by James Phelan
“Hang on,” Lora said. “Cody, do you live alone?”
“No,” Cody replied. “This is my parents’ place.”
Lora was silent for a moment and Sam knew what was coming. He had yet to tell Cody that there was the possibility his parents may not be who they seemed. He looked up from the kitchen bench and scanned the room, as though there may be eavesdroppers.
“Where are your parents now?” Sam asked.
“They left a couple of days ago,” Cody said. “They went to the university in Tucson for work. They won’t be back until the middle of next week.”
“OK, well that’s one less complication to worry about. You should be safe there,” Lora said. “But, Sam, maybe don’t stay at the house tonight, just in case Stella knows more than we’d like.”
“Complication? Stella?” Cody asked. “What’s going on?”
“I’ll explain later,” Sam said, peering through the blinds to the empty road and parking lot at the back of the shops down below. “But we should probably camp somewhere.”
Sam and Cody sat around the new campfire. Cody had been silent since Sam had told him about the possibility that his parents were Agents for the Enterprise. And of the possibility that some surrogate parents may also have defected to Stella’s side. Sam understood—it was a shock to think that everything in life was not as it had always appeared to be.
Sam looked up at the sky. It was a clear night and the air was cool. The camp fire was just low embers now, which glowed dimly with intense heat. They were over a gully and up the hill from Cody’s house. If they walked for a minute to the ridge, they could see the bungalows and the road that branched off the main street and led to the tour shop.
“I just can’t believe it,” Cody said, absently stirring the pot of chili they’d hauled up with them. “I really can’t.”
“Look, try not to think about it—they may not even be Agents. I know it’s hard to take in, but if they have been away for the last few days and don’t know about the dreams you’ve had, then we have no need to worry. We can sort it all out later.”
“Why can’t I just contact them—ask them directly myself?” Cody asked, holding up his phone.
“Ah, that’s not a great idea just now,” Sam said. “We need to make sure we get to the Gear first. Agents or not, if Stella has a way of tracing their phone calls, she might track them down too. We don’t want to put them in danger unnecessarily.”
Cody didn’t say anything but he served up two bowls of the steaming chili and they sat and ate in silence.
“Holy smoke!” Sam said, fanning his mouthful. “This is hot as!” His eyes started watering and he ate a chunk of cornbread and washed it down with a swift gulp of milk. “OK, a little hot, but totally awesome,” he said, eating more.
Cody didn’t seem fazed by the spicy food. He looked as though a thought was just dawning on him.
“What is it?” Sam asked.
“In this place, hidden in the canyons,” Cody said, “there’s that carving showing thirteen figures together. Do you think that could be a depiction of opening the Dream Gate?”
Sam nodded thoughtfully.
“And you know what else?” Cody said.
Sam waited as Cody had a drink of the milk—maybe the chili was finally getting to him, too.
“I found some skeletons. Three of them,” Cody said. “Spanish, I think, by their clothing and kit. Sixteenth century, some of the first European explorers through this area. I didn’t touch any of the artifacts—I just saw them and raced back. But they hadn’t been disturbed, I know, because one of them had some gold coins spilled on the ground from a little pouch—I mean, if anyone else had found it, they’d have taken them, right?”
“And you haven’t been back there since?” Sam asked.
“After finding those Spanish skeletons, I was kinda spooked,” Cody said, finishing off his bowl of chili and serving up seconds.
“Well,” Sam said, looking at their sleeping bags rolled out under the sky of brilliant stars above, “tomorrow’s the day. You and I will find it again and get some real answers.”
24
ALEX
Alex walked briskly in the cold night, Phoebe in step beside him. Their Stealth Suits had changed to appear as the uniforms of the Washington DC Police Department.
“Do I look too young to be a cop?” Alex asked.
“I hope you’ll always look too young to be a cop,” his mother replied, pinching his cheek.
“Ah, Mom!” he said, rubbing where she’d squeezed and looking around to make sure no one had noticed.
