Orders of Magnitude (The Genie and the Engineer Series Book 2) by Glenn Michaels Page A

spun the steering wheel, piloting the vehicle onto
Mitscher Road and hitting the gas.
    “Now, to find the electrical substation,” Paul grumbled as he
glanced around the base.
    They found it easily enough, in a small white one-story,
non-descript metal building with no windows.
    Leaving the Humvee in the parking lot, they dropped a cloak
of invisibility around themselves and strode briskly up the white sidewalk to
the side door. The lock on the door snicked open at Capie’s command, the
building alarm short-circuiting in a silent puff of smoke.
    Inside the dimly lit structure, Paul glanced around at all
the machinery. There were step down transformers and buss bars everywhere.
    The two MCCs (Motor Control Centers) were not hard to find
either. There, Paul studied the main breaker panels and switch designators.
    “Nice of the engineers here to organize things and keep them
up to date,” Paul wisecracked before pointing to several large breakers. “Those
breakers control the feeds to the DIA building where your father is.” He looked
back at Capie. “Not only am I going to open those feeds, I am going to weld
them open. It will take hours, perhaps days for the Normals to replace them.
Are you ready?”
    “Do it!” Capie urged him.
    One by one, Paul grasped the handles and forced them
downward. Then with a wave of his hand, the breakers arch-flashed in blindingly
bright white bursts for a couple of seconds.
    “Let’s go,” Paul said hurriedly. “We need to get to your
father before they try to move him to another location, such as a building that
still has AC power.”
    • • • •
    The Humvee carried them over to Boundary Drive and up to the
gate for the parking lot of the huge DIA complex. They noted with grim amusement
the agitation of flashlights in the guard house.
    As they hurtled past, Paul muttered quietly in that
direction, “This is not the car and we are not the people you’re looking for.”
    Spinning the steering wheel with one hand and leaning hard
on the gas pedal, he raced up the ramp to the top of the parking garage and
straight to the covered walkway at the building’s rear entrance.
    As far as the two of them could tell, only a few emergency
exit lights were on. Otherwise, the building was both dark and silent.
    Paul snapped on his night vision goggles, patted the pistol
in his shoulder holster, and grasped the airsoft rifle.
    “Communications check,” he said softly into his mic.
    “Loud and clear,” Capie nervously replied. “Let’s go get
Dad.”
    Paul gave her a quick smiling nod and got out of the Humvee.
From there, the two of them jogged over to the rear door of the building. With
a flick of a wrist, the lock snapped open and they dashed inside.
    “Okay, we need to go down two floors,” Paul announced as he
fast scanned the hallways around them. “And I want to use the 4-D Man spell.
Ready?”
    “Yes, I think so. Let’s go.”
    Paul stepped close to her and cast the spell. The two of
them dropped through the floor, down past ground level and then into basement
level B-1.
    It was one of the weirdest experiences of Capie’s life,
passing through solid matter as if it was no more than smoke.
    Floating to a stop, they found themselves in a pitch black
corridor, lit only with the IR of their night vision goggles. Everything around
them was only visible in ghostly green images through the goggles.
    But they could hear someone talking.
    “…the whole building,” squawked one male voice. “Thankfully
some of the exit emergency signs are lit up and the radios still work. Alan
should be back with the flashlights soon.”
    Paul waved to his wife and advanced around a corner,
silently stealing toward the source of the voice.
    There were two men there, dressed in security guard uniforms,
restlessly shuffling around in the blackness of the corridor. Pointing his
finger at both of them, Paul cast another spell and the two guards silently
folded up on the floor, fast asleep.
    “I