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disturbing them. He turned the glider back toward the city and lined up on the building he had marked earlier. He saw the forest was dense and landing in the thick undergrowth was not going to be easy. He saw a tall tree behind the tree that had been stripped and he flew into the breeze and stalled his glider close to the top. He yanked the retract cord and felt the wings suddenly lose their lift.
    He fell six feet and managed to grab a branch close to the top of the tree. His glider continued to retract and, just as it moved against his back, the branch broke. He fell ten feet before he could grab another branch. It started cracking but he was able to swing his legs forward around the trunk and hold on as the second branch gave way. He hung upside down for a minute as he listened to see if the sounds had been noticed. He couldn’t see any movement so he reached over his head and grabbed a thicker branch. He released his legs and caught himself against the tree.
    He was committed now. The only way he was getting out was to walk to the cliff’s edge. He pulled a rope out of a pouch in the glider pack and tied himself to the tree. He unbuckled the glider pack and pulled it around to the tree. He reset the pack’s bonds and moved the release cord to the proper location. He pulled a small pouch off the side of the pack and tied it to his belt. He untied the rope and used it to tie the glider pack to the top of a thick branch he found further down the tree.
    The rope and the glider pack were both made of camouflage material and would be invisible from the ground without a head cover. He felt the tree blowing in the wind and felt his nerves take hold of him. He started shaking and knew it had been a close thing. He could have fallen and that would have given everything away. He forced his breathing to slow and after several minutes he forced himself to quit shaking. He was lower than the top of the tree that had been skinned and he could see over the wall. He smiled as he realized he had landed directly beyond the house he had targeted. He reached in the pouch and pulled out a piece of jerky. He began chewing on it and forced himself to remember what Zeck had told him.
    • • •
    Rory and Johnathan saw the skinned trees as soon as they arrived at the city and saw the cables crisscrossing over the city. Rory started moving south over the coastal wall and looked for other defenses the Destroyers had built. Johnathan flew quickly south and moved out over the large harbor. He flew out over the waters and noted the cannon batteries on each side of the harbor’s entrance. He moved back over the city and circled higher in the winds blowing over the cliffs. He arrived above the huge government center and saw the crossties built into a solid wall more than two hundred yards around the building. The fortifications extended along the shore all the way down to the harbor. He saw something scattered among the huge X’s and it took him some time to finally determine that they were materials to start a fire. He looked and saw that all of the piles of flammable materials had a ditch running through the wooden crossties connecting them. They had to be channels for oil or some other flammable liquid.
    The huge jars holding the liquid were hidden below the level of the wood. He shook his head and almost missed the huge cannons sticking out of the buildings that lined the shoreline. He felt a shift in the wind and felt it suddenly change. The easterly wind had given way to the westerly. He turned and gained altitude and flew out over the cliffs. He oriented on the north end of the city and moved out over the ocean. He moved a mile out and saw the Storm Chaser anchored out at sea. He took off his head covering and the ship disappeared. He pulled the head cover down and headed toward the ship. He had been in the air for seven hours and daylight was not far away. He landed on the stern and looked back at the distant cliffs. He saw a small speck