Love you. Wish I could fly right to DC to be with you. Hang tight.
DD
"Wish you could too," Kerry muttered under her breath. "We can talk to them, and try to find out specifically what they're looking for," she told Nan. "If I can't convince them they're barking up the wrong tree, then we just have to tell them to wait until Dar lands."
Nan nodded. "They said the systems were all locked," she said. "It's making the network guys nervous," she added. "Like I said, they'll all be glad to see you. No one minds making decisions but man, when you've got the dark side of the government camped on the doorstep it's freak city time."
"Yeah." Kerry rested her head against the back of the seat, listening with one ear to the chatter on the call. "Freak city? We're living on Freak Planet right now." She shifted and drew one knee up a little, resting her hand on it as she cupped the other over her ear. "That's for damn sure."
Nan leaned back in her seat, watching Kerry from the corner of her eye.
"What?" Kerry caught the look.
The dark haired woman appeared to be suppressing a smile. "You're really not what I expected," she explained.
"In a good way or a bad way?" Kerry asked, wryly.
"Oh. Good way," Nan said. "Definitely."
Now what, Kerry wondered, did that actually mean? "Well, glad to hear it." She clicked her mic on. "Scuse me a minute--Miami ops, this is Miami exec back on. What was that about a power outage?"
Nan drove on in silence, passing quickly through unusually empty streets, for once the lack of traffic causing no one any cheer.
DAR LEAFED THROUGH her magazine, reading the technical articles then amusing herself by viewing the ads that luridly bracketed them.
"Whatcha reading?" Alastair asked.
Dar held up the front page.
Her boss rolled his eyes. "Jesus, lady." He folded his hands across his stomach. "Don't you ever go off duty?"
"I like technology," Dar protested mildly. "Shit, Alastair, what do you think you pay me for? My typing skills?" She had one leg slung over the arm of the chair and now she leaned on her knee a little. "This stuff changes every damn second. You have to keep up."
Alastair chuckled. "I don't have to keep up. That's why I have you." He put his hands behind his head and stretched. "Wasn't bad dinner, eh?"'
"Very good, matter of fact," Dar agreed. "Sure beats chicken Florentine or three cheese pasta, which would have been our choices otherwise." She put the magazine down and got up to wander to the back of the cabin and stretch her legs.
There was an open space there, enough for her to stand and extend her arms. She did so, and twisted her body back and forth to loosen up the stiff muscles in her back.
"Now what are you doing?" Alastair asked.
"Jumping jacks," Dar replied. "Wanna join me?"
Her boss leaned on his chair arm and craned around to watch her. "My last jumping jack was in basic training when I was eighteen years old, way before you were born," he informed her. "My idea of strenuous exercise is letting the caddy drive the cart on the golf course."
"Ugh." Dar tested the luggage rack's strength, then she gripped them and let her body drop back, tensing her shoulders as they took her weight. "I can't handle golf," she said. "I don't have the patience for it. I end up hunting for grasshoppers and losing track of what hole I'm on."
Alastair snickered. "Y'know, I can picture that," he said. "You do sports though, don't you? I thought I remember seeing some pictures of you winning some karate tournament or something, and Bea said you were all joining a softball league down there."
Dar lowered herself to the ground and decided on a few pushups. "I do sports," she conceded. "I've been doing martial arts since I was a kid." She settled into a smooth rhythm, glad for the distraction. "Lets me let off some steam." She paused, her body held up off the floor and peered up at Alastair. "You saw pictures?"
"Sure," Alastair said. "Kerry's quite a photographer." He watched Dar as she merely looked at him, remaining in place. "How long can you stay like that?"
"Long as I have to." Dar pressed herself up into a handstand and felt her back relax as gravity inverted. "I'd forgotten she put that in the department news blurb." She crossed her ankles and pondered the matter. "They wanted me to continue in that circuit, but I figured I'd quit while I was ahead and not push my luck."
"Mm." Her boss got up and sat on his chair arm to better watch her, extending his legs across the aisle. "Yeah, I'd rather you didn't risk getting kicked in the head," he said. "You get into enough damned situations as it is."
Dar bent her elbows, then pushed off gently from the floor of the aircraft and flipped herself upright, shaking her arms as blood returned from her head to the rest of her where it belonged. "It's been a little crazy the last year or so," she conceded. "Maybe I'm just doing more."
"Maybe you actually got a life." Alastair's eyes twinkled. "I used to worry about you sleeping under your desk down in that office."
Dar snorted softly. "I've got a perfectly good couch in there. What kind of a nitwit do you think I am?" But she smiled to take the sting from the words. "But yeah, maybe." She sat down on the arm of the chair across from Alastair. "Feels like it's been busier."
"Been good for you," her boss concluded. "Hasn't it?"
"Hell yeah. Wouldn't have traded a minute of it." She stuck her hands in the pockets of her cargo pants. "But I don't think what we're going through now counts."
Alastair's face grew serious. "No," he said. "I'm sure this is going to have a lot of consequences." He folded his arms over his chest. "You can bet on a military response. I sent a note to Ham to review our contracts with the service branches to see what we're obligated for."
Dar nodded. "I thought of that," she said. "I'm having Mark spool up the new tech groups to start reviewing everything they can get their hands on.
don't know what they'll ask for. I have a feeling Gerry's need to talk to me is something along those lines."
"I figured the same."
Dar exhaled and looked around the plane, then back at Alastair. "Are we there yet?"
Her boss chuckled wryly.
They turned as the forward door opened, and the steward appeared. "The captain wanted me to tell you he's submitted the new flight plan, but he's been told it needs to be cleared by the U.S. Government, even though we're not going to encroach on U.S. airspace."
"Ah."
"It's very tense," the steward explained. "We had to forward a manifest to them. I hope neither of you has any outstanding issues in the States, because that could be a problem."
Alastair and Dar glanced at each other. "Well," Alastair said. "We both have dozens of outstanding issues but they're not personal ones. I believe they'll be glad enough to let us by." He thought a moment. "Maybe we can ask them for permission to land, while we're at it."
"I don't know about that sir," the steward looked mildly alarmed. "The people I heard the captain talking to really didn't sound very friendly. We really don't want trouble. We didn't contract for that."
Alastair held a hand up. "Hold on there, son. We're not looking for trouble either. We work for a company with a lot of government contracts, and it's possible they'd make an exception because there are issues they're looking to us to solve. Chances are when they put our names into their system..."
"Which I wrote," Dar commented, in a mild tone, peering back at her boss when he looked at her in surprise. "That was before I got a life," she clarified, her eyes glinting with amusement. "I had more time back then."
Alastair scratched the back of his neck, and shook his head. "Anyway, when they call us up, they might say something about it."
The steward didn't look reassured. "Well, I'll let the captain handle all that," he said. "Is there anything I can get you in the meantime?"