The artillery bombardment was heavy, but still in the distance. Jack kept waiting for the American bombers to come in and silence the Russian guns like they had last night, but so far it hadn’t happened. Other than a handful of Hornets, Jack hadn’t seen much of an air presence.
The trail headed uphill, and Jack had to pedal harder to keep up. He was amazed at how quickly everyone was moving. He focused on Josi at the head of the line, and heard her panting heavily and her heart thrumming in her chest.
Jack moved down the line and found everyone to be much the same. A few of the Green Berets were doing better—they had to be in great shape—and a few of the lambdas were doing worse. Krezi was really struggling.
The trail turned again, onto an old road with two grassy wheel ruts. Jack pumped the pedals until he could catch back up with Aubrey.
“Hey,” she said.
“Hey.”
“This is going to be a waste if we get there and I can’t do anything.”
“That’s what I’m worried about.”
He focused on the battlefield again, listening for the sound of Russian voices. They were close, maybe a few miles off.
“We’ve got to be getting close,” he told Aubrey.
Tabitha’s voice appeared in his head. It sounded so out of place—there was no panting or heavy breathing, just a calm, soothing tone. “Jack, I know you don’t care about what I say, but I know you care about Aubrey. We need to call this off. You and I have both trained with her. We know how tired she gets when she’s invisible.”
He shook his head, but halfheartedly. They couldn’t call it off, could they? Not when they were so close.
“She’s going to struggle up here. She’s going to struggle and she’s going to make a mistake. It won’t be her fault, but things happen when you’re tired.”
Jack looked at Aubrey. Her face was splotchy, and her cheeks and nose glistened with sweat. She pushed her glasses back up, and glanced over at him.
“You worry about you,” she said, with a huff of breath and the faintest smile.
Tabitha’s voice continued. “It’s not just her, Jack. It’s all of us. If this doesn’t work, we’re all on the front line.”
But it was too late for whatever Tabitha was going to say next, because up ahead Josi slowed to a stop. She laid her bike on the side of the road, and then turned to Gillett, her hands on her hips as she gulped in air.
“We’re five hundred yards northeast,” she said, and pointed into the woods. “That way.”
Everyone climbed off their bikes and stashed them against the side of the road. Gillett came down the line to where Jack was standing next to Aubrey.
“Are you ready for this?”
She let out a deep breath of air, her tongue on her lower lip, and nodded.
Tabitha spoke up. “Captain, are we sure about this?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, after what happened yesterday . . .”
He turned and looked in the direction Josi had pointed. “There’s no artillery falling here. They’re probably avoiding this area because they’re protecting the lambda. This is the safest place on the battlefield. Now be quiet so the fish doesn’t swim away.”
Jack said, “Russian infantry’s coming, though. I can hear them. They’re not as close as the lambda, but they’re headed this way.”
“Then let’s get moving. Jack, find me the lambda.”
He nodded and stepped forward, closing his eyes to focus on sounds. Behind him eleven people wheezed heavily, and their clothing rubbed as they stretched.
The forest in front of him was quiet, all the animals gone to ground. In the far distance—maybe a mile or more away—he could hear the chatter of automatic-weapons fire, the voices of troops. He tried to focus on something closer.
There was water burbling, not much more than a trickle. It was probably an irrigation ditch, he thought. He knew there was farmland up ahead.
Something metal was swinging on a squeaking hinge. A gate, maybe, or a barn door, or possibly a weathervane.
He heard breathing, and he zeroed in on it. It was rapid, and the heart was pounding, and it didn’t seem right. Not for a human. Was it a deer? It had to be something like that.
He searched again, scanning the woods for any sound. A squirrel chattered. Branches rubbed together.
Something ticked.
He focused on that. Something ticking. A watch. And there was breathing nearby. Two separate bodies.
“Found them,” Jack said, and opened his eyes, pointing into the forest. “Two people. They’re probably a lot closer than five hundred yards. Maybe three hundred.”
