This Town Is Not All Right

by M. K. Krys

  “If there was, I would do it,” his dad said. “I know you want to save your friend, but we won’t be able to sneak in. They have security all over the place. We wouldn’t get within a hundred-foot radius of the ship before they knew about it. We might as well walk right in the front door.” Their dad frowned suddenly. Beacon knew that look.

  “What? What is it?” Beacon asked.

  “Nothing,” he said, shaking his head.

  “You’re lying,” Beacon said. “You got an idea.”

  “It would never work, and it’s far too dangerous. Forget I said anything. Come on, let’s get going.”

  “You have to tell me!” Beacon cried, grabbing his arm. “What is it? Something to do with security? Walking in the front door? Come on, please!”

  “I said never mind. It was a stupid idea. They’d see right through the act.”

  The act? What did that mean?

  Suddenly all the pieces snapped into place.

  “We go back through the front door,” Beacon said.

  His family looked at him.

  “Maybe you hit your head harder than I thought in that pod crash,” Everleigh said as she came down to join them.

  “I’m not talking about sneaking in,” Beacon said. “What Dad said gave me an idea. We walk in through the front door. So by now the Sov have noticed we’re missing and have put two and two together that you helped us, right?”

  “Yes . . . ,” their dad said warily.

  “Well, you bring us back. Drag us in there. Tell them we tried to escape and you caught us running away. We’ll play the part. Kicking and screaming, and all that. You tell them we’re out of control and need to be locked up until you can figure out what’s wrong with us.”

  “That is the worst idea ever,” Everleigh said.

  But when their dad didn’t come back with any arguments or glaring logic gaps, Beacon knew he wasn’t totally off the mark. He smiled a victory smile.

  “Your plan isn’t going to work.”

  Beacon’s breath stalled at the familiar voice. The whole family turned. Donna stood at the top of the stairs.

  The kids scrambled away from the woman as she thumped down the stairs two at a time.

  “Back away from my children,” their dad ordered. He whipped a pen out of his shirt pocket and brandished it like a weapon. Donna laughed.

  “Is that how you plan to fight off the Sov?” she said. “You need my help more than I thought.”

  Help?

  “Why should we trust you?” Beacon said. “You work for the sheriff! I saw the pictures—I know you’re really Donalda Pound.”

  “I used to work for the sheriff,” Donna corrected. “And you’ll trust me because you don’t have a choice. Without me, you’re going to get caught. In less than two minutes, Sheriff Nugent’s going to be pulling into that driveway. I plan to tell him you left ten minutes ago, headed toward Shelburne. Unless you’d prefer to chat with him yourself, I’d suggest you move that van into the garage, where I already parked your car, and hide.”

  Donna and their dad eyed each other like wary cats circling. Could they trust her?

  “Clock’s ticking,” Donna warned.

  Beacon and Everleigh looked to their dad.

  “Get in the garage,” their dad finally said. “And stay well back. I’m pulling the van around. Go, go, go!”

  The family jolted into action. Beacon and Everleigh ran outside and jerked the garage door open, while their dad backed the van up into the port next to where their Taurus was already parked. After he turned off the engine, he jumped out and pulled the garage door closed, just as a set of headlights beamed across the property. Through a crack in the door, they saw a police cruiser rumble up the driveway.

  Beacon’s heart raced. The sound of his family’s labored breathing mixed with the quiet tinks coming from the cooling engine. Had the sheriff seen them? What if he noticed the fresh tire tracks leading up to the garage?

  Beacon bit his lip. He felt a hand slip into his. Everleigh smiled at him grimly.

  The cruiser ground to a halt in the driveway. They watched through the crack as Sheriff Nugent climbed out and stomped up the front steps. Donna emerged from the front door. She gestured animatedly and pointed east. Sheriff Nugent followed her gaze before he spoke into a radio at his belt. And then he was racing back to his cruiser. The sirens turned on as he sped back down the driveway, leaving a cloud of dust behind him.

