pping Baron Reth Trillane in the face for a second straight night, showing him that Jason could strike in his capitol city with absolute impunity, anywhere he wished, anytime he wished.

That was what it was all about.

The Baron had a complete and total hissy fit. Jason read about it the next morning, sipping on a cup of soda while reading the intel report Tim had ready for him. The Baron had sacked the general responsible for security in Washington on the spot, put a one million credit reward on Jason's head, and called the Grand Duchess to demand more resources to deal with Jason. After that, he ordered his staff to put more people on the job of finding Jason, and ordered them to tighten the security around Washington, threatening dire consequences if he got through again.

Jason had to smile as he read that. Take that, Myleena Merrane.

_You look happy,_ Jyslin sent as she opened the door. She glanced at Tom, who came in with her, then repeated it aloud.

"Just a little bit," he answered. "I've spent the last couple of nights tormenting Baron Reth Trillane. Since that bitch Merrane woman stopped the mines, I've changed strategy a little."

"Well, I'd be careful about that, hon," Jyslin said delicately. "Piss him off too much, he might respond by burning the entire preserve to the ground to try to smoke us out. It won't do much to us, but it _will_ cause lots of problems for the others."

Jason blinked. He hadn't considered that. "You're right," he agreed. "I think I'd better tone it down a little."

"You can go back to mines, anyway," she told him, handing him a handpanel. "Near as we can figure, the mines won't give off a detectable gravimetric signature if you put them in low orbit. We can put them up there and they can use visual detection to lock onto Sticks. From the math, the ceiling is 367 _kathra_. Any higher, and the mine's engine isn't masked by the planetary gravity well."

"Sounds like part of a plan. How's the building doing on the guns?"

"We have six built, and five more should be done by Friday," she answered. "We'll have all fourteen done in time."

Jason nodded.

"What's those for, Mister Jason? Just out of curiosity."

"Well, we plan on doing our first armed raid in two weeks," he answered. "But before we do that, we're going to attack the Faey's planetary sensor grid in orbit above us to weaken it. We're gonna try to knock it completely out, but I don't think we'll manage."

"I thought we could work around the sensors."

"We can, but they don't _know_ that we can, Tom," he explained. "So, this attack really isn't anything but doing what they expect us to do. They would expect us to try to blind their sensor system so we can move around more freely, and we can't disappoint them. Besides, every array we bring down is more money out of Trillane's pocket, because that's equipment that they have to replace. Remember, Tom, that's the _real _objective of almost everything we do. It's not about tactics or warfare, it's about costing Trillane money. That's it. The more money we cost them, the more we can put them in the red, the better chance we have of getting them off Earth. When Earth is no longer _profitable_, then they'll be amenable to the idea of releasing their control to another noble house. Nobles don't care about their people, Tom, they only care about their bank accounts. So that's how we're going after them.

"The orbital guns are going to go around and fire on every sensor satellite they can find, and unlike other toys I've built, these won't just self destruct when the Faey come for them. They've been rigged with some strong engines, and since they'll have very little mass, they'll be able to outrun most manned fighters. We're going to seed them in orbit, and then when they activate, they'll already be in position to knock out most of the stationary satellites that cover North America. While they're doing that, _this_ is going to be going after the station." He flipped on the holographic emitter on the console, and a three dimensional image of a small spherical object appeared in the air over the console screen.

"What's that?" Tom asked.

"Think of it as the B-B from hell," Jason told him. "It's about the size of a ball bearing, Tom. It's going to be fitted with a fluxing plasma magnet that changes its orientation every time it strikes a solid object."

Jyslin gave him a look, then erupted into laughter. "Demir's sword!" she managed to gasp. "If you let those things loose in the station"

"They'll cause chaos," he nodded, then he noticed Tom's blank look. "Did you ever see that old movie, _Men In Black_, Tom?"

"Yeah, I saw it."

"Remember that little ball that flew all over the headquarters right after they recruited Will Smith? It knocked over stuff and hit people and whatnot?"

"That's what it's going to do?"

