Enjoy the chapter!

Chapter Quote:
"War is not only a matter of equipment, artillery, group, troops or air force; it is largely a matter of spirit, of morale."
~Chiang Kai-shek
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Chapter 14: Coordination

Lydia

We rode a small boat to the shores of Osea where we were greeted by Leonard, Gilbert, and Tybalt in black SUVs.

"They're armored to the tee so if we get attacked, it'll take a lot to take us down. We do have quite a few weapons in the back though to defend ourselves," Leonard informed.

"The helicopter is on its way. It took off about thirty minutes ago," Markus informed. "Lydia, Tessa, Charlotte, Will, and Jem, you have a very short time span to get Helena and go. Her apartment, with traffic and with you leaving in five minutes, should be exactly fifteen minutes from here. Gilbert will be your driver. Sophie, Alec, and Henry, Orson Perrault's place is about an hour away. Leonard will be your driver. We have a separate helicopter coming for you; Axel will tell you when they're approaching. Shiloh, Lux, Isabelle, Liam, the club you're going to and the one I'll meet you at is just down the street from Helena's apartment. Tybalt will be your driver because he's good at stunt driving in case it's needed."

"Where did you learn stunt driving?" Lux queried.

"I had a lot of free time on my hands as a teen," he replied nonchalantly.

"Wish I had that kind of free time..." Alec muttered.

"All right, everyone know the plan?" Markus asked. The groups nodded, and we all dispersed. Gilbert and Tybalt took different routes for safety precautions. Upon arriving at Helena's building, I took a deep breath. Charlotte, Tessa, and I had on black wigs so we looked completely different but I was almost worried we looked too different, as in suspiciously different. Tessa had somehow contoured our makeup so that our facial structures even looked different but I was on edge. The moment we entered that building, we were going to be surrounded by Gray Men.

Gilbert pulled up a block away from the hotel so in case we needed to make a getaway, it'd be hard to see what vehicle we'd used to escape.

"All right, wait here. I'll text you when we're on the run," Jem said. The twins dashed out of the car. We waited a few moments before getting out of the car ourselves. Keeping our heads down, we made our way to the hotel. I pretended to get a phone call so while we waited outside, Charlotte and Tessa kept an eye inside. The moment they saw the twins dash into the stairwell, we made our way in. Everyone was so preoccupied with the commotion that we were able to slip into the elevator unnoticed. Helena, of course, had to be on the twentieth floor, so the ride up there felt incredibly and ridiculously long. However, we arrived without a hitch. The girls and I tried to hurry to Helena's door without seeming suspicious as we did pass a couple people. One was an elderly woman, the other a girl that was obviously getting ready for some hot date, so we weren't worried about them being Gray Men. Charlotte knocked politely on Helena's door. When we received no answer, we knocked again.

"She is home isn't she?" Tessa whispered.

"She's not working tonight. You know how much she sticks to a schedule unless something seriously unavoidable comes up," I said.

"Unless she's looking through the peephole and doesn't recognize us?" Charlotte suggested.

"Then take off your wig. If anyone tries to come after us because of it, we'll shoot them. Easy," I told her. With a sigh, Charlotte slipped off her wig. Almost instantly the door opened, revealing a frazzled Helena Geller.

"What the hell is going on and why is our family being accused of treason?" she demanded, yanking us inside.

"The Gray Men. Need I say more?" Tessa chirped.

"Those bastards? Again? Do they have nothing better to do than screw up our lives?" Helena muttered, running to her room. We followed her to find that she was already in the process of getting ready to leave.

"Where were you planning on going with all the Gray Men downstairs?" I inquired as we began helping her pack.

"I have a parachute here and a motorcycle in the garage across the street. But now that you three are here to help, I'm going to assume you have a plan?"

"So that's where Will and Jem got the parachute idea," Tessa remarked.

"The twins are here?"

"They're the distraction. As we speak, they are climbing thirty flights of stairs with the Gray Men behind them. They're jumping off the roof and then while the Gray Men go downstairs again, we go up in the elevator."

"We should go up one floor because if we time it incorrectly, we could come face to face with the Gray Men and I don't think we want that to happen."

