Even with Rachel’s cold, accurate description of the situation, to Xavier, fighting still sounded like a better idea than simply taking what the Aggregates handed out.
Xavier sat through the by-now-familiar touchdown and used the longer-than-expected taxi to squeeze a few more precious minutes out of his 3-D printer. The package was not complete; he would need another hour, perhaps two. And clearly he wasn’t going to get it.
He hoped Rachel and Pav had a Plan C. “We’re not going to the main base,” Pav said. “They’re taking us to the north end.”
“Probably more secure,” Edgely said. He had recovered from Rachel’s rebuke. “And look at that!” He pointed out the window. In spite of his other concerns, Xavier looked, too, seeing a giant cube-shaped structure off to the north and west. It appeared to be featureless, dun-colored, twenty stories for sure, three or four times taller than any of the more normal-looking towers and office buildings that made up the Edwards main base. “Some kind of Aggregate thing, you suppose?”
“Tell you what,” Pav said. “Let’s just ask when we have time.”
The plane stopped in front of a weathered, ancient hangar. Xavier decided to keep the proteus running—what the hell.
Rachel and Pav were out of their seats instantly. Pav went to the door. “Can you see who’s out there?” Rachel said. She was headed to the rear of the plane.
“People,” Pav said. “No Reivers yet.”
Rachel patted Zeds on his massive shoulder, then crouched next to Xavier. “How are we doing?”
Xavier chanced a look and saw the expected armed guards, four helmeted U.S. military types with weapons waiting where the Gulfstream’s door and ramp would land. Behind them were half a dozen other humans, three of them in strange black uniforms. “Not finished.”
“Shit.” Rachel turned to Zeds, then back to Xavier. “Keep it running as long as possible. We don’t know if they’ll realize what it is.”
As she stood up, and Zeds began the process of standing up and moving, the cockpit door opened. Steve and Jo emerged, looking shaken. “Let us go first,” Jo said.
Except for Xavier, they were all out of their seats as the door opened, letting in fresh desert air. Such a pretty day, Xavier thought, so much more inviting than Bangalore.
Such a shame.
As Steve and Jo went out, Xavier could hear harsh voices and words from outside. Xavier could make out words. “Down!” “Hands up!”
Two soldiers entered, weapons tracking from person to person. Yahvi whimpered. “For Christ’s sake,” Pav said. “We’re coming out.”
At that moment the soldiers registered Zeds’s presence. One of them shouted a muffled, “Jesus!” and backed up, bumping into Edgar Chang.
The other soldier misinterpreted that as Chang attacking the soldier, slamming him with the butt of his rifle. “Hey!” Pav shouted, grabbing the first soldier. Suddenly four men were shoving and shouting—the two soldiers, Pav, and Edgely. Chang lay slumped in a seat.
“Leave them alone!” Rachel was shouting. “We aren’t resisting!”
Xavier glanced at the proteus. He still needed more time—
Another human entered, a young man in black. “Oh, no,” he said, swiftly inserting himself between the combatants and preventing real injury, not that it was possible, in the tight space, for anyone to do much damage with bare hands. The soldiers had not fired their weapons.
“Everyone, I am Counselor Nigel.” The young man’s voice was confident, relaxed, as if he broke up fights every day. Perhaps the English accent helped. From what Xavier could see he was thin, south of thirty, the kind of person who handles large sums of money with little awareness. “These are my companions, Counselors Cory and Ivetta.” Two more young people in black had crowded into the cabin. They were young, too: a thickset man and a petite, dark-haired woman.
Meanwhile, the soldiers backed themselves up against the cockpit bulkhead. “We welcome the crew of Adventure to Free Nation U.S.”
Rachel slid forward. “Wow, so polite, considering you just shot down one of our planes and killed two of our friends.”
“That was regrettable and avoidable,” Counselor Nigel said. “We mean you no harm.”
“Which is why our pilots are kneeling at gunpoint.”
Xavier glanced out the window. Steve and Jo were kneeling on the tarmac, hands behind their heads.
“These are precautions that will end as soon as possible.”
Rachel was in Counselor Nigel’s face. “Do you want to put the handcuffs on us here and march us out one at a time, or wait until we’re outside?”
Counselor Nigel stared at her for a moment, then chose—wisely, Xavier thought—to drop the pretense of normality. “One at a time,” he said. He turned to Chang and Edgely. “You two will go first.”
Edgely helped Chang to the door. The older man looked badly shaken and unsteady. “Then you, Captain Stewart, followed by your daughter, then Mr. Radhakrishnan,” Counselor Nigel said.
Rachel took Yahvi’s hand, partly to reassure the girl, partly, Xavier suspected, to show a bit more defiance. “Better leave Zeds for last,” Rachel said to Counselor Nigel. “He takes a while.”
Then she and Yahvi went through the door.
Xavier glanced at the readouts. He still needed more time, though less than he’d thought earlier. That was one of the problems with the proteus—lack of precision. Ten minutes, possibly.
And the three officers were working their way toward him. “Mr. Toutant,” Counselor Nigel said.
“Nice to meet you.”
“Would you come with us, please?”
“I’m not actually feeling that good,” Xavier said, improvising only slightly. The tense maneuvers had left him momentarily queasy and dizzy. “Can I just rest here for a while?”
“You’d be more comfortable in quarters.”
“You mean jail?”
“You’re not going to jail.”
“Great, then I’d like to rent a car. I’ve always wanted to see L.A. Maybe you guys could help me with that.”
Counselor Nigel’s patience expired. He gestured to his companions and the soldiers, who started for Xavier.
Zeds, who had been silent and motionless throughout the whole exchange, stepped forward, blocking the five assailants as easily as an NFL lineman would a group of peewees.
“Mr. Toutant, tell it to step aside!”
“Zeds,” Xavier said, trying not to laugh, “try to get out of their way.”
“I am,” Zeds said, his voice booming in the cabin. Xavier wasn’t actually sure that Zeds had deliberately gotten in Nigel’s way . . . apparently Nigel and his cronies were confused, too—or they might have shot the Sentry.
Or tried to. Xavier wasn’t sure gunfire would be an effective way to stop the big alien.
While the six beings were trying to sort themselves out, Xavier watched the printer and its line to the Plan B container, weighing the moment when he would have to disconnect it.
Minutes. “Hey, Counselor Nigel, everyone. I think I’m feeling better, so let’s just all relax—”
Bing! It took Xavier a considerable amount of willpower to keep from looking at the proteus.
Zeds’s struggles had ceased. He was now past Counselor Nigel and passing between the two soldiers, who were keeping their weapons trained on him.
“And since we’re all being calm about things,” Xavier said, hoping to keep everyone’s attention on him, not his cargo, “I would love to know how you found us.”
“I don’t have that information,” Counselor Nigel said, “and probably couldn’t tell you if I did. Please be aware, however, that entry to Free Nation airspace is tightly controlled. Any unauthorized aircraft was in danger.”
“Yeah, I figured,” Xavier said. Then he shouted, “Zeds!”
All heads turned toward the Sentry, who, bent over like an old man, paused midway through in the cockpit door. As they looked away, as innocuously as he could, Xavier kicked the connecting tube free of the Plan B container. “Wait for me at the bottom of the stairs!”