Chapter 18Drake sat mesmerized at the console in Station Two, looking up at the surveillance screens. He had achieved his goal of being seated, alone, among the most advanced security equipment in a power plant generating energy in a fashion even DaVinci could not have fathomed. Locked in on camera one was the reactor-core-housing in Containment One. Before him was the image of a multi-tiered step-pyramid with spaghetti-like pipes wrapping around it. The image, of course, showed no evidence of the dramatic process deep within. But within, Drake knew, a magnificent process was in fact taking place—one of splitting atoms and nuclear fission. Deep within the reactor core, a honeycomb of zirconium fuel rods encased in ten-inch-thick steel, subatomic particles called neutrons slammed into urani
