The lunch-hour rush had emptied the Command Center, leaving only a handful of low-ranking officers peppered throughout the room. When Avril and Jimmy walked in to log their daily ammo count, their arrival didn't turn a single head. They made their routine trek to the device docks, submitting their reports in total silence.
"What Lynn's count?" Avril asked her voice in nearly a whisper, swiping across the face of the media notepad.
"She came back with one hundred and eighty-four rounds. Griff counted fifty-two. Mine was..." Jimmy began to answer without a thought.
"I know how many of yours," Avril sighed playfully. "You did not shoot much."
"I was driving," Jimmy defended himself indignantly, until he saw Avril trying to hide a grin. Realizing she was teasing, his expression softened. "I shot at them when I could. Well, more in their general direction." He matched her smile and leaned in to kiss her just as the door across the room opened. Griff walked in a frenzy, carrying both his and Lynn's media pads. Before Avril could dock her notepad, Griff pulled it from her hand and gave a sharp nod. She returned the gesture, then glanced at Jimmy with a curious frown. Jimmy just shrugged, watching as Griff's eyes scan far more than just the daily report.
"Something wrong?" Jimmy's voice was flat, masking the sudden spike of unease. He hated being left in the dark—and whatever Griff was staring at looked big. Griff stayed silent. To break the wall, Jimmy aired his favorite complaint. "I hate not having air cover," he said, watching for a flinch, a blink, anything. "It's like wearing Kevlar long johns with the flap open. We need air patrol over our ground units."
"Not gonna happen. It would be less revealing for you if you just used the aircars." Griff sighed, he had had this conversation with Jimmy before. "Most of the ground troops have gone to the front line. We'll have to make due." His eyes became fixated on something as his face screwed into concern.
"With Sampson, I have to use a ground unit," Jimmy replied with a grimace. He didn't like the look on his boss's face.
"Why do we have four hundred rounds missing every day?" Griff slammed the media pad onto the desk beside the two he had brought in, his glare locked onto Jimmy. Across the room, a few technicians looked up from their monitors, staring as they tried to gauge the situation.
"What the fuck?" Jimmy muttered, the blood draining from his face. He snatched the notepad from the table and flipped back through the logs. There it was. The same anomaly he'd brushed off from the very beginning. His stomach dropped; there was no shifting the blame this time.
"When I ask you for what is doing with ammo log," Avril said in a low voice, reminding Jimmy of what he told her about the situation weeks ago, "you say it always that way."
"What?" Griff was totally confused. Did Jimmy know of the discrepancy or not?
Jimmy lowered his voice, choosing his words with agonizing care. "Well... every time I filled out the ammo sheet, there was a daily total of four hundred rounds missing. From day one. Back when we were in the caves. It was always the exact same amount, so I figured... maybe there was some kind of agreement with the Israeli government? Something nobody told me about. Which, let's be honest, happens a lot."
"Why didn't you mention this from the start?" Griff asked, his voice dead serious. He was fighting to keep his rising panic under wraps. "What if this turns out to be a disaster we could have already neutralized? This could severely damage our reputation as a business. Damn it, Jimmy, you have to keep us apprised of things like this."
"Jesus, Griff. Everything seemed just fine until now," Jimmy kept his emotion down. And it was hard, thinking about how this was a royal screw up pointing directly at him. A really bad mess he didn't know how he was going to work through.
"Before negative...vibration," Avril gave a quick warning. "We find answers and go from there. Not to worry. Not to argue."
"Yes, well, I'm just worried about finding out what happened to thousands of rounds of our ammo." Griff's teeth were clenched. He ripped off his cap and nervously dragged his fingers through his thick blond curls. Where the fuck was he supposed to start? Russia had blown up the caves in the butte before allied troops shoved them back to the coast. Jordan had already scrubbed the hideout. If any information survived, it was in the hands of the Jordanian military. He needed to move on it right away. If he didn't start looking immediately, the trail would go dead; if it wasn't already.
"Four hundred missing shells are still showing up," Jimmy mumbled. "They have to be going somewhere."
"Seriously," Griff said, slowing his head-shake as his eyes drifted back to the figures on the screen. "There's something wrong here. Eight hundred and fifty rounds fit in a single ammo can. That's a little over twenty-five hundred rounds when all three of us head out, and seventeen hundred for two of us. How are we burning through four hundred rounds a day and not notice it? Besides, we carry our sidearm mags separately, so those wouldn't even be in this total."
