Blink of an Eye: Beginnings Series Book 8

by Jacqueline Druga

  “Anything.”

  Frank cleared his throat, let go of her hand, and stepped to face her. “You have to do this for me.”

  “I promise.” Ellen held up her hand only to have it grabbed and kissed by Frank.

  Frank returned her hand. “Tomorrow when you see Henry, I want you to say ‘hi’ to him, just ‘hi’.” Frank flashed a smile. “It would mean a lot. Thanks.” He kissed her on the cheek and opened his front door. “You coming, El?”

  “Yeah.” Ellen stood there in oddity for a second, pondering Frank’s request. Of all the things he could have had, he asked for a simple greeting to his friend. To Ellen that said a lot, and she promised herself right there if the opportunity arose the next day, she would oblige Frank’s request. What would it hurt?

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  AUGUST 3

  The chopper engine noise, the static, and the calm of Robbie Slagel’s voice filled the radio. “Home Base, this is Eagle One. Do you copy?” Robbie leaned toward the side window of his helicopter as he flew and peered out below through his dark sunglasses. “Home Base, this is Eagle One. Do you copy? Over.”

  “Yeah, Robbie,” Frank responded.

  “Frank,” Robbie spoke in a whine, “come on. You promised.”

  “All right,” Frank paused, “Eagle One, this is Home Base. We copy. What’s your position?”

  “Heading in southeast towards Home Base. We’ve got a small ground troop thirty miles northwest of Home Base.”

  “Fuck, you’re shitting me. How many?”

  “Uh ...” Robbie counted. “Twelve no wait, one just came out from taking a leak, thirteen. Odd.”

  “Can you identify them?”

  “Most likely. Hold on.” Robbie lifted his binoculars. “Got the big ‘C’, Frankie-boy. We got ourselves some SUTs.”

  “What’s it look like, Robbie? Are they mobile?”

  “Could be. Two trucks. Pretty settled right now. They’ve spotted me. I’m flying outward and away. They may move but they don’t look like they are with tents and such.”

  “Can you take them out now?”

  “Negative on that, Frank. If I start firing on them, I’m alone up here and they’ll scatter into the trees.”

  “Ground maneuvers.”

  “Could do that.” Robbie tilted the helicopter as he flew taking his last look back. “We’ll let that be your call, big brother, ground or air. Either way, I’m heading home to head out. Get the Big Cheese on it will ya?”

  Frank snickered over the airwaves. “Yeah, I’ll get Dad to Armory to suit up a team for ya. See ya in a few, Robbie.”

  “Call me ... Eagle One.”

  “Yeah, yeah, Eagle One, this is Home Base, over.”

  “Love ya too, Frank.” Robbie grinned, thinking of the excitement ahead and flew onward, back to Beginnings.

  <><><><>

  “Henry, hurry up!” Danny yelled up Henry’s steps. He fumbled with a box, tossing things in it.

  “I knew it.” Henry flew down the stairs putting on a shirt and running his fingers through his wet hair. “I knew I shouldn’t have taken time to get a shower.”

  “You have to get clean, Henry. Besides ...” Danny looked down at his watch. “We have time. How long once he gets back.”

  “Ten minutes, maybe.”

  “Got the papers?”

  Henry gathered the stack. “Got them.”

  “Will he do it?”

  “Oh yeah, but it’s not Robbie who gives the go-ahead, it’s Frank and Joe.”

  “It’s for the good of the community. Could mean ... how many did he say there were?”

  “Thirteen?”

  “Yep. Thirteen more soldiers for Beginnings.” Danny rushed to the door. “Let’s go.”

  Hurrying and dropping things, running back and picking them up, Henry raced with Danny toward town then to the hangar.

  <><><><>

  Ellen would have made a mad rush to the clinic, but what was the point? The injections would still need to be given. The blood would still need to be taken, no matter how carefree she walked from Containment. She took her time, knowing full well she promised Andrea she would be there fifteen minutes earlier.

  Walking slowly, thinking about how she was the displaced worker, always going from one place to the next, she was nearly barreled over by Danny who ran by her.

  “Hi, Ellen, bye, Ellen. Henry, hurry up!” Danny yelled back to Henry who had stopped twenty feet back to pick up the papers that blew from his hand.

