Her eyes went wide. “You’re kidding me, right?”
He shook his head. “Let’s go listen if you don’t believe me.”
“Oh, Lord.”
The little car squealed around every curve of the narrow mountain road, but the tires stuck to the pavement, and Emma’s driving hadn’t killed them yet. At least, Sean reassured himself as they strayed frighteningly close to a sheer drop of several hundred feet, if they went off the edge, his mutant ability gave him the power to fly.
They were twenty-five miles south of Butte, Montana, where they’d left the RVs. Somewhere in this unending wilderness was the ranch of a Native American family that took in Native American mutants from across the West. The head of that family was a man named William Silver, a mutant himself, and a good friend of Charles Xavier. Silver was also, at ninety-two, one of the most elderly mutants Sean had ever met.
“Have you ever met William Silver, Emma?”
“No, have you?”
“Years ago, when I was still with the X-Men.” He flinched as a tree trunk swished by, barely clearing the mirror on his door. “Sometimes, when I look at our wee lads and lasses, I think I was never that young, but when I think about William Silver, I think I’ll never be that old. This business isn’t one conducive to living a normal life span.”
The little car went into a four-wheel drift as Emma guided them onto an even smaller side road, and Sean grabbed on with both hands just to stay in his seat. “Saints preserve us, Emma, you keep driving like that, we may not live out the day.”
Emma smiled, never taking her eyes off the road. She looked happier than he’d seen her in a while. “I only make it look dangerous, Sean. It’s my sense of drama.”
He watched the cliff edge sailing by just below the bottom of his door. “Well, lass, you had me fooled.” He reached for the radio, looking for a distraction from the drive. “I wonder if we can even get a station out here. Feels like we’re a million miles from anywhere.”
Sean pushed the scan button. He watched most of the dial go by before it stopped. They caught the announcer in midsentence. 1 ‘—of the Mountain Sports Network. We now join The Walt Norman Show, already in progress.”
Sean angrily snapped off the radio.
“What?” Emma drifted through another curve. “You found a station. Out here in these mountains, beggars can’t be choosers.”
“Walt Norman,” was all he said.
“The name rings a bell, but I can’t place it.”
“Came out of nowhere a few years ago doing a talk show on some low-watt Chicago radio station. Before that, he’d been doing commodity reports or some such. But then he comes up with this antimutant routine, and the audience eats it up. He gets syndicated on two hundred stations across the country and has been making life miserable for mutants everywhere ever since.”
Emma pushed a strand of snowy hair out of her eyes. “Ah, so that’s how I know the name.”
“You’ve heard his show, then?”
She smiled. “His commodity reports. Business news is about the only radio I listen to. Now 1 know why.”
“Trust me, the man’s the lowest of the low.’*
“Okay, we’ll stop off in Chicago and I’ll turn his brain into vanilla pudding.”
“Be serious, Emma.”
“Who said I wasn’t serious?” she said with a grin as she swerved the car through another turn.
The Expatriate heard the beep that indicated incoming e-mail to his business account. He brought it up on his screen and smiled with satisfaction. The call from the mutant teen had come from a cellular phone, and moreover, his sources were able to find that the call had been placed from somewhere in Montana. His attempt to trace the phone account back had dead-ended with a dummy business and a private post-office box in Massachusetts, but that only supported the girl’s claim that she was a mutant. They were a slippery and secretive bunch.
Moreover, he thought he had an idea which mutant. While Ivan hadn’t been tracking the young mutants from Seattle closely, he had turned in occasional reports as he, or one of their installations, picked up the tracking devices he’d installed on their vehicle. One of those would have put them in the right part of Montana at about the right time.
He opened his briefcase and took out the pictures Ivan had sent him of the young mutants. He flipped through them. Four females. The platinum blonde was too old. One was dark skinned and did not seem to be the type to have the hillbilly accent he’d detected. The other dark-hair seemed to have
Asian features—again, a long shot for the accent. That left the other blonde.
He leaned back in his chair and laughed softly to himself. There was no proof, but he was sure he was right.
There was only one problem. She hadn’t called back, despite Norman’s repeated on-air requests. That would never do. It was time to turn the heat up to high and see if things came to a boil. And if not.. . Well, he knew where she lived—or at least where she was living for the moment.
The Xabago was jammed with the six Gen-Xers and the mutant musketeers. Every piece of furniture and every bit of floor in the front of the camper had someone sitting or lying on it.
On the radio, Walt Norman was finishing a painfully lame patter song about a telepath who robbed his neighbors blind by reading their minds. Paige was sitting on the front edge of the recliner, her whole body posture screaming tension. “This is stupid,” she said.
Recall was sitting cross-legged on the floor by her feet. “He’ll say it. Just wait.”
The announcer came on to introduce a news break. Then he added. ''‘And tune in next hour when Walt will be getting a call from our mutant mystery girl! You asked for it, and she’s back.”
Jubilee nearly fell out of the top-gun seat. “Did you hear that?”
Jono looked puzzled. “What? He’s got a bloody ringer?”
Recall frowned. “I don’t think so. I think Paige hasn’t called back when he asked her to, so he just threw down the gauntlet.”