"We investigate," Avril said with fervor. Every problem had a solution and she was more than ready to find the answers to the questions: where did all that ammo go, who was involved and why and how did this happen?
"I'll be looking around for answers as well," Griff said, picking up his own device and issuing a request to the Command Center, a report on all ammo logs related to only their ammunition count.
Griff started by lining up the data from the Command Center's notepad device with the Holy Trio's ammo order logs. Somewhere, hidden in a department file, a trace had to exist—or at least a clue revealing where those missing rounds went. How could they go out with filled ammo cans, come back with a count and every day, four hundred rounds were unaccounted for? The AI data processor back up should have caught that anomaly right when it started.
"Let me know if you guys find anything. And make sure you contact me the minute you do. Please." He picked up the two media pads that he brought in and left the room.
"Yes, we will," Jimmy assured him. He stared at Avril who stood smiling smugly as she winked at him. He gave a slight chuckle and turned to watch Griff leave the room. They had never seen him so uptight before. The silent one was coming unhinged.
"This is all very alarming," Jimmy said when he finally walked back to Avril's side. "Why would anyone be shaving shells off our daily count?"
"We find out why," Avril said firmly. "But now, we eat." They cleared their workspace in the Command Center and walked down to the cafeteria, eager to talk strategy over dinner.
Lynn and Griff were flying blind into that evening's night maneuvers. The full, cloudless moon exposed the shadow of their aircar completely, and command, as always, did not grant them a ground crew decoy to mask their silhouette. Without that tactical maneuver to safeguard them, they were sitting ducks for the invisible Russian drones scouring the ground for shadow movement. Everything Jimmy had complained about earlier came to Griff's thoughts. The enemy had grown bold, increasingly infiltrating allied airspace with autonomous flying arsenals that used night vision with ground movement sensors. And there was a new kind of devastating ammunition the drones were carrying, able to obliterate a tank. The enemy was sending fewer ground troops over the border, but their presence in the skies was exploding—and their menacing new projectiles were leaving irreparable destruction in their wake.
Night patrol was always safer when the moon hid behind the clouds. Tonight, bloated and full, it offered no such mercy. To stay invisible, Lynn had to stay high, shrinking her shadow against the moonlit ground as she leapt between the rare patches of darkness on the ground. It should have been a routine drive—just another quiet shift—but as she prepared to dart to the next pocket of shade, Griff's voice shattered the silence.
"Did you give anyone special access to our ammunition?" he asked, trying to keep the mood light and airy.
"No," Lynn answered and calculated the distance to the next ground shadow. "Why?"
"Uh," Griff suddenly wished he had waited to talk to her back at the base. "No reason. We can talk about it later. Let's just focus on the patrol."
"What's going on with our ammo?" Lynn asked, stopping the vehicle in mid-air. She turned to face Griff.
"This isn't a good place to stop," Griff said, his eyes locked on flashing green lights in the distance. "Get going!" Before Lynn could turn to look, four Russian drones dived toward them. The lead craft dropped low, apparently tracing the aircar's shadow and unleashing a vertical line of gunfire. A second drone swept side-to-side, weaving a grid of light rays vertically across the first drone's line of fire. Griff yanked Lynn from the pilot's seat, diving into the controls to wrench the vehicle out of the crossfire as the second autonomous unmanned craft shifted upward. He lunged toward a gap in the swarm, but the hull clipped one of the units. The impacted drone instantly logged the collision, pinging their coordinates to their AI command and alerting every quadcopter in the sector. Suddenly, an entire army of artificial hunters materialized from the gloom of the night. As Griff opened fire, the machines converged, weapons locking onto their signature. Spotting a closing gap in the perimeter, Griff punched the throttle, slipping through the bottleneck just in time. He looped the aircar back, matching the pace of a trailing drone to hide their vehicle's shadow directly beneath its silhouette. Masking their movement, he eased the craft down to the terrain and cut the rotors. It was the only way to hide their shadow. They watched in silence as the flying death traps scattered in different directions. Lynn exhaled, amazed at how quickly the danger had passed—sometimes, outsmarting cutting-edge artificial intelligence felt less like a tactical victory and more like dodging a swarm of angry wasps.
They needed to know how the Russians were arming their war bots, and the fallen drones were their only shot. But before they could salvage the smaller pieces of wreckage, a swarm of smaller robotic AI scavengers swept in, gathering up the debris. Given the chance, Griff and Lynn would have secured the components for inspection. But without ground support, risking another attack wasn't an option. Helpless, they watched the robotic cleanup crew vanish into the sky, carrying away every last sliver of evidence.
