Next he placed a small device he had co-opted from his own supply of tools and gadgets. It could loosely be described as a servo, not wholly dissimilar from one found in a remote control car, only it was a little more capable than that. While it was, in fact, one of the stupidest robots you would ever have the pleasure of meeting, it was still phenomenally flexible, versatile, and only an inch tall. And it was strong for its size. It had three limbs, each with three knuckles, and a pincer at each end with rubberized sides. It could grip, open, climb, twist, and do pretty much anything you could imagine an inch-high robot doing, as well as quite a few things you probably couldn’t. But most importantly, it could do all these things remotely, acting as an Agent’s eyes and fingers when they couldn’t be there in person.

Setting the small drone next to the key, he opened a mental link to it and instructed it to grip the key with one of its pincers and brace its two free legs so that it could turn the key on his command. Then he ran from the room, wrenching the door shut and bending its handle sharply so that it would stay that way. That should stop any person who was somehow still awake on board from interfering. Stepping over the two sleeping sailors sitting in the corridor, he ran to the nearest staircase and started to ascend to the bridge once more. His internal clock told him he had one hour. Good, he was ahead of schedule. He only hoped the GBMD system was ready too.

On the bridge he sat and waited. Once the Weapons Console Key was turned in unison with the Command Key he now held, John could operate all the systems he needed directly from here using programmed viruses he had implanted long ago. But like everyone else, he now had to wait. If they did not take out all the remaining hubs in their next attack, then whichever was left would have a mandate to return fire. Its presence obviously revealed, it would not only release the viral pathogen they knew was coming, but also bring its laser systems to bear on any and all military targets it could before it was also destroyed. Thousands would die, hundreds of thousands, under its blistering attack. So John knew he had to wait for the Americans to launch, or allow the satellites to pass overhead unhindered until they were in place once more.