J.M.J.

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Chapter 11

"So they have Mr. Drew and Mr. Hardy and the police detective at the police station, and we have no idea where they have Nancy and Tom." Bess absently twirled a lock of blond hair between her fingers as she thought over the report that Ned had given to her and George. The three of them were huddled in the kitchen of the farmhouse with the shades drawn, for as much good as that might do to keep them from being found out. Both their prisoner and the dog were quiet now, but the two of them weren't far from any of their thoughts.

"If we could just get that guy we captured to talk, he could probably tell us," George commented.

"I'm not so sure," Ned replied. "From what I saw, Delvere has been letting Meyers pretty well do as he thinks best, but now that Delvere bothered to come, he's going to completely take over, and I get the sense that they have some different ideas about how to do things. If that guy ever knew, Nancy and Tom might have been moved by now."

"Yeah, I guess that could be," George admitted. "A few things are starting to make more sense, though."

"They are?" Bess asked incredulously.

"Remember how we were a little worried about coming in here, because we thought they might have cameras?" George reminded her. "They did all over in town, so why not here? But they didn't. I think the reason why is related to Meyers not wanting to turn that electronic barrier on. He must not think very much of Delvere's use of technology, and he's probably refused to use it as far as possible."

"That could be," Ned agreed. "Actually, I think it probably is, but we won't have that advantage anymore. What's worse is that we know we're exactly where Delvere wants us to be. He would have never let me come out here if he didn't have some plan."

Bess shivered. "Do you think he put some kind of tracking device on you so he knows exactly where we are?"

"I thought of that," Ned admitted, "but I don't see how he could of. None of them got close enough to me to do it. I was thinking more along the lines of him sending a drone to follow me, but I didn't see one, so that's probably not it."

"Or he might have just done it to psyche us out," George added. "Unless the whole electronic barrier is a bunch of nonsense—which it could be, but I don't really want to test it—then he really does have us trapped here. He might be the sort who would enjoy that. Or there could be some other reason. Who knows? The only thing we know for sure is that we're trapped, but we're the least trapped of any of our friends, so it's up to us to figure out either a way to rescue them and we all get out or for us to get somewhere we can call for more help."

"We do have one thing going for us," Ned reminded them. "Frank and Joe are on their way here. Hopefully, they won't blunder into this mess as easily as the rest of us did."

"What can they do from the outside?" Bess objected dolefully. "This place might as well be a fortress."

"Maybe there's something we can do about un-fortifying it," George said. "They've got to be using a signal blocker to keep us from having cell service. If we could find where it's coming from, maybe we could disable it. And I've got a pretty good idea where it's coming from."

"The plant?" Ned guessed.

"Exactly."

"But we don't know where exactly in the plant it would be," Ned reminded her. "From what I saw, it looked like a huge place."

George frowned thoughtfully as she considered that problem.

"Would it work to just turn the power off?" Bess asked.

Ned and George looked at each other for a moment, but then they grinned.

"I should have thought of that," George remarked. "Of course, it would work. For that matter, there'd be no more cameras and no more electronic barrier."

"Not to mention that we might be lucky enough that it would wreck Delvere's communication system," Ned added. "It obviously works some other way than cell or radio signals. That could be helpful."

"This sounds like you guys are thinking about more than just flipping the breaker at the plant," Bess said uncertainly.

"There's got to be a central power station in this place," George confirmed. "If we could get the power shut off from there, then that will take care of the whole town."

"I thought I saw one when I was circling around town," Ned replied. "I wasn't paying a lot of attention then, though."

"How do we cut the power besides, like, blowing it up or something?" Bess asked. "Which we don't have any explosives and even if we did, we'd probably wind up setting the whole place on fire."

"There'll be some kind of central switch," George insisted. "We'll have to disable it so they can't just turn it back on, but there's got to be some less dramatic way to do that."

Ned nodded. "There's two big problems here, though, First, obviously, we're not entirely sure we can do it, and secondly, trying it is going to take us back close to town and we could be spotted. The only way we can deal with the first problem is to just go there and take a look, and the only way around the second that I can think of is to send out a decoy at the same time."

Bess sighed. "Well, I wouldn't be any use trying to cut the power, so I guess I'm stuck being the decoy."