Gillett turned to face Aubrey. “Your job is to stop that flyer from flying. We could all march in there and she’d be gone in an instant. You sneak in, and you do what you have to.”
She took a breath and nodded. “Yes, sir.”
THIRTY-FOUR
AUBREY WAITED UNTIL SHE WAS fifty yards ahead of them before she first spoke to Jack. The plan was to let her get a hundred and fifty yards in front—to where they could all see her—and then to track down the flyer.
“I’m sore, Jack,” she said, more to keep herself calm than because she really needed to say it. “It’s been too long since I rode a bike. You probably did fine. You always rode your bike back home.”
They used to ride together—she rode even more than he did, because she lived out on the edge of town—but she’d given that up when she started getting rides to school in Nicole’s Audi convertible.
She stopped walking for a minute, slung her rifle, and pulled the bottle of Flowerbomb perfume from her pants pocket. She sprayed herself with it, the scent of the forest disappearing in a burst of floral fragrance. As much as this stuff reminded her of every dangerous, bloody event in her life, she loved the smell.
“Remember I’m relying on you, Jack,” Aubrey said. “You tell me if I’m crossing a line.”
Aubrey looked back. She judged the distance between them now as being close to one hundred yards. That meant she was only two hundred from the flyer.
“I’m going invisible,” she said. “I’ll see you in a minute.”
She disappeared and immediately felt her strength drain. She was too tired. Hopefully she wouldn’t have to do much more on this mission than get in and get out.
An old farmhouse with a shingle roof and white plank siding came into sight. Aubrey couldn’t see the lambda, but she had to be there. That was where Jack had pointed.
For a moment Aubrey worried that the lambda might be on the roof, or somewhere Aubrey couldn’t reach, but as she moved through the pines and the building became more visible she saw the steep pitch of the gables and knew no one could be on top.
“Jack says he can smell you,” Tabitha’s voice said.
“Hey, Jack,” Aubrey said. “We’re at it again. Just like old times.”
The house wasn’t a square—far from it. It looked like it had once been a rectangle, but had been added on to several times. Rooms jutted off in random directions, and on the far side it connected with a barn.
“There’s a house,” Aubrey said. “I’m trying to find the lambda. I’m assuming she’s not inside, because she wouldn’t be able to fly away.”
There was a pause. A long pause.
“Aubrey?” Tabitha said. “Make sure you report in before you take a shot.”
“Got it.”
She moved in a semicircle around the house, staying about fifty yards from it, giving it a wide berth. Even though she was invisible she didn’t want to come up on the lambda unexpectedly. Most of all she didn’t want to take the shot.
“This lambda could be like us, Jack,” Aubrey said. “Recruited into the army, taken from her home. She could be doing this against her will. Granted, she could always fly away and escape, but fly away where? Maybe she wants to defect and doesn’t know English?”
Aubrey continued to prowl around the building. She could see past a corner and into an alc
ove where a short evergreen grew. She peered at it closely—someone could fit behind it. But after adjusting her glasses again, she decided no one was back there.
She kept walking, her rifle held up to her shoulder as she sighted down the scope at every new edge of the building, expecting to see the girl standing there.
“Take your time,” Tabitha said. “Check everywhere.”
Artillery was rumbling in the distance, and Aubrey wondered how many lives were being lost while she was looking for the lambda.
“I am checking everywhere, Jack,” Aubrey said. “You can hear them. Am I getting close?”
She suddenly thought to check above her, and she pointed the gun up—was the lambda hovering? Could she do that?
“Jack says you’ve got a little farther to go. Hold where you are for a minute.”
Aubrey stopped, aiming the gun up and all around into the trees, half expecting to see the girl clinging to a limb above her. But wouldn’t Jack be able to tell if she was up in the air?
“Jack? What about up in the trees? Or floating up in the air? Somewhere I can’t see?”
