by Lisa McMann
Ms. Sabbith proceeded to pick up the ladybug and put it in the cardinal’s beak. Then she opened the window a few inches—as far as it would go—and slid the cardinal out. She set it on the ledge and left it there, then went back to the computer to make the drone fly through the evening toward the top floor of the bank building.
Mac watched intently everything she was doing. Ms. Sabbith landed the bird on the middle windowsill of one of the three lit-up windows that had its shade drawn, then carefully maneuvered it to deposit the ladybug onto the sill. Then she made the ladybug walk up the edge of the window frame to a spot where the shade was torn, which gave her a good view into the room. With a few quick keystrokes Ms. Sabbith directed the ladybug cam to be displayed on the big screen, and it showed an empty laboratory with several stations and high-tech equipment. “Aha,” she said. “Now we’re getting somewhere. Still no biologist, though.”
By now Mac had pulled up a chair next to Ms. Sabbith, who was fast becoming his new hero. “Doesn’t the ladybug fly?” he asked.
“Yes, but I didn’t want to risk it—it’s windy and dark and she’s so tiny.”
Mac nodded thoughtfully.
Leaving the ladybug in its prime spot, Ms. Sabbith took the cardinal controls and flew the bird to a tall palm tree that bordered the parking lot at the back of the bank building. She pointed the bird’s camera at the back door that the soldiers had used. Then she set the bird to rotate its head every ten seconds to scan the parking lot before turning back to the door. “Okay. The cardinal is in place. Now for the dragonfly.”
Ms. Sabbith sent the dragonfly out the window and flying to the top of the building and out of sight. “Hit Control-Shift-Plus for me, will you, Mac?”
“Sure,” said Mac. He did it, and a light from the dragonfly began pinging on the screen.
“That’ll help us find a way inside.”
Mac nodded and sat up straight, inching his chair closer to Ms. Sabbith’s. He watched every keystroke command the woman made, no doubt memorizing it. Charlie could tell he was itching to do more. She and Maria exchanged a smile as they watched him silently geek out.
Ms. Sabbith was quiet for a moment, concentrating hard on landing the dragonfly exactly where she wanted it.
“There’s a vent!” Mac said.
“Yep,” said Ms. Sabbith. “Good eye, kid. Good eye.”
Mac grinned. Ms. Sabbith crawled the dragonfly over the flat roof to the vent and slowly let it flutter down inside it.
Andy, who’d been mesmerized, spoke up. “Why is there a hole in the roof? Doesn’t the rain get inside?”
“It lets the heat out. There’s a tented cap over the space and our dragonfly is just small enough to crawl under it. So generally no rain can get inside. It’s hard to see how that works in the dark, though.” She shifted in her chair and squinted at the screen. “This is going to take a while,” she told the kids. “And it’ll probably be boring.”
Mrs. Wilde, who had been helping Dr. Sharma sort through the files she’d brought, looked up. When she saw the monitors were working, she came over. Her face was strained as she waited for evidence of her missing husband. “Since it’s going to be a bit before Ms. Sabbith finds anything, maybe you kids should get your homework done. Don’t you have a test, Charlie?”
“Yeah,” Charlie said. She didn’t mention that she actually had two tests the next day. And she didn’t feel like studying.
“I’ll let you know when I find something exciting,” Ms. Sabbith promised.
The four kids reluctantly left the area and went to the table where they’d had dinner to pull out their homework. “At least tomorrow’s our last day of school for a while,” said Mac.
Charlie could hardly keep track of what day it was. Everything was messed up. She started studying some notes from her English class but her mind wandered back to her school day, and she began wondering again where the Talos Global envelope could be. Had she left it in theater class? She remembered seeing it when she’d put away her script of the new musical they were going to do. She looked up quickly. “Oh, Mom—I forgot to tell you our final musical for the school year is going to be The Sound of Music.”
“Nice choice,” said Mrs. Wilde.
“Is Kelly playing the lead?” asked Maria.
“We haven’t had auditions yet—they’re not until Monday after spring break. But probably.”
They chatted a little more about school as they worked. Their conversation was strained as they tried to act normal, and they all kept looking over at the screens, hoping to catch a glimpse of Mr. Wilde—he just had to be there.