When it was finally safe to talk, Lynn looked at Griff, grateful they had escaped the attack but still concerned about Griff's last question.
"Why did you ask me that?" She questioned. The whole premise of the inquiry made the hair on the back of her neck stand up. "Why would I give access to our ammo? We bought it, it's ours. If we share it's because we're out on the ground and need to spread ourselves thin."
"There's no way to tell you this other than to just come out and say it," Griff said cautiously.
"Okay," Lynn was somewhat alarmed by the way he hesitated.
"We've had about four hundred rounds go missing every day since we were in the caves."
"What do you mean?"
"I've started backtracking our ammunition purchases and usage all the way back to when we first arrived in the Middle East," he answered. "I haven't come across anything yet because I've only begun to research all of this."
"What are you doing first?" Lynn asked, her mind was going a thousand thoughts a minute as she calculated in her brain the totality of the ammo that was missing. A small groan escaped her when she realized the impact of their find.
"I'm matching up our orders with each daily disbursement of the rounds. I know if I look at everything that came in I'll find a trail somewhere that will lead us to what the fuck is going on."
"Have you talked with anyone?"
"Just Jimmy and Avril, that's how I found out that we've had disappearing ammo since we were in the caves."
"What did Jimmy say about it?"
"He was just as surprised as I was. He noticed it was happening since we started taking patrols at the first base, that first day. He thought we had some agreement going on with the Israelis."
"No, no," Lynn sat motionless for the longest time without saying another word.
"Do you want me to bring it up to General Taylor and General Sefira?"
"No, I'll do that. I'll face that music when we have something, some kind of information on hand. General Sefira is going to wonder why it took us so long to realize we're missing all that ammo. In the meantime, just find something out...anything to take to the general when I do talk to him."
"On it," Griff said with total confidence.
"What will you do next?"
"I requested our full ammunition reports from command and put Jimmy in charge of the patrols. While he covers the perimeter requirements, I'll be searching every square inch of this base. The Jordanian team that scrubbed those caves must have detailed reports, and I'll figure out our next move once I have them."
"Okay," Lynn said trying to squelch the anxiousness that pressed in on her. "Okay...that's good. How long do you think it will take to get some kind of information back?"
"Don't worry about it," said Griff, hoping she wouldn't unravel through the process. "Let me worry about this. You just...I don't know, calm the fuck down. I've never seen you like this, and I don't like it." She sat back in the passenger seat, not sure to be hurt or mad. She may never have acted like this before, but he had never lost his temper with her like this either. Mister cool was getting irritable and it was not helping anyone.
"I have to think," said Lynn, turning intentionally away from her partner. "We should head back."
Griff landed the aircar outside the post's main entrance. As it settled into ground mode and flashed into visibility, two guards materialized from the distortion of an active-camouflage guard shack, one on each side of the vehicle. Through the side windows they stood, retinal scanners flashed into their eyeballs, verifying their IDs, before the guards faded back into invisibility and two shadows walked away. With a heavy groan, the giant door to the underground road began to slide open and the vehicle disappeared into the hole. Inside, it descended and the occupants could feel the rumble of the iron door as it closed. Griff steered the landship down the descending road, plunging into the subterranean safety of the stronghold. Lynn powered down the copilot console and leaned back, watching the subterranean walls blur past until they finally reached the motor pool. Before docking the craft and killing the engine, Griff turned to his partner, who sat silent, lost in thought.
"We're going to figure this out," he assured her. Lynn forced a smile before they both slipped from their seats and grabbed their gear from the back. She handed Griff the packs and cradled the rifles against her chest, her knuckles white as she hit the button to close the hatch. Griff could see the tension in her shoulders—she knew as well as he did that they couldn't avoid the generals for too much longer.
They moved slowly across the garage, passing the Command Center. Lynn cast a lingering glance at its closed door, exhaling a heavy sigh before letting Griff lead the way up the metal stairs and into the corridors. The trek back to their quarters felt twice as long as usual. Once inside their own dorm, they dropped their gear and weapons by the entrance—a familiar, grounding routine. Lynn collapsed onto her bunk and stared blankly at the ceiling, trying to piece together the tumult in her mind. They needed answers, and she would have to face the general the second they figured out what the hell had happened with all those rounds.
"Let's get something to eat," Griff said, trying to change the mood. "I'm starving." Lynn sat up and looked at him.
"I'm not really hungry," she said. It was obvious to him that she had the weight of the world sitting on her stomach, as well as her shoulders.
