Ascent

by Thorby Rudbek

  “Blackwell, the President’s Chief Scientific Advisor?” Judy sounded impressed.

  Ed nodded.

  “In… in what capacity, sir?” Leroy questioned hesitantly.

  “That was not explained.” Baynes hedged. “But this operation is now code-named ‘Viking’, on Doctor Blackwell’s authority.”

  “But, sir–” Brisson gasped, suddenly realizing what this might mean.

  “You must give him your full co-operation.” Ed’s face was flushed, and a vein pulsed on his forehead. “As I also must, and will.”

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Controlled roads do carry a toll – anon.

  Richard switched the radio to another channel and sat back, satisfied at last. “Sounds like the kind of station that gives a decent news report.”

  Karen took her eyes off the road momentarily to look at him.

  To her soundless question he responded simply:

  “I want to see if we’re famous yet!”

  Karen grinned as she understood the humour behind the statement.

  They were travelling south on highway ninety-one, towards Springfield; the weather was mild, and the road not exceptionally busy. The ‘DJ’ extolled the virtues of his radio station, promising a complete sports report following the news. Another minute was taken up by commercials, then the news began. There was a national item about a possible school strike across the country, and a brief update about a famine somewhere in Africa, made worse by a military government that blocked the shipment of relief supplies.

  Then the announcer started to describe the terrible happenings in a small town on the east coast. According to the report, a secret store of dangerous biological weapons had been found in Redcliff, Maine. Subsequent to the discovery, the announcer continued, the evacuation of the town and surrounding area was enforced by military units in the early hours of the morning. An official statement released by the National Unusual Incident Team, who were named as the organization which had discovered the caches of biological weaponry, said that the towns-people would be housed in temporary facilities such as school auditoria and indoor arenas until all the hazardous and unstable old materials could be located and removed to a safe storage location, where the materials could be prepared for sterilization. The next part of the announcement referred to the search for two foreign agents who had been seen in the area, who knew about the biological weapons, and had been suspected of planning to use them in a daring attack on Washington, D.C.

  A complete and fairly accurate description of Richard and Karen followed, including their height to a surprisingly high accuracy (at least the figure for Richard was accurate; he had never thought to measure her!) It included their hair colouring, facial features, skin tones, and of course their rather innocuous but distinctive, dark grey jumpsuits and soft toed, rounded boots. Despite this, Richard perceived that no one would have realized Karen’s good looks from the words used to detail her salient features.

  “Clever how they dress up these things,” he commented, turning down the volume as the announcer went on to describe a bus-train accident in up-State New York. “No one would ever guess the real story from that propaganda.”

  Karen nodded, comprehending the reasoning behind the action, but finding the lies distasteful in the extreme.

  “The best thing going for us, I guess,” Richard continued, in an attempt to sound positive. “Is that they don’t know where we are headed.” He stared out at the fields as they slipped rapidly past, not noticing the state of the harvest. As long as they don’t figure out that we are coming back, we might stand a chance.

  “Richard, relax!” Karen glanced across briefly, aware of his continuing doubts. “We’ll take the stuff and get back before they can figure it out; then we’ll just disappear. Once we have gone, you’ll not have another officious concern for centuries.”

  Richard forced himself to sit back and enjoy the scenery, although by this point he felt he had seen enough roads to last a lifetime. Perhaps not an Arshonnan lifetime... He smiled, then grimaced as his insides churned. The sandwiches that they had eaten sat heavily in his stomach. Fortunately, Karen did not seem to be affected in the same way, at least, as far as he could detect. Still, the churning made Richard regret the energy that Karen had expended disinteresting the convenience store clerk; he wished they could have gone to a fast food joint instead, but at the time it had seemed more likely that Karen would only have one salesperson to disinterest in a ‘Seven-Eleven’, rather than the several that would be found in a burger outlet.

  Gradually, he noticed that Karen had started humming. The tune was one that Richard had never heard before, but began instantly to like, especially coming to him, as it was, in the pleasant mid-range tones that she was now using so effortlessly. Before he had heard enough to be tempted to join in (the tune was that catchy), the engine faltered once, then died completely.

  “Slip it into neutral!”

  At Richard’s urging, Karen coasted onto the hard shoulder. Richard did a quick estimate based on the miles they had travelled since the last stop, and figured that they were a little more than an hour (at highway speeds) from their destination.

  “What do we do now?” Karen asked. She selected ‘park’ as soon as the wheels stopped turning, and looked over at him, her stunning eyes blue and full of confidence in his ability to solve this temporary setback.

  “I’ll take a look at it. Pull that catch under there.” Richard gestured vaguely under the dashboard beyond Karen’s legs, and was relieved that she found the mechanism without delay. He climbed out and opened the hood, then leaned back around the front of the car, towards the driver’s window, and signalled for her to open it.

  “Mind you, I know next to nothing about cars. I’ll just check to see if anything has come loose.” The suspension creaked as he leaned into the engine compartment. After a minute or so of fruitless searching for dangling electrical connectors or vacuum hoses, he stepped around to the driver’s side, keeping close to the car to avoid the traffic flashing indifferently past, just a few feet away.

