Page 27 of Wired Target

Nothing happened: no explosion, no hissing spit of a poisoned dart.

Torufu aimed the rubber-tipped grip mechanism at the small turret on the bottom of the drone and touched an embedded button.The remaining propeller stopped.The blinking red light went out.

“Looks like I’ve got it deactivated.”Torufu’s voice was muffled by the headgear.

He approached the device and looked it over from close proximity.Still behind cover, Lei couldn’t help bouncing on the balls of her feet, eager to try to go find Sophie, and yet terrified for her partner.Torufu’s calm was his strength in this kind of task.

“I’m checking it for booby-trapping,” Torufu said aloud.He examined the device from all angles, then walked around it, gently untangling the flexible branches of thehaole koabefore he lifted the device carefully out of the tree, without jostling, and set it on the ground.“Let’s leave it here for now.I’ll take it in to the lab in a containment device.We can check out the manufacturer and see if we can find any fingerprints or other clues.”

“Roger that, Abe,” Lei said.

“Can you get the caution tape out of my kit?Wouldn’t want one of our uniforms to accidentally trigger something.”

“You got it, partner.”Lei opened his toolbox and took out the roll of crime scene/caution tape.“I thought you said you had equipment in your car?”

“No containment boxes.Those things weigh a lot and take up a lot of room.I keep one in the bomb squad truck,” Torufu said.“This is good enough for the moment.I don’t think this thing poses an active threat now that it’s turned off.”He ran the tape around the clearing, then returned to Lei.He took off his helmet.“Now, what are we gonna do about your missing friend?”

“I’m gonna find her, then kill her myself,” Lei said.

“She’ll turn up with empty hands and you can commit homicide then.We’ll have a whole team out here looking in just a few minutes.”Torufu indicated the now silent sirens with his head—their police backup must have reached the parking lot.Sure enough, Torufu’s radio squawked, asking for updates.

Lei helped Torufu repack the suit in the bins, leaving it for when he moved the device to a containment canister.

“I want to know why Sophie thinks she’s a better person to find the drone operator than we are,” Torufu said as they approached the cluster of cruisers that had pulled up and parked in the lot.“Why would she take off like that without even a vest or a weapon?”

“I have an idea,” Lei said, but it was going to be a long story, and a lot of it couldn’t be told right now.“Let’s get those uniforms out there looking.”

17

After dropping off the bin containing the blast suit inside the fenced reserve area, Sophie returned to the sandy rise from which she could see in all directions.

The drone’s range was close to a mile.Having operated one of them herself during a Security Solutions case, Sophie’d experienced how hard it was to pilot one of the devices using only the video tablet and hand switches.Because of the challenges, the operator would have chosen the highest ground they could find to get a visual of the device as they were flying it, as well as using the control panel for maneuvering.Entering the fenced area of the sanctuary would only have slowed them down; they wouldn’t have bothered with breaking in.

Sophie shielded her eyes from the sun, squinting as she evaluated the topography.

She scanned until she spotted a high point near the end of the beach where black lava rock bluffs provided a natural barrier that ended the nesting area.A narrow maintenance trail on the exterior of the tall chain-link fence defining the albatross sanctuary appeared to head in the right direction.

Sophie bent over to tighten her shoelaces, then tugged down her cap and set off at a run.

As she jogged, Sophie’s mind whirled with questions.How had the drone operator found her and followed her out here?Was there a surveillance device on her, Lei, or Lei’s truck somewhere?She’d frisked herself in the parking lot and opened and disabled her phone, finding nothing.

The operator could just have tracked her phone’s signal and been monitoring that, but she didn’t have a spare burner to be able to ditch it right now ...

All these questions would have to be answered, but finding out where the drone operator was, or had been, was the best way to help the investigation right now.If there was any chance at all that the drone operator was Pim Wat, Sophie would be the one to bring her down.

Sophie covered the mile or so of terrain quickly and arrived at the most likely vantage point—a lava cliff among hardy ironwood trees.

Once she reached the ridge, Sophie cast about, walking slowly back and forth until she found a view spot that had been used by either maintenance people or surfers to check the wave break just off the black boulders.

The ever-present wind soughed through the ironwoods’ long, soft needles and tugged at Sophie’s hat, threatening to flip it off.She moved into the bare area between the trees, searching the ground as carefully as a visual bloodhound.

Recent shoeprints not yet filled by the constantly moving sand.

Four small indentations indicated a folding camping stool.

Behind one of the grayish ironwood tree trunks, the stub of a slim unfiltered cigarette, a French brand uncommon in Hawaii.

The operator had been here.He or she had sat quietly, smoking, and directed the drone to attack their party.Whoever it had been had plenty of time to get into position while she and Lei were taking their informal tour in the beginning.

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