Second Base

By David J. Wighton

Wilizy operations always had a degree of uncertainty. Sometimes, a random event could mean a wonderful plan had to be adjusted. Sometimes, an ally acted in an unexpected manner. Sometimes, an enemy struck without warning. Sometimes, the Wilizy just got lucky and an impossible operation became possible. You'll find all of these in the thirteenth Wilizy book.

In the book's main plot, the Wilizy found the home base of the Safe Haven slave owners and searched for a way to bring them to justice. Their attempt to penetrate the defenses of Safe Haven's home base in Switzerland didn't have a ghost of a chance until... well, until the Wilizy joined forces with a ghost. The plan to rescue the slaves imprisoned inside was perfect; and then somebody ignored the plan. Ooops.

My favorite part of Second Base featured Bean. She met the sheriff of Helena Montana, a man who spouted terrible country witticisms like this: "Well, hitch my butt up to a pair of ponies and call me a stage coach." At first, she considered him a buffoon, but he grew on her. He was attracted to her as well but they decided to go their separate ways. And then, he was dying on a deserted Montana prairie. The Wilizy would have helped him if they had known, but they were busy fending off an attack on their base camp.

• Language: English
• Publisher: David J. Wighton
• Release date: Feb 9, 2018
• ISBN: 9781310626241

David J. Wighton

David Wighton is a retired educator who enjoys writing youth novels when he's not on a basketball court coaching middle-school girls. The books in his Wilizy series peek at how people lived after the word's governments collapsed in the chaos that followed the catastrophic rise in ocean levels and the disappearance of the world's last deposits of oil. Luckily today, in the 2080s, the citizens of Alberta are safe because their It's Only Fair society uses brain-bands to zap people whenever they break a rule. That way, all children grow up knowing the difference between right and wrong. Unfortunately, they're also taught that women's ankles need to be covered so that men can't see them and turn into perverts. Plus, no-one in Alberta can have babies any more because the government manufactures them in a way that ensures that no child has an unfair advantage over any other child. All of this makes sense to Alberta's dictator, but not to Will and Izzy – two teenagers who are decidedly different from everyone else.Wighton's novels have strong teenage characters driving the plot and facing challenges that, in many respects, are no different from what teenagers face today. His novels are intended to entertain and readers will find adventure, romance, suspense, humour, a strong focus on family, plus a touch of whimsy. Wighton also writes to provoke a little thought about life in today's societies and what the future might bring. Teachers may find the series useful in the classroom and the novels are priced with that intent in mind.

Book preview

Chapter 1

Why do you want to live in this decrepit old house? Doc asked Granny. Kashmira and Mathias are attending schools in Melbourne. Why don't we live there?

Doc and Granny were standing on a steep bluff overlooking the Tasman Sea on a sunny day in March 2088. Old folks don't tend to pay too much attention to what day of the week it was. They knew it was March and that was good enough. For those of my readers who want to know what day it was, it was Wednesday, March 3.

Technically, the house was in the Australian province of New South Wales while Melbourne was in the province of Victoria. But much of Australia's political system had disappeared during The Troubles and formal provincial boundaries were one of the losses. The steep bluff that had entranced Granny was on the perimeter of the Kosciuszko National Park which featured a mix of rugged mountains and wilderness. Those hadn't disappeared. Mass riots and lynchings don't usually make mountains disappear. But thirty years ago, some people who had been burdened with a surplus of rope had decided to make Australia's problem with its original inhabitants disappear. The mountains stayed; the Aborigines disappeared. Lynchings had that effect on the people being lynched.

Both you and I would hate living in Melbourne. It's too crowded, noisy, and dirty. This house is more like what we're used to and Mathias and Kashmira are only a short sling hop to their schools. Plus the view is great!

That's only because you can't see the squalid fishing village at the base of the cliff.

I don't think we would want to do our shopping there. I didn't feel welcome.

I got that impression too when the shopkeeper kicked us out and said we weren't welcome in his store.

The real estate agent has been more sociable. Granny had noticed that Doc was making no attempt to hide his negative feelings about the house. She agreed to show us the house.

That was before we landed here. She took one look, said that the house was unlocked, and hasn't poked her nose out of the copter since.

