Saint nods and heads out the door.
When Gray sidles up to me and winks, I hiss in his ear, “Was this you?”
“Nope.” He shrugs. “Saint picks his own teams.”
The drone of voices in the war room dies when Teriq and Saint start the briefing. I’m sitting next to Neema, whose body language is oozing with thinly veiled acrimony. She doesn’t think I belong on this mission. That much is clear.
“According to our intel, General Redden has approved the transfer of the Modified prisoners serving a labor sentence in the Ice Canyon salt mine. In two days, some will be relocated to the mine in Ward K,but not all of them. We believe the ones who are left behind will likely face the firing squad.” Teriq’s tone takes on a grim note. “There are currently forty-two Mods in Ice Canyon. We’re getting them out tonight.”
Tonight?
I note a few shocked reactions, and I’m glad to see I’m not the only one startled. This doesn’t seem like enough time to plan a foolproof rescue.
Teriq turns to the holoscreen that takes up the entire wall behind him, projecting a map of Ice Canyon and the mining facilities. He talks us through it. The red dots indicate the guard towers. The red lines mark the path of the guards who walk the perimeter. He points out a yellow section near a tunnel on the facility’s eastern side, explaining that it represents a force field.
“Our intel says it hasn’t been operational for a while,” he says. “Requires too much power to keep it up. This tunnel is used for supply convoys. It’s empty the rest of the time.”
Saint steps forward. “We’re breaking off into two teams for this—extraction and diversion. Extraction, you’re with Teriq. You’ll be briefed shortly. Diversion, you’re mine.” He glances at our side of the table, the five of us whom he chose for his team. “Diversion team will infiltrate the canyon from the eastern cliffs. We’re parachuting in. Luisa will fly us to the drop zone, where we’ll rendezvous with Declan from Bramble Base. He’ll have transportation ready for us on the ground.”
Declan was my first contact from the network when I arrived in Sanctum Point to try to save Uncle Jim from execution. I liked him. He seemed competent.
“Diversion will be split into two squads—attack and decoy.” Saint’s gaze lands on me and Neema. “Darlington and Sharma, you’ll be on the decoy squad with Declan. The rest of you are with me.”
Great. I’m with Neema.
From her deep scowl, I can tell she’s not thrilled to be paired with me, either.
Saint runs a finger over the holoscreen, and the greenish-white particles seem to dance in the air. “Decoy team, your objective is toset charges at the mouth of the tunnel here—” He draws an X on the map. “Darlington, you’ll be covering Declan and Neema while they plant the explosives.”
I nod in a silentyes, sir.
“The attack team will create the bigger diversion,” Saint says. “There’ll be a truck waiting for us at the drop zone, outfitted to look like a supply convoy. We need to get close enough to the security perimeter and then unleash the heat. The goal is to draw all the guards to the mine itself, leaving a hole in the security at the barracks. They need to believe we’re blowing up the mine.”
Orin speaks up, bushy eyebrows raised. “Why not just blow up the mine?”
“Because it’s one of two operational salt mines on the Continent,” Teriq answers. “In other words, a resource we can’t afford to lose.”
“What kind of security are we dealing with?” That comes from Henley, who’s leaning back in his chair, lazy and unbothered, as if he’s playing cards with friends.
“Assault team, we’re looking at six soldiers on three-hour shifts walking the perimeter. We’ll go in right after their shift change. That’ll buy us some time.” Saint traces a line on the map, near the tunnel. “Decoy team—according to our intel, there are usually no more than two guards posted at the entrance of the supply tunnel, and never any at the egress because they’ve always relied on the force field, and they haven’t bothered padding the security after they shut the field down. The tunnel guards rotate around every hour, but our source says they tend to get complacent.”
“How hard do you want the attack team to go?” Henley asks.
“Hard enough,” Saint says. “We want to keep the guards focused on us. The more noise we make, the more time we buy for the extraction crew. Luisa will provide air support for us.”
Teriq takes over the briefing. “While Saint’s team is creating our diversion, the extraction team will move. We’ve been fed intel from prisoners at the camp for years, so we know how the Company runs it. Security is performed by Copper Block, which bodes well for us. Our training is superior in every way. What they do have going for them is a constantly shifting routine.”
He’s not wrong about that. The Command is good at keeping people on their toes. I saw that firsthand in Silver Block.
“While diversion does their thing, extraction will hit the barracks from the west.” He swipes the screen, and the map dissolves to a close-up of the prisoners’ living quarters. “Women’s barracks here. Men over here.” He draws an X on each, then draws a line toward another point on the map. “It’s five hundred meters from the barracks to the delivery gate. Two miles from there to the pickup zone.”
“No runway?” someone asks with a frown.
“I’m taking the transport hover,” Gray says. “It’s capable of carrying that load and doesn’t require a runway.”
“We have people on the inside who’ll get the prisoners into position,” Teriq says. “The barracks are locked at night, so we’ll need to bypass the locks and release them. Ryker can do that remotely.”
“Not entirely remotely,” corrects the tech guy Teriq chose for his team. “I’ll need to be within two hundred meters.”
