The Trouble with Perfect

by Helena Duggan

  “Well, there’s no use in worrying about it, Eugene.” Rose laughed, kissing him smack on the lips before heading into the kitchen. “I’ll turn on the heating to dry us all off.”

  “Nothing is making much sense.” Madeleine’s smile was beginning to falter as she sat down at the table. “I mean, Boy kidnapping children and Edward Archer saving them? Really…fact is sometimes stranger than fiction!”

  “But Boy didn’t kidnap me,” Violet replied.

  “What exactly happened, pet?” her dad asked. “In all the commotion, I never got to talk to you about it.”

  “There was mist coming from a tomb in the graveyard,” Violet said, “and when I went to look, I fell down a metal pipe into a weird white room, where I think the mist was being made. I escaped, but then the nurse found me in the underground tunnel and made the zombie Child Snatcher take me to where Beatrice and Conor were being held, and…”

  Violet’s happy mood faded a bit, as she began to dry out in the warmth of their kitchen.

  “Zombies, really? Are you feeling alright, pet? You haven’t been the same since I found you on the driveway. And now this kidnapping.” A slight worry edged Rose’s tone, and her smile had faded a little.

  “She DID fall through a grave, and we DID see a zombie and a nurse. I was there too. I told Mam about it already!” Anna stomped her foot so the adults would listen.

  All eyes turned to Madeleine.

  “I thought Anna was making it up; she has a huge imagination,” the woman replied sheepishly.

  “We were trying to help Boy,” Violet continued. “We followed him to the graveyard, hoping we’d find out what was going on.”

  “Are you ever going to learn?” Rose tutted, sounding angry again. “The last time you followed Boy, you got into a world of trouble in Perfect, and we’re not even sure that was worth it now.”

  “What do you mean, Mam? We saved Perfect!”

  “Well, according to Edward, it didn’t need saving.”

  “How could you say that, Rose?” Eugene scowled. “You were a victim of the Archers’ plot. Do you not remember forgetting your own daughter?”

  “Oh…I really didn’t mean that. I’m a mess right now, my emotions are all over the place. One minute I’m angry, then happy, now I’m angry again. I just don’t know any more, Eugene!” Rose buried her face in her hands.

  Everyone’s earlier happy mood seemed to have taken a quick turn.

  “How could you just forget what happened in Perfect so easily?” Eugene fumed. “I certainly haven’t forgotten that the Archers kept me captive and half-starved, forcing me to work on their eye plants. It’s obvious Edward is up to something again, and I don’t understand how those people at the Town Hall today can’t see that. It seems like all the Perfectionists believe his story.”

  “That’s not fair, Eugene. You were in your right mind during Perfect,” Rose argued, “the majority of us were not! Our imaginations were stolen and we don’t have clear memories from that time. Maybe the reason Edward is so easily believed now is because the Perfectionists still don’t fully understand what it was the Archer brothers did back then.”

  Rose looked down at her hands.

  “If I could take back that time when I was under the Archers’ control, I would. I hate that I forgot you both, my own flesh and blood. I hate that I believed everything I was told, and didn’t question. I hate that I was so easily fooled. It would be easy to blame someone else. Blaming William and the No-Man’s-Landers makes sense. It would mean that what I did wasn’t wrong.”

  “It wasn’t your fault, Mam.” Violet tried to reassure her. “The Archers made you forget us!”

  “I’m the same, Rose,” Madeleine said, grabbing her hand. “These past few days I’ve felt so awful – all the shame returned and I was so angry at myself. When Edward said those things at the Town Hall, I wanted to believe him. His words made me feel better. I danced the whole way home!”

  Eugene looked at them all. “But Violet’s right. How you acted during Perfect wasn’t your fault, Rose – or yours, Madeleine. The Archer brothers stole your imaginations.”

  “But the No-Man’s-Landers didn’t change, Eugene. They could see the truth when we couldn’t. Sometimes it feels like they were stronger than us.” Rose looked at her family. “You’re both stronger than me.”

