The Leviathan Effect (38 page)

“Okay,” the President said, staring at Wu. “I’m looking at the numbers you’re giving us and the numbers they’re giving us and they’re not lining up. They’re not even close.”

Dr. Wu nodded. “That is correct, sir.”

“The numbers they’re giving us aren’t real. Is that what you’re saying?”

Wu waited before answering, as if it were a complicated question.
He summoned his diplomat’s persona. “Sir, I’ve gone through all of the computer models. Two of them do in fact show a turn to the east, of varying degree, by nine
A.M.
—”

“But that’s not what’s happening.”

“No, not at this point, sir. This high pressure system appears to be pushing the storm north and west.”

“And it hasn’t lost any strength since their report last night?”

“Minimally, perhaps. Because of an eye wall effect. But not appreciably, no.”

“An eye wall effect. Explain.”

“Most large storms go through an eye wall replacement cycle. What usually happens is that an outer eye wall will move in and replace the inner eye wall, forming a larger eye. The immediate effect is that the storm will weaken during this cycle and then re-intensify and become even stronger. That’s what happened with Katrina in 2005 shortly before it struck land.”

He changed the image on the large monitor and pointed to the eastern bands of Alexander, where a counterclockwise system seemed to contain the early stages of another eye wall.

The President turned away. Wu didn’t enjoy being the bearer of bad news, and wouldn’t have been unless he was absolutely certain. Now, there was no choice.

“What’s this about, then?” the President said, at last.

“Maybe they just can’t do it, sir.”

“They can build it but they can’t take it apart?”

“Maybe.” Dr. Wu sighed. “As I mentioned earlier, sir, a storm of this size has so many variables. And, in a manner of speaking, its own sense of logic. Or lack of logic. It can behave in ways that may be, frankly, beyond our ability to understand. This storm has something I’ve never seen before. What almost seems like a survival instinct.”

The Vice President snorted, then scooted back in his chair. “Sorry,” he said.

“No, that’s a perfectly natural reaction,” Dr. Wu said, turning to Stanton. “I would never have said anything like that before yesterday. But this storm isn’t like any I’ve ever seen.”

“All right,” the President said, gesturing impatiently. “What are our options?”

“Options?” Dr. Wu looked at his shoes. “I don’t know that that
word applies anymore, sir. If this new eye wall continues to organize, I’m afraid that our only real option is to get out of its way.”

C
HARLES
M
ALLORY LIFTED
his head and saw the pizza box and the bottle of merlot on the counter from the night before. He looked over at the other motel bed and saw Blaine. She was sitting up, pillow propped vertically behind her back, gazing at the silent television, wearing nothing but one of his dress shirts, half-buttoned, and her underpants. Except for the bruises on her face, she looked awfully nice.

“What time is it?”

“9:32,” she said.

“A long couple of minutes.”

“Funny how that happens.”

He glanced at the TV screen. A scene of boarded up homes along a stretch of North Carolina coast, then a traffic jam coming off a barrier island. A list of
MANDATORY EVACUATIONS
scrolled across the bottom of the screen.

“How’s the storm?”

“Worse,” she said. “I’m really worried. I keep trying to call my son but can’t reach him.”

She gazed down at the cell phone in her right hand. Mallory climbed out of bed and walked to the window, wearing boxer shorts and a dark polo shirt. He glanced outside, saw the rain dimpling puddles in the parking lot.

“Want to come over and sit with me for a minute?”

He turned. “Sure,” he said. “Okay.”

Mallory walked to the bed. Her green eyes were keen and damp, watching him.

“I need a hug,” she said.

Mallory walked around to her. He met her on the other side.

“Just not too hard. Okay?”

They gave each other a tentative hug, then tried a longer one. It felt good. She pulled her head away to look at him and he kissed her softly and she kissed him back. He breathed the scent of shampoo in her soft hair, and pulled her against him. They folded onto the bed together, touching each other’s faces. And then Blaine unbuttoned the shirt and pulled it off and Mallory took off his clothes and
they slipped under the covers and held each other. Everything about Blaine excited him. Her skin, her hair, her lips, her courage, the easy way she held him, the way her eyes watched his, the way she pulled him into her. For a few minutes he forgot everything else that was happening in the world.

