kiDNApped (A Tara Shores Thriller) (39 page)

Rising to her feet and taking several deep breaths, Tara turned her parka collar up against the wind and started down the ridge to Lake Wai’au, Dave close behind.

…GCCC
71
ACGG…

7:01 P.M.

Lance veered away from the road leading to the row of observatories and drove toward a flat area with a walk-only trail leading to the true summit of Mauna Kea. Most of the people present were gathered outside of the one observatory that allowed the public to tour its facilities, and this group was preparing to leave. Further down the mountain there were tour groups setting up star gazing sessions. Here, however, the two siblings found themselves alone.

Donning her parka, Kristen stepped from the SUV into the thin, frozen atmosphere. The more active volcano of Mauna Loa, only a couple of hundred feet shorter than Mauna Kea, loomed in the distance. Lance finished putting on his gloves and scarf, then pointed toward the trail.

“Not much going on here. Let’s check out the summit.”

Kristen agreed and the two began trudging up the moderately steep trail leading to the highest point of the Hawaiian Islands.

“Did you know,” Lance panted as he forced one foot in front of the other, “that Mauna Kea is really the highest mountain on the planet, even higher than Mount Everest?” He slipped on a loose rock, dropping to the ground. Kristen grabbed him by the arm and pulled him up.

“Yes, if you measure it from the bottom of the ocean where it starts, it’s something like 33,000 feet,” she said, panting. “Everest is only 29,000. Also, by volume it’s the largest, since it’s not that steep, but really wide.”

“Yep,” Lance said, moving forward again. “Man, I gotta get into shape, this is killing me.”

“Too much drinking,” his sister chided.

“Yeah.”

The first stars appeared as the sky began to darken. Below them was a thick layer of clouds. The surreal surroundings added to their sense of uncertainty as they approached the summit.

Would there be anything there? Would there be any
one
there?

Kristen tightened her parka collar against a howling wind that blew down from the summit. Conversation ceased as they grew shorter of breath. Soon they could see the summit.

And, they discovered, they could
hear
the summit. Not just the wind. Something else, higher in tone, more melodic. The pair paused their ascent in order to converse.

“Is that—” Lance started.

“Music?” Kristen said. “A guitar?” A series of rhythmic chords tumbled down from the summit.

“A
ukulele
,” Lance clarified.

They looked at each other. Then the wind shifted direction and they heard a human voice. Some kind of chanting or singing. Lance shrugged.

“Let’s check it out,” he said.

Kristen radioed Tara and told her about the ukulele and how they were about to reach the summit. Tara responded that she and Dave were just reaching the lake, and so far had seen nothing. They ended the radio call.

Kristen and Lance began the last remaining stretch up to the summit. The wind picked up again, drowning out the
ukulele
. The final ascent to the summit was not steep, but a gradual incline, and soon they could see the simple structure that marked the top of Mauna Kea.

A crude Hawaiian altar constructed of logs and stones, strewn with flower and shell
leis
, marked the summit. As the siblings neared the apex, they discerned a lone figure kneeling at the altar, back to them, playing the four-string guitar while chanting in Hawaiian.

They stopped when they were ten feet away. The man continued to play. Looking around the summit, Kristen saw no other people. The moon was now rising in the sky in front of the lone performer. With clouds both above and below them, and a row of high-tech observatory domes visible to their right, Kristen’s lightheadedness due to the sudden altitude increase was exacerbated by the dreamlike scene.

Not wanting to disturb the man’s meditation, but needing to see who he was, Kristen began circling the person, slowly walking around the altar. Lance did the same, in the opposite direction. Patches of snow crunched under his feet.

The musician continued playing; lightly strummed chords accompanied by reverential Hawaiian words whose meaning Kristen and Lance could not know. Kristen could see his profile now, but the parka hood he wore obscured his face. Lance walked onto a patch of red volcanic dirt that was free of snow, almost directly across from Kristen.

Kristen was about to say something to the performer—she did not want to startle him if he was still unaware of their presence—when suddenly the ukulele player jumped up and grabbed her, a pistol having materialized in place of the instrument. He put his left arm around her neck and held the gun to her temple with his right hand.

