“Sorry,” they both murmured, exchanging a contrite glance. Clearly, Zina was inwork mode– Trent had seen it before.
“If you want something to do, grab me that sequencer from the bag,” Zina said after a moment, as more code squiggled across both laptop screens. “I don’t need it just yet, but I want to try something out.”
“Right,” Trent said, nodding, before going to the bag Rhys had brought up from the truck. The sequencer was a small, smooth, black box – Trent wasn’t sure what Zina was planning to use it for, but right now, he knew better than to ask.
“Thanks,” Zina said absently as she took it from him, sorting through the collection of cables she’d pulled out earlier, until she found the one she was looking for. “All going well, I should know if I’m in in a second or two.”
Trent stood back, watching the screens, his shoulders tensing. Zina was chewing on her lower lip as she watched whatever code she’d been manically writing compile. And then, the laptop screen went blank.
Is that bad?Trent wanted to ask – but he managed to hold himself back and wait until Zina reacted. She didn’t, though… not at least until something new flashed up on the screen, a sleek, modern graphical user interface with Hargreaves’s slick corporate logo behind it.
Zina breathed out, long and slow. “Okay. I’m in.”
Trent leaned forward, unable to help himself. “So… what now?”
“Hmm.” Zina clicked on one of the icons. “They don’t leave the details of their egg hoarding program just lying around. I’ll have to do a little digging. But… that was surprisingly easy, I gotta say.”
Trent glanced at her. “Easy in a bad way?”
“Hard to say.” Zina’s voice was a little distant as she typed commands into a search field. “They put in a few more tricks and traps than the last time I did this, probablybecauseI was able to do it. But nothing I couldn’t handle. Maybe they were just meant as stopgap measures until they could come up with something more permanent. If I know Hargreaves techbros though, they would have beensteamingsomeone got through their security.”
“I guess you’re just that good,” Trent murmured, looking down at her and feeling a swell of affection.Smart. Beautiful. Amazing. Talented. Funny… well, not that funny. But her bad jokes just make her all the more adorable.
Zina flashed him a quick smile as she typed. “Maybe I am.”
At the sight of her smile, Trent suddenly felt his kangaroo sitting up and flickering its ears, clearlyveryinterested.
Oh, you’re back, are you?he asked it, as it yawned widely and scratched its chest with one clawed forepaw.Welcome home.
I would not have gone anywhere if you hadn’t sent me away,the kangaroo said, sounding mortally offended.Why was I sent away? Especially at a time when our mate needed us the most?
Sorry buddy, it wasn’t personal,Trent told it, genuinely contrite.It was just the need of the moment.
The kangaroo didnotseem best pleased with that explanation, but at least it didn’t try to argue with him anymore – instead, it simply looked away in disgust. Which was how Trent knew it wasreallypissed off.
Well, it’d just have to get over it, Trent thought, as Zina rapidly typed in a few more lines and then said, “I got it. I think.”
Leaning down, Trent found himself looking at a map, with a satellite photo next to it. “This is where Hargreaves have their claim?”
Zina nodded. “Looks like it. Quick, take down these co-ordinates.”
Trent grabbed a pen and paper as Zina read out a series of latitudes and longitudes, and Hector did the same, so they’d have something to verify them against.
“That’s a lot of area,” Hector said, studying them, once Zina had finished reading them out. “Alotof area.”
“They probably don’t know exactly where to –” Zina started to say, before the laptop screen blinked once, and then went completely black. “Oh. Huh.”
Picking it up, Zina shook it. Then she shook her head, dropping it back to the table with athud.
“Sorry. It’s bricked. They must’ve figured out someone was nosing around in their system. Whatever bricked the laptop will be automated, but it will have sent an alert to whoever’s monitoring the system. We probably don’t have a lot of time. And, like you said, that’s a lot of area to cover.”
“And probably heavily guarded as well,” Hector said grimly. “But between us, we’ve probably got enough to cover it. Two griffins, a marsupial lion, a kangaroo and… well, what do you shift into, Zina?”
“An antelope,” she said, with a small grin. “Not much firepower, but I’m pretty fast.”
“Then I think the next thing we should do is come up with some kind of strategy for how to find the opening to Hargreaves’s mine, get that egg out of there, and then get the fuck out of here,” Hector said, nodding.
“Wow,” Zina said. “Are all Aussie men this eloquent, or just you?”
