Stealing Thunder

Season 2: The Power Team learns that Dread is building a new type of aircraft. Knowing the danger it represents to the Resistance, the team infiltrates the enemy facility to steal the fighter, but misleading Intel and dated information puts one of them in danger.

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Disclaimer: The following is a work of fan fiction based on the television series,Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future. It is not intended to infringe on the copyrights of Landmark Entertainment Corporation or anyone else who may have legal rights to the characters and settings. I don't own the characters. However, I am putting them into an adventure since the show was cancelled and the writers/producers/directors/actors can’t put them into any new adventures.

Author’s Notes: I wondered – what kinds of adventures would our team have if there were seven members – the original five (Pilot’s still alive!) plus Christine “Ranger” O’Connor and Chip “TNT” Morrow (aka Andy Jackson from The Intruder)? The more I wondered, the more I pondered. The more I pondered, the more the plot bunnies began to form, and I decided to try my hand at an episode-like tale. This particular story and outline took shape, but it still didn’t quite read right. Then I read LongTimeFan’s story Resurgence (and she graciously gave me permission to use an idea from her story) and watched an episode of Bones, and both of those helped turn this plot bunny into a full-fledged rabbit. It’s set in season two since they’re at the Northstar base, and Christine and Andy are members of the team, but if there’s anything even closely resembling anything else that was supposed to happen in season two by The Powers That Be, that’s purely coincidental.

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STEALING THUNDER

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PROLOGUE

“Did I make a mistake?”

That was a question no commander ever wanted to ask because who would want to know the truth? A mistake in battle or an error in judgment could cost a fighting group dearly. It didn’t matter that no one was infallible. It didn’t matter that a human being could grossly miscalculate facts. The ultimate success or failure – not to mention the credit or the blame -- of any fighting group ultimately lay with the commander.

“Was I wrong?”

Then again, sometimes the harsh truth had to be known for the success of the group. The problem was that the truth could hide in mysterious places. Sometimes, it could be right out in the open, trying to get everyone’s attention. Other times, it was buried deep within the outer layers, hiding for its own unique reasons.

Yet truth had always been a mystifying force. Truth could be relative in some instances, concrete in others, but whatever the ‘truth’ was, it had to be sought. Answers didn’t always appear easily to anyone’s questions. Solutions were sometimes beyond everyone’s grasp. Often enough, events revealed many truths if given the opportunity.

Then there are the questions that that are asked that the truth resolutely defies to give an easy answer.

“Did I make a hasty decision without weighing all the facts?

For a captain of a Resistance team, a hard-to-find ‘truth’ could lead to doubt, concern and anxiety.

Captain Jonathan Power was the type of man who could see the big picture in a mission. He could take smaller details into account almost unconsciously and work them into the attack plan. He could plan a defense tactic and stand by his decision without doubt, certain that the chances of success were in their favor. He knew the strengths and weaknesses of each member of his team and knew how to use them to their advantage and mitigate any dangers.

But that was all before…

“Did I let emotion cloud my judgment?”

The long twisting road of doubt had started more than a year earlier, and it had been a long road of uncertainty for Jonathan Power.

It all began when they lost Jennifer, when they lost the Power Base, when a hidden file in Mentor’s database revealed another base built by Stuart Power – Northstar.

For all intents and purposes, Northstar Base was invisible to the naked eye and hidden from all surveillance equipment. Buried deep inside an icy mountain in the Arctic Circle, the structure was indistinguishable from its surroundings. Only the landing bay doors were discernible if someone knew where to look. It was smaller than the original Power Base – perhaps by necessity, perhaps by natural elements or perhaps because Stuart Power didn’t have the time to build a larger base. It was sparse, bare, spartan but functional, yet its advanced technology made up for the lack of creature comforts. Stuart Power had considered the Arctic base a backup site if the main Power Base was compromised or as a last stand position if Resistance forces failed.

Internally, it was a busy place, a far cry from the way it stood for all those years alone in the Arctic. When the four remaining team members first entered the structure, there was a sterility that permeated the air; a lifeless cold that seeped into them at all hours yet it wasn’t the Arctic winds that caused it. They had lost Jennifer Chase, one of their own, and the cold emptiness of that loss continued to affect them.

That loss had affected Jon in ways he couldn’t have expected. He kept most of his emotions to himself. He turned them inward. He didn’t want to lose any of it… any of her…

Yet they all grieved. They mourned, but then the war ramped up and life had to go on. They set up shop at the new base, downloaded Mentor in the base computer system in double-quick time and learned their way around their new home. They established new jump gates and found various ways of keeping in touch with the Resistance groups. Jonathan Power oversaw the set-up, taking into account the small details while he kept the big picture firmly in mind, all the while keeping his personal thoughts and feelings to himself.

It was business as usual.

Almost.

For years, they had functioned as a five-person team. It had been a comfortable, well-organized balance, only now, they could no longer perform their mission with only four soldiers. Their battle tactics required more soldiers in order to succeed. That meant they needed to find new team members. They had a war to fight, and people were counting on them. They couldn’t let their heartbreak stop them from rebuilding their team.

Christine O’Connor, a former officer in the Special Forces, ex-commando, codenamed “Ranger,” proved her worth when she rescued Captain Power after he had been captured by Lord Dread during a suicide mission. She was a good soldier; there was no doubt about that. She followed orders for the most part and firmly understood the need for the chain of command even if she didn’t always follow each link. Still, her contributions to any team were noteworthy and, more specifically, required. The guys were still adjusting to Jennifer’s death, so it was difficult for them to accept Christine. She had been welcomed, not quite with open arms but with the knowledge that her skills were needed.

Jonathan Power knew that Christine O’Conner could find a niche within the group and work with the team, but she had an independent fighting facet to her personality that had to be taken into consideration whenever he made tactical plans. That particular task was proving to be somewhat tricky.

The next addition didn’t happen quickly, but his consideration for the group started when a single secure communication came over Freedom Two’s frequency. “Black sheep found a lost sheep, looking for the shepherd.” The code was meant for the Power team, but which “lost sheep” was Elzer Pulaski referring to?

Mentor received a coded message less than ten minutes later from Freedom Two.

“Intruder and partner infiltrated Dread lab. Rescued prisoners. Partner killed. Survivors taken to Passages for medical care. Team needed.”

The intruder. Their intruder, Andy Jackson. Certainly, he wasn’t the lost sheep Elzer referred to, was he?

The team left their hidden base and flew to the Passages. Once there, they found a weary, wounded, miserable Andy Jackson being treated by one of the doctors.

“Captain,” he greeted them, his face set in a frown.

"Jackson. You okay?”

"Will be. This morning, me and Jim sneaked into an underground lab we found. Turns out Blastarr’s digitizer was there. Dreadheads been bringing some of the digitizees back for questioning. We couldn’t get all the prisoners out, but we did find out who some of them were and where they were stashed. Jim was killed just after we found out that one of them’s your pilot.”

Jennifer was alive?

“Give the doc a couple of minutes to finish sewing up this gash so I don’t bleed all over the floor and I’ll take you back to that lab before the Dreadies get there.”

Jackson led them back into the well-defended lab, destroying any biomech that moved, getting revenge for the loss of his partner, and helping to secure the facility so Power’s team wouldn’t lose any more personnel.

Amidst the hundreds of prisoners they rescued, they found Jennifer -- badly hurt, unconscious, but alive.

Afterwards, back at the Passages, the conversation with Jackson had been somewhat tired, strained and clumsy, yet the gratitude from the team was unmistakable. He’d risked his life to save Jennifer’s, and they owed him. In a spontaneous moment of truthfulness – and after a cup or two of celebratory homemade moonshine -- Jackson told the team that his real name was Chip Morrow, a former marine demolitions expert with Earthforce, but please, call him Andy. Dread had placed prices on the heads of the Earthforce survivors, so he had used the name Andy Jackson to throw off any of Dread’s bounty hunters. He didn’t ask to join the team, but he did say that if they ever needed help on a particular mission, he’d be happy to toss his hat into the mix. He still owed the Dreadheads for what they did to his partner, and the Power Team seemed to be at the business end of all the action against Dread and his clickers.

He wanted revenge. That was something Jon understood all too well.

Somewhat reluctantly, Jon reconsidered Jackson for the team. It wasn’t the same war anymore. Dread becoming a full biodread had altered the course of the fighting. The enemy had changed, that meant their tactics had to change. Andy was an unpredictable resource, and that unpredictability could be an asset against machines who think logically. He had the experience and an impressive résumé, that was certain, but it was more than that. Jon was grateful to him for helping rescue Jennifer, but gratitude alone could not be the sole deciding factor in allowing him to join. Then there was his personality to contend with – the man had little to no concept of verbal restraint, cracked bad jokes like his life depended on it and seemed to have a boundless supply of energy. Could they work with that? It wasn’t a quick decision. They had a team to rebuild – Christine was still a relatively new member and was learning how they worked together. Jennifer had just been returned to them and needed time to recover. They couldn’t take the chance of adding the wrong person to the mix, but was Jackson a team player? Could he become one?

Could the seven of them work together well?

There was time to discuss the matter. There were other opportunities to work with Jackson, and after a few months of debate, it was decided. The next time they worked with Jackson, Jon would officially invite him to join.

“Did I just make the biggest mistake of my career?”

No matter how many doubts, no matter how many questions, one thing was certain – life would not be boring.

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49-3 Mark 12

Captain Power reporting. For the last month, rumors have circulated about a new type of aircraft Dread has designed to help wipe out the Resistance. Its location has been a closely guarded secret, but an undercover operative from another Resistance group found the information we’ve been looking for. Scout and Jackson met with them and have brought back Intel we need to plan an attack.

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Control Room

“And this, ladies and gentlemen, is the latest addition to be found in the Dread winter catalog,” Andy Jackson pointed toward the recording playing on the monitor of a new type of fighter made specifically for biomech pilots. “As you can see, it comes fully equipped with power windows, power seats, power steering and a turbo thruster system that is second to none. The only things this beauty doesn’t have are air conditioning, all steel radial tires and power brakes, but then again, clickers don’t seem to need them.”

Sitting around Mentor’s console, the rest of the team studied the recording. The fighter had no aesthetic beauty, that was for certain, but it was aerodynamically impressive. The fighter could probably obtain speeds at least three times faster than the fastest ship the Resistance had.

“However,” Andy continued, “as we are all well aware, the Dreadheads are severely lacking in imagination when it comes to naming such new inventions, so calling it just a fighter jet is a bit of an insult to our Resistance pilots who prefer to give rather innovative names to such gadgets. That’s why it took our buddy Jensen a while to find the plans for this little darlin’ when he hacked into Dread’s computers since he didn’t know what Dread was calling it.”

“But just a fighter jet?” Jennifer asked. “Dread would have filed it under some kind of designation.”

“And almost right you are, little lady,” Andy fast-forwarded the recording and zoomed in on the computer screen on the console in the hangar. “Dread might not have named her, but she is tagged into this particular little endeavor Dread is currently interested in.” The words Project Zeus were blurry but legible. “Zeus. King of the gods, ruler of Mount Olympus, god of thunder and the precocious praiser and pursuer of pretty women – looks like Dread Incorporated still likes using all those mythical Greek references.”

Jon hid a smile. Meetings had not been the same since Andy joined the team. Jon could appreciate the sometimes crass humor; he could appreciate the irreverence. Sometimes, he could understand the lack of seriousness that the professional soldier hid behind, but then there were moments when his wit precariously approached a line he shouldn’t go near. Little lady and precocious praiser and pursuer of pretty women – Jon looked over at Jennifer and saw that she was getting slightly annoyed at the various almost-chauvinistic phrases Jackson was using. Truth be told, Jon didn’t like it when Jackson spoke that way around Jennifer. It wasn’t that she couldn’t banter with him with the best of them – she could and did on a regular basis -- but it was the fact she would occasionally reach the limits of her patience, give Jon a very serious look which meant he needed to have another talk with the man.

