It was a great birthday party. Someone had made the Robochef work overtime. Everywhere he looked was more food: pizza, chicken, coconut ice cream, pies, a layered cake filled with cream and yogurt, and cheesecake just for Brickert. The food was delicious, the games were fun, and it seemed that everyone had bought Sammy a present. His favorite part of the evening, however, was when everyone sang “Happy Birthday” in a strange but beautiful mixture of languages and tunes.
After two years of receiving no presents, Sammy was overwhelmed with gratitude. Only two people had any clue what the gifts really meant to him. But instead of crying, he laughed himself silly when he opened the presents, revealing the contents of each one to be different articles of clothing. Apparently during his nine months at headquarters, someone had taken notice that he either wore jumpsuits or the same red hoodie and jeans that he’d worn on his very first day. All told, he received two new pairs of jeans, four new hoodies, some tee shirts, a few new pairs of shoes and socks, and lots of under-shorts. The only person he could not find a present from was Jeffie.
The festivities continued into the evening with dancing. But at 2000 Al asked everyone who would be leaving the next day to retire. The mood quickly became somber, and about half the Betas left. Sammy stayed a little longer to thank everyone a third time for his gifts. Brickert told him not to worry about cleaning up and gave him half a hug, wishing him the best of luck on tomorrow’s mission. Sammy looked around for Jeffie, but she had disappeared.
He deliberately took his time walking downstairs in case he might catch her, but he never saw her before reaching his dorm. In a last attempt, he sent her a short text asking where she was. When he remembered that she had not been wearing her com at the party, he gave up. Betas typically did not wear coms on Sundays, especially if they were all together.
Reluctantly, he undressed and showered knowing he wouldn’t want to when he woke up early the next morning. It was awkwardly quiet in the bathroom and passing other Betas in the halls. The usual bantering as they stood side by side at the sinks was starkly missing. After stalling as long as he could, Sammy went to bed. He didn’t think he’d be able to sleep with all the jumbled and pent up emotions flooding him. He was wrong. All the work he’d done had a toll, and it was collected that night. He fell asleep almost immediately and had no dreams of Thirteens chasing him into bloody dead ends.
17. Rio
Al shook Sammy awake.
“O-four hundred,” his voice whispered. Sammy couldn’t see Al’s face and wondered if he was dreaming. When he smelled Al’s morning breath, he knew the truth. “Come on, Sammy, time to get up.”
No more words were needed. Sammy knew exactly what was going on and what he needed to do, a mark of how well Al had prepped his team for the mission. His mind was alert—very alert given the early hour. He drew in a sharp breath as the realization hit him like ice cold water: We’re really doing it. Right now.
He jumped out of bed and dressed in the uniform issued to him especially for this mission. It clung to him differently than his normal jumpsuits, and he wasn’t sure if he liked that. Smoky gray, just like the Alphas’, but emblazoned with a Greek beta symbol instead of the usual alpha symbol. The beta symbol acted not only as a homing device so Al always knew his location, but it also monitored Sammy’s heart rate and respiration.
He climbed the stairs alone and crossed the second floor landing where he had stood awkwardly fumbling out good nights to Jeffie so many times. Just as he was passing, the door opened quietly. Still wearing her night clothes, hair angelically tousled from sleep, Jeffie slid through the crack of the opening, smiling at Sammy. It was an incredible wonder to him how she could look so beautiful straight out of bed.
She smiled brightly at him. He wondered if the beta symbol was already registering his increasing heart rate. Hopefully not.
“Hiya,” she said sleepily. Her voice sounded somewhat huskier because her nose was stuffed. Sammy thought it was really cute.
Jeffie, you are perfect. “Hiya, sleepy,” he replied.
“Nervous?” she asked.
“No, not really.”
“Liar.” Her smile got bigger. “I wanted to see you before you left. Sorry I disappeared last night, but I got your text.”
“Where did you go?”
“Dealing with stuff.”
What could she possibly have to deal with on my birthday?
“Don’t worry about it,” she said when she saw his perplexed look. “I have to give you your birthday present.”
