Gone Series Complete Collection (29 page)

“I’m going to try something,” he announced.

Sam killed the engine and let the boat wallow. The boat seemed to want to drift along the wall. There was a current, only slight, but definite. The current chased down the side of the wall heading away from land, following the long curve still farther out to sea.

“Do we have an anchor?” Sam asked.

The answer was a retching sound. Sam looked away as Edilio gave up his lunch.

“Never mind,” said Sam, “I’ll look.”

There was no anchor. But he noticed that Astrid was making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. She handed one to Sam.

He had not realized he was hungry. He stuffed half the sandwich in his mouth. “This is why they call you Astrid the Genius,” he mumbled through the peanut butter.

“Man, don’t talk about food,” Edilio groaned.

Sam searched his little boat. No anchor anywhere, but there were some plastic bumpers, which he hung over the side in case he brushed against the barrier. And there was a coil of blue-and-white nylon rope. He tied one end securely to a cleat and tied the other end around his ankle. He stripped off his shirt and kicked off his shoes, leaving him in shorts. Rummaging in one of the holds, he found a long screwdriver.

“What are you doing?” Quinn asked.

Sam ignored him. “Edilio, man, you going to live?”

“I hope not,” Edilio said through gritted teeth.

“I’m going to dive down, see if I can get below the barrier.”

Astrid looked skeptical, worried, but Sam could see she was in her own head, preoccupied. Probably trying to come to grips with almost getting shot.

Quinn said, “I’ll haul you in if you get jammed up.”

Sam nodded, not ready to talk to Quinn. Not sure he would ever be ready to talk to Quinn. Then he dived off the side.

The water was a welcome friend. Cold, a shock, but welcome. He laughed at the taste of salt.

He took a couple of deep breaths, held the last one, and dived. He swam with powerful kicks and his free hand while the other hand held the screwdriver out to fend off the FAYZ wall. He had no desire to be pushed up against it. Touching with a finger had hurt. Laying a shoulder or thigh against it would not be pleasant.

Down and down he went. He wished he’d had the foresight to grab some scuba gear or at least a face mask and fins at the marina, but he’d been a bit preoccupied at the time. The water was pretty clear, but still, visibility was reduced in the shadow of the barrier.

When he reached the end of his air he stabbed toward the barrier. The screwdriver hit nothing, and he felt a momentary surge of excitement that disappeared when his next thrust stopped dead against solid resistance.

He shot to the surface and gasped for air.

The barrier extended at least twenty feet down below the surface. If there was a bottom to it, he’d have to find it using an air tank and flippers.

The boat was rocking against the barrier, fifty feet away. He heard the distinct snap and
pff
as Astrid popped open a Coke for Little Pete. Quinn sat on the bow tending the rope, and Edilio was still looking as if he might heave up a part of his liver.

Sam swam to the boat, taking his time, enjoying the water on his skin too much to feel disappointed that he hadn’t found a way out of the FAYZ.

He heard the sound of the engine and the smack-on-wave impact long before he saw the boat. He kicked hard to lift his head above the water far enough to see. “Hey,” he yelled.

Quinn had heard the engine at the same time. “Boat coming. Fast,” Quinn yelled.

“Where?”

“From town,” Quinn reported.

“Fast,” he repeated.

TWENTY-SIX

126
HOURS
, 10
MINUTES

SAM SWAM
AT
full speed and soon had his hand on the gunwale of the Boston Whaler. Quinn hauled him aboard. Up and over, falling and rolling onto the deck.

He was on his feet in a flash and saw the big speedboat, the kind they called a cigarette boat, bearing down on them, not a quarter mile away. The boat threw out a huge bow wave. At the wheel was a kid Sam couldn’t recognize from this distance. Standing like they were holding on for dear life were Howard and Orc. No Drake.

“We can’t outrun them,” Quinn said.

Adrenaline seemed to have steadied Edilio’s stomach. “Maybe, man, but we don’t know till we try.”

“No, Quinn’s right,” Sam said. “Astrid, hold on to Little Pete.”

Edilio reeled up the slack in the rope, both hands flying. They couldn’t leave it trailing in the water or it would foul the propeller.

As soon as the rope was aboard, Sam gunned the throttle and quickly picked up speed running along the barrier. Orc’s boat veered to follow.

