by Black, Chuck
And so the journey continued, with Drew always under the watching glare of the dark invader. One thing was for certain—if he survived the trip, he could not continue on to Chicago, at least not yet. Searching for Ben with his enemy seeing his every move would destroy his mission before it began. He had to hide his final destination from the invaders at all cost. What should he do?
“When facing an enemy, first control your area of engagement.”
Jake’s words whispered through him, and he knew what he needed to do.
By the time the bus stopped in Des Moines, Iowa, Drew had a plan. He found the ticket window and purchased another ticket to Duluth, Minnesota. An hour and a half later, Drew was back on a bus heading north. The night wore on, as did the ever-glaring gaze and presence of the dark invader. Fatigue tore at him mercilessly.
Somewhere in the night, Drew found exhaustion a companion enough to let him sleep a couple of hours despite the invader. By early morning, he was in Duluth and hitchhiking a ride north into the Superior National Forest. The thick pine, fir, and mountain ash forests welcomed Drew like old friends. The Boundary Waters in the Superior National Forest was one of Jake and Drew’s favorite places to camp. And it was the easiest environment in which to survive, as long as the temperatures didn’t get too subzero.
The forest’s nearly four million acres of woods and lakes was the perfect place to lose himself from humanity.
He stopped at a shop near the park border and picked up a few more survival essentials, including a map of the forest. Three days after the Drayle University incident, Drew was deep in the wooded wilderness of northern Minnesota. Though it was late spring and the weather was still a little cool, Drew was happy to be there.
All through the journey, the invader watched and waited. At first it was eerie, but Drew learned to cope. And then he realized this might even prove to be beneficial. It could allow him the opportunity to study his enemy up close and personal. His biggest concern was whether he would survive if the invader decided to attack him in some way. He was still unsure about how such an attack might happen. So far it seemed to be through other humans or by apparent natural events. Perhaps, since he could see his enemy and his actions, he could avoid such events. Only time would tell, but the cost of failure might be his very life.
Drew hiked another three days north toward the Canadian border and set up a camp in the most secluded and isolated area he could find near one of the larger lakes. He continued his act of ignorance toward the invader, taking mental note of every action and inaction he observed. Drew put his survival skills to use. He had to admit that at first it was a little uncomfortable not being able to rely on Jake, but within a week, his confidence grew as he realized just how perfectly Jake had prepared him. Fresh water was not a problem, and the mild climate made shelter a cinch. The forest was abundant in plant and animal food, so he settled into the game of wait and watch.
As the days became weeks, Drew thought often of the angst he must have caused his mother. He tried not to think about it too much. At least she had Jake with her to help her deal with it.
Don’t drop your guard, Jake, and take care of her.
By the third week Drew still hadn’t fallen to some evil scheme of the invader. In fact, the invader seemed more agitated and annoyed as the days wore on. Seeing a massive dark invader so irritated was unnerving, to say the least. Drew guessed that the reason he hadn’t yet been attacked was because the invader was restricted by orders of observation only.
One afternoon while he was sunning on a large boulder on the shore of the lake, the invader paced back and forth and then began screaming at Drew; at least that’s what it appeared to be. At one point he came to within inches of Drew’s face, and something changed. Drew could feel anxiety rise, and thoughts that did not seem his own pierced his mind. Fear welled up, and bizarre thoughts of suicide entered his mind. He shook his head and ran his fingers through his lengthy hair and beard, but it didn’t help.
The invader continued his raging bursts of assault on him, and Drew wanted to run away, but he knew it would be pointless. He stood up and paced back and forth on the massive boulder overhanging the lake’s shoreline. The internal turmoil the invader was causing confused and angered Drew. Was this how they controlled the fate of mankind?
When Drew thought he couldn’t take it anymore and he feared he couldn’t hide the fact that he could see the invader any longer, he did the only thing he could think of: he jumped into the icy-cold water of the lake. The shock of the cold on his heightened senses freed him from the mental and emotional turmoil caused by the invader. He figured it would be a brief reprieve once the invader followed him, but that was not to be. The invader’s ranting continued with even greater vigor—but he didn’t enter the water. Drew swam a hundred yards along the shoreline in an attempt to warm his body with exertion, and when his skin became too numb to continue, he moved toward the shore.
The invader finally stopped his silent attack, but fury was upon his face. Drew expected the onslaught to start again, but as he waded through the shallow water, he pretended to be preoccupied with an odd-shaped rock a few feet from the bank. Though his feet were numb, his experiment was too valuable to quit just yet. He stayed offshore long enough to convince himself that the invader wouldn’t enter the water.
How bizarre.
And what intriguing and incredibly valuable information.
Drew built a large fire and dried himself and his clothes in its warmth while eating a delicious meal of dried rabbit and pine-needle soup made from the fresh light-colored tips of a budding pine tree. He flavored the soup with some wild honey he had recovered from a hive. The meal and this newly discovered information delighted him. He tilted the tin bowl to finish off the last bit of soup and felt something change. There was a lifting of a dark burden. He lowered the tin bowl—
The invader was gone.