"Actually I'd feel bad if they came across us because we're kind of armed from head to toe," I remarked.

"How so?" She queried, zipping up her large, military backpack.

"Hey, we didn't wear baggy pants and puffy coats because we think they're stylish." I lifted up the billowy pants to show six guns in holsters on my thigh. I had an even bigger gun pressed against my back, hidden by my coat.

"Who exactly is helping you?" Helena asked.

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you. You'll meet our friends when they come to get us."

"Well this will be fun. Where are the others?"

"Your apartment is probably bugged so it's best we don't say until we're in a safe place. You almost done?" Charlotte questioned nervously, peering out the window.

"Done," Helena announced.

"Good. Because part two of the plan is in action. Let's go!" I encouraged. Charlotte, Tessa, and I armed ourselves in case we ran into any unwanted guests while Helena took the back. Poking my head into the hallway, I announced that it was all clear. We ran to the elevator where I pushed the 'up' button over and over again as if it would make the elevator come faster. After an agonizingly long minute, it finally arrived. We filed in just as the door to the stairwell burst open with a bunch of Gray Men.

"There they are!" one shouted.

"Oh come on!" I groaned, pressing random buttons for floors below us. The elevator doors shut just before they reached us.

"Why are you pushing all those buttons?" Tessa demanded in exasperation.

"Because they can see the floor numbers the elevator stops on and if we stop at each one, they won't know which one we will get off at. I say we get off two stops from now, grab an elevator going up to the top and then escape. If all else fails, we have Gilbert waiting for us in a car a couple blocks over."

"Who's Gilbert?"

"Belkan Navy," Charlotte informed.

"We're being helped by Belkans?"

"Long story short, they're our friends. They're the only reason we're alive and here to help you," I explained as the elevator stopped on the seventeenth floor, pushing the down button repeatedly to make the door shut faster. Finally they shut again and brought us to the fourteenth floor where we disembarked and proceeded to hit the up button, waiting for another elevator. When it came, we got on and pressed the top floor button. Another agonizingly long wait. All of sudden, the elevator came to a screeching halt.

"What's going on?" Tessa asked.

"They must be putting the apartment building in lockdown because you guys are here. Don't worry. I have a plan. Any of you afraid of heights?" Helena asked, lifting up her backpack and pushing a ceiling tile away. "Can someone help me up here? And then I'll help the rest of you."

Charlotte and Tessa locked their hands together. Helena used it as a stepping stool to launch herself onto the top of the elevator. I went next. Helena and I reached down to help the other girls up. Geller's daughter led us to a service ladder next to the elevator.

"Why do I have the feeling you've had this escape route planned for a long time?" Charlotte noted in amusement.

"Because I have," Helena laughed. I tried to find the humor in the situation but being almost twenty stories up, with another ten to go, with nothing below us but an elevator that we could possibly roll off of if we fell. Cheerful thoughts. I simply kept my eyes on Helena who seemed to know exactly what she was doing. Being Jens Geller's daughter, being a child of the Razgriz, I didn't know why I was surprised by her tenacity.

Finally, we reached the thirtieth floor where we briefly allowed ourselves to catch our breath and while I texted Axel saying we were ready to be picked up. His response was immediate, saying he would be there in t-minus fifteen seconds. The girls and I took off towards the stairwell to the roof. Thankfully, there were no Gray Men up there. With perfect timing, Axel arrived just as we opened the door to the roof so we had no trouble getting on the helicopter.

"Axel!" Helena exclaimed. "You're helping us?"

"Any chance to help the Razgriz, I'm in. Although seeing you is definitely a perk," he replied, giving her a wink.

"I completely forgot you two knew each other," I said. "I would've said he was helping us but I didn't trust your apartment to be bugged since our rooms were back on base."

"Don't worry about it," she told me with a smile. "Thank you all for coming to rescue me."

"Where are the twins?" Charlotte asked.

"That's where this is going to get a little... complicated," Axel admitted.

"What did they do?" Tessa, Charlotte, Helena, and I asked simultaneously.

He rubbed the back of his head. "Well, according to our last transmission from them, Will is on top of a taxi and Jem is surfing on a bus."