“Come on, let’s check the Metro station,” Phoebe said, stepping up the pace so that Alex had to jog to catch up with her.
“But there’s a team of Agents staking that out!” Alex said, protesting. “Can’t we have a break to grab a bite to eat, I’m starving!”
“Sure,” Phoebe said, not breaking her stride. “Who really wants to save the world anyway?”
“Argh, I knew being keen to get involved would come back to bite me,” Alex said, kicking at the ground. “Fine, we’ll go to the Metro. There’ll at least be a vending machine down there.”
“You don’t need anything that’ll rot your teeth,” Phoebe said.
“Yeah, Mom, I know …” They strode across Washington Mall, and he stopped to look up at the towering obelisk of the Monument.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” Phoebe said.
“Yeah, I guess,” Alex said. “But, like almost everything I’ve seen so far, it’s hiding its true purpose.”
Alex yawned. They’d been up all night without so much as a jaywalker in sight. Aside from them, there were twelve of the best Enterprise field Agents in the area, in two-person patrols disguised as police, scouring for any sight of Mac or Stella.
So far, nothing.
“Well, that was boring,” Alex said, yawning again.
“What, hanging out with your mother all night on a mission to save the world?”
“Ah, I’m too tired to argue, Mom, so I’ll take it back. It’s been a blast walking around the streets of Washington Mall with you in the middle of the night.”
“Better.” Phoebe smiled.
Alex looked around. “When’s this changeover shift coming?”
“They’re late,” Phoebe said. “They were supposed to meet up with us half an hour ago.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I didn’t want to worry you,” she said. “Let me call them again.” She was about to make a call on her radio when she saw a little coffee truck serving cab drivers at a street corner a couple of blocks down. “Hey, would you please get me a coffee? I’ll wait here in case they turn up.”
“Sure, be right back,” Alex said, and he jogged across the Mall and ordered a couple of double-shot espressos and some food. He paid the guy and walked back to where his mother had been standing—but she was gone. He spun around, immediately anxious.
Nothing. Plenty of people, but no Phoebe—no cops at all. He called into his radio, a closed circuit used only by them and the Agents, but got no reply.
Nothing at all.
“Mom!” he called out loud. “Phoebe!”
His shouts startled a flock of pigeons and some Japanese tourists walking past him. One of them handed him a DC police badge, pointed up the Mall a few metres, toward the Monument, miming that they’d found it on the ground. He thanked them, and saw on the inscription that it was his mother’s—like the utility belt that they wore, loaded with handcuffs, flashlight, and pistol, the badge was authentic enough so that they passed as regular DC cops, but not quite right on closer inspection. He dropped the food and drinks and ran toward the towering obelisk.
25
SAM
“No! No!”
Sam woke. By the light of the night sky and the still glowing coals of the campfire he could see Cody murmuring and twitching in his sleep.
Strange. I can’t even remember if I just dreamed or not.
Sam thought about waking him, and then decided not to. Better to let him sleep, finish the dream he was obviously having.
Wait until he wakes and see what he’s dreamed—with any luck, it’ll show us exactly where we have to go.
Sam yawned and rolled back over in his sleeping bag.
CODY’S NIGHTMARE
I look up, following the noise. It’s a huge A380 coming in for landing. My eyes are distracted by—a horse?
It’s a great big stallion, rearing up on its hind legs, its veins snaking around its body, its eyes shining red, terrifying.
It doesn’t move.
I come nearer.
A statue. It’s just a statue …
“Cody!”
I turn at the sound of my name.
Sam.
“Come on!” Sam calls, and I run after him through the main terminal of the large airport. We stop at a door marked, SECURITY PERSONNEL ONLY.
Sam enters a code into the keypad—130107.
The light on the lock bleeps green and the door clicks open. A long corridor lights up before us as we run through it.
“What’s the rush?” I ask, but then the answer comes—
“Hey, you!” A security guard appears from a side hall.