Afterward, they lay in the covers, holding hands. Then it began to rain harder again. And then harder. And eventually, the outside returned.

“I wish we could just stay here,” she said.

“Does it say somewhere that we can’t?”

“No.” She turned her head to the wall. “Except it’s nearing ten thirty.”

“And …?”

“I seem to recall you saying something about confronting Easton.”

“Well, yeah. Someone has to.”

“But the President wants me to come in for an 11:15 meeting about the storm. Dr. Jared Clayton will be there.”

“Oh. Really.” Mallory propped himself on an elbow and watched her with a new interest. “Where is he?”

“He’s at the White House right now. And he’s talking. Sending him those memos worked, apparently. He’s been talking with the President and Dr. Wu about something. The mitigation hasn’t been effective. It’s not working.”

“Uh oh.”

“Yeah. They want to lay the cards out for everyone, apparently.”

“You knew all that but didn’t tell me?”

“A question of priorities.”

“I see.”

She smiled, and her eyes brightened with a lovely, warm intensity. “I just needed to stop thinking for a few minutes.”

Mallory watched her, frowning now, as she sat up under the covers.

“No,” she said, “I don’t mean it like that. Really. That was wonderful.”

Good
, he thought. She reached for him and they held on to each other, and stopped thinking again, for another few minutes.

A
S
C
ATHERINE
B
LAINE ENTERED
the Data Visualization Center in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, Dr. Jared Clayton was seated beside Dr. Wu, his elbows spread on the conference table, his eyes intently watching the monitors in front of him; at first glance, Wu appeared to be his young son.

Blaine nodded quickly to the others around the table as she took a seat: Vice President Bill Stanton, Intelligence Director Harold DeVries, Secretary of State Kathryn Milford, Chief of Staff Gabriel Herring, National Security Advisor Nan Sewell, FEMA Director Shauna Brewster, National Weather Service Administrator Kevin Green, and John Hasty, the Director of Emergency Management for the District of Columbia. Conspicuously absent was Clark Easton, the Secretary of Defense.

Normally, an emergency management meeting would involve the heads of FEMA and Homeland Security, not national defense officials or Cabinet members. Blaine wondered if the President was going to bring others into the circle this morning.

She sat between Milford and Herring, and quietly did what the others were doing: she glanced through the update summaries on Hurricane Alexander. The news was not good. Alexander was a still-well-organized Category 3 hurricane, the largest ever in the North Atlantic Ocean.

After several minutes, the door slid open and the President entered, alone, carrying a bottle of Evian in his right hand and a blue briefing folder in his left. Everyone stood until he took his seat at the end of the conference table.

“Good morning,” he said. He frowned at Blaine as he sat, and touched a forefinger to his right eye.

Blaine shrugged. “I tripped.”

The President’s frown deepened. “All right, then,” he said. His gaze roamed the faces around the table. “Let’s get right to it. I have been to FEMA headquarters and met with Director Brewster, and I think they’re doing a great job. I’ve met with Dr. Wu here and with the folks from the National Weather Service.” The President took a drink from his water. “We’re going to address several issues this morning, but we’ll start with the summary. Jim?”

Dr. Wu, wearing one of his short-sleeved light blue dress shirts and a conservative tie that ended several inches above his belt, stood and clicked the wireless presentation remote in his right hand. Two rows of numbers appeared on the large monitor screen behind him, each showing tracking data recorded over the past twelve hours, relayed from the National Hurricane Center. The smaller row of monitors displayed maps and charts of the system, including one with fifteen computer “spaghetti models” predicting the storm’s path; all of them now showed Alexander making landfall in the mid-Atlantic region in approximately thirty-six hours.

“We’ve seen a shift, a nudge to the left, over the past few hours,” he said. “As you can see, most of the projections now have the center of this storm coming into or near the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay. Unfortunately, that would mean that we will probably see a pretty direct hit here in Washington.”

“Which would be unprecedented,” said Brewster, a sprightly, freckled blond-haired woman in her late fifties.