Just when Mrs. Wilde was ready to call it a night and head home, Ms. Sabbith muttered under her breath. “Annnd . . . we’re in. Where, I’m not sure. But we’re somewhere above the ceiling on the ninth floor.” The screen lightened up considerably, and she maneuvered the dragonfly to rest on the air vent grate. Then she tipped the dragonfly forward so it could look down into the room, being careful not to let him fall through. It panned the area.
Ms. Sabbith stopped it abruptly when the monitor showed something moving. She focused and sucked in a breath. “Diana,” she said, turning to the woman, “I think we found him.”
Everyone came running over to the monitors. Charlie’s mom leaned forward and gasped.
The dragonfly cam zoomed in and focused on two men who were tied to chairs and looking beat up.
One of them was Charlie’s father.
CHAPTER 17
The Non-Rescue Plan
“Dad!” cried Charlie and Andy together.
“Charles!” cried their mom.
Everyone stared in horror at the two prisoners. “What did they do to them?” asked Maria. “Your dad is all beat up.”
“Who’s that other guy?” asked Mac. The second man’s face was in the shadows, and his body was thin and weak-looking.
Dr. Sharma came over too, and peered more closely. Her expression darkened. “Just as I feared. It’s Jack.” She put her hand to her forehead and turned around, like she couldn’t believe what she was seeing. Then she turned back to the screen. “That’s Dr. Jack Goldstein. And clearly he’s not in Peru.” She shook her head. “He’s practically emaciated. They must have had him all this time.”
Everyone gathered around to get a closer look. “Can we go in and get them?” asked Mrs. Wilde. “It doesn’t look like anybody else is in there.”
Ms. Sabbith made the dragonfly pivot, showing a soldier at the door. “I think we need to assess a few things before we rush in.” There was a desk in the room, but no one was sitting there at the moment.
“One step at a time,” agreed Dr. Sharma. “Let’s see our scientists again. Erica, can you zoom in on Charles’s face?”
Ms. Sabbith did so. Though the picture was grainy, they could make out a few scabbed-over cuts and bruises.
“Those bruises look a few days old,” said Charlie’s mom. “No fresh ones that I can see.”
“So?” asked Charlie. Andy just stared at their father. His bottom lip trembled.
“So that means they’re not currently getting assaulted,” said Mrs. Wilde. “Or at least they haven’t been probably since Tuesday when they abducted Charles.”
“Logically, then,” said Ms. Sabbith, “it follows that they’re somehow complying with Dr. Gray’s wishes.”
“But my dad would never help a bad person like Dr. Gray,” said Charlie.
“Yeah,” said Andy tearfully.
“Unless Gray threatened him,” said Dr. Sharma. “Whatever the case, we still have no idea how many soldiers are here and what they’re doing. Our plan for now is to watch them for a while. If either of the scientists look like they’re in serious danger, we’ll drop everything and figure out a way to go in. But if they are not being tortured—beyond this, anyway—we need to sit tight and observe. Figure out when Dr. Gray and the soldiers are most vulnerable. We also need to know exactly what Dr. Gray is up to and what he’s capable of.”
�
��I just want this to be over,” said Mrs. Wilde.
Dr. Sharma put a hand on her arm. “Respectfully, Diana, I know how much you want your husband safe and home again. We all want that. And that will happen. But we’re dealing with unknown factors here. What we know from Charlie and her friends is that there are at least six soldiers, which means we’re outnumbered. So we need to gather more information and come up with a plan. And while we obviously want to put an end to this whole project, our first priority is to get Charles and Jack out of there safely. So for now we wait and watch without them detecting us, and go from there.” She paused. “Does that make sense?”
Slowly Charlie’s mom nodded. “Yes,” she said quietly. She put her hands on her children’s shoulders.
“But my dad will be safe, right?” asked Andy.
“Yes, I believe he will be.” Dr. Sharma gave Andy a reassuring smile, but he still looked troubled. “That’s why we’ve got to do this right the first time.” She straightened up, then said to Mrs. Wilde, “And now maybe you and the children ought to head home. Tomorrow we should have all the cameras placed where we want them and the microphones on the dragonfly and roach working.”
