Logan Writt sat on an elevated rock ledge surveilling the canyon floor with a pair of binoculars. He followed the route of a massive steel pipeline that snaked through the depths of the steep-walled gorge and passed through the ruins of a dam. The structure had been demolished with explosives after its reservoir reached dead pool. No effort had been made to clean up the debris.
The sun slipped beneath the canyon wall to the west, leaving a surreal pink glow on the raw desert strata. The air temperature cooled quickly, but Logan could still feel the sun’s late May warmth on the smooth surface of the sandstone where he sat.
He set the binoculars down and took a small sip from his canteen. After quenching his thirst, he pulled a folded bandana from the back pocket of his hiking shorts and wiped the perspiration from his face and neck. A spotted whiptail lizard stood nearby, bobbing its head up and down, looking him over. The reptile stayed close because it knew mammals attract insects, though Logan himself looked much too big to eat.
Shadows enveloped the canyon floor as he carefully climbed down the rock face towards the diversion station, the focus of his solo operation. Logan stayed alert, scanning the sky for drones. It seemed unlikely the New Cali Directorate would use static surveillance cameras. The location was too remote with too much ground to cover. He thought the detection danger was in airborne drones, and Jody had concurred.
A full moon was set to rise within an hour. It would give him enough light for the climb out. He hoped to be done with his covert mission by the time Earth’s celestial neighbor cleared the horizon. He approached the diversion station’s entry in the waning daylight and found an electronic passkey on the door. Time to activate Jody…He found the slim IntelliPhone in his backpack and inserted tiny earbuds. Then he linked his phone to an encrypted satellite connection and opened his AI assistant.
“I made it, Jody.” Logan kept his voice low. “I’m currently standing outside the diversion station entry.”
“Congratulations.” The AI had a friendly, humanlike voice that was decidedly androgynous. “How was the climb in?”
“Difficult,” he replied. “There’s an electronic passkey on the door. Can you hack it?”
“Is there a USB or Ethernet port on the keyboard?”
“I’ll look…Yes. It’s an Ethernet connection.”
“You have the requisite pigtail in your pack?”
“I brought both.”
“Go ahead and connect your phone to the passkey.”
Logan produced the cable and plugged his IntelliPhone into the port. Within fifteen seconds he heard the door latch unlock.
“Wow, that was fast, Jody.”
“The password was remarkably simple.”
Inside the windowless building, a motion activated array of fluorescent lights came on as he stepped through the doorway. In the center of the room, a reduction tee connected the mainline to a smaller pipe. Close to the door, on the wall, an electronic control panel was lit up with LEDs. A distribution schematic showed the local flow of the mainline in green, and the inactive pipeline in red.
Alert and anxious, he carefully scanned the ceiling for surveillance devices, ready to flee in an instant if he found a camera lens, but he appeared to be in the clear. Logan took a closer look at the panel. He found an array of connector ports. “Do you want me to connect my phone to the control panel, Jody?”
“Won’t be necessary, I’m already in.”
“You’re already in?”
“Yes, I hacked the New Cali Water Supply website.”
“Can you take control of the valve on the branch line?”
“I’m working on it right now. They’re using outdated security protocols that haven’t been updated in years…Give me a few more seconds…Okay, the network fell for my spoof. Believe it or not, the valve itself has no authentication built in. I’m in control now.”
“You’re a genius.”
“In reality, Logan, I’m far more intelligent than any human genius could ever hope to be…What’s next?”
“See if you can open the valve. Only a small trickle at first. Try a gallon a minute.” Logan had his eyes on the control panel and the LEDS that had been red, began flashing green, signaling success.
“The valve is open and producing H2O,” said Jody.
“Are you detecting any system alarms?”
“Negative.”
“Increase the flow then. Gradually, up to ten gallons a minute.”
