“Calm down!? Are you crazy?”
There’s a tap on my shoulder, and I jumped about a foot in the air. Mikey stood behind me, trying hard not to laugh.
“Hey, man,” he said. “Who’re you talking to?”
“Uh… Cheryl called, apparently in hysterics.” Blaming the parents nearly always worked.
“You fighting with your parents again?”
“You mean my ex-parents,” I corrected him. “I’m suing for divorce the moment I turn eighteen.”
“I don’t recommend it,” Mikey smiled. “You know Cheryl. She could whip you and get the legal right to do it.”
“I guess so. I still need them for college money. Maybe I’ll wait until I’m twenty-one.”
Mikey laughed and held out the extra cup he has in his hand. “Here’s some coffee for you.”
I smiled as I sipped. Ah… there was nothing in the world like the rush of bitter beans ground up in extra caffeine. “Thanks. Did you see Mark anywhere?”
“No. This is the emergency room, not the heart floor,” Mikey reminded me. “We can’t be sure he’ll come anyway, you know. He might be in surgery.”
“Yeah, I suppose,” I agreed. “Gwen still hasn’t come out.”
“I sure hope she’s okay.”
The concern etched on Mikey’s face confused me slightly before I recalled Mikey was the one who’d introduced me to Gwen back in junior high; I’d suspected Mikey even had a crush on Gwen for a while, but they were just good friends now.
Still, I supposed Mikey was entitled to feel a bit more worried than what the situation usually required. It’s not often someone gets injured by a real monster.
“I’m sure she’ll be fine,” I told him, trying to shift his attention away from me. Elysian was still clinging to my sleeve in a very casual, almost unnoticeable way. I hoped the stupid dragon was smart enough not to get himself noticed while we were in the company of normal people.
Mikey slouched further down into the uncomfortable chair. “You know, people are going to start thinking our school is cursed or something,” he laughed, almost nervously.
“Yeah.”
“I mean, Rosemont was destroyed, but there were fewer injuries there than there were at Homecoming and now the play.” He looked over at me and asked, “Do you think it’s possible some kids from Rosemont were in on this? That the rivalry between our schools has finally led them off into the deep end?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know. But that smurf-lady and monster-guy, they had pretty realistic costumes.”
“Yeah, I bet it was just a bunch of kids. After all, Rosemont was a private school. Over half those kids are rich.”
“Who do you think that girl was? The one with the bow and arrows? Was she in on it, too?”
Mikey grinned. “Even if she was, I know who she is.”
“Really?” I looked skeptical. “Who was she, then?”
“She’s my next girlfriend.”
I groaned. “What makes you think she’s real? Maybe we just had a hallucination.”
“More than one person can’t have the same hallucination, Dinger, that’s just stupid.”
“Well, what about age? She could be older than you.”
Mikey contemplated this. “Well, there’s no way of being sure, but even if she turns out older than me by five or six years, I could adjust to it. Now, younger would be more of a problem, but I could wait.”
I was about to ask how he intended to find her again when Gwen came out with her parents. “Gwen!”
“Hey, guys,” Gwen greeted us with a tired voice.
Jody – Mrs. Kessler – ran up to me and threw me into a hug. “You saved my baby!” she cried. “Again!”
Mr. Kessler was more sedate. He reached out his hand to me. “Thank you, son. We’re indebted to you for protecting our Gwennie.”
“No problem, Mr. Kessler,” I smiled as I shook his hand.
“Call me John,” he said warmly.
Gwen was blushing, probably from her parent’s embarrassing display. But I was hoping it was for other reasons, too.
“Are you feeling better?” I asked her.
Gwen’s eyes glittered with happiness. “Yes, thanks to you and Starry Knight I am,” she smiled. Indicating her arm, she added, “It’s only a broken wrist, but the doctor told us I was lucky compared to the others from Central.” She looked at me curiously for a moment. “What about you, Hammy? Where are your bruises?”