  “But that’s not true, Mam.” Violet hugged her. “I’ve been scared and angry too, just like I was the first time I entered the Ghost Estate. Then Edward spoke today, and I felt happy again.”

  “Me too,” Anna said, grabbing Madeleine’s hand.

  “My mind’s been clouded too,” Eugene said, shaking his head. “Again, until Edward spoke earlier. The whole thing is very strange indeed.”

  “The clouds!” Violet jumped up, as an idea hit her. “Dad, could someone make you feel awful by using the clouds?”

  “Do you mean the weather, Violet?” Eugene replied. “Dark days can affect a person’s mood, especially long winters without much sunlight…”

  “No, not like that, Dad. I mean, could someone put something into the clouds to make you feel bad?”

  “I’m not quite sure what you’re getting at, pet.”

  “Well, the mist in the graveyard made me feel horrible – like I did in the Ghost Estate, except a million times worse. The mist was floating into the sky and making clouds. It came from the white room, Dad, the one I fell into…”

  “Slow down, Violet,” Eugene said, leaning across the table towards her. “Tell me everything about this white room.”

  Violet started her story again.

  She told her dad all about the steam and the cold-air hatch, and the stuff that was sprayed into the room before all the smoke was sucked out through the ceiling. Then she told him about the storage place and the small metal canisters.

  “They were marked with the letters OA—” She hadn’t finished her sentence, before Eugene Brown jumped up from the table.

  Quickly, her dad grabbed a bucket from under the sink. Everyone followed as he raced outside and placed it in the middle of their gravel yard.

  “What are you doing?” Rose asked.

  “There’s a little drizzle still, we should get just enough rain to test it.”

  Eugene Brown the scientist had sprung to life. He hurried back inside and grabbed a knife from the kitchen drawer before returning.

  “That’s my mother’s good cutlery,” Rose barked.

  “Well, it should do a good job then,” he said, kneeling down on the soggy lawn.

  Violet’s dad muttered to himself as he cut round a sod of grass, removing a deep clump of clay from the middle of the lawn.

  “Eugene, look at the state of the garden,” Rose wailed, following him back inside.

  “Can’t be helped, Rose, the water deep in this clay will be a little older than the rain that’s falling in the bucket.”

  Violet stood beside her dad in his office. She watched as he placed the clay carefully onto his stainless steel workbench, before reaching for his starched white coat.

  “Get the bucket, Violet,” her father instructed. “It should have enough rainwater in it by now. If what you described happening in the white room is what I think it is, pet, and the sudden change of mood we all experienced today after Edward spoke is also as I fear, then we should have a different chemical reading from the water in this clay than we will have from the water in that bucket.”

  “What kind of a reading, Dad?” Violet asked.

  “Patience, pet!” he said, using a syringe to carefully extract water from the clay.

  Violet raced outside and carried the bucket back into her father’s office, leaving it on the floor. Dr Eugene Brown was in full flow. He divided the water gathered into test tubes, and was using all kinds of equipment to investigate his samples.

  While Eugene worked, the others returned to the kitchen for some UniTea. Violet rested her head on her forearm, her worries returning a little. She stared at the purple and gold pack
aging adorned with the tagline, “Bringing Town Together”. Town definitely didn’t feel together right now.

  “I knew it,” Eugene finally cried, popping his head round the door. “The minute you explained that room to me, Violet, I knew what was going on. You’re a genius, pet. Those Archers do love mind manipulation. This has Edward Archer all over it!”

  “What do you mean? What’s going on, Eugene?” Madeleine asked, standing up.

  “Come here, I’ll show you.” He opened the front door and raced outside. “Do you see those big, beautiful clouds?”

  “They’re not that beautiful, Dad,” Violet said, looking skywards.

  “Play along with me, pet,” he replied excitedly.

  “Yes, Eugene – yes, obviously we see them.” Rose was growing impatient.

  “Well, can anyone remember when the recent weather started in this town of ours?”

  “A few days ago, I think,” Madeleine replied, impatient now too.

  “And what else happened around that time?” Eugene asked earnestly.

