Reassemble (Singular Book 4)

by Larry Buenafe

  “But, why would they all do that? Don’t they know it’s dangerous?”

  “I’m sure they do, but they all feel indebted to you. You saved all of them in one way or another. And, I dare say they all see you as something more than just yourself; they see you as a representation of what is possible, of how things could be. A symbol of hope for humanity, and they want to be a part of it. You probably don’t see yourself that way, but you can understand how they would, can’t you?”

  “Well… yeah, it’s logical, so… but they’re wrong, I’m not a symbol of anything, I’m just a kid.”

  Bill chuckled as he banked the jet to the west. “You are clearly not just a kid, Lucas.”

  “Okay, but I’m not a hero or anything. I didn’t ask for any of this, it just happened; I mean, waking up from a coma and getting turned into an android or whatever I am now, then running from the US to Australia, the battle in Melbourne, and the mission in Pakistan, dad getting kidnapped, the mission in Brazil, and now… I am just trying to stay alive and get my dad back, that’s all. After that… I don’t know, but I just… I was going to say I want to be normal, but I can’t be that. I don’t know what I’ll do, really.”

  As we were talking Cheri and Ernie crept up from the back of the plane and had been listening. “Hey, dude, you can just come and hang with me. I’m pretty much a kid, too. I mean, I’m bigger and older and stuff, but you’re way smarter than me, so it kind of balances out, right?” said Ernie, patting me on the shoulder.

  Cheri nodded. “And you and me? We’re a team, Lucas. We’ll always be together, no matter what happens, right?”

  “Well, yeah, I didn’t mean… yes, you’re right. Be careful, though; the longer you hang around me, the more likely you are to lose your other arm.”

  After a moment of silence, the plane erupted with the sounds of laughter. Why is that so funny? I meant it… oh, boy…

  As we flew on up past Central America, the discussion turned to the details of our rescue attempt, and we finally fell to silence as we reflected on what was ahead of us. When we reached central Mexico Leena moved back to the pilot seat, Bill closed his eyes in a meditation pose, and Cheri moved from her seat to mine. She held my hand with her real one, and I thought just for a moment how weird it was that she could do that and not make me uncomfortable. “Lucas, this will work. I just feel it, the same way I knew that somehow we’d get through the missions in Pakistan and Brazil, and even the rescue of Mardig on the docks in San Diego, way back before we really knew one another. And same as those times, there will be stuff we won’t expect, and we’ll just need to be flexible and react. I’m… okay, this might sound like bragging, but I’m good at that, and so are you. And Bill? There’s a reason he has taken the lead on all this. In a few hours we’ll be out of there with your dad. Now, you should close your eyes and just rest for a bit. It’ll help, I promise. Watch.”

  She leaned back, tilted her head up, closed her eyes, and let out a long, exaggerated sigh. “Ahh, that’s better. Go ahead, try it.”

  “That’s not a bad idea, sonny boy. Go ahead, I’ll show you some cartoons.”

  Okay, I’ll try… how about the ones with the coyote and the roadrunner?

  “Ask, and ye shall receive.”

  And just like that, on the screen in my mind, a comical roadrunner, making that weird sound: meep! meep!… not much longer now…

  Suddenly I felt Cheri’s warm breath on my ear as she whispered, “Oh, and Lucas, one other thing. Happy birthday, partner.” Then she kissed me on the forehead and leaned back again, eyes closed.

  31

  DIRECTOR’S NOTES

  MEETING WITH SVC

  122052 17:32

  -Current status, (SVC).

  -Oakes and his group have been scouting out the terrain near the gate of Area 51. The aboriginal and the rest of his group are waiting nearby for the gate-crashers to arrive so they can blend in; if they saw them up there now, they would take too big a chance of being recognized. A caravan of hundreds of vehicles are preparing to leave from various locations in and around Las Vegas on their way to Groom Lake and the entrance to Area 51. Everything is on schedule.

