Hunter studied the transmitting panel, examining each aluminum thread and solder joint, each matrix configuration as he slowly worked his way through the printed circuit cards. He was dimly aware that Takakura had stood up in the half-darkness of the cave and was staring at him curiously. The Japanese spoke.
"What are you doing?"
"Just looking things over again," Hunter replied absently. "Wanted to make sure."
"You can do such a thing?"
"Well, I pick up a little here and there. I might be able to help."
In truth, before taking one of these machines into the field, Hunter had devoted hours to learning the mechanics of the sophisticated communications system, imagining every conceivable worst-case scenario and what might be required to correct the malfunction with the meager tools he regularly took with him.
Bobbi Jo was leaning close to him, on one knee, the other shin flat against the ground. Her arms were wrapped around her front leg. "Where did you learn to do this, Hunter?" she asked so quietly that no one else could hear.
He winked, smiled. "Survival is a habit of mine."
She smiled back and he continued to work patiently, thoroughly. He didn't blink as he followed the circuits, his hand moving fractions of an inch. Minutes passed and then his hand stopped, eyes narrowing.
Stepping forward, Takakura indicated he noticed the change in countenance. "What is it?"
"I don't know," Hunter said. He removed his pocketknife from his waist and gently touched a small circuit board. Without effort he lifted a tiny aluminum wire no thicker than a slender thread of hair. The wire bent easily beneath the blade. Hunter pushed it back down into place, a humorless smile twisting one corner of his mouth.
"You have found something," Takakura said, stepping forward again.
"Yeah."
A pause. "Well?"
Hunter's voice was distant, still in the board. "It seems that a connection between the voice receiver chip that takes sound received and converts it has been severed."
He removed the circuit panel from the machine, holding it high, in the full illumination of the flashlight. "Yep," he added. "Severed."
"How?" Takakura asked angrily. His hands were clenched.
"No way to know." Hunter shook his head. "Could have been anything. Or nothing. The cut…it's clean. But that doesn't mean anything. The wire is thin, so it's impossible to tell whether it broke or was cut.
Silence.
Hunter noticed that Taylor hadn't moved, hadn't said a word. Then Takakura was standing over Hunter, glaring down. The Japanese — and Hunter had expected it — was incensed. Takakura despised disloyalty, but even more than that he hated treason. Hunter could see the rigidity in his stance, could almost feel the cold aura. Takakura, in turn, cast glances at Taylor, Wilkenson. He held the look on Wilkenson a heartbeat longer.
"There will be an investigation into this," he said stonily. Then, turning to Hunter, "Can you repair the damage?"
Hunter studied it. The line was so thin it would have been impossible to see if not for the mini-light. He saw where the connection was broken, wondered how to solder it back in place. He tried to recall the melting temperature of aluminum, could only remember that it was relatively low, under a thousand degrees. Okay, he thought, let's see what we can do.
First he would need heat, a lot of it, and he didn't have much to work with. He looked around, searching. Surely there was something he could use to pull this off. He saw the medical kit, spoke softly to Bobbi Jo. "Do you have any alcohol in that?"
"Sure." She looked at him strangely.
"Give me some. You have any ammonia?"
"Yeah, it's standard for rashes. It's an antiseptic."
"Give me some of that, too."
In a moment he had both bottles and removed a lamp from the wall. After setting it on level ground he removed the glass and turned up the wick until the flame was burning brightly. Then he removed the metal container of the alcohol bottle and poured a little into it, then some ammonia. He carefully positioned the cap at the very tip of the flame, the place where it was hottest.
"Find me a cotton swab," he said quietly to Bobbi Jo.
As he worked, he slowly turned the tip of his huge Bowie in the bottom of the flame, heating it red. After a few moments, the combined chemicals in the cap were bubbling. Hunter spoke distinctly. "I want you to dip the swab in the lower part of the cap. Get some of the gel at the bottom, not the thinner liquid on top."
She did, carefully holding a hand under it as she lifted it from the cap. Hunter could see the glistening clear residue on the swab and knew what would happen when it came into direct contact with flame, or in this case, the edge of his knife, now reddened, almost glowing.
Then he took a 45.70 bullet from his strap, and in a few seconds was emptying its powder on a small piece of wood. Without looking at her he said, "Give me the swab."
She complied silently as he took it and very lightly dusted the thick transparent gel with a thin layer of gunpowder. Then he bent carefully over the monitor, again focusing on the severed aluminum strand.
He would have less than a tenth of a second and there was a danger that the intense heat could melt surrounding circuits as it fused this one.
"Hold the light for me," he whispered, and slowly lowered the tip of the knife to the circuit, holding the severed sections in contact. Then he lowered the swab, and as it touched the white-hot blade there was a brief flash of brilliant light. Hunter slowly removed the knife, pressing down just once, to ensure solid contact.
He looked close.
Yes!
He had done it. He leaned back, wiped sweat from his face. He didn't look at Takakura as he spoke. "We'll give it time to cool, but I think it worked."
Takakura offered a slow nod, obviously pleased but still troubled. "Wilkenson!" The voice left no room for misunderstanding. "Why is it that you could not find this severed wire? You are our communications expert, are you not?"
"Nobody can see everything, Commander." Wilkenson seemed offended, but not overmuch. "Hunter found something I missed. Simple as that."
"Men died because you missed…" Takakura let the words settle. "There will be an investigation to see if you are only a fool or something worse."
"Investigate all you want, Commander," Wilkenson said evenly, holding Takakura's gaze.
Leaning back against the wall, Bobbi Jo beside him, Hunter was faintly startled to see that Taylor still seemed not to have moved. But now, instead of a shotgun, he held his knife in his hand, tip buried in the dirt at his side. Though Taylor's face remained hidden in gloom, Hunter could tell that the commando was glaring at Wilkenson.
Chaney arrived at the Tipler Institute to find Gina Gilbert waiting in the lobby with slender arms crossed over a white lab coat. Her dark-rimmed glasses — a curiously outdated style — framed wide and anxious eyes.
He began, "I received your—"
Then she was moving, hand on his arm, ushering him toward a pair of white double doors located toward the rear of the small entranceway.
"You've got to see this," she said breathlessly. "I found something else on the electrophoresis that—"
"On what?" Chaney managed as she ushered him into the room he had seen earlier, locking it behind them even more quickly. She moved him forward as she continued, "I think I may have found something very important and I don't know who else I can trust."
Releasing him, she sat in the center of a large concrete slab that dominated the lab. On two twenty-inch computer monitors in front there were a series of horizontal lines, moving upward off the screen. Behind the lines were a series of little sparks that seemed to blink and disappear, then reappear where they had been.