by Elsa, Sandra
"But it's my fault, because if I hadn't stolen you away, he'd have had fifteen men following you around."
"Probably. Guess we ought to get going. I need to swing back by the hotel before we go to the hospital, pick up the old phone so I can respond to the message blasting me as an idiot."
"'Cause you know it's waiting for you." I laughed and said in a scolding voice, "Bad son. Bad, bad, son." Then I kissed him. "Good husband though."
Troopers Ralston and Gerrill collected the equipment we'd been using and after making sure Harrison's weapon was unloaded, Gerrill handed it back to me and I slid it in my shoulder holster in place of my newer nine-mil.
"Will you be joining us tomorrow?" Trooper Ralston asked.
"If we're not being bothersome. If you have better things to do, we don't need to practice here."
"I don't mind spending time on the range," Ralston said. "Beats the hell out of sitting on an empty road."
"Same time then?"
"Sounds good. You have a good day, folks." They turned to put equipment away while we left.
We got in the car, but a niggle between my shoulder blades made me stop Harrison from starting it. I searched for magic and found a GPS tracking chip. I wondered if this was the locals trying to keep tabs on us, or if Jordan's people had already arrived.
In view of everything else that had gone on in the past day I went ahead and checked for bombs and electronic bugs. The one tracking device was the extent of it. I concentrated on it for a moment and made it show a location inside District One right outside watch HQ.
Ralston and Gerrill came out of the building. "Is there a problem?"
"Nope. Just debating our next move. Taking care of a minor nuisance. Have a good day."
Chapter 4
At the hotel we applied latex and wigs just in case someone from the previous night's fiasco was in the orthopedics office at the hospital. The disguises proved unnecessary as the office was nearly empty when we arrived. After some discussion with the doctor he agreed to shorten the cast and make it out of a clear acrylic. "It's something we developed specifically for tourists. Accidents happen and then they can't go in the water and most people spend a year planning their vacation.” He held up a clear cast that had been cut from someone’s leg and rapped his knuckles on it. “This allows you to go in the water while providing complete support to your bone and doesn't come apart when it’s wet. Only catch is, you'll have to come in to let us redo it every fifth day, your skin doesn't get enough air in this sort of thing. Most people's insurance will cover three changes, and a soft cast, or wheelchair for a day in between casts to give your ankle time to recover. We couldn't use this if it was a brand new break with surgery, but all the open wounds are healed so there's limited chance of infection."
He wrapped a flesh colored pad around the fracture then sprayed the new cast on, complete with glitter in the acrylic.
While he worked on me, Harrison opened the messages we had on the old phone. There were several from Mage Jallahan and Nan, Which we each answered depending on whom it was addressed to. The most recent addition to the inbox was from Jordan Drover. It was restrained and caring and at no point did he call me a bitch. Just wanted to make sure we were all right down in District Two-Thirty-Seven after some of the phone calls he'd received last evening. Or more accurately early this morning.
We wrote back assuring him life was good, we were fine, and we were fucking like rabbits. That last part was even Harrison's addition without any instigation from me.
We finished with messages about the same time the doctor finished with my leg and we raced off to buy swimsuits, remove makeup and head for the beach. Still walked with a limp but the cast was so much lighter and easier to handle I felt like running a marathon. I settled for a dip in the Atlantic Ocean.
We’d been in the water less than ten minutes when a pod of dolphins appeared midway between beach and dome. One of them strayed toward shore then returned to the pod. All the tourists stopped to stare at them. A lone dolphin broke away again, then zipped back to the safety of its family. I swam a ways out, the exercise felt good. Harrison stayed at my side. As we turned back toward shore I noticed yet another dolphin stray away from the pod and back. I briefly wondered if the behavior was like that of the stallions I read about in old westerns. Was the venturesome one the pod protector? Or was it a different dolphin each time? Not exactly like I could tell the difference. When I could stand, I spun to watch the dolphins but they had disappeared.