"Something like that," Jason told him. "The magnets will give the balls some serious velocity, and since the shell will be crystallized Neutronium, they're not going to be damaged when they hit stuff. And every time they hit something, the magnet inside changes its orientation to match the vector the ball picked up when it rebounded, so it preserves any momentum the ball gained from the impact. When I let them go, they're going to fly around like a cloud of destructive gunshots. While they're not really that hard to stop, the Faey don't know _how_ they work, Tom. It's going to take them time to get readings on the balls and realize what they are, and the time it takes them to figure out what they're dealing with will be all the time they need. If I can get a box of them into the main landing bay of the station and activate them, they can render the entire landing bay completely unusable while they try to figure out how to stop them. And while they work on that, the balls will be hitting the walls, the ships, everything, doing more and more damage. And the nature of the physics behind it is such that the longer they go, the faster they get. If they bounce off something they can't damage, like the hull of an armored fighter, then they have _more_ momentum. Eventually, as they continuously bounce off the bulkheads and the armored ships in the bay, some of them are going to build up enough kinetic energy to start smashing through walls. And once those balls get out of the bay, the cycle starts all over again. I figure that if they can't contain the balls within two minutes, they're going to start breaking through bulkheads and start invading the rest of the station. If they get out of the bay, then the task to contain them will become _way_ harder. I figure that if they get out of the bay, it's going to take them _hours_ to isolate all the balls and get them under control, and that whole time they're knocking dents in bulkheads and breaking anything not made of a very strong metal."

"Oh, Trelle, Jason love, that is _evil_! It's brilliant, but _evil_!" Jyslin laughed.

"The beauty of it is that there's no real technology involved with this," he chuckled. "It's nothing but a special kind of plasma magnet encased in an armored shell. It's a low-tech approach to dealing with a high-tech opponent. They'll be easy to make, and we already have the parts we need to build them. I figure the shop can crank about fifty balls out an hour." He looked at Jyslin.

"I'll put some people on it," she told him. Jyslin more or less ran the manufacturing room when Jason wasn't around. "We don't need everyone to finish building the guns." She glanced at her watch. "Shit, it's almost time for my afternoon training session, and you can't be late for your flight training class again," she warned.

"I know, I know," he grunted, turning off the hologram. "Did Tim fix the flight simulator?"

She nodded. "I can't believe that Maggie _broke_ it," she laughed. "We've been ribbing her about it all day, about how we can't ever let her behind the controls of a real ship."

Jason chuckled.

"Oh, here, this is what I came for," Tom said. "Think you can get some of these, um, E-suits?" asked, looking at a piece of paper. "Mister Fure described 'em to me. We have a problem in the lower storage bunker, something down there is leaking a chemical that makes it hard to breathe. I closed off the bunker so the leak doesn't spread. I need to get some people down there, and I don't wanna send one of you guys that has that self-contained armor to fix it. If I can get some E-suits, I can send a maintenance team down to find what's leaking and contain it."

"No problem, Tom," Jason said. "E-suits are cheap, only like a thousand credits a pop. I can buy one for everyone in the mountain. In fact, that might be a good idea, just in case. If they ever find us and try to gas us or something like that, everyone will have protection." He swiveled in his chair to face his panel, and then called the floating panel Kumi kept with her when she went to Nebraska. She answered quickly. _"Yeah, babe?"_ she asked in Faey.

"We need an E-suit for everyone," he told her. "But I need some of them here by tomorrow. Think you can swing it?"

_"Puh-leez,"_ she snorted. _"I'll have them shipped in faster than a gigolo drops his pants. I'll order two per person, so we have some spares. They're cheap enough. They'll be ready to pick up tonight."_

"There you go, Tom, problem solved," Jason said, motioning to Kumi.

"Thanky kindly, Miss Kumi," Tom called with a grateful nod, speaking in flawless Faey. Jyslin had inserted the language for every rebel a while ago, and while English was customarily used in the mountain, even by the Faey, they were more than capable of speaking the language.

_"Hey, no prob, Tom,"_ she said with a smile and a nod. _"You'll get them when the dropship comes back tonight."_

Temika came in while Kumi said her goodbye and hung up. "Y'all coming or what?" she asked.

Jason laughed. "Making sure I show up on time, eh Mika?" he asked.

"You bet," she told him. "Ah think Ah'm getting the hang of it."

"That you are. I think you're almost ready for your final test."

She beamed. "Ah kinda like flying. It's not as hard as Ah thought it would be."

_Where's she at?_ Jyslin sent privately.

_She can fly no problem, we're going through emergency protocols right now,_ he answered.

