by Ruth Fox
Zach switched on his watch LED and Ryder used the penlight as they arrived at the park. It was dark, but Zach and Ryder knew every inch of grass. They crossed to the far side and sidled along the high brick fence and ducked behind ferns and overhanging trees, disturbing a few birds who had bedded down for the night.
Zach ran his hand along the fence. Something crumbled under his fingers. He aimed his watch closer, and saw a small gap. “Here,” whispered Zach.
The others high-fived—Monster-boy had finally managed to get the hang of this under Ryder’s guidance—and Zach held back a bush while they shuffled closer. Ducking through the gap, they emerged onto the neatly-clipped lawn of the Hope Orphanage.
Garden lights lined the driveway, and a warm glow spilled from several windows on the top floor. The bottom floor was dark.
Zach brushed himself off—the night dew was cold and soaked into his jeans, but he barely felt it through the buzz of excitement. Avoiding the round pools of illumination from the lights along the driveway, they made their way up to the house.
Monster-boy, leading the way, motioned to the side of the house. Of course, they wouldn’t be going in the front door; that was probably locked, and certainly watched by security cameras.
Monster-boy knew where he was going. He hopped up onto the porch and ducked through a few plants in large terracotta pots, stopping in front of a small frosted-glass window. Monster-boy gave it a light thump with his palm, then hooked one of his curved claws between the sill and the frame. The window didn’t budge.
Monster-boy wasn’t fazed. He lifted the hem of his pants and pulled something out of his sock. It was, Zach saw with alarm, a knife—his own very sharp kitchen knife, the one that he used for slicing and dicing. Monster-boy had wrapped it in a thin tea-towel, which he pulled off, then slipped the keen blade between the bottom of the window and the windowsill.
The window slid upwards.
“You—” Zach started to whisper, but Monster-boy held up a hand and shook his head, telling Zach that they needed to be quiet. He motioned to the open window, and after tucking the re-wrapped knife back in his sock he slipped through quickly and easily.
The room beyond was dark and shadowed. Monster-boy’s yellow eyes gleamed on a shiny surface—a mirror, Zach realised, as he awkwardly followed Monster-boy through the small gap. They were in a bathroom—just as Zach thought, this was the bathroom Harrison had told him about on his first visit here. Ryder, being much bigger than the others, had the most trouble getting in, but after a bit of puffing and panting and a few groans, he tipped onto the tiled floor with a grazed knuckle.
They all stood there for a moment, imagining that they heard footsteps, coughs, creaking floorboards. Monster-boy wasn’t daunted. He pointed towards the door.
Beyond, the hallway was shadowed. They tiptoed through it, and Zach recognised the entryway to their right. Slanted beams of moonlight fell through the glass on either side of the door. Zach avoided stepping in them—as if they, too, might be laser beams, somehow rigged to show him as an intruder. Monster-boy gripped his shoulder, making Zach jump; “Sorry,” whispered Monster-boy, and nodded towards the stairs.
Zach put his weight on the banister, then put his foot on the first step, carefully stepping on the carpet, not the bare wood. The others followed close behind—Zach could hear Ryder breathing in his ear, and nudged him back.
He reached the top of the stairs and looked back at Monster-boy. His adopted brother nodded to the left. A board creaked under his feet, and he froze. They all did. After a full minute—Zach counted it by the thudding of his pulse in his ears—there was no movement or shout of discovery.
Monster-boy pointed to a door at the end of the hallway. Zach saw a brass nameplate that read Patricia Cutter, Director. Underneath was a smaller plate that read Private.
If the sign hadn’t been there, the lock would have said all it needed to—and more.
“That’s the biggest lock I’ve ever seen,” whispered Ryder.
It was the biggest and fanciest lock any of them had seen. Gold and bulbous, with ornate floral swirls around the old-fashioned keyhole. Zach suddenly had grave doubts about their plan.
But Monster-boy didn’t. He looked down at the lock with a grin. His eyes shone brightly, and he extended one of his long, curved claws, and slipped the sharp tip into the keyhole.
He wriggled it back and forth. He twisted it a little. He twisted it a little more. He wriggled it again. Something clicked, and something slid back, and something else clunked. And then the door swung open.
Until this moment, Zach hadn’t really believed that this part of their plan was possible. Even though they’d talked it through, and Monster-boy had assured him this would work, that he had broken into locked rooms many times (though he wouldn’t say when, where, or what for) and was sure he could do it, even on a big, fancy, crazy lock, he’d still doubted. But now—
He looked at Monster-boy with incredulity, amazement, and . . . yes, admiration.
Ryder was pretty impressed, too. “I wish I had claws like that,” whispered Ryder.
Monster-boy grinned, but didn’t waste any time pushing the door open and ducking inside.
The office was brighter than the hallway, thanks to a wide window that gave a view of the twinkling streetlights of Main Street beyond the fence. The room was large with a high ceiling, but there wasn’t much furniture in it: a bookcase that had about seven books on it, all of them soppy-looking romance novels; three filing cabinets along the wall; two hard-backed chairs in one corner, and another more comfortable-looking chair behind a wooden desk.
