“You know, I’m not nervous,” I said.
My plan was going to work. I’d never felt so confident.
* * *
Subject #9, Chief Lisa Kaufman: People started gathering hours before the event was scheduled. Most of my officers ended up at the town square, directing traffic and keeping the peace. At 6:00, I made the call to block off Main Street from vehicle traffic. The crowd was already spilling out of the square.
* * *
At Irving High School, the curtain was about to rise on Hamelin!. I texted Cass.
GH: Ready for tonight?
CR: I’ve never been more readily for anything in my life
CR: *redy
CR: Holy zeus **READY
I relayed the information to Ishmael.
“And Owen’s fine with all this?” he asked, keeping his eyes on the road. We passed by Mr. O’Grady’s field and I wondered about the state of our crop circle.
“He doesn’t want to participate, but he’s fine with Cass doing it,” I replied.
Owen and I had a long talk about the hoax—among other things. He still didn’t condone my actions, exactly, but he said he understood my reasons. Sometimes that’s enough.
“And he knows when to hand off his costume?” Ishmael went on. “Cass will have time to change?”
I looked at my brother for a long moment. “I never thought I’d be saying this…but Ishmael, you really need to chill.”
* * *
Subject #14, Arnold (Arnie) Hodges: Oh, we noticed the increased police presence. We knew the government didn’t want Oz’s product to get out. They’d been watching him for a long time, and they were terrified of what secrets he might reveal.
* * *
We were still miles from town, surrounded by woods, when Ishmael slammed on the brakes.
“Dude, did you see that?”
“What?”
He leaned forward and peered through the windshield. I, meanwhile, looked anxiously behind us.
“You realize you stopped in the middle of the road, right?”
“There!” he shouted.
I looked in the direction he pointed and saw a flash of black and white through the trees.
“What is…” I began.
But then I knew.
Ishmael put the Jeep in park and threw the door open. A second later he darted into the woods, shouting, “Muffin!”
The fucking cow.
We were on a sensitive schedule, heading to one of the most important places we’d ever need to be, and my brother took off into the woods after a cow.
I jumped out of the Jeep. “Ishmael! We don’t have time for this.”
I heard my brother crashing through the woods, but with the deepening evening shadows, I wasn’t able to see him. I took a tentative step toward the tree line.
“Ishmael!” I called again.
From the woods, he shouted, “Muffin!”
He was going to make us late. He was going to get stuck in the woods after dark, without a flashlight. He was going to ruin everything. I glanced back at the empty Jeep, still in the middle of the road, engine running.
Then, from inside the woods I heard a loud crash and my brother yelled, “Ow, fuck!”
* * *
Subject #2, Magdalene (Maggie) Hofstadt: Mom was helping Oz prepare for the launch and Dad was at the gym, so I asked Gram to drive me to the softball field, where my team was waiting. Gram asked what we were up to, and I said we wanted to practice before Sunday’s game. Once she was gone, I gathered everyone in a circle. I asked if they were ready to announce our message of peace to the world and make Oz see the error of his ways—myTality really was such a scam.
* * *
Ishmael was on the ground, gripping his right ankle, his face contorted in pain.
“What the hell happened?” I asked.
“She got away, dude.”
“To your ankle, not the cow.”
“I tripped,” he said, wincing. He rolled up the leg of his pants and to my dismay his ankle was already starting to swell.
“Godammit, Ishmael.”
“I didn’t do it on purpose!”
He was supposed to be the graceful one. Tripping and twisting an ankle in the woods was something that would happen to me.
“You had to go after the cow,” I said. “What would you have done if you caught her? Shove her in the back seat of the Jeep?”
“Can you just help me get back to the road?”
Ah, yes, the road. Where our Jeep was parked without headlights in the quickly darkening night, waiting for someone to tear around a corner too quickly and ram into it.
Wonderful.
I helped Ishmael to his feet. With him leaning on me for support, we slowly made our way across the uneven terrain.
“Gideon?” he said.
“What?” I snapped, already worn out from the unexpected exercise.
“It’s my right ankle that’s hurt.”
“Yes, I saw.”
Ishmael hesitated, then said, “You know I won’t be able to drive, right?”
* * *
Subject #15, Sofia Russo: Let’s give credit where it’s due: I was the one who organized the freshman rats. It all happened during the scene when the Pied Piper leads the rats out of Hamelin. Backstage, Cass changed into the Owen’s costume because I guess he wasn’t into the scheme. Who even knows what the audience thought when “Greta” came onstage dressed as the Piper. Whatever. Cass started playing the pipe and the rats followed her, except they followed her right off the stage and through the audience. People were like, “What’s even going on?” But then a bunch of Ishmael’s friends in the audience got up and followed Cass out of the auditorium. I glanced behind me right before we went outside, and other people in the audience, people who were totally not in on the plan, started to follow too. Exactly like Cass said they would. But yeah. None of it would have happened if I hadn’t gotten the rats to agree in the first place.
* * *
I’d managed to pull the Jeep to the side of the road so, at the very least, my brother and I weren’t facing imminent death.
