“Go ahead and open them,” my dad tells him.
Sabby doesn’t wait. He grabs the first one from the pile.
“That one is from us,” Alec and Marya share.
Sabby rips apart the makeshift wrapping, which is really a reused cereal box. He opens it up and finds a disk. He pulls it out and looks at it inquisitively. “What is it?” he asks.
Alec laughs. “It’s a Frisbee. Have you never seen one before?” Sabby shakes his head so Alec continues in his explanation. “You throw it to someone and it kind of flies in the air. I’ll show you how to use it tomorrow.”
“Thanks!” Sabby runs to hug Alec and Marya. Then he runs back to the pile of presents.
He opens a present that has a book about dragons in it from Carrie next. “I found it in the attic,” she tells him. He gives her a hug as well and flips through a couple of the pages, oohing over the pictures.
Connor and Claire give him an old action figure that has a sword and shield. They found it around the house and I try not to think that it may have belonged to a childhood Zack.
Lillie made Sabby a bracelet out of macaroni noodles and string. Sabby gave her a hug and I couldn’t help but think how adorable they are.
My dad’s present is a little larger. He found a skateboard in the attic and he promises to show Sabby how to use it. However, with the snow, they can only practice in the foyer or perhaps the kitchen. My dad knows that he probably won’t be able to bring the gift with him if we go on the run again, but he figured that teaching him to ride would be more of the gift than the actual skateboard itself.
The last gift on the table is from Tony and me. We worked on it together last night. Sabby picks up a small envelope and begins opening it. He pulls out two small cards that could easily fit in his pocket. They are made of a thicker cardstock that we found in the office. He turns them over and smiles when he sees the first picture. He turns it around to show it to everyone. Tony drew a small portrait of my family, including my mom. Both my dad and I posed for him last night. He drew Sabby while he was sleeping. His memory of our mom was pretty accurate and his picture nearly brought her to life. It was so well drawn.
“Now you can keep us with you all the time,” I tell Sabby.
He smiles and runs to give us both a hug. Remembering that there was another card, he turns it over to look at it. His eyes brighten and he smiles in excitement. “That me!” he declares.
Tony and I laugh, knowing what the picture looks like. The others ask to see it. Sabby turns the card around so we can all see Super-Sabby. Tony did a great job on the caricature that turned Sabby into Superman.
“Tank—Thank you!” he says excitedly to us.
“You are more than welcome. The drawings were your sister’s ideas,” Tony makes sure to tell him.
“Thank you, Wi...Wello!” He gives me a second hug.
“Anything for you, little bro,” I tell him, ruffling his curls. I wonder if he will ever get sick of me doing that.
Sabby smiles big at all of his newly opened presents, then he reaches his hands over his head and yawns.
“Are you tired?” my dad asks him.
He shakes his head. “No. I five now. I don get tired.”
We all smile adoringly at him. His little eyelids are heavy. Looking over at Lillie, we see she’s already curled up on the couch, one little, freckled arm hanging off the side as she sleeps.
“How about I read you that book?” Carrie asks Sabby.
He picks the book up and clutches it to his chest as he nods, half-excitedly and half-sleepily. Carrie takes one of his hands and together they walk to the cot of bedding we made downstairs for him. We know there are more than enough rooms in this house, but our family still wants to be close to each other. After all, in times like these, you never know when you will have to rush out into the night. It’s best not to have to go searching for everyone if that happens. The bottom story of the house is also much warmer than upstairs.
My dad rubs his shoulder and stands up. “I must be getting too old for this much excitement.” He stretches and I can hear his joints pop.
I cross the room to give him a hug and with that hug, I send some of my healing power into him. He notices it, leans back, and says, “Perks of having a super daughter, huh?”
I shrug my shoulders and smile up at him. He ruffles my hair and much like old times, his fingers get caught amidst my unruly curls. We both laugh as he pries his fingers away. “Goodnight, Dad.”
