"Why do you give us food, Ogun?"
"Because your people are starving. Who's Ogun?"
"You are."
"My name is Theo."
"I will call you Ogun."
"Why don't you call me Theogun?"
She nodded.
"Why do your people live in the most dangerous place on the island?"
"We have no choice. This is where the men in the copters put the old women. They cannot leave because of the pain from the neck metal."
"It is very dangerous there. Alligators could kill all your people."
"That is why the men in the copters put them there."
"To be killed by alligators?"
"Or to die from starvation."
"Why do they want them to die?"
"Because they are old and no longer useful."
# # # # # # # #
"Will you have some soup?"
"No. It has no meat."
"How about a chocolate bar instead?"
"What is that?"
To answer, Theo rose and rummaged through his pack. When he looked up, she was halfway up the tree that had been behind her. She's scared of me. He found the bar, unwrapped it, took a bite out of it, chewed it, and swallowed it in front of her. He put the rest of the bar next to her cup of soup, returned to his own tree, sat back down, and waited.
Panther Girl came down by winding around the tree. Again she came on all fours to sniff the food. She pulled off the right paw of her clothing, picked the bar up using only her fingernails, resumed her sitting position, and held the bar out for inspection. "No meat," she said after sniffing.
"But still good."
She took a nibble and swallowed. Then she placed the bar down again.
"Not good?"
"Waiting to see if I get sick. Some foods cannot be eaten even if they look and smell good."
"How long have you been here?"
"All my life."
"Do you know how many years that has been?"
"No."
"Did you come in one of the copters?"
"No."
"How then?"
"Inside Marie's tummy."
"Who's Marie?"
"Marie's the one who said you and the man with the red and black markings all over his body would come and protect us from the copters."
"That's Lucas, my brother."
"Shango," she corrected.
"What's your name?"
In answer, Panther Girl picked up the chocolate bar and placed it in her mouth so that half was in and half was out. She put the paw back on and leapt up the tree like a panther – pushing with her legs, landing with her paw-covered hands clutching the bark, coiling her feet underneath her, and leaping up again. Choosing a path between branches, she was gone in seconds.
"The copters will come soon." A voice from a treetop.
"What's your name?" Theo asked again.
A distant voice now. "Nary, nary, quite contrary, how does your garden grow."
Hmm. That doesn't sound too scary.
# # # # # # # #
Perhaps the need to know somebody's name is part of the human condition that we all possess. Like walking erect. Or combing our fingers through our hair when we're frustrated, or checking constantly in the mirror to see if that pimple is getting bigger. So perhaps Theo's and Lucas' need to know the name of the mysterious person in their lives was a perfectly normal human reaction. I'll explain. Pretend there's something growing all over your body, so you go to a doctor.
"What do I have, Doctor?"
"You have Susta-busta-musta disease."
"Ooooh. Sounds dangerous. Will I die?"
If you can't understand the name, it has to be dangerous. Contrast that with – "You have Rooster-scratching-in-the-barnyard disease."
"OK, I understand what's going to happen to me. I can put up with scratching in a barnyard like a rooster."
Thus, when Theo labelled his mysterious creature Panther Girl, that wasn't so scary. He knew what a girl was; he knew what a panther was. From what she had called out in the distance, he also knew that her real name was a line from a nursery rhyme. That was a little bit weird, but still not scary.
Lucas, on the other hand, wasn't getting any reassurance as to what kind of creature his mysterious stranger was or what her name was. Theo and Dreamer were long gone from the gym. Lucas had been on a roll in practice – hitting 8 or 9 out of 10 foul shots. Always coming close, but not quite making 10. He told the other two that he was going to stay until he made 10 for 10. And he did. As he flew out the upper window in the gym, a girl's voice said, "Lucas. Do you have a minute?"
"What are you?" he blurted in response. This had been bothering him. He knew she was female. But what kind of female was she? A female alien? A female Susta-busta-musta disease carrier?
