Chapter Thirty

Jane

“I’m going after Zachary.” Jane pushed the pain of her father’s coldness from her mind. Everyone in the War Room had eyes on her. “You can stay here or come with me. I really don’t care either way. But if you come along, you’ll do what I tell you.”

“I’m in,” Nolan said, terror on his face.

Michael jumped out of his chair. “Me too.”

“LYDIA,” Jane snapped. “Can you get a video feed from the underground?”

The underground is on its own network, but they are transmitting intermittently to Dr. Linda Reddington’s office. The signal is very weak, and I can pull only snapshots.

The War Room monitors flashed static, and then an image that froze Jane’s heart filled the screen—Zachary strapped to a steel chair, surrounded by computer equipment. As quickly as the image appeared, it was gone.

“Where is he?” Michael tapped wildly at the keyboard. “Why did we lose the picture?”

“He’s in the underground.” Jane was sick with dread and the memory of her time with Benson. “That thing he’s strapped to is the machine Benson used to torture me.”

The Large Hadron Collider is operational. It seems that it has a modified beam that will throw an asteroid off course. According to my estimate, the asteroid they chose will survive passage through the Earth’s atmosphere and strike Deer Lodge, Montana in twelve hours.

“Zach needs us now!” Nolan’s voice shook with rage. “And so do all those people in Montana.”

“LYDIA, access the Large Hadron Collider,” Jane said. “Give Michael control.”

The Collider is on the same network as the underground. I can see it through the connection to Dr. Reddington’s system, but Michael will need to find another way to control it.

Michael went at the keyboard again. Images flashed across the wall monitors as he worked. “Okay, I found the LHC code. But it’s not good.”

“Meaning?”

“The algorithms that power the Collider. Quite extensive, extremely complicated…it’ll take forever to analyze them.” Michael’s face became grim. “LYDIA, how deep can you get into the network?”

The next level is as deep as it gets. Hidden paths and encrypted folders. I’ve given you access.

“Now we’re getting somewhere,” Michael said. “I’m opening the equipment files, Nol. Detailed photos. Build breakdowns. See what you can make of them.”

“What is that?” Jane asked as images popped up on-screen. She had never seen such an array of equipment. It was right out of a sci-fi movie. Massive rings with tubular channels flaring out from their centers like gigantic flowers, brightly colored and arranged in perfect symmetry. Under other circumstances, Jane would have thought it was beautiful.

“Photon synchrotron booster, super proton collector, antiproton decelerator.” Nolan stood and stared at the monitors. “Wow. This is the most powerful collider I’ve ever seen. That might be in our favor. It’s got to generate an enormous amount of heat. That can’t be good for the circuits. Mikey, can you take out the heat sinks?”

Michael began to tap furiously at the keyboard. Finally he leaned back in his chair. “That should do it. Once I upload this virus to HAVOC’s system, it will shut down the Collider’s cooling system and fry its circuits the instant they try to fire it.”

“Do it,” Jane said.

Michael tapped at the keyboard again. Suddenly his brow furrowed then, “Crap!”

“What’s wrong?”

“Their security is tighter than I expected. I hit a dead end.”

“I thought you could hack anything.” Jane threw her arms in the air.

“I can.” Michael folded his hands and kicked back in his chair. “I cracked their firewall. Pretty sophisticated, but I got through. The first one.”

“Multiple firewalls are normal. What’s so hard about the second one?” Jane didn’t like the sound of this.

“Low tech. No way to hack it.”

“How is that possible? It’s just code, isn’t it?”

“They’re using the same trick ORDER uses with profiles of the Halo Agents.” Michael slowly shook his head. “A physical switch somewhere inside HAVOC has to be thrown. The system that controls the Collider is completely cut off from the world. There’s no way to hack a physical switch. You have to be there to flip it.”

Jane’s heart threatened to seize. “Is there no work-around?”

You can’t hack wires that don’t exist.

“No, LYDIA, you can’t.” Michael pushed his finger against his cheek. “But what I can do is upload my virus to the first firewall. Once the switch is opened, the bug will pass through and shut down the cooling system.”

Jane was close to passing out. She inhaled quickly and pulled herself together. Zachary needed her, even if he did hate her. She had to make this right. “LYDIA, download the seismology plots to my watch.”

Done. I included maps of the caves beneath the Mastermind Complex and highlighted the shortest route to the underground.

“Thank you,” Jane said. “I’m going in.”

“We’re coming.” Michael pushed his chair back and jumped up.

Jane nodded. “We’ll have to split up. We have two objectives—find the switch, and rescue Zachary. And just so you know, finding Zachary is not your priority. It’s mine.”