Mathias was flying the Wilizy jumbo freight plane in the skies of Alberta and B.C. The plane had a long body like one of the ancients' old planes. But since it was solar powered, and because it was made of light titanium, the wings didn't have to be as long. The entire upper surface of the plane was a huge solar collector and William had put one of his biggest diamonds inside the plane's power unit. The bottom surface of the plane was a mass of little flaps of titanium that were attached by one end to the hull. When the plane was flying, the wind would cause the titanium flaps to click against the hull. Those touches generated a charge that was stored in the plane's batteries. That clicking mechanism was another of William's inventions. Between the solar collectors and the wind power generators, the plane produced more energy than it consumed when it was flying. However lifting it into the air did require a lot of energy, especially when it was carrying a heavy load. The interior looked like the inside of an empty barn.
The jumbo passed its test runs with flying colours, which pleased the Red Deer engineers no end. They began construction on three more jumbos that would be restricted to carrying Wilizy freight. In time, other countries and companies would be able to buy a smaller freight plane that the Red Deer engineers were planning to produce in large quantities. This would have less cargo space, less solar power, no wind power, and none of the other features that William would add secretly as soon as the jumbos left the Red Deer plant.
For example, William had already added a filament cover and a huge number of pinky rings to the first jumbo. In public, the plane would have good speed. It would be very visible in the air and everybody would know that another Wilizy transport had flown by. However when Mathias was away from public view, the pinky-ring powered filament surrounding the jumbo meant that he could fly it invisibly at supersonic speeds in high altitude. This would allow him to move cargo from Asia to the Zeballos storage prison in a few hours. Since nobody in North America would know when the plane left Asia, they wouldn't know how far beyond the speed of sound the plane had flown. With four jumbos soon leaving and landing all over the world, it would be even harder to figure out how quickly the Wilizy's cargo was being delivered. Nobody had thought to ask William who was going to fly the other three jumbos.
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Hank had been spending a lot of time with Lucas, hoping that hard work and some new responsibilities would pull him out of his funk. Lucas was now in charge of preparing the interiors of all five Alberta WC&D buildings for customers. Wizard had ordered display units, shelves and things like that. Lucas was installing all of these on his own. When Hank suggested that he hire people and then supervise their work, Lucas looked at him in disbelief. "Why would I want to do that?" he asked. So Lucas worked eighteen-hour days to get the Calgary store ready to receive its merchandise. Dreamer already had the first load of chocolates ready to go for that store. She planned to put the chocolates section right in the middle of the store so that people were bound to walk by it.
Hank was preparing the Surrey store for its grand opening – a time-consuming task because the retail area that Wizard had leased was old and neglected. Hank had hired the Vice President for the WC&D's entire retail operations and choosing the manager of the Surrey store would be next on Yolanda's list.
At night, Hank and Lucas would meet and talk about how the day had gone. Everybody could see that Lucas wasn't interested in being involved in the stores; he was doing it for his father, I think. Hank offered to continue giving Lucas boxing lessons, but Lucas was more interested in basketball. Theo had been practicing a lot with Granny and was kicking Lucas' butt whenever they played against each other.
The family had always wondered who had given Lucas his competitive instincts. After watching Granny in the three-dimensional basketball game, everybody now knew. The family called the game invisiball and played it every Sunday night. Lucas enjoyed himself in those games and the old Lucas appeared, if only briefly. He never smiled outside of the games.
As I have mentioned, Theo was practicing basketball with Granny in the evenings. In the daytime, he worked with Momaka. The family wanted to try that out because that kind of work got him outside. Theo worked hard and did what Momaka wanted, but he was not cut out to be a farmer. Momaka offered to teach him more judo, but Theo wanted to do basketball instead. He has become very tall and everybody is expecting him to stretch even higher into the sky. He dunked the ball for the first time this week and Winnie said that his face just lit up. Granny kept him on a tight leash in practice – dribbling and shooting only.
