by B. C. Tweedt
Grover gave him a look and shook his head, intent on arranging the items in the back of a van with a Plumbers’ Supply logo on its side. His tattooed arms bulged as he picked up a box of ammunition.
Still bouncing on his toes and petting Kit, Greyson kept the questions coming. “Sir, how’d he get his own plane? Is he rich?”
“No.”
“Well, how’d he get it?”
“If I tell you, will you shut up?”
Scrunching his brow, Greyson drew back. “Sorry, sir. Just a question.”
Grover turned to him and squared his broad shoulders. “He was our pilot. He earned it. And stop being so frickin’ polite – calling me sir like some Nancy-boy.”
Greyson froze at the callous words, but his stubbornness rose against the insult. “Sorry. Should I be rude?”
Grover turned back to his work. “Better than your sissy talk.”
Thinking to himself, Greyson turned away, shrugged to himself, and then turned back. “So tell me…was he your pilot in the army, Jerk?”
Eavesdropping, Forge stifled a laugh as he opened the truck’s passenger door. He hid his face with his hand. Grover turned toward Greyson again, even slower, not a hint of a smile on his worn face. For a moment Greyson thought he was going to hit him – or throw him somewhere hard.
“Jerk is the best you can do?”
“Well…”
“You afraid your mom’s gonna wash your mouth out with soap?”
Greyson’s expression dropped into frustration. “My mom was killed at the fair.”
The man seemed annoyed. “I heard the story. You’re an orphan.”
Greyson shrugged. “For now.”
Grover leaned down with a jerk, giving Greyson a close up on each one of his scars. One cut across his right cheek. Another jetted diagonally from his eye to his left ear. His skin had the leathery, open-pore texture of someone who’d been in the sun too many years. But he wasn’t ugly. And he wasn’t as scary as he thought he was.
“A lot of parents died in Des Moines, Orphan… and in Chicago, New Orleans, Dallas. More victims than I care to think about. Quit your complaining. Don’t be another one.”
The soldier leaned back, still glaring at Greyson as he contemplated the words. He’s calling me a victim? For complaining?
The anger bubbled up and spouted from Greyson’s lips. “You’re a butthole.”
Grover let the surprise register in his brow, but he chuckled, deep and quiet in this throat. “That’s better. Now shut up and hand me that bag over there. Be useful.”
After a pathetic glare, Greyson shuffled to the duffel bag, kicking at the dirt. He grabbed the bag that was nearly as large as he was and lugged it to the van like a forklift. Grover took it with one hand, without a thank you.
Avoiding Grover, Greyson circled to the other side of the van to where Forge was loading more gear. Greyson looked for other things he could help with, but he didn’t know the first thing about the equipment. Instead, he eyed the computer pad attached to the man’s wrist. He’d seen Forge type on it as soon as he had returned to the clearing; the drone had buzzed over their heads, off to some other mission, obedient to Forge’s silent commands.
Every now and then the same drone would buzz overhead, always from a different direction.
“Is the drone watching around us? For Plurbs – or soldiers?”
Forge nodded to the sky. “It’s on overwatch. Random sweeps so no ones tracks it to us. And Diablo’s keeping watch as well.”
“Diablo?”
Forge nodded to the tree line where the third soldier was nearly invisible in his ghillie suit of leaves and brush.
“Why you call him that?”
“Long story – and don’t ask him. Diablo…he doesn’t talk much; just be glad he’s on your side.”
“Is this all of you?”
“Smokestack didn’t make it to the fight in time. He’ll be here before too long.”
“Smokestack? How’d he get his name?”
Forge smirked and tied a complicated knot over a container like he’d done it a thousand times. “You ask too many questions.”
“But you guys saved me. And…and I don’t even know who you are.”
Forge pulled a strap tight. “We like it that way.”
“You guys in the Army? Like, Navy Seals or something?”
“Only a few men in the world know who we are. Think you can just ask?”
He shrugged. “Worth a try.”
