Johnny Graphic and the Etheric Bomb (20 page)

“All I ask of you characters,” Louie admonished the youngsters, “is that you use your noggins. Think before you jump, okay? Don’t try to be big heroes. Just figure out Dame Honoria’s location and get her out. The Lieutenant’ll help you come up with the best strategy.”

On the one-hour flight from Gorton Island to Old Number One, Ozzie had spent time up on the flight deck, fascinated by the workings of the flying machine. Johnny kept “translating” the ghost’s questions, and Danny explained everything he was doing and why.

Leaving Ozzie in the cockpit, Johnny returned to the passenger cabin, and had an urgent, whispered conference with his sister and Lieutenant Finn. They hatched a plan to deal with the traitorous Ozzie Eccleston.

Within moments of beaching their dinghy on the southwestern shore of Old Number One, Johnny, Mel, and Nina headed inland through dense jungle—led by Ozzie. Lieutenant Finn and the greatly depleted First Zenith Cavalry Brigade rode alongside them and out ahead. It wouldn’t do for them to be flying up above the jungle, potentially visible to Dame Honoria’s captors.

Leaves and branches and thorns grabbed at the three kids at every step. Johnny took the lead and had to slash at the undergrowth with a machete. Clouds of insects swarmed around, pestering and biting.

The worst stretch of their march inland was mushing through the swampy spots. Johnny’s boots and socks quickly soaked through. When he felt a peculiar itch on his right shin, he lifted up his trouser leg and discovered a huge leech, half the size of his hand, enjoying lunch.

“
Oh man!”
he yelped.

Nina hurried forward and gave him a disgusted look. “Stop fussing, okay?” She bent over and gently pried the leech away from his shin. Then, probably for the only time in its life, the squishy black parasite went flying.

Mel was wearing her saber. Johnny wondered if maybe she was overdoing it. It sure did look silly, dangling on her hip. But who knew? It might come in handy. At least she knew how to use it.

After an hour of strenuous trudging, the group reached a jungle clearing near a large, wide bog. There they paused for water and food. Johnny, Mel, and Nina were panting and already exhausted. Johnny had taken off his hat and was wiping his face with a handkerchief soaked with sweat. He had thought, at one time, that he might enjoy living on a tropical isle. That didn’t seem like such a swell idea anymore. How could anyone get used to this heat and humidity?

“Hello,” said a tiny voice.

Johnny nearly jumped out of his skin.

Just at the edge of the clearing, not thirty feet away, stood a diminutive girl ghost in a dusty dark shift and headdress.

Johnny tipped back his straw fedora and walked over to her. “Hi, there. What’s your name?”

“Bao,” she said. “Why are you here?”

“We’re looking for a friend of ours.”

Bao regarded the people and ghosts with a certain wariness. Her little black eyes paused ever so briefly on Ozzie. “Who?” she asked.

“A lady named Honoria Rathbone. We think she’s being held prisoner here on the island.”

“Are you her friends?”

“You betcha we are,” said Johnny. “I was born in her house.”

The little girl wraith crooked an index finger and motioned for Johnny to come closer. A good head taller than her, he listened carefully to what she had to say.

When she’d finished, Johnny joined the others. “She doesn’t know anything about Dame Honoria. She saw us arrive, and she was curious about the flying machine.”

Johnny tried to look as casual as possible as he strolled up to Finn and spoke a few quiet words in the ghost’s ear. The lieutenant listened attentively, his face expressionless. In turn, he gave a surreptitious nod to Corporal Marchiano, a small but muscular specter with piercing black eyes and a black beard.

Ozzie didn’t seem to notice Marchiano coming up behind him. Without warning, the ghost trooper locked him into a python-tight full nelson hold. Marchiano’s hands gripped the back of Ozzie’s neck.

“Nooo!” Ozzie howled, his pith helmet flying off. “
What are you doing?”
He struggled to get free, but Marchiano had him under control. Ozzie was going nowhere.

Johnny understood all too well that the only way to hold a ghost captive was to have another ghost restrain him. To prevent Ozzie from springing any ambush, someone would have to stay here and keep him from doing any mischief. And that someone was the corporal.

“The little girl ghost here says that you helped the Steppe Warriors abduct Dame Honoria,” Johnny accused him. “She says that you’re sure to betray us, too.”

