Chapter Thirty
Liber8tor traveled through time.
I stared gloomily out at the swirling spectrum of rainbow colors.
‘Cheer up,’ Chad said. ‘We just saved the world.’
I shook my head. ‘A guy named John just saved the world,’ I said. ‘We just helped.’
A tiny dot appeared at the end of the tunnel. I breathed in, and then we were flying out of it into the light of a clear blue sky.
‘Yes!’ Chad yelled.
Even I had to smile as the city of New York spread out beneath us. At a glance, it looked like the same place we’d grown to know and love: a pollution-clogged, traffic-jammed metropolis. The devastation of the alternate future was gone.
But was everything else back to normal?
‘Ferdy!’ I yelled. ‘We made it.’
Silence.
‘He’s still offline,’ Chad said.
I rechecked the onboard systems. The ship seemed to be working fine, but Ferdy’s system seemed to be out of action.
‘Everything else looks okay,’ I said. ‘Maybe something’s wrong with the ship.’
‘Check to see if you can contact the others?’ Chad asked. ‘Let’s make certain we’re back in the right era and that the Nazis didn’t win the war or the Kennedy assassination didn’t happen.’
I tentatively put a call through to Brodie on the Liber8tor channel. A few seconds passed and then—
‘Axel?’ her voice came back. ‘Is that you?’
Chad and I broke into whoops so loud the entire ship shook. We flew back to The Bronx and, within minutes, were meeting up with the others in The Agency’s underground garage. Dan, Ebony, and Brodie came racing over. What ensued wasn’t so much a welcome as it was complete chaos. It took five minutes to calm down, but we finally sobered enough to have an orderly conversation.
‘How did you get out of the hive?’ Brodie asked.
That was a long story in itself. ‘We’ll explain,’ I said. ‘But what’s its current status?’
She and the others explained that The Agency was still trying to work out a safe way in. I put a call through to Mister Brown and told them to stop doing whatever they were attempting. It was too dangerous.
‘Glad you contacted us,’ Mister Brown said. ‘We weren’t getting anywhere. We were about to send a probe through, but I doubt we’d ever get it back.’
I briefly explained the time distortion effect of the hive. ‘Once you get in, it’s almost impossible to get back out.’
We headed to one of the meeting rooms, where I explained what had happened inside the hive in more detail. I also told the others about our journey to the past. They were amazed when I told them about seeing Twelve again.
‘I did too,’ Dan said.
He told us about his adventure involving the retrieval of the third book and reader. I frowned in concentration.
‘There’s a third book?’ I said.
‘That is true, friend Axel,’ Ferdy’s voice came over our wristcoms. ‘All three books and readers are required for decoding.’
‘You’re back online?’ Chad said.
‘Ferdy was never offline.’
I frowned. ‘Ferdy,’ I said. ‘Your system on Liber8tor was offline. We tried communicating with you but got no response.’
He replied after a pause. ‘There does seem to be an error in the Liber8tor communication systems,’ he said. ‘Ferdy is unsure what is causing it.’
‘Maybe something went wrong with all that time traveling business,’ Dan said.
I felt guilty. Harming Ferdy—or even Liber8tor unintentionally—wasn’t something I’d ever want.
‘We’d better take a look,’ I said.
We headed down to the basement where the ship sat. Settling into the cockpit, Dan examined the displays. He ran a few tests and restarted the engine several times. Finally, he turned back to us, frowning.
‘I wish I knew more about this,’ he said. ‘It looks like there’s a firewall blocking the Liber8tor software system.’
‘A firewall?’ Brodie said.
‘It’s hard to say. Either that or a virus. It’s stopping inward and onward communication with the onboard version of Ferdy.’
The engines started.
‘What’s happening?’ Ebony asked.
Dan looked about in confusion. ‘I don’t know.’
‘I’ll contact the version of Ferdy back in The Agency,’ Brodie said.
She tried contacting him as Liber8tor abruptly took off and headed for the exit. Seconds later, we were airborne over New York and heading straight up.
‘He’s not answering,’ Brodie said.
‘Our wristcoms aren’t working either,’ Ebony said.