“You can do this,” Ishmael said for the third time.
“I can’t,” I replied tersely. My hands gripped the steering wheel. Sweat beaded on my forehead. “Not only is it illegal for me to drive without an adult, it’s also exceedingly dangerous, being that I’ve had minimal practice and—”
“Dude,” my brother interrupted.
“What?”
“Stop using that superior voice. It’s okay to be scared.”
I swallowed the lump in my throat. I attempted to loosen my grip on the wheel. Pain shot through my jaw and down my neck. I was going to grind my teeth away to nothing.
“I can’t do it,” I said again, meekly.
“You can,” Ishmael insisted. “You know how to drive. It freaks you out, but you know exactly how to do it.”
“I can’t merge.”
“You won’t need to merge.”
“I can’t park.”
“We’ll find an open space for you to pull over.”
“I can’t make left turns.”
Ishmael hesitated. “We’ll deal with that when we come to it.”
I licked my lips. I took a deep breath. I glanced in the rearview mirror at the road behind me.
“I can’t,” I said.
“Gideon. Look at me.” I complied. Ishmael’s expression was earnest. “You’ve done harder stuff than drive. Way harder. Setting up everything for tonight was harder than driving. And if you don’t drive now, it’ll all be for nothing.”
He was right.
“Oz will win,” Ishmael went on. “He’ll win. Is that what you want?”
“No.”
It was the very las
t thing I wanted.
“Then put the Jeep in drive, and let’s get to the lava lamp.”
My hands shook. I’d only driven twice. I’d never driven in the dark. I was absolutely terrified.
But Ishmael was right. I couldn’t let Oz win.
Sometimes, no matter how terrifying a thing was, you needed to do it anyway.
I put the Jeep in drive.
“You’ve got this,” Ishmael encouraged.
Slowly, carefully, I eased my foot off the brake.
* * *
Subject #6, Arden Byrd: I stayed home that night because I couldn’t bear to see Oz. Plus things still felt a little awkward with Gideon, even though I could tell he was making an effort to be a better friend. Later, I kinda wished I had gone. I felt—I still feel—like I missed out on something important.
* * *
“I don’t mean to pressure you, dude,” Ishmael said a while later, “but if you don’t go above twenty miles an hour, we’re gonna get there too late.”
“This road is curvy,” I snapped, hunched forward in my seat. “It’s dangerous.”
“Right… It’s just, the speed limit is actually forty-five.”
“Surely, they mislabeled it.”
“Either way, isn’t going too slow kinda just as dangerous as going too fast?”
“I know the rules of the road, Ishmael!” I said.
“Okay, dude. Okay. We’ll get there when we get there.”
* * *
Subject #4, Victor Hofstadt (Father): I’m at the gym, and suddenly people start gathering around the window. I go over to see what the fuss is about. And there’s Cass Robinson, dressed as some kind of court jester, leading a line of people down the street. A couple guys go outside to ask what’s happening, and they end up joining the line. Then a few more people do. Next thing I know, I’m the only one left in the gym besides the kid behind the counter. So yeah. I went out and got in the line.
* * *
My eyes went to the clock. It was 7:00. Oswald would start in about five minutes, fashionably late as always, I presumed.
“Do you think Cass is already at the square?” Ishmael asked as the Jeep crawled along.
“I don’t know.”
“Do you think the crowd is going to be really huge?”
“Ishmael. I don’t know.”
I didn’t take my eyes off the road. Though driving was getting slightly less daunting, my body was still knotted with tension. And we’d finally made it to town. Which meant stoplights and other drivers.
Though, to be fair, there were few people on the road for a Saturday night. I hoped because all of them were at the lava lamp.
* * *
Subject #16, Myrtle Johannsen (tourist): I was in Lansburg with a group from the senior center. I’d never been before, but Janine from water aerobics had so many nice things to say about the town. Lovely shops and restaurants, and a real, authentic German feel to it. I was absolutely charmed, even with that lava lamp in the middle of it all. Until we got stuck there, that is. Our tour bus got trapped in a parking lot before the streets got blocked off. “What in the world is going on?” I asked Janine. The strangest groups of people had gathered around that silly lava lamp. I’d never seen anything like it in my life.
* * *
Later, I saw footage from the beginning of the launch. Some of it gathered by news crews, some posted on blogs by Seekers. So, though I was inching down the street in the Jeep, with Ishmael beside me, moaning, “I could walk faster than this,” I still saw how the event started.
How the speakers blasting ’80s pop music went silent.
How spotlights from the ground were trained on the lava lamp and how the crowd turned their expectant faces upward.
How the Seekers and myTality™ distributors overflowed from the square, and how the Lansburg police department was patrolling, the officers wearing expressions of concern.
How there was a sudden ruckus in the silence, and the crowd turned to look behind them where a teenage girl, dressed in a strange costume and waving a pipe like a baton, joined the gathering, a massive line of people trailing behind her. People from the gym and from the churches, people from the schools and the shops. The town of Lansburg followed the makeshift Pied Piper, and they joined the crowd already formed at the lava lamp until Main Street became a crush of people.
