Tautog took over for Leilani, and the power needle came up into the red. Kurt kept the beam focused on the target.
“What are you doing?” Leilani asked.
“Ever see the old Memorex commercial?”
She shook her head.
“Just watch that window.”
The window was vibrating, shaking back and forth with the sound waves like the skin of a drum. He could see the ripples catching the light. A strange noise began echoing out over the water like the ringing of a Tibetan Singing Bowl. Kurt worried it would give them away, but it was too late to stop, they were committed now.
“More power,” he whispered again, and then, realizing Varu was sweating and exhausted, he took the young man’s spot and put his own muscle into the effort. The boat drifted, but Leilani kept the Pain Maker focused on the glass.
It looked like they were going to fail, as if the hurricane-proof window was going to hold up against the vibration, when all of a sudden two of the other boats snapped their systems on and focused them on the same window.
The three combined beams of sound shattered the glass instantly. It exploded inward, an effect Kurt hadn’t counted on. He only hoped Marchetti and the Trouts were in the room and had been smart enough to back away from the vibrating windowpane.
INSIDE THEIR CELL, Gamay heard the sound first: a strange resonance that initially seemed only like her ears were ringing.
“WHAT’S THAT?” Paul asked.
Apparently it wasn’t her imagination.
“I have no idea,” she said.
Gamay stood, leaving her post at the door and poking about the dark quarters like a suburbanite looking through a quiet house for a chirping cricket.
The noise grew slowly in intensity, if not volume. Had there been a dog present, it would have been howling at the top of its lungs.
“Maybe we’re being abducted by aliens,” Marchetti suggested.
Gamay ignored him. The noise had brought her to the large window overlooking the ocean. She pressed her face against it. Out in the dark, barely illuminated by the few lights Aqua-Terra was running, she saw a collection of native-looking rafts. She recognized a figure on the lead boat.
“It’s Kurt,” she said.
Paul and Marchetti ran over.
“What on earth is he doing?” Paul asked, gazing at the strange goings-on. “And who are those people with him?”
“I haven’t the foggiest idea,” Gamay said.
As they watched, two of the other rafts aligned themselves with Kurt’s, and the strange resonance spiked an octave or two. A crash of shattering glass rang out somewhere to their left.
“I believe he’s trying to rescue us,” Marchetti said.
“Yes,” Gamay replied, proud and sad all at the same time. “Unfortunately, he’s breaking into the wrong room.”
OUT IN THE HALL, the men charged with guarding the prisoners heard the vibration for a moment, but it sounded to them like the massage chair on full tilt once again. The shattering glass was a different story.
They jumped to their feet.
“Check the prisoners,” the lead guard ordered.
Two of his men grabbed their weapons and ran down the hall. As they vanished, he picked up the phone and dialed up to the control room. After four rings, no one had answered.
“Pick up, already,” he grumbled.
The tinkling of more glass falling caught his attention. It was coming from the room across from him, not from down the hall.