Orders of Magnitude (The Genie and the Engineer Series Book 2) Page 4

  Merlin took off his cone shaped hat and picked at a piece of lint on it. “With Paul and the Oni clear of the house, Capie, you can use your gold band to levitate your father out of bed, while he is still asleep, and out to his other vehicle—”

  “His Mercedes Benz C class that he is so proud of,” Capie interrupted.

  “—and drive him back here. Then, under a cloak of invisibility, you can levitate him from the car into the suite here and put him in the spare bedroom,” Merlin finished, with a smile. “In the meantime—”

  “—Paul will use his tantalum block at the airport and effect a portal escape in the crowded terminal building,” Uncle Sam finished. “When he is certain that he is not being followed, he can return here.”

  “At which time, you can use the con game on Chris that you’ve developed,” Tia continued, “and disguise yourselves as Ruggiero and an Oni. That script we’ve written should work just fine to scare him.”

  “Not to mention seeing an Oni or two up close and personal for the first time,” muttered Merlin.

  “When you, ah, ‘rescue’ your father from ‘Ruggiero,’ you must not let it seem to be too easy,” Uncle Sam added. “It will look suspicious, otherwise. And it will lessen your leverage with him, if his rescue appears nearly effortless on your part.”

  Paul nodded. “The simulations we’ve run are pretty conclusive on that score. And I think we know our parts. Capie? Anything to add?”

  She gritted her teeth and pushed a lock of hair back. “Not really. Except that I still don’t like this plan very much.”

  “Understood,” Paul sagely nodded. “I’m not crazy about it either. And not just because of the deceit involved. I’m very concerned that we could run into Oni or even a wizard in the process.”

  “The vacuum permittivity spell,” Merlin suggested with a knowing smile. “You’re thinking of having that ready too, aren’t you? Just in case?”

  “The what?” Capie asked, with a perplexed expression. “What’s that?”

  “Vacuum permittivity.” Paul rubbed his hands together for a bit, trying to think of a way to explain the idea in less than two thousand words. “Merlin once told me that I could change some aspects of the physical universe. I know that I can alter the value of Planck’s constant in a local space-time bubble. I did that several months ago. Since then, I’ve tried playing with a few other physical constants. I haven’t had time to try very many of them. So far, I’ve only found one other that I have successfully been able to change. Vacuum permittivity. It shows up in a lot of electrical and electromagnetic equations. It directly impacts Coulombs law, Maxwell’s equations, and Gaussian law.”

  Capie shook her head in confusion. “Do we really have time for this? Can you please get to the point?”

  Paul leaned forward. “I’ve found that if I create a bubble of space and then change the value of vacuum permittivity inside, it directly affects the ability of animal tissue to conduct neuron impulses. It impacts both the Gaussian field around the dendrites and axons of the neurons and it also impacts the ion channel’s ability to funnel potassium and sodium ions. If I lower the vacuum permittivity value, it lowers the neural activity in a person’s brain and puts them to sleep. Raising the permittivity creates a hyperactive state of neural electrical impulses—sort of like an epileptic attack.”

  Capie stared at him in confusion.

  “It’s not an easy spell to create,” her husband confessed. “It takes a great deal of concentration. I think it’s because the physical universe resists being altered in that way. And it takes a great deal of energy. Even with the tantalum, I can only create a bubble about three feet in diameter and change the constant a few percent. It has a very limited range too. But I have done it enough to know it works, if not well.”

  For several moments, Capie sat quietly absorbing this information.

  “But you’ve put Normals to sleep before,” she pointed out. “How is this different from that?”

  “The spell to put Normals to sleep is a simple one, something like a hypnotic command. And Normals have no way to fight the spell since they don’t have the ability to use magical powers.”

  “If this spell is so powerful, why can’t you use these types of spells to fight the Oni?” she asked with a thoughtful expression. “You know, instead of fusion spells. They would be a lot less violent.”

