Chapter 17: Leadville

Amy, seated at the controls of a trans-dimensional portal in Neal's own off-planet base, carefully manipulated knobs and dials as she searched for the installation Jordan had placed in the mountains near Leadville, Colorado. Behind her, squads of armed guards waited for their moment to go into action. Hovering high over the spine of the Rocky Mountains, her portal showed a jumble of ridges and valleys with a trace of late-summer snow still clinging to the higher peaks.

Centering her position over the orderly rows of buildings that made up the town of Leadville, she followed a road that started out paved, degenerated to gravel and finally was only a dirt track. Off to one side, she made out the rectangle of a dilapidated shack, and up the hill from it she could make out the camouflaged dome of the base she sought.

Lowering the portal window close to the ground, she carefully watched one of the dials on the board in front of her. Finally, satisfied that no other portal was in operation nearby, she shrank the portal opening to less than a foot in diameter and maneuvered it beneath the shack.

"There, she pointed to where she could see traces of

disturbed earth. "That's where Jordan's records should be buried."

Willing hands soon had the trove uncovered, and the records safely stacked in a neat pile behind her. She backed the portal out into the open, and up to and into the hidden base. Drifting it back and forth within the base, she stabilized its position inside an empty room.

"All right," she ordered. "Squad One, clear out

everything in the base that can be moved. Start with the treasure room."

The more lightly armed group of the guards trotted through the portal, fanning out through the deserted rooms and streaming back in with armloads of treasure and other goods, paying particular attention to anything that might give clues as to the builders of the base. They were nearly done when an alarm sounded on Amy's board. She spun dials, and her portal contracted to little more than a pinpoint.

"Squad Two! Ready for action!"

Another portal began to form, the wavering of air, as though rising from a heated surface betraying its location.

Amy carefully positioned her portal directly in front of it, expanding the opening as the new portal completed its opening.

"There!" She flipped a switch and the two portals locked together so that the new portal couldn't be closed. "Squad Two, go for it!"

The heavily armed guards charged through the opening, their weapons out and menacing whatever was behind it. Shouts of anger and panic resounded, but the attack's surprise was complete and no shots were fired.

"All clear here," the squad leader reported. "Everything's under control."

"Very good. Bring the prisoners through and put them in the holding room. You did search them?"

"Sure thing." He nodded, turning back through the portal to snap out orders and in a few minutes some twenty- five men were securely penned up. His squad methodically cleaned out everything that might be of value or interest in the captured base, bringing all of it back through the portal to be gone through later.

"Is there anything to show where this base is located?" Amy watched her dials and other indicators as she spoke.

"Nothing, it's just like the other one. No outside doors or windows."

"No sign of Steve Jordan? All right, destroy the portal

mechanism on that side and come on back through. I've got its coordinates, so we can find it again if we need to." That accomplished she disengaged the two portals, backed hers away so that Squad One could return, and finally closed her portal. "All right, bring the prisoners back in here."