by Dan Koboldt
Not once in our time together had she arrived late.
By 9:15, I had to accept the inevitable. She’s not coming.
My heart sank. I don’t know why it surprised me. I’d been a total ass to her. Again. Girls like Summer didn’t stick around when you were an ass. They didn’t have to. There were ten guys like me who hadn’t screwed up yet and would be happy to swoop in. Just the thought of it twisted my stomach in knots. Stupid. I pounded my steering wheel in frustration.
Thunder rumbled in the distance and grew steadily louder. No, not thunder. A car engine.
I didn’t dare to hope until Summer’s recognizable Jeep rolled into view. Yes!
She had the top down, which explained her wind-tossed hair. She was no less gorgeous for it, though. We met in the empty space between our cars. Octavius took off to do a little circuit of the area but chirped a greeting at her as he passed.
Summer wore a pair of white strappy sandals, the first non-hiking-boot footwear I’d seen her in. How did she manage to get her feet perfectly tan? No sign of Riker, which made our greeting slightly more awkward. Never underestimate an overzealous pig’s ability to break the ice.
“Hey.” I wanted to hug her, but I could tell from her body language it wasn’t going to happen.
“Hey.”
“I’m glad you got my message. Was Octavius a convincing courier?”
“He missed my desk and landed in the trashcan.”
“Oh jeez. Sorry about that.” But not really, because it worked.
“So, I’m here,” she said. “What do you want?”
I did my best not to wince at her tone. “Well, I invited you for three reasons. First, I wanted to apologize for not calling you sooner. The Redwood thing . . . it just totally crushed me.” My voice shook a little. It wasn’t acting. “I didn’t know it did the same to you, and I’m really sorry.”
She looked away. “It’s fine.”
When a girl said something was fine, was not fine. I knew that much. I sighed to myself, because I didn’t want to burden her with this, but she clearly wasn’t going to be impressed with remorse. “I don’t think he died in an accidental fire. I think the CEO of my company had him killed, so he wouldn’t intervene.”
“Shit. Really?”
I shrugged. “It adds up. Redwood had called a meeting with the board. It was supposed to happen on Thursday. The day after the fire.”
“Damn.”
“The worst part is, I think it’s kind of my fault.”
She shook her head. “It’s not. Even if that’s why he died.”
It meant so much to me that she said that. It made me brave enough to confess reason number two. “Second, I wanted to say that I missed you. A lot.”
She looked away from me, out toward the desert. “It didn’t seem that way.”
“I know. But I really did.”
She pressed her lips together but said nothing.
“I even missed Riker a little.”
“Oh, now I know you’re lying,” she said. But a hint of a smile betrayed her lips.
“I’m serious. Pigs aren’t as bad as I thought.”
“All right, what’s the third reason?”
“This.” I held up the little watertight tube that we’d meant to set as our geocache, on the day we found the desert facility. The day we first kissed.
She brightened. “Our geocache. I almost forgot.”
“I didn’t. Do you know where we are?”
“On the southeast edge of Tonto.”
She meant Tonto National Forest. Which was technically correct, but not what I was going for.
“We are at the exact midpoint between the Tortilla Flat cache by the Salt River, and Red Rock Run in Sedona.”
She gave me a look that I can only describe as guarded. “Tortilla Flat was my first geocache in the league.”
“I know. Red Rock Run was mine.”
“How did you find that out?”
“Because I studied you, SumNumberOne. I know everything about your storied geocaching exploits.”
“So basically, you’re a stalker.”
That caught me off guard. I started stammering a protest. Then I noticed she was biting her lip. “You’re messing with me, aren’t you?”
She giggled. “Little bit, yeah.”
“You are mean.” The time felt right, so I hugged her. She hugged me back, and it was the most wonderful feeling in the world. I moved back, aware of the big dopey smile on my face but powerless to fight it. “Well, crap. The only problem is, I forgot to tell you to bring boots.”
“They’re in my Jeep.”