  Forming his hands into a steeple, Paul considered the right words to use in explanation.

  “The wizards and Oni of Errabêlu have many millions of man-hours of experience at creating magical spells and defending themselves against them. And they all have talismans too. So, any spell I might cast, they can easily counter unless the spell strikes in a way for which they are not prepared. And even then, due to the higher levels of energy they can use, my spells may be ineffective. They learned very quickly how to bypass my Planck’s constant spell. The same may well be true of the other spells I might be able to cast that change physical constants. That’s why I haven’t spent a great deal of time trying to develop such spells, because of the potentially limited usability. The advantage to this particular spell is that it will probably render an Oni unconscious almost immediately and therefore it will be hard for the, ah, target Oni to figure out later what sort of spell I used against it. Also, the Oni won’t have any particular defense against this spell, at least not initially, because the spell doesn’t attack them physically, but instead alters the fabric of space that they are standing in. That gives my spell an advantage but not a guarantee of success. Worse, if there’s another Oni nearby that observes the spell, then they might be able to tell a wizard about it and they will figure out a way to block the spell, just as I surmise they did with my Planck’s constant spell.”

  “I see. I think,” Capie admitted uncertainly.

  “I urge you not to delay further with the primary plan,” Uncle Sam advised them. “Time is probably not in your favor.”

  THREE

  Highway 57

  Plymouth, WI

  June

  Monday 3:00 p.m. CDT

  They kept each portal jump short, never more than five miles at a time. Partly, this was to keep energy signatures low in order to avoid attracting the attention of another wizard or an Oni, but it was also due to the limited energy levels that the tantalum block could handle in the first place.

  Working their way down Highway 57 and then Interstate 43, they neared the outer suburbs of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. A small three mile hop westward deposited them on the sidewalk in front of a car rental dealership. They walked through the double glass doors and into the air conditioned interior. At the long Formica counter inside, a pretty brunette salesclerk looked up from her computer terminal.

  “How can I help you?” she asked with a patented professional smile.

  With a frown, Capie turned to Paul. “Are you sure we need to rent a car? We could portal to Dad’s house.”

  Paul shook his head in a distracted manner. “Remember what Uncle Sam said, to keep magical energies low? There’s no magic involved if we just drive up to the house.”

  “Oh. That makes sense,” Capie replied, biting her lower lip. “This having magical powers takes some getting used to.”

  “Excuse me?” asked the now perplexed sales clerk. “Did you want to rent a vehicle?”

  “Yes,” Paul responded firmly. “A large SUV, please. We will need it for several days.”

  The clerk’s fingers danced at warp speed across her keyboard. “We have several available. We have a special this week on a GMC Yukon XL Denali—”

  There was a sudden loud chirping noise coming from Paul’s shirt pocket. For a moment, he couldn’t place the sound.

  And then he blanched a solid white as the blood drained from his face. The burner cell phone. It had to mean…

  “Paul?” asked his wife uncertainly. “Is that—?”

  He jerked the smart phone out of his pocket and quickly scanned the display. It confirmed his worst fear.

&nbs
p; “It’s from your father,” he whispered, holding it up to one ear. “Hello? Hello? Chris?”

  Capie was literally cringing, one hand to her mouth. “Paul?”

  But her husband was shaking his head as he lowered the phone. “I’m sorry. I didn’t hear anything and then it hung up.”

  “They have him,” Capie concluded, extreme anguish in her every word.

  Paul didn’t trust himself to say anything in that regard. She could very well be right.

  “Is there a problem?” asked the clerk, tilting her head to one side and pursing her lips.

  The timing was very bad. They had been so close, so very close! Another couple of hours and they would have been at Chris’s house, ready to remove him from any possible danger. Okay, sure, that was presuming that the fake kidnapping plan of theirs would have worked. But now it looked like they were a day late and a dollar short.

  “We have to go try and save him, Paul!” Capie pleaded. “We must try!”

