Rhonda LeBlanc thought that work party would never leave. She sat in her car in the parking lot of the nuclear plant. Engine running to stay warm, the interior dark save for the dash lights and the orange glow of her cigarette. Slowly, the smoke filled the car. She waited, patiently.
She didn't have to wait long.
One by one, the lights in the administrative department winked out. Rhonda waited until Preston's little stooge, the pilot, left in his rattle-trap car. Once he was past the main gate, she pulled into her assigned parking space, and stepped out.
The bleak weather swept around her, and Rhonda pulled her soot black trenchcoat tighter. She snubbed out her cigarette in the ash tray at the door, swiped her ID badge, and let herself in.
The halls were dark, save for the red exit sign. As Rhonda walked, the lights flicked on. Motion sensors. She and Dimas had ordered them installed in all the main hallways. The respective departments, however, were on old-fashioned switches. Rhonda took the back stairwell up. She didn't want to risk running into Sharon or any of the holiday operation crew. One could never truly be alone at the nuclear plant. Even on Christmas, a skeleton crew of reactor operators and technicians, and their respective supervisors kept an ever vigilant watch. Periodically, security would sweep though. Roving guards, making sure nothing was amiss.
Rhonda didn't need to know the guards' schedules. They stayed mostly out of her way. Rhonda during normal business hours could be intimidating. After hours, she could be downright frightening.
It wasn't uncommon for her to come to the plant during off-time, especially after the normal working day. She found she got some of her best work done alone in the pleasant silence of her fishbowl. No phones ringing, no one popping in to ask questions.
Following Dimas' lead, Rhonda had an open-door policy, but sometimes it seemed people took that too literally. At times, the inflow of loyal if subservient employees hindered her. Rhonda, ever focused on her career, could hardly begrudge them the intrusions. She understood how people operated.
What she didn't care for was chaos and disorder.
Everything needed to follow a natural flow. "So it is," she muttered to herself as she unlocked her office and went in. A quick glance at the ceiling showed the lightbulbs had been swapped out. She examined her desk carefully. She expected it to be put back exactly where it had always been; and no foot prints to be found anywhere. Good.
Everything was as she left it. Antoine and his crew had done a professional job. They'd even swept the dust up afterwards.
Antoine, the pilot. The thorn in her side. He was Preston's guard dog, or possibly his security blanket. She'd never paid much attention to him before, but after their "discussion" in Preston's office the other month he'd been on her radar. Rhonda sighed and sat back in her chair. Once upon a time, she'd actually rather liked Antoine. His upbeat personality and his ability to work with nearly anyone made him a valuable asset to the company. She'd hoped he might settle down, become a little less bohemian as time went by. No such luck. Still, he was a damn fine pilot. She leaned back and wondered why on earth he'd chosen to ally himself with Preston. It made no sense to her.
Rhonda did not like things that didn't make sense.
When Dimas had been alive, it seemed only natural to expect Antoine and Preston to cross paths. What she hadn't expected was that their dynamic would continue after Dimas' death.
One day, Rhonda had gone down to Infrastructure and asked Sharon a simple question. When did Mister Tucci send his pilot to you?
Sharon, practically buried under the messy hoard she called an office poked her head up from a pile and shrugged. Honestly, Ms. LeBlanc, he didn't.
No?
Sharon shook her head. No. He sent himself down here. I don't know why. But he works hard, and he's got more experience than half the people who apply, so I didn't see the harm.
Rhonda thanked Sharon for her time. Curiouser and curiouser, she thought. Why on earth would a highly specialized individual, on salary no less!, volunteer himself for the demanding and thankless job of maintenance? It didn't make sense. There was only one reason, and it wasn't even a very good one in Rhonda's eyes.
He's trying to protect Tucci. But from what? And why?
Rhonda had decided it was high time to find out. Her Christmas present to herself: uninterrupted time in Preston's Executive Office looking for anything that might explain what was truly going on.
She assumed Preston locked his office at night. Fortunately, she had a master key. Dimas had given it to her over thirty years ago. It turned out she didn't need it. What a naïve fool, Rhonda thought disdainfully. She opened the door and let herself in.
Clearly Preston hadn't decorated the office. The relaxing oceanic theme was not his style. The man was the sort who probably lived off motivational posters. She'd known of Preston since he first set foot in the plant as a timid little apple-polisher to entertain Dimas's whim. Preston seemed fairly adept with that at least. He made a fine assistant, Rhonda had to admit. On the flips side, unfortunately, she saw him as an abysmal CEO.