_What I did last week?_

_Yeah. All that's left for you is the final test and your solo flight. I think that's gonna happen tonight. You're bringing the skimmer back solo, love._

_I can handle it. Flying really is fun, and not as hard as I thought._

_Now you know why I love it, he told her._

_I surely do. I shoulda had Zora train me for a Class 3 when she offered to train the squad. The only ones who took her up on it were the twins._

"So, come _on_, sugah! Yo' cuttin' into _mah_ class time!"

Jason chuckled. "Alright, alright." _Tim, Symone, class time,_ he sent openly.

_We're just finishing up lunch, cutie, we'll be there in a couple of minutes,_ Symone replied.

                                        * * *

The flight to Lincoln in the skimmer was an intimate affair, for the only four on the skimmer were telepaths, and they were starting to gel. Temika was a little wary around Kumi and the others, but Jyslin she didn't treat so distantly, because of her relationship to Jason. Jason's fiance was given more latitude than the other telepaths, and the Alabama woman was starting to open up to her. They spent the time basically chitchatting, as Jason allowed Temika to pilot them from the mountain to the Vultech warehouse.

They landed inside the hangar, and the three rebels who manned the warehouse came out to greet them as the doors closed and the hatch opened. "I see you got the full class today," Jenny Wilson noted. "When do I get my turn? I'm ready for my test, you know!"

"Myra said as much," Jason told her. "Your test is coming up, don't worry. Soon as you rotate out of the warehouse, we'll take care of it."

"Well, make it fast," she snorted. "I can't even play with the flight simulator over here."

"It won't be long. Where's Rann and Songa?"

"Probably saying the kinds of goodbyes you don't do in public," Jenny sniggered. "Rann's going back to the mountain tonight.

_Yes!_ Rann's sending raced through the building. _Jason, the DNA testers got a match! We got a picture in the pipe!_

They all raced to the office, where Rann was sitting behind a panel, typing furiously, and touching the screen. _Here it is,_ he called, showing a picture of a teenage white male with red hair and profuse freckles. _Face recognition is running. And, here we go._

His name was Ian Fletcher. He was 17 years old, lived in New York City, and was still in high school according to the bio they pulled up on him.

"Well, now that we found someone... now what?" Songa asked aloud.

"Now, we go talk to him," Jason said. "You got his home address and vidlink number there, Rann?"

"Working on it. Got it," he said triumphantly. "147 west 72nd Street, apartment 4E, Brooklyn. Lemme run this little program Kate gave me to dig up the vidlink number for that address. Okay, got it. Want me to call him? If a Faey calls and tells them they need to have an interview with him, they won't blow it off."

"Hmm, that's not a bad idea," Jyslin mused, and Jason nodded.

"Go for it, Doc."

"What do you want me to do?"

"Get them to agree to a personal visit at home in the next couple of hours," Jason answered. "We can find someplace to land the skimmer near the house and go pay them a visit. And if one of the Docs is there, that's a Faey that can talk us past any soldiers that might try to stop us."

"That'll work, and I know just how to secure that kind of cooperation," he said, clapping his hands together. "Alright, clear out from behind me and I'll take care of it."

Everyone got out from behind Rann as he made the call. It only rang once before the call was answered. Nobody could see the face on the panel, but they could hear the voice of a woman. _"Hello,"_ she called.

"Yes, is this the Fletcher residence?" Rann asked in a personable tone.

_"It is,"_ came a wary, uncertain answer. _"May I help you?"_

"I'm Doctor Rann Elanne, madam, from the City Health Authority. I apologize for calling at such a late hour, but I needed to speak with you quickly."

_"Is there something wrong?"_

"No, no, nothing that can't be quickly fixed," he said smoothly. "I'm calling all the students from your son's school to warn you that one of his instructors has contracted a case of Encaphalic Porosis. It's a disease akin to your human Chicken Pox. But, since it's an illness that's not of human origin, we don't allow it to simply run its course. If you would be so kind, madam, to expect a visit from one of our nursing assistants within the next three hours? He will arrive and administer an immunization to your household that will prevent your son and your family from contracting the illness. We'd usually just ask you to come into the clinic, but these immunizations need to be administered within the next four hours, and it will be faster for us to come to you by hovercar than you try to brave the subway system to reach our facility in the Bronx."

