Runner

by Carl Deuker

  "That he took it out into the Sound to keep the terrorists from getting to the explosives. Either that or..." I couldn't bring myself to say it.

  "Or what, Chance?" Mr. Watts said.

  "The terrorists have got the boat."

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Mr. Watts turned and headed downstairs. Melissa and I followed, and then waited as he made a series of phone calls. I couldn't tell who he called, but I thought it was the Coast Guard and the police, and maybe the FBI. Every once in a while he'd turn and ask me a question. "What was the slip number? ... The length of the sailboat? ... Any distinctive markings?" Finally he hung up. "Let's go," he said.

  "Where?" I asked.

  "There's a police helicopter waiting for us down on Lake Union. Chance, your dad might be out there by himself, safe as can be, but we can't make that assumption. If terrorists have hijacked the boat, then it's a floating bomb. There are a hundred, no ... a thousand, different targets out on the Sound. We've got to find the Tiny Dancer before any of those targets get hit."

  "I'm coming too," Melissa said. "And don't tell me I'm not."

  "You are coming," he answered. "In fact, you're driving. I'm expecting some phone calls."

  We hurried out to the garage. I climbed into the back seat of the Jetta and her father took the passenger seat. Melissa backed the car out, whipped the wheel around, and maneuvered down the driveway and out onto the street. "Drive fast," her father said, "but not too fast. No accidents. You got it?"

  The police helicopter pad on Lake Union is about five miles from Melissa's house. Instead of taking the neighborhood streets, she drove through the Ballard industrial area that runs right along the water. The roads are potholed and crisscrossed by abandoned railroad tracks, but there are few lights or stop signs.

  As we passed under the Ballard Bridge, her father's cell phone rang. The person on the other end spoke for a few moments. "Are you asking me what I would recommend?" he said.

  The caller said something I couldn't hear.

  "OK," Melissa's dad answered. "Here's what I'd do. I'd close every single bridge over the water. I-5, I-90, Aurora, 520—all of them. And I'd hold every ferry at the dock."

  Again the caller spoke.

  "I know it would paralyze the city," Melissa's father said, his voice angry. "And I know this is a long shot. But better to paralyze the city than to have a whole bunch of people dead."

  He snapped the phone shut and slipped it into his pocket.

  "Are they going to close the bridges?" I asked.

  He just looked out the window.

  We were nearing Gas Works Park. "Up there," he said to Melissa. "That gravel road. Turn right and drive all the way to the end."

  Melissa followed his directions. As soon as the Jetta came to a stop, we got out, and three men ran up to us. "Is this the kid?" one of them said, pointing to me.

  "That's him," Melissa's dad said.

  "You come with me," the man said, and he grabbed me by the arm and led me toward a stairway.

  "What about us?" Melissa called after him.

  "Just the boy," the man said, waving her off.

  Before I had a chance to object, we were headed up the stairs. At the top a helicopter, its blades whirring, sat on the pad. "Keep your head down," the man said. "Now move."

  We ran, his hand grasping my upper arm, to the helicopter and I climbed onboard. It was the first time I'd ever been near a helicopter, and the sound of the blades was about twenty times louder than I'd expected. I sat in a cushioned seat and fastened my seat belt just as the copter lifted off. Another man handed me a pair of binoculars. "You know how to use these?" he shouted.

  I nodded.

  "All right then. Find that sailboat for us."

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  The helicopter rose off the pad and headed east toward Lake Union and the major bridges. It was the wrong way and I knew it. There hadn't been enough time for the Tiny Dancer to sail into Lake Washington. The boat would be in the cut or still out on Puget Sound. "We should be going west," I shouted to the man.

  "Just look," he said, pointing to my binoculars. So I looked.

  White sails dotted the lake, powerboats cutting between them. The copter flew low toward the I-5 Bridge.

  "See anything?" the man shouted.

  I shook my head. "They couldn't have gotten here," I said again. "There hasn't been enough time. We need to go west."

  "Are you sure?" he said.

