Glassing the Orgachine Page 8

  Jace blocked the copilot from returning to the cockpit. “That’s not the deal,” he said. “You’re not supposed —” Then he got a look at the man’s face. It was his colleague, Ranger Masterson, looking a sight better than the last time they’d met. Clear-eyed, clean shaven, all business — Masterson had regained his professional demeanor. Plus a new, undamaged parka.

  “Well, if it isn’t Kuliak,” Masterson said, “and his hillbilly sweetheart. Hey, are you kids finally hooking up? Good on you.”

  “Cut the crap and open that door,” Jace said. “You’re supposed to pick up the artifact, not the boy. You have no need of the boy. He’s going back with us.”

  “Out of my way, Kuliak. You’re not part of this.”

  “I am now. I’m responsible for that —”

  Without effort, Masterson grabbed Jace by the lapels, lifted him off his feet, and tossed him aside like a bale of hay. Jace landed on his back in the snow. Masterson climbed into the helicopter, but before he could shut the copilot door, Deut wedged herself in the way.

  “Begone, demon!” she screamed at him. “I take authority over you and command you to leave this man in the name of Elder Brother Jesus. I command you!”

  Masterson deftly spun Deut around and gently booted her out of the way. She landed in the snow not far from Jace. The pilot gradually opened the throttle, the roar of the 850-horsepower engine rose in pitch, and the rotors pelted Jace and Deut with a blizzard of snow and ice. Jace got up and tried to pull Deut clear of the wash, but she shrugged him off and ran to the passenger compartment door. She banged on the window and shouted at her brother to come out. He didn’t seem to notice her there.

  Jace ran in front of the aircraft making slashing motions for Bertolli to kill the engine, but the FBI man continued to ignore him. Masterson motioned to Jace to go back and deal with Deut. Rather than abandon her brother, she was standing on the skid and trying to cling to the side of the fuselage. It frightened Jace; she could get seriously hurt, and he ducked and ran to her. He took hold of her parka, intending to pull her off and drag her away, if necessary, for her own safety, but when she looked at him, her eyes were filled with such misery and fear and determination that it shamed him to his core. What was he doing? Was he a kidnapper after all?

  Jace stepped up beside her on the skid. He smiled at her and shouted over the engine blast, “Hang on tight!”

  Easier said than done. He leaned forward, groping the streamlined fuselage for any finger hold, and found none. They’d be able to hang on long enough to get high enough to do real damage to themselves when they fell.

  The monster engine over their heads continued to roar for several more minutes and then wound down. The blizzard subsided, and Masterson hopped out again and yelled at them, “We don’t want to hurt you but we will if you don’t leave at once.”

  “Give us the boy,” Jace shouted back. “All you need is the artifact, not the boy. He stays here with us.”

  Masterson walked over and motioned for them to make way so he could slide open the big door they were blocking. “You want him,” he yelled, “then go ahead and take him.”

  Deut clambered aboard and Jace followed. Deut unbuckled Uzzie’s restraints and tried to pull him from the seat. She was a strong young woman, and he was just a little kid, but he clung to the armrest, and she couldn’t break his hold. She turned to Jace and said, “Help me.”

  So Jace tried to pry the boy’s fingers from the armrest, but he couldn’t.

  Masterson returned to the copilot seat. Bertolli leaned back into the passenger compartment and shouted, “Time’s up.” With that he spun up the engine again, this time with enough power to lift off.

  “Wait!” Jace shouted. “We’re still here!”

  “Buckle up!” Masterson shouted.

  The icy landscape raced by outside the open passenger door. Jace got up to pull it shut before taking a seat. “It’s going to be all right,” he told Deut. “The pilot is with the FBI. He’s probably taking us to their field office in Anchorage.” With the door shut, the Astar 350 was quiet enough he didn’t need to shout. “I’m sure they’ll bring us back.” Though how she would explain her and Uzzie’s hours-long absence to her father he didn’t know. “Now we should all buckle up.”

