Coming Home: The Finders Series

CHAPTER 10: MAJOR PROBLEMS

We had gotten back from the field trip just in time for dinner.  All the kids piled into the building and were eager to start eating.  Phil and I stood around the cafeteria, "supervising" the children.  After dinner, Eric and Elizabeth went upstairs to their rooms although neither one was tired.  Phil and I were on our way to my little office on the second floor when it happened again, someone probing our minds.  This time I got the distinct image of a face.  Whoever was probing our minds was looking at this face, and I could not stop the anger from coming forth. I looked at Phil, and some of the kids around me got one look and started screaming.

"It's him!" I yelled.  " it's the Major, and he knows the kids are here!" I was not concerned that my eyes were glowing or that the kids around me were terrified right now.  I only had one thing on my mind, getting Eric and Elizabeth out of here and to safety. 

I focused my mind on the kids and began giving instructions to them both.

" Eric, Elizabeth, grab some things and hurry down the back stairs.  Phil will meet you and get you out to my car.  Hurry, and don't ask questions just yet.  I'll answer them later.  Now go!" I could feel their anxiety level increase, but both acknowledged my instructions and hurried.  Phil was already heading toward the back stairs to guide the kids through the boiler room and out the back door to the car.  I ran down the stairs and I met Dave as I was going.  My eyes were back to being blow again as I had gotten a grip on myself. I told Dave that someone was coming, and they were going to be asking about Eric and Elizabeth.  I told him that they were not good people, and he was to say nothing at all to them.  He nodded and rushed to the rest of the children up the stairs while I made a beeline for the car out back. I could feel the major approaching the front door.  I had no idea who he had with him from our world, but I knew he had not told him the truth about what he was doing and why he was after our people.

I got to the car and started it up.  Within minutes Phil was there with the kids, and soon everyone was in the car.  I headed out of the driveway and went up the street.

"Get down and stay down until I tell you otherwise!" I said, and they obeyed.  Because I had to drive past the front of the orphanage to get to the expressway, I made it seem that I was just one more regular person on the road going leisurely home. After I was out of sight of the building, I gunned the engine, and the car picked up speed quickly.  " OK, you two can get up now." And the kids were back in their seats, but you could see the fear on their faces.  This is not what these two needed, and it only angered me more that this was happening. I was tempted to drop Phil and the kids off at the farm and then go back and face off with the Major.  I must not have kept my mental shields up as both Eric and Elizabeth suddenly looked at me and began pleading with me not to do it.  Phil was only puzzled for a minute, and then he realized what they meant.

" Look here.  This is not the time to go running off to play the hero.  He's probably armed, and he has guards with him, especially if he thinks you or I were there." Phil was making sense, but that was not the force that stopped me.

The kids pleading had touched me in a way that I never knew I could be moved before.  My heart softened, and I knew that I was not going to face the Major that day.  I said so to the car at large.  Everyone relaxed for a moment.

I shot past the farm, and Phil just looked me.

"There's no point.  If we stop there now, we'll only be sitting ducks. The Major as one of us with him." I threw extra emphasis on the us, hoping that Phil would understand.

"You're kidding, right?" He asked.  I only shook my head.  This guy must have been sent ahead to see if the kids were there.  That was the probe of a few days ago. My mind was shielded because of the techniques I learned back at the colony.  I knew Phil had learned some sort of methods somewhere, and so I was not too worried about him.  The kids, however, could not shield their minds, and so he must have felt them right away and knew. I could have kicked myself for not realizing it sooner.  I should have gotten them out of there when it first happened.  My first assignment as a Finder and I was already screwing it up.

I got to thinking.  The Major would expect me to head straight back to the colony. I could not afford to do that, for our secrecy was our safety.  I flew down and down the I-86 and headed east which was in the opposite direction up from the colony.  I figured I would drop down as far south as Virginia or maybe Georgia and then head west from there. I had been studying the maps in the car's computer system, and I knew exactly where I was going.  I think Phil had the same idea because when I got on the I-86 and headed east, he said not a word.  The race was on, and lives were at stake here.  I was not about to fail these kids like I failed my sister. They were not going to die at his hands.

I heard a slight gasp from the back seat, and I realized that this was the first time the kids had seen me angry, and my eyes were glowing, which startled them.  Quickly I started breathing slowly, and I forced myself to calm down.  Phil had a slight smile on his face, and I did not need to read his mind to know that he was thinking the same thing I was.  The meditation and yoga were paying off, and with big dividends too.  I looked at Phil, and he looked at me.  I only tilted my head slightly toward the back seat, and he knew what I wanted him to do.  He turned and told the kids what my glowing eyes meant.  They seemed to relax, but I could tell they were discussing something between themselves.  This is one time I wish I had not taught them so well.  I let it go, however, as I had more pressing issues to deal with. 

I turned onto U.S.-219 and headed south.  I knew that it would cross into Pennsylvania and go through the eastern side of Johnsonburg while continuing south.  After a while on the 219, I figured we had been on it too long, and I turned onto State Route 153 and continued south.  I was planning on picking up I-80 just down a bit.  There was a complication we got down to the I-80 connection, however. A truck and overturned on the westbound onramp and was blocking traffic. I had figured on heading south again at the first opportunity. That came quicker than I had planned. I got the impression that the police had the report about the kids, and so I got off the expressway a lot sooner than I wanted. I hoped that we would be a lot safer on the back roads rather than the main freeways.

For the next few days, we were very tense.  I was on heightened alert, which meant that I was not sleeping.  Phil was amazed at how focused I was in this state.  I knew that we were safe for at least 4 miles in all directions.  The Major was not close at all, and most of these small-town police had already written us off as staying on major expressways, so they were not even looking for us.  That knowledge still did not ease the tension at every gas and food stop we made.  We had started getting our meals whenever we stopped for gas.  This way, it saved time, and we were not exposing the kids so much that they might be recognized.

The one thing that ended up slowing us way down was traveling through the mountains like that; you would definitely not go at 60 or 65 on those roads.  There were times when we looked out the side windows, and all we saw was a vertical drop, and I was not talking ten or twenty feet either.  That drop was sometimes hundreds of feet, and other times we could not tell how far because we were above the clouds and could not see the bottom.  Other times we were dealing with turns so tight I could look out the side window and see if our taillights were still working.  One time, just as a joke, Phil suggested that we turn right instead of left as the road went.  He said it would be an express route to the bottom of the mountain.  I wonder if he was starting to get tired of all these tight turns and stuff.

The truth was that we needed time to think, time to work out a plan, time for me to sleep.  I had not slept in almost a week, and the drain on me was really starting to get to me.  I was having a harder time staying focused, and I knew that it would spell trouble for us if I did not rest.  It was when we got to Stony Creek, Virginia, that I found a place for us to relax a bit.  It was a cabin rental place just outside town to the west.  With this being the off-season, I knew they would have plenty of vacancies, and that meant that they would have one far enough from the road that we would be safe.

I told the computer to print out an ID for Phil, and I gave him one of the credit cards I had with the aliases on them.  It was the first time that he could see what my car could do.  He was impressed, as were Eric and Elizabeth.  Phil was only in the office for short bit when he came to the office door and motioned for the kids and me to come inside.  We did, and that it was when things really went crazy.