Chapter 31: Chapter 31: Flying for Fools Part 1

“We’re going to what?” Chleo stared at Merk, shrugging on the cloak Dai offered. She glanced at the others to see if he was serious. It seemed he was. “No, no way, we can’t go back there.”

She felt sweat gather on her palms, subtly trying to wipe them on the cloak’s hard, slick material. The other’s shared a look. Will grabbed her hand eyeing the chain still attached to her wrist. He asked the question she’d read in their eyes since she arrived, “What happened?”

“Nothing,” she said, determined to stay in a world of denial until they escaped. “They healed me… then made me run.”

“They made you… run?” Merk repeated. “That’s why you don’t want to go back, why you don’t want to free the other patients?”

“Yes, no, it wasn’t. That’s not only why…” She ground her teeth in frustration hugging the research papers closer. Experiments, guards, crazy scientist, madman torturer, they were all great reasons, but not ones she cared to examine in detail with an audience.

“Merk, be reasonable.” Chleo could have kissed Dai for jumping in. “You know we can’t.”

“Of course we can.” A hint of desperation edged into his voice. “The kid came up with a great plan. We just hit John’s study a little early. We’ll grab the book now, head down to the lab, and be in and out before anyone knows we’re here.”

They already knew, Chleo thought, glancing at the unconscious guards littering the floor.

“No,” Eelock said with finality. Merk’s mouth snapped shut around another protest. “We head to the rendezvous.”

Chleo’s shoulders sagged in relief. A bout of exhaustion made her lean farther onto Will’s arm. She tried to answer his worried glance with a smile but was afraid it came off more as a grimace.

Merk looked ready to kill but fell in line. None of them were ready when the bookcase banged open, or when guards rushed into the room. Chleo acted without thinking. The chain was in flight and headed toward the first man before the bookshelf’s bang stopped echoing. Merk, Dai, and Eelock reacted in kind, shooting an odd assortment of marbles at the others. The metal balls buzzed to the targets’ necks and stuck. Three more guards littered the floor.

“Handy, that,” Will said, raising an eyebrow at the chain as Chleo reeled it back around her arm.

“It is now.” She meant the comment to be flippant. Instead, it made Will’s face blank. She bit her lip to keep from saying anything else.

“Time to go,” Dai announced as the three Neons flipped their hoods back into place. The room returned to normal, lit only by the flickering flame of lamplight.

Will walked behind his uncle’s desk and pulled a drawer open. Yellow light shot out and bathed the room. “Predictable,” he muttered before grabbing the book and sliding it in his coat. By the time it was tucked safely away, green pigments had retaken the cover.

Staring back into the drawer, Chleo watched his brow furrow. He grabbed something else and slipped it in his pocket. Their mission complete, he stalked over to the opposite wall and pulled a book from the bookcase. Another door swung open, knocking one of the unconscious guard’s legs out of the way.

“Are there any bookcases in this room that aren’t secret passages?” Merk grumbled, still angry.

Will shrugged as they filed inside, pulling the door closed behind them.

~*~*~

“Pst, Chleo,” Dai whispered jogging a couple of steps to catch up. Merk shot her a glare. He’d ordered silence as soon as they’d entered the tunnels. Chleo watched as she scrunched her nose at him and rolled her eyes. “I have something for you. It’s in the pocket.”

She tilted her head toward the borrowed cloak. Chleo furrowed her brow, sticking a hand in. She froze. Her step faltered, before returning to a normal pace. The chain of her watch jingled as she pulled it from the pocket.

She swallowed around a lump. “Thank you.” Her eyes refused to leave the owl etched into the cover’s surface. They needed all the luck they could get. “I didn’t think I’d see it again.”

Dai made a small, comforting hum, placing a hand on her shoulder, “I’ve come to find that the things we lose have a tendency to come back to us in the end.”

Chleo didn’t think there was any logic to it, but it sounded nice all the same. She shot Dai a grateful smile. Will pulled away from the third peep hole he’d checked since leaving the study and snapped it shut. He frowned.

“What is it?” Chleo whispered. Merk grumbled in the back about useless orders that no one followed. She wasn’t sure, but she could have sworn she heard Eelock chuckle.

“They’re blocking all the exits,” Will whispered back with a sigh. “I think they know we’re here, and are-”

“Leading us somewhere,” she finished with him. He gave her a questioning look. She shrugged. “It’s what they did when I escaped.”

He bit his lip, and she couldn’t help but think how cute he looked. Not the time Chleo.

“What?”

“Nothing.” She bit her cheek to keep her thoughts firmly inside her head. “What do we do?”

Will shared a look with Eelock. “It’ll still work?” Eelock asked.

Will nodded. “It’ll still work.”

“Then we continue.”

