Dark Lightning (Thunder and Lightning) (25 page)

“A police vehicle is approaching from the north,” the AI said.

“Oh boy,” Patrick breathed. We both looked out the windows over the empty pool area. I didn’t see anything odd out there, so they must have been traveling without lights.

“A second . . . and now a third vehicle is slightly behind the first one,” the AI said. “I identify them as special forces units.”

Without warning, the windows were flooded with unbearable light. I was blinded, and fell to the floor with shimmering blue spots swimming before my eyes.

“Polly, can you see?”

“Not much. We have to stay cool here. Your vision will come back.” I hoped. So far as I knew, there were no white light weapons on the ship capable of blinding anyone. Lasers, now, that was a different story.

No sooner had I had the thought than I heard a sizzling, crackling sound, and a reddish haze penetrated my closed eyelids. I cautiously opened my eyes, and saw through the persistent dazzle a line of laser light tracing out the edges of one of the big glass windows. The laser would have gone right through the glass, but the putty or metal strips or whatever held it in place was boiling and flaming. In a moment, the big pane fell inward, intact, and hit the floor with a huge thump. It didn’t break.

In the next moment, a hissing, sputtering object the size of a can of soup came arrowing through the opening and crashed against the far wall. It fell to the floor and started spewing smoke. Gas grenade! But what kind? I’d just missed being knocked out by gas, and I couldn’t believe I’d been so stupid as to not plan for it.

“Gas masks!” Patrick shouted, and I didn’t need any more prompting. I glanced back at the smoke, saw it was rising toward the ceiling.

“Stay down!” I yelled, and threw myself to the floor on hands and knees. “Try not to breathe!” Now I could only pray this was the kind of gas you had to breathe and not the kind you absorbed through your skin . . .

It wasn’t, or that would have been the end right there. We scrambled back toward the armory, Patrick a little ahead of me. We hurried into the room and slammed the door closed behind us. I sipped air cautiously and saw that Patrick was doing the same. I didn’t feel light-headed, but would I? I’d never been gassed before.

There were gas masks on a shelf near the back. I grabbed one and yanked it over my head. The straps in back adjusted themselves to my stupid head, and the soft plastic of the mask itself fit itself snugly to my face.

“What do we do now? Try to get out through the back door?”

“I’d expect they have that covered. You mentioned something else. A last-resort escape.”

“No, I don’t want to use that.” He said it firmly.

“We might—”

“No, there has to be another way.”

I shrugged. First we needed to see what the situation was outside. We opened the door, and I led the way, with a gun in each hand. We made our way back to the living room, which was still lit up like a movie premiere in Old Hollywood. I hurried to the wall, not exposing myself, and edged one eye around the side, through a window that still had glass in it.

Or it did. The laser outlined that one, and this time it fell away instead of in. I heard it crash. Another gas grenade came flying through the empty space.

“Pollyanna Broussard and Patrick Strickland-Garcia,” someone bellowed through a bullhorn. “Come to the window with your hands up and no weapons in them, and you will not be harmed. It’s in your best interests to surrender peacefully.”

“The heck with that,” I muttered. The lens in my mask had darkened when the harsh light hit it, another nice feature.

“You will have an attorney as soon as the current state of martial law is lifted. You are guaranteed a fair and impartial trial by a jury of your peers, and you—”

That steamed me.

“There is no state of martial law!” I shouted back. “You are part of an unlawful coup, a mutiny. Everybody out there, if you can hear me, these people have—”

A regular volley, a fusillade if you will, of gas grenades came through the window, at least eight of them.

Well, the heck with that.

I aimed at the big spotlight and fired. Missed the first time. I was ashamed of myself, realized my hand was shaking. Calmed down, fired again, and heard glass shattering. Suddenly it was very dark, both out there and in the apartment. I risked a look around the edge again. People were running for cover. There were park security in their uniforms and others in black uniforms. They seemed startled to be shot at.

Behind them, not being held back by any sort of crowd control, were what looked like dozens of civilians. None of them were running or taking cover. Clearly, they had never heard real gunfire. One of them was actually clapping. I realized that most of them thought it was some sort of new show put on for their benefit. I saw what I thought might be the laser cutter they had used. Taking careful aim, I squeezed off three shots. I heard them ping into the unit. With any luck, I had screwed up the insides. Even if I hadn’t, I don’t think I would want to fire it up with a few holes in it. Who knows what might happen?

