فصل 30

30

Two Dreams

The sun had just begun to creep above the horizon as the boats, one by one, headed out to sea. The sea was as calm as it had been the day Jack and Ostin had arrived in Fiji. Vishal spent most of the day in the cabin with Captain Nikhil, studying maps and communicating with other boats. By the end of the first day, the fleet was spread out more than ten miles. No Elgen were spotted, but there was one incident that slowed the fleet down. One of the older boats broke down and had to be abandoned, its passengers, cargo, and fuel distributed among the other ships.

The atmosphere on the MAS was tense, and most of her occupants kept to themselves. The beautiful weather felt like a lie, since everyone knew there were war clouds ahead. It seemed that with each mile the tension grew still greater. At one point, Jack took one of the guns they’d stored belowdecks and went to the back of the boat to shoot. The diversion didn’t last long because Nikhil sent one of his crew back to tell Jack to stop wasting ammunition.

Ostin was glad when the sun began its descent into the rippling-orange sea and he and Jack went belowdecks to the berths. Ostin lay on the middle of three bunks; Jack lay on the bottom. An hour after they’d gone to bed, Ostin rolled over in his bunk toward the outside edge. “Jack. You awake?” There was a long pause, then Jack said, “If I said no, would that stop you from talking?” “That would be illogical, because—”

“Stop,” Jack said. “What do you want?” “I was just thinking they should almost be there by now.” Jack didn’t respond.

“What do you think Hatch will do to them?” Jack was silent for a moment, then said, “I don’t want to think about it.” “Me neither. Do you think we’re going to live through this?” “I don’t know.”

“What’s your gut feeling?”

“You don’t want to know,” Jack said.

“I really do.”

“I didn’t think we were going to live through the battle of Hades.” “Me neither. If it wasn’t for Michael, we wouldn’t have.” Jack sighed. “How many guards do you think Hatch will bring in?” Ostin thought it over. “The short answer?” “Sure.”

“However many he needs to feel safe.”

“What’s the long answer?”

“At last count there were seventy-two operating Starxource plants. I’ve never seen less than twenty guards at each plant we’ve been in, but they run 24/7, so if they keep eight-hour shifts, triple that number. That would make for four thousand three hundred and twenty guards at plants. If Hatch keeps a skeleton crew on each plant and pulls in two-thirds of them, that would be approximately two thousand eight hundred and eighty guards on their way to Tuvalu. Of course that’s all speculation.” Jack groaned. “Almost three thousand highly trained, armed guards against one hundred seventy-four of us. I don’t like those odds.” “Last time we fought them off with less.” “Yeah, and we had the Electroclan.”

“. . . And Michael,” Ostin said.

“That’s why we’ve got to find Enele and his army,” Jack said.

“What if we don’t find them?”

“Then we go with plan B.”

“Plan B? What’s plan B?”

Jack said softly, “We are the army.”

Ostin rolled back over and closed his eyes. He didn’t want to ask any more questions.

Not surprisingly, neither Jack nor Ostin slept well that night. Ostin didn’t fall asleep until after three in the morning. He woke several hours after sunrise to see Jack sitting on the bunk opposite him eating something.

“What’s for breakfast?” Ostin.

“Coconut granola bars.” Jack threw him one. “How’d you sleep?” Ostin began to unwrap the bar. “Bad.”

“Me too,” Jack said.

“I had the weirdest dream. The weirdest part was that it seemed so real. I could almost swear it was real.” “That’s bizarre,” Jack said. “I did too. Tell me yours first.” “I was lying in bed when I suddenly saw Michael. He was just standing there, his feet a few inches off the floor. And I could kind of see through him, except he was so bright. Like a fluorescent lightbulb.” “Hold on,” Jack said. “You dreamed that Michael was, like, floating in the air, right here next to us?” “Yes.”

“That’s the exact same dream I had. Except, in my dream, he gave me a message. He said we would find Enele on . . . He said two places, one started with an N, the other with an P. Sounded like a planet . . . Pluto.” “Plutus,” Ostin said. “He said to find Enele we needed to go to the island Hatch calls Plutus, the one the Tuvaluans call Nukufetau. He said Enele was sent there by . . .” “. . . Elder Malakite . . . ,” Jack said.

“Malakai,” Ostin corrected. “He went to talk to him before going to war.” “Dude, we had the exact same dream. Except it was like you said, it didn’t seem like a dream.” “Maybe it wasn’t a dream.”

“What do you mean?”

“Maybe that really was Michael.”

Suddenly Jack’s expression changed. “Stop,” he said. “Don’t even go there. Michael’s dead. Just like Wade and Tanner and Gervaso.” “But what if he isn’t?”

“I said, stop it,” Jack said angrily. “It’s just wrong.” “Then explain the dream.”

Jack took a deep breath. “I can’t.”

Ostin climbed out of his bunk. “Just a minute.” He walked out of the room, returning a moment later with a pen and piece of paper. He wrote something down on the paper, then folded it into a square.

“What are you doing?” Jack said.

Ostin handed the paper to Jack. “I’m telling you, I don’t think it was just a dream. At the end of the dream, just before Michael left, he said something very specific. Do you remember?” Jack thought for a moment, then said, “Yes.” “What did he say?”

“He said something like, ‘You will be attacked. But hold on. I will be there when I can.’ Then he said, ‘Look for the . . .’ It was a really weird word, sounded like ‘hurry at you.’ ” Ostin said, “Open the paper.”

Jack unfolded the piece of paper. Ostin had written: You will be attacked. Hold on.

I will be there when I can. Look for the Uira te Atua.

Jack looked up. “How did you do that?” “It wasn’t a trick,” Ostin said. “That’s what he said to me too.” Jack was speechless.

“What if Michael isn’t dead, just changed?” “What do you mean, changed?”

“Energy can’t be created nor destroyed; it just changes from one form to another. Just like chemical energy can’t be destroyed, but it can be converted into kinetic energy.” “I don’t know what you’re saying,” Jack said. “What’s kinetic energy?” “It’s energy in motion. For instance, if you take nitroglycerin, a chemical compound, and detonate it, like in dynamite, you’ve changed chemical energy to kinetic energy.” “What’s your point?”

“Hear me out,” Ostin said. “This is just a what if, but before Hades, Michael was becoming more and more electric—he was becoming more energy and less matter. What if, then, when the lightning struck him, it completed the process and he became pure energy?” “And then he couldn’t be destroyed,” Jack said.

“No. He was converted to kinetic energy, which changed to thermal energy, like a nuclear blast.” “But then, after the explosion, he’s gone.” “Not really,” Ostin said. “What if he is trapped in some kind of energy field and he’s trying to reestablish himself? Taylor said he appeared to her but didn’t say anything. We both saw him and he spoke to us. That means his consciousness is still attached to his energy. It also means he’s starting to figure himself out.” “Then Michael is . . . energy?”

“We’re all energy,” Ostin said. “Michael’s just pure energy. Einstein believed that energy could be turned into matter, which, in 1997, was proven when a linear collider, using a high-powered electron beam and an electric field, was able to collide the photons in a way to produce matter.” Jack shook his head. “I have no idea what you just said.” “What I just said is that I believe that Michael is pure energy trying to convert himself back into matter.” “You mean, you think Michael’s trying to come back?” Ostin looked at him. “I think he already has.”