The Keepers Book Two of the Holding Kate Series (19 page)

“Toss a flare into the center of the room,” Corey said. “The smoke will camouflage our scent.”

“Good,” Dirk nodded. “Any others.”

“Blind them with all of our lights before we attack, and Tara stays here!” Trip grumbled.

“Now wait just a minute—”

“Tara, I am not going to argue with you.”

“Trip, you don’t have the authority to—”

“I am only thinking about your leg.”

“What about your hand?”

“My hand? Woman, you know that won’t even slow me down! But your leg—”

“Stop it! You don’t have any right—”

“GRRRRRRRR.”

They all froze, then slowly turned toward the growling sound. Flashlights trained onto the jackal with haunches raised and teeth bared. Trip didn’t give him time to react. He jumped, grabbed his neck and snapped it before he could make another sound.

The team stared at him with mouths gaping.

“I couldn’t take the chance he would alert the others,” Trip explained.

Pinky snapped her mouth shut. Tara had a gleam of satisfaction. Corey seemed conflicted. Dirk, Mel, and Donnie just gawked.

“I’ve never seen anyone move so fast,” Pinky huffed.

The others nodded. Tara gave Trip her way-to-go smirk, then suddenly broke it and looked away with a scowl.

A sound trickled down the corridor from the lair.

“Is that music?” Dirk asked.

Pinky and Corey both turned a startled expression to the other.

“It’s Kate!” Corey breathed her name in reverence.

The sound of her song sent a jolt through Trip.
Kate is alive! Kate is whole!
He hadn’t really believed it until that moment.

A familiar melody, though Trip couldn’t make out the words, reminded him of kissing Tara on a platform high above a forest. Their eyes met, and he could tell she recalled it too. Her face flushed, and her perfect brow rippled under the assault. The painful expression fled, and her hard emotionless mask quickly replaced it.

“Immortal Song,” Pinky breathed, and her face mutated into sorrow, too. No doubt she remembered countless platform experiences with the husband she left behind in the two century-jump.

This group stood broken. Fractured from the inside out, too many losses, too much sorrow wrecked them. The pain on the faces of his teammates cut him to the core.

“Well, now we know Kate is here,” Dirk said.

As they crept closer, Corey took the lead. He held up his hand for them to halt, and they were able to make out words. Her voice scratched out, as though she had been singing off and on for hours.

“Should we lure them into the corridor and kill them off one at a time?” Dirk suggested.

Corey and Trip both shook their heads. “No, they could catch on and kill Kate for revenge,
”
Corey said.

“So what, you think the jackals are sentient?” Pinky questioned.

Corey and Trip both turned and gave her a pointed glare.

“Right. Of course they are. Everything else has been.” She pursed her lips and blew away the last vapor of her denial.

Trip scrubbed at his face.
What are we going to do?
No good plan ensured Kate’s survival.

Her song broke down into sobs and Corey lost it. It took all of them to hold him back. Trip slammed him into the cave wall and leaned against his chest, rumbling into his ear. “Corey, get a grip. If you lose your head now, she’s dead.”

He stopped struggling and nodded. “I’m okay. I’m under control.”

“Just as we planned, got it?” Dirk said. “Flares at the ready.”

They cracked their flares, and threw them into the cave.

“Now!” Dirk rushed forward and the Keepers followed him.

The flares hit the middle of the cavern and bounced. The jackals rose from their beds, startled. Trip, Tara, Corey, and Dirk sliced twenty of them down before they knew they were there. Mel and Pinky ran for Kate as planned.

Kate raised her tar encrusted head. The red light of the flares flashed in her startled eyes. She yanked her arms, chained to the cave wall. Mel and Pinky skidded to a stop and heaved on the chains, but they wouldn’t budge.

“Donnie!” Mel yelled. “Eunavae, get down.” They hit the cavern floor and Donnie threw an axe from across the room that hit the chain and broke it. Trip had never seen anyone with hand/eye coordination like that dude.

Kate fell into Pinky’s arms, the severed chain trailing through the clasps. With Kate dangled between them, Mel and Pinky struggled over the dead jackals and picked their way back to the corridor. Corey sliced through three more jackals before leaping a fourth and running after them, pushing Tara in ahead of him.

Donnie set off the ammonia bomb at the corridor entrance, and the jackals slung their heads, snorted and backed away. “Go, go, go!” he yelled, motioning with his arm.

Trip and Dirk held their breath and leapt through the vapors, before running to catch the rest of the group. Trip held the rear, but the jackals weren’t following yet.

They found the others at the small cave, gathered around Kate.

“Is she?” Trip asked, afraid of the answer.

Corey bent over her, whispering soothing words. Trip couldn’t see her face, but noticed the rise and fall of her chest and felt relief spread through his.

Kate’s alive.

The sphere came.

