The Lost Colony Read Online Free PDF Page B

One quite recently, in fact. And guess who was there to meet him?”
    “Artemis,” said Holly and Mulch simultaneously.
    “Exactly. Somehow he was able to predict what we couldn’t. We knew when, but our where was off by several feet.”
    Holly sat forward. Interested. Back in the game.
    “Did we get Artemis on film?”
    “Not exactly,” replied Vinyáya cryptically. “If you don’t mind, I’ll leave the explaining to someone more qualified than me. He’s back at base.”And she would say no more on the subject. Most infuriating.
    Mulch wasn’t one for patience.
    “What? You’re just going to take a nap? Come on, Vinyáya, tell us what little Arty is up to.”
    Vinyáya would not be drawn. “Relax, Mr. Diggums. Have another nettle beer, or some spring water.” The commander took two bottles from the cooler and offered one to Mulch.
    Mulch studied the label. “Derrier? No thanks. You know how they put the bubbles in this stuff?”
    Vinyáya’s mouth twitched with the ghost of a smile. “I thought it was naturally carbonated.”
    “Yeah, that’s what I thought until I got a prison job at the Derrier plant. They employ every dwarf in the Deeps. They made us sign confidentiality contracts.”
    Vinyáya was hooked. “So go on, tell me. How do they get the bubbles in?”
    Mulch tapped his nose. “Can’t say. Breach of contract. All I can say is it involves a huge vat of water and several dwarfs using our . . . eh”—Mulch pointed to his rear end—“. . . natural talents.”
    Vinyáya gingerly replaced her bottle.
    As Holly sat back in her comfortable gel chair, enjoying yet another of Mulch’s tall tales, a niggling thought nudged through. She realized that Commander Vinyáya had avoided answering the dwarf’s initial question. Who were these people?
    Ten minutes later, that question was answered.
    “Welcome to Section Eight Headquarters,” said Vinyáya. “Forgive my theatrics, it’s not often we get to wow people.”
    Holly didn’t feel very wowed . They had pulled into a multi-story car park several blocks down from Police Plaza. The stretch armored vehicle followed the curved arrows up to the seventh floor, which was stuffed below the craggy ceiling. The driver parked in the least accessible, darkest space, then switched off the engine.
    They sat for several seconds in the damp darkness, listening to rock-water drip from stalactites onto the roof.
    “Wow,” said Mulch. “This is something. I guess you people spent all your money on the car.”
    Vinyáya smiled. “Just wait.”
    The driver ran a quick proximity scan on the dashboard scanner, and came up clean. He then took an infrared remote from the dash and clicked it through the transparent plastic roof at the rock face overhead.
    “Remote-controlled rocks,” said Mulch dryly, delighted at the opportunity to exercise his sarcasm muscle.
    Vinyáya did not respond; she didn’t have to. What happened next shut Mulch up all on its own. The parking space rose hydraulically, sending the car catapulting toward the rock face above. The rocks did not move out of the way. There was no doubt in Holly’s mind that when rock went up against metal, the rock would win. It made no sense, of course, that Vinyáya would bring them here only to crush the entire party. But there was no time to consider this in the half second that it took the stretch vehicle to reach the hard unforgiving rock.
    In truth, the rock wasn’t hard or unforgiving. It was digital. They passed right through to a smaller car port built into the rock.
    “Hologram,” breathed Holly.
    Vinyáya winked at Mulch. “Remote-controlled rocks,” she said. She flipped open the rear door and stepped out into an air-conditioned corridor.
    “The entire headquarters has been hewn from the rock.
    Actually, most of the cave was already here. We just lasered off a corner here and there. Forgive all the cloak-and-dagger stuff, but it’s vital that what we do here at Section Eight remains