CHAPTER 38 LEE
LEE WAS mostly prepared when Jed showed up outside Kat’s dorm room two days later.
Mostly.
“You sure you want him in here? We could totally use my dorm,” Lee said, when he heard the subtle knock pattern outside her door.
“I gave him the option. He was cool with setting up in here,” she said dismissively, brushing past him to let the cadet in.
“Of course he was.” Lee rolled his eyes. He didn’t bother stepping back to give Jed more space as the cadet’s tall, lanky form ducked in through the portal door after her.
Jed peered around Kat’s hurricane of a room, taking in the sweep of the blankets on her bed and her open closet, while Kat fluttered about, brushing things from her desk so that Jed could set up camp. “Whatever you need,” Kat said, motioning to her dorm room around them.
Lee restrained any commentary along the lines of, “but stay out of her stuff.” Because although he had that smug look in his eyes, the cadet had also agreed to help them, and Jed was one of few they could trust with this.
He dutifully got right to work. And by the time Lee came over to check out what he was doing, Jed had several holo-screens open and was starting work on a line of open code.
“So how’s this going to work?” Lee asked, mentally running through the various schematics they’d have to get past. “Do we walk in through the front doors there?”
“Basically,” Jed said. To which Lee actually did a double-take.
Kat flashed Lee an impressed grin. “I knew he’d be the best.”
“So your security clearance—you’ve got monster access, by the way—will get you through the Command wing doors.
From there, I’ve tacked on a bit of an extension that will get you access to each of the doors beyond that—including the Commander’s own personal suites.
” Here Jed paused, pulling up a schematic of the Command wing.
Kat’s eyes nearly bugged out at that as she glanced over to Lee as if to ask did you know that existed?
Lee hid his grin.
“From there, you will use what I am creating right now,” Jed continued, flicking back to the original hologram with the code. “Mocked it up last night, I am just dropping in the final touches. I trust you can find your way there alright?”
The schematics Jed had previously drawn up for them glowed in the confines of his mind. “We’ll manage.” Lee leaned in closer to better gauge the encryptions and the string of code he was working on. “It looks like it breaks through the current framework.” Lee squinted. “A key-code of sorts?”
“Exactly,” Jed nodded.
“Have you confirmed it will work with the Commander’s firewalls?”
“Don’t need to,” Jed said, leaning back in Kat’s chair.
“Her mainframe is set up the same as ours and is keyed to the user. Each of us have a unique key within the system that auto-scrambles and regurgitates any outside coding—for the case of instances such as these. I could probably figure out how to make it rehash so that it matches the fresh key-coding, but we would likely get flagged by security anyway.”
His confidence was borderline obnoxious—but Lee could also appreciate that. Kid was good and he knew it.
“How much time can you buy us?”
“You’ll have roughly ten minutes.” Jed considered this. “Maybe fifteen if I time the match right. But you’ll want to get out of there pretty quick. Any longer, and the system will recognize the breach, locking you out of the system and likely alerting our fair Commander of the outside intrusion.”
“Ten minutes.” Lee exhaled. “That will be tight.”
“We’ll make it count,” Kat assured him, nodding towards Jed. “We get in there, we get what we need, and we get out.”
They’d gotten very lucky, not just with having Jed on hand, but with finding the Commander away from her suites tonight.
It had taken the last couple of days, scanning the pipeline, with multiple trips down to the Commander’s private hangar to get any grasp on her schedule.
But when they learned of the off-ship council meeting happening tonight, it was now or never.
If it was ten minutes they had, it was ten minutes they would work with.
“Have you done this before?” Kat asked, to which Jed actually looked confused.
“No.” It was several seconds before Jed said anything more, while he fed the hologram he had opened up on his holoblock what Lee would guess were the breach-paths. “Just know my way around a mainframe,” he breathed.
“Okay, and what of the cameras?” Lee asked, as he adjusted first the shoulders of his suit, and then one of the buckles at his cuff.
It was almost time. He could feel the adrenaline already flowing through his veins.
This was sort of their last-ditch effort to find something they could use. And as soon as they said go…
“Offline when I say so.”
Lee nodded. “Good.”
Good. They could do this.
He walked through the plan once more in his head. He knew the micro-stakes. And with all the luck the cosmos had granted them, timing also appeared to be on their side, for once. And if anyone ever found out—well they would deny Jed’s involvement to the brief end of their Academy days and beyond.
But they wouldn’t be found out.
This was simple. And in—Lee glanced down at his hyperband, noting the time. In another, say, twenty or so minutes, it would all be another colorful memory of the past.
While Kat combed her hair back into a fresh ponytail, smoothing down the flyaways with her hands, Lee turned to Jed. He reached into his pocket, extending the thin band he’d been carrying around with him over the past few days.
