“Certainly,” Dr. Lindquist said as she departed the room.
As Agent Murphy turned to leave, Kyle said, “Not afraid of a little nurse, are you, Agent Murphy?”
“Not funny, MacKerron.”
Within a few minutes a secure-satellite-uplink communications device was operational and Knuckles’s face appeared on the monitor.
“Kyle? Cade? Thank God. You people scared me.”
“Yes,” Uncle Bill said as he walked into view. “I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. I’m getting too old for this shit.”
“Bill,” Cade said, “what have we got on Jana? Is there any way to find her?”
“Cade, we’re analyzing satellite data from the two birds we were able to retask to the area. So far, we’ve got nothing. Even the exact location of where you and Kyle were found, in that old barn, is so obscured by trees, we can’t even see the dirt path that leads to it.”
“The target is not Parkfield, Bill.”
“I’m beginning to agree with you,” he replied. “At this point, we have to assume Parkfield was just a decoy. The team and I are thinking Jarrah set up all those clues to point us there for the sole purpose of diverting us and kidnapping Jana. Whether or not he knew he’d be able to pull off the kidnapping is anyone’s guess. But even if that part of his plan never happened, Jarrah would still have succeeded in diverting our attention away from his actual detonation site.”
“Which is where?” Kyle said.
Bill looked down and rubbed his neck. “Been working on that.”
Cade’s volume escalated. “Find the site and we find Jana.”
Bill’s head snapped back to the video monitor. “That’s exactly what I’ve been saying. It would make perfect sense. Since we know it wasn’t Jarrah himself that kidnapped her, the kidnapper, this Ramirez person, would likely be taking Jana to Jarrah. And Jarrah is almost certainly at or nearby the site where he intends to detonate.”
“God, Bill,” Cade said. “What if they’re hurting her? What if . . . what if they’re doing bad things to her?”
“I know, Cade, I know. I’m trying not to think about it. We’ve got to stay on point. We’ve got to figure out the actual target.”
Knuckles said, “But, Uncle Bill, in his previous two attacks, Jarrah didn’t intend to detonate the weapon himself. He always had one of his psycho jihadist followers do that.”
“I know, son. But this time it all feels different.” Bill’s fingers descended into his beard. “In previous attacks, he hadn’t yet been able to carry out his life’s work—to detonate a nuke inside the US. Now that he’s been successful, we all agree, he’s having fun with this one. Remember, this is the last nuclear weapon in his possession. He obviously has a hired gun working with him on this, but I wouldn’t doubt if he is ready and willing to do the deed himself this last time. Even if it means dying in the process. I don’t think he cares anymore.”
“So the question remains,” Cade said. “If we agree Jana is being taken to Jarrah, then where is Jarrah?” Cade swallowed in an attempt to clear the lump forming in his throat. “If Jana is with him, she’s going to be killed in the blast. Or, he’s going to . . .” He couldn’t continue.
“Don’t think like that, man,” Kyle said. “Hey, we’re going to find her.” He looked at the video monitor. “Bill, we have a list of all possible scenarios, right? At the top of the list is an attack on Washington, DC. Last year, that was the first place we thought of, and we were almost right. If he’s headed that way—”
Bill cut him off. “Way ahead of you, Kyle. Washington is on lockdown.”
“What do you mean?”
“It’s a full-scale evacuation of the city. The order came down from the Director of National Intelligence himself. The National Counterterrorism Center has issued orders for the evacuation of all nonessential personnel, and for barricades to be erected. They’re establishing a military perimeter around the city. Nothing will be allowed in that hasn’t been swept with radiation-detection equipment.”
“Jarrah might be able to drive up to a checkpoint,” Knuckles said, “but he’d have to detonate right there. He’d cause terrible destruction, but he wouldn’t be able to get close enough to take out the government.”
“In fact,” Uncle Bill said, “the president and joint chiefs have already been evacuated. The vice president is staying in residence, but most members of Congress are being moved as well. He can try, but he’ll never get close enough.”
