by Noah Harris
12
Nick flew with majesty and purpose, but carried his inexperience with him like a cross he had to bear. His impetuousness was just what Michael feared, but Nick thought of it as decisiveness, loyalty and action. Maybe it was all of those things. Nick reversed his actions to return to his eagle shifter state, and flew toward Jared’s house. He flew slower than he was customarily able, probably because he had stayed in ether state for longer than usual, and also because he had done more shifting on this day than he had ever done before. If only Gideon’s abduction hadn’t occurred after a full hour of training, he wouldn’t be so tired and impaired. He wondered again if the Nydor impedance also affected his energy level after using his powers
After thorough consideration of the best way in, Nick determined that Jared’s balcony was probably the best route. Granted, he did not know their air system well enough to try that approach, and if Jared’s father was, in fact, the leader of enemy humans, then they would be sure to have built in a way for it to be shifter-limiting. There were no cameras inside the apartment, he recalled, so if he could just get behind the camera, against the door on Jared’s balcony, he might be able to enter undetected by anyone but Jared. If this were any other day, he might be tempted to try to enter as ether if there were any cracks at the windows or sliding doors, but there was no way he could do that so soon. A crude approach, perhaps, but a solid plan. He had to talk to Jared.
By this time night had descended. Nick soared high above the stone exterior walls of the estate, followed the creek until he saw the zip-line, and then followed that to the corner of Jared’s balcony. He swooped by a couple of times, looking in the windows to see if Jared was alone. Once, he swooped too close and the motion sensor lights came on. Jared glanced sideways and leaned over a bit, as if looking out on the patio, so Nick flew by once more so Jared could see that the lights had been triggered by a bird. Jared quickly settled back into position and continued watching television. Nick took the opportunity to fly once around the estate, looking in each window, to see if there was any sign of Gideon, though he doubted they would bring him here. While this viewing expedition produced no results, he did manage to avoid all the motion sensor lights except for a small one near the front corner of the house, so Nick felt comfortable as he approached Jared’s balcony once more. He swooped in under the light, landing just to the right of the sliding glass door, where there was only about a two foot clearance—barely enough room to turn back into his base state. Once in human form, the motion sensor light did trigger again, and Nick was eager to get into the camera-free interior as soon as possible. Fortunately, he had learned over the last month to disguise his body by keeping the outer layer of skin shifted into object-state to provide a thin layer of coverage. Unfortunately, he wasn’t as good as Isda yet and couldn’t do proper flowing garments like shirts and jeans, but at least he didn’t have to run around fully nude, though the result had a thin bodysuit, or maybe wetsuit-like appearance, which usually emerged as dark blue or black, though he was doing no conscious color selection.
This time, when Jared glanced over due to the motion sensor light, he was baffled by an oddly attired Nick tapping very gently on the sliding door and motioning with one finger over his mouth for Jared to be quiet. Immediately aware that something was very wrong from Nick’s expression, Jared rose quickly, sprinted to the door, and let Nick into the apartment. Really feeling the exhaustion now, Nick immediately fell to his knees with the full weight of his body on the white tile, which hurt.
“Nick, what are you doing here? And, while we’re at it, how did you get up this high?” Jared asked.
“Shut the door. Shut the door,” Nick urged. Jared closed the slider, and turned to register his first sight of Nick. He looked like a puddle, like he’d just finished running a marathon, and he was wearing some sort of superhero outfit, or… what was that? Jared went to poke at Nick’s ‘garment.’
“What are you wearing? What’s wrong? You look terrible!” Jared strung his questions together as he tried to make sense of what he was seeing. Nick was watching his reactions very closely. Was he really surprised? Is he letting on more than he knows?
“Water,” Nick squeaked out, and since he looked like a man crawling in the desert, still on his knees with his arms stretched forward, Jared sprinted to the bar area and returned with a large bottle of water. Nick chugged more than half of it, gulping in hyperventilating breaths, before pausing for one second to add, “Clothes… get me some clothes.” He glanced toward the bedroom, and continued guzzling the remaining water as Jared, triaging this strange situation, decided it was probably best to just comply, until Nick was at least settled, before bombarding him with more questions. He returned with shorts and a t-shirt, typical Florida garb and just as Nick had pulled the shirt over his head, Jared pressed further.
“What is going on, Nick?” he repeated. “Are you okay?”
Nick looked at him quizzically, still assessing, “You really don’t know?”
“Know what?” Jared replied and his look said it all. He hadn’t the foggiest clue what all this was about, unless he was a better actor than anyone in Hollywood. Trying to be constructive, and figure out how to get information, without involving or endangering Jared any more than necessary, Nick thought of some pieces of information Jared might know.
