Adelaide Walsh
The Great Keeper Boxset
Shake, Drown, Freeze
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© Copyright 2017 by Adelaide Walsh - All rights reserved.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
Contents
Shake
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Epilogue
Drown
Freeze
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Epilogue
One more thing
Shake
Chapter 1
Philippe turned a street corner, following the old fashioned lampposts to the side of town where he would find a place to rest. The soles of his shoes were worn down, so that he could feel the curve of the cobblestones on his feet. His body ached, having spent most of the day walking and heaving around a bag full of paints and brushes, and a canvas nearly as tall as he was.
He reached a church that was fairly modest in size. He knew that there were much grander, more elegant churches in the area, and so he chose to squat in one that would receive less attention from tourists and policemen. He slipped in through an unlocked door on the side of the building.
Despite being younger and smaller than some of the cathedrals nearby, this church was still beautiful inside. The walls were adorned with paintings. A life-size sculpture of Mary stood to the right of the pulpit. Philippe dropped his things and reached inside the podium for candles and a lighter. He lit a few tea lights and sat them on the floor near his belongings, and proceeded to light a few of the bigger candles that lined the walls near the pews.
He knelt before his bag and laid its contents out in a neat row. There were seven tubes of paint, a palette, and three brushes. He got to work on the fresh canvas. There was always a degree of pressure with Philippe’s work, because he only ever made enough money off his paintings, to eat a meal or two and buy more canvas. He barely broke even, so he knew that there was no room for error, no chance to paint poorly.
At the same time, Philippe felt liberated in his painting. The words implied in his art were just about the only ones anyone ever heard from him. He had friends and a family when he was younger, but his art isolated him, and once he became homeless, any tie to society was pretty much severed. No one wanted to listen to what Philippe had to say, or make sure that he had something to eat or drink. Most of the time, he received little other than dirty looks and insults spat at him as he walked past. Street rat he remembered hearing a particularly beautiful woman say earlier that day.
He remembered admiring the woman when he walked past. She was tall and thin and had short, choppy black hair. He met her eyes and could have sworn that they made a connection, as if she had seen more than his dirty clothes and paint stained hands. He could almost feel her soul lingering with his. But just as he walked past, he had heard her insult, followed by her and her friend’s giggles.
He decided to paint the woman. Philippe had curated his own brand of painting. It wasn’t quite abstract, but it certainly wasn’t literal either. He would paint an object and surround it by an idea. For example, he painted the beautiful woman, but not in detail. Her features were geometric, and her body was surrounded by beautiful, but violent swirls of color. He was pleased with the end result. He blew out the candles and went to sleep on the floor.
The following morning, Philippe woke up early as usual, so that he could get out of the church before anyone might notice. He gathered his things and carried his painting out to the street. He visited two art galleries, but was rejected immediately. Frustrated, he continued into the city center. He wondered why he was cursed to live in a world that didn’t appreciate how much of his soul was given to his work. He thought that this was unfair. There were bankers and stockbrokers and government workers who went to work each day and didn’t give a single ounce of their souls away. Sure, those people may work occasional 14-hour days, but an artist was never off the clock. An artist was tasked to experience every second of life more intensely than the rest of the world, and countless hours trying to convince others that this was worth something.
By 15:00, Philippe’s stomach was growling and the skies were turning gray. He hadn’t eaten anything all day, but that wasn’t unusual for him. Five shops had rejected him so far. He had two euro left in his pocket from the previous day’s sales. He had been saving it, hoping that he could just sell this painting and come up with enough to get a whole meal.
Just then, it began pouring rain. Philippe felt fear coarse through his veins. He gripped his painting and bolted into the nearest storefront, the painting having only caught a short burst of the rain. He examined it, and it had survived. He turned around to see what store he was in. It was an upscale clothing store. The employees were looking at him like he was mad.
“Sir,” a tall, thin woman scoffed, “If you’re not going to buy anything – and we all know you aren’t”, - she paused to allow the other employees to laugh, - “then you need to leave.”
Philippe turned to face the woman. He gasped. It was the woman from the day before. They met eyes and her smile quickly vanished. She glanced down at the painting, attempting to avoid making eye contact with anyone. She jumped, clearly recognizing herself in the painting. She met his eyes, looking hurt.
“Well?” she swallowed the lump in her throat.
“I just need a bag,” Philippe mumbled, pointing to a long plastic garment bag a woman was carrying out of the store. It was wide and must have held a wedding dress or some sort of formal gown.
“Right,” the tall woman whispered, making her way to the counter to grab a bag for him.
