The next several days at Bridger's house were remarkable simply for their lack of excitement and anxiety. It had been weeks, perhaps even months, since either of them had endured such a long period of relaxation, with no regard for work or responsibility. It was a rare experience for both of them, and they took every advantage of it.
With money sent from his mom, Lucas bought a summer wardrobe and a few other "necessities," including a healthy supply of his favorite music and a few games to install on Bridger's computer. His own new laptop would take a few days to arrive; he'd ordered enough special features for it that no local stores had what he needed in stock.
At home, for the most part, Lucas spent his days lounging. He slept until noon and spent hours swimming in the water behind Bridger's house. To his great surprise, Darwin arrived on their second day at the island, brushing up against Lucas' legs while he was swimming and nearly scaring him into what would have been an embarrassing accident. With no vo-corder available – the closest one was at the UEO labs where Bridger and Lucas would be working – Lucas was content to simply swim and play with the dolphin, enjoying the game of guessing what Darwin's frequent squeals and chirps meant.
Lucas showed impressive restraint on the computer. He went online for a few hours every day, but he refused to download the mysterious file or to check for any more messages from his father until he had his own laptop. It was a terrible temptation, but Lucas was nothing if not stubborn; once he'd promised himself not to give into the pressure to look, he kept to that promise.
Bridger, for his part, did not show the same stubbornness – Lucas only had to beg three times before the captain let him on his motorcycle. Bridger spent several hours teaching Lucas how to ride, and the island turned out to be the perfect spot for practicing, with its nearly empty roads and non-existent police force.
The captain turned out to be a decent cook, at least as far as Lucas was concerned, and every night they made dinner together. That was an entirely new experience for Lucas, who had grown up with two parents who rarely entered the kitchen. Therefore, at age 17, the only thing Lucas could do in a kitchen was boil water, and that skill came from countless lab experiments. Toast proved a challenge for him.
Two days before their return to work, Bridger was showing Lucas how to make a simple spaghetti sauce when a knock came at the front door. Lucas, covered with tomato sauce that he'd spilled down the front of himself – and grateful for once that the captain had forced him to wear an apron – let Bridger answer the door.
"Well, hello!" Bridger's pleasantly surprised voice carried into the kitchen.
"Welcome home, Nathan," answered two children's voices, nearly in unison.
Overcome with curiosity, Lucas left the sauce unmanned on the stove and peaked around the corner of the kitchen into the front entryway. On the other side of Bridger, he could see a preteen girl and a young boy missing two front teeth. They both had pink noses and the same straight blond hair, and they were holding hands. They grinned brightly at Bridger.
"What brings you two here?" Bridger asked.
"Mama said to invite you to dinner tomorrow night," answered the girl.
"We're having a party," the boy added.
"A party?" Bridger said. "Well, I can't turn down a party. What time did your mom say we should be there?"
"Dinner's at 6," the girl said. "But Mama said you can get there anytime. And she said to make sure you bring your friend."
At this Bridger turned and saw Lucas poking his head out of the kitchen, still unnoticed by the children. Bridger smiled and turned back to the front door.
"You bet," he said to the children. "We'll see you tomorrow. Thanks for inviting us."
"You're welcome," the girl said smartly, and with a small tug on the boy's hand she pulled him away from the door. "Goodbye," she added as they walked away.
"'Bye," the boy echoed.
Bridger watched the children walk down his front walkway and then closed the door and faced Lucas.
"Well, looks like we won't have to cook tomorrow," he said, walking back to the kitchen.
"Who were they?"
"The neighborhood kids," Bridger answered with no further explanation. "Lucas, I thought I told you to keep an eye on the sauce."
"Oops," Lucas said, running to the stove, where the sauce was beginning to bubble over the top of the pan. "Sorry."
"Don't worry about it," Bridger said, tossing a handful of pasta into boiling water. "You're cleaning tonight."
xxxXXXxxx
The next day Lucas found himself sitting in the middle of a long bench at a picnic table, squeezed between two of the four Desmond children and turning down a third offer of fresh emu burger. All of the permanent island residents had been invited to this dinner, which masqueraded as a welcome home party for Bridger and, consequently, Lucas. The six members of the Desmond family alone accounted for more than half of the year-round island inhabitants, which also included an elderly retired couple and a man named Franklin Diamond who appeared to be in his early-30s and lived alone.