  -The military will freak out when they see all those cars on the road heading their way. Do we have anything nearby so we can see it real time?

  -I didn’t want to increase suspicion by putting any drones in the area, but we should get good video from our satellite over the basin.

  -Excellent. I’m feeling a little more positive about this thing. Now, as far as the general meeting tonight, do we expect any pushback from the membership? We’ve kept them out of the loop on stuff, so some of them might be peeved.

  -I think we can expect some grumbling from (SRB), our British rabble rouser, and probably (JM), but I think most of them will see it as standard operating procedure.

  -We’re getting close, (SVC). Now, suppose it doesn’t work. What’s the worst thing that could happen?

  -The worst? The US could uncover all the Bright Hand agents in various government positions and connect them back to us. If they feel sufficiently aggrieved, they could come after us, and that would put us in a tough position. We’re in the pocket of a number of higher-ups, though, so we could probably buy our way out of it.

  -Okay, but what about our plans to make ourselves space-worthy and long-lived? If we don’t get the Dr. Taylor’s tech, our Bright Hand scientists might eventually recreate it, but it’ll take decades, if they can do it at all. We won’t have the resources or raw materials, or space for that matter, for them to work on it while we travel, so we’ll be stuck here, watching the world burn.

  -As a short-term solution, we could duplicate the regime (WK) is on, and that would sustain us and harden us for the trip. Not as good as the boy’s tech, but certainly much better than nothing.

  -I suppose. Kind of a let-down after seeing the kid, but it could get us through.

  -That’s the spirit. Now is not the time for negativity.

  -Oh, that from the guy who sees the ominous clouds behind every silver lining. All right, keep me updated if anything of interest comes up. Now get out of here, I need to put some finishing touches on my speech. And get me an éclair. And a massive adult beverage, stat.

  ****

  D usk was coming on as we approached Las Vegas, the lights from the casinos spreading out in the distance and out-dazzling the sunset. We swept to the east of the city, out over the desert, and Bill said, “Let’s suit up, Ms. Kim. Lucas, you have the lead. The time is six forty-two, plenty of time for us to arrive as the siege commences. Our best intel is that they have your father in an underground bunker beneath the big Red Hat hangars on the northern edge of the visible structures. We’ll make a quick pass and knock out the electronics with the EMP, and from there we improvise. Leena, Ernie, you continue on to San Diego and we’ll meet you there when we complete our mission. When, not if.”

  From the pilot seat, Leena spoke without turning around. “Roger that. Strap in Ern, things will get a bit blustery in here. Godspeed, mates.”

  As he struggled to get his straps clicked around his bulky muscles, Ernie said, “Yeah, man, you dudes be careful. I wish I could jump out with you, though. I mean, how awesome would that be? We’ll hook up back in Cali, and let’s celebrate a little, okay? My Tia makes sweet corn tamales for Christmas, we can go over there and party a little. Dude, this is crazy! Lucas, come give me a hug before you go. Come on, man.”

  I gave him a hug, even though I felt a little uncomfortable, and when I did, Ernie got some tears on my heat suit. “Oh, sorry, dude. You know how I am, I can’t help it. Go get your pops, okay?” he gulped, and then cried some more.

  Cheri hugged Ernie then, and Bill shook his hand. She turned to me and asked, “Do I have everything on right?”

  “Everything looks good, except you should probably put on your helmet.”

  “Oh, crap. I guess I’m a bit nervous.”

  We each strapped small bags with our gear to our
fronts, and I slipped on my helmet as well. Through our helmet-to-helmet connections, Bill said, “Make sure everything is online, and then we go. Ready?”

  Seeing our nodded answer, Bill said, “Leena, Ernie, thank you for everything. Here we go.”

  He unlatched the door, slid it open, and out we went, plunging down as the jet banked and headed west. “Heads-up displays on, and engines in five seconds,” Bill said over the intercom, and then counted down; I stretched my arms and legs into wings as he counted, all our electric jets spooled up at the same time, and they jolted us forward out of our rapid descent.

