Brainboy and the Deathmaster (13 page)

“Get in front,” BJ said.

“In your dreams.”

“Fine, take the back.”

But Boris soon popped out of the rear seat. “I won’t be able to see a freakin’ thing with a big mother like you in front of me.”

BJ steadied the craft while Boris shifted to the front. “So you’ve been in one of these guys before?” Boris said, looking over his shoulder.

“Nah. But how hard can it be?”

They soon found out, nearly capsizing as BJ climbed in. The kayak was incredibly unstable. And when they finally managed to start paddling, they went around in a circle.

“Listen, Boris,” BJ said, lifting his paddle out of the water. “You row on the starboard side. I’ll row on the port.”

“How come you get port?”

“Okay, you take port. I’ll take starboard.”

“Which is port?”

“You don’t know?”

“You think I’m in the freakin’ navy?”

BJ knew of port and starboard from books, but the truth was, he wasn’t sure either. “Port’s right,” he guessed. “Starboard’s left.”

They set off, Boris paddling on the right, BJ on the left. But Boris’s natural stroke was quick and jerky, while BJ’s was slow and smooth, so their progress was fitful, and they ended up moving in a rightward arc. When they nearly hit a sailfish, BJ lifted his paddle again.

“Hey, man, we got to synchronize.”

“What’s that?” Boris said warily.

“Paddle in time with each other. I’ll go faster, you go slower.”

But that didn’t work either. They still arced to the right.

“Maybe we got to shift back and forth,” BJ said. “Maybe that’s how come the paddles have the oar things on both ends. You start on port, I’ll start on the starboard. Then we switch every stroke.”

Though Boris complained bitterly when BJ splashed him, this approach worked better, and they managed to
negotiate the channel that led from Portage Bay out to Lake Washington. On the lake the water soon turned choppy.

“We better go under the floating bridge while we can,” BJ said.

“Why?”

“We’re on the leeward side.”

“What’s that?”

“The side where the waves are. The other side’s windward.”

BJ wasn’t sure about this terminology either, but Boris didn’t challenge it. The floating bridge was on pontoons, so a boat could pass under it only near shore, where it rose up on stilts. Once they paddled through to the south side, the water was glassy, and as they got into a rhythm, BJ actually began to enjoy being out on the lake with the sun on his face. Boris seemed to enjoy it, too—till they’d been paddling about half an hour.

“This is whacked,” he suddenly declared. “We should’ve ripped off that speedboat. My arms are about to fall off.”

“It’s good exercise.”

“You got twenty pounds on me. I got to work that much harder.”

“You’re fourteen. I’m not even thirteen yet.”

This shut Boris up. But the truth was BJ’s arms were aching, too, and by the time they passed between the stilts on the east end of the bridge, he was thinking they should have taken the bus across the floating bridge and rented a kayak on this side.

All such regrets flew out of his head when they rounded Evergreen Point. “Wow,” he said, gaping at the lakefront mansion he’d seen pictures of in magazines.

“How’d you like to have to mow that lawn!” Boris cried. “Look, tennis courts!”

“And check out the helipad!”

“Jeez, you could park a friggin’ aircraft carrier at that dock. I don’t see Nina, though.”

“Or Darryl.”

“Maybe they’re inside beating each other’s brains out at GameMaster.”

As they paddled toward the dock, they clunked up against a log floating just beneath the water’s surface, but the kayak bounced off it unharmed. They were still a good football field from the edge of the property when a Jet Ski swooshed up alongside them.

“Cove’s private,” barked the driver, a beefy man in a dark-red uniform, his eyes hidden by mirrored aviator glasses.

“We’re visiting the Masterlys,” BJ said.

“They expecting you?”

“Well, I’m a friend of Darryl Kirby And this here’s Nina Rizniak’s brother.”

“
Who?
”

“Darryl Kirby.”

“And Nina Rizniak,” Boris piped up.

“Never heard of them,” the guard said.

“But … are you sure they don’t live here?” BJ said.

“What are they? Gardeners? Housekeepers?”

“They’re kids,” BJ said. “Our age. I think Mr. Masterly adopted them. Can’t we at least ask him?”

“Not if you don’t have an appointment.”

“But—”

“Sorry, boys. The Masterlys don’t go in for sight-seers.”

“But we paddled all the way across the friggin’ lake!” Boris cried. “Can’t we even rest on the dock a minute?”

