Although she had been under O'Doyle's command for only two weeks, she'd never seen him act like this, all nervous and fidgety. Rumor had it that he'd served in some secret unit, that he'd won the Bronze Star. She'd never seen him act like anything other than a professional solider and all-around badass. Now he was sitting at the table, fidgeting like a shy high school boy trying to ask a girl on a date.
"Not really like one soldier to another,” O'Doyle mumbled. “Maybe more — you know — like man to woman."
It was a question rather than a statement. Lybrand's eyes widened with surprise and understanding. She felt blood rush to her face. Patrick O'Doyle was interested in her. No one had been interested in her in that way since high school, and she hadn't been interested in anyone since she had killed those men in Afghanistan. But she was interested now. Very interested.
"That sounds cool,” she said, her face hot and flushed.
"It's very unprofessional of me to discuss this with you,” O'Doyle said, still staring at the table as if he couldn't look her in the eyes. “Just so you know I'm not one of those guys who expects you to be interested. I don't want to create any kind of sexual-harassment situation, considering I'm your boss and all."
Lybrand shook her head. “No, that's okay. I mean, don't worry about that. That's not my style. Just so long as whatever happens doesn't affect our working relationship. I've never asked anyone for favors, and I don't expect to start now."
O'Doyle nodded. “I understand."
Still red-faced, she smiled. She smiled despite her self-consciousness about her poorly spaced teeth, sweaty blue uniform, and muscle-bound body. Patrick didn't seem to notice those things.
He finally looked her in the eyes — and smiled back.
Chapter Fourteen
Angus relished the relief brought by the night breeze. The moon hung in full splendor, turning a desolate, brown terrain into a silvery landscape of beauty and mystery. His soul felt at peace among the clean air and smooth winds.
He turned his attention back to the task at hand and activated his newest invention. The foot-tall, pyramid-shaped device contained a ten-pound rod that slammed into the dusty soil with an irregular rhythm. Dubbed a “thumper,” the unit sent small seismic waves into the earth.
Angus checked the satellite feed to his laptop, read the location, and programmed it into the thumper. The thumper's small, green screen showed the input — 11375'22"lo, 3823'15"la, 1821m. He unplugged the cable connecting the thumper to the computer and tiny satellite dish.
He pulled another small machine from his pocket. It resembled a calculator with a spike protruding from the bottom. He called it a “locator.” The sensitive receiver picked up the rhythms from the various thumpers, calculated the time difference between the signals, and used the differences to triangulate location. Angus pushed the locator's spike into the sand and waited. The locator's black display numbers showed clearly against the LCD screen's eerie green background.
The thumper unit he'd just programmed constituted one point of a large hexagon. Thumpers had already been placed at the other five points of the ten-mile-wide hex. He'd programmed the thumpers to go off at 3:00 a.m., 3:05 a.m., and at 3:10 a.m. in order to calibrate and test the entire system. He checked his watch; at exactly 3:00 a.m., the thumper's rod pounded a complex rhythm into the ground. The message was a simple binary language code — the same language used by computers — announcing the thumper's ID number and location coordinates. Binary translated easily to seismic signals; each thump was a tenth of a second long: one thump stood for a one, two thumps stood for a zero. Angus eagerly checked the receiver's screen, waiting for it to receive and process seismic signals from the six thumpers.
The locator's display flashed numbers;—11375'22"lo, 3823'15"la, 1821m.
He pulled the receiver from the sand and sprinted away from the thumper. He ran hard, heading south and down the mountain slope, slowing four minutes later to push the locator spike back into the ground. He was too far from the thumper to hear it go off at 3:05 a.m., but the receiver picked up the tiny seismic vibrations. Angus smiled as the locator display read—11375'21"lo, 3823'15"la, 1784m.
It worked perfectly, giving longitude, latitude, and elevation in meters. Not really sensitive enough for close distance measuring, but then again, the area he and Randy were going to explore was over five miles in diameter and possibly three or more miles deep. With those distances, the new navigational system would prove to be very useful indeed.
Angus pulled a walkie-talkie from his webbing and checked his homemade scrambler. The scrambler changed the encryption sequence every ten seconds. Randy's walkie-talkie, fitted with an identical encryption pattern, was the only thing that could read the signal. The shifting encryption pattern was impossible to break, providing totally secure communication. Sometimes Angus amazed even himself.
"Woodstock, this is Snoopy, do you read?” Angus said quietly into the walkie-talkie. He couldn't help feeling a bit like James Bond.
The walkie-talkie squawked with Randy's mild voice. “Snoopy, this is Woodstock, I read you."
"What's your locator reading?"
"It reads minus-113 degrees, 75 minutes, 72 seconds longitude, 38 degrees, 29 minutes, 91 seconds latitude, 2,034 meters horizon."
Randy was reporting from his perch 250 feet up the mountain and over a mile away. Angus smiled; the system proved even more accurate than he'd hoped.
Each thumper was theoretically capable of sending signals through several miles of solid rock, more than enough to fix a location inside the deepest part of the Wah Wah caves. As long as the locator read signals from at least two thumpers, it could calculate distance and give a coordinate.
Angus planned on being underground a long time. He wasn't taking any chances on getting lost. He needed accurate measurements to fully map the tunnel system.
He'd even accounted for EarthCore's seismometer, which recorded any seismic activity in the area. The staff would be in for a surprise when the machine cut out every six hours: a time conveniently coordinated with the automated thumper cycles. He couldn't have them picking up the thumper signals and coming out to investigate. Angus went so far as to reprogram the seismometer computer's boot-blocks with the precisely timed shutdown. By the time the staff brought the machine back up, the thumpers’ noisy task would be finished.
"Woodstock, get back to the Dog House, Lucy's time is up soon."
"Got it Snoopy, on my way.” Angus turned off the walkie-talkie and put it back in his belt. He threw the laptop in his backpack and headed for camp. They'd paid a guard to look the other way while they slipped in and out of camp, but the guard's shift would soon be over. Angus checked his watch — if Randy hurried, they'd be back in the lab with a few minutes to spare.
Angus's grin couldn't stop grinning. That idiot Kirkland had no idea what was going on under his nose. No idea at all. Angus had already stashed all their equipment and supplies inside the second entrance, the entrance he left off the maps and kept hidden from Connell. Now they had the thumper system working like a champ. The only thing left to do was sneak away and start the greatest spelunk in history.
Only one more piece remained in the master plan. The whole thing was proving laughably easy. They'd already finished the hard part of the plan; sneaking away every night for the last week, stashing supplies, and calibrating the thumper system.
The last part of the plan, however, had some serious style to it. Angus could hardly wait.