The Warning

by Patterson, James

  Jordan ran his palms over his nipples. “The right one is a bit harder than the left.”

  “Mmmph mmmph!” Troy called from the back of the pickup and made the universal pointing-at-your-wristwatch gesture, even though he, like everyone else I knew, didn’t wear a wristwatch.

  “Right,” I said. “We’re taking our chances no matter what. Let’s get going. Where to?”

  “The cliffs,” Jordan said. “They oversee the plant.”

  “I assume you know how to assemble a bomb?” I asked.

  “Now that you mention it, I bet I do.”

  “Then let’s go blow up a supercomputer.”

  CHAPTER 44

  Maggie

  FIRST, THOUGH, WE collectively realized we were wrecked—it had been a long, traumatic day. Plus, only one of us could see in the dark, and by my calculations, we’d have a three-mile hike from the trailhead to the cliffs of Mount Hope.

  Jordan and I offered to take the others home and pick them up first thing in the morning—their parents would be worried, for one, and our friends had no way of reaching them—but they all refused. They were “in it to win it,” as Tico said—or “mmmph mmmph mmmm mmmph mmmph,” to quote Troy. If all went well, everyone could report back to their families afterward. And if not, well, we were all doomed anyway.

  I pulled the pickup into a remote spot near the trailhead where the forest flattened out, and Jordan and I remained in the front seats while Suzanne and Tico took the back seat. There was room for Troy there, too, but he insisted on staying outside on the cargo bed, which at least had a blanket spanning the floor. Plus, it was warm enough that he didn’t have to cover up.

  I placed my hand over the cup holder between Jordan and me, and he followed suit, intertwining his fingers with mine. In unison we turned toward the back seat, where Tico was sleeping with his mouth yawning open and his head on Suzanne’s shoulder. Her head was tilted back, with little whistly noises coming out of her nose.

  “This is nice,” I whispered.

  “It is,” Jordan responded. “What did you mean that I’m not your—”

  “Shhhh,” I whispered, and put my index finger over his lips. He pursed them a little, like he was hedging whether it was a kiss, and then smiled.

  We closed our eyes, and sleep didn’t come, for me at least. My mind was racing with the events of that day and the day before and the day before—and Jordan’s hand was so warm, so soft. I gave it a little stroke with my thumb. He responded in kind.

  I squinted at him, and he was looking back at me.

  “You know,” I whispered, “I thought by now there would be more kissing.”

  “Well, if I were your boyfriend and all,” he responded.

  I slapped his chest with the back of my hand, then took his hand again.

  “Seems like it was just last week that I asked you to the homecoming dance,” I said.

  “I think it was just a few days ago.”

  “Feels like a lifetime ago.”

  I looked in his eyes, and, man, he still could melt me with one look. I glanced again at Tico and Suzanne sleep-wheezing together.

  “We never got to process it,” I whispered. “We were coming together and then boom.”

  “How are we supposed to process it?”

  “Did I mention the kissing part?”

  “You did. You sound like you have experience in such matters.”

  I laughed. “Just Bradley Dunford, and that was a long time ago.”

  “Blechh,” he said. “I don’t want to remember that.”

  “Remember?”

  “I knew about it. Of course I did. I’ve been your best friend since forever, and I liked you back when you were spinning the bottle with that pimply little shit. I just didn’t do anything about it.”

  “You liked me like that in eighth grade?”

  “I liked you like that in second grade, when you were all freckles and buck teeth. Come on.”

  “I’ve had my braces off for two years, but I can’t do anything about the freckles.”

  “I don’t want you to. At any rate, we have kissed.”

  “Um, I think I would remember that.”

  “After the propane exploded.”

  “Right,” I said, with feigned annoyance. “When you tucked me into the window well and told me to stay put and punctuated that thought with a widdle biddy peck.”

  “You were bleeding a lot, and I was worried.”

  “I was bleeding a lot,” I acknowledged. “But that kiss wasn’t a real kiss.”

  “Fine,” he whispered, glanced back at Tico and Suzanne one more time, and said, “then we’ll have to do something about that.”