________________________________  

Will

The moment the Gray Men saw us, they made a beeline for us. Jem and I played dumb, acting like we didn't expect them to be here, shouting at each other, "What are they doing here?!" and "I told you they'd be here!" and "No you didn't!"

Just good, old-fashioned, sibling bickering.

I then realized the major flaw in our plan was running up thirty flights of stairs. Thank god we had such good endurance and stamina from all our training at the base. Unfortunately, for men that looked to be in their late forties and/or early fifties, the Gray Men didn't have a lot of trouble catching up to us. The only thing working in our favor was that we'd gotten a head-start on them.

At the tenth floor, I felt mildly winded.

At the twentieth floor, I was breaking a sweat.

At the thirtieth floor, I was out of breath, sweating like crazy under my jacket, and about ready to break out my guns and just shoot them to get this over with but I didn't want to kill anyone unless absolutely necessary. Strange thing was, they weren't shooting at us. What Gray Men didn't shoot at the Razgriz?

Jem and I came to a skidding halt, peering over the edge of the tower. I began having doubts in this plan about jumping off the building.

"You ready?" I asked.

"Freeze!" A man shouted. We whirled around with our hands up to find ten men pointing guns at us.

"Hey guys," Jem said casually. "We don't want any trouble."

"You should've thought about that before you destroyed the Air Force Academy," another snarled.

"You're Osean?" Jem queried.

"You're not Gray Men?" I added.

"What is it with you people and the Gray Men?" one asked, sounding more exasperated than anything else.

"First of all, we feel you man. We're sick of them too and this is our first time dealing with them. Second, we have proof that they're trying to kill us to get our parents," Jem explained.

"And by proof we mean a few of us were eyewitnesses to a Gray Men trying to murder our cousin. We weren't though. We were scaling the side of the building to escape on one of the helicopters," I continued.

"Men, go grab Helena Geller. They were here to see her so she's probably waiting for them," the leader barked.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you," I warned.

"And why not?"

"Because she's armed and dangerous for one," I said.

"And two, she's long gone," Jem said. "Our friends helped her escape."

"Did you think we came here alone? Look, I know we're blonde, but we're not that stupid," I remarked in mock offense.

"You were the distraction," a soldier said. Jem and I simultaneously threw our arms out that clearly said 'congratulations you finally figured out our plan.'

"We'll catch them again later. For now, you two are coming with us for an interrogation. If you won't tell our government where the others are, we'll force it out of you," the leader growled.

"Actually, we have our own plans," I said.

"Ones that don't involve you. We have places to go," Jem said.

"People to see," I finished. With a salute to the men, we jumped backwards off the roof. I heard their shouts for a brief second before the rush of the wind overpowered everything else. I opened my parachute and suddenly I was going much slower and had much more control as to where I wanted to go. Unfortunately, I'd never been perfect at my landings so I missed landing on our ride with Gilbert by a bit.

And by a bit I mean I landed on top of a taxi ten car lengths ahead of him. I unclipped my parachute, hoping it didn't blind anyone while they were driving but considering so many people stopped when they saw me and Jem, I wasn't too fussed about it. Speaking of my brother, I glanced around for him. It didn't take long. He was as bad as me with the landing and had ended up on top of a bus. He was basically surfing on top of it. We made eye contact with each other, letting out huge grins. This plan certainly hadn't gone like we expected but this was still vastly entertaining.

Gilbert's SUV pulled up alongside me. He rolled down the window and shouted, "Hold on! The helicopter is coming for you! Get ready!"

A few moments later, a military helicopter roared overhead. It dropped a ladder down towards Jem who quickly climbed up it. The ladder was then brought to me which I nimbly climbed up to find Charlotte, Tessa, Lydia, and Helena.

"Hey girls! We miss anything exciting?" I queried.

"How did you pass the parachuting part of class?" Tessa responded, narrowing her eyes at us.

"Luck. So, we heading back to the ship?" Jem asked. Axel nodded.
________________________________  

Lux

Shiloh and Isabelle kept tugging on their dresses as we snuck into the club through the backdoor which Markus had opened for us.