“Pish-posh,” Ozzie said, his head bent at a very odd angle. “Whom do you trust? Someone who has given decades of service to the lady?” He forced a smile that no one could possibly believe. “Or a vile little guttersnipe?”

Johnny looked at Mel, who nodded.

“I think we trust the guttersnipe.” Johnny said. “And Tala—or at least Tala’s head—told me the exact same thing this morning.”

“There’s been a dreadful misunderstanding!” wailed the captive ghost. “This miserable child is leading you into a terrible trap. I am first and foremost my mistress’s loyal servant.”

Johnny looked him in his weasel face. “We’ll see what Dame Honoria has to say about that.”

Chapter 39

Leaving the vile Ozzie in Corporal Marchiano’s firm grip, the three living people and the ghost troopers followed Bao. She promised to take them to Dame Honoria’s cave, where she had left the old lady. A bit more than an hour later they arrived in the shadow of the coral hills that divided Old Number One. The razor-sharp, jagged stone formations were a good three hundred feet tall.

“Is Dame Honoria alright?” Mel had asked Bao along the way. “Have they hurt her?”

“I don’t think so,” answered Bao. “But a few days ago the man in the helmet—”

“Ozzie Eccleston?” Johnny prompted.

“Yes, him. He and some Steppe Warriors took her to see the khan.”

“The khan!” blurted Johnny. “Their chief is here?”

“Yes, he is.”

“Who is he? What’s he like?”

Bao seemed puzzled, but tried to answer. “He is a man, not a ghost. But a strange-looking man, with a long face and dark, scary eyes. He looks very strong.”

“What did Dame Honoria say about him, Bao?” Mel asked.

“Nothing. She would say nothing. She was quiet and sad. ‘Grandmother,’ I asked, ‘what is the matter? Are you sick? Have they hurt you?’ She said no. ‘Then why do you seem so sad?’ She would not say. And it is not like Grandmother to speak so little.”

“That’s for sure,” said Johnny. “She’s never at a loss for words.”

Mel glared at her brother. “At least she’s alive and unharmed.”

As much as Johnny respected Dame Honoria, he thought that she talked way too much and tended to stick her nose in other people’s business. So if she had clammed up, something bad must have happened.

“Do you know why the khan’s here?” asked Johnny.

“To make the second bomb,” answered Bao, as if this ought to be quite obvious.

Johnny and Mel stopped in their tracks and stared in horror at the little girl ghost.
There’s another bomb?

“Have they finished it?” Mel asked, looking appalled.

“I do not know, Sister.”

“Have you seen the bomb?” asked Johnny, thinking darkly about how the first one had blinded him.

“I am sorry, but I don’t know what it looks like.”

Johnny whistled and shook his head. The khan and his super bomb were only a mile or two away. Not exactly a reassuring thought.

As they rested at the base of the coral hills, Johnny pulled a yellowed map of Old Number One out of his camera pack and spread it on a rock shelf.

Mel took Bao gently by the elbow and led her to the map. “Now point out to us where everything is. Dame Honoria’s cave, where they made the bomb, where the Steppe Warriors may be. Whatever you can think of.”

Bao understood the map perfectly, having flown over the island many times. She showed Mel and Finn where everything was.

“Okay, now we need a plan,” said Mel. “Lieutenant, what do you think?”

Finn leaned in over the map, jabbing at it with a bent index finger. “I think we ghosts ought to go on a double action, right through here.”

Johnny and Mel agreed that Finn’s tactic of a pincer movement—attacking from two sides at once—was the proper strategy. One group of troopers would strike from the back of Dame Honoria’s cave, the other would advance from the front. The two units would hopefully overpower the Steppe Warrior guards and safely spirit the old lady away.

* * *

In the hours since they’d set foot on Old Number One, Johnny had been painfully aware that the seventeen men and officers of the First Zenith Cavalry Brigade were scattered all to hell and gone. The colonel and two others had vanished in the roiling inferno of the etheric bomb. Four troopers remained on Landfall Island, waiting for the lost threesome. Two more remained with Uncle Louie and Danny, guarding the flying boat. Corporal Marchiano held the treacherous Ozzie Eccleston. That left just seven troopers and seven horses fit for action. Not a very big force, not even a platoon.

