Chapter 140

Incompetence was something Mother White wasn’t very good at tolerating. Presently, she was surrounded by it. Not only were the idiots in the control room driving her crazy with their inability to follow simple directions and point the cameras where they needed to go, every detail she’d sent out so far to stop Rain and her little group of meddlers had been blasted to bits. Really, how hard was it to stop four people? The fact that they’d broken Lightning out of prison, along with the rest of the women who’d somehow managed to survive since the Rebellion, and now 24C was running across the courtyard with a group of Dicks was enough to make her blood boil.
Knowing how close Lightning was to infiltrating their system was enough to make her want to shoot the rest of the Mothers in the room in the head.
But White was no tech guru. She needed these morons to figure out how to keep Lightning out of their vital records. It seemed the little bitch was already into the systems she shouldn’t be able to access, and all of the highest-ranking Mothers in the Technology and Communications division were unable to catch up to her, much less force her out.
And then there was the problem of Rain….
She couldn’t continue to run around, shooting Mothers, and not know the truth. It was now or never.
If she couldn’t stop the girl from killing every soldier she sent her way, she’d have to find a way to get the girl to come to her.
White pulled her revolver from the holster at her waist and checked that it was loaded. Satisfied that she had enough rounds of ammunition between this gun and the other one she had in reserve stuck into the back of her belt, she headed for the door.
“Mother White? Where are you going?” Flamingo asked from the control panel where she was doing nothing--nothing right, anyway.
“To flush out a little mouse,” White replied. “See if you can keep from destroying the entire Motherhood while I'm gone, hmm?”
White hurried down the hall, knowing she needed a better plan than just walking up to Rain and yelling at her to drop her weapon. No, she’d need to utilize what he’d seen on the monitors to get the girl to come to her. If she had the right bait, it would be easy to catch the mouse. And she was pretty sure she knew just where to get the finest cheese.

* * *

“Lightning!” Rain could hear the other girl furiously typing as she approached the office where she’d left her. It was nearly impossible to believe that she was still there, that the Mothers hadn’t managed to infiltrate this part of the building yet. It wasn’t as if there weren’t more entrances than the one Rain had been covering.
“Hey,” Lightning said. “I’ve got the exterior hard drive full of enough information to prove everything the Quebecians ever needed to show the Mothers were doing wrong. I found a thumb drive, though, and I’m just finishing downloading the same material onto that so we have two chances of getting this evidence out of here.”
While Lightning was speaking to her, Rain’s eyes were on the cameras. She could see fighting going on in other parts of the building. Seth was leading a group down a hallway that looked to be near the medical wing where Rain had done some of her labs. She tried to make out Josie, but she wasn’t visible with a cursory glance.
Nor did she see Adam or Mist and Walt on the screens. Perhaps they hadn’t made it back in yet.
“All right,” Lightning said, pushing back her chair so that it screeched on the floor. She hopped up but then almost fell over. Rain reached out an arm to steady her. “Where’s the closest exit?”
“It’s the one that Adam used to get the men out. By the cafeteria, isn’t it?” She figured Lightning knew the building better than she did. It was clear she was about to fall over, though.
“That’s right I’ll take the exterior hard drive and head for that exit. You take the thumb drive and go a different way. Between the two of us, perhaps one of us will make it back to the Quebecians’ camp with the data.”
“All right,” Rain said. “You don’t think it would be a better idea for me to cover you while you go?”
Lightning shook her head, holding onto Rain’s arm for stability. “Look at the monitors, Rain. They’re not here yet, but they’re coming. Just because I get outside, that doesn’t mean I’ll make it, but I’ve got a hell of a lot better chance of getting this information to where it needs to go if I can get out the door with it.”
Rain took a deep breath and nodded. “Be careful, Lightning.” She handed her a small handgun she had in one of her pockets. “This isn’t much, but it’ll help. Thank you.”
“Thank you for coming back for us, Rain. You didn’t have to do that. You could’ve stayed in the Nation of Quebec with Twenty-four C and had a bunch of babies and been a happy, free woman.”
Rain shook her head. “As long as one woman is indoctrinated into this philosophy, or one man is held prisoner, none of us are free.”
Lightning leaned over and kissed her cheek, her rough lips almost scraping against Rain’s skin. Then, the tech guru, in dirty clothes so loose they were about to fall off, headed out the door.
Rain took a deep breath and studied the monitors. She knew that Lightning thought she could make it out that door before she was caught, but Rain wasn’t sure. She may have stopped the initial assault, but the door was still wide open for more Military Mothers to pour through.
The data was still rolling by on the computer. Rain was tempted to see if she could find the information she was looking for about herself, but she knew it was a selfish move. She needed to get out of there, find another exit, and get the thumb drive to the commanders. Her eyes scanned the screens again. She was looking for Adam more than anything else, but what she saw had her breath catching.
Mothers. They’d made it past the door and were heading down the hallway where Rain had just stopped the breach. There were more of them this time, and they looked more experienced. They were rushing toward the cafeteria.
There wasn’t a camera that showed the exit Lightning was headed toward, only one that was focused on the cafeteria door. She hadn’t seen Lightning pass that point yet, but she also hadn’t been watching.
She could go help. She could go attack the Mothers that were headed down the hallway where Lightning was making her escape. Whether or not she could stop them all, Rain wasn’t sure, but she could try.
If she failed, and they got her and Lightning, they’d have both copies of the files.
Lightning had told her to run the other way and get out.
That’s what she needed to do. Taking a deep breath, she said, “Good luck, Lightning,” and headed out the door.