Crossing the Line

by Meghan Rogers

  It was a few seconds before Sam answered. “Okay, I’m back in. You’re right outside the control room and you’ve got KATO agents heading your way.”

  “How much time do I have?”

  “I’d say about thirty seconds.”

  I exhaled. “Can you get me inside, then seal the door behind me?”

  He was quiet for a moment. “Yeah,” he said. “I can do that. But once you’re in you’re going to have ten or so agents to deal with.”

  I nodded. “That’s okay; I can take them.”

  Then Travis’s voice was grunting in my ear. “Don’t get reckless.”

  “I’m not. Control is a secure, disarmed room.” I could hear the KATO agents getting closer. “You worry about what you’re doing and let me handle this.”

  “Just be careful.” His voice was tense. I was afraid he was having problems, but I didn’t ask. I trusted him to know what he was doing.

  “Command, get me in that room.”

  The guards were getting closer. I could hear them storming the halls that led to the atrium. I would be surrounded in seconds.

  “You’re in!” Sam said.

  I pulled the door open as dozens of agents poured out of the hallways. Bullets flew as I pushed the door shut. “Seal it now. And jam their system. I don’t want anything getting in this room until I’m done.”

  I heard the room vacuum shut. I was using their own protection protocol against them. In case of emergency, this room, made solely of bulletproof glass, was supposed to seal itself. There was no way they’d be able to get in while Sam had a hold on their security system. I turned around and started taking out the tech operatives. They had all been through training, but they didn’t practice regularly enough to be able to take me. Plus, the room bottlenecked in a way that made it impossible for more than two of them to get to me at the same time. I handled them quickly, even with my labored breathing and the pain shooting through my entire arm with every movement. I was down to one guy sitting at a computer in the center of the room.

  “Raven, you got to hurry up,” Sam said. “I’ve got one active computer trying to push me out.”

  “I see him.”

  I charged at his back, using the fact that he was distracted with Sam to my advantage. I knocked my gun hard on the top of his head and he flopped across the keyboard. I pushed him to the ground and took his seat. Then I tore a piece of his shirt off and used my teeth to tie it tight around my shoulder. I needed to control the bleeding to stay conscious. “Command, I’ve got the room,” I said, once my wound was wrapped. “I need you to walk me through this.”

  “Okay,” Sam said. “Priority one is shutting down the missile, but you have to do exactly what I tell you to.”

  I swallowed. “Where do I start?”

  “You’re sitting at the main computer, right?”

  “If that was the last active computer, then yeah,” I said.

  Then Travis cut in. “He’s dead.”

  I froze. “What?”

  “Foster’s dead.” His voice was thick and heavy.

  “He was alive a few hours ago.”

  Travis didn’t say anything for a moment. “Stop the missile.”

  I knew what this meant to him. This was never just a mission. “Scorpion—”

  “Focus,” he said, with a sharp edge. “They can’t win.”

  “Okay.” I exhaled heavily. “Command, I’m at the computer.”

  “All right,” Sam said. “I’m going to get in there and pull up the screen you need, then you need to take it from there. I can see your screen, but this can’t be done remotely.” He went quiet, then a few seconds later my monitor blinked and a dark background with complicated computer code filled the screen. My heart skipped.

  In my head, Nikki asked for Travis to come help them. Cody and Rachel had chimed in and all four of them were talking back and forth.

  I tried to focus on my task. I’d never felt so out of my league on a mission before. “What am I looking at?”

  “It’s the backdoor into the missile command,” Sam said. “You need to find the line that starts with five zeros and a one.”

  I scanned the list of zeros and ones and dashes and carets. My stomach twisted. “I can’t do this.” My voice was barely above a whisper. “I’m not a hacker.”

  “Shut up,” Sam said in a tone so bored I could practically hear the eye roll. “You’re the most capable person I know. Relax, focus, and get to work.”

  I bounced my foot up and down, biting my lip hard as I took in the situation. He was right. I pushed aside the pain in my shoulder and pulled my chair close to the computer. “Okay, what do I need to do?”

  “Find the five zeros and a one.” His voice stayed calm, like he never doubted me. “You’ll know you have the right line if there are two slashes after it. “I’m looking at it right now. It’s halfway down your screen.”

  My eyes jumped. “Okay, I see it. Now what?”

  “Go to the end of the line and type exactly what I’m about to tell you. And whatever you do, do not hit enter until I say so.”

  I waited for the rest of his directions, then followed them to the letter. I typed everything like he said, jumping from line to line as he told me. And after two minutes, he finally told me to hit enter.

  “This is going to take a minute,” Sam said. “Once the countdown was initiated, the control of the missile was shifted to the computer in the missile itself. This is rerouting the control back to the computer you’re sitting at.”

  “So this is only half of it?” I asked, trying not to panic.

  “Yes, but the second part isn’t any harder,” Sam said. “Just give me a minute.”

  I exhaled and glanced around the room while I waited. For the first time since I got in, I noticed the army of agents standing outside the door. I pushed my comm. “Hey, team? Are you almost finished what you’re doing?”

  “Yeah,” Nikki said. “Why?”

