Harley Merlin 7: Harley Merlin and the Detector Fix

by Forrest, Bella

  At least I knew she was okay. I’d sent Wade on his way a while ago, to meet her in San Francisco, although I didn’t fully know why they were there. Something to do with Garrett.

  Everyone at the SDC was hella wary of Levi. Nobody could go against him. He had the security magicals and O’Halloran jumping to every order he barked. They weren’t saying a word about Echidna either, even though it was their job to keep tabs on the Bestiary. I’d spoken to Tobe, and he thought it was mega weird, too. Something smelled fishy. And while Levi was messing around, Katherine was getting closer to completing the next ritual.

  I kept thinking about O’Halloran and the way he’d just blanked out about Echidna. It’d been more than a brain fart. It’d been like a full-on block in his head. He seemed normal, other than that. Krieger had said he’d speak to O’Halloran again, on his own, to see if it was something we needed to worry about.

  I patted my pocket to make sure my burner cell was where it should be. Then, I kept reading about the ISS. It was like some crazy therapy. I could read the boards, look at the pics, and put my thoughts in some sort of order. My brain was like a ball of yarn that was in bad shape. Unpicking and unknotting it was taking ages.

  “Hey, not so fast. Everyone’s going to get a sticker.”

  I got distracted by a voice nearby. Some group of little schoolkids had swarmed this girl, who was dressed in the Fleet Science Center’s tour guide uniform. She looked stressed. They were all reaching up like octopuses, trying to snatch stickers out of her hand. The teachers weren’t doing anything to help.

  Her head was bent as she tried to fend off their sticky little hands. She had short, dark hair that was getting in her eyes. When she stood up, she swept her hair back and took my freaking breath away. She had to be the cutest thing I’d ever seen. Freckled, pale skin. Petite, if that was the right word for small. An elfish face. Big, dark blue eyes. She looked like she’d popped out of an anime I used to watch. Kiki’s Delivery Service, Studio Ghibli vibes.

  Damn…

  My palms were already sweaty. Great. I didn’t know whether to help her or not. I mean, this was her job. She’d probably think I was butting in if I tried to do something. But those little brats were swarming her, literally. They were clawing at her silver waistcoat and tugging on her pants.

  “Make a line, kids,” she urged. “Everyone gets a sticker. I have enough, so just make a neat line and then you’ll all get one.”

  “But I want the rocket ship!” one little twerp complained. He looked privileged. Puffy cheeks, slicked back hair, the kind of clothes that hadn’t been cool since the 1920s.

  “You can’t pick and choose,” the girl replied, super flustered.

  “But I WANT the rocket ship!” the kid wailed. Ugh. Even if I hadn’t been a foster kid with a big old chip on my shoulder, I’d have hated brats like this anyway.

  “Well, you’ll have to wait and see what’s left when it’s your turn.”

  I made a choice. Pushing down my anxiety, I stepped toward the group of kids. “Hey, did you guys know that Pluto has a heart made of ice on it?”

  They looked at me, blinking like feral rabbits. “No, it doesn’t,” one kid said.

  “It does too. See?” I pointed to a nearby picture of Pluto. Sure enough, on its surface was a stretch of ice that looked like a heart. It captured the little girls’ attention first. They rushed up to the picture and cooed over it.

  “Look, it loves us!” one girl said, clapping her hands together.

  “Did you know that Pluto isn’t a planet anymore?” another kid replied.

  “Yes, it is!” a third insisted.

  “No, it’s not. They stopped it being a planet. They made a law to say it couldn’t be one.” The second kid nodded his head as if he knew everything. It was hard not to laugh.

  “Actually, it’s called a ‘dwarf planet’ now.” I looked at the kids, holding their attention. “It means it’s too small to be a real planet, but it’s still sort of one. It’s just a dwarf one.”

  “Like a gnome?” one kid said.

  “Uh… kind of, but it’s more about the size. Gnomes are more for gardens. Dwarf just means ‘small.’”

  A little girl shook her head. “No, dwarves are people.”

  My cheeks flushed. This wasn’t the conversation I’d expected. “Well, yes, they’re a type of people, but it can also mean something small.” Awkward. I wasn’t impressing anyone with this. And I didn’t know how to talk my way out of it. I hadn’t meant to imply anything against dwarves.

