Cragbridge Hall, Book One: The Inventor's Secret (26 page)

The chief cocked his head to one side, and Abby thought she saw the hint of a smile. The chief turned to the party and made some kind of announcement. Abby heard the word
run
again. The braves took off their pouches and canteens. They set their bows and arrows on the ground and picked up spears. The chief held up his hand for them to stay where they were.

He led Abby forward. The men who had been guarding her joined the others. The chief walked with Abby over the hard soil for another three or four hundred yards. She was glad her feet felt calloused, at least somewhat prepared for the terrain.

Finally, the chief stopped. He looked Abby in the eyes and spoke slowly. Somehow, Abby could understand nearly every word.

“Run. Save yourself if you can.”

The chief pounded his staff on the ground and gave out a shrill holler, and Abby heard a cacophonous roar—the screams of hundreds of braves. The war whoop echoed through the area, but Abby didn’t dare turn around. She took off. She had no idea where she was going, other than
away
from the hundreds of braves chasing her. She could hear the muffled thunder of their feet.

Abby pushed over the hard ground, trying to find her stride. She hit something prickly with one foot. It felt like several wasps had stung her foot at once, but she didn’t stop. She couldn’t stop; she ran for her life.

When Abby raced during school, she used to imagine that she was running in the Olympics, or that some little girl was secretly watching and wanted to be like her. If her imagination was vivid enough, she could find energy she didn’t know she had. She had no need to imagine anything now.

If she got out of this, from here on, she would just have to picture this moment to spark that extra length and speed out of her legs.

She knew the braves were coming up on her, and she knew what they would do if they caught her. But if she died in the simulator, would it mean she’d forfeited her opportunity to finish her grandfather’s challenge? It had to. She’d let down her parents and her grandfather. She couldn’t do that. Abby pushed forward, wanting to scream, but not daring to spend the energy. She willed her legs to push harder off the ground, to propel her forward a little more, a little faster.

Abby watched the brush go by, surprised at how fast she was able to go. She dared hope that her effort would be enough. Whoever the Colter guy was, he’d survived this. It was possible; she just had to figure out how to repeat it.

After nearly half a mile across a plain, she hazarded a glance over her shoulder. She felt both relief and panic at the same time. The hundreds of braves running behind her had scattered, many falling behind. She’d outrun the majority. Maybe she could survive.

But one brave, moving fast and clutching a spear, was no more than a hundred yards behind her. He was gaining on her.

Abby concentrated, pushing herself harder. Her legs screamed as she went forward. All at once, she tasted something salty, something wet. There it was again. She lifted her hand to her mouth and pulled it away—blood. She’d pushed herself too hard, and her body was letting her know it. Abby didn’t want to look back—the brave would be closer. She was already at her peak and didn’t know how long she could keep it up. She spat blood to the side as she strode on.

Colter
had
survived. Whatever he did had worked. What did he do? If only she knew his history. But maybe she could guess. He must have run, and he must have pushed himself so hard that he would have started bleeding too. It was his pain she was feeling, right? He was a big mountain-man type. He was strong and bold. Maybe he could last longer than she could. Abby pushed forward. Blood dripped onto her shirt.

She ran and ran. She must have been nearly a mile away from the river, and had she been a little more relaxed, she would have realized that it was her best sprinting time ever. Of course, had she been a little more relaxed, it wouldn’t have been her best time.

Then Abby heard the last sound she wanted to hear: footsteps. The brave was near. She expected to feel his spear drive into her back at any moment. She glanced over her shoulder. The brave was less than twenty yards away, spear raised.

28

The Finish Line

Rafa and Derick pushed a large box on a dolly toward the elevator chute. Derick could already feel the strain on his muscles, though they had only pushed the box down one hall and into the next.

“What are you moving, boys?” a voice called out.

Derick turned around to see a group of girls following them down the hall.

“Nothing really,” Derick said.

“Really?” another girl asked. “Why are you struggling so hard to push ‘nothing’?”

“Yeah,” another agreed. “You’d think ‘nothing’ would be really light. Plus, why don’t you use a robotic dolly? Then you wouldn’t have to work at all.”

