A Rumor of Real Irish Tea (Annals of Altair Book 2)

by Kate Stradling

  “Why?” asked Honey. “If the low-level agents are told to blend into their surroundings, they’ll go inside and order something. The waffle house gets some extra customers, and the agents get some breakfast on the GCA’s dime. Everyone’s a winner here.”

  “Two is probably the max they’ll send from any one office, don’t you think?” Hawk asked. “There are four GCA offices within a ten-mile radius of that waffle house, and they’ll probably pull resources from all of them. You’d think after a while they’d start running out of pawns to send.”

  Hummer grunted. “The GCA has an overabundance of pawns. Let’s go now before this branch starts getting its supplies replenished for the day. Happy, make sure you stay with Honey, okay?” He handed the pilfered cell phone back to Honey, and they stepped away from the wall.

  Hawk whistled a call to Revere, who flapped off the branch of a nearby tree to perch on the surveillance camera positioned in front of the parking garage’s entrance. As the children came into its sight, the bird lowered one wing to cover the lens. They crossed not into the garage but toward the main entrance.

  “Make the call, Honey,” Hummer said.

  Honey already had the phone to her ear. “Hello, accounting department? Can you transfer me to the security desk in the front lobby?” A couple breaths passed, and then a new voice picked up on the other end. “Hi,” said Honey. “I’m coming in through the front door. Could you please unlock it for me right now?”

  They watched through the broad windows as the guard at the desk put down the phone and obediently crossed to the door.

  “Let’s hope that projection lasts long enough,” Hummer said as they all started forward.

  “There’s usually at least thirty seconds after I make a command before anyone thinks to question it, unless they’re conditioned,” said Honey studiously. “Let’s hope he isn’t.”

  Luck seemed to be on their side, for the guard swung open the door. “Thank you,” Honey said as she and her brothers slipped inside. “Could you give me your gun, please? And make sure to lock the door behind you.”

  He complied on both counts, but Hummer immediately confiscated the weapon from her.

  “It’s only a stun gun,” Honey complained.

  “I still wouldn’t trust you with it,” he said, and he tucked it into his pocket.

  She made a face but didn’t press the issue—a great show of restraint on her part, since she could have the gun back from Hummer with a simple request. She turned her attention to the guard instead. “Thanks for helping us out. Forget we were here and go back to work, okay?”

  “Okay,” he said with a cheerful salute.

  Hummer, meanwhile, skirted behind the guard’s desk to look at a layout of the building there. “Got it,” he said. “Elevators are this way. Accounting’s on the third floor. Let’s go, chop chop.”

  Together they filed into a waiting car, and Hawk hit the button for the third floor. “Here’s where we find out whether they’re guarding the home nest or not,” he said, and his nervous gaze traveled up to the security camera in the corner.

  Next to him, Honey put one finger beneath her left eye and pulled the skin there, making a face for the camera’s viewing pleasure. The elevator chimed for the third floor, and the doors slid open. The hallway was empty, but voices traveled from beyond an open door marked “Accounting.”

  “C’mon,” said Hummer. “Honey first. You know what to do.”

  She bolted into the room with Happy right behind her. “Good morning, everyone! I need the supervisor here to come stand with me, and everyone else needs to come play with my little brother. What are they going to play, Happy?”

  “Duck-duck-goose!” he cheerfully replied. “I’m first!”

  Hawk and Hummer entered the room to discover five workers eagerly clearing away chairs and nudging desks so that they had enough room for everyone to sit in a circle. Honey stood between a couple computers with their supervisor.

  “Have you already hooked into the GCA’s main network?” she asked.

  “Not yet,” the supervisor said. “We just finished running our first report.” He shifted bewildered eyes over to where his underlings patiently awaited Happy’s pat on the head. Apparently he could tell there was something off, but that nagging feeling wasn’t enough of a defense against two high-level human-projectors.

  “Good,” said Honey. “You’ll be back at work in no time at all. I just need you to key in clearance to the main system on these two computers here, and then you can join the game, okay?”

