“Garett,” Gunny replied, before spitting a thick stream of tobacco juice into his bottle.
“Skipper came by this morning,” Sergeant Narvaez said, turning to look at him. “We couldn’t find the data from last night’s event. Did you move it somewhere?”
Adam felt his heart bolt like a startled doe, but he breathed through his nose to tamp his fear before replying. “Not since we made a copy for the lieutenant.”
Acting like it wasn’t a big deal, he crossed to his workstation and sat down in the chair and put his back to the other men. He could already feel beads of sweat forming on his brow, and he wanted to avoid drawing even more attention to himself. But if the others thought the missing data was a big deal, they didn’t show it and went back to the normal busywork that defined their jobs on the boat.
Adam logged in to the computer while continuing to breathe through his fear. He needed to lose himself in his work and forget the message he had sent to Chen. He should have felt relief the pilot would soon be off the carrier, but he was starting to wonder how deep down the rabbit hole of treachery he was willing to go. She might not have ordered him to pull the trigger, but he had pointed the gun for her.
As Punky followed Chief Cooper from the back of the Osprey and across the flight deck, she couldn’t help but stare in open-mouthed amazement at the bedlam surrounding her. Everywhere she looked, she saw sailors in different colored jerseys scurrying about in an unorganized fashion performing various tasks she assumed were somewhat important to the daily goings-on aboard an aircraft carrier.
“This way, ma’am,” Chief Cooper yelled, turning to ensure she was still following in his wake.
She remained on his heels, not daring to step away from the invisible path he was treading. To their left, she saw a man in camouflage trousers with a long-sleeved green turtleneck and green vest standing at the nose of an F-35C Joint Strike Fighter. His green cranial swiveled from side to side as he supervised others in green, brown, and white jerseys crawling underneath the jet. He turned in her direction, said something into the microphone attached to his cranial, then turned back to the others and started barking orders.
To her right, an E-2D Hawkeye started its engines, and the propellers began spinning violently in the humid marine air, dangerously close to where she and Chief Cooper were walking. But the seasoned crew chief didn’t seem fazed by it, and he walked with confidence toward the starboard side of the ship, just forward of the island. She breathed a sigh of relief when he led her from the flight deck down a short set of stairs onto a catwalk, then into the ship through a watertight door.
It took a moment for her eyes to adjust to the darkness, but when he led her through the next hatch, the smell of fresh paint intermixed with grease and oil permeated the dry conditioned air and hit her square in the face. The chief stopped in front of a door marked “ATO” and removed his helmet. She followed suit and removed the cranial and horse collar flotation device the squadron had loaned her, handing them back to the chief.
“Do you know where you’re going from here?”
She just stared at him, perplexed. She figured people who flew out to the aircraft carrier usually had somebody expecting them or at least had an idea of the ship’s layout. She had neither.
Chief Cooper sensed her hesitation and put a comforting hand on her shoulder. “If you want my advice, find a pilot in a flight suit and ask one of them to help you. Most of them are underworked and bored out of their mind.”
She grinned. “Know where I could find one of those?”
“Each squadron has a ready room where they usually hang out. All the ready rooms are on this level, so if you walk up and down this passageway,” he pointed to the corridor at the end of the small hallway they were standing in, “I’m sure you’ll find who you’re looking for.”
“Thanks, Chief.”
Colt pulled his stateroom door closed before slinging his duffel bag over his shoulder. He had thirty minutes before they expected him to show at the ATO to manifest for his ride back to North Island, which was more than enough time to collect his gear from Flight Equipment.
His mind was in a fog as he walked aft through the main passageway, then cut across to the starboard side of the ship. He stepped around sailors who were busy touching up paint or polishing brass, but his focus was on collecting his flight gear, getting on the COD, and flying back to North Island. He could worry about hitching a ride to Montgomery Field once he got there.