Suddenly Forge’s wrist pad beeped and he glanced at it. “That’s the drone speaking. You’re so curious ‘bout names. The drone needs a name. All I can think of is 714 Dash M because that’s its model number. Got any other ideas?”
Greyson shrugged. There weren’t many names cooler than Diablo. “I don’t know. Can I see him again?”
Forge thought for a moment, glanced toward Grover and then made up his mind. “Sure.” He typed a few keys on his wrist pad and then craned his neck toward the sky.
Greyson matched his gaze until the drone appeared. It dropped altitude fast and banked toward them. Moments later it hovered in front of them with the hum of an air conditioner. It was three times the size of the drone John had destroyed, twice as big as the police drone he’d seen in Nashville, and twice as intimidating. As Forge pulled it closer and explained its features, Greyson admired its sleek metal with a fearful knot in his throat.
It was shaped like a tire, with a silver panel of armor covering the entire exterior except for a black-tinted strip of material that Forge explained was a window for the six cameras contained inside. Sticking out from the underside was a single gun barrel. “It has 144 armor piercing rounds inside and can reload itself if you use the right ammunition canisters. It ejects the old and lands on the new. Clicks right in.”
Forge brought it down and showed the four whirling rotors inside, like those on a helicopter. “Each works independently. But the cool thing about this particular drone is its extendable wings…”
“Cool!”
But the drone’s wings didn’t extend. Forge sighed. “…if I could figure them out. It’s a prototype – didn’t come with an instruction manual.”
“Where’d you get it?” Greyson asked, rubbing the 714-M stenciled on its side.
“You have to know the right person who has the right set of skills – who can get things.” Forge smirked. “It’s me.”
Greyson gave him a look of admiration, but it dissolved into contemplation. These men were professionals. The type of heroes he saw in movies. He hadn’t really thought that they actually existed. To see them here was surreal.
Forge released the drone, watching it buzz back into the sky. “So,” he said, looking back to Greyson. “Get any name inspiration?”
“No, but can I get a name?” He started cycling through all of the coolest options. “How about Greyve Stone? Or Greyzy Horse?”
Forge shook his head. “First of all, you suck at coming up with names. Second, names are given, not chosen. Besides. I think you already have one.”
Greyson arched his brow, but Forge interrupted his thoughts, peering at his wristpad. “The nameless drone says a truck’s approaching. Should be your ride.”
The same joy he’d had at seeing Kit suddenly returned with the same intensity. Dan and Asher pulled up in their truck, and he met Asher with a hug. When the boy asked for another one, Greyson obliged, picking him up and swinging him in the kind of hug his father had given him when he’d been as small as Asher.
“Kit’s alive! And we’re going to the Bahamas!” Greyson turned to Dan, but he was already talking in whispers with Grover. They seemed to be good friends, exchanging a flurry of words, with intermittent glances in Greyson’s direction. Forge joined the other soldiers, shaking his hand and giving a nod of relief. It was an adult conversation.
Growing impatient, Greyson eventually tapped Dan on the arm. “Excuse me.”
Grover’s glare nearly made him topple backwards. But he continued, “You’re taking
me, now, right? You promised.”
Dan apologized to Grover, dropped his chin to his chest, and stepped up to Greyson. He grabbed his shoulders. “I’m needed here…”
“But you promised!”
“Let me finish.”
“Sorry, sir.”
Dan sighed and knelt to Greyson’s level. “You have to understand – you can’t see it all. All the links in the chain. The consequences of today’s attack. Congress is in emergency session, militias are arming, the media’s raising the war banner. But it won’t happen. It can’t. Not yet. And I’ve got to help see that it doesn’t.”
“But…”
“Everyone has their own war to fight. You have yours and each of us has our own as well – just as complicated, just as difficult. You can’t imagine all the hands at play here. The stakes are higher than they have ever been.”
Downcast and beaten, Greyson lowered his head and kicked at the gravel. Anger fought for control, but he kept biting it down and biting it down.
“But a promise is a promise.”
Greyson’s eyes lit up, and Asher’s next to him.
“So, I’ll take you, but I can’t stay.”
