Some distance from Yerba Buena Island, the Jets joined together in a hovering huddle. Risa held a large bowl, and Chris put the guidestone inside. They watched the stone marble roll to a certain side of the bowl, then moved off in that direction. After they had checked several more times, the guidestone finally settled squarely in the bottom of the bowl.
“We should be right over it,” Chris said.
“It feels like the stone is tugging downward,” Risa said.
Nate looked down at the black water of the bay. “I guess we’ll get a better sense of things once we’re underwater.”
“Too bad Jonas didn’t have waterproof night vision gear,” Risa said.
“We can perceive everything just fine underwater,” Chris said.
“Right, I meant for after we come up,” Risa explained.
“We have Lindy,” Nate said. “She’ll be enough.”
“I see it,” Lindy reported. “The top is barely poking above the floor of the bay.”
“You see the lighthouse?” Chris asked dubiously.
“Remember how she tracked the Hermit?” Nate asked. “Just trust her. She sees really well. Even through water in the dark.”
“Down we go,” Chris muttered.
They flew down and plunged into the water. Suddenly Nate had a precise sense of the floor of the bay and the sea life swimming around him. So far, he had sampled his Sub abilities only in the training facility pool. The capacity to perceive the surrounding environment in open water was a totally different experience. The vivid sensory input was almost too much to process.
Gliding down through the water felt different from flying through the air. The basics remained the same, but everything was slowed down. Not only was his top speed reduced, but it was tougher to accelerate. At least he could make tighter turns.
The temperature seemed perfect. Breathing the water felt no different from breathing air. His eyes saw less, but his perception of his surroundings remained effortlessly detailed.
The water here was neither terribly shallow nor shockingly deep. The bay floor was dozens of feet down, but not nearly a hundred. As Lindy had described, the top of the stone lighthouse protruded from the silt.
“It’s big,” Nate said, his voice carrying clearly through the water.
“Huge,” Lindy said. “This is just the tip.”
“It seems more like the roof of a building than the top of a tower,” Chris said. “It’s too big around.”
“It’s a tower,” Lindy assured them. “It goes a long way down.”
“Really?” Risa said. “You can see through sand?”
“Pretty much,” Lindy replied.
“How do we get in?” Nate asked.
“We dig,” Lindy said. “There are openings into the tower not far below.”
“The guidestone is pulling me,” Risa said. “I think the attraction is increasing as we get closer.”
“Can you feel those sharks?” Chris asked.
“Yeah,” Nate said. Several prowled the water near the edge of his perception, the largest around six or seven feet long. “They don’t seem interested in us.”
“If they come this way, I’m out of here,” Risa said emphatically. “I won’t mess with sharks. Not for any reason. I’ll fly home and go to bed. I’m serious.”
“Where do we dig?” Chris asked as they neared the exposed portion of the tower.
“This side,” Lindy said, pointing. “It’ll get us to an opening fastest.”
Nate plunged his hands into the silt and began scooping it away. The others worked alongside him, sending up clouds of fine particles. At first their progress was hard to measure, but as they kept working, a definite hole began to form. As they burrowed deeper, a large quantity of sand collapsed inward through a gaping window.
“I guess we loosened it up,” Nate said.
“Whoa,” Chris said. “I can feel it now. The inside of the tower.”
Nate instantly recognized that Chris was right. Now that the barrier of sand had been removed, Nate could sense the water extending down to the base of the tower. He could feel the stone stairs winding down the enormous tube.
“It’s solid stone,” Nate realized.
“Yeah,” Chris agreed. “I don’t feel blocks. No bricks or anything. No mortar. It’s one big hollow rock.”
“I don’t want the guidestone anymore,” Risa said. “It’s tugging too hard. I don’t trust it.”
“I’ll take it,” Nate offered.
Risa handed it over. He noticed the pull immediately. Until this moment, Nate had never felt anything unusual while holding the stone. Now the tug was unmistakable.
