Red North!

by Mark Lemke

CHAPTER 66

  ?

  The Headlands, remote as it was, had a small medical facility on site.? It wasn't staffed at that time of day so Hector called Dave and asked for one of the paramedics he had on the fire brigade to get down there ASAP to take a look at Eric and me.

  While we were all waiting, I asked for an update.? Hector told me that Unit 1 was still at 50 percent power.? Members of my team had accompanied Hector's handpicked men to the locations Jerry had identified from SAS and found four devices; two on emergency diesel generators, one in a high radiation area near a highly contaminated demineralizer-which they needed the key for-and one near a Safety Injection pump.? Had all these devices gone off as intended, including the ones in containment, the plant would have sustained serious, if not unrecoverable damage.? And the political fallout would surely have prevented it from ever being repaired and restarted.? It would have been an engineering and political disaster of unimaginable proportions.?

  In the process of finding the bombs, Hector told me his men had found and killed two of Jansen's team, wounded a third, and dropped one in containment. That was four of six they knew to be in the plant somewhere.? He didn't know where the other two were or where Jansen was until they found me standing over the remaining terrorists in Rob's office. That accounted for everyone they knew about.?

  He did not, however, know about Stone.? Seems that he, like Jansen, had a key card made for him by Rob.? He came into the plant just a few hours after shift change.? Hector was appalled at how easily all this had been accomplished.? He was sure the plant security programs would be scrutinized with a fine-tooth comb in the very near future-perhaps with the help of NeXus.?

  When he finished briefing me on the terrorist situation, Hector just looked at me and sighed.? "What a mess.? We've got dead guys all over the place.? And if I can believe you, we've got several more in the hills behind us.? About the only good news is that none of the dead guys are mine.? There's a hole in my fence-that you made-there's debris at the intake from some kind of small boat that I suspect you blew up, and we've violated several dozen laws concerning security at a nuclear power plant.? Not the least of which is you don't have a badge or a key card," and he held out his hand for Jerry's key card, which I promptly returned to him.

  He continued.? "I've got the federal government and a cast of thousands camped on my doorstep ready to come in here and take over.? I'm really looking forward to that," he said with considerable sarcasm.? "You're in a heap of trouble, son."

  "What about Rob?" Eric asked.

  "Got his ass in custody.? He's crying like a little girl.?Seems he doesn't really have the stomach for this kind of thing."

  Hector was looking at me with concern for my injuries, no doubt.?

  "When you're feeling better, but before you leave my sight, you will explain how you and that partner of yours got inside my power plant without my knowing about it."

  He paused for a moment, and then asked with something between awe and confusion.? "And then you can explain who the hell Eric Jansen is."??

  I wasn't going anywhere for a while, waiting for medical attention.? "What I'm about to tell you can't go any further.? You understand?"

  Hector slowly nodded his head.?

  "We've been involved for some time now tracking a group of Chinese businessmen, intent on destabilizing the US domestic nuclear industry."

  "Why would they want to do that?"

  "They're trying to get into nuclear power generation in a big way, and in a big hurry.? They figured if they could cause the US industry to second-guess themselves, they could pick up parts on the cheap.? This is worth billions of dollars to them."

  "So they were behind all this?"

  "It appears that way, yes."

  "And they'd do this by blowing up The Headlands?"

  "Yup.? We didn't know exactly how they planned to do it and needed to catch them in the act.? So we leaked information about Eric to Waxman Industries.? Made him look like a malcontent.? Figured he'd make a good recruit for them."? I looked at Eric, smiled and said, "He does looks like an unsavory character, doesn't he?"?

  "Hey, I resent that!" Eric said with an even bigger grin.

  "Anyway, we suspected that there'd be an insider but didn't know who to trust.? So we had to play this pretty close to the vest."

  "You were taking a pretty big chance with those bombs, weren't you?"

  Eric said, "Not really.? At least, not initially.? I provided the detonators for the bombs and made sure they wouldn't work.? But Stone was a wild card.? He was bent out of shape because they didn't put him in charge of this mission.? He was suspicious of me from day one.? I suspected that he'd try something, but didn't have time to figure out what it was.? I actually just found out that he somehow swapped out the phony detonators with ones that worked.? So the bombs were live."

  I was starting to get tired but wanted information on what else was going on.? "My men?"?

  Hector paused for a minute.? "Most of your men are accounted for.? No injuries."

  "Most?"

  "I understand that Hays and Pak are missing.? They came out of containment with us but stayed behind to defuse the bomb we brought out.? Just haven't seen them since.? We'll find them.? In the meantime, tell me again, just how did you get in here?? What the hell am I going to tell the FBI?? Are you and that other guy ghosts or what?"

  "Something like that.? Maybe some . . ."

  ". . . other time. . . ,yeah, I know," Hector said as he finished my sentence with dripping sarcasm.

  Two of my men missing.? Not good, but not confirmed lost, just unaccounted for.? I'd been putting off the inevitable-a question I needed answered but was afraid to ask.