About that time, I heard what sounded like an explosion.

“I think they’re blowing the doors to the elevator,” Patrick said.

There was another explosion, a lot closer. Everything in the room rattled and swayed.

“That’ll be the main doors,” I said. Nobody came pouring in, so they were either worried about getting shot or hadn’t managed to penetrate the armor I knew would be in the doors.

“We’ve only got a few seconds,” I said. “We have to take the last-resort exit.”

“Uh-uh, I don’t think so,” he said. Dammit, what was the problem?

“Don’t be silly, Patrick. Now where’s the door to the roof?”

“I’m not going up there. You go, I’ll stay here.”

“Where is the door, Patrick?”

He sighed and gave in. I followed him down a hallway to an inconspicuous door near the end. He put his palm to it, and the door opened just as I heard a louder explosion behind us. I could hear shouted voices, both demanding our surrender and talking excitedly among themselves. It sounded like a dozen or more.

There was a narrow staircase. I made sure the door was locked and barred, and started up the stairs after Patrick, who didn’t seem to be in all that much of a hurry. I shoved his ass impatiently, and I heard him breathing hard. Surely this wasn’t tiring him out?

A door opened onto the roof. I grabbed Patrick by the seat of his pants and pulled him back. He had been about to walk right out on the roof. Something that had been building up inside me for some hours now finally gave way. I was disgusted with him. I’d had to lead, cajole, and now even shove him every step of the way. It was like having a ball and chain around my ankle. A part of me considered just leaving him there on the roof, but we were in this together, we were family. I’d get him out of here.

I looked around the doorjamb and saw a rope with a grappling hook come over the side of the building . . . and then slide off. There wasn’t a lot for the hook to hook up to, but there were a few places it would probably catch, and if they kept trying, they’d be up here soon. Time to move.

I pulled a pistol and grabbed Patrick’s hand, slapped the gun into it. He stared at it like it was a rotten, dead fish.

“Here’s what you’re going to do, Patrick, and I don’t want to hear any backtalk about it. If you see anyone coming over the edge, aim the gun down at the roof, at an angle, like this. Not close enough to blow off your toe, but not far enough away to hit anything but the roof. Then fire. I want them to hear it and see the muzzle flash. Keep your head down. Here’s the trigger. To fire it, wrap your finger over it and pull.” I noticed his hand was trembling, but he gripped the gun.

I hurried over to the last resort.

It was a little shacklike structure right in the middle of the roof. The door wasn’t locked; there really wasn’t any need to up here, accessible only through the apartment below. Inside were ordinary things like folding lawn chairs and lounges and tables, enough for a party. There was a barrel-shaped barbecue. There was a badminton set, a croquet set, other outdoor games. All of it looked dusty. And in one corner, flycycles.

They were folded up, small enough to fit several into a golf bag. I stripped them out of their coverings and took a quick look.

Junk. Good enough for dilettante night flyers, but way too heavy for serious tournament play. You could buy twenty of these for what I paid for mine . . . which was now junk, too. But that wasn’t a problem just then. In fact, it might be better, in that these old clunkers were sturdier.

Even better, the first one I unfolded was a tandem. Designed for Marlee and Mike, I figured. It would do just fine for me and Patrick. I used the strap of a carrying case to put another cycle over my shoulder. Back in the shack, I brought out the two JATO units, hoping they were still charged. I fastened them in place on the cycle frame.

There was a gunshot behind me. I turned quickly, aiming my pistol in front of me, but no one was coming over the top.

“It was a grappling hook,” Patrick admitted. “It didn’t catch.”

“That’s fine. Come over here, we’re about to go.”

“Polly, I don’t want to go.”

“You’d rather stay here and get captured?”

“No . . . I . . . maybe I could . . .”

“We’ve got to go now, Patrick.”

He swallowed hard and nodded.

“Get on,” I said. I was holding the cycle a few feet off the ground. He stepped over it uncertainly, and I realized he had never been on one.

