Deadline Y2K (32 page)

At 11:45 on 85th Street, Copeland and Spillman watched Barbra Streisand belt out a love song to New York City live and direct from Madison Square Garden.

Across the rivers, America waited and watched the clock.

The congestion thinned below the Village, and the motorcycle got up to speed on Lower Broadway. At 11:46 Garcia arrived in front of the building on Nassau Street with fourteen minutes to spare.

Doc and Bo were waiting in the street. Bo immediately rushed upstairs with the disk while Doc stayed to invite the police captain to come in.

“I really can't. I have to get back and take care of my precinct,” Garcia said.

“You can probably do that better from here,” Doc told him. “Come on.”

The driver twisted his throttle and said, “What's it gonna be, captain?”

“I gotta go back, Doc. I'm gonna let Copeland out of his house. Did you know he was locked in?”

Doc laughed and waved and went inside.

Upstairs, Bo inserted the Zip disk into the drive, checked the directory on the screen, and loaded seven files into seven systems that would run simultaneously on the IBM, one for each of five power plants, one for the command center on 65th, and one for the grid interconnect switching station at the East River plant. Then he linked the IBM to the seven locations. When Doc walked in, Bo was ready to take over the system with the push of a button.

One small screen in Bo's console was wired into ConEd's security and surveillance system. Doc saw fifty people on the verge of panic in a huge room reminiscent of Houston's Mission Control. Sarah was in the foreground, sitting at the master operator's station, wearing a headset and looking anxiously up at the big screen above the security camera.

Doc put on a headset and called her.

“Doc here.”

“You got the disk?”

“Yes, ma'am. The codes are installed and we're ready to go.”

“You have some heavyweight friends, Doc. I never suspected that.”

“Sarah, the only friend I need now is you. I expect you have a lot of anxious people there,” he said without stating directly that he could see them.

“You might say that,” Sarah replied. “They heard me talk to the mayor and Peter Wilcox because I put the calls on the speakers, and they know I gave the override codes to a police captain on Wilcox's orders.”

“Do they understand your system will crash and burn unless we do this?” Doc asked.

“Some do, some don't. Most of them think I'm out of my mind, and maybe they're right. I am out of my mind, but I'm going through with this anyway.”

“I, for one, am extremely grateful,” Doc said. “Now, I'm going to turn you over to a young man named Bo Daniels. It was Bo who found the Y2K solution for your load factor applications. He found the bad chips in the feeder valves at Waterside that I told you about. Most of the data I've given you in the past two years came from Bo. All right?”

“Whatever you say, Doc.”

Doc unplugged his headset, took it off, and nodded to Bo. “It's all yours. Drive carefully.”

“Sarah?” Bo said. “Hello.”

“Hello, Bo. You nervous?”

“Yes.”

“Me, too.”

“Okay,” Bo said. “We're both nervous, but can we get acquainted later? I have the overrides installed for the five plants, the command center, and the interconnect at East River, and I need to run the them
right now.
”

Sarah punched keys on her terminal and said, “You're in command.”

“Ravenswood,” Bo said crisply.

“Check. She's yours.”

“Waterside.”

“Check.”

“East River.”

“Check.”

“59th Street Station.”

“Check.”

“74th Street Station.”

“Check.”

“West End.”

“Check.”

“Interconnects.”

“Check.”

“Going to the interconnects now. We're going to disconnect ConEd from the grid.”

“Thank God,” Sarah exclaimed. “That's exactly what I believed we should've done two hours ago. The chief thought I was nuts.”

“So we're on the same page?” Bo asked.

“Same page, same paragraph. Let's do it,” Sarah said. “Show me what you got, Bo. Every other company on the grid is going to scream bloody murder, but that's too damned bad. Let's knock 'em down.”

“Ready?”

“Ready.”

“Pleasant Valley.”

“Disconnect. Check.”

“Ramapo–Landentown.”

“Disconnect. Check.”

“Farragut.”

“Disconnect. Check.”

“Goethals.”

“Disconnect. Check.”

“Jamaica.”

