Let the Music Play - 36. Prometheus

“Crap, I drink again,” Jon complained as he lost another turn of beer-pong to Eric. The obligatory backstage after-concert party was in full-swing. After assuring herself that things didn’t seem too crazy, Helen broke away, finding the roadies hard at work tearing down the stage rigging. A brief inquiry informed her that Jerry could be found on the loading docks, so she hurried off to tell him about his son. A smile crept onto her lips; she’d enjoy being the bearer of good news, for once.

Strolling out onto the loading dock, she spied Jerry in the seat of a forklift, with a subwoofer on its hoist, turning away from the back of a shipping container. Jerry saw her and brought the forklift to a halt. He then maneuvered the subwoofer back into the shipping container before jumping down. Smiling, he said, “To what do I owe the pleasure, my dear?”

Helen smiled and proceeded to tell him of her encounter with Joe.

Jerry waited patiently for her to finish, remembering to smile and appear pleased. As Helen wrapped up her spiel, Jerry silently cursed the added complication; he needed to get the subwoofers out before the roadies began loading. He breathed a sigh of relief that she had arrived before he’d loaded the first subwoofer into his rented van. Still smiling, he opened his hands expansively as he said, “Dear lady, that is news that truly warms my heart. Please, help him in any way you can and I will settle up with you later. It may, regrettably, be best if you do not mention me, at least for now. Remember, his issues over my sexuality run deep. We must be cautious and not risk driving him away when success is so close.”

Something about his response struck Helen as a little off, but she couldn’t put her finger on it. “Jerry, you’ll never know unless you try. Let me meet with him a couple of times, then I’ll mention you and see how he reacts.”

Seeing that he had no option but to agree, Jerry nodded. “You are quite right, my dear. Just give him a couple of days first and then test the waters. Now, if you will forgive me, I really must be getting back to work; we are on a tight schedule for the loading. I shall see you back in Los Angeles.”

Helen reminded Jerry. “The guys have set up a catered party for you and the road crew at the hotel tonight and I hope you will come.” Jerry gave Helen a noncommittal reply, truthfully saying that he was already quite tired. Helen bid him a good evening and returned to the backstage party. She knew she had best hurry; she suspected her guys might get a little too wild. Suddenly shuddering, she recalled the wrap party on the last tour and the damage they’d done… she quickened her pace to a jog.

Jerry watched her leave and then in a rush resumed loading the five subwoofers ­– two empty cases and three containing mock bombs – into the large van he’d rented. He had to complete the task before the roadies returned from the stage area and he knew he was running out of time. He couldn’t have any witnesses, otherwise questions might be asked.

Once he’d completed off-loading the subwoofers into his van and the roadies had arrived to begin packing the shipping containers, Jerry flipped open his cell phone to dial Helen. He really had no further reason to trouble himself with the band’s gear. He’d planned to make an excuse, perhaps feigning illness, and leave. However, he wondered if doing so would arouse further suspicion. He had time and the roadies could handle the work, so he closed his phone and sat down with his laptop to work on the letter he’d been composing. He knew he needed to finish it; if things went according to schedule, it would need to be faxed in just over four days.

Five hours later, Jerry watched as the shipping containers rumbled out of Madison Square Garden, heading for a rail depot and from there to a storage facility in Los Angeles.

The roadies gathered up their things, ready to head for their hotel, when the four members of Instinct arrived at the loading dock. Jerry was far from happy to see them; they were a complication he did not need. As the members of the band exchanged high-fives with several members of the crew, Jon said in a loud voice, “We came down to invite everyone to the end-of-tour party! Just come on up to our suites when you get back to the hotel.”

Instinct had arranged for the final concert to occur in the afternoon. One of their reasons was so that the road crew would not finish too late to attend the party. The after-tour wrap party had become a tradition and the guys wanted every member of the team to take part. Over Eric’s unspoken objections and at Helen’s prior insistence, Jon asked Jerry, “We want you to come too. You’ve done a great job for us.”

Smiling, Jerry replied, “Thank you dear boy, I will if I can,” though he had no intention whatsoever of doing anything except sleep in preparation for his trans-continental drive.

Within the hour, the party at the hotel was in full swing, peopled by the usual female fans and the road crew as well.

Eric held a magnum of champagne and as he made ready to pop the cork he yelled, “Thanks everyone, for doing a fantastic job on this tour!” Seconds later, he was spraying the room with the champagne.

Helen ducked, getting only lightly splashed, and tried to let the guys have their fun. She just hoped they wouldn’t wreck the place. Late into the night, Instinct, The Shadows, and the crew partied on.

As the party wound down, Brandon and Chase slipped away and within minutes were celebrating in their own private way. Eric, with three girls in tow, and Jon with two, made their way to their respective suites. Eric took a glance back down the hall, noticing Steve and Wilde making their way to Wilde’s suite, alone. Entering his own suite with the girls, Eric smiled, happy for the two Shadows. He’d long suspected that their relationship would evolve and was delighted that it appeared to be doing so.

