Fallout

by S D Wasley

  “I can’t make that promise. I’m a journalist.”

  I caught her eye in the rear view mirror and shrugged. “Your choice. Story’s yours if you want it.”

  Beside her, Albion looked shell-shocked but Piper watched me with shrewd eyes. I waited. Of course I was anxious but I wasn’t going to beg. At last she sighed.

  “Okay. You win. Tell me the story.”

  We told her the fast and condensed version of the hidden toxic waste tale and ten minutes later dropped her at Augur’s Well Hotel where she was staying. Piper claimed to know exactly who to speak to in order to get an investigating team to the site. She was being straight with me, without a doubt. It was as though I could see into her soul. She said goodbye through the open car window, her fascinated eyes exploring my face.

  “What are you?” she asked.

  I ignored the question. “Call me if you have any problems getting an investigation happening. I don’t want this covered up again. You can reach me through Doctor Caravaggio’s clinic.”

  Piper gave me a long look but, in the end, accepted defeat and moved back from the car.

  Chapter 17: Veritas

  Back at the Old House, Owen, Liz, and Jude were all waiting on the porch. I helped Albion from the car and supported him as he wobbled toward the house.

  “Have you heard from Nadine?” Cain called as we approached.

  Owen shook his head and I caught Cain’s look of disappointment. I opened up and we piled into the lounge room, Liz locking the front door behind us. Futile, I thought. Anyway, I knew Léon was gone, really gone, this time.

  Once inside, my normal Albion came back. He seized a bottle of something strong from his liquor cupboard and uncapped it, pouring himself a good-sized shot. Knocking back his drink in one swig he glared around at us all.

  “I’m going to pee,” he said, “and when I come back I want you all to tell me what the hell is going on.”

  He stalked down the hall. As soon as he was out of earshot Owen stepped forward.

  “Cain, I was wrong. I’m sorry. I trusted Léon and I shouldn’t have.”

  Cain didn’t even need to consider. He nodded at Owen, a look of profound gratitude on his face. “Do you know where Nadine might be?”

  Owen grimaced “She’s still with him. He’s worked hard on her. It’s like he’s radicalised her, somehow. They were talking about leaving the country to go to his home.”

  I felt for Nadine in our web of connections and found her, the channel knotted and almost ruined, stretching away to something powerful I recognised as Léon. His presence was diminishing, receding into the distance.

  I caught Owen’s gaze. “She was looking for a reason to push against Cain.”

  “And Helen?” Cain asked Jude. “Is she okay?”

  “I saw her tonight,” Jude said. “She’s safe. Home with her Gran and her brother.”

  I was going to check for Helen in my complex connection web but the tiredness hit me all of a sudden. I slumped back onto the sofa and Cain leaned over me, checking my face.

  “You need rest,” he told me.

  “Albion,” I said.

  “I’ll make sure he’s okay.”

  Cain helped me to bed and left me to sleep, which I did like I was comatose. Albion barged into my room at one point, demanding to know what the goddamn frickin’ hell that incident with Léon had been about. Although I heard him, and felt him pick up one of my hands to examine my injuries, I couldn’t pull myself out of my deep exhaustion. Not even to open my eyes. Cain talked him into leaving me alone until I’d recovered.

  In the morning I left Cain sleeping in my bed and staggered into the kitchen. Albion was waiting for me. He jumped up and came closer to look at my face, touching my cheekbone. Then he took my hands in his to inspect them again. They were still dirty from when I’d dug at the sandstone wall but all the grazes and scratches had already healed over. Faint pink lines remained where I’d sported open cuts the night before. Albion visibly repressed a shudder.

  “Coffee?” He sounded so stern I could hardly help laughing.

  “Thank you, Alby.”

  He furnished me with a cup and sat across from me, his face expectant.

  “Have you heard anything about the café?” I asked. “About the drums of chemicals?”

