GeneSix (12 page)

“Beam us up.”

And Scott and April simply faded from view, leaving Tompkins standing in the room alone.

Jake walked over to Mandy. “You might want to call the cops to come and haul him away. Though, I’m not sure they’ll be able to hold him.”

He glanced down at the remains of her computer. “Sorry about the laptop, but I’m sure you can remember enough of what was said to re-create it for your article. And what you can’t remember, you can make up.”

“Look, Jake,” she said. “I don’t want us to be enemies.”

“You have a funny way of starting a friendship.”

The photographer had changed film, and was snapping shot after shot of Jake - Captain Courageous - talking to Kimberly Stratton.

“Look,” she said, “for what it’s worth, I’m sorry. You do mean more to me than just an article.”

“I highly doubt that. Power Man, back there, was talking about getting an interview. Were you going to lay him, too? He seemed to have that idea.”

“I don’t take men who dress like bumblebees to bed.”

He couldn’t help but smile. “I’m glad you have some standards.”

She grinned. “Not many.”

He wanted to be angry with her. She had taken advantage of him. She had proven she couldn’t be trusted. She was really no less a viper than the Secretary of Technological Development who thought he was manipulating Scott. But he found he couldn’t quite manage it.

“One mistake you made,” she said, “might have been to let the world know your real name. And you can’t blame me for that. The whole accident with the zeta reactor is public knowledge, and there was more than one article written on it. One of them by Tempest, himself. I don’t know how that Power Man wacko got his strength, and I sure as hell hope there aren’t any more like him in the world, but there are crazies out here. He came to the Press Herald knowing I worked here, because he was looking for you. Anyone in your life could potentially be a target.”

Jake nodded. “I hadn’t taken any of this as seriously as I should have, I guess. But too late to play Clark Kent, now. The cat’s out of the bag.”

He reached into his belt and produced a device smaller than the palm of her hand.

“What is that?” she asked.

“A signaling device. One of Scott’s many inventions. You know, Egghead Man?”

She smiled and nodded.

Jake flipped it open. “Works like a cell phone, but with a lot more range. You just flip it open and it automatically connects with the comm-link in my wristband. You get in trouble, Scott and I can be there mighty quick. You can talk directly, or you can text.” He handed it to her.

“What if I just want to say hi?”

“All things considered,” Jake said, “I’d rather you didn’t.”

She nodded. “I guess I understand. I
am
sorry.”

“Me too.”

Jake’s wristband beeped, and Scott’s voice came through the audio field developing around him. “Captain. You there?”

“Yes, I’m here.” The wrist band had been damaged, but was now once again working. Scott had said there were nanobots implanted in it which could repair damage, and do so fairly quickly.

“I have secured the package,” Scott said. “Meet me at the designated location.”

“Understood.”

“Is everything okay at your end?”

Jake nodded, looking into Mandy’s eyes, wishing he saw something there that he did not. “As good as it’s going to get.”

Tompkins and Kincaid led the way onto the campus. They had discarded their suit jackets in favor of flack vests, and each gripped a pistol with both hands, safety off. They were followed by ten men dressed in full SWAT regalia. Flack vests, helmets, and carrying M16’s.

They passed college students walking with book bags strapped to their backs, some of the kids with ear buds in place. Some were walking alone, others in groups, but all jumped out of their way with expressions ranging from shock to outrage as Tompkins and his group of agents charged by.

“Remember,” he called back to them. “If you see Calder, shoot to kill. No warnings. Simply fire.”

Kincaid added, “Don’t give him time to power-up. If he gets that time, and all he needs is a couple of seconds, we’re all dead.”

At the door to the science building, Tompkins and Kincaid each took the opposite side of the door, then with his gun ready, Tompkins pushed through the door, Kincaid behind him, followed by the rest of the agents.

They decided to forgo the elevator and took the stairs. Tompkins waved his ID badge in front of the hidden sensor and the door unlocked. Then, he leaped into the room to stand feet wide apart, gun gripped tightly in both hands, aiming at..,

Nothing. The room was empty. The tables were gone. The chairs. The various cabinets containing equipment Tempest used in his experiments. The dry erase board he sometimes used to scribble out equations. Even the coffee maker.

Kincaid came in behind him, followed by the SWAT team.

“They’re gone,” Kincaid said.

“Search the grounds,” Tompkins barked at the SWAT men. “Search their quarters. And the girl. Search her dorm. Question anyone who knows her.”

The men began dispersing, to carry out their orders.

Tompkins lowered his pistol and looked around the room in awe. “How could they move that much equipment so quickly?”

“Calder is very strong when he powers-up, sir, and can move quickly.”

“But where could they have put it all?”

“We’ll find it.”

Tompkins strolled to an open door and looked into the tiny room that had served as Tempest’s office. It was as deserted as the lab. Only bare tiles where the desk and chairs had been. Even the poster of the pointy-eared guy on the wall was gone. It was probably the first thing that freak removed.

“We’ll find it, sir,” Kincaid said. “We’ll find it all.”

Tompkins holstered his gun and said with resignation, “No, Kincaid, I somehow don’t think we will.”

Jake had folded up his blue and aqua battle suit and stashed it in a suit case, in favor of a t-shirt and jeans. And a new jean jacket to replace the one the D.T.D. agents had torn up with bullets. He was behind the wheel of a black Jeep Liberty, cruising along Highway Twenty-four. Beside him was Scott, no longer in his battle suit, either. Instead, he was wearing a white turtleneck shirt and khakis. However, they still each wore a wristband.

Sitting in the back seat was April. She was kneeling on the transmission hump on the floor and leaning forward, resting an elbow on each front seat, sharing the view out the wind shield. Her hair was tied back in its ever-present ponytail, and she wore a comfy U of M sweatshirt and jeans. She also now wore a wristband.