  They waited. And waited. And waited.

  Finally, Donna emerged from the front door again.

  “Come on out,” she called over.

  Five minutes later, Beacon had changed out of his Sov-issue hospital gown and into jeans and a T-shirt. He cleaned the cuts on his knuckles, and then he joined his family at the kitchen table, where they sat stiffly with mugs of hot cider.

  Donna had told them that all roads leading out of Driftwood Harbor were crawling with police and Sov, and that it would be smarter to wait it out until they had all assumed that the family was long gone before finally making a break for it. Beacon wasn’t sure it was the best plan, but his dad had agreed with Donna, so here they were. Sipping cider, while an alien nation and the government were after them.

  Beacon eyed his mug suspiciously. He still wasn’t sure he could trust Donna. Was this just her clever way of poisoning their family? Was there some type of sleeping drug in the cider, and they would all wake up inside the UFO again?

  Donna rolled her eyes and swapped out her mug for Beacon’s, taking a big gulp.

  “See? Not dead,” Donna said.

  Beacon took a wary sip of his drink. If it was poison, it tasted like the best hot cider he’d ever had.

  Beacon’s dad cleared his throat.

  “So, you used to be a deputy?” He raised his eyebrows at Donna.

  “And you work for the Sov,” she said. There was so much derision in her tone that the hairs on Beacon’s neck stood up straight. Suddenly the burnt eggs made sense. She’d known all along that his dad worked for the Sov. And she didn’t exactly like him for it.

  “And yes,” she said magnanimously, lifting her chin. “I was the youngest deputy the force had ever had. Not that anyone was too happy about that.”

  “What do you mean?” Everleigh asked.

  “It was a bit of an old boys’ club at the time. Not unlike how it is now, actually. No one took too kindly to the sheriff hiring a girl, never mind a nineteen-year-old girl. But that’s neither here nor there.”

  “Tell us about the night you saw the alien craft,” Beacon said.

  “Why? You know all about that already.” Donna sent him a knowing look, and Beacon’s cheeks warmed. So she had seen his search history after all.

  She took a sip of her cider before continuing.

  “I’d been patrolling the harbor that night, following up on a tip about some kids selling drugs. Then out of nowhere, I saw a set of bright lights in the sky. The thing hovered above the water some hundred yards from the shore before finally crashing. I assumed it was a downed aircraft and called the head office for support. Sheriff Ramirez—he was in charge at the time—he had the Coast Guard there within minutes. But . . . of course you know how that turned out. They never found a trace of the craft. I knew then that there was something fishy going on. But there was a strange air about the crews that came, too. I noticed the Coast Guard whispering to each other and exchanging glances when they thought no one was looking. I was curious. Ramirez was curious, too. He kept pressuring the head office to give us more information—right until he was replaced with Nugent. Was a real uproar at the time. The head office said they needed Nugent’s expertise, but it seemed like they just needed someone who wouldn’t ask too many questions. But Nugent was popular with the deputies, and they got over it real fast. I wasn’t so quick to warm to him. Anytime I asked Nugent about that craft, I wa
s shut down and told to mind my own business in no uncertain terms. With Ramirez being replaced, I didn’t want to take chances with my job, too, so I stopped poking around. Weeks and months went by, and I tried to forget about the craft. I did so well that Nugent took a shining to me, and I was promoted to detective. Next thing you know I’m being trusted with more and more information. Being let in on secrets no one else in the force knows about. I come to find out about the UFO in the water, and this whole government conspiracy happening right here under our noses. Not only were aliens living here, but they were helping us prepare for an upcoming threat. Or so they said.”

  “What do you mean?” Beacon asked.

