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ANASTASIA WAS correct; Ivette was waiting for them in the tunnel to the Lake House. No sooner had the four women indulged in family hugs and a few tears, than Ivette felt a tug on her pants leg.
It was Francesca. “Momma you need to come,” she said.
“What’s the matter?” Ivette asked.
“Nanny throwed up. And Rafe and Donnie are fighting.”
“Ok, I’ll take care of it. thank you for coming to tell me Fran. What room are they in?”
“The one with the big window where we ate dinner.”
“Sorry, Mom, I have to deal with this. I’m afraid Annie isn’t handling the undersea environment well.” She tapped her com and gave orders to power up the infirmary and for a gurney to be brought to the dining room.
Sure enough, Rafe and Don were wallowing around in the floor exchanging ineffective blows. Ivette ignored them for the moment, kneeling by Annie, who was on her hands and knees with Daphne applying a cool cloth to the back of her neck and Leo patting her on the back. Gabe, as usual, was oblivious to everything but his attempt to draw a crustacean who was staring at him through the large viewing window.
“Why didn’t you call me when you started feeling sick again?” Ivette scolded.
“I knew you needed to find out what was happening upstairs,” Annie said. “I really thought I was feeling better.”
The two house robots set the stretcher beside Annie and lifted her onto it.
“Activate Medical protocol,” Ivette ordered. “When you get to the infirmary start a saline IV and an anti-nausea drip. I’ll come by and check on you in a few minutes. Oh, and send a bot in here to clean this up.” She pointed at the vomit on the floor.
"Sorry," Annie whispered as the gurney rolled away.
“This is so much easier when Mathias is here,” Ivette said, eyeing her sons with exasperation. “He gets them, and more important, they seem to get him. These two do this all the time; he says it’s a case of two alpha males growing up together.”
She strode over to the two now exhausted boys and pulled them apart. “What’s going on?” she asked.
“He started it,” Rafe pointed at Don.
“No, you started it—you took my sled,” Don retorted.
“I saw it first! You don’t want to share—”
“Enough!” Ivette barked. She reached over and removed the bone of contention, putting it on a wall shelf out of the children's reach.
“It sounds as if the two of you forgot our last lesson about self-control,” Shifu Abhishree said. She came over to stare down at the boys.
“You showed us how to tumble,” said Rafe, staring back at her, uncowed.
Shifu Abhishree grinned. “That's right. I’m your martial arts teacher and the woman your momma ought to have warned you about. If you’re going to fight, you might as well learn how.”
Mathias had decoded Ivette’s message. With it in hand, he approached Colonel McAdams. “Sir, I think I have something you should see,” he said, handing him the plastia sheet and data crystal.
McAdams scanned it, frowning. “Where did you get this?”
“My wife sent it. She was attacked on the way back from seeing the children’s doctor this afternoon. When she flew over the estate, she saw it had been taken over, so she took refuge in our safe house.”
“Are your wife and children safe now?”
“Yes,” Mathias said. “She took these vids after they arrived at Sea Dream. It has vid links to the Lake House.”
McAdams nodded. “I need to show this to someone.” He turned and left the barracks.
Mathias went to his locker to check his weapons. Modern weapons used by Arcadia’s military were mostly hand weapons. While the ‘earth destroyer’ weapons existed, Arcadia’s military Junta had outlawed them, preferring to train with hand weapons. Why use an atomic weapon which would destroy not only your enemies but render useless the land you were fighting over, when you had weapons to destroy your enemies and leave the land intact?
Mathias’s company were equipped with vortex pistols for short-range urban targets, plasma rifles and sonic grenades for distance targets. He also carried an eight-inch blade and gas grenades. The face shield on his helmet was night vision enabled, bullet proof and filtered out dangerous gasses.
Several members of his troop observed their lieutenant readying his weapons and began to do the same thing.
“Are we moving out sir?” Richardson, one of his scouts asked.
“We don’t have orders to do so yet, but it’s best to be prepared,” Mathias replied. "Make sure your armor and weapons are ready to go."
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