Chapter 12
Chapter Twelve
The phoenix was dying faster than Ben had anticipated.
Rebecca had given him a new watch to replace the one Rosenthal’s guards had confiscated, and he checked it now as they moved through the forest. A little past twelve-thirty in the afternoon.
Their small group had been traveling for three hours, and the creature’s corruption had advanced the entire time.
The contamination had progressed beyond ninety percent, well past the threshold where any previous guardian would have attempted intervention.
But Sidney wasn’t one of those previous guardians.
He adjusted his grip on the makeshift stretcher they’d fashioned from a tarp and branches cut from the Douglas firs that surround the safe house.
Rebecca Morse carried the front end and moved with the easy stride of someone who’d handled worse cargo in worse conditions.
Sidney walked beside them with one hand resting on the phoenix’s side, her face pale and drawn.
She’d barely eaten this morning despite insisting that everyone else should get some food in them before they set out, and her electromagnetic signature was muted in a way that worried him.
No point in bringing it up, though. She’d only tell him she was fine.
The dimensional burns on her arms had stopped oozing. The iridescent scabbing had hardened into something that looked almost like scales and caught the filtered sunlight in ways that shouldn’t have been possible. He tried not to think too hard about whether those marks would be permanent.
He didn’t want to believe she would carry forever the cost of saving him.
“Rest stop,” Rebecca called back from the front of the stretcher, her voice soft, as if she understood they needed to guard everything they said out here. “Five minutes.”
They lowered the phoenix carefully to the ground. The clearing they’d stopped in let some pale sun break through the canopy, but Ben couldn’t let himself be too cheered by its presence.
The phoenix made a soft sound that might have been pain or exhaustion. Its wings, once magnificent even when contaminated, hung limp at its sides. Those terrible shadow veins had spread to cover everything except a small patch of clean fire around its heart.
Sidney knelt beside it and pressed both hands against the one remaining clean spot. Ben watched her close her eyes and reach out with those strange inner abilities, checking the creature’s condition. After a moment, her shoulders sagged.
“It can’t fly anymore.” She didn’t open her eyes, but only continued, “The corruption’s reached its wing muscles. Even if we put it down and told it to go, it couldn’t.”
“How much time do we have?” Rebecca asked. Before leaving the safe house, she’d studied their route on her tablet, but now she seemed to be going from memory alone.
“A few hours. Maybe three or four at the most before the corruption hits its heart.” Sidney finally opened her eyes. Tears tracked through the smudges on her face. “After that, the creature will die whether we’ve reached the portal or not.”
Ben knelt beside her and found her shoulder with his hand. He could feel her exhaustion through their connection, her fear and her desperate determination to save this creature that had suffered so much. He squeezed gently and offered what comfort he could, even while knowing it wouldn’t be enough.
“Then we’ll keep moving,” he said. “We’re making good time. Another three hours should get us close to the portal site.”
“Close isn’t good enough.” Sidney wiped her eyes with her sleeve and left behind smudges of dirt and ash. “We need to be at the exact location. The portal’s energy is what will sustain the rebirth ritual. If we’re even fifty yards off, the merge will fail.”
Rebecca’s expression turned thoughtful. “I think I can get the exact coordinates. Eric Hargrove should have access to all of Rosenthal’s survey data.”
Next to Ben, Sidney went still. “The man whose artificial portal is a big part of our problem.”
Rebecca’s shoulders lifted in a small shrug. “People aren’t simple, Sidney. Yes, Eric Hargrove has made mistakes, but he’s trying to fix them now. I know him better than you do.”
Something about the way she said those words made Ben wonder if there was more going on between her and the scientist than simply being united against Rosenthal.
There had been a slight softening in her tone, accompanied by a certain shift in the set of her mouth.
Small tells, but he didn’t think he was imagining them.
Not that it mattered right now. He didn’t care if Rebecca Morse and Eric Hargrove had been doing the horizontal mambo at every cheap motel between here and Portland. The only thing that mattered was whether the information Hargrove had passed on remained valid.
