22
LOKAN
The motorcycle's engine whined in protest as Lokan downshifted, struggling up the steep grade. Loose rocks scattered beneath the tires, tumbling into the darkness below. The mountain pass had narrowed to little more than a goat track, barely wide enough for the bikes, with a sheer drop on one side that disappeared into shadows.
As the bike lurched over another outcropping, Carol's arms tightened around his waist, and his healing ribs protested, but he didn't say a thing. Having her body pressed to his was soothing to his soul.
The terrain had deteriorated so much over the past hour that he regretted having bikes and not yaks. The animals were well adapted to the cold, high altitude, and rugged, steep terrain.
They would have also made little to no noise and not attracted unwanted attention.
The yaks' smell was another issue, which would have bothered Carol, but given all their advantages, Lokan was sure she wouldn't have objected.
Not that what was coming off the bikes was pleasant. They were overheating, and the acrid smell of burning oil filled the air, mixing with the sickly-sweet scent of engine components that were starting to melt.
If the bikes lasted all the way through, he would count it as a miracle.
Ahead of them, Grant's bike suddenly lurched, and the Guardian raised a fist as he dismounted. "Hold up," he said.
Lokan brought his bike to a halt, and he and Carol got off.
"What's wrong?" He walked up to where Grant was standing at the edge of the path.
The Guardian pointed ahead to where the track seemed to disappear entirely, replaced by a series of rocky ledges that would require climbing rather than riding. "We need to ditch the bikes. We can't get them through that."
"Bloody hell," Camden muttered. "The contact said this was passable."
Dougal joined them. "For smugglers on foot, maybe, or mountain goats."
Lokan studied the terrain with a sinking feeling. "I was just thinking that we would have been better off riding yaks, and that Turner's contact should have thought to warn us that even mountain bikes were not the best choice for this terrain. Now we are stuck making the rest of the way on foot, and that's going to take much longer than we accounted for."
They would run out of supplies, but as immortals, they would survive. The bigger problem was that the longer they were exposed, the more vulnerable they were.
"Maybe we should backtrack and find another route," he suggested. They'd already deviated significantly from the planned path to avoid potential ambush points, and he wasn't at all sure that there was a more accessible route.
"Lokan," Carol said quietly, and something in her tone made him follow her gaze.
She pointed at the sky. "Can you hear that?"
He focused, trying to ignore all the nocturnal noises and isolate a sound that didn't belong. He heard it then, the distant whine of a small engine. Once he knew what he was looking for, it was easy to spot the small dark shape in the clear night sky.
"A drone," he said. "Two o'clock, about three hundred meters up. We wouldn't have heard it over the engine noise if we hadn't stopped."
"How long has it been tracking us?"
"Damn." Carol pulled her weapon. "We need to shoot it down. It's transmitting our location."
"Don't." Lokan put a hand on her arm, lowering it. "They already know where we are. It's better to let them think we're unaware of it while we plan."
Carol snorted. "Too late for that. They saw us looking up. This thing is transmitting in real time."
"It's dark," Camden said. "They might not see details."
Lokan's mind raced through their options. The drone changed everything. Even if they found a way to continue with the motorcycles, they'd be tracked. The enhanced Doomers could be closing in already, guided by real-time surveillance.
"We don't have much choice," he said. "We need to leave the bikes, continue on foot, and pretend that we didn't notice the drone. If they think we don't know that we are being followed, they won't send people after us in the mountains. They will just wait for us to come to them. We let Turner's people know what's going on and ask for help. Perhaps they can mobilize the Russian army and send it this way. I'd rather we get caught and brought in for interrogation than fall into the hands of Doomers."
His father's minions would kill Carol and the three Guardians on sight. The Russians, on the other hand, would take them into custody. That wasn't ideal, but manageable.
