Read Storm Tide Rising: Blackout Volume 2 Online
Authors: D. W. McAliley
Storm Tide Rising: Blackout Volume 2 (47 page)
{Chief Admin}: I don't know who you are, but I know you're not him. You're not Hall.
The response on the screen was nearly immediate, and Commander Price read it aloud.
[Unknown Admi]: How can you be so sure?
{Chief Admin} Because men who execute military coups don't wait around by the telephone. At best you're a trusted lackey. But you'll serve to deliver a message.
Commander Price stopped here and waited. As he watched, the other two system icons suddenly lit up as active. He smiled at that and motioned to Marcus. "That means the program has reached all three terminals and it's at work now," he said. "It'll take nearly seventy two hours for the encryption to complete, but now that it's started it can't be stopped, and no new commands will be accepted."
A message appeared blinking on the screen, and Commander Price opened it.
[Unknown Admin] I can deliver the message up the chain. That's the best I can do.
Commander Price smiled, and typed furiously.
{Chief Admin} Tell the traitor Hall that he will not get anything from me. I've decided to deny access to the databanks at all four sites. Since three of those sites are not within my physical ability to influence, I have decided to deny access the only way I could. Even now, your systems’ administrators should be getting error codes and warning messages. The process cannot be stopped, and it cannot be reversed.
Commander Price paused before typing again, more slowly this time.
{Chief Admin} I don't know who you are on the other end of this line. But you've got to choose. Will you side with Hall, or will you side with your country? I've made my choice.
Commander Price closed the chat window and turned to Marcus. "That's it," he said. "The last official bridge between Hall's forces and ourselves has officially been severed. According to the law, if not the Constitution, I am now a traitor. Hall is the next in line according to the Continuity of Government order under a little known contingency plan. If the President and the Secretary of Homeland Security are both killed while an active state of National Emergency has been declared and there are no higher ranking members of the COGCON plan, then the office and duty of the Presidency falls to the Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security."
"You're telling me that Hall is actually, legally the President?" Marcus asked, a sick feeling twisting in the pit of his stomach.
"Only on paper," Commander Price answered. "He's the one who orchestrated this whole catastrophe; we just have to find the chain of events that ties him to it. If we can find that, then we can expose him as the murderer and traitor he is. On the other hand, if we lose and they catch us, they'll hang us for treason."
"Victori spolia," Marcus said softly. "To the victor go the spoils."
Epilogue
Storm Tide Rising
President Hall stood outside on the broad, flat landing at the top of the steps to the Capitol. The city was moving again, living, and breathing. There were cars and cargo trucks driving down streets. Partial power had been restored to certain critical parts of the city through a system of generators and distribution boxes. If everything went according to plans, an online grocery story would be up and running in the next few days. The store wouldn't really sell anything, of course, but it would serve as a distribution center for FSS rations and rewards.
The citizens that had opted not to participate in the recruiting drive were being relocated to other parts of the city where they'd be easier to sequester and control. There would be another recruiting drive in a few weeks to try and siphon off more people who had grown discontented with the conditions within the secure residential enclaves.
After that, if they still needed numbers, there was always the option of forced conscription. The President wanted that held as an absolute last resort, though. Conscripts throughout history had been notoriously unreliable and tended to disappear at their first opportunity. Or worse, they would turn on you when things started going rough. Defection was a public relations nightmare and could make the administration look weak.
As he looked across the Mall toward the Lincoln Memorial, President Hall couldn't help but think about the riots Lincoln had sparked when he used conscription in the North. People in New York had burned stores, assaulted draft officers, killed, looted, and wreaked all kinds of insanity until troops had been deployed to restore order.
Still, he'd filled the ranks in the end, and President Hall would do the same if he had to.
Behind him, a throat cleared softly, and President Hall smiled to himself. Even now, the leader of the free world didn't get many moments truly to himself. "Yes, Daniel?" he asked without turning.
"Sir, there's been some news," Daniel said, hesitantly. "Two things that I thought couldn't wait."
When he didn't continue, President Hall turned to face Daniel, a frown creasing his forehead. "It's not like you to beat around the bush, Daniel. Whatever it is, out with it."
"Yes sir," Daniel said, but he still hesitated. Finally, with a deep breath, Daniel said in a rush, "Another two submarines have broken contact, sir, along with five surface ships. They don't appear to have been destroyed; they simply broke contact and have gone dark."
President Hall's teeth clenched briefly. He could see why Daniel was hesitant to deliver the message. These defections had become one of the few subjects that would immediately burn past the carefully controlled facade that President Hall presented to those around him. One by one, Captains in the Navy were deserting him. If the trend kept up, he wouldn't have a Navy left.
"How many is that total?" President Hall asked, trying to maintain a tight rein on his mounting anger and frustration.
"Seventeen ships and three air wing commanders," Daniel said cautiously. "That's not including National Guard and Air National Guard."
"I thought we had replaced most of the commanders and captains with our own people," Hall growled. "It just doesn't make sense why so many would take the risk of breaking rank like that, not unless something else is at work here."
Daniel didn't say anything, and after a moment President Hall realized that he'd said there were two things that couldn't wait. "Okay, Daniel, what's the second thing?" he asked.
Daniel took a second deep, long breath and let it out slowly. "There's been an incident with the data backup facilities," he said. "It would appear that some virus or something was injected into the data banks themselves at the three facilities in our control. The data is being encrypted along with facility operations and control software."
This time President Hall's face twisted into a mask of inchoate rage, and he spat a string of curses so retched they made Daniel's face go pale. After a few moments, and with great visible effort, President Hall regained control of himself and turned back toward the view from the Capitol.
"I was almost a meteorologist," President Hall said softly after a long moment. "I never told you that, but it's true. I studied weather on my own for years before and after college. I read everything I could get my hands on about it, especially tornadoes and hurricanes. The idea of so much power concentrated in one place fascinated me."
"Hurricanes especially became an obsession," President Hall said with a small chuckle. "As a kid, I would follow storm tracks and log the data for major storms each season. A lot of the damage from hurricanes isn't done by the wind, it's done by the water. These massive storms hit and they carry with them a surge of water built up by the force of the rotating winds. They drag this mass of water ashore, and that's your storm surge. "
"What most people don't know," President Hall said, turning back to Daniel with a wild look in his eyes, "is that sometimes a storm is timed just right, and it hits with a high tide. That's when you get what they called a 'storm tide' and it can make the damage ten times worse than a similar storm that hits at low tide."
President Hall's voice trailed off, and for a moment his face bore a dark, dangerous scowl. "Go and talk to security," he growled after a moment. "I want things in place for a trip to the Norfolk Navy yards tomorrow. They say that as long as the storm tide is rising, the worst of the storm is yet to land. I will find out from the head of the Navy directly why his men are taking my ships from me. I will learn if the storm tide's still coming in."
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Ch.9 Historic Latta Plantation