CHAPTER 7
Turtlevison?

Although the teens would be spending at least one night in the shelter, there was no assurance that the Feds wouldn't keep them trapped there longer. To be safe, they would sneak up now and get supplies from the house. Surely the thugs wouldn't be back until well after dark.

Since the studio door faced away from Mrs. MacGruder's house, they could come and go unseen. But they couldn't get directly from the garage to the house without being visible from her window, the same as Grashof and Prandtl were. Rather than taking a roundabout fence-hopping route from the back corner of the yard, they waited until they heard her after-dinner TV shows begin, and snuck quietly through the back door.

They were all hungry by then, so they debated whether to chance a trip out for fast food, order another pizza, or make do with whatever they could find in the house. Caution won out, so they dined on peanut butter and jelly, with bread from the freezer warmed in the microwave. They did decide, however, that since it wasn't dark yet and there were still TV sounds coming from next door, it was safe enough for the girls to make a quick and quiet dash to Maud's car for their backpacks.

Frax emptied out his pack from the tornado trip, retrieving his eyeglass strap and putting it in place. It was a cherished one-of-a-kind rainbow of colors in a complicated pattern, woven just for him by his Aunt Marian using "card weaving" on an "inkle" loom — which he'd seen, but never in use.

Everyone packed supplies for a siege, but hoping it would be no more than overnight. All four backpacks were stuffed with the peanut butter and jelly jars and the remainder of the loaf from "supper", plus one more loaf from the freezer. They grabbed beverages, cheese, and other simple foods. If they got really desperate, they could always try the dried and canned goods in the shelter pantry — probably from the 1960s, like the shelter itself.

Back in the shelter, they stashed the food in the pantry and got to work securing the place. The entry shaft came first. By carefully leaning the upper trap door against the lower one, both could be lowered together by someone on the ladder below.

Welded to the underside of the lower door they found two ordinary slide bolts, arranged to fit into matching holes in the steel bezel around the concrete mouth of the hole. The tight fit held the door so solidly it wouldn't even rattle when pounded on.

Next, the ladder was unbolted from the shaft beneath the trap door and laid on the floor in the landing area. The experimental cardboard-tube mugs from the shelter, along with several empty wire spools, were scattered where they'd be sure to twist ankles. To this they added short conduit scraps, intended to roll underfoot.

When that was completed they retreated into the shelter itself, where activity centered on tying the door shut, at least as far as the conduit elbow allowed; they certainly weren't going to try cutting the power conduit. After tying the bolts as planned, they couldn't push the door open from within, so they assumed Grashof and Prandtl couldn't pull it open from without. To get in, the five independent bolt blades would have to be cut, one at a time, in order to reach the cables on their backsides holding each one tight to the frame.

By this time it was dark outside, as viewed on the monitor. Everyone was tired, both from physical and mental effort. But they were too keyed up to even think about sleep. They wandered about aimlessly, looking at different items in the room without paying much attention; real thought couldn't compete with the "fight or flight" centers in their brains.

Frax found himself gazing absently at the monitor near the mug, showing a peaceful scene apparently meant to be relaxing. It certainly wasn't working on him now. Probably a photo from a Stevens family vacation, the shot had been taken looking down over a grassy hillside meadow, with a few large rocks strewn about. Down the slope, beyond the meadow, was a cool and inviting forest, with a few deer grazing at the meadow's edge. A rocky cliff along the left side of the scene trailed down the slope and disappeared into the forest.

Then one of the deer raised its head.

Huh? Video footage as computer wallpaper? Frax's brain jolted to attention. He looked around, but there was no obvious computer or keyboard in this equipment rack, unlike the one beside it with the command prompt. In fact, the monitor cable didn't come from any computer rack; it was attached directly to the mug artifact. The mug's bottom was facing the giant replica, but its open top held what was obviously a small camera pointed into the mug.

"Guys," he said slowly, "there's something very strange going on here. You gotta see this right now!"

They crowded around the monitor. "Watch the scene for a minute," Frax insisted. Deer moved. Wind rippled the grass, and treetops swayed. "And before you say it's a video loop, note the monitor cable is connected only to the mug, in fact to a little camera pointing into the mouth. I think the mug is some kind of TV receiver."

There was a general clamor of "What!", "No way!", and "Yeah, right!", all talking over each other, but the main issue quickly settled into "Then where is the TV camera?" Since the mug had apparently lain buried for 900 years, how could a camera and transmitter somewhere still be broadcasting after all that time? Even if so, why wasn't it buried under nine centuries of debris? Was it mounted up high, like on the side of a cliff, of which there were none anywhere near Ann Arbor?

"There's cliffs like that in the U.P.," said Sparrow.

"And in some parts of Wisconsin," added Maud.

"Or maybe the camera's attached to the wall of an ancient European cathedral, built 900 years ago overlooking this tranquil scene in rural France or Italy?" Wilt speculated.

"But either way," said Frax, "where does the power come from to broadcast all the way to Ann Arbor?"

"And if anyone can figure all that out," said Maud, "then take a guess at what big brother mug is for — home theater viewing?" She looked down into the knee-high mouth. "For pet turtles?"

Wilt started eyeing the rack on the right, the one with a computer keyboard and a monitor showing "Press S to start." After a minute of concentration, he turned to the group. "I think we should try running this. Yeah, I know what I said earlier about Madison, but this seems like a system that's already been in use, not some kind of exotic experiment that's gonna blast the mug with gamma rays or mini black holes or something that will blow us to cosmic dust. I think if we can get a clue to the location of the camera, or whatever it is, we may be able to figure out where Dad and Dr. Leong are. What do you say?"

With some trepidation, they agreed. Wilt hit the `S' key.