“Makes you want to jump in, doesn’t it?” Emerson said.
“Are you going to jump in?”
“No,” Emerson said. “Unfortunately there’s no time. We want to head back before we lose the light. The gulch gets super dark at night because of the double canopy of vegetation.”
Thank goodness, Riley thought. Plotting to catch Emerson in the altogether was one thing. Coed naked swimming was something entirely different. She wasn’t ready for coed naked swimming. Her head was in other places. She had to save the world and make sure she didn’t end up like Spiro.
“How are we going to find the National Park Service research facility without getting killed?” Riley asked.
“No problem. Mauna Kea is very different from Yellowstone,” Emerson said. “Once you reach the higher elevations near the training area and the observatory, it’s basically an arid, treeless moonscape.”
“Is that good or bad?”
Emerson and Riley started back up the path out of the gulch.
“A little of both,” Emerson said. “The good is that there’s no place to hide an R&D facility, so it should be easier to find. The bad is that there’s no place for us to hide either. I have a plan, but it requires a certain amount of diplomacy.”
Riley looked at Emerson. Emerson was a lot of things, one of which was definitely not a diplomat.
“We’re doomed,” Riley said.
“My thoughts exactly,” Emerson said. “That’s why I wanted to talk with you first, without the others.”
“This is going to be good,” Riley said. “Let’s hear it.”
“We need an inside man. Someone who can get us close to the Pohakuloa Training Area without arousing suspicion.”
“You have somebody in mind.”
Emerson nodded. “Alani.”
“Vernon’s Alani? ATV Alani? Vernon’s going to freak out.”
“As long as we keep her away from motor vehicles, Vernon should be fine…more or less. She’s an astronomer at the Keck Observatory. She can get us access to the Onizuka Center for International Astronomy.”
“What’s the Onizuka Center?” Riley asked.
“It’s basically a hotel for the astronomers. There are usually around seventy people there at any one time, so we should be able to blend in to the background. As the crow flies, it sits about four miles up the mountain from Pohakuloa and about seven miles from the dozen or so telescopes at the summit.”
They left the gulch and crossed the meadow that led to the guesthouse. Cows were making cow sounds in the nearby paddock, and the sound of the surf was soft and rhythmic.
It was all calming and wonderful if you could just keep your mind off the scary psycho people who wanted to kill everyone, Riley thought. And then there was the Vernon and Alani thing.
“When are you going to tell Vernon about Alani?” Riley asked Emerson.
“As soon as possible. It’s going to be an awkward conversation, so I came up with plan B.”
“What’s plan B?” Riley asked.
“Send Vernon on an errand, invite Alani over to the house, and find someone tactful to babysit them after the reunion.”
“Would this errand happen to involve Vernon getting our dinner tonight? And would the babysitter happen to be me?”
“Yes and yes.”
Emerson opened the front door to the guesthouse and held it open for Riley.
“Boy, I wouldn’t want to be in your shoes,” he said. “I don’t know how you get yourself into messes like this.”
Riley shook her head. “I ask myself the same thing every day. When can I expect to be in the middle of this new mess?”
“Now.”
TWENTY-ONE
The interior of the guesthouse was a scaled-down Hawaiian version of Mysterioso Manor. Four thousand square feet of over-the-top Bali-style furniture and assorted island-themed bric-a-brac. An eight-foot-tall tiki of a grimacing Ku, the Hawaiian god of war, greeted them in the foyer.
A pretty young woman of mixed Hawaiian and Asian ancestry was sitting in the living room reading a book. She jumped off the couch, rushed over to them, and punched Emerson in the shoulder.
“Emerson Knight, I haven’t seen you in years!”
“It’s been too long,” Emerson said.
Alani nodded. “Agreed. I have to say I was shocked to get your text asking me to meet with you.” She turned to Riley. “You must be Riley Moon. Emerson said he was traveling with you. Aloha.”
“Aloha,” Riley said.
Alani cut her eyes back to Emerson. “You’re in trouble again, aren’t you?”
