His fingers scrabbled at his key ring when he reached his door, the keys of varying sizes and shapes. More than once on his return, he had woken in a panic at the middle of the night, terrified he had left them at a station or stop, or the side of the highway. A drop of his own blood coated the end of each, so short of throwing them into the ocean, finding their scent would not be an issue, but the very thought of backtracking down south made vomit track up his throat.
With four clicks, he twisted each of the locks, sighing as the last one yielded and the door creaked open. He drew a deep breath, letting the smell of home permeate his entire being, the mix of aromas that he had cultivated so carefully. Aromas that no one else appreciated, with their children’s palates—the damp mold, the soured wine, the spices he sprinkled into carpets, and the rat droppings that scattered the floor. His heart beat in double time at that last smell—not just rat droppings, but fresh rat droppings.
“Lucy!” he cried, as the rodent turned a wary head around the kitchen corner, then loosed an excited squeak at the smell of him. For just like him, Lucy relied on smell more than any other sense, and now she bounded towards him, scrambling up his arm to playfully nip his ear. She was fatter than when he had last seen her—far fatter, her scent heavy with the bags of stale cereal he kept in the bottom cabinet. And when he investigated, he saw the neat hole chewed through the particle board, and the plastic shredded in a winding trail across the tiles.
He laid an affectionate finger across her head, the tears in his eyes propping the drooping lids open.
“Smart girl,” he whispered. “I was worried you had starved.”
He stumbled rather than walked the rest of the way to his bedroom, down a short hallway strewn with clutter, everything from laundry to paper plates to magazines. Each with a special smell he would never throw away. Each a part of his collection.
He groaned as he lay back on his bed, shifting so his shoulders found the same worn out springs, lying at a slight diagonal so that his feet could fit. All the smells he had remembered were still there, and he relished them, the muscles in his chest and back relaxing for the first time in what seemed like an eternity. His eyelids fluttered as Lucy crept into the crux of his arm, and he had only just started to snore when three sharp raps knocked on his door.
These were not the knocks of a solicitor, which were always timid, imploring. Nor were they the knocks of a collector, which came in rapid succession, and sounded more like rain against a steel drum. No, these knocks were different—heavy, powerful.
The types of knocks which, if you didn’t answer your door, they’d be replaced by a battering ram.
Three more rang out, and he forced himself not to cry as he sat up, then stumbled to his living room. He undid the latches, then opened the door, shielding his eyes to the light outside in the narrow alleyway. And cursed as he saw the three figures waiting.
“Police,” came the curt announcement, and he snarled in response.
“Oh, so you’re telling me it isn’t Halloween? Good, because I ain’t feeling friendly, and I don't have candy unless you want the chocolates Lucy left on my carpet.”
“Official business, Olef,” said Roland, the chief, as he pulled out a small envelope. “We’ve been waiting for you to return. And I’m afraid it can’t wait any longer. Except,” he continued, his nose wrinkling. “Except for a shower.”
“And lose all the smells?” Olef protested, the tears welling in his eyes once more. "But there are some I want to keep."
Chapter 2
“When the hell am I ever going to use this?” shouted Lucio in exasperation, swiping at a handheld pencil sharpener that snapped on contact with his fist, sending shavings flying in a cloud that rained down on Slugger and me. “What’s the point? Exponents, like what, I’m balancing a checkbook with exponents? That’s what your mum said this is for last time I asked, SC, and the last time I checked, exponents just look like little numbers and I want to make big money.”
“Oi, it’s not that hard,” countered Slugger from across the table, blowing the dust off his own paper, the graphite leaving curving trails across the sheet. He reached across to touch an eraser that lay between them, his fingers brushing the rubber edge as he spoke.
“Math is just takin things away,” he said, twirling his hand in a circle around the eraser as it started to float. He tapped it again to send it spinning in midair, and it accelerated again, rushing like a balloon towards the ceiling.
“And putting things back in,” he continued, and with another tap the eraser slammed back down to the desk, catching on its edge at the precisely right moment to bounce in a trajectory that caught Lucio straight on the nose.