So far, Jennifer hadn’t given Jon ‘that’ look yet, but he could tell she was thinking about it.

Time and events had proven that Andy Jackson was a package deal – professional soldier, class clown and irreverent jackass. Although he had come through for them in every mission, had risked his life time and again for them, there was still something un-team-y about Jackson. He was still something of a lone wolf who was trying very hard to be part of a pack again. Jon couldn’t find fault with his results, but there were moments when he wondered if Andy really would ever become a true team player.

Maybe part of the reason behind Jackson’s continued solitary fighting predilection was because Jon hadn’t assigned him a rank yet to place him in the hierarchy? He hadn’t done that for Ranger either, but the lack of a rank didn’t seem to matter to her. She had basically swapped one team for another, so she knew how to work as a member of a group. Besides, as long as she could destroy biomechs and chase after Tank, she was happy – even though Tank was a bit uncomfortable with the romantic attention Ranger focused on him. Regardless, he needed to give some thought about where the two new members could serve the team best.

And maybe he needed to get the meeting moving a little faster.

“What else did Jenson’s team find when they hacked the computers?” Jon asked.

Andy shook his head, sat down and waved his hand toward Scout. “Scout will have to tell you that. They explained that to him.”

Scout punched a button on the console and brought up the plans for the fighter. “The lab is disguised as a food processing center but it’s classified top secret in the files. Jensen’s information indicates that there are two overunits, a few youth leaders, a platoon of soldiers and a single squad of biomechs to guard the technicians building the fighter. So far, there’s only the one prototype and all the design plans are at that particular lab in that particular base computer.” Scout brought up a plan of the facility. “Jensen got this older layout of the lab, so he doesn’t know how accurate it is today. There’s only one door leading into the hangar where the fighter’s housed. It’s too small to move the fighter through, so I don’t know how they’re planning on getting it out.”

Hawk studied the layout as well. “Maybe they don’t plan to,” he suggested. “Since it’s only a prototype, then it’s possible that it’s not meant to fly anywhere. They could be establishing measurements, trial results, amount of materials needed to build one – they’d just send that information out to wherever Dread’s planning to churn these out in mass production.”

“Get all the specs, get the pieces cut and have someone else hammer them together,” Andy added. “Good assembly line mentality going on there.”

“Pieces might be the right term,” Scout said as he scanned the files. “Look at this -- There are reports here about disengaging the wings in mid-flight and how easy it is to remove the tail section from inside the cockpit.”

A ship that could be disassembled easily? That was a new technology. Ranger almost laughed. “Makes it easier to transport a lot of them if you can ship them in pieces. You can take it apart and put it back together again somewhere else.”

“So Dread’s getting more inventive,” Andy remarked. “Maybe this bird ain’t ready to fly?”

“It’ll fly,” Scout answered. “Jensen found a report from the facility commander telling Dread that the jet is ready for a test run. There’s something here about double-checking windstorm resistances and maneuverability within other weather anomalies that could occur during flight before a real test flight is performed.”

Ranger shook her head. “He’s worried about storms? Does that sound strange to anyone else?”

Tank answered. “Perhaps the technicians are finding problems now that it’s winter. Maybe the jet’s design has problems operating in cold weather. In any case, Dread wouldn’t have such a small group to guard a project if it was that important.”

Andy shrugged his shoulders. “May not need a lot of soldiers there. Just to let you know, this little group of guards has destroyed every Resistance force that’s tried to go in there. They’ve got all kinds of anti-attack weapons inside and outside the base. No one’s been able to get inside, and the information we’ve got was hacked by Jensen’s group about a week ago through a small time window when the Dreadies were doing a computer upgrade. If they’re getting ready to do some sort of wind test in the lab, time’s getting short before that jet’s ready to fly.”

“Lab test…” Scout punched a few buttons and brought up another file. “Here it is. They’re running atmospheric tests in the lab. The lab is a self-contained, self-generating eco lab. They can produce any kind of weather anomaly in there.”

“Eco lab?” Ranger sat up straight at that word, anticipation suddenly shining from her eyes. “Captain, you have no idea how easy it is to blow up one of those things. Eco labs have enough explosive and flammable materials to blast them into orbit. And they’re easy to target from the outside because the eco lab weather-producing machinery causes all kinds of interference with the surveillance cameras. You can sneak in on who-knows-how-many blind spots. That’s usually why the Dreadies keep them secret from us – they don’t want us to rain on their parade.”

Easy to destroy? That would be a change, Jon thought. “That would explain why they’re disguising it as a food processing plant,” he surmised. “No one would destroy a potential food source.” He turned his attention back to Scout and Andy. “Did Jensen give any reason why this particular fighter is so top secret?”

Both men shook their heads.

Jennifer walked over behind Scout and motioned for Hawk to come closer. “Have we got the technical plans to the fighter?”

“Yeah. Let’s see…” he opened another file. “Looks like some of the usual fighter plans we’ve seen.” He moved over slightly so they could get a better view of the schematics. With a practiced eye, each studied the graphics, the gauges, the circuitry and wiring.

Jon watched as the two of them studied the plans. For a moment, the thought of Jennifer and a prototype jet being like a kid with a new toy child crossed Jon’s mind. She absolutely loved to fly, so test piloting ships would be a natural job for her. His thoughts were interrupted by their conversation -- they were seeing something the others weren’t.

“There,” Hawk pointed out. “See that? From the angle of the jets, that would increase the speed three times normal.”

“And here,” Jennifer indicated another section of the fighter. “The wings and tail section have been modified – no wonder they could come off easily, but the undercarriage…” her voice trailed off.

“What is it, Jennifer?” Jon asked her.

“There’s no landing gear,” she confirmed, “no oxygen like Andy said… and no place for weaponry.”

Maybe it was something in Jennifer’s voice that caught their attention. “A surveillance drone of some sort?” Tank asked.

“No,” Jennifer focused on the controls and the particular design for the console. “Drones don’t need pilots. They can be controlled remotely from a distance. This plan is for a very simple, closed computer system with rudimentary flying controls. There’s no contact with any other computer, so the fighter would need a pilot. And this,” she pointed out small compartments throughout the entire fighter, “there’s no need for these to fly the jet. Something else would go in there…” Something else caught her eye. “This looks like a fuel line, but it’s running from this supporting fuel cell…” her voice trailed off.

“Jennifer?” Jon moved to stand next to her, to see what she was seeing. Whatever it was, he believed it was the answer to why Dread was being so secretive about the fighter.

Jennifer sighed loudly. “The ship is designed to go fast, but there is no place for weapons. There is no landing gear or braking system. That fuel line is running from a secondary fuel cell through the engine to the empty compartments. There’s only one reason to do that – this isn’t a fighter jet.”

Hawk concluded the obvious. “It’s for kamikaze missions.”

Jennifer nodded her head. “Just enough fuel to get them to where they need to go, and the fuel stored in the secondary fuel cell would have traveled through the fuel line and would ignite the explosives placed in the compartments when it crashed. The fuel passing through the engines would put enough force behind it to increase the explosion’s capacity. Since it’s a closed computer system, there’d be no way to hack into it and take over the directional controls to stop it. That also means Dread has a new independent computer technology we need to get our hands on.”

“Wow. You got all that from a picture?” Andy asked. “You’re good,” he praised her.

Ignoring Andy’s poor attempts at flirting with Pilot, Ranger asked, “So I guess that means we won’t be lobbing missiles through the front door and blowing the place up. How do we get in if every other team has been stopped?”

Andy leaned back in his chair. “Don’t know. Jensen said that we’d have an easier time getting in than anyone else. Then he said the captain would know what he meant.”

If looks could kill, Andy would have been dead with the look the captain gave him. “Jensen said that?”

“Jon,” Jennifer placed a hand on his arm, trying to calm him down.

Andy nodded warily. “Uh, yeah. I don’t know what he meant though.”

Jennifer tried again. “Jensen may be right. We’ve got to get the programs and the flight specs from that fighter and that computer. Since the jet itself is a closed system, hacking it won’t be possible. We would have to get inside the cockpit to download the information and that would take longer than we’d have if there are extra guards. They’d be able to get there before we could get out. Dread’s making it look like there aren’t a lot of guards but he has to have more troops hidden there to keep this technology safe.”

“There’s no way we’re doing this,” Jon told her, his voice on edge. “It’s too dangerous.”

“Uh, doing what?” Ranger asked.

Jennifer and Scout said simultaneously, “We’ve got to steal the fighter.”

“Excuse me,” Ranger stood up and, in an uncharacteristically prudent fashion, said, “You guys know I like a good smash-and-grab as much as the next person. Heck, if we could, I’d say flat out steal it and blast the place to pieces, but we don’t know for a fact that the jet can get off the ground. I mean, we’d be better off just blowing the place from the outside.” She pointed toward the schematics of the base. “If that fighter can’t fly, we’d have to blast hole in the wall and secure lines to it so we could tow it out of there with the jump ship while bad guys are swarming all over us at the same time. We don’t have the equipment or the time to rig up anything like that. And if it can fly, how do we steal a fighter from a lab that secure? There are no launch doors. We’re back to blasting a big hole in the wall, running in, getting it and then flying it out while fighting off any soldiers that come running. And let’s face it, taking the thing apart and toting it out of there is not an option with all the guards they’ve got.”

“All that’s true if we make a frontal attack,” Jennifer agreed with her. “In this particular case, that won’t work.”

Ranger thought for a moment. A frontal attack wouldn’t work, so that meant… She grinned. “So we hit them underhanded and sideways,” she concluded. “I like that. Always a fun way to work. So how do we sneak in there and get it out?”

“We don’t,” Jennifer told her. “Going in there is a two person job. If luck’s with us, Scout can get to the computer, and I’ll fly the jet out.”

I’ll fly the jet out.

Perhaps the original members of the team were accustomed to rather suicidal missions explained in such a nonchalant way, but both Ranger and Andy were surprised.

Andy cleared his throat. “You know, I’m all for stealing Dread’s thunder and letting him wear egg on his face, but I did mention that everyone who has tried to get in there has been killed, didn’t I?”

“Jensen was right about us having an easier time of it than the other groups that have tried. Scout and I can get in,” Jennifer explained. “That’s the easy part. Getting to the jet, that could pose a few problems but nothing we can’t handle. It’s landing it that would be the biggest hurdle.”

Ranger and Andy were definitely not accustomed to certain ways the team discussed missions.

“Uh, you think landing it is going to be the biggest problem? You can’t even get in inside the facility,” Andy complained.

Jennifer almost smiled. “I can walk in dressed as a Dread Youth soldier, Scout goes in disguised in a biomech hologram. We can walk past their security. A diversion outside will let Scout get to the computer and allow me to climb in the fighter. You blast a hole in the outer wall; I fly the jet out while Scout downloads anything that’s on the computer. I fly it as far as the fuel allows, get it on the ground, and we can rig tow cables to the jumpship and take it somewhere so we can rip it apart and study it. If there aren’t any problems, the first part could be that easy. It’s landing a jet that doesn’t have landing gear or a braking system that could be difficult.”

Ranger and Andy stared at her, mouths agape, then at each other. “Easy, she says,” Ranger just shook her head in disbelief. Then, to Jon, “Captain, you aren’t seriously thinking of doing this, are you? I mean, we’ve gone on some real hair-raising missions before, but this is walking into a snake pit.”

No one missed the look that Jon and Jennifer shared. All knew what would happen if Dread got a jet like this into production and the Resistance had no defense against it. They couldn’t get inside another way other than to pretend to let Jennifer be a Dread Youth and Scout to be a biomech. There was no time to come up with anything more elaborate. They also knew that if Jennifer was recognized, she’d never get out of there alive. After destroying Blastarr, Jennifer was without a doubt the most well-known person on the planet.

