by Sam Fisher
A chain of command was quickly established. Protocol dictated that this remain a local management issue unless a direct call for outside help was made. The federal government had been contacted almost immediately because no one could be certain the explosion at the CCC was an isolated incident. As the federal agencies swung into action, the chain of command in Los Angeles started to take shape. And on the ground – at the frontline – things began to move fast.
36
Methodist Sugar Land Hospital, Houston, Texas The digital clock on the wall read 21:25. Outside, the night was shredded by city neon. From the eighth floor of the hospital, Maiko Buchanan could see all the way to George Bush Park, a distant smudge of darkness nestled in the urban glow.
It was very quiet in the room, just the steady wheeze of the respirator and the occasional click and whir of the machines keeping her mother, Eri, alive. Mai walked back from the window and sat in the chair beside the bed. She could only see parts of her mother's face, the soft pale flesh around the respirator mask, and her eyelids, almost translucent and flickering. Eri Kato's white hair, still luxuriant, lay across her left shoulder. There were two tubes running from under the right sleeve of her gown. They trailed away to shiny boxes beside the bed.
Mai held her mother's hand. 'You haven't had much of a life, have you, Mom?' she said quietly. 'And just when I was able to help, you go and have a stroke.'
Images were racing through Maiko's mind. Memories of her disciplinarian father, who had believed females should be married off at the earliest opportunity and should never work outside the home. Mai had started to resent him before she had reached her tenth birthday, and she had quickly realised the best way to get back at the man was to do the very opposite of what he expected of her. She was not going to follow the example of her mother and subsume her personality to his liking.
Maiko had excelled at school, won a scholarship to college and left home. Her father disowned her. Her mother was forbidden to see her again. But, of course, she had ignored this command. Eri and Mai would meet whenever they could, clandestinely, for almost five years. Mai had only gone to her father's funeral to keep her mother company. She'd been surprised at just how little she had felt as the coffin was lowered into the soil. She hadn't even felt relief – she had moved far beyond that.
It was probably another act of rebellion that had got her pregnant at college. The father of the child never knew he had played a role. And it was certainly more rebellion that had given her the strength to keep the baby, her daughter Greta, and to keep studying and to graduate with a GPA of 4.5, the best in her year.
That had probably been the hardest part – until recently. After obtaining a PhD, Maiko had joined NASA and risen through the ranks. By the age of 32 she had her own command mission aboard the Discovery. Yet as she was reaching her peak as an astronaut, her family was falling into disarray. She had married and divorced, and now found she had sacrificed far too much in achieving her goals ever to find a balance between family and work. Greta had begun to drift away when she hit puberty. Now Mai rarely saw her, and when mother and daughter did get together they could barely exchange a civil word.
There was a light tap at the door. The face of a young woman appeared. She had a puckish face, bunches of black hair and too much eye-shadow. She looked startled for a moment. 'Mom.'
Mai stood up and went to put her arms around her daughter. The girl stood like a piece of wood and Mai pulled back. 'Pleased to see me, then,' Mai said. Her voice was sad rather than sarcastic.
The girl was chewing gum. She shrugged. 'I didn't think you would bother.'
'What is that supposed to mean?'
Greta shrugged again.
'How did you get here?'
'Dad dropped me off.'
They walked over to the prone form lying in the bed.
'So why are you here?' Greta asked.
'She's my mother. What do you expect?'
'Thought you'd be too busy with Buzz Lightyear.'
Mai glared at her. 'If all you can do is insult me you can just go back to your stepfather's.'
There was a pained silence between them. 'Look . . .' Mai began.
'Save it, Mom. It's such a cliché – estranged mother and daughter bond over sick granny.'
'Why, you –' Mai stood up, fury etched into her face. A loud beep came from under her left sleeve. Instinctively, she pulled back the fabric. On her wrist was a metal bracelet, with a high-res screen that lit up like a beacon in the dim room. A face appeared.
'What the hell is that?' Greta exclaimed.
