Jack took Josie’s band. He pulled some coins out of a pocket and laid everything on

the table. Then he pulled on Magik, and looked at the pieces he needed to put

together in a new construction.

“Who’s this, Jack?,” said Warner. He frowned at the flow of numbers and letters

pretending to be a human body.

“Magik, Colossus’s sister,” said Jack. “I was using the Scarlet Witch, but then I

realized her hex power was limited in a lot of ways.”

“So you picked someone who can really do magic,” said Warner.

“Yep,” said Jack. He picked up the coins and concentrated on them, forming them

into discs with holed centers. He picked up the band. He fit the discs against the

surface of the thing, shrinking them to fit into place. He concentrated to add the

markers on the new buttons. “Here you go. Try it out.”

Josie pressed the button for the Enterprise.

“This is Josie, Enterprise,” said Josie. “Status?”

“Optimal,” said Enterprise. “In stationary orbit over Hawk Ridge.”

“All right,” said Josie. “We might be heading south to look at some goblins in a few,

maybe use the transporter to get around town. We’ll call to let you know.”

“Sounds just like Majel Barrett,” said Warner. “You built that?”

“I admit that Aviras reminded me of the possibility,” said Jack. He let the persona

go. “If he hadn’t, I would have done the work of the gardener and wrecked

Shemmaria.”

“The whole country?,” said Warner. “Is that even possible?”

“Yes,” said Jack. He pulled out a thin strip of metal and some more coins. He worked

on them while he thought. “All you need is the ability to propagate your spell until

it is wide enough.”

“And then you can do anything you want?,” asked Warner.

“Not anything,” said Jack. “The spell is a single use summons.”

He worked the coins and strip until he had a new band. He checked against his band

and Josie’s. He put it down, and a ring beside it.

“Josie said you made a bionic arm for Darry Harp,” said Warner. “Is it the same

type magic as these communication bands?”

“This body allows me to do transformations that won’t change back after the spell

is done,” said Jack. “The formulae in my heads allow me to see things, and how they

work.”

He turned the persona off.

“So you’re going to give me a lift to the south of here?,” asked Warner.

“Yep,” said Jack. “We haven’t really flown the Enterprise much. Something the size

of a planet isn’t that much of a challenge for her to cross.”

“I think Jack and Aviras were arguing about exploring the solar system,” said Josie.

She hid a thin smile at their reactions.

“We weren’t really arguing about that,” said Jack. “We were arguing about the

propulsion systems.”

“I don’t understand,” said Warner.

“We were arguing about the use of impulse and warp power versus the jump drive

and gravity stuff Star Wars uses,” said Jack. “Some Stargate stuff too. We thought we

might need a working model. And then we got the quest and I built the Enterprise out

of the enemy’s labs. We still might have to go back and drop a torpedo on some of

those goons so they don’t try anything else stupid enough to endanger the world.”

“There is always going to be someone stupid enough to endanger the world,” said

Warner. He sighed. “Let’s see this model.”

“I have to talk to Elaine first,” said Josie. “If Jane can’t get a big enough building, we

might have to use a touch of Mary Poppins on a cleared piece of ground.”

She checked the kitchen before heading upstairs. Elaine used the office more than

they did.

“Are you okay?,” asked Warner. He kept an eye out in case Josie came back and

interrupted their talk.

“I’m fine,” said Jack. “I don’t need a therapist.”

“Who said anything about a therapist?,” asked Warner.

“Nobody,” said Jack. He put on his grin. “Forget I mentioned it.”

“Is there anything I can do for you before I go home?,” asked Warner. “You seem to

be having a lot of emotional things going on.”

“I’m okay,” said Jack. “This has been good for me for the most part. The magictech

is a major escape for me at the moment. I was thinking about building one of those

cities in the sky like Asteroid M, but now I have one. I have to think about turning it

into a real station instead of a makeshift one.”

“Have Josie send me a letter if you need me to drop by,” said Warner.

“I’m good,” said Jack. “I wish I could get my collection out of storage and sent here,

but that’s going to be hard without any magic there to do the deed.”

“Give me a couple of hours and I’ll think of a way to fix that,” said Warner.

“Really?,” asked Jack. He felt a real smile on his face.

“I’m not guaranteeing anything,” said Warner. “I don’t see why I can’t come up with

something.”

“Hey, Jack,” said June. She carried Matilda and Aviras as she jogged into the dining

room. “Mister Warner. We have some things to look at so we can get started.”

“Here’s your band,” said Jack. “This one is yours, Aviras. Put them on. I already

tested them so I know they work.”

“I only have four buttons,” said June.

“I only gave you a button for Matilda, Aviras, Josie and me,” said Jack. “If you

stay, I may give you buttons for the rest of the girls. Do not abuse the privilege.

