Van Bender and the Burning Emblems (The Van Bender Archives #1)

by S. James Nelson

  “I’m going to make sure it’s safe to go to SOaP.”

  She withdrew from her pocket a pink lighter with Hello Kitty stamped on both sides. As she turned back to the spell, she lifted the lighter and flicked her thumb. The lighter sparked, but didn’t light.

  “Nick Savage said a good lighter is important,” I said. “You never want it to—”

  She turned back to me, her face annoyed, her mouth opening to talk. But at that exact moment Mom entered the dressing room—without even knocking. As usual.

  I didn’t even have a chance to feel guilty about what was going on—and what had gone on—because as usual, she totally freaked out.

  Then I about freaked out, because Kurt came in with her. And Sandra followed.

  Chapter 13: Surprise! Mom embarrasses me in front of my friends

  I’m not a huge fan of crowded rooms. Especially when there’s an angry mom present. See the crap I put up with for Richie?

  -Sandra Montoya

  Mom’s eyes moved from me to Marti to the spell—and widened with understanding.

  Sandra’s gaze went from me to Marti to me to Marti.

  I hadn’t been alone with Sandra since we were just twelve. Suddenly here I was, alone with another girl in my dressing room.

  “No!” Mom said. She leaped toward Marti and me. “Don’t you dare light that!”

  “Marti Walker?” Sandra said. She pointed in her accustomed manner, lifting a hand and turning it upside down. “The CMI was Marti Walker?”

  Kurt paled. His mouth gaped then curled as if he’d eaten a rotten fish. “Marti freaking Walker?”

  I stepped out of Mom’s way, toward Sandra. Marti began to object to Mom’s mad dash by crying out. She actually moved in front of Mom and held her hands out. With a grunt, Mom shouldered her aside like a football player throwing a block, shoving Marti away from the brink.

  “Mrs. Van Bender!” Marti said. “Let me explain.

  Mom huffed and puffed. Her face turned red and she tried to speak, but seemed to fail because of anger. She stepped in front of the brink, as if to separate us from where it hung, tinkling and sparkling.

  Sandra’s brow furrowed and her mouth hung open. She had a dark complexion, and long brown hair. “Really? Marti Walker?”

  “No, no,” I said. “The CMI wasn’t Marti Walker. She just got here a minute ago.”

  “Who was it, then?” Kurt said. His light brown hair was sculpted into a pointed wave all the way down the center of his head.

  “Who are these people?” Marti said. “What’s going on here?”

  “Who am I?” Sandra said. She stepped away from me and over to Marti, back straight, head tall. “Who am I? I’ll tell you who—”

  “Stop!”

  I jumped at Mom’s shout. She still stood there, trembling, glaring at us. Keeping Marti away from the brink.

  Marti and Sandra each took a step back. Marti gave Sandra a dark look, and Sandra lifted her eyebrows at Marti. Kurt seemed to want to meld into the floor.

  “Richie David Van Bender,” Mom said, “what’s going on here? Not only are you alone with a girl in your dressing room—”

  “Mom!”

  “—but you’re also doing brink?”

  “Holy crap, Mom. Chill out.”

  I didn’t really care so much that she was upset, but worried more about what Sandra thought of this. It wasn’t like Sandra and I were a thing, but we’d been best friends since kindergarten, and all through my cancer she’d been the only friend to stick around when my hair fell out. She’d visited me everyday. Nothing had changed when I hit it big. She was my best friend, and had been ever since I could remember.

  I glanced at Sandra. She looked surprisingly serene, as if she’d managed to calm her emotions.

  “Mrs. Van Bender,” Marti said, “I can explain everything. I’m from SOaP.”

  Mom’s eyes grew wider and her face reddened deeper. She moved close to Marti and pointed past her, to the open door.

  “Get out of here! Get out of my son’s dressing room!”

  “Mom!”

  “I can explain everything,” Marti said.

  “Get out!”

  “Holy crap, Mom!”

  “It’s very important!” Marti said.

  “I don’t want you anywhere near my son! Out!”

  “Stop!” I shouted.