“Disconnect. Okay.”

Bo took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “That's all of them. I don't see any leakage, do you?”

“No, sir. We're on our own now. We just violated every rule the public utilities commission ever wrote. I'm popping circuit breakers all over the place,” Sarah announced. “Hold on. Rerouting all 345kV lines. All right. We're isolated. My phones are ringing. I think a lot of pissed off people upstate are already calling me.”

“Don't answer,” Bo replied, turning up both thumbs and winking at Doc.

“Wait a minute. I'm trying to reroute the 345s, and, and, they're already rerouted.”

“That's right,” Bo said. “I don't trust your distribution controls.”

“I guess you know what you're doing.”

“Thanks,” Bo said, “but I'm going to need a lot of help before this night is over.”

Bo began firing technical questions at Sarah, and Doc went into the lounge to watch a little Barbra Streisand. It was 11:55. If the day were to end now, he thought it would pass muster. He had a new lady-friend whom he liked a lot. He'd made fifty million bucks for his little band of outlaws. He'd found a way to get the damned overrides, and Bo was in command of Con Edison with a shot at finding out if his system could run the plants and generate enough juice to keep the lights on.

The members of the Midnight Club were glued to their stations. Jody moved among them, recording these last minutes. She crouched down beside Ronnie, catching a close-up of a sweaty temple, then stood and panned the room, taking in all the clocks.

Doc lit a cigarette and noticed his hands were trembling.

*   *   *

After building toward a crescendo all day and night, during the last five minutes the city's frenzy launched into a cosmic realm. The bands played louder, people danced harder, the religious prayed more fervently and an enormous tintinnabulation radiated from Manhattan like the swelling rise of a long drum solo. It was a cold night and yet people were in a sweat because no one could keep still. The tension forced everyone into motion, into acts of sexual passion, wanton destruction, into confessing their sins at the top of their lungs. People smashed their clocks and turned up their stereos to ear-shattering volume. Thousands fired gunshots into the air to mark the passing of the 20th Century.

In the still air of a surgical theater Bill Packard opened Rudy Giuliani's chest and saved his life.

At 11:58 the frenzy suddenly stopped and the city turned eerily quiet, as though the entire population understood the moment. It was here.

At 11:59 the ecumenical council of the Millennium Religious Sanctuary of the 24th Precinct led their flock in prayer.

“Our Father who art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy name…”

The ball began to drop in Times Square. In silence the crowd watched the descent.

On Nassau Street Bo had installed the overrides. Con Edison was isolated from the grid whose other members were screaming foul. The screens were live with real feeds from the command center, and Bo and Sarah were rapidly reconfiguring their five precious power plants to shoulder the load.

“I'm holding my breath,” Ronnie shouted.

Wilson Picket blew out the last bars of “The Midnight Hour.” Doc threw open a window and looked up at the World Trade Center whose twin towers framed the moon. He kissed Jody, this time without prompting.

The last seconds of the 20th Century were counted down like a rocket launch. Five, four, three, two, one.

Midnight.

PART THREE

January 1, 2000

16

The ball in Times Square descended halfway and stopped, as if time itself were suspended. Twelve thousand rhinestones and 180 halogen lights glistened and sparkled, but the sphere was immobilized. The crowd gasped. The twenty-four giant video screens went blank and the crowd gasped again. Then, with no preamble, the screens suddenly came alive with film of a monstrous subway train rushing headlong at the camera, coming closer and closer, blue sparks flying, the thundering roar of steel wheels on steel rails exploding through the sound system. The unexpected terror of the film slammed the crowd like a howitzer. A half million people were screaming when the hurtling train suddenly stopped in a blurry freeze-frame. In giant script, splashed in crimson across the front of the cab were the words, “Adrian 2000.”

The screens faded to black. A pair of dumbstruck operators in the main video truck thrashed at their controls, shrieking their astonishment, when images from live cameras around 42nd Street popped back onto the screens as they'd been programmed to do. Scheduled events moved resolutely on. Bands played “Auld Lang Syne,” fireworks erupted from the Hudson River and Central Park, the world did not end, Christ did not appear in the 24th Precinct or anywhere else, and the ball completed its descent in stately fashion.

