“I thought that was all in place.” Li said, fingers steepled over the table.
“It is, it is. It’s nothing terrible, really. But we’ve noticed that the performance of some of the units that have been deployed in Asia is not as projected.”
Black’s grip on his glass tightened slightly. “Why?”
“That’s what we’re still trying to figure out. My engineers are working around the clock as we speak to get to the bottom of it. Now, what I recommend is increasing the number of pods in the Asian sector to make up for this deficit.”
“What kind of increase?” Li asked, bringing his beverage to his mouth.
“Twenty percent.”
Li nearly spat out his drink. “
Twenty!
Did you say twenty?”
Dattalo looked around self-consciously as people from other tables glanced over, frowning. “Yes, Jerry.”
Black could tell that Li was doing everything in his power to calm down as the shorter man said, “Do you know how much that would
cost
us, Luigi?”
“I know, I know. That’s why I’d really appreciate it if you could help me convince the boss. You’re the finance guy. You could maybe pull some numbers or something.”
“Nothing gets past the boss,” Li fumed. “Playing with the numbers would likely cost me more than just my job!”
“Bring it back in, Jerry,” Black warned, though he was upset as well. “Luigi, is there no other alternative? Can’t we pull some pods from neighboring regions—maybe the ones from Russia?”
Dattalo had picked up his drink and resumed his glass-to-lip tapping. “I thought about that too, but as it is, we have very, very few units deployed in Russia. And you know why—it has to be in line with our strategy for the expected eventual response from the Chinese and Indian governments when the situation gets out of control with their populaces.”
Black let out a long, conceding breath. “Alright. I’ll speak with the boss, see if we can’t deploy more pods into the region. But please, you better make sure that there are no more surprises. I know I keep saying this, but there’s a lot at stake here. This REAPR project needs to run like clockwork for the other phases to kick in.”
Dattalo’s stressed demeanor visibly deflated as Black spoke. “Thank you, Adrian.”
“What about the pods here in North America? How are they doing?”
The Italian let out a belch, then smiled his first truly relaxed smile of the night. “They’re working just fine, don’t worry. The news channels testify to that. Everything’s on track here.”
Black glanced out into the dark night, eyes raised to the heavens. “Good,” he murmured. “At least that will give the boss something to be pleased about.”
S
tars glittered brightly against the dark canvas of the cloudless sky, as if the cosmos was putting on a brilliant show for no one to see. The moonless night made constellations easy to trace with the naked eye as they twinkled and danced in the heavens. The stars reached to the horizon where sky fused with earth.
Farmland stretched as far as the eye could see in the starlit landscape. The country air was crisp and the place was quiet except for a neigh or two from a horse in a stable somewhere. Farm folk were fast asleep in their beds, and, had anyone been awake to look, their clocks would read just past midnight.
If anyone
was
awake and stepped outside to look up at the serene night sky, they would see nothing but the heavens winking down at them. Were they to look closer at a certain spot to the west, however, they might have noticed some stars vanishing briefly before reappearing, only to have other stars along a certain path disappear as well.
What no human eye would have been able to spot is the entity that was causing the stars to occult in the sky: An invisible shroud in the shape of a large bird of prey that would descend slowly to a lower altitude. Closer and closer it would glide downward, its sixty-foot wingspan partially obscuring the sky.
As the entity known as a REAPR—a REmote Autonomous PRedator—approached the farmland, it would disintegrate into billions of nanomite particles, each no bigger than a red blood cell. The nanomites would disperse across entire wheat fields, descending onto the plants and devouring their way through the heads, destroying the harvestable part of the crop and leaving them barren, much like a tree without fruit.
Once they had ruined one stalk, the nanomites would move on to another and another as programmed, until they had devastated acres upon acres of crops. Then, well before sunrise, the nanomites would regroup and merge once again into the bird-shaped form and take flight, disappearing before the first rays peeked from the horizon.
The REAPR and its counterparts in crop fields across the country would return night after night like shadows of death, laying to waste wide swaths of various farmland, until its purpose was achieved.