“We wanted the exercise.” Derick was secretly glad for the work. He had a good excuse for his heart to be racing. Otherwise, his hammering heartbeat might have given him away. If anyone discovered what he was smuggling in the box, it was all over.

“Can we see this ‘nothing’?” a brunette asked.

“No,” Derick said.

“Sorry,
meninas
,” Rafa said. “We’re kind of in a hurry.”

“You might be able to refuse them, but not me,” a deeper voice said. It was a woman Derick hadn’t seen before, but by her professional pantsuit and hairstyle from 2052, he knew she was either a teacher or an administrator. “It is rather odd that two boys are pushing a box this size through Cragbridge Hall at this time of night.”

Derick and Rafa both stopped cold. Derick spoke up. “We’re just moving some things for Ms. Entrese. You know, trying to give back for our great educational opportunities here.”

The teacher opened the top of the box and looked inside. She then looked back at the boys, and into the box again. “Why are you moving a huge box of hardbound books?”

“Ms. Entrese wants to take them home,” Rafa explained. “She’s checking out a van now, and we’re supposed to meet her behind the building.”

“I think she wants to see if she can auction them off online—get some extra cash or something,” Derick said. He felt grateful that Ms. Entrese shared his grandpa’s love for actual books and had them around for an occasion like this.

The administrator looked at the boys one more time. “Are you two serving detention?”

Rafa and Derick looked at one another. Derick tried to look guilty, which wasn’t hard—he
felt
guilty.

The girls laughed.

“Hurry along, then,” the teacher said. “I’ll open the back door for you.”

He was sure she wanted to check out their story with Ms. Entrese. Derick and Rafa pushed the box farther down the hall. The girls followed, probably waiting to see the boys get busted.

As they approached the back door, the administrator raised her hand to the scanner, and it opened.

“Oh, Vice Principal Fowers,” Ms. Entrese said, looking the administrator in the face. “I see you’ve found my two detention slaves.” Derick was impressed; she didn’t look suspicious at all.

“I see you’re maintaining discipline as well as always,” Fowers said. “But you may want to reconsider selling these books. Perhaps one of those museum/libraries would want them.”

Ms. Entrese flicked her finger, and the back door of the van opened. “I haven’t decided what to do with them yet,” she said. “But I’ve got to get them out of my office. It’s getting too cluttered in there.”

Derick and Rafa pushed the dolly down a ramp. Both grunted as they lifted the box into the van.

“Now go get the second box,” Ms. Entrese said. “And I purposely made it several times heavier than the first.”

Fowers smiled. “Carry on, Minerva.”

Derick walked by Rafa as he pulled the dolly back up the hall. The girls giggled as they passed. One of them said, “Enjoy detention, boys.”

Neither Derick nor Rafa minded at all.

• • •

The brave would launch his spear soon—and guessing how much practice Native Americans had hunting, he probably wouldn’t miss unless Abby did something drastic.

Another stream of blood hit her chin and dripped down her neck. She must look terrible. But it gave her an idea.

It was insane, but it was all she could come up with. Abby stopped running and turned around. She wanted to be able to see the spear coming, or at the very least, fight the brave one on one. Maybe she’d have Colter’s strength.

The brave’s eyes went big. He must not have expected his prey to stop so abruptly—and he probably didn’t expect her to be splattered with blood, either. She might even be intimidating. Abby threw her arm forward as if she, too, had a spear to throw. He veered to one side to dodge what he thought was an attack. But as he shifted his weight to one side, the mix of momentum, exhaustion, and surprise threw him off balance. His spear drove into the ground as the brave fell, and it snapped in two against his body.

Abby couldn’t believe it, but didn’t dare sit around thinking about it. She quickly ran up to the brave, picked up the pointed half of the spear, and kicked the warrior. For a moment she thought about killing him, but she couldn’t do it, even in a simulation. The brave began to rise onto his hands and knees. She kicked him again—hard—and he fell back to the ground. To be sure he wouldn’t catch her again, she jabbed one of his feet with the spear. That would slow him if he tried to rise again.