Relief flooded through me. “You brought them.”
“I never go anywhere without them.”
What a girl. “I like the way you look in those sandals, though.”
“Oh, shush.”
We hiked about a quarter mile from the road, cresting two shallow ridges that ran parallel to one another. After the second rise lay an almost-impenetrable wall of saguaros. Right in the middle was an ancient one absolutely riddled with woodpecker holes. Summer and I grinned at one another, because it was somehow fitting to put our cache in there. We climbed over to it, and both took a pinpoint reading on our watches. I took her hand and compared the numbers to make sure we got it right. Nothing was more frustrating than reaching someone’s cache but not being able to complete the end-goal.
“Looks good,” Summer said. She laced her fingers into mine and smiled at me.
Yes it does. “I’ll upload everything to the database tonight,” I said. “It should go live in a couple of days.”
“Aw, I feel bad making you do all of the work.”
“There’s a way you can make it up to me.”
“Well, that didn’t take long. What do you need?”
“You,” I answered quickly. “And Riker, if you want to bring him. To help me get back to the desert facility.”
She gave me a side-eye, but it was a playful one. “You need us to find a place you’ve already been?”
“So much.” I squeezed her hand.
She laughed. “All right. Count us in.”
CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE
Desertscape
The following Saturday, I sat in my car on the shoulder of the old highway, watching the sun rise over the desert. I’d managed to arrive first but only by asking Summer to meet me half an hour later. I told myself it was so I could scope the place out first. In truth, part of that was simply an eagerness to get Octavius and his new siblings out of my condo before they destroyed it. Hadrian was emerald green. Titus, a fiery orange. Nero was amber and Otho a darker brown. Marcus Aurelius was supposed to be yellow but looked more gold in the light of the early morning sun. Despite their young age, they nearly matched Octavius in size and could fly pretty well. Watching them bond had been fascinating. The hatchlings not only accepted Octavius as a littermate, but also seemed to confer him the eldest-sibling authority. He helped keep them in line, admittedly with mixed results.
A familiar and distant rumbling grew louder behind me. Summer coasted past and parked on the shoulder in front of me. There were no doors on the Jeep. Only a seatbelt and her hand on the wheel kept her from falling right out of the vehicle. She was hardcore.
“Hey!” she called.
“Hi there.” I grinned. Her casual confidence gave me a boost. I climbed out of my car and jogged over. “I don’t know if you realize this, but your doors are missing.”
“Doors are for amateurs.” She killed the ignition and reached back to unbuckle Riker, who bounced with excitement.
I patted his head. “Hey, buddy.”
Octavius flew over, landed on the edge of the Jeep, and flicked his tongue out at the pig. All his siblings followed, swooping down on the Jeep’s rail with the eager clumsiness of toddlers. Riker snorted in alarm.
“Are all these yours?” Summer asked.
“Octavius wanted some siblings,” I said. “Meet Nero, Otho, Hadrian, Titus, and . . .” I look
ed around in a moment of panic. “Marcus Aurelius, get back here!”
The little golden dragon was gliding out toward the saguaros with an air of casual innocence. He dropped his head guiltily when he heard me and turned around. He zoomed down to join his fellows, knocking Nero from his perch and onto Riker’s head. The pig snuffled him, to the amber dragon’s obvious alarm. He scrabbled back to find refuge on the spare tire.
“Wow,” Summer said.
“It’s been a long week.”
She laughed. “I’ll bet. So, are you ready?”
“One hundred percent,” I lied.
“Do you think this is a bad idea, going back there?”
“Probably. But I’ve got to do something.” I saw the uncertainty on her face and added, “You don’t have to go, though. This is my fight.”
She snickered. “You wouldn’t last five minutes in the desert without me.”
“Oh, really?”
“Really. Where are we headed?”
I beamed the coordinates to her watch. She oriented herself, and then pointed. “That way. About a mile and a half.”
