Zeke wrinkled his nose. “You’re not suggesting we take these?”
“Why not? The military use them in dangerous situations. When they need to get in and out in a hurry.”
“No way! I’m not being a human cockroach.”
Scuff threw Zeke his ‘are-you-nuts’ glare. “The pills speed up your reactions, your thought processes. Nothing more. You won’t sprout antennae or go scampering under the refrigerator. Klutz!”
Zeke looked unconvinced. “So, we go faster?”
“Now you’re getting the plot Einstein. We’ll be too fast to see.”
“Faster than light?”
“Not that fast! The pills speed our brains up to about ten times normal. Anymore and our synapses would fuse! So what you could do in ten seconds you can do in one. We’ll be too fast for the human eye. And if we were caught on camera we’d be just a blur. They only last for four or five minutes, real time, but that’s all we need to get up and in.”
“And you’re sure they’re safe?”
“Absolutely!” Scuff insisted, carefully avoiding eye contact.
“How did you get them?”
Scuff flushed.
“Trixie Cutter’s black market.”
“WHAT! That psychopath!”
“Why not?”
“I don’t want a bully like her doing us favours. She’ll say we owe her.”
Scuff’s jaw dropped. “I was trying to help.”
Zeke drew a deep breath. Trixie might be an enemy but Scuff was his friend. “How much?”
The tint on Scuff’s cheeks deepened. “A couple of thousand Martian.”
“Two thousand Martian dollars! Oh Scuff, you shouldn’t have!”
“What’s the point having a rich father if I can’t throw his cash around?”
A guilt attack slapped Zeke in the face. Where would he be without Scuff?
The two boys smiled.
“Here goes then,” Zeke said.
Scuff handed him a pill.
“Place it under your tongue and let it dissolve. Watch the clock. You’ll know when it’s done.”
Zeke copied Scuff’s actions. He had no idea how a cockroach tasted but he imagined it was similar to the pill. A bitter, nauseating flavour furred up his gums. He gazed at the wall clock.
The time was ten twenty-three. Then it was ten twenty-four. But something was wrong. The second hand was slowing, slower, slower. An intense itchiness tingled the inside of his skull, as if his brain was wriggling its way out. He glanced at his friend. Scuff was starting to flicker. The itchy feeling became unbearable. An urge to crack open his forehead overwhelmed him. Just as a scream began rising in his throat the prickliness ceased. The second hand was at a standstill.
Scuff was in focus again, leaning against a washbasin and grinning like a monkey.
“Hey, bro, do I deliver or do I deliver?”
Zeke pushed at the door but it remained glued in its frame. He turned to Scuff and shrugged his shoulders.
“Inertia and speed differentials, bro. You’ve pushed it for a nanosecond in real time. Try for longer, but not too much force. At our speed it could ricochet off its hinges.”
~~~
Zeke and Scuff sauntered lazily over to the foot of the stairs. At first the cleanomacs seemed frozen. Zeke paused for a closer inspection. The robots were moving but too slowly to notice. Zeke clapped his hands with glee. Super speed was exhilarating.
“Don’t linger. Ten of our seconds in one spot and we might register on their visual circuits,” Scuff said. “Now, there are twenty security cams on the way up. They’re all in synch. If we start when the bottom one is facing away we should get to the top.”
“Even if we get caught on film we’d only be a blur, right?”
“Sure, bro, but best not to arouse suspicion.”
Scuff poked his head around the pillar. “Okay, Camera number one is pointing away. GO! GO! GO!”
Laughing like hyenas the two friends cantered up the stone stairwell. With the security cams as swift as sundials it was easy to dance around them and reach the apex. The door to Barnside’s office was waiting for them.
“Open it, bro,” Scuff wheezed, exhausted by the sprint. “I reprogrammed the Chasm’s security timer to unlock now.”
“The technicians in IT told me the School’s server was unhackable.”
“Yes, Zeke, but they never met a three times under-eighteen champion hacker. Go ahead.”
