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One of his eyes glowed red for a moment, then a map of the building appeared on the wall closest to us. There was a little gray dot in the corridor that served as J/O’s “you are here” beacon, and in front of it was a door. Except the door existed only on the map, not in reality.
“Hm,” said Jai. He took a step forward, but didn’t get any further than that before the wall opened, with no fanfare, to reveal Jakon.
The wolf girl was crouched on top of a clone guard, her arm still outstretched from where she’d pushed the button to activate the concealed door. Several more guards were stretched out across the floor behind her, the satisfied smirk on her face making their fate obvious.
“What took you so long?” she asked.
“Good job, girl! You want a treat?” Josef was the only one of us who dared to tease her like that, since he’d demonstrated exactly once that he was big enough (and strong enough) to pick her up by the scruff of the neck. She bared her teeth and growled at him, though it lacked her usual oomph. She was amused. So was I, but I couldn’t help wondering what the point of the one-way door had been. Why have a room you could get out of but not into?
“Is this the computer you need, J/O?” I asked as we filed into the room. “And can you project that map again? I want to make sure there aren’t any other hidden doors in here.”
“An adroit cogitation, Joey,” Jai said as the map appeared on the wall again.
“Joe, remember?” I studied the map. I wasn’t the best at reading them, but this seemed fairly straightforward. J/O’s little gray dot was in the middle of the room; behind it was the door we’d come in; and there were three walls, all smooth and doorless. Everything looked normal—except for several dotted lines going through the picture. “What are those?”
“Vent shafts. How else do you think Jakon got in?”
“Follow this one,” I said, tapping my finger along one of the dotted lines. Then I forgot about the mystery of the doorless room as a new thought occurred to me. “Do you know exactly where the new Walker is?”
J/O’s other eye narrowed in concentration; then another gray blip appeared on the map, a few rooms and hallways over from where we were. “The shafts go right to it. We could send Jakon back up there.”
“Sure,” the wolf girl said, flashing a toothy grin.
“Your plan is sound, but J/O needs to devote his attention to the computers at this juncture. I would suggest we separate to accomplish both objectives.”
Jai was right. I didn’t want to split up the party, but we had a time limit here. The miniscrambler Jakon had placed and the one she was carrying meant they hadn’t discovered us yet, but J/O had been able to make only two, and they weren’t very powerful. His hacking into the system would likely ring the first alarm, and us rescuing the Walker would trigger the second.
“We
’ve gotta do this at the same time,” I decided. “Jo, can you fit in the shaft with your wings?”
Jo looked at Jakon, who narrowed her eyes thoughtfully, then nodded. “They fold,” Jo said somewhat reluctantly.
“Good. Jo, Jakon, and I will go through the vents to get the Walker. Josef and Jai will guard J/O while he downloads the data. Jai, let’s you and me link.”
Jai nodded, putting one hand out, the other to his ear. I did the same, and we touched palms. An odd metallic “taste” touched my mind. It was kind of like when you go swimming for too long and the chlorine starts to feel like it’s part of you.
Testing, I thought at Jai, who nodded.
Your projected voice is perfectly discernible.
“I wish linking gave me access to even half your vocabulary,” I said out loud. Then I turned to Jakon and Jo. “Ready, girls?” At their nods, I glanced over to Josef. “Can you give us a boost?”
The big man nodded, lifting Jakon with one hand. She scrambled up into the vent shaft, hardly making a sound. I went next, unfortunately with a little more noise—Jakon was lighter than I was and a sight more graceful. I silently resolved to be more careful with my weight distribution; the last thing we needed was to have the vent creak and give us away. Jakon looked smug as I slipped carefully past her to take the lead, testing my weight against the metal sheeting.
Jo came up next, her wings folded around her like a cloak. The shaft was too small for me to turn and look at her, but I got the sense that she was irritated. I remembered how she said she’d just gotten out of the shower, and made sure to keep my mirth to myself. She’d need another one after this. “Jakon, do you have your blaster?”
“Yeah,” she growled, in the universal tone for “duh.”
“Good. Pass it to me. When Jai gives the signal, I’ll activate my shield and go in first. The shield’ll take the first few hits; I should be able to take out some of them in that time. After you hear the first four or five shots, you come down and do your thing. The room we’re headed to has an outside window—it’s on the left. As soon as either of us is able, we break it. Jo, when you hear the glass shatter, you come down and get the Walker. Just fly him out—”
“I can’t fly here,” she said. “I can glide, but—”
“Then do that! Find the nearest portal and get back to Base. Got it?”
Jakon nodded. Jo hesitated for a moment, obviously unsure about the idea of leaving us there, but gave a quiet “okay.”
We continued on through the vents in silence—and then came to something I hadn’t anticipated.