Riker jumped to the ground and trotted off in the direction she’d pointed. The dragons all took wing and followed, chattering excitedly.
“We’d better take it slow.” I waved to Octavius. “Keep everyone close, buddy.” You might not be the only dragons around.
Summer and I hiked mostly in silence, checking our watches every few minutes to stay on track. The terrain forced us to make occasional sidetracks—around a pile of boulders, or a thick clump of cacti—but I fought to keep heading southeast. There was a constant breeze out of the north, dry and warm and smelling faintly of creosote.
I kept looking ahead, trying to catch a glimpse of the facility. The satellite imagery for this part of the desert was sparse, even in the archives. The scrub-brush obscured our view. Half a mile out, we still couldn’t see much of anything. I was about to step around a tangle of scrub-bushes when Riker gave two sharp grunts.
“Stop!” Summer said.
I froze mid-step. “What?”
“That’s his warning grunt.” She bent to put a reassuring hand on the pig’s back. “What is it, boy?”
Riker gave a little whine and rolled his eyes at the bushes.
I shaded my eyes and peered into them. When I saw the round shadow that hung there, I went cold inside. “It’s a beehive!”
Summer’s face paled. “Shit.” She grabbed Riker’s collar and pulled him back.
I crept after them, all too aware of the humming undercurrent from hundreds of insects. Africanized hybrid bees had colonized the entire southwest, despite numerous government-led campaigns to eradicate them. They were more aggressive and more likely to swarm than regular honeybees. Most people knew them by another name.
Killer bees.
I’d never been this close to a nest before. If they thought we were a threat, hundreds of bees would swarm us in seconds. Blood pounded in my ears. My whole body tensed. The raw, animal survival part of my brain screamed at me to break and run for it. But that might draw them out. We had no viable shelter, no nearby water. We’d be completely exposed.
That dark thought reminded me. Where the hell are the dragons?
I’d lost track of them when Riker grunted. Now I scanned the sky, growing more frantic each second. At last, I spotted them gliding lazily around a boulder.
“Octavius, get over here!” I beckoned him with short, frantic gestures.
He ignored me, or maybe didn’t hear me. His siblings followed him in a lazy circle right toward the hive. Totally unaware.
“Octavius! Scorpio!” That was our code word for emergencies, one of the first things I taught him. And thank God, it worked. He banked over and swooped back toward me. The other dragons chased him, thinking it was a game. That was fine. Octavius landed on my shoulder, and I took Summer’s hand. We backed away one step at a time. It seemed to take forever. Finally, we got far enough that we couldn’t hear the buzzing.
“We’ll, uh, give that area a wide berth,” I said.
Summer hugged Riker tight against her. “Damn right we will.”
I tapped Octavius. “Keep everyone high up, okay? Warn us if you see anything.”
He launched himself from my shoulder and chirped orders to the other dragons. They followed him up higher, maybe thirty or forty yards, and fanned out ahead. It unnerved me a little to have them so visible, but I never wanted to come that close to killer bees again.
The terrain grew rougher, jumped with rocks and razor-sharp cacti. Summer and I had to keep our eyes on the ground. We covered maybe a quarter mile and then I heard a sharp hiss from above. Hadrian, the emerald dragon, hovered in place and ducked his head toward the ground.
“Shit,” I said. “Looks like another beehive.”
We backtracked again. Ten minutes of hiking, and then got another warning from above. Octavius made the spot this time.
“This can’t be a coincidence,” Summer said.
“No.” They were spaced too evenly, and in a straight line. Almost like fence posts. Whether they were placed to keep trespassers out, or the dragons in, I couldn’t be sure.
It was midmorning by then, and the desert was really heating up. We called the dragons in and took a water break. Summer didn’t say it, but I could tell what she was thinking. If things kept going this way, we’d have to quit. Nothing at the desert facility was worth trying to sneak past killer bees.