  They both fell silent and turned to me. Kurt and Sandra had stepped back, close to the door, and looked at each other in confusion. Dumbfounded, I shook my head, my mouth gaping as I looked at Mom.

  “Does everyone,” I said, “know about brink but me?”

  Kurt raised a hand. “Uh, I don’t.”

  Mom came toward me. “How long has this been going on?”

  I lifted my hands helplessly. “Mom, you’re acting like I’m hooked on drugs. What’s the big deal?”

  She shook her head. “This is far worse than drugs, Richie.”

  “I beg to differ,” said Marti. “Mrs. Van Bender, if you’ll just let me explain.”

  Mom rounded on her, raising a forefinger to her face. “You stay away from my son. You and all the rest of SOaP. You understand me?”

  “Mrs. Van—”

  “Get out!”

  I’d seen Mom mad several times—like the time when I was in the hospital and removed my heart-rate monitor so the machine thought I was dead, and she came in and I didn’t respond to her. I just lay there, holding my breath, staring off into space with a blank expression.

  Yeah, that didn’t go over too well.

  I admit it wasn’t a nice thing to do. I immediately felt bad and apologized profusely. Promised never to do anything like that again. And I didn’t. But that didn’t keep her from getting justifiably irate.

  Well, she seemed just as mad, now.

  Marti stepped back, nodding and pulling her phone out of her purse. She pointed at me as she headed for the door.

  “Okay, Mrs. Van Bender. I’ll leave. But he’s mixed up in things. It’s too late to do a mind wipe. He’s involved with the Sunbeams, and you can’t turn back time.”

  “Out!”

  The volume of sheer hysteria in the shout made me jump. Sandra actually squeaked in surprise.

  Marti gave me a desperate and angry look, started to jam her thumbs into her phone without looking at it, and backed out.

  “Mom,” I said, looking at her, “you know about brink?”

  She slammed the door and turned to me. The brink behind her had started to fade. The tinkling had grown quieter.

  “How long has this been going on?”

  I shook my head and spread my hands wide. “I met Nick before the show.”

  Mom sucked in her breath. “Too long. This is going to require a more sophisticated mind wiping.”

  “What?” I said.

  She shook her head. “We’re getting out of here.”

  Chapter 14: Puke in a bag

  Ah, yes, the motion sickness. Bane of my life. Richie’s greatest source of amusement.

  -Elizabeth Van Bender

  I wanted to know what she meant by “mind wiping,” but Mom grabbed my hand and yanked me out of the door. Sandra and Kurt watched in confusion. I wished I could explain everything to Sandra and Kurt insofar as I understood it, but Mom pulled me away.

  Two minutes later, we sat facing each other in the enclosed helicopter as the blades spun. The pilot sat in his seat, silent, adjusting controls on the panel. Outside, around the perimeter of the well-lit helipad, fans cheered and waved, but three rows of security guards kept them back.

  “You know about all that stuff?” I said to her.

  “What stuff?”

  I waved my hand. “That glowy, shiny stuff.”

  I didn’t want to name brink because of the pilot. All our over-ear headsets, with microphones in front of our mouths, were linked.

  She just stared. Although I was in trouble for the first time since trying to meet Bobby Fretboard, I felt alive, like I was finally actually a roc
k star. I wanted to learn more about brink, even despite the apparent danger of at all.

  “Are you going to tell me anything?” I said. “Because if you were, now would sure be a really fantastic time.”

  She shook her head. Her voice came over my headset, tinny and hollow. “When we get home, we’ll take care of it.”

  “Like, I’m not kidding. A little information would be really nice here.”

  “Not now. You won’t have any questions once we get home.”

  “I would hate to make any more mistakes—”

  “Richie!” She leaned forward, putting her face within inches of mine. “We’ve feared this day for your whole life! We’ve wondered how we could teach you about the... stuff. We’ve fretted over it—”

  “You keep saying ‘we.’“

  “Your father and I. We’ve done the best we could to keep you safe.”

  “You should have known—”

  “We did all we could, and now this. Can you imagine how I’m feeling? Do you have any clue?”