  “Whoo hoo!” Cheri roared, distorting the speakers in our helmets.

  “Let’s keep the air clear aside from mission-pertinent messages. Remember, low and fast, below radar and too fast to identify,” Said Bill.

  “Whoops, sorry, got a little excited. Will do,” said Cheri.

  It’s… let’s see… six fifty-three… whoa, look at that…

  We were flying a couple of kilometers east of a highway leading up to Area 51, and as far as most people could see, the lane heading north was a non-stop line of cars. “Hills ahead,” said Bill, and we maneuvered through them, eventually having to rise in altitude to get over the craggy terrain. Wait… what is that… Ava…

  “There’s a drone following us. Hang on, let me see if I can access it… ah, there we go. It’s a surveillance device, automatically triggered by anything flying near Area 51. We’re at a little over two hundred KPH, and it will not go a whole lot faster than that, so we could outrun it, but if it keeps a lock on us for long, they’ll scramble jets or choppers, so we will have to take it down, sonny boy. It may be able to monitor any over-the-air communications, so don’t contact the others, just bank right. We’ll get it with the laser.”

  I dipped my right wing/arm and made a tight turn; the drone was about half a kilometer behind us, so it had time to notice my turning, and it slowed, seemingly confused by the maneuver. As I completed my turn, I was headed toward it, and it turned toward me; just as Ava manipulated the laser to fire it, over the helmet-to-helmet intercom came: “Hey, Lucas, what are you doing?”

  The drone burst into a ball of flame and fell from the sky as I banked again and accelerated to catch Bill and Cheri. Ava, do you think it heard that before we shot it?

  “It was transmitting the entire time, but whether it got a good enough view of us or got that chatter is not clear. We’ll probably know soon enough.”

  Oh, boy. We split the air with a burst of speed, and in moments had drawn even with them; on the horizon, a kilometer and a half ahead of us, three more drones, these larger and more intimidating. Bill noticed the drones as well; he pointed down, and we slowed and descended as quickly as we could as the drones approached. As we reached a depression between hills, we touched down; Bill and Cheri tumbled over and over as I dashed to stay upright and then skidded to a stop. I whipped my helmet off, motioning for them to do the same as they struggled to their feet, and helped them into a crevice between boulders. “They can monitor our helmet intercom! I don’t think they saw us, though; they’re probably just reacting to the other drone getting lasered.”

  “We’ll know in a second. There they are,” Bill whispered, and we all ducked reflexively. They drifted overhead, their rotors whining, turning from side to side, and soon were past our hiding spot as they continued south along the ridge of hills. Bill and Cheri were both holding laser pistols they’d snatched out of their gear bags as we peered up at the drones moving off into the distance, and Cheri motioned for me to come close. “These suits Dr. Bhat made for the jet packs are legit. Coming down that hard might have killed me, but I hardly even felt it. And they don’t feel heavy at all.”

  “That might be because of the treatment you got. Can you still see those drones?”

  They were about two kilometers south of us now and were rotating slowly over the spot where the remains of the first drone came down after I shot it. “It’s getting pretty dark, but I can kind of make them out. I couldn’t see that far before.”

  Bill put his hands on each of our shoulders. “This slowed us down, but it may actually help us a bit. They will probably send a couple of vehicles to investigate, which means less security on site at Area 51. Lucas, can you measure how much further we have to go?”

  Ava?

  “A hundred and two kilometers as the crow flies, which is good because that’s how we’re going. It’s seven-oh-three, so we need to get moving, though. Carpe noctem, sonny boy.”

  Oh, not that again… seize the night… okay, that’s not bad… seize the night…

  “A hundred and two kilometers, as the crow flies.”

  Bill chuckled. “Very good. We will need to crank it up to two-fifty KPH so we have enough time to scope out the Red Hat hangars before landing. Lucas, you take the one on the left, Miss Kim, the one on the right. I have the center.”

  “You… you want us to shoot down the three drones?”

