Gretchen felt like a big sign hung over her head and flashed 'Guilty! Guilty!' as they emerged with the crate into the bright sunlight and steered it toward the van. Ben tapped his ear and muttered to empty air while Gretchen and Lucia opened the van doors.
An alarm sounded just as they got the crate inside.
Douglas Markovi sat in his office and fumed. This stupid glitch had so far cost him an entire day's work, and it would show on the weekly statement. No doubt HQ would blame him for the whole thing and it would probably cut into his bonus, all because that goddammed bitch of a technician hadn't done her job right. He'd have to talk to legal about that, see what damages they could recover from Compulink. Meanwhile, maybe they could set up some lights in the cacao groves, get the hands off their lazy asses this evening and get some honest labor out of- An alarm blasted through the room. Markovi jumped.
'Attention! Attention!' barked the computer. 'A hand has left the boundaries of Sunnytree Farm. Attention! Attention! A hand has left-'
Markovi waved a frantic hand over his desk computer and the holographic screen popped up. The alarm continued to blare. 'Billy, close down the exits and show me which hand has left the farm. And shut off that goddammed noise!'
The alarm instantly shut off. 'All hands are accounted for,' the computer said.
'What? But you just said someone had left.'
'Please restate request.'
Markovi ground his teeth. 'Billy, explain the inconsistency in the last two reports.'
'No inconsistency found. All hands are accounted for.'
The vidscreen chimed and flashed the words Incoming Call. Markovi tapped his desk. Alex appeared on the wall looking worried. 'What's going on boss? Did someone go AWOL?'
'That's what I'm trying to figure out,' Markovi snarled. 'Get your ass down to the quarters with Joe and do a physical head count. I want everyone-'
He was cut off from another blast of alarm noise. 'Attention! Attention! A hand has left the boundaries of Sunnytree Farm. Attention! Attention!'
'Billy, shut the fuck up!' Markovi yelled, and the computer obeyed. 'Billy, run a count of all hands.'
'All hands are accounted for.'
'Billy, did any shackle bombs go off?'
'Negative.'
The vidscreen flashed another incoming call, and a moment later, one of the Compulink techs-the wimpy one who Markovi had yelled at earlier-appeared on it.
'What do you mean?' Markovi demanded. 'Does this have something to do with the alarm system?'
'How the hell did we get a goddammed virus?' Markovi barked. 'Our goddammed system is isolated.'
The tech shrugged. 'We can try to track it down for you, sir, since we're here.'
'It won't be our emergency rates, sir,' the tech said. 'We're already on the premises, so-'
'Attention! Attention! A hand has left the boundaries of Sunnytree Farm. Attention! Attention!'
'Shut up, Billy!' Markovi screamed. Then to the tech, 'Just fucking fix it!'
'Attention! Attention!'
Markovi had had it. 'Billy, shut up and take the hand alarm system off-line for ten minutes. No more.'
'Acknowledged.'
'Now get off your ass and get to work,' Markovi ordered. The tech nodded and vanished from the screen.
Ben poked his head into the van. 'Go!'
Lucia dePaolo muttered a quick prayer to Irfan and set to work, her white-scarred hands moving with swift, serene efficiency. The boy watched with both interest and trepidation as Lucia forced open the control panel on his wristband with a tiny pick and started on the electronic lock within. He stood inside the crate while Gretchen kept a lookout through the van window. His bands were newer than the ones she was used to picking, and they were going to take longer to work than she had thought.
'What if you make a mistake?' the boy whispered.
'I won't make a mistake,' she told him quietly. 'Just hold-' She broke off and stared at the band.
'Hold still?' the boy asked.
'Seven minutes left,' Gretchen said.
Lucia's face remained expressionless, belying the pang of fear that temporarily overwhelmed her usual calm. The wristband contained a small detonator-another new feature. These shackles would do more than shock. Any slave who left the boundaries of the farm would probably lose a hand and a foot-easily repairable if he were found quickly enough, and a one-footed slave wasn't likely to be running anywhere. The bombs would doubtless also go off if she didn't get the bands removed before the alarm system came back on-line and detected tampering. Lucia spent several precious seconds debating whether she should first remove the shackles or disarm the bombs.
Lucia took a deep breath and murmured a short mantra to restore her peace of mind. This was a simple puzzle, one she could solve with Irfan's help.
'Five minutes,' Gretchen said, then gasped. 'Oh shit-it's that Alex guy. He's coming over to the van.'
Wasting no movements, Lucia pushed the boy down into the crate and slid in after him. She fumbled around in the dark for a moment, pulled a flashlight from her belt, switched it on, and put it in her mouth. The boy huddled, scared and unhappy, on the floor of the crate as Lucia grabbed for his wrist again. Dim light, cramped quarters, time running out. Another deep, calming breath. Irfan was with her, everything would be fine.
'You guys seen Joe anywhere?' she heard Alex say.
'Not lately,' Ben said. 'Why?'
'I can't raise him.' Alex paused. 'Aren't you supposed to be working on the computer virus?'
'Nancy's already gotten started,' Ben said. 'She'll have the alarm system cleared up pretty quick, so Denise and I came back here for the program disks we'll use to check the rest of the system.' His voice got louder. 'You did bring them, didn't you, Denise?'
'There in here somewhere,' Gretchen shot back. 'Probably won't take more than three minutes to find them.'
Lucia pressed another section of the lock with her electric stylus and the wristband popped open. Lucia caught it just before it thudded to the floor of the crate. Mouth dry as a raisin, she reached for the boy's ankleband. This one should be easier since she now knew the lock mechanism better, but she had little time, so little time. The boy was shaking noticeably. He had to know about the shackle bombs. Telling the slaves about such a thing would be a powerful deterrent against escape.
For a moment Lucia considered stage-whispering to Gretchen that she needed more time, that Ben should contact Markovi and tell him to keep the alarm system off-line for a few more minutes. Then she realized that as 'Nancy' she was supposed to be working on the computers in the equipment barn and there was no way Gretchen or Ben could know that she needed more minutes. Activating her earpiece and explaining to Ben over the radio, as 'Nancy' would have done, would eat up too much time.
'Two minutes,' Gretchen murmured.
The ankleband came off.
'Done!' she said hoarsely. 'Go!'
'Those disks aren't here,' Gretchen said loudly. 'We'll have to go back and get them while Nancy finishes up. It'll only take a minute.'
'Better go,' Ben said, presumably to Alex. 'Time is money, after all.'
Lucia poked her head cautiously out of the crate in time to see Ben all but leap into the driver's seat. He slammed the door and drove away as quickly as he dared. Just as the van was about to round the first bend in the driveway, Lucia caught sight of a figure through the van's tinted rear windows. It was a man, and he was staggering as if drunk.
'Who's that?' she said, pointing.
Gretchen glanced out the window. 'Shit! It's Joe. He can't call for help because I took his earpiece, but once someone sees him-'
Ben floored it. The van careened around the driveway curves beneath the dark shade of the cacao trees. Lucia's heart was in her throat, and no amount of deep breathing slowed its pounding. How long would it take Joe