  "What about the Old Man," I asked anxiously.? "Is he okay?"

  Hector frowned.? He didn't know quite what to say or how to say it.? "He went back inside containment after we all came out.? We thought there might be a second bomb and he went back in to find it.? Haven't heard from him since then.? Sorry, man."

  I knew it!? The unexplained containment door alarm.? It all made sense.? Damn it!

  Just then, the paramedic arrived and looked around at the crowd that had gathered.? I could see the guy appeared a little shaky, so I looked at him kindly and said, "Hi, my name's Nick."?

  It was clear by the look on his face that he was intimidated by what was going on and the fact that there was a guy in front of him with a gunshot wound.?

  The young paramedic said, "I'm Steve," as he set his bag down and took off his jacket.

  "Not the kind of wound you expect to see at a nuclear power plant, eh Steve?"

  "First one for me, that's for sure," Steve said, getting things out of his bag.? "Can I ask how it happened?"

  "Maybe Hector will tell you some time.? For now, just do your best and patch me up.? I have to leave and go find someone."

  Hector looked at me.? "No you don't!? You are not going into containment to look for anyone.? I won't allow it. ?I'll talk to Dave and we'll get a search-and-rescue team out.?But we'll do this by the book.? Do you understand?"

  All business now, Steve was in the process of cutting off my shirt to get a good look at my shoulder.? He looked worried.? "I don't know if this is bad or not," he confessed.? "I've never treated a gunshot wound before, but it looks like it went all the way through.? You've got an exit wound on the backside of your shoulder.? I'll clean it up and put a dressing on it for you.? You may have lost some blood, though.? You need to have a real doctor check this out as soon as you can."

  "Yeah, he's heard that before," said Eric, who was sitting in a corner.? Hector still wasn't so sure about him.

  I looked at Hector.? "I know you have your procedures.? But if it was one of your team, would you leave a man behind, Marine?"

  Hector knew he was being played right now, but he also knew what needed to be done.

  "All right," he acquiesced.? I'll go in myself."

  Eric stood up.? "I'm going with you."?

  Hector looked at him.? T
en minutes ago, he wanted to kill this guy.? Now he was on a search-and-rescue mission with him.? But by the looks of him, he'd be an asset to any team.?Hector nodded.

  Before they could leave, and as the paramedic worked on me, Prichard walked in.? He looked at me and didn't say anything.? Then he looked at Eric with the same skepticism Hector had.

  "Jeff Prichard, meet Eric Jansen.? He's a plank owner of NeXus.? Eric, meet the VP of this station."??

  "Eric Jansen, as in the terrorist Jansen who was orchestrating this for the other side?? Jansen, as in the guy who had a member of my staff killed and who tried to have you beat up?? That Jansen?" Prichard asked, dumbfounded.

  "For the record, sir, I did not have Brenda killed," Eric said.? "That wasn't my doing.? Happened before I could stop it.? Those were Waxman employees who did that."

  The look on Prichard's face was hard to read.? It was as if he knew something we didn't know but he still wasn't sure about all this.? It was coming at him fast.

  "As for beating up Nick, here . . . sending two guys after Nick was not a serious threat, I can assure you.? That was just to put the fear of God into the Waxman boys.? I really did want to watch it, though. ?Good to meet you, sir," he said, extending his hand to the VP.?

  Prichard took his hand and shook it as he looked at me.

  "Remember, things are not always as they seem," I told him.

  "Indeed, they're not."

  Just then, Hays walked through the door.?

  "I found this guy trying to get out of the turbine building.? Seems security wanted to detain him," Prichard said.

  I looked at Hays with a question in my eyes.?

  He said, "We defused the first bomb we pulled out, in some kind of deserted boiler room over by the transformers.? It's still there and needs to be picked up but it's inert now.? Then we hauled ass back to containment to help the Old Man.? When we went to open the equalizing valve on the door, we could smell the combustion from exploded ordinance.? Must have happened just before we got there.? We were able to get the door open, went in and assumed the Old Man would be down on the bottom level, as before.? That's where we started our search.? Found him lying on the floor bleeding from his ears, but otherwise mostly okay.? Got him out of there and called the shift manager.? He sent out a couple of guys from the fire brigade who are paramedics.??We didn't know they had a hospital here!"

  I looked at Hays.? "I owe you man."

  "Ain't no big thing, boss."

  "So where is he now?"

  "The paramedics got him somewhere.? They just didn't want him moving around for a while until they could pump him full of antibiotics and fluids.? He looked pretty dehydrated.? I left Pak with him to make sure they didn't kill him!"

  An hour went by as Steve worked on me.? He patched up the hole in my shoulder, gave me a shot of something or other, and put on a clean dressing.? When he was done, he sat back and looked at me.?

  "I couldn't help but notice you have some significant scars up and down your torso.? What happened to you?" he said as he stood back as if afraid to come near me again.?

  Prichard put a hand on the paramedic's shoulder, and said, "I think the less we ask him, the better off we'll all be."