“Ow!” he shouted, nearly toppling back on his chair. “What made you such a genius? And when the hell did you learn to float things like that?”
“Ye always knew I was a smartass. Turns out the smarts just go farther than my ass,” Slugger answered. “But math, math always made some sense to me. All just plusses and minuses at the end o’ the day. Anyway, I picked up that trick back in the jungle—watching some leaves getting caught in a dust devil. Figured out I can make something just about as weightless as air, then make the air lighter to push it around. Good craic, eh?”
“When it’s not in my face,” Lucio answered, still rubbing his nose and glowering. “Besides, if you’re such a genius, you should have given Lola a run for her money.”
“Aye, but this,” Slugger said, jabbing the tip of his pencil down on the page. “Hardly takes anything remotely like a genius, lad. This is the easy stuff.”
I sighed, running my fingers through my hair as I listened to them bickering, staring at my own sheet. We were in the subway, and it was nearly three PM, the final stretch on my mother’s self-ordained school day. Only thirty minutes until we were out, but those last thirty minutes were always the worst —my mother would leave us with our homework during that time, under the condition that if we finished it accurately before she returned from errands, we could be done for the day. Otherwise, there was another hour in store—and whenever Lucio’s and Slugger’s chatter started revving up, it nearly always meant a another hour.
“Guys, come on. Let’s focus,” I said, feeling a slight headache coming on. “We don’t need to do this any longer than we have to.”
“Oi, I’m already done,” bragged Slugger, slinging his heel up on the table and putting his hands behind his back. “It’s up to you two to catch up.”
“That’s not how it works; we all have to be done. And I might just not finish on purpose!” sneered Lucio, standing up and pushing his paper away.
“You wouldn’t, ya bastard,” retorted Slugger, his eyes narrowing as Lucio snapped his pencil in half.
“Yeah, that’s right, I’m a mathematical terrorist,” Lucio announced, strutting around the table. “Looks like it’s in your best interest to do some extra problems, right? It’s for the good of us all!”
“Ugh,” I said as I heard my mother’s footprints sounding in the corridor, descending towards us. “Really just want more schooling, don't you?”
I turned, ready with an excuse for my mother, to plead for five more minutes. But another shape stepped from the tunnel, a man with long enough hair to cover his face, cracking his neck as he entered the enclose.
“Stop right there!” I shouted, advancing and generating two dark orbs as I leapt to my feet. “Don’t move or I'll fire!”
“Stop?” shrieked the man, throwing his eyes wide but continuing to walk. “Stop? Do you know how long I’ve waited to do that? No, you listen here, you—you left me stranded in the middle of the Amazon. I had to work my way with smell alone back to the city—turns out the scent of burnt rubber makes its way even to the center of the forest.”
He jabbed his finger forwards accusingly, his face livid, and I bristled, the orbs in my hands growing as he continued shouting.
“And then when I got there, I didn’t have a lick of cash to my name. So you know what I
did? I panhandled and begged, and offered my services finding lost items until I had enough to buy a bus ticket. Then another bus ticket. Then I clung the side of a train for two hundred miles. Next it was the sea—you know how seasick I get? You don’t. I assure you that you don’t.
“And eventually, I caught smell of home, but even then it took days. You owe me weeks of my life, and some new clothes, and, and—”
“Olef—is that you?” asked Lucio, tilting his head. “What—ooooh, did Lacit’s team not take you back?”
“Yes, Olef. Olef, the forgotten, until the police chief comes knocking on my door the second I arrive home. Oh, how happy was I to hear he wanted to see just the people that left me behind. With a letter,” he sneered, throwing down the envelope with a slap on the table.
“How the hell did you get in here?” I demanded. “This place is closed off.”
“Where the smells get out, I get in. Job finished,” he said, turning on his heel. “And back to my and Lucy’s nap. I swear if I hear word of you again, I’m leaving the city for good, and no amount of smells can bring me back. I don't care how much they pay, it ain't worth it."
