by Rhys Jones
Ellie and Ruff arrived mid-afternoon, but Oz didn’t go down to meet them. Instead, he asked Mrs. Chambers to send them straight up to his room and threw himself into bed, feigning sleep. Through a millimetre slit of barely open lids, Oz watched as they tiptoed into his bedroom. He saw them exchange shocked, worried glances, and then he sat bolt upright and yelled “Surprise!” They were so startled that Ellie actually screamed.
“You total armpit, Oz,” she said, clutching her hand to her chest. “We were really worried about you.”
“And so you should be, letting yourselves be tricked by Rollins like that,” Oz tutted behind a wide grin. He was well pleased with his surprise.
“The git tricked you, too, mate,” Ruff said.
“You are such a gonk,” Ellie said, still not having quite recovered from Oz’s prank. She threw a pillow at his head for good measure, but laughed and shook her head as she did so. Oz jumped out of bed, opened the drawn curtains to let in what little afternoon light there was and saw that huge, charcoal-coloured storm clouds were gathering in the west.
Oz looked at his friends and smiled. But the smile he got in return looked a touch forced and uncertain. A little bubble of awkward silence grew as Ellie and Ruff just stood there, looking oddly uncomfortable and glancing at one another.
“What’s up with you two?” Oz asked when he could stand it no longer.
Ellie let out a tremulous sigh. “We’ve been talking and…”
“We just wanted to say sorry,” Ruff blurted out.
“Sorry?” Oz stared at them. “Why?”
“Because…” Ellie faltered. “Because if I hadn’t just blundered into the passages like I did, or made Lucy Bishop go ape ’cos I kicked her brother when all you were trying to do was make friends with him, maybe none of this would have happened.”
“And if I hadn’t been so buzzardly convinced that there was treasure to find so that I could get rich,” Ruff said, “I wouldn’t have been so keen to solve the symbols and…”
“Ruff’s right. I am like a cow in a crystal maze,” Ellie added miserably. “Oh, Oz, if you’d been hurt or…or…” She trailed off, her lip trembling.
“And I swear, I’m going to give up the Xbox after this,” Ruff said, his face pink. “Dad says it’s filling my head with so much weirdness that I can’t tell what’s real and—”
“You’re right,” Oz said softly, interrupting Ruff. “If it hadn’t been for the two of you, I wouldn’t have ended up in hospital. But if it hadn’t been for you, Ellie, Lucy Bishop would have brained me with a hammer. You saved my life in that room. And if it hadn’t been for you, Ruff, we’d never have solved the puzzle, treasure or no treasure, because I know I didn’t have a clue. We’re in this together. We’re a team, aren’t we? That’s what’s important. That’s all there is to it.”
They were quiet, and for a while all Ellie and Ruff did was study their shoes.
“Think it’ll snow?” Ellie asked eventually as she glanced out of the window and dabbed at her eyes.
“Too warm,” Oz said.
“Anyway, who cares?” added Ruff. “If Oz doesn’t tell us what went on in that basement soon, I’m going to explode. Before you do, though, I don’t know if it’s just me, but is anyone else starving?”
Ellie made eyes to the ceiling, but they went down to the kitchen anyway, because Ellie’s mum had made mini pizzas and a cake in celebration of them all having come through their ordeal relatively unscathed, and Mrs. Chambers had laid them out on the table in readiness. She fussed over the three of them as usual, making sure they had enough of everything as they piled the food onto paper plates.
Oz had watched his mother carefully since they’d come back from the hospital. Perhaps it was just tiredness on her part, but he couldn’t help noticing that her hands trembled as she handed out the cutlery, and her smile seemed a little forced. He glanced at the calendar and felt a tiny shiver of relief pass through him. The black dog was completely hidden. But it had been a hard couple of days for his mother as well, he told himself. Maybe what he was seeing was simply a bit of nervous reaction.
Mrs. Chambers issued strict orders that the orphanage was off-limits, but that was an unnecessary warning. None of them wanted to go back there yet. Instead, they took the food and sat in the library’s comfy chairs.
