Pop Travel (29 page)

The tech caught the Creator’s reassuring grin with his last bit of consciousness. Nodding at the anesthesiologist, they sealed the docks. The tech trusted the Creator and pushed the
send
button.

When the guards broke through, the Creator was gone.

“So where is he?” a guard shouted.

The tech tried to find out, searching for the traceable code of its destination left by every pop.

“I don’t know. I can’t trace it,” the tech said and hid an impressed smile.

“Say that again?”

“It looks like he added an encryption to his code to disguise it. His destination can’t be traced.”

“I wonder how long he’s been planning an escape. Manny is not going to like this.”

FBI – Atlanta Division
9:15 p.m., Friday, July 26

here are they?” Ed asked Nate.

“Geri’s tracking signal is weak. Her audio and visual are out of range.” Nate widened the map to show the rest of the world and searched until he found her blip.

“They are in Mumbai, India.” Then he did a double take.

“
What?
” Ed raised his voice in disbelief. He leaned over Nate and squinted at Geri’s signal. “Keep tracking them. Have we heard from Blake?”

“He is still in the mass of people waiting to be popped. It could be hours. It’s a real mess over there.”

“Send him a new destination code. He’s going to India,” Ed said.

Malbar Hill. Mumbai, India
7:15 a.m., Saturday, July 27 (9:45 p.m., Friday, Atlanta, GA)

Geri grasped at sleep in the cab. Aching all over, she yearned to pass out. In an attempt to stay awake, she rubbed her blistered feet, which threatened to go numb if she walked much farther in her once-pretty, purple pumps. Thank goodness, Hasan said the apartment was on the first floor.

After a slow ride through a light rain, they arrived at an impressive high-rise. Geri and Cooper followed Hasan inside and he rang the bell.

When the door opened, a six-foot-tall man appeared with a stern expression and a small child attached to his leg.

“Uncle Vilas!” Hasan exclaimed and embraced his uncle in a big hug.

The man raised his eyebrows and cracked a smile.

“Hasan? What a surprise! Greetings to you and your friends. Come in, come in.” He had a smooth, deep voice, and held his arms out wide for them. “What in the world are you doing here?”

“Tanay! Come back here!” came a shout from further inside the apartment. The little boy released his father’s leg and ran inside.

Geri smelled breakfast and her stomach growled.

“Ah, uncle. It is so good to see you,” Hasan said as they passed through the sitting room. Hasan either didn’t hear or ignored his uncle’s question. Instead, he rushed into the kitchen and greeted the rest of the family.

“Auntie Jagruti!” he shouted and gave her a squeeze.

Geri and Cooper stood off to the side, staying out of the way. Geri shifted her stance from one foot to the other, itching to take off her shoes. With her muddied, torn evening gown and disheveled appearance, she gave up trying to conceal her discomfort.

“Hasan? It cannot be!” said his aunt. “And who are your friends? They look like they have been through a battle. Please sit down.”

“Oh, yes. My friends!” he said with an embarrassed smile. “These are my wonderful friends, Geri and…” He closed his eyes and touched his head.

“Cooper,” Geri said for him as she took a seat.

“Of course. Cooper!” He hit himself in the forehead. “They helped me escape!”

“Escape?” asked Hasan’s uncle. “What do you mean, escape?”

But Hasan ignored that question, too.

“Geri and Cooper, this is my beautiful Aunt Jagruti and my honored uncle, Dr. Vilas Rastogi. He is a genius!” He elbowed Cooper and added, “It runs in the family.”

His aunt smiled at them as she continued encouraging the children to finish their breakfast.

“Oh, Hasan. Always the joker,” Dr. Rastogi said. “I am pleased to meet you, Geri and Cooper.” He shook their hands.

“The pleasure is mine, Dr. Rastogi.” Geri gave him a weak smile. Cooper nodded.

“Could I offer you something to eat?” Aunt Jagruti asked. “Or a place to freshen up?”

“Oh, bless you. I’m famished,” Geri said. “Can I help?”

“We don’t have much time,” Hasan said. “Just a quick bite, then we should keep moving.”

Dr. Rastogi gave Hasan a stern look.

“Time for what? Please, nephew. You must tell me what has brought you across so many miles. I am overjoyed to have you here, but what is going on?”

“Of course, uncle. I’m sorry. My head is not on right. I will let Cooper explain. I’m too upset to make any sense.” He patted Cooper on the back and added to him, “But please be brief!”

“Sure,” Cooper said.

“I’m going to take the children to their lessons now. I am honored to meet you, Geri and Cooper. Hasan, I wish I could stay and hear your story. Will you be here when I come home? I will only be an hour or so, and then I can cook something,” his aunt said.

“I’ll try, but no promises. We are in a great hurry.” He reached around and gave her a side embrace, cheek to cheek. Then he patted each of his cousins on the head, and his aunt shooed the children out.

“Please. Sit,” Dr. Rastogi said.

Cooper joined the doctor at the table.

Hasan waved off sitting. He had been fidgety on the cab ride over as well, chattering about the scenery and bouncing around in his seat. He raided the fridge instead.