Dinner had long been consumed and the adults were settled in lounge chairs near the water, drinking beer and talking loudly about sports and politics. The kids, and Lucas had to admit that included him, were still sitting at the table.
Lucas was the only one who'd refused emu for dinner. He had never tasted real meat before and the very idea of it disgusted him now. Meat had been banned years ago, but private landowners were still allowed to raise animals for their own consumption. It wasn't the legalities that bothered Lucas, however; he'd seen the faces of those poor emus in the Desmonds' side yard. He couldn't stand the thought of eating something with a face.
Given Lucas' insistence on eating only potato salad and rolls for dinner, his stomach grumbled with excitement when the eldest Desmond child, a shy and lanky girl with the same blond hair as her brothers and sisters, brought two cartons of ice cream and sundae toppings from the house. The children squealed with delight when their sister arrived. Within minutes, hot fudge sauce and whipped cream were liberally covering not just the ice cream, but nearly the entire tabletop.
"So Lucas, why are you staying with Nathan?" asked Trevor, the second oldest of the children and the most inquisitive, Lucas had already learned.
"I'm going to be working with him," Lucas answered, wincing at a sudden ice cream headache from taking too big of a bite.
Trevor's eyes popped in admiration. "Really? That's so cool."
"What about your parents?" Lucy, the middle child, asked. She and her little brother, Stephen, had been the ones to invite Bridger to the party.
"What about them?" Lucas asked.
"They don't mind you living away from home?" she asked.
"No," Lucas answered slowly, not sure how much information to volunteer. But he figured that since these were now his neighbors, the basics of his background would all come out eventually. "My dad is dead, and my mom is used to me living away from home."
"Oh, I'm sorry," Lucy said, and the children became quiet. For several minutes, the only sound that came from the table was the clinking of spoons in the bowls.
"Your mom doesn't mind you being away?" Trevor asked finally, breaking the uncomfortable silence.
"Not really," Lucas said. "I mean, she doesn't like it, I guess. But I've lived away from her before."
"Why?" Stephen asked. Lucas looked at the youngster and smiled; his face was covered with chocolate.
"Well, my parents divorced when I was very young, and for a while I lived with my father."
"Why?" Stephen asked again. Cheryl, the oldest of the children, gave him a warning swat on the arm.
"Stop asking so many questions," she said quietly to her brother.
"When did your dad die?" Trevor asked.
"Trevor!" Cheryl cried, her eyes widening in dismay. She turned to Lucas, her face heavy with embarrassment. He gave her a weak smile in return.
"Hey, kids, how's the ice cream?"
Lucas and Cheryl gave nearly identical sighs of relief to hear Bridger. The captain walked up behind Lucas and settled a hand on his shoulder, giving him a gentle squeeze.
"It's so good. Want some?" Stephen asked, holding up his own bowl and grinning through the chocolate smeared all around his mouth.
"Maybe later," Bridger said with a laugh. "So, did Lucas tell you guys about his new job?"
"He said he's going to be working with you," Trevor volunteered.
"That's right. But did he tell you what exactly he'll be doing?"
The children shook their heads nearly in unison, their identical blond hair swishing around their faces.
"He'll be helping me build the next seaQuest."
"Wow," Lucy and Trevor called out at the same time, the boy looking as though he'd just met a celebrity. Cheryl stared at Lucas in awe. Stephen was the only one who went quietly back to eating his ice cream.
"You're really going to work on the seaQust?" Trevor asked, his voice quiet and serious. Lucas nodded.
"You must be really smart," Lucy said. "Even smarter than Cheryl, and Mama says she's so smart she can take a college class next year."
Lucas smiled brightly at that, glancing at Cheryl, who was staring at the table and turning an impressive shade of pink from her chin to her ears.
"He's pretty smart, all right," Bridger agreed, teasing Lucas and ruffling his hair. Lucas ducked under the captain's hand and smiled back at him.
"What will you be doing on the seaQuest?" Trevor asked.