_"Yes, yes, that's fine. We were about to go to bed, but we can stay up."_

"I'm terribly sorry about that," he said with sincerity in his voice. "We'll do our best to arrive as quickly as possible, so we don't inconvenience you more than necessary."

_"No, no, that's fine. Do I need to do anything to prepare for this?"_

"Oh, no, not at all, madam. A single shot, and you're good to go."

_"Alright. Thank you for the advance warning. We'll be waiting."_

"Very good. We'll be there within the next couple of hours. Good evening to you."

_"Goodbye."_

"How was that?" Rann asked, looking over the panel at Jason as he hung up.

"Perfect. Jys,"

"Already on it," she said, sitting down at another panel. "I'll find us a place to land. Who's gonna go?"

"Just one of the Docs and me," he answered. "The fewer there are, the easier we can move around. Is that fake nose still here? And the beard?"

"Yeah, in your office desk," Rann told him.

"Go get them on, Jason," Songa declared. "I'm not about to let my husband go wander off somewhere dangerous, so I'll go. We'll get the prepwork done while you get your new face on."

_Jason only took about fifteen minutes to get ready. When he came out of his office, he had the fake nose and beard on, which changed his facial pattern just enough to prevent facial recognition software from matching him as Jason Fox when he was wearing a hat. Jason had a fedora for that. He changed into a pair of black slacks, blue shirt, and blue long coat to make it look like he was a medical assistant, and met Songa in his skimmer. Jyslin was inside it, sitting at the controls, typing on the holographic keyboard. Alright, I'm loading up a landing spot for you, in an empty lot about a block and a half from the apartment building, she sent. There's a map on that handpanel in your seat of the neighborhood, so you'll know the lay of the land in case things go bad. You be careful, love, she sent urgently. What you two are doing is going to be dangerous. You've never wandered this far from the skimmer in hostile territory before, you won't have any armor on, and you're going to be doing something pretty delicate. If this boy's mother has a fit or rejects, she might hit the panic button on her vidlink and bring in soldiers. So be real careful._

_I'll do my best, he told her, taking her hand, then kissing her. Her kiss never failed to curl his toes. I'm taking a plasma pistol, just in case._

_Trelle be with you that you don't have to use it._

_Now that I can agree with. Ready, Songa? he asked, sending openly. She too had donned her blue doctor's coat, and the triangular insignia that marked her as a doctor was prominently displayed on her collar._

_Of course, Jason, she replied. This shouldn't take long._

_I hope not._

The flight to New York only took about two hours. They maneuvered slowly and carefully over the city, since it was always active and there was no curfew here, avoiding other skimmers, airbikes, and some high-flying hovercars and zipships as they got over the vacant lot that Jyslin had marked for them. Jason landed it there with a light touch, expertly squeezing it between an abandoned car and a little wooden clubhouse some kids had built in the back of the lot. He left the ship running, with its stealth active, taking the remote for it while he and Songa piled out. He raised the stairs and closed the hatch, which made the ship's lighted interior vanish into a mass of featureless black that hid the building behind the vacant lot.

"Now we hope that nobody looks too closely out of their windows," Songa whispered, for she knew that Jason had now completely closed off his mind to sending, part of his defense that made him appear to be a non-telepathic human to other Faey.

"It's dark and there are no lights in the lot," Jason answered as he pulled the brim of his fedora down just a bit more over his eyes. "If anyone looks out, they won't see anything out of the ordinary."

"Jason, love, I should check out the humans in the apartment before we start talking seriously to them. This Merrane woman is very clever. If they found one of our scanners, they may know what we're doing, and she might have set this up as a trap. This is the _one_ way that they could lure you out into the open."

"That's not a bad idea. And thanks for asking for permission before doing it." He held up the map, looked around, then pointed. "That way."

The walk to the Fletcher's apartment building was fast and nervous. There were no patrols visible on the street, but the two of them constantly kept looking all around, wary of one sneaking up behind them. When they reached the building, they stood on the landing by the locked front door, a door that the apartment denizens could unlock with a button in their apartments, which had a bank of mailboxes on the wall and an intercom over them. Jason picked up the phone and pressed the button for the Fletcher's apartment. Someone answered immediately, a young man. "Hello?"

"We're from the City Health Authority," Jason answered. "You should have received a call warning you we'd be coming."