  “Hey, Richard.” Karen leaned out of the window, treating him to a view of her cheerful face and pretty smile. “Shall I try to start it again?”

  “Well, ugh... sure... hadn’t thought of that!” Richard replied, knowing that she knew he had been unable to find anything obviously wrong with the old clunker. He took down the ingenious unit that Tutor had developed from its vantage point on the roof and handed it to her, through the open window.

  Karen held it close to the steering column, and the engine groaned and coughed a couple of times.

  “Again.”

  The second attempt resulted in similar sounds, then, on the third attempt, the engine went absolutely silent. Karen looked at her hero in surprise.

  “I don’t know what’s wrong,” Richard explained, “but I do know that if we sit here for long, the highway patrol will stop to help out. Neither of us have driver’s licences, and the car is not exactly registered in our names, and with the description that is probably in the hands of every law-enforcement officer in the country by now, that kind of help is the last thing we need. Why, even if you disinterested the police, they would have to call a tow truck for us; that would take a long time. Oh, and then we’d have to handle the towing company and find some way of sneaking away to steal another car, because we couldn’t afford to pay them even if they could fix it really quickly.”

  Karen’s smile faded away completely as she realized the effort that such a process would require, and the amount of time that would be expended. She opened the door and got out, walking quickly away from the now useless car and busy highway, into the comparative safety of the coarse grass on the verge. She decided that the situation called for drastic measures. I just hope I’m capable of doing what I need to do. What I must do.

  “I’ll see if I can find some way out of this that is quicker and safer than that,” she announced to Richard. She turned away from him and stared at t
he vehicles coming up the slight hill towards them. Richard watched her eyes as the now-familiar blue-to-grey tint change occurred.

  After a couple of minutes, beads of perspiration formed on her forehead. Richard stepped closer, concerned about her rapidly diminishing reserves, as her body seemed to sway with the faint breeze. His attention was diverted by the sound of tires squealing faintly. One of the approaching vehicles, a bright red sports car with classic curves, swerved across three lanes of traffic and braked rapidly with a far louder screech of displaced rubber as it came closer. Karen kept her gaze fixed on the lone occupant of the low-slung roadster as it pulled onto the shoulder immediately in front of their old wreck of a car. She stepped falteringly up to the now-useless vehicle and gripped the rear door handle for support as the exhausting effects of her mental manipulations made it increasingly difficult to maintain a standing position.

  The driver’s door of the two-seater swung upwards, allowing a tall woman with frizzy blonde hair to climb out. The woman, who looked to be in her early thirties, walked onto the grass and stood there, just a few feet from them, returning Karen’s potent stare with a frozen, shocked expression of her own. It was clear that she was terrified of something.

  Richard had intended to step forward and introduce himself, wanting to thank her, but another glance at Karen convinced him that the woman had not stopped out of any consideration for them, and that Karen was demonstrating a new, and far more powerful aspect of her abilities.

  Richard turned back to the woman. She stood immobile; the beautifully manicured hands that she pressed against her mink coat were trembling slightly, and the low neckline of her blouse revealed that she was panting heavily, like a cornered animal.

  “Let’s go,” Karen gasped. “Quickly.”

  Richard grabbed her hand, intending to help her into the passenger seat, but he felt suddenly dizzy as, once again, physical contact allowed his energy to flow rapidly into Karen. He steadied himself against the rear of the shiny and obviously expensive, collectors’ dream of a car, then led her across, fiddled with the unfamiliar door until it popped open, and settled her into the deep, creamy-coloured new leather of the faintly reclined bucket seat.

  He walked back around to where the woman continued to stand, absolutely still, except for her shakes.

  “I’m sorry we scared you,” he said quietly. “We just need to borrow your car.”

  The woman returned his gaze, an element of surprise blending with the other emotions showing on her face. Her heavy gold earrings caught the light and his attention for a moment. Richard paused, unsure of his words, but certain that he needed to dissipate the fear she was experiencing so intently. “I–”

  “Richard!” Karen gasped hoarsely. “I can’t maintain this much longer!”

  He turned back to the driver’s door reluctantly, and slid into the luxurious leather seat. He reached up and lowered the door quietly and stretched out for the gear selector.

  “Rats!” he fumed as he realized he had forgotten the unobtrusive box which was their connection with Tutor, and their only means of defence. Pushing the door back up and getting out of the car, he walked back to their old beater.

  The professional model found she could turn and watch as Richard transferred the box-like remote from the old car to the roof of her vintage Mercedes, remembered to walk around and close the passenger door, and finally settled himself in the driver’s seat. She noticed that the object seemed to stick to the highly polished surface from the moment it was put there, despite the curve of the roofline. The other door closed, and seconds later her car pulled away, accelerating rapidly, and swerved back into the flow of traffic about a hundred yards up the shoulder.