"Does it matter?"
If it didn't matter, Lucas wouldn't have asked. And he wouldn't have asked the question in that I'm frustrated and I need an answer tone of voice if he didn't want to know.
"Yeah," he said. "It matters."
"Think of me as your guardian angel."
"Angels don't exist."
"As far as you know."
"If you exist, let me see one of your feathers."
"Humans aren't allowed to see an angel. That's one of the big rules that we have to follow."
"What's your name?" Lucas asked. "Your real name."
Again, if you name it, it might not be quite so scary as the thought of a guardian angel popping out of the black sky while you're invisible and nobody is supposed to be able to see you.
"Azure," she said.
"Why is your name Azure?"
"Because I have blue eyes and Azure is a word meaning blue. That's why."
"OK."
A blue-eyed angel he could accept. Sort of like a human, but with feathers. This almost sounded possible. At least she wasn't an alien or an invisible female dragon called Bobbie.
# # # # # # # #
"You start running hard when you cross the pedestrian lines back at the intersection. Stay on the left side of the street. When you hit the edge of this pothole, you have to dive onto the ground and roll."
"Right or left?"
"Roll right. Towards the other side of the street. Run directly towards this door and stand as tight as you can against it. The person with the gun will be directly above you on the roof. You'll be out of his sight. Wait until you hear him moving away. Then run down this side of the street, turn the corner, go invisible, and return to the ship."
"You know about invisibility and the ship?"
"We're too modest to brag, but angels know a lot."
Lucas was still finding it difficult to have a conversation with a disembodied voice. She was standing close enough to him that she could whisper the instructions. He knew he should at least be able to sense her body even if it were invisible. He wasn't going to risk searching for her with his hands because he had become really tired of her mouth the last time. But still, how can you have a discussion with somebody who doesn't have a body?
"OK. I got it. Dive, roll, run, and stand."
"We'll practice. I'll shoot at you. Just make sure that you don't go past the pothole."
"You're using blanks, right?"
"I'll be using a slingshot and if I hit you, you'll feel it. Did you think we were having a tea party out here?"
An hour later, she pronounced herself satisfied. "He won't be expecting your quickness," she said.
"When's this ambush going to happen?"
"Soon. Probably in the daylight. I'll warn you ahead of time. You'll walk across the street, see the pedestrian crosswalk, and start running hard. Don't miss the mark."
"Are you really an angel?"
"I've been told that many times. Why? Are you looking for references?"
# # # # # # # #
Two days later, Nod texted Dr. Sandman. "Missed the opportunity for a big sale."
"Why?" Dr. Sandman texted back.
br /> "Customer inexplicably changed the direction he wanted his sales to go."
"Can we find another location to service him?"
"Grocery stores near the university perhaps."
"The two other customers?"
"No longer active in our market."
"Watch for an opportunity for a sales call nevertheless."
Back to the Table of Contents
Chapter 29
It was the third week of November and Raging Gardener frustrations were building. William's observation drones hovering above all of the Safe Haven bunker-homes in Washington State had reported no movement into, out of, or around the bunkers. Granny called the satellite compound for help and William, TG, and Wolf came up. I'll describe what they did with the first bunker that they looked at. They did the same thing with all of them.
TG checked the exterior grounds for any booby traps or surveillance. He found plenty in the surrounding woods where a sophisticated passive surveillance system was in place. (A passive system activates itself when motion is detected nearby.) TG was using his own long-range sensors to search for plastic or metal and found the passive system before it could find him. Provided he remained invisible, TG could escape detection.
As to the home itself, William had created spiders with enhanced sensors that could record anything human or electronic inside the buildings. The building may have been waterproof, but it wasn't spider proof.