Sam doesn’t hesitate or skip a beat—he’s on the guy, flipping him onto his back and knocking him out with one swift movement.
“We don’t have much time,” Sam says. “Let’s go.”
“Where?”
Sam stops. “This is your show,” he says to me.
We both stop. There, in front of me, is the black horse again. It towers over us, its eyes glowing bright red. I can make out a low growling sound, and turn my head trying to pinpoint where the noise is coming from. Suddenly the imposing black horse breathes fire at us.
“Down!” Sam pulls me to the floor and we crawl to the other side of the hall. “That’s him!”
“Who?”
“Solaris,” Sam yells out.
“The horse?”
“What horse?” he says.
“You didn’t see the horse?” I don’t understand.
Sam shakes his head. We hear footsteps approaching, they’re loud echoes on the polished concrete floor. A tall figure, dark and shadowy, makes his way toward us. His movement looks unnatural.
“Leave us alone!” Sam yells at the guy, getting to his feet and looking defiant.
The figure shoots flames toward Sam. I can see Sam freeze, before recoiling back. The metallic voice behind the mask cackles, satisfied.
“Sam …” Solaris says with a voice distorted and amplified. I cover my ears. “Who’s your friend?”
“Go away!” Sam says to him, standing between me and this terrifying apparition. I want to help, I think of crash-tackling him, but my feet feel locked to the floor. His shimmering mass looks as if it could shift at the slightest moment.
“You know I will follow you anywhere you try to hide,” Solaris says. “When you dream, any of you, you’re in my world.”
Sam is silent.
“What do you want with us?” I ask.
I feel Solaris move his gaze to look at me with his black eyes.
“The Gear,” Solaris says, and then in a blur of motion he has Sam in a choke hold. He picks him up by his neck and turns him around, so that Sam, feet off the floor, is now facing me. His hands fight uselessly against Solaris’ grip.
“The Gear,” Solaris says again. “It’s here. Give it to me.”
“Don’t do it!” Sam manages to blurt out.
“Sam … always the hero …” Solaris brings his other arm up, his wrist toward Sam’s face, and makes the tiny flame larger, burning like a blowtorch in front of Sam’s eyes.
Sam looks terrified. He closes his eyes tight and everything turns to white in one blinding flash.
26
SAM
“And that was it?” Sam asked, his teeth chattering against the morning chill in the air, the sun yet to appear over the horizon. Cody was checking over their kayaks and equipment. “That was the extent of your dream?”
“Yep. Thanks again for waking me,” Cody said. “I think we’re good to go.”
“So, an airport … I wonder why we were there?” Sam said. Cody explained that the beginning of the dream had been the same as before—the canyon and the rock carvings and the hidden temple. But then it had abruptly changed setting.
“Beats me,” Cody said. “It was a big airport, and one I’d never seen. And that massive black horse with crazy eyes … it was a weird dream.”
“Yeah,” Sam said. “They sometimes are.”
“The same thing happens to you?”
“I … I keep having these dreams of a desert—not at all like this one here, just endless sand dunes, and I’m with a friend, Alex. But the dream just shows me little snippets. It’s all broken up, a glimpse here and there. None of it makes sense, but none of it is good for me or Alex either.”
“Is Alex another Dreamer?”
“Yeah.
“What do you think it means?”
“I don’t know … OK, so how do we get down there?” Sam asked, suddenly eager to change the topic. He pointed to a brilliant blue-green stream a couple of hundred metres down from the parking area. The water seemed to originate at the base of a cliff, where an underground aquifer roared out into the open and foamed like a shaken can of soda.
A million cans of soda more like.
“We BASE jump,” Cody said, matter-of-fact.
“That’s … interesting,” Sam said, his voice edgy. “But how do the kayaks get down there?”
“We sit in them.”
“I don’t follow,” Sam said.
“We strap in,” Cody explained, “and then we push off.”
Sam looked over the edge of the sheer cliff. “And land in the water in our kayaks?”
