The Gryphon Project

by Carrie Mac

  Eva ran into the room and drew her two daughters into her arms with a sob. Oscar came in behind her, his face drawn with worry. Phoenix raised her eyes to greet her father and knew immediately that things were far worse than they should have been. Her unshakable father looked deeply, deeply shaken.

  “What’s going on?” Phoenix set Fawn down and stood. Fawn clung to Eva’s leg. Eva sank into the chair. They should already be down at Chrysalis, collecting his things, sending him to the recon lab with a kiss and a prayer.

  “They say he jumped.”

  Tariq hadn’t told her anything yet. Phoenix had no idea what her mother was talking about. She looked from Oscar to Eva to Tariq and back again. “What?”

  When Oscar finally spoke, it was with his minister’s voice. Calm, steady, and careful. “He was hit by a train. At the Steveston Pier. ”

  BY THE TIME her parents had to leave to meet with Chrysalis, Fawn had fallen asleep, exhausted from all her crying and an afternoon in the sun at the beach. Tariq carried her upstairs, Phoenix trailing behind him, to tuck her into bed. She folded down the quilt and sheet, the cheerful pink rabbits on the linens at odds with her heavy heart. Tariq set Fawn on the bed and drew the sheet up to her shoulders. He reached for the quilt, but Phoenix stopped him.

  “It’s too hot.”

  Tariq nodded and then reached for her hand. He pulled her out of Fawn’s room and steered her to hers. He sat her on the bed and then retreated to the doorway, not sure what to do with himself.

  “Tell me what really happened.” Phoenix glanced up, eyes rimmed red from all the crying. “Please?”

  He’d told her parents before he’d come to the beach. And her parents had told her. Oscar had described what had happened as if he were ministering to one of his parish families. In plain language. No euphemisms or platitudes. As he’d spoken, Phoenix’s shock and confusion had lifted briefly to let in a tiny slice of anger at her father. But almost as quickly as it had occurred to her, it vanished, and she was only thankful for her father’s steadfastness. His calm amid such uncertainty. She wanted the story from Tariq now, though. She wanted to hear it from someone who’d been there. From someone who’d seen.

  “We were on the way to the arcade—” Tariq started.

  “From where?”

  “Me and Huy and Neko had been at my place. We were meeting Saul and Gryph.”

  “Where?”

  “At Steveston. They’d been in the Industrial Sector.”

  “Why?”

  “They … I don’t know. It doesn’t matter.” Tariq took a step into the room and leaned against the wall, just inside the door. “I told your parents that he tripped.”

  But it did matter! Phoenix wanted to know everything. She wanted to hear Tariq’s version, and then the other boys’ too, in their own words. And she wanted to see the security footage too. Any pictures bystanders might have captured. People were always taking pictures of Gryph. Why should this have been any different? A sudden thought catapulted her off the bed. She brought up her own lync screen at her desk and drew her finger to the News icon.

  “I told your parents that he tripped—” Tariq insisted, watching her.

  The screen darkened momentarily and then lit up mid-newscast.

  “World-famous Chrysalis-sponsored athlete Gryphon Nicholson-Lalonde was struck and killed by a train earlier today.” As the newscaster spoke, the screen shifted to play footage of the train station up in one corner. Yellow tape was strung from wall to rail, and a knot of Crimcor agents were down on the tracks, on their knees, combing the ground. “An official statement is expected later today from the Chrysalis-Crimcor joint task force.”

  Phoenix narrowed her eyes at Tariq. “What does Crimcor have to do with it?”

  Tariq reached over her shoulder and paused the image. On one side of the screen the lips of the carefully coiffed newscaster were frozen open, her eyebrows furrowed in appropriate sobriety and concern. The little side box showing the agents searching was frozen too, the camera in mid-swing toward a massive pool of blood on the far side of the tracks. The side nearest the wall. Where no one had cause to be. Ever. No doors opened on that side at that station, and the rail was normally electrified. It would’ve been shut down only after the incident so that the Crimcor agents could investigate. So that Gryph’s body could be collected. Phee looked hard. She didn’t know that station well, had only been to it that one time the night of the rave, and on a Saturday it wouldn’t have been busy. Businesses in that district were Monday to Friday. So Gryph couldn’t have lost his footing in a pushing crowd.

