“Have you figured out what her angle is for doing this? I mean, she risked her life! Can you figure out what her upside is?”
Arquette flipped up his fingers in a prissy discarding motion, “We don’t know what it is yet. But I’ll bet we find out soon.”
Stockton saw Rhodes frown. “You disagree, Sheila?”
“Yes Ma’am, I do. I think she did it because she’s a citizen, you’re her president, and she recognized that she was the only one in the world who could get you out of there alive.”
Stockton drew back in surprise, “Come on, I thought you had some plan?”
“Ma’am, we couldn’t even find you. We would have eventually, no doubt. But we weren’t making much progress. And, I have to tell you, our bomb experts didn’t think there was any way we’d get that thing off your neck without days to work on it. They told us that unless we captured Fallon with his PGR trigger intact so that we would at least have many hours to slowly cut our way in and bypass the wiring, that there would be no way we’d get it off of you without it blowing.”
“How in the hell,” Stockton said exasperatedly, “did Donsaii get it off in a matter of seconds then?”
“We don’t know.” Rhodes sighed, “We assume she must have used one of her new technologies, but it doesn’t seem to be one she wants to share with us.”
“Christ,” Stockton said mostly to herself, “what are we gonna do?”
“If I might make a suggestion?” Rhodes asked.
Stockton nodded wearily.
“Welcome her back in from the cold. Take her off the most wanted list. The only thing she’s done wrong is to refuse to share technologies that are so dangerous that I, personally, feel very glad she hasn’t turned them loose. She’s probably done more good than any other person in history. She doesn’t deserve what’s been done to her.”
Stockton felt anger pouring into her. That had, after all, been a direct slam on Stockton’s own policies. She took a deep breath and pointed a finger at Rhodes, preparatory to letting her have it with both barrels.
Then she closed her eyes, let out the breath, and said with a despondent sigh, “Maybe you’re right…”
Epilogue
Gloria Sanchez felt unclean. She’d spent the day helping Rubin Carivel establish a new identity. He’d been accepted into witness protection after agreeing to provide information and eventually testimony that would lead to the capture and conviction of several of the big drug lords from Mexico. Gloria felt no doubt that the drug lords needed to be taken down. They were horrible people running a reign of terror.
But Carivel himself was a disgusting specimen of humanity. Though there wasn’t proof, there was a great deal of suspicion that he’d arranged murders and participated in rapes. It was a shame that the “greater good” had to be so tainted with slimy evil.
As Gloria thought back on her years in the Marshals’ Office she was struck by how few people she’d helped disguise who weren’t despicable themselves. A few families threatened because of who they knew, and Ell Donsaii, threatened because of what she knew.
She pulled up in front of her house and walked up the sidewalk. Sitting a little ways in front of her door was a clear glass vase with a single white rose in it. Little gold beads filled the bottom of the base which seemed odd. Gloria narrowed her eyes in suspicion, have I pissed anybody off sufficiently for them to leave me a bomb? Could that be a bunch of BBs packed around an explosive?
She leaned down and sniffed, it’s a real rose all right, she thought to herself. She saw a card taped to the side of the vase. Reaching into her utility belt she pulled out a little multi tool and carefully used it to cut the card off the vase. Holding up to the light and feeling it, it didn’t seem like the card could have anything dangerous in it.
She pulled open the card and read, “They took me off the ‘most wanted list’ today. Thank you for your discretion until now. Raquel.”
A warm feeling washed over Gloria.
Ell, one of the good ones.
One of the very few who’d ever taken the trouble to say thank you. She reached down to pick up the vase…
Startled she looked at the vase. It was glued to her front stoop! That just didn’t seem like the kind of silly joke you’d expect from Ell. Could it be anyone else? Gloria didn’t remember anyone but Ell using the “Raquel” pseudonym.
Gloria squatted down and looked at the vase. It seemed to be clear glass and she didn’t see any evidence of glue holding it down. She grabbed it and tugged a little harder. It wasn’t glued. It was just really heavy!
Heart thumping, Gloria carried it into the house. Her daughter ran in from the other room, “Mommy!” The five year old girl’s eyes focused on the flower, “A rose!” Nodding, Gloria headed into the kitchen where she got out her colander and, plucking out the rose, poured the water and the heavy beads into the colander.
Gloria’s husband, Felipe, stepped into the kitchen behind her. He frowned, “Somebody sent you a rose?”
Gloria nodded, reaching into the cupboard and pulling out her little digital kitchen scale. She set a bowl on it.
Felipe said suspiciously, “You goin’ on a new diet?”
