Kinetics: In Search of Willow (35 page)

“
Being deeply loved by
someone gives you strength,

while loving someone
deeply gives you courage.”

―
Lao Tzu

EUGENE YOSHIDA

Rest up I did. I had no
choice with a broken leg. The room where I had found myself was in
an Alliance Hospital, or "Healer's Rest," built into the side of an
unassuming office building. In the distance I could see the tall
buildings of Denver rising above a line of trees along the horizon
line. We were quite a few miles from Jacob's office, but I didn't
know the exact location. The Healers were tightlipped about where
we were. They barely spoke at all when I saw them.

I was stuck with a cast wrapped around
my leg, and told to not leave the little hospital bed. I tried to
stand up once but only got as far as the window. I tested the
window frame, but it wasn't meant to open. The door was too far
away, but I didn't expect that I would get far with a cast
hindering my leg.

There was no TV, no books, nothing to
keep me entertained in the droning quiet.

I spent a lot of time sleeping,
drifting in and out of dreams that made little sense and less
connection to reality. Willow floated through my dreams, telling me
things with muffled words and foggy images. I always grasped out
for her in the dream, but the waking world met my reaching hand
instead.

Part of me didn't want to trust that
Jacob was going to keep his word, but his three-times daily visits
kept me on my toes. He sat with me, bringing my breakfast, lunch
and dinner on a little puke-green tray and quietly read from a
book.

I didn't want to talk to him, so I
didn't.

Even with Jacob or the Healer coming
in to check on me periodically, the room was quiet. The walls and
windows were soundproofed and besides the AC whispering through the
vent, I was alone with the sound of my breathing.

Waiting was painful, and yet I could
do nothing now. I was pretty sure Jacob was having the Healers wait
until the last moment to heal the break in my shin bone, so that
way, even if I did find a way out, there would be little distance
to go before my body gave out.

On the third day of my bedridden
incarceration, Jacob finally broke the silence between
us.

"It's almost time. And I have a few
things that I need to talk to you about."

I tilted my head at him. I didn't feel
like taking the energy to form words yet.

"In about two days I'm going to have
you teleported to just outside the limits of the Isiroan base in
Laramie. While there you have the freedom to do whatever you want
on one condition."

"Condition?" I ventured.

"Yes. When you have found what you
need, I want you to set off this beacon." He held up a small black
device no bigger than a cell phone. The little red display on the
top read: Inactive.

"Beacon for what?" I held my hand
out.

Jacob dropped it into my palm. "This
will allow us to zero in on your location and subvert their shield
tech. All we need is that secure location to teleport
in."

"That it?" I asked,
incredulously.

He smiled. "Yes, very easy stuff. Even
for you."

I frowned at him.

"I can't give you much else to help
you, because if you are caught, then it will lead them to us."
Jacob stood up from the wicker chair and started toward the
door.

"Why couldn't you guys do this?" I
muttered, turning the little device around in my hands.

"I never said that we couldn't." Jacob
looked down at me. "This kind of thing is dangerous and if someone
gets caught, then it could mean all-out war."

"And what they did, stealing Willow,
wasn't?" I snarled, dropping the device to my lap.

"It's politics, Eugene," Jacob
shrugged.

"Politics?" I pushed myself up,
silently cursing the lump of cast on my leg.

"Accept it for what it is, Eugene.
You're not experienced enough to really know what goes on behind
the curtain."

"If you say so," I
muttered.

He went to the door and talked to
someone on the other side, and then retook his seat next to my bed.
"I'll have the Healers come in and fix that leg of yours real
soon."

"Thanks, you're so generous." I
snarked.

"What are brothers for?" He smiled and
reopened his book.

True to his word, the Healer came in a
half hour later, and with the touch of a hand and some
concentration, the break in my leg was gone.

I muttered obscenities under my
breath. Jacob really was holding off until the last moment. Well,
at least I was getting what I wanted. Willow's location was in
sight.

***

We left the Healer's Rest, which
turned out to be an office park surrounded by trees and pavement.
The only noteworthy thing about it was the man I saw waiting on the
curb outside the main doors of the Rest. His hair was stringy and
greasy. He was dressed in a clean day-glow orange jumpsuit with
silver cuffs around each wrist and ankle.

Even through the curtain of hair over
his face I could still see his eyes. They were bright and furious
with the men around him. They pushed him into a windowless white
van, and as the door closed, he grinned blackish teeth at me. I
shuddered but didn't have long to witness the departure of the van
when Jacob grasped my shoulder firmly and led me in the opposite
direction.

"Who was that?" I asked. He seemed…
familiar somehow.

"A volunteer." Jacob replied easily
and winked.

"For?"

"It's not time for 20 questions,
Eugene. Let it be." He let go of my shoulder and shoved me in the
direction of his car.

"Fine," I muttered. I knew little of
what Jacob did in the Alliance. Whoever that man was, I didn't
believe my brother's easy explanation of him. But really, what did
it matter? Only Willow mattered right now.

