Dark Times

by Rob Reger

  Later

  Have shown Lily the Boardroom—briefly. She’d barely stepped a foot inside before she turned and hustled right back out.

  ME: You OK, Lily?

  Lily: [Voice made shaky by her shuddering.] Uncanny . . . place . . . !

  Me: C’mon, Lily. Look at me . . . look at YOU! WE’RE uncanny. Let’s go back in and check it out, huh?

  L: [Clearing her throat. Straightening her shoulders—with effort.] Maybe . . . later.

  Later

  Have found something very intriguing—a series of letters carved into a post!

  ME: I think it’s a code! M.E. wanted M.K. to come see them in the A.M. Don’t you think?

  Lily: Perhaps . . . but . . .

  Me: Yeah, I really have nowhere else to go with that thought.

  L: [Kindly.] Let’s keep exploring, shall we?

  A lot later

  Excellent night!!!! We have been in the tunnels for hours, and I think we’ve mapped them all. Here’s the incredible part: The map seems to form some kind of symbolic shape. Check it out:

  Neither Lily nor I recognize this symbol. Wait, that’s not exactly what I mean. I mean that we’ve never seen it before. As soon as we’d been through the last unexplored tunnel, and I drew in the final remaining piece of the map, we both looked at the completed shape, and . . . we KNEW it.

  This is one of THOSE places.

  Like the secret closet under Aunt Emma’s house in Blackrock. A place Dark Aunts have flourished. I could feel it the first time I jumped into the pit in Lily’s basement—the way my eyes sharpened up and showed me the way into the tunnels.

  I told Lily this, and all she did was nod and say, “Let’s go back to the Boardroom.”

  Later

  PROGRESS!!!!! And even more mystery. We’d been hanging out in the Boardroom for a while, speculating on who made it and what it was used for. Lily was still calling it “uncanny,” but no longer running away. She’s right, though, y’know—I could feel that whatever unusual quality is in the tunnels was strongest right there in that room.

  I was just idly roaming around, thinking the above thought, running my hands over the table, when something caught my eye: another set of letters carved faintly into the back of one of the chairs.

  ME: Lily! Check this out, I found “EM” carved into this chair!

  LILY: Are there any on the other chairs?

  We ran around the room checking them all. Three of the chairs had no letters we could see, but the others had the following carved into them: NL, LC, AV, MA, MF, EM, MK, CU, AM, ME.

  Let the code-breaking begin!!!!!!!!!!

  Later

  We’ve gone back to that post that had the letters on it and looked at it more closely, and sure enough, under a LOT of dust and VERY faint, we found six more sets of letters above the original four, matching the ones on the chairs.

  Not that this explains ANYTHING.

  All right. Lily and I are pooped and the sun will be up soon. Heading home.

  Thursday, August 12, 179O

  Today's assignments:

  Avoid looters-13 points

  Code-break-113 points

  Opal came into Lily’s room at half past sunrise this morning and woke us both up with a newsflash from her psychic boyfriend.

  OPAL: Emily, Lily, please wake up. Caleb says there are looters in the streets. We must be ready for them if we’re attacked.

  Me: Can’t Boris’ henchmen handle them?

  O: Most of them have fled. Here, put some clothes on and come to Mother’s room.

  When we joined the family, Caleb was laying out the situation for Pearl as calmly as possible, but I could tell he was worried—REALLY worried.

  CALEB: Did your husband keep any sort of weaponry?

  PEARL: Heavens, no!

  C: Spades? Pitchforks? Scythes?

  P: No, nothing like that.

  C: [Eyes glazing momentarily, in a way that made me think of Jakey.] Boris is coming. Miss Emily, may I suggest you hide in the dumbwaiter?

  So that’s why I’m back in the tunnel, slogging through the mud. Am going to check in on the Ebenezers and make sure they are not getting looted.

  Later

  I found the Ebenezers hiding from looters in the warehouse. Helped them barricade the doors with crates and boards. John had just returned from his job, which currently consists of roaming the streets with a cart yelling, “Bring out your dead!” and then carting the dead to the fields where the mass burials are being held. Hannah did not want him to go at all, but the job pays in food, which is in short supply—and, after all, looters are not super interested in a man with a cart full of dead people. Can hardly believe I am witnessing such times!

  Hannah has fed me some potatoes and hominy. Extremely delicious.43

  John says we are very lucky to have found a warehouse with some food supplies. Apparently, the farmers who normally bring produce into the city in the wee hours each morning stopped coming when word of the white fever epidemic got around. Prices started going up right away, but even so, people quickly bought whatever they could grab. Soon the markets were empty, which prompted today’s looting festivities. Yes. How quickly civilization becomes chaos!

  ME: And it’s all because of a little mosquito.

  John: Miss Emily, have you ever seen a person die of the white fever? I don’t understand how you can believe a tiny insect could cause such a terrible ailment.

  ME: [And Now, Emily Explains to 1790s Guy . . . Germ Theory!] Well, the thing is, there are even tinier . . . creatures, sort of, called viruses, that are too small to see. And they live inside the mosquitoes. And, uh, when the mosquito bites you, some of the tiny creatures get inside your blood, and make you sick. . . . . . . . . . Uh, seriously.