  He nodded, a sinking feeling in his stomach. He and Capie didn’t have talismans, no, but he did have the vacuum permittivity spell to help defend themselves. To be sure, it was a desperate idea, only to be used in an emergency situation. Not something that he was all that confident would work, despite what he had told Capie back at the Osthoff. Still, for Capie’s sake, they had to try.

  “I agree,” he said, swiftly putting the phone back in his pocket. Then he looked up at the clerk. “I’m sorry, we won’t need the rental car after all.” Then he turned and waved a hand, creating a portal to the nearest interstate overpass. The seven foot oval shaped portal snapped into focus just behind the stanchions and velvet covered ropes of the customer queue line. Through the portal could be seen the massive overhead concrete girders and support columns of I-43 at the Ulao Road overpass.

  Paul tugged on Capie’s arm. “The support columns will be faster than using the tantalum block, due to the masses involved.”

  The desk clerk, frozen in place, was staring at the portal with bulging eyes and wide open mouth.

  Capie practically leapt through the portal, Paul close on her heels.

  • • • •

  Even using the concrete in the interstate bridges and pylons, it took them a half hour to arrive in the parking area of the Yerkes Observatory, just in front of the main entrance. The sun was on its downward trek toward the western horizon.

  As soon as he stepped free of the portal, Paul crouched low, visually sweeping the area as rapidly as possible, ready to dive to the ground or snap out a plasma bolt at a moment’s notice. But other than himself and Capie, there was no one else in the area.

  “It’s his car!” Capie shouted, running over to a Ford Escape and trying the driver’s door. When she discovered it was locked, she snapped her fingers and the door sprung instantly open for her. A mere glance inside told her all she needed to know.

  “He’s not here!” she shrilled. “No sign of him!”

  “Hold it! Freeze, right there! Don’t either one of you move!” screamed a male voice.

  Paul slowly turned. Coming out of the Observatory entrance was John, the elderly Observatory guard that he had met on a previous visit, the same guard that had taken an instant dislike to Paul. At the moment, John was holding, in both hands, a Beretta Model 92C pistol, pointed straight at Paul.

  “So it is you!” shouted the guard in sudden recognition. “You kidnapped the professor’s daughter! I never dreamed I get the chance to arrest you! On the ground, you kidnapping rotten scum! Now!”

  Paul sighed and snapped his fingers. John froze instantly, his mouth half open in readiness to snap out another order. With a wave of Paul’s hand, John levitated up off the concrete steps and floated through the air toward them.

  Capie marched over, getting directly in the security guard’s face. “John, where is my father? Did something happen to him?”

  “A moment, dear, please!” Paul calmly said, before turning to John. “I froze him. He can’t say anything in his condition.” He waved a hand. “In the name of scopolamine, sodium thiopental and amobarbital, may there be an avatar representation of this man, to truthfully answer a few questions.”

  A holographic ball of light materialized, swiftly expanding into an exact visual duplicate image of John, including the handgun.

  The real John’s eyes were bulging wide open, his pupils swinging back and forth rapidly between the avatar image and Capie. It would seem that he now recognized her.

  Capie swung to the avatar. “Where is Dad?”

  The avatar turned its head to look at her. In completely emotionless tones, it said, “The ambulance left about five minutes ago. They said that they would life-flight him to the University of Chicago Medical Center as soon as they could meet up with the helicopter.”

  “Ambulance? Why, what’s wrong with him?” Capie demanded.

  “Looked like a stroke,” the avatar replied. “Two FBI special agents came to see him, in his office. To talk about your disappearance, they said. Five minutes after they went in, your father was clutching his left arm and complaining about doubled vision. I called the county EMTs. I didn’t see the FBI leave, but the ambulance took your father away five minutes ago.”

  Capie gritted her teeth. “A stroke! Oh my God! Paul, we have to see if we can catch that ambulance—”

  “He’s not in the ambulance, dear,” Paul said, shaking his head slowly.

  “Then the helicopter—”

  “Not there either,” he interrupted again. “Merlin?”