And then, with everyone gathered, the spotlights flashed, and J. Quincy Oswald himself stepped to the rail of the lava lamp’s observation deck. He regarded the crowd, a king looking over his kingdom, and from the news footage I studied later, I could see he was pleased.
“My dear distributors,” Oswald began, in his smooth, authoritative voice. “How very much I’ve loved you. How very much good we’ve done together. And tonight, you’ll join me as we embark on a new chapter and invite new people to join our quest to change lives all over the world. Welcome, all!”
Oswald held his arms out, the way a preacher on a pulpit might. He wasn’t bogged down by a bullhorn. The sound system worked perfectly, carrying his voice to the very back of the crowd.
“As many of you know,” he went on, “for some unexplained set of reasons, I happen to be selected by extraterrestrial Visitors as their ambassador. You may not believe it yet, but I’ll tell you, after what you see here tonight, you’ll be forever changed.”
The crowd roared with approval and watched Oswald raptly.
And in the very back of that crowd, at the end of Main Street, near Ye Olde Fudge Shoppe, no one turned around when a beat-up Jeep slowly rolled to a stop behind them.
* * *
Subject #3, Cassidy (Cass) Robinson: Honestly, I didn’t expect that many people to get in my conga line. Add that to everyone already at the lava lamp, and practically all of Lansburg turned up. I’m not saying Owen couldn’t have done it…but while I was leading everyone, it clicked. I was doing exactly what I was meant to. I knew from the start that the role of Pied Piper was supposed to be mine.
* * *
“Holy shit,” Ishmael muttered when the crowd appeared in front of us.
“There’s nowhere to park.” I couldn’t keep the edge of panic from my voice.
“Just stop here.”
“In the middle of the street?”
“Well, I don’t want you getting close to the crowd and forgetting which pedal is the brake. Again.”
I gritted my teeth.
I pulled to the side of the road and positioned the Jeep near the curb as well as I could. Ishmael and I climbed out and were immediately met by Oswald’s voice, carrying through the speakers.
I’d read his speech already—I needed to know my cue to turn the lava lamp on—so I knew he was close to the unveiling. Too close.
“We need to go, now.”
But that was easier said than done. Ishmael walked with a pronounced limp and leaned on me for support. We tried to fight our way through the crowd, but people pushed back. Elbows dug into my sides. My feet got stomped on.
We weren’t going to make it in time.
“Ishmael, you have to cue the recording on the flash drive,” I shouted as we continued to work through the crowd.
“What? I don’t know how to do that.”
“You have to. I can’t turn on the lava lamp and get the recording ready in time.”
“Laser isn’t going to let me touch her equipment,” he said. “She’s hated me since that time I put up flyers advertising free ice cream to anyone who ordered in a British accent.”
“That was you?”
Before he could respond, the crowd began cheering, people around us bouncing up and down, and I was barely able to keep from toppling over.
Oswald was explaining the benefits of the Elixir ETernia. Only a few more lines before the lava lamp was supposed to light up.
“Okay,” I said.
“I’ll deal with Laser and the sound system. You turn the lamp on. It’s just one switch.”
“Now that I can handle.”
The switch was labeled, and it only took a second to describe where in the boiler room it was. “Just listen for the cue. Oswald will say, Behold, the Elixir ETernia, and then you pull the lever marked ‘light’ and he’ll hold up the product at the same time.”
“That’s all?”
“That’s all. The heating element is already on.”
Just one lever, then there’d be a long silence as the crowd watched in awe. And that was the moment the recording would begin playing from the speakers.
Hopefully.
Finally, miraculously, Ishmael and I reached the base of the lava lamp. The myTality™ distributor standing at the door nodded to me and unlocked the boiler room. I practically pushed my brother inside.
Then I began fighting through the crowd again, heading toward the sound system.
* * *
Subject #17, Laser (last name unknown): It wasn’t my kind of event, but I was getting paid, so I could deal. Until this woman in, I shit you not, a purple business suit showed up. She started looking over my shoulder, asking questions like I didn’t know what I was doing. What made that Oz guy think I needed a babysitter?
* * *
I pushed through to where Laser was set up with her laptop. I panted from exertion, tried my best to stay on my feet. I was so focused on the time crunch, for a moment I didn’t notice the person standing behind Laser.
Then I did a double take.
“Mother? What are you doing?”
“Just helping Laser, honey,” Mother said over the noise of the crowd.
Laser rolled her eyes. “Yeah. She’s a huge help.”
I was only 12 percent sure I could pull off my plan in time, so I’d have to worry about Mother later. I dug the flash drive from my pocket and held it out to Laser. “I need you to plug this in.”
She reached for it, but Mother stepped between us. “What’s this?”
“It’s an audio file. Oswald wants it to play after the unveiling.”
“He didn’t mention it to me.”
Up on the observation deck, Oswald neared the pivotal moment.
“It was last minute,” I said.
It Came from the Sky Page 29