We moved east again, and the landscape changed. A wide, angular rock formation rose up out of the desert scrub. Two stories tall, but not terribly steep and free of scrub. Most importantly, no apparent beehives. I even sent Octavius up and over, to check it out. He came back humming to himself, undisturbed, which I took for a good sign.
I looked over at Summer. “You ever do any rock climbing?”
CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX
Jailbreak
It was almost ten by the time we set foot on level ground on the far side of the rock formation. It was strenuous, if not technically challenging. The hardest part was watching Riker negotiate the rocks with apparent ease. I told myself that his lower center of gravity gave him an unfair advantage. We rested in the shade beneath an overhang and drank more water. The heat had grown from mildly unpleasant to stifling. Though Summer and I carried two water bottles each, it was going fast. We hiked over the top of the next ridge, which turned out to border the vale of the desert facility. It looked much the same as I remembered it, a broad steel structure of holding pens beneath a sea of solar panels. Our elevated viewpoint revealed what I’d suspected the last time: there were holding pens on every side. That made for hundreds of them. The massive track-robot that tended them was on the left side, moving steadily clockwise.
“Let’s wait until it turns the corner,” I said. It looked automated, but it probably had at least one video feed.
Summer nodded and bent down to hold Riker in place. She’d sweated through her tank top and was covered in dust from our climb. And just as attractive.
Focus, man. I forced my eyes away, back to the facility. The robot turned the left-side corner and started moving out of view. “Let’s go.”
The terrain offered few challenges here—it was uneven but less rocky and had little slope to it. I told Octavius to keep his siblings close by. It was hard to predict how they’d react to seeing other dragons, especially ones in cages. But as we got nearer, I began to appreciate the scale of the massive complex. I didn’t like it, but I was going to need all of them.
I called Octavius closer. “Okay, buddy. Are you ready?”
He trilled an affirmative.
“Find the Condor!”
He winged off, chirping at the other dragons. They spread out into a loose formation, gliding low across the tops of the shallow ridges. I’d used my simulator to give them an idea of what the Condor models looked like. They were larger than most other prototypes, which would help. Summer and I picked up our pace as we neared the cages.
The nearest one held a purple-and-green Rover model. It was eating noisily out of a stainless-steel bowl but looked up in interest as we approached. It seemed more curious than wary.
“That’s a Rover,” I told Summer.
“Those colors are a crime against nature.”
“I know, right?”
“It’s not your Condor, though.”
“No.” Not one of my designs at all; of that I was certain.
“You want to split up?”
I opened my mouth to protest, but she was right. This place was massive, and my Condors could be anywhere. “All right. Just for this row, though.”
She turned right and moved at a fast walk past the row of cages. I went the other way. The next cage held one of the stout police dragons, the K-10. After that was a steel-gray Laptop model with stunted wings. I wondered if that was an intentional choice from the designer, or yet another biological accident.
“Is this it?” Summer called.
I spun and jogged down the row of cages. She pointed at a large flying dragon. I had a brief surge of excitement and then a blanket of disappointment. “No, that’s a Pterodactyl. See the small head? A Condor is a bit smaller and leaner, too.”
I turned back around. Summer walked to the next cage. “All right, what about this one?”
It took a minor effort not to roll my eyes. She doesn’t have to be here helping me, I told myself. But I turned around anyway and checked the cage. There, right on the other side of the bars, was one of my Condors. It lay in the middle of its holding pen, ignoring its bowl of food, its large wings wrapped neatly around it. The wings were probably what had caught Summer’s attention, but for me it was the eyes. They’d haunted me since the day of the field demonstration. “You found it,” I breathed.
The Condor watched us but didn’t move. I couldn’t believe that we’d come this far and found it. Octavius returned and circled overhead, trilling happily down at us. They’d found another one.
Meanwhile, Summer had moved closer to inspect the door of the holding pen. “These are hydraulic. There should be a control panel somewhere that opens them.”
I looked left and right but saw no control tower or any structure. Just a long line of holding pens. “All right, but where?”