A man bobbed in place where they had been. He must have been a local. At least he was a damn sight better swimmer than I was. Others along the shore watched him and he waved and dove under the water. I watched for him to surface but he must have had dive equipment.
Harrison held me while we bobbed in chest deep water with the waves tugging and pushing. We examined the nearest people then I wrapped my legs around his waist. After a moment of struggling to maintain his balance in the waves while holding me tight against himself he smiled down at me ****.
We discovered that the decreased tint of the eastern side of the dome, wasn't so much to improve the view, but to enhance sun worshipping. By the end of the day I was glad we had started so late in the evening because even so I could feel a burn throughout most of my exposed flesh. Harrison pulled on shorts, t-shirt and cap. I wrapped a skirt around my lower half and tugged my touristy type cap down to cover the upper half of my face and we went off to find supper, walking the boardwalk in the opposite direction from that which we'd traveled last night. We located an oriental restaurant and walked in. Our attire matched half the other diners and nobody paid the least amount of attention to us.
The food was excellent, a trend I was seeing in trying to please the tourists.
We stayed four more days on the top floor of the hotel, hooking up with Terry often enough to assure ourselves he was alive and well, even if he was badly sunburned. On the third day of our stay we became aware of a persistent tail. Since there was no magic that I could find, we decided whoever followed us was just that good. I sensed him on occasion; even caught a glimpse of a car I'm certain was his, but I never caught sight of the tail himself; or herself, I reminded myself of the possibility. When it came time to change the cast to allow my leg to breathe, against Harrison's judgment I talked the doctor into a soft cast. He warned me to keep off of it, and Harrison insisted I use the wheelchair as well, but I was happy with the arrangement.
We checked out of the hotel, collected Terry, repacked the car and headed out the gate. After watching the rearview mirror for many miles, we stopped at the same place we'd run into Troopers Ralston and Gerrill. We got out of the car and walked along the edge of the water for quite a ways, keeping our rebreathers close at hand in case we got company again. At a bend in the river we’d just about decided nobody was following us when a car moved slowly up the road and pulled over, many miles behind our location, only visible because we’d walked around a gentle curve in the shoreline that nearly took us out of sight of our car but brought us into view of a much longer stretch of road.
I raised the binoculars I’d brought along for just this moment and dialed the zoom down to give me a clear view of the driver. Sam Harwid. I cursed under my breath. At least it wasn’t the drug runners.
“Who is it?” Harrison asked.
“Well it’s definitely your father’s doing. It’s the guy I sent potential clients to when I couldn’t take anymore on. He’s very good.”
“So how’s he keeping up with us? You’ve been over the car several times in the past couple of days?”
“Wish I knew the answer to that question.”
“Might be time to call Jallahan," Harrison said. "He’s good with puzzles like this.”
I nodded and we turned around. Harrison stooped down and plucked another piece of plant life from the shore line. It was free-floating but roots dangled and it had yet to gain the slime of decay. Harrison bent over and selected a tiny inlet protected from the vagaries
of current before burying the roots into the ground.
"Does this mean regrowth is starting to happen naturally?" I asked him.
Terry also seemed intensely interested in the plant. As they examined it, I pulled out my handheld.
**Sam -- Good to see you again. How much is the asshole paying you? You know you've never got the better of me.
#
I pushed send then focused the binoculars on him again. He glanced down before picking his handheld up. After staring at the message, unmoving for a good thirty seconds, he returned it to the seat and picked up a pair of binoculars. He focused down the road. At least he didn't seem to be tracking any of us. So it was just a matter of figuring out what new kind of tracker had been placed in my car. Couldn't be magic or it just plain wouldn't work, and whatever it was, my wand for locating electronic bugs wasn't working on it.
I picked up my cell phone hoping we were still close enough to the dome for a signal. It was weak but the call went through.
