The Subatomic Kid

by George Earl Parker

  Great scientific discovery comes in traveling those roads endlessly, like Jack Kerouac; it’s the road that leads to that one blinding moment of enlightenment—a eureka moment that comes when the road dead-ends at a canyon in the middle of a dark night, and all hope seems lost.

  “I never reversed the field!” Leitz blurted out in amazement.

  “What?” Miss Moon exclaimed.

  “In the first experiment, I suspended the atomic structure of the chair and the boy, but I only reversed the field on the chair, because at that time I didn’t know about the boy.”

  “What does that mean?” Angstrom queried suspiciously.

  “It means I have to do it now,” Leitz explained, jumping up from the floor and moving swiftly to his control panel.

  “But the equipment is no longer functioning,” Doctor Angstrom pointed out.

  “That is not important,” scoffed Doctor Leitz as he programmed a series of codes into his computer, “the atomic structure is stored in memory. I just have to enter the human signature and bring it back.”

  Miss Moon and Doctor Angstrom stared at the mad scientist as he illuminated the grid background. It was the only light in the room, and surrounded as it was by sunflowers, it seemed like the stage was set for a momentous event. Neither of them, however, could even imagine what it would be.

  Doctor Leitz leaned over the panel and grasped the lever that reversed the fields. He pulled it toward him slowly and glanced up at the impromptu stage. Doctor Angstrom and Amelia Moon followed his gaze. For a moment nothing happened, and then there was a glimmer as a cloud of softly glowing particles began coming into focus. The particles glowed brighter and shimmered into a shape; then the shape slowly began to coalesce into a figure, and what they saw next left them all completely dumbfounded.

  Chapter 20

  A TIME AND SPACE FOR EVERYTHING

  One of life’s little oddities is curve balls. It loves to pitch them right down the center, but once you commit to your swing, the damn ball swerves away from the bat and leaves you swatting at air. It’s a humiliating experience, full of frustration and anxiety; but it’s all part of the game and it’s going to happen over and over again, so you’d better get used to it.

  John, Kate, Cal, and Tex had just been thrown a vicious curve ball, which they thought they were going to hit clear out of the park. But the physics of motion declared otherwise and left them swinging in the wind. Hunter, on the other hand, had connected with his pitch, and he was rounding the bases as his limousine bore down on the kids from behind.

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Hunter yelled as he regained his composure. “You’ve just totally decimated an innocent gas station!”

  Steve thought Hunter must have gotten a bump on the head that had knocked the sense out of him. “What?”

  There are two sides to this coin, Hunter thought. On the one hand Steve was so dedicated to the pursuit of these kids that he completely blocked out everything else going on around him. That fact, of course, was a positive. But the devastation he caused was totally unacceptable; they were, after all, stealth warriors, and it just didn’t look good to go around wreaking havoc. “Take a look behind you,” he snapped with extreme annoyance.

  Steve glanced in the rearview mirror at the irate silhouette of the station attendant doing a war dance against a giant gas ball of fuel, flame, and smoke. “How on earth did that happen?” he asked in innocent amazement.

  Hunter knew getting into Steve’s ridiculous mistake now would be an exercise in futility. They had a job to do, and Steve needed his concentration to catch up with the kids. He would just have to put the gas station down to an unfortunate side effect of war. “Just catch those damn teenagers,” he wailed in frustration.”

  “Yes, sir,” Steve replied, pushing his foot to the floor.

  Hunter watched the limo in front of them dance away. They were on a well-lit main thoroughfare with three lanes of traffic going in their direction. They had no problem keeping tabs on the kids, except that the little showoff who was driving began weaving through the nighttime traffic like a stunt driver. The kid is clever, he thought, although somewhat predictable. He figured this kid learned the geometry of the car chase from watching television shows and movies. However, the truth about the car chase is that the pursuer always has the upper hand, as long as he hangs onto the guy running away until the guy makes a mistake, or runs out of gas. “Just keep applying the pressure from behind,” Hunter called out to Steve, “and make sure he knows it.”