Everett nodded. “Call back or look like a chicken.”
Recall rocked his head uncertainly. “Something like that.” He looked around. “Where’s the phone?”
Angelo groaned. “Not again.”
Paige looked uncertain. “What if he just makes a fool of me again?”
“He might,” agreed Recall, “but you learned something last time, and you’ll learn more this time. Eventually, you might just make a fool of him.”
Monet found the phone on the dashboard and handed it to Paige. She started to look for the number in her pocket, but realized that it was permanently burned into her memory. She dialed the number quickly, before her courage faltered. The phone was answered by a hold recording. She held her hand over the phone and looked hopefully at Recall. “What do I say?”
“Don’t let him run things like last time. Don’t let him put you on trial. Give him a true anecdote. People love those, and it gives you concrete facts to work from. Those are harder for him to distort.”
‘‘But not impossible to distort?”
He shrugged apologetically. “No, just harder. But it’s better than nothing, right?”
When the screening operator answered, Paige simply said, “This is Peg, the ‘mystery mutant girl.’ ”
The Expatriate pounded his fist on the desk in triumph. His screen showed that “Peg” was on the line. Norman had been furious at his on-air announcement that the girl would call, even though there were no assurances that she would, but the Expatriate had managed to duck out of the booth and avoid him during the break. After that, Norman could only express his anger in facial expressions directed at the booth, and thanks to the mirrored glass, he couldn’t even be sure that anyone was inside.
But the gamble had paid off, and surely even Norman would have to admit that when the time came. For now, despite Norman’s anger, he was playing right along. He flipped over a page in his notes and leaned close to the microphone as though all were going according to his plan.
“And now, as Trent promised earlier, we have our mutant mystery girl, Peg.” He punched up her line on his console. “You there Peg?”
“Yes, sir. ’ ’
“You are the polite one, aren’t you?” He made it sound like something less than a virtue. “You made quite an impression on our listeners the other day. We’ve had just a ton of calls. Seems like people want to hear about the mutant lifestyle, right from the source.”
“What's a mutant lifestyle?”
Norman laughed. “Well, I don’t really have to explain that to you, do I, Peg? Hey, have you done any thinking about what I was telling you last time? Got a handle on this mutant agenda thing yet?”
“Not really, Mr. Norman, but I was thinking about something that happened to some friends of mine a short while back, and I was thinking you could tell me how it fit into the mutant agenda. ’ ’
“A story!” He said it with mock surprise. “Well, I’m always set for a good story. You just fire away and I’ll tell you what I think of it.”
“Some friends of mine, three guys not much older than me, were on a car trip in Idaho, when their radiator boiled over. They pulled off to let things cool down. They were just minding their own business, goofing off, when a truckload of locals stopped and tried to clean their clocks. Would have too, if me and some of my other friends hadn ’t happened along to help out. ’ ’
“Well, now, Peg, that’s an interesting story, all right, and a sad one.”
The girl ran over the end of his sentence. “That’s not the end of it, Walt. We asked them where they learned to hate mutants, and they mentioned your show, mentioned you by name.1 ’
“Well, now, Peg, you have to realize that a lot of people listen to my show, millions of them. Good people, bad people, even you listen to my show, Peg, and I can’t be held accountable for everything that every one of them does. And I am sorry for what happened to your friends.” Then his tone of voice shifted slightly, and he seemed to change gears. “But trying to put myself in the shoes of rural people, farm people, the very lifeblood of our nation, one can hardly blame them for trying to protect what it is that they have from what you’ve described, a veritable mutant invasion. These guys in their car, you and all your friends, there must have been a virtual army of mutants. You can see why they’d be threatened.”
* ‘Nobody did anything to threaten them.''
“Then let me ask you this, Peg. How did they know these guys in a car, stopped by the side of the road like anyone else, how did they know they were mutants?”
A pause. “They were goofing off, using their powers. These guys saw—”
“Driving down their road, in their country, their home, and they see these strange teenagers from out of state, people who don’t belong there, exhibiting strange and terrifying powers? People have a right to defend their homes, their way of life, from the invasion of outsiders of any kind, and I think that goes without saying.”
The girl tried to protest, but Norman had already hit the mute button to silence her. “We’re coming up on a break, Peg, and I want to hear from some other callers about this, but you call back tomorrow, and we can talk some more. This is The Walt Norman Show, and we’ll be right back with more calls after the news.”
The on air sign went out, and Norman took off his earphones, ripped the plug out of the console, and threw the headset at the Expatriate’s window so hard that he caught himself ducking. Fortunately, the thick tempered glass he’d ordered was nearly shatterproof. He looked up just in time to see Norman charge into the booth.
“McComb! What was the idea of that blasted stupid stunt? If that girl hadn’t called, I’d have seemed like a fool to my viewers! Or was that the plan?” He shook his fist in front of him, then pointed his index finger out as an afterthought, as though it had been his intention all along. He managed to keep a lid on his temper, but just barely. “You’re lucky she called, McComb, or you’d be out on the street right now, so help me you would.”
The door opened, and Betty Norman—“Mrs. Dale”— poked her head in. “I thought I heard yelling.”
