“I’m the man for the job, and your mother would agree that with the Reinstated Commanders along you’re probably well covered,” Buchanan said. “However, Mahin’s a hybrid. The moment the rest of you are gone, she’s going to try to overpower me, and she probably can, handcuffs or no handcuffs.”
“That can also be handled,” Jeff said. “Where do we want all of you going?”
“Guantanamo,” Chuckie said without missing a beat.
“That’s fine, as long as I can get a floater to get myself and Mister Katt to all of you, or out of there, depending. It’s not someplace I think your enemies would expect and it’s heavily guarded.”
Jeff and Chuckie made the calls while I explained the situation to Dad. “Pump her for information,” I said in conclusion, in part because he was likely the only one who had a shot, and in the other part because I knew he was disappointed to be sidelined, especially right after Jeff had told him he was coming along.
“Will do, kitten. Should we send you whatever information we have as we get it? Or will that cause a problem?”
“No idea, Dad. I’d say if it’s vital, send no matter what. If not, save it for when we contact you guys.”
The floater gate appeared, hugged Dad and gave him a kiss, then he and Buchanan each took an arm and stepped through with Mahin. Got a text from Buchanan about a minute later saying they were there, all was well, and Mahin was shackled and being taken to a cell designed to hold a bull elephant.
Waited for Chuckie to get confirmation from Guantanamo that our prisoner was secured and that Dad and Buchanan were just fine, and then, confident that we had at least a little part of the problem contained, Jeff called for a new floater gate.
It appeared and the rest of us stepped through. While Jeff didn’t carry me, he did have his arm around me and held me tightly. It was a nice feeling in amidst the nausea and stress.
We exited in a patch of desert I was familiar with—the wash that the Science Center’s old drainage pipe had emptied into.
This location was great for several reasons beyond no one really thinking about it much. For starters, it was about a half a mile away from the back of the Science Center, so not easily seen in the first place. The wash was a big one, wide and deep—the bottom was a good eight feet lower than the main plane of the ground around this area. And the drainage pipe and the area around it were additionally hidden by a variety of cacti and desert scrub foliage.
On the downside, the pipe now had a nice metal grate attached to the opening.
Rahmi and Rhee started to pull at the grate with Chuckie and Tito giving them direction, I pulled Jeff and Christopher aside.
“Christopher, before you and Jeff go help the princesses wrench that grate off and then we all get onto our hands and knees, I have a question.”
“Only one?” Christopher asked, sarcasm knob definitely heading for eleven. “If it’s ‘how are we going to get that grate off without alerting the entire Science Center to our presence,’ I have no idea.”
“At the present time I only have the one question, and that’s not it. When we used this way back when, there was a fork in the pipe. We went to the right. What would we have come to if we’d gone to the left?”
“The reclamation system.”
“Awesome.”
“Why is that awesome?” Jeff asked.
“Because the only thing that anyone’s paid attention to as far as I know is this outer opening and the opening on the fifteenth floor by the Lair. And while Mom and I cared about the pipe and its security breach, I don’t think anyone else, Gladys included, really did. So I’m willing to bet that no one’s done anything with the left fork, including block it off or put security on it.”
“Assuming we can get this new grate off, how does that help us?” Jeff asked.
“Simple. It gives our second team the true element of surprise.”
Jeff and Christopher stared at me, then spoke in unison. “Second team?”
CHAPTER 30
“THE SECOND TEAM, or the stealth team if you prefer, will go down the left fork, and get into the Science Center through the reclamation system.”
“I thought we were all supposed to be stealthy,” Christopher said.
“While the others do what?” Jeff asked.
“Go down the right fork and hopefully get into the Science Center that way.”
“But you expect the first team to get caught,” Christopher said.
“Not entirely. But I do expect that team to have to fight. Which is why I’m going to make you two happy and head up the second team.”
“Oh, yes, that makes me feel so much better,” Christopher snapped.
“Who do you want with you?” Jeff asked.
“Richard, Paul, and Adriana. Chuckie needs to be with your team so someone who can lie believably can do most of the talking. You’ll also have Rahmi and Rhee, who, let’s face it, are worth about ten Field agents each when it comes to fighting.”
“Which team is Tito on?” Jeff looked worried. “I’m not saying I agree with this plan, but I do want to hear all of it.”
“He’ll need to go with you. When push comes to shove, he’s the only man the princesses are going to listen to.”
We argued some more, but I won, mostly because Jeff could see the wisdom of splitting our team and he wasn’t fully convinced anyone was in the Science Center, Mahin’s tell and my brilliant hypotheses or not.
The others didn’t have nearly as many issues with the two teams idea as Jeff and Christopher had. Chuckie, in particular, felt it was something our enemies wouldn’t expect.
It took Jeff and Christopher as well as the princesses, but they were finally able to rip the grate off the pipe’s end. The pipe still had a thin layer of old, icky water in it. This was good and bad. Good in that it indicated I was right and no one had given this pipe more than the cursory “look, we took care of it, happy?” treatment. It was bad because we were going to have to crawl through it to get anywhere.
We had the fun business of deciding who would go first and last. After a lot of whining and arguing, it was decided that Christopher would lead and Jeff would bring up the rear, presumably to have our best fighters and the guys who knew the intricacies of a pipe with one fork in it leading and protecting our rears.
However, because the pipe wasn’t really someplace anyone would want to have to lie down so someone else could crawl over them, our order going in actually mattered.
After much discussion, it was decided that the princesses would follow Christopher, with Tito and then Chuckie behind them. White would be behind Chuckie, with Gower, Adriana, and then me.
Way back when, during Operation Fugly, Matt, Chip, and Jerry were with us when we’d crawled this pipe tunnel, and they’d had flashlights. Turned out the only flashlights we had this time were with Adriana, whose backpack looked nowhere near to being as stuffed as my purse, but which contained so many more useful items. Thankfully she had two, so Christopher took one and White took the other. Those of us not near to those two would get to crawl in the dark.
Truly felt Jeff had insisted on me going next to last so he could be the one staring at my butt for this part of the journey. His grin when this occurred to me was pretty much confirmation. Decided it was cute and flattering and definitely preferred him focused on my butt than, say, Adriana’s, so it was all good.
“Attack” order determined and our two flashlights in the hands of each “team lead,” then it was the fun business of crawling on our hands and knees. Wished we’d left our parachute wrappings on, but hadn’t had the foresight so everyone instead got the fun of crawling through ick.