My mind drifted on to thinking about what Buzz had said. I’d known Keith caused problems for his unit members, often tormenting or lashing out at them. Now I wondered if that was a clue to what had happened between Morton and Celandine four decades ago.
Could Morton have had similar anger issues to Keith back then? Morton’s telepathy wasn’t unreliable, but he’d gone through a traumatic time when he was a new telepath sent to Hive Futura for training. Had some fit of temper led to Celandine’s death?
One thing was obvious. Once we were at the sea farm, I would be able to find out more about Celandine from its records.
Lucas’s voice spoke from next to me. “It’s time for us to board our aircraft, Amber.”
I looked up and saw both Lucas and Admiral Tregereth were next to me. I stood up and walked with them to the nearer of the two aircraft with uncovered windows. Other people were boarding aircraft as well now. There was a ramp to let Nicole ride her powered chair up to the door of Aerial four, but Zak was insisting on getting out of his powered chair to climb carefully up the steps of Aerial five.
Lucas and I went up the steps of Aerial one. He gestured that I should sit down in a window seat, and then sat down next to me. Admiral Tregereth took a window seat across the aisle from us, and then more seats were filled with Adika, Rothan, and members of the Alpha Strike team.
“Do I really have to wear this thing?” Admiral Tregereth twiddled the crystal unit in his ear.
“Yes, you do,” said Lucas. “As I told you earlier, I’ve got everyone in our unit wearing ear crystals, so I can use the flight to brief people on the situation at the sea farm.”
“I don’t need an ear crystal to hear you when I’m sitting just across the aisle.”
“That’s true. However, once I’ve completed my own introduction, I’d like you to tell us something about the sea farm.”
“Me?” The Admiral seemed unnerved by this idea. “What sort of things do you want me to tell you?”
“I’ve arranged for us to fly over each of the four regions of the sea farm before landing at the Haven aircraft hangar,” said Lucas. “I’d like you to talk us through what we’re seeing.”
“You and your Strike team may have adapted to going Outside, but the rest of your unit still find it terrifying,” said the Admiral. “They’re flying in aircraft with covered windows, so they won’t be able to see what’s below us.”
“They’ve all got maps on their dataviews,” said Lucas. “They can see the places marked on those, and learn some useful background information that helps them assist those going Outside.”
The Admiral gave a resigned grunt and stopped arguing.
Everyone was aboard their aircraft now, and the vast hangar doors were opening. I wasn’t worried by the aircraft engines starting, or it moving out of the hangar, but I tensed as we took off. Lucas took my hand during the nerve-wracking period where the aircraft gained height, and then smiled as he saw me relax back into my seat.
“Feeling better?” he asked.
“Yes. It’s ridiculous that I’m scared when the aircraft takes off, but happy when we’re far up in the air. I suppose it’s because everything on the ground looks so unreal from here.”
I stared through the window at the tree-covered landscape below us, and thought of the hundred million people living beneath it. We called our underground city a Hive, but at this moment an anthill seemed a better comparison.
I remembered Morton’s fear of aircraft. He’d told me that he’d never leave the Hive again even if his life depended on it. I’d taken that as a casual remark, but it hadn’t been. Morton had refused to go to another Hive for the operation he needed to save his life.
I was distracted from my thoughts by the sight of the other transport aircraft moving into formation around us, and then there was an eager yell from Eli. “Look! The fighter aircraft are coming.”
I peered out of the window. For a moment, I could only see three of our transport aircraft, but then I got a view of some neatly grouped dots beyond them which had to be the fighter aircraft approaching.
Lucas adjusted his ear crystal to transmit. “Hello, everyone. Our seven transport aircraft are now holding position over the Hive while four squadrons of fighter aircraft join us. One squadron of fighters will lead our way to the sea farm, there’ll be another squadron on each side of our formation, and the fourth squadron will bring up the rear. We’re hoping the show of force will impress the residents of the sea farm, particularly our target.”