  “I know who they are,” Deut said without looking at him. “They’re not free men; they’re doing Satan’s work.” She sat next to her brother and spoke to him softly. He nodded and shook his head but otherwise remained aloof. But when she put her arms around him and squeezed him tight, he looked up at her and then over at Jace.

  “You two shouldn’t be here,” he said. “This doesn’t end like you think.”

  OUTSIDE THE STARBOARD windows loomed Mount Sanford, its snowcapped peak lost in the clouds. Ahead of them was Mount Drum, a long-extinct stratovolcano. Half of it had exploded away a quarter million years ago, leaving behind a fractured crater. Off the port side stood Mount Wrangell, a massive, dome-shaped shield volcano, the only one in this corner of the state to have erupted in living memory.

  The appearance of the three giants meant that they were about to leave the park. The remaining hundred plus miles (160+ km) of their journey would follow the Glenn Highway through the Mat-Su Valley. So it was a surprise when the chopper banked to port and approached Wrangell up close. They circled the mountain’s northwestern flank where a large cinder cone — Mount Bonasso — jutted out like a wart on a snowy butt. Thin clouds of gassy discharge streamed from three cave-like fumarole vents at the base of the steep cone. The snow was melted around the vents, and the exposed rocks appeared lemon yellow in the failing light.

  After the third go-round, Agent Bertolli set the chopper down on the saddle ridge between dome and cone and let the engine idle.

  “What are we doing here?” Jace shouted into the cockpit compartment, but the men paid no attention to him. When Masterson got out and approached the passenger door, Jace pulled it open to confront him. “Tell me what’s going on,” he demanded. Behind him, Deut was trying to restrain her brother, who unbuckled himself and rose from his seat. She held one arm, and Jace took the other, but not even the two of them were a match for the boy. Uzzie jumped from the aircraft and began hiking toward the cinder cone.

  Masterson said, “Do yourselves a favor and stay on board.” He closed the door and followed Uzzie.

  “Pray for me,” Deut said as she slid the door open again and jumped out.

  THE CREST OF the saddle was ice-encrusted and easy to traverse, and they were able to keep up with Uzzie and Masterson. But when they reached the cone, they wallowed in waist-high snow and fell behind. They couldn’t catch their breath in the thin air. Their passage triggered numerous small snow slides, as well as an avalanche that grew in size and fury as it catapulted down the mountain into the valley below.

  “The snow load is unstable here,” Jace said. “I’ll follow them, but you go back and wait in the chopper.”

  She ignored him, and they labored on. Twilight had fallen, and alpenglow illuminated ghostly peaks and ridges that stretched to the horizon like storm waves on a frozen sea. It was cold on Wrangell and a brisk wind made it colder. Jace worried that Deut wasn’t dressed for the conditions. Exertion and worry could keep her warm while they were moving, but every time they stopped to rest, she began to shiver.

  Abruptly, they came to one of the melted patches of bare rock. The fumarolic vent was howling like a jet engine and spewing hot, sulfurous gasses. The going was easier here, but soon they were both gasping for breath. Jace grabbed Deut’s arm and steered her to the edge of the melt, upwind of the fumarole, where the air was clean. They collapsed in the snow coughing and wheezing. Jace’s lungs burned.

  Meanwhile, Uzzie and Masterson were busy clearing rocky debris from the fumarole entrance, lifting rocks and boulders they shouldn’t have been able to move, oblivious to the noxious air.

  “What are they doing?” Deut gasped. Clearly, they were preparing to enter the fumarole. And then Uzzie did
enter it, disappearing from sight.

  “No!” Deut shouted. “Uzzie, come back! Stop him, ranger. Make him come back.”

  Jace wanted to obey, even calculated his chances of sprinting the final fifty feet (15 m), finding the boy inside the vent, and convincing him to come with him, all the while holding his breath. “I can’t,” he said.

  “Can’t? Can’t? Then what good are you?” Deut took a couple of deep breaths and launched herself toward the fumarole. But halfway there she bent over, hands on knees, coughing, breathing hard but unable to fill her lungs.