“Aren’t you forgetting something,” her coworker poked her arm, grinning.
“Right, sorry. Sir, we charge one euro for the bags.”
Philippe exhaled sharply and retrieved one of the two coins from his pocket and placed it gently into the woman’s hand. She returned a moment later with the bag. She opened it, helping him to get the painting inside. Her coworker scoffed and walked to the back. Philippe tied the ends of the bag to seal the painting and headed for the door.
“Sir, wait,” the woman stopped him. He turned to face her, but she was silent, a look of regret on her face.
“Merci, madam.”
Chapter 2
Adele marched into Palais de l’Éysée wearing a smart red pantsuit. She wanted to stick out from the o
ther interns ever since her first day, but had never really come out of her shell. She was shy, but incredibly intelligent and hard working. She hoped that this would be enough to get her recognized.
She logged in on the computer at the front of the intern room. The computer only had access to the time clock. The palace had tight security, and despite interns having gone through intense background checks, they were trusted with precious little technology.
“Good morning Adele. I need a favor,” Rebecca, one of Adele’s bosses, instructed, pulling Adele into the hallway. “You know where the kitchen is, right?”
“Yes,” Adele replied, having memorized the entire layout of the palace as soon as she found out she landed the internship.
“Great. They’re short a hand today, and yes, that means someone is getting fired, but I need you to go down there and run coffees to the meeting the president is in. He’s in Salon Murat. Got it?”
“Yes ma’am,” Adele replied quickly, doing her best not to look too excited. She hurried off to the kitchen, adjusting her straight blonde hair on the way. She didn’t know very many other women who got to meet the president at age 21.
When she reached the kitchen, she could hear chaos, as a few cooks scrambled to do the work of a whole crew. On the counter, she found a large silver platter containing two upside down mugs, a carafe of coffee, another carafe of cream, sugar cubes, and a plate of scones. Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted a dome the same size as the platter. She instinctively grabbed it and placed it on top, making her way to Salon Murat.
She moved as quickly as possible, but focused nearly all of her attention on not dropping the tray. She reached the end of a hallway and turned right, expecting the room to be just a few feet past the turn. She walked slower and composed herself. As she approached the double doors, she could hear the president’s voice. Her stomach flipped. She took a deep breath. Just as she went to open the door, she noticed what was being said.
The president was instructing the other man to transfer funds into his own personal account. It was an offshore account and no one would notice. The other man said that it would be risky. The president said that he would make it worth his while, and that if he didn’t do it, he would pay. Adele felt sweat pool beneath her armpits. She could not be caught eavesdropping on the president and didn’t want to hear anything worse. She balanced the tray against her hip and used her free hand to knock on the door.
“Coffee,” she chimed, doing her best to sound ordinary.
“Come in,” the president exclaimed cheerfully.
Adele opened the door and greeted the president and his guest. She didn’t recognize the guest and wondered who he was. They were both sitting in large, comfortable looking chairs. A side table sat between them. She sat the tray there and lifted the dome, stashing it on a counter behind the president. He nodded.
“Anything else I can get for you?” she asked, trying to sound pleasant, but business-like. She didn’t want to sound star struck, or like she was a servant, but she did want to be as helpful as possible. The president seemed to notice.
“No, thank you.” He smiled and waved her off.
“Well that was fast,” Rebecca commented, as Adele strode back into the intern room. “You know your stuff. Tell you what. Go back down to the kitchen. If you can run meals correctly all day, then going forward, I’ll put you on some bigger jobs. Oh and put this in. Channel 4.” Rebecca tossed Adele an earpiece and accompanying radio to clip to her hip.
Adele put the earpiece on and headed back to the kitchen, adjusting the dial on her radio to 4. She clipped it onto the waist of her pants and turned the volume up. Immediately, she heard a voice come through her ear. It was a man’s voice and it was friendly.
“New user on channel 4. New user, verify, please.”
She felt around the earpiece for a button, and when she found it, held it in and spoke, “Adele Bernard. Heading to kitchen.”
“Thank you Adele.”
She grinned to herself. She had watched other palace employees communicate this way for the past few months. She had paid attention to every move they made, so that when this day came, she wouldn’t have any questions about what to do. She was prepared for everything except the biggest question of the day: what should she do about the president?
She worked hard for the rest of that day, doing her best to act like the other government officials, which meant being reserved and obedient, yet somehow commanding. By the end of the day, everyone in the kitchen was inexplicably reporting to her.
“Am I done for the day yet, ma’am?” one employee had asked her.