“Oh. No, you don’t have to—Don’t worry about it. I can’t even take it with me right now,” he said.
“Shut up, Sammy,” she said with a little push. “You can take it with you.”
He opened his mouth to tell her that she was wrong, but Jeffie was moving closer to him. His brain buzzed softly, clouding out other thoughts, and whatever he had thought was important became utterly immaterial.
Wait, he wanted to scream out. She’s so close to me. What is she doing?
He tensed up, his back stiffened into a board. Since his parents’ deaths, touch had become a foreign language to him. But Jeffie seemed to ignore his hesitance, and softly slid her arms around him in a hug. The embrace was amazing. No one had touched him like this before. It was much more . . . romantic? Is that what this is? Romantic? Gradually, he relaxed and hugged her back, trying to mirror the intensity he felt from her.
What does this mean? Is she trying to tell me something?
But he knew she had never hugged him like this before. She was so close to him, filling his senses with only Jeffie. For several seconds, he stood apart from the world, holding Jeffie and savoring every smell, every texture, the sound of her breathing, the sight of her so close to him.
When she pulled away, a piece of him went with her, and he doubted he would ever get it back. It would always be hers. Her eyes were redder than he had noticed before, and he thought they might even have tears.
“Are you okay, Jeff?”
“I’m fine,” she answered him with a fleeting smile and a downward glance.
He decided it was not the time to argue the point. “Okay.”
“I’m only going to give you half of your birthday present now. The other half you get when you come back safe. Got it?” Her voice was huskier than ever.
“Yeah. I got it.”
“Close your eyes and don’t open them until I tell you.”
Sammy did what he was told, thinking of how strange she was being. He felt Jeffie’s lips press against his cheek. With eyes still closed, he jerked his head back slightly, then got control over himself. His head went light as blood rushed from his brain, which only buzzed more noisily. This means she likes me, right? She actually likes me?!
The place on his cheek where her lips had touched tingled. He reached up and lightly felt the spot. His nostrils filled with that rose scent he had come to associate with only her. Her warm breath tickled his ear, warning him again of the nearness of her presence. Then he heard the faintest of whispers: “I’ll miss you, so you’d better come back to me . . . fast.”
The door to the girls’ dormitory emitted a soft snap, and Sammy realized he was alone again on the landing. He squinted through his eyes, just to check. She was gone. His face had gotten awfully warm and his fingertips tingled a little. His heart was doing jumping jacks up to his throat. And the mother of all smiles stretched from ear to ear.
I could die right now. Brickert’s wrong. Girls aren’t stupid. They’re amazing.
She’d had such a powerful effect on him that he had briefly forgotten about the mission to Rio de Janeiro. He stood there for a moment longer with eyes glazed until it popped into his brain that he needed to be upstairs with the team. He hustled up the next flight of stairs and joined the team in the cafeteria. Inside, Al was making everyone but himself eat breakfast.
No one spoke much. Sammy was able to get down some oatmeal, but his stomach must have shrunk. He mentally ran through the mi
ssion to ensure himself he would not forget a single step. At 0440 Al stood up.
“Any last words before we go?” he asked.
No one said anything. Sammy grabbed his glass of water and started chugging it because his mouth had gone very dry.
“Let’s move out.”
Almost in unison, everyone put their coms on. Sammy swung his leg over his chair and followed Al to the roof. They took the special staircase past Commander Byron’s suite and came to the roof door.
The sun hadn’t risen and the sky was clear enough to see a few stars. Sammy was glad for some reason. He rarely got to see stars. The air was pleasantly nippy and smelled fresh. In the middle of the roof a small, elegant atmo-cruiser waited for them. The noblack exterior told Sammy this cruiser was built for stealth first, everything else second.
It was an average-sized cruiser, capable of carrying no more than a dozen or so. With the noblack coating, a group could get in and out of an area without triggering any form of scanning surveillance. The structure of the ship was made to absorb radio waves, conceal thermal and electronic detection, and, in dark enough surroundings, block reflection of most light off its surface.
