by Andy Briggs
Sneaking a look below, Sarah could see half a dozen technicians casually walking between control panels that were linked to the column by thick cables. She guessed it was an electrical generator. But it was huge, and she couldn’t help but wonder what kind of device required such power.
Without warning a sound wave shook her. It had come from the energy column as it flared brighter. The pulses within the transparent surface gained frequency.
Sarah had the sneaking suspicion that the generator was powering up.
Lorna’s sense of direction was far superior to her brother’s, but even so she was lost. She and Emily had encountered several henchmen walking around the complex and had dealt with them using their combined powers. It was so easy, Lorna almost felt sorry for them.
“I thought you knew the way out?” said Emily. She was sure they had walked down this particular stretch of corridor before.
“Me too.”
“And if we can’t even find the way out, how are we going to find your mother again?”
Lorna felt a little bit annoyed. She had just rescued her friend, but all Emily had done was complain that they were lost. “We haven’t heard any sirens so far, so I think it’s safe to assume they don’t know she’s escaped.”
“Does this corridor seem sloped to you? It feels like we’ve been climbing upward.”
Lorna didn’t reply, but inwardly she agreed, they could well be near the top of the mountain by now.
Lorna suddenly stopped and Emily bumped into her. “What’s—?”
“Sssh,” said Lorna, making more noise than Emily had been and putting her finger over her lips. “Listen!”
Emily couldn’t hear anything, and for a moment she thought Lorna must have downloaded super-hearing or something. But then she caught it: the faintest sounds of activity, punctuated by the distinct crackle of a monotonous voice over a public address system. It sounded just like a distant train station.
“The hangar!” said Lorna excitedly as she took off in the direction of the noise. “I knew we weren’t lost!”
But it wasn’t the hangar. It was another cavernous room, but this one was circular, almost like—
“We’re at the peak of the mountain!” Emily exclaimed in an excited whisper.
The mountain’s peak was gone and had been replaced with a wide glass dome, supported by steel spars and massive pneumatic rams. It looked as though the top of the mountain could be opened on a hinge. The room was bustling with lab-coated scientists who examined multiple computer banks. The whole setup reminded Lorna of sequences she had seen on television of NASA Mission Command, except in the center of this room was an intricate device.
It resembled a giant gun, like the ones that had been mounted on the front of Doc Tempest’s flying barges. Except this one was longer, with a small satellite dish attached to the tip of the barrel. The machine had angular fins, like a shark, and concentric, transparent rings dispersed along the barrel that moved closer together or farther apart as the technicians ran a series of diagnostic checks.
Emily and Lorna entered the room and hid behind a bank of wooden packing crates against the wall. Most were empty, but some had spare parts inside, nestled in shredded newspaper. Emily opened her mouth to say something, but there was no sign of Lorna.
“Lorn?” she whispered. A slight pressure to her shoulder startled Emily, but she quickly realized Lorna had made herself invisible so she could stand up for a better view.
A small knot of technicians were gathered around a computer screen, their voices carrying across the room. “Extend the dampening plane by forty degrees!” As if in answer, the concentric rings along the barrel moved farther apart with a high-pitched whine of motors, similar to a dentist’s drill.
“Rotate the gimbal a hundred and ten along the x-axis, and increase electron flow by twenty percent,” said another technician who seemed to be in charge. “We’ve finally got our coordinates: Washington DC.”
A cheer went up. The entire gun rotated on a complex arrangement of gears and hydraulics, angling the dish at the end of the weapon in a subtly different direction.
“Storm Engine primed!” shouted another technician. “Let’s see how those suits in Washington like a rain of electrical fire!” Chuckles filled the room. “Just hope the bossman gives the nod soon. I’m starving! What time’s the cafeteria close?”
Invisible fingers tugged Emily’s arm, and she allowed herself to be pulled from the room by Lorna. It was a freaky experience watching her own arm lead her from the room.