  The ageless wizard materialized in front of them, wearing a deeply worried expression on his face. “My, my, this is serious.”

  “But—” Capie started to say, but Paul held up his hand.

  John looked like he was on the edge of fainting.

  “Merlin, can you scan the area?” Paul asked him in a steady low-pitched voice. “How much magic has been used here?”

  Merlin closed his eyes and held out one arm swinging it slowly around in a circle. “Your portal to get here, yes. But two much more powerful portals, both of them here in the parking lot, both from really long distances. The energy levels suggest the second portal…yes, the second portal was used for three people.”

  Capie gasped and took a half step back, looking at Paul with widened eyes. “The FBI agents? They took him? But…how did you know?”

  “In Engineering, they told us that there are no such things as coincidences,” Paul announced, his jaw clenched. “The FBI arrives and your father just happens to have a stroke in the same five minutes?” He swung back to Merlin. “Can you track the portals?”

  Merlin sadly shook his head. “They’ve disguised them fairly well. I can tell you that they go a long way toward the east southeast. Maybe six or seven hundred miles. That’s the best I can do.”

  Paul nodded thoughtfully. “The Washington D.C. area. Humph. I’ve wondered now several times why, when they had their hands on me last week, they didn’t portal me directly to Washington, instead of trying to fly me there in a jet. I’ll probably never know the answer to that one, but I’m super glad they did not take me by way of portal.”

  “I don’t understand,” Capie said, frowning, shaking her head and running her hands through her hair. “The ambulance, the stroke…you’re saying that they faked that? But why? That makes no sense!”

  “Merlin, could we talk to Uncle Sam?” Paul asked, eyes narrowed in thought.

  Merlin morphed into the tall strategist with the large top hat.

  John fainted dead away, his head sagging forward while his body remained locked in an upright position by Paul’s spell.

  The distinguished gray countenance glanced over at the security guard and the avatar but said nothing.

  “Uncle Sam, can you answer Capie’s question?” Paul requested, as he rubbed the back of his neck with one hand.

  “Certainly,” the master strategist answered. “It is all part of the plan to entrap you, of course.”

  “I still don’t under
stand,” Capie barked, throwing up her hands. “Please, explain!”

  Uncle Sam nodded. “They want Paul, yes. But if they took your father captive, it would do them no good unless it helped them to set a trap for your husband. So, they fake your father’s stroke. No doubt, they will ensure that the news of his condition is broadcast in some manner, to make sure you know of it. You find out about it and try to go see him at the hospital—this University of Chicago Medical Center. They will undoubtedly have Oni and perhaps even a wizard or two there ready to ambush you.”

  “Oh,” was Capie’s only reply as she wrung her hands and paced back and forth.

  “It’s probably a little too late for them to broadcast it on the five o’clock news but it will likely be on the eleven o’clock version and in the local morning newspapers tomorrow,” Paul said with a scowl. “They’ll embellish it too, to make his condition sound really serious, perhaps even life-threatening. And he won’t even be sick or in the hospital but somewhere in the Washington D.C. area instead.”

  “You will have to go to the hospital,” Uncle Sam stated. “And you will have to take at least one of the Oni captive.”

  Paul looked dumfounded. “Why? Oh, I think I see. We don’t know where Chris is being held captive, but the Oni at the hospital probably do know.”

  “Exactly.”

  But Paul was shaking his head rapidly. “It won’t work. We don’t have talismans to fight them with. What’s worse, even if we got lucky and took an Oni captive, I have no way to get the information out of it. My avatar spells only work on Normals, not on Oni or other wizards. Otherwise, Ruggiero would have used one on me back in France.”

  “Then you must use either deception or force the information out of the creature,” said Uncle Sam resolutely.

  “What, a Vulcan mind meld?” muttered Paul with a disgusted look. Then he glanced at the expression on Capie’s face. So sorrowful, so needy and at the same time, pleading for him to do something!