  “He didn’t trip, though. Did he?”

  “No.” Tariq’s reply was almost a whisper. “He didn’t trip.”

  “Of course he didn’t! He has the balance of a superhero!” Phoenix kept her eyes on the screen as she spoke. “I don’t believe for one moment that he tripped. And my parents won’t either.” She stabbed at the screen, breaking it from its pause.

  “There has been no word from Chrysalis, but they are expected to launch the investigation into this tragic incident as soon as this afternoon. Again”— here the woman paused for effect—“we are saddened to be bringing you the news that much-loved athlete and world-class champion Gryphon Nicholson-Lalonde is dead for the first time at the age of eighteen.”

  A file photo filled the screen. Gryphon and his lopsided grin, the bright blue of his eyes catching the sun at the surfing competition. His hair was slicked back, damp, and the gold medal around his neck caught the hot glint of the sun.

  “Why is she talking like that?” Phee’s heart sank. “Why hasn’t she mentioned his recon? What really happened, Tariq?”

  Tariq stood very still. “I didn’t see anything until it had already happened.”

  “Phee?” Nadia stood in the door, hugging herself. “You okay?”

  “No!” Phoenix shut the screen. She pointed an accusatory finger at Tariq. “He says he didn’t see anything. I know he’s lying.”

  Nadia drew Phoenix back to the bed and sat beside her, her arm slung across her shoulders. “Everything will be okay.”

  “It might not be, Nadia.”

  “He’ll be as good as new. Better, even. I bet they’ll put titanium kneecaps in, seeing as he’s cracked both. And a new whatever cuff.”

  “Rotator cuff.”

  “Yeah. And maybe they’ll clear up his acne problem too.”

  “He has perfect skin.” Phee smiled sadly at Nadia’s attempt at humour. “And you know it.” A horrible thought occurred to her. Gryph had been destroyed. He hadn’t quietly died as she had the first time, her skin duskier until her lungs finally gave up. And he didn’t die intact, as she had the second time when she’d drowned. He’d died violently. With pain and blood and terror. She opened her mouth, a mute protest against the images playing in her mind. The train, the screeching brakes, the thump, the fall, the blood. The screams. She felt a meltdown cresting inside, but then Nadia spoke and broke the swell.

  “Everything is going to be fine”—Nadia squeezed her in a hug— “and you know it.” Any remnants of the girls’ earlier spat had entirely vanished, and Nadia smiled at her now with eyes filled with equal parts fear and support. “Honest.”

  Awkwardness filled the space between the girls and Tariq. They looked up at him, waiting for him to chime in and agree that everything would be fine, but he just fixed his eyes on the floor, his hands shoved resolutely into his pockets.

  “Tariq!” Phee shouted. “Say something!”

  But Tariq turned in to the hall. He took the stairs so quietly that Phee wasn’t sure if he was just lurking in the hall or had left. When she stepped into the hall to see, he was gone. “He left.”

  “He didn’t.” Nadia’s eyes widened in surprise. “That prick!” She ran out of the room and stomped down the stairs and out the front door. Phee hurried down the hall to Fawn’s room and looked out the front window. Fawn was fast asleep, her cheeks still flushed from crying, arms buried under her pillow.
Nadia had caught up to Tariq at the corner. Phee quietly pushed the window all the way open and leaned out, but she couldn’t hear them. She could only see Nadia scolding him. And he stood there, taking it, shoulders curved in defeat. And then Nadia’s voice rose into a yell and Phee could hear her clearly.

  “You get back in there now and talk to her!” she yelled at him, her fists planted on her hips. “Now!”

  As Tariq backed away, he pulled his hands from his pockets and raised them in submission as he shook his head, refusing.

  “Don’t you walk away from me, Tariq!” Nadia was the way she’d been any number of the times when she yelled at Saul during an argument. And Saul always stayed, always gave as good as he got. But this time it was Tariq, the boy of few words. He kept walking. At the end of the block he broke from his slow pace and headed for the station at a dead run.