Drew was careful not to come to conclusions and was also careful not to become too intent on searching for the invader, just in case the creature was watching him from afar. Instead, he forced himself to continue his usual routine.
To Drew’s dismay, less than an hour later the invader was back. That night Drew lay awake into the wee hours of the night, thinking and plotting.
The next day, there was marked change in the invader’s actions. The brute was no longer just an observer—he became a tormentor. It started out with little episodes of frustration—multiple ant bites, spilled water can, collapsing leg of his shelter, and getting treed by a curious black bear—all the direct result of the invader’s actions and influence. Clearly, the invader was attempting to encourage Drew to move on to his final destination.
That’s when Drew decided to take an expedition west along the shore of the lake, but it was so big that he could not circumnavigate the lake in a day. He spotted a small river that spilled into the lake on the southeastern edge. At the mouth of the river, jagged rocks jutted out of the shallow water. It was here that Drew discovered a treasure.
From somewhere upstream, an old makeshift raft had been lodged onto the rocks. It would require extensive repair, but it would do. Drew began patching up the raft, and it agitated the invader to no end, who made every task a frustrating one. By noon of the next day, Drew made his maiden voyage out onto the peaceful calm waters of the lake … without an enemy at his side to torment him. Drew loved it, and the voyage solidified his recent discovery about the invader—he would not go into the water. What Drew wasn’t certain about was whether this would hold true for all invaders or just this particular one. At the very least, he could use this information to his immediate advantage. New plans formed in his mind, and for the first time in weeks, Drew became hopeful that his mission might not yet have failed.
He continued his voyage using a long steering pole and a makeshift paddle and navigated across the lake back to his camp. When he arrived, his ever-present invader was waiting, scowling, and cursing. When Drew gathered wood that night, the invader dre
w his sword and caused him to stumble over an exposed root of a large tree. When Drew caught himself on the trunk, his hand was pierced by a sharp twig, which coincided with a quick slice of the grisly sword. The wound was deeper and worse than it should have been.
Next he dealt with a couple of wasp stings. He was quite miserable that night, but the knowledge that he had frustrated his enemy was consolation. Surely the dark invader could do worse than a small cut and a couple of wasp stings. What was he waiting for?
Over the next few days, Drew put rafting into his routine, and he noticed a pattern by the invader. Each time Drew came back to camp, the invader was gone for a while, but he always returned. Drew lengthened his time out in the raft each day until he had conditioned the invader to disappear for over two hours. He also made sure to take his pack with various items for his excursions. When the routine was established, he was ready to make his move.
Drew woke up early and trapped a couple of tree squirrels to cook for lunch; then he prepared his camp as though he would return for lunch, packed his bag, and set out onto the lake on his raft. He navigated straight into the middle, but this time he continued across to the opposite southern shore. At first he acted as though he was just extending the day’s excursion by prepping the raft for a return voyage. Once he felt certain that he was alone, he cut the ropes holding the raft together and dismantled it. He took the extra time needed to hide all evidence of the raft components.
And then he ran.
He ran for ten minutes straight into the woods and stopped. When he was sure he was alone, he changed his direction ninety degrees and set a running pace that he could handle for the next hour. Still no invader. He rested ten minutes, then ran another hour.
Drew pushed himself to near exhaustion over the course of the day trying to put as much distance as possible between himself and the invader. He had seen how fast these invaders moved, and there was no way to know how much territory he could cover. At one point Drew collapsed beneath the cool shade of a large pine tree, his muscles screaming for him to stop.
“Get up, Carter. You only have one shot at making this work.” He huffed between breaths. “Get up!”
If the invader did find him, he was sure that dark sword would be used for more than just pricking his hand.
Drew also reminded himself that every step away from the camp exponentially increased the area the invader would have to search, so he pushed his body until it was too dark to see the terrain.
Finally, he fell under the cover of some thick brush and slept until morning. He ate a quick breakfast and rehydrated himself, then set out again. This time he went at a pace that he could keep up all day without exhausting himself and in a direction that would take him to a small town to the west. Drew disciplined himself not to rush his escape, even if it took an extra week.
It was a long and arduous trek, but Drew never saw the invader again. Ten days later, Drew found a dumpy motel south of the forest in which to rest and clean up. He kept his hair longer than he liked and decided to keep the beard but trimmed it close. He thought about dying his hair as an extra measure but decided his new look was enough. It certainly was different than he’d ever looked before. It wouldn’t fool an invader close up, but it might from a distance.
Without a credit card, Drew couldn’t rent a car, and he didn’t want to go back through Duluth, so he hitchhiked his way to Grand Rapids, Minnesota, and eventually made it to Minneapolis. From there he rode a bus to Chicago.
