Despite her best efforts, she couldn’t fight the cloying, hospital-sweet chloroform, and her mind began to dim, her body to lose feeling. One man’s hard fingers rubbing against her crotch no longer felt real to her. She had become a mannequin, a plastic effigy of herself that was being carefully folded into the back of the van, her legs positioned apart so that Abu Alam, Father of Pain, could stare at her denim-covered groin while his assistant drove.
Mercer expected bedlam, pandemonium, or at least a small-scale riot when he arrived at the Alyeska Terminal’s Operations Control Center. However, the parking lot in front of the blocky building was devoid of the usual fleet of red Alyeska trucks, and the loud hailers mounted under the eaves of the roof were quiet. Atop the building, the skeletal radio tower was completely hidden by fog, and up behind the OCC, the power plant and the three-hundred-and-ten-foot-tall stacks of the vapor recovery plant could be seen only because of their flashing safety strobes. Within the building, the hallways were empty, eerily quiet. His boots were heavy and strident as he headed toward the control room.
Andy Lindstrom, Alyeska’s Chief of Operations, was standing over one of the blue-faced command consoles, a coffee cup resting on the fake wood-grain desk nearby. Seated in front of him was a young man in a black turtleneck that showed a heavy dusting of dandruff on his sloping shoulders. The young man’s blotchy red face was rapt as he watched computer code scrolling across one of the multiple screens. Mercer could see that his glasses were filthy, and where they curved over his lumpy ears, the tips had been gnawed.
Mike Collins was on the phone, a booted foot on one of the black and chrome chairs, a large cigar clamped between his teeth. The underarms of his western-style shirt were dark with perspiration stains, and the scar on his cheek was a vivid purple. Lindstrom and the computer operator ignored Collins’ verbal assault on whoever was on the other end of the line.
“Fuck you, Ken. You’ve never had a problem borrowing our equipment and even my men when you’ve got some crisis, so don’t tell me that the riot at the depot is an internal matter and shouldn’t concern your State Police, all right? I’ve got men en route from Pump Stations 5 and 6, but it’s going to take them a few hours to get there. According to my people on the scene, the Fairbanks police have units at the riot, but they’re over-matched by the sheer number of protesters.” Collins paused as he listened to the State Police representative. His scar turned from purple to red and his eyes hardened. “I know they haven’t called you for backup. For Christ’s sake, why the hell do you think I’m talking to you now? I’m requesting aid. Jesus, Mary, and the Unlucky Bastard who Never Screwed his Wife, aren’t you listening to me? We need help at the equipment depot, Ken, and we need it now!”
Collins dropped the receiver back in its cradle with a satisfying crash and turned to Mercer, anger and frustration written all over his face. “To think I used to be a cop like that and just as stuck on the fucking rules and regulations. Christ, what a mess.”
“What’s going on?” Mercer asked, slipping out of his jacket and tossing it on a table at the back of the room.
“Everything,” Andy Lindstrom answered for his Security Chief. “Mercer, this is Ted Mossey, our resident computer expert, though right now the infernal machines seem to be a few runs up on him.”
Mossey made no move to stand or shake Mercer’s hand, but he did glance over his shoulder. Mercer recognized him from the night before. Mossey had been in the bar during the fight between the oil workers and the PEAL activists, although he had not gotten involved. He knew Mossey recognized him too, for the womanly young man turned away too quickly, reabsorbing himself with his computers. For just an instant, Mercer was sure that Mossey was frightened of him.
What the hell was that about?
Lindstrom lit a cigarette from the spent stub of the last one. He knuckled fatigue from his red-rimmed, watery eyes. “The shit seems to be hitting the fan around here. Early this morning, some of our security force at the Fairbanks depot found four people inside the perimeter fences, near the next shipment of material heading for the North Slope. They arrested the trespassers and called the cops immediately. Then, about ten this morning, PEAL held a big press conference in Fairbanks claiming we’re holding several of their people illegally. Accused us of snatching them off the streets like a bunch of Gestapo storm troopers, for Christ’s sake. The damned reporters never thought to call us and hear what really happened. They just ran with PEAL’s press kit. Within a couple of hours, about two hundred people were protesting outside the depot’s main gates. It was peaceful at first, but it’s turning into a riot now, bottles being thrown over the fences, protesters lying down on the access roads, that sort of shit. Get this — the protesters there now aren’t even PEAL. It’s a mishmash of groups, mostly native rights advocates and antinuclear demonstrators, which doesn’t make a whole hell of a lot of sense, but hell, once someone starts griping, every nutcase in the state is ready to join in. These mobs multiply and mutate faster than a virus.”
“Any connection to your computer problem here?” Mercer asked.
“No,” Lindstrom said tiredly. “The computer problem is headache number two for the day. A couple hours ago, the whole system crapped out. It froze up solid, keyboards wouldn’t work, disc drives, nothing. Ted’s been trying to find out what happened.”
“What do you think?” Mercer directed his question at Mossey’s vulturine shoulders and back.
“Lockdown like this? I’d guess a glitch in the config or maybe a power spike fried the operating bats.”
“Any chance a hacker did this?”
“No, the problem’s too deep. The security protocols would have detected an unauthorized entry, stopped it automatically, and backtracked so fast the hacker would have been busted still at his terminal. This system’s tighter than the FBI mainframe.”
“That reminds me.” Mercer turned to Collins.
Anticipating, Collins spoke first. “Yeah, I called. I can’t believe you have the FBI director’s personal cell phone number. Jesus, that was really something, talking to Dick Henna, I mean.”
“Deep down, Mike, he’s a cop, just like you. He has a bigger office and a longer title, that’s all. Did he say that he would contact Elmendorf?”
“Yes, he said Admiral Morrison contacted General Kelly, the Air Force’s man on the Joint Chiefs. We’ve got full cooperation.”
“Mercer, the Air Force? What are you expecting, World War Three?” Lindstrom remarked jokingly.
“Boy Scout training, Andy. Be prepared.”
“Guys,” Mossey spun himself from the computer, his face pinched. “I’m having a hard enough time with this without you talking, okay? I could use a little quiet while I work. And I certainly don’t need that cigarette smoke.”
“Yeah, sure, Ted,” Lindstrom said, taken aback by Mossey’s harsh tone. The computer operator had been nothing but docile since starting work at Alyeska. Lindstrom assumed that Mossey was more confused by the system’s problem than he was letting on. “We’ll head back to my office. Call if you find anything.”
“Fine,” Mossey breathed and turned back to the scrolling screen, his bony fingers poised over the keyboard like a musician waiting for his cue.
Back in Lindstrom’s office, the wait began.
“Jesus H. Christ, relax,” Lindstrom said, seeing how anxious Mercer appeared. “We talked about this yesterday. We all agreed that if someone wanted to use liquid nitrogen to disrupt the oil flow, the only logical place would be the equipment depot in Fairbanks, and we caught the bastards at it last night.”
“Did they have any nitrogen tanks with them? Any stainless steel cylinders?” Mercer shot back moodily.