The deep-water basalt trench inside the mountain was quiet now, its dark surface broken only by the steady ripples of the tide.
The violent high-frequency screech that had shaken the granite walls for thirty years had vanished, replaced by the deep, rhythmic hum of the Vanguard's auxiliary dynamos feeding clean, regulated current into the facility's distribution board.
Foreman Haddon stood on the low iron quay, a grease-stained notebook open in his thick hand, directing thirty union shipwrights as they retrofitted the cartel's secondary transformer banks. Heavy copper busbars were being unbolted, cleaned of soot, and re-wired directly into the new public utility grid.
"Keep those ground leads isolated!" Haddon shouted, his voice echoing off the blue ice arch overhead. "We aren't running high-voltage surges into the seabed anymore! Every ampere coming off these coils goes straight into the deep-water guidance buoys!"
