The Gifted (19 page)

Staring at the ceiling, I was overwhelmed by
the size of this cavern. But then I realized I was wrong. It wasn’t
a cavern at all. It was a missile silo. The only reason I knew that
was because I heard Han say, “Hey, It’s a missile silo! We found
it!”

“Yes,” I said. “We found it.” It was
colossal. And out of the blue, I realized I had no idea what we
were doing here.

“Now what?” said Han.

“Now we do what we do best,” Tracy said. “We
destroy things.”

“Is that what we do best?” I said.

“It is this time,” she said.

Suddenly it was as if my brain had finally
engaged and in a surge of confidence I said, “Of course we do!”

I noticed a set of stairs as part of a
scaffolding on the left side of the missile. They were rusted but
solid looking. The missile too was rusted with mismatched panels.
Some were not even cut evenly and did not fit correctly. “We need
to climb to the top,” said Han.

“How do you know that?” asked Tracy.

“From an old movie,” he said.

Tracy looked at me, “I trust him,” I
said.

We all started the climb up the scaffold of
stairs. That is all except Guido. He had limped into the room and
now rested against a wall in front of the stairs, petting Hayasa. I
could see him already getting hard to spot.

There must have been about a hundred stairs!
It was a good thing we had been running and working out before we
left the training facility. Still, my legs were getting rubbery
from the long day.

We got to the top of the warhead and I could
reach out and touch it. We were maybe fifty feet in the air. There
were panels on it, and everything looked welded or riveted, but I
could get my fingers under one piece because there was a gap.

“We can’t get into this,” I said. “We might
as well go back down.”

“What about with a crowbar?” yelled
Guido.

“Even with a crowbar, we aren’t that strong,”
I said.

“Then what are we going to do?” asked Tracy.
“Maybe we should go back and see if one of the men from our group
knows something about disarming one of these. It’s over our
heads.”

“Good idea,” I said. I took a deep breath and
let out a sigh. “Let’s go back and get them. Why did we ever expect
to do this on our own anyway? We’re just kids!”

We came down the stairs, tired and resigned
that we could do no more. We got to the bottom and Guido, I’m
assuming from somewhere against the wall, said, “What’s the
plan?”

“This is a job for the adults,” I said.

“Then we’re done with our part?” he said.

“I think so,” I said. “Han, can you come with
me to find them?”

“Yes,” he said.

“Tracy, can you stay with Guido,” I said. “I
don’t want to leave him here injured by himself.”

“Sure,” she said.

Han and I headed back through the huge
tunnel. We didn’t hurry because we had no need to. The tiredness
was starting to catch up to me. My legs were sore and now I was
getting a headache.

“How do you like this adventure?” I asked
Han.

“Too much for me,” he said. “I like quiet
nights reading or surfing the Internet for origami ideas.”

“I understand,” I said. “I like going out
with friends sometimes. I also do sports after school.”

“Which ones?” he asked.

“I like basketball and soccer mostly. I tried
baseball once, but didn’t like it so much. Too much waiting around.
Do you play sports?”

“No,” said Han, “not really. I tried the
swimming team once and did pretty good, but I only did it because
my friend was doing it. I never tried it again. What I really
like,” said Han, “is origami. I search for different designed
online and then try them out. Once I found out I could breathe life
into them I liked it even more. I would make a couple of dinosaurs
and watch them fight.”

“Cool,” I said. “I wish my gift was like
that!”

“You have the gift God gave you and I have
the gift God gave me,” said Han.

“I guess so,” I said.

We were coming to the door where the
scientists were tied up again. Once we entered, we were surprised
to find that several were up on their feet and many of them were
trying to get free. One had a little knife attached to a set of
keys and was trying to get the blade out behind his back.

But the thing that Han and I noticed mostly
was that one, who was at a computer, had his back turned so his
tied hands were over the keys. He seemed to be typing something.
When he saw us he turned around and pretended that he had been
doing nothing. Then we all heard a voice coming from the computer
say, “Please hit enter to confirm launch.”