“Goodnight sweetie.” He turns to everyone else, “Don’t stay up too late.”
“We won’t,” Claire assures him.
“Mmhm.” He smiles at her and then to Marya before going to bed.
I can sense a feeling of belonging coming from both girls, who are fatherless. I also can sense that my dad knows now that his family is a whole lot bigger than it was before Project ELE.
After he leaves, the rest of us huddle around the fire for a few more minutes. I’m physically tired but my mind is still whirling at astronomical speeds. I can’t stop thinking about Dr. Hastings’s study.
“Do you want to go back and look around again?” Tony asks me.
The others look at us with interest since his question seemed to come out of nowhere. “Yeah, I don’t think I’m going to be able to fall asleep right away anyhow,” I answer.
“You do know that holding freaky, inner-mind conversations with each other is just as bad as whispering, don’t you?” Connor says.
“Sorry. I was just listening to Willow’s thoughts about Dr. Hastings and figured she might want to go back and look around again.” Tony says.
“Do you always listen into each other’s thoughts?” Marya looks inquisitively at us.
“I don’t think I would like that,” Alec adds. “Sometimes, the mind doesn’t have the best things to say.”
“We try not to,” I say, looking over at Tony. “Sometimes it’s hard to stay out though. It’s kind of like a radio that’s playing in the background. You don’t even pay attention to it but every once in a while, a note will hit or an announcer will come on and say something that peaks your interest and you tune back in.”
“Do your thoughts sound the same as your voice does?” Claire asks.
I hadn’t really thought about that before.
Tony answers her. “It sounds a little different. It’s hard to explain but it’s like your thoughts are directly connected to your inner being. If you were to say something out loud, you would be careful how you phrase it, how much emotion you put into it, and how much volume you use. Inside your head, there is no filter. Your thoughts are raw, pure, and untainted. So naturally with that, you sound different than you do aloud.” He turns to look me in the eyes. The intensity in his gaze has my stomach heating up. “To be able to hear Willow’s innermost being is like being able to listen to the real ocean after you have only heard it through a seashell your whole life. It’s capturing the most beautiful chords and strumming them in the most perfect of rhythms. It’s ethereal.”
To say that butterflies are running around my stomach would be an understatement. My stomach had long since fluttered away and is flying up, up, and into outer space. My cheeks are flushed and my heart is dancing about in my chest. I grab his hand gently, lacing my fingers with his. He leans towards me, presses his lips to mine, and for one second—we are flying.
“A-hum.” Alec clears his throat.
...And with that, we are catapulted back to earth. Realizing that our PDA is directly in front of our friends, the blush sets in from head to toe. I lean back from Tony and push my hair behind my ears, keeping my eyes on the ground. Tony’s hand is still laced in mine and I can feel his pulse thrumming wildly in his fingertips.
“That is so romantic,” Claire says dreamily.
“I’ll show you romantic,” Connor says. He pulls Claire up to her feet, then dips her slightly over his arm and gives her a kiss like you would see in old movies. Her right foot even leaves the ground with that f
oot-popping kind of kiss.
I watch in amusement, half expecting that, in true Connor fashion, he would do something funny, like accidentally drop her or fall over or something.
He doesn’t falter but my dad does clear his throat from across the room, loudly enough for us to hear him. “Uh-uh!” he says, shaking his finger at Connor, who is looking at him with that deer-caught-in-the-headlights kind of expression. Poor Claire is still dipped in his arms.
“Yes sir.” Connor rights Claire quickly and then like an admonished schoolchild, he puts a few inches of space between him and her and sits down.
I can’t help but laugh and jab at him for getting caught.
“So, do you want to go snoop around some more?” Tony asks me.
“Heck yeah!” I say. We all get up to head over to Dr. Hastings’s study. “We are going to go do some Nancy Drew-style investigating,” I call to my dad as the guys walk in the direction of the study.