  "I'm sure."

  The man shouted to the pilot. The pilot looked at me. "West," I yelled. "West." The pilot shrugged, then turned the copter around and headed west.

  I kept remembering what my dad had said about the Ballard Locks. Was that the terrorists' target? On a sunny day like this, there would be hundreds of people leaning over the railing watching the boats pass through, and more people onboard the boats tied side by side in the locks.

  Finally we were over the locks. The sailboats were so close to one another that it was impossible to read the names. We hovered overhead; people pointed skyward, puzzled and excited by our presence. Once I thought I saw my father, but then two little boys wearing orange life preservers came on deck and waved to me.

  "Anything?" the man shouted.

  "No," I shouted back.

  "You sure? We could stay longer."

  "I'm sure."

  The copter rose in the air and headed out over Puget Sound.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  I've lived near the Sound my whole life, so I know it's big. But I'd never realized how big until that moment. The pilot shouted something to the man sitting next to me, who turned to me. "Which direction?"

  Which direction? I had no idea. It would be a guess, nothing more. And if I guessed wrong? Then it came to me. South led to the city of Olympia and land. North led to the Strait of Juan de Fuca and out into the Pacific Ocean. That's where my dad would go.

  "North," I shouted to the man. "Head north." He nodded and the copter banked right. Within a minute we were over Shilshole marina. I raised the binoculars to my eyes and looked down.

  Police cars blocked off the entire marina; a line of fire trucks clogged the street in front. SWAT team members were walking up and down Pier B. The whole thing was unreal; it couldn't be happening, but it was.

  I felt a nudge. "Look for the boat, kid."

  That brought me back. The man would point, and I'd focus the binoculars on sailboat after sailboat. "No. No. No." It was hopeless. Hopeless and pointless. Those old guys who comb the beach with their metal detectors hoping to find a diamond ring had a better chance of finding what they were looking for than we did. Puget Sound was too big; the Tiny Dancer was too little.

  The radio crackled. I couldn't make out much of what the pilot was saying, but I could pick up the excitement in his voice. "What is it?" I said to the man next to me. "What's happened?"

  "There's a boat sailing erratically. It passed right under the prow of a freighter, and now it's headed north in the wrong traffic lane."

  "My dad wouldn't do that."

  "He might if he's trying to attract attention."

  The helicopter dipped and then headed northwest toward Kingston. Below and ahead, I could see a patrol boat racing in the same direction as we were. The men in the boat were armed with rifles. "There!" This time it was the pilot shouting and pointing. "There!"

  My hands were trembling so much from cold and from fear that it was hard to bring the binoculars into focus on the boat. But finally I did. Standing at the wheel of the sailboat was my dad. "That's him!" I shouted. "That's my dad!"

  A strange calm came over me. It was all going to be OK. Nothing had happened, and nothing would happen. The Coast Guard or the port police or whoever was in the powerboat below us would intercept the Tiny Dancer. They'd capture the terrorists, my dad would be fine, and nobody would get hurt. If I ended up in jail, that would be OK. Just as long as nothing terrible happened.

  The copter pilot nudged the man next to me and then looked
north. I followed his eyes and saw the Norwegian Sky, a huge luxury liner that carries at least a thousand passengers, and the calm that had filled me dissolved. The Norwegian Sky was less than half a mile from the Tiny Dancer, and the two vessels were on a collision course.

  "What's your dad doing?" the man next to me shouted.

  I looked back to the Tiny Dancer. My dad had left the wheel and he was taking in all the sail. Two men were on the deck pointing guns at him. I could tell they were screaming at him and that he was ignoring them.

  Suddenly, I understood. My dad had seen the Norwegian Sky. He wasn't going to let terrorists use the Tiny Dancer to blow it up. He'd die first.

