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Ethan Blackwood set the report he'd been writing on his desk. Well, technically, it wasn't his desk. He ran a hand over the worn plastic simulated wood-grain surface. He was just borrowing the thing.

Like the room. Like the entire base.

He sat alone in a huge office. The walls were covered with dead computer screens, bookshelves (minus the books), and blank spots that might've once been covered with pictures or maps. The room was three times the size of Colonel Winter's office.

He glanced at the status report he'd just written.

Sterling Squadron was falling apart. Sure, this base had saved their lives. They'd all gotten a second chance. But to do what? Fight the entire Ch'zar alien race by themselves?

Impossible odds were one thing. Ethan's stomach churned. He'd faced impossible odds before--and won.

This time, though, there was zero chance of winning.

Not without the Seed Bank and all its resources and technology. And not without Colonel Winter or Dr. Irving.

Ethan buried his face in his hands. He'd been strong for the last few days. Now, he was exhausted.

Over the last few months, he'd come to think of the secret Resister base, the Seed Bank, as home.

Dr. Irving, and in some ways even Colonel Winter, had been like parents. He didn't think they loved him or Emma like their real parents, but they had cared. He knew they would've rather died than betray him. But if the adult Resisters from the Seed Bank had been captured, then their minds would now be part of the alien collective. The Ch'zar would know his tactics, tricks, everything.

He took a deep breath and squeezed his eyes shut to keep back the tears.

The colonel and the doctor always knew what they were doing when it came to fighting the aliens. No one was here now to help Ethan make the hardest decisions of his life.

Ethan pulled a photo from the stacks of technical manuals piled on the desk. It was the picture he and Emma had found at Titan Base. It was as if the picture had been waiting for them there for fifteen years.

The yellowed photograph was of Melinda and Franklin Blackwood, their parents. They wore white uniforms with silver infinity symbols on the lapels. The picture had been taken here. Ethan could see the computer displays and panels in the background.

But then they'd left. They had to have known about the Ch'zar, and yet they'd picked Santa Blanca to raise him and his sister. How could they have done that, knowing their children's minds would be at risk when they became teenagers?

Being a teenager and hitting puberty was when the big changes in brain chemistry happened and the Ch'zar's mind-control powers got you.

Ethan traced the edges of his parents' faces in the photograph. There was so much more to his parents than he knew.

They'd abandoned him and Emma when the Ch'zar got suspicious about them, but Melinda and Franklin Blackwood had left their children a trail of clues to find this old base, too.

Ethan had come full circle.

If only he could talk to his parents. He had a million questions.

A knock on the door snapped him back to reality.

Ethan hastily slid the picture under his paperwork. "Come in," he said.

The door opened, and Felix entered the office. He snapped off a quick salute. He carried a rolled-up blueprint.

Ethan's best friend had bloodshot eyes. His massive shoulders sagged. It looked like he'd aged a year in the last week.

"Status?" Ethan asked.

Felix stared past Ethan.

Ethan bet Felix was thinking of his mother's office back at the Seed Bank. How could his friend not think about his mother?

Ethan stood and walked around his desk. He wouldn't let his friend down by being weak.

"Status, Sergeant?" he asked again.

Felix's eyes refocused. "Right."

Felix marched to a table covered with maps of the American Southwest and unrolled the blueprint. It showed corridors and rooms, huge fusion reactors, coolant pumps the size of houses--all hooked to a jagged line that said NOT TO SCALE, which then connected to a line of satellite dishes.

They'd found the plans for the base's communication system the day before. Ethan had ordered that section explored. It had looked promising. They needed electronic eyes and ears out there to see what the Ch'zar were plotting.

The great thing about Titan Base was that it was big. There were a half dozen fighter jet bays with parts, ammunition, and fuel for their I.C.E.s. There were food warehouses full of freeze-dried meals that could feed an army for a hundred years (although after having tasted one, Ethan thought starving might have been better). There was a hospital. There were enough beds and bathrooms for a thousand people.

Had this place been built for the Fourth World War, before the Ch'zar invaded fifty years ago? It seemed at least that old, with rusting pipes and tunnels. Some sections were filled with mold and sealed off.

Sterling Squadron had only explored a fraction of the place in the last eight days.

Ethan had no clue how big it actually was. Who knew what else was there?

"I sent Lee and Oliver here." Felix pointed to a room labeled SATELLITE RELAY CONTROL. "They turned on the system with a jerry-rigged power supply. But there's no signal."

"A signal from the satellite dishes?" Ethan tapped the schematics of a dozen satellite dishes. "They can't still be out there, intact, after all these years, can they?"

Felix stood straighter. "That's why we sent a sortie to look."

Ethan waved his hand and nodded. "Yeah, I remember. Sorry."

They'd discussed this the night before. If they could connect to those dishes, they might be able to tap into the satellite network in orbit. Ethan was so tired he was forgetting critical things . . . like dangerous missions into unknown airspace to find critical communication installations.

"Who'd you send?"

"Madison. And Angel."

Ethan flashed him a hard look. Those two didn't get along.

"Their wasp and dragonfly are the best ones for the mission," Felix explained. "Those I.C.E.s have stealth."

"It's not the I.C.E.s I'm worried about. You sure those two won't blast each other out of the air?"

"I've talked with Madison," Felix told him. "She's okay."

Ethan crossed his arms over his chest. This scouting mission should have never slipped his mind. His pilots' lives were at stake. All their lives were at stake every time they went out.

After the Ch'zar had reduced the Seed Bank mountain into gravel, Ethan had no doubt that if they ever found this place, they'd bomb old Titan Base until a million tons of rust buried the Resisters alive.

Secrecy was their first, best, and maybe their only dependable weapon.