With the sharp crrrrack of a gunshot, a tree branch exploded just over Torquin’s head. We all dove into a thicket. “Why are we using darts when they’re using bullets?” Fiddle screamed.
“KI not killers,” Torquin replied. He reached out and lifted Fiddle onto his back as if he were a rag doll. “Go! Deeper into jungle. Hide!”
We followed Cass back the way we’d come. Behind us, an explosion rocked the jungle and we were airborne in a storm of dirt and leaves. I thumped to the ground, inches behind Aly and Cass. A tree crashed to the jungle floor exactly where Torquin and Fiddle had been.
“Torquin!” I shouted.
“Safe!” his voice replied from somewhere behind the tree. “Just go!”
Flames leaped up all along the pathway we’d just taken. As we ran blindly into the jungle, I peered over my shoulder to see Torquin and Fiddle following us. Cass was taking the lead, his head constantly turning left and right. Honestly, I don’t know what he was seeing. Every inch of the jungle looked the same to me. But Cass knew. Somehow.
Panting, he stopped in a clearing and looked around. The explosions were like distant thunder now, barely audible above the animal noises and the sound of our own breaths. “Did you know this place was here?” I asked.
“Of course,” Cass nodded. “Didn’t you? We’ve been here before. We’re near the beach where we saw the dead whale. If we have to, we can follow the coast around to the plane.”
“Whoa, dismount!” Fiddle said as Torquin stomped into the area. Sliding off the giant’s back, Fiddle grimaced. He took off his broken glasses and pulled a tiny shard from his cheek. “This really hurts. That means it’s not a dream, right? Which is a bummer.”
“Are you okay?” Aly asked.
“Yeah, I think.” Fiddle nodded. “Although I should have bought safety lenses.”
“What happened here?” I demanded, catching my breath.
Fiddle’s eyes seemed drained of life. His face was taut, his voice distant, as if he were recounting a horrible nightmare. “I’m . . . sitting in the airport minding my own business—and these turkeys fly in. No one expected it. We were caught totally unaware. Someone must have given us away . . .”
“Marco,” Torquin said.
“Marco doesn’t know the way here,” Aly protested. “None of us do. It’s got to be someone else.”
“It is.” Cass eyed me warily. “It’s . . . Jack.”
I looked at him, speechless.
“Not you, personally,” Cass said. “Your phone. The one your mom gave you, in the Massa HQ. You turned it on while we were here.”
“Wait,” Aly said. “And you left it on?”
“Okay, maybe—but so what?” I said. “No signal can get through to the island. It’s totally off the grid. Any grid!”
Aly groaned, slumping against a tree. “It’s not about location, it’s about vector, Jack—meaning direction. When we got in the plane, the signal traveled with us. Once we left the protected area around the island, the Massa could pick up the signal.”
I imagined a map, with an arching, beeping signal, traveling slowly from the middle of the ocean toward Egypt. Like a big old arrow pointing where to go. “So they just followed the path backward and kept going . . . until they discovered the island . . .”
“Bingo,” Cass said.
I felt dizzy. This whole thing was my fault. If it weren’t for my boneheaded move, we wouldn’t be in this danger. How could I have been so ignorant? “I—I’m so sorry. I should have known.”
Cass was pacing back and forth. “Forget that now, Brother Jack. Really. It’s okay. Actually, it’s not.”
“Need to counterattack,” Torquin added, looking back in the direction of the compound.
“You and what army?” Fiddle asked. “You got zombies hidden away? Because the Massa are all over the explosives supply now. I say we run. However you got here, let’s get out the same way.”
When Torquin turned, his face was lined and his eyes moist, as if he’d aged a few years. “Never leave Professor Bhegad behind.”
“Or the Loculi,” I said. “Where are they?”
Torquin and Fiddle both looked at each other and shrugged.
“We gave them to Bhegad,” Aly said. “He didn’t tell you where he put them?”
Cass sagged. “There goes that plan.”
“Okay . . . okay . . .” I said, rubbing my forehead as I tried to think this through. “Bhegad probably kept the location of the Loculi to himself—one person only, to avoid a security leak. So we find him first, and he’ll lead us to them.”