Chapter 3
“How do we trust it?” Lucio asked, peering down past his homework sheet to where the envelope lay on the table, poking it with the end of his pencil.
“Oi, what do you think, that it’s gonna bite?” retorted Slugger. “You just as scared of that paper as your sheet of homework? Spooky numbers might be inside.”
“It’s from the cops,” Lucio said. “That’s what Olef said. All we gotta do is pretend we never got it, and if they ever do come knocking, then we never knew anything! I say we shred it or burn it, more fun anyways. Or we deliver it to someone else’s front door and let them report in.”
“If they ever come knocking, we likely have bigger problems,” I said. “If they know Olef can find us, and they wanted to capture us, then they could have just come with him. But they didn’t. Which means one of two things—they fear us or they respect us.”
Slugger loosed a low whistle and leaned back in his chair. “Either way, if we don’t open that, they’ll be acting next. Lot better to have their letter here than their faces.”
“Fine, go on!” Lucio said, throwing his hands up in the air. “But I warned you! If there’s something I’ve learned from my power, it’s that a bit of extra information can be worse than missing some.”
“I think we’ll risk it,” I said, running my finger under the sealed edge and pulling out the paper underneath. The message was simple, far shorter than I expected.
We have information you may want to know.
3 AM Tonight.
Same location as last time.
“See! See right there!” shouted Lucio, running his hands through his hair. “Just what I said, now we’ll just have to find out what that is, won’t we? The sequel to Escape to Danger Island is surely going to be pushed back now!”
“The sequel?” I scoffed. “You do remember that your two lead stars are thousands of miles away, right?”
“But you said we’d be back on the first of the month. That’s almost here and it’s the perfect time for a shoot!”
“Hey, if you can get them to agree to it, that’s up to you,” I answered, tapping my finger against the letter. “Until then, we should figure out what this is about.”
“Probably ‘Hands up! You’re under arrest!’,” said Lucio. “Then bam! We’re back in the rehabilitation facility. Maybe this time, we’ll even get to be Uppers.”
Slugger gave Lucio a long look up and down before speaking. “I’d be doubting that one. Like SC said, if they’re going to arrest us, they’ll come knocking. By sendin the letter, they risked us runnin off.”
“And what do you think they have to say?” I asked him, and he shrugged.
“Could be anything. Maybe they want to tell us Lacit is gone, and we should act right surprised. Or maybe they found something out about us; could be for our own protection.”
“Seems odd, though, to ask at three in the morning,” I countered. “They might want to keep this secret. Who knows, maybe they caught Blake and got him to talk.”
“Wouldn’t trust a word of that,” said Lucio. “His thoughts are a bigger mess than my room.”
“Sounds dangerous, then.” I laughed, then spoke more quietly as I heard my mother coming down the subway tunnel. “So, leaving here at two AM. Are we in?”
Slugger nodded, and Lucio frowned, then gave a slower nod.
“You’re lucky,” he said, tapping his forehead before rushing to discover what foods my mother had brought back from the store. “Lucky I don’t just give you a memory of us going. I bet I could make it even more interesting than what they have to say.”
We shared knowing glances at dinner, racing through our plates of spaghetti and meatballs after my mother had us complete our homework. She raised an eyebrow when Lucio completed his without complaint, but otherwise, the night passed uneventfully. Too uneventful, which my mother had learned to grow suspicious of, so I sparked a small fight between Lucio and Slugger for the last ice cream bar in the fridge. Lucio had written his name on it, but I ate Slugger’s in secret, then planted the wrapper on the floor of Lucio’s room.
Bed came quickly after that, and after waking at two, we darted through the streets, keeping to the shadows and avoiding confrontation. With Lucio’s help, anyone in our way suddenly remembered that they had forgotten to turn off the burner at home, or that their parking expired in only a few minutes. And with Slugger’s aid, the lightweight gratings that sometimes stretched over long periods of street grew heavy, and instead of the high-pitched clanging as we walked over, they only released quiet and low thuds.