At least she was honest. She said that she didn't know much about the house since it had been empty for decades. She offered to check at the local bank to see who owns it if we want to put an offer on it. Both she and that bank will be interested enough to take our money, Granny pointed out the obvious. Besides, we don't want anybody being curious about us. If we're living here all by ourselves, the family can sling in and out without worrying about nosy neighbours. We can have our food shipped in by overnight express. Plus, we'll have a huge wilderness behind us that you'll enjoy.

The house looks big enough to accommodate any family who want to visit, Doc admitted. The house was a solid, two storey wood frame building with what appeared to be a lot of bedrooms on the second floor if you went by the number of windows currently reflecting sunlight at them. There was also a stand-alone outbuilding containing nothing other than a cement floor. The sign on the structure's outside wall said Harvesting Facility, so it must have been used at some point when the owner was growing crops. How a cement floor fit in with a place to harvest crops was anybody's guess.

William can give us power, including air conditioning, Granny kept the positive momentum going. Hank can check the building's structure. We'll need to verify that the well has drinkable water and plenty of it if I want to have a garden. Can't be any snakes in the well, either.

TG can send a drone down to check for snakes. There's no electronic reception in this area, but that won't be a problem for us.

We should walk through the house.

Can't hurt, I suppose.

# # # # # # # #

On that same day, the topic of snakes surfaced in a meeting that a newly promoted sheriff was holding in a near empty bar in Pocatello, Idaho. He and his guests were enjoying free drinks in that bar, a gift that had followed immediately after the new sheriff had told the bar's owner that he was here to determine if any of his liquor bottles had been watered down. The bar owner was quick to offer an abundant quantity of the bar's highest quality beverage for testing purposes. The bottles in front of them came from the cellar. What normal patrons imbibed was indeed watered-down. For their own safety in case they became too drunk too quickly, of course.

This spontaneous party was celebrating a promotion. The former sheriff of Pocatello had been found dead just east of Burley that morning, and the Pocatello deputy had dived right into the job, you might say. The men who were at the table with him were the reason the job had suddenly become vacant. The new sheriff had once been in charge of Scandinavia's Special Ops. He had become tired of waiting for the former sheriff to die of natural causes.

I could give all of you deputy jobs here. We'd own this town.

Wouldn't it be better if we collectively owned a lot of towns like this? This strategic insight was provided by the former executive officer of Scandinavia's Special Ops. Currently, he was a deputy in Rock Springs, Wyoming where a certain young filly would be especially impressed if he were elevated to Rock Springs' sheriff position. To date, she had been resistant to the deputy's charms. This sad state of affairs would likely endure into the future seeing as how the deputy had no charms that would attract a filly – human or horse. Plus, he had to live on a deputy's salary which meant that his l'il darling's desire to live in a big house that didn't look like it would fall down in a stiff breeze would go unfulfilled. The Rock Springs' sheriff now, he enjoyed living in a sturdy wind-resistant house provided to him for free by the county.

By the end of the meeting, everybody around the table had agreed that it was best if all of them became sheriffs in their own towns. As they had done for the new sheriff of Pocatello, the ex-Scandinavian officers would make sure that they gave fate a hand in providing quick promotions for all the deputies. That hand would be attached to a gun, but I bet you had already figured that out.

Each sheriff-to-be had his own reason to seek promotion. One deputy's reason was blonde and busty. Another had a body that made a piece of barbed wire look sexy in comparison. In other words, her ultra slender body was not particularly pleasing to look at, nor was anybody likely to touch what passed for her body given the prickly disposition that accompanied it. However, her sumptuous bank account was especially pleasing to the eye. Another deputy had enough latitude in his work routines that he could easily fulfill his ambition to ensure the houses of pleasure in the area were meeting the county's building code. He'd check that the employees of those houses were up to code as well. Another town required their sheriff to control the illegal liquor trade and didn't care how much liquor he had to throw out or drink in the process.

The topic of snakes wasn't mentioned when all of the men gave their reports on what they had seen when each of them had flown over a certain army camp for young cadets. Since air traffic in that part of Montana was normally very sparse, they had taken pains to avoid flying directly overhead and, as well, each had flown on different courses in their surveillance. The fact that they could fly anywhere near the cadet camp was remarkable in itself. The airspace over the Wilizy's base camp in the Aboriginal Nation had been well guarded. But their camp in Montana appeared to be defenseless.

