The Mind Pirates (Harbingers Book 10)

by Frank Peretti

  As Sparks went berserk! He screamed, his eyes rolled, he held his head as if it were bursting; he toppled, rolled on the ground. The hat came off, but it had done it’s work: Sparks would never be clever or conniving again.

  Captain Thatch snatched up the hat and, before putting it back on, surreptitiously removed the earring he’d concealed in the lining. He dropped the earring, crushed it under his boot, and replaced his hat.

  * * *

  This was it! The moment! I knew!

  Running, I touched fire to the vent hole of Cannon One, then Two, then Three. Each gun unleashed a fiery, percussive thunder, recoiling against its tethers; the explosions quaked my insides; the whole ship rocked under my feet.

  The town square disappeared behind a cloud of blue smoke and oat-colored haze.

  * * *

  The Captain knew the moment as well. He held Andi tightly against him, his back to the blast, as three boxes worth of Cheerios, reduced to crumbles and dust, blasted the whole village like a sandstorm. The stuff got into eyes, stung faces, threw everyone into a panic.

  Which was just what Thatch wanted. “Run, lass, run!”

  Andi kicked off her parrot feet and sprinted for the wharf, winged arms covering her face through the rain of oats. The Captain, face sheltered under his hat, stayed right at her heels. Passing the photo booth, Andi grabbed a scarf from the rack of Readers, then dashed onto the wharf and up the gangplank.

  “Cast off, cast off!” Thatch shouted, stomping up the gangplank behind her.

  * * *

  Scalarag had already drilled me on casting off the lines. I cast off the last stern line even as Andi and the Captain landed on the deck.

  “The system’s yours, lass,” I heard the Captain say as he threw off the gangplank.

  Andi did a strange thing: she ran up to me and handed me the scarf. “Here, put this one on!” Then she dashed below.

  A Reader, no doubt. A signal for help? I took off my old scarf and put on the new one.

  The smoke was clearing. Some of Thatch’s crew were occupied with Sparks who was leaping on the tables, waving his knife around, throwing things. The others were scattered like windfall about the town square, bereft of a leader –– or a moral imperative.

  Ling was filled with purpose, however. I could see all of his rogues running our way, some squinting and teary-eyed from the powdered oats, some clear-eyed enough to fire their weapons. Bullets pinged and chipped the bulwarks, the companion. I crawled for any cover I could find as the engines below rumbled and the big hull lurched away from the wharf.

  * * *

  Below, Andi tapped out lines of command and code at the console. Once again, the computer beeped, drives whirred to life, and the very attractive lady pirate appeared on the screen, presenting a menu of links and sub-pages.

  Ready.

  * * *

  “Oh!” said Audrey Snow, viewing the screen in Key West.

  “Oh my word,” said Zedekiah, seeing what she saw. “Oh my word!”

  Tank, Brenda, and Daniel came running from different parts of the house.

  Zedekiah was ecstatic. “The system has unscrambled, and not only that, it’s let us in! We’re getting a signal from one of the Readers!”

  “Way cool!” said Tank.

  And that was the last thing said before they all stared at each other, thinking the same thing.

  Tank looked at Brenda, then Daniel. “I’ll do it.”

  Audrey picked up the earring. “How can we be sure?”

  “Everything looks stable,” said Zedekiah. “Only . . . good heavens! The Reader must be aboard a speedboat. I’ve never seen a sailing ship go so fast!”

  Tank didn’t have pierced ears. He just pressed the earring against his ear. His eyes widened with shock. “Whoa! WHOA!” He backed off, staring at the earring in his hand.

  Zedekiah got quite a scare. “Hello? Are you still with us? What is your name? Do you know where you are?”

  “I’m Matt Damon,” he answered. “Just kidding. I’m okay, but boy, what a ride!” He pressed the earring against his head again. “Man oh MAN!” He almost lost his balance. Audrey and Brenda guided him to a chair. He jerked, he leaned, he ducked as if the chair were a toboggan at the Olympics. “Woo-hooo! We are flying!”

