, and Money.”

Moms answered. “Yes?”

“We have pre-Rift inside the power station,” Ms. Jones reported.

“We’ll be there shortly.”

“Neeley should be there now,” Ms. Jones said. “She’ll help.”

Moms had her own opinion on that, but she kept it to herself.

“This is very different,” Ms. Jones said. “Burns, the golden glow. Something is coming together. Something long in the developing.”

“Yes,” Moms said.

“You need to pay attention,” Ms. Jones said. “Be open to possibilities.”

“What?” Moms said.

“Good luck.” And then the connection was dead.

“The gates are all closed.” Mac was peering through a night vision scope.

Moms shook her head and focused on the immediate situation.

“We have to stop Burns from getting all that power,” Doc said. “He’s going to use it to open a Portal.”

“How can he?” Moms asked as they continued toward the side of the dam with the powerhouse.

Roland was ignoring the discussion, checking his M240, making sure it was loaded and that the nozzle for the burner was loose in its sheath.

“Are we sure that a Portal is a bad thing?” Ivar asked.

That earned him a glare from everyone in the boat — except Moms and Nada and Scout.

“Everyone who’s ever opened one is dead or gone,” Nada said.

“A Rift,” Ivar said. “Not a Portal.”

Nada looked at Doc. “Just tell me how to stop this.”

“I’m not dead or gone,” Ivar said, but he was ignored, except by Scout.

“We have to stop him from getting the power he needs from the dam,” Doc said.

“I’ve always wanted to blow up a dam,” Mac said. It was the dream of every Special Forces engineer/demo man. Along with a bridge, a skyscraper, and various other engineering feats. The bigger it was built, the more a demo longed to blow it up.

“What are you going to use to blow that?” Moms asked. “Even the Excalibur rounds aren’t going to do much damage.”

“We need the cruise missiles,” Mac said. “Kirk’s got the laser designator. I can use it and aim a couple at the weakest points. I’ve done a target survey on a dam. I know where to hit it to cause maximum damage and structural failure.”

Moms nodded. “I’ll get them ready for launch.”

On board the B-52, the crew listened to Moms’s order. On one hand they were happy they weren’t prepping one of the nukes for launch. On the other hand, they weren’t thrilled with the idea of loosing even conventional warheads over the continental United States.

On the third hand, which was duty, they prepped four cruise missiles for launch.

Burns smiled at Neeley as she came into the powerhouse, steel door slamming shut behind her, his face rippling and then becoming Gant. “You survived. I had hope they might get to you in time at the nursing home.”

“Stop with the face,” Neeley said, weapon at the ready, laser site flickering on Burns’s forehead. “It doesn’t work.”

“Oh, I think it does,” Burns said.

“Why did you have hope that I would live when you were the one who killed me?”

Burns’s face flickered, the scars reappearing for a moment and then going back to being Gant’s. “I didn’t want to hurt you. But you understand. Mission takes priority.” He cocked his head. “Your friends are here. My former teammates. The illustrious Nightstalkers. Let’s meet them.”

“I don’t think so,” Neeley said, and she fired twice, double-tapping.

The Zodiac bumped up against the dock on the side of the powerhouse. Roland was first ashore, machine gun at the ready, with Nada at his shoulder. Scout and Kirk jumped off their Sea-Doos to join the rest of them.

Mac took the laser designator from Kirk. Ivar and Doc were arguing about the possible dangers of a Portal opening, akin to the band playing while the Titanic went down in Scout’s opinion, a little speck of calm in the midst of a team in turmoil. That didn’t last long as she looked toward the water in the reservoir.

“Uh, people,” she said as she watched the blotchy hand reach up out of the water and grab hold of the edge of the dock.

No one, of course, was paying attention to her.

Moms was on the radio, done talking to Ms. Jones and getting permission to blow the dam. The TVA would be pissed, but collateral damage would be minimal outside of the dam and some structures immediately downriver.

“Launch and ride the beam,” Moms ordered.

A cruise missile dropped clear from the pods on each wing of the B-52. The two missiles free fell for a few seconds, getting clear of the bomber; then their rockets kicked in and they nosed down, picking up speed.

The first round hit Burns in the chest (go for the largest target first, one of Gant’s rules) and the second in the forehead (go where there isn’t the possibility of body armor, the footnote to the aforementioned rule).

Burns didn’t even flinch.

Both bullets passed into him, not so much hitting as being absorbed. He smiled. “Come, come, Neeley. You’re out of your depth here. This isn’t a Sanction. This is a Nightstalker mission. I was one of them. Let’s go say hello to my old friends.”

He turned for the outside steel door of the powerhouse.

Behind him, the golden glow had grown larger, forming a stable pre-Rift.

“Guys,” Scout called out in a louder voice.

Nada heard her and turned, but the rest were caught up in their own concerns: Roland wanting to shoot something; Mac searching the dam wall for its weak spot through the laser designator since he had two warheads en route; Kirk facilitating Moms’s commo back to Ms. Jones and the launchers of the Tomahawks; Doc and Ivar moving closer to blows about the possibility of even a Rift without the algorithms, never mind a Portal.

“What?” Nada asked.

“Zombie,” Scout said, pointing.

At the same moment, the door to the powerhouse swung open and Burns stepped out, his face covered with scars.

Roland fired on instinct, a good, solid, twelve-round burst, every round hitting the former Nightstalker. And being absorbed.

As Roland fired, so did Nada.

In the other direction.

The former Jimmy DiSalvo had climbed out of the water and was staggering down the walkway to the dock in classic zombie style, arms outstretched, body bashed, bloody, and very dead. Nada’s bullets had more impact on him than Roland’s did on Burns. DiSalvo’s corpse staggered back, chunks of flesh flying off.

But he kept coming.

Until there was a flash of gold from Burns’s eyes. DiSalvo’s body exploded into vapor and the Firefly that had taken him over fluttered up and dissipated.