by Edward Aubry
Harrison waited a beat. "My turn?" he asked.
"Sure."
"Good," he said. "I'll keep this short. I'm too old to give a shit whether the cool girl likes me. Try to remember that when we're watching each other's backs."
When he got back to the buggy, Hadley Tucker and Jeannette Lee were there. Jeannette was dressed as inconspicuously as the others, and Tucker was wearing a Hawaiian shirt. He hadn't seen much of Tucker since first meeting him months earlier, though Glimmer knew him pretty well from the Department of Esoteric Research and said he was strange. He wasn't quite sure how he felt about working with someone who set off Glimmer's freak-meter. He certainly wasn't in the mood for small talk with a relative stranger just then, anyway. He walked back to where Jeanette was sitting and asked, "Is this seat taken?"
She was reading a packet of stapled papers and looked up. "No." She went back to her reading.
Feeling semi-invited he sat down. He knew Jeannette, but not well. She had been another of the first faces he had seen as a citizen of New Chicago, and she had been part of the experiments that had been performed on him early on to test his lock ability. She had black hair that was about one percent gray, and the tiniest hints of lines around her eyes. Harrison was not usually confident about guessing ages, but figured her for somewhere between ten and twenty years older than he was.
"Do you like me?" he asked without thinking.
She looked up again, this time with a stern expression. "Are you hitting on me?"
"What?" he echoed. "No! I mean-no, no, no, no, no. It's just, I …" He faltered. "Crap. I can't say anything right. No, I'm not hitting on you." She frowned. "I hope that's the right answer," he added. "It's just that, well, Alec hates me, Claudia just informed me in explicit language that I suck, and I was just wondering if anybody on this bus is going to give me the time of day for the next few weeks." He hadn't intended to spill it all. It had only just dawned on him how much it all bothered him.
Jeannette put down her reading material. "Do you know why I'm here?" she asked.
"Um," he thought for a minute, "in case one of us gets hurt? Or sick?"
She shook her head. "I'm probably the best surgeon left in North America," she said. "You don't really think they brought me along as a field medic, do you?"
"I guess not," he said. He had no idea where this was going.
"We have no idea what we're going to find in New York," she said. "The only thing we're pretty sure we won't find is survivors. I'm here in case we find people who are, shall we say, not survivors. The hope is that I might be able to determine from whatever remains we come across a year after the fact why they didn't survive. I have no idea if I'll be able to do that, and I have no idea if I'll even have to do that."
"Oh. Okay," said Harrison.
"The reason I'm telling you this," she said, "which you're too afraid to ask right now, is that I think I'll be far too preoccupied to worry about hurting your feelings. I am not at liberty to be your guidance counselor, Harrison, so you're going to have to work out your friendship issues on your own."
Harrison sat still for a moment, unsure whether to feel chastised or just stupid. He got up to go sit somewhere else.
"As long as we're clear on that point," she said, "yes, I like you very much." She smiled at him warmly, and went back to her reading.
Glimmer was the last to arrive, not quite late. She was dressed in black leatherette jacket and pants with embroidered orange flames running down the sleeves and legs. The jacket was partly zipped, revealing a black t-shirt underneath with the Harley-Davidson logo across her chest. Around her waist she wore both a belt and a chain, and over her back she had slung a tiny black backpack. She was also wearing a black motorcycle helmet. There were, however, no black biker boots on her feet.
"You probably won't need the helmet, you know," said Harrison. "The buggy isn't exactly open air."
"I like the helmet," she replied, but she took it off anyway and shook her sparkly hair out and tossed it back. Her black sunglasses were now visible. "Hey," she said when she was satisfied with her style, "I need to talk to you about something Claudia said to me yesterday. I want to get your take on her idea."
"Great." He rolled his eyes. Then, almost as an afterthought, he asked, "You like me, don't you?"
"Oh, shut up," she said. And kissed him on the cheek.
