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Randall sat staring at the opposite wall of the slot canyon as Nora and Tom argued about the best way to proceed.
Nora absolutely refused to leave her partner.
“There’s no way he can do four more rappels,” Tom argued. “Not with the injury to that arm.”
“He did it before. He can do it again.”
“The bleeding will increase if he tries, not to mention he’s bound to be weaker from the pain and loss of blood.”
Randall cleared his throat, and they both turned to look at him. “Do I even have a say in this?”
“Of course you do.” Nora looked agitated and ready to go. “But I’m telling you that staying here on your own is more dangerous than going with us.”
“And I’m reminding you both that I’m the only one with medic training here. We’re lucky to have stopped the bleeding. If Randall tears it open further...”
Randall held up a hand, cutting off their explanations. “I’m going. As far as I can, anyway.”
Which seemed to settle it. They’d take it one wall at a time. Tom led them to the right side of the slot canyon, accessed a small trail up into the woods, and stopped in front of a ponderosa near the edge.
“How did he get up to where we were?”
“What?” Tom and Nora turned to stare at Randall simultaneously.
“How did Karvatsky, or his sidekick, get up to where we were? Climbing up these rock faces has to be harder than rappelling down.”
“It definitely takes more skill and experience,” Tom said. “People do it, but not often, and not in the heat of summer.”
“And why now? Why when we were halfway to him? Did he have some sort of perimeter trip wire or—”
“He had a monitor on Mario.” Nora closed her eyes for a moment. “It’s the only explanation that makes sense because once he’s alerted that we’re on the trail, it still takes some time to catch up with us. As you said, climbing up is twice as hard.”
Randall knew she was beating herself up for not anticipating Karvatsky’s every move, but there was no way they could stay continually ahead of a perp. It was the nature of the job that they spent the majority of their time reacting and playing catch-up.
“Okay. Say he had a monitor on Mario. That monitor triggered a warning to let him know that Mario had moved.”
“And he certainly didn’t move on his own,” Tom pointed out.
“So Karvatsky sends his drone to check it out.”
“Halfway there, the drone picks up our images.” Randall picked up the narrative. “He sends his side-kick to intercept us at the slot canyon, figures it’s the best chance he’ll get, and takes his shot.”
“It was a good spot,” Nora admitted.
“His drone must be state-of-the-art because we never heard or saw it.”
“We have a drone.” Nora nodded toward Randall’s pack. “Maybe it’s time we use it. Tom, how close are we? And how difficult are the rappels?”
“This drop is seventy feet. From the bottom you have a pretty good view to the north, though we’ll continue south. Rappel 7 is ninety feet, and a more complex two-stage endeavor. The final is what we call The Big Exit—150 feet off two bolts. It also requires you to step off several outcroppings before going vertical.”
Randall knew what he wanted to do. “Help me find a way down this cliff, and I’ll set up a surveillance position at the bottom. We’ll send the drone out and decide the best way to proceed from there.”
Tom began to remove his supplies, but Nora stopped him with the shake of a head. “Your ropes and your harness are all brightly colored...”
“Which is common for climbing, sort of like wearing a bright orange hunting vest.”
“But in this case, we’re the hunted. Your supplies stay packed. We use the camo harness and ropes that we brought. We need every advantage we can find.”
Randall found it interesting watching Nora and Tom negotiate. She’d accepted him as a full member of the team for two reasons.
They needed his help.
And she trusted him.
For Nora, things were simple like that. It was something he was still learning. Nora and Tom helped Randall into the harness, then basically lowered him down the seventy-foot wall. Fortunately the pool he landed in was nearly dry. Five minutes later, they were kneeling beside him as he released and directed the drone.
“Why didn’t we use this sooner?” Tom asked.
“Someone who knows what to look for can detect a drone fairly easily. We’d rather keep the perp completely unaware that we’re on his tail.”
“But since Karvatsky already knows we’re coming—”
“He knows someone is coming,” Nora pointed out. “He most certainly knows there are two of us, but that doesn’t mean he knows about you, Tom. A drone is no different from a camera. It can’t take in the entire field of view, only what its lens is focused at. I was already at the bottom and Randall was closer to the bottom than the top when he was shot, so more than likely the drone picked up me and Randall, but not you.”
“All right. That’s good then. We outnumber them, and they might not know it.”
“Also, they might predict that I’d go back with Randall. Obviously they know they hit him. I’d say there’s a fifty-fifty chance they won’t be expecting us.”
“Won’t they just send their drone out again?”
“Doubtful,” Nora said. “Drones have a limited range and have to be recharged frequently. I don’t think they’ve had time to get it back up.”
Randall had already considered the possibility that they had more than one drone, but there was only so much a person could pack into a remote location. Plus, drones of that caliber weren’t cheap. He was betting their lives that Karvatsky only had the one. “Fortunately our drone is probably better than theirs, and now it looks like we have contact.”
They crowded around the small screen as Randall clicked and zoomed. Suddenly they were looking at Ivan Karvatsky and another, shorter man who could have been his brother—the resolution was that clear. They could actually make out the similarities in their profiles.
Which was the good news.
