"Zaltar. It's me, Kara."
"I know. Drink"
She took a gulp of the oily gray liquid, then spat it out.
"It's good," he said. "It helps . . ." He took the cup from her and drained it.
"Oh, Zaltar . . . What's happened to you? Where are we?"
A faint wisp of a smile—or was it a sneer, an exhausted snivel of a sneer—crossed his face.
"Nowhere. We are Nowhere, Kara."
Understanding, Kara sank back on the bed. Nowhere. The Phantom Zone. The place without hope, the place from which no one ever emerged. "How long have you been here?"
"I think . . . forever. And here I'll stay forever, as punishment for my crimes of pride and ambition . . . I'll live on, while Argo City dies." A little spark appeared in his eyes for the first time. "But you, Kara, what are you doing here?"
She told him everything. She told him about her super powers, she told him about Lucy and Selena and the Omegahedron. The only thing she didn't tell him was about Ethan. "Selena tricked me, Zaltar. She caught me off guard. Now she has the Power and I'm here . . ."
"At least we are together again," he said, sadly. He drank more of the vile gray liquid and mumbled to himself and sometimes laughed in a self-pitying way.
Kara studied him. To see Zaltar this way—drunk, uncaring, defeated. Oh, Zaltar! She put her head in her hands. This was worse than anything, worse than death. "I want to get out of here!" she cried.
"You can't," he said.
"I refuse to believe that. Where there's a way in, there's a way out."
He drank more of the liquid, giggling and weeping at the same time. "Youth, youth . . . it thinks it can do anything . . ."
"Zaltar!" She shook him. "Don't drink any more of that! Stop it! Listen to me. We have to get out of here. We must get the Omegahedron back. You know that. Otherwise, Argo is doomed."
"Argo is doomed," he repeated, tears coursing down his cheeks. "And it's my fault. Mine. Only mine."
"Tears won't help," Kara said, desperately. "We have to
THINK
."
He shook his head and laughed and then sobbed.
Kara paced up and down the filthy hovel, kicking at bits of crud on the floor. She bent to pick up a tiny mud sculpture. A little horse with tossing mane. Only Zaltar could have made it, and to make such a thing, here, in this forsaken place, had to mean that some little bit of him was still dreaming, still living. "Zaltar, this is wonderful"
He focused drunkenly. "A—horse," he said, carefully. "They have them on Earth, you know"
"I know" She remembered that he'd always been fascinated by Planet Earth. She sat down next to him and held his hand. "Zaltar, I saw horses, real horses; they're so beautiful, Zaltar, beautiful and free. Zaltar, let's go to Earth. I'll show you horses and trees. Remember your tree, Zaltar? And flowers, there are so many flowers on earth. And the sky, Zaltar! You've never seen anything like it . . . the color, and how big it is . . . it's vast, there's no end to it . . ."
"Dear little Kara." He patted her cheek. "Tell me some more.
She jerked away. "This isn't story hour, Zaltar! I want to leave here. And I want you to come with me. Do you hear me? Do you? We're going to leave this place," she cried, shaking him.
Automatically, Zaltar started to say something discouraged and defeated. But Kara was staring fiercely at him, demanding something of him. . . . A wisp of his old pride returned. There was something he knew . . . but, no, it was impossible . . . out of the question. . . . Still, he could tell her so that she'd know he wasn't just a ruin of a man. "Kara . . . there is a way out."
"I knew it! I knew I could depend on you, Zaltar."
"No . . . wait. It would never work. No one's ever done it, and if we missed . . ." He shuddered.
"Tell me about it!"
Her determination astonished him. And then, with that faint little remainder of his old pride, he remembered that
he
had been her teacher. "No, we can't. . . . We would die in the attempt . . . a death of such horror that living here would seem like paradise."
"We won't die, Zaltar. Together we'll do it togetherI"
"Oh, Kara . . . I'm a broken man, no good for the hero stuff anymore"
She was silent, finally. She turned away and said nothing else. And that was worse than anything. He had killed the spirit in himself, but to kill the spirit in her . . . no, he couldn't bear it. He touched the berry bracelet on her wrist. "Come, Kara," he said. "We'll try."
Bianca and Selena were studying a map. "This will be ours tomorrow," Selena said, drawing a circle around Midvale which took in a dozen outlying towns. "Then
that
the next day." A bigger circle, enveloping whole counties and dozens and dozens of towns.