“It’s just like that passage in the book of Revelations,” Kyle said, before he quoted, “‘Then the kings of the earth and the great ones and the generals and the rich and the powerful, and everyone, hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains.’” He shook his head. “Jarrah is winning. He’s got us hiding. He’s got our leaders hiding.”
“I feel like shit,” Cade said. “So, what do we do? We have to have a plan. We have to . . .” Then Cade squinted into the monitor.
“You okay, Cade?” Bill said.
“Is that Branson behind you?”
Uncle Bill turned to look at the man. “What about him? We already determined Jarrah isn’t going to attack the San Andreas Fault—”
“I know, Bill,” Cade said, this time launching out of the hospital bed and onto his feet. “Jarrah spent a lot of time diverting us to the fault line. But what about anything else geological? Remember what Jana said? She said during one of the phone calls, Jarrah stated he’d strike the place that would cause more damage than anywhere else in the land. What if Jarrah does have some kind of geological target in mind, and that’s what got him thinking about diverting us to another? What if he was referring to anywhere in the United States, and not just California?”
“Hey Branson, mind giving us a hand over here?”
“Giving you a hand? Do I have a choice?”
“No,” Bill replied.
“Didn’t think so,” Branson said as he walked closer into view of the video monitor. “Anything I can do for you? Any other information you want to share with me that’s going to make me not be able to sleep ever again?”
“Sleep?” Uncle Bill said. “Who needs sleep? I haven’t had any of that for about forty-eight hours. Cade has a question about other potential targets.”
“Like what?”
“Anything. In your experience, is there any geological target in the US, outside of the San Andreas, that is, that would cause more destruction than anywhere else?”
“Other targets? Listen, you’re talking to the wrong guy. I spent most of my career as a professor. I teach the stuff. You guys need a researcher. You know, someone who’s spent their life in the field?”
“Dr. Branson,” Bill said, “Not your entire career has been spent teaching. You went into the field for quite a research mission, I would say.”
“Yeah,” Knuckles said, “you took that tour of duty on the USS Colorado, surveying the ocean floor in the Persian Gulf.”
“Don’t remind me. I still have nightmares.” Branson removed his tweed jacket and draped it over a chair. “I spent most of my career teaching oceanographic geology. You know, wet dirt. You guys need an expert in dry dirt.”
“Branson,” Cade said, “there’s no easy way to say this so I’m going to say it. Jana’s life is on the line. Lots of lives are on the line. Think, dammit, think.”
“I’m thinking, all right? So, you guys want to know another geological target that a nuke could be used that would cause more destruction than the bomb itself. A magnified effect. And it’s not the fault line? Hell, I was pretty proud of coming up with that one.”
“Sorry to disappoint you,” Uncle Bill said.
“Another target? Well, I suppose it would be effective to set one off inside an active volcano, if there were one. If an active volcano were nearing eruption, perhaps you’d get a combined effect. Yeah, that would work.”
Bill crossed his arms. “But it would have to be active or getting close to active?”
&nbs
p; “Correct. If the magma were nearing the surface, a nuclear detonation would be able to unleash the majority of the force of the eruption all at once.”
“And what could that do?” Knuckles said.
“When a volcano erupts, even if it blows its top completely off, it’s pretty rare that it blots out the sky, like is mentioned in the passages from the book of Revelations. It’s more typical for it to explode and release the molten magma slowly.”
“Mount Saint Helens didn’t do that,” Uncle Bill said. “I’m plenty old enough to remember that eruption.”
“May 18, 1980,” Branson said. “The explosion alone scorched an area two hundred and thirty square miles across. Ash rose to an altitude of eighty thousand feet. And the top of the mountain was reduced in altitude by thirteen hundred feet. It literally blew its top off. But we knew that one was building up. There’s nothing like that happening in the US right now. Remember, the magma has to be close enough to the surface to be released, and the pressure buildup would have to be unbelievable. Otherwise, a nuclear detonation would probably just suppress any volcanic activity, not magnify it.”