“I can help,” said Mrs. Wilde. “Just let me know what you need me to do.”
“Great. Get some sleep and we’ll talk in the morning. I’ll alert you immediately if anything changes.”
Ms. Sabbith looked at Mrs. Wilde. “You can be sure we’ll have our cameras on your husband and Dr. Goldstein as much as possible.” She went to a different table, calling out, “Quinn, I’ve got the blueprints of the bank building. Let’s get to work.”
Dr. Sharma flashed a grin and joined her.
Mrs. Wilde took one last look at her husband and Jack on the screen, then she swallowed hard and herded the children to pick up their things so they could go home.
Andy was quiet for most of the ride. When it was just the three of them left, he said, “Dad looked really bad all tied up and with those bruises. Do you think those soldiers are going to hurt him again? I don’t like it.” He sniffled and whined. “Why can’t we just go in there and rescue him?”
“Oh, honey,” said Mrs. Wilde, reaching back between the seats to give his leg a reassuring squeeze. “I wish you hadn’t seen that. Your dad is going to be just fine. I promise. We’re . . . we’re going to get him out of there. We just have to wait a little bit.”
“Don’t worry, buddy,” Charlie said, even though she was worried too. “We found him. That’s the first step.” But she couldn’t get the image of her dad tied to that chair out of her head either. It was disturbing enough for her—it was probably even worse for Andy, who didn’t seem to be handling this whole mess very well. And what if things didn’t quite go the way Dr. Sharma expected? The soldiers were violent. Charlie knew that well enough.
After Andy went to bed, Charlie and her mom stayed up a little longer; Charlie to study some more for her tests the next day, and her mother to sit quietly with her troubled thoughts and a cup of tea. After a while Mrs. Wilde nodded to herself and picked up her phone, then went into another room to make a call.
As Charlie packed up her homework and headed upstairs, she overheard her mom say, “Hola, Alejandra, it’s Diana Wilde, Andy’s mom. Is Juan still interested in having Andy go camping with you?”
On Friday morning Charlie, Andy, and their mom all ate breakfast together. Mrs. Wilde looked a little less tired than she had the past couple of mornings. Charlie had slept better too, knowing her dad had been found. And though his condition was certainly concerning, Charlie hoped her mom was right about the injuries starting to heal—maybe there wouldn’t be any more.
Mrs. Wilde sat down at the table next to Andy. “I talked to Juan’s mother last night after you went to bed,” she said brightly. “They’d still love to have you go with them on their trip. I think it might be fun.”
Andy, mouth full of cereal, looked at her. A drip of milk leaked from the corner of his lips, and he hurried to wipe it away with his sleeve. He chewed quickly, then said, “But I need to stay here with you because of Dad.”
Mrs. Wilde glanced at Charlie, then back at Andy. “Well, we know where he is now. And there’s no sense in all of us having a boring spring break. Right, Charlie?”
Charlie nodded. “I wish my friends were going somewhere cool so I could go with them. But their parents all have to stay home and work.” She tried to look nonchalant. “I’d go if I were you, but that’s just me.”
Andy tilted his head thoughtfully. He took another bite.
“You wouldn’t be far away,” said Mrs. Wilde. “Just a few hours’ drive. You could let us know if there are any cool places for us to go as a family once we’re all back together.”
“And,” added Charlie, “we can keep you updated about what’s going on. If we need you, Mom can drive up and get you.”
Andy considered the option for another minute as he finished his breakfast, then a small smile played on his lips. “It would be fun,” he said. “They’re going to be camping and hiking and stuff.” He pushed his chair back. “Are you sure you don’t need me, Mom?”
“I think now that Dr. Sharma and Ms. Sabbith found Dad, we can take it from here. I’d really like you to go. You deserve some fun. You’re a kid, after all.”
“But I’m not packed or anything. They’re leaving tonight.” Andy grew concerned.
“I’ll help you get ready after school,” said Charlie. “It’ll only take a few minutes.”