We took a short drive into the far
suburbs of Denver and it occurred to me to ask why we weren't
teleporting.

"Because teleporters are in short
supply. They are not our personal hover crafts."

"Oh. So…" I decided not to ask the
question, but Jacob beat me to it anyway.

"And only the Isiroans have the
capability of mimicking the power."

"Really?"

"We're hoping to change that soon.
Soon we will all be on equal grounds."

I didn't know what to say after that.
The longest conversation with my brother in years ended
quietly.

We pulled into the driveway of a three
story mansion some twenty minutes later. Jacob pulled the car into
an empty garage spot and parked. I reached to undo my seat belt but
he stopped me.

"Wait for it."

I looked around and then suddenly the
ground shook. The car sunk into the ground, and when I looked out,
I saw that we were in some kind of glorified Ferris wheel of cars.
The floor dropped a few dozen feet and stopped at a
platform.

Jacob led the way out onto the
platform and pulled me by my shirtsleeve into a hallway. The
featureless hallway led into a room with another platform. This
platform was raised, and surrounding it was a circle of men and
women at computers. Each of them was talking or tapping away on
keyboards.

A slight swoosh of air redirected my
attention to the platform where a man and a woman popped into
existence.

"Welcome to W.S.389. This is one of
many way stations where we are safe to teleport to and from," Jacob
said like a proud father.

"Interesting."

"Wait here." Jacob said and left to
talk to one of the women at the computers.

Beyond the computers was a set of
black windows. I stared at them, trying to see if there were any
people behind the glass, but they were far too dark. One way
windows.

Jacob came back and waved at me to
follow him.

We met up in a different part of the
mansion, which really didn't look at all like a mansion on the
inside, with a man named Brown. He wore the tan Alliance uniform,
very U.S. Navy in color and shape, but unless you knew what you
were looking at, you wouldn't know that it wasn't the
same.

Brown took one look at me and scoffed.
"Are they really sending babies into the field now?"

I opened my mouth to retort, but Jacob
took hold of the back of my neck and made me stop.

"He's a special case," Jacob laughed
congenially.

"Special? Ha. Gotcha." He grinned at
my brother.

Something passed between them, and I
think I was the butt of it. I frowned at the both of
them.

"Anyway, kid, you know where you're
going?" Brown snickered

"Kinda." I looked at Jacob for
confirmation. His expression never wavered from muted
amusement.

"Well, look here." He pointed out a
map of the world on a screen near the back of the room. "Find me
the location."

I touched the screen where I thought
Wyoming might be and the screen zoomed in toward it. I stepped
back, startled, and then growled under my breath at the other two
laughing at me.

"Oh, yeah, forgot to mention. Touch
screen." Brown gave me a shit-eating grin.

I shook my head and tapped closer to
Wyoming. Titles of states and then towns appeared over the terrain.
And then as it zoomed closer, I saw names in bright colors, some
red, some blue and some green. Some were labeled 'I,' some 'A' and
others blank.

I found out fairly quickly that the
red spots were Isiroan bases. I found the one and only one in
Wyoming, appropriately placed smack dab in the middle of the
Laramie Mountains.

"There," I said, pointing to the
location.

"Er…" Brown started, but Jacob waved
him off.

"Alright. I'll leave you to it,
Eugene, Mr. Brown. Eugene? Keep your nose clean."

That was the closest he had ever come
to telling me to stay safe. I accepted it, and with a thanks I
waved as he walked away.

"You're stupid to go
there."

I glanced at Brown.

He shrugged. "Just saying. Come
on."

Brown led me back to the huge platform
with all the computers around it and directed me to stand in the
middle of it. He spoke to a man near the edge of the platform who
stood at something like a conductor's platform and tapped at unseen
buttons. The man nodded at Brown as he left to join me at the
center of the platform.

"Ready?"

I
nodded. 
More than
ready, 
I thought.

Within seconds the world around me
dematerialized. I felt thin air blowing through me, shattering my
being like glass. I didn't have enough time to think about the rest
of the odd conflicting sensations before I felt a whole set of new
sensations. My body started to congeal and then all of a sudden I
felt like a pile of rocks trying to become a boulder. Seconds after
that, I was left with nothing more than myself, staring very
intimately into the dirt.

"Whoo! First time teleporting?" Brown
asked from above my head.

"Guess so," I replied, pushing myself
up off the ground.

Brown pointed toward where the sun was
falling into a cup of mountains. "Follow the sun for about 15
minutes and you'll find the base. I highly suggest you wait until
after dark to try and get in. But they have a lot of eyes anyway,
so you're probably shit caked either way."

"Thanks," I frowned

He shrugged. "Toodles," he said and
poofed off in the breeze.

I stared at the spot where he had been
and then started walking toward the sun. It felt like only the
first step in a journey of a thousand miles.

I took a deep breath and followed the
compass and the faraway lights toward the Laramie base. With any
luck I would be able to get into the base before dawn.