He was calm. “I hear that Kansas has soil so rich you can plant steel and it’ll grow.”
Rita, already flooded with six hundred times the normal female hormones, burst into tears.
A month later, they’d packed up what little they owned and bought a farm outside Kansas City. They had an investment account full of stocks that would continue to grow.
Over the years, Rita didn’t keep up with the computer world, but Frank did. He’d complained loudly when the system changed from DOS, the disk operating system where the user had to know a lot, to cute little icons that someone with no brain could use.
All that had led him to where he’d spent the last three days. When Kaley told him of a cave full of smashed computers, Frank’s ears perked up. She knew her grandfather was a genius with computers.
“Where?” Frank yelled over the sound of the helicopter.
“Zeon!” Kaley shouted back.
Frank got the coordinates of the demolished Homestead from Roal. He dropped his passengers off, then said he was going to get fuel. He knew his daughter-in-law ran the Museum of Earth and that she had cars and gas. She’d know about this man, Zeon.
It was almost as though someone had foreseen what would be needed, he thought with a one-sided smirk.
He flew to the museum and refueled. He didn’t see his son or daughter-in-law, but then they hadn’t seen each other in years. They were “busy.” Ha ha.
Again, everything seemed to have been anticipated. Jeff had left a note for his father.
I know you want to see Haver’s computers. Zeon will be expecting you.
He’d left a map that Frank could follow. He was to go high up over the Mist, then on to Zeon’s house.
On the ground, in front of the closed door of the museum, was an old-fashioned, fully charged generator. The islands had spaceships but no electricity to run the computers.
There was also something else Frank was to take. There were three big bales of the Solium that they’d grown. Wisely, they’d given only a portion of what they’d grown to Jobi. Rita’s cartons of books had concealed big packages of the dried algae.
It was an easy trip and Zeon was not only waiting for him, but had horses and guards ready to lead Frank up the mountain to Haver’s cave.
At his first sight inside the cave, Frank was glad to see that whoever did the bashing of the computers didn’t know about them. The motherboards weren’t hurt, and the hard drives were intact. It took him just twenty-four hours to get them working. He was thrilled that they were run on the old DOS system. There was not even one cutesy, annoying little icon. He truly believed that smiling faces didnotbelong on a computer!
Zeon sent food and set it outside so Frank could take his time in searching for information.
After he’d found all he could, Frank fell into a deep sleep. When he woke, it was very early morning, but he wasn’t surprised to see the horses saddled and the two guards ready to take him down the mountain. Had Zeon told them the schedule before it happened?
When they got to the house, it wasn’t Zeon who greeted him, but Tanek and Kaley. Their faces showed their concern. Tanek wanted to go to wherever his son was. Frank had seen that Kaley was with Tanek no matter what happened.
“Think you can stand my whirlybird?” Frank asked. “Or are you going to try to get me on one of your bird-headed lions?”
Kaley kissed her grandfather on the cheek. “He doesn’t know what a lion is. They have no cat species here.”
“What?” Frank nodded. “Right. Cats eat birds.” He looked at Tanek. “You have a map?”
“Yes. Mekos is on an island called Abicis. Aradella is there and it’s possible that Sojee’s youngest daughter is with them.”
“Which means that World War Three has begun,” Kaley muttered. “Those girls hate each other.” She looked at Frank. “Let’s go inside and you can clean up. You stink. We want to hear everything you’ve been doing, then we can go to the island and save the girls from killing each other.”
Frank had no intention of telling them what he’d found out in the cave. At least not yet. “Sounds good.” He looked at Tanek to see if he agreed.
“Yes,” was all Tanek said. It was obvious that he was worried about his son.
What the hell has happened on Pithan?Frank wondered.With an evil queen and a witch mother, what hideous thingcouldhappen?He almost laughed at his own sarcasm.
They went into Zeon’s house.
22