There's a special way of shooting a basketball that involves putting your hand in the cookie jar. Granny told Theo that he had to learn how to do that with either hand. Don't ask me what that means. I'm getting all my information from Winnie and Reese and they aren't basketball players. I've never even seen a cookie jar; I'm lucky if I see cookies. Theo was very athletic, so he was learning quickly. Especially because he was spending every possible free hour in the gym.
When Theo was practicing at one end of the basketball court, Dreamer was at the other. They were learning the same skills. Granny didn't set it up as a competition, (I think), but it certainly became one. Dreamer was better at dribbling; Theo was better at shooting. On Saturdays, they'd practice in the gym all day and into the evening. To give their bodies a rest, they'd take turns being a rebounder or a passer for the other player. Granny said that their progress was tolerable. Every now and then, when they started getting cocky or started slacking off, she'd let them go one-on-one against her. "I'm an old woman with a limp and you still can't get by me?" she'd exclaim after they had failed once again to score a basket.
Lucas didn't put in the same hours of practice as Theo, but he was learning quickly because he was more athletic than Theo. He liked to practice driving from the outside towards the basket. Doing something that Granny called a lay-up. When he wasn't practicing that with either hand, he was charging at the basket and then stopping suddenly and shooting. Granny called it a Stop and Pop. Lucas wasn't so good at that because his running was faster than his dribbling and he'd lose the ball if Granny suddenly stepped in his way.
A lot of Lucas' free time was spent camping in the woods. He even joined Doc on one of his overnight fishing trips. Granny asked Doc how many words they had exchanged in that twenty-four hours; Doc had to think about that and then held up one finger. "Lucas said Thanks."
"Did you ever consider opening up a conversation?" Granny asked.
"Why? We weren't there to talk," Doc responded.
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The Raging Gardeners conducted another kidnapping trial for the man in the Okanagan. It hadn't taken long for Wanda and Momaka to collect enough evidence to convict him. He didn't specialize on blondes. Instead, he aimed for a high volume of brunette victims to make up for the lower commissions. Wanda asked William if he could rig up a sensor for the pervert's copter that would tell them that he had a passenger. Otherwise, the Gardeners could lose a lot of time waiting for him to snatch somebody. William did make the sensor and it worked well. From the compound, it's only a few minutes at high sling speed to the Okanagan. Bob caught him easily in the middle of a kidnap and it was Winnie this time who took a little piece of time out of a lucky little girl's life.
Bob made another appearance to prompt a confession, Granny did her judge act, and Momaka planted another hybrid tree. Wanda and Dreamer were still the first two to go into the clearing, but Momaka told Granny that they handled it better. Mac said that she was too busy to come up for the ceremony. Granny and Yolanda were anticipating that they'd get their Surrey guy in July. Nobody had any idea yet what the Gardeners could do about the snatchers who operated in the U.S. Granny said that she'd ask Stu for help.
# # # # # # # #
Doc was first to hire his vice presidents. One was now running the WZBN and the other was organizing the harmonica and singing contests for the summer. Those events had been publicized widely and contestants were su
bmitting applications to the website. At first, Mac and Wolf said that they wanted to watch the Calgary show. Later they began thinking about entering. With time on his hands, Doc was helping Yolanda find her vice presidents. He'd conduct the interviews for her while she judged character. Doc told her to just hire somebody who was like Wizard.
Wizard and Dreamer were polite to each other, but that was about it. Their Wilizy responsibilities were completely separate now. Dreamer had selected the kinds of sporting goods and footwear that she wanted and that large order would be here in time for the store openings. On the chocolate front, she had already hired her vice president and was letting her set up the manufacturing plants. Dreamer wasn't all that interested in working out details of what she was going to sell in the WC&D stores; she was much more interested in creating ideas for new products. Some Wilizy members speculated that she was getting some of her ideas from her dreams. Her latest idea? Miniature Wilizy cargo plane toys that children could fly remotely. The toy's cargo bay had space for five different chocolates and these would be packaged and sold as Wilizy Jumbo Chocolates. The first five would be included in the toy's purchase. Dreamer was pushing hard for the stores to have an entire toy section situated right next to the chocolate section. With that idea still to be approved, she had lots of time to spend in the gym.