Not once had they been challenged on their surveillance flights even though the camp had numerous shiny planes parked on the grass near what was presumably the camp's mess hall. Those were Wilizy-manufactured planes fresh from their plant in Red Deer and dozens of them were sitting, empty, on what passed for an airplane parking lot in desolate Montana. Obviously, the Wilizy had thought that they could hide in the wilderness without installing any defensive armaments whatsoever.

One of the Scandinavians had noticed several shiny planes coming into camp at the dinner hour. That had suggested this would be the best time to maximize Wilizy deaths from their attack. The who and the how of that attack were yet to be determined. Further research would be needed. It was in this planning part of the meeting that snakes were mentioned. These were very special snakes. Sidewinders.

# # # # # # # #

I can't believe how much dust we found on all the floors, Granny said.

Nobody has been in that house for a very long time. It'll need considerable cleaning. Dusting is only the beginning.

We'll have a family work party. We can have it clean within a week.

What did you think about the bedrooms? Doc asked

The metal frames on the beds are still solid. Very little rust. All the mattresses are toast.

I meant, why so many bedrooms? What was this house for? Who lived here?

Large kitchen; very large dining room. Orphanage?

Could be. Some of the rooms still had belongings. I saw numerous home made crafts that children or teenagers might have created.

Distinctive appearance to the crafts, Granny observed.

Aborigines, I'd say.

The house has a lot of character. I like it. You?

If this house served as an orphanage for aborigines, I wonder why it's still in good condition.

You believe that what we saw is good condition?

This house has been unlocked for decades but since we saw no footprints in the dust on the floors, we can conclude that no villager has been inside it. I see lots of rocks scattered outside the house, but no broken windows. We know from personal experience that the people in that fishing village hate aborigines and yet this house helped keep aborigine orphans alive. Why is this house still standing?

Back to the Table of Contents

Chapter 2

It's Friday, March 5 and the Wilizy executive were holding a virtual meeting. Doc and Granny were in the Wilizy/America, which was floating above Melbourne while they waited to hear from their real estate agent who was trying to track down the owner of the aborigine orphanage. She had managed to confirm that the house had been an orphanage for about eight years in the 2040s. The local bank had no record of anybody taking out a mortgage on that house.

Hank and Yolanda were in their home in the Aboriginal Nation scrutinizing all of their possessions. The house that they were planning to build in Montana would be much smaller. Only Reese and Winnie were still living with them and that wouldn't be for much longer. Reese had a full time job piloting the Wilizy jumbos and Winnie had been sending them signals that she too would be traveling a lot in her new persona as a beam of light that was determining if the Earth were ready to join the Star Trek universe. With most of the Wilizy family now living in the mountains surrounding the Montana cadet camp, Hank and Yolanda only needed a one bedroom home. Perhaps a couple of extra rooms for work offices. Hank was suggesting that they move all their non-essential possessions into the caves. Yolanda wasn't sure that the caves were big enough. She wasn't willing to throw anything out.

Also present at the virtual meeting were Winnie and Marie. Winnie had a proposal to offer the Board. Marie was there because she was tired of hearing Winnie complaining about being bored. She had told her to stop whining and do something constructive. This meeting was the result.

We don't actually know that Safe Haven as an organization is gone, Dad. They never attacked us, so we assumed that they had conceded defeat and had relocated to their other businesses outside of North America.

Winnie's right, Doc confirmed. Last November, we decided that the Raging Gardeners would focus on the Scandinavians while the men would prepare to beat off a Safe Haven attack on the Montana installation. They didn't attack, but the Safe Haven organization is still out there. At one point, Jock had told us to concentrate on the enemy we knew best; Safe Haven could wait until later.

Well, it's later now, Dad. We should find them. Otherwise, we could be surprise attacked again.

How would you find them, Winnie? Yolanda asked. Lucas went through their records thoroughly and didn't find much to go on.