"I'll be on the computer design team," Lucas said.
"Computers?" Trevor asked, his voice cracking. "You're into computers?"
"Yeah, definitely," Lucas said.
"Me too," Trevor beamed. "But I'm just learning. I haven't even hacked into anything interesting yet."
"Oh, I can help you there," Lucas offered.
"You can?" Trevor asked, gasping in glee.
"You can?" Bridger said, cocking an eyebrow at Lucas.
"Um, maybe not," Lucas said, treating Trevor with a knowing grin before smiling innocently at the captain. Bridger just laughed.
"I'll let you two talk about it later," he said, and squeezed Lucas' shoulder one more time. "I hate to break up the fun, but we've got to get going, kiddo. Remember, work tomorrow. You have to get up at 7."
Lucas groaned at that, but stood up from the table and said goodnight to the children, smiling as Trevor continued to gape at him like he'd found a new hero. Cheryl met his eyes just quickly enough to say a polite goodbye. After thanking the Desmonds for dinner and saying goodbye to the rest of the adults, Lucas and Bridger headed back to their house, walking in companionable silence as evening encroached on the island.
A deep dusk had settled by the time the house was in sight, but before they'd even reached the driveway Lucas could see the package on the front porch and knew his laptop had arrived. Skipper delivered the island mail, usually dropping it off in a ferry office on the island at the end of the day, but apparently he'd made a special trip for the package. Lucas grinned and sped up the driveway. Bridger rolled his eyes behind him.
"You've got until 11, Lucas," he called after him as Lucas picked up his package, already ripping off the tape even as he opened the front door. "No staying up all night with your new toy."
"Uh huh," Lucas called back, not even bothering with a glance at the captain as he headed toward his room.
"I mean it," Bridger yelled, but Lucas was already in his room.
Lucas closed his bedroom door – a move that he knew wouldn't offend Bridger, as his need for privacy had been well-known on the seaQuest – and ripped into the package, revealing the new laptop and a packet of manuals that he knew he would never bother reading. He sat down at the desk next to his bed and immediately turned on the laptop. It took him several minutes to get the basics set up on the laptop, but soon enough he was downloading all of the files saved from his seaQuest computer. Once the download was established, Lucas paused for a moment, his fingers hovering over the keyboard. It had been five days since he last checked his messages, and more than a week since he'd heard from his father. Lucas felt a knot twisting in his stomach and he swallowed hard, his throat tight from anxiety. He had to look.
His fingers flying again, it took less than a minute to tap into his messages. And there it was. His father had replied.
Lucas,
I'm sorry it's taken so long to respond to your last message. It isn't always safe where I am right now, so please be patient with me. I will write as often as I can.
Thank you for writing to me. It is a relief to know you believe me. I will answer only some of your questions because too much information could get you into a lot of trouble. Please forgive me the secrecy. It's for your own protection.
I managed to escape in a shuttle, soon after I spoke to you. Two of my colleagues died before we were able to get to the shuttle, so I left alone. I was able to disable the locator beacon and pilot the shuttle to a remote beach. I have been in hiding since then. I'm not sure how I managed to avoid the seaQuest's sensor equipment. Perhaps the extreme heat caused a malfunction.
How are you, son? I hope my absence isn't causing you too much trouble and pain. I can imagine it must be difficult (especially attending my memorial service – I'm sorry to put you through that). Know that I love you very much and look forward to seeing you again. I don't know how long I will have to hide, but I think of you often.
Please write back when you get this. Tell me everything that is going on in your life. Are you with your mother? Have you read any interesting journals lately? It is very difficult being out of touch with the real world. I crave interaction with my fellow scientists.
Remember that you must act as though I really am dead. I know this is asking a lot, but it's important. My life depends on it.
Love,
Dad
Lucas leaned back in his chair, staring at the words in front of him. He felt a smile pulling at the corners of his mouth and scrubbed a hand over his face, then read the message over again, as if to confirm that it was still there, that it was still real. He closed his eyes, his mind racing with questions. He desperately wanted to know what kind of trouble his father was in. He wondered if it would explain what went wrong with the World Power Project. Maybe none of it had been his father's fault. Maybe the entire disaster had been part of a plot to kill his father.
