Abruptly, the lights went out. Blair held her breath, peering into the darkness, trying to figure out if the HK’s rumble was moving away or circling back for a second look.
And then, the light reappeared, coming through the series of cracks and gaps in the east wall.
But this time it wasn’t the eye-burning, full-power glare of the HK’s searchlights. It was the softer glow of that same blaze as it was reflected from the ground and rubble and distant buildings.
Blair and Wince looked at each other, and Wince puffed out his cheeks in a pantomimed puffy sigh. Blair nodded, then lifted a finger to her lips to remind him not to make any actual noise until the HK had left the area. Wince nodded in turn, and together they waited as the growl turned again to a distant hum, then faded out completely.
“That’s the sort of nonsense we’ve had to put up with all day,” Wince murmured, making a face as he stretched muscles and joints that had been frozen too long in the same position. “God, but we’re vulnerable here. The sooner Connor gets us out of L.A., the better.”
Blair ran her fingers gently over the jagged rims of the bullet holes in her plane. He was right, of course. Skynet had way too good a bead on them here, and the noose was only going to get tighter each time they were forced to run from one rat hole to the next.
But where could they go? L.A. surrounded them for dozens of kilometers in every direction, a hell of a long walk when you had to carry everything on your own back. The team itself had no vehicles, and even if they could find a truck that still worked there was no gasoline to put into it.
But that was Connor’s problem, not hers. He would figure something out.
He always did.
“At least until then we’ve got this nice building to keep the rain off,” she said.
“Actually, a little rain would be nice,” Wince said, almost wistfully. “Might clear the air a little.”
He shook his head. “Anyway, you’d probably better get back to the bunker. Get some food, and then get to bed.”
“Don’t worry about me—I had almost six hours last night,” Blair said. “I was just thinking you probably need sleep more than I do.” She cocked her head. “And food, too.”
“I’ve got some lunch over there I never got around to eating,” Wince said, nodding toward the back of the hangar. “We could split it if you’d like.”
“No, that’s okay,” Blair said. Wince was famous for trying to foist food off on people he suspected were hungrier than he was. Blair had fallen for that trick five times in a row before she’d finally caught on. “I’m not hungry.”
“That was your stomach sending out audible distress signals, wasn’t it?” he reminded her dryly.
“Come on, there’s plenty for both of us.”
“In which case we can deduce that you missed at least two meals, not just one,” Blair countered.
“So go eat, then get some sleep. That’s an order.”
Wince shook his head sadly.
“You young people,” he said, mock-mournfully. “Always ordering around your elders.”
“Call it enlightened self-interest,” Blair told him. She had a few tricks of her own, after all. “I don’t want someone tired and hungry working on my plane.”
“Ah,” Wince said. “Well, when you put it that way…”
“I do,” Blair said. “Now go. I’ll stay here until Yoshi gets back.”
“Okay,” Wince said. “Thanks, Blair.” He touched her shoulder, almost shyly. “Don’t worry, I’ll find a way to get you those extra rounds.”
“Thanks,” Blair said. “You pull it off, and I guarantee they won’t go to waste.”
“I know they won’t,” Wince said. “See you later.”
He headed off toward the back, where the hangar’s compact housekeeping corner had been set up. Blair waited until he was digging ravenously into his neglected food pack, then took a few minutes to wander around the hangar, checking on the security of walls and boarded-up windows and doors. By the time she’d finished her tour, Wince was stretched out on one of the hangar’s two sleeping mats, sound asleep.
Blair shook her head. A meal that disappeared that quickly had definitely not been enough to share. Just as well she hadn’t let him talk her into it.
Her stomach rumbled again. Ignoring the emptiness down there, she picked up the other sleeping mat and moved it to a spot where she could keep a simultaneous eye on the door, both of the planes, and Wince.
Drawing her gun, she sat down on the mat, laying the weapon beside her. Nearly out of fuel, nearly out of spare parts, nearly out of ammo, nearly out of food. Life, she reflected, was definitely not looking good for the good guys. All the more reason to be glad this mess was in Connor’s hands, not hers.
She just hoped he could still find a trick or two up his sleeve.
CHAPTER
EIGHT
For Orozco, the day began as so many of them did: with a fight over food.
“But it’s mine,” Candace Tomlinson insisted, her plaintive five-year-old’s whine especially jarring coming from a seventeen-year-old’s mouth. “I found it. It’s mine.”
“But it was my stuff she found it in,” Sumae Chin, the twenty-two-year-old complainant snapped back.
“And where exactly was this private cache of yours?” Grimaldi asked, his eyes steady on Sumae as he stared at the two girls across his scarred office desk. “In your room?”
“She can’t just steal my stuff,” Sumae insisted, glaring at Candace.
“Where was the cache?” Grimaldi asked again, his voice going a few degrees sterner. “Sumae?”
Sumae sent Orozco a hooded look.
“In the lower storage room,” she said reluctantly. “Under some cracked drywall.”
Orozco sighed to himself. All the residents had their own rooms, as well as lockers Grimaldi’s men had lugged all the way from the remains of a high school, almost a mile away. In theory, everyone had all the room they needed for their personal items.
But too many of them had gone the squirrel route, hiding stuff around the building. Some did it because they didn’t want anyone else even knowing how much they’d managed to accumulate, while others were out-and-out paranoid about the Board swooping down someday and confiscating everybody’s private treasures.
The problem, of course, was that one battered can of processed lunchmeat looked pretty much like any other. Once it was outside anyone’s official storage, it was well-nigh impossible to establish ownership. Especially since—even after all this time—it was still possible to occasionally find food items everyone else had missed buried in the building’s rubble.
Which left Grimaldi with really only one possible ruling.
“I’m sorry, Sumae,” the chief said, his voice regretful but firm. “If you choose to hide items outside your designated areas—if the pickles Candace found were, in fact, yours to begin with—”
“But they were,” Sumae protested. “I told you where I’d—”
Grimaldi stopped her with an upraised hand.
“Even if they were yours to begin with, you forfeited all claims when you left the jar unattended outside your area. You know that. I’m sorry, but Candace owns them now.”
Sumae flashed the younger girl a look of pure hatred.
“Just wait,” she said, her voice low and menacing. “Someday you’ll drop something—”
“Sumae,” Grimaldi warned.
“—and I’ll be right there to pick it up,” Sumae finished.