“It’s certainly impressing the members of my Strike team,” said Adika drily. “Eli, get back in your seat.”
“I just want to look out of a few windows so I can count the fighter aircraft,” said Eli.
“Sit down!” ordered Adika.
Eli reluctantly sat down.
“I asked Gold Commander Melisande for an escort of two squadrons of fighter aircraft,” added Lucas. “She decided to send four squadrons because it would make a neater formation.”
“There are twelve aircraft in a fighter squadron,” said Adika, “so Eli can try multiplying twelve by four to work out the number of fighters instead of running around our aircraft to look out of different windows.”
“In fact, there are forty-nine fighter aircraft,” said Lucas. “Gold Commander Melisande said it had been years since she’d had a chance to lead a full wing of aircraft, so she’s out there as well.”
I hadn’t realized Melisande was a pilot, but it made sense for the head of Hive Defence and Law Enforcement to be imprinted with the knowledge to fly a fighter aircraft. I turned to stare out of the window at the bulk of the other transport aircraft and the more distant, much smaller fighter aircraft.
What did it feel like to be at the controls of a fighter aircraft? Was Melisande thrilled by it or …?
… screen display shows the fourth fighter squadron has joined the formation, so …
I tapped the comms control in front of me. “Wing leader to Wing. The extended formation is now complete. Time to head for the sea farm at what sadly has to be a suitably leisurely pace for our transport aircraft.”
I closed the comms channel, and settled back into the specially designed cushion that embraced the contours of my spine.
… heading across country now, with the aircraft controls as warm under my hands as a lover’s skin. Focusing my mind on the music of the engines, as they sing to me of might, of war, of …
But however hard I tried to focus on flying the aircraft, however closely I listened to the music of its engines, I couldn’t silence the anxious voices in the depths of my mind.
I have chosen to endanger one telepath to save the life of another. To hazard Amber to salvage Morton. A desperate gamble that …
… half the truth was enough to appease Lucas, but if he knew the whole of it. If he knew that last year I kept the worst of the statistics from the Telepath Unit Tactical Commanders to stop them and our telepaths crumbling under the knowledge of impending disaster. If he knew exactly how close the Hive came to social meltdown after Claire’s death, and that only Lottery’s discovery of Amber saved me from having to sacrifice …
… and now I am faced with that prospect again. Our five Telepath Units are slowly regaining control of the Hive, but we have far less leeway than when Claire died. If we lose Morton, then we won’t have three years to find another telepath but only one. There is less than a one in five chance of the next Lottery finding a new telepath, and if it didn’t…
I would have no choice but to lock the bulkhead doors.
I had been engulfed by the strength of Melisande’s mind, entrapped by her powerful personality, swept up into becoming her rather than myself. Now I was hit by horrific images that made me recoil back into my own head.
I was trained to think of familiar people and automatically link to their minds, but that shouldn’t have happened with Melisande because I’d only read her thoughts once before. It was possible her complex mind was especially memorable, o
r her thoughts of me had been a contributing factor, but I thought the real reason I’d been drawn into connecting to her mind was the sheer intensity of her emotion.
I opened my eyes and stared out of the window at the other aircraft. Lottery had chosen Melisande to be the Hive Gold Commander because she had the strength of mind to make appalling decisions. If my unit failed in our mission, then our Hive would be sanctioned, and Morton would die. There was less than a one in five chance that the next Lottery would find another telepath, and if it didn’t …
I winced. In that situation, Melisande would only have one way to save our whole Hive from plunging into complete anarchy, where random acts of sabotage could lead to the destruction of the vital systems that gave us light, water, and air. She knew that four telepaths weren’t enough to maintain order over the one hundred million people in our Hive, but they could maintain order over eighty million.
Morton’s Telepath Unit was located at the southern end of the Hive, with Purple and Violet as its two home zones. If we lost Morton, and our Hive was left with only four telepaths after the next Lottery, Melisande would lock the bulkhead doors that connected Navy Zone to Purple Zone. She would abandon the twenty million people who lived beyond that bulkhead to live in fear and anarchy, so she could keep the rest of our Hive safe.
