Conversations stopped and I was flattered by the looks of happy disbelief I’d prompted. Jake jumped up from the table and knocked my fist with his own. “Davis! What are you doing here?”
Terry Blackstone, who sometimes hung with our group, grinned. “Dude! I thought you were supposed to be in the Caribbean or something.” He tossed his ever-present basketball at me.
I caught it. “I was. I’m sort of on holiday,” I explained, dribbling a few times before tossing the ball back.
“Don’t tell me,” Terry joked, “you’ve already got a whole lineup of Bahama babes worked out for when you get home.”
“Uh,” I sneaked a look at Jennifer, “not exactly.” Jennifer seemed as pleased to see me as the others.
“Shut up, Terry,” Tasha broke in. “Taylor’s a nice guy, unlike you dorks.”
I grinned. It felt just like old times.
Shaun pulled me toward the order window and a few minutes later the six of us, seven including Mike, were headed for the park with our ice cream in hand.
A small brook wound past the east end of the shopping district and flowed away to the Raritan River south of town. The city maintained a narrow strip of greenery around the brook with a bike path that meandered between neighborhoods. We followed the path to an open area with a pool, a basketball court, a playground, and a ball diamond. The pool wasn’t open yet, but a few tables had been placed under the picnic shelter. We perched on two of them, facing each other.
“So, Taylor. ¿Ya puedes hablar español con fluidez?” Jake asked.
I looked at him blankly and he laughed. “Never mind, you answered my question. You need to work on your Spanish.”
I blew out my breath in defeat. “You got that right. I spent three days in school not knowing a single thing that was said to me.”
“Only three days? You’ve been gone three weeks. They must be heavy on vacations down there.”
“Ah,” I backtracked. “I mean it was about three days before I started catching on to anything. I’m still universally known as the American idiot.”
Jake laughed again. “You’ll get it. Then when you come back, you and I can speak and none of these morons will know what we’re saying.”
Terry bounced his basketball off the back of Jake’s head. “I can do my talking on the court, brother. You up for the challenge?”
“You’re on.”
“Shaun, want in?” Terry asked.
“Not today,” Shaun answered with a sidelong glance at Tasha, who sat very close to him.
“Right.” Terry winked. “How about you, Davis?”
I shook my head. “I play basketball worse than I speak Spanish.”
“Ah, I seem to remember that.”
He and Jake strode away across the grass, and I tossed my empty ice cream cup into a trash barrel. An awkward silence descended on our diminished group. Tasha was making doe eyes at Shaun, who didn’t seem to remember anyone else was nearby.
I turned to Jennifer. “Do you want to walk down to the brook?”
She tucked a stray wisp of hair behind her ear and smiled. “I’d like that.”
We easily fell into step together. Spending time with Jennifer was always comfortable. We had grown up three doors apart. There were even a few embarrassing bathtub pictures of us floating around. Once we started school, however, we learned about cooties and developed our own sets of friends. I didn’t see her much until junior high, when I suddenly hoped we could share cooties. She didn’t have the same idea. That’s probably why we stayed friends.
The brook ran past the back edge of the park, just a hundred yards away. We stopped under a copse of box elder maples that had almost fully leafed out. Unlike Elena, the top of Jennifer’s head only reached my eyes. I broke the ice. “How long have Shaun and Tasha been together?”
“They’re not, but Tasha’s hoping.”
“Shaun doesn’t seem to be objecting too loudly.”
She chuckled and leaned back against a tree. “I didn’t expect to see you so soon. What’s it like in the Dominican?”
“Hot and foreign and lonely.”
“Is that why you came back?”
“Yeah, pretty much.” The sunlight caught Jennifer’s hair, pulling out strawberry highlights.
“Where are your folks staying? I’m sure my mom will want to get together. She still picks up the phone ten times a day before she remembers you guys moved.”
I kicked my toe against the tree trunk. “Um, my folks aren’t here exactly.”
Something in my manner tipped her off. She straightened. “Taylor! You didn’t run away, did you?”
“Not exactly—” I began.
“But your parents don’t know you’re here.” It wasn’t a question.
“Well, no.” I sighed and glanced back at Mike, who had followed at a considerate distance. “It’s complicated.”
She waited like she expected me to go on, but I shook my head. “If I told you, you’d think I was crazy.”
She relented, but I could tell she didn’t want to give up the line of questioning. “Okay, I won’t say anything. But if you need to talk…”
“I’ll keep you in mind,” I answered with relief and began strolling along the creek bank. She followed. I wish I dared to grab her hand.
“I am glad to see you, you know,” she said. “It’s strange your not being right down the street anymore. I guess I got used to that.”
Those words put an idiotic smile on my face.
“And the walk home from school still seems, I don’t know, incomplete.” She laughed. “I keep thinking you just got another detention and you’ll be back tomorrow.”
“I didn’t get that many detentions,” I protested.
She raised her eyebrows.
“Well, they were usually Shaun’s fault,” I amended.
“I’ll give you that.”