  “The Sov, they were giving these shots to the kids to help them breathe underwater. But I come to find out it also makes ’em behave. Stay in line. It all started to make sense, all the strange goings on in the town. See, ever since that craft came, there were less and less calls to the station, until it seemed like Driftwood Harbor had just . . . stopped having a crime problem. I even stopped getting called down to the pub on Saturday nights to break up fights at closing time. Now all this seemed like good news, but there were things going on in that ship that I didn’t feel too comfortable about. It’s one thing if someone signs up to the program willingly, and I could even make myself believe it was okay if the kids were given that shot without their knowledge, so long as their parents agreed, but they’d started bringing in adults—troublemakers in town. Once, I saw this man, Dusty, who I used to pick up at the pub as a matter of routine, lying on a stretcher. He looked dead, but the next day, I saw him in town applying for a job at the Stop ’N Save wearing a suit. After a while I noticed a pattern. Anyone who opposed the regime, anyone who asked too many questions, ended up being given this shot. It didn’t make any sense. They weren’t giving Dusty the shot to help him breathe underwater—they wanted to shut him up. That scared the bejesus out of me, knowing they could just make people go along with anything they wanted.” She shook her head.

  “Why didn’t you do anything about it?” Everleigh said. “You just let all those people suffer.”

  “Everleigh!” their dad said.

  “No, it’s okay,” Donna said. “Truth is, I was worried I’d lose my job if I made too many waves, after what happened to Ramirez. You don’t understand what it was like back then, being a woman in law enforcement. They were chomping at the bit to find a reason to fire me. I didn’t belong there, or so they told me whenever they got the chance. The boys made a sport out of harassing me, and if I stood up for myself, it just proved their point—that I was weak and not worthy of my badge. So I decided it was better to stay quiet, oppose them from the inside. I know that makes me a coward, but I’d worked hard to get where I was, and it was my passion.”

  Beacon just stared at her. It was too much. The Sov had been injecting children for more than forty years. That meant practically everyone in Driftwood Harbor was under their control. The kids, their parents. A whole town of complacent, docile humans under Sov control.

  “If you were so loyal to the Sov, then why don’t you work for them now?” Everleigh asked.

  “Well, one night Nugent radioed about a participant gone Off-Program who ran away—that’s what they call it when the antidote goes wonky and they can’t control the kids anymore. Used to happen more, before they got the finer details ironed out. Anyway, I’d known this kid. Was a friend’s son. It was raining that night—real kicker of a storm. Some of the others wanted to call off the search till morning, but I looked high and low. There wasn’t a twig I didn’t look underneath. But it didn’t matter. He just clear went missing. No one ever saw him again.”

  “Is—is he alive?” Beacon asked.

  All he could think about was Arthur. Once they discovered that Arthur couldn’t be controlled, and even worse, that he’d been investigating them, what would happen to his friend?

  “Officially, the boy was sent off to live with an aunt out of state,” Donna said. “The day before, his mom had been in a panic. Then all of a sudden she didn’t even want to talk about him. Every time I brought him up, she changed the subject to the weather or the projections for the upcoming fishing season. She stopped calling, stopped answering the door when I dropped by. So I asked questions, and this time I didn’t give up. I went higher and higher until I finally got called into the head office. Only it wasn’t Nugent there. It was some other man—Victor. Head of the Sov. Next thing I know I was discharged from the police force. I asked why I was being fired—they said ‘not a good fit.’ Whatever that means. But I knew the truth. Those boys could hardly stomach a woman on the force to begin with, but a strong-willed woman? A woman willing to ask the hard questions and think for herself? That was something far too dangerous to be holding a badge in this town.”

  “I’m so sorry,” their dad said.

  “Yeah, well.” Donna cleared her throat.

  “Why didn’t they give you the injection?” Everleigh asked. “You had all that confidential information—weren’t they worried you would expose them after you’d been fired?”

  “This was back before everyone in town had to have a shot. After I left the force, I kept my head down and stayed out of their way. I guess they just forgot about me.”

  “How come you never left Driftwood Harbor?” their dad asked.