  * * *

  Well, of course Tank was inside my head, standing next to Captain Thatch aboard the Predator as the ship defied its design and anyone’s good sense, plowing through the water at reckless, breakneck speed, lurching with nauseating power over the swells and kicking up a violent wake. The shrouds were humming, the masts and yards groaning.

  Thatch gripped the wheel, a strange, gleeful look on his face as he pointed the bow toward a small island a mile away. “Bindy’s Mayday, they call it! Very nice channel on the other side with little room for ships to pass! Let ‘em follow us there!”

  I looked astern. Not more than a mile back, the Riqueza was giving chase. Apparently, it had oversized engine power as well; it was keeping up.

  * * *

  “This ain’t real!” said Tank, seeing one three-masted ship from the deck of another, plowing along with a bone in its teeth though its sails were furled. “It’s the pirate show, but we didn’t see this part.”

  “Whose thoughts and impressions are you receiving?” Snow wanted to know.

  I was trying to talk some sense to this loony pirate before he got us all killed, all the while gaining new insight into where the stereotypical sailor got his language.

  “Uh . . . angry, scolding, kind of know-it-all . . . ” said Tank. “Big words . . . whoa! Bad words too.” He grinned with recognition. “It’s the professor.”

  * * *

  Thatch grabbed me. “Take the wheel.”

  Horrors! The man was daffy! “I will do no such thing!”

  “Trust your captain!” He pulled me over and put my hands on the wheel. “She likes to bear away to starboard without her sails. Make her mind. Circle to the right of that rock sticking up, just to the right of Bindy’s, you see it?”

  I was holding the reins of a bucking monster, fighting for control. I nodded as if we were having a reasonable conversation.

  “Stay clear of it, then duck behind the island and into the channel. Scalarag’s giving you full throttle.”

  “Full –– !?”

  * * *

  “Whoa!” Tank laughed. “He is scared poop-less! Sorry . . . ”

  * * *

  The Captain raised his spyglass to his eye. “Aye, it’s Ling’s men, all right. They won’t let us get away, no way in heaven or hell.” He set the spyglass aside and headed for the companion, leaving me alone at the wheel.

  “What are you going to do?” I hollered over my shoulder, my hands welded to the wheel.

  “The right thing, if God be my Judge,” was all he said as he went down the stairs to his quarters.

  The rock to the right of Bindy’s Mayday was a black, jagged tooth, a perfect hull opener. I veered farther to the right to be sure we missed it, then cut a gradual turn to port to head around the island. Now I could see another island beyond this one, and between them, a narrow channel. I steered for the channel and, looking back, saw the Riqueza had veered to port to circle the island from the other direction.

  They were going to head us off.

  * * *

  Zedekiah Snow activated another computer, another program, and a real time map of the Caribbean appeared with a tiny blip representing the location of the Reader. “Well folks, there it is.”

  Tank remained in the chair, eyes closed, experiencing the lurching and dashing of the Predator, the wind in my face, the salt spray in my eyes, the roar of the wind in the rigging –– and the Riqueza rounding the other end of the island to intercept us. “He’s not having fun. There’s something really heavy going down.”

  Brenda stood. “We’ve got to get down there!”

  Tank pulled the earring away from his head, blinked to get his own senses back, and said, “Andi’s grandp
a! He’s got a jet, a chopper, probably has a boat!”

  Brenda grabbed her cell phone.

  * * *

  “So you’ve found your friends, whoever they be?”

  Andi was startled to hear the Captain’s voice behind her, but not alarmed. By now it was clear the Captain knew it all: the inquiry from another system, the access code, her responding, and of course her fitting me with a Reader scarf to send a signal to whoever it was. “I think it’s them.”

  The Captain stepped up and looked over her shoulder. “Look at the tag on the inquiry. You’ve been queried by someone in Florida.” He laughed. “And I can name that party in one guess: Zedekiah Snow! Your friends are in good hands. Come to think of it, so are you! Be assured, lass, they know where you are. Here, put this on.” He offered her an inflatable life vest.