"I think you and I had both better be decoys," Ned suggested. "George can handle the power center, and besides, the idea is for the decoys to be more visible than the one actually trying to shut off the power."

"I don't know," George protested hesitantly. "Splitting up usually isn't such a great idea."

"Well, if we've got a better idea, then obviously, I'm all for it," Ned replied.

"I don't have any right off," George admitted.

"What about the guy we caught?" Bess asked. "Are we just going to leave him here?"

"Hold on." Ned rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "Is he wearing a uniform of some kind?"

"Yeah," Geroge replied. "Why?"

"Let's go take a look at him," Ned suggested. "He might be able to help us, whether he wants to or not."

NDHBNDHBND

Nancy's heart hammered and she tried not to even breathe as she squeezed between an old file cabinet and the wall, listening to what was happening in the main part of the room. She hadn't been sure she could trust Roscoe, but it was better to take his advice than to be certainly caught. Now she had heard the door open and someone come into the room, and she was left wondering whether Roscoe would reveal her presence or not.

"The girl, Roscoe," someone said gruffly. "She's gone. Did she come in here?"

"She'd have to be pretty stupid to do that," Roscoe retorted.

"Yes or no. I don't want to play games, especially not with you."

"What do you mean by that?"

"You tried to throw us all under the bus just to save your own skin. Admit it."

"You're an idiot."

Nancy heard a sudden, harsh movement, and she could imagine that whoever had just come into the room had grabbed Roscoe by the collar. "You're not talking your way out of this with me like you did with Meyers. If Meyers didn't still think enough of you to doubt that you're definitely the traitor, then you wouldn't be alive right now."

"Meyers knows I'm not the traitor," Roscoe insisted. "He would. He's the one who set me up."

"It's not in Meyers' hands anymore, anyway. Delvere's here."

There wasn't any response from Roscoe, and Nancy wondered what that meant.

The other man snorted in a half-laugh. "So. How about the girl? Maybe it would help you just a little if you admitted seeing her."

"Not if I haven't seen her," Roscoe replied. "You'd better stop wasting time and find her, before Delvere decides you're a traitor, too."

The other didn't answer again, but he did slam the door shut. Nancy stayed where she was another minute or two and then she ventured out. Roscoe was sitting on the floor, staring dejectedly at the door.

"I take it that was bad," Nancy guessed.

Roscoe scratched his ear. "Yeah, you could say so."

"What's actually going on around here?" Nancy asked. "They're obviously building something or doing some kind of experiment in this building. What's it all about?"

"I don't actually know, to be honest. I have some vague ideas, but I was just hired as security, so I didn't need to have all the details."

"You must know something," Nancy insisted.

Roscoe folded his arms and continued to hesitate. "I really don't. At least, not anything useful. You see, Meyers is the head of security around here. I've known him a long time. He helped me out of a bad spot years ago, and so when he came to me with this job, I felt like I owed him. Not that the job sounded too bad anyway. High pay, but no questions. Meyers is kind of an old-school type of guy and doesn't trust technology to be able to take over completely for human workers, especially in a security situation, so he wanted a good team, in addition to the security system that was already in place. That was fine until a few weeks ago. There's this electronic barrier about a mile out of town, surrounding it completely. It's a buried wire that gives anyone crossing it an electric shock. We were assured it wasn't lethal, but one of our guys accidentally stepped on it and disproved that claim. Meyers had it turned off and we started patrolling with dogs. Since then, things have been a little strained, to say the least. Then Swift showed up."

"Swift? You mean, Tom?"

"No, his dad. He owns the company that came in took over the plant, but apparently whatever's going on here isn't by his orders."

"Right. Tom did say that," Nancy replied, annoyed at herself for not remembering.

"Anyway, he shows up and wants a tour of the place. Dr. Wilcox shows him around and tells him a whole pack of lies about what's going on here—she's the head of the plant, you see, Swift nods along like he's pretending to understand when he really didn't, but he must have understood more than anyone bargained because the next thing I knew after he left, we hear he was shot, but not dead, and his kid gets brought here, the cell reception blocker goes up, and we're all sealed off with orders to hurry anybody who shows up through before they can learn anything. You and your friends were the first ones who did. We tried to get rid of you, but you wouldn't go. That's when I decided to use the chance to try to help Tom escape. I'm not down with kidnapping teenagers, no matter how much I'm getting paid. Now, though, it looks like getting paid is the least of my worries."