  “Ethan told me that journalist girl Piper got some kind of emergency response agency out and they’ve sealed off the whole vicinity until further notice, including that old ruin where you like to hang out. They’re still telling people not to drink the main water supply, too. There’s been police and fire trucks everywhere, guys in sealed white suits, that kind of thing. It’s like some sort of post-apocalyptic dead zone.”

  Incredibly glad I’d been able to trust Piper I sipped my coffee in silence.

  “Frankie,” Albion whined, “come on. This isn’t fair.”

  I sipped again. How should I handle this? I didn’t want to freak Albion out with the full truth but he really looked frightened. Maybe I could find a way to explain some of it but not everything. I put down my cup.

  “Cain and I. We see stuff.” It couldn’t be lamer as an explanation but Albion’s face brightened.

  “What stuff?”

  “Stuff other people don’t see. It helps us intervene if some pointless accident’s going to happen.”

  He stared at me hard. “How did you climb that fence like that last night?”

  I sighed. He was obviously fixated on that particular moment. “I don’t know. I guess I got a burst of speed or strength or whatever. I knew I had to stop those kids from hitting the drums.”

  “And you knew that because ... because you see things?”

  I nodded.

  “What exactly did you see? What happened?”

  I told him about Gaunt House. Trying to keep the chamber a secret was pointless now, with the enviro-scientist team swarming all over it. I told him how it had been part of a tunnel network used to move the poorhouse women from Gaunt House to the tannery as free labour, and how the tannery workers had, decades later, stored effluent down there to cut costs on toxic waste disposal. And then, probably when the tannery closed down, drums of tanning process chemicals were added to the secret underground store. And finally how the Grace Creek property developers had discovered the drums and tried to sneak them out for proper disposal without being obliged to stop the development work on the café or the housing estate.

  “Was that how you got back to the café after you left last night?” Albion asked. “Through the tunnel? As far as I could tell you just appeared from the kitchen.”

  “We broke through a wall to get into the tunnel. It took us directly there. Moving in a straight line, Gaunt House isn’t far from the old tannery.”

  “You broke through a wall?” His voice shook.

  “Sandstone,” I said. “Soft rock.”

  He reached out and I gave him my hand so he could inspect my nails again. “With your bare hands, huh?” He gave my hand back.

  I avoided his eyes. “No, we used tools.”

  “Hands coming through a wall. Like your dream.”

  I’d forgotten about that. It brought back memories of my dream: little Henri with his blue eyes. Sadness overwhelmed me and for a few moments I couldn’t speak.

  “What would have happened?” Albion asked. “If you hadn’t stopped that girl from hitting the drum?”

  This was the question I’d hoped he wouldn’t ask. The scene was burned into my memory like a soldier brings away memories of a battlefield. I couldn’t tell him exactly what I’d seen. I closed my eyes, trying to dispel images of people screaming and bleeding, blinded and choking on corrosive dust, of those two children thrown by the pressure blast and horrifically burnt by caustic chemicals. I forced myself to manufacture a reply.

  “There would have been a lot of injuries and the chemicals would have spilled into the reservoir. The water would have been tainted for a long time.”

  Albion was a little too smart to be
lieve that was the extent of it. He observed me, head tipped pensively to one side.

  “Did you say anything to Vanessa or Ethan last night?” I asked, eyes down. “About what you ... thought you saw?”

  “I know what I saw,” he said immediately. “Maybe I was drunk but I saw you move faster than is humanly possible.” He shuddered again and his face blanched at the memory. “Of course I told them. Holy frickin’ Christ.”

  “What did they say?”

  He rolled his eyes. “They said I was drunk and should have something to eat so I wouldn’t be sick during the night. Assholes.”

  I chuckled. “Will you do me a favour, Alby?”

  “Let me guess.” He gave an exaggerated sigh. “You’d like me to keep my mouth shut?”

  I shot him my most winning smile. “They’d never believe you anyway.”

  He laughed in spite of himself. “Bitch.”