Andy’s face lit up. “Okay,” he said. “Yeah, I’ll go.” He whipped out his cell phone. “Can I tell Juan?”
“Sure,” said Mrs. Wilde. She grinned at Charlie as Andy texted excitedly.
Charlie grinned back, but then her smile faded. She knew why her mom didn’t want Andy around. She was worried about what he’d see on the monitors. She was worried about trouble. Maybe even danger. Charlie hoped they wouldn’t have to deal with any of that. But the thought of it made her put her push her cereal bowl away. She wasn’t hungry anymore.
Charlie left for school early so she could look for the Talos Global envelope. She checked the Lost and Found table in the office, but it wasn’t there. Mr. Anderson was sitting behind the office counter, just as he had been on Charlie’s first day of school, working intently on something.
“Hi, Mr. Anderson,” she said. Today he wore a brown Hawaiian shirt with pineapples all over it, and he wasn’t wearing his bolo tie.
Her drama teacher looked up over his half-glasses and smiled. “Good morning, Charlie.”
“You didn’t happen to find a big envelope with a bunch of papers inside it in the auditorium yesterday after sixth period, did you?”
“No, I’m sorry, I haven’t seen it.”
“Thanks.” Charlie turned to go.
“Good luck,” said Mr. Anderson.
Next she peeked into her seventh-period classroom but didn’t see it anywhere. She traced her steps to the PE building and checked her locker there, but it was empty. The envelope was nowhere to be found. Frustrated, Charlie let out a deep sigh. The code that would’ve allowed her to deactivate Defense Mode and try out Battle Mode had been at her fingertips, and now it was gone. But she was also worried about losing these top secret documents. Granted, anybody just glancing at the papers would likely have no clue what they were actually looking at, but if someone decided to really dive in . . . well, that could be a big problem.
After Charlie left the locker room empty handed, she spotted Maria outside the main entrance walking into the schoolyard. She went to meet her. Maria was wearing jeans and a long-sleeve top with a bright yellow lightweight scarf tied jauntily at her neck. She pointed to it and explained, “Just in case I need to go full-on Sister Maria because of you-know-what.”
“Nice one,” said Charlie. “Sister Maria. The Sound of Music. You should try out—the nun costumes would cover your beard and tail, I’ll bet.”
Maria flashed her a quizzical look. “What are you talking about?”
Charlie was confused too. “Weren’t you talking about Sister Maria from The Sound of Music? The musical we’re going to do? She, like, becomes a nun and wears a habit thing.”
“No, I’m talking about me Maria. Looking like a nun except with this scarf instead of a habit. And there’s no way I’m trying out for anything—I’m no actor. I’d rather read a comic book any day.”
“You’re sort of acting out the life of a comic book hero right now, aren’t you?”
“Well, I’m not one.”
Charlie put a hand on her hip. “That’s almost exactly what I said to you last week. And you told me I had responsibilities.”
“Aw, shut up, Chuck,” Maria said with a small grin. “At least you look normal.” Her face grew troubled.
Charlie laughed. “Yeah, sure. Running seventy miles an hour down the sidewalk looks really normal. But I get it.”
Maria dropped her gaze and spoke quietly. “You can’t possibly get what this is like for me.”
Charlie blinked. She of all people could relate to what Maria was going through. “What are you talking about?”
“At least when your bracelet kicks in, it doesn’t change your appearance, Charlie. I can’t control this, and I don’t have a clue when it’s going to happen again. It’s scary. I’m . . . I’m, like, really stressed out about it. And . . .” Maria clenched her jaw and blinked tears away.
Charlie’s heart flooded with concern for her friend. “And what?” she asked.
“And . . . when it happens, I look like one of them. The bad guys. I look like a monster. A freak.” She waved a hand in front of her face to ward off the tears. “I don’t even dare to cry. What if that sets it off?”
Charlie was quiet, thinking things through. She had thought she’d understood at least some of what Maria was going through. But now she considered it from Maria’s perspective. What if Charlie had actually taken on the physical features of the animals from her bracelet? How horrible would it be to grow fur like a cheetah when the speed ability kicked in, or sprout an elephant trunk out of her face when her strength was activated? That would be disastrous.