"Come on," he gently coaxed her. "At least get a beer." He would never consider offering her alcohol after her choice to abstain years earlier, but these were desperate times and needed desperate measures.
"Okay," she relented. "But I can promise you, I'm not going to be very good company." She wasn't sure she was going to go for the beer idea, but did feel the need to do something besides lay there.
Griff slipped his hand into hers as they walked toward the cafeteria, a quiet promise that he was with her every step of the way. "You know I'll be with you when you talk to the commander."
As they reached the dining room doors, Avril emerged, walking toward them and stopped to look at her friends standing hand in hand. Lynn quickly pulled her hand away and hurried inside. She did not realize that Avril made no assumptions about what she had witnessed—other than sensing the ominous vibration exuding from Lynn, which she knew tied back to the missing ammunition they had discovered. Avril fought back the temptation to read her friends' minds; she had promised Jimmy she would keep that ability strictly between them and the Essene teachers.
Lynn couldn't sleep that night. A thousand variations of the upcoming meeting replayed behind her eyelids as she rehearsed her lines for the general. Without the right data to explain the fiasco, the entire effort was a lost cause. Morning arrived without her having slept a wink. Hoping to scald the panic from her skin, she stood under a shower so hot the steam choked her, but the crippling doubts refused to wash away. By the time she dressed, her skin was raw and flushed to the neck. She stepped into the hallway, still trapped in her own head, only to bump straight into Avril. One look at Lynn's hollow eyes and rigid shoulders was all it took for Avril to step in, determined to break the gloom.
"This missing bullets," she said as she joined up with Lynn, "can be better. Feelings now need change."
"How do you suggest I do that," Lynn asked helplessly. She doubted any relief would come without some kind of information that would help bring this mess into a better light.
"Just like I say to Jimmy," she answered. "Change to happy." Lynn stopped walking and turned to Avril who also stopped in her tracks, standing face to face with her. It was obvious by facial expression alone that Lynn was perturbed with the suggestion.
"There is no way I'm going to find any kind of positive vibration in this," she said hotly.
"No find, create!" Avril said with a slight grin. "Create happy."
"Avril, I don't have time for this," she said, turning on her heel toward the cafeteria. Her stomach hollowed out with a sharp, familiar ache—she hadn't eaten since yesterday. Minutes later, they were sitting at a nearby table with their breakfast trays, wrapped in a heavy, unusual silence. When Jimmy walked in and grabbed his food, he spotted them immediately. He hurried over, but frowned when he approached the women. It was weird seeing them like this; usually, they were a non-stop blur of morning chatter about the day's plan.
"Everything okay?" He asked and waved at Dave who was filling the coffee urn to bring him a cup of coffee.
"No," Lynn said at the same time Avril said yes.
"I'm not a waitress," Dave said as he brought up the filled cup of coffee and a tiny creamer pitcher. "You can get your own sugar." And then he walked away after a friendly fistbump with him. Jimmy huffed, he didn't want to walk back over to the coffee area and decided to drink his coffee with only creamer. Taking the first sip, he realized it wasn't half bad.
"Why the glum face?" he asked as he took a second sip of the hot liquid. He really did like it better without the sugar.
"Lynn to see general on ammo missing," Avril said in a low voice.
"Oh," he said, choking on the sip as he realized the ramification of her concern. It was inevitable they would have to talk to General Safira about it sooner than later.
"I am to make feel better," Avril said happily. Jimmy gave his sweetheart a curious look, wondering how in the world she would accomplish such a difficult objective.
"With law of attraction," she answered him, forgetting that she had promised to keep her power in check. He gave her a quick, sharp glare and thought words he knew she could hear, cautioning her. She looked down at the plate in front of her and then felt his hand touch and caress her knee. He was sorry to have been so snappy, and wanted to let her know all was well. She looked up and smiled at him as she laid her hand on his.
"She wants me to be HAPPY," Lynn said with a slight annoyed chuckle.
"Isn't that how the Law of Attraction works?" Jimmy asked. He knew exactly what Avril was trying to do.
"I get how that works," Lynn said, taking a full, deep breath. "I just don't think I have it in me to make some other emotion out of what I'm feeling right now."
"Then you breathe," Avril suggested. "Just like that you did now. Breathe deep many more times."
"Oh, hell," Lynn submitted. "At this point, I'll try anything." She took another deep breath and let it out.
"Slowly," Avril coached. Jimmy watched, curious to see how his lover was going to calm down his tightly wound teammate. Lynn drew in a deep breath slowly, and then just as slow, released it.
