"I know you're not part of the military," the CO addressed Kerry.
"No, I'm not. But my father in law is retired Navy, and my partner grew up on a Navy base down in south Florida," Kerry replied. "I won't pretend to understand your world, but I dearly love people who are a part of it."
The CO nodded after a pause. "Good enough," he said. "We'll get you what you need, Kerry. You get us what we need."
"Hey, boss?" Mark entered, then stopped, and sniffed. "Ooo--chocolate." He looked hopefully at the trays. "Got extra?"
Kerry patted the chief's knee and stood. "What's up?"
"ETA six hours for the sat trucks," Mark said, succinctly.
"Six hours? For the trucks that came from Houston?" Kerry asked, in disbelief. "What the hell did they do, put afterburners on the pickup trucks?"
"Didn't ask," Mark said, through a mouthful of cupcake. "Dar taught me sometimes it's better not to ask stuff like that."
The CO's eyes swung from one to the other. "What does that get us?"
Mark licked his fingers. "Couple of long ass cables and it gets your critical systems back online in slow motion," he said. "But it'll work. I've got enough gear in the back of my truck to get rudimentary routing moving as long as we can bring Newark back up."
"In six hours?" The CO's eyes lit up. "You're serious?"
"Sure." Mark nodded. "They said the power generator trucks would be there by then, didn't they?"
"They did," Kerry said. "They sure did."
"Great. We'll start cabling up the gear and running the lines in," Mark said. "I'm gonna need juice though. I can't run those enterprise switches and routers off my truck battery."
The chief stood up and latched on to his arm. "C'mon boy," he said. "I got your power for you. Come with me."
The CO and Billy got up and started after them. "Let's see what we can do to help," the CO said. "Billy round up some of those carts of yours."
"Sure thing." Billy turned and waved at Kerry. "Thanks, ma'am. For everything."
"Bwf--" Mark grabbed another cupcake as he was hauled bodily out of the bus. "Later boss!"
"Later." Kerry went back to the counter and picked up her tea, her eyes flicking to the PDA waiting on the shiny surface. She sat down on the stool nearby and took a cupcake from the tray, unwrapping it as she went back to her message.
She had a lot to do. There were things to arrange, and the conference call to get back to, her mother to call, the government to worry about--but she blocked out a space of time to sit, and have her cupcake, and recover her equilibrium.
Time for a Dar break.
DAR LED THE way toward the front doors to the office, better for a handful of croquettes and a large Styrofoam cup of café con leche inside her. "Know what?" she asked suddenly. "I forgot to tell them you were with me."
Alastair chuckled deep in his throat. "As though the world isn't topsy turvy enough, I show up you mean." He glanced up at the tall building. "Weren't you going to move out of this place?"
"I still might." Dar waved at the guard as the doors slid open, releasing a blast of cold air at them. "Afternoon, gentlemen."
"Ms. Roberts!" The guard nearest the door came around the desk and approached her. "Boy are we glad to see you," he said. "They said you were overseas! We had the building management here five times already today asking for plans, and emergency authorizations."
"I bet." Dar paused and clipped her badge to her T-shirt. "Give me a half hour to get into my office upstairs then send them up to me." She spotted a few familiar faces crossing the floor, and with an effort, wrenched her brain back into place to deal with being back at the office. "C'mon."
"Right behind you." Alastair had regained his cheerful good nature. "You know, that was some damn good coffee, Dar. You were right."
Mariana had just exited the elevator. Dar put two fingers between her teeth and let out a loud whistle, making Mariana stop in her tracks and look quickly around, scanning over them twice before she stopped and stared, then let out a yelp. "AH!"
Heads turned. Dar caught the looks of recognition and then the double takes as Alastair was spotted at her side. She waited for Mariana to reach them, and was surprised almost beyond speech when the woman threw her arms around her and gave her a hug. "Uh."
"Thank god you're safe." Mariana released her. "Alastair, you too," she added hastily. "Great to see you!"
Alastair burst into laughter. "Oh hell." He chuckled. "Nice to see you to, Mari." He patted her on the shoulder. "It ain't home, but it's damn nice to be on home soil again."
"Why didn't you tell me you were back?" Mariana turned on Dar. "Does Kerry know? Of course she knows you're here."
"She knows I'm in Miami, sure," Dar said. "But she didn't know until I landed because we didn't know until we landed. We were supposed to still be in the air heading to Mexico right now." She looked up as a group of people surrounded them. "Hey o..."
Later on, she had time to reflect on the fact that her relationship with Kerry had slowly, but surely, gotten her used to physical contact and how lucky that was for her co workers.
Jose grabbed her arm, and got a hand around her back. "Shit! You're here! Jesus, thank you." He wrung her neck a little then grabbed Alastair's hand. "Boss, good to see you."
Eleanor gave her a quick hug. "No bull, Dar," she said in a quieter tone. "Glad you're safe."
More hands. More voices.
"Jefa!"
Dar turned and found herself enveloped by Maria. This at least she welcomed. "Hey Maria." She returned her admin's hug. "Glad to be back."
Maria released her. "But not for so long, no?" she asked. "I think you will go find Kerrisita and help her. She is doing so much."
"I think you're right." Dar smiled.
"Hey Dar!" Duks elbowed in and got an arm around her shoulders. "Now things are looking up," he announced, giving Alastair a pat on the shoulder. "Sir. Welcome to our banana republic."
"Thanks." Alastair patted him on the side. "Good to see you Louis." He glanced at the crowd. "I think we should move this upstairs, folks. We're blocking the lobby."
"Hey, Ms. Roberts. Welcome home." One of the ops techs timidly clasped her hand. "Boy, we're glad you're here."
Dar felt a little overwhelmed.
"All right everyone, to what our friends in England call the lifts." Alastair took charge. He handed off his bag to a willing Jose. "Someone want to get Dar's roller here? Let's go, march people. We've got work to do." He put his hand on Dar's elbow and started herding people simply by the act of moving and presenting them with the choice of moving with him or being bowled over.
Mariana fell in next to Dar. "Did you get any rest at all since yesterday? Doesn't look like it."
"Not a lot." Dar collected herself. "Cat naps. I was covering for Kerry while she was traveling."
"We know." Mari gave her a sympathetic look. "And Mark was covering for you both while he was traveling. You know, we recorded the entire global meeting place, Dar. One day, a long time from now you should sit down and listen to it."
"That was something, wasn't it?" Alastair had been listening with one ear, apparently, carrying on two other conversations with the other.
"I think it was the finest moment this company ever had," Mari said, simply.
"Well." Dar reached the elevator and got in, going to the back corner and turning to face those following her in. "Maybe we can look at it sometime. Right now, it's a drop in the bucket." She clasped her briefcase in both hands as the elevator filled, and they started up.
"Alastair, I'll have an office set up for you," Mari said. "Just give me a few minutes when we get upstairs."
"Oh please," Alastair said. "What in blazes do you think I'm going to do here? Just give me a damn phone and a chair so I can let people bitch at me." He glanced sideways at Dar. "Keep them off the back of the people who do the real stuff."