Winnie and Reese were the first to take seats in the very front row of the community hall. Both of them had played big roles in these operations and they were excited about being included in the adult part of the meeting. They were chattering back and forth about what they had done in the operations. Reese was bragging how he had shot some cannons, built a fire inside the ship, and was a bailiff. Winnie countered with her role as a court recorder and a liar detector. They both agreed that Winnie had more to brag about because she was allowed to eat a lot of chocolates that Doc had licked first!
Mathias was off by himself. This desire to be by himself had nothing to do with any after effects of the trial. No, his solitude was because Theo had passed on to him one of the family's greatest treasures – at least as far as the boys in the family were concerned. This treasure was the big wooden crate of tiny toy soldiers that their father and grandfather had played with when they were boys. The big box was handed down from one child to the next who "owned" it for so long as he was still using it regularly. Yollie had owned it for about one minute. Theo decided to pass the box on to Mathias today because now that he had been in a real battle, he wasn't interested in pretending to fight battles with little plastic toys. Mathias was in the back of the room unpacking the box and putting his soldiers, tanks, and artillery into their respective armies, as revealed by their faded colours.
Liset had a corner of the room to herself as well. TG and Yollie would be taking turns sitting with her on her blanket and keeping her amused. They were hoping that her amusement would be restricted to the quiet things that they had brought.
Izzy rapped on the table at the front of the room and the meeting began. First on the agenda were heartfelt thanks from Will and Izzy on being rescued. Izzy made a special point of recognizing Hank and Mac for their leadership but also stressed that this had been a full family effort and without that effort, the operations would not have been successful and she and Will would not be standing here today. She asked Hank to summarize what each family member had contributed – she and Will not yet aware of all of the details of all of the battles. Izzy had asked Mac to share that duty with Hank, but she had declined.
# # # # # # #
The debriefing had now progressed to revealing how certain aspects to the battle had been conducted. Stu was curious how the rescue had been completed so easily when the prison's defenses had seemed so difficult to crack. He asked Izzy, "How did you open up the prison's security so easily? Wasn't everything protected by iris scans and key codes?"
Izzy began: "I was munching on a food bar and drinking from a water bottle while we were waiting to be rescued, and that got me thinking about how the prison could have handled the job of providing food and water to so many prisoners. FF had described the security system to me – how there were these tiny gates that people had to go through. That system never would have worked for bringing huge amounts of food and drink into the prison. I figured that they had to have a hidden cargo bay where trucks could come into the prison and unload."
"After Winnie brought me my sling, I went looking for it. I saw how wide the tunnels were and figured that the cargo was being brought in through the front gate. That meant that the big gates could be opened and the little gates avoided. When I saw the utility room with a whole bank of the electrical switches labeled Security, I knew what the prison guards did when trucks arrived. They just turned off the entire security system and let the prison staff bring all the food in on dollies. That wasn't a security risk because the prisoners couldn't climb up to ground level. Meanwhile, Mac was working on an entirely different way of helping us to escape. I'll ask her to describe that to you, but first, in case you haven't heard yet, Mac has agreed to be our permanent Battle Field Commander."
To a strenuous round of applause that Mac acknowledged with a sheepish "Sorry about the military speak," she took over the podium. "When TG and Yollie were taking their drones through the prison, I saw that the iris scanner was still hooked up to the computers. After we found the back door that would allow Winnie into the prison, I figured we'd be able to use her to open the gates. First, we'd find out what the passwords to the key pads were by having Yollie's and TG's drones follow FF into the mine. After FF found evidence of Will and Izzy's death, he'd leave the mine. At that point, Winnie would come in through the back door again, she'd fly up to the computer room, TG would put a drone into the room, and he'd mind-message Winnie through the process of scanning her irises into the system. Then, she'd be able to pass through all the tiny gates to the front entrance and let us in. We'd have Franklin captured by that point, so it would look like he had let us in. Izzy's plan was easier, so we went with that."
Izzy's turn: "But having two people working on a plan from different directions worked out well for us. Even though we didn't use Mac's idea for getting in, it was still a good idea that led to something neither of us had imagined. Mac is going to explain."
Mac resumed the explanation. "When I was able to enter the prison and saw how big it was, and how empty it was, I realized that we could use its security system for us instead of against us. We're going to make the prison a Wilizy safe place. Perhaps we'll use it to store cargo from pirated ships, for example. Or, perhaps a storage area for Wizard's purchases. We can't continue to haul stuff through Yolanda's house and store them in Hank's caves. The alternative of storing invisible pallets in the sky is risky. What happens if someone sees a bird bounce off one of them?"
"In addition to providing us with ample storage space, the prison could be a safe hole in case one of us needs to hide. Perhaps we might use it as a secret command center. There could be any number of ways of using a prison that only we can access. Plus as you've seen, it's built into a mountain so nobody is going to be bombing it. That's why we've scanned everyone's irises into the system, but they're stored under the names of the old prison guards in case somebody finds the files. TG has disabled the keypad entry routine to make it easier for the youngsters. I'm going to put some decent food supplies into the prison's staff room. This won't be a comfortable place for any of us to stay, but it will be safe."