“Festive,” Ruff said on seeing the Christmassy effort Oz had made.
“Brilliant,” Ellie agreed.
They munched pizza and listened in awe as Oz gave them a blow-by-blow account of what happened. When he got to the bit where S and S had revealed the pebble and the dor and produced them with a “ta-da” flourish, even Ruff stopped chewing to gawp in disbelief. Ellie ran her finger over the slight protuberance the dor made in the pebble’s smooth surface and shook her head. “I would never have said it fitted there.”
“And you say that Rollins was trying to pump it full of electricity?” Ruff asked, his brows knitting.
“That’s what it looked like to me,” Oz said.
As if on cue, the first distant boom of thunder rolled out over the sky to the west and a few spots of rain spattered against the turret panes.
“So, how did you two get out of that room?” Oz asked finally, feeling like he’d been the only one talking for what seemed like hours.
“Firemen,” Ruff said. “But they smashed down the real door, not the secret passage one.”
“I expect they’ll all be boarded up now,” Ellie said wistfully.
“You reckon?” Oz smiled. “All the more reason to explore them again, then, once they repair the basement.”
“Buzzard,” Ruff said, grinning. “Chuck us a slice of cake, Ellie.”
Ellie sighed and handed him another slice. “I don’t know why, but I feel really sorry for Lucy Bishop.”
“Yeah, know what you mean,” Ruff said through chipmunk cheeks. “I generally feel sorry for loonies that come after me with hammers, all the while screaming blue murder.”
“Shut up, Ruff. And don’t speak with your mouth full, it’s disgusting. All I’m saying is that it must be awful knowing your brother has been turned into some sort of a…”
“Polecat. Rollins confirmed it.” Oz nodded. “My guess is that Gerber’s used fifth artefact technology to find a way of capturing what it’s like to be an animal…” He let his words trail off before adding quietly, “Rollins really enjoyed telling me that being a cheetah going in for the kill was the best experience he’d ever had.”
“Ugh,” Ellie said, making a face.
“Do you think that’s what’s happened to Gerber’s driver?” Ruff asked. “You know, the one you said looked really weird?”
Oz remembered the sight of the chauffeur beginning to unfurl himself from the front seat of the Rolls Royce and let his voice drop to a whisper. “Maybe. I mean, if Edward Bishop thought he was a polecat, why not turn someone into a snake or—”
“A vampire bat,” Ruff said, his eyes suddenly very large.
No one said anything for almost a minute. It was Oz who finally spoke.
“When I was in the hospital, all I could think about was Gerber. Let’s say he’s covered his tracks with fake birth certificates and stuff, and that he’s really as old as we think he is. I’ve seen him up close, remember, and whatever’s happened to make him live this long hasn’t stopped the ageing process completely, it’s just slowed it all down. Just one look at him tells you that.”
“So, maybe being close to the artefacts affects the way time passes?” Ellie said.
Ruff was nodding. Drawing on his vast Xbox experience, he said, “In Reanimator 12, there are these time bubbles…”
“Ru-uff,” Ellie said crossly.
“No, listen,” Ruff argued. “All I’m saying is that maybe the artefacts bring a bit of wherever they’re from with them. And maybe it rubs off, like…like a sort of dimensional bubble which lets you use up someone else’s time and not your own. That’s what happens in—”
“Reanimator 1
2. Yeah, we got that bit,” Ellie said, but although her words still dripped with sarcasm, she was looking at Oz a lot more pensively now.
“However it works, I bet Gerber’s desperate to find a way to make it permanent,” Oz said. “That’s why he wants the other artefacts so badly.”
“And since the artefacts are tied up with Bunthorpe and Penwurt, that’s why he wants this place, too,” Ellie whispered.
There was another roll of thunder, at which Ruff snapped his head up towards the window. The storm was coming nearer. Rain started hammering on the panes with such ferocity they had to shout to be heard.
“Let’s go down and play some Xbox. It’s too noisy up here,” Ruff suggested.