“I suppose it’s a matter of perspective,” Emerson said. “I prefer to think of it as an adventure. We’re helping a friend find a stolen island, and we need help.”
Alani shook her head. “That’s what I thought. Trouble.” She paused for a moment and her expression changed. “Wait just a friggin’ second. You said ‘we’ need help. Who’s the ‘we’? Are you referring to Riley?”
The front door banged open and Vernon walked in, followed by Wayan Bagus.
“Food’s here,” Vernon said. “I got takeout from the Bamboo Restaurant.”
Spotting Alani, he stopped in his tracks, his mouth dropped open, and the food bag slipped through his fingers and crashed onto the floor.
“Surprise!” Emerson said.
“You!” Alani said, glaring at Vernon, fists clenched. “You!”
“I asked Alani to stop by,” Emerson said to Vernon. “I bet you’re surprised, right?”
Vernon had a red scald rising out of his shirt collar, staining his cheeks. “I couldn’t be any more surprised than if I woke up in the hospital with tire tracks on my back.”
Wayan Bagus stepped forward.
“This is Wayan Bagus,” Emerson said to Alani. “He’s the friend we’re helping.”
Wayan Bagus tugged at Vernon’s shirt. “Isn’t this nice, Vernon? The universe has provided you with an opportunity to heal the roots of the past.”
Vernon shushed the little monk. “Ixnay on the talk about the astpay,” he whispered to Wayan Bagus.
Alani rolled her eyes. “Good grief. What did you tell him?”
Vernon held up his hands. “Nothing. Absolutely nothing.”
“You didn’t tell him about the Unspeakable Incident, did you? Because that wouldn’t end well.”
Riley looked at Vernon and Alani. “Okay, I have to know. What happened?”
Wayan Bagus bowed politely. “Vernon accidentally superglued himself to Alani.”
Vernon gasped and put his hand over his heart. “That was a confession. What happened to the sanctity of the confessional?”
“I know nothing of a confessional. I know only truth,” Wayan Bagus said.
“Vernon, you incredible nincompoop,” Alani said. “You’re not even Catholic, and he’s a Buddhist monk, not a priest.”
“It was dark. I thought it was lube,” Vernon said. “It was an accident. Yeesh, it only took the paramedics twelve hours to get us separated. What’s the big deal?”
“The big deal is I live in a town with a population of one thousand. It made the local newspaper. Everybody called me ‘Doggie-Style Alani’ for a year.”
“Well, you ran me over with an ATV,” Vernon said. “That wasn’t exactly a pleasant experience.”
“That was also an accident,” Alani said.
“That wasn’t no accident. You ran over me twice!” Vernon said. “You’re a whackadoodle.”
“I am not a whackadoodle. How dare you call me a whackadoodle!”
“This isn’t going well,” Riley said.
Wayan Bagus picked up the food bag from the floor. “I will take Vernon into the kitchen and allow him to eat his dessert first.”
Vernon made a crazy motion with his finger going around in circles, pointed it at Alani, and followed Wayan Bagus out of the room.
“Vernon really didn’t know it was glue,” Emerson said. “He’s always felt horrible about it.”
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“I know,” Alani said. “It’s just that seeing him so suddenly brought it all back.”
“We really need your help,” Emerson said to Alani. “I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t important. Lives are at stake, including ours.”
“You don’t even have to ask. I’m in. You guys are like family to me, even the jackass in the next room who’s missing most of his eyebrows. I don’t even want to ask. Besides, I haven’t had a good adventure since you stopped coming to Kohala. What do you need?”
“A room at the Onizuka with a view down the mountain, and a telescope capable of spying on the runway at Bradshaw Army Airfield.”
“Do you think we beat Tin Man and the director to Hawaii?” Riley asked Emerson.
Emerson nodded. “I checked the FAA website. There haven’t been any inbound flights landing at Bradshaw in the past forty-eight hours. Of course, they might not have filed a flight plan.”
“The entire base has been buried in the inversion layer under thick cloud cover for the past three days,” Alani said. “Visibility is zero and, as far as I know, there haven’t been any inbound or outbound flights. This is an entirely different weather system from Kona.”
