Chapter 35

An hour later...

Earth time: Tuesday, April 26, 2033 6:49 PM EDT

Aina time: 7:00 PM day 254 of 1436 H.E.

I was in the back of our home cave with A'moth. She's in a deep sleep, breathing easily. I'm hoping she'll be okay. She did warn me her body would hibernate as it repaired itself and grew a new hand. I was lying with her, caressing her, just enjoying holding her. Occasionally she would sigh contently in her dreams. I think she knows I'm cuddling with her. Yeah, I'm hoping she'll be okay. She just needs to rest.

It's still raining outside, with a dull gray fog. The entrance to this cave is less than a meter wide, and it's completely invisible from the canyon floor below. I'm guessing we're safe here, safe enough for me to sack out, even though there are squads of police searching the canyon...

Did we leave any clues in the Grotto? Over a half hour ago, once A'moth was settled here, I jumped back and inspected the Grotto thoroughly. The people from Aina left nothing in it, and we didn't either. The police... They should be getting to the Grotto just about now... I was very curious how they would act when they came up empty. Very curious... My mind wandered, drifted, expanded, probed...

I suddenly realized I had a jump sense of the Grotto. I could be there in an instant if I wanted. I had all the feedback that I needed for a jump. But instead of jumping, I just tried to do the mental equivalent of focus my eyes. My jump sense got more and more detailed by leaps and bounds. This was the first time anything like this had happened to me. I had a full visual understanding of the Grotto in all directions, all at the same time. It was great! And I could move the visual presence around! I moved it outside the Grotto and took it up.

It was so cool! It was as if I had a real-time satellite image on a screen that filled my vision and my mind. I could zoom in or out at will. The ability and control were fabulous! I zoomed out, took the visual lock far above the canyon, broke through the clouds, saw the sun near the western horizon. Up, up...

Eventually I couldn't go any farther. I probed with my jump sense, 23,140 meters from my current position, mostly straight up. I could feel my body warning me not to make the jump. The shock of decompression would be explosive. I reframed and was back looking at the Grotto an instant later.

The police were just coming into the Grotto, from the opposite direction of what I was expecting. They must have walked to the dead-end a little further down. A few looked grateful to get out of the pouring rain. All of them looked dead tired, and a few appeared boiling mad. There were vibrations in the air, speech. I expanded my jump sense, and was astonished to hear them talk.

A thin guy with just a pistol seemed to be in charge. He looked both nervous and furious, and he started screaming, "Kurt, you fuckhead! I used to think your tracking was good!"

A guy nearby, Kurt I guess, gave a deep frown. "Hey, knock it off! I told you there were no tracks past here!"

"I'm not talking about the last hundred meters dickhead! I'm taking about you leading us down this fork! Damn it Kurt! You worthless piece of shit! You blew it!" The man was livid.

Kurt spat on the ground in disgust at being chewed out. "Hey! It's not my fault! The bike tracks lead here!" The people around these two started backing up in dismay. The Kurt guy looked too tired to care anymore about the danger.

"Yeah?! So where are the bikes dickhead?! Where are the people that rode them?! They must have double-backed on you! You asshole!"

"Shit! I'm warning you Sarge, knock it off with the foul language!"

"You're warning me?!" Both people were screaming at each other. The thin guy's face was purple with rage. Kurt looked as if he didn't care.

It was probably his last chance to apologize, but Kurt said instead, "And they did NOT double back!"

"You expect me to tell Sal that?!"

"I'll bet my life on it!"

"You just lost your bet!" The thin guy fired his pistol twice. The gunshots echoed loudly in the Grotto. A few of the younger cops looked shocked, most of the older ones just turned away and watched the rain fall. I tried to make sense of the matter...

I realized this was the same thin guy who was in charge at the house at Cider Junction, after Sal had shot the police lieutenant. The guy was flipping out over being Sal's new Number-Two man. He couldn't take the pressure. I remembered a comment Mark made in the house. I wondered how Sal would take finding out this guy had just wasted Tucker County's best tracker... I sighed and wandered about the Grotto a bit and then moved out to explore.

I played with my vision for over an hour. Parsons is a little beyond my range, but I checked out the scene at Davis. There are several cops there now. They have some really bad news to tell the mayor, and they weren't looking forward to it...

I wandered about, listening in to their sad conversations. After a while I tried an aerial view of the road to Parsons. I saw a squad car racing west on Route 72, about twenty- two kilometers from me. I'd be able to stay with it for less than a minute. I entered the car with my presence, heard two men in front talking about how to tell Sal they still hadn't found Steve and Bert. There was no radio in the car... I suddenly realized I could jump into the back seat if I wanted to, piece of cake. I could jump into a moving car, no problem at all. I was sure of it.

And then suddenly the car scene popped from my mind. I tested the distance, 23,140 meters... I sighed and shut down my sense and tried to get some sleep. I couldn't wait to tell A'moth about what I could do.