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afternoon, Wire and the heavyset security officer she now knows as Horace Britch ride in the rear compartment of an SI security transport hovercraft. A sole additional security officer serves as the hovercraft’s pilot and is silhouetted behind a partition of ballistic soundproof plastic two and a half fists thick.
    As the hovercraft enters a banking turn, through a window slit in the rear of the compartment Wire can see the tops of palm trees rustling. She’s grateful to be back in some clothes—not her own, naturally—and wears a yellow hemp-weaved detainee jumper with hand-woven buttons. The jumper is a size smaller than Wire would prefer and itchy as all get-out, but the size and itchiness are not as infuriating as the chains shackling her bare feet and wrists. Britch adjusts the gelatinous spread of his thighs on the bench seat across from her.
    “So, once we understood we were witnessing an unusual security event, containment procedures were activated. To be honest, I half expected Martstellar to make a break for the resort air fields, as taking any number of flight craft would’ve been the fastest way off of The Sixty, even with our long-range batteries. Alas, the woman’s creativity—”
    Wire interrupts, “Creativity like what?”
    “Well, first of all she initiated some confusion by digging out biometric identifiers. One of the release specialists, her own, and the wounded man Flynn’s. Together the release specialists led us on dueling chases in a cargo ute and on a terra-sled. This diversion began in a dead zone in The Sixty’s scanners, and it’s obvious to us now that Martstellar must’ve known about the technical oversight.” Britch tames an eyebrow with a finger. “After that she and Flynn got into an outdated access point and entered the maintenance tunnels beneath The Sixty.”
    “These maintenance tunnels, that’s where she stole the submarine you mentioned?”
    “Correct.”
    Wire tongues her cheek. “Oh, man, and you call this high-priced tourist trap secure? You should’ve expected Martstellar to know about backdoors like that. Evasive training is second nature to someone like her.”
    “Indeed. But you must understand, The Sixty is a massive operation. Utterly massive. The maintenance tunnels and lower support infrastructure rivals some of the major European flood zones. Naturally, we secure what we can, but there are over five hundred passages laced beneath the entire archipelago chain. The access point was simply overlooked.”
    Wire jeers derisively. “What a crock. I don’t care if it’s five thousand access entries or tunnels, it’s still sloppy. And cutting out biometric identifiers? What is this? Some kind of half-assed amateur hour? Platelet-tagging is more reliable.”
    “Pardon the pun, but the ship has sailed on all that. Shall I continue?”
    Indifferent, Wire wiggles her fingers—whatever.
    Britch drones boorishly on. “To preserve and maintain the islands’ support architectures, The Sixty operates a fleet of solo and two-person helmed submersibles. The short of it is that Martstellar and Flynn stole one of the larger capacity payload units, the variety our technicians use to service the rest of the fleet. Equipped for larger loads, these submarines cost twice as much as some of the smaller units, so they definitely chose wisely. With advanced calibrated fusion-drive capacities, the submarine they took? Fully submerged it’s able to reach speeds topping out at fifty-five knots and has a range that’s nearly worldwide.”
    “Meaning they’re in the wind.”
    “Well, in the sea anyway.”
    Wire’s chains clink as she weaves her fingers together. She cracks her knuckles. “Well, seeing that the world is three-quarters underwater and then some, how is this even remotely helpful to me?”
    “Oh, I’m getting to that,” Britch assures. “Once we understood what occurred we initiated trans-oceanic tracing sweeps as the stolen sub is equipped with a reliable