“Okay, but don’t let those Hardy boys pull any more moves on my girls!” he says.
I laugh and so do Marya and Claire, who heard his comment. We three chime back at the same time, “We won’t.”
CHAPTER 7
Connor pushes at the bookshelf, trying to get it to open again. It doesn’t budge.
“Maybe you pulled back on a specific book or something,” Alec offers and starts pulling at books.
“He just leaned on it last time,” I say.
“Well, something has to be the trigger,” Alec says.
All six of us are looking around at the bookshelf, expecting to see a big, red, easy button. Marya is the one who ends up finding it, but it’s not a button. Instead, it’s a series of three large medical manuals that won’t pull out from the shelf. When she pushes them in, the door opens. “That seems too easy,” Marya says as we start walking down the dark stairwell.
“Yeah, it is, but who exactly would be looking for a secret panel? Secrets hidden in plain sight seem to be the best kept,” I answer.
“True,” she agrees.
The door at the bottom is still unlocked from yesterday. We go inside and flip on the light switch. We all start to scour the room again, looking for clues we might have missed.
Alec and Connor both try to get the computer to boot up, but soon find out that it’s all password protected. After a few failed attempts of coming up with a passcode, they end up locking themselves out of the computer.
I head back over to the files on the desk and start leafing through them again. There isn’t much useful information in it at all. Sure, the documents have personal information on them, but why go through the trouble of hiding them in a secret drawer? I wonder.
I pick up the instruction manual for the operating table again. I trace over the written code at the bottom with my thumb. The operating table has all types of electrical hookups and device inputs and outputs. I walk over to look at the operating table and end up staring at it for quite a while.
Tony comes up behind me and puts his arms around my waist. “Perhaps you’re right.”
I crane my neck to look up at him—our lips are only inches apart. It takes everything in me not to kiss him right then. “Do you think there’s something to this table?”
“Let’s find out.” He walks towards the table. His eyes turn brown as he pushes his hand through the table, reaching right into the middle of it. I hadn’t even thought of doing something so easy to find out if my hypothesis might be correct.
Less than a minute later, Tony pulls his hand out of the table and along with it, a silver, metal briefcase. He sets it on the nearby desk and I smile up at him in amazement. “Well, that was easy,” I joke. “I might have stared at that table all night looking for some key to finding out if any secrets laid within it.”
“But you didn’t. We make a good team, you and me.” He kisses me on the nose and gestures for me to open the briefcase. Sure enough, there is a number-coded lock that has exactly four sections for two-digit numbers. I enter the code that’s on the manual and the briefcase clicks open.
“More papers, yippee!” I say unenthusiastically. I pull a stack out, hand a few to Tony, and we both sit on the floor, looking through everything.
This info is a little juicier. I find some correspondence between the FDA and Dr. Hastings. He sent in a detailed form requesting to be able to test out some sort of wonder drug on human subjects. The first correspondence dated back five years ago. It seems like they went back and forth with written correspondence asking for facts and figures of a long-term test on animals that Dr. Hastings didn’t have at the time. As we later learned, he had only been testing his drugs on humans, including his wife and children. He didn’t note those facts though. As the correspondence continued throughout the five years, his replies to the FDA’s questions became more and more cynical. He answered them like he was obviously too brilliant to be wasting time on their dimwitted questions. The correspondence stopped about a year prior to Project ELE. “Well, it looks like the government never gave Dr. Hastings permission to test his so-called immunizations on the human populous,” I say aloud.