  The way the ship was rocking and pounding, the vest seemed to her an entirely good idea. She put it on.

  “Now I need you topside.”

  * * *

  “For you, professor,” came the Captain’s voice over the roar of the wind.

  The Captain had returned with Andi and was offering an inflatable life vest. As he took the wheel, I slipped on the vest and clipped it tight.

  “AH!” he laughed, sighting the Riqueza at the far end of the channel and closing fast. “Piel’s thinking hasn’t changed. He’s at the helm of that boat with Ling at his side, no doubt, and doing what I thought! So how’s your Honor, professor? How’s your Truth?”

  The face I made must have been hideous. “I fail to see how that pertains to our situation!”

  The Captain grinned, amused, which I did not find amusing. “So we never talked about it, or you weren’t listening? It’s all come down to the rules, and it’s time to face it: Wherever it comes from, we’ll need a little Honor . . . in our situation.”

  “I would prefer a level head and better driving.”

  “Oh, would you now?”

  He reached for the engine telegraph and signaled Scalarag to ease the engines back to Dead Slow Ahead, the first sane choice he’d made thus far, in my estimation. The Predator slowed, although I noticed the Riqueza did not.

  “Well,” I started to say, still eyeing the Riqueza. “a reasonable first step––”

  Andi screamed. I turned just in time to see the Captain holding her aloft as she kicked and struggled, making his way to the rail.

  What –– ?

  NO! I ran, with no other thought than to get her out of his hands.

  Too late! Thatch threw her over the side! I reached the railing only to see her splash into the waves. Her life vest triggered and inflated, bearing her back to the surface where she splashed helplessly, the moving ship leaving her in its wake.

  I was about to leap in after her when something bumped me. “I suppose you’ll be wanting this?” said the Captain.

  He was offering me a bulky package, rather heavy. The label read “Life Raft.” With no hesitation I clutched the package to my chest, swung my legs over the rail, and dropped into the sea.

  I was still beneath the surface, eyes shut in a grimace and breath held, when the water triggered my life vest and the raft and they inflated, the life vest hugging me as I popped to the surface and the life raft unfolding and forming within my reach. I grabbed on and clambered in, blinking the sting of salt from my eyes as I searched the expansive waters for Andi.

  There! I could see the yellow flotation around her neck, the redness of her hair. She was so distant, so minuscule, bobbing, intermittently vanishing between the swells. But she was waving. She was safe.

  * * *

  The roar of the Predator, again at full throttle, was fading in the distance. I turned to see Thatch looking back and giving a farewell wave, satisfied, no doubt, that we would be all right. Then he looked ahead, closing on the Riqueza as if he fully intended to ram her.

  Which, I still marvel to report, he did. I suppose Piel, at the helm of the Riqueza, expected him to turn tail and run, or perhaps shoot it out, or surrender, being so outgunned. But Thatch would not turn away, nor would he slow down. With cunning and skill, he even anticipated every evasive maneuver the Riqueza made, staying in her path no matter what she did.

  First came the ball of fire and the flying debris –– lumber, splinters, canvas and rigging exploding skyward –– and then, a second or two later, the roar and shock of the explosion. I was transfixed. Stunned.

  “Hey!” Andi called. She was kicking and paddling my way.

  I assembled a plastic oar that came with the life raft and paddled toward her, all the while staring over my shoulder, trying to fathom what I’d just seen, even when nothing remained but steaming embers on the water.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  With both of us paddling the life raft, Andi and I easily made the sandy beach of Bindy’s Mayday, and it was the need to de-pressurize, I imagine, to make some sense of all that had happened, that launched us back into the discussion we started on the Barbee Jay but never finished: was there an ultimate Truth and therefore a basis for Right and Wrong, and was the existence of God necessary for such a Truth to exist? What happened aboard the Predator, from our being kidnapped to the horrendous destruction we barely avoided in the channel, amounted to a practical experiment. The devil was in the data, of course, and our differing interpretations. As a result, three hours passed as mere minutes, the intensity of our debate broken only by the sound of an approaching airplane.

