by Meg Buchanan
“You two ready?” Levi asked.
Jack nodded. “I’ll just check on Leach and the pilot.” He went into the next cellar. Someone had laid the two sleeping beauties out on a pallet and then covered them with a coat, and they were still sleeping peacefully.
They both had bandages around their wrists, he felt a bit guilty about that, but the pilot’s Locate, and her helmet needed to be in the Hover for things to look right and he needed Leach’s. It couldn’t be helped. The pilot would need the warmth of the coat for the next couple of days; she was just in the skimpy clothes Ela had left the City in, and he wasn’t completely heartless. Leach would be all right in his compression suit.
But they were both going to be really pissed when they woke up.
But nothing about this added up. Unless Leach had managed to keep being double-crossed to himself and had been looking for them without any of his superiors knowing.
He seemed to have plenty of autonomy. Maybe, no one knew about him, Jeron and Levi taking off to warn Jacob. Maybe, it got lost in the size of the operation to destroy everything. Maybe the Hover pilot got back, picked up Leach and the rest of the squad and they carried on like nothing had happened.
News that he’d had a mutiny on his hands wouldn’t do Leach’s career any good if it got out. He’d ask the others how Leach had handled it when he got to the Viper, so he knew what he was walking into.
Jack went out of the cellar, pushed the door shut and locked it.
. .
Chapter 27
IN THE VIPER, Leach’s Com crackled again. There had been the constant hum of chatter from other units that always came through a helmet. It sounded like something was about to kick off.
It also sounded like every StealthHover anywhere was being redirected to the City. The City covered a huge area, but the Mambas were massive.
The numbers being directed there would pretty much blanket the CBD with some to spare. Then. he heard Leach’s call sign and touched the side of the helmet.
“Leach.” He saw Ela and the squad watching him. All their lives depended on this looking and sounding right.
“Return to the City,” said the voice in the helmet. “Phase two of Operation RatsNest.”
Operation RatsNest? Leach said something about destroying a rat’s nest last night.
“Yes, sir,” said Jack. “Do we have coordinates?”
“Coordinates, NavMaps, GamePlan all sent to your Tablet. Familiarise,” said the voice in his ear.
“Yes sir,” said Jack and the Com cut back to the background chatter.
He’d spent enough time in Leach’s office to know how Leach did things, Leach was a tidy sucker. He went over to the VidScreen at the front of the cabin behind the cockpit to find the Tablet Leach used. It usually lived on the ledge under the screen and sure enough Leach had put it back where it belonged.
And Leach didn’t seem to use any password to unlock the Tablet so hopefully it was synced with his Locate.
Jack looked at the bandage on his wrist. The cut Phillipe had made to get his Locate out stung a bit, but it didn’t look like it was bleeding any more, and Leach’s Locate was still taped over it.
Ela stood and leaned against him, her hand resting on his back, her cheek against his hair, and he moved to break the contact, then went back to firing up the Tablet.
“Jack?” Ela asked.
He looked up, and she looked hurt again.
“Sorry,” he said. “I can’t help it.”
She nodded. “I know. But it’s strange. I like being near you, and you can’t stand it.”
He touched the side of her face for a moment. “It’s temporary. I’ll get over it.”
Ela nodded again and he turned back to the Tablet. What they’d done to him in ReEducation he’d hold against Vector forever.
Finally, he got the Tablet working and could see the orders and NavMaps firing up. He called the squad over.
“Can you get this up onto the main screen?” he asked Dante, he was the Coms expert, and they were all in this together so they might as well all have all the Intel.
Dante nodded, took the Tablet and synced it with the VidScreen then waved his hand at Screen to bring up the feed. Now the array on the Tablet showed on the Screen on the cockpit wall too.
Coordinates flashed up, morphed into a 3D grid of the City, then swirled through the buildings until they came to a stop when they matched the ones showing their landing site.
He studied the area. It wasn’t a part of the City he knew. He turned back to the others to ask if any of them were familiar with that area, and he saw Ela’s face.
“What’s the target?” he asked.
She had to know, she looked sick. “The Station,” she breathed. “That’s where Nick and Curly are. That must be the RatsNest. We have to warn them. They’re about to be attacked.”
Jack nodded. That made sense. “Can you get Nick on your Com yet?” he asked. “Even a CatchingFire, just to let him know to get everyone out.”
Ela pulled out her Com and tried a Connect. Then shook her head and looked over at him eyes wide, stricken. “Even if we could warn him. Where would they go? There are dozens of kids in there with him.”
O’Hara was at the controls, still familiarising himself with them, but he’d sounded pretty sure he knew what to do.
Jack turned to him. “Time to leave. Do you know what you’re doing yet?”
O’Hara nodded. “Ready when you are.”
“Head for the coordinates. No one’s going to attack before we do. The squad’s always arrowhead. It’ll take us twenty minutes to get there, we use that time to come up with a plan.”
O’Hara touched the icons on the cockpit screens. After a few seconds, Jack could hear the whine of the Viper taking off. Then felt the slight force to one side as O’Hara made a sweeping curve to head for the City.