The home they searched first was indeed a bunker built to keep its inhabitants safe for a long time. A kitchen, a living room, and the master bedroom were on the ground floor. Belowground, they found a concrete bunker that included: a large storeroom for food and water; another large storeroom for arms and ammunition; a large library of bots that were presumably for entertainment purposes; and, four small bedrooms for the family. The bunker also had a periscope that the inhabitants could use to determine if enemies were waiting outside for them to emerge.
The bunker had a front door as well as a solid underground metal door that required a passcode before it could be opened. The Gardeners didn't have the passcode to what they assumed was an escape tunnel; they didn't even know how many digits were in the passcode. Wolf couldn't even slip a drone past that door. They searched the woods as best as they could without activating the bunker's outside sensors, but they couldn't find where the escape tunnel emerged. That meant they couldn't TiTr the occupants after they had left the bunker.
Wolf expected to find security devices inside the home and he wasn't disappointed. Motion detectors were active in all of the ground floor rooms. The ground floor also had a sensor that TG had never seen before. William studied it via a drone and was 95% sure that it was looking for increased levels of carbon dioxide in the air. It would become active if somebody had managed to enter the bunker and had made the mistake of breathing. They didn't try to find out what would happen if the bunker's internal security were breached by a breathing human. Some form of death, no doubt. Learning how an intruder would die was not worth the risk of pursuing the lead.
Each bunker had a small bedroom downstairs with an enhanced level of security inside and outside of it. They found a small bed with appropriate bedding, a bathroom, a closet that was empty except for some small hangers, and a large screen display. The door had a lock but that lock was on the outside of the door. That meant it was a cell. The size of the bed and the small hangers left in the closet said, A young girl had been imprisoned here.
The inhabitants had removed everything personal from the bunker when they left. The drones found no paper or electronic information that would give them even a hint on where the inhabitants had gone. But all the bunkers did have charred paper in wastebaskets. The Gardeners concluded that the inhabitants had left their bunkers calmly and with the intention of purging anything within the bunkers that could lead to the discovery of where they went. They messed up by leaving the small bed and the small hangers, but other than that, the Wilizy had nothing to go on.
Subsequent searches of all of the other bunkers gave them only one additional piece of information. The number of bedrooms in the bunker could vary from two up to six. This was not helpful information. It simply meant that the original doomsday families who had built the bunkers varied in size. The Safe Haven families that took over the bunkers had changed only one bedroom into a cell. This meant that whatever they were doing to the little blonde eyed girl, they were doing it with no other little girl present.
"We forced them to quit," Wanda concluded. "At least that's a positive."
"We forced them to re-locate," Momaka corrected. "They're still operating."
Everybody agreed on that.
"Should we just focus on home-grown perverts now?" Granny asked. "Or should we wait for them to come back?"
"You have an elaborate set of sensors watching the bunkers now," TG offered. "I can notify you if anybody comes back."
"We need to circulate information to all of the Gardeners on these bunkers. They're too dangerous to let anybody go bumbling around the property. TG, can you do that?"
"Can do. I'll send out exterior and interior pictures. I'll also include a list of all the threats you'd face when approaching the bunkers and how to avoid those threats."
"We should also circulate pictures of all of the kidnappers we've shut down; a picture of the personnel officer too. Wanda?"
"Good idea, Granny. I'll take care of it."
"How about asking my dad to talk to his military friends? He could ask them to contact him if they hear anything about young, blonde, blue-eyed girls disappearing in their area."
"Good idea, Mac. But we also need to set up some sort of network where citizens can send us news of kidnapped girls quickly enough that we can do something." Both Mac and Izzy were participating by video link.
"What about using the WZBN?" Winnie suggested.
# # # # # # #
Lucas was frustrated. Through TiTr excursions, he had managed to slip some drones into Dr. Sandman's house and medical offices. These allowed him to search for other occasions when the three henchpersons might have met in the treatment room, but he found only the one meeting that he had already discovered. He monitored the bugs daily. He found no signs of the henchpersons meeting with the doctor. He couldn't even catch Dr. Sandman talking by pinky ring with any of them. He did observe Dr. Sandman texting, but this was infrequent. If Dr. Sandman were running an insurance racket, he certainly was not a hands-on manager.