  He leaned in toward me, and my heart pounded like conga drums, and I could feel his breath against my lips as I heard a strangled “MMMMMPHHRRRRGGGGH!” and felt violent thumping coming from the back of the truck.

  “Oh, shit!” Jordan shouted as he bounded out of the cab and toward the cargo bed, where Troy was covered with snarling raccoons.

  “MMMPHH! RRRHHMMPH! ARRROOMMMPH!” Troy cried as he thrashed around.

  I didn’t have the tranq gun with me, and I’m not sure how much good it would’ve done with six, seven, no, eight raccoons digging their teeth into various parts of Troy’s body.

  “GET AWAY, MOTHERFUCKERS!” Suzanne, having woken up with a start and bolted out of the truck, yelled at them as she poked a branch in their general direction.

  But they kept attacking.

  “Jordan, I don’t know what to do!” I called amid Troy’s strangled cries.

  Jordan leaped onto the cargo bed and started grabbing the raccoons one by one around the neck from behind, squeezing his grip until they went limp and tossing them into the woods. He was relentless, and one or two got a few good chomps into his arm before he had dispatched them all.

  “Holy shit!” Tico exclaimed as Jordan flung the last raccoon corpse deep into the woods.

  Troy was bleeding from his ears down to his ankles while making agonized groans.

  “Suzanne,” I said, handing her the truck keys, “get him down to my mom. He needs attention now, and you’ll never get through to the hospital. Tico, go with them and help. And tell my mom that Jordan and I are okay, but don’t tell her what we’re doing. Please.”

  Jordan lifted Troy, all two hundred and sixty or whatever pounds of him, as if he were a toddler and slid his groaning, writhing body into the back seat while Suzanne and Tico took the front.

  “Go,” I ordered.

  “Wait!” Jordan called. He grabbed the Hogan Construction bag from the cargo bed. “Now go.”

  As we saw the red taillights fade in the distance, I felt myself starting to shake. Jordan wrapped his arms around me from behind, and I couldn’t keep from crying.

  “It’s my fault,” he said. “It was stupid of me to leave Troy exposed like that. I of all people knew about the animals.”

  “Oh, Jordan,” I choked out, “let’s not play the blame game. It’s fair to say we’ve had a lot on our minds and not much rest in the meantime.”

  I looked down at his forearms, both smeared with blood, and I could see puncture marks in each. The sight filled me with despair, and I began sobbing all over again.

  “We all should’ve gone back,” I cried. “I should’ve had my mom look at you, too. What are we doing out here?”

  “It’s okay, it’s okay,” he murmured into my ear. “We’re not playing the blame game, remember? Besides, it doesn’t hurt that much, truly. I’m strangely fine.”

  He held me like that for a couple more minutes as I calmed down and got my shoulders to stop heaving and my nose to stop sniffling.

  “So much for getting a little sleep,” I muttered.

  “You’re probably right,” he said. “Shall we begin our hike?”

  I looked into the dark forest and couldn’t see beyond the first row of trees.

  “How about we just sit here for a little bit, maybe until we see some light?” I said. />
  “Okay,” he said. “It won’t be long now.”

  “How will we keep from getting attacked?” I asked, trying to keep any element of a whimper from my voice. But I was scared.

  “Oh, after the bear and boar, the word is out in the animal kingdom,” Jordan said. “They know not to mess with me.”

  I didn’t really believe him, but it wouldn’t help not to believe him, so we sat together in the field, my back against his chest, and I closed my eyes and didn’t open them again until the sun was peeking through the leaves off to the east.

  “Did you get any sleep?” I whispered.

  “Sure,” he said. I didn’t believe him for a second.

  He grabbed the bag, and we began to walk, dew on the grass and leaves dampening our sneakers and arms. I knew I was slowing us down—he could’ve gotten up that incline four times as fast with me not there. But I knew he wanted me there. And I wanted to be there. And it’s not like I had anywhere else to go.