Mai ignored her, and with a supreme effort composed herself. 'Mark. What a pleasant surprise.'
'I'm sorry, Mai. I wouldn't have disturbed you, but –'
'What's happened?'
'Two bombs in a conference centre in downtown LA.'
'But we're not operational.'
'We are . . . as of three minutes ago.'
Mai swallowed hard. 'Okay.'
'We need you.'
She turned away from the screen, noticing the stunned look on her daughter's face, and felt the undertow of emotion. What lay there? Sadness? Resentment? Pity? She turned back to the tiny screen and nodded.
37
Fire Station 9, Los Angeles
Captain James McNally was 59 years old. He had been in one of the first fire trucks to arrive at the World Trade Center on 9/11, and that day he had seen dozens of his colleagues die. A year later he had retired and moved to Los Angeles with his invalid wife, Geraldine. But the boredom of early retirement was killing him, so he joined the Los Angeles Fire Department. Initially, his was a teaching role, but he could never resist the smell of a fire and the power struggle between man and nature.
The call had come into the station at 7.22 pm, and they were out of there within 90 seconds, roaring through the gates of Fire Station 9 and onto E 7th Street. It was smack in the middle of Skid Row, one of the most deprived and dangerous areas in Los Angeles. Even this early in the evening, it was getting pretty funky. Station 9 was the busiest in the country, dealing with 50 or 60 incidents a day, of which only a few were fires. The crews at Station 9 were the last defenders of the public, going in to mop up junkies or to get smashed-up kids to hospital after the cops had given up or were too busy with bigger business.
McNally watched the ramshackle shops flash by, the light from the fire truck doing battle with the cheap neon. All the trucks had left in convoy, with his in the lead. One of his young guys was at the wheel. Freddie Bantelli was only 21, with just a year on the job. He was still full of enthusiasm and sincere in the belief that he could change the world. The word was that something really huge was going down; so maybe Bantelli would have his chance.
Captain McNally surveyed the small screen of the laptop fixed to the dash. It was part sat-nav, part feed to the internet, but in his old-fashioned way he felt more at home keeping in constant touch with the communications operator, a human being sitting in a control room.
At Main, they cut left, blaring the horn every few hundred feet. From a side street to the north they saw another truck heading towards them.
'That's from Station 14,' said Bantelli, nodding towards the vehicle, its lights blazing and horn blaring.
'Yep. Whatever's going down, it's big,' McNally responded. He turned to the radio. 'This is 9-Alpha. Got anything new for us, guys?'
'9-Alpha. What's your ETA?'
McNally glanced at the laptop. 'Six minutes.'
'Roger that. Incident is a multiple blast. Paramedics are right behind you. We expect high casualty figures. The structure of the CCC has been compromised. Advise extreme caution. I repeat, extreme caution.'
McNally knew precisely what the operator meant – there could be more bombs.
The operator was talking again. 'Looks like you'll be the first rig there, 9-Alpha,' she said. 'You'll soon have company. We're bringing them in from across the city, as far as San Fernando. Out.'
McNally whistled and turned to the
other three men in the back of the rig, Gene Connor, Maney Steinberg and Raul Burgos. Their faces were flushed with excitement. Two helicopters roared overhead – LAPD – their searchlights sweeping across the glistening city.
Apart from the emergency vehicles, the streets were unnervingly quiet. One of the guys at the station said he'd felt the explosions. This close to the incident it must have seemed like a quake. Anyone with half a brain would have hunkered down.
They took Main all the way to Pico and hung a right, sweeping across the lanes, cars and trucks stationary or heading away from the CCC, east along Pico Boulevard.
They were only a couple hundred yards away now. The smell of burning was getting intense. McNally signalled to the guys in the back and they all put on their masks. He held the wheel as Bantelli did the same. McNally gave the operator an update.
