by Wesley King
“Fine,” he said. “So . . . anything I can do? You can, like, lower me from a wire or something.”
Marcus snorted. “That’s just what I think of when I look at you. No . . . we’re all right . . .”
“Actually,” George said. “Maybe we could use you.”
Marcus, Dree, and Brian all turned to him. “Really?” they all asked.
He nodded. “You can’t get in the emergency exit . . . but you can knock on it.”
“A distraction,” Marcus said, turning to Brian. “Now that might work.”
Brian’s grin slowly slipped away. “Is this going to be dangerous?”
Marcus turned to the window, where the sun was already in the west. “Definitely.”
Later that night, Marcus, Dree, and George once again crept through the Arlington cityscape, moving as quickly as they could. George was in the lead, with Dree close behind and Marcus at the tail. Lightning Bug floated along overhead, scanning the sky for other drones. Marcus could see his creation darting along and around buildings, but as of yet it hadn’t spotted anything. No red eyes blazing in the darkness, no humming sound of a hovering Destroyer. For now, at least, they seemed to be in the clear.
“We’re here,” George said, as they stopped in an alley across from Johnny Burger.
Marcus and Dree joined him, and then Marcus looked up at Bug. “Go!”
The small drone zoomed past them, hovering above each surveillance camera in turn to transmit a code that would loop their current recording. It stopped at the last camera above the door, and then beeped twice to indicate that the signal had been successfully transmitted. All three cameras would now show the same empty parking lot on a loop. Meanwhile, Brian was trying to force his way into the other door down the block, and hopefully the agents were heading there now. George guessed that they would just tell him off and send him on his way. Marcus hoped he was right.
“Excellent,” George said, watching as Bug hovered in the middle of the parking lot, as if waiting for them. “Very advanced design, Marcus.”
Marcus flushed a little. “Yeah. I mean, Jack got the parts. But yeah . . . I built it.”
“That’s my boy.”
They hurried over to the innocuous metal door, and Marcus turned to Bug.
“Go wait for us at home, okay, buddy? Good work.”
The small drone took off, and George stepped up to the metal door, took a quick look in either direction, and nodded to Marcus.
“Here goes nothing,” he muttered.
Marcus took a deep breath and stepped forward. He withdrew the replica he had made of Jack’s fingerprint in the hair gel, handling it very carefully. Marcus placed the thin, waxy replica on the scanner, pressing it firmly to make sure it could read the fine imprint.
Sure enough, the door slid open, revealing a small lobby with an elevator.
“Nice,” Dree said. “Maybe you should be a spy.”
“He takes after his old man,” George added, leading them into the elevator.
Marcus flushed. He felt strangely pleased, though he wasn’t quite ready to think of George as his “old man.”
“Round two,” he said, eyeing the keypad beside the elevator.
He tried to hide his disappointment. The keypad had numbers and letters. Jack’s password could be almost anything. He tried Jack’s debit pin, then his birthday, then his street name. He tried Jack’s mom’s name (Carol), his first pet (Ralphie), his favorite number (14)—nothing was working.
Marcus shook his head, defeated. “I’m sorry, guys . . . I don’t know. I thought I’d be able to figure this out, but—”
“What about Marcus?” George cut in.
Marcus looked at him. “What?”
“He raised you like a son,” George said, his voice gentle. “You’re the biggest part of his life. Try typing in Marcus.”
Marcus punched in his name. The door slid open.
“Oh,” he whispered.
George patted Marcus’s shoulder. “Come on, let’s go.”
Marcus flushed yet again. He had kind of always assumed that Jack just put up with him because he had to. Jack didn’t really show any affection either. This was strangely touching. Marcus stepped inside the elevator and saw that there was only one floor below them, just as George had described.
George turned to them. “Now it gets tricky. Ready?”
They both nodded, and he hit the button.
“They will be alerted that the elevator is moving, so we have to be quick.” He put another tiny round transmitter on the elevator controls and flicked it on just as the doors opened. “Follow me!”
They ran out of the elevator and turned right into a small office that Marcus remembered from the plans that George had drawn out back at the apartment. The entire annex was painted a sterile white, like a creepy hospital basement, and smelled like floor cleaner and recycled air. Dree carefully closed the office door behind them, and George ushered them behind a large desk. “Stay out of sight,” he whispered.
Footsteps came storming down the hall, and Marcus held his breath as he heard a voice on the other side of the door . . .
“Lisa, come in,” a man was saying. “The elevator just came down. It’s empty.”
A loud voice came crackling back over a walkie-talkie. “I’m almost to the other door. It’s just some kid messing around. I’ll tell him to get lost and be right back to help you look. You check the cameras?”
“Yeah. No one came in.”
“The elevator must be malfunctioning. Why don’t you take a quick look outside just to be sure?”
“Good idea,” George murmured, as they heard footsteps getting farther and farther away. George pressed his ear up to the door. “The elevator doors just closed. We’ll let it get halfway up and then—”
He pressed a button on his little pocket transmitter and grinned. Through the door, they could hear the elevator as it squeaked to a stop between floors. “Voilà! He’s stuck in the elevator. Let’s move . . .”
