Logan could hear a very loud “but” in the tone of his words. He knew what was coming. But you are too old for Alisha… And how could he argue against that? He was too old.
Daniel seemed to be struggling with how to say it.
“You have a wife, I believe…”
“No.”
“A lady with whom you have a long-term commitment?”
“No. Not unless you call the Corps a lady,” he added ruefully.
Daniel considered this and laughed at some private joke in his head. “In fact, my dear wife frequently referred to the Corps as my mistress. Ah, Alisha…”
Logan was confused. “I’m sorry?”
“Alisha…her sense of humor is sometimes too witty for my old brain. She led me to believe you had a woman already. I’ve just now realized she meant the Corps.”
Chapter 17
Alisha had thought she could out-fly the squad, even without her modified windcatcher. She’d almost paid the ultimate price for her arrogance several times already.
While she could certainly out-fly any one of the squad, the six working together proved more than she could handle. Even if she evaded the first five Ryders, eventually they would corral her, preventing her from escaping DC as he swept down from above and stalled her catcher.
After her third stall-out and dunking on the ridge, she attempted to out-climb him, but Washington and Ollie were behind her, diverting a major portion of her wind. All she did was increase the distance of her fall when she stalled. Thank God the suit she wore was three sizes too large, for it helped her to slow the descent and direct her fall into an overhanging tree so the windcatcher caught in its limbs, preventing her from smashing down onto pointy granite rocks at high speed.
When the tree limbs broke from the force of impact, she still fell and hurt her knee in the tumble, but at least she lived.
She had hoped DC would be satisfied with the results of the day. She’d been thoroughly beaten, humiliated, and humbled. While severe, her injury would not cause him censure. His punishment had been perfectly planned and executed.
To her shock, he commanded her to get up and take another run. Alisha realized something had broken in his twisted mind. It wasn’t his intent to punish her. He planned to kill her.
Thus Alisha saw no alternative but to fly into the wind farm. Using a standard catcher, death was a probability, but if she didn’t escape DC and his obedient squad, she now realized death was a certainty. If his intent had been anything but murder, he would have stopped after the last crash.
How she managed to turn and steer her clumsy catcher into the farm, she didn’t know. Feigning left, she pulled the catcher hard right, aiming between two rows of invisible blades. The greatest danger was that the wind would blow her catcher into a blade. There would be no recovery. Within seconds of first contact, the blades would reel her in and chop her body into a thousand pieces.
Without question she’d be safer if she just collapsed her catcher and hit the ground, but if she landed too close to the border of the farm, DC could hunt her down on foot. With her leg busted up, she’d be the slowest rabbit he’d ever bagged.
Alisha held the catcher steady against the west wind until she estimated she was a mile into the farm. She released her harness at the exact same time she collapsed her catcher. She hoped it would fall safely to the ground and not wrap up in a wind generator, but if it did, she sure as hell didn’t want to follow it up.
She hit the ground favoring her strong leg, but it didn’t matter. The pain was so intense that she rolled into a ball, trying desperately not to black out.
“Get up,” she warned herself. “Hide the catcher and get away from here.”
Somehow Alisha forced herself to bury the catcher and move farther into the farm. She didn’t worry about leaving prints in the sand. The wind blew so hard any footprints disappeared in seconds.
After walking over half a mile east into the farm, she noticed blood dripping from her knee. She unzipped her suit and pulled off her shirt, wrapping it tightly around the open wound. The pressure hurt like hell, but she had to stop the bleeding. While the sand covered the drops of blood in seconds, the tracking gear DC had could still follow it.
Realizing they had to be close behind, she altered her direction and headed south.
A sense of danger made her turn around. When she did, she saw the laser bead on her shoulder. She weaved through the windmill posts, hoping the metal would confuse the bullet as it attempted to follow the path to its target. When she heard the bullet ricochet on metal, she stopped for a moment and reassessed the situation.
While she presently remained out of visual range, that wouldn’t last long. DC would have no trouble outpacing her with her injured leg. Her only chance was to run in the opposite direction from what he would expect. She had been running east, into the farm, before he’d beaded her. Going east remained her best chance of survival.
So she headed west, straight for the edge—the last place she’d want to be. The farther she went, the slower she moved. She stopped when she was about a mile and a half from the edge of the wind farm. She couldn’t risk getting any closer. If DC had ordered some of the crew to land on the ridge, they’d be able to see her with binoculars if she didn’t have sufficient wind towers to hide her.
Her best chance of survival was to become invisible to anyone on the ridge or flying above. Using her hands, she scraped a small indentation in the sand at the base of the wind turbine and lay down. Within just a few minutes, a fine layer of sand covered her blue suit. Soon she would disappear altogether.
The only problem with lying in a desert, buried in hot sand, with an injured knee throbbing from pain, was that time wouldn’t move. Minutes turned to hours.
She had almost convinced herself that her watch had broken and DC must have given up by now when she sensed the proximity of a windcatcher. How she heard it over the drumming of the turbines she had no idea, but a second later, its shadow crossed over her.
Thank God she hadn’t moved and caused the sand to shift off her suit. The close call gave her incentive to remain buried, no matter how slowly time moved or how much her leg hurt.