Abby had no time to feel relieved. The next brave was only a hundred yards behind her. She took off running again even though her legs felt like lead. When she forced herself forward, it felt like she was running in thick boots. She didn’t know how much longer she could keep her pace up. She had lucked out against one brave, but several hundred others were bound to catch up to her. She had to keep trying.

She heard another whooping sound and glanced back. The next warrior had come across his injured tribesman and was attending to him. That would buy her time. Maybe there was hope over the next hill.

Abby ran through cottonwood trees and over a landing. She saw a river below. As she moved closer, she spotted a beaver dam built against the riverbed and ran over to it. She wouldn’t be visible to the braves behind her for at least a minute.

Abby dove into the river. The water felt like ice as it slapped her skin. It was a chilly relief from the blood and sweat. She swam as quickly as she could beneath the dam.

Abby remembered from a documentary that beavers always made their dams so they could enter them from underneath the water. That kept out most predators. Abby held her breath and went under the frigid water. She opened her eyes, searching for an opening. At first, she figured that the beavers that made this dam must have been a great exception to the documentary—all she could see was a wall of sticks and mud. Finally, she found a hole, and though she had to push and shimmy, she eventually made it up through the opening.

Her chest heaved up and down as she huddled inside the wood home. She moved her arms around as best she could to help her heart gradually slow down, but there wasn’t much room. Had any of the braves seen her enter? If so, she was a sitting duck—or beaver, or girl in a simulator—whatever.

Splash
. Someone was there.

Abby cupped her hand over her mouth, trying to muffle the little sound she made. She heard the footsteps pass through the river, onto the other side.

More splashes—this time one right after the other. They also continued to the other side. It appeared as though her ruse was working. Less than a minute later, she heard the screeching and yelling of more and more braves. There was a good size crowd. One brave yelled something from a ways across the river. Another responded. They had probably figured out that she wasn’t still running ahead.

With her arms and legs freezing from the cold water, she tried not to move, not even to shiver. The Indians would be on the lookout. She knew the water would probably muffle the sound, but she wasn’t about to take any chances.

She heard a brave moving through the river. Through a tiny hole in the dam, she could see his eyes.

He saw her. He moved in her direction. What could she do? She looked around for a loose stick to defend herself with but couldn’t find a thing.

Abby was so wrapped up in her terror that she hadn’t realized that the warrior had stopped moving. She held her breath. He turned and looked in several directions. After a few more seconds, he moved to the other side of the river. He hadn’t seen her at all.

Abby shuddered with relief and waited, shivering in the beaver dam, hoping her test was over.

29

Ice

Jefferson Cragbridge looked at his stolen watch. It was nearly 11:30.

“Perhaps this is a blessing,” his wife said, hugging him in the cold air. “Maybe we should change what happens.”

“No,” Jefferson responded, pulling away. “You know the cost. Any attempt to intervene with events could be extremely dangerous. It will alter the course of people’s lives. Then they in turn alter others. Key events in history may change or never happen. We’ve both heard my father warn us about that over and over again.”

“But what if the cost isn’t as high as we imagine?” she said. “At this point, it’s all theoretical.”

“And what if it is as terrible as we fear? Who are we to decide?” Jefferson asked.

She looked past him to the ocean waves. “I know, I know. But I look into these people’s faces, and I know what’s about to ...” She shook her head. “I don’t know if I can just—”

“You can,” Jefferson said. “And if we have to be part of this lesson in history, we will be.” He looked at his watch again. “All we can do is hope that those with lockets will discover us. We still have a few hours.”

• • •

11:40 p.m.

There was no moon out, the sea a mass of darkness. A man—the lookout in the crow’s nest—pulled the collar of his coat up again, hoping to protect himself just a little more from the near-freezing temperature. He spotted something ahead, then peered for several seconds through the dark trying to identify it, squinting. His eyes widened. In a panicked flurry, he rang the bell three times and grabbed the phone. He called into the receiver, “Iceberg, right ahead!”