“When you’re done here, if you don’t mind, do you think you could look into this?” he asked quietly. It was another last-minute project. Almost an afterthought, but Lee intended to leave no avenue unturned. Not when he and Kat were gambling their futures on it.
“These were created for radiation tracking purposes,” Jed said, frowning. But he also didn’t hesitate in accepting the band and rolling it delicately between his fingers. The familiarity of the weight and feel on the pads of his fingers was evident with the motion.
“I don’t need to remind you, but be very careful as you work on this,” he murmured over Jed’s shoulder.
“I’ll see what I can do,” Jed agreed, folding it into his hand, before slipping it discreetly into his pocket.
Jed tinkered with the code on his holoblock for another few minutes.
But Lee knew the moment the cadet gave his personal approval.
Knew by the way Jed sat back in his chair, posture still stiff, rubbing a hand along the hollows of his eyes, even as he continued to rove over the code, proofing, and reconfirming, going over it again and again in his mind.
Lee had little doubt it would do the trick.
“You ready?” Lee asked. And Kat spun back around to face them, face resolved with her vanilla ponytail whipping sharply behind her, and a fresh coat of liner. She flicked those fierce eyes up to him. It’s go time.
She grinned, white teeth flashing under the holograms’ glow.
He could see the nerves peeking through that smile, but that likely had very little to do with them flexing the rules tonight, and everything to do with the Commander’s office they flexed the rules around.
But Kat was ready, she always had been. Just needed to remember how to stand on those fighting legs of hers.
Lee’s hyperband buzzed.
“Just sent the code. That will reset the timetable and get you into the system. Watch the hour,” Jed said, sinking further into the chair back.
“Thanks,” Lee nodded, double-checking he had the code.
“Feel free to take off once it times out. Just wait until we’re offline?” Kat requested, then she turned back to Lee. “Shall we?”
“After you, m’lady.” But Lee looked back briefly to Jed. “Thanks. For everything.”
And with Jed’s quiet nod, Lee followed Kat out of her dorm.
“Remind me again what we ever had against him?” Lee murmured once they were no longer in sight of her dorm.
Kat snorted. “I believe you were the one who was cool on him. I’ve always liked Jed.”
“Fair.” Lee eyed her sidelong with a fresh appreciation, his eyes betraying him despite the urgency of their latest escapades as they honed in on her lips and the slip of her tongue, before her mouth bowed into a coy smile.
The titillating spark of danger dancing between them.
He’d always loved getting tangled into these scenarios with her.
He tabled that last thought. Something he could see to later…
They kept silent, the grates churning overhead as they took the stairways up past the PARC and over to the Command Wing.
Jed had confirmed the cameras would be off. But that wouldn’t stop any staff or cadets or loitering commanding secretaries who happened to be passing beyond these doors from physically spotting them…
“If anyone sees us, we act like she sent for us,” Lee said, more to himself than to Kat as he raised his hyperband to scan his upgraded security clearance at the doors.
“Here goes,” she breathed.
The doors split open.
They knew this next sequence of hallways that made up the beginning labyrinth of the Command wing well enough, thanks to all their trips to see Nolan. Lee could probably locate his office blindfolded. But as to locating the Commander’s suites…
A sea of unmarked doorways greeted them, with hallways branching off to either side, along with a central hallway that continued straight ahead.
Thanks to the schematics they had a general sense of direction; he was just grateful there were no actual figures present to witness their hesitancy as they continued onward.
On padded steps they passed the door Lee thought he recalled as being Command’s Assignment and Briefing, although his memory mucked about some of that.
The hallway opened up even wider as they continued on, the doors fewer and more spaced out. As they reached these larger rooms, Lee slowed his steps. They had to be close.
They drew up alongside the nearest doorway and Lee stopped and listened. He could hear the faint pulls of the air circulation draft, which made this one a staircase. “I’m guessing staff living quarters are up this way?”
“Which makes Commander Blanche’s suites one of these,” Kat breathed.
They studied the two doors up ahead. The suite where she kept her mainframe would be larger than most, the office of the current reigning Commander of the Academy. Lee stopped outside the door with the largest gap of space on either side of it. “I think it’s this one.”
Beside him, Kat sucked in a breath, her face a shade or two paler than usual. “Here goes,” she chirped, her words staccato in Lee’s eardrums.
When she didn’t make a move to scan her own hyperband, Lee lifted his to the plate, taking the half-step back to stand beside her.
This would work. Jed knew what he was doing. Still, he counted the milliseconds.
And then the door sprang open.
He ushered Kat forward, then they both slipped through the door, letting it close behind them.