We arrived at Olef’s secondary apartment, the door already unlocked, and Olef’s snores quite apparent through the wall. Seated at the table was Roland, the police chief who had helped us fight Siri in the subway tunnels, then given us the tip-off about Lacit. He occupied the same chair as before, dressed in civilian clothes, the jeans and dark t-shirt almost making him near unrecognizable. In his right hand, he clutched a round object, waiting for us to shut the door before beginning. Then, as the lock clicked, Roland snapped, slamming down a roll of film on the table and making us jump backwards as he hissed, “Is this some kind of joke?”
Chapter 4
“You mean a masterpiece?” asked Lucio, snatching up the film and cradling it to his chest. Under his arm, I could just see Danger Island, but his sleeve covered the “D,” leaving only Anger Island, a title that seemed all too fitting for our current interaction.
“You’re lucky as all hell that you didn’t win that contest,” fumed Roland, shaking his head. “You do realize that the winner was optioned to Hollywood? You had actual video evidence of you fighting the acting chief of police that almost went nationwide! Forget about the law; you don’t think that Lacit’s old buddies would have come a-knocking? You’ve been a thorn in their side, but they never knew who you were, where you were. They didn’t know you had anything to do with Lacit’s disappearance!”
“Oi, word will get back soon enough,” Slugger interjected. “We recognized people there. They knew us. And they’ve been runnin their merry little mouths all about it, I would bet.”
“Rumors and reports are one thing,” responded Roland, still glaring at the roll of film. “Rubbing it in their faces is another entirely. If there’s one thing the bosses hate more than losing, it’s other people knowing they lost. Damaging their pride is far worse than eradicating their armies. They can’t forgive that. They will root you out for it.”
“Right, because if they could root us out, then they wouldn’t have done that already,” Lucio drawled, and an image flashed through my mind, that of a mole buried deep under a boulder while foxes prowled around its edge. And by the look on Roland’s and Darian’s faces, I wasn’t the only one presented with that memory.
“None of your mind games,” snapped Roland, shaking his head. “I respect
your space, now you respect mine.”
“Just go ahead and drop some images in mine then, why don’t ya?” Lucio said, waving a dismissive hand. “Or did I forget, are you a Memwriter as well? Except I don’t forget memories; I make them.”
You make trouble. Now sit and listen.
The words popped into my thoughts unbidden, so loud that I thought Roland had spoken—but his lips had not moved, and his eyes stared at us, intense. They left a slight ringing around the inside of my skull as they faded, and I shivered—it felt as if someone’s fingers had grazed against the top of my head, but on the inside, there was a tickling feeling, almost as if I had to sneeze.
“The hell was that?” I asked, leaning away from the table.
“That was my power.” Roland folded his arms over his chest. “But we’re civil here, so we don’t need to use powers in discussion. Or if you prefer, we can have this all in our heads—but like I said, I respect your thoughts. And you should do the same.”
“You had a power?” Lucio asked, his mouth agape. “Where the hell was that when we were fighting Siri?”
“Lucio, relax, he was using it,” I said, the pieces falling together in my mind. The way that the officers had naturally aligned in a V shape when fighting in the tunnel. How they moved in such cohesion, like the arms of an octopus, directed in the center by Roland. I recalled an entry for the directory, one that I had read nearly a year before. “You’re a Director, aren’t you? You can broadcast your thoughts into the minds of others.”
“And perceive their senses, should they be willing. A more than useful ability as a police chief when conducting teams. And likely the reason I have the job.”
“I thought all Directors were sports team coaches?” said Lucio. “You could make way more doing that.”
“Not everything is about money, son,” said Roland. “There are other motivations. And besides, you could consider the force my team. But back to business—the only reason you haven’t been rooted out is because you’re far down their list. Those at the top likely haven’t even heard your names. Even Lacit left the city rather than hunt for you, and you’d managed to make his blood boil beforehand. If they wanted you gone bad enough, you’d be gone. And don’t let your pride convince you otherwise. You’re nothing more than pawns in this game. As am I.”
Negative Film (Star Child: Places of Power Book 2) Page 38