The youngest member of our team is Dan, a boy from China. He can control metal with his mind, but he can also control other people’s minds or read their thoughts. Sometimes. It’s not a very reliable power, so he doesn’t use it much.
Last but not least, there’s Ferdy. He’s a savant, which means that he’s brilliant, but also autistic. He can do amazing calculations and tell you the distance between Sydney and London, but he can’t carry on a regular conversation.
We were given our powers by The Agency. They were a secret organization in cahoots with aliens known as The Bakari. I say were because an alien spacecraft recently crashed to Earth with the peoples of a hundred planets on board. Everyone now knows about The Agency and The Bakari and that there’s life on other planets. The refugees of that ship are now living in a makeshift town called New Haven, located in Virginia. People aren’t allowed to visit, and the aliens aren’t allowed to leave. The whole situation is still being worked out by the United Nations.
Everything changed for us recently. I had a little misunderstanding with the Russian government, which meant I ended up being labeled a criminal. Ferdy lost his life while saving the planet—but then he got it back again. His body was destroyed by a device called the Solar Accelerator, but his consciousness was transferred to an alien warship we’ve christened the Liber8tor.
I got put into jail, but then my friends broke me out, and now we’re on the run from The Agency and every government on the planet.
Yeah, I know it all sounds weird, but weird is our business.
At least things can’t get any worse.
Can they?
Chapter One
‘Three flex fighters are approaching at Mach Four,’ Ferdy said.
‘How far away?’ I asked.
‘One thousand miles and closing.’
We were sitting on the bridge of the Liber8tor. The name had been decided upon by the others while I was still in jail. Liber8tor had been owned by a race known as the Tagaar. It had eight decks of accommodation, torpedoes, laser weapons, and a cloaking device. The interior was a cross between the inside of a submarine and the skin of a green lizard. It wasn’t a good look.
The others had a basic understanding of how the vessel worked, but it was still a complete mystery to me. As was Ferdy and his relationship to the ship. His consciousness was contained inside the Liter8tor computer. He was alive but trapped. I could not even imagine what that would be like. At least it was better than the alternative.
Each of our stations—navigation, weapons, science, environmental, and engineering—surrounded the helm. The viewscreen before us showed little, just a vast expanse of ocean and sky. We had hoped we might be lucky, evading capture by flying loops over the Pacific.
It seemed luck was not on our side.
Dan, despite being the youngest of our group, was the helmsman. We’d all taken turns flying the ship, but Dan seemed to have a natural affinity with the controls. Maybe all those computer games were finally paying off.
The others knew their assigned roles. Ebony was navigation, Chad weapons, and Brodie science. I was in charge of environmental systems, which meant I was clueless, as I was still trying to learn the Tagaar language.
Pushing back his black hair, Dan leaned forward in his seat and gripped the controls. We felt a slight acceleration as he increased engine thrust.
‘Are you sure you know what you’re doing?’ Chad asked.
‘No,’ Dan said. ‘I’ve completely forgotten how to fly this ship, and we’re all about to die.’
‘That’s really funny,’ Chad said, flashing a look at me. ‘Don’t you hate smart kids?’
‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘But I’ve grown fond of you anyway.’
‘Hardy-har-har.’
‘The Flex fighters are closing on our position.’ Ferdy’s voice was clear and without panic. ‘The first Prime Minister of Australia was Edmund Barton.’
‘That’s handy to know,’ Brodie said.
‘Funny,’ Ebony said, smiling. ‘I was just about to ask you that. Can you read minds, Ferdy?’
‘Is Ebony making a joke?’ Ferdy asked.
‘Ebony is making—I mean—yes, I am.’
‘Then it is a funny joke.’
‘How are those fighters?’ Brodie’s face was calm, but her fists were tightly clenched. ‘Are we losing them?’
Brodie didn’t like to not have control. I sometimes joked she wasn’t happy unless she was hitting someone. Or maybe I wasn’t joking.
