In walked Major Hewitt Barnes from the Belt Station.
“We can begin.” Octavia pointed at Frank. “Would you do the honors?”
“Follow me.” Frank walked up a set of metal stairs at the end of the office.
Once we were on the second story, we lined along a panoramic window, overseeing the entire main manufacturing facility warehouse. It was full of welding sparks and hundreds of robotic arms, each producing an imperative step in the building of our fleet.
Frank glanced at me and quickly looked away. “This is Mars. Sage is hosting the production of Earth’s defense forces.”
“With the assistance of the other Corporations,” Octavia added.
“Of course.” Frank clearly hated being corrected. He glowered and continued. “We’re working on building twenty Defenders.”
“How are we going to stop the Squids? We witnessed how easily they destroyed your Defenders,” Eclipse said.
“Those were early iterations, and we’ve had the best minds on this since the day we returned,” Octavia answered for the CEO. “They have a triple-layer energy flip.”
“Won’t that cut the power of the Cores in half?” Jade asked.
“Good point. We figure that the Defenders will be in position at imperative postings, so the need for speed will be less important than defense,” Octavia said.
“Meaning we’ll draw them in, instead of us going to them?” Luther inquired.
Major Hewitt Barnes cleared his throat, and Octavia motioned for him to speak. “We don’t know how they’re going to reach Earth. It’s possible they needed a gateway to travel to our solar system. That was destroyed in their initial attempt, suggesting it might take them years to gather enough drones and fly them here before we have to worry about an invasion.”
“Or they already recruited backup and are weeks from arrival,” I mumbled.
“That’s a theory as well, but judging from the footage I’ve watched of Preston Lewis’ statements, we feel that he didn’t expect anyone to be able to breach the gateway like you did. If it wasn’t for Pilgrim’s quick thinking with the Hub Core that powered the Race rings, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.” Barnes peered at me, then at Jade.
“Okay. We’ve established it might be years before they’re back, but what if we’re wrong?” Luther pressed.
“We’re building the fleet as quickly as we can,” Frank advised us. “We also have a surprise. If you’d follow me.” His grin was uncharacteristic, and I was prepared for anything as we took another set of stairs, these ones leading to the warehouse floor.
We were each provided ear protection caps. They fit over our ears with ease, and once you pushed the button on their sides, they conformed to make the perfect seal. Everything went nearly silent. Frank spoke, and I picked up his voice through the magic of technology.
“This is our top-secret project. You’ve provided your thumbprints of confidentiality, and that means you cannot speak of it outside our Defense group.” Frank walked over to the edge of the warehouse, where something sat covered by a giant black cloth. His assistant went to it and waited for Frank to give him the word. “The Racers captured one of the Velibar flyers, and we’ve managed to gather some very pertinent information about our enemies. Hans, remove it.”
The cloth pulled off, sliding to the floor, and we all gasped. Underneath it sat a flyer, just like the ones we’d been digitally using as target practice near the moon. Varn was the first to its hull, setting his palm on it. “Is this the one we captured?”
Frank’s smile grew. “We’ve made an exact replica.”
“What?” Luther barked. “We’re making Velibar ships?”
“What’s the best strategy for a wolf to hunt sheep?” Frank asked.
“Dress in sheep’s clothing,” I answered.
“Precisely.” Frank clapped his hands together. “We’re going to have hundreds of them in the fleet. Each identified for our own people, of course, but imagine the surprise on the Velibars’ faces when they realize what’s happened. It will be our greatest trick, and we’ll only have one shot at it. Do not spoil this bombshell.”
“We’ve also managed to pull some interesting information from the database. There are schematics rooted inside, but our teams have been able to extract it from their system.” Octavia pulled her PersaTab out, rotating it to show us an image.
“Is that a Squid?” Jade asked.
She nodded and closed the program. “It is. We’re attempting to duplicate it. Worst case, we have valuable information about their shields and weapon systems. I hope it’s years before come, because it may take that long to replicate something so large and intricate.”
“And if they come next week?” Jade asked.
Octavia glanced at her sister, then at Frank. “We die.”
Everyone appeared solemn at the thought.
Frank walked away. “Let’s continue.”
He showed us ten different stations for weapons, shields, and spacecraft manufacturing, and finally, we ended back up in his office, seated around a table where he brought up video feeds of the Defenders in the space stations above Mars.
Considering it had only been two months, I was doubly impressed with how far we’d gone.
Frank ordered Hans to retrieve some refreshments, and I leaned my elbows on the table as everyone broke into private chats. “Varn, where’s your team?”
“They backed out,” he sighed.
“Are you kidding me?” I questioned, too loudly, apparently. Everyone stopped what they were reviewing to stare at me.
“I discussed the plan, and none of them wanted to leave their families behind. If you ask me, no one has the stomach for adventure these days.” Varn fidgeted with his water glass.
“Maybe we should contemplate bringing another Racer with us, Octavia,” Luther suggested. “Luna was pushing for Captain Nebu to join our mission to Refuge.”
Varn rose and jabbed a finger at Luther. “I’m going, and that’s that. Did you see how well we worked together against the Velibar the first time? I was close to winning the Race. We all know that Killer’s my Racer, not those wannabes. I’ll secure another crew.”
I appreciated his enthusiasm. “I have a few suggestions.”
They waited for me to list the names.
____________
“Are you certain this is such a