Han and I looked at each other and both of us
started running toward the man. But he was quick. He fell on his
knees just as we reached him and hit enter with his nose. He hit it
so hard, his nose started to bleed. Even through the blood he
smiled. “Too late now,” he said.

“Five minutes, zero seconds,” said the male
computer voice.

“What do you mean, too late?” I said. “Turn
it off!”

Another scientist who had his gag off, said,
“That’s a one way switch. We couldn’t turn it off even if we wanted
to.”

Han and I looked at each other. Without
saying a word we both ran back to the missile. About half a minute
later we were standing in front of it again.

“Tracy!” I yelled. “Let’s get up the stairs;
we need to break into that warhead! It’s preparing to launch!”

We all ran to the top of the stairs. In front
of us was the top of the missile. “Can you heat that enough to melt
through?”

“I don’t know,” she said.

“Now’s a good time to find out. We have about
four and a half minutes before this launches and twelve million
people die!

She closed her eyes to focus. Han and I tried
to stay quiet, but that was hard to do when I was practically
jumping out of my skin with anxiety. After about half a minute, she
said, “Any difference?”

“Not yet,” I said. Then losing patience I
walked up to the panel in front of us put my hand on it. It was
nice and warm, but not hot. “Why can’t you do it? You melted the
lock!”

“I think the heat is dissipating. Too much
metal in one place. The lock was small.”

“Great,” I said. “Han, can you get one of
your planes through that?”

“Think of a block of wood smashing the side.
That’s all you’d get.”

“Ahhh!” I yelled. I was hyperventilating now.
“What do we do?” I pounded my fist on the metal hull.

“You guys okay?” yelled Guido from below.

“New York’s going to get nuked and we’re the
only ones who can stop it!” I screamed.

“Calm down,” said Han. “You sure a crowbar
won’t work?”

I shot back, “Look at that plate of metal,
it’s too thick. No one is strong enough to. . .”

Then it hit me. Perhaps the dumbest idea I
have ever had in my life. “I’ve got it!” I said.

“What are you thinking?” said Han, looking a
little scared.

“Chess! We have to get the king. We can’t
play safe anymore!”

“What’s that mean?”

“Wild and whacky things!” I yelled. “This
time we’re playing to win!”

I laughed, half crazed as I took off down the
stairs with Han just behind me. I headed down the hallway and came
upon the scientists, still trying to break their bonds. I ignored
them and ran on. There he was. The troll was trying to scratch his
back against the far wall. I pressed the button that opened the
door all the way, but I could tell it was still going to be too
small. The troll kept scratching his back.

“Aren’t you afraid of the troll?” asked
Han.

“Not this time,” I said.

I closed my eyes and focused on the troll,
trying to make him like me, to follow me. I was afraid, so I used
that fear to concentrate harder. Then I opened my eyes. The troll
had stopped his scratching and paused as if lost in thought. Then
he went back to scratching. Since he didn’t have eyes, it was hard
to tell what he was thinking.

“It’s not working,” I said. “It’s not
working. We need. . .Ah!” I ran over to the refrigerator and
grabbed the leftover pizza. “You’re going to eat pizza?” said
Han.

I ran over to the other door and said, “He
has a huge nose for a reason, right? And we need a monster right
now!”

I ran back to the troll. I held the pizza box
up and waved it at him. The troll sniffed and then turned toward
us. Then he started to move. He tried to come out to where we were.
The only problem with this is that the door was too small. Even if
he squeezed he couldn’t get his shoulders through.

Meanwhile the scientists, seeing what was
going on, ran into the prison cell for safety. One yelled, “They’re
letting Billy in here. He’ll destroy everything!”

“I sure hope so,” I said.

I held the pizza out of his reach and then he
got mad. He made a loud roaring sound again and started pulling on
the doorway. At first he was only able to tear away small pieces
off the wall by reaching through the door and yanking hard on the
wall. But then he really got into the spirit of things and started
ripping larger chunks. I guessed this took about a minute and a
half but it felt like forever. We still had about 3 ½ minutes left.
Once Billy was starting to squeeze his shoulders through, I said to
Han, “We’d better get moving.”

