Storm (Swipe Series)

Once he’s done with this next attack . . . well, let’s just say the drought will have done its damage by the time anyone will be able to fix it. But you’re right,” Lily added. “Marked wouldn’t stand for it. Which is why Lamson has stayed as far away from the execution of this plan as possible. His IMPS aren’t involved. DOME’s not involved. He’s found a loyal patsy to pin it on. A fourteen-year-old kid, in fact. A real go-getter by the name of Connor Goodman. Lamson asked Connor’s parents to start sabotaging the mill last September, shortly after the Marked outbreak of Project Trumpet—and no doubt as a result of it. For months, the Goodmans delayed launches and created one temporary malfunction after another. But just a few weeks ago, the Goodmans got scared—and they got hasty. They blew the place up—destroyed all the computer servers that run the place, along with a good bit of the rest of it.
    “The whole town of Lahoma’s come together since then to bring the plant back online—and they’re succeeding. First launch of the new and improved mill is set for three weeks from now—April 1 at 5:00 p.m.
    “But now it seems Connor’s taken up the mantel of his parents’ responsibility. He’s set out to complete what they started. And this time, he’s going to destroy the mill for good.
    “It’ll be billed as domestic terrorism, carried out by a lone, crazed individual. He’s likely to die in the act. Not the prettiest plan, perhaps . . . but Lamson’s hands stay clean.”
    “How do you know all this?” Hailey asked. “And why does it need to be us who stops it?”
    “I’ve been working as Lamson’s personal assistant in the Capitol for weeks now. At this point, he’s told me everything.
    “Needless to say, I myself am powerless to stop it. I can’t even leave town, let alone find a way to get to Lahoma. Even this call is putting me at enormous risk.
    “DOME won’t stop it, because they don’t see it coming. Same goes for the IMPS. And anyway, Lamson would never give the order for them to interfere.”
    “So it falls to us,” Logan said. “That’s what you’re saying.”
    Lily paused. Her connection flickered. “That’s right.”
    Logan, Peck, and Hailey were quiet for a minute. Waves crashed behind them. The salt air mixed strangely with the sweet, rancid smell of the junkyard beach.
    “Okay,” Hailey said finally. “So where do we begin?”
    “Lahoma’s about a thousand miles from Sierra,” Lily said. “Just a few hundred miles south of Spokie, in fact. It won’t be an easy trip.”
    “Getting there’s not necessarily the hard part,” Logan said. “We have the River for that.”
    “The hard part,” Hailey added, “is that even if we make it there in time, none of us has the slightest clue how to actually run a weather mill. Depending on what that Connor kid is planning, the reboot process could easily end up falling to us—and what then, huh? We’d be screwed.”
    “So we’ll have to learn the basics before we head out,” Logan said. “We’ll cram for it ahead of time.”
    “How?”
    “The SSC must know how weather mills work,” Logan said. “Arianna can explain it to us.”
    “Well, yeah, she can explain the science of it,” Hailey said. “But she won’t have any idea how to man the control panel—that’s all European proprietary technology. It didn’t come from the SSC. There’s no way she has a schematic of the controls themselves. What we need is a technician. And unless you just happen to know someone who’s actually been hands-on with a weather mill before—”
    Logan’s eyes lit up. “Hailey, that’s it—you’re a genius!”
    “Why?” Hailey asked. “What’d I say?”
    But already, Logan was climbing out of the POD. He kissed the glass projection of his sister on the way out. And just like that, he was off and running along the Sierra junkyard beach, fast as he could back to the SSC.
    4
    The evening in Spokie was calm and hushed, as almost every evening was these days in Logan’s old home. His parents, Mr. and Mrs. Langly, sat on the fifth floor of their Wright Street residence, stretched out on the couch and watching the television frame with the sound on low. It was turned to the news, quietly spilling out useless facts about the Markless protests in New Chicago and Beacon. Some of these facts were more factual than others; this new Global Union media left something to be desired.
    It did speak of middling