* * *
Their first day out consisted mostly of staring out the window while the buggy managed a variety of terrains. Sergeant Smith drove. Harrison left unspoken his wish that they could take turns behind the wheel. They drove through forest, which was plentiful, across plains, which were scattered, along some fragments of highway, and past some oddities. Harrison's personal favorite was the golf course, which took them an hour and a half to cross, and on which he counted seventy-two holes. He played "I Spy" with Glimmer for part of the day, but it got old after a while, and he soon found himself coveting Claudia's Game Boy. They feasted on sponges and took turns in the tiny lavatory to address their hygiene needs. They slept in their seats.
Day two was more eventful.
They were moving along about the same as before, making pretty good time, right up until mid-afternoon. Although Harrison was keeping to himself, he was eavesdropping on a conversation between Hadley and Jeannette about magic fields and parapsychology, a dialogue so far over Harrison's head that he couldn't help but find it entertaining. At one point, when Hadley mentioned something Glimmer had shown him, he sat up and said, "Where's Glimmer?" The question was posed loudly enough for everyone to hear. The scientist was really just trying to get her attention, but as Harrison looked around to see her response, he realized it was a valid question. She was nowhere to be seen. He looked at Claudia, who was already looking at him, and their eyes locked. She nodded very slightly.
"Lieutenant," Smith called from the driver's seat, "we have a possible situation."
Lt. Anderson moved up to the front of the buggy. He and the sergeant exchanged a few words, but they were speaking much too quietly for anyone else to hear. He looked back over his shoulder. "Director? You may want to see this."
Alec went up to join the two men. The lieutenant was talking to him, but Harrison still couldn't hear. Alec looked up at the ceiling, then said something to the sergeant, who nodded. Alec came back to the other passengers. "Everybody stay put," he said, and as he said it, they heard a noise outside. It was a kind of whining roar, and it got louder and seemed to pass right over them. Even though the ceiling of the buggy was all they could see, almost everyone looked up, then Harrison tried looking out the window beside him. After a few seconds, he was just able to make out the probable source of the sound. It was a large, gray object, although it was impossible to tell exactly how large it was because it was flying over them at a distance. It was shaped a bit like a manta ray, and it seemed to be circling them. It kept dipping out of view, then coming back again, so rapidly that Harrison figured there must be at least two of them. He confirmed this a few seconds later when he saw them both.
The buggy came to a full stop. They had been crossing an uneven field, so the team was used to starts and stops, but this was different. "Don't let anyone leave," Alec said to Lt. Anderson, who nodded. Harrison could see now that one of the manta things had landed on the ground, right in front of them. The other was still circling.
"Armed, you think?" Anderson said to Alec.
"Not likely. But they may not have to be."
As Harrison listened to this conversation, a ramp extended from the landed flier and four men emerged. They were wearing swords. They took positions in front of the buggy and stood still.
"This can't be good," Harrison muttered.
"I'll be right back," Alec told team. "Seal the door behind me," he added, and Sgt. Smith nodded.
Everyone got up and moved to Harrison's side of the vehicle, where they had a better view. As soon as Alec stepped out of the buggy, the four men converged on him. No one made any moves that could be d
escribed as particularly threatening, and they spoke for about two minutes, at which time Alec turned around and walked back to the buggy. He got back in and closed the door.
"What do they want?" Louise asked.
"The transport," said Alec. "They would like to offer us their protection in exchange for it, and they will give us a lift to their base. Pretty standard shakedown, on the face of it. Unfortunately, we haven't got much time to consider this. They think they've cast a persuasion spell on me, and that it's spinning out right now onto all of you. If we don't all pile out of here in about two minutes, they'll know it didn't work. We have about that much time to decide if we want to tip our hand."
Hadley was obviously alarmed by Alec's words. "A spell?" he asked. "Are you sure? Are they human? Were they using some sort of projection tool? A human shouldn't be able to cast a spell like that." He stood up. "Are you sure it didn't work? May I speak with them?"
"No!" Alec shot back. "You may not speak with them. Sit down!" Hadley sat. Alec sighed. "Yes, I'm sure they tried it, and no, it didn't work. Bess filters all that rubbish and sends me a signal to tell me what she's caught."
