by Peter Telep
I hunker down. “Keane!”
“I’m dying,” his says, his face twisted in agony. “Just leave me here. Leave me.”
“You’re not dying,” Tommy says, grabbing Keane’s shirt at the collar to expose the wound. “Look at that. Just a little souvenir. Clean entry and exit.”
“So I’m okay?”
“You’re more than okay,” I tell him. “Now you’re a total badass with a bullet scar!”
Tommy drapes Keane’s arm around his neck and hauls him to his feet.
With pairs of grren personas at our sides, and Brave just behind, we rush out of the observatory—
And into a powerful wind.
Two helicopters have landed on the uneven hillside, rotors spinning and grinding, navigation lights flashing, doors wide open and awaiting passengers.
Solomon’s group breaks into a mad dash for the choppers, about fifty yards away... and that’s when our rumms attack.
I’m screaming for them to hold their fire. If Solomon dies, Earth dies with him.
But no one can hear me over the gunfire and rotor wash.
As Tommy carries Keane to the Jeep, I climb onto Brave’s back. We charge across the hill and reach the nomads, along with Solomon and Julie.
Brave’s personas flash like lightning and attack, dragging nomads away—
Even as Julie screams and jumps into her persona, trying to protect her father.
Solomon’s in his persona, too, firing a pistol at the grren as one by one his nomad bodyguards get torn away.
Claws dig into faces. Jaws clamp down.
And then it’s just Brave and me charging after Julie and her father.
Solomon empties his magazine and tosses the pistol.
Back at the telescope building, Tommy, Meeka, Steffanie, and the rumms are getting pinned down. Triplets of gunfire grow more intense as Mama Grren’s pack hisses and fans out for another assault.
I catch a glimpse of the nomads who were with us in the temple. They shift along the pyramid-shaped building, ready to ambush Solomon’s men.
With my throat tightening, I connect with Brave. I show him what to do. He breaks into a dash so fast and powerful that I’m nearly thrown off.
He launches us into the air—
And as we pass over Julie and Solomon, I bail out and crash into Solomon’s back.
Down we go.
Brave hisses and hits the ground.
Julie screams for me to get away, but I’m already on top of Solomon, straddling him. He’s a bag of bones, his wrists so thin I wonder if they’ll snap as I pin him to the ground.
“She’s not going with you,” I scream.
Off to my left, Brave’s personas have surrounded Julie and her persona, cutting them off—
But then Brave trots over to us.
He looks at me.
Looks at Solomon.
And then I can see it in his eyes. He recognizes Solomon. This is the man who saved him when he was a cub.
He glances back at me and bares his teeth.
I swallow. “Brave?”
Solomon glances over at the grren. “Is that you, Brave? Is that you?”
Brave hisses, as if answering. He shifts closer—
And suddenly, he swipes me away.
I tumble across the rocks and dirt, landing on my back. I’m dizzy and all banged up.
Solomon reaches for Brave’s ear.
No, no, no...
I get shakily to my feet and start toward them.
A hand slaps on my shoulder and whirls me around.
It’s Solomon’s persona. He rears back and punches me in the jaw. Bam, I hit the deck.
Now he’s straddling me. I’m not sure how he does it, but his persona is way stronger than his body.
I groan and lift my arms, straining against the pressure. He fights back. Tries to pin me again. I relax a second, and then scream and roll him over.
I’m on top now. I wrench out of his grip and get my hands around his throat.
But I’m no longer choking him.
I’m choking my father. “Doc, don’t do this.”
And then I’m choking Julie. “I love you, Doc.”
And then it’s my mother. “I’m here for you. Always.”
An arm slides under my throat.
Hands seize my arms.
And with one powerful thrust, I’m ripped off of Solomon and thrown to the ground.
I roll over, sit up, and come face to face with not one, not two, not three—
But all six of Solomon’s personas.
He’s learned to divide himself just like the grren.
“Forget it, Doc!” Solomon cries. He stands there with his palm on Brave’s head. They’re buddies now.
How does Solomon do this? How does he convince people to join him so quickly? He must be an expert at reading minds and drawing on every weakness… and it works… even on the grren…
Brave’s personas have been called off from Julie—
But now they’re running toward me with their lips curled back, ready to attack.
I get Brave’s attention and shout his name.
Julie’s back in her body and jogging toward her father.
Brave just looks at me.
My shoulders slump. It’s all over now.
Sometimes the home team loses.
The good guys fail.
But don’t tell that to Tommy.
He charges over with his pistol.
He doesn’t know about the bomb—
So he shoots Solomon right in the chest.
CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN
As Solomon staggers forward, clutching his wound, Julie arrives breathlessly at his side.
At the same time, Brave’s personas drive claws into the dirt and shift course, heading for Tommy.
Just then, a round thumps near my foot. Sand blasts into my face. Two nomads are about to capture me.
I don’t care. I can’t take my eyes off Solomon.
He’s pulled back his personas.
He knows he’s dying.
