Chapter 210: Pearl Harbor

Sunday, July 11, 1971

Of the forty-seven people on board the Tri-Star (not counting me), I can safely say that the vast majority of them were, to some extent, unhappy with me. While I’m reasonably sure that the four guys, Robert, Jimmy, Kip, and David, as well as the pilot, co-pilot, and flight engineer, were not on that list, I wouldn’t bet either way on the two stewardesses.

As for the other thirty-eight passengers, there was one toss-up and one that just didn’t care because she loved me no matter what. And at the moment, she was the one currently nestled sleepily in my lap. I looked down at Sunny’s brown curls in the crook of my arm and smiled. I was glad that she wasn’t mad at me.

The toss-up was Narvenia. She knew that the other thirty-six women (and probably the two stewardesses as well) were feeling everything from mild annoyance to extreme exasperation with me. And while she was very sympathetic to the collective group’s feelings, she didn’t understand exactly why they were vexed. Of course, there was no limit of volunteers willing to explain to her just how big of a jerk I really was.

“Stop that!” cried several of them when I tried to share my feelings of love with them.

“Can’t I apologize?” I asked, my ignorance now showing. After all, I, of all people, ought to know that you should never try to get between a female and her wrath.

“I think you should take a long walk off a short pier,” Jenny quipped.

“Or try that door...” added Deedee, pointing to the hatch, “ ... without a chute!”

Realizing that resistance was futile, I put up my heavy-duty shield to block them all out, hugged Sunny to me and closed my eyes. After worrying about my screw-up for a few minutes, I gave up and began thinking about the mysterious codex and if it might have some connection with the fourth piece of Thesan’s Te’trad.

“Mr. Wagner?” she asked, gently shaking my shoulder. “We’re on approach to Honolulu. I need you to fasten your seatbelt, please.”

“Thank you, Pam,” I replied, reading the name on her name tag. I immediately scanned for Sunny who was no longer on my lap and found her up front, playing checkers with Vickie and Trealyn. There was a distinct coolness in the cabin as no one said a word to me. Buckling my seatbelt as requested, I re-erected my shield and resumed trying to puzzle out the mystery of the codex. The next thing I knew, the pilot was announcing our arrival.

” ... local time is 1:15pm and the temperature is a balmy 76 degrees. Once again, thank you for flying Eastern Airlines. Aloha,” the intercom voice said. Then, a few moments later, “Check that. Thank you for Flying with Wagner Industries.”

“If I buy this thing, I’m going to have to come up with a better name,” I thought.

“Grace can probably help you with that,” Vickie thought to me. “And just so you know, I’m going back to New York with Adriana. She really needs me right now.”

“What?” I cried as I jumped up and started scanning for Adriana. “What do you mean, going back?”

“Take it easy, Michael. We’re in the bedroom, getting freshened up,” Vickie explained. “Eastern asked us if we minded a two-day layover in order to get their pilots here for the next leg. We agreed, so you get to enjoy two days at the new Sheraton Waikiki Hotel. Besides, it’s after 7:00pm New York time and we’re all tired.”

“But why is Adriana going back to New York?” I asked, whining a little.

This was followed by a painfully long silence.

Finally, Vickie said, “You hurt her, Michael. You hurt all four of them. But Hanna says she’s going through with the wedding, even if there is no honeymoon. She couldn’t back out now. Not with all her family here. And Sandy says she probably will too. Poor little Abby doesn’t know what to do. But her sister is urging her to just go back to the states with us. And Adriana? Well, she’s decided to take a break and re-think her options.”

“I guess I really screwed-the-pooch on this one, didn’t I?” I thought back.

“If that means that you fucked up, then yeah. You really did.” Vickie said. “I mean, you, of all people, Michael, should know better than to make jokes about a brides’ concerns, especially the honeymoon!”

“C’mon, Michael,” Grace said, standing beside my chair. “We’ve got a bus arranged to take us all to the hotel. And remember to take your sword. You can’t leave it on the plane.”

“It’s a real shame, you know,” said Sergeant Stooksbury, from Erwin, Tennessee.

“What’s that?” I asked without looking at him.

How I ended up on the western side of Ford Island is too long a story to tell, but the short version is that while we were waiting in the hotel lobby for our room keys, I wandered away from my group and sort of joined in with a group that was headed out on a sightseeing tour. Their first stop was Pearl Harbor, which is where I lost them.

It seems that the Navy isn’t too keen on allowing a teenager onto a Naval Base wearing a sword. After being escorted into the barracks that served the main gate, I simply gave the Marine Lance Corporal my name and the phone number to the White House and settled down to wait. Sixty to ninety minutes was my bet on how long they’d make me wait before they showed me the door, or worse, the brig. I should have known better than to wander onto a naval base while wearing my sword, but my mind was on how badly I had hurt Adriana and the others and I had forgotten I had it on.

I lost. Again. This was turning into a rough day. It was exactly seven minutes before a very senior looking Chief Petty Officer returned with a big, burly Marine.