The Giant Smugglers Read Online Free

warning signs. “Why is he called the Stick, anyway?”
    â€œHe’s the kind of man who solves problems one way. And talking isn’t the way.”
    Atop a blasted-away section of hillside across the quarry, the old man in the leather duster frowned. He watched the van snake around the gravel piles, crushing red plastic cups from the previous night’s party. Powder stood at his heel. She followed the van’s journey with wary eyes.
    Reaching into his duster with a steady left hand, the old man pulled out a detonator. The dull metallic trim was scuffed and scratched. He rested his thumb on a lone toggle switch, mostly bronze because all the chrome had long since worn away. It sat in the middle of the controls beneath a stub antenna and red button.
    He squinted to make out a green logo imprinted on the van’s rear doors. Everyone in town knew the Accelerton symbol, a double helix that formed the stem of a leaf. The multinational conglomerate had an agribusiness arm that controlled nearly all of the local fertilizer and seed market.
    The van continued toward the vine-covered silo. Powder let out a low growl. The old man’s thumb twitched against the detonator’s switch, but he pulled it back, spitting into the dirt and slipping the metal box back inside his waist pocket. He turned to his dog. Her black ears shot up.
    â€œPowder,” he commanded. “Go say ‘Hi.’”
    Powder didn’t need to be told twice. She exploded from her perch on the hilltop, kicking up a cloud of dust as she darted toward the silo. The old man winced as he began the rocky descent toward the quarry’s trailer office.
    The van pulled up next to the silo. Barton grabbed a metal case off the seat and hurried out of the vehicle, his shirt already wet with anxious sweat. He peered up at the battered old building’s dome.
    Fitzgibbons swiped his phone to call up a grainy, black-and-white satellite photo. He compared it side by side with the actual silo, weather-beaten and leaning just a bit to the right. It was the same building, but there was a crucial difference: in the picture, four huge, oblong shapes pushed up the silo’s dome. They looked like immense fingers.
    â€œThe place is sure big enough,” Barton said. He couldn’t wait to see a giant up close for the first time but was a little frightened by the idea as well. He dropped the metal case on the ground, opened it, and reached for the custom rifle inside. It fired a tiny device that could be tracked anywhere in the world.
    â€œHold on,” commanded Fitzgibbons, peering over his shoulder back toward the office trailer. “Let me scan it before you bring that out into the open.” He closed the photo app with a finger swipe, then opened another labeled WiVi . He held up his phone as if he were shooting video of the silo. Using a satellite signal, the app penetrated the walls and allowed a blurry view of the structure’s interior, like an ultrasound searching for an unborn baby. Fitzgibbons let loose a frustrated sigh. “There’s nothing here. It’s empty. We’re late again.”
    â€œYou’ve got to be kidding me. That picture is from ten forty-two last night!” Barton slammed the case shut. “It was just here! Where could it go?”
    â€œWhoever’s helping the giants is shrewd.” Fitzgibbons drew in a breath of the country air, heavy with the earthy smell of manure. He took in the small, tilled field a short distance away. “We already knew they’re moved all the time. We just need to find where.” He circled the silo’s exterior. “Chin up. You were right about Richland Center; it appears to be on the giants’ route, and that’s something.”
    â€œWhat will we tell Gourmand?”
    â€œI’m not concerned about her right now.” Fitzgibbons pulled a small flashlight from his pocket. “I’m going to take a look inside the