Preston Tucci was too inexperienced, too frail in Rhonda's opinion. She didn't expect him to measure up. He'd crash and burn, and take the plant with him. He had no idea how to conduct himself. He brought doubt and uncertainty to everything he did. Chaos too. This whole relationship with his pilot? It transcended mere professional boundaries. Despite what Antoine had said to her about how he'd always been this way, Rhonda could sense and undercurrent of familiarity between them that she was loath to have at her plant.
He'll undermine everything! Rhonda thought angrily as she opened the filing cabinets. I haven't spent three decades of my life building a solid business just to watch some child ruin everything. Rhonda leafed back through the papers. She wasn't sure what she was looking for, but she'd know it when she found it.
After nearly two hours, Rhonda hadn't uncovered anything aside from Dimas' private stash of scotch. She was about to give up when she noticed a single document sticking out from behind the rock glasses in Dimas' cabinet. Oddly out of place for everything else that fell neatly into line. The way things seemed untouched, it was as if Preston had never even bothered to go through the filing cabinets themselves.
Rhonda gently tugged the paper free. It was a shipping manifest, for national cargo on a major airline out of Albany. Nearly six thousand pounds of cargo. Though the destination had been blacked out, the date remained. Autumn of last year. The same time as the alleged "kid-napping" incident in Springfield.
She'd have to pull Dimas' travel logs, but it was too much to be coincidence. Three tons of cargo, distributed into three respective shipping containers… Rhonda grip in the paper tightened. There was only one thing of that weight that Dimas would be shipping.
Though Rhonda didn't have exact numbers, each one of their fuel assemblies weighed about fifteen hundred pounds. Dimas had been most proud about maintaining a proper number of spent fuel rods in his cooling ponds. He had abhorred the idea of so-called re-racking, stacking additional rods in where they were never intended to go.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission authorized it, Rhonda had pointed out, attempting to talk him down from the rage he'd worked himself into one last afternoon.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is a pompus overblown government agency that wants to make everything look pretty for the public, and avoid the real issues.
Rhonda couldn't entirely disagree. Although Dimas' statement could apply to just about any government body, she reasoned. It was neither Rhonda's place, nor her interest, to judge. The government was like anything: a mixture of good and bad. As long as rules were followed, Rhonda didn't see the need to get involved.
Rhonda had never questioned it when Gary in Engineering had his crew arrange a transfer of spent rods from the reactors into the cooling ponds. Likewise, she never stopped to question exactly where the rods went after they'd sat for the several years required to be sufficiently "cool."
Dimas had played everything masterfully, Rhonda thought, sitting down at his desk. Preston's desk. Whichever. It would always be Thaddeus Dimas' desk to her.
She stared at the cargo manifest, willing it to reveal something more. Alas, the ratty piece of carbon-copy paper had already yielded its secrets. It was enough though.
"Business trip, my ass," she snarled to the empty room.
Clandestine transfer of nuclear waste was more like it. The incident in Springfield? Clearly no kidnapping attempt gone wrong. Thaddeus Dimas, and Montgomery Burns had been involved in something illegal; then it went pear-shaped. And that illegal thing had involved several tons of nuclear fuel assemblies.
Damn you, Tad, Rhonda muttered, thinking of Dimas. Your lofty ideas got the better of you. If you hadn't been such an idealistic idiot, you'd still be alive. We wouldn't be here at the mercy of your untried personal assistant and his feeble attempts…
Preston.
Preston! He had been there too! Not just there, but involved. And Antoine, the pilot!
Rhonda leapt to her feet, barking out a profanity she was glad no one could hear. "They know," she growled, eyes wide. An image of Antoine and Preston flashed through her mind: Preston, recovering from his bullet wound, and Antoine gamely defending him from prying eyes. "They both know and they've been playing me for a fool!"
No wonder, Rhonda decided, the pilot and Preston had latched on to each other like illicit lovers. They were partners in crime, both carrying the same secret; the real reason behind Dimas' death. They knew the truth, and they were covering for each other every step of the way.
Well, Rhonda thought, settling herself, two can play at that game.
Carefully, Rhonda tucked the manifest into her hip pocket. They might be young and reckless. She was patient. If what she surmised was true, sooner or later they'd be going back to Springfield. And when they did, Rhonda chuckled, rubbing her hands together, she'd be right behind.
Charles Montgomery Burns picked up his knight, and moved the small piece beyond his unbroken wall of pawns. "King's knight opening," he explained quietly, raising his eyes to Smithers.
The two men sat in Burns' private study, a marble chessboard on the table between them. A fire roared in the hearth, throwing enough heat to ward off the chill of the storm outside. Wind howled against the leaded panes of glass in the window, driving snow in sweeping drifts. The trees beyond swayed and bowed, as if surrendering to the gale. Occasionally harder snow, little ice pellets would streak across the glass with a rattle.