“Do not move,” the gunman said to Lance, who maintained an at-the-ready stance.

“I’m not,” Lance said. “Don’t hurt her.”

“If you comply with my instructions, she will be fine,” the gunman said.

Suddenly they heard other voices coming from farther down the opposite slope of the summit. The gunman called down in Chinese without taking his eyes off Lance.

“Sit cross-legged on the ground,” he commanded. “If you make any sudden moves, I will kill your sister.”

They heard the crunch of rock coming from below as people—more than a couple, by the sound of it—made their way up to the summit’s altar.

“So you know who we are,” Lance stated.

“Silence,” the gunman said, twisting Kristen’s neck a little.

A procession of men reached the summit. Kristen noted that their blue parkas had been thoroughly smeared in red volcanic dirt so as to make them blend in with the surroundings on the summit. From a distance, they would be indistinguishable from the slopes of Mauna Kea.

She also noticed that all of them but one wore hoods—the largest of the men, the one with an exposed shock of white hair—her father.

“Dad!” Kristen shouted, the muscles in her neck straining against the kidnapper’s forearm.

“Kristen, Lance: do what these people say.” Dr. William Archer looked around the summit, as if searching for anyone else, then appearing disappointed that his children had come alone.

A squat Chinese man lowered his hood and stepped to the front of the group. “I see that your father’s resourcefulness has led you to him. I wish you a lasting reunion. Now that the GREENBACK testing is nearly complete, we are prepared to reunite you with your father,” he said to the siblings.

“Then let me go,” Kristen spat, squirming in the gunman’s vice-like grip.

“First we must complete the testing. Not far from here. In the special conditions of Lake Wai’au.”

He barked a command to his security team. “Line them up.”

Lance, Kristen and their father were formed into a single-file line, in that order. Guards were positioned in front, behind, and on either side of them. Then they began to march down from the summit.

“Are you alright, Dad?” Kristen called behind her. A kidnapper promptly pistol-whipped her in the forehead. “Silence! Walk only,” he said as a rivulet of blood sluiced down Kristen’s face. Any doubt she had as to their fate was removed by the pistol.

She forced herself to think about the science of GREENBACK to take her mind off her suffering. The sought-after microbial system was an
atmospheric
one, she knew. So why did the kidnappers want to go to the lake? Yes, the lake had some interesting microbial activity of its own, but she didn’t see what it could have to do with GREENBACK.

As they stumbled down from the summit in near darkness, she felt the first rain drops began to fall.

“Aha!” one of the Chinese men said. “This is a predicted effect of the microbial launch. CO
₂
uptake has resulted in atmospheric water formation, hence, it rains!” he exclaimed, sounding quite pleased. Behind Kristen, her father nodded, but remained silent.

As the grim procession descended the grand slope of Mauna Kea, Kristen wondered to herself,
Why would they want to take us to the lake if it’s not connected to GREENBACK
? She glanced over at the observatories, where the only people near the summit could be found. The star-gazing parties were farther down the mountain, at the visitor center and below. They were alone up here, and Lake Wai’au would be completely deserted, except for Dave and Tara...

Kristen actually stumbled because her brain momentarily stopped telling her feet to move when it came upon the realization:
they’re going to kill us at the lake
.

She didn’t think the kidnappers would take a chance on shooting her up here on the ridge, where the shot would be heard at the observatories in the quiet of this pristine wilderness area. But in the depression of the lake...
There is no other testing to be done
.
They just don’t want us to freak out. And Dad probably knows this, but he doesn’t know what to do.

The flanking guards eyed her as she lost her footing, and then as she regained her stride, a static blaring issued from underneath her parka.

The walkie-talkie.

Dave's voice issued from the radio while the guards converged on Kristen.

“Sis, there's nothing down here. How are you guys up there?”

She had to warn Dave. Not to warn him would be signing his and Tara's death warrant. Signing all of their death warrants. She had to risk whatever punishment they would mete out. In one swift movement, Kristen reached under her parka and retrieved the radio unit. She keyed the transmit button.