“Unless the Massa get to him before us,” Cass said.
“Bhegad tough,” Torquin said. “Won’t crack under pressure.”
“We need to find his EP assignment,” Fiddle said. “Emergency protocol. We all get one. It’s where we have to go in case of an attack.”
“These EP assignments,” Aly said. “Are they stored somewhere?”
Fiddle shrugged. “Must be. The assignments are changed randomly from time to time. We’re notified electronically.”
“I’ll need to get to the systems control building.” Aly looked up. “The sun is setting. We have maybe an hour before it gets too dark to see outside. That’ll help us.”
“But the control building will be full of Massa,” Cass said.
“We clear it,” Torquin declared.
Fiddle looked at him in bafflement. “How? With darts? You guys are out of your minds. We need an army, not a sneak attack with a half-blind geek, a caveman, and three kids barely out of diapers.” He looked toward the water.
Aly’s jaw hung open. “Did you say . . . diapers?”
“Caveman?” Torquin added.
Fiddle backed away slowly. “Oh, I forgot—feelings. Guess you guys want sensitivity. Fine, it’s your funeral.”
He turned, lurching into the jungle.
“Hey!” Torquin cried.
As he lumbered after Fiddle, I followed. Aly called me back but I kept going. “Torquin, let him go!” I cried out.
After a few turns, deeper into the dense-packed trees, I felt my foot jam under a root. I tripped and landed a few feet from Torquin’s pack. I guessed he must have dropped it to lighten his load. But I couldn’t leave it there. Not with those tranquilizer darts inside. We could use those.
Wincing, I sat up. I could hear movement—footsteps? I wasn’t even sure from which direction the sound was coming. The sky was darkening. I looked over my shoulder, but the jungle was without paths, and even my own footsteps were lost in the dense greenery. “Aly?” I called out. “Cass?”
I waited. High overhead a monkey screamed. It dropped from a branch and landed on its feet, jumping wildly up and down. Eeee! Eeee!
“Go away!” I said. “I don’t have any food.”
It was slapping its own head now, gesturing wildly back into the woods.
“Do I know you?” I said, narrowing my eyes at the creature. During my first escape attempt from the island, I’d been lured to Torquin’s helicopter by an extremely smart chimp. Who looked very much like this one. “Are you showing me which way to go?”
Oooh, it grunted, darting straight for the backpack.
So that was its game—distracting me so it could steal the pack! “Hey, give me that!” I shouted.
A loud crack resounded, followed by a familiar scream.
Aly’s voice!
Ignoring the branches and vines that slashed across my face, I ran back toward the noise. In moments I saw the dull glow of the clearing.
Silently I dropped into the brush. I had a sight line. Cass and Aly were where I’d left them. Aly’s arm was bleeding. Cass was holding a branch high like a spear. Around them were four helmeted Massa, armed with rifles. They grinned, jeering, taunting my friends in some language I didn’t know.
My muscles tightened, ready to spring.
No. No way you can jump in there alone.
Where was Torquin?
I felt something jam into my
back and nearly screamed aloud.
Whipping around, I came face-to-face with the monkey. It was holding out Torquin’s backpack to me.
I grabbed it and spun back toward the clearing. Shaking, I pulled out the blowpipe. My hands were sweaty. As I reached for a dart, the weapon slipped out of my hand. It clattered onto a rock. Behind me the monkey screeched in surprise.
From the dense jungle, a rifle emerged, pointing directly at my face.
CHAPTER SIX
GOOD-BYE, WILBUR
“YEAAAGHHH!”
Torquin’s roar blotted out all sound. He leaped from the brush into the clearing, about twenty yards to my right.
The four soldiers wheeled around. Torquin landed full body on the one who’d found me, squashing the guy to the ground. Behind him, another Massa soldier was trying to take aim at Torquin, but the two bodies were too close. Instead he raised his rifle high and brought it down on Torquin’s head. Hard. It hit with a solid thud.
Aly ran toward Torquin to help, but the assailant backed away, the weapon still in his hand.