  “I know, I know,” Anna cried, her arm catapulted into the air.

  “Yes, Anna?” Eugene nodded like a school teacher.

  “Well, all the kids started going missing. I’m sure I would have been a bit scared that someone would kidnap me too anyway, but when it started properly raining, I got really, really, really scared, and really angry too.”

  “Precisely!” Eugene exclaimed.

  “What do you mean by ‘precisely’, Eugene? Stop being so cryptic,” Rose said, fuming.

  “Just like Anna said, the weather’s making everyone angry and scared, and, as of today, even happy!” Violet’s dad replied, racing back to his notes.

  The others followed and stood around Eugene’s workbench, as he threw open his findings and began to explain his discoveries.

  “Making clouds is a simple school experiment,” Eugene told them. “Hot air – as Violet described streaming out of a pipe in the bottom of the white room – rises to meet cold air pumped in from the hatch at the top of the room. This cools the hot air, which wants to turn back into a liquid but needs help to condense – cue the gas sprayed into the mixture, forming clouds.”

  “So Edward Archer’s making clouds?” Madeleine interrupted, bending closer to eye the notes.

  “Yes, Madeleine – well, someone is making clouds, but it does have his signature all over it. I know how those twins think.”

  “But that doesn’t explain our moods, Eugene. How can clouds make us feel a certain way?” Madeleine questioned again.

  “Are the clouds making us afraid?” Anna asked.

  “The rain from the clouds is, Anna. The chemical in the clouds falls down in the rain. It seeps into our skin, our clothes, our soil, our water – even our food. These chemicals alter our perception. I read about a similar experiment, years ago, in one of my periodicals,” Eugene said, getting excited. “Researchers used a range of toxic gases to control the mind. Depending on the concoction, they could instil fear, hysteria, happiness, anything. I found OA gas in the water sample I took from deep in the soil. It’s full name is oxide adrenatonin – it’s a delirium used to create fear and fury in individuals. And in the bucket, our recent rain, the water contained nitreous oxitocin. It’s a happy, calming chemical with euphoric and relaxing properties.”

  “But why would the Archers want to make us angry?” Violet asked, confused.

  “It’s another control mechanism, Violet. Those brothers are forever trying to mould our minds! If you can instil fear in a person, it will build anger. Give them a reason for their fear and you can direct their anger, thereby controlling them,” Eugene stated.

  “Divide and conquer, a method used to gain or to maintain power,” Madeleine rattled off, as if reading from a textbook. “I remember learning about it for a philosophy exam. Who knew that’d ever come in useful?”

  “Why would Edward want to divide conkers? Is he going to hit people with them?” Anna questioned.

  “No.” Madeleine smiled. “It’s called divide and conquer, Anna. Edward is using our anger and fear to turn us against each other, the No-Man’s-Landers against the Perfectionists. If he can divide us, he can win back Town.”

  “But why make us feel happy earlier?” Violet asked.

  “Oh, Edward’s a clever man,” her dad replied. “This has all been very carefully stage-managed. I suspect he’s behind the robberies and the kidnappings, using them to grow fear in Town. Then he added the rain, building on this fear and anger until he returned into Town as a hero, having rescued our lost children.

  “He pointed the blame at William and the No-Man’s-Landers, giving us all a reason for our anger. Cue the fresh downpour, this time filled with nitreous oxitocin, and we were all happy and calm again, believing Edward’s return made us feel that way. I counted back on the rain showers – I think they’re on a cycle, a couple of hours apart each. Edward’s return was timed to perfection, to coincide with the last rain shower.”

  “But I’m starting to feel a bit angry again, Mr Brown,” Anna whispered, “and I’m not in the rain now.”

  “The anger will probably linger for a while, Anna. We’ve been exposed to the OA gas for a few days now, and it’s worked its way into our bodies. It will take some time of non-exposure to work its way properly back out. The effects of the happy gas, I’m afraid, will be much more fleeting. I’m certain Edward has used it over Town just once, so its force was only really felt when we were directly in the downpour.”

