The Indestructibles (Book 4): Like A Comet (7 page)

Chapter
9:

E.T.
phone home, long distance

When Titus and Kate returned to the
Tower they found it eerily quiet. They wandered the halls wearily, backpacks
slung over their shoulders, wondering where everyone went.

      "You're the werewolf,"
Kate said, raising an eyebrow at Titus. "Sniff them out."

      Titus shook his head.

      "Neal keeps this place too
clean. The whole place smells like intergalactic disinfectant," Titus
said. "Speaking of…"

      "Entropy Emily is looking for
you in the library, Designation: Whispering," Neal said unexpectedly.

      "Not the first choice I had
in mind, but fine," Titus said. Kate held out a hand to take his backpack,
and he handed it to her gratefully. "Thanks."

      "I'm going to shower. Good
luck with Baby Einstein," Kate said.

      Titus sighed and headed for the
library, a circular bay on one of the lower levels. Both he and Emily had found
it on their own and discovered the library to be surprisingly full of print
books dating back hundreds of years. The center of the room held an electronic
research hub, which Titus used to dig into werewolf history and past exploits
of the residents of the Tower. Emily mostly used it like the galaxy's best
Wikipedia, pulling at threads of subjects she knew nothing about until she fell
asleep sitting at the terminal. More than once Titus had found the blue-haired
girl passed out while sitting up, random subjects displayed in front of her,
like evolutionary theory, the schematic plans for the Eiffel Tower, or a dissertation
on the history of fennel.

      As soon as he walked into the
room, Emily latched onto him.

      "I need your brain," she
said. "I broke something."

      "Great," Titus said, pulling
up a chair next to her. A holographic projection of planet Earth spun in front
of them.

      "Watch this," Emily
said. "Library: Display all outgoing communications signals leaving the
planet."

      Suddenly the virtual globe lit up,
hundreds of points of light appearing all across it.

      "What the hell," Titus
said.

      "I know, right? I thought,
hey, like Doc said, if there's this invading army coming our way, they probably
have spies and scouts. So those guys would try to signal back to the mother
ship, yeah? Send their spy notes. But this can't be right. That's like seven
hundred signals leaving the Earth on a regular basis."

      "If I may interrupt,"
Neal's monotone voice chimed in, startling Emily and Titus both. The surprise
caused Emily to standup startled, then sit back down again.   

      "Do we have a choice?"
Titus said.

      "Can you at least knock
first? I think I may need to change my pants because of you," Emily said.

      "What is it, Neal?"
Titus said, ignoring Emily's melodramatic response.

      "Designation: Whispering, you
should be aware that Earth plays host to a large number of embassies for alien
cultures, as well as poses as a waypoint for several space-traveling beings."

      "Define a large number,"
Emily said.

      "That's ridiculous,"
Titus said. "Earth is what, the bus stop of the Milky Way?"

      "Watch what you call
ridiculous, Titus. You're a werewolf. People don't believe in you either,"
Emily said.

      "Look at that screen, Em,"
he said. "That doesn't seem impossible to you?"

      "Listen, Chewie, we just came
back from the future. I believe everything now. You could tell me the ghost of
Elvis is controlling the body of a Food Network host and I'd be like, yeah,
cool, that makes total sense to me," Emily said. "Earth being
chockablock full of aliens? Not really a stretch right now."

      Titus rubbed his eyes in an almost
eerie imitation of Doc's habit.

      "Okay. Okay. Let's talk
parameters. Parameters. How about this. Library? Please narrow those signals
down to only the ones that are two-way. A bunch of those have to be Earthlings
just yelling into the abyss hoping someone yells back," Titus said.

      At that point, roughly half the
lights on the virtual Earth went dark.

      "Half of those signals get an
answer?" Titus yelled, voice cracking.

      "Holy carp, Earth is like the
Internet provider of the Universe!" Emily said.

      "This is crazy," Titus
said. "Okay. Again. Parameters. Got it. Library, remove from this search
any signals Doc Silence or our predecessors were aware of and deemed
non-threatening. Closed cases or whatever."

      This time, most of the lights
winked out, leaving only five distinct points of light on the map: in northern
California, Nevada, in a mountain area in the American Southeast, in the ocean
to the East of Florida, and finally one in the South Pacific.

      "One of these things is not
like the other…" Emily sang.

      "Stop. That's a lot of
locations," Titus said.

      "And one of them is the
Bermuda Triangle," Emily said.

      Titus stared at the globe.

      "Oh come on," he said.

      "Right there," Emily
said.

      "I know," Titus said. "But
this is just stupid. Neal, is Doc home?"