Its barrel was now bent, forming the shape of Torquin’s skull.
Torquin stood, scratching his head in puzzlement. Then, grabbing the rifle, he flung it against a tree, with its owner still holding tight. The guy folded without a whimper.
“Two down,” Torquin grunted.
As the other two men maneuvered in the confusion, I snatched up the blowpipe, jammed a dart down the tube, and blew. It sailed into the clearing, nearly hitting Aly and Cass along the way.
Eeee! chided the monkey, holding out another dart.
The men couldn’t seem to decide where to point their rifles, at Torquin or me. I aimed carefully, firing once again. Cass and Aly dove to the ground, out of the way. But my shot sailed true this time, catching one Massa in the side of the neck.
EEEEEE! The monkey was jumping up and down now.
“My feeling exactly,” I said.
The monkey began gesturing frantically into the trees. I turned to see the remaining commando on his knees, lifting his rifle.
I ducked behind a bush, reaching for a dart. But I had used the last one. The monkey was grabbing my shoulder, leapfrogging over my head. “Hey!” I shouted.
Crrrack!
I flinched as the creature’s body jolted backward. It hit me in the face, knocking me to the ground. As I fell, a warm liquid oozed downward onto my neck.
I turned to see Torquin pummeling the last attacker with his massive fists. Cass and Aly were screaming, but I couldn’t make out the words.
“Little man, are you okay?” came Fiddle’s voice.
I blinked the blood from my eye. Fiddle was kneeling over me, cradling my head in his hand. “F-fine,” I said, spraying his face with red dots. “I thought you were going without us.”
“I was, until Gigantor got ahold of me,” he replied. “Dude, you totally rocked the Massa. I am impressed.”
“It wasn’t just me,” I said, sitting up.
Above, the setting sun had cast the sky orange. The waning light illuminated the small body of the monkey, lying in a twisted position on its back.
I watched Torquin quickly dig a hole with a bayonet. As he lowered the monkey’s body into it, distant shouts and explosions filtered through the thick jungle. The sky was darkening, which would only be to our advantage. By my calculation, the battle for the island had been under way for hours. We had little time and less hope of defeating the Massa. But in that moment all I could think about was the bravery of the little creature.
I felt a tear drop from my cheek onto the dirt. Aly looked at me with concern and put a hand on my shoulder.
“He took one for me,” I said with a shrug. “He didn’t deserve this.”
Aly nodded. As we rushed to cover the hole with soil, Torquin softly murmured, “Good-bye, Wilbur.”
“That’s the monkey’s name—Wilbur?” Cass asked.
Torquin wiped at his cheek with a huge hand.
“Guess he really meant something to you,” Aly said.
Torquin shook his head. “Humid today, is all.”
With a rustle of leaves, another commando emerged from the bush. It took a moment to recognize it was Fiddle, dressed in a Massa outfit he’d taken from an unconscious soldier. “I suggest we all suit up, guys. No time to lose.”
I turned. The four Massa officers were tied to trees at the edge of the clearing, their uniforms piled at their feet. “Four Massa, five us,” Torquin said. “I get uniform later.”
“Better hope they make them in plus sizes,” Fiddle said. “Now, hurry. And take the weapons, in case these guys wake up and break free.”
Leaving the gravesite, we each grabbed an outfit and put it on. The guys were all big, so the garb fit loosely over our own clothes.
Cass rolled up the cuffs of his baggy pants, pulled his belt as tight as it went, and grabbed a commando rifle. As Aly picked up another rifle and strapped it over her thin shoulders, her whole body sagged.
Fiddle gave her a dubious look. “You guys are a bigger danger to yourselves than the Massa are.”
“Try us,” Aly said.
“Follow me,” Cass said, stepping to the edge of the clearing. As we fell in behind, dodging our way around vines and trees, the jungle seemed to grow darker by the second. Under the helmet I was sweating like crazy. The noise from the compound had subsided, which meant the battle was winding down. What would we see? My heartbeat quickened with a mixture of hope and dread.
My rifle clanked heavily against my side, but that was nothing compared to the swarm of mosquitoes around my ankles. “Get away!” I said through gritted teeth, bending to swat at the cloud of tiny bugs.