We had reached the point where the brook flowed under High Street when my belt started vibrating. I glanced around in alarm. Jennifer and I were the only people in sight. The bike path that had followed the sidewalk around the playground now converged with the water once again. I looked up the path and back but saw no one. I glanced at the sky. Clear. Maybe the belt was malfunctioning.
I started to cross the road, stepping around an orange tabby that had planted itself firmly on the crosswalk. “Don’t step on the cat,” I cautioned.
She laughed again and playfully slapped my arm. “You’re so weird, Taylor.”
I froze. “You do see it, don’t you?”
The cat started bulging like a tire about to blow. Its legs stretched into long, snaky appendages. The whites of its eyes grew milky yellow. Orange fur solidified into leathery skin the color of an old bruise. I knew what this meant.
I pushed Jennifer behind me and fumbled for my sword before I realized I’d left it with Ranofur. Digging frantically through the Dim-ex panels on my belt, I searched for any other weapon I could find. All I had was a dagger.
Mike was beside me in an instant. “Jennifer, get under the bridge,” he commanded.
She looked at me. “Who’s he?”
The muscles in my face felt strained. “A friend,” I answered brusquely. “Just do what he says.”
She backed up a few steps in confusion. “Taylor, what’s going on?”
“I’ll explain later. Just go!”
She retreated and Mike and I faced the Swaug. It hunkered in the middle of High Street, dangerous but not fully formed. Still, I didn’t dare attack with my stubby blade. I hesitated at the farthest reach of its ropy arms.
“Do something,” I urged Mike.
He shifted nervously. “Er, like what?”
I glanced at him sidelong. “Don’t you have something you can throw at him?”
He pulled an apple out of his shirt.
I scowled. “Something a little more deadly?”
He twitched his shoulder. “In all the excitement of the Wasitter attack, I, uh, sort of forgot to restock.”
The first strike saved him from answering. A tentacle flicked with such speed that I didn’t even see it coming. I maintained the hold on my weapon, but the blow sent me tumbling over the railing of the bridge and into the water below.
“Taylor?” There was fear on Jennifer’s face now. It magnified tenfold as the bridge started to crumble overhead. I could see the powerful arms that wrapped around the structure, warping steel beams and cracking pavement that fell away in large chunks, but she couldn’t.
“Watch out!” Mike screamed.
I grabbed Jennifer and pulled her out of harm’s way. She fell headlong into the water. Her hair tie came undone and tumbled soggy tresses across her face.
“Get out of here, Jennifer,” I pleaded. “Run for the trees. It’s not safe here. I’m not safe!” The truth of my words hit me like another blow. My presence put my friends in danger!
Jennifer paused to stare at me through wide, frightened eyes before she fled to the cover of the greenway. It was the image I would carry away with me.
I rose and grasped my knife tightly. I was furious—furious at the unfairness of it all, furious that I’d been singled out for this job, and furious that the Swaug had almost killed someone I loved. I seethed, but I knew there was no way I could defeat the monster without help.
The Swaug waited motionless in the road, watching me. Mike was nowhere to be seen. I was on my own.
I advanced, heart thundering, chest heaving, every nerve fiber tingling. My vision narrowed till all I saw were the vicious yellow eyes glaring back at me. The Swaug and I were the only things left in the world, and one of us wouldn’t be leaving Somerville the same way we entered it.
I crouched at the edge of the monster’s reach, my weapon nearly worthless. I hadn’t even the four-foot reach of a sword. I would have to fling myself at the creature’s vitals. My thrust would have to be hard and fast, my timing perfect.
The monster held perfectly still, waiting, taunting me. As we took measure of each other, a movement far down the road caught my eye. A car was approaching. A heavy, old style Malibu. The creature hadn’t yet seen it, and the driver could not see the creature.
A crafty smile touched my lips and I inched around to the right, willing the Swaug to follow. Little by little I turned it away from the rapidly approaching car. I tensed. Just a few more seconds…
There was a crunch of metal and a roar of pain. At the same moment, I flung myself onto the creature and plunged my dagger into its body. It jerked violently, tossing me to the edge of the pavement before it shuddered and melted into a puddle. Green goo trickled away to wherever it was monsters went to regenerate.
Mike was at my side in an instant, tugging me to my feet. “That was awesome, Taylor! In all my millennia, I’ve never seen anything like it!” He laughed out loud, slapping me on the back and nearly sending me back to the pavement.
A disheveled, middle-aged man leaped from the car. “What the Sam Hill just happened?” he demanded, looking over his crumpled car with crazed eyes. “There was nothing there! At least, not until this flying boy leaped in front of me and flew away again.” His eyes flickered between my unharmed body and his car, trying to work out the details.
Mike had already regained his composure. “Flying boy? Sir, have you been drinking?” he asked in a patronizing tone of voice.
The man’s face grew redder. “What?” he stormed. “No, I haven’t been drinking. I’m on my way home from work.”
I intervened. “I think what you saw was me getting tossed into the air when the bridge buckled. It must have struck your car, too.” I looked into the shallow chasm that had been the overpass. “Be glad it didn’t happen a moment later.”
The fellow’s face paled as he followed my gaze.
“Must have been a structural weakness,” Mike observed. “Set off by a slight ground tremor, perhaps, or the vibrations of an approaching automobile.”