They moved farther down the corridor, which offered cover behind yet more stacked supply crates. The air shimmered as Lorna became visible.
“That’s Doc Tempest’s weather machine! That’s how he’s been able to create those storms!”
Emily nodded. “And it sounds like Washington is going to be burned off the map. We have to find a way to stop it!”
“We also have to find our way out of here. The moment we try and sabotage that weapon, they’ll know we’re here. I have to get my mom out first.”
Emily sighed. “It still doesn’t change the fact that we don’t know where the hangar is.”
“Hey!” The voice made them turn—a guard was staring at them, rifle leveled, his finger on the trigger. Lorna and Emily froze like rabbits caught in headlights, raising their hands in surrender. “Don’t try anything funny or else!”
“No!” whimpered Emily. They had been so close to success; to get caught just as they were about to rescue Lorna’s mother didn’t seem fair. The man stared hard at her.
“No!” the man repeated.
“I’m not doing anything!” Emily said in alarm. Her body ached from where she had been pummeled with the glue, and she had no desire to go through that again.
“I’m not doing anything!” echoed the guard.
Lorna experimentally lowered her hands. The man didn’t say anything, but the gun remained leveled. Lorna gingerly approached him, pulled off his red visor and waved her hand in front of his face; he was rooted to the spot, staring fixedly at Emily.
“He’s in a trance.” She smiled gleefully. “You have him under some kind of control!”
“Me?” Emily said doubtfully. “Okay … lower your gun.”
The man complied without a squeak of protest. Emily remembered something. “I was wondering what the fourth power I downloaded was. This is it—mind control!”
“Just get rid of him.”
Emily finally lowered her hands. “Go do your job and forget you saw us … in fact, you can’t see us at all.”
The guard looked around, seeming confused. He glanced at his rifle for a moment, wondering why it was in his hands. Then, with a shrug, he shouldered the weapon and continued past the girls, completely oblivious to their presence. Once he had turned a corner, both the girls quietly giggled.
“That is so cool!” said Lorna.
“Yeah. Mind control would be so useful at school. But it still doesn’t change the fact that we’re lost.”
“Actually we’re not. We know we’re at the top of the mountain, right? When they flew you in here, I had a view from the front of the barge. The hangar door is built into the side of the mountain, just below the peak. We’re really close to getting out of here!”
Toby and Pete flew into the base without more antiaircraft missiles trying to pluck them from the sky. They felt warmer as they passed through the main hangar tunnel that led inside the mountain. The tunnel itself was a runway that ran entirely through one peak and into an adjoining one. The end of the runway opened into the hangar.
The boys flew close to the ceiling when they entered the cavern. They hovered in a high corner to allow their eyes to become accustomed to the light after flying through the dark tunnel, and also because they were next to an air vent that was pumping out hot air.
Dozens of soldiers milled through the hangar, oblivious to the hovering heroes. Some worked on another empty Hercules transport plane that was being prepared to retu
rn to the supply island. A pair of mechanics gripped a refueling hose that fed the Hercules with avgas from a massive tank at the rear of the hangar.
A platform circled the second level of the hangar, doors branching off it. Boots clanged on the steel steps that led from the hangar floor to the mezzanine level as technicians busily walked to and fro with clipboards, equipment, and on one occasion a burger, the smell of which drifted into Pete’s nostrils and made his stomach growl so loudly he feared he would be heard.
Beyond the Hercules aircraft lay the barge that had brought the bullion from Fort Knox, although there was no sign of the gold. The barge rested on a giant steel trellis, and a similar, but empty, bay stood alongside it.
To one side of them were freestanding racks that housed a dozen flying glider-discs, which were stacked sideways to save space. Pete took some satisfaction in noticing there were many empty slots. Testament to the heroes’ combined might.
“So many doors,” Toby said, looking around. “Which one is the right one?”
“We need some kind of map,” said Pete. “Maybe they have the ones on the wall with a dot saying, ‘You Are Here’?”
“Somehow, I doubt it. And if we get lost, we’ll never find my mom!”