      "I'm right here," Doc
said, walking into the library and throwing his long black coat over a nearby
chair. "I was hoping you two would be working on this."

      "Are there really over seven
hundred aliens living on Earth?" Emily said.

      He waved his hand dismissively. "Alien
is a relative term. What've you got?" Doc said.

      "Five unexplained two-way
signals which had previously been unknown or unaddressed," Titus said.

      "Well that one you can
discount entirely," Doc said, pointing to the spot in the Pacific.

      "Because it's an outlier?"
Emily said.

      "Because it's a moveable
island we've never been able to figure out," Doc said. "We know it
pings outer space. It also does some weird stuff with numbers. But it's relatively
harmless as far as we can tell."

      Emily stared at Doc, hard.

      "There's a moveable island in
the Pacific Ocean?" Emily said.

      "Flying islands too."
Doc said. "But most of those are in Europe."

      "Would you call the moveable
island… lost?"

      "Oh no," Titus said. "Emily,
can we focus?"

      "Are there castaways there?
Did their plane crash?" Emily said.

      Doc raised one eyebrow at her,
playing along. "There may even be a polar bear," he said.  

      "You're pulling my chain!"
Emily said, thrusting and angry finger in his face.

      "You watch too much TV,"
Doc said. "What else do you have."

      "The Bermuda Triangle,"
Titus said, gesturing to Florida.

      Doc sighed heavily.

      "I hate the Bermuda Triangle.
What's left?"

      Titus pointed to the remaining
three locations.

      "Northern Cali, somewhere in
the Appalachians, and New Mexico," Titus said.

      "That's not New Mexico, that's
Nevada—oh my stars and garters is that Area 51?" Emily said.

      Doc and Titus exchanged weary
looks.

      "There is no Area 51. But
that's a good spot to get a signal off-world, we know that from experience. We
should send a team to investigate," Doc said.

      Titus called up the California
location, then zoomed in on a digital map. "I know this place. It's the
Research Institute for Extra-Terrestrial Information," he said.

      "Nerd," Emily said.

      "No, seriously," Titus
said. "They're not quacks. Constructed one of the largest signal
structures in the world to ping out a welcome message. They're like SETI."

      "Even if they're benign, it
could be that our enemies are stealing that signal structure to send out
messages to their fleet," Doc said. "You and Kate should go talk to
them."

      Titus nodded. "And the last
location?" he asked.

      Doc inspected it for a long,
pensive moment.

      "That one looks familiar to
me," Doc said. "I can't place it, but we should investigate."

      "We'll be spread pretty thin,"
Titus said. "I assume Billy snuck off in the middle of the night."

      "Yeah," Emily said.

      "It's okay. I expected him
to," Doc said. "Let's get Jane and Kate up to speed and see if can't
find some backup. The five of us are going to be short-staffed and we need to
check all three places simultaneously in case they're related—we can't risk
spooking the others by hitting them one at a time."

      "I'll get Kate," Titus
said, standing up. "And I think I know someone we can call for help."

      "That's a terrible idea,"
Emily said.

      "I haven't even said anything
yet."

      "Doesn't matter," Emily
said. "I already know who you're going to say, and it is a bad idea. Bad
dog, Titus. Bad dog."

Chapter
10:

Journalistic
integrity

Jane hated to admit it, but she found
being around Jon Broadstreet incredibly uncomfortable since returning from the
future. She understood the reporter wasn't fated for the same horrible end she'd
seen in that alternate timeline. They were on a different course here. He'd
never infiltrate a world-destroying organization as a spy and die while trying
to escape. There were a million other ways the young journalist could meet a
bad end, but, Jane thought, at least we can dismiss the one I've actually seen
happen.    

      But still, she'd witnessed a
future version of him die, and she felt sad around the present-day version of
him every time they met, now. She longed for the old days when his unrequited
crush on her was the main cause of her discomfort. Now during those times when
he'd ask Jane out to dinner, her pained expression didn't indicate a lack of
interest so much as it reflected a covert attempt to cover up her awkwardness.

      And the poor man had no idea.

      Today they met on a footbridge
that crossed a river cutting through the heart of the City, an area that had,
in the old days, been a crime-riddled pathway for illegal smuggling in and out
of the metropolis. But before Jane lived here—really, almost before she was born—City
officials had labored tirelessly to beautify it, and they'd done a magnificent
job. The once grimy and dangerous section had become a walking route and bike
path, frequented by joggers and families with strollers, dotted with coffee
shops and restaurants with outdoor seating.

      Broadstreet showed up with coffee and
handed it to Jane as she adjusted the knit cap on her head. He laughed.