  NADIA GLANCED BACK at the house and saw Phoenix at the window. She shrugged in bewildered apology. Phee waved for her to come back and then went downstairs to meet her at the door.

  Nadia started talking when she was halfway up the path. “I told him he had to tell us and that we deserved to hear it from him. I told him we know something is fishy.” Nadia was at the door now. She looked at Phoenix with sad eyes. “We do know something is fishy, right? This is not happening like it should.”

  “You’re right. It’s not. The news is talking like he’s never coming back.”

  The girls retreated to the kitchen, where Nadia poured them each a glass of iced tea from the pitcher in the fridge. Phee stared at the amber liquid. Had it only been that morning when her mother made it? Had it only been that morning when she and Nadia were arranging date squares on china platters and cutting crusts off cucumber sandwiches? Had it only been—and now she glanced at the clock above the stove—not even an hour since Nadia had stalked off in a huff, convinced Phee and Saul were up to something?

  Saul. And the others. “What about Neko? He was there.”

  “He won’t talk,” Nadia said. “Not if Tariq told him not to.”

  “We can make him talk. He’s your brother. Call him.”

  Nadia brought her phone to her ear. “No answer.”

  “Try Saul.”

  “I did.” Nadia set the phone on the table. “When you were upstairs. No answer.”

  “Text him, then. And Huy. Copy them all on it. Tell them I want to talk to them!”

  “I already texted Saul a hundred million times.” With a wary eye on Phee she picked up the phone again and started a new text. “I’ll try again, but they’re not answering. I’m telling you, Phee. They’re in some kind of brotherly lockdown. Neko too.”

  “Then get your parents to call Neko and order him to come home.” Phee stood. She paced the kitchen, cutting through the same slice of sunlight, back and forth, back and forth. The chime at the front door sounded and her grandparents shuffled in, neither of them looking all that concerned.

  Her grandmother sat her back at the table and made her and Nadia bologna sandwiches with fixings she’d brought from her house. White bread and cheap bologna, a bag of ripple chips. Three things Phee’s parents never let them eat. Phee almost cried at her grandma’s small comforting gestures.

  “Now don’t you pay any attention to the news,” her grandmother said as she set a pickle and a pile of chips alongside each sandwich. “There’s just been some kind of misunderstanding. That’s all. It’ll get sorted out.”

  Her grandfather sat at the head of the table in his gardening clothes, dirt under his nails, his filthy sunhat misshapen and faded atop his bald head. “Misunderstanding,” he echoed. “That’s all.” Phee’s grandma wetted a towel and went about scrubbing her husband’s hands clean from his morning puttering around in the garden.

  “That’s right.” Phee’s grandma patted her shoulder as she passed on her way back to the sink. “This will all work out just fine. Look at you, dear. You’re the perfect example to us all. You reconned beautifully. Twice.”

  Except that Phee didn’t remember a thing from before she was six. That was not a beautiful recon. And if she died again, that was it. Some perfect example.

  “Reconned beautifully,” her grandfather mumbled through a mouthful of sandwich.

  “You just wait and see. Six weeks, and he’ll be in the news again for another one of his competitions. Getting another blue ribbon or what have you. All this fuss is over nothing. We’re blessed to be three-pers for a reason. Your job, Phoenix, dear, is to stay calm and help keep your mother calm.”

  “Calm,” her grandfather echoed.

  “I’ll try, Grandma.”

  But her grandmother was wrong. If there was an investigation, it meant only one thing. Someone at Chrysalis or Crimcor had reason to believe that Gryph’s death was no accident.

  What if he’d jumped?

  Phee felt the colour drain from her cheeks.

  Chrysalis did not recon suicides. Ever.

  And it was widely known that no champion athlete could ever have been reconned, due to the likelihood and opportunity for performance-enhancing adjustments. What if he had jumped?

  To get out of his contract once and for all?

  What if he’d staged his own death?

  No, no, no. No. Phee shook her head, arguing with herself. Gryph would not have killed himself. No way.

  And she’d never believe that he’d fallen.

  Which meant that he had to have been pushed.

  And if they thought he was pushed, then who pushed him? If they caught whoever did it, they’d be decommed. Decommissioned. Chrysalis’s tidy term for the death penalty.

