Finn: Scifi Alien Invasion Romance (Hell Squad Book 10) (8 page)

“Keep working on it, Noah,” Holmes finally said. “We need to make contact with the other human bases. It’s imperative we work together on driving the Gizzida away.”

Lia knew the general was right. If they didn’t work with the other survivors, then even if they defeated the Gizzida in Sydney, alien reinforcements would come from other parts of the planet.

“General, Devlin and I will plan a ground trip into the factory area,” Santha Kade said from the back of the room. “Devlin will obviously be the one to go in.” She gestured at her rounded belly.

“I think it’s best I go alone,” Devlin said from beside Santha. “We need to get a better understanding of what’s going on in there, and I can move faster on my own.”

Holmes nodded, but his frown had deepened. “Plan it out. But Dev, take one other person with you. Someone from the squads.”

Devlin inclined his head. “Yes, sir.”

Thoughts were turning around in Lia’s head. “General, if we have to drop the amplifier a long distance offshore, we’re going to need an aircraft capable of traveling the distance.”

Finn stirred. “The Hawks—”

“Aren’t designed for the kind of range we’re talking about.”

Noah ran a hand through his long hair. “Lia’s right. I was hoping we’d find some way to get the amplifier to travel, but it’s not looking that way. We need to have a Plan B.”

“We need a supersonic aircraft,” Lia said.

Finn snorted. “Right. Have a supersonic jet parked outside, do you?”

Jets had gone supersonic fifty years back, and had given birth to the United Coalition of Countries. It had allowed fast travel between all parts of the planet.

“The aliens have destroyed any and all aircraft facilities,” Finn continued.

Lia straightened. “I was a pilot for Fusion Air. I know of one manufacturing facility in the area that my company had purchased aircraft from. There’s a chance, a slim one, that there might still be an aircraft there that we can use.”

“Where’s the location?” Holmes asked.

Lia reached over and tapped on a comp, excitement filling her. She pulled up the map on-screen. A glowing dot appeared. “In my spare time, I’ve been studying all the facilities I could remember, and analyzing drone footage of them when I could. I won’t lie, most of them have been destroyed, but this one—Aeron Industries—still looks like it’s mostly intact.”

She heard Devlin and Finn curse almost in unison. The men were staring at the map.

Lia cleared her throat. “This is based on old footage from a few months ago, so I’ve no way of knowing if this is what it looks like now.”

“That’s on the Central Coast,” Finn said. His gaze bored into her. “Right next to the alien factories.”

She nodded. “I know.”

***

“It’s risky, but it has to be done,” Holmes said. “We need a supersonic jet.”

Everyone in the room started talking. Finn stared at the map and knew that Lia and the general were right. They needed to get to this location and check it out.

“First,” Holmes said, “we need to confirm if there are any jets left. If there is a viable aircraft, we’ll send a team and pilot in to retrieve it.”

Finn glanced at Noah. “Noah, how long do you need to make the tweaks to hide the Hawk’s heat signature?”

The other man blew out a breath. “Weeks. But I can get something temporary rigged in a day. Won’t be perfect, but it should throw off these missiles.”

If Finn could avoid the missiles, he could get in close to the Aeron facility and take a look.

Finn nodded. “Then I’ll go in. I’ll come in from the west and take a look at this location. I’ll do a quick flyby of the facility and see if there’s anything left.”

Holmes stroked his chin. “All right.”

“There’s only one problem.” Doc Emerson strode in, her white lab coat flaring out behind her. “Finn does not have medical clearance to fly. At least not solo.”

“What?” He was grounded? A panicked sensation erupted in his chest.
No way
. “Doc, I’m fine—”

“You suffered significant trauma,” the doctor continued. “I’ve patched you up, quite well I might add, but I don’t think you’re ready for a combat mission alone.”

“It’s just a flyby—”

Emerson gave him a sour look. “In dangerous raptor territory.”

He muttered a curse.

“We can talk with the other Hawk pilots,” Holmes suggested. “I know none of them are quite as skilled as you—”

“You want to send one of the others in, with heat-seeking missiles out there that can bring down a Hawk?” Finn shook his head. “No way. I won’t ask them to risk their lives.”

“He won’t be alone.”