I stopped in midslap at the sight of a flat rock, nearly as big as a manhole cover. On it was a carving of a fierce griffin, a half eagle, half lion. I bent down to examine it. I’d seen it before—back when I’d first tried to escape from the KI.
“Hm,” Torquin said, looming up behind me. He picked up the rock and scowled at the carving. “Griffin. Pah!”
The burning smell grew stronger. Through the branches now, I could see the winking lights of the compound. Distant voices shouted. From our left came the sound of painful, pitiful groans. Cries for help.
I looked at the others. They had all heard it, too. We changed direction, moving closer. I knew where we were now—just behind our dormitory.
We crouched behind thick brush. Not ten feet in front of us was a scraggly field, where a guard moved slowly back and forth, smoking a cigarette. “They’re using our dorm as a prison,” Aly whispered.
“At least they’re keeping KI people alive,” Fiddle said.
A pinpoint of light shot through the air. Before I could react, the stub of a lit cigarette hit the side of my face.
“Gggghhh—”
Torquin’s beefy hand closed around my mouth, cutting off an outcry. My cheek stung, and his fingers only made it worse.
The guard stopped in his tracks. He came closer to the jungle’s edge. Toward us. I held my breath. His eyes scanned the bushes as he shone a flashlight. From the dorm came a sudden clatter and the muffled voice of a KI captive: “Emergency! Yo, Massa lunkheads—Fritz is having a seizure! Somebody get him his medication!”
Fritz. The mechanic who had been part of my KI training.
But the guard ignored the voice. The beam was coming closer. It would discover my face first. I crouched lower, pressing my hands against the rocky ground. Torquin was to my right. He turned to me and mouthed the words “talk to him.” He gestured to my uniform.
I had almost forgotten. We were dressed like them. But what was I supposed to say?
“I see you . . .” the guard said, stepping closer.
Torquin glared. Taking a deep breath, I stood. “Of course you did!” I said, pointing to the welt on my cheek. “I . . . fell.”
Lame, lame, lame, Jack!
A smile grew across the guard’s face. He raised his rifle. “Nice outfit, kid. I know w
ho you are,” he said. “And your face is going to look a lot worse if you don’t tell me where your little friends are.”
He lifted his rifle high over his head. I stepped back, shaking.
A dull gray blur shot across my line of sight. It connected with the Massa’s face with a sickening thud. Silently, he and his rifle fell to the ground.
The griffin rock was resting by his head.
“Now,” Torquin said, stepping triumphantly out of the woods, “we have fifth uniform.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
EMERGENCY PROTOCOLS
“HOW DO I look?” Torquin walked stiffly toward us, wearing the fallen Massa’s garb. The pants had ripped at the seams, his arms dangled out of the too-short sleeves, and his belly protruded from an unbuttoned shirt.
“Like a bear in samajap,” Cass replied. “Too bad it’s getting dark. We could kill them with laughter.”
Aly and I were poised at the edge of the jungle. Fiddle had raced into the dorm, which was now unguarded. Around us, the compound was in utter chaos. The place may have been a great research institute, but it wasn’t built to withstand an assault.
A piercing alarm made us jump. Seconds later, Fiddle raced out the back door of the dorm. Behind him swarmed a group of bedraggled KI people. Two of them were holding Fritz the mechanic by his legs and shoulders. As they disappeared into the jungle to our left, Fiddle gestured toward the escapees. “All of you!” he urged. “Get to MO twenty-one, now!”
“Is Fritz okay?” I asked.
“Diabetic,” Fiddle explained, as KI prisoners streamed out of the dorm. “Needs an insulin injection. Fortunately, there are plenty of medical doctors among the KI. We have a couple of hidden shelters on the island. MO twenty-one is near Mount Onyx. There’ll be insulin in the emergency supplies there.”
I could barely recognize some of the KI staff. Brutus, the head chef, had been beaten badly, his face swollen and red. He had to be helped by two others. Hiro, the martial-arts trainer, was walking with a crutch. They looked toward us, weary and bewildered, as if we were a dream.