Mount Emily Revisited

by Low Ying Ping

  After Patsy had done so, Wu Ji said, “So…the first scene you saw—where Auntie Min Ling was comforting my mum—that was definitely after Maggie died…sorry,” Wu Ji gave Maggie an apologetic look. “Don’t mean to say you’re dead.”

  Maggie waved at him to carry on.

  “So it must have happened after August 1987, but before I arrived here in September this year.”

  “Nothing much for us to learn from this scene,” Elena commented. “We already knew that Auntie Yvonne was depressed about losing Maggie.”

  “All right then, on to the second scene,” Wu Ji said.

  Patsy recounted what she had seen, trying to remember all the little details.

  “That man Auntie Min Ling was quarrelling with…” Elena said, frowning. “It sounds like a lovers’ quarrel. Could it be her new husband, Ye Kang?”

  Patsy shrugged. “I don’t know. No names were mentioned. The funny thing is that I thought the man looked familiar, but I’ve never seen Auntie Min Ling’s husband before, so how can he be Ye Kang?”

  Maggie’s face brightened. “Come to think of it, you two have met him before.” She nodded at Elena and Patsy. “Remember, during your last time travel, just after I’d died, you all were dashing to Mount Em to heal the time breach?”

  Patsy gasped as she realised what Maggie was getting at. “Auntie Min Ling was driving us, but we nearly got into a car accident because of the time breach. Charlotte, Elena and I took the crystal and ran the last leg to school, leaving Auntie Min Ling behind with the car.”

  Elena caught on as well. “There was a man who left his own car to check if Auntie Min Ling was all right.”

  Maggie nodded. “That’s him. According to Charlotte, he sent Auntie Min Ling home that day. They became friends, then got together as a couple.”

  “What a romantic story,” Elena said dreamily, cupping her chin with her palms and leaning forward with her elbows on her thighs.

  “I’ve met him several times too when visiting Charlotte,” Wu Ji said. “He seems like a nice guy. Takes really good care of Auntie Min Ling. He doesn’t seem to mind that she already has a daughter. Maybe because he too has a son from a previous marriage.”

  “Hang on,” Patsy broke in. “Haven’t you all heard what I said? They were quarrelling, and he slapped her!”

  “We never knew they’d split up!” Maggie said in wonder. “When I last saw Charlotte, she didn’t say anything!”

  “Wait!” Wu Ji interrupted. “How do we know this has already happened? Maybe Patsy went into the future?”

  Wu Ji’s question stumped the rest. How could they find out? Maggie had told them it was impossible to travel into a time when you were already physically present, but that piece of information wasn’t of much help. After all, she, Elena and Wu Ji could have gone back to their own times by then, so it was still possible that Patsy had travelled into the not too distant future.

  Suddenly, she saw in her mind’s eye Min Ling’s ring bouncing off Ye Kang’s body and rolling across the floor. An idea forming in her mind, Patsy slid off her sofa seat and started crawling around on her hands and knees.

  “Er…what are you doing?” Elena asked.

  Patsy reached under the sofa, then held up her hand in triumph. Lying on her palm was a plain, gold ring.

  “You found the ring!” Elena cried. “That means it has already happened!”

  “I can’t believe he’s a Midnight Warrior,” Maggie sighed.

  “Charlotte had guessed it somehow,” Patsy said. “During the scene I witnessed, Auntie Min Ling said it was Charlotte who led her to find out the truth.”

  “Charlotte gave Wu Ji the crystal just a few days ago,” Maggie said. “She must have found out then.”

  Wu Ji shook his head. “Or maybe at that time she’d suspected something, but didn’t know yet if she was right. That’s why she didn’t want to tell us the reason for passing the crystal to me.”

  “So Ye Kang is really the reason Charlotte gave Wu Ji the crystal?” Elena said excitedly.

  “It does sound too coincidental otherwise,” Patsy said thoughtfully.

  “My mum used to say that ‘coincidence’ is a word that people use when they don’t believe in magic,” Maggie said with a grin.

  “It’s not a coincidence,” Wu Ji said with confidence. “The husband or boyfriend is more often than not the murderer…I mean,” he stuttered, turning red, “this is not a murder case. Of course Charlotte and Auntie Min Ling are all right…”

  “It’s okay,” Patsy smiled, liking his awkwardness. “We know what you mean.”

