The Dark Edge Chronicles - Hardwire

Chapter 15: Face to Face with the Lion

A thin detection web was the outer most level of security, throwing a widely spaced detection grid around the entire building. It covered both the sides and top completely, but was relatively easy to circumnavigate, if one knew what to look for. The next layer, two paces closer to the building was similar, if more tightly woven. And so on it went, right into the fabric of the walls themselves, where Mordecai had to finally withdraw his probe after running into a virtual wall some twenty centimetres in.

'There's no way I'll be able to punch through that without bringing the whole cave down,' he thought as he sat back on his haunches, the fabric of the collar firmly in hand. He had to come up with a couple of alternatives, or this was going to be a very short trip!

A quick scan of the modular community to the right yielded a similar detection grid in operation. Both also had standard surveillance in place, similar to the network that protected the cottage topside. Between the surveillance and the detection grids, all entry points to the two complexes were completely covered. That included air and heating ducts. No sneaky way in, even miniaturized.

As Mordecai stared at the shimmering glass of the breeding complex, coming closer with each step, an idea occurred to him. If he could somehow establish a link-in point within the building, he could do a stealth teleport around the wards. But it would have to be someplace secured, inside the wards and outside their detection threshold.

Another thought followed closely on the heels of the first. Unless, of course, those wards were all inclusive with built-in detection ability to ignore those individuals that are authorized to be inside the building! The traffic between the two complexes was heavy, yet no one psionic was being slowed from entering either complex; the entry was apparently effortless, without the psionics doing anything to deactivate the wards. Either they carried some sort of passive device that identified them to the webwork, or the wards themselves had been programmed to detect their individual patterns and account for them.

Mordecai quickly calculated the remaining distance to the facility's front doors. Perhaps fifty metres, if he was lucky. Regardless, he had to move quickly or the window of opportunity would close.

Refocusing his meta-senses on the two doors, Mordecai was about to attempt another probe when he saw a group of psionics step out. It took only a moment to recognize them as the ones that had landed the first time outside the cottage. 'They must have dropped off their prisoner,' he thought as they waved to the group he was riding on. Who quickly waved back, some cheerful comments tossed back in forth in French before they were out of earshot.

Greetings apparently satisfied, the second group made their way towards the gated entrance into the community, walking with purposeful strides. Scanning them as deeply as possible without setting off their personal wards, Mordecai followed them closely with his senses as they passed over the road between the complex and the community just as a flat bed transport rumbled by, a load of plastic cartons in its box.

It was at the moment that they crossed the detection grid's threshold that the man in black managed to catch what made them invisible to the wards. 'A scan of their neural patterns,' he noted with a nod. It was as he suspected, as he 'watched' the brief sparkle of a telepathic scan wash over them as they passed across the threshold. They then continued on to the gates without any delay.

Hunkering down once more, Mordecai quickly made a mental inventory of the neural signatures he had already managed to gather since entering the underground base. By far, the most complete was of the man on who's shoulder he now rode. It shouldn't be too difficult to alter his signature to look like his unaware ride's. The man in black shrugged after pondering the possibilities for a moment. Duplicating the mule's signature was his best chance to get through the ward. Carefully he began to bend the magnetic and bio-electrical patterns of his mind to fit that of the psionic in front of him.