  “Deut!” Jace screamed. “Turn around! Come back!” She glanced at him but pushed on toward her brother until she doubled over and fell. “Crap.” Jace hyperventilated until he was dizzy before dashing into the miasma after her. When he reached her, he lifted her to her feet and half-carried, half-dragged her toward safety.

  But he lacked the breath to make it all the way back. Lightheaded and confused, he wanted to drop her and save himself. He was panting but suffocating at the same time while scorching the entire length of his windpipe. Yet he kept going until his knees buckled and they both went down.

  He would stay to die by her side, like the love-addled fool that he was.

  It wasn’t so bad a way to go actually.

  But it was not to be. A strong hand grabbed him by the collar, dragged him across bare rocks, and deposited him on a snowbank in the clear. It was Uzzie. He had dragged both of them and lay them side by side. Deut was unconscious but breathing.

  “She likes you, ranger,” Uzzie said. “Even a striver can see that.” He turned to leave.

  “Wait. What’s going on? What are you doing?”

  Even if Jace had wanted to stop him, he lacked the strength to stand up, let alone slow down a boy who could move boulders. So he watched as Uzzie returned to Ranger Masterson and the two of them vanished into the fumarole. Next to him, Deut sat up quickly but grew faint and lay down again, vomiting a gruel of gastric juices and the morning’s oatmeal. He lent a hand to help support her, but she batted it away.

  By then, the alpenglow of dusk had vanished from the horizon, and the crescent moon barely defined their surroundings.

  “Where is he? Where’s my brother?” she said at last.

  “In the cave.”

  “Well, don’t just sit there. Go and get him.”

  “We tried. Don’t you remember? You ran out there but collapsed halfway there. I went to get you and almost passed out. Uzzie saved us but he went back to the cave.”

  “And you didn’t stop him?”

  “I couldn’t. Could you stop him on the airstrip? In the chopper?”

  Deut stood up but was still too woozy to walk. So she called her brother’s name again and again, but the wind snatched away her words.

  “You’re cold,” Jace said. “We need to get back to the chopper.” He removed his parka and tried to wrap it around her.

  “Stop that!” she ordered, pushing him away. “I don’t need that. I need my brother. Don’t you understand?”

  “I do. I understand. But what can we do? We’ll die out here.”

  “Go. Leave me. I never asked you to come.”

  There were sounds of sliding rocks, and Jace dug out his flashlight and swept the area with its beam. Ranger Masterson was heading down the clearing to the trail. Uzzie wasn’t with him or anywhere in sight.

  “Hey!” Jace shouted. “Where’s Uzzie?”

  The man didn’t even glance their way, and Jace continued to shout at him until he vanished in darkness. Then both of them shouted Uzzie’s name until they were hoarse.

  “Enough,” Jace said. “We have to go, or they’ll leave without us.”

  “Then go.”

  Deut Prophecy wasn’t a small woman, but she was all played out and too far gone to resist, so Jace crouched down and tipped her over his shoulder and carried her over the rocks and down the cone to the trail. She kicked and beat her fists on his back. Carrying her through heavy snow was another matter and after only a few yards he had to stop. So he set her down, grabbed her kicking legs, and dragged her like a sled. He could hear the chopper engine revving up before he could see its running lights.

  “Here,” Jace said, pressing his flashlight into her hand. “Uzzie’s gone. Get up and walk. I have to stop them from leaving.”

  He jogged the rest of the way and plunged through the rotor wash to the pilot’s door. It was locked, so he pounded on the plexiglass with his fist, but like before, Agent Bertolli didn’t even glance at him. Jace was prepared for this. He drew his Ruger and tapped its barrel on the plexiglass. Then the agent did look at him. Jace pointed the gun at the engine cowling over their heads and made the most deadpan expression he could muster.

  Bertolli’s expression was even deader, his eyes flat and dull, and Jace was not surprised. By then he’d worked out the fact that Deut’s little brother, as well as Jace’s park service colleague, were somehow altered. Now he knew that Bertolli was altered too. Satan’s work indeed.