  ***

  It was one of those balmy nights; the moon hung in the sky overhead like a nightlight and filled John’s imagination with magic. He knew he was in the hot seat; his hands gripped the steering wheel so tightly his knuckles turned white, and every ounce of concentration was so involved with navigating through traffic, he felt he actually was both the car and the road ahead. He didn’t know if it was the moon, the stars, or just the pure exhilaration of speed, but he felt invincible. The faster he moved, the slower everything else around him became, and he knew with certainty he could slip through spaces in traffic that under any other circumstance would have been impossible to pass through.

  It was as if high speed had somehow affected the molecular structure of the vehicle itself, and given it a minute amount of elasticity. The idea was completely crazy, but he could tell when he glanced in the rearview mirror that he was passing through gaps in the traffic that the limo behind was not even attempting.

  He had absolutely no idea whether this was a lurid invention of the mind, or a concrete reality but one thing was absolutely certain; he had never felt more alive in his life. Was he out of control, or was he in control? Did it even matter? Just do it, he thought! Do it because you can. Life is a gift that doesn’t come with instructions, and if it did, many of the greatest inventions would never have come to light.

  Just do it! Anything else is procrastination; talk is cheap. For now he would abandon the idea that he had any semblance of control over his destiny. He was going to trust in the fact that the peculiar forces at work knew where he was going far better than he did. His only obligation was to be present in the moment, and if he could just do that, everything else would take care of itself—he was sure of it.

  ***

  Steve couldn’t believe it! He was being out-driven by a thirteen-year-old kid who probably hadn’t even taken a driving lesson in his life. Plus the kid seemed to be oozing in and out of nearly non-existent spaces between cars as if he were a speeding ball of mercury. It was downright uncanny, and it was annoying. He felt like Wiley Coyote trying in vain to catch up with the Roadrunner. His life was rapidly turning into a Saturday morning cartoon.

  To make things even worse, Hunter leaned over the back of the seat, breathing down his neck, and stated the absolutely obvious: “He’s three cars ahead of you! How could you let him get three cars ahead of you? All you had to do was stick to his tail!” But Hunter had been watching every move since they’d left the gas station and he couldn’t believe it either.

  There was something inherently odd about the way the kid was getting away from them, and even though he could see it with his own eyes, his mind was not equipped to deal with the mental gymnastics necessary to understand the complexity of the phenomena. Perhaps it was because it wasn’t overtly obvious, but it was apparent the rules that governed the laws of objects in motion were not being completely broken, but they were definitely being bent out of shape.

  Just as he was wondering what it would cost to buy some of the kid’s luck, a gap opened up in the traffic off to his left. “Okay!” Steve shouted triumphantly, “I’ve got him now.” He yanked hard on the steering wheel, sending the car careening out into the fast lane. He hit the gas and sped past the cars separating the two limos, bringing him parallel with the kid and one lane away. Hunter was pleased, they had the upper hand again, and now they could begin to apply the pressure.

  Steve ripped his gun from his shoulder holster. “I
could blow his head off right now and take care of him for good.” He held the gun up and aimed as he steered the car across the lane toward them.

  “No! We need him alive,” Hunter warned. They could just make out the kid’s head over the top of the half-open window. Steve was very tempted to fire, but instead he sighed and dropped the gun onto the seat.

  ***

  John glanced up at the rearview mirror, but he couldn’t see the limo, “Where’d they go?” he yelled excitedly. He was running on pure adrenaline, and every second was a lifetime.

  Cal, Tex, and Kate were tracking the limo through the rear window. “He’s in the fast lane,” Tex volunteered.

  “Yeah, and he’s moving up beside us,” Cal added.

  “He should be coming into view any moment now,” Kate said as she climbed back over the seat and flopped down beside John in the front.

