35

Going to war

Laser Offline! he memoed again. An image appeared in my head of a disengaged wire and a red exclamation mark that kept jumping. Albert followed it up with a picture of one of the six posts—the one that was closest to the trail. Easy fix—black tape!! I noticed that inside the garage Albert was holding a spool of tape. He waggled it to get me moving.

“Oh, great,” I said to Lars. “There’s a messed-up wire in the woods. I gotta go fix it!”

“Where is it?” Lars asked.

“On the post nearest the trail.” I darted into the garage and snatched the tape from Albert. He reminded me to keep cold and calm by placing the image of a frozen pond in my mind’s eye. I nodded at him and then I hurried back out.

At the doorway, Lars grabbed the tape from me. “I’ll do it,” he said like there was no argument. “I’m good at fixing things.”

“Lars, don’t go,” Brit begged him from the door—but he was already running down the trail.

“Keep the snow in your mind!” Brit yelled after him.

Albert had to turn the big lever to OFF so that Lars could make the repair. The screeching sound of the lasers stopped and the white light immediately vanished. Now the red spiders grew restless; they had no bait to chase. They probed and scuttled with mean little thoughts. Be calm, I told myself, be icy calm. “Brit, we can’t be fearful right now.”

“It should have been you,” she said bitterly. “Albert could have protected you with his memos. There’s no one out there to protect Lars.” Her eyes had gone shifty and mean.

“Brit, please don’t give in to the anger. Remember the icy wall.”

“Right,” she whispered. “You’re right.” Her face was as pale as the snow she envisioned.

I realized that the TV was on and there was a girl talking.

“They’ve been playing a loop of it, over and over,” Brit said. “You’re on that big sign above Times Square.”

The sweet notes from Lars’s guitar sang in the background, and there I was, standing in the snow in a dark forest with the pink light shining down. I looked small and determined. In a voice that was like melancholy music, I talked about my family and Brit and Lars. But this Mary didn’t exactly look like me—and she didn’t exactly sound like me, either. She could have been anyone’s daughter, talking about anyone’s family.

The crowd was silent as they watched me on the high-up electronic billboard, waiting, wondering what this was about. I don’t know how they felt, but here in the garage I was glad to have this reminder of small things that are big. As I spoke in Times Square, BREAKING NEWS showed a segment in the corner that flipped to channels all over the world, and to websites, too. In all those places I spoke all their languages! There I was on the news in Italy, and Russia, and Nigeria, and South Korea . . . the Commodore had put our commercial all over the globe.

I remembered with a start that I had to stay neutral! The evil thoughts were sneaking in and my distrust of those people watching in Times Square and the people watching in those other countries had become my main concern. I froze the angry thoughts in midair and I raised the icy wall just in time.

Suddenly Albert memoed Laser back online, and he reached to flip the large lever to ON. Once again the white light flashed in the forest. The electrical sound buzzed and screeched. Albert intently watched the screen.

“Lars must have fixed it,” Brit said hopefully. She waited by the door, biting a nail.

Across the room Albert sat rigidly on his tall stool, focusing inward, creating the fractals to open the wormhole again. He was getting better at it—it wasn’t long before he memoed the image of the tunnel that twisted and writhed as he filled it with his best thoughts.

“There’s Lars,” Brit announced. She was smiling expectantly, the relief shining in her eyes. “Thank goodness you’re back!” she hailed—but it was an angry Lars that pushed past her and he lunged at me, smacking me hard in the face. He was flushed and fidgety and his eyes were horribly bloodshot. He raised his fist to pound me again, but there was Agent Saunders in the doorway. Just that quick, Saunders chopped a secret agent move on Lars’s neck.

Poor Lars collapsed, and Saunders set him gently on the concrete floor.

“Sorry about that, kid,” Saunders said in a husky voice.

The smack I’d taken from Lars kicked in and I saw stars. I staggered, but Brit held my arm to steady me.

Albert stayed on task, still sending the good energy as best he could, but a noise had begun outside—or maybe it was inside my mind. It was like a howling monster scraping on metal. The red mist stalled and hovered. It lay frozen in the air, as if undecided about which way to go. And then it chose a direction. Lazy waves of red began to roll through the forest away from the rip, heading back out into the world where it could find billions of conscious minds to ruin.

Albert memoed a message of DANGER that felt stressed and brittle and ready to snap. My head was throbbing from where Lars hit me, and a gnawing fear was growing in my gut. “Icy calm, icy calm,” I said desperately.

A shadow appeared in the doorway and a man’s voice bellowed, “Found you!”

We all turned to see the Partner, his face contorted with hatred. He fired a gun at Saunders, but in his crazy excitement, he missed. Saunders ducked and swiveled and tried to pull a move on the Partner, but that guy knew his tricks. With punches and grunts, they fell out the door and continued to battle in the snow.

“Hurry, Albert,” I urged.

Albert memoed an image of hearts cracking and shriveling and turning to dust. He couldn’t keep sending the positive thoughts in the midst of this madness. The garage window told me all I needed to know; the red column was blasting up again and the spiders were roiling at the base like poison from a geyser.

Suddenly the Partner was back in the doorway, grinning like a lunatic. Had he killed Saunders? His eyes locked onto Albert and he smiled that angry smile. But Brit surprised the fiendish Partner, jumping him from behind, trying to grab his gun. Without mercy or remorse he smacked her head with his elbow—and she fell to the floor. Now the sick Partner pointed his gun at Albert, and he fired. My brother slumped into the computer screen.

“Albert!” I cried.

But I didn’t have time to help him because now the Partner was aiming at me.