Dark Lightning (Thunder and Lightning) (28 page)

“You asked me that before, Patrick,” Polly said. “No, not specifically, she just said everyone was okay.”

After that, there wasn’t much to say. In a few more minutes the call came in. Not only for Polly, but me and Patrick as well.

“Where are you?” Aunt Elizabeth wanted to know.

“At the South Pole,” Polly told her, unwilling to be more specific.

“Is Jubal there?” That was Travis, sounding more worried than I’d ever heard him.

“Yes, Travis. He’s fine. He had another brainstorm while he was in the bubble. He’s working on it.”

Our words were only going to Elizabeth’s ears, through her clandestine phone. I heard her say yes.

“Okay. Okay. That sounds good. Keep his mind off all this other stuff. How much does he know?”

“We told him you were all in jail,” Polly said. I heard Elizabeth repeating her words, quietly.

“We’re going to orient you now,” Elizabeth said. “Just a minute . . . okay, here we go.”

A picture appeared in my peripheral vision. I blinked it to the center.

It was fairly steady, but a bit lopsided. Part of it near the top was obscured by something out of focus. I realized it was a couple of Aunt Elizabeth’s fingers. The almost microscopic lens must have been located in the palm of her hand, concealed in a wrinkle when she didn’t want it to be seen. I could see the top of one of her knees near the bottom of the picture. Beyond that, Travis was sitting, his back against a wall off to my right, looking away at nothing I could see. He almost filled the scene, though I could see vague shapes beyond him that looked like more people sitting against the same wall.

Putting the spatial relationships together in my head, I figured Elizabeth was sitting with her elbow on her knee and her head resting on her open fist. You could pretend you were dozing off in that position and still be able to speak into the microphone.

“Can you see?” Elizabeth asked.

“I can see fine,” I said, and Polly and Patrick echoed me.

“I’m going to do a slow pan,” she said. “At some point you’ll see the guards. And the rest of the room, and the people here. I have to be careful. They watch us all the time. You ready?”

“Ready.” And ready, and ready, from sis and Patrick.

The camera moved away from Travis’s profile and slowly took in the wall beyond him. I saw a door. The wall was an ugly green, and it looked like some screens had been mounted on it not too long ago. Naked wires protruded here and there, and what looked like holes for bolts.

There was one man standing with his back to that wall, close to the door. He wore black clothing. There was a yellow armband around one biceps, and a riot helmet on his head.

He was holding a long, bulky stick that I knew was a stun rifle, the most potent weapon our police forces had. Guaranteed to put down a charging rhino if you set it high enough. They could be lethal at that setting.

Past the corner and on to an identical wall that had no features that I could see. A couple of dozen people were sitting, leaning against the wall. Mike and Marlee were sitting together. I heard Patrick’s sharp intake of breath but didn’t look at him. I was trying to take it all in at once, not miss anything. But I didn’t see anything useful.

Past the next corner there was another bare wall with some wires sticking out, and two more guys and one girl dressed in black with the yellow armbands, also cradling stun rifles. That made four guards.

At last, Elizabeth had panned 180 degrees, and I saw more of my family sitting against the wall. Closest to the camera, almost filling the screen when the pan stopped, was Mama, also in profile. Suddenly, there was a burning sensation in the back of my throat. I coughed to get rid of it and hastily wiped my eyes, which had started to water.

Mama looked disheveled, like all the others. Her hair was a mess, and her eyes were dark circles, and not from makeup.

“Girls,” she whispered. “Are you all right?”

“Yes, Mama,” we both whispered back. The camera moved slightly, which I interpreted as Elizabeth’s nodding.

“And Jubal . . .” Her lips were barely moving, in what I think they call a jailhouse whisper. Which was exactly what it was.

“Yes, Mama. We’ve got him safe.”

“I love you more than I’ve ever been able to tell you, Cassandra Ann, Pollyanna Sue.”

“We know, Mama,” Polly said. Her eyes were red, and she sounded like her nose was stuffy. Well, mine was, too. I put my arm over her shoulders and squeezed.

“They know, Podkayne,” Elizabeth whispered.