“Yes.” Dr. Wu nodded. As he stood beside Dr. Clayton’s chair for a moment, the two men appeared to be the same height, Blaine noticed, even though Clayton was seated. “Quite possibly the worst we’ve ever had,” he said.

“Uh, can you explain that?” said the Vice President, punctuating the question by clearing his throat. “I thought being inland here gives us a buffer that the coast doesn’t have.”

“No, actually not,” said Dr. Wu. “Not if the storm comes up the Chesapeake, and the bay and its tributaries overflow. Much of what is between us and the Bay is sea level or close to it. On this track, we’re going to be extremely vulnerable. Much of the eastern shores
of Virginia and Maryland are going to be under water. That’s maybe less than twenty-four hours away.”

“Under water,”
said the Vice President.

“Yes, unfortunately.” Dr. Wu took a breath and glanced at the President. “We all heard the criticisms about New Orleans allowing building below sea level. Well, the Eastern Shore isn’t much better. With the projected storm surge, much of the land surrounding the Bay is going to be flooded. I don’t think there’s any other possible scenario at this point.”

Blaine saw what had changed: there was no room for caution anymore; Dr. Wu, who had become a likeable resident expert in recent years, was clearly uncomfortable as the bearer of life-altering news. He looked physically ill to Blaine, as if he were about to vomit.

“So what are we looking at?” asked DeVries. “How deep under water?”

“In some areas, a few inches. In others, perhaps ten to twenty feet.”

“Jesus H. Christ,” said the Vice President.

“And what about Washington?” asked Secretary of State Kathryn Milford.

“Yes, I’m getting to that,” Wu said, an unfamiliar edge in his voice. He stepped to one of the workstations and typed a sequence on a keyboard, then stepped back and clicked his wireless remote. “This is the model that we created with the National Weather Service just in the past couple of hours. I’ll walk you through it.”

Dr. Wu narrated the progression of images that appeared on the large monitor: computer simulated models of the Potomac River flooding its banks, the water then spreading over land, dispersing throughout the city.

“This is the most likely scenario,” he began. “Tomorrow afternoon or early evening, the Potomac will begin to flood, first into the streets of Georgetown, Southeast and Alexandria, Virginia.”

The simulation focused in on Georgetown for a moment, showing water filling the lower streets and then rising all the way to M Street.

“We’ve got forty-five miles of riverfront in D.C.,” Dr. Wu continued on, “and all along those forty-five miles we’re going to see extensive flooding. There’s simply nowhere for all that water to go. Hains Point, East Potomac Park, and most of the Mall will be under water by tomorrow evening.”

“The
Mall
,” said the Vice President.

Blaine looked at the President, who was soberly watching the screen.

“So we’d be particularly vulnerable
here
, presumably,” said DeVries.

“Yes. As you can see.” Dr. Wu pressed a key to start a new simulation. “This is what we expect overnight tomorrow.”

On the screen, a tide of floodwaters rolled steadily east from the Potomac, covering the entire National Mall and the surrounding streets to the Capitol, drowning the South Lawn of the White House, reaching to the top of its first-floor windows.

“There’s a basin just south of where we’re sitting now,” Dr. Wu went on, “which is the lowest point in the city. The flood waters will most likely move north along Seventeenth Street, then down Constitution Avenue and settle into the Federal Triangle area. Everything within the boundaries of Fifteenth Street, Constitution Avenue, and Pennsylvania Avenue will be under water.”

“Inches? Feet?” the Vice President asked.

Wu blinked at the President, not looking at Stanton. “Again, that depends,” he said. “If you want to stay with worst-case scenario.” He paused, glancing at Brewster. “Then we’re talking ten feet, minimum.”

“Probably a lot more,” said the FEMA director.

“This may seem an inappropriate question to ask at this point,” said the Secretary of State, “but with this inherent vulnerability, has anyone ever thought of constructing levees to protect the Mall?”

“Actually, we do have levees,” Dr. Wu said, in his flat, measured tone. “But they’re old and they’re not adequate. There’s one right behind us, in fact.” He pointed out the window toward the Washington Monument. “You may have noticed when you’re on the Mall, there’s an odd little hill north of the Reflecting Pool, between the World War II Memorial and the Lincoln Memorial.”