“Perfect. All we have to do is wait for the bad guys to arrive and use our telescope to track them to their secret lair, all from the safety of our first-class accommodations at the Onizuka.”
“It’s a moldy, cramped room with four bunk beds and the combined stench of a thousand dirty, tired scientists,” Alani said.
“Then we’ll do it from the safety of our barely-third-class accommodations,” Emerson said. “The plan is still sound, even if it doesn’t smell the best.”
Riley raised her hand. “Except for one small detail. What do you intend to do after you find out where they’ve taken the Penning trap?”
“ ‘Penning trap’?” Alani asked.
“I’ll explain it all later,” Emerson said. “It’s complicated and barely believable.”
“About the plan,” Riley said.
Emerson rocked back on his heels. “It’s a bit fluid at the moment.”
Riley narrowed her eyes. “Fluid?”
“Trust me. What could possibly go wrong?”
—
One hour later, Alani had organized a three-day stay for all of them at Onizuka, and Riley had checked the weather report for Pohakuloa. The cloud cover was expected to dissipate by the next morning and the airfield would be open for business. Vernon and Wayan Bagus were eating in another room. Emerson had disappeared.
Riley looked up from her iPad. “Where’s Emerson?” she asked Alani.
“He went into the master bedroom to pack supplies and meditate. He said he needed some private time to come up with an idea that didn’t involve Macaulay Culkin.”
Riley shook her head. “He’s not normal.”
Alani smiled. “You like him, don’t you? I thought I sensed a spark between the two of you.”
“He’s the most irritating person I’ve ever met.”
“And you like him.”
“He is constantly getting me into trouble. Did I mention he got me fired from my last job?”
“And you like him.”
Riley sighed. “Yes. Maybe. I don’t know. He has his moments. It’s just that some of those moments make me want to punch him in the face. What about you? Did you and Emerson ever have a thing?”
“No. We were always just friends. I had a thing for Vernon. He has his moments too.”
Riley checked her watch. “We should be moving on. I’m going to see if I can help Emerson pack.”
She left the living room and walked down the short hall to the master bedroom. The door was ajar and she could hear Emerson pacing. She pushed the door open, stepped into the room, and came face-to-face with Vernon in the buff.
“Crap on a cracker,” she said, clapping her hands over her eyes. “What are you doing in here?”
“I was using Em’s shower. It’s better than the one in the guest room.”
Riley peeked at him from between two fingers. “Okay, I guess I get that, but why are you still naked, standing in the middle of the room, flapping your arms?”
“I like to air-dry. It’s real refreshing and it keeps my skin all silky smooth. I got a butt like a baby. I guess you already noticed that.”
“I didn’t notice anything!”
Riley spun around and fled the room.
Alani and Wayan Bagus were in the living room when Riley rushed in.
“Are you okay?” Alani asked Riley. “Your face is flushed.”
“I just saw Vernon naked.”
Vernon followed Riley into the room. He was still damp and he was wearing a towel. “Yep, she saw my doodles and my dongle in all their glory,” he said.
Alani gave a bark of laughter. “Your dongle isn’t that glorious. I’ve seen it, along with half the women on this island. You’ve got a teeny wienie.”
Not that Riley had seen hundreds of dongles but from what she’d just seen of Vernon he looked pretty darn good from head to toe, dongle included.
Emerson walked into the room. “What’s going on?”
“Riley saw Vernon naked,” Wayan Bagus said. “Furthermore, Alani thinks Vernon has a teeny wienie.”
“It was an accident,” Riley said. “I thought Emerson was in the bedroom.”
“I’ve heard about this on HBO,” Vernon said. “It’s a fetish called CFNM, or Clothed Female Nude Male. Apparently some women just like to look at as many wieners as they can. You’re probably next, Little Buddy.”
Wayan Bagus shook his head and looked disapprovingly at Riley. “Not good. Not good at all.”
“Criminy,” Riley said, “I don’t want to see everyone’s wiener! I only wanted to see Emerson.”