"Would you two stop that?" I hissed. "It makes us look suspicious."

"Oh and the obvious wigs don't?" Shiloh snapped back.

"Where's Markus?" Liam asked, interrupting our spat.

"He said he'd be at the bar... found him!" I exclaimed, pointing in his direction. The four of us finagled our way over to him.

"Girls, Liam, I'd like you to meet the best racer I know: Roman Baumann. Roman, these are my friends I was telling you about," Markus introduced.

"What exactly do you need us to do?" Roman inquired.

"Is there a more private place we can talk?" Shiloh countered, sending the driver a flirtatious smile.

"Yeah, follow me. I come here a lot so I have my own private room." He led us to a room in the back of the club. Once inside, Shiloh, Isabelle and I took off our wigs. His reaction was almost instantaneous.

"Markus, what have you gotten yourself into now?" Roman demanded, pointing at us. "Do you know who these people are?"

"Yes, I know who they are. And it's not just me. Axel's in on it too," Markus answered. "These people who are being wrongly accused of treason and they need to clear their names and their parents' names. Again."

"Okay, whatever I do, I'm going to be committing treason too and I'm sorry for the predicament you're all in but I'm not helping. No way! Besides, where would we go after we helped you get the planes?!" Roman exclaimed.

"We could keep you on the ship until it passed over," Markus added.

"And who would get us there? How would we get there?" Roman asked.

"Well, that's actually part of our plan," I said.

"Do I even want to know the plan?"

"Probably not but you need to know so you know what you and the others will be up against."

"I'm going to regret this, aren't I?"

"Maybe at first, but then once we clear our names, you'll be famous for helping the Razgriz," Isabelle said.

Roman sighed, throwing his back. "... What's the plan?"
________________________________  

Alec

When we arrived at Orson Perrault's house, I was surprised by the lack of security he had. Besides a few cameras, there was nothing. Of course, the guy was probably armed like no other.

I knocked on the front door, nervously waiting for him to open the door. When he did, he immediately tried to shut it but I stuck my foot in the gap, saying, "Hey, you owe our parents and since they can't make the call in for the favor, we are."

"No, you're not your parents. My favor doesn't extend to you!" He answered, trying to kick my foot out of the doorway.

"You know," Sophie began, "If Alec, Henry, and the others die because you won't help them, and the Razgriz get wind of it- and believe me they will- they will never forgive you. Anyone bad in the eyes of the Razgriz is bad in the eyes of the public. You seem like a guy who wants to continue to be relatively popular after your floundering in the Circum-Pacific War. So let me ask you: do you really want to turn us down?"

"Who the hell are you?"

"Will's girlfriend. My dad's a lawyer so I picked up quite a few tips from him. If I die on the mission with the rest of the Razgriz Legacies, my dad will join the Razgriz in their fight against anyone who helped get their children killed."

Perrault stopped trying to slam the door on my now immensely bruised foot, but he didn't open it any farther.

"Why is it always your family that gets involved in this crap? First the Belkan War, then the Circum-Pacific War, then Rald, then the Emmerian-Estovakian War, now this," he griped.

"I mean in our defense, we never started any of it except for maybe the Rald one. Bad guys just choose to do stuff that somehow gets our family involved," Henry explained.

Perrault sighed. "What exactly do you need from me?"

"Your pull in the military to get us a tank or two," I stated.

"Do I even want to know why you need tanks?"

"They're a distraction," Henry said.

"For what?"

"The plan is kind of top secret but long story short, we need some planes, and we need those tanks to blow a hole in the fence so our drivers can get us through to the planes. I mean we'd get in the tanks ourselves but we're going to have quite a few people and we wouldn't all fit in the tanks so..."

"For a family who doesn't like me, you sure do ask me big favors," Perrault remarked.

"Well you have a lot to make up for after branding them traitors, trying to have them shot down, and helping one of the main leaders of the Gray Men out," Sophie countered back. "You have the pull we don't because half of our group hasn't graduated yet and the half that have don't have the ranking to pull off what we need. No offense Alec."

"None taken. Like you said, we wouldn't be here if we did," I said.

