Kill Zone

42

The speakers blared through the enormous cavern, and the voice sounded like a pronouncement from Olympus. “Ms. Rojas? Colonel Whalen? I don’t know if you can hear me. Dr. Garibaldi?”

Adonia couldn’t believe it. “That’s not Harris — it’s Stanley!”

“Van Dyckman’s alive?” Shawn held himself steady on the ladder. “How did he get out of the vault and the sticky foam?”

Garibaldi asked, “And how did he get out of the cavern?”

The voice continued to boom out. “I hope against hope that you managed to survive. I’m afraid Undersecretary Doyle is dead, but I made it out through a maintenance shaft. I’m back in the operations center now.”

Shawn hung on the lower ladder and yelled, “We’re here!”

“He can’t hear you,” Garibaldi said. “Loudspeakers aren’t made for two-way communication.”

“If you’re alive and can hear me, please stay where you are,” van Dyckman continued. “You’ll be safe. The system reboot will be over in eighty-seven minutes, and then we’ll finally have access to the facility’s inner storage levels. We’ll rescue you, don’t worry. Specially cleared recovery and decontamination crews are waiting just outside Hydra’s main entrance, as well as NEST teams. We have everything under control out here. There’s nothing you need to worry about.”

“If Stanley escaped, then he would have told the rescue teams exactly what they’ll find down here, the cooling pools and the nuclear devices,” Adonia said, feeling great relief. “They’ll be prepared when they enter.”

“But he doesn’t know about the leaking pool with the damaged fuel rods,” Garibaldi pointed out. “Or the Senator’s body plugging the breach.”

Van Dyckman’s voice sounded pompous, and much too loud. “I have assumed control of Hydra Mountain and relieved Site Manager Harris of his responsibilities for gross negligence. He is being held, pending arrest. I’ve already announced this to the rest of the facility—”

Adonia realized he wasn’t speaking for their benefit at all. She was rattled. “He’s relieved Rob Harris? Arrested him?” She remembered how van Dyckman had held that ill-advised press conference after the extremist attack on Granite Bay and claimed credit for supervising the recovery effort. “Harris wasn’t the one playing fast and loose with regulations.”

Over the loudspeaker, van Dyckman’s voice sounded businesslike and commanding. “I’m doing everything in my power to bring you safely out on the assumption that you’re still alive, and then we can determine what to do. Once Mountain operations get back to normal, I’ll work with the staffs of Senator Pulaski and Undersecretary Doyle to make appropriate decisions. We will find a way to preserve Valiant Locksmith for the good of the country. Again, I don’t know if you can hear me—”

“He sounds more concerned with his nuclear storage plan than with our well-being,” Garibaldi said, then added more ominously, “It would be a terrible inconvenience to him if we were still alive.”

Van Dyckman’s amplified voice grew harder. “You must be very careful not to let word get out, which could cause a widespread panic. All Hydra Mountain internal matters must remain at the highest level of secrecy, until we can determine a proper framework for disseminating any information.”

“What’s he talking about?” Garibaldi said, appalled.

Van Dyckman rambled, probably assuming that he was speaking to an empty chamber full of dead people. Was this a sort of confessional for him?

“—far greater ramifications than this temporary setback. A black mark on the program now could turn Valiant Locksmith into another expensive political disaster like Yucca Mountain, and we can’t let that happen.”

Shawn frowned. “He’s covering his butt faster than he can rescue us.”

“Simon’s right. I don’t expect he wants to find us alive,” Adonia said. “If he’s the only one, he can tell the story however he likes.”

“—you have my personal assurance that each of you will be cared for in a special medical facility, where you will also be debriefed in a secure environment until all of this can be worked out. So hold on just a little longer. We’re coming for you! The emergency teams will soon be on their way with all due speed. When they find you, they’ll escort you to safety. Good luck, and Godspeed.”

The loudspeakers fell silent, leaving the huge cavern to echo and hum with background noise.

“Like hell they will,” Garibaldi said. “You know he’ll squirrel me away in some covert, undisclosed location until I die. I doubt the word ‘radiation’ will ever even be used in any public announcements. If he expects me to go quietly and pretend I suffered a heart attack, he’s in for a big surprise.”

Adonia began to shake with anger. If a prominent activist like Simon Garibaldi died from radiation exposure, such a casualty would cause a public uproar. If van Dyckman was already sweeping the deaths of Victoria Doyle and Senator Pulaski under the rug, would he whisk Dr. Garibaldi away to a locked-down hospital wing for “special medical attention,” keep the scientist away from his Sanergy activists until he succumbed from radiation sickness? Just so Garibaldi couldn’t blow the whistle?

The older scientist looked to Shawn and Adonia, red with frustration. “And while I’m in quarantine, you two will be transferred to the Aleutian Islands. You’ll have no chance to make a public comment.”

“At least we’ll be together,” Shawn said to Adonia with wry humor. “For the first time in our careers.”

“I’d rather be together somewhere other than Shemya, Alaska,” she replied, then made up her mind. “Keep climbing. We’ll get out on our own.” She ascended, rung by rung, toward the converging lights far overhead.

Garibaldi panted as he climbed after her. “We need to get the word out, fast. Give me a phone and a few minutes, and I can mobilize my Sanergy contacts. Then we won’t be swept under the rug.”

Shawn called up from below. “Van Dyckman got out, and so can we.”

Garibaldi flexed his burned hand, then gripped the next rung. “We escape, spread the word, and stop this ‘temporary storage’ insanity without widespread public discussion and agreement. Or we die trying to get out of here — and believe me, that would not be my preferred outcome. We have to stop kicking the can down the road and figure out a permanent, long-term solution.” He was quiet for a moment. “Maybe that means opening Yucca Mountain after all. With the accelerating pace of science and technology, I suppose it might be possible to solve the current environmental concerns — so long as someone actually works on it. I just worry that an easy solution will be a disincentive to develop cleaner, safer energy alternatives.”

“Or there’s another possibility,” Adonia said. “If one of those random neutrons rattling around the lower cavern hits its mark, the Velvet Hammer warheads could detonate any second now.”

“Look on the bright side,” Shawn called up. “That would solve the problem of what to do about Hydra Mountain.”