He knows the bomb is about to go off, followed by nuclear blasts around the globe.
And I wonder if he realizes that this is the world that he’ll leave his daughter:
A world of suffering and death. A world just like Flora, a world that already poisoned him.
He looks at her. At me.
Maybe in these final seconds he’ll change his mind.
Maybe he’s got a remote detonator wired inside his body, something he can switch off at the last second—so he can die and not trigger the bomb.
I gasp and wait for him to do something.
Anything.
But all he does is kneel there, clutching his chest, with the choppers thundering behind him.
“Brave, call ‘em off!” Tommy shouts.
But the grren’s not listening. All six personas spring into the air, glowing nightmares ready to rip Tommy apart.
Meeka, Steffanie, and even Keane are running up, firing at the pack, but it’s no use. Brave’s personas can take a lot more damage than ours can.
He’s been influenced—brainwashed—just like Julie.
“Don’t move!” comes a voice from behind me.
There’s a rifle barrel at my head.
I look back near the Jeep, where my father’s sitting in his wheelchair, shielded by a few rumms.
I face Julie. I’ve never seen more hate in her eyes.
The grren personas sound like a billion raging animals.
Tommy will be dead before I take another breath.
Solomon lifts his arms... extends his fingers...
...and projects his persona in front of us.
It’s glowing brighter and brighter, becoming larger, twice as big as he is. Pulsating with energy that reminds me of the engine. Blue bolts flicker inside the green halo.
And then... it begins to turn pure white...
Until it finally explodes!
Ringlets of the blast wave slash into th
e helicopters—
Even as we’re swept like ants off the ground.
I’m tumbling through the air, along with Brave’s personas and Tommy and Julie and everyone else.
Two more explosions strike like thunder.
Light flashes in my eyes.
I roll and cartwheel and fall...
I see stars. Ground. White walls. I’m about to throw up.
And then... boom, boom, I land face down, ears ringing, arms and legs shaking with pain.
My neck grows warm. Shadows. Fire. The smell of burning fuel. I push onto my side.
In the distance, what’s left of the choppers lies beneath fires and tall columns of smoke. There’s a piece of something right next to me, sizzling and burning.
With a shiver I realize I’ve been blown all the way to the other side of the observatory.
Someone’s running toward me.
It’s Meeka and Steffanie. “Doc?” Meeka calls.
“What happened? Where’s everyone else?”
“We don’t know,” she answers.
My imagination’s running wild. I already see Tommy lying in a ditch with a piece of metal jutting from his chest. He’s alone. Calling for us. Dying.
Julie’s behind him, all mangled up, her eyes locked open. Forever.
Don’t think that! I order myself.
And then, with a loud groan, I’m on my feet. Dizzy as hell. Meeka grabs my arm before I fall over.
Hissing sounds... Loud. Just behind us. We turn.
It’s Brave.
I step toward him. “Brave, whatever he showed you was a lie. You don’t want to kill us.”
He growls.
I take a deep breath and hold it.
“Doc, what’re you doing?” Meeka asks.
Before I lose the nerve, I rush to Brave and grab his ears.
And now I see what Solomon showed him. The lies about my father killing my mother.
Images of my father hunting the grren.
Torturing them, killing them.
I scream in my thoughts: It’s not true!
Panicking, I show him memories of being right here at the observatory. Looking through one of the telescopes. He sees my father homesick and crying. Maybe he’ll realize that my father is not the evil person Solomon made him out to be.
I wish it were that simple. I know it’s not.
As I’m ready to give up, Brave shows me something: an image of my father in the wheelchair.
He wants to connect with him. He’s willing to see more...
I sigh and return back to the moment.
“I think we’re okay,” I tell Meeka and Steffanie. “At least for now...”
“Doc? Julie?”
That voice. I’m ready to pass out with relief. It’s Tommy running toward us, backlit by the burning helicopters.
But then he stops short when he sees Brave.
“It’s all right,” I reassure him. “We’ve called a truce.”
He backhands dirt from his brow. “Imagine that.”
“Are you okay?”
“Oh, I’ll be a hurtin’ bird later, but I’ll live. Now, what the hell just happened?”
“I don’t know. But come on. We need to find Julie.” I wave for Steffanie, Meeka, and Brave to follow us.
As we take off over the hill, Solomon’s remaining nomads shout to each other to stand down. A few holler, “He’s dead! Now what?”
Our nomads, the ones Tommy brought from Flora, link up with us near the solar telescope.
Tommy heads off to speak with them about “mopping up.” I spot my father and Keane. They sit near the Jeep, which has been blown onto its side.
I gesture to Brave and bring him over to my father.
“Are you guys all right?” I ask.
My father nods, his eyes still a little vague from what I assume are the drugs Solomon’s been giving him.
“Did you see that?” Keane asks me.
“Yeah, and Julie was right next to him.”
“I saw it, too,” my father says.
“Dad, did the bomb go off?”
“I’m not sure. We need to get inside and check on the computer.”