  “Because I’ve got about two dozen agents outside my door,” I said. “There’s no way I can get out of here on my own.”

  “Give me five minutes,” Travis said. I heard metal scraping in the background. “Can the room you’re in withstand an explosion?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “It was designed to. Why, what are you planning?”

  “You worry about the missile. I’ll worry about the agents.”

  “All right, Raven, you’re up,” Sam said. I looked back to the computer. The screen had turned green. “But here’s the thing. I don’t have a view or access to the computer anymore.”

  “What?” Panic shot through me. “Why?”

  “Because the security this deep into the system is too advanced to hack. This is why you had to be on-site.” His voice was calm, and it forced me to keep it together.

  “But you can talk me though this?”

  “Absolutely.” I could practically hear the single nod of his head. “You’re looking at a green screen now, right?”

  “Yes.” Relief flooded me. Just the fact that he knew that made me feel like I wasn’t blind.

  “Okay. I don’t want you to freak out,” Sam said, “but you can’t make a mistake here. One wrong keystroke could ignite this thing early.”

  I grunted. “I don’t know why you would think something like that would freak me out. I mean, it’s not like any of this is over my head or anything.” My sarcasm could not have been more apparent.

  Travis cut back in. “The rest of the team is clearing out. The hovercrafts are destroyed and I’m en route to the control room.”

  “Copy that,” Sam said. Then he turned his attention back to me. “You’re going to be fine. Just take your time and type what I tell you.”

  I drew a shaky breath. “Okay. What’s first?”

  “First you need to find the computer’s operational pr
ogram.” Sam told me what keys to hit. I tried to move as fast as I could, but I was so inexperienced in this area, and now millions of lives were sitting at the tips of my fingers. “You’re doing good,” Sam said after a few minutes.

  “How could you possibly know that?” I asked.

  “Because we can tell from the satellites that the missile hasn’t launched,” he said. “Just keep doing what you’re doing.”

  I closed my eyes, taking a moment to refocus. “Okay. What’s next?”

  “Here’s the big part,” Sam said. “You need to override the countdown to make the computer think the device has already been launched.”

  I swallowed and nodded, even though he couldn’t see me. “All right. Tell me what to do.”

  Sam walked me though the code and after a few nervous keystrokes, I was starting to feel more comfortable. I could tell by Sam’s tone that we had to be getting close when Travis interrupted us.

  “Stop what you’re doing for a second,” he said.

  I froze. “Why?”

  “Because I’m about to take care of the guards outside your door and I don’t want you to make a mistake.”

  I sat up a little straighter. “Scorpion, what are you doing?”

  But he didn’t answer. The next second the hallway outside the control room lit up and an explosion shook the entire room so hard it knocked me off my chair. I stared at the windowed wall as the smoke cleared, at the agents sprawled across the floor. “You’re going to want to hurry up,” Travis said. “I’m sure backup is on its way.”

  I stumbled to my feet, thoughtlessly using my injured arm to try to help me off the ground. I gritted through the pain and got myself back in front of the computer screen. “Command, what’s next?”

  “Type eight, zero, one, five, six, three. Then hit enter twice.” His voice was hurried and I knew we were running out of time.

  I typed fast without stopping to second-guess myself. I hit enter. “Now what?”

  There was a pause on Sam’s end, like he was double-checking something. “Now you get the fuck out,” he said finally.

  “It’s done?” I asked.

  “Yes,” he said. “And I erased the hovercraft data.”

  “Okay, give me a minute to wipe this.” But that wasn’t all I was doing. I started typing furiously. I knew KATO’s computers enough to do a basic system search and there was one more thing I needed to do before we left. It took me seconds to find what I needed. Then I wiped the computer. “Now.”

  “Go!” Sam said. “I’ve got the door open.”

  “I’m right outside,” Travis said.

  I hurried down the small tunneled hall, jumping over the agents I had taken out when I’d come in. Travis was holding the door open for me when I got there.

  “I can hear them gathering in the entry hallway,” he said. Both of the exit shafts I knew about were in that direction. “Command, you got another way out for us?”

  “Go to the back right corner of the atrium you’re in. You’ll find a hidden door that will take you down a tunnel. There’s a way out from there.”

  Travis headed right over to the corner, but I stopped to take in the agents littered across the floor. I started to panic when I saw who wasn’t there.

  “Hey!” Travis barked when he noticed I wasn’t with him. “Let’s go!”

  “He was here,” I said.

  “What are you talking about?” It was taking every ounce of patience he had not to completely snap at me.

  “Chin Ho,” I said. “I shot him, but he’s not here anymore. He didn’t die.”

  Some of the impatience left his face, and I could see a part of him wanted to find Chin Ho as much as I did. “We don’t have time to look for him. We’ve got to get out of here while we have the chance.” I didn’t move. “Raven!” He spoke sharply enough to startle me back to life.

  I hurried over to Travis, pushing Chin Ho out of my head.

