Rebel Heart

Her heart dropped to her stomach, and she ran. She reached the command hub to find the general pacing in front while three guards waited a short distance from him. The doorframe was red, indicating it was locked. Out of breath, she waited for the general to speak.

"You feel it?" General Greene asked. "I think he disabled the field."

She listened for the familiar thrum of energy over her breathing. It was gone.

"It's the least of my concerns," the general mumbled, jabbing at the keypad. "But I am concerned about any other systems he decided to disable."

She pulled out her microcomputer and approached the door. The security system didn't recognize her thumbprint. She maneuvered through the complex network systems available to her remotely.

"Ready," she breathed. "I'm disabling the power. We'll have a few seconds to blast the door without affecting the rest of the networks."

The general signaled the three guards over and pulled her out of the way. The guards prepared their laser weaponry and waited. The light around the doorframe went dark, and the three opened fire. The screech of metal on metal drove her to cover her ears as she moved farther away. Sparks and blue fire erupted around the door until it glowed red. With a boom and a crunch, it folded in a cloud of smoke.

The guards lowered their weapons.

"You two, drag the commander out and wait here," General Greene snapped. "Lana, see what's broken."

She followed the two through the acrid smoke into the command hub. The commander was slumped over a workstation, out cold. One screen was a flash of colors and shapes. She went to the workstation monitoring the underground systems and saw with relief that the underground lair was functioning as normal. Her eyes strayed to the wall kept behind translucent, titanium-reinforced glass. Arnie knew the importance of the buttons and keypads behind that glass, but the wall looked secured. She dragged the unconscious commander to the floor and replaced him in the seat before the energy terminal, assessing the damage done.

"We'll have to post guards with the security system inoperable," General Greene muttered as he stepped through the hole in the door. "What do we have?"

"I don't know what he was doing," she replied, puzzled. "It looks like he was attempting to arm the remaining weapons systems in the East."

"Madman."

"He didn't get far," she said. "The specialist can fix it in the morning."