He hit the flight path icon, it expanded to take up the screen. Jack could see all the arrows showing the planned path for the StealthHovers too. It looked like they were all headed in the same direction. Dozens of them with the same ETA and destination as they had.
The only good thing about it was the StealthHovers would stay in the air Hazed waiting for Leach to give the signal the squad was in place. If he couldn’t contact Nick before they got there, it looked like he had that small window between when the Viper landed and when the Mambas did, to warn him.
He had ten men, and that was counting Ela. And eleven lasers between. What hope did they have of getting to Nick in time to save everyone? And if they did, how were they meant to fight off a force of that size?
Once the Viper was headed for the City, Jack took off Leach’s helmet and settled in front of the VidScreen. They had a bit of time to orientate themselves. No point in planning in a vacuum.
“Now to find out what’s happening.” He waved his hand at the VidScreen. The array of the different feeds appeared again. This was normal, not the way the Screen in the Vault had looked with everything frozen and unreal. This looked like real time.
He studied it. The rest of the squad watched too. They’d put their faith in him, and he had to find a way to make this work or they were all going to end up dead, not just unemployed.
Ela touched on image, and it spread. With the helmet off she looked cute. All short spiky hair and those grey eyes of hers. He still felt easier if she wasn’t too close to him but that was getting better.
“I think this is from a satellite,” she said. “From the coordinates, this is near Jacob’s farm, but there aren’t enough landmarks left to be sure.” She pointed at an area in the top corner of the screen. “I think this is the mountain.”
Jack nodded. “Yeah, that looks right. Can you get in closer?”
Ela drew a square on the screen with her hand and brought the mountain into focus. “It’s real time.”
“Yeah.” Jack nodded at the six numbers at the bottom of the screen. The last one flipped over second by second. “Go back in time.”
“Shit.” Jack looked back at Dante. “How many people have seen that?”
“Can’t tell,” said Dante. “But Leach would have watched it, and that will be why this feed is on the array and why he knew we were alive.”
“Go back to when we got to the boundary of Jacob’s place. We could have led them right to the Vault.”
Ela nodded and keyed in the time. It had been the middle of the night, and the screen was dark. They could see heat signatures in the darkness, but all shaped like cattle. There were no service numbers and nothing to show them on the bikes. Lucky they’d all been in uniform, and he’d thought to give Jeron and Levi wrist shields.
They kept watching and saw a tide of black slide across the screen, blanking everything out.
He saw Ela bite her lip. “That’s when the StealthHovers turned up. There are so many of them they’re blocking the Satellite feed,” she said.
“Can you go back to when Mum left Jacob’s?”
Ela frowned. “Why?”
“I want to know what happened. Why Mon went back to the house.”
Ela keyed in the time and then the coordinates for Jacob’s house. They watched the Fitzgerald and Patsy heat signatures get into the patrol car, and then the shape of the car leave Jacob’s property and go along the road.
“Jump forward in five-minute increments,” said Jack. He could still see the outline of the car. He couldn’t tell where it was headed, but they were well past the OutPost and hopefully they’d got somewhere safe.
But after Ela had jumped the Vid ahead three times, the black tide crept across the Screen again, wiping out everything.
Ela paused the Vid. “Sorry Jack, I don’t think there’s any point to this. We can’t see anything.”
Jack nodded. She was right, he wasn’t going to find out what happened to Patsy this way. “We need to wipe the Vid of us coming out of the Vault so no one else can watch it.”
“I don’t know how,” aid Ela.
But Dante would. “Can you do it?” he asked Dante.
“Yeah, hand me the tablet.” Jack gave it to him then turned back to Ela. “We need to contact Nick and Curly. Do you have a way of doing that?”
Ela shrugged. “Usually I send an Emoji or an innocuous Txt. Just something to let him know I’m coming.”
He nodded at the VidScreen. “If Leach had seen this, why would he wait for us in town?”
“It takes time to get anywhere,” said Levi. “Maybe Leach came back, trawled through the Vids, got lucky and spotted us, then he’d have to sort out a Hover and get the squad together.”
“Maybe.” Jack moved the feed-back to the present and watched for any shimmering in the air to indicate the presence of a Hover. But there still didn’t seem to be anything living or moving in the Hinterland.
He stood up. They weren’t achieving anything watching Vids. “We need to sort out our next move.”
Ela waved her hand at the Screen. “Let’s see what we’re going to find when we get to the City.” But when the feed from the City Cams came on, there was nothing to see. Just a City going about its business as usual.
“That’s no help,” said Jack. “We know what’s really happening.” He brought up the flight path again. The arrows were moving relentlessly towards the target. When they got there the StealthHovers would be there, hovering above them, waiting to UnHaze, and land.
Jack finally had a bit of a plan. He’d make everything look normal to the Commander, but once the squad left the Viper, he had about ten minutes to warn Nick and hopefully they could come up with something that would save them all.
“Ready to land,” said O’Hara from the cockpit. The pilot’s helmet and Locate were on the seat beside him so all that would still look right to anyone monitoring them.