Alisha breathed a sigh of relief when the entire squad flew over her and headed east toward the compound. She still waited another twenty minutes before she pushed herself out of the sand and tried to stand up. The pain literally knocked the breath from her lungs. How the hell can anything hurt this bad? Shouldn’t my body go into shock and stop hurting?
She dropped back to the base of the turbine and used it as a backrest. Taking a swallow of water, Alisha realized she only had a quarter of a pint left. She had no food, little water, and no gun to fend off coyotes and mountain lions. If the colonel didn’t rescue her before dark, he’d probably be taking bad news to her grandfather.
Chapter 18
The squad returned late from training practice, missing one.
DC sounded more irate than distressed over the matter. “She disappeared in the middle of the wind farms. We walked in as far as we could, but we couldn’t find anything. I flew three rounds above, but I couldn’t see anything.”
Logan doubted he had flown three rounds, and if he had flown one, it would have been with three thousand feet of safety cushion and no possibility of actually seeing her.
Logan geared up. “I need one of you to show me where she was last seen.” He stared down his crew. They all looked stressed and miserable.
“I’ll do it,” DC said in exasperation.
“No. You’ve done enough,” Logan snapped. “Philly, put your gear back on. You just volunteered.”
Philly nodded and headed toward the landing field.
When Logan joined him, they took off in tandem and rose high in case Alisha was attempting to fly home as they went in search of her.
They’d yet to see any sign of her when they reached the wind farms. Logan stared across the two hundred miles of nothing but wind generators standing in rows like strange, tall
aluminum flowers with rotating invisible petals.
Logan spoke to Philly through the ear buds that connected to their comm units. “Do you remember where she went in?”
“We were low on the ridges when she swerved into the wind farm. We pulled back.”
“Was she the rabbit?”
“Yeah. Had been all day. She’d taken some hard falls. DT had us practicing six-man stall-out maneuvers.”
“Over the ridge?” Logan asked, trying to suppress his anger.
“Yes, sir.”
Logan flew low over the area. He saw no sign of the chute tangled in the blades of any of the wind generators.
“How far did you really go in after her?” Logan demanded. His earpiece remained silent. “Philly?”
“I can’t remember, sir. It’s been an exhausting day.”
“It’s going to be your last exhausting day as a Ryder unless you come clean right now.”
After a moment of silence, Philly responded. “DC and Ollie went in to look for her. I heard a few rounds go off.”
“They fired on her?”
“DC fired at her, but I don’t think he hit her. I was posted on the ridge to call off her position. She was running at a fast clip. When she ran west, I told them to go southeast. She went out of sight soon after.”
“Let’s go west, then.”
“Sir, we’re about to lose light.”
“You ever fly over wind farms at night before?”
“No, sir.”
“Well, you may gain the experience if you’re wrong about her going west.”
Logan knew Philly feared the wind farms. Any flyer with sense was terrified of them. The blades moved at such high speed that they were barely visible to the eye, but go a foot too low and you’d find out invisible didn’t mean harmless. A sudden wind dip could result in the immediate amputation of your legs. And if your catcher snagged in one, it would roll you up for a decapitation before you could even utter your final “Oh shit”.
Logan spotted her below, leaning against a generator pole. She tried to duck for cover behind the pole, but upon recognizing him, she stepped out and pointed to the west border of the farm. Logan nodded and headed in that direction.
He and Philly landed on the narrow strip of land between the ridge and the generators. He knew such precision landing was always a challenge for Philly, but he held his line well. Logan would normally have praised him for the landing, but today he was far too angry with the Ryder, even though he knew, technically, Philly had done nothing wrong. He’d followed his captain’s orders. The fact his captain was not fit to give orders was not Philly’s responsibility. That fault lay with Logan.
“Stay with the catchers. I’m going in after her.”
Logan felt as if he had run a mile when he finally met up with her. He saw why she wasn’t making better time. Her left knee had swollen to twice its normal size and was bleeding heavily despite the tourniquet she’d applied.
“First, sit down and let me look at your knee,” he ordered as he lifted her in his arms and eased her down onto the sand. Pulling an emergency tent from his backpack, he created a shield from the blowing sand before he unwrapped the wound.
“This doesn’t look like a bullet wound,” he observed as he opened his medical kit.
“No, his laser shot got confused with so much aluminum,” she replied with amazing calm. “That’s from being stalled out over rocks.”
“I’d have thought you had better sense than to get caught on rocks,” he scolded as he cleaned the wound.
“My choices were the ridge or the wind farm. DC had me and the team start the chase on the narrow strip. He started on the ridge, so he had a faster wind. He’d be on top of me before I could pick up any real speed. If I’d had my windcatcher, I could have outmaneuvered him. With a standard, he kept stalling me out. He stalled me out at three hundred feet on the last run.”
“Three hundred feet?”
“Yeah, but he’ll say it was twenty,” Alisha replied. “When he ordered another go, I realized he wouldn’t stop until I was dead. I decided if this rabbit wanted to survive it needed a burrow. So instead of turning toward the ridge, where they waited to stall me out, I flew across the windmills, stalled out on purpose, and skydived into the farm.”