Zeke pushed at the handle. Once again it was surprisingly resistant. They both gripped the handle and tugged. Despite being made of plastic, the door seemed to weigh a ton. The boys grunted as inch by inch it opened. They were in!
“Oh!” Scuff groaned, turning greener than a cabbage. His stomach growled noisily.
“My pill…wearing…off,” he said. His voice and movements were winding down. He came to a complete halt. Zeke waved his hand in front of Scuff’s eyes. No response. The geek was as still as a waxwork.
Zeke guessed he had only moments before he too decelerated. Wondering if there was anything to do he scrutinized Barnside’s office. His gaze alighted on a framed photo on her desk. He bent down for a closer look.
It was a group scene with someone cutting a ribbon. An inscription written in the corner dated the photo as a hundred years old. Zeke studied its details. There, among the crowd, Lutz and Barnside solemnly watched the ceremony.
How could either of them be so old?
At that instant Zeke’s stomach quivered violently. A side effect? Scuff’s hand began rising, first at a snail’s pace, then accelerating. Of course it was not Scuff who was getting faster, but Zeke who was returning to normal.
“Bucket!” Scuff gasped, and they dived for the wastepaper bin…
~~~
The sound of Martian plumbing gurgled through the tower.
“Let’s hope nobody hears that,” Scuff said, as Zeke returned from the toilet with the washed out bin.
Zeke said nothing. He tried the door to Lutz’s office. It opened easily. Zeke hesitated for a moment then stepped inside.
“Wow!” Scuff said softly, following on Zeke’s heels.
The octagonal shaped room was much larger than Barnside’s office. Three galleries, stuffed full of computers and filing cabinets looked down on Lutz’s humble work station. Ladders and staircases connected to each level. Fingers of dusty light poked through the skylights.
“Sneaky,” Scuff went on. “She has her own independent network. No connection to the Mars-Wide-Web, or even the School’s intranet. Watertight security, bro. Bro?”
His friend wasn’t listening. Zeke was mesmerised by the artwork behind Lutz’ s desk. A large rectangle of rock had been set into the wall.
“What’s that? Modern sculpture?”
The ochre slab was engraved with abstract patterns and symbols. A spiral dominated the centre, with all kinds of squiggles and shapes radiating out. A border of dense markings ran around the edge.
“It’s Hesperian, you idiot!” Zeke snapped. “A relic. It must be nearly two billion years old.”
“How do you know?”
“Believe me, I know.”
“Whatever, bro. Time to get busy. Lutz’s PC is bound to connect with the rest of these antiques. I’ll hack in from there and do a search for your dad. What’s his first name and date of birth?”
Zeke didn’t answer.
“Hey, Sigmund, would you mind waking from the trance?”
Zeke continued gazing at the mural. Frustrated, Scuff shoved him.
“Your old man! What was his name and D.O.B.?”
Zeke pulled himself together. “Cole Hailey, born March 12th 2206.”
Scuff clicked on the computer and plugged a memory stick into a spare port.
“The very latest in password decoding from the Tokyo underground,” he explained with a flush of pride. Zeke had already stopped listening.
“Dthoth thla ryksi thnga bchrfft xgiishi dthoth thla gleqxuus jchzaa,” he mumbled, reading a
loud the runes in the stone imagery. “All that comes…out of the dangerous pattern…no, dangerous spiral…eats up space.. and…everybody….dies.”
The image rippled. Something was happening. Zeke had activated something when he voiced those ancient syllables.
The picture was growing. And the rest of the room was shrinking. Within a few seconds Lutz’s office, along with Scuff tapping away at her keyboard, disappeared beneath the rock frame.
Zeke put out a foot and stepped into a two-dimensional world.
Chapter Fourteen
Inside the picture
Zeke held up his hands and saw circles and rectangles. He had changed from flesh and bone to a line diagram. Fear swamped him.
“Don’t panic,” he said, gritting his teeth, only to realise he didn’t have any teeth.
Thoughts crowded his head. The engraving had to be some kind of Hesperian technology, similar to Magma’s orb. But what was it doing to him? Could he die inside this picture, or worse, become trapped forever?