  John didn’t want to lose the advantage he had attained, and by sneaking up beside him they were obviously trying to steal that advantage. He checked the road ahead to see if he had any options coming up.

  “Here they are,” Kate warned.

  John glanced to his left as the limo began to draw parallel with them. He had seen a side street a block away and he had wondered if he could possibly make a turn at the speed he was doing. Cal and Tex had moved over to the side window behind him, and they had an unobstructed view.

  “He’s drifting toward us,” Tex reported. “Maybe they’re gonna broadside us.”

  “And I think he’s got a gun!” Cal added, as he watched Steve’s silhouette stretch out an arm. That was all John needed to hear; he immediately turned his full attention to the road ahead with his mind made up.

  “Hang on!” he shouted abruptly as he wrenched the wheel into a full lock and the tail of the huge limo fished around with a squeal, until the car was skating sideways on the smooth surface of the tarmac. Cal and Tex tried in vain to grab onto anything, but to no avail. They shot across the back of the limo like bullets and slammed into each other on the opposite door. Kate lost her battle with momentum and shot into the space underneath the glove compartment for a second time.

  John spun the wheels straight again as the street appeared in front of him. He hit the gas and the limo shot forward into a tiny opening barely wide enough for one car. It was a miracle, he thought; he hadn’t even scratched the paint-work, and as he roared along the unkempt road, he glanced around for his friends, but they were nowhere to be found. Where this road would lead them he had no idea. All he knew was that he was on the edge of town heading out into the countryside, a fact that became more apparent the further he drove. The road was unkempt, full of bumps and potholes, and it made for an extremely choppy ride.

  ***

  Steve was completely astounded by the dexterity and agility with which the limo had disappeared. One moment he was right beside it; the next moment it had spun on a dime and very nearly opened up the side of his car like a sardine can, then it was gone. The traffic behind him screeched to a complete halt and he swiftly pulled over to the hard dirt shoulder and hit the brakes. Clouds of dust erupted into the air, and the cars behind him let fly with a cacophony of horns and flashing lights.

  Undaunted by the furious outburst of vehicular frustration, Steve slammed the car into reverse, turned in his seat, and challenged anyone that may have been behind him to do battle by speeding backwards as fast as he could go.

  Crazed anger is detectable to human radar, and the force is amplified in traffic. Steve’s was so palpable that every approaching vehicle gave him a wide berth. To say he was an accident aching to happen would be overstating the obvious. He was fast becoming a seething ball of frustration as he backed past the turn, rammed the car into drive, spun into the alleyway, and took off like a ferret down a rabbit hole.

  ***

  Kate peeked out from the space beneath the glove compartment and dazedly stared up at John. “Please tell me it will be better when you actually learn to drive.”

  His hazel eyes were wild with determination as he stared fixedly over the steering wheel. “I think I lost them,” he announced through gritted teeth.

  “Guys!” she murmured with exasperation as she climbed back up from the floor, pushed her disheveled hair off her face, and snapped herself into the seat belt.

  “Well, you nearly lost us,” said Tex as his dark head appeared over the back of the seat behind her.

  “Yeah, and if we’d been moving any harder or faster, we’d have gone right through the door,” said Cal, popping up beside him.

  “Hey, I’m sorry, guys,” John reasoned, “But I gotta tell you, I know it looks cool and everything, but driving is a real pain.”

  “Well, you seem to be enjoying it,” Kate stated ironically.

  “That’s just because I’m stuck behind the wheel,” John replied, “I have to do it, or we’re dead.”

  John turned his attention back to the road, which seemed to be coming to an end. “Where the heck are we?” he mumbled. Getting oriented in the dark was always more difficult, and out here in the countryside with no street lamps, everything was vague and misshapen. He’d had the strange feeling they were climbing uphill, and when he saw stars thrown across the sky from horizon to horizon, he knew he was right. He slowed to a halt and gazed at the valley below.

  “Wow!” he said, and all four of them stared out the window.