“We’ve got to get that ship,” Jon said in a low voice. Then, a little louder, “Let’s iron out any problems and make it happen.”

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Landing Bay

“I get that we’re still relatively new to this gig,” Andy complained to Ranger as they loaded the refueled sky bikes onto the jumpship, “but do you ever get the feeling that you and I just aren’t in the proverbial loop?”

“More than once,” she answered. She pulled her red hair quickly back into a ponytail. “It was bad enough when I first joined the team, but that was because I had no idea everything these guys had been through. I certainly didn’t know how they worked.”

“What do you mean?”

Ranger sat down on the sky bike and double-checked the fuel readings. “You know I met them not too long after Pilot had blown up the first base and took Blastarr with it?” She saw Andy nod his head. “They thought she’d bought it too. They were grieving. The captain didn’t really want anyone new here, that’s for certain. They didn’t exactly toss out the welcome mat but none of them were acting like that intentionally. They didn’t include me in a lot of their bull sessions. I was only supposed to tag along on the missions and kick some metal butt. They didn’t explain a lot to me either. It was a rough time.”

“That bad, huh?” Andy commented as he finished securing the sky bike. “And this is better?”

Ranger laughed. “Like night and day. Now, you and me are both treated like we’re part of the team even if we are considered more like replacements than actual members.”

“Good way of putting it,” Andy agreed. “You know, my first meeting with them didn’t go quite as smoothly as yours did, I imagine.”

“Hey, pal, you sneaked into the first base. That didn’t make anyone happy from what I hear. Me, I’m inside Volcania, trying to steal some Intel about gun placements and blow up a few computers when I find out Dread has the Captain prisoner and is going to execute him. It turns out that the Captain wanted to assassinate Dread for his part in what happened to Pilot.”

“Wait a minute,” Andy stopped her. “Our captain? Jonathan Power? Captain Power himself? The guy who doesn’t kill, reveres human life, all that? He went in to kill Dread?”

Ranger smiled and nodded. “Yeah. That Power. Same guy. He went a little off script then. None of them talk about it though.”

“Huh,” Andy grunted. “Who’d’ve thunk it?”

“I took a U-turn in my own mission and got him out of there. The rest, as they say, is history, but they weren’t happy about my being around at first. They’d lost one member of the team, they didn’t want to trust or like anybody new. They only let me join up because I was a Special Forces commando and they realized they needed a fifth wheel with my capabilities.”

“Looks like they got a seventh one with me. But they seem fine with us here now. What made them change?” Andy asked.

“They got Pilot back,” Ranger told him. “You told them that she wasn’t dead, that she was being held prisoner and we went after her. And let me tell you, you saw how they worked on that mission. I had never seen that kind of focused fighting from them before. Even the Captain didn’t have a problem keeping up with me when I was shooting the clickers. They were destroying anything with the Dread name attached to it in sight until they found her. When they got her back, their attitudes changed overnight. They started working as a whole different team then. Everything I thought I knew about them flew out the window, and I just started figuring out their own personal operating system of working together when you got asked to join the party.”

Andy leaned against the bulkhead. “You’ve figured out this bunch? Please, enlighten me. I’m still kind of working in the dark here myself.”

Ranger locked down the sky bike and strapped the helmet to the seat. “Okay, long story short, those five are the Power Team. You and me, we’re just with the team, kind of like a relief squad or main backup. It’s a slight difference in perception – if that makes any sense.”

Andy considered that idea. “It makes sense. I guess when the war’s over, neither one of us will have high schools named after us, huh?”

Ranger shook her head. “No, probably not.”

“But we’re still on the team,” Andy complained. “Why keep us out of the loop all of the time?”

“They’re not. It’s that they’ve got this way of communicating so they don’t have to say one single word. They communicate through looks and body language. It used to annoy the hell out of me until I figured out that they don’t know they’re doing it. It’s something they learned over time, we haven’t learned the language yet, and they don’t realize we don’t know it. My guess is that they’d already decided to sneak into that base in disguise before either one of us said a word.”

Andy scoffed as he strapped another helmet to the sky bike. “Didn’t have to say anything, but you pretty much wanted to put the kibosh on the whole infiltrating idea,” Andy pointed out. “’Fess up, sweetheart. You love to crash Dread’s parties whenever you can. Why is this one any different?”

Ranger pointed her thumb toward the general direction of the control room. “Did you notice that look in their eyes when they talked about it? None of them like the idea. You heard the Captain. Sending Pilot in there scares the life out of him, but he’s not going to argue because we need that ship.”

Andy didn’t disagree. “Sure it scares him. They’re a couple; she’s great; I can see why he’d feel that way.”

Ranger gave him a sideways look at the ‘she’s great’ comment. Andy flirted shamelessly with her at times – not that Tank ever took notice of it, but Andy wasn’t too good at hiding whatever torch it was he was carrying for Pilot. He toned down his flirting when it came to her, but didn’t he realize he didn’t have a chance? Not with Power in the picture. Or was he the type who’d chase anything who could wear a skirt? “There’s just something more there that I don’t know about,” Ranger explained. “I don’t know what it is, but whatever it is, there’s another reason the captain doesn’t want Pilot to go inside that lab other than the fact she’s wanted for blowing up Blastarr.”

Andy stopped working, turned and looked at Ranger. “Wait, you don’t know about her?” Andy asked her.

“Know what?” She brushed her hands on her pants to wipe them off.

Andy whistled a low tone. “Jeez, nobody talks about anything around here. Okay, how much do you know about Pilot? Personally, I mean?”

“Not a lot. The guys didn’t talk about her much when she was gone. All I knew then is that she existed and was dead and not to mention her name around the Captain. I know she’s a pilot, no family, been with the team for a few years, doesn’t scare easy. That’s all.”

“So you two still aren’t buddy-buddy enough yet to swap recipes, huh?”

“I don’t think she’s ever had to deal with females as friends before. We’re working on it though.”

“Christine…,” for a moment, Andy became very serious which was a rare occurrence for him. That meant that all kidding was put aside, and everyone should listen. “This is what Jensen meant when he said we’d have an easier time of it – Pilot used to be in the Dread Youth. Former youth leader. She broke through the training and escaped. I don’t know the story behind it. As far as I can guess, the team found her and let her join.” He chuckled. “Jensen meant that she could sneak in because she used to be one of them.”

A former youth leader? That was something new. No one had told her “I didn’t know,” she told him. “But how could a youth leader ever break through the training much less join a Resistance group? Especially this group?”

“No idea, but she did and it works out pretty well,” Andy grinned.

Ranger looked sideways at him, and then asked, “Just out of curiosity, what is this whole flirting thing you’ve got going on with her? You know it ticks off the Captain.”

“I’m not flirting,” he protested.

“Oh, yes, you are. You think no one’s noticed? The smiles, the winks, the innuendos? I mean, you do the same thing around me but no one really notices --”

“You mean Tank doesn’t notice, don’t you? And speaking about the big guy, what about how you’re going after Tank? At least I’m subtle –”

“Subtle?” she asked. “Since when?”

Andy looked around to make sure no one was around to hear. “Yeah. Look, I think Pilot’s great, but she and the Cap are a pair that I’m not trying to come between. I’m just having a little fun.”

“Until the Captain reins you in,” she observed.

“All in fun,” Andy quipped. “You have noticed that the Captain sends you on missions with Tank a lot? You think he’s not having fun doing that? He’s enjoying watching Tank squirm a little. Hawk and Scout are having some fun teasing Tank about it too.”

Ranger thought for a moment. Andy was on to something. “What are you getting at?”

“Easy. Until you and me came along, this bunch didn’t do much more than trade jokes or one-liners. They didn’t have a lot of fun going on. Now, they actually do things that amuse each other – like the Cap sending you on missions with Tank or listening to me say things to Pilot that makes the Cap rein me in. Besides, I don’t think Pilot’s ever been flirted with before I came along. It’s good for the Captain to know that he’s a lucky man, and he shouldn’t take her for granted.”

Granted? “Is there a story behind that?” she asked him.

Andy gave her a big smile. “You should have seen how those two were together before the big Blastarr bake-off.”

“Seems like that was the moment everything changed,” Ranger suggested.

“Seems like. I think the Cap figured some things out then. And it’s like you said, they’re the Power team, and we’re just on the team. Heck, we don’t even have ranks yet,” Andy said as he put up the rest of the equipment. “Those five need each other for this little business to keep going. You or me could get killed, and it wouldn’t make a big difference in the grand scheme of things, but if they lose one of the first five, they’re completely out of kilter. The problem they had was that they lost Pilot and that led to something being really off.”

“The balance,” Ranger nodded her head as they walked out of the jump ship. She slapped her head in frustration. “That’s what Mentor meant.”

“The balance?” Andy asked.

“Yeah. It was something Mentor said to me one time when I was on night duty. I didn’t understand it until she was back here. He said Pilot wasn’t an ordinary resistance fighter. She’s the one person who held this team together. Look, the captain loves her, Hawk thinks of her like a daughter, now I know she and Tank have similar backgrounds, well, similar enough to be the result of something Dreadish, and you see how she and Scout work together. They’re like two sides of the same coin. When she was gone, they lost their balance. They’ve got it back, so things went back to normal.”

Andy considered that comment for a second. Then, “That’s what Mentor said, huh?”

“Practically word for word,” she said. “You think I could come up with something as sappy and sentimental as that?” She gave him a playful punch in the arm. “Give me a break.”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Jennifer’s Quarters

“Overunit, youth leader or cadet?” Jon sat down in the chair as Jennifer looked at the stolen Dread Youth uniforms, considering which rank would be the best to impersonate.

“Youth leader, I think. An overunit would think it was beneath them to cater to technicians and engineers, and a cadet may not be allowed in. A youth leader is probably the lowest rank with access to the lab. Too bad I don’t have a lab tech’s uniform. That would probably work better.”

It made sense. The plan was simple, but Jon’s gut was twisting. “I hate the idea of you going in there,” he told her. “If you’re recognized –”

“If I’m recognized, things could get very bad, very quickly.” She looked back at him and smiled.

“Wear your power suit just in case?” he asked, already knowing the answer.

“I can’t. The sensors in the lab would register the power spike if I had to activate it, and I don’t want to run the risk of Dread’s technicians getting the suit if I get caught. Scout will have his suit activated when we go in, so it shouldn’t set off any sensors.”

More and more, Jon kept trying to think of ways to avoid the mission or lessen the dangers Jennifer was going to be in, but the choices were limited. “I wish there were another way,” he told her.

She unfolded the youth leader uniform, a frown on her face. She hated the uniforms. “It’s not something I want to do, but we need that ship and the programs that run it. We sneak in, download what we can, destroy what we can’t, steal the jet and we’ve got an advantage.”

She’s rationalizing the danger, Jon thought to himself. She had to, so did he. They couldn’t not fight Dread just because of the added danger. They were soldiers, and facing trouble is what they did. “Have you given any thought about how you can land the jet?”

She took a deep breath, turned around so she was facing him. “I’m going to head out to the Flats. They’re getting ready to do those tests, so my guess is that it will have a full tank of fuel to gauge wind resistance and turbulence on a heavier ship. If it does, given the typical rate of usage and what the specifications lead me to believe is the consumption rate, the Flats should be about as far as it will fly before the fuel cell runs dry. The ground is sandy there. If it doesn’t have a full tank, I’ll try to reach one of our emergency landing sites. I’ll dump any fuel that’s left and eject. If I can’t, I’ll take it down in a controlled crash.”

Controlled crash? Jon knew she wasn’t just rationalizing danger. She was plotting out contingencies. And she wouldn’t be wearing her suit… “You’ll have to take a parachute and an oxygen tank with you,” he needlessly reminded her. “It’ll take up a lot of room, and the cockpit’s small.”