“It’s easy,” I told him. “You’ll be in back, I’ll be up front steering. Put that strap around your waist. I’ll control the wings and the tail. We will be upright when we launch, but as soon as we get in the air we will stretch out almost prone. You grab this bar and hold on. Put your feet on these pedals back here, and when I tell you, pump like the dickens. Got that?”

I swung my leg over and was strapping in when I heard a clanking sound over to my left. I watched as another hook hit the roof, dragged . . . and hooked. I could see the rope grow taut. Someone was coming up.

“You stick your head over, and I’ll blow it off,” I yelled. “I’m not kidding. I haven’t hurt anyone yet, but I’ll kill you.”

There was no response. I aimed at the hook and fired. The bullet hit the hook, which rang like a bell. I’d like to brag, but it was a lucky shot. Annie Oakley would have cut the rope, I’m sure. But the rope went slack, as whoever was on his way up changed his mind.

“You ready?” I called over my shoulder.

“Y-y-y-y . . . yes.”

“Hang on to my waist. The first step is a killer.” I hit the button, and the JATO units thrust us up into the air at a forty-five-degree angle.

JATO is Jet-Assisted Takeoff. The idea has been around since the midtwentieth century, and it’s real simple. In this case, the bottles contain two chemicals that, when they mix, produce a great deal of gas very quickly. There is a nozzle, pointing down and back. Those suckers get you into the air quite smartly and are almost essential for a ground takeoff even under our relatively modest gravity. With Patrick behind me, clinging for dear life, getting up would have been completely impossible, and it would have been a heck of a strain for me alone, even with my competition cycle.

The units make a heck of a noise but don’t leave a trail of smoke. This was the dicey part. That laser could cut us in half if they intended to kill us, and I still wasn’t convinced they didn’t. But it would be dicey for them, too, unless they just didn’t care about collateral damage. A laser that powerful would reach clear across the interior, and do a lot of damage where it hit. It’s crowded enough on the far side that there would be an excellent chance of starting a fire or even killing someone.

I itched like crazy between my shoulder blades, anticipating the searing heat of the laser, which would cut right through Patrick, but no shot came.

In about thirty seconds we were a third of a mile in the air and the JATOs cut off. I adjusted the wings to get as much of a glide as I could, because I had a fair-sized pedal ahead of me. I jettisoned the JATOs. They had parachutes and radio beepers so they could be recovered. I didn’t want them to beep my location.

I very quickly began to wish I could jettison Patrick.

He was clinging to me like a barnacle, both arms wrapped around my waist, his face pressed to my back. I could feel his rapid breathing.

“Patrick, you’re squeezing me to death. Can’t you hold on to the handlebars?”

“I’m sorry, Polly. I can’t.”

I started pedaling, and knew instantly that his feet weren’t on his pedals. “I need you to help, darn it. Find the pedals with your feet. Press down on them, and a latch will wrap around your feet so you can get power out of the up and the down stroke.”

“I can’t find them.”

“Move your feet around. Look behind you, or down. You’ll see them.”

“I’m afraid I can’t look down, Polly. I just can’t.”

“Are your eyes open?”

“No. It’s the only way I can ride this thing. I think I may throw up.”

“You’d better turn your head to the side if you do. I swear, if you vomit on my back, I’ll ditch you.” There was a short pause.

“I’m better. But I can’t look.”

After a few more heated exchanges, he did manage to get his feet in the proper position. And instantly some of the burden was taken off me. I heard the prop in back change pitch as it bit more powerfully into the air.

And, finally, I was able to devote a little time to navigation. I was headed away from Fantasyland, but in the wrong direction. In a few minutes I’d be over Duckburg, not where I wanted to go. I eased up through a ninety-degree turn—Patrick made loud, gasping sounds—and headed south.

“What is it called?” I asked. I thought maybe by getting him talking it would calm him down some.

“What is what called?”

“Your condition. I know there’s a word for it, but I can’t remember.”

“Acrophobia. I’ve had it all my life.”

“That sucks. I wouldn’t think . . . I mean, here in the ship . . . there aren’t many . . .”

“Tall buildings. I know. I don’t even like to look out second-floor windows. I do, but it makes me queasy. Anything above four stories, forget about it. I’ll have a panic attack. Like I’m having now.”