"I can get you two tanks max but you're going to need to give me a believable cover story as to why the Razgriz need them in the first place."

"Oh we can give you all the details. But first, you're going to need to let us inside."

With a groan the ex-Base Commander opened the door fully for us. We followed him inside, eyes darting around to make sure there weren't any traps. He hadn't known we were coming so it was doubtful that there was anyone here who would take us captive but in this day and age, you never knew.

We took a seat in his living room where he asked, "So what is this stupid plan you've come up with?"

"We need to get some planes off of a base and the only way to do that, since we can't waltz in anymore, is to blow a hole in the fence or the entrance of the base so we can get through with our rides," I informed.

"What are your rides?"

"Really fast cars to cause a distraction for the tanks that the base is going to have," Henry replied. "Shiloh, Lux, and Isabelle are working on that."

"How do those girls know racers?"

"We know people who know them."

Perrault sighed. "What should be my reasoning for having a tank delivered to the base?"

"Just say the Razgriz are worried about an attack and they want to increase security while they're away," Sophie stated. "Because then you're not actually lying. They do want to increase security and they are away from Oured at the moment."

"Where are they?"

"Do we look like walking satellites or something? We don't know," I retorted. "And they have no idea about what we're going through and we need to keep it that way because they need to focus on their mission. We think they may have found Henri and are on their way to rescue him."

"Why not go to them first chance you got?"

"Because they wouldn't let us help and we want to, in honor of Percy. They attacked our family and we don't take kindly to that," Henry stated.

"Do I want to know what base you want me to send this tank to?"

"You kind of need to know."

"It was a rhetorical question."

"Demons Base," Sophie told him. Perrault stared at us for a few moments. He then proceeded to get up, go to his liquor cabinet, and poured himself some whiskey (or maybe it was brandy). He paused for a second or two, staring at the half-full glass, then poured some more in. Grabbing the glass and taking a massive sip, he asked, "When do you need the tanks by?"

"We're not sure yet. But soon. We'll give you a good heads up for when it's about to happen so you have enough time to get it all situated," I promised.

"Fine. I'll be waiting. Here's my cell number," he said, writing it down on a piece of paper and handing it to me.

"Thank you for helping us. I know you don't want to," Sophie remarked.

"I'm helping because the Razgriz scare me more than our government. The government would believe my lies. Your aunt wouldn't," he grunted, wagging his finger between me and Henry when he said 'your aunt'.

"Yeah, we're glad we're related to Blaze. She's the last person I'd want to be against. But you've been there, haven't you Perrault?" Henry inquired rather sassily.

"Don't even go there. Now go. I don't want to be around you three any more than I want to be around your parents." He escorted back to the front door. Just as we stepped down the stairs, he added, "Hey, don't get killed. As much as we don't like each other, you and your family are still the best thing that ever happened to this country. Hell, to the world. I'd hate to see it end now."

"With your help, we won't be dying anytime soon. Thank you," I said. With that done, the three of us headed back to the designated place where our helicopter would be picked up.
________________________________  

Shiloh

"So you're telling me that you want to break into your parents' base, use a tank to a blow a hole for an entrance where me and my friends would then drive you to the hangars where you would steal your parents' planes, take us with you because we're going to be on the most wanted list after this thing, and then escape to an aircraft carrier where this guy and Axel had to lead a mutiny to get?" Roman clarified, pointing accusingly at Markus with the last bit of his rant.

"Yeah, sounds like you have it right," Lux remarked.

"What made you think I'd help you?"

"Him and Axel," Liam said, nodding towards Markus.

Roman turned to Markus, obviously annoyed that his 'friend' had suggested we come to him. "What made you think I'd help them?"

"Mostly for the same reasons we are. Our parents tarnished our last names with what they pulled in the Circum-Pacific War. Axel and I want to put a positive association with our names again."

"What's the reason you're helping them and why I wouldn't?"

"They're our friends. Or at least we considered them friends."

"You're our friends too," I promised.

"... How many of you would there be?" Roman asked after a few moments of hesitation.