Chad’s eyes met mine. ‘What’s going on?’ he asked. ‘This makes no sense.’
The ship accelerated high above the city. Then it put on an additional burst of speed and angled upwards again. Dan struggled with the controls.
‘Nothing’s working!’ he said.
‘Something must have happened to the ship during all that time traveling,’ I said. ‘The whole system’s gone crazy.’
Liber8tor continued high into the atmosphere. Soon the world lay below us like a map. The sky above slowly transitioned from cobalt blue to indigo and then slowly to black. From here, the atmosphere clung to the planet like layers of paint. Space beyond was crisp and infinite, the sun hanging in it like a tiny flare. Looking at it was painful to the eye.
What are we doing here?
The intercom clicked.
‘Enjoying the view?’
The voice came across Liber8tor’s speaker system. We looked at each other in confusion.
‘Who is that?’ Chad demanded.
‘An old friend,’ the voice said. ‘It must be so lovely for humans when you encounter old friends. The years pass and—as Shakespeare once said— friendship is constant in all things. You meet up again, and it must be like curling up before an open fire.’
There was something about the voice that was oddly familiar.
Who is it?
‘Of course,’ the voice continued. ‘All things must end. Friendships. Loves. Hates. Humans live such brief lives.’
Humans.
‘Oh no,’ I gasped.
It’s not possible.
‘How can you be alive?’ I asked. ‘You’re dead.’
‘Bakari can die, but we are hard to kill.’
Brodie spoke. ‘Bakari? What do you mean—’
‘Of course,’ the voice said. ‘You best know me as Twelve.’
Chapter Thirty-One
Twelve.
This wasn’t possible. Twelve was dead. We’d dropped a ton of molten metal on him. We’d seen him in the alternate timeline, but time had reverted back to normal when we returned. The Twelve of this timeline—our timeline—was dead. He’d been dead for a year.
‘We killed you,’ Dan said. ‘You’re dead.’
‘Life takes us down some interesting rabbit holes,’ Twelve said, his voice ringing through the cabin. ‘I must confess to feeling some satisfaction at your level of confusion. You must be amazed at my remarkable survival.’
‘All right,’ I said. ‘I’ll bite. How can you be alive? We turned you into a statue.’
‘Oh, yes.’ Twelve’s voice became very soft. ‘Yes, you did. You poured molten metal over me, sentencing me to death. That would have killed anyone—even a Bakari—but I had some foresight from a world you refer to as Earth-B about what my future held.’
I stared at Chad. Earth-B? How could Twelve know anything about the other timeline? That was impossible, unless…
Piece by piece, the puzzle came together. It wasn’t fast, but over the space of the next few seconds, realization dawned on me about what had happened.
‘It was when Chad and I went to Earth-B,’ I said, slowly. ‘We left Liber8tor in The Cavern. It had already been repaired by then. The Twelve of that world must have already had a supply of francium. He used it to fly L
iber8tor back in time one year to Earth-A. There, he contacted that version of himself and told him what lay ahead. The Earth-B version then returned one year in the future before disabling Ferdy onboard Liber8tor. That’s why he stopped working.’ I stopped. ‘But if you knew what was going to happen, why allow yourself to be killed?’
‘But he wasn’t killed,’ Brodie said, nodding to the speaker system. ‘Obviously.’
‘I took precautions,’ Twelve said. ‘I could have changed history, but I’m wise enough to know when to leave things be. I injected my body with an agent that allowed me to survive the molten metal. It put me into a state of hibernation. And so I slept, locked in my metal suit, for the day when I could awaken again.’
‘That must have been a boring wait,’ Chad said. ‘No television, computer games, internet…’
‘I awoke once more when Dan retrieved the reader from my body,’ Twelve said. ‘But before that, I dreamt of hate. I dreamt of a time when I could make you pay for what you did.’
‘So why are we here?’ I asked.
‘To die,’ Twelve replied. ‘I thought I’d make contact with you before that happened. After all, it’s important to celebrate our successes. Don’t you think?’
‘Axel!’ Dan yelled. ‘We’re getting a build-up in the power relays. I think the ship’s—’
Ka-boom!