‘Quite the opposite,’ Ferdy said. ‘The ships are closing with three more vessels converging from the west.’
I swallowed. The Agency had declared us international criminals and had been pursuing us relentlessly for weeks. Every time we thought we were safe, they turned up again. Liber8tor had a cloaking device, but they seemed able to see through it like glass.
‘That’s six ships,’ Chad said.
‘You can count?’ Dan looked impressed as he tapped controls on his panel and the engines gave another surge of acceleration. ‘Ferdy? Can those flex craft follow us into orbit?’
‘It is impossible to know if their systems have been modified for spaceflight.’
‘Hmm.’
I wasn’t sure what that meant. ‘Does that mean we’re going into orbit?’ I asked. ‘Or are you going to outrun them?’
‘Hmm.’
‘Or are we about to die?’
‘Hmm.’
Now I was as worried as Chad looked.
‘What exactly does hmm mean?’ Brodie asked.
‘It means we’re going to do the unexpected.’ The scene in the viewscreen shifted as Liber8tor angled for the Pacific Ocean. ‘We’re going down.’
‘Is Dan about to test the new modification?’ Ferdy asked.
‘Now’s as good a time as any.’
Chad acted like he’d been stung. ‘Modification?’ he said. ‘What modification? Why don’t I know anything about this?’
‘They’re on the notice board,’ Dan said.
‘What notice board?’
‘On level nine.’
‘Level nine? Where’s level nine?’
‘Just above level eight.’
I would have laughed if I weren’t so worried; there was no level nine.
The ship’s speed increased, and Chad fell to silence as we accelerated towards the ocean. White waves and spray appeared. Then, at seemingly the last instant, Dan adjusted our angle of descent, so we skimmed low over the waves.
‘Flex craft are closing on all sides,’ Ferdy reported. ‘The closest is one thousand feet...five hundred...’
‘Hang onto your hats,’ Dan said.
I looked at Ebony. Swallowing, she gripped the armrests of her seat. She sometimes appeared vulnerable, and this was one of those times. I gave her a comforting smile—then noticed Brodie was glaring at me.
‘What?’ I said.
How can someone be jealous at a time like this?
The Liber8tor hitting the ocean felt like we’d slammed into concrete. A vast spray of water obliterated the screen, followed by a wash of bubbles. We saw shimmering blue-green water cut by bands of sunlight. A school of startled fish zoomed away.
‘We’re underwater!’ I said.
‘Really?’ Chad’s voice had gone up a notch. ‘I hadn’t noticed!’
‘The Liber8tor is at five hundred feet and descending,’ Ferdy said. ‘And the second-highest mountain in the world is K2.’
‘Thanks for letting me know,’ Chad said, looking green.
‘You’re most welcome, friend Chad.’
‘No, I wasn’t—I mean, never mind...’ He stopped. ‘Are we safe down here?’
‘That is impossible to say,’ Ferdy said. ‘Although Ferdy can calculate many possible futures, often with great accuracy.’
This was news to me.
‘You’re saying you can see the future?’ I asked.
‘Ferdy is simply able to calculate the possibilities of many different courses of ac
tion.’
‘So are those Flex fighters going to follow us?’ I asked.
‘It is unlikely their craft have been modified to travel underwater,’ Ferdy said. ‘This is fortunate because Liber8tor’s chances of surviving an air battle with six flex craft were no better than one chance in eighty-two.’
‘Lucky for us,’ I said. ‘Unlucky for them.’
Chapter Two
‘Mister Price?’
‘Yes?’
Agent Palmer peered at the gaunt young man sitting in the waiting room. He had an untidy mop of black hair, unwashed clothing, and looked like someone who rarely left his basement. Another recluse living on corn chips and cola, she thought. Palmer had dealt with all sorts of people since being put in charge of New Projects, the latest initiative by The Agency. Some of the people had been quite brilliant. A few had been crackpots. One or two had required a call to security and a straitjacket.
‘I’m sorry to have kept you waiting,’ she said.
‘I’ve waited weeks for this appointment.’