A bit after ten o’clock, beneath a clear sky and blistering sun, Lieutenant Finn led three mounted troopers straight into the solid pink stone that formed the coral hills. Bao guided them, sitting in front of Finn on his saddle. Simultaneously, Sergeant Clegg and his two men headed up the narrow path that divided the island’s rocky spine—a stone-strewn track just barely passable for the living. Finn promised that he would send back a trooper in an hour or less to report on the mission’s outcome.

But the hour passed, then another half hour, and no one showed up. No Zenith Trooper of any sort.

“I’m really afraid that something’s gone wrong,” said Johnny, his patience wearing thin. There’d been nothing to do but sit and wait and sweat. He wanted to get into action. “We have to go check things out.”

In spite of being an accomplished hiker and outdoorswoman, Nina didn’t look happy about trekking through the coral hills. She had looked at the path and said it was terrible ground. But Mel agreed with her brother. It wasn’t like Finn to not report back.

Nina, as usual, was right.

Johnny had never taken a harder, more arduous hike. The path wended through the coral hills for over a curving, twisting mile. Much of the way there was no flat surface to walk on. They all balanced precariously on angled rock after angled rock. It was a miracle that no one ended up with a sprained ankle like Uncle Louie’s.

The trio stopped only to replenish their canteens at a freshwater spring, where Johnny also snapped a picture of the two girls. To add to the ordeal, the sun was beating down, with a searing, oven-like heat.

Finally emerging on the other side, the three peeked out through a jumble of rocks to survey the situation. They saw decrepit tin buildings, rusting farm equipment, palm trees, dense undergrowth, and a road covered with crushed seashells. A few ghosts wafted around aimlessly. From what Bao had said, the cave mouth to the northwest was where Dame Honoria would be.

“Do you see any of the troopers or Bao?” Nina asked.

“Nope, no one,” Mel answered, peeping above some rocks, searching the sun-blasted landscape. “The place looks deserted. No guards in front of any of the buildings.”

“No Steppe Warriors?” Nina continued.

“Don’t see any.”

This whole business was getting on Johnny’s nerves. He was tired of waiting for others to act. He just wanted to find Dame Honoria and get the heck out of here. The sooner she was rescued, the sooner they could continue on their around-the-world newspaper assignment. And the sooner they could start investigating what had happened to their parents. But they wouldn’t get anywhere unless they quit hiding. Uncle Louie always said the best defense is a good offense.

“Why don’t I run over there and check Dame Honoria’s cave?” Johnny said. “It’ll take me a few minutes, tops. Nobody’ll see me.”

Nina shook her head vigorously. “I think we ought to wait until dark before we go exploring. Too dangerous in the daylight.”

In turn, Mel shook her head. ”I don’t think we can wait that long. But I’m the oldest, so I should go.”

“Are you nuts, Sis?” Johnny sputtered. “If anyone gets caught, it oughta be me. They grab you, they get what they’ve been after all along.”

“It’s a bad idea for either of you,” argued Nina. “You don’t have any idea who might be sneaking around out there, or where Steppe Warriors might be lurking. Johnny’s right, Mel, you’re too important.” Then she glared at Johnny. “As for you, I’d have hoped our little adventure in Jadetown would have cured you of any urge for recklessness.”

Johnny glared back at Nina. Who did she think she was? His mother?

“Some friend you are!” he snapped.

Eyes and mouth wide open, Nina looked as though someone had slapped her in the face.

She was about to make a retort when Johnny abruptly barked, “
Gotta go!”

And he spurted out from behind the sheltering rocks, into the open.

Feet pounding, legs pumping, he made for Dame Honoria’s cave—gripping his camera pack for dear life.

Chapter 40

Johnny took a hard left into the open cave mouth, past two rusted, gaping steel doors that drooped on their hinges. Deep shadows enveloped him, cutting ten degrees off the baking heat. He panted wildly, bending over and putting his hands on his knees.

Suddenly he heard rushing footsteps outside. He pivoted around with a fierce expression, ready to wallop whomever it was with his camera pack. And he almost did, too, until he realized his pursuer was none other than Nina.

She skidded to a stop, not quite seeing Johnny in the dim light. The instant she did, she screeched and hopped backward. She glared at him. “Now you’re going to smack me with your camera bag.
Some friend you are!”

Having his own insult thrown back in his face stung Johnny considerably—and, he had to admit, deservedly. He turned even redder. “You shoulda stayed back with Mel, Sparks. Why’d you follow me?”