“That’s another reason why I have to do this. I’m the smallest one of the group. Even Ranger is almost six feet tall. She towers over me by six inches. It’ll be cramped but doable. Besides, who here can out-fly me?” She tried to make him smile, but it didn’t work. She walked over to him, placed her arms around his neck and said, “I know the risks. It’s dangerous, and I know it’ll be worse for everyone if we don’t do this. The UTO is short of experienced pilots right now and can’t get more recruits quickly enough. The Resistance groups are at an all time low when it comes to personnel numbers. If Dread gets jets like this into the air with our forces the way they are now, a lot of innocent civilians are going to get killed in kamikaze attacks, and he could wipe out the Resistance a lot easier than before. We get that jet, decode the program, learn about this new technology, and we might be able to build jets that can fight the technology itself.”

Jon couldn’t argue the logic. He could only hate the fact that this mission scared him. “I don’t want you to get killed. I’ve been down that road, and I don’t want to go there again,” he told her as he hugged her to him and pulled her onto his lap. “You’ll be alone in that jet until you can get it to ground. Once you’ve got it down… if you run into any trouble before we can get there –”

“I’ll handle it,” she told him. “And if I can’t… Jon, I know I’m an added risk on any mission right now since Dread put a higher price on my head, but we’re both soldiers. We know there could be another mission where one of us won’t come back for whatever reason. We accepted that a long time ago. All we can do is our best, right?”

Those were his words. He’d said them before many times, but it didn’t matter. He was terrified of losing her again. It took all his willpower to not tell her to stay, to refuse to go after the jet, but the war came first. Even for them

“Take a tracker with you?”

“Absolutely. I definitely want you to find me if I have to ditch the jet. That would be a long walk back otherwise.”

He brushed a strand of hair away from her face. Her eyes showed that she was worried but determined. She was doing the one thing that pilots didn’t do – she was orchestrating a forced landing, maybe even a crash landing. Perhaps it was superstition -- more likely, it was common sense – but it was tempting Fate, and Fate had a tendency to get even.

And she wouldn’t have her suit…

“I’d feel better if Hawk, Tank or I were there with you,” he muttered. However, his omission of the other two members of the team didn’t go unnoticed.

“You’re still wondering if having Ranger and Andy on the team is a good idea,” she concluded.

Jon shook his head. “I don’t really have any serious doubts about Ranger. She’s occasionally gone off on her own against orders and blown something up, but she proved she was a team player when I met her.”

“Which I’m very grateful for,” Jennifer added.

Jon smiled. If it hadn’t been for Ranger being in Volcania that day, he wouldn’t be sitting there with Jennifer. Of course, if it hadn’t been for Andy, then Jennifer wouldn’t be there. “Andy, however…”

“It was just him and his partner all those years and he had to make his own decisions. Working for someone else isn’t easy for him,” she explained. “Look at me. I was a youth leader, in a position to give orders to biomechs and any non-military personnel and have them obeyed without question. I only took orders from overunits and Dread himself. Learning to take orders from a non-Dread Youth human wasn’t something that came naturally or that I was trained to do.”

Jon hadn’t considered that similarity, but maybe he should have. Jennifer hadn’t been trained to take orders from someone like him. It had to be a self-taught response. Maybe Andy just needed a little more time. “So is that why you tolerate his remarks so well?”

Jennifer laughed. “No. I don’t tolerate them at all. I just recognize the attitude. Making bad jokes was one of the first things I had to learn about when I escaped the Dread Youth. Remember all the ones that Hawk and Scout used to tell, and I had no clue what they were talking about? Andy’s doing that. Besides, it seems to entertain everyone until he goes too far.”

Entertainment? Was she kidding? “You think he’s funny?” he smirked.

“No, not really, but watching you when he says those things is funny,” she told him with a slight giggle. “Sometimes, you have this little vein that sticks out on your forehead,” she pointed to a place just below his hairline and followed it down to his temple, “just as you’re starting to get angry at him…”

“Oh, so I amuse you, huh?” Jon mused as he took hold of her hand. “Well, then, you know, I could have Andy waiting out at the Flats on a sky bike to keep you company until we get there. He still has that crush on you and since he’d keep you entertained –” he stopped talking when Jennifer placed a finger over his lips.

In a very low voice and with an amused glint in her eye, she said, “As amusing and annoying as Andy can be sometimes, I will get even with you if you even think of doing that.”

It was the glint that hinted at interesting methods of revenge. “Really? I guess I wouldn’t like the results?” he joked.

“No,” she laughed as she gave him a quick kiss. “I’ll change the combination to the lock on my quarters, and you won’t be able to override it and come in.”

Considering that outcome, Jon chuckled, returned her kiss and quickly said, “That would be cruel and unusual punishment. I’ll keep Andy away from the Flats. Definitely.” Then, in a roundabout way, he brought up a conversation they’d started a few days earlier but hadn’t finished. “I was thinking, if we were assigned the same quarters, you couldn’t change the lock combination without accessing both our key codes.”

“Think so?” she grinned. “You don’t think I could override Mentor’s security protocols? I wrote some of them.”

“True.” Joking aside, Jon wanted to settle a discussion before the mission started. “So how about finishing that conversation we started the other night. Move into the same quarters with me? Everyone knows we’re together.”

Jennifer leaned her head on his shoulder. “It doesn’t have to do with what everyone knows,” she told him. “How about if we finish that conversation sometime in the future? It’s not that I don’t want to; it’s that I need my own space right now. I can’t explain why, I just know it’s what I need.”

Jon nodded his head. “Good enough reason,” he murmured as he hugged her to him.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Jump Ship

“Everyone clear on the plan?” Jon asked as Jennifer landed the jumpship just outside of sensor range of the facility.

“Piece of cake,” Andy said. “Although…” he adjusted his biomech armor to sit more comfortably on his body, “I think we need to talk about all of us getting those hologram generators like Scout has for our suits. Whoever designed this thing didn’t make enough room in the seat.”

Hawk glanced back at the fidgeting man and grinned at the sight. “That’s because there’s usually no one in the armor. It’s only the outer layer that’s had the robot hulled out of it.”

“Still a bit uncomfortable,” Andy noted. “You can’t see out of those helmets either.”

“Quick recap,” Jon interrupted quickly. “Andy gets into position outside the structure. Pilot and Scout walk in to the facility. Hawk, Tank, Ranger and I will start diversions on the perimeter after everyone is in place and Pilot tells us they’ve reached the lab. Pilot gets the jet, signals Andy to blast the wall out, she flies the ship out while Scout downloads all the information on the computer. Scout will set off charges to disrupt communications inside, we regroup here at the jumpship and then go pick up the fighter.”

Ranger looked back at Jennifer, looking slightly uncomfortable at the sight of a youth leader in the ship with them. What was worse, even though Jennifer seemed uncomfortable in the uniform, she also acted like it was a ‘natural’ thing to wear. Her entire posture and attitude seemed to change when she put on the uniform, and that was a bit unnerving. There, in their midst, was a former Dread Youth youth leader, presumably the only one who had ever escaped the Dread Youth. That was going to take a little getting used to. “Where do you think you can land the jet?” she asked.

“The Flats,” Jennifer answered. “That would be the farthest distance out the jet could fly on a full tank. If I have to ditch before that, I’ll try to reach one of the primary landing sites between here and there.”

“The Flats are a good choice,” Andy said as he kept trying to adjust his armor. “That’s man-made sand out there, you know.”

Six heads turned in his direction.

“You didn’t know?” he asked.

“Man-made sand?” Jennifer asked.

“Yeah. In the late 21st century, some scientist developed a chemical process that literally grew sand. The construction engineers liked using it for structures because of the lower cost of mass production. I don’t remember exactly how it works, but it had to do with putting the raw sand through some kind of pre-treating process to make it un-raw. Then you put it in the mold of whatever it is you want to make, you freeze it with a chemical compound that slices and splices the molecular bonds together, then it takes on that shape and becomes rock solid hard. The only way to loosen it up is to blast it in a furnace and melt the bonds. The Flats used to be a huge complex of sand farms. Once the wars started, the factories got shut down but the sand kept growing.”

Everyone continued to look at him. “My dad was a building engineer. He liked using the man-made sand to design houses.”

“Man-made sand?” Jennifer asked. “Interesting. Is it any different than naturally formed sand as a landing strip?”

“No idea. Guess you’ll find out if you’ve got enough fuel to get you there, but since it’s cold, the sand shouldn’t be too loose. It might be a semi-solid substance or kind of chunky. Basically, don’t land that jet nose first or you’re gonna have one heck of a headache in the morning.”

“Right,” Jennifer agreed. “Go for the belly landing.”

“Anything else?” Jon asked. No one said anything. “Okay, let’s move.”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

West Of The Lab

Ranger and Tank took position on the west side of the lab, hiding behind boulders on high ground. Ranger looked at her watch… a few more minutes left before the fireworks were to start if everyone was still on schedule.

She looked over at Tank who was keeping a keen eye on their surroundings. He kept glancing at his watch as well, looking out at the facility, anywhere but her. She knew that at times, she made him uncomfortable -- Andy hadn’t been wrong about the shameless way she flirted with Tank, and perhaps he was right about the Captain sending her on missions with Tank for his own amusement, but at that moment, flirting was the furthest thing from her mind. She needed answers. “Tank, can I ask you a question that might not be any of my business? Just tell me if it’s something I should keep my nose out of.”

“Of course,” Tank answered.

Well, he was direct, that was certain. “Pilot was in the Dread Youth?”

Tank seemed surprised by the question. “You didn’t know?”

Ranger shook her head. “You guys never talked about her much when she was gone because you didn’t want to upset the Captain, and it’s not like it was ever a topic of conversation.”

Tank glanced at his watch again. “She was a youth leader. She escaped after the Sand Town cleansing.”

Sand Town. Ranger vaguely remembered hearing about that. That happened years earlier. But a youth leader? From the enemy army? And a resistance captain was in love with her? That was something right out of the storybooks.

“So… is it a secret?”

Tank shook his head. “No, it’s no secret. It’s not something she talks about often anymore, and we don’t find a need to mention it.”

The others were respecting her silence. Ranger could appreciate that. From what she could gather, there were a lot of things that the original five didn’t talk about anymore. The most obvious topic was what happened on the day Pilot blew up the first base. No one mentioned it, no one discussed it. She and Andy had to find out the details by asking Mentor, and that discussion had been nothing more than bare facts. There seemed to be a lot of respected silence around that time. “So her sneaking in to a Dread facility dressed as a Dread Youth, that’s not something new either, right?”

Again Tank shook his head. “No, she’s had to do that on several occasions. Before, no one would have given her a second look. Now, every Dread soldier knows who she is and what she looks like and is ordered to be on the lookout for her. A diversion should keep their attention on other things.”

Ranger was amazed. She knew Pilot didn’t scare easy, but walking into a snake pit when all the snakes were looking for you would make the bravest soldiers shake in their boots. “Wouldn’t it have worked better if she was wearing biomech armor when she sneaked in? No one would see her face.”

“Better for her, maybe,” Tank agreed, “but her suit isn’t equipped with holographic capabilities, and it would be difficult for her to fly that jet if she was wearing real armor. Besides, the armor doesn’t fit her.”

Doesn’t fit? Ranger had the sneaking suspicion that there was a story behind that as well, but they didn’t have time for more stories.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Front Of The Lab

Andy walked in step with the biomechs as they marched in front of the building. As they turned the corner, Andy ducked back and waited until he couldn’t hear mechanized boots crunching on dirt anymore.

“Some gig, Jackson,” he whispered to himself. He took out his gun and opened the hilt. His specially modified biomech weapon doubled as a storage case. He pulled out a folded up net made of primer cord and loaded the mass into a makeshift gun. When it fired, the net would cover the side of the building. Then all he’d have to do is explode it. It’d leave a hole big enough… well, big enough to fly a fighter jet through. He checked his watch. It wasn’t show time yet.