When it was time to leave, she beeped into her earpiece a final time, to check in. No one had any more tasks for her. She headed back to the intern room and removed the earpiece. She handed it back to Rebecca and pulled her long hair up into a ponytail, hoping to dry some of the sweat dripping down her neck.
“Good work today. Be here early tomorrow. There will be some new things to show you.” Rebecca shook her hand and turned to leave. No one had shaken her hand before. She felt two waves of emotion battling one another. She turned to the computer and punched out for the day, anxious to get home and relax.
Chapter 3
Armand crouched beneath the bushes across from the palace and pressed his binoculars to his face. He watched as Adele, the beautiful blonde intern, strode out the gates and down the street to catch the metro. He had watched Adele since her first day. Something was different this day. He decided to follow her home.
Armand was a sophisticated hacker, and had known where she lived before he ever saw her set foot in the palace. He had memorized all of the interns’ addresses. He also had a tracker on their cell phones. He came out of the bushes and walked in the direction of the metro. He opened an app on his phone, which showed him where Adele was located. She was on the path he had expected her to take. He cut through an alley and ended up behind her, entering the metro a few moments after her.
He watched her from a distance, observing her posture and every detail he could memorize. She was wearing a red pantsuit. Her long blonde hair was pulled into a messy ponytail. She cast periodic nervous glances around her, and checked her phone more frequently than usual. Armand wanted to find out what had happened to her, but knew that he couldn’t just walk up and ask.
He followed her part of the way, to continue observing her behavior, but when she got off the car to switch trains, he stayed on and headed back to his apartment. Once inside, he fired up his computer. It was state of the art, with lightning speed, two monitors, and software that wasn’t on the market yet.
Armand tapped into a program that allowed him to send text messages from an anonymous number. The program not only used a blocked number, so that it would appear as 00-000 on a cell phone, it also pinged the signal off seven different towers around the world, making him virtually untraceable. He tapped a new chat bubble and typed Adele’s phone number.
“I know that something happened today in the palace. Meet me tomorrow, 19:00 at the Eiffel tower. Try to look like a tourist.” He hit send and waited for a reply. The message was opened immediately, but he didn’t receive a reply for five minutes.
“Who are you? How do I know I can trust you?” Adele finally replied.
“I’m the man who is going to take down the government. And you don’t know you can trust anyone.” Armand replied and exhaled deeply. He had been waiting months for a moment like this. He knew every detail about Adele’s life, and yet somehow she was still in control. He closed the computer and tried to get some rest.
The next day, Armand watched carefully to see how Adele would act at work. He was unsure whether she would shake off whatever she had witnessed. He knew that if she was smart - and she seemed brilliant - she wouldn’t tell anyone about the conversation the two had the night prior. If she did, that person would have to ask what information Armand was trying to get, and from the looks of it, it wasn’t information she was ready to share.
> Adele looked nervous going into work, but came out with cool confidence at the end of the day. When she left work, she went into a shop and bought a pair of denim shorts and a tank top. She changed into the new clothes, tossing her work clothes into the shopping bag. She made her way to the Eiffel tower slowly, stopping for a pastry and admiring street performers.
Armand was no longer watching Adele. He had taken off after she bought the new outfit. He had to head to the Eiffel tower to be sure their meeting spot was not bugged. He waited for her next to a cart serving crepes, snacks and beverages. By 19:22, he was starting to get nervous that Adele wouldn’t show.
He was fidgeting with his cell phone. He knew that it would be unwise to call Adele on it. He had programs that could block his number, but they would be easily traceable if she had any help. He wanted to be patient and logical, but his nerves were getting the best of him.
Just then, Adele strode around the corner, her eyes sweeping the street in front of the tower, searching for the person responsible for the messages. Armand stared at her, but their eyes never met. He was relieved to see that he did not look suspicious. He approached Adele slowly.
“Hello Adele,” he said in a deep, but gentle voice, placing a large, tan hand on her shoulder. She quickly turned to face him. Her posture remained the same, but her eyes widened upon taking him in.
“Hello. I’m sure I won’t catch your real name.”
“Armand. It’s Armand. Really.” Armand’s rich brown eyes explored Adele’s baby blues. Her expression softened.
“You’re telling the truth. Thank you. Now what do you want from me?”
“Let’s walk, shall we?” Armand slid his hand to the small of her back, guiding her away from the tower and toward the lawn where picnic blankets were scattered to and fro. “You know, I might have hired someone else to do this assignment if I had realized how breathtaking you would be.”
The Great Keeper boxset: Science Fantasy Page 1