‘I’m sorry,’ she repeated. ‘We’ve had a backlog since The Agency went public.’
Give me the good old days. It was a simpler time, but—
‘Agent Palmer?’ The young man scowled. ‘If you don’t mind...’
The agent led Price down a wide corridor clad in glass and steel. The building, located in Lower Manhattan, employed over a thousand people, with more joining every day. Everyone wanted a role in this new world. Palmer surreptitiously glanced at her watch. Price better not be another crackpot. She was only twenty minutes away from lunch.
They entered her office where her receptionist, Carl Jackson, sat at his computer. He was an army private, a tall black man with a stutter and a sixty word per minute typing speed. Offering Price a seat, Palmer noticed he was carrying an old doctor’s bag.
What’s in there?
She glanced down at the file of information Jackson had gleaned about Price. There wasn’t a lot, but it was interesting. James Price was older than he looked, twenty-two, and had completed a double major in chemistry and physics at UCLA, his specialty being rare elements.
‘Today we’re going to change history,’ Price began.
‘Really. How?’
James Price seemed not to hear her. ‘I’ve been working on my device for almost ten years.’
‘Ten years...’ Palmer did the calculations. ‘So you started—’
‘When I was twelve.’
She nodded. ‘And what does it do?’
‘It’s a TDR. A trans-dimensional resonator.’
‘And...’
‘It siphons energy from an alternate dimension,’ he explained, ‘providing free and perpetual energy—forever.’
It took Agent Palmer a moment to put it all together. ‘It collects energy from another dimension?’ she said.
‘That’s right,’ he said. ‘Endless amounts of it.’
He pulled something from the bag that looked like a cross between an old sewing machine and a gramophone. Most of the parts were handcrafted from brass or steel with wires running from a control panel to a cone resembling an early twentieth-century loudspeaker.
Inwardly groaning, Agent Palmer peeked at the clock on her desk.
Lunch in ten minutes, she thought. What will it be today? They make a good pasta at—
A whirring came from James Price’s machine as a thin sliver of light appeared from its conical end.
‘What is that?’ Palmer asked, peering at the light. ‘Exactly?’
‘It’s the future.’ Price sounded breathless as if he’d been running a marathon. ‘Perpetual energy.’
‘It’s...it’s...’ Palmer was lost for words. ‘It’s very little. And bright.’
Price laughed, looking geekier than ever. ‘But very powerful,’ he said. ‘It runs on Francium.’
‘Francium. What’s that?’
‘Francium is one of the world’s rarest elements.’
‘And it’s taken you ten years—’
‘Francium isn’t easy to come by, but my device—the trans-dimensional resonator—uses it to crack open a hole in the dimensional fabric of—’
‘Hold on.’ Agent Palmer held up a hand. ‘Explain this to me like I’m a dummy.’
‘You are a dummy,’ Price said as if it were obvious. ‘Most people are. That’s why a TDR has never been invented before.’
‘TDR?’
‘I told you before. The trans-dimensional resonator.’
‘Explain it to me. Slowly.’
‘Okay, you’re familiar with the big bang—’
Fortunately, James Price was able to condense the entire history of the universe into a few short lines of explanation. ‘The big bang created multiple dimensions,’ he explained. ‘An infinite number of universes. Every single action since then has resulted in the birth of new universes, with more being created every second.’
‘I’m familiar with that idea.’ It was often bandied about in science fiction stories. Alternate realities where John F Kennedy had not been assassinated, dinosaurs still roamed the Earth, and where the South won the American Civil War. ‘What’s that got to do with your invention?’
‘One of those many realities is where the big bang occurred and is still a mass of hot, subatomic particles. It was, after all, chance that led to the formation of galaxies, solar systems, and planets.’
Palmer nodded as if she thought about these kinds of issues all the time. ‘Of course.’
‘The TDR simply opens a crack into one of those dimensions and siphons off energy. That’s what we’re seeing right now. Energy flowing from that crack.’