Marie and I are volunteering to TiTr the Safe Haven man who was meeting with Wilhelm. Remember him? He agreed to coordinate attacks with Wilhelm, so he must be important. We know the last time he was in Stockholm. It would be easy to follow him.

What are you hoping to find? Granny asked.

Their head office. Once we know where that is, William and Wolf can probably insert drones throughout the building and we can listen in. We won't be caught by surprise again.

Sounds dangerous.

Mom, we're not conducting an operation. All we're doing is trailing a man from Stockholm to his company's head office.

And then coming straight back here. Right?

Once we're sure that we've found their home base, yes. It'll take one day, two at the outside.

Marie? Doc asked.

It makes sense to find out where these slave owners have gone to ground. I wouldn't mind paying them a visit.

As part of a Wilizy operation, right? Not on your own.

Sure, Yolanda. But I still plan to do some chewing and swallowing.

# # # # # # # #

Let's turn our collective attention now to Lucas. My readers will recall the basketball game that the Vikings played against Coach Kidneystone and the U of T practice roster Blues. Here's what happened after the game was over as I have written in Tickled Pink.

After engaging with the moms in a long hopping and stomping group hug, Lylah turned her exuberance to the person closest to her. That happened to be Lucas.

I grew a spine, she enthused to him.

You did, Lucas agreed although he had always thought that she had a spine, the better to hold up her bones. The bit about being spineless was a Lylah - Lohla confidence that hadn't included Lucas.

Thank you for your help, Lylah offered.

I didn't do...

Lylah wasn't listening. She grabbed Lucas in a tight embrace and planted a lip-lock directly on his... well, on his lips and after that matters went internal. It became rather steamy for a moment.

I've wanted to do that ever since we met, Lylah shared. But I was too scared. I've just grown more of a spine. On that re-declaration of spinal growth, Lylah turned abruptly on her heel and rushed out of the gym.

Lucas watched Lylah go, wondering what had just happened, before remembering that Lohla had been in the hopping and stomping group hug too. He turned to see Lohla leaving the gym by another exit. She had to have been right behind him when Lylah was kissing him. Lohla would have noticed that he hadn't returned the hug, right?

That kiss had been ten days ago. Lohla hadn't said one word to him in those ten days and Lucas had graduated from being annoyed to being peeved. Lohla must have noticed that Lucas had just been standing there when Lylah had approached him. He hadn't encouraged her to kiss him. He hadn't even closed his arms into a hug when Lylah had tried to climb inside his body through his mouth. She must have noticed that, right? Arms wide open. Right?

Why was she not talking to him? Why was she always enveloped inside a rush of other girls on their way to their next class? Why didn't she see him as he stood by her locker, trying to get her attention? Why was it always Bean who opened the door to her apartment after school, only to shake her head negatively at Lucas, and then close the door firmly? Why was Lohla's pinky ring on automatic block whenever he called? He hadn't done anything wrong! It was all Lylah.

If Lohla had somehow misinterpreted what she had seen, then Lucas would ask Lylah to explain to Lohla that he hadn't encouraged her. But he hadn't been able to find Lylah in spite of how often he showed up at her apartment. The girl living in her room had finally taken pity on him and invited him inside. She's moved out of Toronto, she said and showed him the empty closet and the empty bureau.

Where did she go?

She didn't say. Stop coming around. You're creeping me out.

Lucas could have used time travel to follow Lylah after she left her room. He could find her, but he'd never be able to explain to her how he had found her. She didn't want to be found; so, he wouldn't track her. He'd have nothing to do with her. It was abundantly clear that Lohla didn't want to talk to him. Spring break was coming up. Perhaps, when she had a chance to calm down, he'd find out why she was mad at him. He hadn't done anything!

Back to the Table of Contents

Chapter 3

Marie and Winnie left the home compound on Sunday. Both took a change of clothes and enough food for two days. Winnie threw some drones into her backpack while Marie threw some gold coins into hers. These coins were courtesy of Wizard who agreed that it was best if they had some currency for their trip but entrusted the money to Marie since a young girl with gold coins would attract attention. They flew at twice the speed of sound to Stockholm, traveled back in time to November 19, 2086 when the Safe Haven man had left Wilhelm's office, and followed his copter directly to a midsized building in a mountainous country in Europe. He disappeared into the building through a back entrance. A large lake provided the necessary landmark and after calling up some online maps, Winnie announced that they were in Switzerland. Both the lake and the city were called Zurich.

