Page 92 of Never Enough

Midas jumped back into the conversation. “Second on the agenda, I called in a favor from a contact in Johannesburg. He sent up a drone and sent me the footage it came up with.” He flipped the screen around so everyone could see. “There are two guard shacks on the main road in, and there’s a dirt track going out toward the river. In the past twenty-four hours, there has been no traffic on the dirt road, and there’s only one guard. The guard there shifts out every four hours, beginning at zero hundred. The guard does carry a sidearm and a machine gun, but so far, none of them have seen fit to take the latter off the hooks in the back of the booth. I’m guessing no one ever comes through that way, but they put a guard on it just in case. In addition, there’s no surveillance equipment, according to Nova’s scans, so probably more primitive contact there. Walkie-talkies if we’re lucky. Cell phone at worst.”

“Nova hitched a ride on the drone?” Waters asked, concern written all over his face.

“No, I put the old system on the drone. I put a burn-out on Cyclopes in case he was compromised. His program is out-of-date, anyway, since Nova is up and running. I transferred the information he brought back through a scrubber, then gave it toher through a ghost system. It can’t hurt her. So far, Cyclopes is showing no signs of compromise, but if someone did try to download his software, Cyclopes’ll eat himself and blow up.”

Waters nodded. “I know that would suck, but better safe than sorry.”

Steel cut in, “So I’m guessing TB and I will be going in the back door.”

There was a pause. When there was silence, everyone looked at Nemo. He was eating a handful of grapes and studying the footage. When he realized everyone was looking at him, his face turned puzzled. “What?”

“No comment from the penis gallery?” TB asked.

“Peanut gallery, fuckwitch.” Nemo popped another grape in his mouth.

“I know what the saying is,” TB growled, “but when talking to you, sometimes the sayings make more sense if they change.”

Nemo thought about it as he ate another grape. “Nope. No comment.”

TB looked at Demon. “Better check his temperature, dude. Think he’s sick.”

“Har dee har har,” Nemo barked out. “I don’t always have to make a twelve-year-old-boy comment.”

“No, but it’s abnormal when you don’t,” Waters agreed with TB. He looked at Haskell. “You need to stick around. He becomes a human being when you’re here.”

With the exception of the Mythos crew, they all turned back to the monitor, blissfully unaware of the panic they’d just caused. The Mythos team, however, were all staring at her. She couldn’t stay. She knew it. They knew it. Her contract wasn’t up until 2025. When this was done, she was leaving with them.

Medusa shook her head at her, telling her not to address the comment. She nodded in return, then focused on the screen with the rest of them.

Steel was speaking again. “All right, so TB and I will go in the back door, take out the guard. Are we leaving someone there?”

“No,” Waters replied. “We’ll have you go in at the start of a shift. We need to be in and out within three and a half hours. Should be manageable.” He looked at Haskell.

She nodded. “Even if I have to go through tunnel choice B or C, it’ll be enough.”

“And what if you can’t get in through any of those choices?” TB questioned.

Haskell looked TB straight in the eye. “Then we won’t need three and a half hours, will we? We’ll have to abort. But don’t worry. I can get in through tunnel choice A as long as there hasn’t been a recent cave-in.”

TB turned back to Midas.

“Okay,” Midas picked up again. “The main road is a completely different story. Traffic goes in and out pretty regularly. And… no outsiders. It’s all people who belong to the camp. No food vendors, no suits, nothing.”

“That creates major difficulties. We aren’t exactly going to pass as locals,” Demon pointed out.

“Nova did take a walkabout through their limited email system. There’s an inspection planned in two days.”

The group shared a look around the table.

“Then we either need to go in before that check or after. We can’t do it during.” Haskell chewed on her lip. “I think we’re better going in after. They’ll be more relaxed once the inspection is over. More prone to be careless since they know they’re in the clear for a while.”

“Agreed,” Waters confirmed. “The day after?”

“Midas, the inspection is set for the sixteenth?” she asked.

“Yes. Thirteen hundred.”

She considered his suggestion. “That’s Friday. New shipments of workers come in on Thursdays. Or, as of a couple of months ago, they did. That’s when the other girls and I came in and when the previous week’s girls were shipped out. They also brought in new miners to replace any they lost during the week.”

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