“Thank you.” Another couple of people trickled out of the crowd and headed in their direction while everyone else began to push toward the transport again.
“Hey! We’re going, all right?” Sheppard swore. “Just stop shoving before you trample somebody.” His request went unheard as the townspeople piled into the transport. Raising a helpless shrug toward Rodney across the mass of humanity, he called, “See you later.” His determined gaze refused to acknowledge the fact that ‘later’ was an uncertain concept at best.
“Yeah. Later.”
The transport and its terrified occupants soon swallowed the Major up. Rodney followed the warriors outside, his ragtag team of eight volunteers hanging back to listen to him explain the plan.
The sounds of Darts screeching toward them punctured the night. Unable to see them, it was by auditory cues that he recognized several peeling away from their pack, presumably trying to avoid the newly established EM field generated by his and Sheppard’s Shields. And not entirely successful in the attempt, as two spiraled uncontrollably toward the ground beyond a nearby hill. A few seconds later, a double explosion sounded in the distance. Probably the pilots activating their self-destruct mechanisms. Good. Two fewer life-sucking goons to worry about.
“What news have you?” one of the Nemst workers asked. “Why does the Enclave burn?”
“There’s been a coup d’etat inside the Citadel,” Rodney replied shortly, without taking his eyes off the worn path under his feet. The fewer times he had to recount this particular tale, the better. “The Chosen — who were not, incidentally, running things as you’d been led to believe — are also dead. That’s why we’re all fairly dependent on this plan to work. So if you wouldn’t mind picking up the pace a little?”
The townspeople obeyed, to his surprise. The dire implications of the Chosen’s fall seemed to bolster their resolve. “We will do what we must,” another worker said.
The path wasn’t long, fortunately. Nemst was actually situated on a plateau at the top of Black Hill. The river off to their left was running at a reasonable speed, having just exited the mountains on its way down toward the Citadel. Even in the dead of night, the twin planets rising from the east, while themselves cast in shadow, offered about the same level of illumination as a full moon on a clear night back on Earth. Helpful, that. This would be dicey enough without the additional risk of working with oil under the light of open flames. Although he’d thought to bring a flashlight, it certainly wouldn’t have lasted the night.
One of the engineers pointed toward a large waterwheel. “This drives the bellows for the forge,” he explained. “Our foundry makes the finest wrought iron in Dalera. It also drives the pumps to fill the barrels with blackwater and drinking water.”
“Be sure to put that in your travel brochures.” Rodney was growing increasingly edgy. He looked back over his shoulder and studied the snow-capped mountains, then glanced at the ground. Black Hill appeared to be an upward protrusion of shale, beneath which was a large deposit of oil. Shifting his gaze to examine the geography of the river, he worked through the situation aloud. “So when the water is high, it floods this area and cascades down the cliff to join the main body of the river. Then there’s a series of short rapids before it widens and splits into the North and South Channels that surround the Citadel. Right?”
Of course it was right, and the general nodding of the others confirmed it. His primary concern was the amount of oil that would be required to pull this off. And the risk of toxic fumes blowing off unlit crude oil on the South Channel, directly into the Citadel. All right, two primary concerns.
In his borderline manic state, the entire situation was beginning to feel disturbingly Monty Pythonesque. In fact, there were three primary concerns. The wind had to pick up in order for the oil ignited on the North Channel to blow away from the Citadel.
When he finished explaining the plan, one of the engineers reassured him. “This time of year, the spring floods create an embankment at the entrance to South Channel, which is always silted and slow flowing. The largest volume of water flows along the North Channel, so most of the blackwater will also flow there.”
“All right. That’s good. That’s a start. Second, we need enough oil — blackwater — to sustain the fire.”
“I believe this will be likely.” The engineer drew his chapped lips into a thin line. “In ages past, barbarians like Gat who controlled the city dug tunnels deep into the rock to collect blackwater to fuel their forges. The tunnels have caused the cliff to fracture in places. If a crack widens too far, the river is poisoned with the blackwater that spills out. Repairing the leaks has been constant and difficult work for many years. If we were to break through one of the patches, it is likely that a section of the cliff face will collapse.”
“And there’s a lot of blackwater behind it? And by a lot, I mean — well, a lot?” At the engineer’s nod, Rodney exhaled. Coming close didn’t count with this kind of thing. If they broke into the cliff face, there would be no way to seal it back up again. Still, with the added control provided by the weirs and dam, he’d definitely rather deal with the possibility of too much oil than too little.
“And if the blackwater runs dry as a result?” another man demanded. “We will have no way to support ourselves when all this is over.”
A biting remark was on the tip of Rodney’s tongue, prompting him to point out that post-attack revenue would be an issue only if they survived the Wraith culling in the first place. In a stroke of diplomacy that felt inherently atypical, he chose another line of thought. “You’ve got the lake. What’s it called? Quickweed? There’s little doubt that it’s proof of a vast oil field in this area. Trust me, on my world, people would sell their own mothers for that land. After Black Hill is breached and a few years of floods wash the area clean, the Citadel’s blackwater problem will probably go away, while you can still go on collecting the stuff via shallow wells and those pumps you’re using to supply the city with water.”
With every step across Black Hill, his ever-expanding mental checklist of things that could possibly go wrong was, Rodney reasoned, the result of basic paranoia, nothing more. It was a perfectly natural response to impending doom. After the past few months, he was getting accustomed to it. There was no cause for panic here. Really.
God, I hope this works.
The villagers moved with admirable efficiency, hitching a rope to a pulley system anchored at the top of the cliff. While the rest manned the ropes, two engineers rappelled down the escarpment in search of a suitable patch to exploit. Rodney opened his mouth to call out instructions, but quickly realized that there was no need. Their system was low-tech, but they had a solid grasp of the mechanics. It wasn’t long before they’d chiseled a number of well-placed holes in the patch, which as far as he could tell had been fashioned from some sort of bitumen, and secured strong ropes to the timber framework that held the patch in place. The pulley took up the slack in the ropes just as the two engineers scrambled back up over the top of the cliff.
A tense silence fell when the ropes grew taut. Then, before his nerves could snap, he heard the telltale crack of the timber and felt a deep rumble underfoot. Rodney’s initial rush of elation was swiftly replaced by a sense of dread. This was a serious rumble.
He had a number of utterly justified phobias, but heights wasn’t one of them. Moving closer to the cliff’s edge, he glanced over. “Oh, damn…Get back!” But it was too late. The ground beneath his feet abruptly collapsed, and he fell backward into the darkness.
“Well, we’re here now, all right? So if you’d quit griping, we can save—” John was highly tempted to say ‘your asses,’ but checked his frustration and, offering his most winning smile, finished, “All of you.”