The Elders (19 page)

“So be it,” George says. “But I still don’t see the need to involve your aunt.”

“I won’t put her in danger if that’s what you’re concerned about. You’re not the only one who cares about this family.”

“Are we interrupting something?” a voice booms from a few feet away.

“No, we just settled on our
destination,” George says. Then he turns to face the muscle-bound guy who spoke. “Stephen, this is Darren.”

“Nice to meet you, Darren,” the man says. His handshake reminds me of the time I got my finger caught in a lobster’s claw as a kid. Those things do not make good playmates, and neither would Stephen, I’m guessing.

“Where are the others?” Kate asks.

“Eleanor was right behind me,” Stephen
says. “John and Richard were in the training room at the Castle, so I’m not sure when they’ll arrive.”

“I’ll go ready the plane,” George says. “Kate, please go through the safety procedures as you wait for the others.” Without waiting for her reply, he walks off toward Pandora.

Kate clears her throat and fishes a pill bottle out of her pocket.

“Are you kidding me?” I stare at her. “I have to
take an Ambien again?”

“It’s standard procedure for now,” she says. “Once the Elders say you don’t need it, I won’t do it.”

“But Frederick trusts me. He wouldn’t have authorized all this if he didn’t.”

“He didn’t say anything about safety to me, which means I have to stick to the standard protocol,” Kate says.

“Fine. At least let me meet the rest of the team,” I say.

We wait in tense silence
until the others arrive.

“Is this everyone?” I ask, looking over the four new arrivals—three dudes and one woman. They look vaguely familiar. I think I saw each one of them in the Victoria Sutra room as statues.

“Darren, this is James, John, Eleanor, and Richard,” Kate says. “Now take your pill.”

“What?” I ask, trying to keep my incredulity out of my voice. “You’re telling me this mighty team
consists of just the seven of you?” As I say this, I study them.

James looks like a hard man, his fierce expression heightened by a cleft lip scar.

John is just as big as James and Stephen, only he somehow looks less healthy, probably due to the bags under his eyes.

Richard is the scariest of them all, though he’s the least muscular. I think it’s his bearing, coupled with leathery skin and
an intense stare, that creates this effect.

Eleanor has more in common with the guys than with Kate. She’s more muscular than me, and I’m not exactly a wimp, even if I currently feel like one in comparison.

If this team were a circus troupe, John would be the sick lion, Stephen and James would be a polar bear and a grizzly bear, Eleanor an elephant, Kate a panther, and Richard a scorpion.

“Who’s the seventh?” Richard asks with a sneer. “You wouldn’t be talking about George, by chance?”

“Well, yeah. I thought he was the leader,” I say.

“He’s a politician, a glorified bureaucrat,” Richard says. “We don’t work for him.”

“Sorry, I stand corrected,” I say. “I’m sure you guys are awesome and all that.”

“If by ‘all that’ you mean that the
six
of us have never failed a mission,” Richard
says, “then yeah, we’re awesome.”

“Enough chatter.” Kate demonstratively takes a pill out of the bottle. “Can you
now
take the fucking pill? Or should I make you?”

“I’d listen to her,” James says, smiling. “You wouldn’t enjoy it if she made you swallow.”

Ignoring the merriment James’s comment created, I take the pill, trying my best not to choke on it. Before Kate can ask, I open my mouth to
show that I did as I was supposed to.

“Such a good boy.” Eleanor’s voice is deep, matching her physique to a T. “You’ve trained him well, Kate.”

I just walk onto the plane and take the seat I slept in earlier.

I hear the others come in but pay no attention to them.

This time around, I’m determined to fight off the effects of the Ambien by exercising mind over matter. I have free will, don’t
I? I should decide whether I sleep.

“You really part Leacher, kid?” asks one of the dudes. James, I think.

“Part Reader, yes,” I say.

“What’s it like to Leach—I mean Read—someone’s thoughts?” maybe-James asks.

I yawn and say, “It’s like living as them for the duration of the Read. You’re your target, like in a super-realistic virtual reality that on top of sight and sound also has taste, smell,
and touch.”

“Must be trippy,” the guy says.

“It’s pretty awesome.” I yawn again.

I don’t hear his next question because my mind goes blank—again.

