With These Eyes (16 page)

Inside her converted garbage truck, Tasha and
her Troopers were watching a close-up of Isabelle, courtesy of the
camera in the Trooper's hat on the mezzanine level. "She's going to
the car. Purple 13, stand by to make your call." Tasha's level of
excitement was rising. Finally, the mouse followed the maze she had
built for it. Tasha watched Isabelle walk across the lobby on the
feed from the museum's security cameras. A sensor in the automated
teller-machine in the lobby registered increasing levels of
radioactivity as Isabelle approached. She exited and radiation
levels dropped abruptly as the door closed behind her. Troopers
with cameras hidden in hats, bags, glasses and one just out like a
tourist, provided Tasha ample video coverage of Isabelle's journey.
Isabelle pulled out of the snowy parking lot. The sun had just
risen above the horizon where it would soon disappear again and
make room for the arctic February night. The Trooper in the
Tyrolean hat made a panicked call to the police. He reported his
invented daughter missing from the museum after seeing her with a
stranger in a funny-looking hat.

The rising sun reminded Isabelle of
exercising with her puma. She could tell a lot of stress had come
to Tonati because they were on the run. His instinct made the
jungle cat aware that there was a clear and present danger to both
their existences, regardless whether or not he understood the
technology involved. Isabelle had great empathy for her furry
companion. Tonati had been part of the family since her childhood
in the jungle and his happiness mattered to Isabelle as much as
that of her father. She felt appreciation for Tonati. He had found
the radioactive marker on her. As long as she had that on her body,
it would be very difficult to hide from her pursuer. Like a
fluorescent ball in Tasha's pinball machine, Isabelle travelled
back to Fuji's retreat. She drove along the icy road. The sun was
rising for its hour-long journey along the horizon and bathed the
Arctic landscape in its golden light.

On her way, Isabelle encountered a battalion
of police cars racing towards the museum.

20 OF LEMMINGS AND EAGLES

The sun was setting. Isabelle, Fuji and
Tonati were enjoying nature's unedited beauty during a walk. The
mentor and his disciple strolled atop an icy cliff that descended
steeply from Fuji's property towards the rest of the island. Fuji
and Isabelle were comfortably warm in their thermal clothing,
despite the brutally cold temperatures. Tonati, for whom nature had
intended to live in the jungle, was truly an unusual wildcat. To
him, few things seemed as exciting as snow. His thick fur provided
him with ample insulation, and he generated plenty of heat because
bounding in and out of shoulder-deep snow was the height of
entertainment for him.

"You look like a dolphin," shouted Isabelle
from across the ice garden. Tonati stopped for a moment and looked
at her. A puffin fluttered across their line of sight and Tonati
immediately broke eye contact to chase after the bird, who
eventually flew off. Isabelle looked reminiscent. "There was a
cliff like this in Alaska." She looked down the steep, rocky drop
and continued. "Every year these ground hogs, the lemmings, would
get into a frenzy and jump off the cliff."

Fuji was familiar with this strange
phenomenon. He nodded and looked at Isabelle. "The
lemmings-run."

Isabelle enjoyed her talks with Fuji, he
shared a frame of reference with her on every subject. She went on.
"Every lemming they pass joins the heard, thinking the herd knows
best. They run until they reach the cliffs that line the Arctic
Ocean."

A behavior Fuji had seen in many fans of
Pin the Ponytail
. He added, "The lemming follows the masses
to his own demise. An eagle rises high above the world. Now that
you know there lays a cliff ahead, you'll continue to think like
the eagle and never run with the lemmings again."

Isabelle felt a bit overwhelmed by all she
had to face and how far away civilization was from her. She gave
Fuji a look of despair. "Some eagle, I can't even fly on a
plane."

Fuji had an answer for this, too. "The
blood-thinner should wear off in a couple of days' time. You'll be
safe here." He gave Isabelle's shoulder a reassuring squeeze and
left her with Tonati to contemplate his wisdom.

There had been many moments in the past when
Isabelle played in the snow with her puma, before they lost
everything. Anchorage and her field trips to the icy bush had been
like this in many ways. It was the Arctic frost where Isabelle had
cut her teeth as an investigative journalist. Tonati was bouncing
around the snow just like he did in those days. Isabelle could hear
her father's warning still ring through her head. It played in her
mind with every decision she had made in life since. Isabelle
remembered the morning he called her into his office.