Gloria grinned at him, “It does look suspicious doesn’t it? Getting a flower and then getting out the diet scale?” She pressed the tare button on the scale and picked up the colander. Pouring the beads into the bowl on the scale, she said, “I’m just wondering how much these beads weigh.”
Felipe’s brow furrowed as he watched the little beads pour into the bowl. They sounded heavy. “Why do you care about the beads?”
The little scale read 3.05 kg. Gloria thought, I’ll bet it weighs exactly three kilograms once the water evaporates. She glanced up at her husband and winked, “‘Cause I’m pretty sure they’re gold,” she whispered.
Felipe’s eyebrows rose, “Gold?” He reached out and picked up a couple of beads, surprised at their weight. “How much is three kilograms of gold worth?”
Gloria spoke to her AI a moment, glanced up at her HUD, then smiled broadly. “About $190,000.”
“Holy crap!” Felipe’s eyes narrowed, “Is it dirty money?”
“No,” Gloria said dreamily, “I think it’s about as clean as money can get.”
***
Ell picked up Zage and started down the stairs of their old farmhouse. As expected, Tanner got up and started along in her wake, his toenails clicking on the wooden floor. Just as she reached the ground floor she hissed as she felt a sudden pain in her right index finger.
Holding it up, she saw that she had picked up a splinter from the old banister she’d been sliding her hand along. Need to have those replaced, she thought to herself as she turned towards the bathroom.
She sat Zage on the floor in the bathroom and pulled open the medicine cabinet to look for tweezers. Zage promptly got up and started playing in the drawers. Ell glanced curiously at him. Usually he stayed where he’d been placed until he got bored, then he went to find Tanner, or one of his videos.
Turning back to the cabinet she found the tweezers. She flipped on the light, looked carefully at her finger, and plucked out the splinter without a great deal of difficulty. She still felt irritated about the banister though.
She turned back to Zage and found him holding a Band-Aid out to her. Not only that, but he’d put away the box he’d gotten the Band-Aid out of and closed the drawer. She smiled broadly, immensely proud of her son for trying to help her, and for recognizing that she might need a Band-Aid like he’d had put on his own injuries in the past. Reaching down to take it she said in a singsong, talking to baby, voice, “Did the Z-man get his Mommy a Band-Aid?”
Zage held the Band-Aid just out of reach. Looking at her with concern he distinctly said, “You should wash your finger first.”
Ell’s heart practically stopped and she felt herself starting to drop into the zone. Suddenly weak, she took a deep breath and sat with a thump on the floor next to Zage. “Zage! You can talk?”
> Zage’s brows drew together, giving him an expression that made Ell think he thought it was a stupid question. He nodded but said nothing.
“Why don’t you then?”
Zage only shrugged.
For a moment Ell felt frustrated, but then in a sudden burst of exuberance, she picked Zage up. Swinging him around in a joyous dance, she made her way into the kitchen.
Shan was setting out cereal, bowls, milk, and a banana. He frowned, “Why is Zage carrying a Band-Aid? Did he get hurt?” Then he looked up and saw the beatific expression on Ell’s face. “Why are you so happy?”
The End
Hope you liked the book!
If so, please give it a positive review on Amazon.
Try the next in the series, to be published someday soon.
Author’s Afterword
This is a comment on the “science” in this science fiction novel. I have always been partial to science fiction that posed a “what if” question. Not everything in the story has to be scientifically plausible, but you suspend your disbelief regarding one or two things that aren’t thought to be possible. Essentially you ask, “what if” something (such as faster than light travel) were possible, how might that change our world? Each of the Ell Donsaii stories asks at least one such question.
“Rescue” asks what might happen if a charismatic terrorist assembled a large group and took on the government? Real charisma can wield surprising power for either good or evil in its own right, but what if such a person took advantage of some of the apparently simple things ports could let you do?
How might we use the huge amount of heat energy that could transit a port from a near solar parabolic mirror to revolutionize subterranean engineering? There was actually a moderate amount of work done in the 60s on the possibility of using nuclear power to heat subterrene tunnelers. The idea was that they could then be used to melt their way through soil and rock, with the melted material fusing to form a kind of glassy ceramic wall for the tunnel. This would be much simpler, of course, than digging a tunnel, moving all that dirt, and then bringing in concrete to coat the wall. Though in the story, melting tunneling is proposed for Mars, it should be obvious that subterranean real estate could be opened up here on earth using the same technology.
If we really had ports, their potential applications in the medical realm would be almost endless.
Acknowledgements
I would like to acknowledge the editing and advice of Gail Gilman, Nora Dahners, Allen Dietz, Kat Lind, Kerry McIntyre, and Abiola Streete each of whom significantly improved this story.
Rescue (an Ell Donsaii story #11) Page 22