“Did your dad say anything about me after I left?” Nick began.
“My dad?” Jared replied, even more incredulously. “Just that we should have you back.”
“I bet,” Nick fumed. “Listen, I don’t have time to go into everything right now, but there’s a lot I need to tell you, and I mean a lot. For now, can you just help me?” Nick asked.
“If I can,” Jared replied, still confused.
“Does your father’s company have any warehouses, or large holding areas, anything like that where he might take—” Nick stopped himself and rephrased. “Where he might take something that he didn’t want found.”
“Around the world—he’s got lots of places like that. I wouldn’t even begin to know them all,” Jared replied.
“How about within a day’s drive or so?” Nick continued.
“Look, I don’t know what’s going on here, Nick, but asking me about my father, it’s feeling a little strange, and you look awful. I’m really worried about you.”
“I don’t have time to tell you everything that’s going on, and it’s actually better if you don’t know too much. Listen, your Dad is into something, and some people I know may really get hurt if I don’t figure this out and get to them in time.” Jared’s eyes flashed a small sign of recognition. He knows something, or suspects perhaps, thought Nick. Jared’s mind tumbled the way only a child growing up being fed half-truths and conflicting information could. He had long suspected, since he was about nine or ten at least, that his father was involved in something. The security did seem excessive, even for an executive, and there were odd people in and out at late hours, not business people, but some other category altogether that Jared could never fully put his finger on. Sometimes they would need to leave abruptly, and once they picked up someone in their own car who was injured and bleeding, looking like they had been in a horrible fight, but his father wouldn’t take them to the hospital, or even call the police. While deprived of all other information, Jared’s mind could only reach one conclusion.
“Are they criminals?” Jared asked, bracing himself for the answer, which might confirm that his father was mixed up with the underworld.
“No,” Nick responded, recalling how clueless he himself had been just under six months ago. He continued. “No, nothing like that. They haven’t done anything wrong. He just doesn’t like who they are and there’s something he wants from them.”
Jared spit out the million-dollar question. “What does he want from them?”
At that moment Mr. Finley burst in, flanked by two security guards, with guns.
“Get away from it, son!” Mr. Finley shouted to Jared, who remaine
d frozen, maybe in shock.
One guard held a device which Nick recognized as a shift trap from the video of Gideon’s abduction. He didn’t have the heart or time to tell them they didn’t need it. He tried with all his focus to shift, but was unable to do so. He remained a sweaty pile of human, but they activated it anyway. He didn’t feel much different, probably because he felt so poorly already. The guards pointed guns at the wobbly Nick, and this was enough to break Jared’s shock. He jumped in front of Nick, spreading his arms wide to cover him.
“What are you doing, Dad? This is my friend,” Jared was pleading.
“That is no friend, Jared. It’s not even human.” Mr. Finley replied. “He’s just not changing forms in front of you so you don’t know his true nature. Don’t believe it, son.”
Jared’s eyes suddenly reflected an understanding. “Dad, you’re overworked. It’s okay. We can get some help. Let’s just sit and talk about this, call your doctor. Did they switch your blood pressure medication, maybe?”
“Jared, step aside. You don’t understand what you’re dealing with. I am not crazy. I am one of the most sane people on the planet, and it’s my job to keep everyone safe from these …non-humans,” Mr. Finley responded emphatically, clearly emphasizing each word so that his son would understand the seriousness of the situation.
Jared shifted his attention to the guards, “Guys, help me. You can see something is clearly wrong with him.” Nick took a half-step backward toward the patio door, and the guards stepped forward menacingly with poised guns, while Jared remained in front of Nick, stepping back slightly as well. At this moment, Forrester entered with his shock of red hair and mouth agape at the scene before him.
“Forrester!” shouted Jared. “Help him! Dad needs help! He’s completely lost it and he’s threatening my friend. He’s talking about aliens or something. Call the police!”
Forrester’s concerned look brought Jared some comfort, and the trusted old household member immediately walked between the two sets of people until he was standing somewhere near the coffee table in the middle of the room. Thank heaven, Jared thought as he saw Forrester reach toward the table, presumably for Jared’s cell phone. Forrester began to reach for it, but at the last moment, instead of picking up the phone, he reached under the edge of the coffee table and pressed a recessed button.
“The cage is engaged, sir,” Forrester reported to Mr. Finley. “You may lower your weapons, gentleman.”
Nick and Jared remained in place as the guards lowered their weapons, but then Nick, spotting the opportunity, flung open the sliding glass door and leapt out. As if captured by an invisible net, Nick’s body was flung backward, landing halfway between the outside and inside, where he writhed in pain at the burning sensation in his body. Unable to change, unable to move, he looked at Jared with longing eyes.