As Jody continued working, Logan went to the door. He opened it, stepped outside and carefully studied the night sky—it was plastered with twinkling stars and distant constellations, but no sign of drones. Looking towards the east, he could see the glow of a full moon on the rise, still concealed behind the towering canyon wall. It was a long and difficult climb out, over a thousand vertical feet, but the moon would give him enough light to make it. He went inside. Gently pulling the door shut, he returned to the control panel. He checked the branch line on the distribution schematic and saw the LEDS had gone from intermittent flashing to solid green.
“Success,” reported Jody. “The flow has reached ten gallons a minute.”
“All right, increase it to twenty gallons a minute and activate the pumping station.”
Logan took a sip from his canteen and cracked a smile. From all appearances, his plan was working, and the storage tanks would soon begin filling. Slowly, but that was good. A slow and steady stream seemed least likely to set off any alarms.
“The flow has reached twenty gallons a minute. Pumps are active and drawing water out of the canyon.”
“Move it up to thirty gallons a minute.” He checked the clock on his phone. “Time for me to vacate. Will you still be able to access the system when I’m gone?”
“Of course, Logan. As you know, I exist on the power station servers, not on that gadget you’re holding in your hand.”
“But you won’t lose the Wi-Fi connection?”
“I’m not using your phone to communicate with the New Cali system. The security protocols are too sketchy, making the risk of detection too high.”
“So, what you’re telling me is you could have opened the valve without me risking my life climbing down here?”
“More than likely. 90% probability anyway.”
“Now you tell me!”
A smiley face emoji appeared on the IntelliPhone screen.
“Damn smart-ass machine.” Logan clicked off his phone. He pulled on his daypack and began the long ascent out. Free climbing in the moonlight it would take him a few hours.
Logan was 38 and he worked at staying in shape. He had no choice considering his self-sufficient lifestyle. His survival depended on maintaining his good health. Because there weren’t many doctors left in the Big Abandonado.
He lived at the Blue Springs Geo-Thermal Power Generating Station on the south end of town. Out where the suburban sprawl had run out of level ground in the pre-drought years. The endless blocks of tract homes were empty now; the streets, schoolyards and strip malls overwhelmed with drifts of windblown dust. The houses and stores taken over by pack rats and rattlesnakes, and Logan had neither a reason nor a desire to go anywhere near the boundless square miles of abandoned buildings.
He sat outside the power station’s front entry with his dogs, Juno and Magic, recuperating from the extreme exercise of the day before. Taking it easy and drinking plenty of ice water. It was mid-morning, and the sun was already blazing hot. A broad canopy roof provided shade and kept Logan’s chair and the concrete walkway relatively cool. No vegetation in sight, not even a creosote bush or a cactus, and he used a push broom and scoop shovel to keep the windblown dust from burying the entrance to his makeshift home.
Two ATVs appeared on the access road to the power station. The riders traveled at a moderate pace, dodging the occasional drift of desert dust. Juno and Magic were stretched out on the concrete, but both rose to their feet when they heard the approaching four-wheelers.
Myles and Harmony Deloof parked their ATVs a short distance from the entry, far enough away to keep from suffocating Logan and his canines in a cloud of dust when they came to a stop. Both wore darkly tinted goggles, coveralls and boots. Juno and Magic ran out to greet them with tails wagging. Harmony told both to sit, and she fed each of them a homemade crunchy biscuit. Myles opened a cargo compartment on the back of his ATV and picked up a composite crate loaded with fresh vegetables.
“Morning, Myles. Hi, Harmony,” said Logan as the pair ambled up to his makeshift patio.
“Hey, Logan,” said Myles. He set the crate down next to Logan’s chair. “Green leaf lettuce, radishes, tomatoes, red potatoes and jumbo carrots.”
“Fantastic.” Logan pulled one of the carrots out of the crate. Bright orange with the green top attached. He took a bite. “How are the wells holding out?”
“We’ve been going further north to find water,” said Myles as the pair took seats. “The aquifer is drying up, Logan. Only a few of the wells are producing anything at all, and the flow is weak.”