“That’s it,” Cody said. “So technically we don’t jump, we just kind of line ourselves up near the edge and then—whoosh, off we go. Cool, huh?”
Sam swallowed hard and strapped on the parachute Cody handed to him. Cody checked the straps, then Sam reciprocated with a cross-check, before checking his own again nervously.
“You ever skydived or BASE jumped?” Cody asked.
“Yeah, once or twice,” Sam said, thinking back to how he’d turned his Stealth Suit into an improvised glider to escape from Solaris at the top of the Eiffel Tower, and again with Rapha in the jungle. “It’s not an activity I’m in a hurry to repeat …”
“You’re gonna love this, Sammy!” Cody was all smiles. “It’s a blast!”
“Yeah …” Sam nodded. “Let’s, ah, let’s do this!”
Cody slapped him on the shoulder and then helped him into the kayak.
“Me first,” Cody said, getting into his own craft. “Count to three, then follow my lead. When we land on the river, keep the canopy up until we reach the first junction—it’ll work like a power sail as the wind’s ripping through the canyon behind us. Then ditch it and switch to the paddle to get to shore.”
“Where’s that exactly?” Sam asked, squinting his eyes to see down to the tiny little river far below.
“Can’t see it from here, but just follow me, OK?”
Sam nodded, tightened his helmet strap and made sure the paddle was clipped securely to the kayak’s side.
“Hang on, why the first junction?” Sam asked.
“It’s too turbulent from that point on, so we have to paddle.”
“How far?”
Cody smiled. “Not that far. You ready?”
“As I’ll ever be.”
Cody wriggled back and forth and his kayak started sliding along the loose dusty ground and down the steep slope until—
He disappeared.
“Hee-yaaaaa!” Sam could hear Cody call over the microphone headset he was wearing, although Cody was so loud he would have heard him clearly without it.
“OK, ancient prophecy,” Sam said aloud. “I’m trusting that this is what I’m m
eant to be doing, so I really hope this works.”
He rocked back and forth quickly, just as Cody had done, and in seconds he’d slid away from the sloped ground and out over the edge of the cliff—
“Arghhhhh!”
“Sam? Sam!”
Sam sat up, coughing and spluttering water.
“Are you OK?” Cody asked.
Sam nodded and wiped the water from his face as he emerged from the rapids. The two of them were on the sandy riverbank. Only Cody’s kayak was visible.
“You … did you just give me mouth-to-mouth?” Sam asked, struggling to focus against the bright light of the morning.
“No,” Cody laughed. “I just cleared out your airway and you started heaving out water.”
“Thanks,” Sam said. “How’d I get out of the river?”
“That outfit you’re wearing,” Cody said, pointing to Sam’s Stealth Suit. “After you caught an updraft and crashed into the canyon wall and into the water, I thought you were a goner. But then you bobbed up, floating like a cork—wearing the biggest full-body life vest I’ve ever seen.”
Sam looked down and saw that the suit had morphed into an inflated coverall.
Latest gen Stealth Suit … thanks, Jedi.
“I glided to the river about five hundred metres downstream from where you were, and waited for you to float down,” Cody said. “You came past and I pulled you ashore.”
“Thanks,” Sam replied, then stood on wobbly legs and changed his Stealth Suit back to the survival-type gear he’d started out the day with.
“Whoa! That’s pretty cool.”
“Yeah, they’ll give you one of these suits when you go to the Academy,” Sam said. He looked back at the river. “My kayak?”
Cody pointed a thumb downstream. “Floated away, I’m afraid. I’ll be billing you for that later,” he laughed coarsely.
Sam looked at Cody’s kayak. There was no way that the two of them could ride in it and keep it afloat. “So what now?” he said.
“We hoof it,” Cody said. “I’ll leave my kayak here. The temple is still a couple of clicks downriver. We should be able to follow the river’s edge, but we’ll probably have to do some serious rock climbing over these boulders.”