  The woods were fully illuminated now, and my stomach gurgled. Normally I’d be up and finished with breakfast by this time. What was my mom doing right now? How was Troy? Was he getting helicoptered somewhere for medical help? Granted, we hadn’t heard a chopper. Were Tico and Suzanne still with him?

  “Someone walked this trail recently,” Jordan said, frowning, his tone suddenly flat. He crouched to touch the grass. “I’d guess no one used it for the year or so we were all gone, which is why there’s all this grass. But these footprints are here.”

  We continued up the mountain, and when I could see the steam rising from the nuclear plant’s cooling towers, I knew we were almost to the overlook.

  We reached a warning sign made of carved wood that was pounded into the earth probably seventy years ago. It gave notice of the crevasse: a long shaft that went down several stories to where this cliff face was cracked. When we reached it, Jordan and I hopped over it.

  The view at this point was breathtaking, not only of the power plant and its towers but also of the whole valley, the river, the rolling hills, the lush greenery. I breathed in deep through my nose and held it there: a mixture of pine, grass, wildflowers, moist soil, and whatever else grew in this miracle of nature.

  “Sometimes when everything seems hopeless, when the world becomes too scary, when too many people are showing how mean or selfish or thoughtless they can be, when the ugliness gets overwhelming, I need this. I need this reminder of beauty,” I said, and turned to Jordan. “The world is a beautiful place, and I’m so glad you’re in mine.”

  He set down the bag of explosives in a clump of brush and cupped my face in his hands.

  “Maggie Gooding, we make a pretty good team,” he said, smiling. “Like Han Solo and Princess Leia.”

  “Okay,” I said. “But I’m Han Solo.”

  “As you wish.”

  “Wrong mov—”

  Suddenly his lips were pressed into mine—a gentle brush at first, then with more determination. I closed my eyes. My hands were against his chest, and I ran them down to his sides, pulling him closer as he wrapped his arms around my back. Forget Bradley Dunford. This was my first kiss. It was slow, soft, and lingering. It rushed through me like a river, with streams sprouting off to areas I didn’t know existed.

  I opened my eyes for a moment to take him in, to revel in what was happening, finally—just in time to glimpse the pistol butt crashing onto Jordan’s head.

  CHAPTER 45

  Jordan

  MY HEAD SWIRLED with pain. Maybe my skull was cracked. I definitely had a concussion; I was an expert on that by now.

  And, you know, concussions are bad for you. As previously discussed, all the literature and cinematic evidence say so. Didn’t Alpha tell me to quit getting them way back when? I think he did. So he was inconsistent on top of everything else. Of course, I was assuming he had anything to do with this attack, ha ha.

  Two black-suit guys—Scar, a.k.a. Kappa, and a new guy (Lambda? Mu?)—swam into focus. Yep.

  Maggie was sitting on the ground in front of me. I didn’t know why. Everything else looked like the color and hue settings on my TV had been scrambled. I shook my head, as if that would reset my sight, but, no, the predominant color palette remained a pale yellow-green. The bushes were as pale as the tan duffel that held the explosives. The trees were silvery gray or dead. So I guess more than the hue was off.

  “I knew our first kiss would be a knockout,” I muttered to Maggie.

  She grimaced, and I realized blood was dripping from her arm. My empty stomach turned over—nothing was funny if something was wrong with Maggie.

  I looked more closely. Her right elbow had a nasty scrape, and the blood was dribbling down her freckled arm, curving around her knuckle and trickling off her ring finger and pinkie. A small puddle of it had collected on the granite beneath us—maybe two minutes’ worth, my brain somehow told me.

  My brain also got around to noticing that my hands were cuffed behind my back. Thanks, brain. I swayed slightly and tried to stand up in front of the two men. Cuffs or no cuffs, a dozen ways to attack flashed through my mind. But I didn’t know how to take those guys on and protect Maggie. Offense and defense at the same time—that’s tough.

  My first instinct was to rush Kappa, who stood to the left of me. I could see from the bulge in his jacket that he had a gun in a shoulder holster. If I used my defensive-lineman skills to plow him backward a few dozen feet, maybe I could plunge him down the fracture in the rock, that crevasse we’d had to jump over to get to the edge of the cliff.