Emerson glanced down at himself. “And who could blame her.”
TWENTY-TWO
By five A.M., Riley, Emerson, Vernon, Wayan Bagus, and Alani were loaded into the ranch SUV and passing through the cowboy town of Waimea on their way to the Mauna Kea summit.
“The turnoff to Saddle Road is just ahead,” Alani said. “It’s about twenty-five miles from there to the Pohakuloa Training Area and another ten miles from there to the Mauna Kea Access Road and the Onizuka Center.”
Riley wound her way up the mountain road in the darkness and felt her ears pop. “How high are we going?” she asked Alani.
“Waimea is at twenty-six hundred feet elevation. Pohakuloa is about nine thousand feet. The summit is almost at fourteen thousand feet. It’s usually below freezing there through the night and, in winter, it’s not uncommon to have snow.”
By five-thirty A.M., the thick cloud cover was right above them.
“It’s called an inversion layer,” Emerson said. “The temperature difference keeps a dense cloud over Mauna Kea at this elevation most of the time.”
Riley drove into the cloud. Even with the high beams, it was almost impossible to see more than a foot or two in front of the car.
“This is kind of spooky,” she said as the car passed a sign reading POHAKULOA TRAINING AREA. Riley slowed and looked off to the side of the road. The visibility was so bad she couldn’t see a single building, let alone the army airfield.
“There’s no way a plane could land in this soup,” Riley said. “Especially if you’re carrying cargo that could explode if you jostled it the wrong way.”
“That’s what I’m counting on,” Emerson said. “There’s an eight-hour window tomorrow when the sky will be clear. I’m betting our friends try to land with the Penning trap during that window.”
Five minutes later, the car popped through the clouds, and the impenetrable white ceiling turned into an impenetrable white floor. Riley looked up into the predawn sky. “Wow. I’ve never seen so many stars.”
Alani smiled. “Mauna Kea is the world’s largest observatory for optical, infrared, and submillimeter astronomy for a reason. The atmospheric conditions at the summit are near perfect.”
A couple
minutes later, Riley turned on to the Summit Access Road and climbed steadily until reaching the Onizuka Center, where the paved road ended.
“There’s a very steep five-mile-long gravel road to the summit from here,” Alani said. “It requires a four-wheel drive.”
The sun was just beginning to peek above the horizon, and they all got out of the car. The air was noticeably thinner, and even walking up the small hill to the center was a workout. Only Wayan Bagus and Emerson seemed unaffected.
Vernon put his hands on his knees. “It’s kind of hard to breathe proper up in this here high country,” Vernon said.
“We all need to be alert for signs of altitude sickness,” Emerson said. “We haven’t had time to acclimate. Mauna Kea is probably the only place in the world where you can go from sea level to fourteen thousand feet in less than two hours.”
Alani led them to their dormitory. “The air is even thinner at the summit. Most of the observatories make the scientists spend a night or two at the center before using the telescopes.”
“Why?” Riley asked.
“There’s forty percent less oxygen up at the top than at sea level, and it can seriously mess with everything from your vision to your mental condition.”
“Interesting,” Vernon said. “Suppose a person worked where she was chronically deprived of oxygen. Would that cause a perfectly normal person to go all loopy and run over her boyfriend with a motor vehicle?”
Alani cut her eyes to Vernon. “You’re a chronic jackass.”
Vernon watched Alani walk inside the dormitory. “Okay, so I might be a chronic jackass, but that’s no reason not to like me. Some people even think I’m a fun jackass.”
Wayan Bagus put his hand on Vernon’s shoulder. “It is written by the Sage that you, yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.”
“Thanks, Little Buddy,” Vernon said. “Right back at you.”
Alani returned with a key and handed it to Emerson. “You’re all set. I have to get to work at the observatory. Call me on my cell if you need anything.”
—
Alani had given them an accurate description of the dormitory room. It was a small, serviceable room with two sets of bunk beds and a distant view of the Bradshaw Army Airfield. A telescope had been placed on a tripod next to the window.