He heard a small click on his earpiece. He reached up and pressed the button. “Jackson.”

“Everything ready?” the Captain asked.

“No need to worry. Just waiting for the starter’s pistol to go off, Cap.”

“All right. Stand by.”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

East Of The Lab

On the east side of the lab, Jon and Hawk waited.

“Jackson’s in position,” Jon said. “Tank and Ranger are waiting for the signal. Have you spotted Jennifer or Scout yet?”

Hawk watched the front of the building through binoculars. So far, everything had gone smoothly and according to plan. Nothing for them ever went that smoothly or that according to plan. Was there reason to worry? Then, he saw what he was looking for. “They’re coming around the side of the building now with a group of clickers. You know, our girl’s pretty good at thinking on her feet.”

Jon looked through his binoculars toward the facility. Five clickers marched toward the entrance. Scout’s biomech hologram was holding steady as he took position at the rear of the column. Jennifer was walking to the left and a pace behind. She was wearing the regulation winter coat – that meant no one could see her youth leader uniform. She could pass for any rank depending on the situation, walk right past the guards and then get rid of the jacket just before she walked into the lab as a youth leader.

“I don’t think I want to know where she got the coat from,” Hawk chuckled. “She knows how the Dread Youth think and work. She must have thought about how to sneak in the front door as much as she did sneaking into that lab. She knows what she’s doing,” he said.

“I know.”

“She knows how dangerous it is,” Hawk pointed out.

“She does,” Jon agreed.

“She can fly anything with wings on it,” Hawk reminded him.

“No argument there.”

Hawk waited a second, then asked, “I’m not helping any, am I?”

“No, not much,” Jon told him. “Her flying that jet out of there is dangerous enough, but for her to walk into a facility that is crawling with soldiers and biomechs who have been ordered to find her is even worse. If just one of them recognizes her –”

“Then we keep them so busy that nobody will,” Hawk assured him. “Something else is worrying you, isn’t it?”

Jon sighed. “I’m just wondering -- Jenson’s team gets this information during a small time window that no one else discovered. Every attempt the Resistance has made to get into this lab has failed, but we’re the only ones who can get in there. Does it all seem a little coincidental to you?”

“You think it’s a trap for us?”

“Dread’s getting sneakier since he became a full biodread. I wouldn’t put it past him to do something this elaborate.”

“Just to catch us? That’d be going overboard, even for him,” Hawk surmised.

Jon almost laughed. “Not anymore. He knows Jennifer destroyed Blastarr and that she’s alive and back with the team. Like Ranger said, we’ve gone on some suicidal missions over the last year, and we’ve destroyed a lot of his facilities. We keep fighting him every chance we get. Right now, I’d say we’re the biggest thorn in his side. He needs to get rid of us. He may have a professional grudge against me but he’s got a personal one against Jennifer. He wants revenge for what she did to Blastarr.”

Hawk had considered that. He had no doubt that Jennifer had as well and volunteered to go in there regardless. “Then again, this whole thing could be about a new kamikaze fighter that Dread’s building,” Hawk suggested. His comment didn’t elicit a response from his friend. “I know you want to protect her, Jon, but –”

“It’s a war,” Jon finished for him. “I know. We’ve already discussed that, but it doesn’t make it any easier.”

There was a click on his communicator. “Power.”

“Approaching lab,” was Jennifer’s whispered response.

Jon glanced at his watch. Maybe this infiltration had set a team record? “How long?”

There was a pause. “Give us thirty seconds then move.”

He touched his communicator. “Okay, everybody, thirty seconds then attack,” Jon said as he readied his first volley of grenades to throw toward the lab.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Inside The Facility

Jennifer marched behind Scout as they walked toward the lab, eyes not darting back and forth, posture straight, coat now removed to show the rank insignia on her shirt, acting as if she had been assigned there for weeks. No one paid her any attention. No one asked her where she was going or why she was there. Everything she did, every move she made was typical of a youth leader which meant she was seen but invisible. Nothing stood out about her to give anyone a reason to notice her.

Scout’s head turned slightly, and he forced his hand to not touch his communicator. He glanced back as casually as a ‘biomech’ could and said, “Thirty seconds. Time’s up.”

Explosions sounded outside. Alarms sounded inside, and the cadets ran toward the facility entrance to repel the attack. The youth leaders hurried to their assigned positions to protect the lab. The overunits stood at strategic locations to direct the defense.

There were many more soldiers than the pitiful few Jenson’s reports stated. Many more.

“This may be tougher than we thought,” Scout whispered. “Any suggestions?”

“Just keep our heads down and don’t make eye contact,” Jennifer advised him.

Scout quietly counted the troops as they ran by him. “How many?”

They reached the lab door, and as Jennifer accessed the opening panel, she whispered, “At least five platoons.”

“At least,” Scout agreed. “Can you get in?”

Jennifer pressed certain buttons on the panel and the doors opened. “Think so,” she said with a slight grin. “No one ever changes these entry codes,” she whispered.

When they entered, Jennifer glanced at the fighter. Oh, she looked like a runner. Jennifer had no doubt she could get some true speed out of that one. She heard the door slide shut and lock behind them.

One of the technicians approached her. “Youth Leader? We’re under attack?”

In the most unemotional voice she could muster, Jennifer said, “Our forces are engaging the Resistance soldiers at the moment; however I have been alerted that some soldiers have entered this facility. All of you must retreat to the Safe Room immediately.”

The Safe Room? Scout didn’t know what she meant, but the technicians did. Without another word, they picked up their tools and gear and hurried out of the lab, the biomechs guarding them following.

“What just happened?” Scout asked.

“There’s always a location at every research facility where the scientists can go. Dread thought that if the techs believed there was a bunker they could hide in since they weren’t soldiers, they’d feel safer and work better.”

That made sense in an odd, Dreadish sort of way.

Scout shut down the hologram, handed Jennifer the parachute and the oxygen tank he was hiding in his disguise and then rushed over to the computer. “Simple, as usual,” he almost complained. “Just once, I’d love to see a Dread computer that gave me a challenge.”

Jennifer hurried over to the jet and climbed into the cockpit. She did a quick systems check, but… “I think Jenson’s plans were incorrect. Some of the gauges aren’t the same.”

“The plans he had of the base were older ones. Maybe the jet designs were too?” Scout suggested.

“Maybe. This could change things. How are you doing?” She asked.

“I’m in. Downloading now… you’re good to go.”

Jennifer spoke into her communicator. “Andy, now.”

“Gotcha!” Andy’s cocky voice answered back. “And a-one and a-two –”

The explosion didn’t just blast a hole in the wall – it blasted the wall out! Jennifer closed the canopy, looked back at Scout and gave him the ‘all clear’ sign and ignited the engines. She eased the throttle forward and pushed the joy stick slightly –

The jet screamed out of the lab, through the blasted out hole in the wall and off into the sky.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Outside The Lab

Jon watched the jet shoot out of the building as they kept up the attack. He spoke into the radio, “Pilot’s clear! Scout?”

He needn’t have worried. Scout came running out of the lab, shooting behind him as he escaped the soldiers and biomechs inside. “Woo hoo!” Scout yelled when he dove behind a boulder as Tank shot out more biomechs.

“Got it!” Scout yelled. “I put a couple of explosives on the spare fuel tanks I found in the lab. It’s gonna blow in seconds!”

Good. So far, so good, Jon thought. He yelled into the communicator, “Let’s finish this. Meet back at the jumpship!”

A rolling thunder of explosions screamed from the building and then exploded the facility from within. That was another Dread facility that was history.

Jon could hear Ranger’s cheer. “Told you these eco labs blow up easy!”

Jon glanced back up. The jet was a small speck in the sky. They had to get to the Flats fast.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Jet Cockpit

The jet’s speed was exhilarating! Since there were no braking thrusters, the ship only had two speeds: all-stop and full-speed. There was no in-between. The jet was faster than the jump ship’s XT. If they could figure out more of the ship’s specs, maybe she could alter the XT’s design to make it go faster.

She handled so easily! The simple instrumentation design gave the jet a bit of an un-technological nuance, one in which the pilot and ship existed together without all the ‘assistance’ of too many modern instruments. Jennifer felt more in control, not like she was depending on a computer with an advanced piloting program to help -- although there would have been an advanced navigation system running in the background if she hadn’t disabled it. Oh, there was nothing like flying to help clear away the cobwebs in one’s mind and let someone have a few moments of fun. It was a type of freedom non-pilots rarely experienced. Up in the air, looking down on the earth below, there was a disconnect from everything. It was just pilot, the plane and the wide open sky.

Jennifer watched the landscape speed by in a blur. Plains, mountain ranges – all sped beneath her so fast. Yet it was what she knew was above her that tickled her imagination. Looking up at the polluted brown clouds, she imagined them gone and blue sky and bright sunlight shining down. She remembered the first time she ever saw the real sky. She’d been with the team for a month when she accompanied them on a mission to attack a base she had been assigned to in the past. After escaping from Soaron, Hawk flew the jump ship high above the brown clouds and Jennifer could only stare at the sight through the viewport. Blue sky, bright sunlight – all for her to view for the first time.

Tank saw her staring and glanced out the port himself. He saw nothing strange.

“What is it?” he asked her.

She pointed to the view. “It’s blue,” she answered as if she had made the most amazing discovery.

Hawk motioned her forward to the co-pilot’s seat. “You’ve never seen the real sky before, have you?”

Jennifer sat down and just stared. She shook her head. “No. I’ve read about it, seen pictures, but it’s more… vibrant than I ever imagined.”

“That it is,” Hawk told her. Then he looked at her, watched her stare out the window, and then asked, “I’ll bet you’ve never seen stars before either, have you?”

Jennifer could only shake her head again. “Just in a picture.”

Hawk looked back at Jon who couldn’t believe what he was hearing either. Dread had deprived the Dread Youth of so much. “Tell you what,” Hawk suggested as he turned the jump ship toward the base, “we’ll go flying tonight and we’ll show you what stars and a night sky really look like. How about that?”

“Won’t that be an unnecessary flight and a waste of fuel?” she asked, knowing how difficult it could be for the Resistance forces to keep enough fuel for their ships.

“It won’t be a waste,” Jon interrupted as he walked up behind her. “It will definitely be worth it.”

When she flew a troop transport for the Dread Youth as a cadet, she was ‘restricted’ to certain air space and flight levels. When she volunteered to help the UTO, she had to stay within set flight plans that were safer from Dread’s patrols. As the pilot on the Power Team with a jump ship she helped modify, she could go just about anywhere she needed to in order to do the job. She could get her jump ship to go almost anywhere at a speed many didn’t think a jump ship could attain. The sky was her playground, and she reveled in it during those few chances when she could fly for the sheer enjoyment of it, not escaping from flying biodreads.

Although she knew that she was on a mission, she couldn’t resist putting the jet through a few paces. She maneuvered left, maneuvered right, climbed a little, returned to her original flight level… oh, the jet was like a new toy just taken out of the box and she was the first one to play with it. The jet handled so smoothly that just the merest touch on the joystick moved it. A biomech would undoubtedly be jacked into the ship’s computer system on some level, possibly allowing the computers of both machines to work together to fly the jet, but at that moment, it was just her flying by her own instincts.

She flew through rock formations, angling the jet on a steep turn, banking left, banking right… “Okay, Jennifer, enough playing. You need to concentrate on reaching the Flats,” she whispered to herself.

But she was test-flying a prototype jet, and an opportunity like that didn’t come along every day.

As she concentrated on flying the ship, a few stray thoughts crossed her mind. She’d never been one to deny herself an opportunity when it presented itself since she left the Dread Youth. She always felt that she was trying to catch up with everyone else. Once, life experiences other people never thought twice about were foreign ideas to her. She’d come a long way since that day she first crossed paths with the team, and look where she was now. Then the stray thought of ‘where do I want to go’ crossed her mind.