      "You realize almost everyone
who walks by does know who you are, hat or no hat," he said.

      "Can you at least pretend my
civilian disguise works?" Jane said.

      The reporter struck a suddenly
serious look, his mouth a hard straight line.

      "I barely recognized you. It's
like I'm looking at another person," he said. "You know, in a certain
light you kind of resemble someone. An actress or something."

      Jane sipped her coffee and leaned
against the railing, stealing a quick glance up at the sky. She wondered what
was in store for them. Emily ratted Billy out as soon as he left; now everyone
knew he was gone. And hadn't said goodbye. Probably for the best, Jane thought.
Perhaps saying goodbye is bad luck. The thought of him out there by himself in
the blackness of space made her heart hurt. She could do it, or someone like
Kate, but Billy couldn't stand being alone for dinner, never mind flying out
into the endless sky.

      "You've got something on your
mind," Broadstreet said.

      "I've always got something on
my mind," Jane said, shaking off her wandering thoughts.

      "Anyone ever tell you that
you worry too much?" he said.

      She gave him a hard, almost angry
look, and then shook her head.

      "Can I tell you the truth?
Sometimes I worry so much it physically hurts," Jane said. "I'm
practically impervious to harm, and I sit here freaking myself out until I'm
sick. Normal people don't do this, do they?"

      Broadstreet shrugged, then joined
her by leaning against the bridge's rail.

      "You'd be surprised at how
many people do," Broadstreet said. "We live in this big, beautiful,
amazing world, and every day all we do is obsess about every little thing. The
big picture should be a miracle and instead we're…"

      He waved a hand vaguely around,
gesturing toward the bustling streets of the City.

      "Instead we let all of this
bog us down," he said. "But who am I to judge. I almost got you
coffee with cream instead of milk and practically had a panic attack."

      "I still would have drank it,
you know," Jane said.

      "Exactly. See what I mean?
Why worry about something like that?"

      "Because you care," Jane
said.

      Broadstreet nodded, almost
embarrassed.

      "I'm not giving you a hard
time," Jane said. "I bet you're concerned if you're rude to a
stranger in traffic too."

      "Happened on the way here,"
he said.

      "I knew it." She studied
the young reporter's face, the way that beard he'd been trying to grow for
months now almost seemed to be filling in—he had a spot below his jaw line
where no hair would come though and it gave him an almost comedic patchy look—and
then she reflected on the rumpled aesthetic of his clothes, the way he watched
everything around them. It's so unfortunate you keep asking me out,
Broadstreet, she thought; if you'd just be normal, we could be good friends, I
think.

      "So what is today's concern,
Solar," Broadstreet asked.

      "If there were ever a real
emergency, like something that might require people to evacuate calmly, and we
got wind of it early—what could you do to help?" 

      "Me? Like, the press?"
Broadstreet said.

      "The press, yeah. But
starting with you," Jane said.

      "You know something I should
know about now?"

      "Maybe," Jane said. "Yeah.
No. Wait. Off the record."

      "We're always off the record
until you tell me these days," he said. "My bosses would murder me
for saying that, but you know it."

      Jane looked over her shoulder. The
dark water of the river drifted by.

      "We're trying to prevent
something big," Jane said. "And if we can't…"

      Broadstreet's eyes went distant
for a moment, deep in thought. He let out a long, frustrated sigh.

      "This is where I betray my
profession," he said, resigned. "You want to know the truth?"

      "Of course."

      "You need to control your
message," he said. "You make the announcement. Distribute everything
you need us to know at the same time, to everyone, immediately. That big old
floating fortress of yours has to be able to broadcast a message in large-scale
way, yeah?"

      "I think so," Jane said.

      "Make sure the right people
know it's coming. Public safety. Emergency management. Disaster teams. And then
do it in your voice," he said. "Because people will listen to you. We'll
catch up, but it's going to need to come from you."

      "From us?" Jane said. "The
team?"

      Broadstreet laughed.

      "No. From you. I know you don't
like to admit it, but you're the one we trust, Solar," he said. "If
the worst happens, we're not gonna want to hear it from a werewolf, or a sociopath
in some mask, or from a kid who glows, or a blue-haired teenager who talks way
too much. People are going to look to a full-fledged hero when something
catastrophic occurs, and congratulations, kid—that means you."

      "You know how I said I worry
about everything and you said I shouldn't?" Jane said.

      "I just made it a lot worse,
didn't I?" Broadstreet said.

      "Yep."

      "Sorry," he said.

      And together, they watched the
river drift by in silent reflection and concern of things far beyond their
control.