Then there was an explosion of light and a shockwave as Liber8tor exploded. The debris flew out from the blast in all directions as cold, dark space closed in around us. The full sweep of the earth lay below, bathed in the harsh rays of the distant sun. Beyond it lay space, a black night without end. Anyone else would have been killed instantly by the explosion, but I had an advantage that normal humans didn’t.
‘Axel?’ Ebony said as we floated about in space.
‘I created an air shield around us at the last moment,’ I said. ‘We’re okay.’
‘You sure about that, buddy?’ Chad said. ‘Things aren’t looking so good to me.’
We were spread about fifty feet apart from each other. I cast my eyes across the group. We were all still alive. My shield had saved us all from destruction and contained enough air to survive—for now.
Suspended over the planet, I peered down at the vast sweep of North America. It was a hundred miles below us, but we had no ship and no way to get back to Earth. I’d saved us from immediate death, but there was little more I could do.
The cold was terrible. Shocking. I dreaded to think what the radiation would be like out here. Long term exposure to it without a spacesuit would kill us. Of course, there were plenty of other things that could kill us in the meantime. Lack of air was one of them.
‘How are we going to survive?’ Dan asked, his frightened eyes darting between me and the planet. ‘How will we get back to Earth?’
I had to be honest. ‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘I’m out of ideas.’
We hung in the cold vacuum of space, a tiny bubble of air separating us from certain death. The Earth wasn’t that far away—it filled most of our field of view—but it might as well have been a million miles away.
‘We have to stick together,’ Brodie said. ‘Don’t give up.’
A tear slid down Ebony’s cheek. ‘But…we don’t have a ship,’ she said. ‘Nothing. We’re stuck in space!’
Brodie’s voice was calm and clear as she spoke. ‘That makes no difference,’ she said. ‘We need to work together. That’s how we’ve succeeded in the past. It’s how we’ll succeed now.’
Swallowing, I felt a sensation of immense relief that she was here.
‘Now,’ Brodie said. ‘Let’s think. We need to get back to Earth. How are we going to do that?’
‘First things first,’ Chad said. ‘We need air.’
‘And protection,’ Dan added. ‘It’s freezing out here, and the radiation will kill us.’
‘Axel,’ Ebony said. ‘Can you bring us all together? Any plan has got to involve getting us together first.’
‘I can do that,’ Dan offered. ‘I’ll focus on the metal in our clothing and carefully bring us closer.’
Bit by bit, inch by inch, he pulled the five of us closer to each other until our hands were touching. Gripping Brodie and Chad immediately made me feel better. A look of relief crossed Chad’s face.
‘Great getting the band back together,’ he said.
‘Don’t expect any music,’ Ebony said. ‘I’m no singer.’
Dan continued. ‘There’s a section of the hull over there,’ he said. ‘Axel, I can drag that over. Maybe I can form it into a makeshift vessel.’
‘Do it,’ I said.
Using his powers, Dan dragged over the biggest remaining section of the hull. The part was essentially what used to be the rear of the vessel. We’d been lucky it hadn’t been blown too far away. Dan now used his powers to mold the outer metal until we were enclosed in a thin metal sphere about twenty feet across. There was no window, so we were completely closed in, and the sound echoed eerily about the interior. Still, it was better than being stuck out in the void with the earth below us.
‘It’s thin,’ Dan said. ‘And not very strong.’
‘I can add to it,’ Ebony said and focused on increasing the metal’s thickness. ‘I’ve added about six inches of titanium all around. That’s enough to keep us free of radiation.’
‘And the cold,’ Brodie added.
‘It was getting chilly out there,’ Ebony agreed. ‘I’m also creating air by making oxygen and nitrogen.’
‘This is great,’ Chad said. ‘If we’d bought a chessboard with us, we could have had a game.’
Brodie shook her head. ‘Why didn’t we pack one?’
‘Games will have to wait,’ I said. ‘Now, we need to work out how to get back to earth.’
And no one had an answer to that.
Chapter Thirty-Two
We spent a moment deep in thought.
‘We need a rocket,’ Brodie said.