  “Midnight Warriors are like Keepers of Time—they can sense the presence of the Crystal of Time,” Maggie said. “Charlotte must have discovered his identity, and knew that hiding it in her house, even in a secret drawer or something, would not have been good enough. I remember my mum telling me before that the only way to obscure the power of the time crystal is to hide it within the human body. There is this story of a Keeper of Time hundreds of years ago who swallowed the crystal rather than let it fall into the hands of a Midnight Warrior.”

  “What happened to the Keeper after that?” Patsy asked.

  “Well, he died,” Maggie admitted. “The crystal is rather large. But his comrades were able to open him up and retrieve the crystal!”

  “All right, all right,” said Elena. “Enough of the gory storytelling. Charlotte obviously wasn’t planning on swallowing the crystal since she gave it to Wu Ji.”

  “You know what?” Wu Ji said. He inched slightly forward on the sofa and pushed at his spectacles which had slid slightly down his nose. “If Ye Kang is a Midnight Warrior, then his meeting Auntie Min Ling a year ago might not have been just purely chance. He might have been attracted to the power radiating from the crystal during the time breach!”

  “I think you’re right!” Elena said admiringly. “Oh, you’re amazing!”

  He sure is, Patsy thought wistfully.

  Maggie said, “That scene you saw must have happened very recently. I know they hadn’t broken up yet two days ago when I first entered Joyce’s mind and went to visit Charlotte.”

  “Who will know?” Patsy wondered.

  “My mum?” Wu Ji suggested. “She and Auntie Min Ling became close friends after Maggie died—sorry again.” He shot another apologetic glance at Maggie.

  She shrugged. “It’s okay, I’m kind of getting used to being dead.”

  “I’ll ask her when she gets back later tonight,” Wu Ji said.

  “OK, let’s move on to the third scene,” Elena said.

  Patsy swallowed. This was the hardest scene for her to recall. That face of pain, that scream… She steeled herself, then recounted what she had seen to Maggie.

  “Is that in the past or the future?” Maggie asked.

  “If it’s in the past, it can’t be too far back,” Wu Ji said. “My mum and Auntie Min Ling only became good friends after Maggie died. Oops, did it again.”

  Maggie gave an exaggerated sigh. “I’m dead, I get it. No harm done.”

  “So it could have happened in the near past, or sometime in the future,” Elena concluded.

  “I think it’s in the future,” Patsy said in a small voice. “I think it’ll happen because of me, because I failed… Do you think she’s being tortured by Ye Kang? Do you think she’s going to die?” Her lips trembled and it was all she could do to keep from tearing up again.

  “Nonsense,” Wu Ji said loudly. “No point speculating if we don’t have a clue. Let’s focus on what’s useful to us. I’ll ask my mum whether she knows about the breakup and we’ll take it from there.”

  The doorbell rang.

  “And here’s our pizza,” he announced, relief sounding clearly in his voice.

  chapter fourteen

  atsy and Elena stayed the night at Joyce’s flat, as Elena wanted to spend time with her grandfather. It was obvious to Patsy that even though all he saw was his daughter’s friend when he looked at Elena, she was gl
ad to simply be in his company.

  She’s never been so at ease in her own home, Patsy realised as she watched Elena joke and laugh with Joyce’s parents. What’s going on in her family? We never did get to talk properly after I turned her away from my window that night.

  There was no opportunity for Patsy to ask Elena privately however, as they shared Maggie’s, or rather, Joyce’s room. Maggie found some of Joyce’s clothes for Patsy and Elena to change into, and they spent the night comfortably.

  The next morning, Maggie called Mabel to check if the police had contacted her mother with any new information. When she hung up the phone, she looked furious.

  “Any news?” Patsy asked anxiously.

  “The stupid police told Mabel’s mum that they don’t think it’s a kidnapping, since there is no ransom note! They said kidnappers would not kidnap all three members of a family either. They think it’s just a simple burglary while the whole family was out!”

  “But it’s so obviously not a burglary!” Elena exclaimed.

  “I know!” Maggie ground her teeth. “But they don’t!”

  “It’s because they don’t know about time magic and stuff,” Patsy fretted.