D
evastator the pocket mouse sat in a corner of the office pantry, observing two men who were guarding the storage room where the girls were being held. One was Elvis—who sat on a chair right beside the door to the girls’ room—and the other was a long-faced man with a potato for a nose and eyes that were too close together. Devastator wandered around aimlessly, as if bored.
Elvis and Potato Nose,
Tegan thought, amused, as she observed the pair through her mindlink with the mouse.
What next? Dumbo and Clown Face?
The wall-mounted clock in the office read two a.m. Tegan was out and about scouting for a way to get past the storage room door. Calling one of the guards over again wasn’t going to work this time, that was for certain.
“Hey,” Elvis suddenly called, startling Tegan. “Get me a cup of coffee, would you?”
Potato Nose sighed and ambled toward the counter where the appliances were. He checked the coffee machine, then the cupboards overhead. “Uh, I think we’re outta coffee.”
Elvis groaned. “Bloody he—okay, hold on.” He removed a key ring from his pocket and went through each key, muttering to himself. “First aid room, locker, storage room . . . ”
Devastator’s ears perked and Tegan noticed the keycard attached to the small silver hoop.
Elvis slid a key loose from the ring and held it up, tossing the ring with the remaining keys and keycard onto the small side table beside him. “Here, take this and go get some coffee.”
Potato Nose gave him a wary look. “And where am I getting said coffee from?”
Elvis sniggered. “The main office.”
“Are you joking? We’re not allowed up at the mining site! I’m not going out there!”
“’Course you are. Come on, then.” Elvis wiggled the key between his fingers.
“It’s a ten-minute drive there and another ten minutes back,” Potato Nose growled. “I’m not going. If you want your coffee so badly, you can go and get it yourself.”
Tegan stared closely at Potato Nose. His eyes seemed to droop a little, and he continued to amble around like a sloth.
He’s too lazy to go out
, Tegan thought.
What a bum.
Elvis scowled at the other man. “I don’t ask you to do much, Yank. Just wanted some coffee . . . ” He got up and walked past Potato Nose, roughly hitting shoulders with him. Potato Nose wisely ignored that and walked over to take Elvis’s seat, picking up the magazine the other man had been reading.
“Stay alert,” Elvis warned him. “I know you pulled a double-shift for Tony yesterday but we still haven’t caught the girls’ accomplice. Whoever it is may come back to help again.”
Potato Nose snorted. “Who’d want to help them?”
“How am I supposed to know? Either way, someone did, so be on your toes.” Elvis absently touched the ping pong ball-sized bump at the back of his head as he checked the car key holder by the door that led to the cavern.
“Take one of the Hummers,” Potato Nose said, opening up the magazine. “The truck’s got some problems with the brakes.”
“Cheers.” With that, Elvis was gone.
Tegan watched the remaining man in the room from her spot under the pantry cabinet. He yawned loudly as he thumbed through the magazine, eyes drooping further. Tegan held her breath as he started to nod off. She took a few steps forward but froze when Potato Nose jerked and his eyes snapped open. He shook his head vigorously as if to keep himself awake, then got up and paced around.
“I hope that moron gets back with the coffee soon,” he muttered.
What I’m hoping for is that you plunk your butt back down on that chair and fall asleep,
Tegan grumbled.
She was in luck, for a minute later he settled down on the chair again, slumping deeply. He scooped up the magazine and opened it but Tegan could see he wasn’t even reading. His eyelids slid low and his head started nodding slightly. With high hopes, Tegan watched him intently. Potato Nose tried for another minute or two to keep himself awake but eventually his head lolled forward until his chin rested on his chest.
Tegan waited for a bit, not daring to breathe, but the moment she heard the first snore, she tore out as fast as Devastator’s little legs would allow. Upon reaching the coffee table where the key ring was laid, she stared up and contemplated how she’d reach the table top.
I wonder if . . .
The mouse bunched its hind legs and leapt up a good foot before digging its tiny claws into the wooden table leg and scurrying up the rest of the way. Tegan was exhilarated that her idea worked.
Loud snoring diverted her attention and she stared up at Potato Nose. A full-grown human was
huge!
