The Source: Book III of the Holding Kate Series (16 page)

“Okay, we will just come there for lunch today…a table for four…yes…thank you, Ms. Ermadean.”

Mama Ty’s plump, short frame turned. “It is all set. Oh, Pops, have we got a boat load of information to tell you.”

Gregory topped the hill and looked down at First Cabin. It was unusually quiet. No carts coming and going, the jeep was parked under the carport, but the house was dark. Lights were on in the boathouse, one upstairs and one downstairs.

The Terminal back at the village had been shut down. There had been no jumps for a while. The scanner did not pick up any recent temporal displacement at the terminal. He lifted it up and scanned the cabin, nothing. He started to put the scanner in his pocket, then he paused, aiming it at the boathouse. The scanner chirped and the gauges spiked.

“What have you done, Mr. Chastain?” He began walking over the hill toward the boathouse. “Did you think you could fool me by moving the QHR?”

He crept along the edge of the pond, his footsteps muted by the soft grass and croakers. He glanced to the glassy surface of the black water, and then he skirted the pier. Something jumped into the pond with a splash, and an owl called from the trees across the yard.

He walked up to the boathouse window and peered in. Sure enough, it had been converted back into a QHR and jump pad. “So this is where you jumped from, my dear Kate,” he whispered.

The door was unlocked, so he quietly entered the lab where he had conducted so many experiments with Rick Wilson, years ago. The equipment was dated in comparison to his advanced technology. Regular turn of the century computer terminals with keyboard interfaces dotted the room.

No one was there, so he sat down at a computer terminal and called up the jump log. It was blank.

“Now, now, I know there have been recent jumps from this pad. Let’s see how deeply you cleaned this terminal.” He searched through the archives and deleted folders but couldn’t find any trace of the coordinates.

He would have to retain some record of the jump so he could retrieve them eventually,
he surmised. “Manual records?”

He began to search the lab for books, ledgers, compads, anything that could be documented on, but found nothing.

He heard voices coming down the stairs.

“Ah, Mel, you really are a pro at meatloaf!” Wallace laughed and patted his belly.

“I’ve had a lot of practice.” The petite blonde rounded the corner following Wallace.

“It is my favorite.” Donnie defended while rubbing his stomach. “Are you sure you don’t want to walk with us, Wallace?”

“Yeah, I’m sure. I’ve got some calculations I need to go over.” He patted his jacket pocket.

Greg watched carefully from his hiding place and noted the bulge in the scientist’s right pocket.
He carries the journal with him, of course.

“Okay, we are going to stay in the cabin tonight. If you want to use the guest room upstairs, feel free. We won’t be back until tomorrow morning.”

“Please do, Wallace,” Mel added. “It has to be more comfortable than that old couch.”

Wallace chuckled. “I may take you up on that offer.”

“Donnie, while they are gone, we might as well just live in the cabin and let Wallace have the apartment.”

“That’s a good thought, Mel. We’ll have all that room to ourselves.” He pecked her cheek and opened the door to the boathouse and they walked through it and shut it behind them.

So, now I know what the big jump was about. They all jumped. I will find Kate if I can find the coordinates.
Greg waited patiently while the man named Wallace checked the systems, then plopped down on the brown leather sofa and nodded off.

“I’ll be right back, sweetie.” Donnie jogged down the steps of First Cabin’s porch toward the boathouse. Mel wanted her own pillow from their bedroom and Donnie forgot his toothbrush.

He smiled as he thought of the moonlight swim he would enjoy with his wife later. They loved to “swim” after their nightly walks. The smile faded from his face when he saw a shadowy figure emerging from the boathouse.

“Wallace?” He slowed. “Is that you?”

The man that turned to face him was not Wallace. Donnie felt a jolt of shock course through his body when he recognized the old man.

“Pops!” Donnie jogged to his old friend. “When did you get back?” He wrapped the fatherly man in a hug and lifted him off the ground.

“Whoa there, Donnie. My, my, aren’t you growing like a weed!” He chuckled as Donnie set him on the ground. “I just got back today. Good as new!” He bent his knee back and forth to prove the surgery had been a success.

“Man, it is so good to see you.” Donnie laughed. “You
have
to come talk to Mel. She will be delirious that you are back!”

