I seriously considered trying to tap into Elisha’s brain, but I figured that’s exactly what she wanted. She’d probably have some sort of trap waiting for me. And my one ally, Roberta, who could truly stand against Elisha with super-mojo-powers, was dead! Making her vulnerable against Elisha. The fact that Elisha could control Roberta like a puppet was infuriating. It meant I couldn’t rely on Roberta’s help as much as I’d like. (And admitting that was difficult to swallow!)
“Now that we know we’re looking for a girl of eighteen not seven, I think I spotted her on some news footage. I brought it over. You want to come see?” Jason dangled the holo-chip containing the footage in front of me like a carrot to a rabbit.
“Uh, yeah.” I punched him playfully in the shoulder. “Let’s go downstairs.”
We all headed downstairs and were quickly joined by Bill and Jill, who had arrived together. I didn’t want to pry, so I kept quiet.
Nancy and Jason had obviously filled them in on Ryan since the two of them looked at me like I was a fragile egg teetering on a ledge. I decided not to acknowledge their stares. Though their hearts were in the right place, it just made me worry more about Ryan. I didn’t trust Turner. And to give Ryan over to him made me sick, even if it was for the best.
Everyone sat on the couch. That’s when George and Vianne walked in from the kitchen. I was surprised that Vianne didn’t have a giant breakfast waiting for everyone as usual, but Ryan’s seizure had obviously taken its toll on her psyche. She held a basket full of power bars and placed them on the coffee table for anyone that wanted one. I wasn’t hungry. In fact, the thought of food made me even more sick. I just wanted to focus my attention on taking down Elisha so I wouldn’t be allowed to be alone in my head anymore. It was dangerous in there and making me insane.
Jason plugged the hole-chip into the TV, and news footage reenacted itself in front of our faces as if we were there.
Jason walked directly into the life-sized holo-images and began pointing out what he wanted us to see.
The footage was on an army base, showing the boring opening ceremony of a new gym. Aside from joining the military to get in better shape, a huge part of the poorer population joined mainly for the early use of Age-pro. The government had made a deal with the military recruiters: if someone joined for five years, then that person would be eligible to take Age-pro early, fully funded by the government. Normally, the lower class wasn’t eligible for Age-pro until they were thirty when National Health Care kicked in, so being able to take it by the age of twenty-three was a big deal. Thinking about how the military now was such a different organization than when Turner joined was surreal to me. It was so much more a fitness thing than a fighting thing nowadays. Sad but true. So opening a new high-tech gym that the world had never seen before, I’m sure was fascinating to health nuts, but for the lazy like me, it was a snoozefest.
Jason pointed to a young woman off to the side of the ribbon-cutting ceremony. “There she is.”
And there she was.
Elisha.
She looked my age. And, like I had already guessed, Elisha was annoyingly gorgeous. Long wavy black hair, large violet eyes, perfectly sculpted face with prominent cheekbones and she even had Barbie-like curves. Hated her.
Elisha was beyond stunning. But she somehow managed to hide in the background and not bring any attention to herself.
“What is she doing at an army base gym opening?” I asked aloud. Somehow drooling over all the really buff guys didn’t seem to me like it was Elisha’s cup of tea.
Jason started to fast-forward through the holo-images. “Not once, but twice.”
The next piece of footage was at a Naval base. It was another press conference, only about a week back, when they announced that the military was lowering the amount of service time for Age-pro recruits, cutting it down to three years instead of five. After that announcement there was a major upsurge in volunteers…
Oh crap.
“You don’t think?..” I left the sentence hanging, but I could see that Jason definitely did think what I was thinking.
“That Elisha was somehow responsible for the age cut and that she counted on the record number of recruits? Yes.” Jason paused the holo. “But how is she going to recruit them to her army?”
“Kill them?” Jill guessed.
“But Turner could control them or I could. It has to be something more,” I sighed heavily.