The skyline of the Windy City was a beautiful sight. There would be invaders … lots of them, but if there was one thing Drew had learned these last six weeks, it was that the invaders were not all knowing or all powerful. They had limitations—some that Drew didn’t have. As frustrating as the time lost was, it encouraged Drew.
He had evaded an invader!
16
OFF THE GRID
There was something compelling about the city of Chicago, but as with every city, along with the glamor came the grunge. Those with money could insulate themselves from the dirty, desperate people who lived at the fringes of their wealth. And though it was tempting for Drew to stay suburban, he had learned from Jake that the best camouflage was in the dirt, grass, and muck. That was why the Rangers and the SEALs were so effective. They operated in places most people didn’t even want to look.
In Chicago, these places were the ghettos and the slums.
It was easy to drop off the grid into the wilderness and survive, but the city would be much different, since Drew was sure the invaders were drawn to the hubs of humanity. As much as he wanted to stay off the enemy’s radar, his mission was not just to disappear but to find Ben. Search and rescue while staying off the grid would be very difficult. He had to be careful, methodical, and thorough.
Drew got off the bus late in the night at the Greyhound terminal not far from downtown Chicago. A few blocks west of the station he found a cheap hotel and crashed. He slept the rest of the night and far into the afternoon of the next day. When he awoke, he downed a couple of granola bars and some water and clicked on the television. He surfed until he came across a news station doing a recap on the shooting at Drayle University, which had sparked a renewed effort by antigun lobbyists to propose a ban on semiautomatic handguns. The memory of the tragedy became fresh again as he heard the reporter state that nine students had died and seven more had been seriously wounded.
They replayed some of the interviews with the students—shock, disbelief, and tears filled the eyes and faces of the students. Drew’s heart sank as he remembered that day. Had he caused it? Were the invaders targeting him, or was he just caught up in a coincidental mass shooting? Why were the invaders fighting each other? All the hundreds of unanswered questions came rushing back. After an hour of fruitless effort to make sense of what had happened that horrific day, Drew pulled out his computer and deleted his Facebook and Twitter accounts and every other web account he could remember.
The disappearance of Drew Carter was complete.
As far as he could tell, neither the human grid nor the invader grid could pinpoint him now. His mind then turned to Ben. He web searched for the building where Ben’s International Science and Engineering Fair would have been held two years ago and found the Chicago Tech Center. Good.
That would be his starting point.
Jake had prepared him for wilderness, not the urban jungle, but he figured some of the same techniques with modification would still make sense and work. He located a few possible apartment buildings less than a mile from the Tech Center where he might be able to find a cheap place to stay. After many hours of searching, plotting, and planning, the enormity of the job depressed him—millions of people, hundreds of thousands of buildings and businesses, and no idea where to begin. His money was limited, so finding a source of income would become important soon. He figured he could make it two months before he had to earn income locally to sustain himself.
He mentally prepared himself to be in this for the long haul … potentially years.
He closed his laptop and leaned his head back, feeling like he alone was carrying the burden of the world on his shoulders. But no. Ben was somewhere out there, and he probably felt the same way. Two were better than one.
Do what it takes to find him, and then you have a fighting chance.
His stomach rumbled, but he was too tired to leave the room and too cautious to order out. He found some dried apples and another granola bar in his pack, devoured them, and dozed off.
WHEN MORNING BROKE on the Chicago skyline, Drew was well rested and on the street, heading toward one of the apartment buildings he had found in his Internet search yesterday. The crisp morning air bit at his cheeks, but he didn’t mind. With the morning came a sense of hope, and his spirit was somewhat renewed. Drew walked south, occasionally taking a moment to catch the gleaming sunbeams streaming through the towering cityscape a mile or so to his left. He stopped in a bakery and bought a muffin and an orange juice for breakfast.
The first two apartments he checked out were unlivable. The third was certainly not the Hilton, but at least it was furnished and clean enough so that he wasn’t worried about catching a disease. It was a second-floor apartment in a depressed but clean neighborhood. All the doors and windows had iron bars across them, which seemed so unnecessary in the bright morning light with birds singing and the leaves of the boulevard trees budding with new life.
Evidently the nighttime would paint a different scene for the neighborhood.
Here, the buildings were all two to three stories tall and built so close to each other that only a narrow sidewalk separated them. To the east was a small grocery store, and one block south there was a small park with playground equipment for children and picnic tables surrounded by trees.
The landlord, Mr. Dench, was a gruff old man who spoke in broken sentences.
It took Drew a few minutes to adjust before he could understand him.
“Rent the first erry mawnth. Late … you out. Got it?”
Drew nodded.
He paid his deposit and first month’s rent in advance, then set out on his search, reminding himself to stop by the grocery store on his way back from the city.
After fifteen minutes of brisk walking through outlying neighborhoods of the city, Drew found himself standing in front of the Chicago Tech Center. The stone and glass building towered above him, an icon symbolizing the enormous task that lay before him. He half expected Ben to walk up and greet him after all he had risked and sacrificed to get there. But it didn’t happened.