Capture the Flag (8 page)

“Anna! Anna!”

Anna didn't know if it had been ten minutes or an hour when she woke. The airport was darker, and at first, she thought the voice was part of a dream. But it didn't go away.

“Anna! I am in need of your help.”

She blinked and saw Sinan's mother. Her eyes darted from chair to empty chair, full of worry. “Have you seen Sinan?”

“No. He was going to meet you after he used the bathroom.”

“I thought he might be with you.” Sinan's mother blinked fast. “He never came back from the bathroom.”

“But where would he go?” Anna whispered. Her eyes had adjusted to the lights now. Henry was slumped over a chair, dozing, and José was still sound asleep on the floor. Even her father had drifted off in his seat, his mouth hanging open, hands folded over his cell phone on his chest. Anna could see the message light blinking between his fingers.

Sinan's mother shook her head. “We do not know,” she whispered, looking nervously around the gate area. “I'm not supposed to be here. They've restricted us to a small area down the hall, but we are so worried. We thought perhaps he was hungry and went off to find something to eat — he loves the pizza — but it has been more than an hour. And I do not believe he had his backpack with his money.”

“He didn't,” Anna said. “All he had was —”

“There she is!” The security guards who had caged Hammurabi were stepping briskly over backpacks and purses, headed right toward them.

Sinan's mother shrank back against the window. “I am sorry. I know we were to stay in the area you set out for us, but my son —”

“Let's go.” One of the guards reached for his handcuffs.

“Please.” Sinan's mother raised her hands. “There is no need for that. I will come with you.”

“Darn right you will. You've got some questions to answer.”

The other guard grabbed her elbow and led her back down the darkening hallway before Anna could even find her voice.

That poor lady! She was just looking for her son, and they were treating her like a criminal. And Anna hadn't even had a chance to finish telling her.

Sinan didn't have his bag with him. He didn't have anything.

Except Mr. Squeaky.

Anna closed her eyes.

She pictured the chewed-up toy in Sinan's hands.

She heard its wheezy squeak.

And she knew where Sinan had gone.

“Wake up!” Anna poked José. She tugged on Henry's sleeve and tried to ignore the trickle of drool coming out of his mouth. “Come on, you guys, get up!”

“Whaa?” Henry rubbed his forehead with the heel of his palm, wiped the drool on his sleeve, and blinked. “What?”

“It's Sinan.” Her words tumbled out, one on top of another. “His mother was here, and you know when he went to the bathroom before and he had Mr. Squeaky? He never went back to his parents, and I think I know where he is, but before I could even tell his mom, they took her away, and I don't think they'll let us see her if we try to go over there now.”

Henry squinted at her. “
What?
”

“I think Sinan went to look for Hammurabi. We need to find him.”

“So … what exactly are you proposing?” José asked.

Anna took a deep breath. “We have to break into wherever they keep the luggage.”

There was a long pause.

A very long pause.

“Ordinarily, I'd say that what you're proposing would be impossible as a result of airport security.” José scratched his head slowly.

“But …?” Anna's eyes were huge. “You said ordinarily. There has to be a
but
.”

“Everybody has a butt.” Henry snickered.

Anna glared at him.

“Sorry, but you kind of set that one up.”

She turned back to José. “But …?”

“But if ever there were a time when it might be possible for three minors to slip into the baggage area unnoticed …” He glanced out the window, where a million huge, feathery snowflakes swirled in the runway lights as if giants were having a feather-pillow fight on the tarmac.

Then he turned back to the terminal, where the only other person awake was the World's Greatest Grandma, knitting what looked like a big green sock. Even she was starting to doze off.

“If ever there were a time when it might — just might — be possible,” José said, “I'd say that time is right now.”

“Are you sure this is the only way to get in?” Anna hurried along beside Henry and José. They'd left hastily scribbled notes about walking over to Terminal C to find a snack, just in case her father and Mr. McGilligan woke up before they got back. “It seems so risky.”

“Let's see … three kids sneaking into the baggage-handling department of an airport without an adult going with them or even knowing where they are. Oh! And there's a big guy with a tattoo around here somewhere who may be trying to kill the next president.” Henry scratched his chin. “Can't imagine why you think it's risky.”

“Well, we
have
to find Sinan. I just … thought there might be a different way in with … stairs or something.”

“Don't worry,” José said as they passed the food court. Even the Cinna-Bunny stand was closed. “In theory, the chute will be angled so the luggage items will have a stable landing no matter how far down the baggage-handling level is. That means we should have a pretty stable landing, too.”

They walked down a long hallway back to the security checkpoint, and José pulled open the glass door. There was no metal detector to walk through to get out of the terminal — only in.

The check-in area, so busy and bustling when they'd arrived this morning, was eerily empty. Only one counter was staffed, by a JetBlue lady eating a cupcake and reading a book called
Ten Days to a Flatter Belly
.

“Back here.” Henry ducked behind an empty American Airlines counter. Anna and José followed, crouching down behind a computer monitor that stared back at them with a list of canceled flights.