Cade steadied himself against Kyle. His balance and strength were returning. “And there’s nothing like that happening now?”
“No.”
“When’s the last time something like that happened in the US? Something huge, besides Mount Saint Helens, I mean?”
“Oh, good God. Now you’re talking about looking back six hundred and forty thousand years.”
“Where did that one go off?” Bill said.
As if in slow motion, Branson bit his lower lip and turned his back to them.
“Branson?” Bill said. “What is it?”
41
TO BLACKEN THE SKY
NSA Command Center
“How could I have been so stupid?” Branson yelled, but then began to walk away as he continued talking to himself. “But I don’t study this kind of thing. I barely pay any attention to it. It’s the stuff of doomsdayers,” he said as his arms flailed into the air. “That’s not real science. That’s for those guys that just want to get their names splashed across the news, scaring people half to death.”
“Branson?” Bill said. “Hey, you still with us? We’re over here.”
“Oh, sorry. I just have a hard time with thrill-seekers in the geology world.”
Cade erupted. “Spit it out! Branson, whatever you’re thinking, get it on the table.”
“It’s the caldera. I can’t believe I never thought about it before. But you guys were so busy getting me to think about California and the fault line. I never really considered anything else.”
“What caldera?” Bill said.
“Jellystone,” Branson said, hoping to elicit a laugh. “Uh, sorry. Yellowstone. The Yellowstone caldera.”
“Tell us about it,” Bill said. “And don’t assume we know our calderas from our references to The Flintstones.”
“Yes, sir. A caldera is a huge impression or crater left behind when an old volcano collapses. Come to think of it, I’m surprised you don’t know about it. If you guys spend as much time thinking up doomsday scenarios as I think you do, this one should be on your radar. Anyone following me? No? I’m talking about the Russian analyst that splashed himself across the news in March of 2015 by calling for a nuclear attack on the Yellowstone caldera itself. Most people thought he was nuts.”
“And is he nuts?” Knuckles said, probing Branson to go deeper.
“Look, we’ve always known there was an ancient volcano under Yellowstone. Like I said, been dormant for six hundred and forty thousand years. But we didn’t learn until 2013 that the magma chamber was so large. Enormous, in fact. But now that we know, the Yellowstone caldera is listed as one of the largest active continental volcanic fields in the world. When I said that Russian analyst was nuts, I meant that he was believed to be nuts because it was just so much political rhetoric. He’s apparently the kind of guy who thinks Russia should take out the US in one swift stroke. But the science is real. The scientific community agrees that a full-scale eruption of the caldera would devastate the United States.”
Bill looked over the tops of his glasses. “And how do you define ‘devastate’?”
“Let’s be clear here. We’re talking about an eruption that no one feels is eminent. In fact, I think they estimated the probability of eruption on any given day to be something like one chance out of 700,000. But if it were to erupt, it would be one thousand times more powerful than the Mount Saint Helens blast. It would blacken the skies over much of the country. So much ash would fall, it would cause a yearlong winter. The US Geological Survey predicts there would be molten ash ten feet thick for a thousand miles in any direction. Temperatures would drop, for God’s sake.” Branson was speaking fast enough to begin losing his breath. “Air travel would stop, people wouldn’t be able to drive their cars. And think about how heavy ten feet of ash would be. Roofs would collapse, bridges, buildings—” He drew in a deep breath.
“He’s right,” Knuckles said, interrupting Branson. “Remember that eruption in Iceland in 2010? It stopped all air travel.”
“Compared to this, that eruption would look like child’s play. There would be a worldwide food shortage.”
“Wait, wait,” Kyle said. “You said the ash and damage would extend in any direction. Yellowstone is out in Montana, right?”
“Wyoming.”
“So how would western areas in the US be affected by that? The jet stream blows everything east.”