She stared at him. ‘Let me get this straight,’ she said. ‘You’ve cracked open the universe, and the light coming from your...gramophone is from a different reality.’
‘Right.’
‘That’s...’ Palmer struggled for words. ‘Crazy. It’s the most insane thing I’ve ever heard.’
Price’s face darkened. ‘Great minds have always fought to be recognized by lesser beings.’
‘That’s always a problem, I’m sure.’ Agent Palmer eyed the computer. Lunchtime! ‘Thanks for coming in to see us—’
‘I have harnessed the power of the universe!’ Price said, furious, as he punched a switch on his device. ‘And you will recognize that power!’
The tiny spear of light expanded into a bright orange globe the size of a chair. It flew upwards, punching a hole in the ceiling. Palmer yelled and fell backward off her chair and onto the floor. Private Jackson raced in, skidding to a halt in astonishment.
Agent Palmer got off the floor and rounded her desk as James Price snapped off his machine. She peered up into the gap as people from all eighty-eight floors stared back down. Beyond them, she caught a glimpse of blue sky.
‘Sit down, Mister Price,’ Agent Palmer said. ‘And tell me again how this device works—starting with the Big Bang.’
Chapter Three
An hour had passed since we’d descended into the depths of the ocean, and we were in Liber8tor’s galley. Dan had the ship on autopilot, which allowed him to join us while we cut through the water. The Agency ships had given up—for now.
I inserted five plastic bags of green goo into the Tagaar equivalent of a microwave, pushed a button, and waited a few seconds. The oven beeped. I removed the bags and passed them around. Chad opened his and sniffed cautiously at the contents.
‘Is this another packet of—’
‘K’tresh?’
Ferdy had found the name in the Tagaar database. Not only was it hard to describe K’tresh, but it was even harder to eat. The taste was a mixture of fish and avocado, but with the consistency of grease. Ferdy had assured us it was highly nutritious and completely safe for human consumption.
Still, it wouldn’t have surprised me if someone started growing a second head.
Ebony peered at the plate. ‘There’s only one thing wrong with this.’
‘That is?’
> ‘The taste. Oh, and the look...and the smell...and...’
‘I get the idea.’
Brodie spoke up. ‘We need some fresh food,’ she said. ‘And a holiday.’
She was right about that. While we weren’t at the top of the FBI’s most-wanted list, we were on it, sandwiched between serial killers, armed robbers, and terrorists. It wasn’t a good list to be on. The stress wasn’t easy to take.
‘There is an island approximately thirty nautical miles from our current position,’ Ferdy’s voice came over the loudspeaker. ‘Rousseau island.’
‘Wassat?’ Chad said.
Ferdy spelled the word. ‘Named after the French explorer who first discovered it in 1863, it was briefly occupied by a colony before being eventually abandoned.’
‘Why did they leave?’ I asked.
‘They deemed it to have no commercial value, and was not on their shipping lanes.’
‘So no one lives there?’ I said. ‘That could prove the ideal place for us to settle down.’
‘That’s right,’ Chad said. ‘Plant lawns. Raise a few kids. Drink beer on the porch while watching TV—’
‘I know what you mean,’ Brodie said, ignoring Chad. ‘Maybe we could set up a base of operations.’
‘And there would be fresh food,’ Ebony added.
‘Fresh food,’ Chad echoed, warming to the idea. ‘No more K’tresh.’
‘Oh, I don’t know,’ I said. ‘K’tresh sort of grows on you after a while.’
‘Yeah. Like mold.’
The idea of an island base appealed to me. Liber8tor was a good ship, but built for a race of warriors, not for comfort. The ship was even capable of interplanetary flight, but that wasn’t on the agenda. Not yet. Returning to the bridge, I sat down at the environmental console while the others checked their controls. I could only make out a few words in Tagaar. Liber8tor was fully operational—as far as I could tell, anyway.
The clear waters of the Pacific slid past the screen.
Teen Superheroes Box Set | Books 1-7 Page 49