“That's where we need to go.” Henry pointed to an idle conveyor belt next to them. Any other time, it probably would have been chugging along with luggage, but now it looked as if the snowstorm had frozen it in place. The belt led away from the counter and disappeared into an opening in the wall. Rubber strips hung down, blocking their view of whatever was on the other side.

“So that leads to the … baggage place?” Anna's heart thumped like one of those orchestra drums. “How do we know it's safe?”

“It's not safe.” Henry's voice was matter-of-fact. “It's meant for suitcases, not people.”

“Well, that's comforting. You know, I —”

“Shhh!” José grabbed her elbow and yanked her back down behind the counter. “It's him!”

Snake-Arm was heading in their direction. He had changed out of his apron from the diner and was wearing the same heavy, fluorescent orange vest the baggage handlers wore outside.

“He works in baggage, too?” Anna whispered. She heard her own voice quiver and remembered her mom's anxious tone when the Serpentine Princes came up in their phone conversation before they got cut off. What had she been about to tell Anna about Vincent Goosen?

“Stay down,” Henry whispered. “Here he comes.”

Snake-Arm hurried past their counter and leaned up against the United Airlines desk as if he were talking with someone behind it. But no one was there.

“That's weird,” Anna said. “It's almost like —”

“Shhh!” José and Henry said together, just as Snake-Arm stretched a long arm over the counter. He must have pressed a button or something, because the conveyor belt started to move. Snake-Arm glanced around the check-in area, but the JetBlue woman never looked up from her book, and Anna, José, and Henry were tucked behind the American Airlines counter, barely breathing.

Snake-Arm sauntered over to the moving conveyor belt and sat down on it. He tucked his long legs in, hugged his bulky knees into his even bulkier chest, rode through the opening in the wall, and disappeared. The black rubber strips swung gently and settled back in place behind him as the belt came to a stop.

José stared at the swinging flaps.

“You think he's a real baggage guy, or did he, like, steal that outfit?” Henry's eyes got big. “That'd be like the game Golden Oath. There's a treasure hidden in this thousand-year-old castle full of nuns. So you gotta dress up like a nun and sneak in to knock out the guards.”

“Are the guards nuns, too?” José asked.

Henry nodded. “Ninja nuns.”

Anna frowned. “But there's no treasure here.” As soon as she said it, she realized she might be wrong. If the flag was here, there was indeed a treasure at the airport. “You guys …” Her eyes got bigger and bigger. “If Snake-Arm works in baggage, he had the perfect opportunity to hide the flag in a really big suitcase or something, and now he's going to check on it. Or … move it. Or hide it better. Or … or something! We need to stop him!”

She turned to José and gestured toward the conveyor belt. “You can go ahead.”

José shook his head. “Women and children first.”

Anna put her hands on her hips. “Who's
that
quote from?”

José shrugged. “Anonymous.”

“Figures. Some scared anonymous
man
. Come on, José. What happened to the Ancient Greek action poet?”

“Yeah,” Henry said. “Do it for Pinhead.”

“
Pindar
,” José said. He took a deep breath. “Fine.” He crawled gingerly onto the belt, as if he expected it to leap out from under him.

Anna climbed on behind him and settled in, cross-legged. “All right.” She nodded at Henry. “Let's get this thing moving.”

“Ready?” Henry peered behind the check-in counter, where Snake-Arm had found whatever button or switch he'd needed to get the belt moving. “Must be this one.” Henry poised a finger in the air. “Hold on, 'cause here we go!” He pressed the button and leaped onto the belt just as it rumbled to life. “This is awesome!”

“Oh!” Anna's stomach turned a flip as she rode behind José, headed for that black hole in the wall. On their way to wherever it ended up.

The rubber flaps brushed against her face, and on the other side, there was only darkness. Before Anna's eyes had a chance to adjust, she heard José's cry.

“
Whoooaa!!!
”

“José?” Anna leaned forward, reaching for him in the blackness, but there was nothing. Right away, she found out why.

The conveyor belt dropped away from under her bottom, and she fell. “
Whoooaa!
”

Anna landed on something soft, lucky for her.

It was unlucky for José.

“Get your knee out of my stomach!” he hissed.

“Sorry, I —” But Anna's knee was the least of José's worries when Henry came down the chute feet first and landed on both of them.

“Wow,” he said as Anna and José tried to catch their breath. “That didn't hurt at all.”

“Shhh! We don't want him to hear us.” Anna crawled out from under Henry, scrambling over the heap of duffel bags that had helped to break their fall, and looked around. They were definitely in the right place.

The cavernous room had to be ten times the size of Anna's school gymnasium at home. It was cool, with high ceilings and dim fluorescent light, and crammed full of baggage in every size and color. Near the chute Anna, Henry, and José had just flown down were several more like it, maybe to carry baggage from other airlines.