“That doesn’t surprise me,” Tony says as he hands me a new stack of papers. “Here is his application and acceptance letter for becoming the leader of the shelter here. Nothing states anything about injecting the populous with strange immunizations. In fact, it looks like he was given a detailed list of what immunizations would be given. They are the standard ones that anyone going into another country would be given. Also, if you read further, you will find that there is a bunch of stuff he didn’t follow. Like the testing for example. That should not have taken as long as it did for people to gain entrance to the shelter. They estimated twenty-four to forty-eight hours at most for all citizens to finish testing. Also, the test to see if you have the virus seems to be a finger-prick blood sample. It’s not nearly as in depth as the one that we were given. There were no shots that people who were infected were supposed to be given, like we were. They could be given antibiotics and a month’s prescription of pain pills, but that was all. Then to top it all off, the protocol specifically stated that if more than ten percent of the population were found to be infected, he would have to notify the appropriate officials because it could be the sign of another mass outbreak. There is a huge list of things that would happen if that were the case, including some major restructuring of how the shelter would be set up and run. I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty positive that way more than ten percent were declined entrance. I would guestimate it to be closer to thirty percent. I know too, that not everyone sent away was infected. I didn’t see one person get sick. I doubt it was the shots that we took that kept us healthy. Dr. Hastings obviously didn’t follow the protocol at all.”
“Wow,” I murmur and so does everyone else. They’ve all gathered around to hear these new details about Dr. Hastings. “What’s truly sad is that none of this surprises me much.”
“Yeah, Dr. Hastings was a very bad man,” Claire says.
“At least we know that the entire U.S. government isn’t corrupt. They weren’t a part of the craziness that occurred here,” Marya says.
“But that doesn’t explain the military. If the government doesn’t have anything to do with what happened here, then why did they come? Why did they take everyone away to who knows where?” Alec asks.
“That’s a good question.” I sigh. I’m tired of good questions. I want answers.
Connor had been sifting through more papers and he holds up one that I hadn’t seen yet. “Look at this. It’s some type of diagram of a machine.” Tony takes it from Connor, who huffs in response but just picks up another paper from the pile.
I watch Tony as his eyes dart back and forth, devouring the words at super-human speed. He looks back up at me. “This looks like a hand written manual for the machine that somehow disables our powers. Looking at the date here, it looks like this was created four years ago.”
“Meaning, he already had a backup plan for what he would d
o if all heck broke lose when he unleashed his super shots,” I say.
“Yes, and it also looks like there is another device here that looks like the one Zack used to disarm the Reapers.” Tony holds up the manual so we can see the sketch of the handheld remote that kept the Reapers down.
“Is there anything in there about how we can get around that disabling device that the military used to disable everyone’s powers?” I ask.
“Not that I can find. This does explain, in scientific terms, how both devices work though.” He hands the papers to me.
I leaf through them. “This isn’t even in English,” I say a moment later.
Tony laughs and Claire pulls the papers from my hand to look at it. “This is in English, goofy. I don’t understand a lick of it, but it’s in English.”
Connor, Alec, and Marya all take a turns looking at it and after only a few glances, they all concur that it doesn’t make a lick of sense to anyone without a Doctorate degree in Medical Science.
“Hey, look at this!” Alec says. “This looks like a deed to land. I saw the deed to this land that the house is built on and the physical address isn’t far from this other one. This looks to be only a mile or so down the road.”
“Interesting, especially since it was well-protected amidst all of Dr. Hasting’s layers of secrecy,” Tony says.
“Yeah, anything that was hidden in a secret briefcase that lay within a secret table that could only be opened by a secret code that was found in a secret-drawer compartment within a desk that is in a very secret laboratory, must be super top secret.” The way Connor pronounced laboratory in a mad, European scientist-type of accent cracked me up.
“We should check this place out tomorrow,” Tony says.
I yawn, the day’s excitement starting to catch up with me. “Agreed.” Being Sherlock Holmes isn’t easy work.
“Let’s call it a night,” he suggests, smiling at my inner statement.
Everyone agrees with tired voices. We place all the paperwork back into the briefcase, close it, and carry it up with us. I figure that my dad will want to see this in the morning. Especially if we hope to convince him that further investigating needs to be done.
Ending ELE (ELE Series) Page 9