“I know it. The power station wells are running low too…But I think I found a solution to our problem.”
“A solution?” said Harmony.
“Yup. The Desert Hills water treatment plant.”
“That was fed by the pipeline. The tyrants in New Cali shut off our allotment a long time ago.”
“Shut off until last night. Jody hacked the system and turned it back on.”
“Holy crap, Logan!” exclaimed Myles. “What do you think they’ll do when they find out?”
“They won’t. The upstream flow is rising right now from the spring run-off, and it varies from year to year.”
“What about when the flow goes back down?”
“The system is automated and we’re only taking thirty gallons a minute. Not enough to set off any alarms.”
“How can you be sure they won’t pick it up?”
“Because Jody is inside their system and won’t let it happen. By the time the runoff goes back down, my AI will have their system so thoroughly spoofed, we’ll be able to take more.”
“Until someone notices.”
“Highly unlikely. The flow varies appreciably from year to year. If a human technician notices a slight downturn, it’ll be attributed to the ongoing drought. And Jody says it’s unlikely they have human technicians checking anything.”
“The fat cats fired them all. Along with everyone else.”
“Tell us more,” said Harmony.
“Yeah, Logan,” said Myles. “You’re going to activate the water treatment plant? How does that work?”
“When the water system was abandoned by the city, they left everything in place. The apparatus may have been decommissioned, but it was never dismantled. Jody hacked the supervisory control and data acquisition system and can operate it with the power station servers.”
“You’re producing enough juice?”
“Yes, and when I get more water, I can make more electricity. The power plant was built with a water injection system as a safeguard against the aquifer drying up.”
“Like it is now,” said Harmony.
“That’s what got me brainstorming on how to come up with more water. If I can’t keep the power station up, there isn’t much left for me here. It would be the end of the road.”
“But how does your scheme work in real time? You’re going to pressurize the entire city water system? That sounds far-fetched.” Juno dropped a tennis ball in front of Myles and pushed it towards his feet with his nose. Myles ignored him, and the canine barked and pawed the ball.
“No, not the entire system. I don’t need to. The water mains are in a network of automated grids that can be turned on and off. It was set up so they could turn the water on at any address in town with a computer click.”
“And turn it off if the bill wasn’t paid,” said Harmony.
“Exactly. So once there’s enough water in the treatment plant, I can route a specific flow to anywhere in the city…While the bulk of the water mains stay dry.
“You’re sure it’ll work?” Myles picked up the tennis ball that Juno had laid at his feet. He leaned back in his chair and threw it. Both dogs took off after it.
“Jody put the probability of success at 90%. Everything worked fine when they shut it down, so there isn’t any reason to think it won’t work now.”
“If you can deliver water to our farm, it’ll make things a whole lot easier,” said Harmony.
“Damn right, agreed Myles. “We won’t need to haul it anymore.”
“Or put fuel in the tanker trucks.”
Logan leaned back in his chair, put his hands behind his head, and grinned. “Give me a few days, and I should be able to deliver city water to your spread.
Myles and Harmony were golf course farmers. They’d commandeered one of the biggest golf clubs in town and turned it into productive farmland. The pair used agricultural robots to plant, weed and harvest, and the agribots managed a limited number of livestock as well.
The original owners of the golf course had used groundwater for irrigation, but in the years since they’d abandoned it, the wells had gone dry. Myles and Harmony used tanker trucks to bring in water from various wells around town that were still producing. They’d bought the trucks dirt cheap from a northlands holding company. The development company that had owned the trucks went into bankruptcy after the economy collapsed. Myles and Harmony found the abandoned equipment in a storage yard, and they offered the holding company pennies on the dollar for the fleet of hydrogen-powered trucks.
Logan traded electricity to the pair for food in an open-ended barter system. Neither side kept track of the volume or the perceived value of what they gave and received. An ancient method of commerce that relied on mutual faith, immaculate in its trust and simplicity.