  “Where are we?” Kate asked incredulously.

  At the bottom of the hill a huge neon sign flashed: THE BLACK CRYSTAL BOWL.

  “It’s a bowling alley,” Tex said.

  “Yeah, but where did it come from?” Cal asked. “I’ve never seen it before.”

  “True, but we never had a car before,” John offered. “We must have covered more distance than we thought.”

  “So that means we’re lost, right?” Kate ventured.

  “We’ve been lost all day,” Tex replied.

  “Lost or not, we’ve been found,” Cal warned, “I seem to recognize those headlights.” He was looking back down the hill through the rear window.

  John weighed his options as he glanced in the rearview mirror. Between them and the bowling alley there was a busy eight-lane highway, and getting closer every moment from behind were the agents that wanted to imprison them. However he viewed it, there was no alternative; the highway won every time.

  “What are we gonna do?” Kate asked.

  “We’re gonna cross that road,” John promised, “and then we’re going bowling.”

  Cal and Tex sat back in their seats and snapped themselves into their seatbelts. They could see the dirt road they were on connected to the highway, but it wasn’t a legal access road. Once they got across the first four lanes of the highway, they would have to negotiate a wide, grassy median and then drive across the next four lanes of traffic going the other way. It looked like trouble, smelled like trouble, and it was trouble.

  Each kid stared intently at the unrelenting stream of traffic as the limo gained speed, until Kate felt compelled to speak, “We’re not stopping, are we?”

  “No,” John replied, “we’re not stopping.”

  Cal cleared his throat nervously, “And the reason being?”

  “We have the right of way,” John claimed.

  “Er, before we die,” Tex ventured, “could I just point out that it’s a solid wall of speeding steel that we’re aiming at.”

  “Don’t concentrate on that,” John said, “concentrate on the space between things.”

  It was the most ludicrous thing any of them had ever heard. But the one thing they had learned to do on this day was to trust John’s instinct; so far it had not let them down. They did as he asked, and even though it looked like they were headed for certain doom as the limo gained speed exponentially, a calmness descended over them all. Whether it was a miracle, luck, fate, or just the strangeness of traffic patterns, the wall of steel parted and they passed through unscathed.

  ***

  Hunter’s limo leapt over th
e crest of the hill like a gazelle jumping a pride of sleeping lions, and came to earth with a crash that sent him bouncing around in the back like a tennis ball. Never in all of his checkered history had he had this much trouble with a simple pursuit. It was as if all of his ghosts had come back to haunt him at once. He grabbed hold of the seat in front of him and gazed over Steve’s shoulder as they tore down the hill.

  Steve had committed himself to a course of action that was difficult to undo. He was blistering down the sharp incline after the kids and imagining the sea of steel would part for him in much the same way it had for them, but it wasn’t going to happen. As soon as he hit the roadway cars began whistling in front of him like cannon shells: horns blared, lights flashed, and Steve did the worst thing he could possibly do, he lost his nerve and hit the brake.

  This sent the limousine into a 360-degree spin, and it careened across the highway like a pirouetting ballerina. As they turned in the tightest of circles, they saw vehicles bearing down on them, missing them by inches, and then hurtling away. In this manner they traversed the highway with the same pattern repeating itself over again and again until they mercifully reached the other side stunned, dazed, and glad to be out of the jaws of jeopardy.

  “What the hell just happened?” Hunter asked, as images of death and destruction still flashed before his eyes.

  Steve wrestled with the steering wheel and brought the car under control, but his head was still spinning in giddy circles. “I think we made it,” he said uncertainly.

  Hunter fell back in his seat and fished a cigar out of his pocket. He had been close to the edge many times, and he knew exactly what Steve was going through. He was wondering if they were themselves, or just a shadow of themselves who existed for a short while after their destruction. He lit the cigar, listened to his heartbeat, and felt his nerves jangle. There is more to this chase than meets the eye, he thought: a lot more.