  The puzzled furrow between his brows smoothed out as he typed a ten-key password into the prompt on first one screen and then the other. The GCA’s welcome page flashed up in response.

  “Done,” he said proudly.

  “Goose!” cried Happy from the circle, and he shrieked like mad as the worker chased him around back to his place. The supervisor went to join the fun as the next round began.

  Hawk and Hummer had already slipped into the empty seats. “You know what you’re doing?” Honey asked.

  “It’s not the first time we’ve cracked the main system,” Hummer said as he began to type. “We did it a couple times back at Prom-F to prep for our escape.”

  “In only five minutes?”

  “If you’re going to talk, say something useful.”

  “Type faster,” she said sarcastically, and then she left them to watch the hallway.

  Hummer brought up a search engine on his screen, while Hawk tapped into the surveillance database and keyed into their location.

  “Looks like we’ve got newcomers at the parking garage door,” said Hawk. “They don’t look like they’re on alert yet. What else is on this floor?”

  “It’s administrative,” said Hummer as his fingers flew across the keyboard. “No one else should be here yet. There’s next to nothing here on Altair, Hawk.”

  “Next to nothing is still something. We don’t need the mother lode. We just need a lead. Copy it.”

  Hummer plugged a portable drive into the computer’s casing. “All of these files are pretty old—ten, twenty years. It’s a wonder they even still exist.”

  “The GCA doesn’t get rid of anything. And in a digital age, why should they? It’s not like these are file boxes taking up space in a warehouse.” Hawk’s gaze shifted between Hummer’s screen and his own, which was split between four different camera views. Searching for Altair on the main network would surely trigger an alarm, which made their time now all the more precious. As few files as Hummer had to work with, it seemed to take forever to save them. Every movement on Hawk’s screen made his pulse spike.

  “We’ve got agents at the elevators,” he announced, his heart almost leaping out of his throat.

  “Just a second more,” said Hummer.

  “They know we’re here,” Hawk said. “They’ll be covering the stairs before we can get out.”

  “Then we use Plan C.”

  “There was no Plan C. What’s Plan C?”

  “Line ’em up and zap ’em with the stun gun,” said Hummer.

  “Stay calm,” Honey said. In front of her, the duck-duck-goose game had become frenzied under influence of Happy’s increased nervousness. Her command brought everything back to a quieter atmosphere.

  “We’ve got maybe thirty seconds before they have us cornered in this office,” Hawk said, “and there are five agents coming up the stairwell.”

  “That’s it,” said Hummer at long last. He ripped out the drive again and slapped it into Hawk’s waiting hand. “Honey, wrap it up. We’ve got to go.”

  “Okay, people!” called Honey to the group. “New game! It’s time to trash the office! Whoever’s able to get a computer through the window first gets ten extra bonus points! Go!”

  Hawk snagged Happy by the arm on his way out the door, with Hummer and Honey close behind. “Five guys in the stairs,” he said to Honey. “Work your magic.”

  “Happy, back me up here,” Honey said with an anxious
little tremor in her voice. The pressure was getting to her more than she wanted to admit.

  They slammed open the door to the stairs as a man rounded the landing on the flight below. “GCA workers stand against the wall and throw your weapons to the ground!” Honey shouted down the shaft.

  The nearest man complied. Below, the pounding footsteps lessened but didn’t entirely stop.

  “Against the wall!” Happy yelled in desperate fury. This time, only the four children’s footsteps echoed as they raced down the stairs. At the rear of their line, Hummer extracted the stun gun from his pocket and jabbed it at the first man they passed. He slumped against the ground, unconscious.

  “Four more to go,” Hummer muttered.

  They made it down two flights and past four men when they heard the door fly open back on the third floor. Shouts ricocheted into the stairwell.

  “Get against the wall and stay still!” Happy called up before his sister had the chance.

  “Honey, there’s no time to hot-wire,” said Hummer. “Ask this last guy if he has any car keys.”