“See, Jared?” Mr. Finley said. “He’s not human. He’s trapped by a molecular cage we built. It traps the cells of shape shifters like him.”
Realizing how much pain Nick was in, but not understanding the source, Jared could tell enough to determine that it began when Nick crossed the threshold, so he moved over to him, and dragged his body back onto the white hexagonal tile so it was completely inside. In doing so, Jared’s own arms crossed the barrier, and he felt a burning sensation in his forearms and hands.
“Aaaah!” Jared yelped. Mr. Finley, realizing this meant he contained shifter cells in his body in a greater quantity than those he had provided to Jared in crushed bone, became livid. He directed his rage at Nick.
“What did you do to him?” he screamed at Nick.
“You gave it to him,” Nick accused. “You know you did. Where’s Gideon?”
“I never gave him doses that high. The cage is specifically calibrated. You must have done something to him! And your friend? He is on his way to becoming protein powder—even as we speak!” Finley spat as he spoke.
Jared still didn’t fully understand what they were talking about, but it was obvious his dad thought Nick was something he was not, clearly, because the door had hurt him, too. Convinced his dad was losing his mind, involved in some crimes, or both, he didn’t want to hurt him, but he had to save Nick from this nightmare caused by his father. Jared knelt forward and held his arms out as if he were still in pain, yowling and making noise. While doubled over, he pressed the button under the coffee table, which removed the invisible shifter cage from the room. Jared leapt up, flinging the coffee table forward toward the others in one swift motion while he grabbed Nick by the arm, and they ran for the zip-line. Jumping on they disappeared quickly under the cover of night as they sped toward the creek. Gunshots rang out behind them, and Jared heard his father’s voice in the distance.
“Don’t shoot at my son!”
Jared and Nick landed less gracefully than they had a couple days earlier. In the dark they couldn’t see when to lift their legs, so they crashed spectacularly in the creek, getting wet. They ran within the camera dead zone for about a minute and a half before immediately dropping to their knees just prior to the edge of it. Lights flooded the entire property both behind and in front of them, and the barking of angry dogs nipped at their eardrums from far away.
“Once we go, we can’t stop. We have to clear the wall before they hit the creek, or they can close the distance,” Jared instructed. Nick, exhausted, and still weak from having his body tasered by the cage, nodded. He had to find the strength. He couldn’t believe how strong Jared was, in heart and in character.
“3…2…1—” They shot off, racing toward the back wall. As soon as they did so, the motion-sensor floodlights lit the entire area as if it were midday. With Nick’s impaired condition they ran at about the same pace while both running full out. They reached the back wall, and, for the first time, Nick observed its height. It had to be about fifteen feet high. There were no trees next to it, for obvious reasons, but Jared had scoped this out long ago, during his teen years of sneaking out. He’d never had a successful attempt to get over it, but, just like life preparing you, the setbacks of the teen years became the saving lessons of today as they ran toward a tree about ten feet from the back wall. Jared scrambled up easily but Nick struggled, getting weaker by the second. Nick followed Jared as he moved quickly along a lengthy branch, with Nick just behind him. The tree was nowhere near the wall, but as they traversed along the branch, their weight made it sag down and dip to just above the top of it. They stepped off the branch and perched atop the wall. The first splashing through the creek could be heard as the two jumped down safely on the other side.
Once there, Jared led them to a nearby gardener’s shed.
“They’ll find us here too easily!” Nick objected, as Jared kicked over a clay pot and watched small stones tumble out. He grabbed a small set of keys, and used one to enter the shed, then to Nick’s amazement, he wheeled out a small, old Indian motorcycle he used to ride when he was fifteen, placing the other key in the ignition.
“Get on!” Jared shouted, and Nick slipped quickly behind him on the small bike. There was barely enough room for them both so they knew they wouldn’t get far, but they got away—together.
13
Nick and Jared decided that going anywhere familiar would be too great a risk, so they rode to an abandoned barn that Nick had played in as a child. There used to be a petting zoo there, run by an elderly couple with help from a few hired workers. When the couple passed away years ago, their children—not being local—had let the petting zoo go, and the property had fallen into an overgrown shambles, though they couldn’t yet bring themselves to sell it. There had been running water, but even that was shut off now. Fortunately, the property was so old that there was still a functional pump and associated well out in the back field. Nick pressed the lever up and down now, hoping it still held water. After giving it a few extra minutes due to the years of non-use, he was just about to give up when the clear water began pouring forth. Jared moved in to scoop some up immediately, but Nick advised him t
o let it run a few minutes more to clear out any debris.