  The rest happened fast. The patrol boat pulled up about one hundred yards from the Tiny Dancer. I could see someone shouting into a bullhorn while two other men pointed rifles. A gunshot was fired from the Tiny Dancer toward the patrol boat. Right then my dad jumped one of the men. As the two of them scuffled on the deck, the other man clambered below. My father grabbed the man he was fighting, spun him around, and hit him hard in the stomach and then again in the face. The man reeled backward and fell off the boat into the Sound. My dad picked up the man's gun from the deck. He waved it over his head in the direction of the helicopter. I'd put the binoculars down, but I could still see his face clearly, and I think he could see me. He smiled, and he looked happier than I'd ever seen him. Then he turned and started down into the cabin after the other guy.

  That's when the Tiny Dancer exploded.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  The helicopter had turned and was flying back toward Lake Union. The blades were whirring; the pilot and the man next to me were shouting at each other; the walkie-talkie radio was alive. I heard it all, and I heard none of it. A numbness came over me, a numbness of mind and body. The Tiny Dancer was a ball of flame. My father was dead.

  After the helicopter landed, two tall men wearing sunglasses led me to a beige Chrysler. Melissa's father forced himself into the back seat of the car with me. "I'm his attorney," he said to the men. "Wherever you're taking him, I'm going."

  As we drove off, I saw Melissa standing by her Jetta. She waved to her father, and he rolled down the window. "Go home," he said as the car drove quickly away. "I'll be there later."

  Twenty minutes later I was sitting alone in a room on the thirty-eighth floor of an office building in downtown Seattle. Mr. Watts was in a separate room; I could see him through a glass window talking to a balding man in a gray suit. The two talked for ten or fifteen minutes. They could have kept talking forever, for all I cared.

  When Mr. Watts finally came out, he sat down next to me. "Chance, did you know you were working for terrorists?" he asked, his voice low.

  "No," I said.

  "You're sure."

  "I'm sure."

  "All right, then. Here's what I want you to do. I want you to answer every question you're asked, fully and completely. You understand what I'm saying?"

  I nodded.

  Mr. Watts motioned to the man in the gray suit. He came over, showing me his badge as he spoke. "My name is Don Benjamin. I work for the FBI. I'm very sorry about what happened to your father. Very sorry. We all are. I know you must be in a state of shock and I wish I could give you some time. But there are questions you have to answer, and you have to answer them right now. You understand that, don't you?"

  "I understand," I said. "Ask whatever you want. I'll tell you everything I know."

  Hours later, Don Benjamin turned off the tape recorder and tapped his pencil on the desk. "That's it for today, Chance. We'll need to speak with you again, though. OK?"

  I nodded. "OK."

  Mr. Watts led me out of the room and we took the elevator down. "Are you hungry?" he asked as the elevator went down and down and down.

  "Not really," I answered.

  "We're going to eat anyway."

  There was a Starbucks in the lobby. He ordered a coffee and a sandwich for himself, and he bought me an apple juice and a muffin. We sat at a table away from everyone else. I was able to drink the apple juice, but looking at the muffin made me want to throw up.

  Neither of us spoke for a long time, but finally I couldn't keep the words in. "I killed him," I said, looking down at the table. "I killed him."

  Mr. Watts shook his head. "Don't do this to yourself, Chance. You didn't know what was going to happen. How could you? Nobody did."

  "I killed him," I repeated.

  For a while he didn't say anything. Then he took a deep breath and sighed. "Listen to me, Chance. I knew your dad. We both knew him. He didn't want to be a janitor mopping floors at night. He wanted more than that from his life. He expected more than that from his life. Today, he got it. He's a hero—you know that, don't you? He stopped a terrorist attack. He saved people's lives. Lots of people. Your father died the way he wanted to die. It's a rare person who manages that. A rare person."

  I picked up the fork and turned it back and forth. I knew what Mr. Watts was trying to do—he was trying to take some of the guilt away. Most of what he said was true, and I knew that too. My dad was no janitor. The look on his face that last time I saw him—I'd never seen him look like that. But it was what Mr. Watts didn't say that ate at me, and that eats at me still. My dad died a hero on the Tiny Dancer, and I'll always be proud of him. Always. But that I put him there—that's my shame. And that shame will be with me my whole life.