"Bess?" said Harrison.
"His little sword," Claudia said. Alec glowered, no doubt at her use of the word "little."
"Well," said Louise, "this may be an opportunity. The purpose of this venture is to gather information. If these really are humans casting spells, we may have more to gain by going along with them than by trying to make a stand."
Alec nodded. "That's just what I was going to say. And at any rate, we may not have a choice." He shook his head. "Right. Anything not already locked down should go into the cargo vault this instant. Sergeant, please encode the doors so that the entire transport will go into lockout mode as soon as we are out." He looked around at the dumbfounded faces of his team. "Straight away, people! Let's do this!"
Harrison was terrified. Everyone was following these new orders as though they made perfect sense, when, as far as he could tell, they were basically surrendering to pirates. His safest bet would be to say nothing, however, to follow swiftly and hope for the best. It was a blind trust. He struggled to distinguish it from madness.
He was one of the first out, and he emerged holding his hands over his head. No one took any interest in him, and he noticed that he was the only person with his hands raised, so he lowered them. The others came out slowly, looking uncertain as to what to do next. It was impossible for him to tell how much of their apparent surrender was an act. For him, no acting was needed.
Sgt. Smith was the last one out, and as soon as he cleared the door, it snapped shut. Harrison tensed, expecting the raiders to try to gain entry and expecting their rage when they failed. One of them did approach the buggy, but not very closely. He waved what looked like a pocket calculator at the vehicle, then inspected the device, and put it in his pocket.
Harrison tried to watch what they would do next, but he was abruptly herded up the ramp into the parked flier. Only he, Claudia, Hadley, and Lt. Anderson were taken inside before the door was sealed, and he had a moment of panic as he considered the possible fate of the others. Then he saw through a window that the other flier had landed and that the rest of the team were being escorted into it. The reason for their separation was immediately obvious. The compartment he was in could seat only ten. Putting all eight of them in one flier would give them an overwhelming edge in numbers.
He was shown a seat, and as the raiders were not openly hostile (not yet, anyway), he saw no reason to defy them. He sat still, silently gazing out a window. They took to the air quite suddenly, and Harrison fought off a touch of vertigo. He watched the other flier take off, too, and observed that they appeared to be abandoning the buggy. Then he watched the other flier circle the buggy, swoop down on it, and somehow snatch it up. It hung from the belly of the flier, with its rear end protruding slightly ahead of the flier's nose. Clutched backward like that, it looked somehow helpless, and Harrison adjusted his impression of the flier. Before, it had looked like a manta ray. Now, it seemed more like an owl taking flight with a freshly captured baby rabbit in its claws. He shivered.
"Excuse me," Hadley said to one of their six captors. None of them turned. "Where are we going?"
At first, Harrison did not think he would get an answer, but after almost a minute, and still without looking at him, one of the pilots said, "The castle."
"A castle?" Hadley was evidently unsatisfied with this laconic answer. He repeated his question.
This time the pilot did turn. "The castle," he said. "You guys are lucky. You're about to meet the monarch of the Lone Star Kingdom."
Hearing these words, Harrison was now solidly convinced that Alec was an idiot and that they were screwed.
This, he thought, sucks.
Chapter Twenty-One
The Castle
They spent over two hours in the air. Harrison was reminded, unpleasantly, of his experience in the Worm, although the only thing the two modes of transportation really had in common was speed. They rode in silence, under the scrutiny of their captors. Harrison tried to make eye contact with each of his teammates, in the hopes that they could, somehow, communicate without words, but Hadley just smiled, Claudia wouldn't look at him, and Roland appeared to be staring at his hands, which were folded in his lap. While Harrison was trying to get the lieutenant's attention, he saw his eyes flicking toward the front several times. Harrison realized that he was probably casing the inside of the flier and did not look back to him for fear he would be noticed.