“It can’t be a coincidence that she was at two military events. She must have been sussing something out,” Bill volunteered as he took a bite out of a power bar.
Suddenly the paused holo-images started to blur and made a kind of buzzing noise.
George took the remote from Jason, “Must be something wrong with the holo-player.”
The buzzing sound grew louder until it was almost deafening!
“Turn it off!” Vianne yelled over the noise to George.
“I’m trying!” George shouted back, frantically trying to turn off the holo-TV.
The holo-people started to shake violently and lose their shapes altogether.
That’s when I saw him.
Ryan.
The holo-images shifted into his face.
His eyes were wide with terror.
The buzzing turned into Ryan’s voice, robotic and loud. “Chelsan? Are you there?”
“YES!” I screamed.
Everyone including myself was standing at this point, terrified and worried at seeing Ryan’s larger-than-life face staring at us in the living room.
Ryan didn’t seem to hear me because he repeated, “Chelsan! Are you there?”
“I’M HERE!” I yelled as loudly as I could.
Ryan’s eyes shifted in horror, looking around like a rat caught in a trap. “Get me out of here! Chelsan!”
SNAP.
All the power in the house went out.
We all stood staring at the spot where Ryan’s face had just pleaded for my help.
I was frozen in shock.
Ryan.
It took all of two seconds for me to snap out of it. I picked up my phone and dialed Turner. Everyone else was silent. I could feel their eyes on me, not sure of what to say or do themselves.
George was the first to try and bring the room back to some kind of sanity.
George mumbled, “I’ll go flip the breakers.” Then he walked off toward the back of the house.
The phone rang and rang until Turner’s voicemail picked up. “What did you do to Ryan?! I’m coming there right now!” I hung up and threw my phone across the room. I heard it smash against the wall, but I didn’t care. I was so enraged I couldn’t see straight. Why on earth did I think I could trust my grandparents with the most important person in my life? I was so desperate to get Ryan help, I didn’t even want to consider the possibility that Gramps would betray me. Again.
“I’m driving,” Bill volunteered.
Jason stepped in, “I’m coming too.”
Jason was just as spooked as I was.
That look in Ryan’s eyes…
“Let’s go,” I said, walking toward the door.
Vianne called out, “I’ll call the school and tell them you’re all staying home today.”
I appreciated Vianne’s concern for our school attendance, but it was the very last thing on my mind. I didn’t want to be rude to her, though. She was just trying to be helpful in a helpless situation.
Before I knew it Bill was driving me, Jason, Jill and Nancy to Turner’s headquarters. I was a Chelsan sandwich in the back seat with Jason and Jill as the bread. Somehow Nancy always managed to call out shotgun before the rest of us. Since headquarters (a.k.a. Population Control Center and Research) was open to the public, I knew we wouldn’t have a problem getting in. It was getting to see Ryan that I wasn’t sure about. If Turner was experimenting on him, I somehow doubted he would let me take Ryan away.
I needed to reach Roberta. Work on her a bit.
I closed my eyes and concentrated on Roberta.
&
nbsp; I felt myself floating above my body and then I followed the strong white thread of light that I knew to be Roberta’s tie to me. I could see the barriers Roberta put up against unwanted intruders like myself. It was strange. It looked like a bubble around her brain. I figured this is what it must look like when Elisha and Roberta tried to jump inside my head.
I thought about how Max would tap on my bubble and I tried to do the same on Roberta’s.
A pin-sized opening formed on the surface of her protective barrier. I assumed this was an invitation to enter, so I zoomed inside. This was way more difficult to do when I was awake! When I was sleeping I’d just summon Roberta to my head and she’d appear. I suddenly knew how much work she really had to do in order to master astral projection. Seriously impressive.
Roberta’s new, younger self materialized in front of me. We were in the oak forest where she’d helped me when I was buried alive by Elisha. It made me instantly calm. “We’re coming to get Ryan,” I told her.
Roberta actually looked surprised. I couldn’t tell if she was acting or if Turner hadn’t told her about what he planned for Ryan.