“Behind you,” yelled Han. As we ran, we heard
the sound of crashing equipment. Billy must have been coming
through the room with the computers.

We ran toward the missile silo. The tunnel
was enormous, so I knew Billy could follow us here. When I got to
the silo I shouted out. “Get out of the way or help me smear this
pizza all over the missile! Troll coming through!”

“Are you nuts?” yelled Tracy.

“Today-yes!” I yelled. I ran up the stairs
toward the top of the missile with Han just behind me.

By the time I got to the top, Billy was
already at the bottom. Tracy, and presumably Guido, had moved away
from the door so they wouldn’t get trampled on. I opened the box of
pizza and started smearing it over the cone of the missile. I heard
the troll underneath me let out one of those deafening roars
again.

Once Han got to the top of the stairs, he too
started smearing pizza all over the cone. There was a gap between
two panels, so I wedged a piece in there. Then I wedged in a
second. The troll sniffed again and started to climb the stairs.
Only he couldn’t fit, so he climbed the outside of the
scaffolding.

“Do you know how to get down?” said Han.

“I have no idea,” I said. “Let’s just save
New York.”

“This will blow up, you know,” said Han.

“I know,” I said. “It probably will. But you
know what that means?” I yelled. “We saved New York!”

Now Billy was close enough that I could see
his bat ears pointing toward us. His head was raised and I could
see inside his nose, and let me tell you, it wasn’t pretty. Did you
know that troll buggers are blue?

Billy was almost up to us now. “Han!” I
yelled, “Climb down the opposite side of the scaffolding!”

“Already there,” he said.

I took the last piece of pizza and slapped it
on the hull of the missile and it stuck. The whole thing looked so
gross it made me not want to eat pizza for a month!

Just as Billy got to the top I stepped over
the outside of the railing away from him and jumped.

Now I don’t remember if I’d mentioned this,
but the missile was probably at least fifty feet off the ground. I
don’t really know why I did this, but having a monster tear me to
pieces scared me more than the jump. On the way down I tried to
grab a hold of a piece of scaffolding, like some superhero or
something. But this was not a comic book and I was no caped
crusader. I missed, and kept falling until I landed on both legs.
For a split second I thought,
This is good, I landed on my
feet.
Then I heard a loud popping sound and I realized it was
me.

I didn’t bother to look down. Instead I was
fixated on looking up at Billy. He was licking the missile. Then he
tried pulling off panels. He must have smelled the pieces I shoved
in there. He yanked and then I heard a creaking sound and then the
sound of grinding metal. One of the panels came loose. Once that
first one was off, he started ripping off other panels. He grabbed
a piece of pizza from inside and a bunch of wires at the same time
and yanked.

I wonder if he found this entertaining,
because he then leaped onto the missile and really went nuts. “Go
Billy!” I cheered.

Han, who had still been climbing down the
scaffolding stood next to me and yelled, “Yeah, go Billy!”

Tracy, who was already next to me, but I
hadn’t noticed her, said, “Billy, Billy he’s our man, if he can’t
do it no one can!” like she was some cheerleader or something. We
were acting like little kids! And we were going to die.

“You know,” I said. “At any moment that thing
is going to go off. Then there will be a big flash and a loud
noise, but we won’t hear it, because we’ll be vaporized.”

“I like bright lights,” said Tracy.

“Yeah,” said Guido “pretty.”

Then we heard the sound of pounding feet. A
group of soldiers came rushing in through the door. These were our
guys, and now they had guns. One of the men looked up,
“Eeeiiieeaahhh! What’s wrong with you? He’ll kill us all!” He
yelled, “Get that thing off of there before I have a heart attack.
He’s going to blow us all to smithereens!”

“Wasn’t that the plan?” Guido said to me.

“That was the idea,” I said.

Our soldiers took out their guns.

“Don’t shoot him!” said Tracy.

One of the men threw a canteen at Billy who
turned to face us. He started climbing down.

“Food!” I yelled. “You have to use food to
lure him down. He’s probably already eaten what he can off the ship
anyway.”