George opened the door and was about to exit when Dree grabbed his arm and yanked him back inside. “Wait,” she whispered. “There’s still someone out there.”
They all froze, and soon they could hear the man’s voice again.
“I sent it back up,” the agent said into his walkie-talkie, “to see if it was malfunctioning. I think it just got stuck.”
“So just a broken elevator, then,” Lisa replied. “Better call the head office.”
Still ducking under the desk, George frowned. “Well, that’s not good.” He looked around the room, and his eyes fell on a laptop. “Plan B.” He scooped the laptop off the table and sat down with it, his fingers flying over the keyboard.
“What are you doing?” Marcus whispered.
“I set up this security system with Jack,” he murmured. “I always build in overrides.”
An alarm suddenly went off in another area of the annex, and they heard the man curse and take off down the hall. “Another alarm just went off!” he shouted into the walkie-talkie. “You better get back here!”
“Quickly now,” George said, climbing to his feet.
Marcus and Dree hurried after George as he eased out the door, waiting for the guard to turn down the hallway. Then he started to briskly walk in the same direction, Dree and Marcus close behind.
“He’ll only take a minute or two to turn off the alarm,” George said. “Faster.”
They were almost at a full run when a muffled voice filtered through the noise.
“Marcus?”
They all slid to a stop. Marcus ran up to one of the doors lining the hallway, where a small glass window revealed a familiar face: Uncle Jack was staring back at him. Marcus pressed the automatic lock and Jack hurried out, looking at Marcus incredulously. And then he saw George.
“You’re back,�
�� he whispered.
The two men embraced, and then Jack stepped back and looked between him and Marcus.
“Finally,” he said, grinning.
“What are you doing here?” Marcus asked.
“The CIA started looking for your father again. I’m guessing when Marcus went through the portal, he triggered another electromagnetic disturbance . . . just like George did. They must have picked it up. They took me in for questioning a week ago. I told them nothing, but the agency is still looking for you, George. If they find you in here, they’ll lock us all up in here.”
“We’re here for the Egg,” George said.
Recognition filled Jack’s eyes. “Let’s move.”
“Freeze!” a commanding voice shouted from down the hall.
The guard was walking toward them, his gun pointed right at Jack’s forehead.
“Nobody move or I open fire.”
Chapter
5
Dree watched as the armed man stalked toward them, his index finger quivering over the trigger. The man was tall and lean, but he clearly wasn’t a warrior. His pale face was flushed and sweating. He had probably never expected any trouble at this secret annex.
Marcus, George, and Jack all had their hands raised, and Dree knew that if they were detained, the mission was over. The Egg would stay where it was, and Francis Xidorne would win.
That was not an option.
“Sorry,” she murmured. But she wasn’t saying it to the guard.
Dree raised her hands, letting her fingers brush against Marcus’s T-shirt. As she released all of the anger and frustration and fear of the last few weeks, rippling flames leapt from her fingertips and quickly caught on Marcus’s shirt. Fire raced up his back, and George shouted in alarm, immediately working to pat out the fire. Marcus, who hadn’t even noticed the heat, saw the commotion and knew what to do next. He flailed and screamed, pretending to burn terribly. It was quite a show.
The CIA agent hesitated, but soon hurried forward, trying to help.
That’s when Dree made her move. She cocked her fist and punched the man across the jaw, dropping him hard to the sterile white floor. His gun went clattering down the hall. Dree rubbed her knuckles gingerly and turned to the other three, who were staring at her, stunned. The fire was out, and Marcus grinned.
“Not bad,” he said.
“I try.”
George looked between them, his eyes scanning over Marcus’s charred shirt. “It didn’t . . . why didn’t it hurt you?”
Marcus forced a smile. “We’re both immune to the fire.”
George narrowed his eyes. “Are you sure?”
“Pretty sure,” Marcus replied, shrugging.
George was silent for a moment, and then he shook his head. “We need to get the Egg. We don’t have long before the other agents arrive. Soon, this whole place will be locked down. Follow me.”
They ran down the hallway to another elevator door—this one at the far end of the annex. Jack led them inside and punched in a short code. The elevator jumped and started the descent.
“How did you get in?” Jack asked.
“Turns out you raised our boy well,” George responded. Jack glanced at Marcus proudly.
“The lower level is deep below the surface,” George explained. “It’s where the research floor is located, and it’s where I built the vault.” He cast a worried glance at Marcus. “We don’t have long. I predict five minutes until reinforcements arrive and get the first elevator working. We’ll need to move—”
He was cut off as the elevator suddenly lurched to a halt, causing them all to stumble. Dree caught herself on the wall as a piercing alarm split through the air, filling the elevator like the dragon sirens back in Dracone.
George paused. “Perhaps I miscalculated.”
“What now?” Marcus asked frantically.
Jack looked around the elevator, and then turned to Dree. “Boost me up.”
Dree didn’t stop to think—she just put her hands together. Jack stepped onto them and reached up for the ceiling. She lifted and he slid one of the ceiling panels aside. “We’re going to have to climb down.”