“Kidnappers taking us down to the lake! Go get—”

The guard on her left snatched the radio from her and threw it to the ground, crushing it under his hiking boot. A second guard elbowed Kristen in the gut, causing her to double over with a grunt. Another guard's gun waved back and forth between her father and Lance, as if daring any of them to use this as an excuse to start a fight. They did not.

The kidnappers spoke rapidly to one another in Chinese. Then one of them took off at a trot down toward the lake. They had been alerted to Dave’s presence, but not Tara's. Still, Kristen did not want Dave to be simply shot on sight as soon as he came within range. At least now he was on alert.

At least she hoped so. She hadn’t had time to hear a reply back on the radio. What if he hadn’t heard the message?

There was nothing more she could do. Except march. March to their death. Every step down the mountain took her closer to the lake. From their position on the ridgeline, she judged that at their current pace, the lake would come into view in about five more minutes.

For the first time in her life, Kristen felt completely out of control. Even her father, who was one of the few people she judged to be more successful than herself, was now powerless to help her.

Or was he? William Archer had been oddly silent since their meeting, Kristen thought. Almost detached. Perhaps this could be attributed to the abuse in captivity he had suffered at the hands of the kidnappers. But it seemed more than that.

The rain intensified.

...ACCA
72
ACGT...

7:58 P.M.

The half-moon high overhead provided the only light as the kidnappers marched the Archer family down the final rock-strewn yards to Lake Wai’au. Presently the advance scout they had sent down trotted back up to the leader. He spoke something in Chinese, accompanied by a shake of the head.

Kristen didn’t need to know Chinese to understand what was said. The scout had found no one.

So where
were
Dave and Tara?

Kristen guessed that at least Dave had heard the radio message. She wondered if he and Tara would have enough time to summon help. At least that’s what she hoped, as she heard one of the guards grunt and point at the nearest lake shore. They marched to the water’s edge. Two guards walked point, looking for Dave but seeing no one. No one was on the trail back to the main road, either, and it was not possible that Dave had ran the distance already.

The lake’s surface, ordinarily placid, was now peppered by raindrops. Kristen looked up at the ridges and cinder cones around her. It was as if they were standing in a bowl whose bottom was covered with water. Even under duress, Kristen marveled at the intensity and sheer number of stars in the sky. It was like being in a planetarium, she thought. She had had no idea that, separated from the light and air pollution emitted by major urban centers, and elevated above much of the atmosphere, this was what the night sky truly looked like.

But her mind quickly left the stars and came back down to Earth when she saw one of the kidnappers force Lance at gunpoint to walk ankle deep into the lake.

Then her father received the same treatment.

Now, a guard came for her, grabbing her roughly by the elbow and dragging her to the water’s edge.

It seemed to Kristen that her family had no recourse. Altogether there were six kidnappers—all of them armed, and only three of them, each unarmed.

“Dr. William Archer,” the squat Chinese man said, pointing his gun at Kristen’s father, “we thank you for your scientific contributions to TYR Corporation. Unfortunately, your services are no longer required. Now that we own and control the functional GREENBACK biotechnology, you and your family have become a liability to us.”

Kristen's mind screamed,
WHERE ARE THEY?

“Hey, what happened to our deal?” Lance interrupted. “I gave you what you wanted.”

The kidnapper frowned while his henchmen were largely unreadable. One pulled a hood down tighter against the heavy rain driven by lashing winds.

“And for that we thank you. No doubt your father does not,” he added with a chuckle, “but we most certainly do. I hope you have had sufficient time to enjoy the payment we made to you.” This elicited much laughter from his cohorts, except for one, who remained quiet on the edge of the group, gaze roving around the lake bed.

“It gives me no pleasure to do this,” the man continued, “but in order to control this bio-resource, you must all be ‘out of the picture’, as they say in America. You will be buried forever in this sacred Hawaiian lake. Not the worst possible fate, I suppose. Had you decided to stay away as we warned you,” the kidnapper said, jerking his silenced pistol toward Kristen, “then you would have outlived your father, as was nature’s purpose. But unfortunately, it will not be so,” he concluded, nodding to an assistant who then pitched Lance forward into the lake.