Harrison glanced up from his little project and smiled as I arranged for Troopers Ralston and Gerrill to harass Sam. We stood and walked slowly back toward the car. I turned the binoculars back on Sam and watched him sweep out away from the road. Finally he saw us and I gave him a little wave. He lowered the binoculars, rubbed his eyes then put them back in place fiddling with the zoom, then dropped them again.
He picked up his handheld and tapped at the keypad.
**You're not wearing rebreathers!
**Nope. Just one of the things your employer doesn't want the world to know.
**Why are you carrying them then?
**In case somebody happens to drive by. Besides the air's still quite thin.
#
I didn't include the thought that it did seem to get easier to breathe down here at ocean level and my cardio pulmonary seemed to improve as I spent more time outside the domes, thriving on thin air.
**Why let me know?
**So you realize there's more to this than the president's son out on a lark. We've always gotten along Sam and I’d hate to have to hurt you, but this is too important.
#
He leaned his head back on his headrest and closed his eyes.
**Dammit Frankie -- I can't quit without explaining why and he knows I've been tailing you successfully for four days.
**Not completely successful. Knew you were back there. Wasn't quite sure who though. Whatever you're using to follow us, I'll find it.
#
I swung the binoculars down the road where a Hummer was racing toward Sam's car. I took out my rebreather and put it on then watched Sam's reaction as Harrison and Terry followed my example. It only took a few moments for Sam to put his handheld down mid-message and pick up his binoculars to watch what we were doing. A few seconds after that he searched the road ahead and behind, latching onto the Hummer, then starting his car and pulling out into the roadway. We watched his car fly down the road, but the magic enhanced drive of the Hummer overtook him two miles past the point our vehicle was parked at. We watched the confrontation as we climbed back in our own car and removed the rebreathers.
Harrison started the car then drove slowly up the road. As we passed the threesome I was glad to see Trooper Gerrill's pistol pointed at Sam and Trooper Ralston snarling at whatever Sam had just told him.
Whatever he said, it pissed Ralston off badly enough he snatched Sam off his feet and literally tossed him in the back seat of the Hummer. We waved as we cruised by. Sam did not look happy. Ralston and Gerrill nodded back to us, then climbed in the vehicle and drove toward the dome. They disappeared around a curve and I made Harrison turn around and go back to Sam's car.
A brief search turned up a locator beacon that showed our car sitting ten feet away. I got out and walked around the Subaru watching as the arrow pointing directionality changed. After three times around the car I bent down and felt along the fender of the car. I'd checked before and the results this time were exactly the same. Nothing there.
I laid down on the ground and slid under the car, watching the directional arrow. It slid along the bottom of the car as I did, shifting slowly from just ahead of me to just behind me. I backed up and examined the undercarriage of the vehicle exactly where it changed direction. Running my hands over the surface I felt all the dust and grime from our off road trips but nothing more.
"Right there." Terry raised his voice.
"How the hell do you know?"
"I foresaw you finding it. You're right on top of it."
"Well how far in the future did you foresee this happening? Because there's nothing down here."
"You were lying in the exact position you're in now. So whatever it is, you're close." I wished the damn locator would beep in proximity to the tracker but it remained stubbornly silent and I put it down to use both hands to examine the underside of the vehicle. I screamed in frustration as dust fell in my face yet again. Bad move. I got a mouthful of the next clump that dislodged. But as I choked on the filth, my eyes lit on a bright white pinpoint. I scratched it off the car and slid back out.
I examined it closely for magic. As I expected, there was none. Even waving the wand over top of it failed to register an electronic signature. What the hell?
I placed it on the pavement and grabbed a rock, tapping it lightly, when it opened, there was liquid inside it. Red liquid. I wasn't Were but I was reasonably certain it was blood. So… back to tracking DNA. I'd heard they'd developed something like this but hadn't actually seen it at work before. I pondered the source of the DNA then looked at the locator and grinned
"What's up?" Harrison asked.