“I don’t think that’s going to be too much of a problem,” Pete said in a strange tone.
Toby shook his head. Sometimes Pete was just too optimistic. He turned to his friend.
“That is your mom, right?” Pete said, pointing.
Toby’s head snapped around. His mother had appeared from a passageway at the back of the hangar. She looked weak and disheveled and was clutching a rifle. She was clearly in need of her medication.
“Wow, she’s got a gun!” Pete said, stating the obvious. “I didn’t know your mom was so adventurous!”
Neither did Toby. His hand fell onto the diabetes kit stashed in his pocket. He was about to comment, relief coursing through him, when movement across the mezzanine level caught his attention: Lorna and Emily ran from an opposite corridor and paused to take in the hangar. Once more his heart leaped, and he heard Pete gasp as he spotted them too.
“Lorna! She’s alive!”
Tears of joy welled in Pete’s eyes and he almost fell down in relief. Nobody had seen the boys hovering in the shadows of the hangar corner, but Lorna and Emily had spotted Sarah. With complete disregard for their own safety, and apparent disregard for what Sarah would think, they jumped from the mezzanine and glided down in front of Sarah, who yelped loudly in surprise.
Even from this distance, Toby could see the astonishment and joy etched on his mother’s face as she hugged Lorna tightly. Toby felt an unexpected surge of jealousy. His mom would never hug him like that.
But that feeling vaporized when he noticed a group of guards advancing toward his mother’s hiding place. They must have heard her loud cry of surprise.
Worse still, Sarah, Emily, and Lorna hadn’t seen them approaching.
Wrath of Tempest
Once Sarah had crushed the breath from Lorna in a mighty hug, she held her daughter at arm’s length and studied her up and down.
“What are you doing here? Did that nut kidnap you too?” Then she noticed Emily was with her. “Emily? What—?”
“There’s no time to explain, Mom. We’re here to rescue you!”
Sarah was flabbergasted. This was too much to take in. She adopted her stern parental tone. “I may be feeling awful but there’s always time to explain, young lady!”
“Yeah, please explain,” said a deep male voice. They all turned to see ten armed soldiers surrounding them. “Because I think this is the end of your little superrescue attempt.”
Lorna noticed something behind Tempest’s soldiers. She replied with a smile: “No. This is only the beginning.”
The lead guard was puzzled for a second, a witty reply formulating in his mind. But before he could utter it a series of fireballs exploded into the barrels around them. The men scattered as the fuel drums exploded vertically into the air like rockets.
Lorna and Emily pulled Sarah back from the conflagration just as a pair of laser beams raked across the floor, severing three of the thugs’ weapons. Everybody craned around to see—
“Toby!” exclaimed Sarah in surprise. “What are you doing … flying?” she finished weakly.
The boys dropped down and Toby handed his mother the insulin.
“Quick, Mom, take it.”
Relief flooded across Lorna’s face when she saw the insulin. Then, she was surprised when Pete hugged her slightly.
“Thank God you’re okay! I thought I’d killed you!”
Toby looked surprised, but Lorna succeeded in pushing him away with a grin. “You’re not that good of a shot!” She winked at her brother. “Good to see you again! I knew you wouldn’t leave us.”
“You too … I thought …” He hesitated; talking about his feelings was something that didn’t come easily. “Never mind,” he finished lamely.
Even with trembling fingers it had taken Sarah only moments to inject the insulin into her system. It was not a miracle cure, but already she was feeling the benefits.
Pete smiled at Emily. “Glad you’re all right. Feeling okay?”
“Oh, yeah,” grinned Emily.
Together the four heroes stood in front of Sarah, poised for action. It only took a few seconds for the remaining armed men to rally, and the explosion had already caught the attention of a dozen more who were running their way.
“Get ’em!” yelled Toby.
Several things happened in the next ten seconds. All four heroes took to the air. Emily rippled as the chrome-skin enveloped her body.