Marcus blanched. “Climb down the pulley cable?”
He nodded. “It’s the only way. One more push, please.”
Dree heaved, and Jack pulled himself up through the ceiling before reaching back down for the rest of them. One by one they pulled themselves out, until they were all perched atop the elevator like a flock of pigeons. The only pale light filtered up from the inside of the elevator. Dree took a quick peek over the edge and saw nothing but darkness. They would be descending completely blind.
Tentatively, Jack reached out and grabbed the cable. “Here goes nothing,” he muttered.
He stepped out over the side, still clutching the cable, and started climbing down.
“Are you sure you can do this?” Marcus asked his father, who was still frail from his time in Dracone.
George nodded grimly. “I think so.”
He started after Jack, leaving Marcus and Dree alone. She squeezed Marcus’s hand.
“He’ll be fine. We’ll be fine.”
Marcus snorted. “We’ll see. I wasn’t exactly the best in gym. You want to go first?”
She shook her head. “I’ll be right behind you.”
Marcus slowly started down the pulley, and then Dree reached out and caught the hard cable, gripping it with both hands. She stepped out over the chasm, feeling her stomach flop and roll over as she shifted her entire weight onto her arms, leaving solid ground behind her. Flying on Lourdvang was one thing, but this blind descent into an abyss did not appeal to her at all. Trying not to look down, she started climbing hand over hand, wrapping her legs around the cable just in case her fingers slipped.
“Okay?” Jack called out from the bottom.
“Super,” Marcus managed, his strained voice echoing in the elevator shaft.
The climb seemed to take forever. Dree didn’t even see the floor until her hide boots scraped the concrete. The other three were standing next to her, peering out into a flashing hallway. She removed her aching hands and hurried up behind them.
“Let’s go,” George said. The alarm was still blaring. “The alternate exit is at the far end of the hallway . . . it leads to the exterior door where your friend Brian was trying to get in. We grab the Egg and make for that. We have to be fast. If you get separated, remember there is a second small exit that leads out of a sewer grate. Both of them can only be exited, but we can use them now.”
He ran down the hall, and Dree followed in the rear, blinking against the flashing white lights that lined the walls and cringing as the alarm grew ever louder. They passed a few closed metal doors, and she wondered just what Jack and George had been experimenting on down here. Were there half-built drones just sitting behind those doors in the darkness? She shuddered just thinking about the glowing red eyes.
George slid to a halt in front of a slate door. It looked almost impenetrable.
“This one never changed,” Jack said softly.
George keyed in a code, and Marcus, eyeing the numbers, turned to his father.
“What was the password?”
His father glanced at him and then turned back as the door slid open. “Eria.”
The vault was no bigger than a closet. A glass case stood upon a raised stoned platform, and sitting in the middle of the glass case was an ebony egg, as black as tar and a bit larger than a soccer ball. Red and orange ripples moved across the black surface like waves, and Dree felt the little hairs on her arms stand up. The Egg had a tangible, almost visceral energy that she felt all the way down to her bones. Dragon magic.
George noticed everyone’s awestruck expressions. “Now you see why I desired it so much,” he said.
He was reaching to remove the case when
a shout burst through the air.
“Step away from that case!” a woman ordered.
Dree glanced down the hall and realized that the other agent had returned. They had all been so transfixed by the Egg that they hadn’t noticed her stepping into the hall, gun raised.
She looked angry.
Jack turned to her. “Listen, Lisa, just—”
She didn’t wait. She fired a warning shot well wide of them, the bullet chewing into the rock.
“Run!” George said.
They took off down the hallway, and the agent sprinted after them, clearly not willing to gun them down just yet. Dree pulled ahead, her eyes on the door at the end of the hallway. Their escape route.
But the agent was closing in fast, and Dree knew that by the time they opened that door, the agent would be on top of them. They were trapped.
George must have realized the same thing, because he suddenly stopped and turned back to the agent.
“Dad!” Marcus shouted. “What are you doing?”
Jack and Dree slowed down, grabbing for Marcus’s arm.
George turned and looked at his son.
“Go,” he said firmly. “Remember. If you can weather the storm—”
Marcus shook his head. “No, Dad—”
“Marcus, if you can weather the storm, home—”
“Home is on the other side,” Marcus finished softly, the two of them locking eyes as the CIA agent slammed into George, tackling him to the ground.
The group fled to the end of the hall, and Dree pulled the door open, gesturing for Jack and Marcus to run.
“Go!” she screamed.
Marcus and Jack burst through the door and sprinted down the corridor. Dree watched them go before turning back to the hallway, where the agent was pinning George.
They were still at war, and Dree wasn’t going back empty-handed.
Chapter
6
Marcus felt his legs moving, but he didn’t even know who was controlling them. All he could think of was his father, pinned to the concrete floor, smiling as Marcus and the others got away. Tears streamed down Marcus’s cheeks, but he barely felt those either. After all these years, after so much searching, he had lost his father again. And they didn’t even retrieve the Egg.