"Yeah, hold on." There was a buzzing sound at the door, and Songa pulled on the handle to open it. "You got the door?"

"It's open, thank you," Jason answered, then he hung up the phone.

They went up four flights of stairs, and as soon as they were on the proper floor, a door opened. A portly woman with long graying brown hair done in a tail was there, wearing a robe over a nightgown. "Please come in," she called, stepping back.

Jason and Songa entered a small, rather poor apartment, filled with old furniture and worn-out appliances. But the place was clean, the old furniture was well positioned, and the place had a warm, homey feel from all the pictures that were spread liberally on any horizontal surface. They were pictures of relatives and the home's residents.

"Yes, thank you for receiving us," Songa said to her with a warm smile. "We're sorry it's so late."

"I'm just glad you didn't call at two in the morning," the woman laughed. "It won't take you long, there's just the two of us, Ian and me."

There was a brief silence, and the woman's eyes seemed to glaze over for a second. Jason couldn't feel anything because he was completely closed off, but he realized that that wasn't really necessary in the apartment, so he opened himself in time to feel Songa delving through the woman's mind, quickly, efficiently, and very gently. She looked to Jason and nodded, which told him that she was clean. She looked to the boy, and repeated the process. Jason touched his mind ever-so-slightly as well, and felt an odd _pressure_ there, a pressure that he only felt when he specifically went looking for it. It wasn't something that the normal Faey would sense on a casual scan. This boy definitely had talent. His talent was unformed, but it was definitely there. It would take time and some work to get him ready to express it.

"Yes, well, unfortunately, we're not here for the reason we explained over the vidlink," she said carefully, after Jason nodded to her. "It's a bit more complicated, but I assure you, it's nothing especially dangerous at this moment," she said quickly, raising a calming hand when the woman's eyes widened and her body posture stiffened. "May we sit down? I'm afraid this will take a bit of time to explain."

"Oh, please, yes," she said, motioning. "Would you like something to drink?"

"No, no thank you," Songa told her as she sat sedately on the couch, and Jason sat down beside her. The woman seated herself in a chair across the coffee table from them, facing them. "Please sit down young man," Songa told Ian. "This matter involves you as well."

Ian gave his mother a nervous look, then he sat in the other chair, the one facing the vidlink's screen.

Jason looked at them, cleared his throat, and began. "First off, let me explain something to you," Jason began, and then he explained the basics of telepathic ability. "As you know, all the Faey are telepathic, but it's been showing up in humans as well. That's something that they've been censoring on the news and CivNet, because they don't want it to be common knowledge. Well, that's why we're here. This Faey lady and myself are part of an organization that's trying to find all the humans that have the genetic predisposition to express telepathic ability and move them somewhere safe, somewhere the Faey can't reach them."

"Safe? What do you mean?"

"Miss, think about it. Telepathy is the biggest hammer the Faey have to keep us in line. If humans started expressing telepathic ability, what do you think they'd do when they found out?"

"They'd either kidnap them or kill them," she said almost immediately. Clearly, this woman was rather bright.

"That's _exactly_ what they're doing," Jason nodded. "Well, the organization we represent has found the genetic footprint that's showing up in humans with talent, and your son matches the profile."

"My son's a telepath?"

Jason shook his head. "Not yet. He has the ability, but it's unformed. If we did nothing to help it along, he'd never express it, but we can help urge it to come out. With some training and some time, he will express some telepathic ability. But at this moment, no, he's not."

"How did you know that?" the woman asked. "Did this woman tell you? You know, using," she hedged, tapping her forehead.

"I'm in this situation, Miss Fletcher, because _I_ am a telepath," he told her evenly. "It's why they can't catch me. They rely too much on their telepathy, and when it comes to me, they can't use it. What makes me hard for them to catch is because I had a Faey, friend, before I expressed, and she trained me instead of turning me in."

She had a _very_ worried look on her face, but the young man, Ian, just stared at Jason, very hard, and very long. Then he laughed. "I know you!" he blurted.

"Excuse me?"

"You're wearing a disguise! I saw that video you made on CivNet at school! You're Jason Fox!"

"That's me," he chuckled, taking off his hat. "I'm wearing this stuff to trick the facial recognition programs they run off the cameras. So, if you know who I am, then maybe you know why I'm here."

"You think my son's a telepath?" the woman asked. "And you want to take him with you!"