Do you need to know anything about this?”

“Josie showed me how they work,” said June. “And my coaches will remind me

on how it works if I forget.”

“Are you sure about this, Juniper?,” asked Warner. “Saving the day takes a lot

of work.”

“I’m hoping that I qualify enough that I can stay here and avoid problems at home,”

said June. “If I am missing, my creditors might write everything off.”

“We’re going to deal with some goblins, and then I am on my way home,” said

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Warner. “Do you need me to give a message to your folks?”

“Can I write something down for you to take home?,” said June. “Matilda and

Aviras think they have a foolproof plan that I can use to finish my quest.”

“I wouldn’t go that far,” said Aviras. “But if it works, we might be able to finish

June’s quest today.”

“I like a dragon with some confidence,” said Jack. He grinned at his not so tiny

friend.

“My ring doesn’t seem to work,” said Aviras. “I don’t see any buttons.”

“Yours is voice activated,” said Jack. “You have to say call person with band.”

“Call Jack,” said Aviras. “Hmm.”

His hum came from him and Jack’s arm.

“Echo,” said June.

“Then you say end call to cut the call,” said Jack.

“End call,” said Aviras. “This will be useful. Thank you, Jack.”

“No problem,” said Jack. “I’m like Q from the James Bond movies.”

“Can you tell us about them?,” said Matilda.

“We’re on a schedule,” said June. “If things work out, I will tell you about them. I

will try to get you copies of the movies if things don’t work out.”

“I can ask the head cheese to be let to go home and fix your problem like a quest,”

said Jack.

“I got it, Jack,” said June. “Send a letter home to explain things. The folks would love

that.”

“I will think about it,” said Jack.

“Let’s go, kids,” said June. “We have our gadgets. It’s time to do the mission.”

They rushed up the stairs.

“They must be headed upstairs to look at the model,” said Jack. “It will paint targets

and Aviras and Matilda know that.”

“If the target isn’t in Hawk Ridge, how are they going to get there,” said Warner.

“I don’t have a clue,” said Jack. “Maybe one of June’s bodies can fly really fast.”

“All right,” said Warner. “I can see that.”

“That reminds me,” said Jack. “I have your old ring. I think I can alter it to take voice

commands for Bea.”

“Josie said you took it off some guy trying to raise the Dark Rider,” said Warner.

“Donald Corle,” said Jack. “He was going to sacrifice Jane and her initial crew to do

it.”

“Jack!,” called Josie from upstairs.

Jack jumped from his seat and ran upstairs. He found an angry Josie and a dismayed

Elaine in the office. He didn’t see the three stooges anywhere.

“What’s wrong?,” said Jack. “Where’s Matilda and the others?”

“Aviras called the Enterprise and beamed them aboard,” said Josie. She said it

with the face that she put on to keep her anger in check. He stepped back out of fist

range.

“Call and tell the Enterprise to beam them back down,” said Jack.

“The Enterprise is not answering the call,” said Josie.

“That’s impossible unless Aviras told the ship to ignore us,” said Jack.

“Of course he did,” said Josie. “Can you find them and get them back?”

“Finding them will be the easy part,” said Jack. He grinned. “I never thought he

would shut us out of the system. I might have to revoke his officer status.”

“They used the model first,” said Elaine. She pointed at the black dots moving

around. “All of these dots are Boim Russ.”

“That’s six, or seven, guys there,” said Jack. “It looks familiar somehow.”

“What do you mean?,” asked Josie.

“Hold on,” said Jack. “Let me call up Mister Fantastic.”

Jack called up his genius persona and looked at the model. He flicked back through

all the other times he looked at the model to find things. He frowned at the

associated memories.

“Todd Fain did this,” said Jack. He let the persona go. “When I asked where he was,

the model gave me two Todd Fains. The other one was about where this Russ is

now.”

“Do we fly at this?,” asked Josie.

“Will that disqualify June if we do?,” asked Jack. “Do we care if it disqualifies June?”

“We need to figure out which Russ they thought was the one they needed to hunt

down, and we need to catch up with them,” said Josie.

“They came in and looked for their target,” said Elaine. “June changed into one of her

other forms. She looked at the model for a second. Then she picked the one farthest

away. Then Aviras called the Enterprise and they left.”

“They picked the one where the other Todd was?,” asked Jack.

“I am sure of that,” said Elaine.

“So we need to get out there and do something about them commanding the most

powerful force on the planet,” said Josie. “I can’t believe this.”

“I got it, Josie,” said Jack. “Don’t worry about it. Nothing will happen to Matilda.

What do you have to do here?”

“Jane was able to do arrange to buy the first building we emptied over the Pears,” said

Josie. “She said they were working on how much. Everyone we already sent is non-

responsive and set up in a small tent city on the lawn until they can move them into

the first building. They don’t know who owns the second building so we can offer to

buy it from the member of the Montrose using it for a hold point when we find them.”