  “No, they’re not real people. They’re in The Hobbit. My dad reads it to me.”

  I sighed with relief. “Yes, but in The Hobbit they’re called dwarves because they’re smaller than other people. And they are real people, too, in the real world. Not the characters.”

  “Is that true?” The little girl eyed me suspiciously.

  “Yes. It’s why people who are born smaller than other people have something called ‘dwarfism,’ because of their size. But they’re not the same as the characters in The Hobbit. You shouldn’t get them confused.”

  “You’re confusing me,” the girl complained.

  Another kid nudged her in the arm. “He’s just saying it’s called a dwarf planet because it’s smaller than the others, stupid. It’s not rocket science.”

  “Well, actually, it is!” A little boy giggled, clearly hyped by his joke.

  I looked over at the tour guide to see what she was making of this. She smiled at me, her eyes twinkling. I smiled back, hoping she couldn’t see how red my cheeks were. They had to be burning like beacons right now.

  As the rest of the kids gathered around the Pluto picture, all of them stroking the ice heart, the girl finally had the chance to hand out the rest of the stickers without having to deal with a mini-sized uprising. Even the twerp who’d wanted the rocket ship barely looked at his sticker. He was too fixed on the Pluto picture. She really was a beauty. Pluto, I mean. For years, the Hubble telescope had done her dirty. She’d been a fuzzy speck. Now, we could see her in all her glory, and she’d shown us love in return. No idea why I thought she was a she, but it seemed to fit.

  “You want a sticker?” I looked up to find the tour guide beside me. She had a sticker on the end of her fingertip. The rocket ship. “You’ve earned one. I thought they might eat me alive.” Her voice was soft and sweet, like a marshmallow. And her face. Not that her face reminded me of a marshmallow. It just looked soft and smooth, her cheeks plump in a nice way.

  “Uh… sure.” I took the sticker and put it awkwardly on my t-shirt.

  She chuckled, and it was the best sound I’d ever heard. “Only the best kids get the rocket ship.”

  “Not like that spoiled twerp?”

  “No, he got an amoeba. I save those for the kids I don’t like.”

  “Harsh.”

  “Too harsh?” She eyed me.

  “Not at all.”

  Her smile returned. “Good. I was starting to wonder if I should even be in this job for a moment there.”

  “Are you here a lot?”

  “Are you asking if I come here often?”

  I almost died of shame. “No, no, not at all. I just meant… uh, have you worked here long?”

  “A few months. Trying to save some cash for a car and college, the usual sort of thing. The only reason anyone does this kind of job, right?”

  “I guess so.”

  “Nah, it’s not that bad, actually. I usually like it, but this group of kids is particularly… feisty. And the teachers don’t seem to be paying much attention to them.” The girl shot an annoyed look at the group of adults standing nearby, who were chatting amongst themselves. “It’s a shame, because this is usually the best part of the tour. The space station stuff is my favorite.”

  “Mine, too,” I blurted out.

  “I guessed. Good call on the Pluto thing.” She smiled, and my heart felt like it was going to explode. “I’ve got a picture of it up on my wall at home. We nev
er gave her the respect she deserved, and then she went and had a complete glow-up when the satellite did its fly-by, showing off her heart and everything.”

  She thinks Pluto is a she, too. I knew I had a goofy look on my face, but I couldn’t wipe it off. This girl was super cool. Pretty, nerdy, funny… perfect.

  “Are you going to college soon?” I couldn’t figure out her age just by looking at her.

  “I’ve got another year of high school.”

  So she’s a year older than me. Cool. Harley said I had a problem because I liked a more mature woman. Tatyana, for example. Yeah, she was way out of my league, and age bracket. This girl was probably out of my league, too. But at least I wasn’t a kid to her. I thought about Harley and felt my cheeks burn again. She’d have teased me mercilessly if she’d been here right now. I missed her, but for the moment I was glad she wasn’t here.

  “I’ve got a year and a half,” I replied, even though she hadn’t asked.

  “Cool.” She smiled shyly. “What’s your name, hero?”

  “Uh… Jacob.”