  “I did,” Donna said. “Or at least I tried to. I can’t tell you the number of times I packed up my truck and started driving. I figured I’d just go away and let this all be someone else’s problem. Maybe I’d phone in a tip from the road, once I was far out of the Sov’s reach. But every time I tried to leave, I’d only get as far as the city limits before I’d turn back around again. I can’t explain it. I just . . . changed my mind. I couldn’t even remember why I wanted to go anymore. I think—and I know this sounds out there—but I think the Sov have some kind of power over this town. Unnatural power that has nothing to do with the shots.”

  Beacon had suspected this. But something about hearing it said out loud made the skin on the back of his neck prickle.

  Donna cleared her throat loudly. “But enough about me. I want to help you get your friend back.”

  “How?” Beacon asked.

  “Well, I like your plan—the one about acting as if you’re escaped participants. But it won’t work unless you have someone on the outside helping, too.”

  “What are you suggesting?” Everleigh said.

  “You two kick up a real fuss while your dad hauls you back. Once you’re in, you focus on finding that kid. I’ll create a distraction and get you all out.”

  “What kind of distraction?” Beacon asked.

  “Oh, I can think of a few things,” she said, winking.

  “But why?” Everleigh said. “You spent forty years standing by while all this happened—why are you suddenly helping us?”

  Their dad opened his mouth, probably to tell Everleigh she was being rude, but then he closed it again. It seemed even he wanted to know the answer to that question.

  “I just couldn’t do it anymore,” Donna said. “Not after I got to know the three of you. I couldn’t convince myself it was okay this time. Seeing the way you changed . . .” She looked at Everleigh and shook her head. “I liked you the way you were. The way you are. It isn’t right what they’re doing. I’ve spent too long watching this town change. I’m going to be the brave woman I always wanted to be back when I was a sheriff’s deputy.” Her eyes watered, and she blinked fast to work the tears away.

  There was a long, loaded silence.

  “Come with us,” Everleigh finally said. “When we get Arthur and leave Driftwood Harbor—there’s room for you in the car.”

  “Absolutely,” their dad agreed.

  Donna swallowed. “That’s real kind of you. Kinder than I deserve. But I’m staying here. I need to right the wrongs of my past.”

  Everleigh opened her mouth to argu
e, but Donna was already shaking her head. “I won’t go when all those kids are still in trouble. I’m one of the only adults not under their control. If I leave, what hope do they have?”

  Everleigh didn’t have an answer for that, but she frowned, deep and hard.

  “Are we getting that kid out, or what?” Donna said, forcing a cheery tone.

  “Yes!” Beacon said at the same time as his dad and sister said, “No.”

  Beacon gaped at his family.

  “What?! Dad, I thought you were on board!”

  “I’m all for helping Arthur if we can,” his dad explained, “but what you’re proposing is too flimsy. There are just too many unknown variables. One slip, and they’d be onto us. And then all of us would be trapped in there. It’s too dangerous.”

  It was true. There were problems with the plan big enough to drive a truck through. But it was the only plan they had, and Arthur needed him.

  “We can’t just leave Arthur behind,” Beacon said fiercely. “We’re his only chance. Who knows what they’ll do to him if we don’t help? It’s like you’re always saying—do the benefits outweigh the risks? And they do. They definitely do.”

  Their dad looked from twin to twin. “I’m sorry, but—”

  “Listen,” Beacon said. “I know you don’t know Arthur. I know you just want the best for us, and I know you don’t want to take any chances after—after Jasper died,” he said, forcing himself to say the words in one quick rush. “But I’m doing it with or without you. If I don’t try and he dies because of me, because I didn’t do anything to help him, then that would be on me, and I just wouldn’t be okay with that. I would never forgive myself, and I would never forgive you for stopping me. I’m not asking you to help. I just need you to let me walk out that door.”

  There was a long, strained pause before his dad ran a hand through his thinned hair and blew out a harsh breath.

  “We better get going right away then,” he said. “It’ll look suspicious if we’ve been gone for too long.”

  “Y-you’re going to help?” Beacon asked.