A door in the cruiser’s side opened. The rear of the ship contained a small cargo area, which besides containing the team’s packs and Al’s portable command station, also doubled as a small medical station with several emergency supplies, fire extinguishers, and food rations. The rest of the ship held seating for two pilots and ten passengers.
Sammy and the rest of the team went to the cargo space and grabbed their packs. The pilot was an Elite. Sammy heard the pilot’s voice in the cockpit, hailing NWG Flight Command for departure clearance. The team moved to the passenger area. The climbers put on their climbing shoes and secured them. Sammy strapped himself into his seat as Al slipped into the co-pilot’s chair. Then he and the pilot began methodically preparing the cruiser for take-off.
The engines hummed as the ship came to life. The pilots exchanged low murmurs of conversation going through the starting up cycle. Sammy glanced nervously at Marie. She smiled back at him as if to say, “Don’t worry. He’s a good pilot.”
In a matter of minutes, the cruiser was cleared for take-off and began its rapid ascent from the ground. “Estimated time of travel: two hours and twenty-three minutes,” Al announced.
Sammy gazed out the window as the cruiser headed west, picking up more and more speed. It was not long before the landmass of Capitol Island disappeared from view, replaced with the inky blackness of the Atlantic Ocean stretching out impossibly endless in every direction.
Far above the ocean, the cruiser passed through a storm that spattered bullets of rain on the small windows. Thoughts and memories chased themselves through Sammy’s mind. He’d arrived at headquarters nine months ago, almost to the day. All of this because of his anomaly. Anomaly Fourteen. Had it not been for the abilities, he would be back in the Grinder right now, trying to figure out another way to escape. It seemed to him miraculous that such opportunities had come along in his life, changing him so drastically. Without them, he would never have met Brickert . . . Jeffie . . . everyone . . . wouldn’t even be on this cruiser right now. He took comfort in the idea that when it was his turn to lead a mission, his best friends would be coming along.
“We’re now flying over CAG territory,” Al announced. Everyone understood what that meant. The cruiser slowly dropped in altitude, and their speed noticeably decreased. It was only a few minutes later that land came into sight. The great city of Rio de Janeiro.
The city itself, divided into several zones, boasted world-famous beaches and historical sites. It was the industrial North Zone of the city that housed the factory they would be sabotaging.
High enough to discourage curiosity, and low enough to quickly dip down for a safe blast-landing, Al skillfully flew the cruiser over the beaches and into the heart of the industrial district of the city. Several enormous skyscrapers passed by on the south. Sammy saw a red button blinking on the cruiser’s control panel. Al reached up and pushed the button. That was the team’s cue to move to the cargo area.
“Your ship,” Al told the Elite pilot. He unbuckled himself and joined the others in the cargo space. “About thirty seconds until we fly over our jump site. Everyone get ready.”
The side door of the cruiser opened again, letting cool air swirl around the cabin. The air smelled different to Sammy, dirtier and heavier than the air around Capitol Island. The ship flew relatively slow approximately a hundred meters above the ground.
“Hold on to something,” the pilot warned them. In one smooth movement, the cruiser turned and sharply dipped down. Sammy could not see the factory yet, but Al began counting down.
“Three.”
Al stepped to up to the doorway. Sammy thought he could see the factory now.
“Two.”
The factory landing space was coming up fast.
“One.”
The cruiser leveled off a little over one hundred meters above ground, still too high for a Psion to safely land with blasts. Al jumped out the door, free falling in a spread eagle formation to slow himself as much as possible. Everyone quickly followed him out. Sammy was the last. He tried not to think too much before he leapt. Giddiness, terror, and perhaps some craziness were all bundled up inside him. All he could do was grin and throw himself out. The cold air nipped his ears and nose, and whipped his curly hair as he fell. Seeing the ground rush up closer and closer gave a high nothing else could match. Down below, Kobe and Kaden whooped and laughed. Sammy grabbed two small loops on the sides of his suit and pulled hard. Two large flaps of cloth like miniature wings billowed out, reducing his velocity by over a third. This made it possible for him to land-blast without dying.
