“Sounds good,” he said as he handed outearplugs to us. “When you give me the signal, expect a countdownfrom ten, and then BOOM.”
I nodded, told Linda to begin, and turned myconcentration out to the rock with the C4. I raised it off theground a few inches and prepared to implement my plan. I startedwith my first shield in the middle being one of the solid ones.From there I began working outward, alternating between theflexible and the rigid. After I had done a dozen layers in eachdirection, I figured that it should be enough and I sealed theedges together.
“I think I’m good,” I sent to Linda.“What about you?”
“Good to go here,” she sent back asshe ducked down behind her rock.
I ducked down behind my own rock and wavedfor Sid to proceed.
“… 3 … 2 … 1” he counted. BOOM, theexplosion roared in both my ears and inside my head. In sudden painfrom the mental backlash I cried out weakly and clutched myhead.
“Mark!” Linda cried, rushing over to myside.
I was close to unconsciousness and couldn’treply immediately. I felt the three of them around me, helping tolay me out on the ground, my head in Lindas lap. After a minute theworld stopped spinning and I was able to reply that I thought I wasok. I started to sit up, but Linda held me down and told me to restfor a few minutes. With my head aching badly, I relaxed and noddedagreement.
After about fifteen minutes or so, I feltthat I might be able to move without having my brains leak out ofmy ears. Getting up slowly, I made my way over to the front of ourrock pile and sat down on one of the boulders with a reasonablyflat top. Carl and Sid were standing over where the explosion hadbeen, checking out the results. Sara was sitting near them, givingadvice which they seemed to be ignoring.
My head seemed to be getting slowly better,but I felt cold and weak. After hearing of my complaints, Lindaimmediately began bringing deadwood over for a fire. Sara, seeingwhat Linda was doing, made a crude fire pit in front of me andbegan breaking up small branches for kindling. Within five minutesthey had a small fire going and plenty of wood ready to add asneeded.
“Thank you,” I said gratefully as I began towarm up a bit. “Don’t make it too big though. We don’t want someforest ranger thinking that there’s a wildfire in the area.”
Sid and Carl finished their inspection of theblast site and came over to join us at the fire.
“How’s it going, eh?” Carl asked me.
“I’m fine, you hoser.” I replied, making funof his use of ‘eh’. “But for a while there, I thought my head wasgoing to explode.”
“Speaking of explosions, you did it. Or youmostly did it, anyway. It appears that the explosion itself wascontained, but the rock below the explosives busted through yourshield. If I had to make a guess, I would say that it was thedestructive failure of your shield that caused the backlash youfelt.”
“What about you?” I asked Linda. “Did youfeel anything?”
“Nothing,” she replied. “Your shield stoppedit all.”
Sid looked me over carefully and commented,“You look like hammered dog shit. There was a whole pile of stuffthat I wanted to try, but I don’t think it’s a good idea now.”
I nodded my agreement vehemently andimmediately regretted it as a sharp pain shot through my skull,causing me to wince.
“Mark might have broken his brain, but that’snot a big loss really. We could do some stuff with Linda still. I’msure her brain is much better than his,” Carl said hopefully.
“That might be an exceptionally bad idea,”Sara opined. “Linda’s brain might be bigger and better than Marks,but if we put her out of commission, then we’re all stuck in thisvalley until they heal.”
I raised both of my middle fingers towardthem, and stuck out my tongue for good measure. “Bad comedy aside,”I said to Linda, “The two retards have a point, and I don’t justmean the ones on the top of their heads. It’s going to be toughgetting out of here now, so we shouldn’t take any risks that can beavoided.”
After a bit more teasing and insulting bantereveryone was in agreement, so we settled down to allow me some timeto recover. Linda handed out the sandwiches that she had packed forlunch, and I forced myself to eat mine even though I had noappetite whatsoever. I was a little nauseous at first, but soonstarted to feel a bit better.
The sun was starting to go down when Ifinally decided that we couldn’t put things off for much longer.“We need to leave. It’s going to be dark by the time we get backhome, and I want at least some light to navigate by so we can getout of this valley without worrying about flying into a tree orsomething.” Everyone quickly agreed.
We didn’t have much to pack, so everyone wasready within a few minutes. Linda, in a stroke of genius, made aspherical shield under the surface of the lake and floated a ballof water over to douse the fire. Carl looked almost as impressed atthat idea as he did at my explosive retention sphere.
Linda took control of Sid, Carl, and the gearfor the flight back, allowing me to only carry Sara. Still feelinga bit out of sorts, I agreed and started retracing our flight uptoward the pass. We went slowly, with Linda ordering several reststops along the way. It was fully dark by the time we made it backhome, and I was glad that the patio light was left on, as it gaveme a target to aim for.
Arriving back at the house, Linda immediatelyescorted me to the bedroom and ordered me to get some rest. Shehelped me undress, got me under the covers, and then held me forthe three or four milliseconds that it took for me to fallasleep.
Chapter 13
Linda: Violent Disagreements
Once I got Mark into bed, he fell asleepalmost immediately. I carefully disengaged from him and floatedmyself toward the door, trying to stay
