"We're on final approach to the insertion point," Jhondie said a matter of hours later. She'd been running low enough to avoid detection by radar, and with her vision was able to go without lights as soon as they got into the valley. Logan had given them a place on the border of Utah who would refuel without asking questions. Jhondie didn't say anything, but she knew the proprietor as someone who Eye's Only had helped about a year ago.
"Remote checking base, base you copy," Zack said into radio equipment that Logan had provided. The headsets were wireless, and had a built-in scrambler to keep someone from tracing it. Only a special chip could de-code what was being said.
"Base copies loud and clear," Zack heard Alicia say. "ETA?"
"ETA five minutes," Jhondie replied. This equipment was excellent. She used her enhanced vision to bring the ground closer, scanning for problems with their runway. It wasn't in the best condition, but there weren't any large rocks or cracks that could disable the plane. Justin would kill her if she messed up his ride.
They could all feel the adrenaline rush as the plane began to descend. This was it. They were going to get Bryn. All they could do was pray that their intelligence reports were accurate and that she was still there. The landing was rough, but Jhondie thought it was pretty good all things considering. She taxied onto a dirt road away from the main one. Alicia had said there was scrub brush in that area that could hide the plane.
There weren't really any trees around, but the brush would hide the plane from a ground search. Any further in and they might not be able to get the plane back out. The got out and checked their equipment. Everything was working great. They had all memorized the maps they needed, and now Zack mentally checked it before continuing on foot.
Jhondie and Max didn't know it, but Zack was wearing a tracking device. At Logan's, Alicia had it superimposed over a map so that she would know where they were. Logan wasn't too happy about it, but he knew better than to try and warn Max. He had to trust that Alicia wasn't setting them all up for a very nasty surprise.
Zack gave a hand gesture for Jhondie and Max to follow. It was strange how easy it was to follow his lead just like they had back at Manticore. They started to move carefully through the night to the tunnel entrance. After a fifteen-minute hike, it was there, right where Alicia said it would be. Zack made another signal, and he and Max took up guard positions while Jhondie started in on the security.
There was brush and the like in front, but that actually helped them. There was a camera, but the brush had long since grown over it, obscuring the view. Nobody knew about the tunnel, and who would want to go to the island anyways, so why take the time to fix it? There was a security system to boot. The trio silently blessed the complacency of idiots.
It was easy to get to the panel Alicia directed Jhondie to. She opened it, careful to first disconnect the warning signal that was supposed to go off if the cover was removed. She accessed the internal cameras, made them film for thirty seconds, and then put it on a loop. Some things just didn't change. She made a few cross connections and instead of the door opening, and other panel slid out. She mentally cursed. This was much harder than the systems she'd broken into over the last three years.
"It looks like a color-code system," she said to Alicia.
Alicia casually hacked into another A-1's personnel files that she knew of and pulled a list of codes. She'd done it a thousand times before just to see if she could, but never thought she would do it for real. They were just lucky that there wasn't a retinal scanner on this side. The Utah weather was too harsh for such delicate equipment. Once they got into the hospital, it was going to be a different story.
She gave the code to Jhondie who punched it in. Jhondie was starting to like having this X-6 on their side. She'd just saved them a few hours of decoding time. The door slid open. The tunnel behind was lit, and large enough to drive a car through. They were probably going to need one to get Bryn back. They knew it was going to be a ten-mile hike to get to the other end.
They started moving quickly. Zack made them pace themselves so that they would have plenty left to get them through. It took a little over two and a half hours at that pace, but they were doing good as they got to the end without incident. There was still several hours of dark left to get in and get to the objective.
They took a deep breath as Jhondie opened the other end of the tunnel. The two guards that were standing there nearly leapt out of their skins as it opened. They both drew down their rifles on the emerging trio. One had never seen the tunnel open before. Max stepped forward, trying not to play with her newly blonde hair. She'd never been a blonde before and now it was pretty weird. Still, she and Alicia had the same height and build, and with a few other small changes, the picture on the clearance could pass as an old one.
Max held out the clearance. "You never saw us," she said firmly, and started to walk on through. Alicia had explained to her about how to act with that kind of high clearance. You do whatever you want.
"Hey," said the younger of the two guards. "We have to see clearance on these two." Well, Alicia said you do what you want. Max backhanded the guard, sending him flying. She looked at the older one arrogantly.
"You want some clearance too?" she snapped. The guard had seen some weird kids like this before. He didn't know everything that was going on at the hospital, but he was very intelligent. There were kids with high clearance, and a mean streak. He'd accidentally seen one jump about twenty-five feet out of a tree once on the other side of the tunnel when he was trying to fix that broken camera. Whoever they were, whatever they were, you didn't mess with them.
"Don't need any, ma'am," he said. "Never seen any of you." It seemed the safest thing to say. The last thing he wanted was to tangle with an A-1 that could take him out in a second. He didn't want to know what they were doing on Antelope Island at one in the morning, and he didn't care. There were some things enlisted men just accepted. He tried not to watch as the two girls and the guy slipped onto the base.