  “Like you just won a prize?”

  She grunted and sat back, shaking her head and staring out the window.

  “Like maybe you should have told me already?”

  She didn’t look at me.

  “Like going out for a pizza?”

  She still looked outside.

  Annoyed at Mom, I waved at the fans. They had cameras out, and the flashes punctuated the night with moments of brilliance. The helipad attendants gave the thumbs up.

  “Here we go,” the pilot said.

  The tone of the helicopter motor increased as the blades accelerated and we lifted into the air. As my stomach began to turn, something occurred to me. I looked at Mom.

  “You have a lighter in your purse,” I said.

  She glanced at me, and looked away.

  “You have no reason to carry a lighter.” I couldn’t help my tone from being accusatory. “You keep it to... to light that other stuff. And you have that orange lip gloss. I’ve never seen you use it, but you’ve always had it with you.”

  “Richie,” she said, “it’s complicated. We’ll talk soon. You won’t have any questions. I promise. We just need to get home.”

  I frowned. “Because being home is going to make this conversation oh-so-much simpler? It’ll reduce the complexity a little—like magically?”

  She glared at me.

  “Because, you know, all the really hard conversations work out better at home.”

  “Enough, Richie.”

  “Home makes it—”

  “I said enough!”

  I shook my head and looked outside.

  The crowd and the football stadium slipped away beneath us, and the lights of the city spread out under and around us. My stomach started to do flips.

  I don’t know if the cancer messed me up, or if it would have happened, anyway, but before the cancer I loved roller coasters and amusement park rides. I could spin on the Scrambler or the Rock-o-Planes for hours without getting sick. I loved high-speed coasters the most. But since the cancer I couldn’t go on more than one or two rides without getting queasy and wanting to blow my lunch all over the place.

  Extended rides in vehicles do the same thing to me. My gut turns and people say I go pale. Cars aren’t so bad if I sit in the front seat and watch straight ahead, and I used a similar tactic with the helicopter flight. I focused on a light ahead, on the ground.

  Fortunately, we didn’t have to go far. Just to our home in Malibu.

  As we flew away from the stadium, a movement outside the window caught my eyes, and I turned to see Agent Maynerd standing upright, soaring through the air. He still wore his wide-brimmed hat. His long coat flapped out behind him like Superman’s cape as he approached the helicopter. He had one hand extended, fist closed as if he held onto something.

  He wasn’t far away. Perhaps thirty feet. Surprised, I rubbed my eyes, and looked back. By then, he’d flown up next to the helicopter. I started to say something to Mom, but he tapped on the window to get her attention. She jumped in surprise.

  “What the—!” She cut herself short. She always did. I’d never heard her swear even once.

  “Uhhmm,” the pilot said in our headsets, “it appears there’s a flying man outside the copter.”

  Agent Maynerd knocked again and mouthed something we couldn’t hear. From his lips, it looked like pumpkin pie is the best, but I figured that probably wasn’t really it. Mom looked ready to go into shock.

  “Can we let him in?” I asked.

  “You can slide the door open,” the pilot said. Just make sure you’re both buckled in, first.”

  We both were, so I reached over and grabbed the handle.

  “Wait!” Mom said. “I don’t know if we want to let him in.”

  I raised my eyebrows. “Why not? Are you worried about stranger danger?”

  “Given what I found you doing tonight,” she said, “I’m a worried about much more than that.”

  Agent Maynerd knocked again, this time with more force. He frowned, held up his badge, and widened his eyes.

  I yanked the handle. The door slid open. Wind rushed in and the volume of the chopper blades increased. I’d half expected to see Agent Maynerd sitting on a Pegasus or standing on some funky flying surfboard, but he didn’t. He stood in thin air.

  As calmly as if he stepped onto a boat from shore, he ducked his head and came into the copter. He kept his extended hand outside for a moment, until he opened his fist.

  A dazzling array of red light blossomed from his hand, accompanied by the sound of spinning fireworks. The crimson lines shot out and away, fading in an instant.