  She paused in her descent halfway down the next flight. “Give ’im your car keys,” she said.

  The man fished a set from his pocket. Hummer repaid him by thrusting the stun gun into his shoulder. “To the garage!” he called.

  As they burst through the last stairwell door into the parking garage, Revere let out a shrill call from near the exit. Hummer hit the unlock button on the keychain, and a black sedan on the middle row chirped. “Get inside! We’re cutting it awful close!”

  As the three younger kids piled in, Hawk extracted the portable drive from his pocket and threw it to a circling Revere. The raven caught the object with ease and glided out of the garage into the bright morning sunlight. Hawk climbed into the back seat with Honey and Happy, and the car sparked to life with Hummer in the front.

  “And away we go,” he cried, and he peeled out of the parking space, up the row, and straight through the restrictive arm that blocked unlawful entry to the lot. Lights flashing, he cut into traffic and careened around the corner, clipping a mailbox and narrowly avoiding a couple of pedestrians.

  “Never again,” said Hawk. “Never, never again.”

  Beside him, Honey placed a protective arm around a jittery Happy but lifted her eyes in skepticism. “You say that now, but we all know you’ll change your mind if the need arises.”

  “Never again,” he repeated firmly.

  “Goose!” said Happy with a punch-drunk laugh.

  XI

  A Meeting of Minds

  July 31, 9:04am mdt, Prom-F

  Classes at Prom-F started at exactly 9:05 every morning, Monday through Saturday. Emily thought this was a rather odd time, especially at a school where the entire student body lived on campus instead of getting bused in or dropped off. Whatever the logistical or managerial reason for this scheduling, it was beyond her understanding. On a morning like this, though, when Oliver dragged his feet at every turn, she was grateful for the five-minute grace period.

  He was not a morning person. She’d learned that fairly early on in their time together. Even with the rigid nine o’clock bedtime that the Prometheus Institute mandated for their students, Oliver still had trouble waking up. The hour they were allotted for breakfast gave him some wiggle room, but this morning, he woke up late and moved at a snail’s pace. It was a dangerous combination that had a dinner-detention riding on the line if he missed the bell for his first class.

  Emily prodded him. “Hurry, hurry.” The corridor was all but empty, except for a few stragglers and their handlers. “You’ve got less than a minute before the bell.”

  “The classroom’s just around the corner,” Oliver said grumpily, “and I still have forty-three seconds.” Nevertheless, he did pick up his pace, much to her relief.

  As they rounded the last corner, though, a new obstacle appeared in their path: Ben Birchard stood nonchalantly next to the classroom door. Emily’s heart sank. She’d had quite enough of his presence after last night’s conversation.

  Interestingly enough, Oliver shared her sentiments. “Stand aside, Birchard,” he said as he tried to skirt majestically past the man. “I’m about to be right on time for my class.”

  “Think again,” Ben replied, and he fluidly redirected Oliver by the shoulders.

  “What’re you doing?” Oliver cried. The school bell pealed across the intercom, signaling that he was officially late.

  “You harass me about setting up a meeting with Principal Jones, and then you yell at me when I come to deliver?” Ben asked. “How ungrateful can you get?”

  Oliver’s breath quickened. “She’s going to meet with me?”

  “Yes,” he said. “Probably.”

  That tacked-on qualifier caused both Oliver and Emily to stare in open disillusionment.

  “There’s a very good chance of it,” said Ben, seeming not to notice their frowns, “but she won’t have a lot of time, so rather than pulling you from class when that time comes, I’ve excused you. Your teachers have been kind enough to provide a list of your assignments, so it’ll be self-study for you this morning, just how you like it. Come this way.”

  Emily would have complained further, but Oliver fairly bounced with suppressed glee. Of course he’d prefer a morning of self-study over attending class. What kid wouldn’t? The meeting with Principal Jones didn’t even factor into the equation.

  If he was fine with this arrangement, then she had no cause to object. She was only going to spend the class period gossiping with Crystal anyway.