"Mac, how'd you find the back door to the cell block," Stu asked. "Is it possible that someone could get in that way?"
"I only found it because the prison officials left their air conditioning on when they shut the prison down. Or perhaps FF turned it on. After we had inserted the drones into the cell block, I saw Will and Izzy huddling under blankets and wondered why they were shivering. Deep in a mine, you'd think that the temperature would be warmer than outside. Instead it was colder. I figured that it had to be air conditioning, or at the least, a reaction to air that was being blown into the mine for breathing purposes. If the air supply was being constantly replenished, that meant that a fan was active somewhere and it had to have air vents to the outside. Heat from that equipment had to be visible. So I told Wolf to turn on the heat sensors on the Wilizy and we saw bright red spots all over the hillside. They were all overgrown with vegetation but we managed to find a vent that was big enough for Winnie and Patella to use. We've turned the fans off now, so finding any of those air vents will be extremely difficult."
With no further questions on the prison break, Mac left the podium and took a seat in the back row of the audience. Winnie took that opportunity to find Will and put her arms up in the "Would you lift me up, please" signal. Will immediately brought Winnie up to his chest and she put her arms around his neck and burrowed in. Will clasped his arms under her bum and left the building with Patella in a dead run to catch up. Everyone saw the hasty exit and the room went quiet. We may assume that there was a flurry of mind-messages and then Yolanda announced that Winnie would be OK; she just needed to be alone with Will in a quiet place.
# # # # # # #
The questions had now moved to the operation against Bubba Franklin. By this time, Mac had moved to Mathias' battle field at the back of the room. She had brought two of the folding chairs with her and had laid them on
their sides so that they could serve as forts, or ambush sites, or mountains, or whatever. Mathias was now crouched behind one chair and a line of soldiers was exiting his position. Mac was hiding behind the other chair and she was bringing out her long range artillery. Mac was listening with one ear to the conversation, but her input wasn't needed. Granny asked the only question about that particular operation.
"What's happened to all those women and children who had been abused in Bubba's camp?"
Wizard replied in a round-about fashion. "We returned the secret reports that Franklin stole to the B.C. government, however they didn't want his money. They didn't want to have to explain how he had been able to take money from Zzyk for several decades without the government knowing about it. So they gave his stash to us in the understanding that the source of the money would be kept confidential. I'd like to put all of FF's money into a Wilizy Trust for Abused Children. We'd invest the money in ways to make it grow and use the proceeds to fund some programs that would help children recover from attacks by pedophiles. I haven't had time to work out the details yet, but I'll probably put a proposal forward at our next Director's meeting."
(Narrator: Wizard did indeed put that proposal forward and it was unanimously approved. In future, any valuables like cash or gold that the Wilizy recovered during one of their operations would be placed in this fund. The Wilizy Fund for the Treatment of Abused Children is still active to this day.)
As to how Franklin had been able to capture Will and Izzy in the first place, Doc asked the question designed to make sure this could never happen again. "What are we going to do about strangers being able to feel our slings or braided rings? Do we all have to stay out of crowds?"
Izzy was filling in for Will who had not returned yet with Winnie. "Will had a lot of time to think about that while he was relaxing in Camp Franklin," she said. "He told me that he has a solution, but it could take some time to create it. He has a number of other ideas that came out of Camp Franklin that will take priority. One change that he's going to make immediately is to include TG and Wolf in more of the science research from now on. That was Mac's idea, by the way."
# # # # # # #
Izzy wanted to give the pirates a lot of attention in the meeting, so when nobody had any questions about that battle, she asked them if they had any suggestions for making such an operation go more smoothly in the future.
"We ran out of peanut butter," Reese said.
"More star trek bots but add their movies too." This from Theo.
Mathias looked up from his soldiers and suggested "Stoves that don't burn food."
"I was sort of thinking along the lines of strategy suggestions," Izzy said. "Did you win your battle easily? Was the weaponry sufficient? Did you have any difficulty moving in and out of invisibility? Was there anything particularly dangerous that you weren't prepared for? Those kinds of things. Lucas?"
Lucas looked at his dad and Hank answered in his place. By the time he was finished, the group knew about Alaska's light ship, their light planes, their weaponry, and how high one had to fly to avoid their bubbles. They also learned that Lucas had taken the initiative of trailing their aircraft carrier back to its base in Anchorage, Alaska – a base that is completely concealed from the air and which the Wilizy wouldn't have known about without Lucas' daring. And none of Lucas' information could have been gained if he hadn't had Theo to take control of the Wilizy/Asia and a good crew to bring her home. "A first class job, boys," Hank concluded. "I expect Will is going to be flying over Anchorage in the near future."
Praising Lucas for being daring is like pouring kerosene on an open flame, Yolanda mind-messaged to Granny. Granny nodded and asked Lucas, "What the heck is a jolly lucas."
Reese answered before Lucas could shush him. "It's a flag that we made. I have a picture on my pinky computer. Wanna see?"
"Oh, my," Granny said. Then, she rallied. "Very ... uh .... interesting. This was your arts and crafts project?"