  ****

  For the next few days, Augur’s Well was crawling with media and emergency services personnel. Gradually things settled down and the media departed. Only small mop-up teams were left, seemingly to conduct testing. Uncle Max heard a rumour that the development work had been suspended while the matter was under investigation. It was likely the Grace Creek Property Company and former tannery bosses would be charged and end up before the courts.

  We met at Owen’s place, or at the Old House if Albion was going out in the evening. None of us heard from Léon again, nor, to their general dismay, Nadine. It seemed she’d left the country with him after all. Cain, Jude, Liz, and Owen all felt it keenly. Nadine had always shown me such enmity that I didn’t suffer much from her desertion, except in seeing the pain it gave Cain. Helen didn’t have any long term allegiance to Nadine, either.

  “She betrayed you,” she reminded them. She took a breath and said what she really thought: “Good riddance!” Secretly, I applauded her.

  “You didn’t know her while she was at her best,” Jude said to Helen. “This is really hard for us. There’s a bond.” He paused. “It’s hard to explain.”

  Liz agreed. “Yes. Once you’ve transformed it will all be much clearer.” The gentle delivery of these words didn’t hold an ounce of condescension. “For you and Frankie I can understand why it makes no sense that we feel this way, why we’d welcome her back in a heartbeat.”

  “No, I get it,” I said. “I get the bond.”

  Liz nodded. “Of course. You and Léon.”

  Cain blanked his face when she said this. The link between me and Léon, even broken, must hurt for him. It sure hurt for me. My thoughts frequently returned to Léon, worrying about how he was faring in his attempt to save his son. Maybe I should contact Sara ... she was still in contact with him, wasn’t she? When I opened my email to contact her in the days after the tannery event, Sara had beaten me to it. I read the two-day-old message.

  Dear Francesca,

  You want to know why Léon lost the loyalty of those he found, for whom he was protector? I’ll tell you honestly. It was because he pushed us too hard. He tried to induce our premonitions, first using traditional methods of the indigenous people, and then with medication and finally hallucinogens. He was obviously frustrated with us. Worse, when Yousef first had the premonition of Henri’s death Léon became agitated and unstable. He constantly pressured us to drive ourselves harder, to seek out the premonitions and immerse ourselves even more deeply into them in order to garner clearer information. When he worked out that a dangerous event heightens the clairvoyant power he tried to place Yousef in danger to force his transformation. Yousef could have been killed. He disappeared the next day and Léon has not been able to track him down, despite his efforts. Tania eventually became frightened as well. She left town, breaking all ties. As I already told you, I’m the only one who maintains contact with him now, and only on the condition that he doesn’t try to see me in person.

  Sara’s story made my heart ache all over again. I worried about Léon often throughout each day, lying in bed at night wondering if he would be able to save little Henri. In the end I sent an email to his address to tell him I would keep my promise. I couldn’t see him again but I would assist in any way I could to save Henri. I would tell him anything that might help and he could send me information he found on the off-chance I could decipher it. Sending that email felt like betraying Cain but I had no choice. My mind wouldn’t rest until I’d offered my help. I didn’t receive a reply, anyway.

  Those few days were a confusing time. I was at a loose end, part of the group but not. Transformed, gifted, but not in the same way. There were no answers for me, either, because Léon was gone. I wasn’t sure even he would understand how my gift worked. Throughout each day I got flashes of what the others were doing. The channels opened up at random moments, showing me Liz reading a patient chart at the hospital or Cain unplugging a drain at the trailer park, and then within minutes I would get a phone call or text message from whomever I’d opened the channel with. I was like a chatroom where everyone was invited but no one knew why they were there. Whatever this power was, whatever it meant, it was clearly going to take time for me to understand it.

  The following Friday marked the start of term break. When I arrived home from college I discovered my mother in the house.

  “Did you forget I was coming?” she asked, plainly amused by my shock.

  “Um, no, of course not,” I told her, giving her a hug.

  “Albion’s given me his room. He says he’ll stay in the Main House with Max for the week.”

  “Oh, good.”