Sidney’s jaw stayed tight with anger, but she seemed to decide there wasn’t much point in arguing. She gave a single curt nod.
“Anyway,” Rebecca went on, “he’s been documenting everything he can. Every experiment, every protocol violation, every time Rosenthal pushed the system past the safety parameters he and the other scientists set up. When this is over, his testimony should be enough to shut down DAPI completely.”
“If we survive to make use of that testimony,” Sidney said.
Rebecca didn’t blink. “Yes, if we survive. Which is why we need to finalize our approach. Eric sent me updated reconnaissance information about twenty minutes ago. DAPI has forces positioned around the portal site. Not a full perimeter, but enough to make a direct approach difficult.”
She reached into her field jacket, brought out her tablet, and turned it so they could both see what she was talking about.
The map showed the portal’s location marked in red, with multiple blue dots scattered in a rough semicircle to the north and east. Ben counted at least fifteen positions, and there were probably more that weren’t showing on the basic tactical display.
“They’re expecting us,” Rebecca went on.
“This is an ambush formation, not a defensive perimeter. Rosenthal knows we need the portal to complete the ritual, and she’s betting you’ll go there despite the risk.
” She paused, then zoomed in further and highlighted a gap in the formation to the southwest. “Luckily for us, she can’t cover every approach.
This route follows a ravine system that’s too narrow for vehicle access.
If we move fast and quiet, we should be able to reach the portal before they realize we’ve slipped through. ”
Ben examined the route and narrowed his eyes. “Our route will be exposed for the last hundred yards. Once we clear the ravine, we’ll be visible from at least three of those positions.”
“Which is where the diversion comes in.” Rebecca pulled up another file, this one showing the schematics of the DAPI facility.
“Eric will trigger a catastrophic failure in the artificial portal’s containment systems. It won’t be enough to destroy the equipment, but it’ll still be sufficient to require an immediate response from most of Rosenthal’s teams.”
“When?” Sidney asked, frowning as she studied the tablet.
“Whenever we’re ready. He’s standing by, waiting for my signal.
” Rebecca closed the file. Her expression had turned more serious.
“But we’ll only get one shot at this. The moment Eric triggers the failure, Rosenthal will know someone’s sabotaging her operation from the inside.
She’ll lock down the facility and start searching for the leak.
He’ll have maybe thirty minutes before they find him. ”
Sidney repeated the words, her tone thoughtful. “Thirty minutes.” She looked at the phoenix, its breathing shallow and labored, and gave a small nod. “That should be enough. If we’re in position when the diversion starts, we can reach the portal and begin the ritual before DAPI responds.”
Ben wanted to argue, wanted to point out all the ways this plan could fall apart. The exposed approach and the ambush positions were bad enough. Add to that Sidney’s depleted state and her complete vulnerability once she started the merge, and the odds weren’t good.
But they didn’t have any better options.
“What about the extraction?” he asked instead. “After the ritual, I mean. Assuming Sidney survives the merge and we complete the rebirth, how do we get out of there with DAPI forces converging on our position?”
Rebecca Morse was quiet for a moment, her expression troubled.
“I don’t have a good answer for that. The ritual will create an energy surge that should overload the artificial portal’s systems. That’s the whole point.
But that surge will also draw every DAPI agent within five miles directly to your location. ”
“So we’ll complete the ritual and then run like hell,” Sidney said. “We just have to hope that destroying the artificial portal will create enough chaos for us to slip away in the confusion.”
“That’s being a little optimistic, don’t you think?” Ben asked.
She crossed her arms and met his gaze. “Do you have a better plan? If you do, I’m all ears.”
He didn’t, and that was the problem. Every scenario he’d run through in his head since they’d left the cabin ended the same way.
Sidney vulnerable during the merge, DAPI forces closing in, and him trying to protect her with nothing but his determination and his electromagnetic compatibility with her abilities.
Those weren’t great odds.
“We should keep moving,” he said at last. “The longer we delay, the less time the phoenix has.”
Sidney sent him a knowing look but said nothing. Instead, she only nodded.