“Ready?” he asks.
I lock my gaze with his. We can do this. We have to.
He nods. “The plans are in Walter’s office. I know the code to get in. It won’t take me long to get them. We’ll be back in the car before Bobby’s finished his sandwich.”
We walk right up to the main security desk. A guard who might as well be Bobby’s younger brother sits there. Same rattlesnake gaze, same complexion that says he’s been working on his tan under the fluorescent tube lights overhead for decades.
“Leo,” Jasper says, his voice deeper again.
“Jasper. What are you doing here?”
Jasper goes to point upward, but when the coat sleeve slides halfway up to his elbow, he drops his hand again and insteadmotions with his chin. “Electrical problem on twelve. My friend here is going to fix it.”
“No one’s on the list,” Leo says, flipping through a clipboard of his own. What is it with these guys and lists? Not like anyone ever comes to audit a supervillain’s standard operating procedures. Isn’t the whole pointnotto have documentation of their business operations?
“We already talked to Bobby. He said it was cool. It’s a quick fix.”
“You won’t mind if I give Mr. Wolfe a call? Any after-hours entries have to be approved by him.” Leo lifts a phone from the console he’s sitting at. It’s a typical security desk configuration. A bank of monitors show footage from a dozen or more security cameras. The sight of them makes my throat go dry. I can see me and Jasper standing at the desk. Our backs are to the camera currently being displayed, but when I look around, there are two more behind Leo facing directly at us.
Leo and Jasper are still haggling. I dip my chin and casually pull the hat a little lower down my forehead. While they argue, I take a small step toward the desk, making it look like I’m leaning on it while I wait for a resolution. I can’t do anything about the cameras, but maybe—just maybe—I can do something to buy us a little time.
The cables running to the monitors are all bundled together with zip ties. Slowly, I wrap a hand around them. I’ve never had enough power to do more than short-circuit a laptop, but maybe that’s all that’s required here.
I have to clench my teeth as I try to focus. Leo’s rattling the clipboard in Jasper’s face, and Jasper’s calling him a jackass. I’d tell him not to lay it on so thick, but getting my powers to work at all is like trying not to scare off an orgasm, so I can’t be distracted.
There’s a burning smell like, probably as I melt the coating around the wires. I cough a little too loudly, hoping no one notices. Then there’s a pop and a flash as sparks shoot from the back of one of the monitors. Leo yelps and even Jasper hops away in alarm. He gives me a worried look, but I can’t tell if he noticed what I did or if he’s only making sure I didn’t accidentally set his favourite shirt on fire.
“Oh, hell.” Leo pounds at his keyboard. When I move to stand a little closer to Jasper, the monitors are all completely black.
Fortunately, Jasper sees the opportunity and slings an arm over my shoulder. We’re already moving, pushing past the desk. Leo tries to catch us as we go by.
“Hey. Hey, Jasper. Where are you?—”
“We’ll start upstairs, then my friend here can help you with your stuff. Just make sure you try turning it off and turning it on again. Sometimes that’s all it takes.”
“Jasper! Wait!” Leo’s flustered voice trails after us, but we’re already stepping into the elevator and the door slides shut. For a moment, I lean into Jasper as relief floods me, realizing a second too late that he’s dropped his arm and isn’t touching me anymore. Embarrassed, I push away.
“Sorry.”
“We won’t have long. Leo’s going to check the building systems and know there’s no electrical problem. We’ll go out the back before Leo can find us, but I’ll need a few minutes to download the plans.”
“Download?” When he said the plans were in Wolfe’s office, I pictured a big roll of blueprints. Something hard copy we could grab and make a run for it. I could kick myself for not clarifying. This is why I was never going to make it as a superhero. Never mind the wimpy powers. I couldn’t even think to ask what kind of plans Jasper was talking about.
He doesn’t notice my upset. His gaze is on the elevator’s display as it ticks upward. Eight, nine, ten. He says, “They’re on his computer. He’s got his own personal server where he stores his most confidential information. It was upgraded last year and can’t be accessed remotely. I have to be at his desk.”
“But once you’re there, you’ll be able to find it, right?”
“Should be.” He throws me a smile that tightens too much at the corners to be truly confident. “I’m the one who set the server up for him.”
The elevator dings at the fifteenth floor and the doors slide open. We don’t exactly run up the hall, but we certainly don’t linger either. It’s only as we’re ten steps away that I realize we aren’t in some long office hall like I’m used to at Ziro Labs. The whole floor is glass. Walls, ceiling, even the floor is glass that looks down at the level below, which is some kind of vast white box with no furniture.
“What is this?” I ask.
“Told you he was a paranoid bastard,” Jasper says. “The glass is all bulletproof, but he thinks the white room means he’ll see the attackers coming before they can get to him.”
“Who would attack him here?”
He winks. “That’s the paranoia.”