The following morning, The Scar began his drive, heading southwest, towards Philadelphia. Arriving by late afternoon, he stopped at a swimming pool supply store and purchased some potassium peroxymonosulfate, paying cash. He then spent half an hour removing the three fake bombs – which were empty steel cases containing just a few scraps of plutonium along with some shielding – from the subwoofer cases. He soon discovered that this was no easy task in the tight confines of the van. After weighing his options, he removed the backing from one subwoofer and shoved it over, open-end down, thankful that the mock bombs, being mainly empty, weighed far less than the real ones. He then pulled the empty subwoofer case upwards to free it. With some juggling, he managed to remove the remaining two bombcases as well. With that task done, he stole the license plates from a car he had spotted parked in a distant section of a nearby parking lot.

He then drove to a self-storage facility. Pulling over a block away, he donned another disguise. He then attached the stolen plates over the van’s plates, using some Blu-Tack adhesive putty. He did so in the expectation that the facility would have security cameras and he did not want the van traced by its license plates, due to it having been rented in New York. He knew he was being overly cautious, but he also knew he had to leave as many breaks in his trail as possible. Pulling into the self-storage facility, he used a forged credit card to rent a small drive-up storage locker. Wheeling his van into place, The Scar used a ramp and a hand-cart to unload one fake bomb. He was thankful that the mostly empty bomb cases weighed far less than the real devices, allowing him to move them with comparative ease.

He placed the bombcase, which was just a nondescript cube of steel, inside the locker and then carefully wiped it down to remove any fingerprints. While wiping it, he took care to smear it with the potassium peroxymonosulfate. He smiled as his clever idea; using potassium peroxymonosulfate, most commonly used as a non-chlorine pool-shocking chemical – pool-shocking being the use of an oxidizer to remove organics from the water. The fact that an oxidizer made an ideal means of removing fingerprints and DNA made it an ideal choice in that regard, but there was an added dimension to his choice. He knew the substance would be traced back to its manufacturer within hours of his revealing the location of the mocked-up bombcases, as the F.B.I. would no doubt be examining them in minute detail. By giving the F.B.I. a false lead to follow, he would be giving them something to do. Chuckling at the thought, he closed the storage container, padlocked it, and drove away. Half a block later, he removed the stolen license plates and drove west.

Using a different set of ID and credit card, along with a newly stolen set of license plates, The Scar repeated the procedure the following day in Chicago. A full day later, he did it again in Salt Lake City.

That evening, in his hotel, The Scar finally completed his letter. After adding a list of fax numbers he’d collected over the previous two years, he encrypted it and sent it to Dimitri.

Driving towards Las Vegas from Salt Lake City, The Scar stopped in St. George, Utah. There, he drove to the local landfill and for a ten dollar fee dumped the five empty subwoofer cases. The stolen license plates, along with the remaining pool chemicals, were disposed of in a gas station garbage can an hour later. With his van empty, he resumed his drive.

In Las Vegas, he returned the rental van – he’d rented it using another of several fake IDs and credit cards Dimitri had provided – to the car rental agency and paid the exorbitant drop-off fee. He would have merely abandoned it, but he felt there was no reason to draw untoward attention to it. With that done, he caught an evening flight to Los Angeles. There, he changed both planes and identities, boarding the midnight flight from Los Angeles to Brisbane.

At the desert compound west of Toowoomba, Dimitri took a last walk through the empty machine-shops and foundry. All the components and machinery to be saved had been trucked to the Toowoomba facility: there they had been loaded into shipping containers the previous day, along with the precision equipment from that facility. The two containers had sailed from Brisbane, bound for Buenos Aires. The few remaining scraps of plutonium, along with some radioactive debris, had been placed in a surplus bombcase and stored next to the one containing Adam Creston’s body in the back of a storage shed in the Toowoomba facility.

All that remained were the personnel. Ensuring that his security detail performed a head-count, he had them loaded into the cargo container of the eighteen-wheeler. He took pains to assure them all that within a day, they would be well-paid and free to go. Leaving two of his guards in the back with the men, he had the other two accompany him in the truck’s cab. Without a backwards glance, he pulled out of the desert compound for the last time.

The rough dirt road made for a bumpy and uncomfortable ride for those in back, which did little to improve their temperament. Many consoled themselves by thinking what they would do with their newfound wealth, though a few harbored thoughts of a far darker nature.

Glancing at the two security men next to him, Dimitri chose the closest one. He was loyal and moderately intelligent. Dimitri decided that he would have the task of delivering the disposable cameras – the ones that had been used to document the building of the devices – to the U.S. Embassy in Canberra. His fellow members of the security detail would draw the somewhat less enjoyable task of guarding the men at the Toowoomba facility.