  “Hi, Danny.” Ellen smiled at Danny’s rushing, then walked again.

  “Excuse me.” Henry walked by her.

  “Hi, Henry,” Ellen said as he passed her.

  Henry’s heart dropped at the same second his feet stopped. He quickly spun, to look back at her. “Hi, El.” Henry wanted to smile but feared it.

  Danny tugged at Henry’s shirt. “Henry, come on.”

  Spinning quickly back to Danny, Henry stuck all his papers into Danny’s chest. “Go on up without me. I’ll be right there.”

  “Henry, the helicopter is ...”

  “Please,” Henry whispered. “I’ll be right there.”

  “Hurry up.” Clutching the papers and his box, Danny took off running.

  Henry took a second to run his fingers through the grain of his wind-blown hair as he walked to Ellen. “How are you today?” Henry asked, begging in his mind that Ellen would answer him.

  “Good. How are you?”

  Henry hid his shocking gasp well. “I’m ... I’m good.”

  “Where are you running to?”

  “We have this invention we need Robbie to try. It’s pretty neat.”

  “That’s nice.” Ellen began to walk away.

  “You?”

  “Me what?” Ellen stopped walking.

  “Where are you headed?”

  Ellen’s eyes shifted to the clinic. “Here. I have blood to take and it’s beginning of the month so we have the Birth Control Hormones to inject. Boring stuff. I ... I really have to go.” She pointed with her thumb.

  “OK, so do I.”

  “Bye, Henry.”

  “El?” he called out to her. “Thank you. Thank you for saying ‘hi’.”

  “Thank Frank, Henry.”

  “Frank?”

  “Yeah. It was his doing.” She gave a half smile and walked to the clinic, not looking back.

  “Frank,” Henry spoke with a grin. “I have to really thank ... shit. Robbie.” With that thought, hearing the helicopter, he picked up speed and raced to catch up to Danny.

  <><><><>

  Henry saw the helicopter landing as he made it to the hangar building. With enthusiasm and a bit of nervousness, he ran inside. Danny was already there waiting. Frank and Joe stood with weapons and a team of four men, waiting for Robbie to come in. “Frank.” Henry smiled as soon as he saw him. “Frank.”

  “Yeah.” Frank looked up only in enough time to see the vision of Henry racing at him. Before Frank could say anything, he was greeted with a hug and a kiss to his cheek. “Uh! Henry, what the fuck?” He wiped off his cheek. “Why are you kissing me?” He heard the snickers of his men. “I don’t know what is up with the men in this community. First, Dean holds my hand last night, and now you kiss me this morning ... You guys want all that from me but both of you get mad when I’m near Ellen.”

  “Frank, thank you.”

  “For what?” Frank asked.

  “Ellen said ‘hi’ to me.”

  “No big deal, Henry.” Frank tried to walk by him.

  “No, Frank, it is a big deal. It is. Thank you.”

  “So did you come up here to kiss me or is there another reason for your and Danny’s visit?”

  “Oh yeah.” Henry grew even more excited. “We have this invention. In fact it will help you build the Beginnings Army.”

  “Great.” Frank nodded. “Share it with me later. I have an attack about to happen.”

  “No!” Henry stopped him. “I have to share it with
you now. Now, Frank. Joe!”

  Joe, who had been eavesdropping and avoiding getting involved, was forced to when he was called. “What, Henry, and don’t kiss me.”

  Henry snickered then started to explain, but before he could, Danny’s summon to him that Robbie was there, made him stop and run over to Robbie.

  Robbie expected to be pummeled when he walked in. He expected to hear Frank rambling on about the plan of action. He didn’t expect to be approached by two fast-rambling—talking at the same time—mechanically-inclined men, who really didn’t look alike when they stood side by side.

  “Hold it!” Joe shouted out, unable to take the un-interpretable chattering. “What the hell are you two up to?”

  Henry, out of breath, turned to him. “We have this thing, Joe, an invention of Danny’s and mine. We were working on the Dean thing. You know, and we came up with this. It’s amazing. It’s taken us longer than the Dean thing but it works, huh, Danny?”

  “We think so,” Danny added. “We need Robbie to try it. What it is, Joe ...” Danny pulled it out.

