“So what you’re saying is we just walk away?”
“—and live to fight another day. That’s what we do in a situation like this. Otherwise, nobody pays but us.”
Liz took a few beats to process everything he’d just said. She didn’t want to admit it, but his answer made sense. Yet her heart hated every one of his words more than the devil himself. Even if Bishop had more experience, she still didn’t like what his plan meant.
Bishop latched onto her arm, jolting her back to reality. “You with me, Doc?”
She nodded, but continued to ponder, wanting to make sure she got this right. She knew he was correct about one thing—they needed a plan to make sure the payback happened. Otherwise, everyone died for no reason.
She brought her eyes up to his. “Okay, I get all that, but I want your promise, Bishop. We don’t stop until we make them all pay. For the children and their families.”
Bishop took a few beats, his eyes indicating he was about to answer. “Sure, Doc. For the children. You have my word. But first, we need to stay alive and go find the others. It’s the only way any of this works. We’ll get another chance, but we have to be smart and patient. Get help.”
“Fine,” she answered, holding back the rest of what she wanted to say about thinking he’d never agree with her.
Bishop continued, “But the problem is, I’d bet my last dollar they’ll be guarding the vault doors. Probably heavily, too. In teams. Layered inside and out. That’s how I’d do it. Cover their six.”
“Well then, the answer is simple. Get me a gun.”
“I appreciate that, Doc. But no chance in hell that’s ever going to happen.”
“Trust me, I can shoot.”
“I’m sure you can, but that’s not the point. We’ll never get through them all. Even if you are a crack shot with fifty confirmed kills, the two of us have no chance. And I mean zero chance. Not with only one way in or out. We’ll never make them pay, not by going all Rambo on their asses in a narrow corridor like that.”
Liz paused when a new idea shot forward in her mind, from the deepest recesses of her memories. “Hey, wait a minute. I just remembered something.”
“Okay, but make it quick. We’ve been here too long as it is.”
She brought her arm up and aimed an index finger over his left shoulder, at an area along the wall about ten feet behind him. “You see that tarp covering the round thing?”
Bishop whirled his neck around and peered in the direction she pointed. “Yeah, so?”
“That’s the hatch to the airshaft. It leads to the surface.”
“Okay, but—”
“If I remember right, there’s a ladder inside. For emergencies. I’d say this qualifies, wouldn’t you?”
He brought his focus back with his eyebrows pinched, looking almost pissed. “Why didn’t you tell me this before?”
“Forgot it was there.”
“Really? And you were just ragging on me?”
“Sorry, Edison told me about it a long time ago. Just forgot, that’s all. I think only he, Summer, and I know about it.”
He shrugged, looking beaten and battered. “If not, we’ll be walking right into a trap.”
Liz scooted past him on her hands and knees. “Let’s just hope it still opens. Come on.”
* * *
“Well, would you look at that?” Craven said to Wilma Rice, giving her the binoculars he’d brought to the top of the observation hill.
“What?” she asked, putting them to her face, aiming them at the barn down below.
“On the left there. Just coming out the double doors.”
“Oh, I see,” Wilma said. “That’s Fletcher and his crew.”
“Did you notice who’s with them?”
She paused, adjusting the focus on the binoculars. “Those are ours, right?”
“The very same.”
“At least we know what happened to them now,” Wilma answered. “Looks like a couple are missing.”
“Might have gotten caught in the crossfire.”
Wilma took the binoculars from her eyes and said, “Or just fought back.”
“Well, there is that. Like all females, they are a little temperamental.”
“If you say so, boss.”
“And let’s not forget unpredictable.”
“I’ll agree with you there. But not just the females—the males as well.”
Craven nodded. “The question is, how did they get there?”
“Edison must have found them somehow,” she said. “Do you think he was doing research on them?”
“Wouldn’t put it past him. Though somehow I doubt it. Would go against his agrarian ways, always thinking compassion first for everyone. He was probably giving them shelter and food, then trying to teach them to sing Amazing Grace or some shit like that. ”
Wilma gave him the binoculars back. “Do we follow them and wait for our chance to steal them back?”
“Fletcher will be expecting that, at least eventually, or they’ll want to trade for them, thinking they are valuable. Which is precisely why we do the opposite.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t follow, sir.”
“We stay right here. If my calculations are correct, our best move is to wait until they roll out, then we roll in. Once we’re sure it’s safe to do so, that is.”
“What about resistance inside?”
“If I know Fletcher, and I think I do, there shouldn’t be any. He took care of all of that for us.”
“Which, I take, is what you’d hoped would happen when you set this all in motion. Even before the latest adjustments.”
Craven slapped Wilma on the shoulder blade, feeling a swell of pride fill his insides. “Sometimes a plan just comes together.”
She cleared her throat. “Of course, we’re assuming Fletcher didn’t take Edison’s tech with him.”
“I doubt he would even know what he was looking at.”
“No, probably not. Let alone realize what that advanced solar tech would mean.”
“Or the other goodies Edison’s been working on. Men like Fletcher only focus on the task at hand. As in the immediate. They never think three-dimensionally or look at the greater picture. It’s called myopic intention.”
“That’s an interesting term.”
“Yeah, but it fits.”
“Can’t argue with you there.”
“He’s either heading back to his camp with the females for God knows what, or he’s taking off for the others—”
“—to finish them all off once and for all.”
“Yes, all of this is completely and totally predictable. Like a moth to a flame. Kill first, then ask the important questions later.”
“If ever.”
“Yes, Rice, if ever.”
“Which is why you didn’t want to follow Summer and the others earlier. I think I’m starting to understand, sir.”
“Yes, stoke the fire and then sit back and let them do the work for you. Then step in and take what you want, all without lifting a finger.”
Wilma nodded. “If they are going after the others, it’s going to take a while with how heavy they’re loading their transports.”