  Inside the cockpit, the agent and ranger exchanged a few words while Jace held the power plant hostage. He kept glancing into the darkness for Deut’s arrival, unsure how long he could prolong this standoff. Finally, Bertolli revved down the engine and slid open his window.

  “Go get her,” he said. “We’ll wait.”

  “Nice try,” Jace replied. “Tell Masterson to get her.”

  Bertolli closed the window, and a moment later Masterson opened the copilot door and got out. He started to retrace their path to the cone but halted when Deut emerged from the night and approached the chopper under her own power.

  SHE CRIED THE whole way back, and Jace made no attempt to comfort her. A warm front was moving in from the south with heavy clouds, and it was snowing big, wet flakes by the time the chopper landed next to his snowmobile on the glacier. Jace decided to take the Stubborn Mountain trail back to the mine. Deut’s family was probably crawling all over the Mizina spur looking for her and Uzzie. The trail past the Bunyan place was overhung with snow-laden branches, and he approached Curve Canaveral with caution. He stopped just short of the Prophecy compound and turned off the engine.

  Deut said, “Where are we?”

  “Just outside your property. Come on, I’ll help you up. We’ll walk from here, okay? Are you good to walk?”

  He held out his hand but she refused it. She labored to her feet on her own and balanced a moment before setting off for home. He fell into step with her, but she said, “You’ve done enough, ranger. Now leave me alone.”

  So he let her go. After a few yards she paused to reach into her pocket for his flashlight and flung it to the trail.

  A tragic first date and the end of everything.

  The Great Escape

  GE5 1.0

  WITH EVERYONE GOING out to search for Deut and Uzzie, Ginger volunteered to help Corny, the eldest of the middle boys, at the gate, even though he was one of her least favorite Prophecys. He always seemed to have a grievance or grudge to air. He wasn’t frightened by her proximity to demons, as Cora was. Just the opposite, he expressed a creepy curiosity about her exorcism. He asked often enough about it that she had to declare the topic off limits more than once.

  Someone banged on the sally door.

  “Who goes there?” Corny shouted through the sniper port.

  “Adam. Open up. Hurry.”

  Ginger ran to the sally door and unbolted it. Adam and Sue came in supporting Deut between them.

  “Praise Jesus you found her,” Ginger said. “Is she all right? Where did you find her? Where’s Uzzie?”

  “She’s fine,” Adam said.

  “She’s cold and exhausted,” Sue added.

  “But where’s Uzzie?”

  “She says he’s gone.”

  “Gone? Gone where?”

  Adam said, “That’s enough talk. Corny, go get the cart.”

  Corny jogged up tunnel to fetch the cart. While they waited for him, Ginger and Sue helped Deut out
of her parka and snowpants. Deut cried and wouldn’t answer their questions. Ginger sat next to her on the bench and held her. When Corny returned with the cart, they helped her climb into it.

  Adam asked Corny, “Where are the others?”

  “Ithy, Solly, Cora, and Sarai are back, but Hosea and Proverbs are still out looking.”

  Adam tossed him a walkie-talkie. “Get clear of the adit and see if you can raise ’em. Tell ’em to come in.”

  WHILE ADAM PUSHED the cart up tunnel, Ginger and Sue followed behind. Ginger asked Sue, “Where did you find her?”

  “In the old main yard. She was returning under her own power. She only fell to pieces when she saw us.”

  Sue’s tone sounded accusatory.

  “What about Uzzie? Did she say anything about him?”

  “Gibberish.”

  “What, exactly?”

  “That the demons took him away in a helicopter.”

  THEY HELPED DEUT up the porch steps and into the common room where Sarai was leading children in prayer for their missing loved ones. Some of them were asleep on their knees. When Adam and Sue entered with Deut, the kids went nuts hugging and kissing her, but just as quickly turned their concern to Uzzie. Where was he? Was he all right? Unable to answer, Deut buried her face in her hands and wept. Poppy came down the stairs with bleary eyes and pillow head and sent the children to bed. They protested and lingered as long as they could until Sarai herded them upstairs.