"Good-sized chunk," Bianca commented.
Selena drew another, bigger circle, which gobbled whole states. And then another circle, and another. "By Saturday, the North American continent is ours."
"What happens on Sunday.
"South America. Africa on Monday. Europe on Tuesday and Russia on Wednesday."
"Gotcha," Bianca said.
It was suppertime in the Big House. Bianca, Selena, and Ethan sat around a twenty-five-foot-long table, sumptuously set with crystal, silver, and china. Bianca was eating purple grapes and cream-filled chocolates. Ethan poked dispiritedly at a fresh strawberry shortcake drowning in whipped cream. Selena had pushed aside her plate. She was sunk in thought. After a while she stirred. "Ethan!"
"Yes, my darling."
"Don't call me that. I know you despise me."
"Yes, my darling," he said in the same emotionless voice.
"Get me the Coffer of Shadow."
"Yes, my darling."
He set the Coffer of Shadow down in front of her.
"AII right, you two, follow me," Selena said.
Bianca popped a last mouthful of the luscious grapes and stuffed her pockets with chocolates for later when she got hungry. It was a drag to go through twenty-seven rooms just to get a snack.
She and Ethan followed Selena into the throne room. At the far end were three thrones set on a raised dais. Selena studied the fifty-foot-high cathedral ceiling. "Bianca, I think we need something there . . ."
"Riiight. Like, maybe, a ceiling fan?"
Selena pointed the Burundiwand. A flash of red light and four steel cages appeared, suspended from a twelve-tiered chandelier. Lucy was in the first cage, Jimmy in the second. Nigel, older than ever, slumped in the third cage. The fourth one was unoccupied.
"Cute," Bianca said. "Who's the empty for?"
"We shall see what we shall see," Selena said, leading the way to the thrones.
"Lucy . . . Lucy . . . are you all right?" Jimmy whispered.
"Oh, Jimmy . . . you told me not to say anything to her. . . . I should have listened. We're in all this bad trouble because of me. Me and my motor mouth."
"Golly, you were brave, Lucy."
"You were, too, Jimmy," she whispered. "I want you to know something. If we die, I'm proud of you."
"Lucy, I want you to know something, too. I've been crazy about you for years. Remember when you used to visit your sister in the press room and smudge up my camera lens?"
She smiled sadly. "Didn't you know I was just trying to get your attention, Jimmy?"
"You were! You mean, all this time I've wasted . . . you mean you . . . me . . . we . . . we could have . . . been an
us
?"
"You bet your sweet foot, Jimmy."
"Awww, Lucy."
She reached out to him through the bars. Looking into each other's eyes, they held hands, tenderly . . . bravely.
Stumbling after Zaltar, it seemed to Kara that there was no before, no after; no past, no future; there was only
now
, stretching in every direction. Nothing else existed. No thoughts, no hopes, no dreams. She had never been anywhere, or done anything but follow Zaltar over this unyielding ground.
Oddly, the longer they pushed on, the more strength Zaltar seemed to gain. It was as if, having finally decided to struggle, some energy source within him had been released. The way went on, on and on, endlessly on over an unchanging, colorless landscape. Nothing but gray rocks and gray, swirling clouds above the lifeless ground.
"Where is it, Zaltar? What are we looking for?"
"The Rift, Kara. The Rift is everywhere, everywhere and nowhere. No one knows where it is, or how to find it, or even if it exists. To leave the Phantom Zone, we must search for the Rift, search without hope. One must look for it, although one will never find it. One can only make it, Kara, through one's own suffering and pain. . . ." He was silent for a moment, then said, "We must press on and hope, without hope . . ."
"I hope," said Selena, leaning her elbow on the arm of her throne (which was, of course, set slightly higher than either Ethan's or Bianca's), "I hope, Ethan, that we can resolve this little problem we seem to be having."
"Yes, my darling."
"Number one, you don't call me that again—until you mean it"
"Yes, my darling."
"Oh, God, he's hopeless," Selena said. She looked speculatively up at the fourth cage.
"Aww, no," Bianca said in Selena's ear. "He's still the cutest—"
Before she could finish her sentence, the Coffer of Shadow began shaking rapidly. The lid flew up and a brilliant pearly light flowed out of the Omegahedron, mixed with a high, eerily beautiful, nearly inaudible—
what
? Noise? Song? Voice? Selena had never heard anything like it.