Cooper looked from Dr. Rastogi to Hasan to Geri and back to Dr. Rastogi.

“In the interest of time, I will get right to the point. Miss Harper and I wanted to meet with Hasan and discuss a serious problem I discovered with pop travel.”

Hasan sprang upright from his ransacking, slammed the fridge shut, and erupted.

“Yeah! My bosses are hounding me for ‘fine tuning’ but didn’t tell me about any problems to fix! They know I never completed my doctorate. They don’t care I’m trying to finish it. They just keep pressuring me to make improvements. And I’m not allowed to talk to professors, interns, or even students. No help from anyone!” He paced as he ranted, shaking his fist, waving his hands, and beating on his chest. “I have had no life, uncle! Sure, it was fun at first. But over the past couple of years, they have given me more restrictions and rules. It’s unbearable! I want to quit but I can’t! They tricked me into signing a deal and now if I quit, I lose everything! It’s my invention! And I must provide for my mother. I need you to help me find an answer.”

He pleaded, clasping his hands at his heart. He had obviously kept everything bottled up a long time.

Dr. Rastogi leaned back and raised his palms for Hasan to stop and settle down.

“Peace, Hasan. Of course I will help you. If I can.”

“And we can’t stay in one place for too long. We are safe for now because when we popped out, I added a new line of code to erase the destination as soon as we were sent. I’ve been working on that for a while. They may not know where we are yet, but they will figure it out soon. Plus, I need to get back to Mother,” Hasan added.

“You sound as if you have broken the law. Do you believe my sister is in danger?” his uncle asked.

“No. I’m sure she is fine. But she will be very worried.” Hasan bit his nails.

“I see.” Dr. Rastogi put a hand to his chin. He turned to Cooper. “How do you know there is a problem and Hasan did not?”

“It’s complicated. I will have to show you. I have it on a stick drive,” Cooper answered.

“Ah. Why don’t we go downstairs to my office? I have a secure Qnet connection,” Dr. Rastogi said. “And Hasan, I believe you should help me understand the process, so that I may be of better service to you.”

They all got up and followed the doctor downstairs.

“What exactly do you do, Dr. Rastogi?” Geri asked. Not many people were allowed to have a completely private Qnet.

“I work at the hospital. I specialize in cybernetic prosthetics.”

“That sounds fascinatin’.”

Hasan’s uncle waved on the lights. They arrived at what appeared to be a simple office in a basement. As more lights came on, they could see past the tidy desk and large CC imager. The room opened up to reveal an elaborate laboratory.

Hasan’s face lit up at the magnitude of the facilities.

“You have added so much, uncle.” He took in the surroundings like a special guest at Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory. In addition to the expected laboratory workstations with test tubes, beakers, and microscopes, wall imagers hung around the room, displaying X-rays and collected data in tables, graphs, and charts. Ominous-looking machines lined the back wall. But the items drawing the most attention were the mounted extremities. Clear plastic-encased robotic hands, limbs, and feet, covered in flesh and pumping blood.

After his initial reaction to the impressive lab, Hasan wasted no time gawking and jumped on the compucenter. He typed in some formulas to show his uncle. Geri joined the others gathering around to watch the imager. Hasan explained as he typed.

“This is the formula for my biogen laser which I originally developed for removing and preserving lesions and tumors for study.” He stood up again and pointed at the large wall imager. Geri noticed Hasan had a hard time sitting still, like a kid with ADD hyperactive tendencies that increased when he got excited.

As Hasan continued, he emphasized each point with dramatic hand motions.

“Here is a crash course in pop travel. First, the subject is given a diazepam injection to knock him out, relaxing the body’s systems and preparing it for cell separation. Next, the unconscious subject is scanned to make a map of the cells which is sent to the destination. Third, the biogen laser snakes around the subject, attracting every cell into it, and is then transmitted with the cells to the destination, making that lovely
pop
. Last, the destination platform receives the scan and laser transmissions and re-forms the subject according to the map, all in a matter of seconds.”

“That’s all?” Geri asked. It sounded so simple.

“Oh, there’s much more to it than that. But, yeah, that’s all. It is such a relief to talk to someone about it!” He plunked into the chair and sighed from his exertion.

“I am so proud of you, Hasan. Thank you for sharing that with me. I look forward to hearing the details. But what is the problem? I have never heard of any malfunctions. What is the company asking of you?” Dr. Rastogi asked.

“The biggest problem is they won’t tell me what to work on!” Hasan shouted his frustration. “They make me work night and day and give me hints and suggestions. They tell me to try experimenting on one subject many times, but the poor lab rats don’t make it very far. Their little systems aren’t strong enough to endure more than fifteen pops in a day. Some pass out and some, I don’t want to tell you about,” he said, waving his hand. Then his eyes widened. “No one does that, right? Fifteen pops in one day is way over the predetermined limit! People aren’t going over the limit, are they? Did someone die? That would be horrible!”

Geri felt sorry for Hasan. She feared what might be on Cooper’s stick drive and suspected the worst.

“Not that I know of,” Dr. Rastogi said.

“Hasan, I think it’s time for you to see this,” Cooper said. He removed his QV and slid a tiny cylinder from one of the links in the band.