The bad news? Karvatsky had set up a small rocket on a launch pad. When Randall zoomed in, they could just make out the countdown clock. They had forty-three minutes.
🙛
Their supplies contained an extra pair of communication buds. Nora showed Tom how to use them, then turned to Randall.
“Ready?”
“I am.”
“There’s plenty of time remaining on the drone?”
“Two hours, though...” He hesitated, then voiced the concern they both knew was one of many weaknesses in their plan. “If he manages to set off that EMP, it’ll fry the drone.”
“Then we won’t let him set it off.” She reached down to her ankle holster and pulled out her back-up weapon—a Sig Sauer P320. “Do you know how to use this?”
“I do.” Tom pulled the slide, confirmed the barrel was empty, then popped out the magazine.
“It’s full. You have fifteen rounds. Let’s hope you don’t need them all. And keep one in the chamber. If it comes down to it, when it comes down to it, every second will count.”
She squatted down in front of Randall. The bandage around his arm continued to seep blood, though it looked to be at a reduced rate. The compress was doing what it was supposed to and helping the wound to clot. Unfortunately, the walk and the climb down had opened some of it up again. She wished they had time to rewrap it, but if Karvatsky had a nuclear EMP device and was allowed to set it off, then it wouldn’t matter if Randall’s arm was bleeding. “I’ll be back for you, Randall.”
“I know you will, boss.”
He gave her that cocky smile that he’d been giving her since he was first assigned as her partner, and perhaps that was what caused Nora to do something completely contrary to her nature. She put her hand on the back of Randall’s head, pulled him toward her, and rested her forehead against his. She breathed in his scent and thanked the God that Tom and her old friend Benjamin Lapp believed in for his friendship.
Randall reached into his pocket and pulled out the Saint Francis pendant. “Take this. It was good luck for me.”
She put the chain over her head and tucked the pendant into her shirt, could feel it there next to her heart. “I’ll give it back to you when this is over.” Then she ruffed his hair, stood, and said to Tom, “Let’s go.”
She might have enjoyed the next rappel under different circumstances. The first drop landed them near another dry pool. For the second drop Tom led her down canyon, where they rappelled down a smooth wall and landed on the other side of a pool with a good amount of water remaining in it. They were able to avoid the pool by walking on a narrow shelf above the water. Then the canyon once again turned sandy as they approached the mouth. They scrambled over several large boulders, and suddenly they were at the final two rappels, which was really one long plunge totaling 320 feet.
She stopped a few feet shy of the edge and dropped to her stomach. Tom did the same.
“How are we doing, Randall?”
“Their attention is still focused on the rocket.”
“Have you been able to determine what type of EMP it is?”
“Negative, but I sent a screen shot to Jericho. Awaiting results.”
“The time clock...”
“Twenty-four minutes.”
“Roger that.”
She clicked off, crawled to the edge and peered over, surprised that Tom followed. From their height, she was treated to an excellent view of red and tan sandstone walls that stretched off into the distance. It would be easy to get lost out there. It would also be easy to sneak in, which was no doubt what Karvatsky had done. She understood now that he hadn’t originally rappelled down as they had. There was no way he could have carried such heavy equipment. Besides the rocket itself, there was a launch pad, a tent with camping gear, even a cook stove.
“He must have set up days ago,” Tom muttered.
It was a big drop, but far enough away that there wasn’t a chance either of the perps could hear them. Nora could now understand why Karvatsky had picked the spot. Basically he was able to launch the rocket out and over the plateau. The question was how high his rocket would go and what type of EMP he was using.
If it was nuclear, and they didn’t stop him, it would kill everyone in the surrounding area. Even as that thought passed through her mind she was grateful he’d picked a sparsely populated position.
But of course Karvatsky wasn’t an altruistic person. Saving lives hadn’t figured into his choice of location. She could practically see the overlapping circles of his and the other eleven devices. Infrastructure throughout the entire southwest would be obliterated...California, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico would all be offline. Everything from 9-1-1 call centers to electrical grids would be defunct.
She belly-crawled backwards and stood once they were both well clear of the cliff. “Describe the descent to me.”
“The first rappel is one hundred and fifty feet. There are several outcroppings you have to step over, and past that is a landing zone. You can’t see it until you get there. From the shelf, you can scramble into a small alcove—”
“A cave?”
“Of sorts. It’s small.”
“Would we both fit?”
“Yeah. I think so.”
“All right. I go first. You follow. If there’s any indication that they see us, you do not join me. Understand? You go back to Randall. He’ll call in reinforcements to get you out of here.”
“If there’s time.”
“Correct.”
“Better case scenario...we both make it to the cave.”
“Once there, we reassess. If nothing has changed, we do the final rappel—”
“One hundred and seventy feet. Twenty feet of back walking, then you’re free hanging.”
“We do it together. You’ll take up a position behind the large boulder to the south and provide cover fire. Try to draw them away from the EMP device, and I’ll attempt to disable it.”
If he was hesitant about her plan, he didn’t show it. Or maybe he just didn’t have a better idea. “I’m in,” he said.
“Thank you.” She keyed her microphone and relayed the plan to Randall, and then she was dropping off another cliff—only this time, her main goal was to be completely silent.
🙛