The following morning in Los Angeles, Helen answered her phone, slightly surprised to hear Joe’s voice. He asked if he could see her about the counterfeiting, at her convenience. She agreed and told him to come to her office the next day, she’d be waiting. The intervening time would give her the chance to set things up with Günter.

Deciding that she couldn’t delay, Helen phoned Jerry. She was surprised to find his cell phone out of service and decided to call later. After several tries, she got through to him just before her lunch.

The Scar was not happy. His son meeting with Helen was bad enough; uncomfortable facts might be revealed. Certainly, he did not want to disclose his current location, Brisbane International Airport. “My dear, I am afraid I cannot be there for at least a few more days. Please, do not push the boy. I will be back as soon as I can. I’m in France. I’m afraid it is little Vlad; I had him flown to Europe for a new and experimental radiation treatment, on the chance that it might buy him some time. I regret to say that Vlad will be gone by tomorrow.” The Scar allowed himself a smile at the irony.

Helen found it decidedly odd that Jerry would fly off, given the possible rapprochement with his own son. Still, she knew he must feel very attached to Vlad. His death would surely hurt Jerry deeply… and perhaps he was also a little fearful of facing his son again. Deciding that she could do little except push, Helen replied, “I’m so sorry about Vlad, but Jerry, your son may need you. He’s in rehab and he seemed clean to me. This is what you hoped for.”

Seeing Dimitri approaching and eager to end the phone conversation, The Scar replied, “Fear not, my dear, I shall be back in a couple of days. In the meantime, please tread carefully with my son, and thank you for all that you have done.”

The Scar hung up and without a word followed Dimitri from the terminal and out into the early morning air. Once they were in the Land Rover and on the highway, Dimitri smiled and said, “It is good to see you, Vohzd. Everything is in readiness. My security detail reports that the men are growing restless and fearful at the Toowoomba facility. The security men also expressed concern regarding their ability to control the situation; they cannot carry their weapons outdoors, due to the risk of being observed. If the men decide to leave en masse, there is little they could do to stop them all.”

“Today then, as we planned,” The Scar replied, glad that he had slept well on the plane.

Helen smiled as Joe walked into her office. Ushering him to a seat, she asked, “How are you doing?”

“Pretty well, I guess. Still clean and I feel better than I have in years. Look, I need to say this; I’m really sorry for what I was like when I was in Instinct. I treated you all like shit. I won’t make any excuses, there aren’t any,” Joe said, emitting a sigh of relief, glad to have gotten that off his chest.

Helen smiled and in her own mind began thinking of the person before her as ‘Joe’ rather than ‘Lump’. “People change Joe and I’m glad to see that you have. I’m certain that others will be too. Now, about the counterfeiting; are you willing to help us?”

Joe pulled a handwritten note from his pocket and slid it across the desk to Helen. “Here’s everything I have. Their names, phone numbers, what they offered me and their mailing address. I did let them pay me, because I need the money. I sold my residual rights along with everything else, so their offer was one I couldn’t turn down. I don’t have any other income.”

Astounded that Joe had handed over the information with no strings attached, Helen asked, “Would you be willing to meet with our security chief Günter and an agent of the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement? They’re the lead agency for investigating counterfeit imports, which we believe these to be. Due to your contacts having a local address and phone number, we’ll also need to get the Los Angeles Police Department involved.”

Joe nodded and after a few moments said, “Anytime, my schedule is open. I do have one request. I’d like a chance to apologize to the guys in the band… all of ‘em, for the grief I caused. It’s part of my twelve-step program but I want to do it anyway. Do you think they’d see me?”

Not at all sure what the reply would be, Helen side-stepped by answering, “I’ll call and set up the interview with Günter and the detective. I’ll also call the guys. I can’t make any promises though, because they are leaving for Telluride in a few hours.” Helen left her office to make the call from her cell phone.

Minutes later she was back. Though it had taken a little cajoling to achieve, she had good news for Joe. “They said yes. The customs agent will be at the studio in just over an hour. Günter will be here in a few minutes to pick you up. While you wait for the agent, you can see the guys. I know you didn’t ask, but I will pay you for your time. I’ll also ask around and see what I can find you for work.” Deciding to broach the subject, Helen added, “You might also want to think about contacting your father. I know he misses you and has been worried about you.”

A derisive snort startled Helen, and Joe said with a shrug, “That’s all great, except for the bit about my old man. He couldn’t give a damn. If he wants to talk I’m willing, but no way in hell would he be, trust me on that.”

Unsettled by Joe’s certitude, Helen began to reply but stopped; she didn’t want to argue and push him away. Accepting his statement with a nod, she walked him to the door. “I’ll see you again, Joe. Call me anytime. I’ve got to meet with a promoter in fifteen minutes, then I’m leaving with the guys and will be on vacation, but the number I gave you will reach me pretty much anywhere. Don’t be afraid to use it. I’ll be in touch soon about the jobs and other matters. Take care.” Günter pulled up to the curb and for the first time, Helen was sorry to see Joe leave.