The crowd uttered a huge sigh of relief, thinking the moment had passed with nothing more than a trick. If that was the worst the dread millennium bug could do, party on!

The 21st Century commenced in the Eastern time zone. People in Manhattan danced and laughed away their fears and trepidations. To them, Y2K had been a hoax. It was all a big nonevent.

On the edge of the crowd, a five-year-old, bundled up against the cold and perched on his father's shoulders, pointed up at Mickey Mouse's big digital clock.

“Look, Daddy!”

The display read, “8:01
A.M
. January 5, 1980.”

*   *   *

On Nassau Street, Doc had watched the finale of Barbra's show from the Garden. After Barbra blew kisses and gushed, “Happy New Year! Happy New Year everybody!” New York 1 had switched coverage to Times Square, and Doc had witnessed Adrian's prank.

Laughing so hard he fell out of his chair, he lay on the floor and shouted across the room, “Adrian, you're beautiful!”

The kid was irrepressible, God bless him. Doc picked himself up, crossed the room, and gave the boy a pat on the back.

“Way to go, Adrian. Nice hack.”

Adrian shrugged, fixated on his monitor that displayed a duplicate of the big screen in the MTA dispatch center. Red and green lights twinkled and jumped from one electrical block to the next, showing the movement of trains in 238 miles of tunnels.

Doc glanced at the clocks. 12:02. The Eastern time zone was toast but didn't know it yet. He went from station to station, offering murmurs of encouragement. He'd done his part, preparing the Midnight Club for their moment of glory, but this was like nuclear war. There was no way to practice.

“Ronnie? How's the water supply?”

“Okay coming in. Going out not so good. Six of fourteen treatment plants are down, and three more are on the brink.”

“Carolyn? Phones?”

“MCI and GTE are down. Bell and AT&T are up. Military hardened land lines are up. State police dedicated lines are down. All our lines are up.”

“Judd? The Web?”

“Internet is dead. There is no Web. DARPA is still up, but spotty.”

“Bo?”

“I'm going to lose two plants in Queens and one in the Bronx.”

Bo's fingers trembled above his keyboard and sweat poured down his temples.

“How's Sarah?” Doc asked.

“Terrified.”

Doc lit a Camel. On Bo's main screen, the flow of electricity through the grid of which Con Edison was no longer a part was measured by a flickering chart. The grid had been under heavy load since nuclear-fueled plants were taken off-line earlier in the day, and all the plants were straining to provide extra power for all the cities illuminated for millennium celebrations.

An array of smaller screens displayed the output from each of ConEd's ten remaining power plants, three of which were faltering.

“Steady as she goes,” Bo said into his headset. “Steady, steady, oh shit.”

Spikes appeared on several of the smaller screens, and a huge downward spike flashed on the big monitor.

“It's coming! It's coming! Hold onto your hat, Sarah.”

“Oh my God.”

“You're going to lose Astoria, Hudson Avenue and Narrows right now,” Bo said rapidly, naming the three failing Con Edison power plants. “I'm initiating the isolation of Manhattan. We can't wait. Astoria has lost all boiler controls in number three and she's about to blow sky high.”

“I can see that.”

“Well, shut the damned plant down!” Bo demanded. “Do it!”

“I'm trying,” Sarah answered, her stress radiating from Bo's headset. “I'm losing my phones to the six outer plants.”

“Shit,” Bo shouted. “Carolyn! Her phones are going down.”

“I can't do a damned thing about their dedicated lines, Bo. I've been telling them for months to check their telcom switches, but they didn't. They're toast.”

“We're all toast,” Sarah said dejectedly.

“Not yet,” Bo said as he launched a program that reconfigured the transmission and distribution of electricity from the five plants he hoped were compliant through 53 substations to Manhattan and thin slices of Brooklyn and Queens along the East River waterfront. The isolation of the island was complete. The rest of New York had to stand or fall on its own.