Cat’s little speech, bordering on silly, nevertheless had the right effect on Elna. Just deal with it. Of course. She took a deep breath, held it for a second, then let it out slowly. Much of the shock and strangeness went with it.
“You’re right,” she said. “Thanks for talking sense to me. Show me the camera room, please.”
“Follow me,” Cat said, limping across the room toward the short hallway that led to the control room.
Dr. Ruzka shouted at them from the barracks room. “Don’t walk too much on that bad hip! It needs to heal!”
“Yeah, yeah, I hear you, Doc,” Cat replied, waving a hand at her.
Elna and Malin followed Cat down the short hall to a door near the back. She shouldered it open, revealing a space little bigger than a closet with a couple of chairs in front of a bank of old CRT screens. A single fluorescent light flickered from the ceiling. Cat eased herself down into one of the chairs and patted the other one.
“Let’s turn these on and see what’s going on around here,” she said, flicking a row of switches.
As Elna sat down beside her, she heard the faint, high whine of the old screens warming up. Malin stood behind them, though there was barely enough room between the backs of the chairs and the wall. As the images appeared, Elna’s sense of disquiet returned. She saw views of places all over the island that she recognized: the fishing dock from a high view, the causeway somewhere close to the vineyard sign, the lighthouse, the rocky western shore of the island, and so many more places.
“Where the heck are all of these cameras?” she said.
“High in trees, from the look of it,” Cat replied, wincing as she leaned back in her chair. “Inside fake rocks. All over the place. The government spooks are pretty good at hiding cameras. Hey, we didn’t do this. This is probably NSA work.”
“Private property doesn’t seem to mean much to them,” Malin noted. He sounded more upset than freaked out.
“You just figured that out?” Cat said with a little bark of a laugh. “We’re all in it now, friend. Let’s stop whining and have a look for your friends.” She swept her hand at the row of cameras. “Look real close.”
Elna leaned forward and began to study the screens. Unfortunately, they weren’t high-resolution images. She saw trees swaying in the wind, waves crashing against rocks, island birds flitting about, a small fox rushing up the dirt road. On another screen, she saw the back of the guesthouse. Somehow, this seemed more invasive than anything else, and she fought a moment of rage.
Stay on task, she told herself.
Sudden movement on one of the screens caught her attention. The camera was pointed down a hill toward a rocky shoreline somewhere on the west side of the island, but a small pale object had moved into a corner of the screen. It was some kind of small military patrol boat. It swept right up to the rocks and came to a stop, and armed men began piling out of it. They were dressed all in black, with black hats and black tactical vests. Each bore a rifle, and some had packs. As they stepped among the rocks, they began to fan out along the shore in pairs, moving in what was clearly a coordinated effort. Elna counted a dozen of them.
“These are not militiamen,” she said.
Cat leaned forward in her seat, her dark eyes getting wider and wider. “No, these guys are worse. Mercs. My guess is they anchored the big schooner out at sea somewhere and used a smaller boat to come ashore. I’d better tell the staff sergeant.” She pushed herself out of her chair with a loud groan and hobbled out of the room.
Seeing these strange men marching onto the island filled Elna was an icy dread. This was worse than the bunker, worse than the cameras. This was a real invasion. The men moved with purpose, a well-coordinated group. She tracked some of the groups from screen to screen.
“They seem to be looking for something,” Malin noted.
“Yeah, us,” Elna replied.
As the soldiers fanned out in pairs, they seemed to be looking low, peeking behind trees and rocks. They were like men on a treasure hunt, as if they thought pirate treasure had been buried somewhere on the island.
Prig, Spence, Fish, and Cat all appeared then, trying to crowd into the room but mostly getting jammed together in the open door. Prig pushed past the others and leaned in close to the screens, moving back and forth.
“What are they looking for?” Elna asked.
“This place,” Prig replied, making a little spinning motion over his head. His demeanor had changed. The glint, the slight smile, all gone. He was severe and sharp-eyed, a sheen of sweat on his forehead.
Something about his answer bothered Elna, but it took her a second to articulate it. “They’re looking for this place…why, exactly? So they can use your communication equipment for some reason? Why would an armed group like this—mercenaries—raid an island to get into the communications room?”
She stared hard at Prig. He didn’t answer, his blank gaze fixed on the screens. However, Elna thought the other Marines looked suddenly uncomfortable. Spence was fiddling with an empty Mentos wrapper, twisting it around his fingers until it ripped in two.
“Sir, can’t you just tell them,” Cat said. “I mean, it’s not exactly normal circumstances here, and they did join you on the last mission. Heck, they were under fire with you and everything. Led you right