“Thought you were giving it up,” Ellie said, and earned a withering glance in reply.
“First I need to hide this.” Oz took out the pebble and the dor and looked around for an appropriate spot.
“Could try the passage,” Ruff suggested.
“No,” said Ellie. “I know just the place.” She fetched the ladder, climbed up the bookcase and took down a heavy, black, leather-bound tome. Inside, a space had been cut out of the pages in the shape of a hip flask.
Oz laughed. “When did you find this?”
“First time we looked for Morsman stuff.”
“It’s perfect,” Oz said. He slipped the artefacts in and read the spine. “The Victorian Gentleman’s Guide to Herbalism. Don’t think we’ll forget that one very easily.”
In his bedroom, while Ellie and Ruff played Xbox, Oz fired up his laptop and Skyped S and S.
“Just wanted to thank you properly for everything,” he said when their faces appeared on the screen.
“We’re glad you’re home,” said S and S together.
Ellie shot Oz a look full of wary incredulousness and, off-camera, mouthed, “Are they for real?”
Ruff groaned as a bear-droid from Pluton 6 imploded on the Xbox screen. “I wish I could get past this Octodecimator. He gets me every time,” he said through gritted teeth.
“Is your friend playing Death Planet Hub?” Savannah asked.
“Playing and losing,” laughed Oz.
“We know how to beat the Octo-decimator,” Sydney said.
“What?” said Ruff, coming around to join Oz in front of his laptop. Half a minute later, Oz looked on, bemused, as Ruff perched the laptop so that the camera was on the Xbox screen and proceeded to take a master class in Death Planet Hub from S and S.
“I think I’ve seen it all now,” Ellie muttered, shaking her head in amusement.
The storm was gathering strength with the onset of darkness. Through the window, Oz saw a car’s lights pull up on the street outside. A figure huddled inside a coat got out and hurried in through the gate.
“Where are you going?” Ellie asked as Oz rushed out.
“Said I’d meet Caleb in the tenants’ kitchen,” he said, and didn’t stop to explain.
Caleb was sitting at the table when Oz got there, his coat hanging on the chair next to him, a small pool of rain beneath it. His face was unreadable, but his eyes were full of troubled wariness. He didn’t get up.
“Oz, I am so sorry for what happened.”
“Mum said that, too,” Oz said. “Though I can’t see how it’s your fault or hers.”
“I should have known Lucy was heading for trouble. And as for Rollins…” Caleb rubbed the back of his neck in despair. He kept his gaze on the table as he spoke. “I think I owe you a bit of an explanation.”
“Yeah, so do I,” Oz said.
It earned him a glance from Caleb, but no immediate words.
“Mum thinks Rollins and Lucy Bishop were working together. They weren’t, were they?”
Caleb shook his head. “Rollins managed to slip under everyone’s radar. But he did know Edward Bishop. He was part of the same research team. He lost his job in disgrace after the experiments, and was trying to get back into Gerber’s good books by finding the artefacts.”
“So he was working for Gerber.”
“Indirectly.” Caleb nodded. “But there’ll be no proof.”
“Lucy Bishop tried to smash the artefacts when we found her. She blames me for what happened to her brother. Why did she do that?”
“There are things about Gerber that not many people know or would understand,” Caleb said, looking suddenly awkward.
“Do you mean the fact that he has a fifth artefact and has been experimenting with it ever since he found it or stole it from the Shoesmiths in 1914?”
For the first time that Oz could ever remember, Caleb’s mouth fell open in dumbstruck wonder.
“How…?”
“Me, Ellie and Ruff, we make a very good team,” Oz said, and allowed himself a small grin at Caleb’s surprise.
“So, you know that one of his so-called experiments made Edward Bishop very ill. Lucy was supposed to be protecting you. But in truth, she was trying to find the artefacts to see if they could help her brother. I didn’t know he was in the park all this time.”
“Is that why she followed us when we went to Garret and Eldred’s?”