First thing Winnie did was install a drone so that it gave a good view of that back entrance. She then looked for other doors into what was a very solid brick building three storeys high with the front entrance on a short narrow street named Zeugwartgasse as it met St. Peterstrasse. The building was one of several office building that formed a square around an interior courtyard that at one point in time might have been green space. It was now covered with cobblestones, and on top of them, empty copters. A mini-parking lot if you like. Safe Haven Man had parked his copter (dark blue in colour with white highlights) next to three other copters with a similar appearance and used some form of ID card to enter through the back of the building. The other buildings around this parking lot courtyard also had company copters with their own designs. All of the older buildings in Zurich had steeply pitched roofs that meant that roof top copter pads were impossible.

They found out later that the design of the roofs was intended to ensure that snow did not collect on top of the buildings where it might cause roofs to collapse under what could be a very heavy weight. Instead, the snow would slide off onto the ground below before it could build up on the roofs. Obviously this was not needed in the 2080s, but changing the design of most of Zurich's ancient architecture to accommodate roof-top copter parking was not possible.

At the front, SH-Man's building was entered through a main door that also required an ID card. This entrance was also guarded by an iron gate that would bar the entire door when it was closed. During business hours, the gate was open and fastened to the wall. A similar gate guarded the back door as well. The front of the building had two identification signs. These were a street number made of four white wooden digits (3642) and a bronze plaque with four black letters engraved on it. Those letters spelled out SHIB. Otherwise the front of the building was solid brick, as in it was entirely brick and had no windows whatsoever. At some point in time, it may have had windows, but they had been bricked over. The back of the building was similarly solid brick.

There was no way to enter the building other than through the two doors protected by ID slots and by additional iron gates at night. Each building in this square was constructed so close to its neighbour that the street was one solid mass of brick with front doors and back doors but no side doors. Winnie installed a second drone at the front. The drones would give them a visual history of everybody who entered or left the building between November 20, 2086 and the present.

With nightfall coming, they TiTr'd forward to Sunday March 7, 2088 and went to sleep in their slings high above the city – all baffles shut tight to stay warm. Switzerland in March was cold. Some of the nearby mountains even had snow on their tops.

# # # # # # # #

Monday morning, Winnie downloaded the surveillance videos of the two SHIB doors. She browsed through both sets of records, but only to confirm that the drones had been working properly and had been focused properly. Analysis could come later. Both she and Marie were in their slings and invisible.

I think we're done here, Winnie announced. Should we take a look around Zurich before we go?

While they were flying over the city, Marie noticed that interior courtyards for copter parking were quite rare in Zurich. Since most people were using a network of horse-drawn trams to move around the city, any business that could park its copters next to its own building in the center of the city would probably be occupying very expensive real estate.

Both Marie and Winnie wanted to see what snow was like, so they flew high into the sky and picked a mountain peak that had plenty of snow. The snow was too crusty and grainy to make snowballs that they could throw at each other – one of Granny's games from her youth. But the crust was strong enough to hold their weight and they walked around and left faint imprints of their visit. The top of the mountain was all pointy and it had steep cliffs that prevented any long walks. They flew up to the very top instead and looked around. Below them was a vast sea of clouds that wasn't much of a view, so they went back to Zurich.

Winnie wanted to walk around the streets that were now very busy, but Marie hesitated and said she wanted to look around some more first. It could be dangerous. Ten minutes later Marie shut the door on Winnie showing her face in Zurich. That face was aboriginal brown and the Zurichians, for lack of a better word, were Caucasian white. No other skin colour had been visible as they flew up and down the streets. No Asians, Africans, or Hindi. All the pedestrians they had seen in the city were white and all were speaking a language that neither Winnie nor Marie could understand.

You should look up Zurich in Wikipedia, Marie said. Find out what they're speaking.

It's the largest city in Switzerland, Winnie started. "Over 100,000 people live in the city and surrounding area. The Romans set up camp in the area in 15 BC and called it Turicum. Archeologists have found early settlements going back over 6,500