“After you,” Chris said.
Nate drifted into the lighthouse. “I don’t sense anything alive,” Nate said. “There’s nothing moving,”
Chris agreed. “Stay ready for traps.”
“Can you feel how the tower widens out down at the bottom?” Lindy asked. “Like it finally reaches a really large room.”
“I feel it,” Risa confirmed. “Really big. Lots of space.”
“But no giant squids,” Nate said. “No sea serpents.”
“I don’t feel anything like that,” Lindy said.
Nate started gliding down the stairs at a gentle pace. They had a long way to go, but he didn’t want to hurry too much and blunder into a trap.
“This is perfect darkness,” Chris said. “It makes no difference whether my eyes are open or shut. I’ve never seen anything to match it.”
“I almost can’t appreciate it,” Nate said. “I can tell that my eyes see only blackness, but I sense everything even better than when I have full sight. That sense almost becomes sight in my head, even though I see nothing.”
“Not for me,” Chris said. “I can feel everything, but it’s way different from sight. It’s more like touch. It’s like my nerves extend into the water. I feel whatever the water feels.”
“I can feel and see,” Lindy remarked.
“No surprise there,” Risa said. “You see better than Superman. Should we speed it up? The Tanks will be after us.”
“We don’t want to hit traps,” Chris cautioned.
“What traps are we going to hit?” Risa argued. “We’re not touching the floor or the walls. We’d feel tripwires coming long before we reached them.”
“She has a point,” Nate conceded. “I’ll hurry more.”
As they wound deeper into the lighthouse, the guidestone pulled harder than ever, not with overpowering force, but certainly insistent. Nate suspected that if he let it go, the stone would zoom directly to the Protector.
“Finding the Protector should be easy,” Nate commented. “The stone will haul us straight there.”
“I hope so,” Chris said. “I don’t want to stay here long. This would be a lonely place to die.”
“Shut up, Chris,” Risa said.
“Our bodies would be lost forever,” he said.
“I’ll leave,” Risa warned. “Don’t mess with me like that.”
“The one who freaks out and leaves is usually the first to get taken,” Chris assured her.
“Don’t let him scare you,” Nate said. “This is more cool than scary. Think how ancient this lighthouse must be. We’re probably the first people to come here in thousands of years.”
“It’ll be cooler once it’s a memory,” Lindy said quietly.
They continued deeper. When the space widened out, it did so dramatically. The lighthouse must have had a huge building at the base. Nate could feel multiple large rooms. Trying to find the Protector would have felt really daunting had the guidestone not kept tugging him in an obvious direction. Soon it was dragging him along with enough force that he questioned whether he could bring himself to a standstill.
“You keep going faster,” Chris noted.
“It’s the guidestone,” Nate explained.
“I think I feel the chest,” Risa said. “Farther ahead on the path we’re on.”
“You’re ri
ght,” Nate realized. “We’re almost there.”
“I see it,” Lindy said. “It’s pretty. I can’t see inside of it.”
Nate felt the chest coming closer. It rested alone on a platform. As the stone pulled harder, Nate began to worry that his hand would get crushed if he kept hold of it. Just before he reached the chest, Nate let go of the stone. The guidestone thumped softly against the chest.
“It changed shape,” Lindy said.
Nate could sense the transformation. He reached out and grabbed the new incarnation of the guidestone. It no longer seemed drawn to the chest. It had grown somewhat. “It turned into a tiny replica of the chest,” Nate said.
“The chest is pretty big,” Chris observed.
“What’s it made of?” Lindy asked.
“Wood, maybe?” Nate said. “Worn really smooth? With jewels in it?”
“Is it clay?” Chris wondered. “Some type of ceramic?”
“It’s definitely smooth,” Risa said. “I don’t feel any cracks. It’s shaped like a chest, but I can’t tell where it opens.”