Astrid, clutching her little brother, peeked over the side and yelled, “He’s chasing, not aiming to intercept us.”

It took Sam a second to understand what she meant. The cigarette boat could have set an intercept angle and easily cut them off. But the driver hadn’t thought of that.

Almost too late, the speedboat’s driver veered right, trying to drop in behind Sam, but the turn was sloppy and the speed too great. The cigarette boat slid sideways into the barrier with a surprisingly loud, bass-drum smack. Then, when the props bit again, the cigarette boat surged forward and shot past the Whaler.

“Hold on,” Sam warned.

The wave from the cigarette boat’s turn washed over the Whaler and slammed the smaller boat against the barrier. Sam rocked but held on, his bare feet fighting the crazily tilting deck for traction.

The Boston Whaler stayed upright, and as the propeller found water again, it gained speed. They shot to the right of the cigarette boat, close enough that Sam could have stuck his arm out and high-fived Howard.

Now the Whaler was going all out, bouncing from wave top to wave top with the barrier flying by on the left, heading farther from land.

But the speedboat was much faster, and now that the driver had recovered, he came roaring after Sam and was soon churning Sam’s wake.

“Pull over, moron,” Orc bellowed at Sam.

Sam ignored the demand. His mind was racing. How could he get away? His boat was slower. It was more nimble, but it was definitely slower. And the speedboat was so much bigger, so much heavier, that it could run right over the Boston Whaler.

“Pull over or we’ll run you down,” Orc shouted again.

“Don’t be stupid, Sammy,” Howard yelled in a smaller voice, barely audible over the roar of engines and rush of water.

Astrid was suddenly at his side. “Sam. Can you do anything?”

“Maybe. I have an idea.”

In a tight whisper she said, “Are you talking about . . .”

“I don’t know how to do that, Astrid, it just happens. And this isn’t exactly the time for me to consult Yoda on how to use my power.”

Edilio was with them now. “You got a plan, Sam?”

“Not a good one.”

Sam picked up the radio handset beside the throttle. He keyed the button. “This is Sam, are you guys receiving? Over.”

Glancing back, he saw the surprise on Howard’s face. Yes, they were receiving. Howard lifted his handset and frowned at it.

Sam keyed his radio. “You hold down the button, Howard,” Sam said. “Then when you’re done, you say ‘over’ and let go of the button. Over.”

“You have to pull over,” Howard said, his voice harshened by the tinny receiver. “Oh, over.”

“I don’t think we’re going to do that, Howard. Drake tried to kill Astrid. You and Orc almost killed me. Over.”

That occupied Howard for a minute while he thought up a good lie. “It’s okay, Sammy, Caine changed his mind. He says if you behave yourselves, he’ll let you all go free. Over.”

“Yeah. I absolutely believe you,” Sam said.

Sam edged his boat still closer to the barrier. It was so close now, he could have touched it.

He depressed the send button again. “You try to run me down, you may run into the barrier,” Sam warned. “Over.”

There was a silence. Then, a new voice, faint but audible. It had to be coming from a radio onshore. “Get him,” the voice commanded. “Get him or don’t come back.”

Caine. He was using the radio he used to stay in contact with Drake and the day care and the fire station.

Howard said, “Hey, Caine, they have Astrid and the retard, too. And Quinn.”

“What? Say again: Astrid is with them?”

It was Sam who answered him, relishing the moment, even though the triumph was likely to be short-lived. “That’s right, Caine. Your pet psycho failed you.”

“Get them all,” Caine ordered.

“What if they use the power?” Howard whined.

“If they could use the power, they’d already have done so,” Caine said with a smirk that carried across the airwaves. “No excuses: take them down. Caine out.”

Astrid said, “Sam, if you can do it, you need to do it.”

“Do what?” Edilio demanded. “Oh. The thing?”

The radio crackled to life again. Howard said, “You have till I count ten, Sammy. Then we hit it and run you down. Doesn’t have to be like that, but we have no choice. So . . . ten.”

“Edilio, you and Astrid and Little Pete, down on the deck. Quinn, you with them.”

“Nine.”

Edilio pulled Astrid down beside him and lay flat on the deck with Little Pete between them.

