Isle of Man (The Park Service Trilogy #2) (23 page)

“They’re gone,” the professor says.

“Whataya mean they’re gone?”

I reach for Jimmy’s shoulder to console him, but he pulls away and steps closer to the professor, glaring down at him.

“I asked you somethin’,” he says.

“And I answered,” the professor replies. “They’re gone. Got it? Incinerated. Vaporized. Dead. As if they’d never been. But don’t worry yourself, kid—they didn’t feel a thing.”

Jimmy steps up and kicks the professor’s teeth in with the heel of his bare foot. The professor’s eyes go cross with pain, and he falls back and lies on his side, moaning with his mangled mouth open and blood gushing out. Jimmy raises his foot to stomp him again, but I grab his arms and hold him back.

“You were right, Jimmy,” I say, my voice feeble now that the initial anger is subsiding. “We’re nothing like them. Besides, we need his help to get us back. We’ll deal with him later.”

“What about Hannah?” Jimmy asks.

“Her too.”

CHAPTER 24
Over My Head

The sun rises, just like any other day.

The cloud of debris in the eastern sky paints the sunrise in beautiful shades of purple and orange. It looks as though we’ve sailed straight out from heaven. It feels as though we’ve sailed straight into hell. I try to imagine what it looks like now, back there, with the island gone. You could probably sail right over it and never even know there’d been an island there. It turns me ill to think of all those people dead. Just like that. It makes me so sick that my mind won’t even let me quite believe it yet.

We couldn’t get another word out of the professor last night after his confession, and I have no idea how much of this was Hannah’s idea and how much of it was his. But I plan to make damn sure they both answer for it when we return.

I can’t imagine feeling more betrayed. I guess I never knew Hannah at all. Not the real Hannah anyway. The manipulation, the lies, the outright evil of sending Jimmy and me onto that island to possibly lose our lives. And all for what? They never really planned on stopping the drones—they just want control of them again. And they don’t want to free my people from Holocene II—they used this trip to deliver a bomb that wiped out the few people who were living peacefully on the surface.

It’s clear to see what happened now, looking back. I think about all those hours Hannah spent alone with the professor—in the command center and in the scientists’ apartments. The whole time she must have been planning this with him right behind our backs. Then the last minute show she acted out on the dock the day we left. The fake emotions.

“Someone needs to be here for the people,” she said. And the professor rushing us off like he did. What lies! Nothing has prepared me to accept what I now know Hannah is: a lying murderer who used me.

I feel hatred.

I feel rage.

I feel sad.

But mostly, I just feel over my head.

A dark speck catches my eye, black against the sun on the eastern horizon. I squint to get a better view through the glare. I could almost swear I see the silhouette of a warship plying the waters on its silent hunt for humans to slaughter.

When I return inside to the submarine control room, I find Jimmy right where I left him—guarding the professor with his knife. His eyes are focused like a laser beam on the back of the professor’s head, and I see so much rage twitching beneath his determined features that I’m nervous to even rouse him from his vigil. I set aside my fear and lay a hand on Jimmy’s shoulder.

“Why don’t you go rest,” I suggest. “I’ll watch him.”

I expect Jimmy to protest, but he rises and hands me the knife and heads off toward the bunkroom without a word.

A long time passes as I stand watch over the professor. He consults his charts and works the controls, easy and calm, as if nothing had transpired between us at all. I look at his head of wild, white hair and wonder what disease infects a brain that could do what he and Hannah have done. What genetic trait or youthful trauma turns a man or woman’s self-righteous desire to do good into the megalomania of a mass murderer?

Maybe humans are the problem. Some humans, anyway. At least a person can see a shark’s teeth. They don’t hide their intentions. And they don’t kill because they can kill, they kill because they need to survive. And what’s a drone except an extension of the human brain? A mechanical hand of sorts. I’m reminded of something Finn said to us about the hand being indifferent as it does the bidding of the mind. I was once afraid of drones. A few days ago, I was afraid of sharks. But the only thing that I’m afraid of now is the 1,400 grams of gray matter firing inside two human skulls. The professor’s. And Hannah’s.

I have no idea what we’ll discover when we finally get back to the Foundation, but it worries me more than a little that the professor seems happy to take us there. Their scheme to send Jimmy and me blind onto the Isle of Man was so well thought out that I can’t imagine they planned nothing for our return.

As if reading my thoughts, the professor turns and flashes me a bloody, toothless grin. He doesn’t say anything, but when he turns away again, I tighten my grip on Jimmy’s knife.

THE END
of
BOOK TWO

State of Nature
Book Three of The Park Service Trilogy

For information on where to purchase, please visit:
www.ParkServiceTrilogy.com

About the Author

Ryan Winfield is a novelist, poet, and screenwriter writer living in Seattle. His debut novel
South of Bixby Bridge
quickly became a viral success story, selling over 100,000 copies in the first year.
Isle of Man
is the second book in
The Park Service Trilogy
and his third novel. If you would like to get in touch with Ryan, he would love to hear from you at
www.RyanWinfield.com
.

Copyright

Isle of Man

Book Two of The Park Service Trilogy

By Ryan Winfield

Copyright © 2013 Ryan Winfield

All rights reserved.

Please visit
www.RyanWinfield.com

Kindle Edition

Cover art by Adam Mager

Cover art and design © 2013 Ryan Winfield

Cover image: laverrue / Flickr / Getty Images

The Licensed Material is being used for illustrative purposes only; and any person depicted in the Licensed Material, if any, is a model.

Author photo: Sarah T. Skinner
www.sarahtskinner.com

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used here fictitiously. Any resemblance to any real persons or events is entirely coincidental.

Summary: After learning the horrific truth behind the Park Service and overthrowing its leader, fifteen-year-old Aubrey Van Houten sets out with his best friend Jimmy and his girlfriend Hannah on a quest to take control of the drones and free his people from Holocene II.

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