Will straightened his shoulders and lifted his head high. With a quick nod and whispered, “Stay close.” They continued down the passage.

The seventh peep hole was clear. “This is it,” Will muttered to the others. He looked back at Eelock. “They’re forcing us higher in the tower.”

At Eelock’s nod, Will pulled the tapestry aside and ran across the corridor. They watched him pull a lamp mount down releasing a ladder from the ceiling. He motioned for them to follow.

Chleo stepped onto the ladder first, the others trailing after. The climb was long, but nowhere near the height needed to scale Timekeeper’s outer wall to the roof. She pulled up into a small crawlspace. Will hefted himself into the passage next, trying to hide his shaking hands.

“Why is it always heights?” he complained. She smothered a laugh. Dai joined them.

Eelock and Merk were nearly there when the darts started flying. A couple struck their cloaks and fell harmlessly to the floor before they scrambled to join the others. Will yanked the ladder up just as the first guard arrived. More darts shot through the opening in the ceiling before they slammed it closed.

“Well, you were right,” Merk said breathing heavily. “They definitely know we’re here.”

Will hummed in agreement. “This passage is rarely used, but well-known. It won’t be long before they follow. This way.”

He led them forward in a hunched jog, checking every few meters to see if they could exit. They couldn’t. The tunnel began to narrow as the floor inclined. Merk had to start crawling first, then Eelock. Dai, Will, and Chleo followed not long after.

The sound of boots pounding stone echoed off the walls. With an unspoken urgency, they increased their speed. Chleo’s knees ached. Her arms shook from unheeded exhaustion. Just a little farther, she bargained with them.

It became a mantra after the seventh spiral, boots and rustling uniforms a constant beat behind them. They were still traveling up, and she wondered how they would ever get out with all of the exits at the bottom. The boots echoed closer.

Finally, Will gave a frantic nod and shoved a panel open on the ceiling. They scrambled out. The relief from stretching her legs was short-lived.

The room was large, almost the size of the infirmary below, with trophies lining the walls. Some were from hunts on Terra, sporting mounted animals she’d only seen in books. Others were statues of precious metals engraved with an achievement worthy of them. Windows spanned the outer wall, lending a spectacular view of the planet rising over the horizon. It was beautiful, and if not for the guards stepping out from behind some of the larger structures and through the intricate entrance, Chleo would have enjoyed it quite a bit.

The sheer history of the room and its owners’ accomplishments would have taken her a lifetime to explore. Instead, she found herself and her friends edging back toward the outer wall and its indulgent view of the countryside in a defensive semi-circle.

“You know, this would be much easier if we had comms up,” Merk grumbled to her left. Chleo couldn’t help but agree. Mic’s bird would have been a huge help at the moment.

The guards began to close rank, pushing them farther into the room until they were backed against the windows. Chleo glanced over her shoulder. A thin pane of glance stood between them and a long fall. She readied her chain. The guards would win, but she didn’t have to make it easy.

The guards shuffled, bringing their arms to bear in a choreographed move made from hours of drilling. Chleo’s muscles tensed. Merk vibrated with energy to her left, reminding her of a dog waiting for his owner’s permission to chase a rabbit. Will stood with grim certainty to her right. She felt more than observed their group take a collective breath, preparing to do battle.

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Squeak, rrrr, squeak, rrrr, squeak.

A rusty wheel echoed through the hall. Chleo watched as the guard nearest her furrowed his brow doing his best not to turn and search for the misplaced noise. She shared a questioning look with Will. He shrugged.

“Excuse me. Excuse me. Terribly sorry about this,” a voice bumbled through the waves of guards. They parted at its coming. “You know how the His Majesty can be about these sorts of things. Go clean the trophy room, he says. Right in the middle of a break-in, can you believe it?”

A smile split across Will’s face. The wheel squeaked closer, the splash of a mop accompanying it. The guards shifted, unsure how to handle the new development. None of their drills ever covered it.

Finally, the line parted letting Mops break through to the others, a mop and pail wheeled behind him. “Sorry, am I late?” he asked through his cleaner’s mask and goggles.

“Right on time,” Will congratulated, pulling his own mask up over his mouth and nose. Chleo watched the others do the same as Will handed her a spare. She wasted no time following their lead. The guards hesitated a second too long. She assumed they were waiting for orders. A blind man would have seen the danger they were in.

Mops lit a match and tossed it in the pail. Blue flames erupted, latching onto the mop and following it down to the floor. Guards knocked into each other trying to avoid the chemical fire as it shot through their ranks following the trail he’d left on the way in. They needn’t have bothered. It burned out as quickly as it started, leaving silky smoke behind in its wake.

Chleo watched as the guards toppled like dominoes. A couple almost reached the doors before the smoke took them, too. She turned to ask Mops what he’d used, when the window behind them shattered.