Norman didn’t look back. “Get out.”
She put on a brave smile. “The switchboards are jammed. Everybody is talking about it.”
He turned on her suddenly. “Get out of here, old woman! You’ve meddled in my life for the last time. McComb isn’t the only one who could be fired around here! The ratings have been flat, and the network has been talking about making changes. I could sure use that to simplify my life right now.” Norman’s mother withdrew quickly.
He turned back. “You just remember who’s in charge here, Trent. I’m not warning you again.”
The Expatriate tried to look sincerely abject. “It won’t happen again, Walt. You’re the boss, and judging from how you handled that call, you’re the man. That’s the only reason I’d even think about putting you on the spot like that. I know you can handle it.”
Norman was brought up a little short by the unexpected flattery. “I can handle everything, Trent, but your blasted excuses.” He started to back out of the small room. “Just make sure I don’t have to listen to any more.”
When he was gone, the Expatriate clinched his eyes shut with rage, and with some effort brought his anger back under control. He sat down, picked up the phone, and dialed. “Ivan? This plan cannot be completed too soon, my friend. Norman is a fool, and he will wreck everything to salve his own monumental ego. We must stop him.”
On the other end of the phone, Ivan chuckled. “We will.”
CHAPTER NINE
HONK IF YOU’RE HUMAN
'
-ifiSS ...... .',A. .^-#1.: ; . ’
—bumper sticker
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From a thousand places among the towering trees, plumes of steam drifted up lazily, tracking with the wind until they evaporated in the blue sky over Yellowstone National Park’s geothermal area. It was a museum of volcanic oddities, spectacular geysers, bubbling mud-pots, rainbow-colored hot springs, and towering mineral formations that looked like modern art. Sean Cassidy couldn’t help but grin at the look on Emma Frost’s face. She was obviously, and probably despite herself, impressed.
Sean drove the Xtravagant, letting her rubberneck. 1 ‘I take it, lass, that you’ve never been here before.”
She shook her head. “I have to confess that I haven’t travelled much where business didn’t take me. I didn’t know I was missing so much. There can’t be another place like this on Earth.”
“It reminds me of the Savage Land, actually, but you have to switch the grizzly bear and moose for T-rex and stegosaurus.”
As they pulled into the crowded parking lot for the Old Faithful geyser, they both started scanning for a parking space. “I suspect,” Emma said, “that there are fewer RVs in the Savage Land.”
‘ ‘Aye, the critters eat them as soon as they can pull off the Antarctic freeway,” Sean said.
They turned into the RV area just as a silver motor home with British Columbia plates cut in front of them and took the last space. Sean squinted in annoyance. “Blast them.”
The door opened and an older couple dressed in matching flower print shirts climbed out, seemed in unison to remember something important, and jumped back into the RV. It backed out of the space just as Sean and Emma pulled up.
Sean glanced suspiciously at Emma. “Tell me you’ll not be having anything to do with that.”
She shrugged innocently. “It’s possible that they really did leave a burner on at home.”
Sean said nothing. Breaking Emma Frost of her wicked ways was a job done only by millimeters, not inches. Besides, it hadn’t been that wicked. He carefully eased their rig between a smaller RV and a twin-cab pickup pulling a trailer. “Well,” he said, setting the parking brake, “that was no more difficult than landing the Blackbird on a wet sponge.”
Emma looked down the line of parked rigs. “Where do you think the students are?”
�
�They’re supposed to meet up with the M.O.N.S.T.E.R. lads. They’ll catch up with us later.”
“Maybe I should scan for them.”
“Let the kids be, Emma. If’n you’re really worried, call them on the cell phone like regular folks.”
“I’d feel like an anxious mother hen.”
He chuckled. “But scanning their minds, that’s not a problem?” '
“It’s just—they spend so much time by themselves. I suppose I figured that the girls would ride over here with me, and you over there with the boys.”
“It’s only natural that they’d not want to hang out with a couple of fossils like you and me. And as for me staying over there, you’ve seen that great beastie they picked out. Can y’blame me for wanting to stay over here as much as I can? It’s bad enough I have to sleep there.”
Sean watched the clouds of steam coming from the Old Faithful basin. “I wonder when the geyser’s next set to erupt.”
“Twenty minutes,” Emma said without hesitation. Sean shot her a look, and she shrugged. “It’s foremost on the minds of most of the people around here. It would be difficult for me not to know.” She got up and headed back to the kitchen area. “Do you want a sandwich?”
He raised his eyebrows in surprise. “Are you offering to serve?”
She smiled as she raided the fridge. “I’m offering to leave out the Dijon if you want to make your own.’ ’
He climbed out of the driver’s seat and went back to join her. “Coming from you, Emma, that’s practically a proposition.”
Paige kicked aside a pile of dirty T-shirts so she could sit in the Xabago’s recliner. She remembered the pile as having been there yesterday, but she was certain that it had grown. “Don’t you guys ever wash anything?”
Angelo was digging through the pantry, and came up with a chocolate-chip granola bar. “Si. When I run out of shirts, I
wash them. Assuming I can’t find one in the pile that isn’t too
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