It disconcerted her how everything that seemed normal to her as a human was grossly mammoth-like from a mouse’s perspective.
Wow, what a honker,
she thought as she took a closer look at the guard’s nose, then shook herself.
Don’t have time to waste!
The mouse scampered over the table and grabbed the key ring in its small jaws. Surprisingly, it wasn’t too heavy for the little creature. Pulling on the rounded metal, Tegan dragged the keys and keycard to the end of the table and then gazed at the touch-scanner by the storage room door.
How do I get it there without making any noise?
Tegan glanced at Potato Nose. Hoping that his snoring was loud enough to cover any other sound, she pushed the keys toward the end of the table. They jangled against each other—louder than she had expected.
Potato Nose grunted and shifted in his chair. Tegan looked over, heart pounding. The man was still fast asleep. Not risking another moment, she grabbed the keycard between her teeth, braced herself, then launched off the table. She flew for a good two seconds, soaring high above the ground toward the scanner, though with the mouse’s size, it felt more like an eternity.
Then her flight ended abruptly as she smacked against the wall. As she plummeted to the floor, she was panic-stricken.
I missed the scanner!
But no, the door quietly buzzed as she landed on her rump. So great was her excitement that the mouse let out a squeak. Potato Nose grunted again but didn’t awaken. Tegan severed her connection with Devastator in the next heartbeat.
When she opened her eyes, she was startled by Mariah standing nearby, staring intently at her. “The door’s unlocked, but I don’t know for how long!” she whispered.
Mariah looked horrified. “What?”
“Shh! Just do what I do!” Tegan stood up and leaned forward so her tied hands were past her bottom. She put one leg back through her arms, then the other. She straightened, her bound hands now in front of her.
Mariah followed her example. “Where’d you learn that?”
“Movies. You can actually pick up a thing or two. Get the box cutter.”
Mariah retrieved the tool and cut Tegan free before being freed herself. Tegan hurried to the door and, hoping that they weren’t too late, pushed on it. It opened. The girls silently stepped out, sharing amazed glances as they tiptoed past Potato Nose.
They paused at the main door to gather themselves and took a few breaths to get rid of their jitters and relax. Then, with a firm nod, Tegan opened the door and stepped out into the cavern.
T
he girls headed out, making sure to close the door behind them. Tegan paused to take Devastator out of her pocket and set him on the ground. The mouse twitched his nose up at her as if wondering what was going on. She gave him a small pat between his ears. “Thank you for your assistance,” she whispered. “Stay safe, little buddy.”
Devastator watched Tegan as she took the lead and the girls ran from mound to mound. Breaths quick and short, they hurried around the steel building they’d seen earlier, giving it as wide a berth as possible. But even at this distance they could still hear a low, guttural growl.
“Teegs,” Mariah whimpered, “why does that sound so familiar?”
Tegan didn’t respond.
The growl sounded again, and Mariah reached out to grab Tegan’s shoulder. “Oh, my God . . . Is that—”
Tegan shushed her. “Don’t even think about it! Stay focused on getting out of here.”
Mariah swallowed and followed as Tegan led them around to the first of the three dirt roads they had to cross. They passed the first one without a problem but as soon as they reached the next road, they heard a vehicle approaching from the main tunnel. They avoided detection by circling back around a large dune of dirt and rocks until the truck was out of sight. Leaning against the mound, they took a moment to catch their breaths.
The last road was about a hundred feet away from them, but fifty feet to their right several workers in orange coveralls were clustered around some kind of drilling machine. Two large work lights illuminated the area and their light partially spilled in the girls’ direction.
Tegan puffed her cheeks as she took stock of their situation. “Oh, boy.”
“It doesn’t look like the light reaches all the way here,” Mariah said. “I think we may be in the clear.”
“You wanna chance it?”
“Elvis will be back any minute. I’d like to be as far away from here as possible.”
Tegan darted out, bent double. It took less than ten seconds to reach a stack of wooden pallets, but it may as well have been an eternity. The girls knelt down behind the pallets to catch their breaths again