At the studio, Günter ushered Joe into a conference room, where the four members of Instinct sat waiting with more than a little unease. Deciding to give them their privacy, Günter excused himself and left. Joe glanced at the four faces and their unreadable expressions. He remained standing as he got right to the point. “I asked to meet with you guys so I could apologize. I know I put you through hell, three of you especially, and I’m sorry. I know I can’t fix it, but, I needed to say that.” Mistaking the stunned silence for the rejection he’d expected, Joe turned to leave the room.

Chase surprised everyone, most of all himself, by saying, “Wait…”

Joe paused. Turning to face his former band mate, he said, “I wish there was something I could do about the past, but I can’t.”

An awkward silence followed, until Eric decided that an opportunity had presented itself. “Pull up a chair, Joe. If you’ve really changed, there is something you could help us with; your father has been doing our shipping and lately he’s been filling in as road boss.”

Joe rolled his eyes. “Watch your backs. He’s a self-serving bastard of the first order. Do yourselves a favor and get rid of him.”

Wondering if prejudice was playing a role in Joe’s feelings, Chase asked, “Did you get along with him before you found out he was gay?”

Joe froze for a second, his eyes opening wide in shock. “Look, I know how I treated you about… that before and I won’t claim to be totally comfortable with it even now, but no way is my old man gay. He’s a womanizer…”

Scenting blood in the water, Eric asked with barely concealed glee, “He told us that the reason you and he split was you found out he’s gay. He said he blamed himself for that, because it led to your slide into drugs. He’s also a flamer.”

Shaking his head, Joe replied, “I think you’ve got an imposter. My old man is many things, but a flamer he ain’t. What’s this guy look like? My old man is mostly bald and has a big ‘ole scar above his forehead.”

Jon shook his head and was about to describe Jerry, thinking that Joe was right, they had an imposter, but Eric interrupted to say, “When we were in Australia I dumped him overboard into the ocean. When he got back in the boat his hair was on all crooked, it’s a toupee, right? I bet he has a temper too; when we were at his house for a charity fundraiser, I got kinda wasted and he snapped at me. It was as if he changed for an instant and then changed back. Same thing on the boat; he didn’t say anything, but he looked ready to kill me.”

Nodding, Joe said, “Yeah, he often wears toupees and yeah, he’s got one motherfucker of a temper. You said you’ve been to his house here in L.A.? I saw it once, a few years ago; a huge living room, more like a ballroom I guess, crystal chandeliers in a high ceiling, marble floors and walls. Does that sound like it?” The four members of Instinct nodded and Joe said, “He’s gaming you. I can’t see him having anything to do with charity…” Joe paused to think back and remembering an old suspicion he added, “You said he does your shipping? I think you really better watch out. When I was little, he took me on a couple of business trips. I think he did it just to fit in with some people, not for me. He’s always off somewhere so I thought nothing of it, but I overheard a few things one night, like, he’s not really in the shipping business. I think that’s a cover and he’s mainly in the arms business.”

Brandon’s guts turned to ice as a deathly chill ran down his spine. Turning to his band mates he said, “The subwoofers. I haven’t had a chance to ask Helen for the master inventory yet but Jerry seemed real protective of ‘em and I don’t think they’re our gear–”

“And they’re big enough to stash stuff in,” Jon said, completing Brandon’s thought.

Eric grinned like a Cheshire cat. “See? I told you guys he was up to something and I also told you he wasn’t gay.” Deciding to poke into one other mystery in order to test Joe’s honesty, Eric asked, “What was the deal between you and Gabe? Were you in on the scam he was running on our crew?”

Joe lowered his head, looking at his feet, and thought for a few moments. He wanted to come clean, but he knew he’d be taking a legal risk. “No, but I heard about it,” he said, thinking it best to lie.

Günter poked his head in the door to say, “The customs agent is here, we’re going to do the interview just down the hall. We’re ready for you, Joe.”

As Joe got up to leave, Eric said, “We’ll get together with you again the next time we’re in town. Thanks, both for the apology and letting us know about your father.”

With a nod, Joe left with Günter. As soon as the door closed, Jon asked Eric “Was he leveling with us? We know he was in on the deal with Gabe.”

Eric shrugged. “I think so, other than that I got a feeling he’s really changed. He’s not the same guy he was and some of the stuff he said sure fits.”

“We’d better tell Helen about this,” Brandon said.

Jon nodded. “Yeah, and soon. Günter too; we need him now more than ever. They’ll be on the plane with us this afternoon so we’ll have a chat then if not before.”

While passing to the south of Toowoomba, Dimitri received the coded-phrase text message he’d been waiting for. He frowned upon reading the final part. “Vohzd, Mario reports that all is in readiness for the hit. However, there has been a complication. He mentions that he had their hotel under observation earlier and saw their former lead singer going in with their security chief. Vohzd, Mario does not know that is your son. Do I tell him to abort the hit if your son would be with them?”