“I hear you two have made it official.” Pops eyes glinted merrily in the moonlight.

Donnie’s face flushed. “Yeah, you were right all along, Pops. I love her.” He shuffled his feet nervously. Pops patted him on the shoulder.

“Glad you came to your senses, son,” he laughed.

“Pops, did you need something?” Donnie pointed to the boathouse.

“Nah, I came to see Wallace. They told me he was moved down here, so I wanted to pop in on him.”

“Come on in, then. I know he’ll be glad to see ya.”

“Nah, don’t worry about it. He’s sound asleep on that couch in there.” Pops frowned and pulled on his ear. “Strange, though.”

“What? What’s wrong, Pops?”

“Well when I got here I could’ve sworn I saw someone come out of the boathouse and jog around the pond and over the hill. I just figured Wallace had a visitor. But when I got in there, Wallace was sound asleep.”

“Are you sure it wasn’t Schmitz? He helps Wallace here. They take turns running the QHR, three days on three days off. His cabin is just over that hill.”

“Yeah, that’s probably who it was, yeah, now that I think about it. I’m sure that’s who it was.”

“Have you had supper?”

“Oh, yeah, course.” Pops shuffled inside the boathouse with Donnie.

“Okay, wait here for a minute. I need to get some stuff, then I’ll take you to Mel.”

“Sure, take your time,” Pops whispered as Donnie ran toward the stairs, then stopped and glanced around.

Wallace moaned and rolled over on the couch, his journal open on the floor beside him. Pops stared out the window, to the hilltop just past the pond, and frowned.

DIRK AND THE
others jumped back into Spear Cathair after completing their surveillance runs of the kingdom. They met in the commons with the rest of the jump team to debrief.

“Where is Kate?” Dirk asked Corey as he silently took attendance.

Corey averted his eyes, and Tara put her arm across his shoulders. Eunavae sat on the other side of him and took his hand in hers, with a curious expression searching Corey’s face for an answer. From the actions of Tara and Corey, Dirk wondered if Kate was ill.

Tara spoke up. “She won’t be coming. You can go ahead and start.”

Dirk sat and scrutinized Corey’s devastation with concern for a second then shook it off and launched the meeting. “As you know, Brashtor and I jumped to the major cities on the east side of Ampeliagia. Starlythe and Staid took the west, while Krenne and Drayse took the far north and south. I’ll let Drayse report first.”

Drayse cleared his throat. Dirk noted he had been staring at Eunavae and Corey as though he too were trying to figure something out, but snapped his attention to the report. “Cheulseti is fine. Only three deaths reported there and they were travelers.” He spoke to Starlythe and Staid, their shoulders relaxed a bit. “We found no one in the north. Dead bodies littered every town. The Crystal Certosa is empty, Lumisphere is a ghost town.” He stopped speaking when his voice broke.

Krenne picked up the report. “The south is dying too. We had difficulty rousing them to give us any information. One man who was a Cheleuthi trader told us that the people slept 20 hours per day with short periods of wakening a few times per day. They fed themselves and toileted but other than that they slept. Unattended fires had devastated many of the villages. The animals roam untethered, many have fallen dead in their tracks from neglect. The people are weak from lack of movement. Many have died of other diseases, unable to maintain proper septic systems and dispose of the dead. The squalor and stench of the towns is heartbreaking.” Krenne’s tears rolled freely down her cheek. Drayse held her right hand and Manifus held her left hand. Their faces were drawn into unspeakable sadness.

“There is no better report from the west. The coastal towns are littered with dead bodies. No one…no one is left alive.” Starlythe reached for the comfort of Staid’s hand. “The once great Watshfeau Castle now drowns in the stench of rotten corpses. No one was even buried. It is as though they fell ill at the same time and died within days of each other. I have never heard of such an aggressive disease.”

“The east is dead, too. Port Destin lies in ruin. The ships have been battered against the docks and the dead are washed out with every tide,” Brashtor added.

“This is wrong.” Manifus suddenly stood.

“It is a tragedy,” Tara whispered.

“No. I mean, well yes it is a tragedy, but it isn’t right,” Manifus insisted.

Corey raised his head seeming to enter the conversation for the first time. “What do you mean Manifus?”