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CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

The Ramp-up

To my immense disappointment, we didn’t get to attend the trials of the water dragons in person. Apparently, this had something to do with a nuclear submarine that was necessary for the demonstration, but whose precise whereabouts we weren’t allowed to know. The majors sent cars for us this time. Evelyn and I headed out the front door two minutes before our agreed-upon pickup time to find a large SUV waiting for us. No, not an SUV. A Humvee.

“Yes!” I hissed. I’d always wanted to ride in a Humvee.

Evelyn glanced up from her tablet. “They’re here already?”

“I guess in the military, early is on time.”

Two men in fatigues climbed out. They were young guys, maybe early twenties. Clean shaven and fit.

“Evelyn Chang and Noah Parker?” The guy from the passenger side reached us first. “I’m Sergeant Delgado.” He jerked his head over his shoulder. “That’s Corporal McGuire. He’ll be driving us.”

I really wanted to ask if Corporal McGuire was old enough to drive, but I also didn’t want to spend the trip in the trunk. If Humvees even had them.

“Thanks for the ride, Corporal,” Evelyn said.

“Our pleasure, ma’am.” Delgado opened the door for her.

I got a terse nod from McGuire as I jogged around the far side to let myself in, but that was about it. The door was so heavy, it barely moved on my first pull. I’d been spoiled with the Tesla’s power-assist doors. I put my back into it and got it open, then had to climb up to get onto the seat. This was made of sturdy polyester, and dull green in color like the rest of the sparse interior. The actual space inside was massive, though. Evelyn and I were separated by a steel table that had to be three feet wide.

Delgado produced a heavy metal container about the size of a shoebox and set it onto the console between us with a heavy thunk. He unlocked this with a key on his key ring and flipped the lid open. I was hoping for some sort of refreshments, but no, the thing was empty. “Please put your phones in the box.”

“Tablets, too?” Evelyn asked.

“Yes, ma’am.”

So what am I supposed to do while we drive? I didn’t ask. I put my tablet in first, and my phone second. At least I get to keep my—

“Is that a GPS watch?” Delgado asked me.

I suppressed a sigh, unstrapped my watch, and set it on top of my phone. “Good eye.”

“It’s in good hands, I promise.” He locked the box, lifted it back into the front, and set it down in the middle of the center console.

Evelyn looked a little bit frazzled to be without her tablet. She’d had that thing in hand pretty much since I’d met her, and I imagined that becoming CEO made it even more essential.

I gave her a smile. “Whose idea was this again?”

The ride was uneventful. I had to crane my neck down to get a good look out the window, but I tried not to do that too often. That was just asking to be blindfolded. Or tranquilized. Not that we should have bothered. Once we were on the highway, Delgado flipped a switch in the center console and suddenly the window glass went opaque.

I caught Evelyn’s attention and rolled my eyes at the glass. It was like staring at a plain white wall. Instinctively, I touched the glass, but it felt normal. Whatever caused the opaqueness wasn’t on this side.

It might even be a variant of the privacy mesh that protected Build-A-Dragon’s exterior windows from eavesdropping. Only this type could be turned on or off, whereas the RF shield had to be lowered into place.

Man, we really need this contract. Not just to save the company, but because the military had the coolest tech.

The drive lasted fifty-five minutes. I only noticed when the vehicle came to a full stop. McGuire, who hadn’t uttered a word since we’d started the journey, shut off the engine. I’d been lost in trying to visualize the marine dragon design and remember all the changes Wong and Korrapati had made to it. Which was hard to do; I’d gotten too used to our design programs and the biological simulator, all reachable through my hot-linked tablet. I used to make fun of Evelyn for keeping hers with her all the time, but now I understood. Without it I felt disconnected, and not in a good way.

Delgado climbed out and pulled open my door. Hot desert air washed over me as I climbed out. We were in an unmarked parking area completely enclosed in ten-foot fences. A three-story, glass-and-steel building occupied most of the fenced area. Similar in design to Build-A-Dragon’s headquarters, but something about the architecture gave it a utilitarian feel. Plus, there were several other Humvees and a tan transport truck parked in precise fashion along the near wall.

We followed our hosts along the edge of the structure to the southwest corner, where two panels slid apart at our approach. Behind them waited a steel door, a biometric access panel, and two not-so-subtle surveillance cameras that swiveled to follow our progress. Delgado used the panel while McGuire discreetly blocked our view with his body. There came a soft beep, and then the steel door swung inward.

We were in.


Five minutes later, we sat in comfortable chairs beside Major Johnson in a large conference room. A huge projection monitor occupied the far wall. Overhead lights illuminated the table and the chairs around it, but kept the periphery of the room in darkness. Unlike the bunker near the weapons testing range, this whole place had the feel of a planned, permanent installation. We’d passed a tidy mess hall on the way in, as well as several smaller conference rooms that were similarly equipped.

“What can you tell us about the testing location?” Evelyn asked.

“It’s a training site for Navy divers,” Major Johnson said. “Two hundred feet deep with a sandy bottom. Visibility in the water is only about thirty feet today, so that’ll make things interesting.”

“How so?”

“We have fixed cameras on the bottom in certain locations, but we’ll have to send in some drone cameras during the trials to make sure we can see everything.” He frowned. “Will that be a problem for the units you’re testing?”

Evelyn looked at me, and I shrugged. We certainly hoped not, but the possibility of distraction by surveillance cameras wasn’t a scenario we’d planned for. “I suppose we’ll find out,” she said.

The projection monitor flickered into life, and suddenly we were under water. Or so it seemed, at least. The monitor wall became six panels, all with live feeds from the training site. Four underwater cameras, two on the surface. It was calm on the surface; the gunmetal gray ships in the background barely moved with the ocean swells. And it was ocean. The color, the surface texture, all of that spoke to a very large body of water.

“Where are they?” I muttered, half to myself. It had been the usual waiting game since we sent off the eggs to be hatched and trained for these trials. My simulator, as much as I loved to tout its benefits, was never designed to predict performance in an ocean environment. The salinity and the limited visibility could affect things. So could the waves. Quite honestly, I had no idea how they were going to do.

“Patience, Noah.”

“You know that’s not my strong suit.”

“The other team is going first,” she said, without a trace of surprise.

“You knew about this, huh?”

“Since the end of the last trial.”

“I kind of figured we wouldn’t always get first-run advantage. You didn’t want to tell me?”

“We’ve found it’s best not to give you too many things to obsess over at a time.”

I cleared my throat. “We?”

“You know.” Evelyn gestured broadly with one arm. “Society.”

“Oh my God. Evelyn Chang made a joke!”

She opened her mouth in mock offense. “I make jokes.”

“Sure, all the time. Now seriously: Are you going to call the Associated Press, or should I?”

“If I asked the major to throw you out of here, do you think he would do it himself?”

“Nah, he’d order someone to do it.” I nearly made a joke about the major not wanting to wrinkle his uniform, but I bit my tongue. He was a big dude and all jokes aside, he could throw me out if he wanted.

The man materialized right beside us, which made me very grateful I’d kept my mouth shut. “It’s starting,” he said.


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Framed