“I said don’t panic.”
Surely it was an illusion. And if it was all in his mind he couldn’t come to any harm. The important thing was to explore deeper. The answers to everything that was happening might lay ahead. Zeke steeled himself and put forward an elliptical foot.
Above and beneath him were segmented hexagons, each with six external lines serving as limbs. Instinct told him these were the long dead Hesperians.
“What kind of creatures were you? Octopi? Crabs?”
They were screaming. Their bodies trembled as they desperately scuttled away. Zeke glanced higher. A giant black spiral dominated the flat sky, rotating and expanding. As it increased it was eating into tall triangular mountains. Smaller spirals sprouted from its central ravenous tentacle.
“DON’T LOOK!” the Hesperians shrieked in Martian, as they scurried past. But it was too compelling to turn away. Zeke watched as the slower hexagons were sucked up into the Spiral’s fanged curves. Blood rained.
And yet as Zeke watched, his sense of horror gave way to a strange feeling. A curiosity.
How must it feel to be snatched up into the sky and devoured? To feel bones cracking beneath those building-sized teeth? A memory popped into his mind. A nasty scab on the knee sustained during sports practice. He remembered the sense of relief as he peeled the dried clot away. Perhaps entering the Spiral was like that?
Zeke’s fascination grew. He could become bigger and better than an insignificant human. Merge with the beautiful darkness. A thrill shuddered his body.
“Digest me! Over here!” he cried with a sudden joy, waving energetically.
His tiny inner voice interrupted.
‘Think you fool! THINK!’
Zeke shook his stick-figure head. He was in a tug of war between the Spiral and the voice. But the Spiral was stronger. For the first time Zeke felt its great wind, pulling him nearer. Terror broke the spell.
“THIS ISN’T REAL!” he bellowed with all his might.
The two-dimensional world freeze-framed. A Martian word slithered up to him. He spelled out its five runes.
“Thrith, Dthoth, shfah, nthrth, nxngth.”
That spelt nbqchii or in English ‘ask’. Zeke no longer marvelled at his fluency in a primeval alien language. The orb had re-programmed his brain to understand. That much was obvious. But what use was the orb to Magma?
The word shuffled impatiently. ASK!
Zeke struggled to pronounce a question. The non-human syllables had his Earth tongue in knots.
“What is this place?”
The letters rearranged themselves.
‘A warning.’
“I don’t understand. Is this what happened to you?”
The word became a sentence.
‘Will happen to you.’
“What will happen to us?” Zeke demanded, the Martian syllables clinging to his palette.
It jumbled and un-jumbled.
‘Key unlocks Infinity Trap.’
“Make sense!” he barked. Confusion gushed through his brain.
The words didn’t move. Zeke frantically tried to think. He knew he had to ask the right questions, but what were they?
“How can I stop this happening?”
‘Save her.’
Save who? What was the picture trying to tell him?
“Zeke. Zeke?”
He glanced over his shoulder. Scuff’s face was creased with worry.
“Mars calling planet Zeke, are you receiving me?”
Zeke was standing infront of the prehistoric engraving. He had never left Lutz’s office.
“Scuff! Have you seen Pin-mei today?” Zeke demanded, grabbing his friend hard.
“I’ve found the data. Your dad’s file.”
“THAT’S NOT IMPORTANT. TELL ME ABOUT PIN.”
Scuff gazed at him in disbelief.
“Not important? After all I’ve risked—”
“Tell me what you know!”
“About Pin? What’s to tell? She popped in this morning. Feeling much better.”
“Where is she?”
“Cycling, bro. Trixie Cutter invited her on a cross-country tour of the Valley with Snod.”
“WHAT!” Zeke shouted. “GIVE ME THE PILLS!”
Bewildered, Scuff handed three of the four remaining tablets. Zeke dashed for the door, swallowing down all of them. Scuff lurched after him.
“Don’t take them all! It could be fatal!”
“No time!”
“WAIT. THEY MUST TAKE EFFECT. THE CAMERAS WILL SEE YOU.”