“The nature of the ‘collapse of the wave function’ is determined by our self-concept stored in the subconscious mind. Our subconscious mind is aware of the ‘many-worlds’ occurring simultaneously and chooses the reality we continue to exist in based on our self-concept.”
~ Kevin Michel,
Moving Through Parallel Worlds To Achieve Your Dreams

QUANTUM PERSPECTIVE SOURCE (QPS): KATE WILSON

I hate myself. What a horrible creature I am to cheat on my husband and give false hope to Trip just when he started to move toward Tara. I am…I am just like my dad, a cheating, egomaniac who abandoned us for another woman. I’m a cheating egomaniac. Just like Dad. I hate myself.

They rode in the golf cart back toward First Cabin. Kate sat beside Corey and felt shame at his continued devotion. He held her hand and kissed her as though nothing were wrong, as though she had not betrayed him, genuinely pleased that she lived and sat beside him.

She couldn’t stand it. A great division rose between them, and the more he tried to pull her back, the worse she felt.

I don’t deserve him.

They made it back to First Cabin and Navarro jogged down the steps. “Hey, Keepers!” He flashed a welcoming smile. “I delivered your dinner. Kim sent over a tray of sandwiches and potato salad.”

“I love that woman!” Dirk grinned.

They dragged all of the equipment into the cabin with Navarro’s cheerful company and assistance. Mel restocked the first aid kit and rations, as Tara and Trip sat down to inspect the weapons. Kate passed out the sandwiches, keeping her face down to avoid any scrutiny. She selected a spot on the sofa between Navarro and Dirk. As she nibbled on her sandwich, she glanced across the room at Corey.

He furrowed his brow and considered the empty chair next to him. Kate studied her toes and crammed a bite of ham and cheese into her mouth. Difficult to swallow, she gave up after one bite.

She couldn’t stand his perfect gaze on her. She felt so dirty, so unworthy of his love.

Navarro chatted about their old teammates while they ate sandwich wedges. They just finished dinner, and Tara snapped closed the weapons cache, when another sphere fell.

No rest for the weary.

QUANTUM PERSPECTIVE SOURCE (QPS): MELANIE MARCUS

Good grief!
Mel couldn’t believe another sphere fell so quickly. She wanted some alone time with Donnie and a good night’s sleep.
Not gonna happen anytime soon.

They landed in pitch black.

She felt solid flooring beneath her boots and reached out to her sides but felt nothing, no one.

“Hey, where are you guys?” Mel’s voice echoed, but no one answered.

“Donnie!” She raised her volume a bit.

Nothing.

“Can anyone hear me?” she yelled.

Nothing.

She squatted down and touched the floor, smooth and cool to the touch, like marble or ceramic. She sat down. Nothing to do, nowhere to go, she took the time to rest. She dozed.

Buzzing startled her.

She opened her eyes. Awash in neon lights embedded into the walls, the room glowed. She walked over to the nearest wall and ran her hand along the smooth surface. The lights behind a transparent barrier, bent and weaved into fantastic shapes, swirls, loops and whorls. Turning her face to the ceiling, she followed a strip of blue neon light pulsing along the center. It arrowed through an open door, guiding her into the distant corridor. Curious, she decided to follow it.

She walked along a passage with hands out to her sides. Light reflected off of the black floor and smooth walls. She walked about fifty paces and the light broke sharply to the right down another long corridor. At the end of the hall, a door made of the same shiny black stone barred the passage.

As she neared, it slid to the side and Dirk stood on the threshold.

“Dirk,” she sighed his name and her shoulders fell forward.

“Mel? Have you seen anyone else?” He grabbed her in a bear hug.

“No, just this blue light.”

He snapped his head up. “Mine was yellow.”

“You followed a light here, too?”

He nodded.

“Dirk, I have never seen a jump like this before. Have you?”

He nodded again, mannerisms jerky and wild.

“When?”

“My first year as a jumper, eleven years ago, we came to a place like this.” His face morphed into panic. “Only one survivor. Me.”

Mel’s jaw dropped. “Dirk! What happened?”

“Shhh.” He cocked his head and stepped behind her.

Mel turned around then heard it too.

Click, click, click, scrape, click.

“What is that?” Mel wheezed out.

“That is not good!” He grabbed her hand and jerked her back through the door he had emerged from.

Mel glanced around just before the door closed and stifled a scream.

They sped along the path of the neon yellow light. Dirk had an iron grip on her hand.

“Dirk, wait!”

He continued to drag her along the corridor.

“Dirk! Stop!”

He whirled around in panic. “Keep moving, Mel,” he insisted.

“Dirk, if we follow the path of the light, won’t it just lead us to trouble?” Mel struggled to keep up with his long strides.

“Dirk?”

They slid to a stop at the end of the corridor at a dead end. Dirk pressed her into the corner and stood in front of her watching their trail.