Halfway through his report the truck came over the crest of a hill and they could see the incident site for the first time. 'Holy crap!' McNally said slowly. Then he fell silent as the operator babbled away. He had only ever seen anything like this once before. The memory of that day still burned in his brain, as hot as the fires he'd fought, the fires that had killed his friends and colleagues. 'Bastards!' he said quietly.
38
Base One, Tintara
The main hangar at Base One was foaming with human activity. At one end Ringo, one of the Silverback jets, was being made ready for its first operational flight. It was a small aircraft, 49 feet from the tip of its shapely nose to its tail, with a wingspan of only 27 feet. But it was incredibly beautiful, like a flying Ferrari or something designed by Philippe Starck. Each of the Silverbacks had been sprayed a distinctive colour. Ringo was a metallic auburn, John was black, Paul grey and George a deep blue. Each was coated with Camoflin, the high-tech material that confused cameras and camcorders.
A team of engineers in pale-green boilersuits was making final checks. One man was lying on the wing and peering into the sleek port engine. He adjusted something inside, carefully closed the engine cover and slid off the wing to the floor of the hangar. As he straightened up, he saw Josh Turner, kitted up in his cybersuit, striding towards Ringo.
'Ready to go, boss,' the engineer said. 'Good luck.'
Josh gave him an exaggerated salute and climbed a short flight of stairs. A panel in the side of the plane slid open, revealing three more steps up to the cockpit. The black Perspex-titanium canopy was levered upwards. Josh lowered himself into the padded seat. The panel on the side of the plane slid invisibly back into place.
Josh touched a sequence of keys on a virtual keypad to his left, and the canopy came down slowly, locked into place and let out a high-pitched hiss. He pulled on a lightweight helmet that covered his skull and ears like a swimming cap. Three thin wires hung in front of his face. The lower one, a tiny transceiver, came close to his mouth. The upper two were miniature projectors that displayed holographic images close to his eyes.
With the canopy closed, much of the noise from the hangar disappeared. Enclosed in this beautiful, sophisticated machine, the pinnacle of human technology, Josh felt empowered and protected. It excited him and he felt completely at home – almost a part of the machine itself.
In a way, this was more than just a feeling, because Josh was indeed interfaced with the Silverback. Nanobots that ran many of the plane's systems interacted directly with the nanobots in his suit, and they even communicated with those implanted in his ear, behind his eyes and in his brainstem. It was the closest anyone had come to genuine cyborg technology, a synthesis of human being and machine.
Josh surveyed the controls in front of him. The console was a single sleek piece of ultra-strong plastic. Imprinted into it was a collection of panels showing an array of lights and strips of colour. He ran his fingers over a virtual keypad and a holographic display appeared in front of him.
'Ringo's ready to roll,' he said into the transceiver.
'Copy.' It was Mark's voice from the control room. 'Opening roof.'
A moment later the vast roof of the hangar began to part. It was smooth and quiet, but surprisingly fast. Within ten seconds it had opened, revealing blue sky above.
'All systems green.'
'Copy that, Josh.'
'Initiating launch sequence.' His hands skittered over the virtual keys and he kept his eyes fixed on the holographic image now changing rapidly in front of him.
The twin engines under the wings of the Silverback began to hum. 'VTOL jets on green,' Josh said.
The plane began to lift. It slowly cleared the roof of the hangar. Then it appeared to hang in the air. Josh kicked in the main VTOL thrusters and the plane shot upward at phenomenal speed. Within seconds it had reached the first plateau of 10,000 feet. Josh then put the forward thrusters onto minimum power and the plane flew horizontally for a little over twelve seconds. It then started to climb vertically again. Three minutes after taking off from Base One, Ringo had reached its operation cruising altitude of 60,000 feet.
Pausing for a second, Josh sat back in his seat. 'Sybil?' he said. 'Play song selection 0891, please.' The opening notes of Lynard Skynyrd's 'Freebird' burst through his earpieces. Josh engaged the forward thrusters and gradually crept up the speed. Ninety seconds later he was rocketing towards the west coast of the United States at mach 10, heavy rock guitar reverberating through his cochlear implants.