But Zeke no longer cared. He threw Scuff aside and sprinted for the stairs. Scuff watched him go before gulping down the last pill.
“You are so totally over, bro, finito.”
~~~
Zeke flew down the stone steps three at a time. All twenty security cams he dodged on the way up caught him on the descent. He didn’t care. Pin-mei was in danger, he knew it.
The cockroach pills didn’t kick in until he reached the ground floor and was already racing to the main door. His chest boiled. His heart boomed like an engine. His skin squirmed. He ran faster and faster, zooming past waxworks that were really people.
“I must get to the bike. I must, I must,” he cried. He was going so quickly the school corridors blurred into one.
And then he was there, beside his mountain bike in the parking lot. How had he arrived? The last few moments were a blank. But there was no time to think about it. Zeke jumped onto his bike and peddled furiously out, through the open entrance, into the vast bowl of Ophir Chasma.
Which way? Mountain biking was a popular pastime among students. Fresh tracks in the sand indicated several bicycles had gone out and back already. Pulling at his blue hair he scoured the dirt. A set of three trails headed off to a distant ravine. They had not returned.
Zeke turned the handlebars and pushed off in the same direction, his wheels humming under the pressure of super-speed. He shot across the barren scene. The rocks gave way to boulders. The trail threaded into a fissure. Sharp crags rose up on all sides like clawing hands.
He turned a corner and cycled headlong into Cutter and Snod. From his super-speed perspective they were travelling as fast as slugs. Cutter wore an expression of malevolent glee. Snod’s face told a different story. He was terrified.
Zeke rode on, deeper into the gorge.
A convulsion punched through his stomach, throwing him from the bike. The pills were wearing off. He vomited into the red dust. With tears of pain he forced himself to his feet and remounted. He had to find Pin-mei.
Now Zeke was back in real time he considered switching Albie on. But that would slow him down. He pressed on, struggling to maintain his balance as the pills’ after effects rumbled around his guts.
“HELP!”
The scream bounced off the basalt cliffs. She was somewhere up ahead. There was another sound too, the moaning of wind. Zeke grunted and rammed down hard on his pedals.
The last bend opened up onto
the plains of Mariners Valley.
“What on Mars!”
In the distance his friend was cycling for her life. A dust devil, larger than a fully grown man, seemed to be pursuing her.
“PIN-MEI!” he shouted, but she couldn’t hear.
It was gaining on her. Zeke’s blood froze. Within the whirlwind he could make out a white light in the shape of a man. It appeared to be walking leisurely but every step crossed several metres.
With a sudden leap the dust devil engulfed Pin-mei in a torrent of dust. An impenetrable cloud obscured them both. A moment later her bike hurtled through the air and crashed behind Zeke.
“PIN-MEI!” he shrieked again. Leaping back onto his saddle he zoomed after the swirling column. But it was retreating at an impossible rate and melted into the ochre landscape.
“PIN-MEI” he cried, desperately searching the horizon. His voice echoed back across miles of dead rock. The sand slowly settled and the crushing silence returned. Pin-mei was gone.
Part Two
Chapter Fifteen
Lutz’s Office
Principal Lutz buried her face in her hands. Zeke sat in front of her desk staring at the clock on the wall. He listened as it ticked away the seconds, like a time bomb counting down to an explosion. And then came the BOOM!
The Principal erupted in a blast of foul language. Zeke turned beetroot-red as the words slammed into him. Lutz’s outburst leapt from English to German to Russian. Zeke looked out the window at the skeletal fingers of rock and said nothing. Finally the Principal ran out of curses and sat back down.
“Never in all my years running this establishment—and believe me they are many—have I experienced such criminal behaviour.”
Zeke remained mute.
“First you break into my office. Do you deny it?
Zeke shook his head. The woman aimed her remote and clicked. A tiny hologram appeared on her desk, replaying the security cam footage. Zeke was running down the steps again and again.
“And can you explain, mein kleiner Einbrecher, how you evaded the detection all the way up? But flaunted your presence on the way down?”
“Translocation Ma’am,” Zeke fibbed bravely.
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