Her own father, the managing director of his
chain of television stations, wanted to discuss content. A true
journalist always puts the story first. The truth - that’s was what
her father had taught Isabelle and it was the reason he had hired
her. She stood there in Lionel's office. Isabelle had looked up to
him her whole life. His passion for the news, and moreover his
principles of integrity were, in her eyes, the reasons he had
prevailed in his endeavor. Lionel had achieved his goal to bring
news independent from political agendas to the people of an entire
state. He had stood behind his daughter every time one of her
controversial newscasts brought him the wrath of a leader of
industry or politics. Every time; but this time he had asked her to
kill what was a story of enormous proportions. Isabelle wasn't just
going to stand there and break her principles.

"Dad, it's my biggest story ever. I need to
tell the people of this country the truth about what's going on.
It's my duty as a journalist."

This was difficult for Lionel. In her need to
remain steadfast behind her principles, Isabelle hadn't noticed the
fear that was welling deep in her father's eyes. He had faced a lot
of enemies and competition, none ever slowed his progress, but
Isabelle was looking at a man who had met his match. With a hint of
desperation that has haunted her ever since, his plea to her rang
out.

"Isabelle, listen to me, please. Do you
really believe that someone as big and powerful as them would let
you tell the whole state that they were illegally robbed
blind?"

"They have no choice. I believe in the
fact that there is
freedom of the press
. I chose this
profession to do my part in making sure that truth always prevails.
You made me news director so please, let me do my job."

Isabelle's father sat back in his chair. He
was exhausted.

"I'm telling you, there are some stories you
cannot run."

Isabelle returned from her daydream, she
heard Fuji calling from the window. There was something he wanted
to show her. Together with Tonati, Isabelle went inside. Kato was
sitting by the television. He had put tea and cookies on the table.
Isabelle poured herself a cup with milk and sugar. On TV, a news
report described the kidnapping of a little girl from the museum
earlier.

"Weren't you there this morning?" asked a
concerned Fuji.

Isabelle nodded slowly and listened to the
anchor give a description of the suspected wrongdoer. The
individual sought by the police was a woman about Isabelle's age,
weight and height. She was said to have been dressed in khaki
pants, lumberjack shirt and a rustic green jacket - the clothes the
candy-giving Trooper had worn. The screen was filled with a police
drawing that looked an awful lot like Isabelle. The woman in the
phantom drawing was sporting a bola hat that sat on top of her head
funnily because it was too small. Isabelle saw this wasn't just
going to blow over. Her pursuer had committed too many acts of
aggression to simply ignore.

"I think it's time to get going."

21 A DIFFICULT GOOD-BYE FOR ISABELLE

In the arctic frost of Spitsbergen, Isabelle
was getting ready to pack her bag. She opened the heavy wooden
wardrobe she had stocked with her clothes just the day before.
Isabelle reached for some of her garments when she noticed a
cardboard box in the middle of the cabinet that hadn't been there
before. Peeking prominently from the box's opening was the hat
Isabelle had seen in the police drawing earlier. Out of curiosity,
she put the hat on her head - it was too small and looked just as
out of place as the one on TV. Inside the box were the clothes the
Trooper wore while dispensing candy to unattended children at the
museum. She discovered the green jacket, lumberjack shirt and tan
snow pants, exactly what the news had described the kidnapper was
wearing. Isabelle knew she had to move fast. She thought it best to
forego packing and to get on her way. A few moments later, Isabelle
was in the retreat’s mud-room where Fuji and Tonati were watching
her put on snowboarding boots.

"Tonati, make sure Fuji is safe while I'm
gone."

The puma growled nervously. She gave him a
loving look. Tonati glanced at the door in anticipation. Isabelle
used to take him to the top of secluded slopes in Alaska so he
could run next to her when she rode her snow board.

"Sorry, you need to stay and protect
Fuji."

Tonati put his right paw against Fuji's hip
for a moment; he understood. Isabelle gave the nervous puma a kiss
on top of his big nose. She grabbed goggles and board, and exited
into Fuji's front yard. Her two friends followed. The island's
harbor laid in the distance. Fuji stood beside Isabelle, he pointed
to an icebreaker that was anchored off shore.

"Give Lars my regards, he's a good man.
Remember, Isabelle: It is fear that brings the lemming to its
demise."