“I love you, and I’m so proud of you two my heart could just explode. You realize you’re our only hope?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“You’re too young to have this burden fall on you. But there it is.”

“We’re not much younger than you were when you had all that trouble on Europa,” I said. “I only hope we can do as well as you did.”

“You’ll have to do better,” she said. “I didn’t save everybody. We can’t lose any of these people.”

“We won’t, Mama.”

“Okay then. I have to shut up. I think one of those guards is looking at me.” As she said it, she raised her hand. “I have to pee, you guys.”

She must have gotten an okay, because she got up and walked away. The picture jerked around, and we got a view of Elizabeth’s lap, then her hair as she brushed it back behind one ear. Then she resumed the position.

“I’m sorry you couldn’t talk to her directly,” she said. “But I passed on everything you said, word for word.”

“That’s okay,” Polly said. “We appreciate it.”

“Patrick, we aren’t allowed to move around much, but if I can, I’ll get next to your parents and see if you can talk to them. I’ve already signaled them that you’re okay. Not hurt.”

“I appreciate that, Elizabeth, but don’t take any unnecessary chances.”

“Let me add that I’m just as proud of you all as Podkayne is, and Travis, too. Now I’m going to turn it over to Travis, and he’s going to tell you what he has in mind.”

“He has a plan?” That was Polly, who sounded as relieved as I felt.

“Travis always has a plan. There’s more up his sleeve than Max ever imagined. You’ll have to be smart, and quick, and strong, but I know all three of you are. So listen carefully. Take notes. Girls, I want you to study it like it was the game plan for the biggest skypool game in your lives.”

“That we can do,” I said, with a laugh.

Then Travis came on the line. And it was a hell of a plan. Impossible, but a hell of a plan.

—

First, we had to figure out what to do with Papa. The trouble was, none of the options we had made me happy.

One, put him in the ship, in or out of the bubble. If someone came looking, Sheila would defend herself and him and, if it came to it, leave
Rolling Thunder
and stand off at a safe distance until this thing was decided, one way or another.

Two, take him with us. I list that one only because it was barely possible to do so. But it was by far the worst alternative.

Three, leave him here, at the lodge.

“It’s too chancy,” I said. “They could get on our trail somehow and track him right to this room.”

“How would they do that?” Patrick asked.

“How the dickens should I know? That’s all happening in the cyber war we’re not even able to eavesdrop on. My point, we have no idea how many of them there are or how close they might be.”

“I don’t like leaving Papa behind at all,” Polly said. “I think we ought to take him with us.”

“Into a possible battle?” I asked, incredulously. I lightly tapped the side of her forehead. “Hello? Hello? Anybody home up there, sister? Can you imagine Papa in a firefight like you just went through?”

She didn’t reply, but her lower lip stuck out stubbornly. I’ve always hoped I don’t do that, but maybe I do. We can both be mighty determined to get our own way.

“I don’t think it’s such a bad idea to stay right here,” Patrick said. “I can watch over him. Or if I see anyone coming, we can run.”

That got him a laserlike glare from
both
of us.

“What do you mean, take care of him? We’re going to need you.”

He looked very uncomfortable and wouldn’t meet our eyes. “It was just a thought,” he said. “He obviously needs somebody to stay with him.”

“Sheila can do that,” I said, firmly.

It took a little longer, but Polly finally gave in, and Patrick didn’t seem like he even wanted to vote on the matter.

“I think we need to hear from one more person,” Polly said.
After
we had decided, I thought. She nodded toward the bedroom door.

I sighed. She was right. In the end, it was really up to him to decide what he was up to and what he wasn’t.

“I want to stay right here, me,” he said, shocking us all.

“But, Papa . . .”

“I can’t think on that ship, where it be weightless. And I need to think. I need it worse than I ever have, I think. So, unless y’all can bring the ship down here where there’s gravity . . . I’m stayin’ right here.”

Okay. None of us liked it, but what can you do? Papa is so gentle and makes so few demands that it’s possible to forget that, like someone he sometimes refers to, a comic book character called Pappy Yokum, when he has spoke, he has
spoke
!