  But the other guy was too close to Maggie, which meant she was too close to whatever weapon he might have. She was vulnerable and could be used as a shield or target.

  Too big a risk.

  No one appeared to be paying attention to the duffel full of explosives, but that didn’t help me at that point—it’s not like there were grenades in there. Modern dynamite doesn’t have a simple fuse that you light and throw. Plus, we were all so close together that any attempt to blow them up would’ve blown us up, too, and any threats to take us all down would’ve been empty. Maggie and I were the ones with real lives at stake.

  “You were hit in the head,” Maggie said, her voice cracking.

  “Well, that would explain the pounding pain.”

  “And you’re bleeding.”

  I put my hands to my head and felt around. My face was wet, and my fingers came back all red. That’s the one color that looked right to me.

  “Does everything appear weird to you?” I asked.

  “Weird how?”

  “The air’s a sick green, the clouds yellow, and there’s something like a haze of death over everything.”

  Kappa interjected in an instructional-video tone of voice: “The implant has become dislodged from your perception center. What you are seeing now is reality.”

  “Wait, what?” Maggie asked, whipping her head toward him.

  “It was a simple alteration to ensure our specimens would be content to stay in our research area,” Kappa said.

  “Specimens?” she asked.

  I thought about how beautiful and green everything looked when we returned to town, how pleased Mom had been with the condition of the house and everything else. If they were messing with this basic perception, what else were they doing?

  “So now Jordan’s seeing things as they are, and I’m seeing the fantasyland version?” Maggie raged. “Does that mean he sees you as a turd on legs?”

  “No,” I said, “still a bland bureaucrat.”

  Maggie banged the heel of her hand into the side of her head. “Get! Out! Of! There!” she ordered, then stopped and turned to Kappa again. “You have no right to play God this way. You’ve killed and experimented on innocent people!”

  “And,” I added, “you took away our cell-phone service, which can really mess a brother and sister up in this day and age.”

  “We serve Ishango,” he said plainly.

  “Are you ready to come with us now, Rho?�
�� the other guy asked with a creepily ingratiating smile, his bright blue eyes crinkling.

  “Why? Why? Why do you keep coming after me? What do you want?”

  “It is what Ishango wants. You are a valuable specimen.”

  “For what?”

  He motioned at the trail. Chat time was over. It looked like we were going to visit Ishango.

  Maggie threw me a questioning look. I shrugged. We didn’t have much choice at this point, and by now I was curious to come face-to-interface with this wicked supercomputer. Maybe there was some way we could convince or compel it to stop destroying lives.

  Or at least we could find out what the hell it wanted.

  The suits prodded us along single file down the trail, with Maggie in front, then Kappa, then me, and the new suit in back. I calculated that I could take out the bad guys as the descent got steeper, but the risk to Maggie remained too great.

  “Sorry about your friend Iota,” I called to Kappa. “He grew too attached to me, so I had to let him down. Way down.”

  The chin-scar guy continued as if he’d heard nothing. Sentimental dude.

  “So, blue eyes.” I turned back toward the other guy. “What’s your name? I was thinking Lambda or Mu. I’ve decided Mu.”

  “It is Mu,” he said.

  “You look like a Mu.” I continued down the path. “Muuuuuuuuuu!”

  Maggie laughed from up front. “Jeez, Jordan.”

  Kappa turned back toward me and glared. Was there an actual nerve to be touched?

  “Kappa, man, I’ve been meaning to ask you,” I continued breezily. “Where’d you get that scar on your chin? Did you put it somewhere you shouldn’t have?”

  He whipped around and shoved me in the chest, and as I tripped and fell, I grabbed his jacket and pulled him down with me while angling my body to avoid the sharp rock edges.

  “Get up,” Mu said. “Now.”

  As I stood, I held up Kappa’s gun, which I’d grabbed on the way down, and pointed it at Mu, who instantly pressed his gun to Maggie’s temple. Figured.