  I put the fork down. "Can we go now?" I said.

  Mr. Watts stood up. "I'll get us a taxi."

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  One week has passed since the explosion. Since then, I've spent every day answering questions. Sometimes it's the asking, sometimes it's Homeland Security, sometimes the port police or the Seattle police. Once it was the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Mr. Watts is always with me, but there's nothing that anybody asks that I don't answer. I'm not hiding anything; I'll answer questions for as long as they want to ask.

  The FBI found the black Mercedes in the Shilshole marina parking lot. Inside were a bunch of maps of Puget Sound and of Seattle. The Ballard Locks, the Aurora Bridge, the ferry routes—all of them were circled in red. But so were the Space Needle and Safeco Field and the University of Washington, so nobody is really sure what they were trying to blow up. Mr. Watts says they probably didn't care, that they just wanted to blow up something and kill a lot of people. But the only person they killed, beside themselves, was my dad.

  There was a memorial service for my dad three nights ago. A huge crowd of people filled Phinney Ridge Lutheran Church. I sat in the front row with Melissa and her father and mother. As people filed in, I couldn't keep myself from looking around, hoping to see my own mother. She must have heard what had happened; it had been in the newspapers and on television. I had a small hope that she might actually be in the church, be close to me, but be afraid to talk to me. I wanted her to know that it was all right, that she could talk to me, that I didn't hate her. Once in a while, I'd catch a glimpse of a woman who looked something like my mother, and my heart would start to pound, and then I'd look closer and see it wasn't her.

  I was glad when a female minister finally stepped to the podium and said a prayer. After she finished, men I didn't know spoke about how good a soldier my father had been in Kuwait, and how he had died a soldier and a hero. Melissa cried and her mother cried and even Mr. Watts cried. Around us complete strangers cried. But I didn't. Even after all the speeches at the memorial service, even after seeing the coffin with the American flag draped over it, I didn't cry. I don't know why I didn't, but I didn't.

  I've been staying at Melissa's house all this time. When her father suggested I move in that first night, I told him no. "Where else can you stay?" he asked, and I didn't have an answer. I sleep in a guest bedroom that's bigger than the Tiny Dancer.

  Yesterday the FBI was done with me at three o'clock, which was earlier than they've ever been done with me before. The questioning was finally coming to an end, though one agent told me they migh
t be talking to me off and on for years to come.

  "When are they going to arrest me?" I asked Melissa's dad once we were alone.

  "What?" he said.

  "When are they going to arrest me?" I repeated. "I know I broke the law; I know I helped terrorists; I know I'm going to jail."

  He shook his head. "I've worked it out with Mr. Benjamin. As long as you cooperate, nobody is going to arrest you. You were a pawn in all this; the FBI knows that and so do the police. Your father died a hero. His picture was on the front page of all newspapers around the world. There's no way the government is going to put you in prison."

  "But you don't understand, Mr. Watts," I said. "I have to go to jail. I have to make up for what I did."

  He folded his hands in front of him and leaned forward. "You're right, Chance. You do have to make up for what you've done. But serving time is not the only way to do that. And it's not close to being the best way."

  "Then what is the best way?"

  He shook his head. "You'll have to find that out for yourself."

  He drove me to his house and dropped me off. "I've got to get in to work," he said. "Someone will probably be home. If not, there's a key under the mat. Just let yourself in."

  I walked up the long driveway and knocked on the door. Melissa answered. I'd been sleeping in her house for a week, but this was the first time I'd been alone with her. She hugged me, and I held her close. Then she led me by the hand into her living room and had me sit down next to her on the sofa. For a while, neither of us said anything. It was almost as if we didn't know each other.

  "What are you going to do now, Chance?"

  "What do you mean?" I said.

  "I mean when all this settles down. What are you going to do?"

  "I guess I'll finish the school year somehow," I said. "After that, I really don't know."

  "Listen. I've got it all figured out. I've already talked to my mom and dad about this, and they are one hundred percent behind it."