The man sighed and pulled out a cell phone. “How do I explain this to my insurance company?”
With the skill of a pickpocket, Mike slipped a large bill into the man’s jacket pocket as he turned to pace the length of the accident site.
I leaned against the car’s crumpled fender. I could hear an oldies station playing on the radio through the open door. “So, is this what I should expect every day for the rest of my life? Raging monsters and friends scurrying for cover?” I shook my head in disbelief. “I wasn’t even outdoors for an hour.”
“I told you before, we don’t usually see the enemy on consecutive days. But, yes, you’re a superhero now, Taylor. Part of a supernatural team. Taking out monsters is what we do.”
“It’s not what you do,” I said darkly.
Mike mumbled something and jerked at his collar.
I sighed. “I don’t want to be a hero. I’m no good at it. I’ve failed in every battle I’ve been in.”
“Every battle but one.”
I shrugged. “I would have been dead if the car hadn’t happened along at just the right moment.”
“Ah, but it did. And you had the wits to use it.”
I glanced around. “All this, it’s going to keep happening, isn’t it?”
“I’m afraid so,” Mike agreed.
We leaned against the car in silence, arms crossed, listening to Chuck Berry belt out “Johnny B. Good.” The song ended, and a news announcer began reading off abbreviated reports.
“In other news,” he continued, “a motorcycle gang caused substantial damage in Eureka, California this afternoon. Witnesses report that several dozen gang members mounted on Harley Davidson motorcycles rode into town after lunch. After loitering near the Old Town waterfront for several hours, the gang became destructive, defacing several buildings and disturbing the peace. Police were called to the scene, but the gang had already cleared the area. Police pursued the suspects across the bay to the Fairhaven docking facilities where they found only abandoned bikes. It is unclear what happened to the gang members, as no ships were detected in the area. An investigation is underway. No one was injured in the disturbance.”
The announcer moved on to traffic updates, and Mike looked at me significantly. “An underwater ship, perhaps? Only Raybold metal is undetectable by human devices.”
I shoved my hands in my pockets and gazed around my hometown. The wrecked car, the crack in the bridge, the hair tie that had snagged in the brook. My friends lived here. America was filled with small towns just like mine. Elena was right; someone had to stand up to these creeps.
By the time my eyes worked their way back to Mike, I had accepted the inevitable. “Okay,” I sighed. “Let’s go back.”
Lesson #23
Camping Calls for Industrial-Strength Toys
The plane ride back to the West Coast was almost as quiet as the trip to Somerville. Before leaving town, I slipped letters into Shaun’s and Jennifer’s mailboxes in which I tried to reassure them of my safety without explaining any details. Jennifer, I was pretty sure, wouldn’t believe a word of it. My parents would probably be receiving a very interesting phone call.
I left my hometown with a heavy heart—a feeling that followed me to New York City and then into the air. I didn’t know if it was regret for the normal life I’d lost, terror at the events that awaited me, or fear that I’d make an idiot of myself yet again. Perhaps it was a mixture of all three.
Mike seemed to sense my thoughts. Somewhere over the Great Plains, he slid a small gift wrapped in sparkly silver paper onto my in-flight tray. “What’s this?” I asked.
He adjusted his Raiders cap self-consciously. “Just a little something I picked up.”
I turned the package in my hands. It was thin and oblong, and the contents chunked against the box when I shook it.
“So, open it already,” Mike prompted.
I tore off the paper. Inside was the latest model i
Phone.
Mike ran a finger under the collar of his T-shirt. “It was…uh…sort of my fault that you lost your iPod, so…” He shrugged. “I already downloaded some of your favorite tunes.”
It was more than a gift, I realized. It was an apology. One I was finally ready to accept. I bit down on my bottom lip. “Thank you, Mike.”
He nodded.
I unwrapped the earbuds and strung them around my neck, but I paused before placing them in my ears. “Mike,” I asked, “what happened at the tree?”
Mike blew out his breath and nodded. “I guess it’s time you knew.” He dragged both hands down his face then leaned back in his seat. “I think I told you I wanted to be a pilot, didn’t I?”
“You mentioned it.”
“I’ve always loved flying, and I enjoyed working in the stables, so when my general agent courses were completed, I entered the pilot program. I was eager to prove myself. I was young and foolish enough to think I was invincible. On my very first solo flight, I thought I’d show my instructors just what I was capable of.” His shoulder jerked in an involuntary twitch. “I attempted some maneuvers only permitted for experienced fliers and, uh—”
“You crashed?”
He sighed. “Yeah.”
“Was everyone all right?”
He nodded. “I was the only one on board, and the horses were fine. Like us, it takes a lot to destroy them—Raybold steel, or an enemy’s claws or fangs. But the chariot ended up in the scrap heap. I was tossed out of the program.
“After that I worked a lot of different jobs—food service, janitor, secretary, musician. I sort of floated around, and each time I bombed out. Finally, after several centuries had passed, agent Schmiel suggested I take an aptitude test. I placed very high in technology sciences and reentered agent training. This time I passed with a third class ranking.
Taylor Davis and the Flame of Findul Page 17