Seven Unholy Days by Jerry Hatchett Read Free Book Online Page A

firepower. I had a stainless Beretta fifteen-shot 9mm at home, but I was a long way from the Oregon coast. The guard’s gun would have to do, a Colt that looked to have been handmade by old Samuel himself.
    Inside the control room, the night monitor was sitting on the floor beside his console, conscious but groggy. He had no idea what happened, only that he had a killer headache. Tark did a walkthrough of the building and found what looked like the scene of a scuffle in a janitor’s closet, but nothing else looked out of place.
    I went to the code console where Abdul Abidi spent his days and started digging into the code where the crack had been hidden that caused the earlier failure. This time wasn’t going to be quite as easy. That module of code had been encrypted and asked me for a password, which was bizarre. If they wanted to flat out deny access, all they had to do was encrypt it and leave it at that. Why set it to pop up a password prompt?
    “Matthew, I just pulled this out of the CEPOCS wire.” Tark handed me a sheet of paper. I literally stopped breathing for a moment when I read it.
     
    PRIORITY COMMUNIQUE
    FROM: GREAT AMERICAN ELECTRIC
    TO:
    GREAT EASTERN ELECTRIC
    GREAT CENTRAL ELECTRIC
    GREAT MOUNTAIN ELECTRIC
    GREAT PACIFIC ELECTRIC
     
    BEGIN MESSAGE – AT 2:16 AM EASTERN DAYLIGHT TIME THIS DAY, THE POWER GRID OF THE UNITED STATES WENT INTO A STATE OF TOTAL FAILURE. ADVISE ALL CONTROL CENTERS TO COMMUNICATE VIA SECURE ELECTRONIC MAIL ON EMERGENCY VPN FROM THIS POINT FORWARD TO MINIMIZE CONGESTION IN TELEPHONE SYSTEM. TAKE ALL APPROPRIATE MEASURES TO RESTORE OPERATION AND ADVISE THIS HEADQUARTERS OF ANY SUCCESS. A NATIONAL STATE OF EMERGENCY HAS BEEN DECLARED BY THE PRESIDENT. STOP
     
     
     
     

8
     
     
     
     
    9:45 AM CENTRAL DAYLIGHT TIME (LOCAL)
    HART COMPLEX
     
     
     
     
                  Jana watched Dane stow the single-engine Beech Bonanza in the hangar, then swallow a couple of pills as he walked back outside.
    “What now?” she said.
    “We wait for the boss. When he gets here, we stick to the plan.”
    They sat on the ground beside the hangar and waited, ne ither speaking. Within a half-hour the Gulfstream appeared on the horizon. Three minutes later, the pilot floated the sleek jet onto the runway and taxied to the hangar.
    “Why is this woman here?” Hart said as soon as he stepped off the plane and saw Jana standing beside Dane.
    “She’s a nurse. We lost the one we had on staff here, so I brought her with me as a replacement.”
    “Brought her from where, Mr. Christian?”
    “Mississippi.”
    “I see.” Hart turned to Jana. “Within the realm of medical technology, what does the term CBC refer to?”
    “Complete blood count.” Something about Hart’s eyes terrified her.
    “And within a complete blood count, what primary param eter might return a value of fifteen thousand?”
    “White cell count.”
    “Assuming a white blood cell count of fifteen thousand, what might we infer about the patient?”
    “They probably have an infection of some sort.” Did the man never blink?
    “Very well. What is your name?”
    “Jane Ashley.”
    “I assume it is Miss Ashley?”
    “Yes, sir.” Dane seemed to soften a bit en route, but not enough to land the plane and let her go. He explained the ruse and advised her to be convincing if she wanted to live. She couldn’t use her real name for fear Hart would know of Brett’s involvement and recognize the name. Jane Ashley would be easy to remember; Ashley was her mother’s maidn name and she had spent a lifetime saying, “It’s Jana, not Jane.” According to Dane, Hart also didn’t allow married workers or volunteers, no room for distractions from pure loyalty. Since she was i ndeed a nurse there would be no problem with that aspect; she only hoped Hart didn’t find out it was Dane who had given the order for the existing nurse to be transferred immediately to what he referred to as the L.A. branch. All she wanted