“Like I said, it’s private property.”

Already red in the face from all the sun and exertion, Boris went almost purple.

“Let’s go,” BJ murmured, turning the bow of the kayak back out into the lake.

But Boris refused to do any paddling, and after a minute or two BJ stopped, too.

“I’m dying of thirst,” Boris muttered.

“So am I.”

“I’m hungry, too.”

“Me, too.”

Drifting along, they heard a roar and swiveled around. A boat sped out of the private cove, driven by another man in a dark-red uniform, pulling a water-skier who looked about eighteen, very tan, his sun-bleached hair whipping in the wind.

“It must be Keith Jr.,” BJ said. “If he falls, maybe we could rescue him.”

“He doesn’t look like he’s gonna fall, man.”

Boris was right. The powerful boat and expert slalom skier shot past them. When they got out into the choppier water past the end of Evergreen Point, the boat looped back, the skier jumping the wake and sending arches of spray into the afternoon sunlight.

“When they come by, jump in and wave for help,” BJ said. “He’ll have to stop.”

“Why me?”

“You’re white. You’ll stand out better against the water.”

“No way, man.”

“Come on, it’s our only chance!”

“No way.”

This time the boat nearly clipped the kayak, and they took on buckets of water. While they were bailing
with their cupped hands, Boris cried: “Cripe, here it comes again!”

This time the ski boat gave them a wider berth. But as it shot by, the graceful skier plummeted headfirst into the water. He made hardly a splash, and the boat continued obliviously on, the handle of the ski rope skipping along between the wakes.

First the slalom ski popped up. A few seconds later the skier surfaced, floating facedown in the water. BJ and Boris paddled fiercely his way. When they reached him, BJ dropped his paddle and hauled the skier across the cockpit by his life vest. This nearly capsized the kayak, and sent Boris tumbling into the water, but BJ concentrated on the skier, administering a good smack on the back. The skier coughed and gagged and spat water, then slid off the kayak and started treading water, blinking up at BJ.

“What happened?” he asked.

“You took a header.”

“Man, oh man. I hit a deadhead.”

“A deadhead?”

“A log floating just below the surface. Skier’s nightmare. Lucky you were here. Thanks a lot. I’m Kit.”

“I’m BJ. This is …”

But there was no sign of Boris anywhere around the kayak. Alarmed, BJ slithered out of his cockpit into a
lake far colder than at shallow Madison Beach. Icy as it was, he submerged his head and opened his eyes. A figure was flailing about four feet below him. BJ swam straight down to him—and Boris immediately got him in a death grip, leaving BJ no choice but to jab him in the solar plexus, causing what little air Boris had left to come shooting out of his mouth in bubbles. Though BJ was getting pretty desperate for air himself, he maneuvered behind Boris and grabbed his ponytail before frog-kicking back up to the surface.

BJ latched onto the kayak with one hand and pulled Boris’s head above water with the other. Boris grabbed the front cockpit, his face squashed up against the fiber-glass. He took a rattling breath, coughed up two or three cups of lake water, managed another breath, then sputtered and turned his head sideways so his cheek was against the kayak’s hull. His eyeballs looked as if they were about to rupture.

“You come out in a kayak without a life vest,” BJ cried, “and you can’t even swim?”

“I’m drownded!” Boris croaked, spluttering.

“You’re not drowned. You’re just an idiot.”

Boris was starting to catch his breath. “You almost pulled my hair out!” he said hoarsely.

“You’re alive, aren’t you?”

“You guys okay?” asked Kit, swimming around from
the other side of the kayak.

“I guess so,” BJ said. “This idiot’s Boris.”

“Here, I’ll hold this thing so you guys can get back in,” Kit said.

Even with him bracing the kayak, getting back in was an adventure. By the time they managed it, the ski boat was roaring their way.

“Hey, Kit!” BJ cried over the rumble of the out-board. “Are you Keith Masterly’s son?”

“That’s right.”

“Do you know Darryl Kirby?”

“Or Nina Rizniak?” Boris chimed in.

Kit shook his head. “Never heard of them. Sorry.”

The driver cut the engine as the ski boat swooped up.

“Are you all right, sir?”

“Thanks to BJ and Boris here.”

“I’m so sorry!” The driver put a ladder over the side of the boat. “I’d gotten used to you never falling.”