“He still needs Dr. Johnson’s help,” Roberta replied.
“Ryan was screaming for help through the holo! He’s being tortured! I never should have trusted you two!” I screamed at her. I couldn’t help it. I was so angry at them! But truth be told, I was more angry at myself than anything else.
Roberta placed her hands up to stop me from yelling. “Dr. Johnson is taking good care of Ryan. I promise you…”
I interrupted her in fury, “He isn’t! I’m telling you, I just saw Ryan trapped in the holo! Get him out of that machine!”
Roberta nodded. “I’ll go right now.”
“Good. I’m on my way there already,” I said, then jumped out of her head before she could tell me any more lies.
Roberta was way too good at lying. I couldn’t tell the difference and that was really frustrating. It was better just to let her know we were coming and that they’d better have Ryan waiting to go.
“Are you okay? You went all slumpy,” Jill’s voice brought me back to reality.
“Yeah, I’m fine,” I smiled at her reassuringly. Then I announced to the car, “Roberta’s playing dumb, but she’ll let us in,” I said even though Roberta had made no such promise. I wasn’t about to take “no” for an answer from my grandparents.
“We’re coming up on the building,” Bill announced.
The deep red maple forest that surrounded the white spectacle that was Population Control Center and Research was breathtaking. The enormousness of Turner’s main base of operation still amazed me. I knew there was so much that went on in that building that I had no clue about. And probably didn’t want to. A room full of Franklin clones for one. How many other people had my grandparents cloned? Themselves, obviously. My dad. I suddenly wondered with terror.
Me?
I didn’t want to think about it.
We landed in the public parking lot. Instantly twenty guards surrounded our car.
Uh oh.
“I thought you said they were cool with us coming,” Jill kind of gulped.
“I’ll take care of it,” I said with more confidence than I felt.
We stepped out of the car to find Turner himself waiting for me.
Instead of anger or irritation at my presence he actually looked…
Frazzled…?
Not a normal look for him. Not much could faze the rock that was my Gramps. He was pretty much an emotionless lump. Except for the emotions of rage and irritation. Those he had in spades.
“Ryan’s not here,” he said before I could get a word out.
“Bull!” I countered. No more lies.
“I know you’d like to believe that I’m an evil mastermind, but I’m telling you the truth. When Roberta went to check on him, he was gone. Roberta’s looking at the surveillance holos as we speak. Come with me.” Gramps didn’t even wait for my retort. He turned and started walking toward the side entrance to the facility.
I glanced at the others and we all followed suit.
Ryan gone?
I wasn’t sure if I could believe Turner or not, but for some reason in that moment I did.
If Turner didn’t have him, who did?
No.
No.
Please No.
I said what I feared most out loud, “Turner? Do you think Elisha has Ryan?”
Gramps barely glanced back at me, but I could see from his eyes.
Yes. That’s exactly who he thought had him.
Oh crap.
“What does she want with him, do you think?” I was trying to keep it together.
“I don’t know. Ryan has a once-in-a-lifetime mind. If Elisha found a way to harness that…” Turner left the thought unfinished.
Jason chimed in, “What about Dr. Johnson? Did he see anything?”
Turner didn’t bother to look at Jason, apparently I was the only one he’d stoop to acknowledge, but he did answer, “He’s dead.”
Turner didn’t elaborate, but the news stunned us all. Gramps didn’t let anyone else have a chance to ask more questions. He moved ahead and let some of his men step in-between our party and him.
Jason walked directly beside me. “We’ll get Ryan back,” he said reassuringly.
I appreciated his attempt to calm my nerves, but it really didn’t help much.