Chapter 15

I
wake up with a jolt and attempt to move, but find myself restrained for some reason. Did someone tie me up again?

As my eyes adjust to the light, I realize my vision is somewhat restricted too. However, I
can
see, which means I’m not wearing a bag over my head. How crazy would it be if my second trip to see my Enlightened grandparents once again had all the comforts terrorists
enjoy on their way to a secret prison?

The world whooshes past me so fast that, for a moment, I wonder whether the plane is plummeting toward earth. In that case, the fact that I’m tied up doesn’t matter.

A shot of adrenaline clears the remaining sleepiness from my brain.

The good news is that I’m not plummeting from the sky while inside a metal coffin.

The bad news is that I’m inside a metal
(with too much plastic) coffin that’s rocketing forward.

The restraints binding me are actually seat belts crisscrossed around my chest. Some kind of visor with tinted glass is restricting my vision. Judging by the person sitting next to me in the driver’s seat, I’m wearing a helmet.

All this adds up to me sitting in a car, or a car-like rocket, that’s moving faster than my still-groggy brain
believes a car can go.

“What the hell is going on?” I try asking, but a grunt-mumble hybrid comes out instead. My voice is hoarse, post-Ambien. I think my mouth was dry like this last time too. As a side note, if you start noticing little patterns like this, it means you’ve been drugged too many times.

“Rise and shine, sleepyhead.” The high-pitched, friendly voice can only belong to Hillary—same
with the small, gloved hands on the steering wheel.

“Is the Super Pusher controlling you?” I ask. “And if so, why is he trying to kill us in such an unconventional way?”

I feel the urge to rub my eyes, but the visor and my limited range of motion leave that desire unfulfilled.

“No one is controlling me,” Hillary says. “We just needed to get to Apalachicola quickly, and I had this idea, you
see.”

Palm trees and parked cars zoom past our windows so fast they look like two solid blurry walls of interconnected wood and colorful metal.

“What’s your idea, besides killing us in a glorious car explosion?” I ask, my sarcasm missing the bite that comes with not being scared shitless. Also, I’m probably still under the drug’s influence; at least I think that’s why I feel this intense nausea
coming on. “And what’s up with all the cars parked on the side of the highway?”

“I had them all pull to the side so we don’t, as you say, die gloriously. I’m not crazy.”

“You’re not? The speedometer reads one hundred and fifty. Even with all the cars out of the way, that’s way too fast.”

Though I’ve done similar Guiding in the past, the scale of what she’s accomplished—clearing an entire highway
for miles and miles—is truly staggering. Now that I’m paying closer attention, I notice that the parked cars are facing us and not away, which means we’re speeding down the wrong lane.

“I have two and a half hours to get us to our target,” Hillary says. “Given the slightly over three hundred miles we have to cover—well, you can do the math. Your beauty sleep put us behind schedule, so I’m trying
to make up the time.”

“Why do we need to get to this place so quickly?” I ask.

We swoop through a more deserted area with only a handful of parked cars and no trees. This allows me a view of the other side of the highway, the one moving in the correct direction. I can see a cavalcade of cars, but given our insane speed compared to their law-abiding one, it’s clear we’ll be leaving them far behind.

“It’s so that I can execute my plan,” Hillary says. “And your chatter isn’t helping me focus, you know.”

“Is this a car chase?” I ask despite her very reasonable point about breaking her concentration. Looks as though my curiosity is stronger than my sense of self-preservation, similar to that of some now-deceased cats.

“It’s not a chase, per se,” she says.

“Are those police on the other side?
In those Crown Vics?”

“Yep, that’s the law,” Hillary says. “And there’s more where that came from. More cars will be joining them in a few miles. Also, before you ask, George and the rest of your new friends are in that Humvee behind us.”

I turn and see that, indeed, a Humvee just turned the bend behind us.

Then I hear a motor revving, and something passes us on our right, causing a cloud of
dust to billow around us.

Given how fast we’re going, I have to assume a ballistic missile just passed us. Upon closer examination, I realize I was only slightly off.
 

It’s a black motorcycle.

“That’s Kate,” Hillary explains.

She must be right. Though I couldn’t see the face under the black helmet, the BDSM-inspired outfit is telling, as is the sword sheathed on her back.