  Joe looked at it. “An aural thermometer.”

  “No. It’s called the Auralnator.” Danny laughed. “Great name. Anyhow, we just used the shell. It’s a stunning, descrambling device for the SUTs. You place it in the ear, press this button and it deprograms the SUT immediately, makes them drop like that.” Danny snapped.

  “You’re shitting me?” Joe looked closer at it. “We’ll have to try it someday, but now is not the time to be ...”

  “No.” Henry stopped him. “Now is the time. Frank needs more men, we can get them.”

  “Henry.” Joe didn’t want to argue. “We’d have to use the sneak-attack approach to make this work. They’re too close.”

  Robbie disagreed, “No way, it’s perfect. They’re relaxing. Come on, Dad. Let me try the thing.”

  “What happens if it doesn’t work?” Joe asked. “What happens if you sneak up behind one and zap them, and it doesn’t work?”

  “I’ll break their neck, so what. Let me at least get one. One,” Robbie pleaded. “Then we’ll pullback and take the rest out. Please.” He took the Auralnator. “It would be so cool.”

  Joe took a second. “Fine, one. We have everything ready for a ground move. And ...” Joe looked curiously at Henry. “If you’re running about inventing things, who the hell is running Mechanics?”

  “Uh ...” Henry pointed to Robbie. “Him, well he was.”

  “Robbie?” Joe asked with a raise to his voice. “Robbie is busy now. Last I heard, Mechanics was swamped.”

  Robbie shook his head. “Not anymore, I caught us up.”

  Though there wasn’t really time, everyone was shocked by this and looked, with silent faces, at Robbie.

  Joe spoke up, “You took care of it. Yesterday there were sixty-eight reqs left. You did sixty-eight repairs.”

  “Fuck no,” Robbie said. “I went to the source. They were all bogus. The women put them in to get Henry.” Robbie lifted his shoulder. “Anyhow this thing.” He looked at the Auralnator. “In the ear and press the button?”

  Henry nodded. “That’s it. It should drop them right there so we can reprogram them to what we need.”

  “Excellent.” Robbie gripped it tighter. “Wish me luck. See you in a few.” He stepped back. “Frank, escort us to the back, big bro, since you have to miss this one.”

  “Yeah.” Frank started walking out. “Henry, Danny, good job.”

  Joe, annoyed with the pleased faces of Danny and Henry, called out to Frank as he, Robbie, and the four men headed out, “Frank, make sure you tell them again, One SUT, then take them out with heavy artillery and Dean’s gas.”

  Danny nudged Henry with a snicker. “They’re using Dean’s gas as a weapon?”

  Henry started to laugh too. “That’s funny.”

  Both of them lost their smiles when Joe turned, with annoyance, at them.

  Joe shook his head, so disgusted, as he walked from the hangar. “Christ, what are we now? Twelve? Dean’s gas.” Another grunt and Joe left.

  Henry was quiet and then he started to laugh again at the same time as Danny. “I think it went good.”

  “Me too. They’re gonna use it,” Danny said proudly.

  “Shit, what if it doesn’t work?”

  “It will.”

  “It has to.”

  “Most definitely.” Henry bounced from heel to toe. “Wanna head to the basement and get the program ready.”

  “Might as well.”

  “Let’s go.” Making a sweep by the hangar table to gather the stack of notes that weren’t even viewed, Henry led Danny out, and back on track to the basement.

  <><><><>

  Between checkups, hormonal injections, and replacement of cervical covers, Andrea was a busy woman. Birth Control Days were always that way. Whether it was one woman coming for her every third-month shot, or the annual-August distribution of the Beginnings Diaphragm, it was hectic. What really bothered Andrea the most was that Josephine insisted on showing up on Birth Control Days. She always added pandemonium to the schedule and would fight with Andrea when Andrea refused her. Josephine insisted that if she was having sex, she could get pregnant. Arguing that point with Josephine wasn’t what bothered Andrea the most—it was the fact that she wanted to kill whoever was taking advantage of an eighty-some-year-old senile woman’s sexual promiscuity. To top off the hectic craziness of the day, the fuel-pump line-rupture on the corn-shucking machine, sprayed fuel into some of the workers’ eyes. Jason was busy handling those six men who needed their eyes flushed, and Andrea handled the clinic aspect alone. Where was Ellen?

