“Look on the bright side. We should be out of the city by now. If it does blow, we’ll only take out a few kangaroos at most.”
“And us.”
“And some terrorists.”
“You are just a positive guy, aren’t you?”
Tyler grinned. “I try. Now let’s do this before I decide it’s moronic.”
He followed Grant behind one of the barrels and crouched down. Even if the load didn’t detonate, the shrapnel from the blast could be deadly.
Grant nodded that his phone was ready to receive. Tyler closed his eyes, covered his ears, and hit TALK.
The explosion sucked Tyler’s breath away and assaulted his nose with the signature smell of burnt tar he always associated with C-4. He held his breath to wait for the smoke to dissipate through the new hole in the truck door.
He opened his eyes to see sunlight blazing into the trailer. He peeked over the barrel to look at Grant’s handiwork. The charge blasted a perfect hole in the bottom of the door, taking the external latch with it.
“Nicely done,” Tyler said.
Grant stood. “Well, we’re still here.” He went to the rear of the trailer and pushed the roll top door up on its tracks until it was wide open. Wind swirled into the truck, but the turbulence did little more than muss Tyler’s hair.
Except for the occasional scrub brush, the rusty outback consisted of nothing but dirt and rocks, with low mountain ranges in the distance. The rapidly receding asphalt pavement disappeared to a point at the horizon. Tyler didn’t like the idea of leaping out onto it. Unless they could clad themselves in bubble wrap, the impact wouldn’t be fun. Without helmets, they’d be lucky not to bash their heads in.
“They’re not slowing down,” Grant said. “They had to have seen the explosion from the chase van.”
“They might be guiding the truck by GPS. I know I wouldn’t want to be this close to a truck full of ANFO.”
“I’ll see if I can find any landmarks.” Grant poked his head around the corner on the passenger side. When he pulled back, his expression was even grimmer than before.
“It’s worse than we thought.”
“Why?”
“Take a look.”
Tyler exchanged places with him and peered around the edge, squinting as the wind lashed his face. At first all he noticed was the white side of the trailer pasted with the name “Western Lines.” Then he blanched when he saw the source of all the bumping and clashing metal they’d heard before heading out on the highway.
They weren’t on just a conventional tractor trailer. They were on a road train. Instead of just a single trailer, there were three more identical ones hitched in front of it. That explained why the detonator’s receiver was nowhere to be found. It must have been in one of the other trailers.
Bedova was wrong about the amount of explosive Colchev had acquired. If the other trailers were as chock full of ANFO as this one, the road train was hauling 320,000 pounds of the stuff, enough to destroy not just a city block, but an entire downtown.
TWENTY
After the car carrying Kessler, Morgan, and Vince was cleared through the front gate of Pine Gap, it was just a short drive to the main part of the facility. Although Morgan had been expecting the dazzling white buildings she’d seen in the photos, the six spherical radomes housing the satellite uplink equipment were far larger than she thought they’d be.
They came to a stop in front of a two-story building that would have looked right at home in an American office park. The semi following them continued around the building.
“Welcome to Pine Gap,” Kessler said as he got out.
Joint Defence Facility Pine Gap, run by both the US and Australian governments, sprawls across a dusty plain eleven miles southwest of Alice Springs. The National Security Agency station, shielded by mountains on all sides, is so secret that it’s the only facility in Australia designated as a “prohibited” flight area, meaning no aircraft flying lower than 18,000 feet are allowed within 2.5 miles of the base.
Speculation about the facility’s true purpose has been rampant. Morgan knew that its widely believed function as an ECHELON listening post was correct. The NSA ECHELON program samples cell phone, email, and text messages from around the world for any specific keywords deemed critical to protecting US interests, and Pine Gap is important for communicating with satellites orbiting over the southern hemisphere. But few knew of the facility’s other role in preparing weapons to be evaluated at the Woomera Test Range.
“When can we start the briefing?” Morgan said.
“Follow me and I’ll show you to an office you can use while you’re here. Then I’ll need to instruct my people where the equipment from the truck should go. It ought to take about ten minutes. When I’m done, we’ll begin the briefing.”
He took them inside the structure and guided them to a small room with two desks and chairs. After giving them the security password to the internal WiFi system, Kessler walked out.
Vince leaned over to Morgan. “What’s your secret?”
“What do you mean?”
“We’ve been in the air for twenty-four hours, and you look like you’re ready to run a marathon. I’m about to keel over.”
Morgan shrugged. “I don’t need much sleep.”
“That’s it? You don’t need much sleep?”
“Right.”
They both sat and started setting up their laptops to securely access the OSI network when the door opened and Collins poked his head in.
The technician scanned the room. “I thought Dr. Kessler might be here.”
“He just left. Is there a problem?”
“No, I just need to let him know that we’re ready to receive the Killswitch.”
Morgan looked at Vince in confusion, then back to Collins.
“What do you mean?” she said.
“Wasn’t the Killswitch coming separately from the semi?”
“Yes,” Vince said. “Kessler said you were expecting it.”
“I am,” Collins said with a puzzled look. “That’s what I’m trying to say.”
“Isn’t it here already?” Morgan said. She and Vince stood. Something was very wrong here.
Collins looked as if he were being asked a trick question. “If the Killswitch was here, I wouldn’t be telling you we’re ready to receive it.”
“The truck left ten minutes before we did,” Vince said. “Josephson was with it. He should have been here by now.”
“Are you sure the Killswitch truck isn’t somewhere in the facility?” Morgan said.
Collins nodded slowly, his face dawning with horrified comprehension. “I’m absolutely positive. The truck with the Killswitch on board never arrived.”
While Zotkin drove the van, Colchev sat at the control station in back. Although they were six miles behind the road train, the video feed from the cab allowed Colchev to monitor the truck’s progress on its suicide mission. He had a driver’s eye view of the road, only eleven miles of which were left before it reached its destination. More cameras on either side gave him panoramic views to the left and right. When the truck blasted through the Pine Gap gate, which would prove no match for the massive protective steel bullbar frame over the engine bay, he’d be able to see it wend its way into the center of the complex before the contents of the four trailers blew the facility off the