“You’ll take me? On the plane?”
“Yes.”
“Right now?”
“Soon.”
The way Greyson jumped and shouted for joy startled the soldiers, but Asher joined in with just as much enthusiasm.
The wait flew by. After Forge decided to keep Kit with him to recover, Greyson and Asher gave the dog a long hug. Before parting, Asher whispered in the Kit’s ear. “Sic the bad ones. Lick the good ones.”
From their hideout in the woods, it only took a few stressful hours to make it to the small airport. Most of it Greyson spent hidden in a giant toolbox in the bed of the truck, sleeping as if it were his coffin. He even slept through the military checkpoint. But they made it safely and boarded the twin-engine Cessna without incident.
After fueling and pre-flight preparations, the plane finally barreled down the runway – its engines humming louder and louder as the g-force dragged at Greyson’s face. He watched out the window in fascination as the landscape rushed by faster than he had ever seen.
“This is awesome!”
Asher looked at him from the adjacent seat, holding his armrests like they were the only things keeping him from falling. “Yah! Totally!”
“We’re flying! Look!” He pointed out the window, watching the trees shrink and the roads dwindle to lines. Soon the forest melted away into farmland and small towns passed one by one. Asher handed him a set of headphones and they pointed out the landmarks to one another.
When the plane leveled out above the clouds, he leaned back in his chair with a deep sigh, the adrenaline and the joy still flowing through his tired body.
Finally. He was on his way. He’d be there in a few hours. And there were no more obstacles in the way. At least not until Nassau.
He smiled at Asher and then at Dan in the cockpit ahead. As he drifted toward sleep, images of his journey ran before his eyelids. The couple he hitchhiked with, the horse he rode through the storm, the car behind the RV, the rioters’ faces and protest signs, the bike he left behind with a flat tire, the train, and now the plane. He’d gone a long way.
But the last thing he thought about before he fell asleep was the cat, Pawl. Perhaps he could have brought him along for a pillow. Plus, he could have tested to see if cats land on their feet when dropped from an airplane.
He smiled to himself as he dozed off.
New self? Maybe not yet. Not entirely.
Besides. If I change too much, Dad might not recognize me.
He will recognize me, won’t he?
PART 4
Chapter 48
Thirty minutes until Nassau
Sydney hadn’t been able to sleep very well. There were too many things to think about. First on her mind was how to actually find Greyson once they ported in Nassau. With their parents now dedicated to never letting them out of sight, they were stuck. Unless they ran away.
And then her mind wandered to the Plurbs on their ship. She replayed the messages they had intercepted over and over. Nick had thought it was enough…but was it? All they knew was that the Plurbs planned to depart at four o’clock before a man named Daryl arrived, and that there had been another attack in the USA that would cause security to be tighter. Putting those two together, Nick had reasoned that they were planning some other attack revolving around Daryl’s arrival. But how to find out who Daryl is?
With so much on her mind she had taken to the balcony to read Sam’s note just as the sun peeked over the lip of the ocean’s horizon.
Good morning! Are you reading these in the morning? I hope so. Mornings are good times to hear something to set the heart and mind right for the rest of the day. Mom used to do yoga in the mornings, I hear. Dad reads. Me? I watch cartoons. Haha! But anyway, here’s something to set you right. I admire you. Tomorrow you’ll be arriving at Nassau (if I did the math right). You traveled halfway across the nation and across the sea to help your friend. That’s devotion and loyalty. Keep it up! I hope you find him. - Sam
Sydney wrapped the note in her arms with a deep sigh. He was so good with words, even though he must have gotten the math wrong. They were arriving today. Still, it made her giddy just thinking about him writing the note, with that dimpled smile on his face.
“Gooooood morning, American Dreamers!”
Sydney jumped, nearly losing the note to the ocean breeze. But it was just the cruise’s intercom.
“This is your Captain, Chip. I trust you all had a gloooo-rious rest after a goooo-rgeous night of festivities, and you are now feeling ship-shape for an excursion to the beautiful port city of Nassau. Located on the island of New Providence, Nassau was once known as a stronghold for pirates, but is now known for its luxurious resorts and pristine beaches.”