"Again," her friend said with a smile. She squeezed Jimmy's hand as she felt the tension in Lynn's vibration begin to release its hold on her. She had her take a few more breaths before she stopped making her breathe.
"God," Lynn said in a much calmer demeanor. "I do feel better." Jimmy smiled triumphantly and turned his hand up to squeeze Avril's hand. He was so proud of her. "But how is that going to help me think of the right words to say to the general?"
"Just be happy," said Avril. "Words come at right time."
Her stomach growled, loud enough to break the spell of the night's tension. It was shocking to actually want food. Normally, anxiety clamped her throat shut, forcing her to choke down meals or starve. But this hunger was aggressive, crowding out every other thought. She didn't even remember loading her tray with a croissant, pudding, and salad until she was already diving in. The first bite of tomato tasted incredibly vivid, fueling an urgent, sudden appetite.
"Slow down," Griff said as he joined the three at the table. "The food's not going anywhere." He was glad to see her eat after worrying about her through the night. He had also found it difficult to sleep, but his concern was with his partner more than the missing ammunition.
"What have you been able to find out so far?" Jimmy asked as Griff unloaded his tray.
"Well, I'm still waiting on a response from the Jordanians," Griff answered as he poured what was left of the cream in the little pitcher into his own coffee. "They had scrubbed the caves after we evacuated and I'm sure something there will come up. I've explored damn near every area in the base this past week. I know we'll find something. I feel it in my bones."
"Vibration not in bones," Avril informed him.
"Figuratively," Griff said, stirring his coffee.
"What?" Avril asked.
"It just means it's like a saying," said Jimmy, taking a forkful of food into his mouth.
"A figure of speech," Griff smiled at Avril. She was one of the smartest girls he had ever met, including among Lynn and a handful of women he knew in Denver, but her ignorance of the English slang made her seem so innocently childlike. An endearing quality.
"When do you think you'll have that information?" asked Lynn after she swallowed her food.
"Any time now," he answered her. "Merc is supposed to be in today. He should have some details on anything the Jordan military found. Although, I didn't tell him about the missing ammo, I just told him we were looking for anything odd that he found in the scrub reports from the caves."
"That was wise," Lynn sighed, the less people who knew, the better.
"I wouldn't put it past him if he figured it out on his own," Jimmy interjected. He took a big sip of his coffee and smiled. He was going to drink his coffee just like that from now on.
"Yeah, well," Griff said as he cut up his breakfast steak. "He's going to have to know about it as well. If he finds out for himself or is told, he may feel like an outsider, this should include him as well."
"Regardless," Lynn said, raising her fork at the crew, "I'll be the one to tell him if he doesn't find out for himself."
"Sure," Griff said with a nod and looked at Jimmy, giving him a knowing look to keep his mouth shut about it.
"I wasn't going to say anything to him or anyone," Jimmy said defensively, catching sight of Griff's threatening glare.
"Thank you," Lynn mumbled and took in another bite of food.
"You really need to slow down," said Griff, eyeing her as she chewed and swallowed too soon afterwards. "You're heading for an ulcer."
Lynn didn't answer. Instead, she deliberately slowed her pace, locking eyes with Griff and exaggerating every single chew. Griff rolled his eyes and shook his head, clearly exhausted by how hostile his business partner had become under the pressure.
Watching the unspoken warfare from across the table, Avril felt a knot of worry tighten. The tension between them was escalating by the day. If Lynn didn't get a handle on her stress soon, she was going to push Griff past the point of no return. There had to be a way to help her friend see just how strained their bond was becoming.
"I know that look," Jimmy caught the concern on Avril's face and whispered to her. "Just let things fall into place for themselves. Isn't that what you're always telling me. You know, everything works out for the best for everyone. Oh, no...that was Lynn. Please don't get involved. This is between the two of them. It will all work out for the best."
"What is best?" Avril whispered back, watching the hateful expressions pass between the other couple at the table. "This making only hate between them."
"Oh, for Christ's sake," Jimmy said, intentionally turning his face away from his teammates. "Those two have never had an argument all this time that I've known them. Maybe that's what they need between them, a little raw emotion."
"What if wrong thing said?" Avril mumbled. "What if it divide them?"
"Well," Jimmy said with a renewed smile. "I know it's you who's always told me that the path we walk is always the right path, no matter what happens."
"Glad I hear you listen," she gave in to her sweetheart. "I will not make problem in path of friends." Both turned back to their breakfast and watched as the couple sat glaring at each other as they ate.