Although she didn’t let opportunities pass her by, she didn’t rush headlong into them either. Sometimes, she had to think them through and consider the outcome or the ramifications. That was the real reason she put off answering Jon’s question about sharing quarters. Things were very different after she was rescued. Ranger had joined the group, Jon was considering asking Andy to join, they had a new base, Dread had become a full biodread – there had been a lot of changes, and the slightest change had an effect on the balance of the team – if they could be called a team, that is. Jon still had some misgivings about Andy but fewer about Ranger, and Jennifer couldn’t blame him. It was an odd assortment of people that made up the Power Team, and there had only been the five of them for so long, the addition of two more ‘could have upset the apple cart,’ as Hawk liked to say. Jennifer didn’t want to upset anymore apple carts, so thinking through what a closer-quartered relationship between her and Jon could do to the team balance was a necessary step.

However, she mused, the one thought that did cross her mind is that maybe she should have that conversation with Jon sooner rather than later.

Much to her dismay, she found she was reaching her destination far sooner than she thought possible.

She glanced at the fuel gauges. The primary fuel cell was nearing one-tenth, the secondary was stable at one-quarter. That was enough to get her to the Flats. Good thing, too. So far, she hadn’t had to use the oxygen, but it was becoming warm and close in the cockpit. If she was lucky, she’d either have the jet on the ground or have ejected from the cockpit before the air was out completely. The one thing she didn’t want to do is overshoot the Flats because of too much speed and too much fuel. There was nothing beyond the Flats but hard, rocky ground.

“Pilot, location?” she heard Jon’s voice over the radio.

The Flats were just on the horizon. “I can see the Flats,” she answered. She could also see a wall of sand heading her way. A sandstorm? That’s all she needed. It stretched from horizon to horizon. There would be no going around it.

“I’ve got a sandstorm in my path,” she said into the radio. “This won’t be a fun landing. I’m going to dump the extra fuel and get her on the ground before it hits.”

Jennifer pressed the button to dump the fuel –

Nothing happened.

She tried again.

Nothing happened.

Was it too much to ask for a kamikaze jet to be able to dump fuel? Of course, it was.

“Pilot?”

“I can’t dump the fuel,” she said into her radio. “It must be a failsafe so the explosives have enough accelerant to burn from if the fuel line broke.”

There was some static, then, “Eject and let the jet crash,” Jon’s voice sounded worried.

“That’s the plan.” Jennifer pressed the eject button –

Nothing happened.

“Dammit.”

“Jennifer?”

“Jon, I can’t eject. I’m going to have to force a landing at the Flats. Zero in on my tracker.”

“We’re on our way. We’re maybe ten minutes behind you.”

Jennifer could hear how tense he was. Good thing he couldn’t see how worried she was.

Wait, did he say ten minutes? Were they flying her jump ship past safe operational speeds? “Ten minutes? How fast is Hawk flying my ship?”

There was a brief pause before she heard Hawk answer, “Faster than you’d want me to.” She could almost hear the amusement in his voice.

She flew directly through the sandstorm, the blowing dust obscuring her vision. Talking to the jump ship always gave her a positive result. Maybe the jet was receptive as well? “Okay, ship, we are going to put you down… right there,” she found what she hoped was a good spot to attempt a forced landing. If she could keep the jet level in a violent windstorm… if she could keep the jet level in a headwind… if she had worn her suit…

Severe turbulence knocked her off balance. She felt the bottom of a wing scrape the surface of the sand, felt the resistance and the slight decrease in forward motion. She kept the jet’s nose up; she couldn’t afford to let it go down first. At that speed, it’d be suicide. She lowered the entire jet slightly, felt the belly of the jet drag on the ground --

She hit a burst of wind!

The jet tilted, the wing dragged into the ground, the nose pitched forward, dug into the sand as the jet flipped. Sand crushed steel -- the jet turned -- tumbled -- crashed through the sand -- it slammed -- it burrowed -- then darkness…

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Jump Ship

“Jennifer?” Jon called again. No answer.

“Just a couple of minutes away from the Flats,” Hawk told him as he flew the ship past the safety tolerances.

“Can we get there any faster?”

“Not if you want to get there in one piece,” was the answer. “She’s shaking apart as it is.”

Jon could hear the jump ship creak and shudder at the high speed. He could almost hear Jennifer scold Hawk for doing anything that could damage her ship. She had pushed the ship beyond design limits time and again, but for someone else to do it…

“There’s the sandstorm,” Hawk pointed out the view screen to a massive wall of sand in front of them.

“Can you go around?”

“Negative,” Hawk said. “The storm is massive.”

Jon glanced back at Andy. “Are sandstorms normal for man-made sand?”

He tossed the last bit of the biomech armor to the side. “It should be impossible to have a sandstorm in the wintertime. Growing sand should be too cold to be loose enough to blow around. Unless…” Andy hurried over to Tank’s console and pushed a few buttons. “Sensors show it’s a fine grain blowing… the only way it could do that is if somebody was setting up shop in some way. Hey, Tank, scoot for a minute.”

Tank stood and let Andy have his seat.

“What?” Jon asked.

“The fine grain is a by-product of the freezing or heating process. It’s a type of dust that gets blown off the processed sand particles only it’s thicker than dust. That might mean – uh oh.”

“Uh oh what?” Ranger almost growled.

“Got a power spike off to the north. Betcha that means someone’s building bricks somewhere and that’s where the sandstorm originated. We may have company out here so it’d be best not to dawdle.”

Scout zeroed in on Jennifer’s signal. “Got the tracker signal. It says she’s only about a thousand yards away,” Scout said as they looked out at the sand blowing viciously at them.

“Got a landing spot!” Hawk yelled back as he wrestled the jumpship to the ground. The winds tried to pick up the ship as Hawk forced it down. The ship landed hard, the metal protesting the rough treatment.

“There’s nothing here,” Jon said quietly, all emotion gone from his voice.

“We can’t see anything in this storm, Jon,” Hawk said. “We’ll have to wait until it’s finished.”

“What if she’s hurt?”

“No choice, Cap,” Andy told him. “That sand’s a fine grain. It’s like razors. It’ll even cut through power suits.”

Hawk hated to say it, but he finally said, “We’ve got no choice, Jon. We’ve got to wait.”

Jon sat in the co-pilot’s seat, trying to will the sandstorm to stop. Jennifer was just mere feet in front of them, and he couldn’t see her.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Jet Cockpit

First, there was the dark. It seemed impenetrable.

Then there was the something tight around her. It hurt every time she took a breath.

Next were the unmistakable smells of fuel and steel and warm sand. Then came the sound of sand sifting through… something.

Awareness came back to Jennifer slowly. In the pitch black, she had no idea where she was or what condition she was in. She moved slowly – very slowly. It felt like every muscle she had was screaming. She felt for the parachute’s harness. It was still secured tightly around her. She followed the harness until she found the attached equipment bag… ah, there was the flashlight. She turned it on to get her bearings –-

Where was she?

The light shone in the small space around her. The cockpit controls were bent slightly, forming an odd looking V shape. The sides were crushed inwards by the impact. She had to sit at an uncomfortable angle and had very little room to move. The canopy was cracked and sand was leaking in…

Sand?

Sand.

Sand was leaking in which meant oxygen was leaking out.

She realized she was sitting slightly sideways but downwards. That meant that the jet had crashed and was tilted downwards on its side, but sand was flowing into the cockpit above her, puddling at her feet and rising.

She was buried under the sand on the Flats.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Jump Ship

“Jennifer, do you read?” Hawk said in the microphone again. He glanced back at Jon. “Nothing. No answer.”

Tank used every sensor on the jumpship to zero in on the tracker. The sandstorm had kicked up even more, the winds screaming at 70 miles per hour. Other sensor readings were more worrisome though.

Andy stood over Tank’s shoulder and kept an eye on particular readings. “Cap, winds dropped the temperature another ten degrees. That’ll kill the sandstorm sooner.”

“How?” Jon’s voice sounded tense.

“Easy. Stuff gets cold, it gets heavier. It won’t fly around as easily as it’s doing now.”

Jon walked over to Tank’s console and looked at the readouts. “What temperatures does the sand respond to?” he asked Andy.

“The processed stuff uses extremes -- minus 1000 degrees Fahrenheit to freeze it in a mold if you use the chemical compound, 2000 degrees Fahrenheit to break the bonds. This loose, raw stuff acts a little differently. It won’t freeze solid no matter how cold it gets but it can get pretty hard in the wintertime. This stuff out there, it’s been growing for years and might be 20 feet thick. Temp out there now is 21 degrees Fahrenheit. That’s below freezing. That makes the sand cold… it’d be more like firm sand chunks. A campfire could break them apart.”

The console beeped and Tank adjusted a control. “Captain, I’ve got an approximate position on the tracker, but I can’t get a direct fix. It’s below the surface.”

Below the surface?“What?” Jon’s voice dared Tank to repeat that.

“It’s about fifty feet away, but the signal seems to be coming at us from an angle. That means –”

“She crashed the jet and she’s under the sand,” Jon finished for him, his voice low and tense. She was buried under the Flats, and Jon didn’t know if she was dead or alive or wounded.

Ranger twirled a knife around on her fingers. She wasn’t one to sit and wait. It went against her nature. A member of her team was in trouble, and her code of conduct demanded that she assist. Only she couldn’t. Blasted sandstorm. Man-made sand. Sand that froze. Lots of sand blowing around, lots of sand on the ground – “Andy, what kinds of conditions are under the surface?” she asked quickly.

“What do you mean?”

“It’s wintertime. It’s been below freezing temperatures for weeks. You’re saying the ground is cold with sand chunks but not frozen solid. What about under the surface of the sand? How cold is it down there? Is it solid or loose?”

Without delay Andy focused the sensors on a deep scan of the sand. If what Ranger was thinking was true – “Normal ground dirt would be a good insulator against the cold. Man-made sand isn’t quite as good at keeping the cold out… this readout says it’s approaching ten degrees at the surface – ”

“And the colder it gets, the harder it gets, right?” Ranger continued. “If she crashed the jet, then just friction alone would have heated up the sand, wouldn’t it? Not to mention the engines and the thrusters --”

“Right!” Andy adjusted another control. “So all we have to do is look for a big batch of warmer sand – Cap! Got her exact position. Tracker’s right in the middle. She’s maybe seven feet under the surface. Sand temperature in that location is approximately 40 degrees. Should stay at those warmer temps for a while.”

“Sand would be looser. We could dig,” Ranger said.

“Good idea, bit dicey,” Andy told her. “Ever try to dig in sand? It falls back on you. The problem is the sandstorm. The shield will keep it off the ship, but if we go out there, it’ll rip right through our suits.”

“We can extend the shields,” Scout suggested. “We reroute the power cells to shields only. That would give us maybe an hour at full strength.”

“Do it,” Jon ordered. Hang on, Jennifer, we’re coming, he thought to himself. I’m not losing you again. Not like this.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Jet Cockpit

With fumbling fingers, Jennifer unhooked the parachute so she’d have a little more wiggle-room, then she removed the strap that held her in the seat. She turned slightly – oh, bad idea. Her ribs and her head screamed at her. Wait, her head hurt? She reached her fingers into her hair and felt a sticky substance. Head wound, possible concussion, hurt ribs, no telling what else was injured – Fate just had to get even with her for even considering an on-purpose crash, didn’t it?

Slowly, carefully, she shone the flashlight around the cockpit. The canopy was smashed inwards, cracked and leaking in sand.

Loose, un-solid sand.

Wait… if cold temperatures solidified the sand and it was winter, then why was this sand loose?

She reached over to grab the equipment bag again and touched the metal of the ship. It was warm.

Warm.

