D. MacHale - The Soldiers of Halla

“Just get us close,” I called back to him.

“I’ve lost control!” Boon shouted.

“It’s okay,” I said calmly. “You don’t need it anymore.”

The rock walls around us melted into crystal. The gig twisted. Instead of falling down, we found ourselves flying forward. We were in the gig, in the flume, flying to Third Earth.

I glanced at Boon. He was looking forward, fixed on the tunnel with huge cat eyes. “You did it,” I said.

“Did what?” he gasped. “What is this?”

“You’re taking your first flume trip.”

His paw was wrapped around the control stick in a death grip. I put my hand on it and coaxed him to let go. He did reluctantly. The gig stayed upright and charged through the flume. It turned when the tunnel turned, dropping and rising with every curve. The rotors still spun, dangerously close to the edges of the tunnel. I didn’t worry. I felt sure we would make it. We were surrounded by stars beyond the crystal walls. The multiple images of Halla were no longer there.

“It’s beautiful,” Boon declared, finally relaxed.

“It better be. We paid a steep price for this little construction job.”

Boon gave me a puzzled look, but I didn’t bother to explain.

Up ahead I saw light. We were nearing the end. “Grab the stick,” I ordered. “When we come out, you’re back in control.”

I had no way of knowing where the flume opened up on Third Earth. A sick thought hit me that if it opened in a subterranean cavern, we were in trouble. I had assumed that it would be out in the open, like the other larger flumes. But we wouldn’t know until we emerged.

“Get ready,” I said. For what, I didn’t know.

The light grew brighter. I held my breath. The gig flew into the light. I felt gravity take over as I was pressed back into my seat. A few seconds passed. We didn’t crash into anything. That meant we were outside… and climbing fast.

“Level out!” I commanded.

We had flown out of the flume, nose first, headed skyward like a rocket. Boon took control and pressed forward. For a moment I felt weightless as we blasted over the arc and finally went level. It was a hell of a ride. My stomach was in my throat and my head felt twisted. The disorientation was complete.

“Try to hover,” I said, though it wasn’t easy, because my brain was scrambled. “We need to see where we are.”

Boon wasn’t suffering the same effects that I was. He masterfully kept control of the gig, stopping our forward movement. I closed my eyes, hoping that my brain would stop spinning around inside my skull.

Boon laughed.

“Don’t laugh,” I said. “I feel like puking.” “I’m not laughing at you,” Boon said. “You gotta see this.”

I cautiously opened my eyes. The first thing I realized was that it was daytime. Gray clouds traveled overhead. It looked like we were back on Third Earth.

“What am I supposed to see?” I asked.

“Down there!” he shouted.

I shifted my weight and peered over the side of the gig. The derelict buildings were proof that we were hovering over the city. We had made it. We were on Third Earth. Directly below us was a large, cleared, square space. Many of the buildings surrounding it had been laid to rubble. One structure stood out because it was in the cleared square, untouched. It was a large, marble archway. I recognized it. It was the arch in Washington Square Park.

“Can you believe it?” Boon laughed.

He wasn’t talking about the buildings. Or the archway. Or the fact that we had made it to Third Earth in one piece. He was laughing giddily about something else that was down in that park. Actually, it wasn’t just in the park. It also spilled out along adjoining streets. The sight made me laugh too. What we saw below were people. Thousands of them.

The exiles had come home.

With them looked to be every last gar from Black Water. I’d never seen so many people in one place before. They filled the park and the sidewalks and most of the streets. In the dead center of the square was the flume we had just flown out of. The mystery of where the gars and exiles had gone was solved. They had made it to Third Earth. They had escaped.

They were safe.

I hoped they were ready for a war.

Boon put the gig down right next to the flume.

A large area was cleared near the arch. People were pushed back to make room. We touched down in the center of a group of thousands… who were all cheering. Seriously. All eyes were on us for as far as I could see. They were applauding for us, though I wasn’t sure why.

I looked to Boon and said, “I guess they liked your flying.”

Boon didn’t know what to make of it either. His cat eyes were wide with wonder.

Uncle Press was the first to reach us. “What’s going on?” I asked.

“Can you feel it?” he exclaimed with a big, broad smile.

“I don’t know what I feel, except a little airsick,” I said as I crawled out of the gig.

“Their spirit. It’s already re-energizing Solara.”

I looked around at the cheering crowd. I saw both exiles from Earth and gars from Eelong. Their excitement and enthusiasm was overwhelming. I couldn’t imagine what was going through their heads. I didn’t even know how they’d ended up here.

I suddenly felt arms around me, squeezing me in a big hug.

“We did it!” Courtney exclaimed.

Yes, Courtney was there too. As we spoke, the rest of the Travelers gathered around us.

“What happened?” I shouted to her. “I don’t get it.”

“The gars and Yanks had voted to join us even before I got back to them!” she shouted above the cheering. “They’d already begun to mobilize when you returned to Solara to create the flume. They completely evacuated Black Water. When they saw the flume you made, every last doubt was erased. Isn’t it amazing? They’re with us, Bobby. They’re with you’.’

I took another look around at the cheering mass of humanity. Their enthusiasm had nothing to do with our trick gig flying. It was a show of support. For us, and for the chance to strike back at Ravinia. It was more than we could have hoped for. No, I take that back. I also hoped that these people would be just as happy when the sun set on that fateful day. On Eelong I had barely missed the evacuation. The entire population must have been moving to the outskirts of the village as I was running into the center. Incredible. I wanted to revel in the moment, and the applause, but we weren’t even close to being done. Our plan was working, but barely.

As the applause died down, I said to Uncle Press, “We dodged a bullet. Saint Dane has made his move. He created a flume. The entire dado army is in Black Water.”

The Travelers exchanged nervous looks.

“Hobey,” Spader gasped. “That was cutting things a might close.”

“Where is the flume?” Uncle Press asked.

“On Eelong it’s on the exact opposite side of Black Water from ours. Here, I don’t know.”

“I do,” came a familiar voice. Mark Dimond stepped up through the crowd. He had an earth-style walkie-talkie pressed to his ear. “It’s directly in front of the Ravinian conclave… just as we thought.”

So far things were working out the way we expected. More or less.

“The clock’s ticking,” Mark cautioned.

There was no time to second-guess and fine-tune. Now that the dados had moved, we had to put our plan into action.

“You ready?” I asked Mark.

“Waiting on your word,” he answered with a clear, strong voice.

Courtney put her arm around him and beamed. “Can you believe how this guy turned out?”

It was an awesome moment. We were back together again. The three of us. We’d been through this entire adventure together in spirit; it was fitting that we were together, for real, at the end.