Without thinking, she tackled Will to the ground trying to shield him from the spray of glass. She waited for impact… and waited… and waited.

“Uh, Chleo?” Will asked from beneath her.

“Yeah?”

“Not that I want to discourage this type of… what I mean to say is…” He stuttered as his face turned a color that looked more at place on Merk.

“He means, why are you on top of him?” Mops jumped in helpfully.

“Quite right, yes.” He nodded.

It was her turn for red cheeks. “Oh, I uh.” She sat up clumsily. Her coordination still wasn’t one hundred percent. “I just thought, you know, big noise, glass… everywhere…” she finished trailing off.

His face morphed into a teasing smile. “You tried to save me.”

“I, well.” She glanced at the pane-less window, Merk smirking at her as he replaced some sort of device into his belt. Wind whipped her hair, and she found herself wishing for her goggles. Not a shard of glass touched the trophy room’s floor. “Of course I did, you Starlit fool.”

She caught Merk mouthing Starlit to Dai and the woman’s answering shrug. Shaking her head, Chleo turned back to Will. “What did you expect me to do?”

He laughed slinging an arm over her shoulders and kissing her temple. “Lets get out of here. Mops, you sure you won’t come?”

Chleo looked back at the empty window, brow furrowed.

“Nah, someone has to look after this place while you’re gone.”

“Come on, I thought you always said you wanted to get out of this Lux forsaken palace.”

Mops smiled. “And I do… as a chauffeur.” Chleo understood. The palace was his home. He wanted adventure, but that didn’t mean he wanted to leave. A pang of loss shot through Chleo as the image of the Shack flashed through her mind.

“But you could-” Will started. Chleo tugged on his sleeve giving him an empathetic look. He caught her eye and paused. “It’s just,” he said turning back to his friend, “what if they know you helped me?”

Mops sent her a grateful smile. “They won’t,” he scoffed. “You know us mops and brooms boys. We’re invisible.” He winked.

Will unwound himself from Chleo’s shoulders and stepped forward offering his hand. “You better be.” Mops reached for it and pulled him into a one armed hug.

“You be careful, alright?” She heard one of them mutter. It was hard to tell which, maybe both. When they stepped away each boy had suspiciously bright eyes, not that they’d ever admit it.

“Mr. Mopeth,” Eelock approached as Chleo eyed the open window again. Seriously, how were they going to leave? “Thank you for your help. You’re truly a credit to your family.” He took a moment to glance toward Will.

“Thank you, sir. That’s very kind of you to say.”

“If you ever need us, or change your mind.” Eelock pulled a small device from his pocket with a single button. “Just press this. Wherever we are, we’ll know, and we’ll come back as soon as we can.”

Mops reached out and took it, laying it out in his hand to examine. “This little thing will find you all the way on Terra?” he asked raising an impressed eyebrow.

“If that is where we are, yes. If we are farther, it will reach us there, too.”

“Farther?” Mops’s second eyebrow rose to join the first.

“That’s the thing about life Mr. Mopeth. No one knows quite where it will take you.” Eelock chuckled.

“Right.” Mops swallowed, tucking the gadget into his pocket. “I’ll remember that.”

“Are we ready?” Merk shouted from the window, standing entirely too close to the edge, in Chleo’s opinion. Will must have thought the same because he paled three shades lighter when he looked over.

“This was your plan?” she muttered out of the side of her mouth. Wordlessly, he nodded trying to keep his face blank. She bit her lip to keep from laughing. There would be time to tease him about it later. To do it now, would be cruel. “What exactly is it?”

“Hm?” He still hadn’t looked away from the window. Wind tussled his hair, making him look windswept. She liked it. Chleo slid her hand into his.

“The plan,” she clarified. “What’s the plan?”

“Oh, uh-”

Chleo didn’t hear whatever came next. Something caught her attention… something in the sky. It was a crack… and it was growing larger.

“What the-” Before she could finish her thought, the crack grew into a hole, and suddenly, she was staring at the inside of a very metallic room with a strange, decidedly human man in foreignly fashionable clothes waving at them.

“- and so when I learned what ‘ghosting’ meant, it seemed like the most logical solution,” Will finished beside her.

“Huh?” she asked tearing her eyes away to look at him. “Will what happened to the sky?”

He gave her a questioning glance before turning to look out the window. She waited for him to freak out as much as she was. He didn’t. Why wasn’t he freaking out? There was a surprisingly large room where the outside used to be, and everyone was acting like it was normal. Merk and Dai were already halfway up the ramp leading to it.

“Easy, easy,” Will broke into her not so mental ramblings. She bit her lip to stop them. “That’s what I was trying to explain. It’s a ship.”

“A ship,” she repeated. She turned to look at him. “That can fly?”

“And disappear.” He nodded.

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