Unknown to the Hail and his crew, their tiny drone B-52s was being observed.
From far up in a tree and on the other side of the pool; a pair of eyes watched the bee fly towards the table. A mind plotted an intercept course and an action was taken.
From the view atop of the power-pole, the camera on Styx recorded a colorful bird fly into the frame and pluck B-52s right out of the sky.
“What the hell!” Knox yelled.
B-52s camera was still in operation. It was transmitting video of the ground below. However, the ground was going by sideways.
“What is going on?” Hail yelled.
Fox had seen the whole thing happen in real time on Styx’s main monitor.
He told Hail, “A bird got B-52s.”
“You have to be kidding me?” Hail groaned.
“Sorry, but I’ve got it recorded. Check it out.”
On Hail’s right was the live video still being transmitted from B-52s that was tracking a crazy path over ground, and then a moment later all he could see was sun and sky. On the left large overhead monitor, Fox began playing the video of the bird strike. It happened just as Fox had said. In the time it took fifteen video frames to click past, a bird could be seen snatching the tiny dot out of the sky and then disappearing to the right.
“What the hell…” Hail said, totally exasperated.
“Told you it was a bird,” Fox said.
“Actually it was a Summer Tanager to be exact,” Pierce Mercier piped in. Then like analysts do, Mercier went into a big long explanation about how there are not many birds that eat Bees, but the Summer Tanager happens to be one of them. They also eat wasps, hornets, and dragonflies. The birds are mostly found in Africa, Asia, southern Europe and Australia. Their main habitat is…
“That’s enough,” Hail interrupted.
Video was still being streamed from the captured B-52s. Hail turned his head sideways to reference what he was seeing. It appeared that the bird had the tiny drone in its mouth and was flying back to the tree from which it had come. With his head still sideways, Hail recognized the pool and the courtyard twenty feet below. Then the screen went crazy with motion. B-52s took three jarring hits that scrambled the video and then a fixed image appeared on the screen. The drone’s camera was now focused on several thick blades of grass.
“Looks like the Summer Tanagers do not like B-52s. The bird dropped it,” Mercier said.
“Perfect,” Hail snarled, infuriated.
There was silence in the room as the crew regrouped.
Then the timeline kicked in.
Renner informed everyone, “We have probably less than three minutes to complete the bombing run before Chang walks out that door and sits down.”
Hail asked, “Is there any way to get B-52s off the deck?”
Renner answered, “It doesn’t matter. It’s already exhausted more than eighty percent of its battery. Even if it could fly, it may not even make it to the target.”
Knox added, “And there is no way to spin up when the drone is lying on its side. Those are external propellers and one of them is pinned to the ground.”
“Alright, quickly,” Hail told the crew. “Let’s go with Plan B.”
Paige Grayson moved into action made. She made some selections on her screen and said, “Opening the hatch on Stones.”
“Switching control to Beatles,” Knox announced, pulling up a new screen and pressing the corresponding icon.
From the inside the core of Stones rose the drone called Beatles. It was identical in every way to B-52s, except that it had a fully charged battery and had not been chewed on by a big bird.
“Anyone watching for the bird?” Knox asked as he carefully flew the drone toward the breakfast table.
“Does it matter?” Hail said. “Just complete the mission and be quick about it before Chang comes out. If the bird makes another run, then it makes another run. There is nothing we can do about it.”
Knox didn’t reply. He simply concentrated on keeping the drone flying low to the ground. After traversing what seemed like miles of bricks, Knox began to gain altitude as he neared the table.
The tiny drone buzzed louder as Knox increase thrust and spun the rotors faster. Plates, silverware and glasses of various shapes and sizes filled with liquid of different colors, came into view as the drone crested the edge of the table.
“All right, easy now, Alex. We only have one shot at this,” Hail cautioned.
“But no pressure, right,” Knox shot back sarcastically.
The dishes and glasses on the table were so close to the drone that they looked like small buildings in front of the camera.
Knox found the glass of orange juice in the spot where Chang had sat the last three mornings. He worked the controls until Beatles was hovering directly over the glass.
“Are you sure you’re in place?” Hail asked.
“As close as I’ll ever be, Skipper,” Knox confirmed.
“OK,” Hail said, “Bombs away.”
Since Knox’s hands and feet were busy, Hail himself push the icon on his monitor labeled BOMBS AWAY.
A tiny valve opened and allowed a small amount of compressed air into a chamber inside Beatle’s tail. The air pressure pushed out a squirt of clear liquid that landed directly in the glass of orange juice below.
“We’ve got company!” Fox warned.
On Styx monitor, Fox noticed that the sliding glass door was being opened. “It’s Chang,” Fox added.
“Go, go, go!” Hail yelled at Knox.
Knox whipped both flight sticks to right. The tiny drone whirred and buzzed and went rocketing off, totally out of control.
“Get it out of there,” Hail told Knox.
Knox squeezed both triggers on his controllers, pouring full power into the drone’s rotors. The video was nothing more than colorful static that flew by. Knox made no effort to fly the drone; he just needed to get it as far away as possible. Seconds later and five feet into the grassy area, the drone stuck a tree at full throttle and disintegrated on impact. It went from a buzz, to a pop and then to complete silence. The big screen that was showing the video being streamed from Beatles went black and a message popped up that read NO SIGNAL DETECTED.
“Are we good?” Hail asked his team.
Knox released his controllers and shook out his cramping hands. He checked his instruments and saw that everything was dead.
Satisfied that Beatles was dust, Knox announced, “We’re good here,” and gave everyone a thumbs up.
“We are good up here, too” Fox said. “Chang didn’t see anything. He is sitting down now.”
The loss of both B-52s and Beatles was inconsequential. Even though each drone cost ten-thousand dollars to build, the crew understood that their mission was only a one-way trip. Neither drone was designed with enough battery-life to make it back to their mother-drones. It was a suicide mission for the picos. They were the kamikazes of the Hail drone fleet.
The crew watched the video feed from Styx. Everyone in the mission center was quiet and pensive.
“If anyone wants to leave, then feel free to do so. There are no judgements here. What you are going to see is not going to be fun or pretty.”
Hail looked at the faces of his crew. They continued to watch the video feed from Styx. No one left.
Fox refocused the camera and zoomed it in tight on Chang sitting at his table. It was understood that there was a certain degree of error involved with Beatle’s mission. There was really no way to know for sure that the liquid dispensed from Beatles had found its mark and had landed inside the glass. The drone was too small to have more than one camera, and the camera it did have, only showed a view from the front. There was no camera underneath the drone. But the rim of the glass had been smack in front of the camera, so if the load had exited the craft in the way in which it was designed, then gravity should have done its job.