  “Then it’s up to us to do the rescuing!” Elena said firmly.

  The trio returned to Yvonne Yoong’s house after breakfast to meet up with Wu Ji. They had to sit in the downstairs living room for several minutes, exchanging pleasantries with Yvonne, but soon managed to signal to each other with various winks and nods and made their escape to Wu Ji’s room. Gesturing to Patsy and Maggie to take the bed, Elena plonked herself comfortably on the floor. Wu Ji sat down on his swivel chair beside Elena.

  “You managed to find out anything?” Maggie asked once she had updated Wu Ji about her phone call to Mabel.

  Wu Ji nodded. “My mum doesn’t know they’ve broken up. She did say something odd, though.”

  The girls leaned forward expectantly.

  “She said that two nights ago, she was expecting Auntie Min Ling and Uncle Kang over for dinner. She left them in the house for an hour while she went out to collect the cake she’d ordered for dessert. When she came back, no one was there. Later that night, she received a call from Auntie Min Ling, apologising for her no-show, explaining that she wasn’t feeling very well, so Uncle Kang had driven her home.”

  “That must be the same night as your second scene!” Elena said excitedly, looking at Patsy.

  Wu Ji nodded. “It seems so. I didn’t know about it because I was out with Charlotte then. Fortunately, we had the crystal with us or Ye Kang would have sensed it in the house. My mum said she has not spoken to Auntie Min Ling since. She said Auntie Min Ling’s voice sounded muffled, like she had a blocked nose, so she’s letting her rest to recover from her cold, and hasn’t tried visiting her at all the last few days.”

  “Poor Auntie Min Ling,” Maggie sighed. “Her blocked nose must be from too much crying.”

  Patsy was counting on her fingers and thinking hard. “If that scene happened just two nights ago, that means Auntie Min Ling and Charlotte must have been kidnapped that very night, or yesterday morning, just before Elena and I arrived!”

  “We need to find out where he’s taken them,” Elena said.

  “I’ll ask my mum if she knows where Ye Kang used to live before he moved in with Auntie Min Ling,” Wu Ji said, getting up and disappearing down the stairs.

  The moment he was gone, Elena got up and started poking around the room. Patsy raised her eyebrows at Maggie, who shook her head and gave a shrug.

  “Hey!” Patsy finally exclaimed when Elena pulled open one of the desk drawers.

  Elena quickly slammed the drawer shut and smiled sheepishly. “Sorry, got a little carried away.”

  “What were you doing?” Maggie asked.

  “I was just…oh it’s nothing. I was just bored.”

  Patsy didn’t think Elena’s curiosity about Wu Ji’s things had been aroused by just boredom, but before she could say anything, footsteps were heard in the corridor and Elena quickly sank to the floor, resuming her earlier relaxed posture.

  Wu Ji re-entered the room with a grin on his face. “It’s a house at Springleaf Road. Last night she was babbling about how nice he was to move into Auntie Min Ling’s flat instead of insisting she move into his place, so I told her we were curious to know where he used to live. She never suspected a thing.”

  “Cool. But are we sure he’s holding them there?” Elena asked.

  Patsy glanced at Elena, inwardly feeling amazed at how composed she was, considering she had just been caught snooping a short minute ago.

  “It’s most likely,” Wu Ji said. “He probably knows no adult would think a kidnapping has occurred, so there’s no reason to fear the police knocking on his door.”

  “But how will we rescue them? We can’t tell the police. They won’t believe us!” Patsy said.

  Nobody seemed to have any bright ideas. Patsy tried to focus on the problem at hand, but she could not help being distracted by thoughts of how interested Elena seemed in Wu Ji. For a few minutes, the silence in the room was punctuated only by Maggie’s sighing and the regular squeaking of Wu Ji’s chair as he swivelled slightly left and right.

  At last, Elena blurted out, “What’s the point of having the Crystal of Time and two Keepers if we can’t even use your power to save them?”

  Maggie and Patsy exchanged apprehensive looks. “But we’re both not properly trained!” Maggie protested.

  “You’re better than me,” Patsy said. “You studied your parents’ notebooks for some time. I only became a Keeper yesterday!”

  Maggie shook her hands. “No, no, no… I’ve only read books; you time travelled several times before. You’re more experienced than me in practising time magic.”