Chapter Eighteen
I wasn’t sure how long I stared out of the window before Lucas’s voice spoke, his words coming both from beside me and through the crystal unit in my ear. “We’re nearing the sea farm now. Can everyone please look at the maps on your dataviews?”
I fumbled for my dataview. There was no need for me to feel so deeply thankful that it would be Melisande who had to make the decision to lock the bulkhead doors rather than me. No need for me to picture horrors happening in Purple and Violet Zones. The people there would continue to live their lives happily and safely because we would succeed in our mission.
I tapped my dataview to make it unfurl, and studied the map with ferocious concentration. I’d seen some maps of Outside that were a mass of bewildering multicoloured lines and symbols, so I was relieved to find this one was relatively simple.
“The map shows the area covered by the sea farm,” said Lucas. “That area is roughly as large as the area covered by the Hive itself, but most of it is Outside and only has one level.”
He glanced down at his own dataview. “That Outside level is divided into four regions, which are the sea farm equivalent of the Hive zones. They’re shown on the map in different shades of green and labelled with their names. The red patch is the neighbouring coastal patrol base. The large blue area is the sea. If you look at the green area labelled Harbour, you will see a small black square. That’s the inside area of the sea farm, a miniature Hive, which is called the Haven.”
I heard the nervous voice of one of the Liaison team speak on the crystal comms. “The inside area seems awfully small. Are you sure there’ll be room for all of us in there?”
“There’ll be plenty of room,” said Lucas, in his most reassuring voice. “The Haven is carved into a hillside, effectively making it underground like the Hive, and has ten levels. The Admiral’s wife, Tressa, has informed me that the aircraft hangar, the Admiral’s command centre, and all the offices of Sea Farm Security and other services are at the top on Level 1.”
He paused. “We’ll be setting up our base down on the bottom level of the Haven. Level 10 has been disused for over a century. It has two exits to the Outside. One on the beach side of the Haven, and one inland. We’ll be occupying a block of four corridors next to the beach exit.”
The nervous Liaison voice spoke again. “We won’t be able to go through the wrong door by accident and find ourselves Outside, will we?”
“Definitely not,” said Lucas. “There’ll be large warning signs as well as Strike team members on guard duty.”
There was a relieved sound on the crystal comms.
“We’ll be arriving at the aircraft hangar, which is on the beach side of Level 1 of the Haven,” said Lucas. “There is an adjacent bank of lifts and staircases that we can use to get down to Level 10, but the shape of the hillside means Level 10 extends across a wider area than the levels above it. Since our chosen base corridors are right at the edge of Level 10, and there is no belt system in the Haven, we’ll have a lengthy walk to reach them. We’ll obviously need to walk back to the lifts again whenever we wish to visit higher levels of the Haven.”
“Isn’t that a little inconvenient?” asked Megan’s voice.
“Our chosen base location has huge defence advantages,” said Adika pointedly. “Our corridors will only have earth and rock both above and below them. We’ll just need to guard the three fire doors that link us to the rest of Level 10, and the beach exit itself, to be totally secure.”
“I agree with Adika’s choice of a defensible base,” said Lucas, “and the long walk to and from the lifts won’t be nearly as inconvenient as it seems. We need to arrive in the Haven aircraft hangar, and take the lift and long corridor route to our base, to avoid anyone having to go Outside. We won’t need to carry our luggage with us though. Once we’ve all disembarked, our aircraft will fly down to land near the beach exit. The Strike team can then go Outside and collect our luggage and equipment.”
“Ah, that does make a crucial difference.” Megan sounded far more approving now.
“Aircraft being able to land by the beach exit will make it easy for us to send Amber and the Strike team on airborne emergency and check runs,” said Adika. “It also gives us useful options in the case of an emergency evacuation.”