  J: [Polite, but unconvinced.] I see.

  Sweetie-Pie: ’Squito fish eat ’squitoes.

  HANNAH: Yes, dear. Finish your potatoes.

  ME: [Interested.] What ’squito fish are those?

  H: Oh, the children raise mosquito fish and sell them to the neighborhood children. Or they used to, anyway.

  Me: Those fish you’re keeping in those jars by the window? But you’ve been feeding them ants. No mosquitoes in this warehouse.

  James: They do best on mosquitoes, though.

  Matthew: [Proudly.] We all saved our fish when we ran out of our house when it burned.

  H: They couldn’t have saved their shoes instead?

  SP: Emily’s keeping the ’squitoes out.44

  Me: Yeah, well, I gotta put the lumber where the language is.

  Later

  Dude! I LOVE Sweetie-Pie! That three-year-old has pointed out something that none of the town fathers or senior physicians ever would have. The mosquito fish could save this town, if we can get enough of them out there. Have talked the boys into contributing their stock of fish, and finagled permission from Hannah for them to come out with me. Here’s the funny part: I could have sworn it was Sweetie-Pie, in the end, who instructed her family to do as I wanted. I’m probably wrong. I do know that she convinced me to take her with us. Totally against my better judgment—the streets of Seasidetown are no place for a three-year-old right now. Nevertheless, she’s coming with us, and she was VERY clear on that point.

  We are off to hit the cisterns!

  Later

  Am exhausted. Have been out for hours (DAYLIGHT hours, mind you—hours when I should have been peacefully asleep) with James and Matthew and Sweetie-Pie, releasing fish into the town’s cisterns, looking up their friends, convincing their friends to come release fish with us, convincing them to go fetch THEIR friends to come join in. No one had been allowed to leave the house in days, so they didn’t take much convincing. And everyone seemed to have a secret way out of the house. Nearly every home is boarded up—some obviously empty, some just as obviously with people inside. Absolutely nothing is open for business. The wharf has been cordoned off—completely quarantined. Drastic decline in foreigners on the streets.45 Still plenty of
looters—we stayed out of their way. Getting kidnapped and sold into slavery is not my idea of a happy ending to this story.

  Later

  Have been watching Sweetie-Pie quite closely. At first it was to make sure she was OK. Three years old and all. Pretty soon that turned into watching in amazement as she led our group through the town. Not to mention watching all those boys, five to eight years older, following her pretty much unquestioningly. Yeah, I shouldn’t have worried. In this town, she should be looking after ME. That little girl knows all the good shortcuts through yards and alleys, under fences, across gardens. VERY impressive!

  Anyway—we have managed to find six of the boys’ friends so far. Two of them have no mosquito fish. Three have a few fish each. The sixth kid has been sort of a motherlode, with many dozens of fish in jars under his bed that he’s been hiding from his mother. And knowledge of two more kids with epic stashes of fish. So now we’re taking a hominy break before we get back to it. Still three-quarters of the town to cover!

  Later

  Snack break, part two. We are all pretty hungry, and we’ve been foraging as we go. The Ebenezers sure know their edible plants. Plus we found an apple tree and gorged a bit on sweet juicy apples. Man, apples of the 1790s are DIFFERENT from what I’m used to. Both tarter and sweeter somehow—spicier, even. You better believe I filled up on them. Then filled my pockets. You never know when a sweet juicy apple will come in handy for bribing hungry kids.

  Later

  Have encountered Ye Olde Gange of Youthefull Ruffians again. The leader’s eyes went wide in fear when he spotted me. He had a rock whizzing at me from his slingshot almost instantly. I managed to catch it in my hand. Returned fire—using an apple. He caught it. Gnawed it to the core in about ten seconds. Then all of them came running over, slingshots held over their heads. His gang has lost five members in two days to the white fever. No markets are open for them to steal their daily meals from. They are in sorry shape. We have enlisted them in the mosquito fish effort—BRILLIANT! They have volunteered to take on the quarantined wharf, gardens surrounded by tall fences, and other places not easily accessible to younger children (or girls outfitted in impractical 1790s gear).

  Also, pointed them in the direction of some unguarded fruit trees. They were very grateful.

  Later

  Looting seems to have died down a bit from this morning, and instead there are children to be seen everywhere, walking the neighborhoods, sneaking behind buildings and into gardens, and plopping tiny fish into cisterns, wells, water barrels, what-have-you. I wasn’t kidding when I said they were not big on public health and safety in 1790. Every cistern is a disgusting, swarming pit of mosquito larvae! And people drink this stuff! Anyway, if the fish do their work, the town should be relatively mosquito free in a week.

  It’s kind of a case of too little, too late, though. And there is nothing to be done for people who already have the fever. Will just have to keep encouraging Lily to get some dark elixir summoned!

  Later

  OK—have seen some pretty strange stuff!!

  Like I said, I was keeping close tabs on Sweetie-Pie, and after a little while I noticed she didn’t actually seem to be releasing any fish. She’d plop one into a rain barrel or whatever, wait a moment, then put her hand in the water and scoop up the fish again.