"Let's see, me, Lux, Isabelle, Will, Jem, Alec, Henry, Charlotte, and Tessa, so nine there... Then we'd need Axel and Markus to control the tank and Helena and Liam to fire them so that would make it thirteen. There's nine planes so the max amount of drivers we could have would be seven," Isabelle calculated.

"Let me call up the others, see if they'd be willing to do it," he mumbled. Roman went off to the corner and pulled out his cell phone, dialing some numbers. He must've been doing a group call. The rest of us huddled around Markus.

"What if he's calling the cops instead of his friends?" Liam whispered.

"There's a reason we came armed. Here, girls, I know you couldn't hide much under those dresses so I brought some more weapons for you," Markus said, unzipping the inside of his jacket to reveal at least ten handguns along with rounds of ammo. He handed one each to us.

"Uh, guys, hold on," Roman said, placing his hand over the speaker on his phone. Turning to us, he demanded in shock, "What the hell?!"

"What?" Markus asked. "We have people after us."

"Jesus Chr-" he turned back around and continued speaking in Belkan. With the exception of Liam and Isabelle, I and my sister and Markus could understand exactly what was being said.

"Yeah, I said Markus Adler... no Axel isn't with him but he's on this whole thing they need our help with... they need our help breaking into the Razgriz's base... because their kids are stealing their parents' planes... a couple of them are. I don't know who the brooding brunette is with them though... he says he's doing it because they're his friends and he wants to give his last name a new meaning... yeah, I get it... they only have a way out for us when we help them get their parents' planes, not for when this whole ordeal is over..."

"Tell them our parents can get you out of any crimes that will be brought against you. You'd technically be working for them and their cause so..." Lux said.

"Also, we speak Belkan so if you're trying to hide anything from us, it's not going to work," I added.

"Oh now you tell me?" He responded sarcastically. Roman went back to being on the phone though he continued to speak Belkan. "Their parents could apparently get us out of being charged for any serious crimes because let's face it, we would be... there'd be eleven of them total. The nine Razgriz Legacies, Markus, Axel, Liam, and Helena. Apparently the last four are going to be manning tanks... yeah you heard me right... I called you four because I figured you'd be the ones crazy enough to do this along with me... all right, I'll let them know."

Roman hung up, turning to face us. "God help us, but we're in. Schulz, Hoffman, Richter, and Vogel are in. All our cars can fit three people so no need to worry about there not being enough room for your comrades. When does this all go down anyway?"

"We don't have an exact date yet, but we'll let you know when we do. There's just a few things we have to work out before it happens. Now, I know you might have trouble with this but keep your mouth shut about this unless you're talking to the others in person. And make sure no one is around to hear you. If the Gray Men or Osean government suspects we've been in contact with you, they might put a target on your back."

"Understood. Good luck." The five of us said goodbye to Roman and snuck out the back door, hiding our weapons so as not to look suspicious... well, more so than we already did.

"Let's have Tybalt drive us back to the rendezvous point where we'll wait for our helicopter," Markus said. We all agreed that it was the best course of action. We found Tybalt where we'd left him a few blocks over, waiting for us in the SUV. After we were all in, he floored it to get out of the place. He'd just pulled onto the freeway when a helicopter flew over us.

Our helicopter.

"What's going on?" Isabelle asked.

"They certainly got Helena out quick," Liam said.

"No, they wouldn't be flying over the freeway like that if they had her already. Something's up," Markus observed.

"The twins," Lux and I groaned simultaneously.

"I bet you anything they didn't land where they were supposed to be," Lux added.

"You'd be right," Tybalt called from the front. "Axel just informed me that one twin is riding on top of a taxi and the other is surfing on a bus."

"And we were worried about the Gray Men causing problems," I muttered.

"It's better that they landed on vehicles rather than in front of them," Lux remarked.

"The helicopter is getting them now. We're still-" Tybalt halted in his speech, listening to something over his radio. "Never mind. You guys have to climb up the helicopter's ladder as well. Axel's spotted armed vehicles coming onto the highway after your brothers and probably us as well. Get going!"