“Which is highly unlikely to happen,” interjected Lucas swiftly.
“The Beta Strike team’s primary duties will be guarding our corridor block,” continued Adika, “while the Alpha Strike team handle the emergency and check runs.”
I could see smug expressions on the faces of the Alpha Strike team members, while several resigned groans on the crystal comms had to come from the Beta Strike team on board Aerial two. Adika always gave the Alpha team the more critical assignments. They were currently far more experienced than the Beta team, having been recruited months earlier than them, but the Beta team were working hard to catch up.
“People in Sea Farm Security use surveillance cameras and drones,” said Lucas. “Tressa told me their equipment is concentrated in the busier areas of the sea farm, and there shouldn’t be any surveillance devices at all down on Level 10 of the Haven, but I want Adika to do a full security sweep of our chosen corridors to confirm that.”
Lucas’s voice developed a grim edge. “Our first course of action will be to investigate the possibility that our target has evaded capture for so long because they belong to Sea Farm Security. We don’t want our target spying on us as we investigate them.”
“I’ll make very sure that no one can spy on us,” said Adika.
“Can I make a point please, Lucas?” asked a determined female voice on the crystal comms.
Lucas laughed. “I would never dare to stop you from making a point, Hannah.”
“If Level 10 of the Haven hasn’t been used for over a century, it’s going to be indescribably filthy. It’s not that the cleaning staff aren’t willing to do the work. We are. I just want to warn you that it will take us a long time to get enough rooms clean to accommodate everyone.”
“I appreciate the scale of the problem you’re facing,” said Lucas. “The Beta Strike team will be busy on guard duty, so the Alpha Strike team will assist your people with cleaning our four corridors. Just order them to do whatever you want.”
The Alpha team were frowning now, but there was a burst of laughter on the crystal comms, and one of the Beta team shouted enthusiastically. “High up!”
Adika coughed. “Forge, please explain to your Beta team that they should only speak on the crystal comms during a briefing if they have an important, relevant comment to make. They shouldn’t be shouting ‘High up!’”
“There is a general fe
eling on Aerial two that ‘High up!’ is an important, relevant comment about the Alpha team being put on cleaning duties,” said Forge’s cheerful voice.
Adika laughed.
“There’s a fire door that leads to corridor 5 and the beach exit,” said Lucas. “Most of the apartments on corridor 5 have windows giving views of Outside, so we’ll have warning signs on the fire door. Before Hannah starts worrying about the cleaning of corridor 5, the Alpha Strike team can handle that by themselves. I’m sure Adika will be happy to inspect it afterwards and make sure their work is up to standard.”
“If Hannah wishes, I can make the Alpha team eat a meal off the floor to prove its cleanliness,” said Adika.
“I’m afraid living conditions on Level 10 of the Haven will be very basic,” continued Lucas. “The apartments should have functioning power and water, but there’ll be no sleep fields or kitchen units, and virtually no furniture. Tressa is arranging for wooden beds, tables, and chairs to be delivered to us at the beach exit. Clothes and other personal belongings will need to be kept in bags and spare crates. We’ve brought several kitchen units with us, and will set up a communal dining area in one of the large rooms. Rather like the food arrangements at Teen Level community centres.”
“We’ll make sure you and Amber have your own kitchen unit, of course, Lucas,” said Megan’s voice.
“There’s no need for that,” I said. “The communal dining area sounds fun.”
“Now let’s move on to details of what’s been happening at the sea farm,” said Lucas. “If you look at your maps again, you’ll see a lot of black dots, which mark the positions of houses. Those get their name from the fact they house people. You can think of them as being tiny Hives, each of which provides shelter for one family.”
He paused. “You can see there are some red and orange dots as well. Red dots are the locations of confirmed incidents caused by our target. Orange dots are the locations of what were initially assumed to be accidents, but we now suspect were actually target-related incidents as well.”
Hurricane (Hive Mind Book 3) Page 17