Dreamer was practicing late one night when Theo and Lucas heard the dribbling and came in to watch. One rebounded for her and the other put a little defensive pressure on her. When she was finally exhausted, she thanked both of them for helping. Then Lucas said something unusual, for him at least.
"I never realized how much Double-Tom had hurt you until I heard you at Yanker's funeral. If you need help to get better, Theo and I will be there for you."
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Chapter 10
The little blonde girl's name was Karita. At least that's what Renfrew and Jenkins insisted it was. She knew that it wasn't. Her real name was Maddy – short for some name that was longer. Her first parents had told her once what that longer name was but she couldn't remember that word now. She did remember the name Maddy and she remembered how happy her first mommy had been when she had spelled it for the first time. It was the first word that she had ever printed.
Maddy was the word she was printing now on the inside of the heavy top to the toilet tank in her bathroom. Renfrew had given her a set of felt pens and colouring books when she had first arrived in the house with the special basement room. When Maddy found herself having difficulty remembering her real name, she had decided to write it down. Jenkins hadn't liked it when she had written it down on paper and had taped it to the wall in her bedroom. That was when she had learned that the thing around her neck wasn't a necklace after all.
Maddy was finding it difficult to remember her first mommy's face now. She remembered her first daddy only as a man who wore glasses. Maddy couldn't even remember what colour hair he had, but she did remember him telling her that she had blood that was different from everybody else's. If he ever saw some of her blood, he'd know it was hers. That was why Maddy had deliberately cut herself with a knife yesterday while she was washing the dishes. She made the cut under water, and since she couldn't see what she was doing, the cut was much longer than she had wanted it to be. Renfrew had pulled out the wand that would make her body shake, but she didn't push the button because Maddy was crying really hard. It hurt way more than she thought it would. Renfrew had put a thick Band-Aid on the cut. The Band-Aid with her blood was what Maddy was taping right next to where she had printed her name on the underside of the toilet tank top. She'd say that the Band-Aid had come off in her bath. And it had. She wouldn't say that she had helped it come off.
Maddy didn't like her afternoon naps. Naps were something that babies had. Maddy knew that she didn't used to have naps in the afternoon. She didn't know why she had to have naps now. All she knew was sometime after lunch, she would become very sleepy. Jenkins would let her nap on the comfy little couch in the special room – the one that had a computer screen with cartoons that she could watch when she had been especially good.
Maddy didn't like the dreams she was having in her naps. A frowning blonde lady was in those dreams. She made Maddy think that she had done something very bad and the lady was going to punish her for it. When Maddy had told Renfrew about her dreams, Renfrew had said that she was remembering things from her childhood. The people who she had thought were her parents were actually kidnappers who had stolen her from her real parents. Her real name was Karita, not Maddy. Now that those bad people weren't around any longer, she – Karita – was beginning to remember things from her childhood with her real parents. When Maddy had asked what had happened to the kidnappers, Renfrew had said that they had been caught and she wouldn't have to worry about being hurt by them again. Maddy didn't remember ever being hurt by them.
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Chapter 11
It was mid-August and the Raging Gardeners had just buried the Surrey pervert. This one had focused exclusively on blondes. His capture, trial, and funeral were all routine. Yolanda had been involved in the capture, so that was one difference, I guess. And Mac had messaged that she didn't feel the need to be at the burials any longer and Wanda had gone into the clearing third instead of first. And Dreamer was currently patting the shovel on the grave and not showing any signs of wanting to leave the clearing. There were lots of differences, come to think of it.