  Suddenly there was a pounding on the door.

  “Who is it?” Rose called, racing into the hallway.

  “It’s me!” Merrill Marx mumbled through the wood.

  Violet’s mam opened the door and the toymaker rushed inside.

  “They’re releasing George! They’ve swapped him for Boy, who’s now locked in the clock tower,” he panted, as though he’d run the whole way from Town. “I’ve heard rumours the Watchers are being let out next!”

  “I told Vincent he couldn’t do that,” Eugene fumed, grabbing his coat. “It’s a decision for the Committee to make.”

  “Crooked has gone ahead and given the order,” Merrill continued. “I tried to stop him, but he wouldn’t listen. Everyone there was cheering. Trouble’s brewing. If they let out the Watchers, we’re finished. Crooked’s called an emergency Committee meeting, right now. Who knows why, since he’s acting like he owns the place! I left to find you and Madeleine.”

  “Crooked’s an idiot. He won’t get away with this!” Violet’s dad said, striding towards the door.

  “No, Eugene, please! Just let things settle. Edward is dangerous.” Rose shook her head. “It’s getting late, can’t we just wait and see what happens in the morning?”

  “And let them take over Town? We didn’t battle against Perfect, just to have it happen all over again, Rose.”

  “Please, Eugene, can’t we just think about it a bit more? Put together a plan?”

  “It’s a Committee meeting, Rose. The Archers won’t be there, and if they are, they won’t try anything in front of everyone else. They’ll want to keep up a nice front, at least for a while. They need to build back trust.”

  Madeleine Nunn turned to her daughter and kissed her forehead. “Stay here, Anna. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

  “But, Mam, I want to go too…”

  “No buts, Anna.” Madeleine was firm as she stepped out the door. “I’ll be back to get you soon. I promise.”

  “But what if it’s a trap?” Violet insisted.

  She remembered when the Archers told her mam that her dad was called to an urgent opticians’ conference, just before he disappeared from Perfect.

  “Violet,” her dad said, bending down to his daughter. “We know what Edward is like now. We won’t fall for his tricks again, I promise.”

  Eugene looked at Rose and kissed her forehead.

  “If we don’t come back, find Iris and Macula. They might know where William is,” he whis
pered. “And be aware of your feelings, don’t get swept away by them.”

  “Your father will be fine, Violet,” Rose stuttered, as she closed the door of their home.

  Her mam sounded worried. Violet was worried too. She wished Boy was here, he’d know what to do, but right now he was another worry of hers.

  As her mam disappeared back into the kitchen, Violet pulled Anna aside.

  “I have to follow them,” she whispered. “Dad and the others could be in trouble.”

  “Then I’m coming too,” Anna replied, her eyes wide.

  “No, you have to keep Mam busy. Ask her to show you how to bake – she loves all that stuff, since Perfect. Dad always jokes that they gave her back the wrong imagination. If she says anything about me, tell her I was tired and angry, and I’ve gone to bed and locked my door so you couldn’t get in.”

  “But why do I have to stay behind?” the little girl huffed.

  “Sometimes you have to do things you don’t like, Anna, because it’s good for somebody else,” Violet replied, remembering what her mother had told her when they first moved to Perfect.

  Anna scrunched up her face and was about to protest again, when Violet turned and sprinted up the stairs. She didn’t have time to lose and couldn’t waste any of it trying to convince Anna. She locked her bedroom door, raced over to her window and lifted up the bottom pane.

  As quietly as possible, Violet eased herself out onto the roof tiles, just as she’d done the night Boy appeared in her garden. Her ankle was still sore from earlier and she tried to ignore the pain as she crept across to the overhanging branch, then clambered towards the tree trunk and finally climbed to the ground, only releasing a breath when her feet touched grass.

  Night had almost fallen and it was easy sneaking past the kitchen window. She grabbed her bike and slipped down the driveway, before pedalling towards Edward Street.

  The closer Violet got to the Town Hall, the more people filled the street. Many carried banners announcing their support for the twins.