They had left Kansas behind miles ago, and were now in the foothills of Colorado. They had passed through a day of flat grasslands that opened up for miles on either side of the road. The grasslands had been replaced by low green hills, and those were now giving way to higher, forested mountains. Pine trees, standing tall and straight as arrows, covered ridges and mountainsides,.

Ahead, on the right, was a mountain taller than the others. Behind it was one with a snowy peak.

“There,” Scott said, indicating the one before the snowy peak. “That’s going to be our new home.”

“Up there?” April asked.

“Jake, how long do you think it would take to hollow out a space toward the top that was, say, the size of the lab we had back in Boston, with maybe some room for quarters for each of us? And a large hangar deck?”

Jake shrugged. “If I powered up enough, not too long. Minutes, maybe.”

Scott nodded. “That’s what I thought. I’ve been scouting out this area for months, hacking into various surveillance satellites. I’ve charted out exactly where to strike when hollowing out the mountain, so you won’t bring it down on top of us.”

“What are we going to use to reinforce the ceilings?” Jake drove with one hand on the wheel, his gaze drifting from the road to the mountain beyond.

“Construction companies are always discarding steel beams and such. It shouldn’t take long for us to find what we need.”

Jake nodded. “And a power source for all of your crap?”

“I have that worked out, too.”

April said, “So, where
is
all of that stuff?”

“Safely tucked away.” Scott looked over to Jake, who grinned.

She said, “Come on, guys. I’m part of the team now, you said. No more secrets.”

“That’s right,” Jake said. “Tompkins proved just knowing us puts you in as much danger as knowing everything we’re up to.”

Scott said, “It’s all in a cave, in a neighboring alternate universe. The one immediately neighboring us, actually.”

She said, “An alternate universe? Really? How did you get it there?”

“You can thank Kimberly Stratton for that, and her idea for an interdimensional teleporter. Of course, no one but Jake and I knew my teleporter was more than merely theoretical, but was up and fully functioning. I had already discovered the existence of the alternate universe. And a few others, in fact. All I had to do was tweak the existing teleporter a bit, and voila.”

Jake said, “It’s all tucked away in a cave in what would be Arizona on our world.”

She said, “Aren’t you afraid someone living there will find it?”

Scott shook his head. “Humans in that world are still in a very primitive state. I’m not sure just exactly what happened over there, but it appears their world had another ice age, and the glaciers are only now receding. Asians are just beginning to cross the land mass of the Bering Straight into Alaska. It’ll be some time before they make their way south to Arizona.

“It does bear studying, however. Why two Earths, in bordering parallel universes, should be so similar and yet so different. But it can wait until we’re fully set up for business.”

“This is going to be so cool,” April said. “We’re really going to explore the universe, aren’t we?”

Scott nodded. “There are thousands, maybe millions of discoveries out there waiting for us to stumble onto them. And we’re going to seek them out.”

“How about money? How are we going to pay for materials?”

“I’m filthy rich. Something else the good Secretary in Washington knew nothing about.”

“I didn’t either,” Jake said. “The nutty professor, here, has been selling patents under a false name. Been doing it for years. As well as banking most of the cash the D.T.D. sent him.”

“I have nearly half a billion in off-shore accounts. It should be enough, combined with discarded materials we can pirate, to furnish all we need. I was playing dumb to the guys in Washington, accepting their funding while I was stockpiling a private fortune. I knew this day would come and I wanted to make sure we were fully prepared.”

“You know what we need,” April said, “is a name for our organization.”

“Well,” Scott glanced at Jake, who couldn’t help but smile. Jake found April’s leaps of whimsy amusing. “I don’t know that I would call it an organization. There are only three of us.”

“Then, how about the Meta Three? No, even better...the Genesis Three. Sounds kind of cool, doesn’t it?”

Jake said, “Sounds like the title of a bad movie.”

She punched him in the shoulder.

There was a sudden beeping from Jake’s jacket pocket. He glanced to Scott, suddenly serious. “The signaling device I gave Mandy.”

He pulled it from his pocket and flipped it open. There was text message on the small screen. CAPTAIN. I’M PREGNANT. ITS YOURS. AS IF I HAD TIME FOR THIS NOW. CALL ME.

Jake drew a long breath. “Gang,” he said. “I don’t think we’re out of the woods yet.”

A jetliner pushed its way through the sky. It had left LaGuardia behind, and was bound for Logan.

One of the passengers was a man like any other. His name was Rick Wilson. Not the kind of name that would stand alone in a phone book. His hair was sort of a light brown, almost sandy but not quite, and his face was plain. Not unattractive, but not one that would make a girl look twice. He was of average height, and average build. All in all, quite average.

He wore a blue collared cotton shirt and jeans, and sat in Row 12, Seat C, of Delta flight 324, headed for Boston. In his hands was a magazine. Newsweek. Full of ordinary things an ordinary man would read about. Politics, news events, sports.

One of the passengers was a man like no other. His hair was jet black, and fell to his shoulders. A long, Roman nose decorated his face. He wore jeans, as did Rick Wilson, but on his feet were sandals. His shirt was of a Chinese design, held together with braided toggles, its tails hanging loose, and which rose to a Mandarin collar about his neck. He answered to the name Quentin Jeffries, not a name that would ever fail to stand out on the page of a phone book. He sat in Row 12, seat D. In his hands was a book on Buddhist meditative breathing.

The seat immediately to his right, Seat E, was empty at the moment. Thirty minutes earlier, Quentin had been required to get to his feet to let the holder of that seat, Chuck Burroughs, slide past him and Rick on his way to the restroom.