“Uh, what do you mean?” I asked, vaguely recalling how I had been miraculously healed.
“You were thrown on the ground and through a window. Not to mention into a tree. I thought you had some cuts earlier.”
“Well…” I (briefly) glared at Elysian, who smirked up at me with an ‘I-told-you-so’ look on his face. Another riddle to solve. “I must’ve just looked like I was scraped up. I have no idea what you’re talking about. Hey, is that my dad over there?”
Here’s a good hint. Awkward conversations are soon remedied by changing the subject. And it’s best to change the subject to something connected to the conversation or environment. That way you won’t be called on it.
Elysian snickered into my sleeve.
“I don’t see him,” Gwen said, craning her neck to see down the hall behind her.
“Gwen, honey, we’d better go,” her mother called out to her. “It’s late.”
“Coming! Give me one moment!” she called back. Gwen turned her attention back to me. “My mom told me school was canceled tomorrow.”
“Well, I guess I’ll see you on Monday then,” I squeezed her good shoulder affectionately.
She pushed through my shoulder pat to give me a hug. “Yeah… thanks again, Hammy. I really appreciate you saving my life again.” She looked over at Mikey. “I owe thanks to you, too, Mike, for helping to get me out of there.”
“It’s nothing. It’s what friends are for,” Mikey smiled brightly. “Who else is going to help you out when you’re being chased down by a monster from outer space?”
Conjuring up a mental image of Starry Knight, I wisely said nothing (for once.)
“Eek! A snake!”
I shuddered at my mother’s shriek. It was late, and everyone was usually in bed. But thanks to the monsters, I’d lost eight dollars for the play, fought weirdo-alien people, went to the hospital, and now shared my room with an annoying dragon – a dragon which my mother had no doubt just found sneaking around the house.
“Cheryl, you can be so annoying,” I muttered to myself as I made my way downstairs.
I found my mother having her conniption as she stood on the armchair in the living room.
“Uh, what’s wrong now?”
Cheryl pointed to the couch. “There’s a snake under there! I saw it! I saw it!”
“It’s not a snake. It’s… well… I kinda forget to mention I brought home a new pet today.”
“What?”
“Well, it’s like a project. For biology. It’s not a snake, either; it’s um…” I scratched my head. ‘Changeling dragon’ wasn’t really a common pet for anyone. “Well, he’s a rare lizard Mr. Elm wanted me to take care of for a while… since I’m doing a report on it!” Yeah, that’s it. Brilliant. Another brilliant imaginary fabrication.
“You’re sure it’s not a snake?”
“Positive,” I promised.
“Well, good!” she exclaimed as she climbed down from the chair. “Next time that you do something like this for school, ask Mr. Elm for a signed permission slip!”
“Won’t happen again, Cheryl.”
She frowned. “I’m your mother.”
“Good to know,” I muttered, heading for the stairs again. I’d learned over the course of my teenage years the less I dealt with my parents the more I seemed to like them. But I could tell that wouldn’t be a good long-term remedy.
“Ham! Pick up your lizard before you go, please. And make sure he stays in your room. I wouldn’t want Adam frightened first thing in the morning. His n
anny will be coming over tomorrow, and we don’t need another reason for her to hesitate.”
“Why is she coming here tomorrow?” I scrunched up my face at the thought of Mrs. Weatherby, Adam’s nanny. She was a pill. Who needed to take a lot of pills.
After a moment of careful thinking, Cheryl pursed her lips and said, “After the attack at the high school tonight, I thought it best for you and your brother to stay here with someone tomorrow. It would be safer.”
“What?” I knew school was canceled, but I was not just going to willingly stay here. I had several more attractive offers to either make or consider – Jason’s, Mikey’s, maybe even Gwen’s house.
It was the wrong thing to say to Cheryl. She barked back at me. “Hamilton! Do you know how many people were taken to the hospital? Do you know how many are being quarantined tonight? Your father will be stuck at work for the whole weekend, and the police have nothing on the attackers! Nothing! It’s too dangerous. Now get your lizard and get to bed.” And with that, she left me alone in the living room.
