Page 5 of Mastermind

“That’s the first thing the Jersey field office checked. They’ve got EMF meters that should pick up anything that powerful,” replies Sheppard.

“And?”

“Nothing. Across the river, it’s business as usual. This is literally localized to Manhattan, and there’s been no sign of an EMP. What else could it be? What’s a more exotic explanation?”

“Like a mini black hole,” says Vaslov. “We might as well be talking about aliens at that point. It could be some kind of weird atmospheric phenomenon we’ve never seen before.” He thinks for a moment. “At really high altitudes, you can get what are called trolls—huge, dark mushroom-shaped clouds that have massive lightning discharges.”

“Could we be looking at one of those?” asks Sheppard.

Vaslov shrugs. “Probably not. They appear at high altitude for a reason.”

“Could someone cause one at a lower altitude?” Sheppard is desperate for any answer. “Maybe if they used some kind of inert gas to replicate the oxygen density and had a way to start a plasma discharge . . . I don’t know.”

I point to the top of a building poking out above the Void. “Well, there’s something there. Can we send in a drone for a better look?”

“We have a helicopter waiting for us at the airport. How close do you want to get?” he asks.

“As close as possible,” Vaslov answers for me.

I silently question the judgment of taking a chopper too close to what may or may not be an EMP capable of taking down an entire city, but Vaslov is the physicist.

“Okay. I’ll get you both on it,” says Sheppard.

Well, it’s too late to point that out now.

CHAPTER FOUR

FLYOVER

Our Black Hawk helicopter skims across Upper Bay, and the void that is New York City looms before us like a frozen tidal wave of darkness against the luminous blue night sky.

Electrical discharges are visible to the naked eye from here. A thermal camera with a monitor in the passenger compartment shows the outline of the skyline under the mysterious cloud.

“Look there,” says Sheppard.

To our left is the Statue of Liberty, still illuminated, looking like a miniature against the massive obsidian backdrop surrounding the city.

“What do we know about what happened before . . . this?” I ask over the intercom.

“Not much. There’s a dispatch call center in Brooklyn that says right before, they were getting reports of possible car bombs and fires.”

Car bombs? Interesting.

“Any reports from the island?” I ask.

“Not yet. We’re about to send some people over the bridges on foot with face masks and air tanks. It’s so thick there, you can’t even make it ten feet. There are also lots of car fires.” Car fires . . .

We fly closer until the Void looms so high above us that it looks like a mountain range. And yet we’re still not even close. The most similar sight I can think of is the plume from a volcano. Last I checked there weren’t any active volcanos within thousands of miles of here.

“Vaslov?” asks Sheppard.

“It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen.” The physicist is leaning against the window, his mouth open.

“Now you’ve seen it. Explain it.”

“It’s like the ash cloud of a volcano,” he replies.

Great minds . . .