The Scar thought for a moment, before answering casually, “No. The hit must proceed regardless. That band and their manager know too much; they are the only connection to the shipping and device emplacement. As for my worthless son, he will be no loss. Send the confirmation order.”

Nodding, and approving of The Scar’s admirable pragmatism, Dimitri sent the pre-arranged phrase ‘timetable approved’ which ordered Mario to proceed immediately with the contract on Instinct and their entourage.

At the Toowoomba facility, the engineer muttered to himself, irked that it was so crowded. Dimitri’s security people had shepherded most of the machinists, metallurgists, and gunsmiths into the far end of the building that had once contained his cleanroom. Dimitri had installed a large TV set and rented some DVD’s to keep the men occupied, but several were wandering around in the engineer’s work area. One clumsy oaf had, he complained to himself, even knocked his large stuffed kangaroo from its perch on the nuclear device. The engineer was very particular when it came to that nuclear weapon. He believed that his substitution of the firing code had rendered it incapable of being triggered remotely without his assistance, but the anti-tamper wiring was another matter. A net of insulated wires installed just under the outermost layer of steel, they would trigger the device if the circuits they formed were broken. One stray hit with a forklift and the capacitors would draw their charge. That would take five seconds and then the bomb would fire.

Miffed, the engineer returned his giant stuffed kangaroo to its perch. Just one more day, but the stress was beginning to weigh on his nerves. He was fearful of his employer’s reaction to having been deprived of control of his devices, but the engineer was certain that he would accede to the fait accompli, especially when all the engineer wanted was what he had been promised.

Twenty miles south of Toowoomba a low grassy hilltop, one of many, jutted into a bright and cloudless sky. A rough track led to its crest, and at the turnaround at the top, the rain-etched remains of a long-forgotten campfire stood within a small circle of rocks. A lush carpet of long grass, green strands interspersed with amber straw, rustled in a light breeze, sweeping around the two men who had arrived just moments before.

Standing next to the Land Rover, a few feet to the right of The Scar, Dimitri looked to the north. “Vozhd, we are ready. We could have done this from anywhere on the planet, but I am glad that you wish to see it. I do as well. It will be beautiful to behold. I have checked the weather forecast; the winds are to the north so we should be safe here so long as we face away.”

Dimitri opened a regular cell phone and called his chief of security at the Toowoomba facility. Moments later he listened as the man reported that the workers were growing paranoid and were demanding to be paid and released. Satisfied that all was in order, Dimitri hung up and dialed a second, longer number. His call rang through to a computer at a tiny office he’d rented in Sydney, on which he’d installed a fax program. After entering the three-digit access code, he navigated a simple voice menu and ordered the thirty queued faxes to be sent after a five-minute delay. He then checked his watch. The plan was simple; he could cancel the fax if the bomb did not detonate. If the bomb was a total dud, there was still the remote chance of finding the problem and making repairs to the two in the U.S. That, he knew, could only occur if the failure occurred in the control unit; if that functioned, it was nearly certain that the high explosives would detonate, which would result in the revelation of the project. Dimitri could manage to fix the control circuit himself. Any error beyond that would result in the exposure of the program, so for that reason they had not felt the need to retain the engineer.

The faxes the computer had to send were identical;

Gentlemen;

By now you have noticed a nuclear detonation in Australia. That event was our doing. A package has been delivered to your embassy in Canberra. Inside, you will find three disposable cameras. These were used to document the construction of the device you observed and at least ten others just like it.

As you will soon discern regarding the detonation in Australia, these are fission weapons in the eighty-kiloton range. They utilize cobalt tampers and case linings; we’ll leave it to your physicists to explain the ramifications of that. In brief, they will contaminate a vast area with persistent radiation, far more than a conventional nuclear device.

We have selected ten of your twenty greatest cities. The remaining bombs are now in America. The detonation in Australia is our demonstration that we have both the means and the will to do as we claim. Over the next twenty-four hours, we will give you unequivocal proof that the bombs are in America.

The process here is simple. Within seventy-two hours, we will entertain bids for the detonation codes for the devices. I am certain that several groups, along with several foreign nations, would enjoy possessing them anonymously. To avert these eventualities will prove moderately costly to you, but not averting them will be vastly more so.

We have proven that we have the capability. Over the following twenty-four hours, we shall do so again at a time and place of our choosing.

In twenty four hours, once you have further proof of our claims, we will fax you a series of demands. Remember, our options are many; we can auction off control of the devices, or we can destroy your cities one by one. Alternatively, we can merely call a press conference to cause the residents of your largest cities to flee in panic. Your options are few. You can concede to our demands, which will be primarily monetary, mainly half the gold bullion from your repository in Fort Knox. In addition, we will require, immediately upon us providing further proof, twenty billion dollars.