  “Accidentally!” Patsy cried out. “What part of the word ‘accidentally’ do you guys not understand?”

  “All right, cool it,” Elena interjected. “We’re not forcing you.”

  Wu Ji nodded vigorously, evidently eager to keep the peace.

  Not at all mollified, Patsy folded her arms and regarded the other three sullenly. Why were they always forcing her to be someone she wasn’t?

  After a moment, Maggie said hesitantly, “Let’s say I’m willing to do it—to use my power—what am I supposed to do? I mean, the crystal can be used to time travel and heal time breaches, but how can it be used to rescue kidnapped people?”

  Patsy nodded miserably. “We’re just a bunch of half-baked Keepers. If only one of us was really powerful, we would know what to do…” Even as she said those words, an idea popped into her mind. “Actually, we do have someone powerful…Raine!”

  “Raine?” Wu Ji looked puzzled. “She’s not even born yet.”

  “But if she has such great control over her power, surely she can easily come back to this precise time and solve this crisis for us!” said Patsy.

  “But how would we contact her?” Elena asked.

  Patsy turned to Wu Ji. “You’re due back in 2017 tomorrow, right? When you get back, you tell her we need her help and get her to come!”

  Wu Ji shook his head. “Auntie Charlotte didn’t send Raine back. She sent you. She must have had a good reason for that.”

  “She thought too highly of me,” Patsy said. “I can’t resolve this crisis. We need Raine.”

  “I can’t do it,” Wu Ji said stubbornly. “I can’t ask Raine to risk her life if Auntie Charlotte didn’t mean for her to come back.”

  Patsy flared up. “Then you’ll risk mine and Maggie’s?” Her voice quivered, not so much with anger, but with resentment. Did she really mean so little to Wu Ji, compared to his childhood friend Raine?

  Wu Ji was quiet for a moment. He looked troubled, and Patsy felt sorry for her outburst. Finally, he spoke up. “I won’t risk any one of you. I’ve a better idea.”

  Elena leaned forward eagerly. “What?”

  “What Ye Kang wants is the Crystal of Time, isn’t it?” he said.<
br />
  The girls nodded.

  “I’ll bring it to him, and offer to give it to him in exchange for releasing Charlotte and her mum.”

  “No!” Maggie exclaimed. “We can’t just give him the crystal my people died to protect! Who knows what he’ll do with it? The whole time stream might just break down!”

  “I won’t actually give it to him,” Wu Ji said.

  “What do you mean?” Patsy asked. “You just said you would exchange it for the hostages.”

  “I said I’ll offer to do that. I’ll tell him to take me and the crystal. He’ll be able to sense the crystal on me, so he’ll know I really do have it. I’ll say that I’ll only pass him the crystal when I’ve seen Charlotte and Auntie Min Ling leave safely.”

  “But then you and the crystal will fall into Ye Kang’s hands,” Elena objected.

  “Ah, but I’m due to disappear tomorrow at 2pm,” Wu Ji said with a childlike grin. “When the time comes, I’ll disappear back to 2017—with the crystal.”

  “But what about us?” Elena asked, looking dismayed. “Patsy and I will be left trapped in 1988. Without the crystal, we can’t get back.”

  “Not that it makes much of a difference,” Patsy muttered. “Even with the crystal, I doubt I’ll be able to control its power well enough to send us back to 2016.”

  “Don’t worry,” Wu Ji said. “My plan is that when I get back to 2017, I’ll ask Raine to come back to 1988 with the crystal and send you both back to 2016. That won’t be risking her life since I’m not asking her to rescue Charlotte and her mum from a Midnight Warrior. She’ll just come here for the purpose of bringing you two home.”

  Both Elena and Maggie looked pleased with the plan, and Patsy supposed she ought to feel gratified that everything would be resolved without her having to do anything after all. So why did she feel even more miserable than before? She had kept trying to convince everyone that she could not be a Keeper of Time, so why did it hurt so much when they finally believed her?

  Her earlier worry was also still nagging at her. “We still don’t know if Ye Kang has gone back to his house at Springleaf Road. What if we’re wrong?”

  “You’re right,” Wu Ji said. “We should try to make certain. Tell you what, I’ll sneak round to the house later and—”