“All right, let’s light it up,” she said.
The secretary of defense, who’d been an aerospace executive before she was brought into the administration, casually held a cigar in her right hand. It was part of her shtick, that she was more of an old boy than anyone in the old boys’ network she’d knocked down on her way to the top of the business. Simmons noticed the cigar was the real thing, not the e-cigar his former mentor smoked indoors. Admiral Murray seemed unfazed by the purple smoke starting to cloud up the room, but this was the first time anybody had smoked inside the Z during his command. He had no idea where she would put it out. There was no ashtray aboard the ship.
The test was designed to see how quickly the Zumwalt could deliver a peak power load and how long it could sustain it. This had been a problem during the refurbishment, because they couldn’t utilize such power over an extended time without the Directorate noticing the surge, which would potentially give away the ship’s new capabilities.
Simmons nodded at Cortez, who began barking out orders to shift power from the ship systems to the cables linking to shore.
“You know, Captain Simmons,” said Secretary Claiburne, “President Conley is watching tonight back in the situation room. Not just for you, of course; he’s a big Nationals fan. He had their closer, T. D. Singh, over at the White House a month ago.” One of her military aides, an Army major who scowled at Simmons from behind a pair of thick black assaulter viz glasses, appeared at her side with an empty coffee cup. Claiburne dropped an inch of ash into it.
“Thank you, Secretary Claiburne. We’re the lucky ones tonight, getting paid to watch the game,” said Simmons, smiling at her through the smoke.
“Something like that, Captain,” said Secretary Claiburne. “Take this.” She handed him a San Francisco Giants jersey signed by the team. She shot a look over at her aide and motioned for a pen. He was there in an instant, hovering over her as she took back the jersey, added her own signature to it, and then returned it to Simmons.
“Wear it in good health,” she said.
Simmons thanked her with a bemused smile, handed the shirt over to Cortez when she turned away, and then turned to watch the screens showing the ship’s power production. On deck, crew stood near the cables that snaked off the ship and ran under the Bay’s waters to the pier near the park.
“At ninety-nine percent power capacity,” said Cortez. “ATHENA is online, it’s green for go.” After the failures they’d had with the ODIS-E software, the decision had been made to keep using the old ATHENA management system. It would have to be isolated, not networked with any other ships for security reasons, but at least they knew it worked.
“Execute the transfer,” Simmons ordered.
The lights flickered out on the bridge, causing Admiral Murray to wince. Onshore, a microsecond later, the stadium lights flickered and then returned to normal, the ship’s systems now feeding their demand as well as the surrounding neighborhoods’. The Z’s crew could hear cheering from the park. They knew it wasn’t for them; the forty-four thousand people inside were celebrating a leaping catch that had robbed the Nationals of a home run. But the crew felt like it was for them all the same.
A tense silence took over the room. Claiburne mostly tracked the game — the Giants were now at bat and ready to add to their 5–3 lead. Simmons and his officers monitored the screens playing beneath them on the lower deck, windows onto the ship’s systems status. None of the crew frantically chasing software glitches or figuring out ways to dump heat buildup were visible, yet their grueling work was revealed by the soothing reds, blues, and greens of the monitors. The Z was feeding the shifting demands of the park, but at a cost. Self-defense systems went on- and offline; secondary systems collapsed; and ATHENA itself started to act up.
Cortez caught Simmons’s attention and tapped his own ear.
Mike’s voice boomed into his headset.
“Captain, we can’t keep this going more than a minute more,” said Mike. “We’ve got thermal-management problems with the battery. Fans are running full speed, but they’re just heating it up more.”
“Anything Dr. Li can do with the software? Any tweaks?” said Simmons.
“Nothing yet,” said Mike.
“Let me talk to her,” said Simmons.
“She’s fighting with one of the machines right now,” said Mike. “Don’t think she can stop.”
“Stand by,” said Simmons into his headset.
He put his trigger finger over the microphone near his mouth and, using his command voice, addressed the room.
“Nice work, everybody. Nobody has ruined the president’s game so far. We’ve got one more play to make. Admiral Murray and I spoke beforehand and it’s time we threw a curve ball.” They wouldn’t get more tests like this, so it was important to understand the ship’s limits.
“XO, take ATHENA offline,” said Simmons. “Then bring power output up to a hundred and ten percent.”
Mike started to shout, but Simmons just dropped the channel, and the profanity-laced protest disappeared from his ear.
A faint smell of burning plastic began to seep into the room, competing with Secretary Claiburne’s fragrant cigar.
“Max the fans,” said Cortez.
His father’s voice boomed again in Simmons’s ear. He winced out of instinct, an all-too-familiar feeling.
“Captain, we’re losing it. Ambient temp in the control room is at a hundred and fifteen degrees. Two of the boxes are cooked. You could put a burger on them. Dr. Li here says that —” said Mike.
“I understand, Chief. Task a team to replace them,” Simmons said, trying to keep his side of the conversation calm in front of the SecDef.
“I’d do it if I had anyone to send. This goddamn ship doesn’t have enough crew on it.”
“Understood, Chief. Keep the power coming,” said Simmons, again for the crowd.
A flicker on the monitor that was showing the game caught his attention. The stadium lights had gone out for a second and then returned.
“Give me Dr. Li,” Simmons ordered. “Now.”
“Yes, Captain?” said Vern in his earpiece. He could hear her inhale and exhale loudly, as if she were coming off a run. “We need to tail off the power now. We weren’t expecting to go above the test thresholds. Otherwise I’m not sure what we can do to keep the ship from burning itself out.”
The game’s lights flickered again.
“Dr. Li, you have one chance to understand me,” said Simmons, his voice rising in volume now, a bit of anger for the audience in the bridge. “I don’t care about the equipment. The Z is the means, not the end. Now, get me results or get off my ship!”
He looked over at Admiral Murray. Her face was a mask, leaving him uncertain if he’d just blown it in front of her. Secretary Claiburne looked impressed by his performance; that is, until her aide handed her a phone and whispered, “President Conley.”
Moyock, North Carolina
“Not our usual sort of acquisition, is it?”
Sir Aeric Cavendish wore a baggy white dress shirt over a brand-new pair of formfitting technical pants. He looked out the window of the Cadillac Cascade SUV and took in the sprawling camp. As they drove, he felt the vibration of an explosion in the distance resonate through the vehicle’s polished aluminum body.
“Well, sir, there’s nothing about this location that’s usual,” said Ali Hernandez, a retired command master chief from DevGru, the U.S. Navy’s Naval Special Warfare Development Group, more famously known by its original name, SEAL Team 6. “Not for a long time.”
As the lead of Cavendish’s personal security team, Hernandez spent a lot of time answering questions. The Sir didn’t see the world the same way others did, which was why he was so damn rich. But his curiosity could be overwhelming. A day with the Sir meant more questions than Ali had been asked in his thirty years in special operations. At times it was like traveling with a toddler.