"It's a DNA tracker. Brand new tech, no doubt paid for with your father's money."
"Why the grin?"
"Because if the thing had been loaded with any of our DNA he would have seen us as we trekked away from the road. It must be his own DNA. If we keep the tracker we should be able to tell if he gets close."
Terry shook his head. "How can that work? If it's his DNA the locator would constantly be telling him he was sitting right on top of it."
I hated when other people were right. I shrugged and accepted Harrison's hand, pulling myself up from the road. "I guess it doesn't really matter whose it is. The important thing is we found it, and now we need to get out of here before Ralston is forced to let Sam go."
I tossed the locator back in Sam's car, reached under the fender and pressed the ceramic container of blood firmly onto the metal. It attached with no other adhesive than dirt. Wasn't too worried about it staying, the blood would dry out shortly anyway since I'd broken it open.
We got back in our car and started back up the road. At the edge of what used to be marsh, but was now just briny water in numerous rivers and inlets, we drove off the road to collect our plants from the gully we left them in. They looked sad after six days without water, but none of them were completely dead yet.
I looked at Harrison and said, "Don't suppose you could do something about these. Or do I need to use the water we packed?"
He grinned and turned back toward the nearest water source. I followed after him eager to see the phenomenon I'd gambled on when I took him on as a client. He stuck his hands in the water. I watched his aura while he closed his eyes, a look of concentration on his face. His aura grew darker, the black portions overtaking the violet until he appeared to be standing within a gleaming shadow. After several moments he turned back to the car. Dark clouds appeared overhead as we walked. The water transferred from his aura to the sky and we climbed in the car as large gentle droplets of rain began to fall in a very localized area.
Harrison looked uncomfortable as the rain began to slow. He leaped from the car and shook like a wet dog. Fine white crystals erupted in a cloud and pattered into the damp dirt.
"Side-effect?" I asked, as I followed him away from the car, out from under the falling rain.
"Guess I should have expected it. The conversion from ground source to sky source filters out the impuri
ties. They have to go somewhere."
I laughed. "So that was salt?"
"You got it."
"So we do this at supper time we'll never need a salt shaker again."
He wrapped his arms around me and shared my laughter. "If I always stand in the same place we could have piles of the stuff. We could rule the world's salt market."
The final raindrops fell and we retrieved the plants and traveled back to the road. There was no signal for the phone so I had no way of knowing what was happening with Sam. It was safe to assume he would be released shortly after they granted him his phone call. So we hurried north along a road that the maps claimed used to be route ninety-five. An hour later we turned onto a nearly nonexistent track that used to be a paved road in a place that used to be a town named Coosawhatchie but was now just one more oddly contoured wide spot in the terrain. Gravel marked the decay of stone and brick buildings. Brown flakes turned out to be mountains of rust. The piles must have been entire buildings to still leave any trace a thousand years later..
Tire tracks clearly marked our path over the dusty trail. Harrison noticed me watching. "I could stir up the dust with a breeze."
We stopped and he obliterated all trace of our turning. We spent the next week camping on a site historical maps named Old House. There was a nearby lake, or at least a dry dip in the ground that had not been completely filled with sands blown in by the annual storms. Crystal forests surrounded the depression in the ground. A dry river bed ran east and west before veering north to flow into the Port Royal Sound. A deep channel cut the wide depression that our books told us used to be marshland.
There was evidence of the regular passage of water and we assumed this was a roaring river when the annuals came. We walked to the nearby Sound. And stared at the water. This inlet flowed into the sea and as eager as I had been to swim in District Two-Three-Seven I stayed back from the edge of the water, the words, undertow, and current, strong in my mind. Harrison wasted no time absorbing water and returning to the dry little depression we were camping beside. We planted two flowers there and set the rest of the pots on the ground to be watered as we experimented with attempting to soften the ground to a point where water wouldn't just flow directly through the soil.