Ky blinked. “Do you really think they weren’t?”
“Admiral!” That call came from somewhere back down the passage. “We got one running.”
Ky hurried back that way; Betange followed.
The vehicle was a twin to the one Ky had launched through the roof exit. Instead of up, it went forward and back, and wove an accurate path through the other parked vehicles as Droshinski tapped the control cylinder.
“How did you do that?”
“Cautious experimentation,” Chok said, grinning. “Turns out there’s a dimple inside this back end we’ve been calling the cargo area and one inside the cab. If you push a rod into one of those, the rod extrudes little textured buttons—show her, Droshinski.”
Droshinski held out the rod. Ky could see the buttons. “This one at the bottom is stop. The others are away, to me, and turn.” Ky nodded, repressing a desire to grab the rod and start pushing buttons. “It won’t hit another vehicle,” Droshinski said. “It won’t hit a wall. It turns whichever way there’s more room.”
“We think we’ve found guide paths, though,” Hazarika put in. “When it goes between parked vehicles, it always stays on the same path, and the path is not equidistant from adjoining vehicles. And one guide path leads straight to that wall—” He pointed. “It’ll go close, but then back up and turn around.”
“I think that wall’s not a wall,” Droshinski said. “I think it’s a big door.”
“There’s a dimple over here,” Lakhani said. “But we didn’t try it yet.”
The same control that opened the other doors did not open this one—if it was a door and not a wall—but it did generate a sound, a rising and falling tone.
“A warning,” Sergeant Cosper said. “Like a siren, but not so loud.”
“Droshinski, try driving that vehicle toward it; let’s see what happens.”
A startled look from Droshinski and Cosper both. Then the vehicle rolled forward, turned, and straightened out as it approached the wall. A wide section of wall—wide enough for any of the vehicles—slid sideways, opening onto a gently sloping passage where lights blinked on, one after another. The vehicle rolled through.
“Stop it,” Ky said. “Back it up—we don’t want that door to close again with it on the other side.” Droshinski stopped the vehicle and backed it until it was in the new entrance.
“I could ride it through, and then bring it back,” Droshinski said.
“I hope you can, but I’d like to find out without your getting stuck on the other side. We do need to know what’s down that corridor.” If it came out somewhere useful—if it could be blocked from intrusion by the enemy—if there were multiple entrances by which the enemy could penetrate—if, if, if.
“Now she’s got it open, I can head down that way on foot,” Cosper said. “Get some idea of what’s there.”
“Try it,” Ky said. “But not past any doors—and not farther than a kilometer, if it goes that far.”
Without any ifs at all, the passage, plus a working vehicle, gave them mobility. Just one vehicle could carry more than all her people combined. “Get another working. As many as you can,” Ky said. “Wherever we go is better than staying here, and now we have supply carriers.”
By the end of the day, they knew all the vehicles would respond to commands, and Cosper had made a second foray down the tunnel, leaving his pack as a marker at ten kilometers, the farthest distance Ky would let him go.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
The next morning, their meeting had a different tone. “We have supplies. We have small-arms weapons, enough for everyone,” Ky said. “And now we have transportation. Time to leave.”
“But we don’t know where that goes! What if we’re trapped?” Corporal Barash’s voice rose.
“Admiral’s led us well so far. Why not trust her?” Yamini glared at Barash.
“Easy for you to say!” Barash glared back.
“What d’you mean by that?”
Ky thumped the table. “No personalities. Thinking. Barash, what do you think will happen if we just stay here?”
“You say there’s a force coming that will kill us.”
“I asked what you thought.”
“I—I don’t know. They might be on our side, the ones who land first. Rescuers. You said you’d been in contact… why wouldn’t they come? Or we could hide until they do. We could—we could hide in that part the others never found.”
“That we think the others never found. We can’t be sure. If they do know, or if they have some kind of detection that can find more voids, this is a nice big open trap. Clearly this secret—the whole continent, this base, whatever else they’re keeping down here—is important to whoever it is—a family, a corporation, even a foreign government. They might even be willing to drop a bomb that would blow the top off this to get us.”
“But they couldn’t hide that.”
“They’ve been able to hide everything up to now. I think they’re desperate to keep their hold on this continent and its contents—this base and whatever else. Our side can’t be certain of getting here first; they don’t know how much opposition they’ll face. They’re trying to move fast, and secretly, but they know the opposition is aware of them.”
“Your aunt is the Rector; surely she can have whatever she wants. Troops, transport, weapons—” Gossin, this time.
“Apparently not.” Ky looked around. Faces now were sober; some were once more scared. “You remember when Vatta was attacked?” Most nodded. “There’s still opposition to her, as a Vatta, within Spaceforce and the Defense Department; she had a row with Air-Sea Rescue when the shuttle went down. She’s not sure she can trust all the senior commanders.”
Ky paused, but no one said anything. She went on. “There are troops on our side, but they’re not in position yet. Another few days, but we may not have another few days. What we can do here—improvise blockages, create killzones—is not enough. We can’t protect against heavy weapons, and we don’t have enough of us—or weapons or ammunition—to fight a prolonged battle. Sure, I would prefer to know where every branch of that tunnel goes, how deep it is, what’s on the surface, but we don’t have the time. We’re leaving as soon as we’ve loaded the vehicles.”
“We should take all the control rods we can find,” Inyatta said. “That will keep them from opening the secret doors or operating any vehicles we leave behind if they blow them open.”
“Good thought,” Ky said. “Now—since we have vehicles and aren’t limited to what we can carry—”
“Food,” Gurton said. “How much should we take?”
“Everything we can get into a vehicle,” Ky said. “Concentrates first, but if we can take every scrap, all the better. Then they’ll have to use their own supplies, and that will delay them, at least a little. Staff Sergeant Gossin, you’re in charge of assigning work parties to strip this place of everything we need or they might use against us. Staff Sergeant Kurin, you’re in charge of getting the vehicles loaded, making sure they can move with what you pack inside them, with room for personnel as well. Pick your four; you’ll get more help when all the supplies have arrived here.”
Gossin began assigning work parties for the rest of it. Ky went back to Greyhaus’ office and dug through his desk for anything of possible use to Grace. She had to use a chisel and hammer to break the lock on one drawer, but what she found was worth the delay. A list of contact numbers, some with names—officers in various military units, all the way up to very high ranks—and some with initials only and code numbers after. Journals, like Greyhaus’, from previous commanders of this facility, dating back… over two hundred years. And more.