Despite her headache, she was able to reason through on idea – the ship was warm, that meant the sand just outside the ship was warm. The ship, the crash, the engines, everything must have heated up the sand enough to fall loose. If it was loose, then it could be moved – or at least blown away. Not only that, since the ship could be taken apart – literally – maybe it could be used in some way. Remembering that, a small idea began to form.

There was a soft crackle in her ear. She realized that someone had been talking to her the entire time. Why hadn’t she paid it any attention before?

Ah, possible concussion. Maybe her thinking was muddled?

“Jennifer? Do you read?” Hawk’s voice repeated.

Painfully, she pressed the respond button. “Yeah. I hear you.”

There was a moment of silence, and then Jon’s worried voice sounded in her ear. “Jennifer, are you all right?”

She looked around the small space that was quickly getting smaller, darker and scarier. “Uh, no. I think I’m in trouble.”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Jump Ship

The team listened as Jennifer described her situation.

“We’re going to dig down to you,” Jon said sounding strained and worried. “You’re under seven feet of sand. We think that the ship heated up the sand enough to loosen it up to let you land that deep.”

“That’s what I thought, but it’s sand, Jon,” she answered as she coughed. “Digging in it won’t be easy. There needs to be less to dig through.”

“We can haul it out –”

“Not enough time,” Jennifer interrupted. “The sand is leaking in through the cockpit window. I’ve got maybe ten minutes before it’s filled if I’m thinking clearly.”

“Thinking clearly?” Ranger asked. “Concussion?”

“Probably,” Hawk said lowly.

“What about the oxygen tank?”

“Oxygen tank?” There was a pause, and then she said, “The valve is smashed. The oxygen is leaking out slowly. The sand will fill the cockpit before the tank is empty if I don’t have to open the tank manually.”

Ten minutes.

They had to orchestrate a miracle in ten minutes.

“I can tell you’ve got a plan. What do you need us to do?” Jon asked immediately.

“I hope it’s a plan,” Jennifer said, her voice sounding winded. “There’s about a quarter of fuel left in the secondary fuel cell. I’m going to hook it directly up to the thrusters. That means bypassing the engines altogether so the blast won’t be too massive. I’ll disengage the tail section. If I shut the internal panels on the thruster ports and force the fuel through to the thrusters, then the blast won’t have anywhere to go. It should shoot off the tail section like a missile and take a lot of the sand with it. It will probably shatter what’s left of the canopy since it’s already cracked open. I’m going to try to crawl out after that.”

Jon froze. The plan was desperate; it was suicidal. In that moment, he was hearing the memory of her final words before she blew up the base. That was not going to happen again. Not her, not that day. “It’s too risky. We can use the jump ship’s thrusters to blast off some of the surface sand.”

“You’d have to get the ship to hover at an angle, and you can’t do that in a sandstorm even with shields. The winds are too strong. Besides, it won’t blast away seven feet of sand. And there’s no time,” her voice remained steady. There was silence the span of a heartbeat, then, “Meet me halfway?”

“We’ll be there,” he said without hesitation. “Stay in contact.”

Ranger and Andy watched the other four for a brief moment. Andy asked, “Meet her halfway? What does she mean?”

“We’re meeting her halfway. Power up,” Jon ordered as he activated his suit.

“What does that mean?” Ranger asked.

As they disembarked, Tank answered. “She’s going to blast the sand out as much as she can and try to dig her way out. We need to dig down as far as we can to her before then.”

Ranger looked over at Andy and whispered, “We’ve got to learn to speak their language.”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Jet Cockpit

Tick tock

Time was counting.

The fuel line that ran from the secondary fuel cell was damaged. Moving slowly so she wouldn’t jostle her ribs more than necessary, Jennifer pulled the cover plate off the control console, inched her arm into the now sandy circuits and wiring to reach the primary fuel line. With a quick yank, she was able to loosen it just enough to reroute it through the circuitry and pull as much length of it as possible toward her. Another yank shook it loose from the now spent primary fuel cell and she carefully but quickly reattached it to the secondary fuel cell.

The stench of the fuel hit her nostrils hard. It was getting harder to breathe in the enclosed space.

“I hope this works,” she whispered to herself as she coughed, holding her ribs to keep them steady as her body shook. It had to work. She was not going to die in a buried jet. She had too much she wanted to do. There were battles yet to be fought and conversations yet to be had. There was one conversation she needed to finish with Jon. One day. Eventually. Soon.

She coughed, the smell of the fuel filling her lungs. She tried to breathe shallow, to conserve her oxygen, but the imaginary clock running in her head was ticking off her minutes. She was running out of time and the sand was gradually getting deeper in the cockpit. Moving quickly, she attached the other end of the fuel line to the engine thrusters – it was just long enough. The angle of the jet had the thrusters pointing mostly upwards. If igniting them worked, it would blast a lot of the soil away and she could dig her way out, but she wasn’t certain she could do that before she suffocated.

The oxygen tank…

She considered the oxygen tank. She looked around in the dim light – if she were to ignite the thrusters while the oxygen tank was in there, she ran the risk of exploding the tank. Too much oxygen, a fire could burn her. She had to make a decision. Finally, she grabbed the tank and turned the broken valve as far as she could to let more oxygen seep into the cockpit. If the oxygen was spent by the time she ignited the thrusters, then there would be no air to burn.

Okay, she had enough fresh air to keep on working. She tightened the clamps on the fuel connectors and maneuvered herself back into the seat so she could reach the controls. She did a quick check of the secondary fuel cell. The fuel level was steady, it wasn’t leaking. She hoped there would be enough to do what she needed to do.

Then she turned her attention to the tail section. She could see the clamps holding the pieces together. It took some effort, but she finally unlocked the clamps and disconnected the tail section from the rest of the jet. Then, with a quick jerk on a control lever, she heard the two metal panels closing to cap off the panels inside the thrusters. Hopefully, the pressure would be enough to blast the tail section off, sending it up like a rocket when she fired the thrusters, leaving her a shallow tunnel to dig through to get out.

Luck was with her that last day at the base. Maybe, just maybe, luck would be with her once again.

One thing was certain – Jon was not going to let her sneak into a Dread facility without wearing her suit ever again.

“Jon?”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Crash Site

“Will this work?” Ranger asked Andy as everyone began to push away as much sand over the crash site as possible.

“It could,” he said. “She was right when she said that there had to be less sand. When she ignites those engines, that should blow off some of this, but not nearly enough. We’re still going to have to dig down fast.” Then, in a low voice, “She won’t last long in that. At least it’s really the raw man-made sand not this lightweight stuff that’s flying around. That’ll suffocate you.”

“She has an oxygen tank,” Ranger reminded him.

Andy shrugged. “It’s better than nothing. At least the raw stuff we’re digging through won’t worm its way under an oxygen mask.”

Scout lost his footing and slid a bit down the sandy hole they were digging. Sand fell back in. Andy watched as Hawk helped Scout back up out of the pit. “This won’t work like this,” he muttered as he ran back into the ship and brought out a couple of long lengths of rope.

He glanced back at their surprised looks. “Cap, when she hits those thrusters, a lot of the sand will get blasted away but the rest will fall back in on her. We won’t be able to pull her out if we’re slipping and sliding around up here.”

Without another word, Andy tied the ropes to the ship and tossed the other end of one to the Captain as he secured the second around himself. All they had to do was tie the ends around their waists to anchor themselves and use the ropes to haul themselves up. Simple.

“Jon?” Jennifer’s voice came over the radio.

“Jennifer? We’re down about three feet.”

There was a pause, then a crackle of static. “Okay. I’m ready to fire the thrusters. You need to get clear. I don’t want the blast or the tail section to hit anyone.”

Andy grabbed his radio as they scrambled away from the pit. “Pilot, do not breathe that sand in. It could do some damage. You’ll have to use the mask on the oxygen tank.”

“Can’t,” she coughed. “The oxygen tank is almost depleted. If I use the mask, I won’t be able to breathe at all.”

“Crap,” Andy muttered. “Tie something over your nose and mouth. It’ll help.”

Jon looked over at Andy, a worried look in his eye.”Will it help?”

“Not much, but it’s better than nothing,” Andy told him. “Even if this works, we’ll still have to go through several feet of loose sand. Let’s hope we can meet halfway.”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Jet Cockpit

Jennifer ripped off the sleeve of her shirt and then tied it around her nose and mouth. She didn’t think it would do much good, but maybe it would buy her just a few extra seconds when the sand fell back on her.

She worked quickly, continually paying attention to the imaginary clock ticking down in her mind. She counted to ten to give the team time to clear out from the area… she touched the control to fire the thrusters -–

BOOM!

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Crash Site

A plume of flame shot up out from the sand, tossing up sand and chunks of smashed metal, the explosion heating and loosening the sand.

“Move fast!” Andy shouted as the flames died down, leaving behind a deep funnel shaped pit that sand was falling back down. The blast tossed up sand, but it forced the jet deeper down into the hole it dug for itself. The resulting pit had steeper sides to climb down.

Jon didn’t need to be told to move quickly. Nothing would stop him from reaching Jennifer.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Cockpit

Jennifer held her breath as she clawed her way through the darkness, digging through the now warm sand that separated easily as she dug through it.

She pushed herself up, through the dark, through the sand – she could feel the sand creeping in under the mask, trying to fill her nose, her ears, her throat, she could feel the fine sand begin to give way, to release her from its grasp… she dug… she felt the side of the ship as she crawled upwards… she couldn’t breathe… her air was giving out…the sand cut her fingers… hot metal touched her…

Hands were suddenly there. They grabbed the back of her uniform and hauled her free of the ground and dragged her across a cold surface. Sweet precious air! She felt the material get ripped away from her mouth as she fell to her hands and knees and coughed out the sand in her throat. She felt a gentle hand pat her back hard to her dispel what was in her lungs while a strong arm kept her from falling. Then she was held against something warm and hard. Something cold was placed over her nose and mouth and fresh air was suddenly there. She could breathe! Her lungs dragged in the precious nectar. The smell of the fumes still danced around her nostrils, but she could breathe oxygen for that moment. Everything else was secondary.

“Pulse is strong,” she thought she heard someone say as if from far away. She could still hear the echo of the explosion ringing in her ears.

It had to be the team. Good. They reached her just in time. A few more seconds underground, and that tunnel she was digging would have been her grave.

Buried alive was not how she wanted to go.

A violent cough shook her, and she held on to her tender ribs to keep them from moving as her body tried to rid itself of the fuel smell and the sand.

Tears formed in her eyes. She had to blink a few times and carefully brush the sand away before she could open them enough to see where she was.

Right – bottom of a sand pit, the tail section of the fighter jet in pieces all around them, the stink of burnt fuel in the air. She was leaning against Jon who was saying something, but her ears were still ringing too much to make out the words clearly.

She was alive, free of the jet and the tail section was history. The rest of the aircraft could be salvaged once the sandstorm ended. Everything would be fine.

Now that she was free of the immediate danger of being buried alive, her ribs and her head were demanding attention. That crash didn’t do her any good. That meant a few weeks downtime whether she wanted it or not.

Note to self: do not orchestrate a crash landing because Fate will get even

But they did get the jet.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Northstar Infirmary

Jon casually balled up the now useless uniform and tossed it down the garbage chute. That was one uniform that wouldn’t do anyone any good anymore. He would have been happy to destroy all the stolen uniforms they had but he knew they would be needed in some future subterfuge. He just had to deal with the fact that Jennifer might have to risk her life again posing as a Dread Youth.

He was tired of “dealing” with that particular danger. He never wanted her to have to masquerade as one of Dread’s soldiers ever again. She was uncomfortable doing it, and truth be told, it scared him. One day, someone might realize who she was and if she was captured…

Jon stopped the thought mid-sentence. She wasn’t caught, she got out safely, she was alive and they got the information. The mission was a success. What-if scenarios worked when planning tactical assaults, but at that moment, they were ghosts haunting his worst imaginings.