  The sound of the engine working its way up to cruising speed was like music to Richard’s ears after the tired and dismal-sounding rumble which the previous car had made. The gears seemed very smooth. He watched the showy woman in the rear view mirror, until the road curved right, and she disappeared from his field of vision. Just below the mirror, which was mounted on the dashboard, instead of the more familiar point high on the windshield, Richard noticed an inscription: ‘300 SL’. And, fortunately for them, the lady’s bag, which lay unnoticed behind the passenger seat, contained all the model’s personal belongings, including her cell phone.

  Karen sighed a long, slow sigh.

  Richard glanced over at her. She was slumped down in the soft leather of the passenger bucket seat, her head back against the rest, her eyes closed.

  “Karen, are you all right?” He drove on, anxiously gripping the steering wheel when she did not reply immediately.

  “I didn’t know I could do that,” she murmured finally, in a sleepy voice. “I just knew I had to try. It’s a terrible thing to do to anyone, least of all a sensitive, insecure soul like she is. I hope she isn’t too frightened anymore.”

  Richard smiled, relieved that she was still capable of coherent expression.

  “I’m sure glad you didn’t try to put her to sleep instead, like all the other ones you’ve handled recently!”

  Karen smiled faintly, but said nothing, and her eyes stayed firmly shut.

  The car ate up the miles easily, and Richard started to relax again. When he glanced over at Karen after a few minutes, he saw she was sleeping.

  A little later, he reached over and touched her cheek with the back of his hand. Despite her apparent condition of repose, he could still faintly feel the slow but steady flow as a great portion of his energy seemed to be sucked down his arm and into her exhausted body. He kept up the contact by resting his hand on her neck, despite the draining effect it was having on him, until it faded away to nothing, then he somewhat reluctantly withdrew his hand and returned it to the steering wheel. The engine purred smoothly and quietly, and Richard found that he was finally enjoying driving at last.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Annihilation prevents rebellion – Jarkader

  Richard slowed a little more as he found a quiet neighbourhood at last. The sweet purr of the engine soothed his anxieties a little as he drove up a gently curving road past modest but well-kept houses. It was at least a half hour since their arrival in Springfield, but all he had succeeded in doing so far was getting lost. He looked at Karen again. Still sleeping. He smiled in awe at her tremendous abilities. Who wouldn’t be tired after doing something like that? Pulling over to the side of the road, he faced up to the fact that she would have to use her powers once more if they were to get a suitable vehicle in which to collect the metal.

  He turned off the engine and sat back, hoping that she would awake of her own accord. A removals truck cruised past, the vibrations working their way up through the suspension of the immaculately rebuilt Mercedes that they had commandeered. Richard had discovered this detail a few miles down the highway from their unwilling sponsor, when the excitement of the hijacking had faded a little. His thoughts turned to Citadel, so he contacted Tutor once more, speaking as quietly as he could.

  “What’s the latest news from Redcliff?”

  “Citadel is now enclosed in a tarpaulin-covered structure of metal rods, scaffolding being the correct term.”

  “Is that bad?” Richard asked anxiously.

  “Not particularly. But it does mean that I can no longer determine what is happening outside the covering, except by visual scans with the remote you are transporting.”

  Richard pondered the implications of this latest twist, until Tutor continued.

  “It also severely limits Citadel’s ability to collect energy for running necessary equipment. Fortunately several alternative systems have been restored to operating condition since the Control Centre and its associated memory banks and computers have been released for general use.”

  Richard appreciated that the phraseology Tutor used regarding this latest development was a euphemism meaning that Karen’s computer mentor had repaired parts of the Scout Craft that may have last operated hundreds of years earlier.

  “I calcu
late no short term difficulties, however, because the energy used earlier this day in a futile attempt to break through Citadel’s skin was diverted into the temporary power accumulators, bringing all functioning units up to their current capacity.”

  Richard realized that the good news was all Tutor’s doing; he marvelled at Sheldrif’s ability, when everything depended on him, to really create a masterpiece for Karen. “I’m impressed, Tutor. Have you been able to tap into any of the communications relating to us?”

  “Most communications have been coded. As yet, I have insufficient data to analyze and decipher the code. No other communications have referred to either Karen or you.”

  “Okay, let’s hope that’s good news. Let us know if you do hear anything interesting that might indicate they have found our trail or something.”

  “I will continue monitoring both video and radio frequencies.”

  Richard checked the time; a full hour had passed since their arrival in Springfield, half of which they had spent sitting in a hot, ‘hot’ car on a busy road. Most of the drivers passing by gave it a second glance, many of them obviously envious. Our luck isn’t going to last forever. He reached over and stroked Karen’s silvery hair where it had been dislodged slightly by the pressure of her head on the headrest.

  Karen’s eyes flickered open.

  “Sorry, my dear one,” he began gently. “We’re here now, and we must change to a less conspicuous vehicle before we are spotted.”

  “Here?” She sat up and stretched as she smiled back at him. “You sound a little sad to have to give this one up!” She remarked with the unfailing discernment of mind contact. “Drive around some more, I’ll try and find someone who doesn’t really want his truck, while you savour the experience of a genuine Mercedes for just a little longer!”