  No matter how this went, it was not going to go easily.

  Phee glanced up at her grandmother, who smiled at her. Phee knew her grandma was going for a reassuring smile, but to Phee it looked like poorly disguised panic.

  “Everything will be okay.” Still with the smile. “You’ll see, dear.”

  Her grandmother was a smart woman. She was hiding behind this homely nurturer act only because she was scared. Well, they all were! And should be! Phee wanted to grab her grandmother by her collar and march her out of the house. She didn’t want to be placated. She didn’t want to be soothed. She wanted answers! Her grandma turned to the sink, and Phee glowered at her grandma’s back.

  “Don’t you—” Her grandfather’s tone was angry. Phee realized he’d seen her glare at his wife and didn’t like it. She couldn’t tell when he was as good as oblivious or when he caught on to something with fleeting lucidity.

  “Sorry, Granddad.”

  “Calm.” He patted her hand, still frowning. “Okay?”

  “Yes, Granddad.” Phee couldn’t stand to sit still for one moment longer. “Grandma? You’ll stay here and look after Fawn?”

  Her grandma smiled at her. “Of course, dear.”

  “Come on.” She grabbed Nadia’s hand.

  Nadia went along with her until they were out of the house. “We should stay here. Your parents will be back soon.”

  “With what?” Phee felt frantic. “Not with answers! Not real answers, anyway! We have to go find the boys.” She pulled Nadia across the green, heading for the train station. Nadia followed reluctantly.

  “We shouldn’t—”

  “Hurry!” At the top of the stairs Phee could hear the whine of a train coming to a stop. She took them two at a time until she reached the platform. The five-car train stretched the length of the station like a polished serpent. Heavy. Predatory. Nadia caught up to her and stood at her side while the warning bell sounded and the automated voice announced the train’s departure.

  A terrible screech. A crash. Blood. So much blood.

  Phee couldn’t move. She closed her eyes, willing away the images. The expression on Gryph’s face when he realized he couldn’t get out of the way. He would’ve tried. He would’ve scrambled up from where he’d fallen and tried to get a leg up. But there hadn’t been the time. Or so the boys claimed.

  INVESTIGATION

 
Phee wanted to sit them all down and grill them until they told the truth, but the boys were nowhere to be found. Phee and Nadia checked the Balmoral, the arcade, and even went as far as to make their way to the Steveston Pier, but Crimcor had the entire train station taped off. The train slowed well before the station, switched tracks, and took a detour. The girls had to get off at the next station to turn around. As they were waiting for the train Phee glanced up at the layout of the station, at the security cameras in particular. All the stations were the same, right down to doorways and staircases. There were ten cameras in total, three at the far end, where it had happened.

  According to the news reports, the cameras on that end of the station platform had been destroyed moments before the collision, and the ones elsewhere on the platform wouldn’t have caught anything relevant. The boys were not talking, even to Crimcor. There were few bystanders, and all of them had been at the other end of the platform, and claimed that they hadn’t seen anything or noticed anything was wrong until the train screeched to a stop and the boys screamed for help.

  “You can appreciate the situation.” This from the Chrysalis recon rep, sitting in the Nicholson-Lalonde living room not even twenty-four hours after Gryph’s death. Oscar and Eva stared hollowly at the man. He was wearing a suit jacket, despite the heat, but he wasn’t sweating. He’d rung the doorbell not ten minutes earlier, and now here he was telling Oscar and Eva that they were investigating the possibility of suicide. “Of course,” he carried on while the grief-numbed parents kept staring at him, “we’ll go ahead with the recon process until we can accurately determine the events of yesterday afternoon.”

  “Thank God,” Oscar said with an enormous sigh. “Thank God for that.”

  “And when will we know?” Eva fiddled with the locket at her throat. It was a tiny triptych, each section with a photo of one of her children as newborns.

  “I can’t say at this point.” The Chrysalis rep tried for a sympathetic smile and failed. It was more condescending than anything, or that’s what Phee thought. She sat across from her parents, listening intently, holding the one hand that wanted to wipe off his smile with her other hand. “Soon, we all hope. We love Gryphon as much as you do—”