The first outlines of the island came into view as the ship made a turn. The ship bellowed its massive horn as it pulled closer to harbor.
“Make sure to stop by our excursion counter to make your stay a memorable one. You can take a guided island tour on a plucky scooter or a Segway. You can swim with stingrays or learn how to jet ski. Or, my personal favorite – you can get a day pass to the legendary Atlantis Resort Waterpark! Finally, for those of you leaving the ship, make sure to be back by 6pm. You’ll have plenty of time to avoid Daryl, so don’t you worry! Unless of course you get left behind. Haha!”
Daryl?
Had she heard him right? Or had she drifted off to sleep?
“He said Daryl, right?”
She snapped to her right. Nick was on the adjacent balcony again, his pajamas and bedhead blowing in the breeze.
“Yeah,” she replied, hastily hiding Sam’s note in her drawstring bag. “Weird.”
Nick’s stare caught her attention. He was transfixed on some point past the sea, past the island and beyond. Glancing at her puzzled look, he pointed to where he was looking.
She followed his finger, squinting to see something worth staring at. There were deep blue clouds out to sea to the east. They weren’t much to look at, being so far away, but the breeze had already picked up since she had been outside. On the island, the palm trees were swaying with regularity and the waves were coming in at a good pace.
“I think I know who Daryl is. Or what he is.”
Sydney nodded, putting it all together. And suddenly, when it all made sense, a chill ran over her arms.
They had been right. They were headed back into the storm. A storm so big they gave it a name.
“Hurricane Daryl.”
Chapter 49
Nassau brimmed with life, enthusiasm, and tourists. The gusty wind may have dampened some of the passengers’ moods, but to others it raised the level of excitement. They were the last ship to dock and would be the last to leave. Honeymooning couples and families flowed from the ship onto the wooden dock, stopping to get their picture taken next to
a fake anchor and a costumed pirate.
When Sammy put the pirate’s hook in his mouth, Jarryd rolled his eyes. But where his eyes landed happened to be their future destination. Across the channel, giant pink towers rose above the palm trees like a portion of a medieval castle had been cut and pasted onto the small island. It was the majestic Atlantis Resort. Jarryd’s eyes grew wide and he prodded Nick and Sydney to look as well. Soon, both of their families were gawking – until the other passengers complained, urging them on.
Jarryd nearly salivated. “I can’t believe we’re going there.”
Sydney’s mom turned to him as they followed the crowd down the dock and toward the welcome center. “Too bad our stay is cut short. We’ll only have a few hours in the waterpark after the tour.”
Mr. Hansen eyed the horizon. “Well, it does look bad. Even if it’s moving north.”
“Dibs on the water park,” Sammy exclaimed.
“You can’t dib the whole park,” Jarryd whined.
“Then dibs on the slides.”
“You can’t do that either.”
“I just did. And the beaches.” His saliva bubbled on his lips. “And the girls.”
“I’ll dib your face with my fist,” Jarryd threatened.
“Boys! Knock it off,” Mrs. Hansen chided. “We’re on Paradise Island and you’re arguing?”
“Yeah, Sammy. Going to dib paradise, too?”
“I may.”
“Boys!” Mrs. Hansen repeated, stepping between them and gently shoving them toward the welcome center at the end of the dock. Sammy stuck his tongue out at Jarryd and Jarryd returned a sneer.
As the families passed through the welcome center entrance, one man stood at a distance, watching, smoking a cigar and blowing out the smoke in small puffs. He wore a pair of dark sunglasses, so large they nearly covered his cheeks. He wore them casually, near the tip of his bulky nose. His skin was brown and dark, like one who had been under the sun for most of his life, and indeed he had. Before he had become a bounty hunter, hunting men, he had been a fisherman, hunting fish and sharks.
It had been an easy transition. Both needed the necessary bait and the proper hook. If anything, fishing for prey above water was easier. And it paid a whole lot better.