Finn whipped his head around to look at Lia. But she was looking at the general and Emerson.

“I’ll go with him. I’m the best person to assess the jets. And I’m trained to fly a Hawk, if Finn needs the help.”

“I don’t.”

She ignored him. “I’d also like to take a drone. I can send it down for extra intel.”

The general gave a few slow nods. “Okay, it’s agreed. Finn and Lia will go together. Plan the mission as fast as you can.”

The meeting ended, and, as a few people stayed to talk with Holmes, Finn saw Lia leaving. He hurried out after her. He spotted her at the end of the hall, turning a corner. He followed her and soon caught up with her in an empty corridor.

He grabbed her shoulder. “I don’t need a babysitter.”

Green eyes looked up at him. “The doc thinks you do.”

He growled.

Lia sighed. “Look, I’ll let you do your thing. I’m only there in case of an emergency, and to find us a jet.”

Finn felt a muscle tick in his jaw.

“I know you’re good at flying, Finn. You won’t need me.”

“What if I do?”

“Do what?” she said frowning.

“Need you.” He backed her up against the wall, pressing his body up against hers. Without another word, he crashed his mouth down on hers.

She went still for a brief second, then her hands wrapped around his shoulders and she kissed him back. Finn slid his tongue inside her mouth, pulling the taste of her inside him.

Then she yanked her mouth away from his. “We have to stop doing this.”

“Why?” He pressed his mouth back against the side of her neck, nipping and tasting her skin.

“Because…we’ll get attached. You don’t want that, right?”

Hell
. She was right. For a second, he wanted to say fuck it, but he thought of his family. The loss of them tore at him.

Reluctantly, he pulled away from Lia’s warmth. “I need to meet with Noah to do work on the Hawk illusion system.”

She straightened, tidying her hair. “I need to get prepped for this mission. I’ll get my drone organized, and be ready whenever you’re ready to go.”

Finn really didn’t want to take Lia out there. Right into the heart of alien territory. A part of him desperately wanted to keep her safe.

“See you soon, flyboy.”

Finn forced himself to turn away from her and head toward the hangar. He needed to focus on the Hawk and the mission.

He found Noah already there, and hard at work. It wasn’t Finn’s Hawk, but one of the others in their small fleet. He glanced over to where his girl sat, parked off to the side in a maintenance bay. He walked over to her.

She was pretty beaten up. He knew the maintenance team was good and they’d do what they could to get her fixed. He patted her. “We saved each other, didn’t we?”

He’d have her back soon enough. He went back over to join Noah. The tech genius was cursing.

“How’s it going?”

Noah scowled. “Like crap.”

Finn bent over the diagnostic panel Noah was looking at. “Looks like you need my help.”

Noah snorted. “I’ve got a few different things we can try.”

They got to work. That involved a whole lot of circling around the Hawk, climbing into the cockpit, climbing out of the cockpit, trying a few tests, arguing, and swearing.

Finn wasn’t sure how much time had passed, but when he looked up, he saw General Holmes standing nearby. His face was grim, and Finn knew he wasn’t going to like whatever the man was going to say.

“I need you to step up the mission timetable,” Holmes said. “You need to head out within the hour.”

“What’s happened?” Finn demanded.

“We received a partial message from the Groom Lake Base in Nevada. It was garbled.” The man pressed his hands together, his jaw tight. “It sounds like the aliens have attacked them. We’re not really sure what their status is, as we couldn’t get a message back to them.”

Shit
. Finn could imagine the terror of the poor people at the base. They all knew what it had been like when Blue Mountain Base had been attacked.

“Parts of the message are missing,” Holmes said in a frustrated voice. “But they mention an alien weapon.”

Finn straightened. “Something we haven’t seen before?”

The general nodded. “They said it’s something the aliens are building.” Holmes shook his head. “Not enough info came through. But whatever this is…they said it’s a humanity-ending device.”

Finn bit down on the inside of his mouth. “Something to kill us off once and for all.”

“We need to get the rest of the information. We need to get the amplifier out there.”

Finn nodded and looked at Noah. “What we’ve done will have to be good enough.”

Noah gave a single, dissatisfied nod. “I’ve added extra flares to the Hawk’s arsenal. Even if the missiles do still pick up your heat signature, you can use the flares to confuse them, and give them other heat signatures to follow.”