Lorna became invisible and in the next instant the two closest guards fell; one smashed across the jaw, the other clutching his crotch in agony as the invisible assailant whirled between them.
Pete, his glasses perched on his forehead, swooped low, twin lasers burning from his pupils, striking several troopers down. He was being careful to attack at close range, which enabled him to positively identify which blur was the enemy.
Toby rocketed straight up, feeling the burning power in his hands swell with a ferocity he hadn’t experienced before. Once he reached the ceiling he pointed downward, unleashing countless fireballs from his crackling fingertips. They smashed into the ground, scattering men and exploding equipment.
Sarah watched in total disbelief. A hand on her shoulder brought her crashing back to reality. She cocked her head to see a serious-looking mercenary behind her. Even in her weakened condition she rifle-butted him firmly in his face. He fell to the floor, visor cracked, blood running from his nose, and spitting teeth.
Lorna hurtled through a dozen soldiers, all of whom ricocheted from her solid mass like pins struck with a bowling ball. She gained some height in time to see several more troopers advancing on Sarah; but they fell from invisible blows.
The air was suddenly filled with glue-bullets, randomly fired across the hangar. Some caught other troopers, pinning them to the walls and floor. Emily zipped aside as a hail of bullets slammed into the ceiling.
One struck Pete on the side of his leg. Momentum forced the resin-bullet onward and it ripped a swatch off his cheap jeans and hit the wall. But the impact was enough to spin him around. He had been busy blasting a group of guards running to the gold carrier, presumably to use the craft’s gun on them—his laser strayed across the floor, ripping through the hose that was refueling the Hercules. Liquid gas spurted across the floor in every direction.
Pete slid his glasses back onto his nose and looked at the devastation he’d caused. “Oh no!”
Toby circled again, performing lazy barrel rolls like the fighter aircraft he’d piloted on his computer. The glue-bullets pinged all around him. He saw a handful of guards run toward the rack of glider-discs.
“Oh no you don’t!” he roared, and a monstrous fireball shot out across the cavern and hit the glider rack. The effect was devastating: the remaining glider-discs were blo
wn to smithereens, the whole rack toppling down on the men who were running toward it. Flames swelled as the structure crashed against the deck, the fire spreading to a number of wooden crates stacked against the wall. Toby cheered triumphantly, then noticed the fuel hose pouring gasoline across the floor. Already some soldiers were running away, slipping in the slick avgas that pooled under the Hercules and trickled toward the blazing glider rack.
“Watch out!” bellowed Toby.
But a deafening siren drowned out his warning. The alarm had finally been raised.
Doc Tempest stood in front of a set of eight giant plasma screens. Each showed the close-up of a world leader, all members of the world’s powerful G8, and all of whom regarded Tempest with steely defiance. Currently the president of the United States was speaking.
“We know you’re bluffin’, bucket-head. So we say no to your demands, and if you don’t return our gold reserves then you’ll have one big war headin’ your way!”
Doc Tempest was apoplectic. He yelled at the screens, spittle flying from his mouth. But his words were lost as a siren filled the command room. He furiously waved at a technician, shouting at her to stop the alarm, but he couldn’t be heard. Exasperated, Tempest wheeled around and fired an electrical bolt from his fingers, blasting the alarm-speaker on the ceiling and plunging the command center into silence. Tempest stabbed a finger at the screens.
“You’ll pay for your insolence, Mister President! Say good-bye to Washington DC!”
Tempest stabbed a button on his wristband to cut the video transmission. He turned on the cowering technicians.
“What the—” He stopped, suddenly aware the eight world leaders were still staring at him. Tempest stabbed the button again, several times. This time the screens went blank. He turned again to the technician.
“What is happening?”
“Er … we have intruders in the hangar. And your prisoners have … um … escaped,” squeaked the young technician. He called up a video feed from the security cameras. Doc Tempest gazed venomously at the screen: Toby, Pete, and Emily could be seen darting around the hangar, which was already up in flames.