  “We’re here,” Travis said to Sam. Sam started rattling off a step-by-step process of exactly what we needed to do to get out of KATO. I focused on his voice and on Travis’s movements, pushing myself to keep moving forward, fighting everything inside me that wanted to go back and finish what I had been too weak to do the first time.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  HOLES

  When we got to the end of the tunnel there was a tall ladder leading to a manhole. Travis went up first. I struggled, pain spiraling through my arm every time I had to grip the rung. When we got to the top, Travis reached to help me, but I pushed myself past him. The only reason I was keeping it together was because I kept moving forward and making myself focus. If I let him help me, I was done.

  Travis had his tablet in his hand quickly and squinted at the GPS map. “We need to move this way, through the forest. The street we parked on is on the other side.”

  I nodded. “Let’s get there fast.” I led the way through the woods, with Travis right behind me.

  “Let me see your shoulder,” Travis said once we were safely covered by the trees.

  I pulled away from him. “We don’t have time. We need to keep moving.”

  “I need to see if you’re okay.” He was forcing himself to be patient.

  “I’m fine.” I grabbed his tablet and navigated through the forest, back toward the car. I heard him sigh in exasperation, hurrying to keep up. We moved quickly and quietly through the trees. I figured we had about a ten-minute head start before anyone started searching the surrounding area. They had no way of knowing how we got out of the building, which meant they would have to fan out and search the entire facility before they checked outside.

  We zigged and zagged our way back to the car. I pulled open the passenger door. “We’ve got to move,” I said. “They’ll have people on the ground and road looking for us.”

  Travis jumped in the car and pressed hard on the gas pedal, putting enough distance between us and KATO before he slowed to a less noticeable speed. Once he had, I felt like I could finally catch my breath. And that was when I could really process everything that had happened. They killed Dr. Foster once they realized the IDA was inside. He knew too much for them to risk us getting a hold of him. He was alive this morning and I didn’t even try to help him.

  Then I blinked and I saw Chin Ho lying helplessly in front of me and I saw myself unable to do what was necessary. I slammed my good hand against the dash. “Damn it!” Angry tears slid down my face. I brushed them away roughly, furious they’d shown up at all.

  “Hey!” Travis’s voice was sharp. “Take it easy.”

  “I had him.” I couldn’t look at him. “They killed Foster.” He stiffened, but I kept going. “And then I had him right in front of me and I couldn’t—” I broke off, shook my head and leaned back into my seat.

  “Who are we talking about?” He sounded cautious and I had a feeling he knew exactly who I was talking about, but I couldn’t find my voice to answer. I didn’t want to explain. I wasn’t ready yet. Instead I stared out the window, and other than a few uncertain glances in my direction, Travis let me be. I replayed the entire encounter in my head. I had him lying in front of me.

  I found myself shivering when Travis pulled the car to a stop a few blocks away from the safe house, which was right inside the city limits. He threw a jacket at me when we both got out of the car. “Put that on.”

  “I don’t need—”

  “You’ve got a bleeding hole in your shoulder that’s going to draw more attention than we can afford. Put on the damn jacket.”

  I closed my eyes for a second and nodded. I got my good arm into the sleeve easily enough, but I struggled to get the right side over my shoulder. Travis came up behind me and dropped the jacket over it without a word. His arm moved to my back and pushed me forward. “Come on.”

  I followed half a step behind him, feeling slightly absentminded a
s I navigated the narrow streets and back roads until we got to the safe house. Travis locked the door behind us.

  Nikki came out from a room in the back. “Thank God,” she said.

  “Where are the others?” Travis asked.

  “Cody got caught on a broken pipe on the way out. Rachel’s treating him in the back.”

  “He’ll be okay?”

  “He’ll be fine. Rachel just needs some water.” She answered Travis but her focus was on me. “Are you okay?”

  I nodded. She didn’t look like she was completely convinced, but the jacket hid any evidence that I was lying.

  Travis steered me toward a room off to the left. “I need to talk to Joss for a second,” he said to Nikki, “but I may need you in a little bit.”

  She nodded, a little confused. “Yeah, just let me know.”

  He opened the door and waited for me to step inside.

  It was a medium-size bedroom with a small fireplace in the corner and a double bed pushed up against the wall. Something about it made me feel antsy and claustrophobic. I started pacing, thinking about what Chin Ho had said to me and what I couldn’t do to him. And what KATO had done to Dr. Foster.

  “Let me see your shoulder,” Travis said, bringing me back to the room. He stood in front of the door, watching me with his arms crossed. I was finally starting to let my guard down and I felt a little dizzy.

  Travis put his hand on my good shoulder. I jumped when he touched me, but he didn’t apologize. His face was etched with a confused and concerned expression that I’d seen before, but still stopped me in my tracks. He tilted my chin up, taking in my new bruise. “What exactly happened in there?”

  I shook my head and dropped my gaze to the ground. “I wasn’t being reckless.”

  He squeezed my shoulder a fraction tighter. “I didn’t say you were, but I need to know what happened.”

  When I looked back up at him, I saw his jaw was set and determined. I sighed and nodded. Travis sat on the bed, guiding me down next to him. He watched me patiently, waiting for me to start talking.

  “It wasn’t as bad as it could have been,” I said. I told him about waking up with Chin Ho watching me, and being forced into the trunk, but being able to pick my way out. “Nikki got there right before he stuck me. I got lucky.”