This was difficult for Isabelle. Once again,
she was leaving loved ones in her journey through life. The young
woman could feel the pressure from her pursuers increase. Isabelle
knew without the help of the friends she was leaving behind, she
would have already been caught. Fuji's wisdom and the connection
with nature she had learned from Tonati were going to be with
Isabelle on her journey, regardless. Fuji and Isabelle exchanged a
long look. He could only hope that he had given his apprentice the
weapons she needed to face this manifestation of darkness, which
had blanketed the globe like a parrot's cage. Gemma had told him
this moment would come. Isabelle didn't know it, but the fate of
humanity was going to be decided by the outcome of her struggle.
Fuji saw in her eyes the confidence of a warrior who was ready to
fight for the survival of the tribe. He could tell that she left
fear no chance to distract Isabelle from her defenses. The young
woman was surprised at the warrior qualities she harbored. She had
always stood her ground in the past but never had to fight so
fiercely to find the truth or to stay alive. Everything she had
learned to this point was going help her on her quest. There wasn't
another person like her in the world, and that would give Isabelle
an edge. No matter how cunning, her pursuers wouldn't be able to
anticipate all her moves. Like this one.

"Thanks for everything, Fuji."

She didn't have any more time to waste.
Isabelle rode off along the side of the mountain, towards the
lights of the harbor in the distance. Like a paper lantern, the
large moon lit up the icy landscape. A few scattered Northern
Lights moved across the starry sky. The streaks of light cycled in
yellow and green, dancing as earth's dynamic field of magnetism
shifted high above in a gust of solar wind. For thousands of years
people had ascribed magical powers to the aurorae, a theory
Isabelle didn't discount just because she knew what made them glow.
Often, people considered magic what they didn't understand. Maybe
there was more to aurorae borealis than just a glow in the sky,
Isabelle wondered. The wind was hissing in her ears. Her feet felt
the crunch of the snow under the board. The lights from the harbor
and the faintly illuminated icebreaker still seemed far away. The
wind hissed louder when her ears popped, with much of the decent
still ahead.

Despite all the problems her pursuers had
caused Isabelle, in this particular moment, she felt a sense of
appreciation. The sight of the Arctic island at her feet and the
feel of the pristine elements surrounding her, gave Isabelle great
enjoyment. This was what Fuji had been talking about. Fear would
have kept her from recognizing the beauty that laid within this
moment. It kept many people from having a mind clear enough to make
the right decisions. Isabelle felt very powerful at that moment.
She felt the awesomeness of nature, stripped of man's devices.
Isabelle was one with nature. She glanced at the narrow and icy
roadway that lead from the town below up the coastline. Nature's
light show had been disrupted by a row of blue flashing lights that
was snaking towards the split in the frozen roadway. The snake
slithered up the road that lead to Fuji's retreat. Isabelle knew
the police were getting help from someone, good thing she didn't
stay for another cup of tea at Fuji's.

The harbor wasn't so far away any more. The
serenity had been replaced by extreme concentration and the
pressure to evade the police. If she succeeded, Isabelle would
still have to deal with her pursuers' relentlessness. Isabelle
didn't know what was coming next, she concentrated on feeling the
snow under her board.

In the control room of her mobile command
post, Tasha was watching a live satellite image of the
mountainside. Isabelle's face and gloves glowed bright yellow. "She
still thinks she can outsmart us." Tasha was amused by the
resourcefulness of her prey and the fact that she had tagged her
with her mark.

Isabelle soon arrived at the island's small
harbor. She unbuckled her snow board, stuck it upright into the
snow and walked across the small parking lot. Its frozen surface
was covered in sand. A few cars were parked scattered across the
lot. Like horses' reigns at a hitching post, cables for their
engine-block heaters tied the cars to their spots. At one of the
docks, Isabelle spotted him. Fuji's description was uncanny. He had
said Lars would be the only Nordic marine biologist in the harbor.
A mismatched combination of native clothing and high-end thermal
gear was the trademark of his craft. Isabelle was looking at a man
in a woolen Norwegian hat with intricate indigenous designs. His
green and blue jacket and matching snow pants were made from
several layers of thermal fabric and sported the brand's
four-legged animal logo in stitching over his heart. Atop thermal
gloves, a pair of crocheted mittens left his hands guarded from the
frosty night. He was quite a different sight from the dock workers
clad in their thick brown thermal coveralls and jackets. The
self-evident marine biologist was watching a crane lift a yellow
research submarine out of dry dock and into the water.