“Open an airlock please, Sheldon.” I gathered the gadgets into my backpack, except for the communicator, which I put in my pocket. We headed for the lowering staircase, which had appeared in midair. I stopped abruptly halfway there, and muttered, “Wagon doors.” Patrick swerved without stopping and joined me as I made for the front of the barn. The two of us muscled the doors open with only moderate cursing.

“We could really use a garage-door opener,” Patrick commented.

“Yeah,” I said, “that wouldn’t be suspicious at all.”

“Fine. But let’s oil the tracks properly before we do this again, okay?”

“You mean like now? Because we still have to close them after Sheldon is out, then re-open them when we get back.”

Patrick looked back into the barn. “Shit. That also means we have to enter and exit the ship in plain sight.”

I paused. “Yeah, that ain’t good. We may need to bite the bullet on the opener.”

We were still at it when Nat’s voice came from the communicator. “You two sound like my grandparents arguing. Why don’t you just get married?”

We grinned at each other before I replied, “Have Sheldon float around behind the barn, Nat. At least we can be shielded from the house. It’s not ideal, but it’s better than nothing.”

“Already there,” Nat replied.

We walked around behind the barn, and an airlock door lowered to greet us. In moments, we were on the bridge.

“We should record this.” Patrick took out his phone. “Sheldon, can we get a view downward?”

A section of the wall view changed to a different image, looking straight down at some scrubby grass. Patrick nodded in approval. “Now, can you do a search pattern of some kind, centered on Dunnville, covering everything?”

“Yes. We have an advanced geometric form called a ‘spiral.’ Shall I draw you a picture?”

Patrick rolled his eyes. “He’s really mouthy.”

Nat elbowed Patrick in the ribs. “Honestly, you deserved that one.”

Snorting, Patrick started his phone recording. “Okay, Sheldon, proceed when ready.”

“You know, if you were to ask,” Sheldon replied, “I’d probably mention that I could do the recording and then send it to you. Much better quality, too. But by all means, do it your way.”

Patrick slumped and looked down at his feet. “Malicious genie.”

“Please do that, Sheldon,” I said, grinning. “Let’s get this operation started.”

The aerial survey took a solid hour. It wasn’t the ship’s speed or maneuverability that was at issue. Rather, we needed the video recording to have enough detail to be useful, which meant we couldn’t zip past so quickly that it recorded a blur.

I also had Sheldon do a more abbreviated survey from higher up and take several high-res stills from just below cloud level.

“MOBIUS,” Patrick said at one point.

I turned to him. “What?”

“For a team name. Or whatever.”