  “Well, Uh Jacob, I’m—”

  “Suri, we need you in the gift shop. Are you finished with the tour?” A member of staff rudely interrupted us. He looked frazzled. His name badge read “Eli—Sales Manager.” I’d seen him a couple of times. He always looked frazzled. I wondered if he’d been born that way.

  She nodded. “Yeah, I just finished. Do you need me right now?”

  “I wouldn’t be over here if I didn’t.”

  I didn’t like the way he was talking to her, but she seemed to take it in stride.

  “Okay, I’ll be right there.” She glanced at me as Eli stormed off. “Well then, I guess I’ll see you around, Uh Jacob. I’ve got stuffed toys to sell at a hugely inflated price.”

  “Yeah, see you around. Enjoy your… uh, toys.” With that, she walked away. I couldn’t have felt more stupid if I’d tried. Enjoy your toys? She probably thought I was an idiot.

  Suri… I rolled the name around in my mouth. It felt nice. It sounded nice. And it suited her. It really did. And she’d called me her hero. I couldn’t stop grinning. I wasn’t anyone’s hero. Their mess-up or their liability, sure, but never their hero.

  I had things to do, but I figured it wouldn’t hurt to hang around the exhibit a while longer. I covered my rocket ship sticker with my palm and smiled wider. Who else were the kids going to get their useless facts from?

  Fourteen

  Jacob

  An hour later, I’d moved on to bugs. The schoolkids had vamoosed, but there were plenty of other people about. Visitors were taking pictures beside the oversized sculptures of bumblebees and dragonflies. The real reason I’d chosen this exhibit was because it was opposite the gift shop. From here, I had a good view of Suri. She was on the cash register, selling overpriced toys, just like she’d said. I couldn’t fault her customer service. She had a grin for every person she served.

  I was in the middle of sneaking a sly look, when I froze. She was staring right back, her whole face lighting up in a smile. Man, I could’ve looked at that smile all day, every day. She had to turn back to her next customer, eventually, but it’d been enough to get my heart going.

  From then on, it became a game. I’d look, and she’d catch me, and vice versa. I probably looked like a total weirdo, standing beside a four-foot wasp, gazing at some girl, with a rocket ship sticker on my shirt. I didn’t care. She was worth being labeled a weirdo for. Plus, it was an awesome distraction from the coven. When she looked at me, I wasn’t thinking about Levi or Katherine or the end of the world. Playing this glancing game, I just felt… well, normal. And what made it even better was that she was normal, too. Like, actually normal. When she’d stood next to me, I hadn’t sensed any magic in her whatsoever with my Sensate ability.

  Santana and Raffe make it work, and he’s a djinn. That was way more complicated than a human and a magical, right? Tatyana and Dylan had made it work, and they were different, too—a Herculean and a Kolduny. Heck, even Harley and Wade were making it look easy—a scrappy foster kid and a classy dude in head-to-toe Armani. Why wouldn’t I be able to make it work with Suri? Yeah, she was human, but there were harder things to overcome.

  You’re living in la-la land, pal. I turned my gaze away from her. She couldn’t know what I was. She wouldn’t know what to make of me. Plus, I’d be getting her into this mess with Levi, and the coven, and Katherine, and all that bad stuff. It would be too dangerous for her. She was too damn nice to put in the middle of that, and I wasn’t worth the risk.

  But what if we just got smoothies together? That wasn’t a commitment. It would just be smoothies. Smoothies weren’t dangerous. Not unless you got too close to the blender. But where could we go for that kind of thing? I wasn’t allowed outside this building. It had a café, yeah, but I would never have subjected Suri to the drinks here. She probably wouldn’t have subjected herself to them, either.

  I couldn’t exactly invite her back to my place, smack bang in the middle of the coven. Oh, by the way, there’s this huge interdimensional world inside the place you’ve been working for months, where magicals live—yeah, magicals. Like witches and wizards, that sort of thing. Don’t freak out. That wouldn’t fly. But I was desperate to have some kind of date with her. Girls like this didn’t come along too often. Especially not ones who willingly spoke to me.

  “Penny for your thoughts, Uh Jacob.” I looked up to find Suri standing in front of me. I’d been so wrapped up in my thoughts that I hadn’t noticed her walk over.