“Don’t worry about it.’’ Kit climbed into the boat. “Ski’s over there. Careful, there’s a deadhead around here.’’ He looked back down at the kayak. “Thanks, guys. Anything I can do for you?”

But the news that he’d never heard of Darryl or Nina was so discouraging that BJ just sighed and shook his head. Boris was even more dejected. Not only was
there no Nina, his cigarettes, which he’d transferred from his sock to his shirt pocket, had gotten soaked. Only when the ski boat was out of earshot did it occur to either one of them that they could have asked to be pulled back across the lake.

T
he ruddy faces were blurry and wavery, but the eyes were all trained on him, filled with bitterness and recrimination. He inched closer, squinting, trying to make out who they were. Wasn’t that his mother? And his father? Yes, and there was his brother! And his aunt and uncle and cousin! And his grandmother and grandfather! He reached out joyously toward his mother—and snatched his hand back, scalded.

“Rise and shine, friend and colleague. … ”

Darryl sat bolt upright. He was in the luxurious bed in his rosy room in Paradise Lab. But although the sheets and pillowcases were as cool and crisp as ever, he was soaked with sweat.

Still shaky after showering, he changed into an ice-blue jumpsuit and hustled to the dining hall, where his vitamin awaited him by a glass of tomato juice at his place. Everything had changed since he’d skipped it yesterday. The rings had terrified him, and his room had been lonely, and now he was having nightmares.

Yet he hesitated to take the pale-blue pill. He didn’t really want to forget about BJ and Mrs. Walker again.
And soon Nina came in and sat down beside him, which reminded him of the moon.

“To conquering Time!” Ruthie said, lifting her juice glass.

Darryl only pretended to pop the pill, instead squirreling it away in his pocket.

Down on L he ducked into Bio and studied his slide of G-17 until a hubbub lured him back out to the octagon. Mr. Masterly had returned to Paradise.

“Look, sir!” Paul Pettinio cried, waving a computer printout as he waddled up to the great man. “I’ve been changing the agitation rate on the compound.”

Mr. Masterly glanced over the results. “This looks promising, Paul.”

“Mr. Masterly!” Billy O’Connor cried from the doorway to Chem. “Come see! I’ve been building an armor for G-17 out of mercury!”

Though there was something creepy about the way they all clamored for Mr. Masterly’s approval, Darryl couldn’t help wishing
he
had an interesting finding or new idea to share.

After encouraging Greg Birtwissel’s latest experiment with growth hormones, Mr. Masterly went to one of the computer stations and slipped a CD-ROM into the D drive. Everyone crowded around and watched a full-color model of the G-17 molecule bloom on the monitor.

“Thanks to groundwork laid by Suki and Mario,” Mr. Masterly said, “the graphics department at MasterTech was able to complete this. Look how it shows all the ion permutations and hydrocarbon links.”

Using the mouse, he moved the cursor to a circular icon on the tool bar and clicked. The entire complex molecule rotated slowly on its axis, giving them continuously different angles on its architecture.

“Wow,” Darryl said, leaning in.

“Billy,” Mr. Masterly said, “will you load the new image onto all the computers?”

“Yes, sir!” Billy cried.

Darryl spent the rest of that morning poring over the new image at one of the computers at the central console. It was far clearer than the real thing, and he was just reaching some interesting conclusions when a bell rang and the red globe lit up, revolving like the cherry on a police car.

“Who wants to take it?” Mr. Masterly said.

“Me!” came a chorus of three or four, Ruthie the loudest.

Darryl was trembling violently. As everyone else crowded around Ruthie, Nina tugged him out of his chair and dragged him into Bio.

“What’s wrong?” she whispered, closing the door softly.

Darryl just stood there shuddering.

“Something really freaked you,” she said. “If Mr. Masterly noticed, he’d know you’re off the vitamin. Was it the bell? The red light?”

“Water,” he managed.

She brought him a beaker of water from one of the sinks. He pulled the vitamin out of his pocket and popped it in his mouth.

“Don’t!” Nina cried. “Throw it up!”

But he’d swallowed it. And in a matter of minutes he calmed down enough to return to his computer station.

N
ina could have wrung his neck for taking the vitamin. But furious as she was, she was also curious. Why had he panicked like that? She spent the rest of the day watching Darryl go about his lab work and exercise and dinner in the same focused way as the rest of the team.