  She followed Oliver and Ben down the hallway to the elevator, which immediately opened. How was it always ready when Ben Birchard was involved? Did he have some sort of administrative access to the system, something that would allow him to summon an elevator car whenever he wanted, like how law enforcement officials could change traffic lights at will?

  She decided against asking this aloud. Ben would undoubtedly deny it, and Oliver would probably call her an idiot for speaking.

  Once they all filed in, Ben hit the button for the second floor. “Principal Jones is in a meeting with the other Prometheus principals. If she has time to meet with you, it will be when that meeting has adjourned. That could be anywhere between nine-thirty and noon.”

  The doors opened to the campus’s administrative offices. “Now it’s if she has time to meet with him?” Emily asked archly.

  “It was always if,” Ben said. “I can’t absolutely guarantee her schedule unless she tells me to, and she was, unfortunately, a bit vague this morning when I spoke to her.”

  Oliver immediately picked up on his verbiage. “You didn’t speak to her about it until this morning?”

  Ben rolled his eyes toward the ceiling. “When I spoke to her again about it.” He gestured to an open door. “You can both wait in here. It’s the office they’ve lent to Principal Jones and me for the duration of our visit.”

  Emily followed Oliver inside, taking a quick evaluation of the office as she did. It was large enough to fit two executive-style desks in the back half of the room and still have a more casual space in the front. Two thick-padded chairs faced a short sofa in one corner, with a low coffee table between them.

  She was impressed. “They give an office like this to all the visiting principals?” Did the room stand empty waiting for someone of importance to show up? And how many more were there like it on this floor?

  “Principal Jones always requests an office,” Ben said. “Principal Lee does as well. Carter and Legrand prefer to work from their allotted quarters. I’m not sure where General Stone is working.”

  “He’s not a principal,” Oliver said as he flopped into one of the padded chairs.

  Ben simply arched his brows, otherwise ignoring the remark entirely. “Make yourselves comfortable. I’m supposed to be observing the principals’ meeting, but I took a break to fetch you here. With any luck I haven’t missed anything important.” He punctuated this with a wry laugh.<
br />
  Emily assumed that he would leave the office, but instead he sat at one of the desks. The computer screen flashed to life to reveal a familiar surveillance feed as Birchard fitted a pair of headphones over his ears. Silence descended upon the room.

  She had nothing to do. Crystal had said something about loaning her a novel to read today, but of course she hadn’t seen her at breakfast. She only had her weekly report journal and Oliver’s file. A glance around the room showed how bare it was: no books, no magazines, not even a pamphlet. Ben sat at one of only two computers, and since she assumed the second had been provided for Principal Jones, she dared not even ask whether she could use it. With growing discontent she settled on the couch and belatedly recalled how much she hated the couches here.

  Oliver shot her a glare that commanded her to behave herself. Ever obedient, Emily schooled away her annoyance. Three weeks in a holding cell had given her plenty of practice on how to endure the next who-knew-how-many hours.

  Soon, her eyes focused over Ben’s shoulder to what she could see on the computer screen. The security feed was from the same angle as the one he had briefly shown her the day before in the hallway. Emily could make out some of the figures around the table—three of them she had only seen from above anyway, so it wasn’t hard to recognize Principal Carter’s hideous comb-over or Principal Legrand’s frizzy blond hair. The others were blocked from her view until Ben leaned back in his chair and put his feet up on the desk, thereby exposing the full screen.

  Principal Gates was next to Principal Legrand, and Principals Lee and Jones were on the other side of the oblong table. Emily recognized General Stone’s salt-and-pepper hair cut at the table’s head. It made sense to let the military man run the meeting.

  The two visible corners of the room had occupants as well. Maggie sat in one and Michelle in the other, and each tapped away at a keyboard in front of them—a laptop for Michelle, and a stenography machine for Maggie. Either Principal Gates was extremely old-school, or else Prom-F’s budget was utter crap compared to the other schools.