She hadn’t checked the whole house yet, but she didn’t dare leave the shelter of the pines in case the lambda was more than a hundred and forty yards up—flying where she could see Aubrey.
Tabitha spoke. “Jack’s not sure. Check every tree.”
THIRTY-FIVE
“DAMN IT, JACK,” GILLETT SAID. “What’s taking her so long?”
“I don’t know,” Jack answered, frustrated and afraid. “Tabitha, does she know how close the infantry is getting?”
“She knows,” Tabitha said. “Unless she can’t hear me.”
“She’s so close,” Jack said, listening to Aubrey’s breathing and the breaths of the other two lambdas. They had to be just around another corner, just behind a tree. He couldn’t pinpoint them with the breeze in the air, but they were so close. And the Russian infantry was only a few hundred yards on the other side of the house. “I don’t know why she’s standing in one place.”
There was a pause.
“I’m checking everywhere,” Aubrey said, still not moving.
She couldn’t be doing this, Jack thought. Not going against orders. Not again. Not after their talk last night. She said she was going to be the best soldier that there was. And here she was, disobeying every word Tabitha was telling her. Every order from Gillett.
“Tabitha,” the captain said, his voice terse and deliberate. “Tell her to circle that whole damn house. Tell her to search the barn. Tell her to do anything, but quit standing there.”
“I’m telling her,” Tabitha said.
“Tell her again,” the captain snapped.
Aubrey still wasn’t moving, and Jack wished he could see her. She hadn’t taken a footstep in more than a minute.
“Ask if she can hear you,” Jack said.
Aubrey moved a foot but only one. It was like she was standing in one spot, rotating in a circle.
“I can hear her, Jack,” Aubrey said. “Every word, loud and clear. I swear, I’m checking everything.”
Jack could hear the Russians coming. They weren’t fighting anyone. They were advancing toward the house. Toward Aubrey.
“Does she know the Russians are going to be there in a minute?” Jack said.
The captain turned to Jack. “You know her. What’s she doing?”
“I—I don’t know,” Jack said. “She’s reluctant to shoot. Maybe she’s freaking out about that. But usually she’ll talk to me when she’s scared.”
“I’m going to have to send my guys in,” Captain Gillett said.
“Give me one second to reason with her,” Jack said. “I can get her to do this.”
He looked at Tabitha, who stared back at him. “Repeat every word I say.”
THIRTY-SIX
“YES, TABITHA, I CAN HEAR you,” Aubrey said, getting annoyed. She had almost gone in a full circle, searching every tree. Her gun was getting heavy in her arms and she wondered how long she could stay invisible. The bike ride had drained so much out of her.
“The captain wants you to make sure you leave no stone unturned,” Tabitha said. “Every tree. She could be up any one of them.”
“What do you think I’m doing?” Aubrey said. “Jack, I’m trying. I’m really trying, but I wish Tabitha would shut up.”
She turned past the last tree and was facing the farmhouse again.
She took another step, hearing the crunch of dry pine needles and brush under her feet. She aimed her gun at the edge of the house, continuing in her original path around it. Five more steps. She stopped and looked at the trees again, hoping she was getting a different view, maybe seeing the lambdas in the trees.
It was a painfully long search, but these trees all seemed clean. She focused back on the house, took five more steps, and another alcove appeared. She thought she saw movement.
“Wait, Jack, I think this is them. I can see—hang on—I can see, okay, there’s a girl. She’s wearing a harness with some kind of latch in the center, and there’s a boy on the ground, wrapped up in a tarp. It’s like the carrying harnesses they use to lift cattle into trucks, like the one we saw the Fredricksons use that one time. They aren’t latched together right now, but they could be in a second.”
Aubrey took a breath, watching the girl through her scope. The girl wasn’t wearing body armor, just some kind of black bodysuit under her harness. She didn’t even look to be armed. Aubrey aimed at the girl’s chest.
“Should I take the shot?”
“Hold on a minute,” Tabitha’s voice said. “They’re thinking of taking her alive.”
