| |
Exton watched, momentarily transfixed, as Patty put down her empty mug on a nearby countertop, while activity continued to bustle all around them. Time had passed both quickly and slowly, and he’d forgotten his own coffee cup in the wake of oncoming battle.
Emery was sitting down at a desk, finally, as she was searching through some of their older records.
“We have a legion of URS forces in Panama,” she said, pulling a map up onto her screen. “There are some scattered forces in other South American principalities, but Panama has the highest soldier count.”
“That’s got to be one of their loading sites.” Exton centered himself in the middle of the room, watching as Patty sent the evacuation codes, while he talked with Henry Carville, Tyler’s primary copilot now that Jared was grounded.
“Okay, Captain,” Henry said, “we’re sending the latest imaging. It looks like you’re right. There’s been some massive damage to the area where you landed.”
“Great.” His sarcasm was sharp enough to draw blood. Exton tapped his foot impatiently, watching for updated satellite feeds to come in. “Let’s get a good look at it. We need to know what kind of fire power they have onboard. There’s got to be more than what we saw while we were in the air.”
“Affirmative,” Henry said. “I’ll send these down to Rhodey, too, to see if he can’t help us identify any.”
“Thanks. Tell Rhodey he has my thanks, too.” Exton sighed.
From the information that the Perdition had been able to pick up from their location, there were only three major Craftcarriers currently in movement, as they slowly circled the world, hidden by the dense cloud cover.
The Craftcarrier they ran into earlier was still afloat, running on standby power, but its movements, especially toward the clear skies of the Antarctic Ocean, had finally allowed for it to reveal itself.
“Did Tyler and his crew find any additional leads from Panama?” Exton asked. “IP addresses, coding signals, hidden frequencies, anything?”
“Not sure. I’ll have an analyst look at the information we pulled up, so we can anticipate them in the future,” Henry said. “For right now, there’s only one carrier coming your way.”
Exton had to bite back his sarcasm. “Good.”
“Exton,” Emery called. “I found them.”
“You found the blueprints?” Exton stepped over to see Emery’s progress.
“Yep. Here they are—Papa’s old Craftcarrier schematics.” Emery frowned. “We won’t know how much they were modified by the final team of engineers.”
Exton glanced down at the files, dismayed to find Emery had a point. “Em, see if you can pull up the log from my Chainsword shuttle. We can try to compare and see if they made any significant modifications on the outside.”
“Good idea.”
Exton glanced over at the time. He was tempted to ask Henry if Tyler was awake yet. The early morning hours had passed, but he knew day shift wouldn’t be up for another hour onboard the Perdition.
“These files are scattered everywhere,” Emery said. “Look, there’s an old blueprint of the Perdition in here, too.”
“Silas was commissioned to work on the Paradise—I mean the Perdition—before the Craftcarriers were finished,” Patty said. “The URS had to coordinate it between several different building sites. Silas hated moving from site to site. That was part of the reason he was very adamant about keeping the Perdition close by and in one primary location.”
“I do remember visiting one of the sites for the carriers when we were younger,” Emery said. “When was that, Exton? When I was six?”
“If you’re thinking of the one in the Canadian West, even younger than that, I think,” Exton said. “Papa began working on the Perdition when I was seven. I got to help him with some of the construction.”
They glanced down at the scanned prints. Exton recognized several examples of his father’s trademark style—the efficient spacing, the security designs, and the centric clusters of living and command centers.
Exton shuffled through the different drawings, looking for any signs of weaknesses he’d missed before. He knew they had been lucky in the shuttle. There was too much at risk for them to depend on luck this time.
“I miss him,” Emery murmured softly.
Exton nodded. “I do, too.” He smiled down at the blueprints of the Perdition. “I don’t think I’ve seen this since we were barely teenagers.”
“The Perdition is almost ten years old,” Emery reminded him. “We were able to steal it only after the URS put all the finishing touches on the inside.”
“I’ll be twenty-five in a few months. No need to make me feel older than I need to.”
“You grew up quick,” Patty said, putting a comforting hand on his shoulder. “My sister would be proud of you.”
Exton only nodded.
“Look at this.” She pointed to a side note on the screen. “It’s one of Papa’s notes. ‘212528—see Lu for details, tell Exton about Ark.’”
“Who’s Lu?” Exton asked. “I don’t remember anyone with that name.”
“Papa did have a system all his own,” Emery reminded him with a sad smile. “Remember? Even his friends called him ‘Boötes.’”
“Aunt Patty,” Exton called. “Do you know who Lu is, the one Papa is talking about here?”
Patty frowned as she glanced at the blueprints. “Let me think it over,” she said. “We have to take care of this mess first.”
“True.” Exton turned back to the main screen where the satellite imaging was coming in. He saw the first picture, and saw that only the Craftcarrier was blurry.
He had been on the Perdition for the majority of the past six years. Exton knew that there was a lot of technological advancement being made. It wouldn’t be hard to make an image scrambler to help camouflage vehicles, he thought. Most of the technology before the URS was created had been lost, supposedly, but even the Perdition had been outfitted with a missile scrambler capable of messing with smaller missiles.
“Blow up that image,” he called to one of the techs behind him, pointing at the newest image. There was a large, black mass on the picture, and he had a sinking feeling he knew what it was.
“Yes, sir.”
Exton watched as the black hole on the photo was enlarged.
The remnants of a cargo ship were blasted into dust, with only random scraps of twisted, burning metal sticking out of the darkened earth every few feet.
“Well, we don’t have to worry about going to pick up Brock’s ship now,” Emery said with a sigh. “That might make it harder to get rid of him.”
“We still have that fighter one of Aerie’s brothers came in on,” Exton said.
“I guess that’s true. Maybe that’s what Brock was doing in the hangar earlier this morning.”
Exton frowned. “Why was he in the hangar? I thought he was in the med ward for his injury.”
“He was. But I saw him coming out of the hangar and heading back that way a few hours after midnight.”
“Where is he now?” Exton asked.
“He should be heading down to the mountain shelters with the others,” Emery said. “If you’re worried about him, I’ll see if I can find him on the cams.”
“Do it.”
“Exton, the Craftcarrier is hovering around the area surrounding the ship,” Patty said. “It looks like it’s waiting for orders.”
“Henry,” Exton called. “Can you have a tech check the comm feeds for any filtration?”
“Will do, Captain.”
“Let me know what they pick up.”
“Exton,” Emery said, interrupting. “Brock’s down by the hangar. He’s got Aerie with him.”
“He told me that he didn’t want to leave without Aerie, and if he thinks he can take her away from me again, he’s crazy.”
“He might be crazier than you think,” Emery said. “Look.”
Exton glanced down at the monitor where Emery was looking. Rage and fear collided into him, as he saw Aerie struggling against Brock in the commissary hallway.
“What are you waiting for?” Emery asked. “Go and help her.”
Exton hesitated, looking around. The room took on a strange, surreal quality. They were trying to prepare for a possible battle. He had a responsibility to his community.
“Go,” Emery urged him again. “We can take care of things here.”
“Thank you,” he murmured. “I’ll be back in a few moments. Ground all flights in the meantime. Once I have Aerie, clear them. If we need to send ships out, we will.”
Emery nodded. “You got it.”
“Don’t forget, I’m here, too,” Patty called as she leaned over another data screen with an analyst. “I’ll look for more weaknesses in the carrier design and compare the blueprints while you’re gone.”
Exton barely heard them. His anger was already simmering around inside him, his heartbeat pounding between his ears as he headed off to find Brock.