  So I asked her about it.

  ME: Hey, Sweetie-Pie.How about leaving that fish there so it can do its work?

  SWEETIE-PIE: Meryl’s all done. [Moving on to next barrel.]

  ME: [???] Hey, James, does Sweetie-Pie have a special pet fish or something?

  James: ’Course. That’s Meryl.

  Me: Oh, Meryl.

  MICHAEL: You should see some of Meryl’s tricks. You never saw a mosquito fish do anything so funny!

  ME: I will make a point of it. [Catching up with Sweetie-Pie.] OK, Sweetie-Pie, so you want to keep Meryl, that’s cool. But we really should leave some fish behind to eat the mosquito larvae.

  SP: [Patiently.] Meryl’s done. She ate them all.

  ME: Oh . . . kay. Here’s the thing, though. The adult mosquitoes, the ones in the air, they’re just going to lay more eggs in that water, so we need to leave the fish behind to eat them. I mean . . . flagjax, it would be great if we had a way of getting rid of the adult mosquitoes, but we don’t.

  SP: [Nodding silently, then

  walking on toward the next rain barrel.]

  Yeah, so, I kinda shrugged that off and decided to just follow her, and release a fish into each rain barrel as she finished with it.

  So I was pretty close when I saw her fish float.

  I don’t mean in the water, I mean IN THE AIR.

  And here’s the thing—while it’s floating in the air, it’s eating mosquitoes.

  After I recovered from the shock, and ascertained that I was indeed awake, I asked the boys about it.

  JOHN: Well, we all heard you say that the fish need to be eating the adult mosquitoes. How else are they going to do it?

  ME: I’ve said many things in my time, kid, and I’m not QUITE delusional enough to believe the laws of physics and biology will change just because I say so.46

  J: Well, it’s different for Sweetie-Pie. She heard you. She told Meryl what to do.

  Me: [Mulling this over. Deciding that since Sweetie-Pie was concerned, I was going to buy it, no questions asked.] [—OK, a FEW questions.] Has she always been able to do stuff like that?

  J: Only since she started talking. She’s been telling everyone what to do ever since.

  Me: Three-year-olds can be like that, but things don’t usually happen just because a three-year-old says they should. You do understand how rare she is, right?

  Later

  Have apologized to Sweetie-Pie for questioning her methods. Then suggested that if more fish could be instructed on the whole floating in the air thing, they’d find quite a tasty meal waiting for them.

  To my semi-surprise, that’s exactly what occurred.47

  Later

  We have been to the main square, where Uncle Boris’ caravan has been parked—but there is no caravan in sight! I questioned what non-looting locals I could find, and got confirmation from two people who saw Boris split town. Interesting! Will check in with Lily and family and see what they know about this. Am taking the Ebenezer kids back to the warehouse, and getting my cheeks back to Lily’s house posthaste.

  Later

  REALLY BAD STUFF!!!! Everyone is gone except for Mystery, who was hunkered under Lily’s bed, ears plastered backward in “things have gotten really uncool and heavy” mode. No note, no clues, and no food. Am horribly anxious. I need to figure out where my relatives are!!!!!!

  Much later

  Am sleep-deprived, hungry, and excruciatingly worried. Am trying to collect my wits and come up with some kind of plan.

  Have been sneaking peeks out the attic window at the looters. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but we are very lucky that Boris boarded up the house so thoroughly. The next-door neighbors are frantically loading their valuables into a carriage while the man of the family stands guard with a musket. Next door to them, the situation is not so pretty. Looters are leaving that house with armloads of stuff. I hate to think what has happened to the occupants. Am hoping they are safely away at their summer home.

  Gagging bolgfix, did Boris drag my relatives out of town with him?!? If so, where on earth would they have gone? And if not . . . well, I don’t even want to follow that train of thought. Possibilities seem much too grim. Am trying hard not to panic, but I can’t help freaking out about what he will do to them. Also, am trying very hard not to focus on the fact that Lily is my only hope of getting some black rock to power my Time-Out Machine. Frazzling shakatax!!!!! I do not want to live out my life in this century! I wish I had even the smallest clue where they might have gone. As well as some means of transportation. Reliable source of food would not hurt.

  —OK, well, not much I am going to accomplish by cringing in the attic.
Must shake off this incipient freakout, and at least do what I CAN do.

  Later

  Have done the following:

  Wrote Lily a note telling her I have gone to look for her. As if that is likely to be any help at all.

  Hid said note under her bedsheets.

  Went to the cistern in the garden to fill a canteen with water for my journey.

  Discovered to my unpleasant surprise just what Caleb put in said cistern on Sunday.

  Went next door to raid their cistern instead.

  Felt extremely glad their dogbeast was no longer on the scene.

  Raided their vegetable garden and fruit trees while I was at it.

  Made a bindlestaff and outfitted self as authentic Hobo sapiens.

  Wished REALLY hard for that map of roads out of Seasidetown that I do not possess.

  Wished even harder that the Time-Out Machine were pocket-sized, so I would not be forced to leave it in Lily’s bedroom.