  “What the heck was that?” I said.

  He sat down next to me and pushed the door shut. The wind cut off, and the propeller blade volume became muffled. My stomach still churned. I reached for the barf bags we’d prepared.

  Mom watched with a tight mouth. The copter pilot kept looking back, eyes wide. Agent Maynerd grabbed a headset hanging behind him and put it on. Then he lifted his badge again, showing it to Mom.

  “Stop that,” she said. She smacked his hand down. “I know who you are.” Then to me, “What, exactly, have you been doing?”

  I shrugged. “I tried to talk with you about it back at the stadium.”

  “Pilot,” Agent Maynerd said. “Please remove your headset so I can talk in private with your passengers?”

  “I, uh, don’t know... .”

  “Do it!” Mom said. “Just do it!”

  The pilot tore his headset off, but continued to glance backward every few seconds.

  “It’s such a pleasure to see you again,” I said to Agent Maynerd. “Aren’t you going to brandish your badge, again?”

  His hand twitched, but didn’t otherwise move. He gave me a level look and reached over to pull my headset off. I tried to object, but he moved too quickly. Before I knew it, he’d tucked my headset inside his coat. I could only hear the chopper blades cutting through the air in their rhythmic thumping.

  I had to continue to focus on the ground outside as Agent Maynerd spoke to Mom, but I frequently glanced at them. His lips moved fast while the rest of his face looked like stone. At first, her eyes grew wide and she slouched deeper in her seat as if suffering an extreme moral defeat, but soon she became more animated. Angry, even. She sat up in her chair and began to motion with her hands. Several times she looked at me and ran her hand in a horizontal wiping motion, as if she were clearing condensation off a window.

  I felt like I watched one of those old silent movies, except I didn’t get any captions. Every now then her eyes would flit to me, or she would shake her head with fast, short movements. I tried to lean in close to listen, and thought I heard her say something like “wipe his mind,” but Agent Maynerd put a hand on my face and pushed me away, and I could only hear the thumping of the blades and the rush of wind.

  After about a minute, my motion sickness became too strong. My stomach clenched involuntarily, my
mouth gaped, and I puked into the bag. As far as barf bags go, it was a pretty good one. Probably industrial strength. I tied it off, set it aside, and grabbed another.

  As I raised the next bag to my mouth, Agent Maynerd gave me a concerned look. He pointed at me and said something to Mom. She shook her head and shrugged. I really wished I could read lips. I added it to the list of skills I needed to learn, next to karate and riding a unicycle. Agent Maynerd looked at me with skepticism.

  Within about thirty seconds, I threw up again. I didn’t have much food in me. Mostly just bile. I hadn’t eaten much that day, due to the jitters. Surprisingly, my body didn’t feel weak after the puking. In fact, it still felt better than it had in weeks—no doubt due to the spell Nick had cast on me.

  After another half a minute, and another heave or two on my part, Agent Maynerd leaned forward and tapped the pilot on the shoulder, then motioned for the pilot to put his headset back on. The pilot obeyed, and Agent Maynerd spoke to him. The pilot listened, then nodded in response. A moment later, my stomach lurched as the helicopter turned in another direction. Below, the grid of lights wheeled.

  Mom tapped my knee and indicated that I should put my headset back on. Agent Maynerd handed it to me.

  “What did he tell you?” I said when I had my microphone in front of my mouth.

  “I told her what you’ve been up to,” he said.

  “What? Learning about things I should have been told about a long time ago?”

  He gave me a level stare. “Aiding a suspected criminal.”

  “Nick Savage?” Mom said. Her voice sounded like venom. “Really? Nick Savage?”

  “You knew about all this?” I said. “Brink? And you couldn’t tell me years ago?”

  She shook her head in indignation. “Don’t blame this mess on me. I just wanted to protect you. You disobeyed me.”

  “Clearly that worked out pretty well.”

  She settled back into her seat and shook her head. Her eyes became unfocused, and she stared out into the night.

  “I tried so hard,” she said. “But I’ve failed.”

  “Why protect me from all this? It seems pretty awesome.”