The attempt to assassinate him in the street seemed like an opportunity to learn some more about the group. So, Lucas TiTr'd back in time to see where the assassin had hidden himself. He found Winker climbing onto the roof of a building that gave an excellent view of the street where Lucas had been scheduled to die. Not only had Azure picked the exact spot where Winker would fire the gun, but she had also directed Lucas to the safest spot to avoid being hit with a follow-up shot. Lucas also learned that Winker was the sniper and Blinker was the bomber. Lucas TiTr'd even further back and found Blinker watching Basher's condo every night that week.
They knew I was visiting Basher, but not when. I left the area in a predictable route and that gave them the opportunity to snipe me.
This was valuable information because Lucas could now appreciate how serious these people were. A sniper had staked out the one possible place where Lucas might show up and had stayed there until he did. Lucas also learned how they were intending to kill him – by gun from a hidden location. He'd make no more visits to Basher's home. He had been hoping that Basher would reveal something out of ignorance, but further contact with him was now too risky. With his access to Basher now denied, Lucas had no idea how to link Dr. Sandman to the insurance racket.
Lucas dropped into the university gym that evening to clear out his head and reduce his frustration. He was flying back to the ship well after midnight when a familiar voice beside him said, "Lucas, do you have a minute?"
Having Azure pop into his life at that exact moment was
a little disconcerting since, once again, Lucas was invisible at the time. She took him to a poorly lit, giant, empty copter parking lot where she gave him instructions on how to avoid the next attempt on his life. This escape route would involve much more twisting and turning this time. They practiced for a long time.
"Is Blinker not using the sniper rifle this time?" Lucas asked. "I don't see a sniper rifle being able to cover this much territory."
"He'll have help this time," Azure said.
"I have some questions," Lucas asked after he had made it successfully through her escape maze three times.
"About the escape?"
"No. About you."
"I already told you. I'm your guardian angel."
Lucas almost believed that now. He had been wondering how she knew what was going to happen. Was Azure sitting at the table when this assassination attempt was being planned? Or if angels actually existed, did they know everything going on in the world? He could ask her if angels were all-knowing, but he had a more pressing question.
"What colour hair do you have?"
"Hair?" she replied.
"Yeah, hair. I know that angles have feathers and wings. But you must have human hands and a human head, right? If not, you couldn't talk and listen. So if you have a human head, what colour is your hair?" Lucas had looked up Angels in the Internet and he found some very old pictures of what angels were supposed to look like. They resembled humans, but with feathers and wings.
"I have blonde hair," she said. "Can we get back to making sure you're alive tomorrow?"
"Tomorrow? So soon?"
"Yes. I can't tell you exactly when. Don't change anything you were planning to do tomorrow, because that may throw their plans off. If they make last minute changes, that might foul up your escape. Just do whatever you were planning to do during the day. I should be able to give you at least twenty seconds notice. This escape maze will work if you do what you've practiced."
Lucas was going to ask where the attack would come, but she was gone.
On the way back to the ship, Lucas was feeling good about tomorrow. First, he had a real live angel watching over him; plus, he knew where he could find her if he ever wanted to. The last time she had helped him escape, she had said, "Did you think we were having a tea party out here?" That was exactly what Dreamer's basketball coach had said when Dreamer had finally knocked her down on the way to a basket. "Did you think we were having a tea party out here?" Lylah was blonde with blue eyes. As far as Lucas was concerned, she looked like an angel. Azure was blond with blue eyes and feathers. Was Azure guarding Dreamer too, but as an undercover angel whose name was Lylah? If angels can see a person in an invisible sling, then surely they can play a wicked game of basketball too. No, they wouldn't be able to do that. Make that a heavenly game of basketball.