Momaka finished collecting the gardening tools and stored them in a soft cloth bag that she placed at the foot of a cedar tree. Dreamer continued to pat the loose soil on the top of the grave flat.
"I'm tired," Momaka said. "I need to rest." Then she sat down, patted the ground with her left hand, and motioned Dreamer to join her.
She did. It was about 5 p.m., and although it was August, the deep woods were beginning to darken. "If you're worried about bodies rising from the grave in the dark woods, Bob is here to protect us." Momaka tried to make it a light comment.
"If he can't, Dreamer the manipulative bitch will take his place." Not a light comment. "I'm not getting any better," Dreamer said as she tossed the shovel towards the sack of tools and took up a cross-legged sitting position directly opposite Momaka.
"Why do you say that?"
"I'm still screaming and howling."
In that, Dreamer was right. The intensity of her released emotions had actually increased.
"Perhaps that's because you couldn't let everything out when Wanda was with you."
"Mac is all better, Nonny said I should come on my own now, and three of the Franklin women have quit coming."
"Every woman's experience is different, Dreamer. Mac was older when she was assaulted and she dealt with the incident herself at the time. Your nonny wasn't sexually assaulted; her daughter was murdered. Two different situations. Two different rates of recovery."
"Will I be able to have babies?"
That question came out of the blue. Momaka shifted her position as though she were trying to get more comfortable before answering. This answer would take some fudging. It was entirely possible that Dreamer might not be able to have babies if Momaka couldn't repair the psychological harm. She said something else instead. "You weren't physically harmed, so why not?"
"Is that why you never married and had kids? Because you couldn't?"
"There were a number of reasons, and yes, physically I can't bear children. Plus Bob is not the kind of companion that husbands like to wake up to."
"How did you deal with not being able to have children?"
"I didn't handle it very well. But after I was able to keep Bob under control, I decided to have different kinds of children. My flowers, bushes, and trees."
"I don't think I'll be able to have sex. That means I won't be able to have children. I don't like to garden. What am I supposed to do?"
"I have a thermos of tea that we can share. Why don't you start at the beginning?"<
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"After my dad was taken off to jail, I thought that I'd stop being scared. All the other bad things that had happened to me when I was a kid had gone away. Colds, flu, hurt fingers. Even the arm I broke when I fell out of a tree healed. I figured I'd gradually get better. But I didn't. I was still frightened of undressing even though I knew it was silly and that he wasn't around to look. I still locked my bedroom door at night. If I heard a man's voice in the house, I'd still hide in my closet. I didn't get better."
Momaka passed the thermos cup to Dreamer but said nothing. Dreamer moistened her lips and passed the cup back.
"When Wizard came to the tribal center, I recognized him from one of my nice dreams and I thought that we could be friends. I wasn't scared around him. We held hands and I liked that kind of touch. And we hugged. I didn't freak out. He wasn't touching my, ah..."
"He wasn't touching you sexually."
"Yah, he wasn't touching me sexually, but I thought that might eventually happen and I was OK with that. And everything would be all right because I was finally better. I had been cured. I had waited a long time, but now I was better. And then my dad burst into my bedroom, and he was hugely angry, and I remembered what he had said that he'd do to me if I told anybody what had happened."
"He was going to rape you."
"Yeah. He was going to rape me and he had told me exactly how that would happen, step by step. And now he was in my bedroom. But I hadn't told anybody what he had tried to do, so why would he do that to me? And I freaked. I absolutely freaked. And Granny brought me to the compound where my dad couldn't hurt me. But I knew that I hadn't been cured after all. I wasn't going to be able to let a man look at me naked, and I knew that they liked to do that. I wasn't going to be able to..."
"Let him touch you sexually."
"Yeah. That. And if I couldn't let him do that, I wouldn't have any babies. And I wanted to have babies. And I wanted Wizard to be my husband. But that couldn't happen even if I was forever protected from my Dad. I wasn't better after all."