  “Hey!” Andi cried, “it’s the Silver Lady!”

  It was the nickname given to her grandfather’s floatplane. We could see Tank, Brenda, and Daniel waving from the plane’s windows as it set down in the channel like a big, aluminum goose.

  I thought it best to wrap up our discussion before we rowed out to the plane. I granted her the possibility––since it brought her comfort––that nature, physics, and morality could make sense because there was a Superior Mind behind it all; she granted me the fact that, despite the danger and with no thought of what a supposed God might require, I still jumped into the sea to save her.

  As for the Captain . . . though I assumed he’d acted upon a spark of good in his own nature, Andi preferred to think our being there may have fanned that spark to life. Well . . . either way, I suppose.

  But most of all, I summarized feelings I felt no need to explain. “All things considered,” I said to my assistant, “I am boundlessly glad and relieved that you’re safe.”

  She smiled and nodded. “Same here.”

  * * *

  I’ll close my recounting of the tale with a certainty and an uncertainty.

  The certainty: Zedekiah Snow was a decent fellow –– at least, as one such as myself might measure such a quality as “decent” –– and knew his own technology well enough to isolate memories and impressions in any brain that were not native to that brain. In Andi’s case, he quickly identified the memories and impressions of Ben Cardiff and neutralized them in a two second treatment. Andi is well again, no longer plagued by any past tampering with her mind.

  The uncertainty: While we were lifting off from the channel, we flew over the blackened debris field where the two ships collided and saw on the nearest shore a familiar little craft: the Predator’s wooden boat that first carried Andi and I to the ship. It couldn’t have gotten there unless someone had rowed it. Had the Captain granted Scalarag a dismissal to safety as he had granted us? To add to that, the ships were quite a distance away, too far to tell if Captain Horatio Thatch was still on board when they exploded.

  At any rate, neither man has ever been found to our knowledge . . . and perhaps that was the whole intention.

  A strange thing, Honor. I’m sure more discussions will follow.

  Fair winds.

  Preview

  From Harbingers 11:

  Hybrids

  Angela Hunt

  I stood at the bottom of the Tampa airport’s escalator and searched for Tank with an odd mingling of excitement and dread. Excitement, because I
hadn’t seen him, Brenda, or Daniel in several weeks, not since we parted after our adventure in the Caribbean. Dread, because each time I met Tank after a separation, his face lit up like Times Square on New Year’s and I didn’t know what to do about that. I loved him like a brother, but clearly, he felt something more for me . . . feelings I didn’t think I could ever reciprocate.

  I blew out a breath and studied the passengers on the elevator. Most wore the look of people who’d spent too much time in a cramped space, but a few faces were smiling, probably because they were meeting the pretty young women who held welcome signs for the various cruise lines. Tampa was a major port, and who wouldn’t look forward to a few days at sea? As long as we didn’t encounter pirates, even I might be tempted to board a sailboat again.

  “Andi!”

  I smiled up at Tank, who seemed to span the entire width of the escalator as he waved. I pointed to the baggage carousel for his airline, then walked toward it. Tank was loud, enthusiastic, and eager—not exactly the sort of person I wanted to meet in front of all those people coming down the escalator.

  I had no sooner arrived at the baggage area than I felt my feet leave the ground. Tank had come up from behind and wrapped me in a bear hug, and his overly rambunctious greeting lifted me at least two feet off the floor. “Andi, it’s so good to see you,” he said. “I didn’t think we’d ever land.”

  “I’m glad you did. Now, will you please put me down?”

  He lowered me gently, then stepped to my side, arms extended as if he planned to hug me again. I lifted my hand and patted his chest in an effort to hold him off. “Brenda and Daniel came in yesterday and spent today at Disney World. They’ll probably be back around dinner time.”