He dropped his feet and blasted hard several times to kill his speed. His feet touched down on the dusty earth over fifty meters past where Al landed. After zipping off the flaps and stowing them into his pack, he craned his neck upward to see Al’s portable command station gently floating down on its parachute. It landed only a few meters beyond.
The landing area was an unpaved square open at one end to an industrial back road that appeared fairly well-used. The rest of the square was enclosed by the factory’s horseshoe-shape extensions on two sides and a long loading dock that faced the road. The dock had two large ramps and several heavy-duty rolling doors for deliveries. The team met up at the portable station and moved it into the shadow of one of the ramps.
It took less than ten minutes to nestle it into place. Al ran checks to make sure he could communicate with everyone over their coms. Then he gave Gregor and Li the go to enter the building.
The U-shaped factory was by no means picturesque, but Sammy thought it could have been much worse. At a glance, he could see that the center section of the building had been built first, the wings added on later by what must have been a penny-pinching owner because the original section looked in better condition than the additions. It was a windowless stucco building. Once a magnificent, gleaming-white facility built to impress the eyes, produce cutting-edge communication products, and prevent industrial espionage, now it looked dirty and forgotten. The paint was chipping badly and cracks in the stucco were racing several long vines up the walls.
Sammy, Kobe, Kaden, and Marie split from Cala and Martin. The four climbers jogged up one of the ramps onto the dock and crossed its length. A small metal door used for parcel deliveries had been built right next to an employee entrance on the far side of the dock. Fortunately, it was wide enough that if they took off their packs any skinny person could fit through it.
“We’re in position,” Marie reported to Al in her com.
“Great,” Al answered. “Hold tight. The others are still working.”
The four climbers already had a good idea of how long they had to wait. Routine practices had taken no more than ten minutes and no less than seven for Gregor and Li to handle the security. Then it took about fifteen minutes for Martin a
nd Cala to reach the power station in the right wing basement and shut off the selected systems. A slight breeze blew across the square, carrying dust that stung Sammy’s eyes if he looked into it. Marie’s hair billowed in a mesmerizing sort of way, so he watched that instead. No one had any reason to speak, and the silence both comforted and scared Sammy. The quiet here seemed watchful, but he knew it was only his nerves. He checked the clock on his com every couple minutes. After waiting twenty-three minutes, Al spoke: “So far so good. The security system is hacked. Power’s off. The cameras won’t be seeing anything interesting. You’re clear to enter.”
Marie grabbed the handle of the mail slot and pulled, but the door didn’t budge. She yanked harder, but it only creaked.
“Al, we’re having trouble opening the mail portal.”
“Hold on a sec.” A brief silence followed. “They’re sure they killed the power. You should be able to open it.”
Sammy saw the rust collecting all around the exterior of the mail door and got an idea. “Let me try for a second, Marie.”
Marie stepped aside. He spread his hands out and blasted as strong of a spread blast as he could. There was a dull crunch of metal on metal, and he pulled again on the slot handle. It opened right up.
“What was that?” Kaden asked.
“Rusted shut,” Sammy said, pointing around at what he’d seen. “Just needed a little jarring.”
“We’re going in now,” Marie reported.
“Hopefully, that was the worst of our problems,” Kobe said.
“That wouldn’t be bad at all,” Kaden said. “In and out.”
In and out, Sammy told himself. Jeffie had told him to come back fast. That sounded good to him.
One by one they removed their packs and crawled into the large square hole. Sammy entered last, giving Kobe a few moments to get through. He scrambled through two meters of claustrophobic tunnel and entered the factory.
The docking area of the factory reminded Sammy of his old grocery store. It was dirty and dark, with an out-of-order, industrial-sized elevator in one corner and stacks of broken pallets in another. The only sounds came from the tiny feet of mice scratching the floor. Sammy imagined that in a few months there would be a fleet of heavy-lifting equipment in this area. Surveillance would be needed to see who was dropping off raw materials for CAG production and in what quantities. Kaden and Marie would be planting the cams in this main room and in the basement.
Psion Beta (Psion series #1) Page 26