“Eight.”

“This better be a good plan, brah,” Quinn said. But he went and crouched with Astrid.

“Seven. Six.”

The bow of the cigarette boat towered above the stern of the Whaler, a huge red cleaver, bouncing up and down, chopping its way toward them. The roar of all three engines bounced off the barrier, twisting and amplifying the sound.

“Five.”

He had a plan. But the plan was suicide.

“Four.”

“Everyone ready?”

“Ready for what?”

“Three.”

“He’s going to hit us.”

“That’s your plan?” Quinn shrilled.

“Two.”

“Pretty much,” Sam said.

“One.”

Sam heard the twin engines of the cigarette boat ramp up. The red meat cleaver bow leaped forward. It was like someone had strapped a rocket to the back.

Sam shoved the throttle of the Whaler into neutral and steered to scrape the left side of the boat into the FAYZ wall.

The Whaler slowed very suddenly.

“Hang on!”

He dropped into a low crouch, kneeling on the wet deck, clutching the wheel with one hand and yanked it to the right, then steadied it. He covered his head with his free arm, shouting to keep his nerve up.

The Boston Whaler slowed.

The speedboat did not.

The tall, dagger-sharp prow ran up over the left half of the Boston Whaler’s stern.

There was a screech of shattered fiberglass. The impact knocked Sam away from the wheel. The back end of the Whaler plunged, and the five of them and the entire boat were suddenly underwater. Sam was yelling into water, yelling and fighting to avoid being sucked up into the propellers that tornadoed the water a millimeter above his head.

The speedboat blocked out the sun, deep red and death white, a knife drawn across the smaller boat. The big twin outboard engines screamed.

But the cigarette boat didn’t entirely crush the smaller boat. Instead, hitting the Whaler at an angle, the cigarette boat went airborne like a stunt car hitting a ramp. It rolled in midair and smashed its topside into the barrier, shattering its windshield and crumpling its railings.

The cigarette boat hit the water hard on its side twenty feet ahead of the Boston Whaler. It landed in a sideways belly flop, plowed so deep, Sam thought it might stay under, but then it wallowed back up like a surfacing submarine and righted itself.

The Whaler had taken a bad beating. The stern was crushed, the railings on the left side were gone, the black-cowled engine was askew but still attached. There was a big divot smashed out of the fiberglass on the bow. Two feet of water sloshed on the deck. The command console was bent forward and to the side so that the steering wheel was askew and the throttle handle was out of its slot and hanging loose. The engine had been swamped and had sputtered out.

But Sam was not hurt.

“Astrid!” he yelled, terrified when he didn’t see her immediately. Little Pete was alone, staring, almost as if this at least had really penetrated his consciousness.

Quinn and Edilio jumped up and leaned over the back. They had spotted Astrid’s slender hand holding the railing. They pulled her aboard, half drowned and bleeding from a gash in her leg.

“Is she okay?”

Edilio nodded, too waterlogged to answer.

Sam turned the key and hoped. The big Mercury motor roared. The throttle was stiff, jammed, but by pushing with all his might he could shift it forward. The crooked wheel still turned.

The cigarette boat was just ahead, stalled. Orc was in the water, yelling in fury. Howard scampered around looking for a life jacket while the driver tried to restart the engines. Unfortunately, the engines did not appear to be damaged.

It was now or never.

With frantic fingers Sam untied the rope from his ankle and took the loose end in his teeth. He jumped into the water and plowed through the few feet of water separating the Whaler from the speedboat.

“He’s swimming over here. His boat is sinking,” the speedboat driver yelled, misunderstanding.

But Howard knew better. “He’s up to something.”

Sam dove down under the water. It had to be now, before the driver got the engines started. If those props started turning it would be too late, and there was a very good chance that Sam would lose his fingers or even a whole hand.

Fighting his own buoyancy, Sam stayed under, peering through the churn, fingers trying to make sense of . . . there. That was one propeller.

He looped the nylon rope around the rightward prop and twisted it as tight as he could. Then he jetted to his left, blowing out the last of his air so he could stay submerged.

He heard the ignition click, the key being turned over. One twist of the boat driver’s fingers and . . .

The engine gave a start. Sam pushed back in panic.