Deeper in the room, bigger pieces of baggage — crates and cases and cartons — were piled along both side walls. The not-so-gigantic pieces — suitcases and backpacks, smaller cartons and kids' car seats — lined a conveyor belt that snaked through the center of the room twisting over on itself and looping around. It climbed hills and plunged down again, a giant roller coaster for suitcases. In the shadowy light way across the room, the belt split into several different tracks that disappeared into holes in the far wall.

The conveyor belt wasn't moving, though, and there wasn't a single baggage worker to be found.

“Doesn't anybody work here?” Henry whispered.

“Maybe they're all on break since no flights are leaving,” Anna said. She looked around. “So now what? These bags must be headed all over the country, all over the world, even. We need to find the ones for our flight to Vermont. That's where Hammurabi would be, wouldn't it? And I bet that's where Sinan will have ended up. I wonder —”

“Shhh!” Henry shoved her head down and pulled a big red duffel bag over the top of her. She started to push it off but heard noise from the far side of the room. Like someone throwing things.

Anna wiggled the duffel bag to the side enough so she could see. Someone was indeed throwing suitcases out of the shadows over there. When the person stepped into the light, Anna gasped.

“It's
him
!” she whispered.

Snake-Arm sent a set of golf clubs clattering onto the belt, then paused. Anna froze, afraid he'd heard her, but he never looked back in their direction; he just cursed and lumbered over to the conveyor belt. He ran his hand along the smooth metal rails that kept the luggage on the belt. When he got to a place where the track started to rise toward the ceiling, he hoisted himself up and climbed along the belt on his hands and knees, toward the high ceiling and around a curve, until they couldn't see him anymore.

Anna waited to make sure he was gone, then pushed the duffel bag off her face with a grunt. “I don't know what someone has packed in this bag, but it stinks to high heaven.”

Henry poked at the bag. “Hockey gear, maybe. The tag says it's headed to Buffalo.”

Anna looked, and sure enough, the white loopy sticker the airline had attached to the bag's handle was marked BUF. “We need to find the ones marked BTV — that's what my boarding pass called the Burlington airport.” She crawled over the heap of suitcases. “These are all BUF. Wait — there's BOS. That must be Boston.”

Henry made a noise that was halfway between a grunt and a growl.

“What's wrong with Boston?” Anna said.

“One, it's not BTV,” Henry answered, “and two, I'm being
forced
to move there. With my dad and his new wife.”

“Oh.” Anna wasn't sure what do say, so she started calling out letters on tags again. “ROC. LAX. Another BUF.”

“TPA. ORD. ATL.” Henry tossed bag after bag off the heap and sent them clunking onto the cement floor. Anna and José had to jump off to the side to avoid a maroon suitcase on wheels that came whooshing down from the baggage chute.

“Where are the BTV bags? It's like they disappeared.” Henry's forehead shone with sweat as he checked the last bag that had been in the pile. Another BUF.

“Well, when we got here, there were still flights scheduled to leave,” Anna said, “so our luggage might have gone out by the planes.” Her eyes followed the swirling maze of conveyor belts. She counted four places where the belts disappeared into the opposite wall, behind rubber flaps like upstairs. Four exits to somewhere. “We should check the bags on the belt, too. One of those tunnels must lead to the Burlington baggage.”

A deep metallic
thunk
made them all jump. There was a
rumble-creak-hum
of motors grumbling awake, and conveyor belts all around the room started up again.

“Don't move,” Anna whispered. “It might be Snake-Arm!”

They froze. Anna held her breath until she thought she'd explode. But there was no sign of him. No sign of anyone.

“Maybe they started it from up there.” José nodded toward the top of the baggage chute. “Looks like more luggage.”

The baggage that had been frozen in time chugged along past them now, in a colorful suitcase parade.

“Well, this is easier than climbing all over them,” Henry said. “Spread out, and we can watch for Burlington ones.”

They stationed themselves at three turns on the conveyor belt. Anna would rather have stayed together, but she saw Henry's point. They'd be less likely to miss something this way.

She watched the bags pass.

Big green suitcase. BUF.

Medium red with a silver ribbon tied to the handle. BUF.

Little princess suitcase. TPA.

Big black suitcase with its sticker folded over itself. It passed by before Anna could turn it to see the destination. Probably another BUF.

But what if it wasn't?

She hoisted herself up onto the belt next to a maroon BOS suitcase with wheels, then climbed over a couple of ORD duffel bags.

As soon as she reached the black suitcase, she had to duck and flatten herself against it to avoid clunking her head on a crisscrossing baggage belt that made a sort of bridge over the one she was riding on. She sat up and straightened the sticker.

“Oh my gosh! BTV! BTV! You guys! Over here!” She called and looked over her shoulder to where she thought Henry and José should be, but she'd taken so many twists and turns through the huge room on the snaking conveyor belt that all she saw were more curves and loops and suitcases.

Were there any landmarks in this gigantic room? She turned to face forward again and found herself ascending the section of belt that led way up by the ceiling. Way up where Snake-Arm had gone before.

She looked over her shoulder again, but the boys weren't there. She looked back down at the big black suitcase.

BTV.

This bag was the only thing that could lead them to Sinan. Alone or not, she had to stay with it.