As they’d planned, Monster-boy went straight to the desk. He crouched in front of the locked drawer, fitting in a claw to test the keyhole. Zach’s attention was distracted by the filing cabinets.
They were all neatly labelled with little white cards and clear black permanent marker slipped into the little windows at the front. Harlin–Hawkins, Jameson–Jones, Leithman–Lancaster. He paused for a moment, considering. Monster-boy hadn’t been able to tell Mr. Rivers his last name.
Maybe monsters didn’t even have last names.
Then his eye caught the bottom drawer of the last cabinet. Miscellaneous. He slid it open, and found that there were only three files inside. The one at the back was Morton X (Morgenstern).
Zach pulled the file out. Inside was all the paperwork his mum and dad had spent so long filling out. There was a copy of the little yellow permit that Morton had to carry, and a smaller green folder, with a very unhappy-looking photo of Morton on the front. Zach shoved this green folder into the front pocket of his jacket, then put all the rest back. He slid the cabinet shut.
“. . . might not work,” Ryder was saying quietly but urgently. He was shifting from foot to foot, and looking more nervous by the second. “But we can say we gave it a shot . . .”
But Monster-boy was determinedly focusing on his task. He refused to be distracted.
“Zach!” said Ryder, imploringly. “We’ve been in here for ages. I’ve got a bad feeling about this. We should go.”
“Morton?” asked Zach.
Monster-boy didn’t look up. This lock, unlike the one on the door, was small, not delicate, but intricate. He had to be careful. He had to be methodical. “I can do this,” he said. “I can do it.”
That was all Zach needed. “We’ll wait,” he whispered determinedly. “It doesn’t matter how long it takes.”
Ryder didn’t look happy. “I’ve just got a feeling—something’s going to go wrong,” he said, then settled back into bouncing from foot to foot.
“Hah!” Monster-boy let out a little whoosh of breath, and the drawer came open. He reached inside and came up with a handful of goods—a bunch of rings, a silver necklace, two old mobile phones, and a beaded headband. He dropped these and dug deeper. T
here were more mobile phones and a pair of pretty good headphones, a stuffed toy bear clutching a padded heart, and an old-fashioned fountain pen in a velvet case. Ms. Cutter must have been stealing from kids for years to accumulate all that stuff, Zach thought; but why? Some of the things were valuable, but if she was just keeping it here instead of selling it, what was the point?
“This is it,” said Monster-boy. He held up a thin silver wristband made of solid metal. Zach had pictured it being bigger. Monster-boy tucked it into his pocket before he could look closer.
“Let’s go!” said a very relieved Ryder.
“Should we lock up?” Zach asked.
“It’ll take too long,” Ryder said. “Let’s just get out of here!”
They retraced their steps along the hallway, down the stairs, and back through to the bathroom. The window was still open. It was all a bit too easy, Zach thought, wondering if Ryder was right; but he wasn’t going to complain.
They had just climbed off the porch when a light flickered on behind them. Zach turned around and saw Harrison standing there behind the window, his face lit up with a wide grin.
Zach raised his hands, looking back through the window. No, please don’t . . . he mimed. But Harrison was already opening his mouth.
“Ms. Cutteeeeeer!” he called.
“Crap!” Ryder yelped.
There was a soft sound from upstairs, and a light flicked on, bathing the three friends in a yellow glow.
“Run!” Zach said, pushing his friend ahead of him.
More lights flicked on through the windows of the bottom floor. A door slammed open, echoing down the slope; someone had just come through the front door.
Zach glanced towards the corner of the grounds, where they’d climbed in through the fence. It was too far—whoever had come out would reach them before then! Zach glanced over his shoulder at the looming barred gates—they were much closer.
But if someone didn’t do something right now, they were all going to get caught. Zach didn’t have time to muck this up.
“Okay,” he said, reaching into his pockets and finding the pumpkin seeds he’d put there earlier. He flung them over the gates. The camera detected the movement and swivelled to track the falling and bouncing seeds. “Go now. Go!”
Monster-boy did it so easily. He scrambled up and over the gates like a spider. He dropped over the other side and landed in a crouch before either Ryder or Zach had made it halfway up.
The gates rattled under them. A blinking red light flashed on and off. The camera whirred, shifting left and right, trying to focus, but the motion sensors weren’t fooled. Seconds later, a sharp wailing alarm rang out.
Ryder stopped, clinging to the top of the gate, puffing.
“Don’t stop!” Zach called, waving him on. The figure striding towards them was unmistakably Ms. Cutter. Her face was pale in the garden lights lining the driveway.
With a burst of speed, Ryder hauled himself over the top, then dropped to the ground and started running. Zach wrenched his shoulder reaching for the top bar, but ignored the pain. He swayed a little, losing his balance on the unsteady gates, but refused to let himself fall. He tried to put his foot down on the other side, but missed the bar and slipped. Instead of holding on, he let go. The gate swung back as far as its hinges would allow, and he tumbled in a heap. He hit the street with his palms and his knees. Jarring pain zapped through his wrists.