Burns interlaced his fingers and dropped his chin into them. Smithers was new to chess, but he was proving to be a quick study. Who knew: in time, Smithers might prove to be a worthy opponent indeed. They'd celebrated a small and intimate Christmas, an exchange of gifts early in the morning; though in Burns' mind the best gift was being able to wake up next to his beloved. It was strange, Burns mused. All the money in the world, and yet that simple pleasure was one of the best.
Well, with Smithers anyhow.
Outside of that, money and power held quite a prominent place in Monty Burns' list of priorities. Waylon Smithers was the exception, not the rule. In all other walks, Burns was still the gleefully malevolent mogul he'd always been.
The chess board had been one such simple gift between them. The pieces were elegantly hand-carved out of red and white botticino marble. Intricately sculpted, down to the smallest details. The board made of the same red and white stone, and framed with a mahogany border. Burns had it imported from Italy; a gift for Smithers that gave them yet another reason to spend time together.
"The trick is, my boy, to control the center of the board." Burns' blue eyes looked almost green in the firelight. He eyed Smithers with a fierce intensity.
Smithers studied the board. He finally decided on the pawn in front of his king, and moved it two spaces forward. A traditional opening, Burns noted. Not exciting, but a solid choice. It afforded them both several options. There were few things Burns enjoyed better than a game of chess while discussing business.
"Have you done anything with that Tucci boy yet?" Burns asked. He didn't hesitate as he moved one of his own pawns two spaces forward.
Smithers shook his head. "Done anything? No. But it's not that I've done nothing." He ran his finger over his row of pawns, thinking.
Burns waited patiently. This was not a timed game. They had all night.
Outside, the wind rose to a roaring howl against the stone corners of Burns Manor, as if demanding attention. Burns and Smithers both ignored it. "It was a night not entirely dissimilar to this that I first showed you your father's room, was it not?" Burns asked.
"Was it winter?" Smithers asked, moving a knight out to guard his pawn.
Burns rolled his shoulders. "If it wasn't out there, it definitely was inside," he replied cryptically. He studied the chessboard, hands still folded under his chin. No sense in rushing. He'd make his move when he was ready. Smithers looked as if he were on the verge of speaking further, and Burns didn't want to interrupt. Over a game of chess, Smithers could be very forthcoming.
As usual, Burns' assessment of his partner proved correct.
Smithers kept his eyes on the board as he spoke. "I did talk to him on the phone again the other week. They had a benefit ball or something in the city. There was a blurb about it online. I figured it was time to try and shake an answer out of him." Smithers paused. "I'm not sure I was successful."
Burns selected his bishop, and deftly moved it through the gap made by his pawn. The center of the board was now his. A classic Italian opening. Time to see what Smithers would do with one of the oldest set-ups in history of the game.
"When I spoke to him, he said he was going to re-rack for the next swap out, and make a decision later on."
Burns snorted. "The boy's a fool. One or two assemblies, no one notices. Get more than that, and it becomes a nightmare in logistics."
Smithers moved a pawn forward a single space. Burns tried not to let his face reveal emotion. It wasn't a move he would've made. What was Smithers up to?
"It will be three years almost before he needs to refuel the second reactor. I was there for the last swap out. Three years is a long time. He may yet change his mind."
"That's pure malarkey. Three years is inconsequential against the life of a man. A thimble in the ocean. A miniscule hiccup in the grand scheme of things." He quickly brought out his second knight. "Why, what could ever happen in a mere three years?"
Smithers raised his eyes shrewdly. "A man can build a nuclear power plant, fall in love, save a city." Without hesitation, he moved a different pawn forward. Again, only one space. He gave Burns a calculating smile.
C. Montgomery Burns paused, taken back by Smithers' audacity. He looked away from his brown-eyed former assistant, and stared into the fire. So many memories. So much he couldn't unsee. Once upon a time he would've considered himself consigned to the fires of hell. Now, instead of balefire, he saw hearthfire. Home, safety. Memories without the pain. A glow that mirrored the flame burning in his heart.
"Well, yes. I suppose that," he murmured.
"Three years can be a lifetime," Smithers continued. "So Preston wants to do things his way. So what? If you're worried about us, don't be. I can handle it."
Burns tapped his fingers against his cheek. "As you said, my dear, there is time."
"'Unto each day the evil thereof,' Monty. I'll keep a close eye on Preston, and see what he does." Smithers tapped the board gently. "Your move."
"Yes, yes, I was getting to that," Burns snapped. He gave Smithers a one-sided smile. "You wouldn't want to rush a fragile old man now would you, Waylon?"
Smithers returned the smirk. "I would never do that. If I see any fragile old men around here, I'll be sure to give them plenty of time. Wily silver foxes though? Well, that's a different matter. Your move, old friend."