"Wait. You said something about my friends?"

"Yeah, there were two other girls with you. I didn't catch either of their names."

"Would you recognize them?"

"Sure. But maybe you would, if you saw them."

"Maybe." Nancy chewed her lip, wondering if she would. She wouldn't have remembered her own name if Tom hadn't told her. She doubted if she'd remember her own friends. If that wasn't bad enough, she had overhead Meyers—as she assumed it was—saying that he was intentionally going to trick her with people posing as friends of hers. For that matter, maybe Roscoe wasn't really trustworthy, either. Whoever had come into this room a minute ago hadn't bothered to search. Maybe that incident had been calculated to make Nancy trust Roscoe, and now they would have two of their own people pretend to be her friends. She didn't even have anyone to talk this over with this way.

"There must be some way to get out of here," she said finally. "Do you know how to turn of the electric barrier?"

"I think I could figure it out, but we'd have to get to the controls without being seen, and I don't even know that we can get out of this room."

"It doesn't sound like we have much choice but to try," Nancy replied.

NDHBNDHBND

There hadn't been any chance to make escape plans before Carson, Fenton, and Dawson were all separated from one another. Carson was taken to another building altogether. He was blindfolded when they moved him, but from the noise and the industrial feel of the room he found himself in when the blindfold was removed, he guessed that he was in the plant. The room they had brought him to was a very drab office. He had no way of knowing it, of course, but it was the same room where Nancy and Tom had been questioned earlier.

Carson wasn't left in the room alone, or he would have tried to escape. Instead, a tall, stocky guard who refused to say a word stayed with him, next to the door. There was no way to escape around him.

They had only been waiting in the room a few minutes before Meyers came in, looking rather perturbed. "I'm supposed to find out whether Swift has talked," he said without preamble as he sat down. "I'm not going to try very hard to find out. Delvere can use his tech if he's so sure that it can replace humans in every way."

Carson raised a confused eyebrow at him, but he didn't say anything. If Meyers meant anything by this, he could explain it on his own.

Meyers leaned forward a bit. "Look, Delvere doesn't approve of how I've been running things here. Maybe he's partly right. If I'd done things the way he told me, it would all be a little bit less of a mess than it is now. But you see, if I'd done it that way, then my men and I would all be dispensable, and it wouldn't have solved all the problems we've had. It wouldn't have kept Swift from getting in…and out, and it wouldn't have made that assassination any more successful. But of course, he doesn't see it that way. He just sees it as proving his point, that human employees can fail to follow orders where computers will follow blindly. He's already gotten one of my men killed, and I think he intends to kill another. The rest of us will end up the same way before long, I expect, so I'm not going to bother doing Delvere any favors." He paused for a moment. "You know, I could help you all escape, if you'd help me in return."

"Help you with what?" Carson asked.

"I'd testify against Delvere," Meyers asserted. "All my people would if you need it. Delvere's doing some weird mind control experiments or something. None of us know enough about it to testify about that, but we can tie him to the murder attempt on Swift, kidnapping Swift's kid, and holding all of you here."

"It looked to me like you helped with that," Carson replied.

Meyers nodded. "That's what I need for you. I need you to arrange that we won't face any charges for that."

"I can't guarantee anything like that," Carson told him.

"You can't refuse. If we move fast enough, I can get you all out, but we really do have to move fast. Delver doesn't waste time. You don't honestly think he intends to let any of you go, do you? He's going to have you all killed." When Carson didn't say anything, he added in desperation, "Look, I don't have to help you. I could get out of here right now. It's my own people guarding the road out, and so I can just leave if I want, and I know how to avoid Delvere. He won't be able to hunt me down. But I'd rather not have to avoid him and the law, too. I'd even settle for reduced sentences if that's the best you can do. But if you're not willing to cooperate, then I'll do what I need to to stay alive."

He stared at Carson a moment or two longer, but then he turned and started to walk away.

"Wait," Carson said, causing him to stop and turn to him again. "I don't have any control over what's going to happen to you, but if you help us, I'll do what I can, including that I'll do what it takes to get Delvere in prison."

Meyers glanced at the other man in the room, who remained impassive. Then he looked back at Carson. "All right. That's better than nothing. I'll take you to your daughter now."