Logan glared at her. “Do you have any idea how dangerous that was?”
“Yeah, but I thought I’d have a better chance than crashing on the ridge. At least until DC came in after me with a spot-rifle. I took off running and got lucky when they headed off east while I went west.”
Logan finished with the new bandage. Replacing the medical kit and shield tent in his backpack, he helped her to stand. Before she could take a step, however, he lifted her into his arms and headed out of the farm.
“I can walk, Colonel.”
“Yes, but Philly’s afraid of night flying, so I’d like to get out of this farm before the sun sets,” Logan grumbled, trying not to let Alisha know how angry, outraged, and ready to kill one captain he was.
Alisha leaned her head on his shoulder and gave up arguing. Her acceptance surprised him. She must hurt more than she’d admitted.
He tried to harden his heart to the physical pleasure her head upon his shoulder gave him. This was no time to let his emotions go unchecked. He was a colonel of the SkyRyders, and he’d lost control of his captain and his squad. He had no time for even the slightest sensual pleasure.
As they came to the edge of the wind farm, she cried out in alarm at the realization that she’d left her windcatcher back in the farm. Logan never imagined she would still have one after landing in a wind farm.
“You don’t need it. I carry packages that weigh more than you on a regular basis,” he assured her. Handing over his backpack to Philly, he adjusted his harness so that Alisha could comfortably ride behind him.
By the time they were ready to take off, it was near dark, and Philly’s eyes filled with terror as he stared across the wind farm.
“Just keep a slight pull on the left toggle,” Alisha advised him by leaning over the colonel’s shoulder and speaking into his mic.
She kept an eye on Philly during their takeoff. Once he cleared the wind farm and the ridge, she spoke again. “Great job, Philly. Did you feel a slight shudder when you were about ten feet up? That’s because you have your front toggles too tight. If you loosen them about a quarter of an inch, that won’t happen.”
“I don’t think he’s in a frame of mind to take flying lessons right now, Alisha,” Logan pointed out.
“I know, but it’s the only chance I’ll have to give him advice.”
“What does that mean?”
“I’m going home tomorrow.”
“We’ve discussed that, Alisha. Long term, you can’t save your grandfather if you scavenge. Eventually, you will get caught.”
“I meant going back to Flatland. I can strike a deal with my father. I’ll do what he wants if, in exchange, he’ll see Gramps gets his medicine.”
“Is that what you really want?”
“No…but I can’t help Gramps if I’m dead. You asked me back there if I knew how close I came to dying today. The answer is yes, I do. I was lucky, and I might be lucky tomorrow as well, but eventually…”
“Things are going to change, Alisha. Give me two more days and I’ll have DC up on charges…and Philly, I know you can hear me on your mic. If you warn the bastard about what’s coming down, I’ll wring your neck, do you understand me?”
“Yes, sir. I won’t say a thing—except it’s about time!”
***
Alisha nearly burst with happiness. She wouldn’t have to leave the Ryders. She clung to the colonel tighter than ever.
“Alisha, you’re choking me,” he complained.
“Sorry.” She loosened her grip.
“Does that mean you’ll stay on?” he asked after a few minutes of silence.
“Of course.”
He didn’t respond, but since his muscles relaxed, she thought
him pleased with her reply.
Chapter 19
When they reached the compound, Logan brought the catcher down so softly that Alisha couldn’t isolate the exact moment he’d set down. One moment they were in the air, and the next he unlatched the harness.
He transferred her from his back to his arms and carried her, leaving Philly to fold and care for both catchers. When they entered the compound, there wasn’t a single squad member in sight—not even Ginnie.
The colonel took Alisha to his rooms and carried her to the bathroom, placing her on the edge of the tub. “First thing we need is to get you cleaned up. Can you undress by yourself?”
She shook her head. “I’m going to need help.”
***
Logan almost called Ginnie to help Alisha undress, but given Ginnie was part of an ongoing attempted murder investigation, he nixed the idea.
He helped Alisha peel off the flysuit, expecting her to object to his assistance. The first night she certainly would have, but this time she remained as docile as a kitten.
“You’re in a lot of pain, aren’t you?” he asked as he lifted her from the rim with one arm and pushed the suit and polypropylene undergear over her buttocks.
Carefully, he maneuvered the suit over her swollen knee. Once it was off, he removed the polyprops as well. His actions were uncomfortably intimate, and he wondered if embarrassment caused her eerie silence. She had never answered his question about being in pain.
When she handed him her bra, he wondered how the hell he had previously given her an exam with no improper feelings on his part. This time, he had nothing but improper feelings.
He reached around her to turn on the shower. “First, we need to get the sand off of you. Then we’ll remove the bandage, and you can soak in an antibiotic salt solution. Can you stand on your good leg to take a shower?” he asked, knowing that he was going to have to call Ginnie in for help if she said no.
“I think so,” she replied, reaching out and grabbing his arm for a brace. When she stood on her own, he stepped back to give her a little privacy—very little privacy. He had to stay close enough to help her if she started to fall. She also needed help reaching the soap.
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