Further instructions to follow. We will utilize the authenticator word ‘Prometheus’ in all communications.

Dimitri told The Scar, “I sent one of my security detail to Canberra. He’s a former Spetznaz and fiercely loyal. He will serve us well in South America. I made certain that he knew nothing of the device delivery method and had no contact with the engineer or his assistant lest they tell him anything about the subwoofers. Unless he receives a call from me, he will push the package containing the disposable cameras through the embassy fence in about ten minutes. He will then make his way to Paraguay. Speaking of which, two weeks ago I chartered a plane for later today. It will take us from Grafton, which is about a hundred miles down the coast from here, to Auckland, New Zealand. We will stay overnight there and then take a commercial flight to Paraguay via Santiago, Chile. I hope that the havoc our demonstration will cause does not hinder our travel arrangements too greatly. We will be covered as New Zealand businessmen and we will have nothing incriminating on us, so I foresee the risks as minimal.

Dimitri smiled as he flipped open the cell phone prepared by the engineer. The Scar had an identical unit. The concept was simple: A set of control codes would route a call to a specific cell tower, one near the bomb. That tower will broadcast a series of tonal pulses: standard dialing. The nuclear device’s receiver was set to receive on the frequencies normally used by cellular phones and was continually on the lookout for the specific thirty-two digit code sequence, so long as it arrived within a sixty-second window. The Scar had specified the one-minute timeframe in case manual code entry via telephone might be required; with the code, and a call to a cell phone number in the bomb’s area, the bombs could be detonated from any phone on the planet. Even if the cellular network was incapacitated, any transmitter on that frequency could detonate the bombs if it sent the correct code.

Pressing a button, Dimitri played the tonal sequence over the phone’s speaker. The Scar looked at the device and smiled as Dimitri said, “It is like music, is it not, Vohzd?”

Standing tall, The Scar turned to face the south, the thrill of the moment spurring him to indulge in his penchant for theatrics. Raising his arm like Zeus triumphant and wielding power that far surpassed the storied Gods of old, The Scar’s voice boomed forth, “Then let the music play, Dimitri, LET THE MUSIC PLAY!”

Dimitri, smiling, his own pulse pounding in his ears, keyed the phone for speed-dial number three.

At the Toowoomba facility, the engineer was a dozen yards from the nuclear device. He chanced to glance at his watch, an analog Russian make, and wondered what he would be doing on the following day… and at that moment, the bomb’s control circuit detected that the proper code had been received. The control unit carried out its function and sent a pulse of electricity down a wire, closing a relay connected to the series of laptop batteries. It also started a timer. All this was relatively silent and took less than a tenth of a second.

What followed was not quite silent. The two banks of capacitors, one large and one small, began to charge. The distinctive rising high-frequency whine they emitted was a characteristic of capacitors taking on a charge. High frequency sounds penetrate metal rather well and the engineer heard it, recognizing the sound instantly – he’d run many tests on the electronics.

The engineer’s mind raced as his head snapped around to stare at the non-descript metal cube. He realized that Dimitri had lied to him. They weren’t going to detonate it at the desert compound; they had moved all the workers here, in order to get rid of them and him as well. The engineer felt a flash of anger, but not surprise. For a moment, he thanked the foresight that had enabled him to substitute the firing code. He felt a sense of relief that lasted for as long as it took his watch to tick off another second. The steadily rising hum of the capacitors clamored for his attention; his harried mind remembered that the command to charge them occurred after the code had been accepted. That meant one thing; that the bomb was detonating and his code change had somehow been bypassed. One part of his mind, forever analytical, wondered how it had been done. A more pressing thought was that he had to do something. His watch ticked again, for the penultimate time.

Inside the bombcase, the capacitors attained their full charge.

The engineer knew there was only one way to stop it; distort the explosives or the core, so that the implosion, which must be precise and uniform for fission to occur, would fail. A high-powered rifle with an amour-piercing round could do it, but he lacked a gun and above all, he lacked time. Running, he knew, would be pointless. Even the high explosives alone would prove lethal in the few yards he would be able to cover in the moments remaining. Knowing that it was a useless gesture, but needing to do something even so, he snatched up a wrench from his workbench and hurled it at the bomb’s heavy steel case as his watch ticked again.

The wrench, twisting in the air, had barely left the engineer’s fingers when the timer reached zero. Things would soon begin to happen; events that can only be perceived on a scale of nanoseconds. A nanosecond is a billionth of a second. In three nanoseconds, a ray of light, in a vacuum, moves approximately one yard.

Reacting to the timer’s command, the large high-voltage array discharged into a heavy wire only six inches long. It, like all the others, had been cut to a precise length, taking into account the speed at which an electrical charge moved in a wire.