“Right,” he said to the squad, as they strapped themselves into their seats, and sat there, lasers in their hands, ready to do whatever he told them to.
Blind faith. He hoped it wasn’t misplaced. “When the Hover has landed, we disembark and set up at the three points of the compass the way Leach would have got us to. That leaves five of us to enter the Station. I’ll take Ela, Levi and Jeron and one other. Any volunteers?”
“I’ll come with you,” said O’Hara. “I can set a delay, so the doors won’t shut until I’m out. That gets everyone else clear.”
“What are we going to do?” Gregor asked.
“Just stay at your posts until I know what’s happening.” Jack could hear the whine and shudder as the Hover landed. “It’s going to take time to get into the Station, and we don’t know how much they know.
Ela and I’ll talk our way in. Jeron, Levi and O’Hara will act like they’re covering us and stay in position. Keep your Coms on my channel. If things turn to shit, come back here and clear out. But what I’m hoping for is we’ll all finish up in the Station, and it’ll be our job to protect the kids there.”
“You won’t have long to make it happen,” said Dante.
Jack shook his head. “No, about ten minutes before someone in command figures something’s wrong. Not a big window.”
He marched across to the doors of the Viper, the way Leach would have if he’d been in command. “Everyone know what they’re doing?” He got ten nods and turned to O’Hara. “Leave the Viper in Haze, set your delay and open the doors.”
Chapter 28
CURLY LEANED BACK in his chair and studied the main VidScreen in the Coms room. “It all looks too normal. And there’s nothing on the airwaves that tells us anything.”
Nick was standing behind him with Scott and watching the Screen too. He nodded. “Since the feeds from the Drones went, we can’t tell what’s happening anywhere.” He waved at the VidScreen. The City was operating as normal, but nothing was normal.
“Sometimes it even looks like we’re being fed stuff we’ve seen before,” said Scott.
“Yeah,” said Nick. Last night they’d seen StealthHovers move over the Hinterland, Jacob disappeared, and then nothing. No chatter from the Administration, nothing from Vector, no plans or instructions.
Nick rubbed the back of his neck. it was like the Administration had changed to a channel they didn’t know about and were carrying on without them. Something was happening, but he couldn’t work out what.
They couldn’t even access a feed that would show them what was going on at the University. For all they knew all the kids might have been killed.
“I could take a couple of the others and go scout around,” said Scott.
Curly put his chin on his fists and kept studying the screen. “What would that get us? We already know what’s happening in the City. That’s the one lot of feeds that are working.”
Nick nodded. “We need to know what Vector’s up to and what’s happened at home.” He ran his fingers through his hair. “God, I hate not knowing what’s going on.”
Then the screen beside the main one flicked on.
He was monitoring the entrance. “Incoming,” said his voice.
Curly flicked to the Cam covering the east entrance to the Station. Two VTroopers were coming up the steps. He could see another three posted close, behind pillars.
He focussed on the nearest two. They were carrying lasers, the smaller one didn’t look like he knew what he was doing. Just following.
The other did the half sidestep, kept surveying what was around him and held his laser high. When he got to the top step, he nodded at the other trooper to get behind him then checked the covered entrance. Once they went past that point, no one would be able to see them from outside the Station. They’d be right outside the door.
Would they try to blast it open?
Nick flicked on the InterCom. “We’re under attack. All guards to the main entrance, now.” He could hear the urgency in his voice. And the response wa
s instant. Kids with rifles seemed to come from everywhere and piled into the foyer area facing the barricaded door.
“Wait for orders,” he said. He looked back at Scott, waiting behind him. “You go.”
Scott nodded and took off.
“They’re the sniper squad,” said Curly. “It might be Jack.”
Nick shook his head. “Nah, his helmet says Leach. And the service number’s different.” He’d watched the Vid of the squad at Humicrib where he and Ela nearly got caught and had figured out which Jack was.
The trooper checked the entranceway and then nodded at the other one to go in.
“That’s Jack,” he said. Recognising the sequence of numbers.
“Nah,” said Curly. “That’s female.”
“They don’t have female troopers, and that’s Jack’s service number.” Now the smaller one was entering a code into the keypad. “What the fuck?” Nick breathed. “Ready to defend the entrance if the door opens,” he said into the intercom, then turned back to Curly. “Leave the minimum number here to watch the monitors and get the rest of the kids to the abandoned tunnels. If Vector gets in here, they need to be somewhere else.”
Curly nodded and switched on his Com and gave orders to evacuate. They’d figure this day would come and had a plan in place to get everyone out of the City. But they didn’t know whether even the Hinterland was safe now.
“Tell them to wait in the east side tunnel until we know more.”
Curly relayed that message to the group leaders while Nick watched the trooper with Jack’s service number enter the code into a Com. Then breathed a sigh of relief.
Ela’s Com, Ela’s code. For some reason Ela was in Jack’s uniform, and with any luck the other Trooper was Jack.
“I think it’s Jack and Ela,” he said to Curly. “You go. Let them in. If there’s even smallest doubt, shoot first, ask questions later.”
Curly nodded, grabbed his walking stick and took off to the entrance.