Jason nodded. "He isn't yet, but he will be. But when the Faey do what we did and start doing wide-spread genetic testing to find telepaths, they're going to find your son, Miss Fletcher. I just got here first, that's all. There's a chance they won't find him, but if I could find him, then odds are they will. After all, they have much more resources than me. I can't really say what they'll do if they find him, but one way or another, I can more or less guarantee that they won't just leave you alone.

"If you want, you can come with me, back to my hideout. I can shelter you there, and I won't ask anything of you. I won't _make_ you help me. At this point, just getting your son out of Faey control and moving him to a safe place is all we're interested in. But, if you want to help, we'd be happy to have you. You can help us fight Trillane and force the Empress to bring in Faey that will treat us better, because if you saw my video, then you know what's going on. Everything I talked about in the video really happened, and is still going on. If you don't want to help, that's fine. But at least with us, you'll be out of the Faey's sight, where they can't get at you.

"So, I know this is pretty short notice, Ian, and it's gotta be a shock, but what do you think? After all, it's your choice. You can stay here and maybe the Faey won't find you, or you can come with me. If you're a telepath, you can help us out. If you're not, well, you can still help us out. I can't deny that it's going to be dangerous. I'm sure you've heard it on the news, about all the damage we've done so far, and we plan to do lots more. It's going to be a war eventually, and that's not exactly safe."

"Are you kidding? A chance to be a _rebel_? I'd love it! Yes!" he said enthusiastically.

"Well, that was fast," Jason chuckled. "Miss Fletcher, want to come with us? He's rather young yet, he could use his mother."

"I don't like the idea of it, but I can't deny what you said," she sighed. "If my son is a telepath, he won't be safe out here. He'll need to be protected, and since you've been staying hidden for months, well, you've proved you can do it. And now that I know about you, I'd kinda have to go too."

"No, honey, if you want to stay here, I can fix it so you forget all about what we've said," Songa told her gently. "I can make it so you think Ian's run off, or he's on special assignment to another school. Whatever you'd like."

"I didn't realize you could do _that_," she breathed.

"Yes, I can, honey," she nodded. "I don't really like doing it, but I've been trained for it."

"Well, truth be told, I think I'd rather go with you," she said. "I take it we'd have to leave more or less right now?"

Jason nodded. "We don't have much time. I'll explain why some other time. But if you do want to go with us, you'll only have about half an hour to decide what you want to take."

"Do you have clothes and such where you're at?"

"We do," Songa assured her. "We can see to all your needs."

"Well, then I think we just need to take our keepsakes," she mused. "My pictures, and my scrapbooks."

"Well, then, let's get them all packed up and ready, shall we?" Songa proposed, standing up.

It didn't take long. What they ended up with was a pair of large suitcases, filled with pictures, photo albums, a jewelry box, and a shoebox filled with assorted little keepsakes, and some of Ian's trophies and souvenirs and other mementos. Jason put his hat back on, and picked up both suitcases and nodded to Songa. "Alright, we're going to go to where our transportation is. It's about two blocks away. Just follow us, and keep up. Me and Songa's going to be shielding us so the Faey can't find us with their telepathy."

"Alright. I'm ready to go!" Ian said, almost jumping up and down. "I can't wait 'til I tell the guys about this! I'm gonna be a freakin' _rebel_! This is gonna be so awesome!"

_The follies of youth,_ Songa noted with amusement to Jason.

_Amen._

With their new recruits in tow, Songa led them back to the skimmer quickly and without fail. There were no Faey patrols in sight, and nobody seemed to either take notice of the suitcase-toting group or particularly cared about them. The skimmer was still there, and Jason fished out the remote and caused it to open the hatch and extend the stairs. "_Wow_!" Ian gasped when, to him, the night itself just opened a door to let them in.

"Inside, please," Songa said, ushering them ahead, as she turned her head towards the street. _Jason, I'm sensing a patrol, moving quickly this way,_ she sent.

He could feel the edges of it himself. _I feel them too. They're coming this way. We need to get moving. Get inside._

She nodded and rushed into the skimmer, and Jason followed her in. He didn't bother stowing the suitcases, he dropped them in the back seats as the Fletchers gawked at the interior of the ship, even as Songa helped Ian buckle his seat belt. "Quickly, please," she told them. "We have to get into t