Years later, I would be astounded at myself for not being more worried about the crew of monsters and their potential to harm people. I supposed it was largely due to my mother’s uber-concern for the situation; my mother was completely backwards in her thinking, and I disagreed with her on practically everything as a teenager.
I walked over to the couch. “Elysian, what were you thinking?” I mumbled.
The glowing dark eyes narrowed. “If you hadn’t kicked me out of your room, I wouldn’t have been seen.”
“My room is upstairs,” I shot back.
“You kicked me out!”
“Shut up already!”
There was a slight noise behind us; I looked over to see Adam with an unusual expression on his young face.
“Er… hi there, Adam,” I waved.
“Hammonton,” Adam smiled shyly. He took a cautious step closer, hugging his organic-cotton stuffed panda bear.
I backed away. “Good night!” I called, turning around and breaking into a run.
Safe in my room, dragon clutched in my fist, I exhaled. Whew. That was close. Adam didn’t say a lot, but it only took one instance to make a mess of an already-confusing situation.
Elysian transformed back into his smaller form as he jumped up on the bed. “I didn’t know you had a brother.”
“Yeah, he’s only three. Doesn’t talk too much. Cheryl and Mark think he’s autistic or overly shy or something.”
Elysian huffed. “There’s nothing wrong with him. He’s just intuitive.”
“What do you mean by that?” I asked, putting my skeptical face back on.
“Children sense things older people don’t. I think he knows I’m not just some ‘rare lizard.’”
“Hey, I couldn’t think of anything else to call you,” I replied defensively. I was suddenly very tired. Tired and tired of. This whole mess tonight had me upset and confused and half-crazy. I still wasn’t done processing it all. “I hope you don’t snore,” was all I said to the lizard before slumping over.
“A mansion this size is big enough for both of us,” Elysian grumbled as he curled up on the edge of the bed.
It’s so hard, even as this small animal-thing was drifting off to sleep in front of me, to believe this dragon was for real. For really real.
I looked up at the ceiling as thoughts about Gwen and the events of the evening swirled around me. Haunting me. Taunting me. Terrorizing me.
While there had to be a reasonable explanation for it all, there were none that came to me. And without an explanation, it was just better to ignore it. That usually worked.
But I was getting tired of running from all of these things. And I feared the day when I would be devoured alive by the truth I refused to acknowledge.
It was this fear that ripped through me now, as I drifted off, hoping to dream. But for all my exhaustion, I couldn’t find the peace of sleep.
I scrunched up my face, trying to block it all out.
The girl who saved me tonight jumped into my head. Starry Knight.
She… well, I didn’t like her, I knew, but there was something about her I just didn’t get. “Elysian?” I asked, sitting up. “Elysian, who was that girl with the bow and arrow and wings and stuff?”
When the tiny dragon just snarled sleepily, I rolled my eyes in exasperation. But I let the picture of her settle into my mind. I decided I’d much rather think of her than the fear swiping at me.
The dream started out as normal, but it wasn’t far in when I could tell it was going to be a bad one again.
The light unveiled the haze to reveal their faces, and I knew it was too late to go back to the nothingness. A moment passed, and then I heard their voices. It’s almost like I’m one of them, but they couldn’t see me.
“Maia, Maia, Maia,” Orpheus sighed, his half-mutilated face coming into clearer focus. “You managed to get some supply of power, but it is hardly adequate; not to mention you consumed most of it yourself.”
She shrugged. “I would’ve gotten more, if it hadn’t been for that Starry Knight person, or whoever she was, and that strange kid.” I knew she was talking about me.
“I see. You’re going to blame your failure on human children?”
Maia’s eyes snapped up, looking unusually alert for someone as lazy-looking as her. “I’d hardly call their powers human,” she huffed. I had to agree with her. But I didn’t want to think of what it made me if I was not human.