Branson’s arms again flew into the air. “You’re not getting it! This thing would be so huge it would create its own wind. It would disrupt the entire jet stream. There would be two inches of ash in New York City.” His chest heaved. “Oh my God. I don’t feel so good. I think I’m going to be sick.”
Knuckles grabbed him around the waist and guided him into a chair.
“Here, sit down. Hey, Mr. Branson.”
Branson looked at him through bloodshot eyes. “Aren’t you, like, fifteen years old? That’s Doctor Branson to you.”
“Yes, sir. Listen, it’s going to be okay, okay?”
“That certainly makes me feel better,” Branson said as he tried to laugh.
Uncle Bill turned toward the video camera. “Kyle, Cade, I think we’ve got our new target.”
In the hospital room, Agent Murphy stepped forward. “Mr. Tarleton, I’ll get on the horn to my people. We’ll deploy hostage-rescue teams to Yellowstone Park and start combing the area.”
“We’ll send you coordinates of the caldera itself. Hey Branson, how big is the actual opening into the caldera?”
“It’s at least thirty-five miles across. But . . . hmm, let me think about this for a minute. I think there’s a steam vent there though. It’s pretty small, actually. It’s probably not twenty feet across.”
“And does the vent lead straight down? Like a mine shaft?” Bill said.
“Well sure. Where else would it lead?”
He was met with silence.
“Sorry. Yes, it would look something like a misshapen hole twisting straight down. But it’s bright yellow all around the edges. And greenish a little further down. That’s caused by all the sulfur that escapes. It would be very easy to spot the steam vent from the air.”
“Agent Murphy,” Bill yelled, “let’s get moving! We’ve got to locate Jarrah. We find Jarrah, we find Jana and the nuke. I’ll call the president. Cade, Kyle, I can’t tell you what to do. But if you can walk, Jana needs every eye she can get.”
In the hospital room, Kyle looked at Cade. “You up for this, man?”
“Shut up and tell me where my damn jeans are. I hate these stupid hospital gowns.”
42
AN ANCIENT BLADE
Remote cabin, Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming
Jana drifted in and out of consciousness. As she awoke, all she could see was darkness. Then she dropped back into a swirling blur of muted sounds, snapshots in her mind of memories
from times gone by, and a throbbing headache that felt like a migraine. She was having trouble telling what was real and what was a dream. And the more she tried to reason it out, the less sense any of her thoughts made.
Voices, she thought. Those are voices. I know I heard that. But no matter how hard she tried, she could not lift her eyelids. They felt like sheets of lead pushing against her pupils. But there were voices all right. Muted, faint, distorted, and she could understand none of it.
Another language? she wondered. She felt tugging against her limbs. Not rough and forceful, but it was definitely there—a pulling sensation. As if, something, or someone, was pulling against her arm, then her leg. It was a moment later she realized what was happening—her clothing, someone was pulling against her clothing, and then a blindfold was torn from her face. She felt like she was in a drug-induced stupor, but forced her eyelids open.
What she saw before her was grotesque. A Middle Eastern man glared at her through coal-black eyes; the smile of a madman painted his mouth. His thick, black hair, distinguishable only by a single shock of white that ran up one side, was wild and unkempt.
The man’s eyes wandered across her body, and his grin widened. It was Jarrah. Jana was sure of it. It was Waseem Jarrah.
“Wipe the drool from her mouth,” Jarrah said. “It disgusts me.”
“Well, what can one expect from a woman,” Rafael said as he laughed. “Here, here you are,” he said as he wiped Jana’s mouth with a towel. “Now, she’s all prettied up for you, Señor Jarrah. But whatever to do with her? As for myself, I can think of something.” He applied a vice grip to her jaw and she yanked against it.
Jarrah laughed. “Ah, Miss Baker. We are again face-to-face. We haven’t been this close since our time together in Spain. How are you feeling? Are you glad to see me? After all, you’ve been looking for me for a long time. And now you’ve found me.”
Breach of Protocol Page 16