“What are you doing?”
I ask when I see her foot press on the gas and feel the vibrations of the car’s engine working overtime.

“I’m catching up to Kate,” Hillary says. “I want to make sure there’s no bloodshed.”

“Wouldn’t splattering us all over the pavement be considered bloodshed?” I ask. “Can you explain what you’re doing? Wait—only answer if you can do so without killing us.”

“After you and George left, and
after I caught up with my folks, I had this idea,” Hillary says, pressing harder on the gas. “Once Mom and Dad started getting on my nerves, I left and went to a local police department.”

“I thought you were going to say you cooked up the most elaborate suicide plan.”

She continues, ignoring my interjection. “I Guided the local sheriff to aid in my plan. He got in touch with his brother, a Florida
State trooper, and they sent out an APB to all the states from New York to Florida.

“Oh,” I say, beginning to catch on. “You wanted the cops to catch the minivans? That’s a great idea. Why didn’t I think of it?”

“The effort turned out to be futile, though,” Hillary says. “The cops were out of their depth when it came to your friend Caleb and the monks.”

“Shit,” I say. “I was hoping—”

“If my
original plan had worked, we wouldn’t be driving like maniacs right now,” she says. “But a version of it may still work. You said the Temple is near Apalachicola, in a forest. That limits the number of ways the vans can get there. So I had the cops create a bottleneck on the roads they’re bound to pass.”

“And we’re trying to get there in time to catch the vans?” I ask.

“Exactly,” she says. “Or
else Caleb and the monks might repeat their shenanigans.”

A strange noise catches my attention. It sounds like an alarm going off during a bank robbery. I tense, wondering if the car makes this sound when some part of it is failing, but realize the culprit is a phone attached by a pink mount to the windshield.

“Can you get that? I don’t want to risk reaching for it,” Hillary says.

Deciding
not to mention the annoyingness of her ringtone, I steady my hand and press the ‘speak’ button. With a southern drawl, a voice says, “The two Honda Odyssey vehicles are fifteen minutes apart.”

“Thank you, Sheriff Jackson,” Hillary says. “Which blockade are they heading toward?”

“Just program Telogia, Florida, into your GPS,” the voice says, “and it’ll take you there. But you don’t have much
time.”

“Thank you,” Hillary says. “We’ll try to make it.”

I take this as my cue to end the call and enter new GPS coordinates into the phone.

“The GPS thinks we’ll get there in half an hour,” I tell her.

“It assumes we’re following the speed limit,” Hillary says. “I hope to be there in fifteen.” She accelerates.

“Have you spoken with Eugene or Bert?” I ask to keep my mind off our speed.

“Hold on,” she says. “And press the voice command button on my phone.”

I press and hold the button. Had she reached for the phone herself, I would’ve mutinied.

“Call George,” Hillary says in a clear voice.

The device rings through the car’s speakers a few times before someone picks up.

“Hello,” George says.

“Put Telogia into your GPS,” Hillary says. “And tell the same to Kate.”

“No problem,”
George says, “but we’re falling behind.”

“Whoever gets there, gets there,” Hillary says. “Remind her to only use the tranquilizer guns, okay?”

“Affirmative,” George says. “We all understand Darren’s friends and family are in those Odysseys.”

He sounds annoyed with her implication that he or one of Kate’s people would need such a reminder.

The line goes dead.

“Sorry about that, Darren,” Hillary
says. “Yes, I did talk to Eugene and Bertie. They’re a couple of hours behind the vans. They told me not to bother them so they could concentrate on their research, so I haven’t.”

In the distance, I see Kate veer her bike onto an exit ramp.

“Brace yourself,” Hillary says and turns the wheel.

I bet those are some of the most famous last words, right after ‘Oops’ and, if coming from a doctor,
‘This will be uncomfortable.’ As we turn, I feel as if I might throw up. Had I eaten anything today, I definitely would have. As is, the world around me goes silent.

Looking at our car from the side of the road, I realize her turn made me spontaneously phase into the Quiet. While my heartbeat calms down, I note how peculiar it is that I’m actually outside the car rather than in the back seat.
I must’ve spontaneously Teleported thanks to George’s recent training.