‘I left mine at home with the chessboard,’ Dan said.
Chad nodded. ‘I can produce heat,’ he said. ‘And flame. But that’ll use up our air pretty quickly.’
‘Producing those elements is easy,’ Ebony said. ‘As well as our fuel.’
‘Which is?’ I said.
‘Hydrogen. It’s highly combustible—the one used for airships in the old days.’
‘Like the Hindenburg?’ Brodie said. ‘The one that exploded in New Jersey in 1937?’
Chad nodded thoughtfully. ‘Ebony,’ he said. ‘If we create a hole at the rear of this sphere, can you fire hydrogen out the back? I can ignite it—’
‘—to form a rudimentary rocket,’ Ebony said. ‘This will take a lot of focus. I’ve got to keep producing oxygen and nitrogen as well as a supply of hydrogen.’
‘Plus, we’ve got to see where we’re going,’ Dan said. ‘We need a hole in the front to look through.’
Good, I thought. We’re working together. Our chances of survival just went from zero to something in double digits.
‘Okay,’ Ebony said. ‘First, I’ll reshape this thing to be more like an ellipse—so it’s more rocket-shaped.’ The metal sphere groaned as it was reformed into a rudimentary elliptical shape. It wasn’t perfect, but it would suffice. Then she pointed to one end. ‘I’m creating a hole. I don’t know which way is up or down now.’
I said I’d keep the air bubble intact.
She created the hole, giving us a clear view of the Earth before us, then transformed the hole into thick glass. Ebony then created another hole at the opposite end. ‘That’ll be our rocket,’ she said. ‘I’m starting the flow of hydrogen at that end. Chad, the next part is up to you.’
Nothing seemed to change for a moment as Chad pointed to the rear. Then a small spurt of flame appeared in the gap. Peering out the window, Dan searched for some sign that we were moving.
He gave an excited yell. ‘That’s it!’ he said. ‘We’re moving. I don’t know how fast, but we’re moving.’
�
��Just keep doing what you’re doing,’ I said to Chad and Ebony.
The minutes passed. A line of sweat ran down my face.
Is it my imagination, or is it getting hot in here?
I mentioned this to the others.
‘I think we’re at the upper reaches of the atmosphere,’ Brodie said. ‘We’ve got to re-enter at exactly the right angle, or we risk bouncing off into space.’
My hand touched Brodie, and I stared into her eyes. At that moment, despite the craziness of everything, I felt a deep, enduring love for her.
‘Brodie,’ I said.
‘I know.’
‘What?’
‘I feel the same way.’
Dan turned back from the window. ‘Angle us down,’ he said to Chad. ‘Er, I mean so the front of the ship is lower.’
Chad did this. More minutes passed. Our makeshift ship was still getting hotter, and now there was smoke at the front window.
‘Chad,’ Brodie said. ‘We need you to handle the heat on the outside.’
He nodded without replying. Both he and Ebony were so wholly focused on their jobs they couldn’t do anything else. Soon smoke was pouring past our makeshift window. My hand hit the sidewall, and soon I was plastered against it as were the others. I suddenly felt ten pounds heavier.
‘What’s happening?’ Brodie asked in panic.
‘It’s gravity!’ I said and felt like cheering.
We were falling toward the planet.
Despite Chad’s efforts, the heat continued to build up in the ship. Soon we were all pressed against one side of the vessel.
The exertion was clear on Ebony’s face. ‘I…can’t keep this up much longer…’
‘We’re ditching this ship,’ I said. ‘Ebony, get ready to keep supplying oxygen and nitrogen. Chad, you’ll have to disperse any residual heat around the ship.’
Chad nodded. ‘I’m turning out the flame,’ he said.
‘Cutting off the hydrogen,’ Ebony said.
‘I’m reforming the air bubble around us,’ I said. ‘Chad?’
‘I’ll continue to disperse the heat. Otherwise, we’ll burn up.’
I told everyone to hold hands. ‘Get ready,’ I said. ‘Counting down. Three. Two. One. Now!’
Teen Superheroes Box Set | Books 1-7 Page 108