The sunroof in the back opened. We had a brief argument about whether the guys or girls should go first but convinced the guys to let us go first because we were wearing dresses and that just would've been awkward. Markus climbed the dangling ladder faster than anybody I'd ever seen before. Liam was much slower but we all were compared to the Belkan. Lux went next. Isabelle followed. I was last, but quickly ducked down and asked Tybalt, "What about you?"

"I'm getting evacuated too, don't worry. Just a little later because I have the SUV to deal with. Now go!" he barked. I didn't need any encouragement. As quickly as I could, I scrambled up the ladder. It was much more difficult than I thought it'd be because it was moving around more than I realized when I was watching my friends and family go up. However, I got up safe and sound. Will and Jem were grinning from ear to ear, making it obvious they clearly enjoyed their little jaunt.

"You guys get the racers?" Axel asked.

"We got five total, including Roman. Our plan is good to go from our end. I see your guys' mission succeeded," I said, smiling at Helena. "Have we heard anything from the last group?"

"Nothing. We're heading back to the ship but we're keeping an ear out for any news. Remember they had much farther to go," Axel reminded.

"I know. Doesn't make me any less on edge though."

"Where are we headed now?" Helena queried.

"Back to base. We have an aircraft carrier as our base of operations thanks to Axel here."

"How did you get an aircraft carrier? And a Belkan one at that?"

"Markus and I led a mutiny against the captain who was part of the Gray Men. Captured all the others too," Axel informed.

"Nice job," she complimented.

"Thanks. Now what do you say we get out of here and back to safety?" All of us heartily agreed.
________________________________  

When we arrived onto the aircraft carrier, Allison was waiting for us. By the look on her face, I knew it something was up.

"What's wrong?" I asked when I walked up to her.

"I tried to find the schematics on your parents' planes and there is no electronic copy of them anywhere in the Osean database. I even hacked into the Belkan government's database and couldn't find anything. The only thing I did find was that they exist in paper form. There are four copies in existence. Two in the Belkan government- one at Grunder Industries, one in the BAF's presidential building- and two in the Osean government which are both at Versailles in different places. My guess is one would be with the president, one would be with your parents."

"And we need those schematics to understand how the plane works," I said, pinching the bridge of my nose in annoyance. "Okay, so how are we going to get those because if we risk going out any more than we already have, we're going to get caught."

"I've thought about that. Brett Thompson has been given access to certain files on the Razgriz and Galm Team by your parents and the President for the articles he writes. What if we had him do it and then have Axel or Markus meet him at a pre-arranged spot?"

"That could work," Markus agreed.

"Henry and I have the USB disks with us that have the building plans to Versailles on it so we can figure out where all the passages are for him to escape because once he opens that safe, they're going to be onto him and he's going to need to hightail it out of there."

"Password is 86848486858679," Isabelle recited. We all looked at her with a mixture of awe and confusion. "What? I watched dad open it once."

"That was easy," Alec said. "Do the numbers stand for anything of importance?"

"It's the years that Blaze, Chopper, Genette, Nagase, Grimm, Cassie, and Snow were born."

"So now we just need Brett Thompson on board. If not, then we're going to need to go in ourselves," Charlotte pointed out.

"There's also going to be a guard with him," Tessa said.

"What about Alex? If he goes with Brett to keep an eye on him... Alex has always been our friend. He would defend us to the last breath."

"True. Remember that time he took on sniper fire when someone tried to shoot mom?" Will said grimly.

"When did that happen?" Axel asked incredulously.

"When we were ten. Lux was nine and Shiloh was eight," Jem explained. "Alex was in the hospital for a good week or two and had to go through rehabilitation afterwards. He came straight back to working for our parents."

"Have Brett ask for Alex. He'll say yes, especially if Brett asks Alex if he can speak to him privately about something for an article. If he agrees to the whole thing, great. If not, we'll have Thompson knock him out."

"This just gets better and better, doesn't it?" Helena chuckled.

"And that's still not the trickiest of our plans. All right everyone. We've had a long day. I say we go to bed, get some rest, and then convene in the morning to come up with the rest of this plan," I suggested. Everyone agreed. The moment I was done with my shower, had dried my hair, and brushed my teeth, I collapsed onto my bed, falling asleep within minutes.
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The plot thickens. Reviews would be lovely :)