Harrison dreaded this impending encounter. It did not surprise him that more than one government had risen from the ruins of the United States. It even stood to reason that many small nations might be able to harmoniously coexist in this new land. He had been very pleased to discover that New Chicago was a US-style democracy, and what troubled him was the idea that any of these new governments would be a monarchy. He could imagine what type of person would suddenly declare himself king and what it would be like to live under that person's thumb. He also admitted to himself (but to no one else) that he had ingrained Yankee prejudices about Texas that he was unable to shake. This Lone Star Kingdom was bound to be trouble.
They flew over a landscape as incongruous as any they had seen yet. As they approached the "airport," Harrison could see a vast stretch of desert plain that was interrupted by a perfectly square, bright green patch. As they came closer, he saw that the square was much larger than his first estimate; it must have been at least half a mile on each side. The green was lush, dense plant life, including many plants Harrison recognized and many he did not. There were palm trees side by side with firs, and ferns and ivy or grass or moss covered every bit of open ground. He soon saw that roads ran through this motley forest, and at the exact center of the square stood a stark, blocky building, all right angles, with wide turrets at the corners. He didn't see it at first, because it was a monochrome olive and looked more like a shadow of the surrounding brush than an object in its own right. The structure was ringed by a perfect circle of Windex blue. At first, he thought this blue was the color of the liquid in the moat, but as he got closer he could see that the bottom was painted, like a swimming pool. He wondered if the water was chlorinated. A road led across the moat. At first, Harrison thought it was a drawbridge, but then he recognized that it did not draw. A fixed bridge like that meant that the moat was for show, not defense, and Harrison couldn't decide if that made him nervous or not.
They set down just outside the moat, gliding slowly into an open hangar, which held three more mantas. Then they were escorted off the craft. As he stepped off the ramp, the heat hit Harrison like a flaming wall, but it felt different from the sticky New England summer heat he was used to. This felt like being in a toaster. As they walked out of the hangar toward the bridge, Harrison watched the other flier glide slowly down and release the transport. It let go about a foot off the ground, and the vehicle hit with a crunching noise. Harrison tried not to find tha
t troubling, as he knew from experience how sturdy those buggies were. He was also now able to see how they had lifted it. He had imagined some sort of magnetic device, but it was a simple metal claw made of about a dozen opposing hooks. They opened and grasped one more time at nothing, as though they needed to stretch their muscles after hauling such a heavy burden so far, then retracted completely into the flier. Harrison wondered if he should add to his list of indignities that the buggy would now require a paint job.
The other team members were led away from their flier, then all eight of them were herded across the bridge. As they passed over the water, Harrison indeed smelled chlorine, which made him realize that he couldn't smell much else. He had worked on a farm for two summers when he was a teenager, and the one vivid memory he still carried from that experience was the scent of growing vegetation. Surrounded by this much plant life, especially in this heat, he should have been able to pick up any number of plant smells, but he got nothing. He assumed it was because the climate was different, and the plants would just have different smells he wouldn't recognize. He hoped it wasn't the other bizarre notion that flashed into his head: that all the plants were fake.
The castle itself was not what he had pictured. He had imagined that it would have a vague storybook look, with towers and curves. Bold, yet graceful. But this thing was a box, pure and simple, like something built from a child's set of blocks, and an off brand at that. He managed, among all the other emotions battling for dominance in his brain, to find room for disappointment. Then they went inside.
The experience of having his world view turned inside out was becoming so common that Harrison hardly noticed it anymore. But this time it slapped him hard. He was already having trouble with the castle's exterior, and now they walked through an open portcullis into what looked like an ordinary hotel lobby. The floors were carpeted, there was comfortable, expensive looking furniture placed tastefully throughout. Floor lamps revealed that this so-called castle was wired for electricity. The illusion might have held, if not for the fact that the walls looked exactly the same on the inside as outside. They were made of rectangular blocks of some rough, olive-green stone, with square windows at regular intervals. One thing Harrison had not noticed from the outside, but which he couldn't help but notice now, was that the windows had vertical iron bars in them instead of glass. He was far less upset by the bars than by the fact that no glass meant no air conditioning. He had been hoping. It was a slight relief that the sun was just beginning to set, which might make for cooler air. Harrison had lost track of time, but the setting sun told him it must be after eight o'clock.