“No hinges,” Lindy agreed. “No keyhole. Not the tiniest crack. It’s like it has no lid.”
“The little replica has a lid,” Nate said. “I can feel the lid.”
“Right,” Chris agreed. “Me too. It seems obvious on the guidestone.”
Nate tried to open the replica. The lid wouldn’t budge. “It’s locked.”
“Mr. White didn’t think we could open it underwater,” Chris reminded him. “We can give it a better try when we get it out of here. Should we see if we can move it?”
“Lindy?” Nate said. “Would you hold the replica?”
“Sure,” she said, accepting the transformed guidestone.
Chris went to one side of the chest, Nate to the other.
“Moving the chest could set off a trap,” Nate said.
“True,” Chris acknowledged. “Everybody get ready for trouble.”
“Go for it?” Nate asked.
“Why not?”
They lifted together. Nate found the chest a bit lighter than he expected. It had a fair amount of weight to it and was pretty bulky, but overall it felt manageable. Nothing indicated that lifting it had triggered any sort of trap.
“How is it?” Risa asked.
“Could be worse,” Chris said. “Let’s get out of here.”
Advancing through the water, Nate and Chris carried the trunk back to the tower and started gliding up the stairs. Risa and Lindy followed.
Taking the chest up the tall tower didn’t particularly fatigue Nate. Once they got some momentum going, the effort almost felt more mental than physical. They just kept toting the chest upward, keeping away from the stairs, walls, and ceiling.
At last they emerged from the lighthouse and brought the chest up to the surface of the bay. The air felt empty and dark after the vivid sensations available underwater.
Lindy and Risa surfaced nearby.
“So far, so good,” Lindy said.
“Should we try to fly with it?” Chris asked.
“Sure,” Nate said.
With the chest between them, Nate and Chris ascended out of the water. They hadn’t risen more than ten feet before Nate’s arms were trembling with exertion. The boys stopped rising, and Chris’s side of the chest dipped. Nate lost his grip, as did Chris, and the chest splashed down into the water.
Nate dove down and stopped the chest from sinking clear to the bottom. Chris took hold of the other side. The girls gathered near.
“It’s too heavy to go far,” Nate said.
“It isn’t bad underwater,” Chris noted. “We could take it through the water to Angel Island. Then we would just have to fly it a little ways to a quiet spot.”
“Alcatraz is closer,” Lindy said, “but Jonas nixed that as a destination, along with Treasure Island and Yerba Buena.”
“He left Angel Island as fair game,” Chris said. “The Tanks will have a tough time getting there. Let’s go see if we can open this thing.”
Chapter Eighteen
The Chest
Working together, with one of them at each corner, Nate, Chris, Lindy, and Risa managed to fly the chest a few hundred yards inland from the Angel Island shore, crossing a small road and struggling some distance up a brushy slope. When they reached their limit and let the chest thump down, it struck the ground with finality.
Risa rubbed her hands briskly. “I lost circulation to my fingers.”
“That thing was heavy,” Chris said, stretching his arms. “This spot seems as remote as anywhere.”
Nate ran a hand over the top of the chest, then down the side. Unlike his body, the chest remained damp. “I still can’t feel how to open it. I can’t even tell whether it’s wood or ceramic or what.”
“I can sort of see it with the moonlight,” Chris said. “The color is darker than I realized. But I had a much better sense of it back in the water.”
“Let me get out the guidestone,” Lindy offered. She had stashed it in her backpack so she could help carry the chest. “Maybe it has a key inside.”
“The chest has no keyhole,” Risa pointed out.
“Well, maybe there’s something else in it,” Lindy said, rummaging. “It seems suspicious that the guidestone turned into a miniature chest. At least the little replica has a lid.”
Lindy produced the tiny chest and started prying at it with her fingers. “It’s stuck, but the lid has some wiggle to it. Wait, here we go.” She lifted the small lid, and simultaneously the top of the chest folded open as well. And then the chest kept unfolding in astonishing ways, as if lid after lid were opening in unpredictable directions. With a startled squeal, Lindy dropped the miniature chest as it transformed as well, mimicking the larger version.