  How was I going to escape to see Cain without my cousin there as a decoy? That was probably Albion’s plan, the damn sneak. Perhaps I could palm Mum off on Vanessa once or twice. When I brought my attention back to my mother she was observing me closely. I tried to make my face pleased and welcoming.

  “Still not back on tour with Dad then?”

  “No, I think I’m over that,” I said. “It doesn’t appeal to me anymore.

  “Are you still seeing that dark-haired boy?”

  I fought the urge to smile at Cain being called a ‘boy.’

  “Yes.”

  “Well.” She looked around the kitchen. “Have you got a drink to offer your mum?”

  “Oh, yes! Wine? Beer?”

  “Do you have any spirits?”

  “Uh ... like what?”

  “Whisky.”

  I raided Albion’s drinks cabinet and found a bottle that appeared to be whisky. Mum raised her eyebrows when she saw the label.

  “Expensive drop.”

  I checked the cap. “It’s already open.”

  “Pour it out then, girl.”

  I messaged Cain to say I wouldn’t be able to get to Owen’s that night, and then Vanessa to tell her Mum was in town. My sister turned up and we spent the night drinking with Mum. She could certainly hold her liquor. All those years of bartending in Land’s End, I guess. She laughed at Vanessa and me sipping our white wine and said she looked forward to family pasta night on Sunday with Uncle Max’s Sangiovese.

  “What happened in town this week?” Mum asked, her sharp eyes landing on me. “The tannery story? It’s been all over the news in Revel City. Vanessa, you were working that night, weren’t you? Did you see anything?”

  She shook her head. “Frankie saw more than me. Albion says she stopped some kids from opening the drums full of chemicals.”

  Already the story had become distorted. I was glad of it. “Yeah, I saw them messing with some drums of stuff and told them to go back to the playground.”

  “That must have been how that journalist, that Pavlich girl, noticed the drums,” Vanessa said. “I wondered what made her go snooping over into the construction site.” She made a face. “Sucks that I don’t have a job for a while now. I just mastered the fern leaf in my latte art, too. Still, I’m glad they found all those sewage barrels before it got dumped into the stream.”

  “Was that what it was?” Mum sounded surprised. She glanced at
me but I kept my face neutral. “Frankie?”

  “Waste chemicals from the old tannery, I think.” I was vague. “I got poisoning from the first spill a few weeks back.”

  Mum frowned. “You did? Are you all right?”

  “Yes. It was like a gastro virus. All over in a day. I’m totally fine now.”

  Mum was still watching me with interest so I steered the conversation toward Vanessa’s gym crush. She was always happy to talk on about that.

  ****

  Mum slept late in the morning. The whisky, I suppose. I’d never noticed before how much she drank. She and Uncle Max still got on like brother and sister instead of estranged in-laws. Their relationship was all about constant ribbing and refilling one another’s wineglass. After the big family pasta night Mum and I wandered back to the Old House together.

  “Beautiful night for stargazing,” she remarked, staring upward. “Why don’t we go into the pool yard and lie on those deckchairs, Frankie? I’ll tell you some of the constellations.”

  I went with her obediently and she pointed out several arrangements of stars. She knew some I hadn’t heard of before. After a while she fell silent. I got cold and had made up my mind to suggest we go back inside when she spoke again.

  “There’s no easy way to raise this, Francesca. I can see something’s happened to you. You look different, as though a sort of peace has come over you.”

  I tensed. This had come out of nowhere.

  “I’m just finding my own life at last.”

  “Well good, but that’s not what I mean.” I checked her face but Mum was still staring at the sky, eyes reflecting starlight. “I mean you have found peace with your power. You see things, don’t you?”

  I went into a silent panic, mouth drying up as my heart thumped. Albion, was my first thought. He’s betrayed me. At length my mother glanced at me.

  “I don’t see things,” she said. “Not anymore. I did when I was younger. Not much older than your age, I suppose, although I already had two kids. I was drawn here, to the special waters of this place. Augur’s Well. The augurs of the lakes.”