  “I was just… uh, thinking about the life cycle of a leaf-cutter ant.” Idiot! She’d caught me off guard. My tongue was all tied, my body paralyzed. But, surely, I could’ve come up with something else? Anything else!

  She laughed. “I thought maybe you were trying to play it cool. You know, aloof, James Dean type of thing. The life cycle of a leaf-cutter ant is way more interesting, though.”

  “I’m not sure I’m the James Dean type.”

  “I don’t know about that. If I put a trench coat on you and turned up the collar, maybe swooshed your hair back a bit, you’d fit the part to a T. No cigarette, though. It’s bad for you.”

  I couldn’t tell if she was teasing me or not. “Swooshed my hair? Is that a technical term?”

  “For sure.” She swept her own hair back to show me. “See?”

  “Ah, now I get it. The swooshed look suits you.”

  She smiled. “Does it?”

  “Yeah, though anything would probably suit you.” That was smoother. At least, I hoped it was.

  “Even a Fleet Science Center uniform?” She smoothed down the suit jacket of her uniform. “I hear Dior is very into silvers this season, especially the really cheap, polyester kind.”

  I chuckled. “Like I said, anything suits you. Even silver polyester.”

  “So, is this what you do all day, when you’re not in school? Just hang around the bugs and space exhibits?” She paused. “I only ask because I haven’t seen you around here before, and I’m usually the first to spot cute guys.”

  My heart lurched. She thinks I’m cute! “I come here now and then, when I need a distraction.”

  “Did you find one?”

  “One what?”

  “A distraction.” Her eyes sparkled with mischief.

  I was about to answer when I felt a familiar tingle in my heart. It was exactly what I hadn’t felt when I’d stood next to Suri before. She’d made my heart thunder like a runaway herd of cattle, but this was different. This was the subtle twinge of a nearby magical. My Sensate ability, in action. I put my hand over my heart as the sensation began to build, getting a bit uncomfortable. Was it just the coven? There were loads of magicals there, in its little parallel dimension. Maybe someone had come out for a walk, like I had.

  The only problem was, this tingle felt way stranger than an ordinary magical. It felt different. Raw. Cruel, somehow. It gripped at my heart.

  “Hey, you okay there?” Su
ri put her hand on my shoulder. “You look pale. Are you sick? Do you need to sit down? I can get you some water.”

  I shook my head. “No, I’m—”

  A crystal marble the size of a ping-pong ball rolled across the floor between us. I couldn’t even move to kick it away as it erupted in a pillar of white light. A time-lapse bubble exploded out of it. The glittering glow spread out in a way I’d never seen before. It shot out in four strands, from the central pillar, making a cross. That cross spun, and the bubble rose from the ground up. It met in the middle, forming a dome over our heads.

  Who’s doing this? I tried to look around, but I couldn’t see anyone suspicious. Only visitors, who hadn’t noticed what was going on, thanks to this weird version of a time-lapse bubble.

  Suri’s grip on my shoulder tightened. I looked into her eyes and saw terror, her mouth wide in shock. I opened my own mouth to speak, just as the bubble lit up in a pulse of blue and cut us off from the rest of the world. To any onlookers, we’d probably vanished. Not that they mattered. Suri was what mattered.

  “What’s going on, Jacob?” she whispered, her face turning white.

  “It’s okay. It’s going to be okay.” I had no idea if it was. I just needed to say something to calm her down.

  “What the hell is happening?” Panic shivered from her every word, and she stared frantically at the visitors who happily cruised past. They were oblivious. I put out my hands to steady her. She grasped at my forearms, taking shaky breaths. All I knew was that this was magical, and it was coming from a dark place. A cruel magical, somewhere near.

  “Breathe, Suri.”

  She shook her head. “I can’t! I can’t breathe!”

  On instinct, I pulled her to me. She buried her face in my chest, her whole body shaking violently. No sooner had I put my arms around her than a rush of air blew me forward. I staggered with her, holding tight. I wouldn’t let her go. Glancing over my shoulder, I saw a portal tearing through the fabric of space and time. But this was nothing like my portals, or Isadora’s. Instead of gaping darkness surrounded by a crackle of bronze energy, there was nothing but blinding white light and edges that burned red. Every particle sparked and fizzed, thrumming as if it had a life of its own.