"May I see?" Hank said. Granny obliged. The flag showed a giant kangaroo with a black eye patch and a sword in its right hand. The left hand was lifted in a salute. The kind of salute that required the use of only one finger. Hank described the flag for the audience. "Care to explain where you got the idea for this, Captain?" he said.
"From a bot that was on the ship about the animals in Australia," Lucas started. He then went into what would have become a rambling description of how they had found the bot, and read about the kangaroo, and cut a picture and pasted, ....
"You know, I've heard that the one finger salute is very common in Australia," Hank interrupted.
"It is, Dad," Reese said. "We saw it being used all the time."
Oops.
"I thought Granny had said you couldn't fly far from the ship."
The Wilizy/Asia crew had nothing to say.
"Commander-in-Chief notes the stellar results of your battle with the North Korean freighter and so punishment will be adjusted accordingly. The crew of the Wilizy/Asia are hereby denied their daily tot of rum for this week."
"Dad," Reese started. "What’s...”
Shut up, Reese Lucas sent before his dad could change his mind.
# # # # # # #
As for Will, he was circling far above Anchorage at that very moment and leaving invisible repeater stations with cameras in his wake. When faced with the choice of flying with Winnie in circles for several hours, or flying in a straight line to Alaska and back for several hours, Will had chosen to multi-task. Winnie was now sound asleep on his chest, and Patella was snoring while curled up on his legs. Both Patella's and Winnie's legs were twitching together in synchronization. Sharing the same dream. Will felt his own legs starting to react. He turned the sling around and vibrated his way home.
# # # # # # #
All that remained now was for Yollie to name the battles. She called the battle against Bubba Shock and Awe after Patella's charge into Bubba's belly and the reaction Bubba had to Mac's appearance. The rescue from the prison was named Jailhouse Rock and, of course, the battle against the freighter had to be called Hoist the Jolly Lucas.
Yollie ended the meeting with two surprise announcements. TG had proposed to her the day before Will and Izzy had been captured and she had said Yes. Tonight there'd be a grand celebration. Some might call it a wedding.
# # # # # # #
Izzy and Granny had just left the community hall when Mac came running up from behind and stopped them.
"That operation name – Hoist the Jolly Lucas," she said. "Did either of you think that was kind of weird?"
"No," Izzy replied. "We all heard Lucas tell Theo to hoist the jolly lucas. Seemed like a good operation name to me. Why?"
"I did some more research on my great-great-grandfather, the writer. I couldn't find him before because I had been searching for books that he might have sold. He never actually sold any books. That's why I couldn't find any records. He did actually write some though. Including a book with pirates in it."
"Yeah, you told us about the pirate angle," Izzy said. "Writing is difficult. Not everyone can be successful."
"Well, it's more than that. One of my great-great-grandfather's books was titled Hoist the Jolly Lucas. He published it in 2014. I double checked. That was definitely the title."
"Wow," Izzy exclaimed. "That's weird. Your ancestor wrote a book 69 years ago that has exactly the same name as the operation Lucas ran. Why are you looking so upset?"
"Well I can't help but wonder if perhaps the book that he wrote has a Mac in it. Obviously, it had a Lucas in it. Plus pirates. What if it had a Will too? And a Granny? And an Izzy? What if he had been writing about us?"
"You mean, we could be characters in a science fiction book? Wouldn't that mean that we aren't real people?"
Granny leaned across Izzy's body and pinched Mac on the arm.
"Ouch," Mac said. "Why'd you do that?"
"I felt warm flesh," Granny said. "You felt pain. If we were characters in a
novel, would we have warm flesh and feel pain?"
"I know. I know. We're not fictional characters. But, he wrote a book with the exact same title. And since he was a science fiction writer, he was writing about something that he imagined would happen in the future, and we're living in what would have been his future . . . Don't you think that's weird?"
"You could have a weird gene in your family, Mac." Izzy, teasing her.
"There were some rumblings in the family that he was kind of weird. My grandma Lily remembered him making funny faces at her. She said that he also told puns."
"Nice people don't tell puns," Granny declared. "Put it out of your mind, Mac. Lots of people have a weird person in their family Mac. It's no reflection on you."
"I know. It's embarrassing, that's all. I mean, he could have put puns in his books."
"That would explain why he didn't sell any," Granny concluded.
"So you're saying it's just a coincidence that we had an operation named the same as the title of one of his books." Mac, seeking reassurance.
"Sure. What else could it be?" Izzy replied. "The only other explanation is that he's travelling ahead in time, watching our operations, going back to his own time, and then writing about them."
Back to the Table of Contents
Chapter 44
From Izzy's journals: Tuesday afternoon, March 13.
After the debriefing, Hank, Yolanda, Granny and I retreated to the Wilizy – the community hall having become a swirl of activity as everyone pitched in to prepare it for a wedding. Mac had been part of the secret and had been buying all sorts of food and treats. Now, she was helping organize the kitchen while Stu took care of the cooking. Wolf and Winnie were on the cutting boards. The boys were putting up decorations and cleaning. TG and Yollie had volunteered to help but had been sent packing – as in packing for their honeymoon.