—

We showed Patrick a variety of weapons and tried to convince him to take the simplest to use, which was a shotgun with a big magazine. Just point and shoot, another shell would be in the chamber before the noise had even died down. But he wouldn’t take it.

“I’m sure I’d only blow my own foot off,” he said. Okay, if you say so, Patrick. We finally got him to take a small handgun. We fitted him with a shoulder holster, as he was clearly horrified at putting it in his waistband. It was also clear what parts he was afraid of blowing off if he had it there.

Boys. What are you gonna do?

With final hugs for Papa, we headed out.

—

There were three ways for us to get from the South Pole to the North Pole. The first way was underground. Sheila was dubious about that but had no evidence that it was impossible, and it had a lot of advantages over the other alternatives.

The second way was out in the open, on the interior. We would have to sneak six miles through densely populated land, dressed like everybody’s worst nightmare escaped from a virtual game, armed to the teeth, with an unknown number of people looking for us. If we traveled by day, even regular, uninvolved citizens would notice us and cause a ruckus and be alarmed. Also, various cameras up around the curve could spot us easily. Even at night we wouldn’t be able to hide from the infrared cams.

Third was to fly it. We had the skycycles for it, and we also had a passenger who would be in full panic mode all the way. Even without Patrick—something I was thinking more and more about—it would be damn near impossible at night. We would be the only ones in the air, and once more our infrared signatures would give us away.

So underground seemed the best way.

Using the maps embedded in our phones we located a concealed entrance to an elevator that would take us below the interior level. To say we were edgy would be an understatement. I was not shaking, so much as shivering, like a racehorse at the gate. I was eager to get started because I was equally eager to get it over, one way or another.

We took positions at the sides of the elevator when it came time for the doors to open. Outside was . . . nothing. Or the next thing to it. A small, bare room, a long, long tunnel lit only in the parts near us. And along a magtrack, a little car big enough for six people.

“That looks like a death trap to me,” I said. “We going to just get on the little toy train there and go zipping along? And how many ambush points do you think there might be along the way?”

“They don’t seem to have projectile weapons,” Polly said. “That gives us an advantage.”

“Yeah, but not if we’re in the middle of epileptic seizures from their stun guns. Besides, I don’t want to kill anybody.”

“Me either,” Patrick said.

“And that makes three,” Polly said, angrily. “But we found out these guns are real good at making people keep their heads down.”

We looked down that long tunnel. Here was a place easy to choke off with just one or two or three soldiers or police or whatever they were calling themselves. Even if we scared them with a few bullets, they could instantly alert people down the line to block the tunnel, then block it behind us. We’d be trapped like rats in a maze. And how many stations were there ahead? I counted eight. There could be people at any or all of them.

“I say we at least give it a try,” Polly said.

I gave in, and we all took seats. Polly spoke to the car. And nothing happened. It just sat there, no lights, no action.

“They’ve turned it off,” Patrick said.

“Which means they’re aware of it,” I said. “We were hoping this was Travis’s secret underground railway, remember?”

“All right. We’ll walk it,” Polly said.

I was about to ask who appointed her squad leader . . . then realized I was okay with it. She had recently been through a real-life fight, as opposed to a survival course, so maybe her skills were a bit sharper than mine. And damn it, we did have to get to the North Pole some way.

But I really didn’t want to shoot at anybody, much less kill them.

—

We were all wearing boots with soft soles, but in a tunnel like that it’s almost impossible to move in complete silence. To do so, you have to move so slowly we wouldn’t make it to the North Pole in a week. So we compromised, careful not to stomp our feet but managing a moderate walking pace.

Among the things we had picked up at the armory were three sets of goggles. They had lenses that flipped up or down, could give you starlight vision or infrared. You got a sick green picture with one, a sullen red with the other. There was also a directional mike in the goggles, and an earbud. The goggles were made for sneaky work, seeing and hearing someone before they see or hear you. That’s always a big advantage.

It was pitch-dark in there without the glasses. I was glad we didn’t have to resort to our flashlights.

We had come about halfway to the first station, Polly slightly in the lead, when she stopped and held up a hand. We had agreed, no talking, not even whispering. They were just as likely to have listening equipment as we were.