“We will. But what about Solomon?”
“I think he did it. He pushed his entire essence into his persona. That was the explosion... And then he jumped.”
“So where is he now?”
My father shrugs.
“And does he live forever?”
My father winces, like he knows the answer but doesn’t want to tell me. “Uh, maybe so.”
I glance back. “Dad? Brave wants to connect. He needs to see who you really are, not the guy Solomon showed him.”
“Bring him here.”
With a click and hiss, Brave bows and eases toward us.
My father manages a weak look of surprise. “You’ve tamed the grren.”
“It was Julie. And trust me, they’re not tame. Anyway, please, show him the truth.”
He nods.
I shift away and offer my hand to Keane.
He takes it and stands, favoring one arm as though it’s in an invisible sling.
I tighten my lips. “Does it hurt?”
“Yeah.”
“I’m sorry. I guess Earth really sucks now, huh?”
“I’ll let you know after I have my pizza.”
I nearly smile. “Can you help me find Julie?”
Meeka and Steffanie see us heading off and decide to join. We sweep the hills around the observatory. The others jump in their personas to cover more ground.
We shout her name. One of our nomads joins me and uses his flashlight, directing his beam over the rocky slopes.
Mama Grren sees what we’re doing. I connect with her, and she volunteers to help. Maybe she and her personas can sniff out Julie.
Now we’re a major search team. We won’t miss anything.
But after nearly thirty minutes, we regroup—
And the expressions say it all.
Tommy hurries over and says, “No luck?”
I shake my head.
“Well, we checked the web. No reports of any nukes going off, thank God. One guy told me they got the other scientists locked up in a hotel. I just called to have ‘em cut loose.”
“That’s awesome. So we need to go, right?”
“It’ll take a while for law enforcement to get up here in the park, but you can bet someone called in those fires. So yeah, we need to roll. And we need transport back to Florida.”
“What about the grren?”
“Oh, they’re coming. We just need to hide them.”
“All right. You guys go. I’m not leaving till we find Julie.”
“Neither am I,” Keane says.
“Neither are we.” Meeka tosses a glance at Steffanie.
“Are you sure?” I ask them.
“I am,” says Keane.
Meeka sighs. “For some reason you still like her...”
I glance away. “Yeah, I guess I just keep coming back for more. So let’s keep looking. We’re running out of time.”
“Doc, we’re already out of time,” Tommy says. “But I’ll get everyone out here. We’ll do one last sweep.”
CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT
Where did Julie go? Did Solomon take her? How?
I realize now that I don’t care if she hates me. I just want her to be okay. So what happened?
She was standing right there. Right next to him.
Maybe the blast or the energy killed her.
No!
We search near the helicopter wreckage.
No sign of her body. Or Solomon’s.
I look at Meeka. “What does this mean?” I draw a circle around my heart, and then cross it.
“That’s random,” she says, echoing my earlier comment.
“Not really.”
“Okay, whatever. The circle is the wreath. The cross is a promise to yourself.”
“What promise?”
“It’s like many things, like
never forget your family. Help others. Be kind. Be safe. Do your best. Express your feelings. Stuff like that. It can also mean that you’re sealing yourself so that no one can change you.”
“Julie and I used to do that when we were kids. We didn’t know what it meant, but it was inside us.”
“Yeah, I guess it’s always been a thing on Flora.”
I lower my head. “Julie would be here if I’d shown her the truth. But I was too scared.”
“You didn’t want to hurt her.”
“So I did worse.”
“We’re not finished looking.”
“Yeah, we are.” I walk away.
“Doc?”
I wave her off and wander alone down the hillside, behind the clouds of smoke.
About a hundred yards below, tiny flashes of green bounce around the mountain. Could be someone still searching for Julie...
I frown and quicken my pace. As I get closer, I realize it’s a persona jumping back and forth to random spots within the same broad circle.
The jumps are so quick that I can’t see who it is—
So I leap in my persona for a better look. However, the persona’s so fast that I still can’t see it. Just blurs.
And then it’s gone.
And then back again. Inches from my face. Never seen anything like it.
I chase after, jumping again and again. Finally, I turn—
And it crashes into me. I grab its shoulders. I’m forced to lean down...
Because this persona is small. A little girl. Maybe seven years old. Those eyes.
“Julie, is that you?”
Her little brows tighten, and her nose crinkles. “You know me?”
“Yeah, I do. Where are you?”
“Right here.”
“No, I mean your body.”
She looks down at herself. “It’s here.”
“Julie, listen. You might be in trouble. You need to tell me where you are right now. Do you understand?”
She shrugs. “Are we on the island?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“Where’s the old lady with lots of cats?”
I smile. “I’m asking the same question.”
She winces in pain. “I don’t feel so good.”
I start to pant. “Julie, look at me. Tell me where you are.”
“I think we should get married now.”
“Okay. But where are you?”
She looks around. “I’m lost.”
Meeka and Steffanie jump in behind Julie.
“Hey, whoa, is that—”
