Lucifer's Hammer

The Dutch had lived with that knowledge all their lives, and what they feared had come to pass; Holland couldn’t conceivably have survived the tidal waves following Hammerfall.

“I think the best place for your radio is on one of the cooling towers,” Dolf said. “But those are cut off from the plant.” He climbed a board staircase to the top of the levee and pointed. Across a hundred feet of water the cooling towers loomed up, four of them set inside a smaller levee that had leaked badly. Their bases were partly flooded. A thick white plume rose from each of the towers, climbed into the sky, growing ghostly, finally vanishing.

“They won’t have any trouble finding this place,” Tim said.

“No.”

“Hey, I thought nuclear plants were nonpolluting.”

Dolf Weigley laughed. “That’s no pollution. Steam, that’s all it is. Water vapor. How could it be smoke? We’re not burning anything.” He pointed to a narrow planked footbridge leading from the levee to the nearest tower. “That’s the only way over unless we get out a boat. But I still think it’s the best place for the radio.”

“So do I, but we can’t carry the ante

“Sure we can. You ready? Let’s get the stuff.”

Tim gingerly climbed the slanting ladder that zigzagged up the side of the big redwood tower. Once again he was impressed with the organization at SJNP. Weigley had gone into the yard and come back with men to carry the radio, car batteries and ante

He reached the top of the fifty-foot tower. He was about thirty feet above the level of the sea. The base of the tower was surrounded by a leaking dam, and pumps worked to keep its intakes clear. There was a strong wind into the tower at its bottom.

The thing was big, over two hundred feet in diameter. The deck where Tim stood was a large metal plate pierced by i

“This is a good place for the radio,” Tim said. He looked doubtfully out across the San Joaquin Sea. “But it’s a little exposed.”

Weigley shrugged. “We can put some sandbags up. Build a shelter. And we can string a telephone line from here back to the plant. Question is, do you want the radio here?”

“Let’s find out.”

It took an hour to get the beam ante

Weigley found a perch on the rail. “It surprises me, sometimes,” he said.

“Were you here when… ?”

“Yeah. None of us believed the comet would hit us, of course. As far as Mr. Price was concerned, it was just another working day. He was mad about absenteeism. A lot of the crew didn’t show up. Then, when it did hit, that just made it worse. We didn’t have all our people.”

“I still don’t see how you could do it,” Tim said.

“Price is a genius,” Weigley said. “As soon as we knew, even before the earthquake, he was getting things set for survival. He had those bulldozers out scraping up a levee before the rain hit us. He sent me and some others out into the valley to the railroad, to fill up the tank trucks. Diesel fuel, gasoline, we got all we could. And there was a boxcar on the siding. full of flour and beans, and Mr. Price made us get all of it. We’re sure glad he did. There’s not much variety, but we didn’t starve. Why you laughing?”

“The fishermen feel the same way.”

“Who doesn’t? Can you believe you’ll never taste a banana again? We could use some orange juice, for that matter. We’re worried about scurvy.”

“The orange tree is extinct in California. Sometimes we can dig some Tang out of a market.” The longer Tim looked at that wall of earth between him and the San Joaquin Sea, the bigger it got. “Doff, how could you have put that up while the valley was flooding?”

“We couldn’t have. It’s a crazy story. The original idea was to put the plant over nearer to Wasco. Mr. Price wanted it up here, on the ridge, because the blowdown from the cooling towers would drain better, we wouldn’t have to dig the ponds as deep. The Department’s managers didn’t like that. Made the plant more visible.”

“Oh, but it’s beautiful! It’s like a 1930s Amazing Stories cover. The future!”

“That’s what Mr. Price said. Anyway, they did put the plant up here on the ridge.”

It wasn’t much of a ridge, of course; no more than a low rolling hill. The plant wasn’t more than twenty feet higher than the surrounding valley.

“And after they did the work, the Department got scared and they built the levees,” Weigley said. “Not for any real reason. Just to hide the plant so the environmentalists wouldn’t think about it when they drove along Interstate Five.” Weigley’s lips tightened. “And then some of the bastards who tried to kill the plant raised hell because we spent the extra money on the levee! But it came in handy. All we had to do was bulldoze up enough dirt to fill the gaps, the places where the roads and railway came in through the screening banks, and a good thing, too. That water rose fast after Hammerfall.”

“I’ll bet. I drove over that sea,” Tim said.

“How’s that?”

Tim explained. “Heard any stories about Flying Dutchmen?”

Weigley shook his head. “But we haven’t had much contact with outsiders. Mayor Allen didn’t think it would be a good idea.”

“Allen. I saw him. How’d he get here?”

“Showed up just before the water got too deep. He was in City Hall when the tidal wave came through Los Angeles. Man, has he got a story to tell! Anyway, he showed up the next day with a dozen cops and City Hall people. You know, Los Angeles owned the plant, before Hammerfall—”

“So Mayor Allen is the boss here.”

“No! Mr. Price is in charge. The mayor’s a guest. Just like you. What does he know about power plants?”

Tim didn’t point out that it was Weigley who’d told him the mayor was the one who discouraged outside contacts. “So you’ve ridden out the end of the world,” Tim said. “By keeping the plant going. What are you pla

Weigley shrugged. “That’s up to Mr. Price. And don’t think it’s been any soft job keeping things ru

“That sounds like a lot of—”

“Ten million light bulbs.” Weigley gri

“A lot, yeah. How long can you keep that up?”

“At full capacity, about a year. But we’re not ru

Tim looked back at the plant. Two enormous concrete domes, which contained the nuclear reactors. Each had a series of rectangular buildings attached that contained the turbines and control equipment.

“Number Two’s not operational,” Weigley said. “Getting her up will be our first job once the water’s gone down. And then we’ll be able to put twenty megawatts on line for somebody else to use. We can keep that up for fifty years.”