The speed of an electrical charge in a wire is variable. The charge itself is carried via electromagnetic waves, guided by the charges of the electrons in the wire. The speed of the charge is not the speed of light, but varies with the configuration and composition of the wire, along with the amperage of the current. Another factor is what surrounds the wire; if it is an insulated space in a vacuum, the speed increases. Inside the bombcase, the charge from the capacitors traveled down the first six inches of wire at almost two-thirds of the speed of light.

Another complication, due to the nature of electricity, is that the charge front is not uniform across a cross-section of the wire. The charge travels mainly as electromagnetic waves on the wire’s exterior, so the simple method of branching the wires from a single splice and cutting them to a precise length cannot be used to deliver an equal and simultaneous charge to the ends of the wires. The result would be differing charges, which would result in different travel times down each wire; this is why Kryton switches are needed for applications requiring accuracy measured in nanoseconds.

The charge front arrived at the divider array, flowing first into a single Kryton switch. The Kryton switch is essentially a set of glass tubes radiating out from a central point. The tubes are filled with krypton gas; the electrical charge arriving at the hub causes a wave-front in the gas, radiating out into the diverging tubes, being compressed by their tapering diameter. The result is an even distribution, in both energy level and time, of the charge.

The first Kryton switch fed into others in the divider array. One nanosecond later, the charge, evenly divided, entered the thirty-nine wires, each trimmed to an identical length to an accuracy of microns, leading to the detonators. Five nanoseconds later, the single detonator at the end of each wire fired, with less than a nanosecond separating the fastest from the slowest. This was well within the design parameters.

The thirty-nine detonators were each positioned in the exact center of an explosive block. Some were hexagonal, some pentagonal, in order to form a sphere. The design on the surface of a soccer ball is strikingly similar. Each block was ten inches long and tapered to a point at the end closest to the core of the device. The thirty-nine blocks were composed of a TNT and barium nitrate, a slower form of high explosive; the explosive front would radiate outwards in a sphere from the detonator at a known rate. A faster explosive, a compound of RDX and TNT, has been used to fill the voids between the thirty-nine blocks, each section ground to precision for a perfect fit and configuration, for a single purpose. As the thirty-nine spherical detonation-fronts traveled inwards, they impinged on the higher-speed RDX compound, causing those sections of the front to accelerate. The result, by the time the detonation front neared the inner edge of the explosive sphere, was a melding and smoothing of the shockwave, converting it from thirty-nine point sources to a sphere. The combined force of the hundreds of pounds of high explosive was mainly directed inwards: an implosion.

The shockwave reached the outermost of three nested spheres of different metals; aluminum half an inch thick. A soft metal, the aluminum attenuated the shockwave, lengthening it in amplitude so as to null the low-pressure wave behind it; this was needed to maintain the implosive force for a few extra nanoseconds.

The aluminum sphere contained another, thinner one of beryllium and the innermost sphere was uranium 238, which is heavier than lead. This mass, accelerated to thousands of miles per hour by the shockwave, raced across the intervening vacuum towards the core. The three spheres, which were being symmetrically crushed, are called the driver.

The plutonium core itself was not of a standard spherical configuration. Due to the high proportion of plutonium 240, the engineer had chosen linear implosion. The plutonium core, six inches long and shaped roughly like an elongated egg, had a hollow cavity inside, which contained two ounces of lithium hydride. The pointy end of the egg also held a small titanium tube, leading outwards from the core. The engineer, to avoid vastly complicating the implosion process, had encased the core with a tamper of varying thicknesses and void spaces, which would shape the shockwave and compress the plutonium to the shape he required; roughly that of a cigar. The tamper itself consisted of metallic cobalt. The tamper’s primary purpose was, by virtue of the inertia of its mass, to contain the core once fission was underway.

Traveling at over seven miles per second, the converging sphere slammed into the cobalt tamper, impacting it from all directions. This force was transferred to the plutonium. The shockwave entering the plutonium compressed the metal as it traveled, vastly increasing its density. By the time the shock front had affected half the volume of the plutonium, the plutonium core’s outer layers had quadrupled in density, reaching critical mass.

At this point, with the plutonium approaching one third of its maximum density, the timer performed its second and final act; it closed the relay on the second, smaller bank of capacitors, sending a high-amperage charge down a single wire, which led to a device resembling a soda can in size and shape. It was a neutron generator. This, like all the electrical components aside from the Kryton switches, had been easy to obtain commercially.

The neutron generator fired, sending a stream of high-energy neutrons down the small titanium tube directly into the center of the plutonium mass, an area known as ‘the pit’.

The neutrons arrived in the pit just as the outermost layer of the plutonium core achieved critical mass. These neutrons were, in essence, the spark to ignite the atomic fire.

Fission, in simplified terms, is the splitting of an atomic nucleus. Plutonium 239 has the attribute that, when an atom of it captures a neutron, it splits, releasing two or three neutrons. When this occurs, the mass of the resulting particles and elements does not quite add up to the original mass of the plutonium atom; a tiny fraction has been converted to energy in the form of gamma and X-rays and also into kinetic energy by imparting momentum to the atomic fragments themselves. The resulting neutrons perpetuate the chain reaction by causing other plutonium atoms to fission.