“Whoa,” Nate breathed, taking involuntary steps back as the chest grew and evolved with each new lid that lifted. The unfolding process sped up. Strange new shapes unfolded manically, expanding the chest to improbable proportions.
When the process ended, Nate found himself staring at the entrance to a stone building that extended back into the slope. The structure stood three times his height, with a triangular pediment supported by pillars. Because of how the building protruded from the slope, it looked as if it had been mostly buried in a landslide. A massive bronze door shielded the entrance.
“That was awesome,” Chris said.
“More like freaky,” Risa replied.
“I can’t see inside,” Lindy said. “Same as with the chest.”
Nate crouched, pointing at the ground. “Look, the guidestone matches the chest’s new shape. It’s even partly buried.”
“What’s with the guidestone?” Chris asked.
“It must be some sort of simulacrum,” Nate said. “I think touching it to the chest activated it.”
“Opening the guidestone chest made the actual chest transform,” Lindy said.
“So what happens if we open the little door?” Risa worried. “Will it change again? Will it turn it into a spaceship?”
“Let’s try the actual door first,” Chris suggested. He walked to the entrance of the building and tugged on the bronze door. It didn’t budge. Planting himself firmly, he pulled hard but still got no result.
“It might take them some time, but the Tanks are coming,” Nate said. “We should probably try the little door.”
Lindy crouched and opened the door of the small building. The door to the large building opened in perfect synchronization. Nate was braced for something more, but nothing else happened.
Risa, Nate, and Lindy joined Chris at the entrance. Nate could see a long, shadowy hall with seamless stone walls. Light shimmered in the distance.
“Big chest,” Chris said, the words gently echoing down the corridor.
Nate snorted softly. “A building in a box. It’s kind of like the Hermit making a boat or a barn using some junk in his backpack. Weird magic.”
“Let’s go find the Protector,” Lindy said.
br /> “She’s right,” Chris agreed. “We should hurry.” He bent down to grab the guidestone, only to find it solidly stuck in the ground. “It won’t budge,” he said.
“We’ll have to leave it,” Nate said.
“That means we can’t keep the Tanks out,” Chris said.
“Then, like you said, we should hurry.” Rising off the ground, Nate glided forward. The others followed his lead. The air was cool and still. Glancing back, Nate saw his fellow Jets hovering along the dark corridor, their feet dangling. They looked like phantoms. From up ahead, Nate heard a distant, steady pounding, supplemented by whirring murmurs and rhythmic squeals.
“Hear that?” Risa asked.
“Sounds like a big machine,” Chris said.
“A machine?” Lindy questioned. “In here? This place looks prehistoric.”
Nate increased his pace.
“Be ready for traps,” Chris warned.
Nate slowed a little. He could no longer feel everything the way he had in the water. All it would take was him brushing up against a tripwire in the gloom to trigger some serious trouble.
Up ahead, the hallway elbowed left. Golden light reflected from beyond the turn. The pounding, swooshing, squeaking, whirring sounds grew louder. When Nate reached the corner he stopped, then looked back at the others. “I think I found the traps.”
The hall stretched ahead of him, a chaos of moving parts, the scene lit by lamps embedded in the walls. Razor-sharp pendulums whisked back and forth at high speeds. Deadly blades whipped out of slots in the walls, ceiling, and floor, disappearing only to return, some alternating their vicious swipes, others twirling like propellers. Sharp spears erupted out of deep sockets, thrusting and retracting at a disheartening pace. Toward the far end of the corridor, large pillars pistoned up and down, pounding the floor with implacable force. The other Jets joined Nate, staring down the lethal corridor in despair.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Chris muttered.
“It’ll be like flying through a blender,” Risa said.