He looked back at Jennifer as she lay sleeping in the infirmary bed. She spent time in the regenerator to heal her bruised ribs, torn muscles and concussion and she was going to be fine. He needed to be grateful for small favors when they presented themselves, but he could have lost her. He knew how close it had been. So did she. She had made light of the situation in her own unique fashion even after he got her back into the jump ship.

“There’s no way Hawk could have flown the ship here in ten minutes,” she amusingly scolded Jon for pushing her ship beyond its safety specs.

"Hawk didn’t,” Jon told her as he made certain she was comfortable in the sleeping bunk. She was hurting, and there was no way she could fly the ship. They needed to see if she had broken bones or worst wounds. That meant she needed to rest and stay still until they got back to base. “The ship knew you were in trouble and flew here that fast all on her own.”

Jennifer gave him a disbelieving look. “The ship flew herself that fast?” she smiled at him. “Now why do I find that hard to believe?”

Jon grinned. “Well, you won’t yell at the ship if she flies past specs. You’ll yell at Hawk,” he leaned over and gave her a quick kiss. “Next time, you wear your suit and no crashing at the Flats.”

She reached up and brushed some of the sand out of his hair. “No, no more crashing here. Digging through sand isn’t fun.”

Fun, she said. How she could deal with the dangers better than he could and make a half-hearted joke about all of it amazed him. Maybe he hadn’t acted like it, but he’d been terrified he was going to lose her again. Speaking over the radio, calmly explaining what she was going to do while he was far from her, helpless to do anything. It was too close to what happened before…

He pushed that thought out of his mind. He wasn’t going to think about that time.

He focused on how the mission went overall. Despite what happened, his people worked together as a team. For the first time,Jackson behaved as a member without bringing any of his lone wolf attributes to the forefront. He had been a marine, so he knew how to work within a group, so it really was a matter of him learning how to work that way again. He used his knowledge and skills to complete the mission and they all survived. Ranger had not focused her attention on Tank and didn’t ‘decide’ to blow up the facility on her own. They each did their part; they worked within the team structure and they completed the mission.

For months, he’d been plagued with questions about his decision to allow Ranger and Andy to join the team. Did he make a mistake? Was he wrong? Did he make a hasty decision without weighing all the facts? Did he let emotion cloud his judgment? Did he make the biggest mistake of his career? Putting together the original members of the group had been a serendipitous process. One by one, he met each person, they proved their worth and they merged into a team so easily that it seemed as if Fate had stepped in and chose the team for him. There had been no doubts, not about any of them.

What had changed?

The truth was he had. The threat that one of them could be killed on a mission was turned into fact, and Jon was faced with the unalterable fact that he held people’s lives in his hands – people he cared about, people who were his family. It was a responsibility he knew he had but had never truly realized until that day when Blastarr attacked the base and Jennifer was there alone. When he lost her… when she was gone… when new people were needed to round out the team, it was ultimately his decision. New people would place their lives in his hands, and he could send them on a mission where they wouldn’t come back.

It didn’t matter that each person on the team knew the risks and was willing to die to stop Dread. That was expected of every Resistance fighter on the planet. Jennifer had said as much to him before they went after the jet. What mattered was that each person on a team knew that one of them could die and they had to work together to keep that from happening if at all possible. That had been the one doubt that Jon couldn’t dispel. Could two lone wolves like Ranger and Andy put the needs of the group above personal vendettas or old habits?

Now he knew. Commanding a seven-person team wasn’t as easy to do as a five-person team, but the mission proved to Jon that they were going to work. Maybe he could put away his misgivings once and for all.

Now he just had to assign them ranks in the hierarchy.

“Hey,” he heard her say. He saw she was awake and trying to get in a more comfortable position on the rather uncomfortable bed.

“Hey,” he sighed with relief as he walked over and tucked another pillow behind her head.

“You looked like you were a million miles away,” she commented as she leaned back into the pillows.

He rested his hands on the mattress, Leaned forward and kissed her cheek. “Not quite that far. I was just thinking about… things.”

“Things?” she asked. “Anything you want to talk about?”

Did he look bothered by something? Maybe he did. She was always more perceptive of his moods than he was. “Mostly about the mission,” he told her.

She frowned a little, then said, “Are you still worried that you may have made a mistake letting Ranger and Andy join the team?”

He should have known he couldn’t keep anything worrying him from her. “Not anymore. I think what I was worried about has worked itself out.”

“I see,” she said, her expression indicating that she was in a rather playful mood. “Well, if they’re going to stay, you’re going to have to assign them a rank.”

She knew he was wondering about ranks? He nodded. He really couldn’t keep his reservations from her. One day, he was going to learn that fact. “I was just thinking about the team and how well we worked together, but we have to have the military hierarchy. Got any suggestions where to put them?”

She gave Jon a very direct look. “As long as Andy doesn’t outrank me…” she smiled.

He smiled in return. “Okay, I’ll see what I can do. How are you feeling?”

“Sore,” she told him. He sat down next to the bed and she took his hand. “I don’t want to do that again,” she said in a low voice.

“I don’t want you doing that again,” he agreed wholeheartedly as he weaved his fingers with hers. To think that he might not have been able to do something as ordinary as hold her hand ever again…

She turned their hands over, looked down at their interlocked fingers. “What about the jet?” she asked.

“Tank and Jackson rigged towing cables to it and pulled it out of the sand once the sandstorm died down,” Jon told her. “Jensen’s team has it, and the engineers are absolutely positive they can rebuild the tail section from the plans Jensen stole. They think they can hammer out the damage to the hull but it’s more likely they’ll have to replace the entire outer layer. The canopy can be replaced, and the programs were intact. They were very impressed with how you got out of the pit and I think Jensen’s mechanic said something about only a member of the Power Team would be crazy enough to shoot off the back end of a plane to crawl out of a hole. The big complaint is that the sand still in the cockpit seems to keep growing and they can’t get rid of it.”

Jennifer would have laughed if her ribs weren’t still sore. “Why haven’t we ever heard of this man-made sand before?”

Jon shrugged. “I think it’s like a lot of things that used to exist. It’s been forgotten by most of us. Someone has been using it though. That’s where the fine grain in the sandstorm came from. Andy picked up a signal north of the crash site that indicated someone may have been building bricks.”

Building bricks – maybe someone was trying to build structures, build a permanent town, maybe even stockpile building materials for when the war was over?

“No time to investigate?” she asked.

He held her hand a little tighter. “We had more important things to do.” He paused for a moment, then, “So what did you think of the jet?”

He saw her eyes light up. “That ship could fly faster than anything we have in the Resistance, even the XT,” she said, the excitement of the fast ride still apparent in her voice. “It handles well on banks and steeps. I think the design of the body reduces wind resistance to such an extreme that it might actually reach Mach 3 in less time than any of our aircraft.”

He just knew it – she was a pilot, and the jet was like a big toy for her. “Do you want one?” he teased her. “I’ll see if the techs can backwards engineer one for you.”

She grinned as she gently pulled his hand until he sat next to her on the bed. He put his arm around her shoulders and she settled down against him. “Oh, it was fun to fly, but not nearly as reliable as my jump ship. Every single part of that jet could be used as some type of weapon. The wings can come off, the tail section can be removed – at least I know my jump ship will stay in one piece for the most part.” She looked up at him, seeing the disbelief in his eyes. “But if they happen to have one of the jets just lying around and no one flying it…”

He hugged her to him. “I’ll see what I scrounge up,” he joked. “You’re sure you’re okay?”

“I’m fine,” she assured him. “I really am just a little sore.” She paused for a moment, and then admitted, “I misjudged how the jet could react on impact when we were looking at the plans.”

“What do you mean?”

“I didn’t take into account until after the crash that since the parts were removable, they could be turned into the weapons, not just be part of the ship when it crashed and exploded. It’s what gave me the idea -- the fuel line can go to the compartments where explosives are stored, but part of the blast itself could be funneled through the thrusters. That way, the ship becomes added shrapnel as well as a missile itself and the explosion covers an area greater than just an exploding jet alone could initiate. Dread could do a lot of damage with a design like that.”

Jon considered the idea for a moment. What little information they had in the stolen plans hadn’t mentioned any of that. “Could the designers not know that the fighter could be used that way?”

“It’s possible,” Jennifer agreed readily. “There’s a big difference between designing a jet and flying a jet. Pilots have to improvise and perform maneuvers that the designers never thought of, push the craft past its limits or do patchwork repair jobs that the designers would swear should make it fall right out of the sky.”

“So a pilot will know what an aircraft will do but the designer only knows what it was designed to do,” Jon surmised.

“Sometimes.”

“That could give us an advantage,” Jon thought out loud. “If Dread does get this jet into production, we’ll know more about it than he will, and since biomechs will be flying it, they won’t get creative while they’re in the cockpit.”

Maybe they were getting a break? It had been a while since any good, useful information came out of any of their missions. Usually, it was attack and run, blow up a Dread facility, destroy biomechs, save a settlement – valuable information that could give them an edge in a battle was sometimes hard to come by.

Jennifer looked up at him, a slight grin still on her face. “So what’s our next mission?”

That grin meant that she was up to something. “Well, I’ve been thinking about that. Maybe there’s a way we could halt production on the fighters when we find out where the manufacturing facilities are, so we’ll need to plan for several contingencies. Or maybe we can find out some information and tell Jensen he and his team have to sneak in a Dread base next time just to get back at them. I’m not sure yet. Any ideas?”

The grin grew just a little bigger. “Take a day or two off? I was thinking that maybe we could continue our conversation about a lock combination that couldn’t be changed unless both our key codes were accessed?”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Epilogue
Control Room – One Month Later

The team sat around Mentor’s console and watched the recording of Dread’s latest project taking form – an advanced biomech with blaster-resistant armor.

“Oh, that’s not good,” Andy murmured.

Scout shook his head. “No, that will definitely take some of the fun out of shooting clickers.”

“It gets worse,” Tank showed another image of a particular biomech. This one was more gold than silver, taller, more streamlined and less machine-looking. “This one comes with a more advanced self-destruct and is programmed to run over uneven ground much more efficiently. I think we’re looking at the next two generations of biomechs.”

Jon leaned forward and studied the pictures. “Is this the only facility building these?” he asked Hawk.

“As far as we know.”

Jennifer looked closely at the facility. “Security?” she asked.

“Usual for a manufacturing lab,” Tank answered. “We may not run into any new surprises.”

Ranger pointed to a particular area in the background. “I know this place. There are paths that lead up through the woods and right up next to the building. Tank and I could sneak in the back way and not be seen.”

Andy checked the information concerning the contents of barrels scattered around the grounds outside the building. “Highly flammable. Could definitely light up the night sky with what’s in there. I’ve got this one dandy little explosive that works great on barrels.”

Jon sat up straight. “Since their armor is blaster resistant, we’ll need something else to shoot at them. Ideas?”

The brainstorming began and within minutes, they had a working plan of attack.

When the meeting was over with and each went to gear up, Andy and Ranger lingered behind for just a moment. There was a synergy to the group that neither had experienced before but definitely noticed.

“So did what I think happen, happen?” Andy asked her.

“I think we figured out how to speak their language,” she told him. “Notice no one had to go into details and we understood everything that was going on?”

Andy thought for a moment. “Yeah. I noticed how fast you volunteered you and Tank to sneak in the back way, too.”

“You have your fun your way, I’ll have mine my way,” she teased.

“So… think we’re members of the team yet?” Andy asked her.

Ranger didn’t have to consider it. “Let’s just say that maybe we’re not replacements anymore,” she said as she headed off to get ready for the mission, “but we still don’t have ranks.”

“I don’t know about that,” Andy argued as he followed her. “The Cap was talking to me about being a private…”

The End

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