"Shut it," Bianca said, shrinking back.
But Selena stood up, holding the Coffer of Shadow above her like a dowser, a waterwitch. "Lead me," she Ordered. "Point the way, tell me, speak to me."
"Zaltar, speak to me," Kara cried. She almost fell into the crevice where Zaltar had disappeared. The crevice—a gash like an open wound splitting the ground. Out of it rose a roar so deafening she had to scream to be heard.
"This is the Way," he screamed from below. "Come, Kara."
Slipping and sliding, she entered the Rift.
"Now, for the Quantum Vortex" Zaltar clung to the wall as a howling, hungry wind tore at them from below. "I must accept my fears," Zaltar screamed. "Confront my demons . . . Are you ready, Kara?"
Far away, obscured by the swirling wind, a distant point of light flickered, appearing and disappearing. They clutched the walls, climbing toward it, climbing up and down. Sometimes the light seemed fixed, other times it floated away from them. The walls pulsed. Sloping, sliding, slipping, they defied Kara and Zaltar to hold on. The wind from the churning cauldron below clawed at them. Something foul and hot, churning and spitting, something unbelievably evil, waited greedily for them.
"Hot spit!" Selena's viewing mirror was going crazy in its own special way; showing a wavering image of billowing, grayish clouds. The Omegahedron was also going crazy, blipping, beeping, belching, and bouncing around.
"What is it? What's happenin'?" Bianca said.
"You got me," Selena said, going closer.
"I thought you knew everything."
"I do. Shut up and watch."
"Let me see, too." Ethan shouldered his way in, irresistibly drawn toward the screen.
"You're in my way," Bianca said.
"Excuse
me
," he said, "but you're in my way."
"I was here first."
"I'm bigger"
"Seel-eeen-aaaaa!" Bianca wailed. "Tell him to let me watch"
Selena pushed them both aside. Two little specks had appeared in the gray, swirling mass of clouds on the screen. Gradually the picture cleared. "Curses! Bah! Humbug! This is impossible."
Bianca peered around her. "That looks like, you know, Supergirl."
"I refuse to let it be her! I will not allow it." She dived for her occult books. "How do you knock off someone in the Phantom Zone?" She paged feverishly through book after book. "It's gotta be here somewhere . . . I know it's here. . . . 'ABC's of Gold Making.' No! 'Basic Weather Changes: Sleet, Slush, and Snow.' No! 'How to Transform Your Enemies into Rats, Lice, and Frogs.' No, no, no,
NO!
" Books tumbled to the floor.
At the screen, Bianca and Ethan watched Zaltar and Supergirl's struggles. "Gutsy," Bianca said. "Look at them go. They might, like, you know, make it. Come on, guys! A little more effort. Go, team!"
Selena pitched a book at Bianca's head. "Whose side are you on?"
"Oops. Sorry about that." She sneaked another look at Zaltar and Supergirl.
"Aha!" Selena said. "This is what I want. 'Thessalian Fireballs chapter seventy-nine, page three thousand five hundred twenty-two, note a, subscript BB' " She flipped pages. "Awwww-right!"
In their cages, Jimmy, Lucy, and Nigel watched helplessly.
Kara turned to watch Zaltar lurching behind her. For a long time, he had led her, but now she was leading him. What would happen if he couldn't make it? Would she be able to support him? Would she go on by herself?. No, she would never leave him in the Rift.
Were they getting any closer to the light? Sometimes she thought so. Sometimes she was sure it was farther away than ever. She talked to herself. Keep climbing, girl. Keep your eye on the light . . . the light at the end of the tunnel . . . better to light one candle than curse the darkness . . . lead kindly, sweet light . . . sweet, sweet light . . .
Zaltar stumbled, fell to his knees. . .and stayed there. "No!" Kara said. She crouched over him. "Up! Get up, Zaltar!"
"I can't . . ."
"I won't go without you."
After a moment, he staggered to his feet.
A huge flaming sphere burst out of the light toward them. "Save us," Zaltar choked. "A Thessalian Fireball!" It missed thein by inches.
Another fireball sped toward them with deadly accuracy. "Zaltar," Supergirl cried, "
duck!
"
Too late. He was too tired . . .too slow . . . too weak . . . too old . . . The fireball found its target. Zaltar cried out in anguish. "Kara! I've been blinded by the light." He stumbled and fell.