This was it. “I’ll call Lia. Our mission is a go.”

Chapter Eight

Lia adjusted her flight suit and gripped her drone. She strode down the corridor toward the hangar. As she stepped inside, she watched people moving to and fro, working on Hawks, refueling equipment, moving spare parts. She spotted Finn’s damaged Hawk, and her stomach did a slow turn.

Then she spotted another Hawk in the center of the hangar. She could see Finn through the cockpit window.

She pulled in a deep breath, calming her nerves. The last time she’d been out on a mission, she’d ended up running across an alien battleship while being attacked by raptors. The last time she’d watched a mission on screen, she’d seen Finn go down in flames.

This was their life now. Heading into danger, taking enormous risks. She looked around at all the people. To keep the Enclave and its people safe, some people had to take risks. To fight off the Gizzida, some of those fighters would die.

She looked at Finn again. He looked almost normal, busy getting the Hawk ready. But she remembered what he’d looked like, how hurt he’d been, when Hell Squad had brought him home.

Her thoughts turned to their night together. She knew she shouldn’t think about it, about him. But she didn’t want to see him hurt again, and she wanted more. She wanted to touch him and taste him again. God, she was an idiot.

At that moment, he looked down and spotted her, then waved her inside.

Lia climbed into the Hawk and moved through to the cockpit. She settled into the co-pilot’s seat.

“We’re just about ready to leave,” he told her.

“I heard about the message from Groom Lake.”

He nodded. “Not enough info got through. No one’s sure what exactly happened, or if they are okay. We need a jet and we need it yesterday. We have to get the amplifier out there.”

“Then let’s do it.”

Finn moved through his preflight check with an ease and skill that proved he’d done it many times before. Soon, the Hawk was shooting upward, through the retracted hangar doors. The afternoon sunlight was almost blinding. Lia closed her eyes and absorbed the warmth of it. There were some days when she really missed the sunshine.

“Good luck, you two.” Elle’s voice came through the speakers. “I’ll stay with you as long as I can.”

“Thanks, Elle,” Finn replied. He tapped the controls, and the Hawk tilted and moved northwest.

Lia could see that Finn was moving them a long way to the west. He was avoiding the main part of Sydney, and the areas that had the most alien activity. Soon, she saw the dark purple shadow of the Blue Mountains.

“I wonder what’s left of the old base,” she said.

He shrugged. “No point thinking about it. We made it out, that’s all that matters.”

He said it so matter-of-factly. Lia nodded, but she wondered if it mattered more than that. After all, it had been their home for eighteen months.

But maybe he was right. It was another thing that she’d gotten attached to, and then had snatched away.

She turned her gaze downward. Every now and then, she spotted raptor patrols. And once, off in the distance, she saw the huge form of a rex lumbering along. The creature had gotten its name because it resembled a T-rex.

“Do you think many survivors are out there? Alone?” she asked.

“Probably,” Finn said.

It had to be horrible to be so alone and afraid. “I wonder what this new alien weapon is.”

“We won’t know until we get this amplifier out there, and can talk to Groom Lake. Or other bases. Someone else might have intel on it.”

Worry ate at her, as she imagined what else the Gizzida had up their scaly sleeves. But Lia pushed it aside. For the moment, she had to focus on this mission.

Soon, they were flying over the thick trees of a national park on the northern side of Sydney.

“Okay,” Finn said. “We’re coming up on the facility.”

“I’ve been there a couple of times.” Lia scanned the ground below, to see if she could spot Aeron’s buildings. “I went to take a look at some new aircraft designs they were working on. They did good work.”

“Look. There it is.” He pointed straight ahead.

Lia could see the white curved hangars in the distance. “Any alien signatures?”

“None. Factories are that way.” He nodded his head toward the east.

Lia looked in the direction he indicated. She couldn’t see the buildings Finn had described, but she could see the thick clouds of smoke hanging in the air on the horizon like ugly storm clouds. Her gut cramped. What the hell were the aliens doing?

“Shit.”

Finn’s curse made her look back. They were right over the Aeron facility.
Oh, no
. Despair stuck its sharp claws into her. She could see it clearly now. The hangars were all crumpled. One had been burned, and was now just a blackened husk.