Aubrey almost yelled. This was already so hard for her—she was staring down her sight at this girl, this blond, pretty, normal-looking girl. And now they wanted to talk it over.
Aubrey took a step toward the lambdas, and then another. Her shooting arm was aching, and she lowered the gun for a minute to rest her arm, to get rid of the shakes.
That’s when she saw them.
“Jack,” she said, raising her M16 and taking a few stumbling steps backward. “There are Russians here. Soldiers. They’re coming through the trees. I think—I think they’re too close to see me, but Jack, that means they’re close. What do I do?”
There was no answer. Tabitha was completely silent.
“Jack, what do I do? I don’t think these lambdas are going to stick around. As soon as the flyer hears noise, she could take off. All she has to do is connect that latch. You told me to report in.”
Tabitha spoke. “Engage with the Russian soldiers.”
“What?” Aubrey said, swinging her gun around to the approaching infantry. “Check that: You said the soldiers, not the lambdas? This doesn’t make any sense. Is that an order from Captain Gillett?”
The Russians were getting close. There had to be an entire company—over a hundred men. They were strung out in a loose line crossing the fields on the far side of the barn. Aubrey dropped to one knee to get better aim, and then thought better of it and ran to a tree she could lean against. She was getting so tired.
“Engage with the Russians,” Tabitha said again.
“Jack, this is stupid,” she said. “As soon as I do this the flyer’s going to take off.”
She centered her scope on one of the men who seemed to be in charge. She couldn’t see insignia, but he seemed to have people clustered around him. Maybe he was just popular.
“Okay, Jack,” Aubrey said. “But mark me down as objecting to this order. ‘Ours is not to reason why.’” She breathed out.
She heard something just before she pulled the trigger, but it was too late. She’d squeezed, and the man dropped, her shot just above his Kevlar vest, right in the neck.
“Take the shot!” a voice called, somewhere behind her. “Take the shot!”
Chaos erupted on the Russian line, and Aubrey turned to see the flyer scrambling with the latch. She turned farther to see Captain Gillett in a full sprint.
&nb
sp; “Take the shot!” he yelled. “Shoot the lambda!”
Aubrey set her scope on the girl, whose latch was now locked. She lifted off the ground.
Aubrey fired.
THIRTY-SEVEN
JACK WAS RUNNING FORWARD, FOLLOWING the Green Berets. He left Tabitha in his dust.
What could she have been thinking? Feeding Aubrey the wrong orders? What good would that do for anyone? Even for the rebellion, what good would that do?
There were strange noises coming from all around him, and it took Jack a moment to recognize what they were. He was too close to Aubrey to hear her, so he wouldn’t hear her rifle either. But he would hear the echoes of that rifle as the sound bounced off of trees and hills and the side of the barn. Aubrey was firing, still invisible.
A second rifle joined in, and he recognized the sound as an M4—Captain Gillett’s gun.
Jack could see Russians now, and he dropped to his knee, aimed at a soldier, and fired. The man dropped.
Bullets began to fly from the Russian line—muzzles flashing with bursts of flame as the soldiers shot into the forest. They probably couldn’t even see what they were aiming at—they just knew that they were under attack.
Jack lined up another man in his sights. He could hear all of the Green Berets firing now, the chatter of six M4s. And Jack recognized one M16. Josi. Krezi should have been using her power, though Jack hadn’t seen her blasts of energy. Gillett had snatched away Tabitha’s rifle and handed it to Rich, so she wouldn’t be firing unless she took it back.
Jack shot at another Russian, hitting him squarely in the chest. His armor probably held the bullet, but the man dropped anyway. It likely cracked his ribs.
The returning fire was incredible now. Jack dropped to his stomach. He tried to listen, tried to focus on the lambdas, to see if Aubrey had hit her target, but he couldn’t hear anyone’s breathing through the cacophony of gunshots.
The air over his head began to screech with flying lead, and the trees were erupting into matchsticks.
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