  Andrea couldn’t wait. Ellen was already nearly a half-hour late. There were four women left to inject and one diaphragm fitting. Andrea supposed she could pull Dean in for the injections, filling the syringes for him. But he was busy creating the eyedrops for the injured men, not to mention, awaiting the results of the two throat cultures on the allergies-turned-strep cases. They had to be run and if positive, the strep cases, as usual, had to be handled immediately.

  So, Ellen was it. Andrea had to help Jason, and Ellen would just have to finish up. The checkups were completed, and all Ellen would have to do is give the injections according to the doses Andrea had indicated on their charts. Though Ellen hated to do it, she was quite capable of doing the internal examination on Catherine to measure her for the cervical cap. Settled.

  Figuring Ellen just got held up at Containment, Andrea grabbed the five charts and brought them with her to Dean’s lab. “Dean, I need you to ...” She stopped in the empty lab. Where was he? “Dean?” Her head turned to the hallway when she thought she heard a giggle. “Dean?” She called out, thinking he was doing his typical under the counter adjustments of something. “Dean-Dean.” As she went to leave, she heard a shuffling sound from the back of the lab. Taking a step toward it, the shuffling became a banging, then a thump, and finally had become the flinging-open of the back closet door. “Dean?”

  Looking so surprised and so hurried, Dean stepped out and pulled the door half closed. He stood there, fussing with his shoe, banging it and pressing it in small circles on the ground as if he were adjusting his foot better in the high top. His one hand tucked in his tee shirt, while the other ran frantically through his hair. “Andrea?”

  “Right here.”

  Dean moved his head to where the sound of her voice came from. “Hi.”

  “What in the world are you doing in there? Are you all right?”

  “Who me? Fine.” He cleared his throat and shifted his weight from one leg to the other. “I was uh ... uh ... looking for ... shit.” Dean banged his other foot and lifted his head with a smile. “Looking for something in there and damned if I couldn’t see it.”

  “Dean, you’re blind.”

  “Yeah and that made it pretty tricky.”

  “Need some help?”

  “No, no.” Dean shook his head. “I felt my way through it ... I’m uh good.”<
br />
  “Good.” Andrea smiled. “I’ve got to go help Jason. Dean, I have five more women left, four injections and one internal. Ellen is just gonna have to finish it up.”

  Surprising Andrea, Dean let out a loud, long grunting moan.

  “Something wrong?”

  “Cramp ... in my uh foot.”

  “Oh those get nasty. Anyhow, I’m leaving the folders for her on the counter by your computer.” Andrea’s voice faded as she started to walk out. “I know she got held up at Containment. Can you try to call her there to get her here pronto?”

  “Will do.” Dean leaned on the archway.

  “Thanks, Dean.”

  Listening to the clicking of her hard flat soles fade from the room, Dean let out a breath of relief when he heard the lab door close. “She’s gone, I think.”

  Ellen peeked her head out from the closet. After seeing that Andrea was gone, she laughed. “Close huh?”

  “Nah.” Feeling Ellen start to leave, Dean put his arm out on the doorway, stopping her, finding her, feeling her. Dean leaned into Ellen and kissed her.

  Pulling from the soft, long kiss, Ellen touched Dean’s face. “We’d better work and you’d better fix that hair.”

  “It’s not that bad, is it?”

  “Yeah.”

  “How bad?”

  “Bad.” Ellen tried to straighten it with her fingers, kissed him quickly, and then walked by him. “I have a brush in a drawer here.” She walked across the lab, slowing down when she saw the file folders Andrea left there. “I guess I should go see these patients.” She opened up the drawer and pulled out the brush. “I can’t believe she’s making me do an internal on someone.”

  “Yeah and I thought for sure Andrea was going to hear you moan about that.”

  “Thanks for making that noise to cover up.” Ellen finished brushing her hair and set down the brush. “I’m leaving the brush for you by the computer.”

  “Thanks.” Dean made his way there. “Do you want help?”

  “No, finish up what you’re doing so we can have that meeting with Joe.” Ellen looked through the folders. “Besides, there’s only ...” Her voice dropped. “Four.”