Nancy held on to my arm as we walked. She knew she didn’t need to say anything, just having her there was enough to keep me sane. Bill, Jason and Jill trailed behind. Bill and Jason had already been inside the underbelly that was Population Control. But I could tell this was Jill’s first time. Her dad had worked as Turner’s second-hand-man for years so I figured she’d have been here for sure, but from the expression on Jill’s face I could tell this was all new. Being here must be difficult for her. After all, most of her father’s reign in Turner’s court was as a pose-able corpse. Jill didn’t know that, however, so she just thought she had a really horrible dad that never spoke to her. It was why she was so ornery (and that was putting it lightly!). If I’d thought my dad was ignoring me on purpose during my formative years, I’d be pretty angry and bitter as well. Not that I’m making excuses for her, but over the last few months I’d learned to appreciate Jill’s unique view on things, even if they leaned toward the mean.
Our journey into the belly of the beast would have been more fascinating if I wasn’t totally freaking out at the moment. We walked through mazes of metal, to plaster, to marble, to glass: Headquarters was like a freak show of architecture. I stayed arm-in-arm with Nancy as we passed by every door imaginable, from intricate iron-wrought design to plain old hollow wood. I wondered why Turner had the place designed so randomly jumbly. Maybe it had something to do with how old he was. I could only imagine what it would be like to be over three hundred. I mean, for me everything was kind of the same and had been for the last two hundred years. But for people like my grandparents, and even Isabelle, they lived in a time when immortality was off the table, when there were things like paper and concrete that cars that drove on. It was an entirely different existence. So maybe this building was Turner’s way of capturing all of his lifespan’s history in one place. It wasn’t exactly tacky, but it wasn’t terribly Feng Shui either. It was just a cluster of every type of building material possible.
I decided it was becoming a weird kind of “nightmare” home, if that makes sense. I’d had the most terrifying moments of my life here, but I couldn’t help thinking that I had a room full of my dad here as well. I knew he was wrong, but it was still him to a certain degree. They were cloned from his DNA, so they were a part of me.
Stop.
I needed to focus.
Dad clones needed to be put on the back burner.
The mass that was Turner’s entourage turned left, through a large oak door, and into the next room.
When we entered the room I stared in awe. It was gigantic, the size of a football
stadium. The ceiling was domed and the surface was a moving depiction of the night sky. The Milky Way moving at a snail’s pace (though miles faster than real life!) across the faux sky was a spectacular site. Despite the fact that by all appearances it was nighttime inside, the room itself was surprisingly bright and well lit. The floor was a swirling green marble that resembled the sea. If the room had been empty, I imagined myself pulling out a blanket and staring at the ceiling for hours on end, but it was full of holo-images all playing different footage at the moment. The images were like Nancy’s house, fully life-size, so it felt like we were in a crowded room full of people doing various activities.
Even Jill made a small noise of appreciation though you’d never be able to tell from the expression on her face. She was scowling, as usual.
Jason was already watching the footage around us with a professional eye, trying to take in as much as he could, knowing the chance of us ever returning to this room was slim to none. Bill and Nancy were my guard dogs as usual. Each of them by my side, not even remotely distracted by the spectacle, just wanting to keep me safe. My besties.
Then through the packed crowd of holo-people came a solitary figure walking straight toward us.
Roberta.
Turner nodded for his men to leave and they immediately complied.
Roberta stopped next to Gramps and addressed the five of us. “You all need to see this.”
Roberta swiped the air: a small holo-box materialized. She typed into the floating image and a new scene appeared in front of us.
My heart stopped.
It was Ryan.
They had just arrived, and Ryan was walking toward the entrance of the Population Control Center with the help of Dr. Johnson acting as his crutch. There were at least ten guards behind them, surveilling the area and keeping it safe.
Ha, ha.
Black figures dropped from the sides of the building, all on ropes, all silent.
Before Ryan or Dr. Johnson could react, all of their guards were shot and killed.
Ryan was too weak to fight, but he didn’t stand a chance anyway. These were professionals and they meant to accomplish their goal.
Kidnap Ryan.
When Dr. Johnson tried to stop the men from taking Ryan, he was shot in the head.
The Riser Saga Page 76
