“In case this wasn’t autopilot but is an attack,” I answered for Tim. “And I think you should have given Weapons to me.”
“Whine later. Get the ship talking to you now. I’m in the position Chee was supposed to fill and I have close to no idea of what I’m supposed to be doing.”
“I thought that triple the necessary crew had been assigned to this mission to ensure that we had redundancies in case of emergencies,” Jeff said. “And that each member knew at least two of the roles.”
“Right you are,” Tim said cheerfully. “Guess what I’m trained for? Communications and Weapons, which is why I put you and Kitty there, because I can at least talk you through those roles. I was not ever supposed to be the one at the main controls.”
“Jeff, stop complaining and just do what we do best, which is handle crap like this. The faster we get the ship under control, the faster we find Jamie and Lizzie.”
Jeff grunted, but stopped complaining. Knew he was as worried about the girls’ whereabouts as I was. Lizzie was with Christopher, but that didn’t make either one of them safe. Sure, Charlie had been dreaming that they were likely with the other kids, but that didn’t mean his dream was accurate. And we had no idea who was actually on board or not. Which was, per Tim, now my job.
Thankfully, despite the array of meaningless buttons and levers in front of me, Drax’s ships were made to connect the personnel with the ship’s computer mentally or electronically or some such. So, with my helmet on, I was linked in and, therefore, some of what I needed to know was given to me by the ship itself. Closed my eyes for a moment and let the ship share what I was supposedly looking at. Opened my eyes and hit the ship’s intercom button.
“Everyone who can hear this, we have no idea who’s on board and who is not, but yes, to confirm what you’re thinking, we’re in space somehow. If anyone who trained to fly this puppy is able to get to the command deck, please do so ASAP. If you are not trained to fly this ship and you are secured, please stay there. If you’re not safe, get to safety. Um, if you can.”
Realized I had no way of telling who was where, and we’d had a lot of people in the Engineering and Weapons sections, which might mean they’d been baked alive or something.
Heard the sound of running feet. But the person who arrived wasn’t who I was expecting.
“Tito?” Jeff asked, sounding as surprised as I felt. “What are you doing here?”
“Rahmi, Rhee, and I came on board to help find Amy’s children,” he said as he stopped running.
“Where are the princesses?”
“No idea, Kitty. We separated to cover more ground. I was lucky enough to be in the main medical quarters, which are just below the command deck, when we started lifting off, so I strapped in. What do you need me to do?”
Tim tossed Tito into Station Three, which was now the blind leading the blind for that position. The men were all trying to be cool and not snap at each other, with limited success, and my stress started to go into overdrive. My worry about Jamie, Lizzie, and everyone else was already there. Meaning I was having a lot of trouble focusing.
Really wanted to hear music. As if on command, “Ready to Go” by Guards came on my airwaves. “Um, does anyone else hear that?”
“Yes,” Tim said. “You asked for music, didn’t you?”
“In my mind, not out loud.”
“The ship’s made to link with us electronically,” Tim pointed out.
“Then why don’t I know where my daughter and our ward are?” Jeff asked, sarcasm knob at nine and threatening to go higher fast. “Because I’ve been asking that mentally for as long as this has been going on.”
“No idea. Maybe Kitty’s request is easier to fulfill. We didn’t cover a soundtrack in training.”
“But music is a form of communications, and searching for kids isn’t a part of Weapons, so maybe that’s why it’s working for me and not for Jeff. Anyway, let’s take it and roll with it. Barring the tunes causing the rest of you to lose focus, it helps me a ton.” Had no idea who’d added music to the ship, but had a feeling he was on board somewhere, petting a bunch of least weasels.
“Still can’t get autopilot to disengage,” Tim said tightly.
Found the external communications button and hit it. Had no idea who I was calling, just hoped they’d be helpful. “White House Communications,” a familiar voice said.
“Walter! Boy, am I glad it’s you!”
“Chief First Lady, what’s going on? News reports are jumbled, but it appears that the Distant Voyager has taken to the air.”
“To the space, Walt. We’re in space right now, so I have no idea how long I’ll get to talk to you. I need the Vice President or the Secretary of State.”
“Ah . . .”
“That doesn’t sound like a good ‘ah,’ Walt. What’s going on? Christopher said that he got politicians off the ship.”
“He did, but none of the President’s Cabinet were among them.”
Right, Christopher had already told us that. Silly of me to hope that he’d been wrong. Let myself think, but only for a moment, because I had no idea how soon I’d run out of communications time. “Am I right in thinking that, as far as we all know, the entire United States’ governing body is inside a spaceship that took flight of its own accord?”
“Ah, yes.”
“Well, here’s another fine mess we’ve somehow gotten ourselves into.”
CHAPTER 11
“WELL, ALL BUT ONE,” Walter amended. “Secretary Kramer is onsite.”
“Wow. Okay, it’s Designated Survivor the Reality Show for us, then. Can you stay on the line but connect me to Marcia?”
“Yes.” There was a soft buzzing sound. “You’re on with the First Lady, Secretary Kramer.”
“Kitty, are you guys okay?” Marcia sounded freaked out, not that I could blame her.
“As far as we know, yes. Autopilot engaged without anyone’s influence as far as we know.” Well, that wasn’t a lie—we didn’t know for sure that Charlie had somehow activated it, after all. “So far we aren’t in any danger, but we can’t determine where the ship thinks it’s going yet, nor have we been able to stop it.”
“Got it. The Head of the P.T.C.U. is on her way to the White House, as are the Joint Chiefs. They’re coming via conventional means so that they’re seen.”
“Probably all in the same car but at least they’re on land. And I think the ‘we’re here’ plan is a good one. No matter what, Marcia, hold the line. Don’t let anyone bully you into doing something stupid.”
“You mean like war with the aliens because the spaceship’s stolen our homegrown alien President and all of his Cabinet?”
“Um, yeah, like that. Seriously, I think we’ve been spaceborne for less than ten minutes or something. Is that the buzz going around already?”
“Yes, from the YatesCorp-owned stations. Being picked up by all other outlets, naturally. The press positive to us are in the ship with you and I can’t tell if they’re still broadcasting.”