Even as he grinned with pleasure as he read the note, a short stab of anger shot out at Lucas and a coldness fogged his mind for a moment. A handful of friendly, even loving messages, that cold part of his mind insisted, weren't nearly enough to make up for years of neglect. He should fight back. He should retaliate now with a mean, stabbing message in reply, something that would make it clear that Lucas couldn't be reclaimed so easily. Or better yet, he should just delete the message altogether and never reply to his father.
But that anger wouldn't sit still in Lucas, and before those thoughts could fully form in his mind, he pushed them aside and reread the message from his father. He cared. He wanted to know what was going on. He was interested.
Lucas' fingers danced across the keyboard in his reply, much longer than any other note he'd sent so far. In several paragraphs, he told of the memorial service and Bridger's house on the island. He talked about the seaQuest going down, his illness, his upcoming work on designing a new submarine. If they had been speaking in person, it seemed to Lucas that he would have been chattering nonstop for an hour; as it was, his thoughts raced far faster than even his nimble fingers could type.
Nearly 45 minutes later, Lucas sent his message and leaned far back in his chair, tipping the front legs off the floor and linking his hands behind his head. He sat quietly there for a moment, basking in the exchange with his father, and then remembered the file he was supposed to download, Frodo. His chair came crashing back down to the floor.
A quick search of the files he had downloaded found Frodo, and Lucas opened it up, unsure what to expect. It turned out to be a document, and a rather large one at that. A quick scan showed nearly 1,000 pages of text mixed in with charts and a few sketches; but mostly there was a lot of text. He groaned under his breath and flipped to the first page of the document to read the title: "An Investigation of UEO Production Data on Optimal Technologies for Measuring Resource Management Cycling." This time he groaned quite loudly.
Surely this report couldn't have come from his father. As he skimmed through a summary of the document – the summary alone was 30 pages – he saw nothing that directly related to his father's most recent work in thermal energy.
It occurred to him that he couldn't be positive his father had actually sent the file. He assumed as much, simply because of the file's name. It couldn't have come with any of the messages, because Lucas would have seen the file attached; it wouldn't have automatically shown up on his hard drive. Lucas had simply figured it must have been sent in secret during his father's last contact with him from the World Power Project facility. But he didn't know that for sure.
He briefly considered sending another message to his father and simply asking if he was the one who sent it, and why, but immediately rejected the idea. If his father had indeed sent the file, he would have told Lucas about it – unless it was because of the file that he was in danger. If that was the case, it was too risky for Lucas to mention it. Lucas would have to figure out why he'd been sent the file on his own.
He reread the title. "An Investigation of UEO Production Data on Optimal Technologies for Measuring Resource Management Cycling." Damn scientists and their arrogant vocabularies, he muttered to himself. Couldn't they come up with a title that actually meant something?
With a sigh he started reading the report summary in earnest, absently realizing that his mind was probably craving this type of scientific jargon, having been gone from his job at the seaQuest for a week now. Just a few pages into it, a soft knock came at his door, and Lucas quickly closed the document before telling Bridger to come in.
"It's almost midnight," the captain said, and Lucas looked sharply at the clock on his desk. He'd had no idea it was that late.
"All right. I'm going to bed," Lucas said.
"Really? It's that easy? No arguments?"
"I can argue a little if you really want me to," Lucas said with a grin.
"No, that's quite all right," Bridger answered with a smile of his own. "Remember, we have to be up at 7."
"Yeah, right," Lucas mumbled.
"What was that?"
"You're right," Lucas said with feigned eagerness. The captain walked to Lucas' desk and ruffled his hair with an affectionate pat that Lucas only half-heartedly dodged.
"I'm heading to bed," Bridger said. "I'll wake you in the morning. You really should try to get to bed soon."
"I know. I will."
"Good," Bridger said as he walked back out the door. "Goodnight."
"'Night."
True to his word, Lucas didn't stay up much later, already losing interest in the document he'd downloaded. He figured he had plenty of time for reading later and anyway, the next day really was too important to risk spoiling with not enough sleep. Lucas was sprawled in his bed and deeply asleep by 1 a.m., a small smile still settled on his face.