  “It’ll cause more confusion and keep them from following. And it’ll be fun, don’t you think?”

  Bill’s Hollywood smile returned, just for a moment, and Cheri said, “Oh, yeah. Let’s do it.”

  On the count of three we took our shots, and seconds later three more drones lay in fiery pieces on the hilly terrain. “Right, that should draw some attention. Now, quickly, low as possible; it’s dark, so heads-up displays and night vision on. If we need to communicate, use hand signals from here on. Lucas, you lead from here.”

  Ava, can we fly without making my arms and legs into wings?

  “Oh, feeling frisky? Sure, our top speed just won’t be as high. We can do two-fifty, though, no problemo. Heat suit will get all flappy, but we’ll be low enough that we won’t get cold, so just take it off. Otherwise, it’s all good, dude. I said that in honor of our buddy Ernie.”

  You really are getting more human, aren’t you?

  “I’ll ask you to stop right now with that kind of sacrilege. Let’s move, sonny boy.”

  We spooled up our electric jets, making a gigantic cloud of dust as we lifted off, going straight up for about twenty meters before darting forward. We swung further east before heading north again and were now on the east side of the ridge of hills and were low enough that anything on the west side would not see us. Ava, is that sound what I think it is?

  “You know what that is, you’ve heard it before. Melbourne, remember? Blackhawks. Lower, sonny boy. As low as we can go and stay tight to the east side of the hills.”

  Oh, boy, no jokes; that means it’s serious.

  I motioned to Bill and Cheri that we were dropping down, and they followed as closely as they could. Soon, the whup-whup of the Blackhawks was past us, and then… forty kilometers from Area 51: “Hang on, shorty, we have another message coming in on the QC. Zoey Perez says… what? Oh, no. Abort mission to Area 51. Jawad Rajput has been in contact with the former American ambassador to Pakistan, Marlin Roehl. Because of his position, he is privy to some intelligence… the Americans knew about the throngs going to Area 51, so they moved your dad. He’s not there anymore, he’s now in… Area 52?!”

  32

  DIRECTOR’S NOTES

  MEETING WITH SVC

  122052 19:15

  They what!?

  -The jet… it banked northeast of Las Vegas and simply continued on west. It’s over the California border now.

  -What the hell, (SVC)?

  -It appears that there was one possibility that we didn’t consider. I will go out on a limb and say they bailed out.

  -Son of a… why didn’t we consider that?

  -…

  -Well, what else? I know there’s more.

  -Yes: satellite picked up a military drone in fast pursuit of something over the hills east of highway ninety three, and the drone went down in flames. Three attack drones are circling over the downed unit and two Blackhawks are approaching the area.

  -That had to be them, right? No one else could have done that.
<
br />   -Without question. Have a look at this satellite video, director.

  -What am I looking at?

  -I believe you meant to stay ‘at what am I looking’, but either way, this is the line of vehicles on the junction between Highways ninety three and three seventy-five, and on the road up to Area 51. That mass at the far end? Those are vehicles already at the gates. There are close to a thousand people already near the entrance. The image is a bit blurry up here, but this line are military vehicles aligned on the other side of the fence, and you can just see several more Blackhawks approaching from the northwest. It’s a good-sized distraction, I would say.

  -In this moment, you’re going to correct my grammar? You are something else, (SVC). Any shots fired?

  -Nothing yet, but things are just getting heated up. You might be able to make out a thin, dark line here… those are gate crashers spread out along the fence. One moment… I’m getting a transmission from Oakes… they are at the guard booth right at the front of the pack, and he and Dave Concannon are speaking with the guards, trying to keep them occupied for as long as they can, and Oakes has the credentials to get their attention, I daresay.

  -So all good so far. There were five in the jet, right? Do we know how many bailed?

  -Not clear, but I suspect three: the boy, Chi Kim, and (WK). Any more than that and their approach would be much more difficult.

  -I assume we’re continuing to track the jet? Maybe we can snag (WK) as they board, assuming they survive.