Orpheus sighed again. I got the feeling he did that a lot with Maia. “I don’t believe it. Starry Knight is one thing, but to blame your shortcomings on a high school teenager and his friends… that’s a new level of low for even you, Maia.”
“Yeah,” The one I named Elektra agreed. I faltered here in my vision, as I took a good look at her. Her orange glow made me think of cheap tanning lotion.
“Maia, you’re so lazy,” Meropae – the pinkish-toned one – complained. “There are plenty of people out there to coax into giving us their souls. You think you were just so unfortunate as to find the only four who would resist? And on top of that, you managed to get our beloved ally, Gibliom, thrown from this realm?”
“I almost had the girl,” Maia shot back. “If it hadn’t been for that Starry Knight girl, I would’ve succeeded.”
“Sure, sure,” Alcyonë spoke up. I didn’t know if I’d ever seen her before up close either. She looked sick; her skin was greenish in color. Made me think of the Wicked Witch from The Wizard of Oz. “You’re just jealous the rest of us have more power.”
Orpheus cleared his throat. “Excuse me, ladies, but let’s not forget Maia did bring back more than anyone else this week, small and relatively useless as it is. I say she goes out again. As you all well know, slothfulness is one of the easiest deadly forces used to access humans. And it is one of the most readily available, too.”
Slothfulness? What the heck is that? I was not sure, but I thought it meant laziness. Yes, that’s it. And I supposed that would explain why Maia was so lazy, if her chief power source was laziness.
The others huffed, rolled their eyes, or just stared with no particular expression at all.
Orpheus’ one-eye blazed at their reaction. “This is not a game, you incompetent morons! Do you think it is funny, that you will run out of energy and be forced into the Prince’s submission? Might I remind you, we are trapped here until we can gain enough power to break through Time!?”
“Orpheus, just –”
“No! You girls need to take this more seriously. You have no idea how fortunate we are to be here on Earth.”
What was he talking about?
“If we’d been properly sentenced, we would have been sent back inside our prison – or even worse, sent to the broken realm where our master resides! Do any of you want that?”
“No.” Several of the sinister ladies muttered that out quickly enough.
“Fine. I want to see more effort.” Orpheus nodded. “Maia! You have un
til the end of the week to redeem yourself.”
“Oh, all right. I’m going then.” She slouched and dragged her feet along the floor as she walked out of the darkened room. The scenery, even though it was darker than night, looked familiar. It had to be somewhere in the city.
“Great,” Maia spit out bitterly, “Another mission where I have to work! This is getting ridiculous.”
And then I woke up, sweating and breathing heavily, in my bed in my room, but feeling more than a little out of my mind.
14
Sidetracked
I walked down the crowded school hallways, waving to my friends, who cat-called me from all angles, and said hello to some teachers, surprising them with sincerity (I knew they would more likely respect me if I faked respect to them.)
School resumed on the Monday following the attack along with some sense of normalcy, for which I was grateful; you have to admit, as much as school was a bother, it had its perks. A few, anyway.
The damage to the school was reported, despite witness accounts to the contrary, as due to thunder and lightning. The play was postponed until further notice; the football game against Shoreside was rescheduled for the following week. I couldn’t really complain, but I would if asked for my opinion on the matter.
After all, I had a reputation to consider.
My school was small, especially for a public high school – probably because it was in the older part of town. I’d lived in the Lake County Heights – a subdivision basically created for the most financially secure families of Apollo City – for nearly all my life now. Cheryl and Mark had moved to the city when Cheryl was first promoted in her law firm. And Mark, well, he was a cardiologist; he could find work anywhere as long as a hospital was around.
But Apollo Central, in my opinion, was a good school for me. Here, I was the popular guy nearly everyone liked, and everyone else was too jealous to like. I liked that better than going to some prep school where mommies and daddies are the only reasons students could brag. I was better than that. I was cultured and mature. I was capable of making other people envy me on my own.
The Starlight Chronicles: Slumbering Page 14