“She was actually making sure that Gerber’s men weren’t following you. Unfortunately, it was all proving too much for her. Like her brother, she is very clever, but she’s also what some people like to call highly-strung. She must have snapped and stolen the artefacts to try and use them herself. She failed and then turned on them.”
“And on me. Lucky Ellie’s a blue belt in taekwando.”
Caleb said nothing.
“Rollins said something about Lucy. He said she was Obex. Was she?”
Caleb sighed and looked out of the window. He seemed to be weighing things up in his mind. Finally, he turned back and said, “Obex is a society sworn to keep the artefacts from getting into the wrong hands.”
“Puffers’ hands?”
Caleb let out a mirthless laugh. “You lot ought to work for MI5. Yes, Puffers. Greedy, meddling, ignorant people, like Gerber, who think that the artefacts have been sent for their benefit.”
“What do you mean, sent?”
Caleb’s eyes held Oz’s gaze now. “Some people think that the artefacts aren’t from here, Oz. I mean, the here that we live in every second of every day. Some people think that they’re from somewhere else.”
It was suddenly very quiet in the kitchen as the storm abated momentarily. Oz looked up at the window. The night was impenetrable beyond it.
“You mean, like another planet?” he whispered.
Caleb shrugged. “Planet, existence, universe, who knows? Somewhere different, definitely. But some of us think they’re here for a reason. And that reason is not to turn people like Edward Bishop into feral lunatics.”
Oz was remembering snatches of conversation between Caleb and Lucy Bishop, and suddenly he looked at his father’s friend as if seeing him for the first time.
“You’re Obex, too, aren’t you?”
“Yes, I am, Oz. And so was my father, and his father, too. We took an oath. As I told you before, our prime concern is for the artefacts. Sometimes that makes our choices… difficult.”
Oz didn’t quite understand what Caleb meant by that, but he wanted to know more. “Did my dad know?”
“Yes, he did. And I made him some promises.”
“What sort of promises?”
“Amongst others, that if the artefacts found their way to you, I’d help protect you.” Caleb’s eyes fell away. “And I failed in that promise.”
But Oz was intrigued. “What do you mean, found their way?”
“Exactly that. It’s one of their abiding mysteries. They choose people. Morsman. Your dad. You. None of this is an accident.”
“The Puffers, do they know all this?”
“They do.”
Oz shivered, but then looked down and shook his head. “You’re going to have to explain all this to Mum. Make her listen. She doesn’t believe anything I tell her. I know she doesn’t want to believe you, either, but somethin
g happened in that basement. Something I can’t explain yet. But Mum wants to leave here, and I can’t, not now.”
Caleb shook his head. “Oz, I…”
“You have to,” Oz pleaded. “I know this stuff isn’t good for her. I can see what it’s doing to her already, and I don’t want her to be like she was before, but we owe it to Dad to stay here and find out what all this means.” There was a long moment of loaded silence in which Oz did not let his gaze fall away from Caleb’s face. Finally, Caleb nodded.
“Okay, I’ll try,” he said. “But I’m not hopeful.”
Relieved, Oz led the way up to the second floor and across to the spiral staircase that took them back down to the main kitchen. Mrs. Chambers sat at the table, an empty glass in front of her and a bottle of unopened malt whiskey next to it. She looked up, defiant, as Oz entered.
“Well, if your dad could do it…” she said with a shaky, unconvincing smile.
“Mum?” Oz said in a panicky voice, but then Caleb entered the room behind him.
“What do you want?’ she said, her mouth suddenly ugly.
Caleb looked first at the glass and then at Mrs. Chambers. “Gwen, we need to talk.”
“After what’s just happened here?” Mrs. Chambers demanded.
“Especially after what has just happened here.”
“What is there to talk about? Rollins is in custody, Lucy Bishop is in hospital. Penwurt is still standing.” She raised her glass in mock salute.
Caleb was shaking his head. “This is just the beginning. The Puffers…”
“Puffers? That’s another one, is it? Another of those stupid, silly little words like ‘artefact’ and ‘Obex?’”
“If you’d let me explain…”