“All right,” said Jack. “Mister Warner has to deal with some goblins before he can

go home. I already said we would help him with that. I had thought we would use

the Enterprise, but first we have to get it back. You two go ahead and sort the

building things out with Jane. I’ll get the Enterprise back and help Mister Warner

with his quest so he can go home.”

“I would like his old quests before he goes home,” said Josie. “Some of our problems

might have been some of his problems.”

“We will work on that between the other stuff,” said Jack. He grinned at her. “Don’t

worry. Whatever else goes down, Aviras will protect Matilda with his tiny little

body.”

“He better,” said Josie. She rubbed her face for a moment. “All right. What do you

need to get out there and get them back.”

“Don’t worry about that,” said Jack. “Elaine, would you like to go out to that

restaurant again when I get home?”

“Another date night?,” asked Elaine.

“Maybe not a full on date, but at least some food and maybe some stealth hugging

in the dark somewhere,” said Jack.

“Stealth hugging in the dark?,” asked Josie.

“You wouldn’t know anything about the mighty stealth hug,” said Jack.

“I know it will be hard to hug someone if I rip both of your arms off, buddy,” said

Josie. “That’s some basic anatomy right there.”

“I will be glad to do some stealth hugging in the dark after we take care of our

obligations,” said Elaine.

“All right,” said Jack. He took one more look at the model to make sure he knew

where to go. “Let’s get dangerous.”

Jack leaned over and gave Elaine a kiss on the cheek before leaving the room. He

knew where to go to look for his sheep. He didn’t know what Juni had done to pick

that Russ to be the prime target over all the others, but he could find that out when he

caught up with them.

Then he might have some harsh words for his adopted cousins and natural sister. He

didn’t know what to say as he wondered which hero he could use to cover the ground

to the northernest part of the continent.

He was impressed that one of them had thought of shutting out anyone else from

taking over the Enterprise until they got to where they were going. He never thought

any of them would think of that.

He would have to fix that loophole in the chain of command.

“What happened?,” asked Warner. He had dug up a plate of food and a glass of

juice from somewhere while Jack had been upstairs.

“One of our trio of misfits figured out how to steal the Enterprise and fly at their

target across the map,” said Jack. “My money is on Aviras since I made him third

in command in case something happened to me and Josie. Josie is mad about it

since we were going to try to offload the injured goblin tree victims and the infected

Shemmarians we picked up.”

“June might have come up with the idea,” said Warner. He sipped his juice. “She

knows about the Next Gen just like us.”

“Either way, it’s going to cost a little time to deal with your goblins,” said Jack.

“Josie said to remind you to leave your books for us to read.”

“Not a problem,” said Warner. “Do you want me to show you how things are done in

the evil fighting business?”

“I doubt you can show me anything in that regard,” said Jack. He grinned at the older

man. “But I am always willing to take whatever someone leaves for me to better

myself.”

“Let’s see if I have some of the old juice left,” said Warner. He touched his watch and

became a younger looking version of himself in a tuxedo. “All right. This will take

me a couple of minutes.”

He made a hand gesture and pages fell out of his sleeve and dropped on the table in

a stack. He waited for the rain of paper to stop before making a gesture and letting

strips of metal clip the whole thing together like a book.

“All right,” said Warner. “That should do the trick for you.”

“Josie’s looks a lot better,” said Jack.

“Really?,” said Warner. “There are a lot of memories in that pile of paper. Not a lot

of them are pretty either.”

“It’s okay,” said Jack. “Anything I made would look a lot worse. Let’s see what

we can do about our stolen star ship.”

“It makes sense if June didn’t have anything with fast travel,” said Warner. He let

the persona go. “I have Skyman so we can get there pretty fast if we want.”

“Skyman?,” said Jack. “How fast are we talking here?”

“Pretty fast,” said Warner. “I can get us to the Ell Zee in two hops maybe, depending

on where it is.”

“All right,” said Jack. “I had an idea to get out there, but yours seems faster to me.”

“All right,” said Warner. “Let’s step outside and I will show you what a true dial

can do.”

“I would love to see this,” said Jack.

He led the way outside. He checked his watch, and it was almost full. If Warner

dropped him, he had enough time and power to save himself.

“Here we go,” said Warner. “Just remember, you might have to do the heavy lifting

at the other end.”

“Don’t worry,” said Jack. “How much trouble can Juni get into?”

“You know better than to tempt fate like that,” said Warner. “Skyman.”

Warner vanished in the air. Something invisible picked Jack up, retaining a grip

around his middle. Then he soared out of Hawk Ridge to the farthest point north you

could go unless you decided to sail to some other northern destination on the other

side of the globe.