“Come on,” said a voice in his ear. A pair of clawed hands grabbed his shoulders and lifted him to his feet. He was momentarily stunned—he thought Monster-boy would run as soon as he was free, as Ryder had—but he was grateful.
Together, they pelted down the street after Ryder, the alarm ringing in their ears.
❖ ❖ ❖
They didn’t stop until they reached Main Street, and then only because they couldn’t run any more. Well, Zach and Ryder couldn’t. Monster-boy was barely puffing.
They stopped next to Frankie’s Pizza and leaned against the wall.
“What are we going to do?” Ryder wheezed.
Zach didn’t know. None of them knew. If any of them had any idea, before they left tonight, that this would happen, they would have thought it would be an awesome adventure. But here in the darkness, with the sound of the alarm still ringing in their ears, it wasn’t a joke.
“Should we tell someone?” Ryder went on.
Zach nodded, then shook his head. “I don’t know.”
“They’re going to find out about us being in the orphanage,” Ryder said. “Even if she didn’t see us, they’ll have caught us on the security cameras.”
Monster-boy was looking down at his shoes. “I don’t want to get in trouble,” he said quietly.
“I think we’re already in big trouble,” Zach said.
As the words left his mouth, red and blue lights flashed blindingly over them.
“Put your hands in the air!” a man shouted. “Don’t move! Hands in the air! Now!”
Chapter Twelve
It took a moment for Zach to figure out what was going on. The dazzling lights blinded him, and the man’s voice was so loud: “Turn around slowly. Keep your hands where I can see them. No sudden movements.”
A figure emerged from the fog of flashing lights. Zach squinted up at him. It was Police Chief Andy.
His heart skipped a beat. He tried to remember that Chief Andy was a pretty decent guy, most of the time. If they were going to get caught by anyone, it was probably best that it was him.
“Zach Morgenstern?” said Chief Andy. “What on earth are you boys doing out here? Don’t you have any idea what you’re—” he clucked his tongue, then lifted his police radio, which was buzzing and saying “Number Four, number four, report.”
“Geez, Jenson, give us a minute,” he growled, then shoved the radio back through the car window. Then he fixed his gaze on all three of them.
“Now,” he said, very gravely, “Do you want to tell me what’s going on?”
❖ ❖ ❖
Chief Andy took them back to the station. Zach had been in the police station only once for a school excursion which had been cut short when Jayden Davies had tried to pinch a pair of handcuffs from behind the front desk. Still, even with this limited experience, he had an idea that it wasn’t usually this crowded in here at this time of night.
Zach’s heart seized in his chest, and the others must have had the same thought, because Ryder whispered, “Are they all here for us?” as they were ushered past the reception desk.
The blonde officer behind the desk looked up. “Any of these relations to the victim, Andy?”
Chief Andy shook his head. “Picked them up on the way.”
The woman narrowed her eyes, focusing on Monster-boy. “Has he got his yellow permit on him? I’ll need to see that . . .”
Andy growled. “Honestly, Deb, I’m not going to fuss about a permit at a time like this.”
“But it’s the law—”
“Not now,” Andy said firmly, ushering them into a small room with hard plastic chairs and a long one-way window. “Sit down. All of you.”
They sat, instantly. They put their hands in their laps and looked uneasily at their reflections in the long glass window.
Andy closed the door.
“Look,” he said. “You’re all smart boys. I’m sure you recognise the gravity of this situation, hm? We’ve just had another kid reported missing, and you’re out gallivanting in the streets like it’s a Sunday in the park.”
The three friends looked at one another. None of them knew what to say. They had half-expected that Chief Andy would know about their break-in and the orphanage—that the security firm might have sent the footage straight to the police. But he seemed to think they’d just been out mucking around, breaking curfew for the
fun of it.
“Oh,” said Zach, feeling sick.
“That’s why it’s so dangerous for you to be roaming the streets,” he said. “These attacks are becoming more and more frequent. We’ve asked all parents to implement measures—”
“They did!” said Zach. “I mean, sir, my parents did, um, implement measures. They told us not to go wandering. So it wasn’t their fault. We were just . . . um, mucking around.”
“I’m not blaming them,” Chief Andy growled. “You’re not toddlers. You should have more sense.”
The three of them hung their heads.
“Zach, you’re a good lad, and I’m very good friends with your father. Was there any reason—any reason at all—that you felt you had to go wandering around the city streets at this hour?”
Zach opened his mouth to tell Andy everything that had happened to them that night, but then he thought about the knife. It was as though someone had thrown a bucket of ice water over him. If he told him about breaking into the orphanage, Chief Andy would question Morton. Monster-boy, who was sitting there with a knife in his shoe!
Morton would be sent straight back to the Other Side of the Wall.
Zach sat with his mouth half-open, in agony of indecision. The story was on the tip of his tongue. But how could he do this without getting them all into more trouble?
At that moment there was a knock at the door. “Andy! We’ve got something out here—” said the woman they’d seen at the reception desk. “You need to see this.”
Chief Andy puffed out a breath. “Fine—you three—I’m going to give your parents a call. I’ll leave the punishment up to them. But I don’t want to see any of you out on the streets after dark again, hm?”