The neutrons from the generator, entering the pit only nanoseconds before the titanium tube was crushed, raced into the critical mass of plutonium, initiating the chain reaction. Fission was underway.

The resulting gamma and x-rays radiated outwards, only to strike the uranium and beryllium layers of the driver. Uranium is an X-ray reflector and beryllium reflects gamma rays. Both of these forms of electromagnetic radiation, carrying enormous energy, were largely reflected back towards the core, focused on the pit.

Under neutron bombardment and incredible pressure from the fissioning plutonium, a small percentage of the lithium hydride at the center of the pit fissioned and some of the fission products were deuterium and tritium; two isotopes of hydrogen. Under the fierce heat and pressure in the pit, these isotopes underwent fusion, releasing a small amount of energy but doing so mainly in the form of a massive pulse of high-energy neutrons into the already-fissioning plutonium. This is called fusion-boosting and is, in essence, throwing fuel on the fire, increasing the rate of fission by a factor of three.

By this point the core, now at maximum compression, would have blown itself apart due to the kinetic energy of the fission fragments, but the inertia of the tamper and drivers, along with the residual pressure of the chemical explosives, held it in place for a few fractions of a second as the fission reaction grew at an exponential rate. The energetic neutrons that escaped outwards met with the cobalt tamper. There, many were absorbed by cobalt atoms, forming the deadly isotope cobalt 60.

The elapsed time since the main relay had closed could best be perceived by the engineer’s hurled wrench; it had flown less than five inches. Had he been capable of perceiving events on such a timescale, the only effect the engineer would have noticed came from the room’s fluorescent bulbs; their phosphors were excited by the first gamma and x-rays to escape the still-intact bombcase, causing the tubes to emit an intense burst of light.

The atomic fires ebbed as the expanding core’s density decreased. Gamma and X-ray radiation seared at the tamper and driver, converting them to dense plasma. The plasma began to expand and in doing so became transparent to the gamma and X-rays, allowing them to blaze forth in full fury from the bombcase.

Hard X-rays flooded out, accompanied by gamma rays, both traveling at the speed of light. The engineer, had he been capable of perceiving events so quickly, would have noticed the bomb case, and then the building around him, begin to glow in both the visible and ultraviolet spectrums as the gamma and X-rays impacted. He himself however, ill-equipped to discern events on a timescale of nanoseconds, never felt a thing as the radiation pulse obliterated his central nervous system, a split second before the gamma and X-rays heated his flesh to a temperature equal to that found on the surface of the sun.

The core finally succeeded in blowing itself apart and the nuclear reaction guttered and died. All told, just less than five grams of matter had been converted to energy. The energy potential of five grams of matter is approximately equal to a block of high explosives the size of an aircraft carrier. A kiloton is the energy equivalent of a thousand tons of TNT. The engineer’s calculations had proven overly conservative; the total yield of his device was not the eighty-four kilotons he’d predicted, but one hundred and two – the fusion-boosting had been more effective than his calculations had predicted.

The building, and everything in it, flashed to plasma as the bomb case disintegrated, allowing light and heat to shine forth at trillions of candlepower. For a brief moment, before the light and radiation heated the air itself to incandescence and formed a fireball to block it, the pulse of actinic light shone forth, lighting up the daytime sky like a lightning flash, but a million times brighter.

Driven by pressures approaching those found at the core of a star, the expanding fireball advanced in all directions at several times the speed of sound. The fireball grew to enormous size, radiating a brilliant light of its own, thus generating the second half of the characteristic double-flash; an attribute unique to nuclear detonations within an atmosphere.

Downtown Toowoomba had no warning. The first effect to arrive was the burning flash of the heat pulse. All flammable objects within three miles and in line-of-sight of the fireball burst into flame. People out in the open were no exception; their clothes ignited. The heat pulse also inflicted third-degree burns on exposed skin. The only mercy was that those within two miles of the bomb did not have long to suffer. Following on the heels of the heat pulse, the shockwave from the blast roared through the city at supersonic velocity, followed by winds in excess of five-hundred miles an hour. The initial shockwave was enough to shatter most of the structures in its path and the winds behind it turned the rubble into a burning maelstrom of death and destruction. No one within two miles of the blast survived. Further out, survival would depend on happenstance, though for those downwind, the living would soon envy the dead.

© 2008 C James

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Many thanks to my editor EMoe for editing and for his support, encouragement, beta reading, and suggestions.

Thanks also to Shadowgod, for beta reading, support and advice, and for putting up with me.

A big "thank you" to to Bondwriter for final Zeta-reading and advice, and to Captain Rick for Beta-reading and advice.

Special thanks to Graeme, for beta-reading and advice.

Any remaining errors are mine alone.