Part Three
STATE OF EMERGENCY
39
California Conference Center, Los Angeles
When the banging started, Kyle Foreman was sitting on the floor with his back to the door, shaking from head to toe. He had no idea how long he had been there. All he could think about was Sandy – and the baby he would never see.
Shouts broke through the panic. At first, Foreman couldn't work out where the sound was coming from. Then he realised it was a human sound, voices and thumping on the door.
He pulled himself up and saw that the door had a glass panel above the handle. Through it he could just make out a shape on the other side. Then a face came into view. It was streaked with dirt and blood. A man. He was screaming something and coughing. Then, almost as though he was waking from a daze, Senator Foreman understood what the man was screaming. 'It opens from your side!'
'It's locked,' he shouted back. His chest was burning from the acrid fumes and he went into a coughing fit. Turning, he scanned the floor and the walls to see if there was anything – anything at all – that he could use to smash down the door. He could make out a shape to one side, and he crawled towards it on all fours. He was below the smoke but it was still getting into his throat. He had almost reached the object when he felt his stomach heave and he retched, feeling burning acid slither into his mouth.
Another effort and Foreman was there. It was a metal box. He cut himself on a sharp corner. Then, feeling around it gingerly, he found a wire coming from one side. The other side had knobs and switches. Peering closely, he realised what it was – an amplifier from the sound system.
Crouching, Foreman picked up the amp and heaved it over to the door. 'Get back,' he yelled. He smashed the amp against the glass, which cracked but did not break. Foreman pulled back and again slammed the object forward. This time the glass shattered. Encouraged, he kept going, ramming the metal box against the wood of the door with all his strength. After four more blows, he was exhausted and feeling sick again. He paused, trying to breathe as little as possible.
Foreman watched as a small backpack flew through the opening. A leg appeared, then the rest of a man's body, a torso, an arm. He just fitted through the jagged opening, but cut himself on the splinters and shards of glass. He was a young, skinny guy with very short hair, wearing a pair of round glasses and a 49ers sweatshirt. One lens of his glasses was cracked. His bony face was filthy and he had a gash that ran from the bridge of his nose to his left cheek.
'I was trapped,' he was saying, 'in the john. Whole fucking place was shaking.' He was on the verge of hysteria. He bent down and pulled
the backpack across his shoulders. Then he recognised Foreman. He started to say something but the senator took him by the arms.
'What's your name?'
'Dave,' the kid gasped. 'Dave Golding.'
'Dave. The passage your side. It's blocked, yeah?'
'Locked from the other side.' He nodded and gasped for air. 'A girder came down in front of it.'
Foreman looked back through the dim light towards the metal door at the end. 'There's only one way to go,' he said. 'Back to the auditorium.'
'But the heat –'
'We don't have any choice. Come on.'
The light grew redder as they approached the metal door. Foreman touched the door and recoiled. A searing pain shot up his arm. It was scolding hot. Yanking off his jacket, he bunched it around his palms and pushed on the door. It was stuck fast.
'Help me,' he said. 'Take off your sweatshirt.'
Dave did as he was told, wrapped the fabric around his hands and pushed as hard as he could against the metal sliding door. It gave, but they could feel the heat on their hands. Dave jumped back. Almost in tears, he was shaking his hands in pain. He bunched the shirt in his palms and they gave the door another push. It opened two feet. Just enough. A moment later they were on the other side.
Hall A was filled with smoke and the sounds of hopelessness – death groans. The only way they could move forward was to close their minds to it. They stumbled to the nearest wall, which was covered with cracks and smeared with blood. The only light came from the flames – reds, oranges, an occasional flash of purple.
They made it to the other side of the room. Foreman was trying to visualise where the room was in relation to the rest of the building. He had hardly noticed the Reception and the Main Concourse when he'd arrived earlier that day. All his thoughts had been focused on getting to his room, being alone. What a simpler life it once was.