“Evil.” Thorn nods.
A flock of Reds sail to us, eeping, fluttering, crowding in, but not too close, not nipping.
Thorn lets them land all over him. “They want to go with us.”
“Let’s do it,” says Blane.
“I’ll pack us some food and gear,” I say.
“Bring your elixirs,” Armonk suggests.
“Right. I’ll bring the healing and also the paralyzing one. And you, bring your bow,” I tell him. I glance over at Blane. “Please, no guns.”
He sears me with his hot, glittering eyes. “No guns. We have other ways now.”
Other ways, echo the Reds.
In the field, the Fireseed sways and whooshes in audible agreement.
Chapter 29
Over the Pacific the wind screams sideways, and our glider catches on its violent current. It spins us around, and in the roll, we’re thrown further and further from the gigantic orb. Helplessly, we stare out as its pearl-blue presence slides behind monstrous, humid clouds.
Armonk navigates the glider back to the cloud cluster, only to have the wind shriek sideways again and toss us mercilessly. How frustrating! We’re as far from it as we were in that first airborne rollover. Howling, the bluster vibrates the glider as if it’s a breakable toy. I’m starting to get airsick and again the orb is nowhere. I recall the way Blane described the pearly ship as disappearing in plain sight and this brings me to an unsettling, new thought.
“Could this wind be manufactured?” I ask as Armonk tries unsuccessfully to steer the glider back to an upright position for the third time. “Do you think the NanoPearl techs know so much bioscience that they create these unnatural winds and clouds to hide their headquarters?”
Blane, next to Armonk in the front, grips the hand rests during another abrupt upside-down spin. “That would be a disaster. What if they can even make their place invisible?”
Armonk groans. “That would mean if they don’t want to be found we won’t find them, and also, if we get trapped inside, we’ll never be found.”
“Guys, calm down, we can’t afford to concentrate on all the negatives,” I plead, feeling no surer of things than they are. The terror leapfrogs to all of us—the downside of the automatic stroma flow.
In the backseat, Thorn presses his hand in mine. Ask the Reds.
How? I think.
We see the invisible they answer. The Reds eep frantically in the cargo hold below, their snouts tap on the floor below our feet. Out! Out!
Kneeling down, Thorn starts to fiddle with the cargo latch as the Reds go wild underneath it. I help him lift the cargo door, and the Reds burst out, falling over each other in their haste to do the mission. Thorn picks four of them, placing them one by one on the lip of the glider window, now closed. It’s no easy task to nudge the rest of the Reds back down in the hold. They make sharp eeps of protest. But we manage.
At least for the time being the wind’s died down, so Armonk steers the hovercraft as close to the dense cloud formation as he can to make up for the distance lost to drift.
I help Thorn open the back window and the four Reds leap out in a wild flutter of wings. They burrow through the thick haze and disappear.
Armonk frowns as he stares at the clouds. “Where did they go?”
“Steer!” Blane orders. “Go in the direction they flew in.”
When Armonk guides the ship into the gauzy core, we lose all sight of sky and ground as if we’re stuck in the mother of all sandstorms. No visibility whatsoever.
Then comes the thrumming, very faint at first, then louder, in our heads.
Windows, windows, windows.
“Windows, eh?” With narrowed eyes and white knuckles, Armonk blindly presses forward. “There! I see the orb,” he exclaims as it slides out of the cloud cover.
“I see one of its windows,” I yell and point to it.
“Careful, Armonk, we’re almost touching the frying thing,” Blane hisses.
It’s true. Armonk’s guided the ship within inches of the orb’s vast curved shell. The windows, if you could call them that, are long, narrow and few. In fact, I count only two on this side. Set in the huge round globe they look like sideways alien eyes. The Reds have already zeroed in on one, and are flitting madly around it.
Armonk levels the ship to that window and cranes his neck to study it. “It’s sealed.”
“Looks as if the Reds have found a slit underneath the window though.” Blane opens his window for a better view.
“Some kind of extra ventilation system,” Armonk guesses.
“It’s very slim. An inch tall and about six inches wide,” I gauge.
The Reds peck and fret over the slit. Clearly, they know what they’re there to do. I glance at Thorn, biting his nails, and in front at Blane, jiggling his big, booted foot.
Silently I command the Reds. Squeeze, squeeze, squeeze your way in.