The Lost Celt

by Conran, A. E. ;

  The minute I see it, my mind whirls. I mean, who wears a torc in California? This guy’s a warrior, a Celt. In fact, he’s the best type of Celt—a berserker just like my guys in Romanii: Northern Borders. They were the most feared of warriors. They were the best, and I’m watching a Celtic berserker, right here, right now.

  Kyler will never believe me! I grab my phone to take a picture when the warrior lets out this massive cry. It’s louder than anything so far. It’s like an order in a language I don’t understand.

  I freeze, phone in hand.

  He points right at me, his eyes pleading, and he yells, “Not this time!”

  CHAPTER TWO

  “What are you doing, Mikey?” Mariko throws herself in front of me and hustles me back to the door. “You shouldn’t be seeing this! You shouldn’t be here!” She keeps shielding me and pushing me toward the hallway. “You might get hurt.”

  The warrior glances around, his eyes wide, and I can tell he’s really confused. I would be too, if I were him. I scan the room. There’s no time-travel machine or anything that I can see, no portal, no wrinkle in time, so I don’t know how all this is working, but this guy must be really freaked. There were no hospitals in his time, no syringes or IV lines, none of this stuff.

  “It’s OK. It’s safe,” I say, peering around Mariko’s white coat. Mariko shushes me, but I wriggle to one side so I can see the warrior better, and I keep talking. “You’re in a hospital. The VA. My grandpa’s here, too. He says the VA may have its problems, but they’ve always treated him right.” I must be saying the right things because the guy looked like he was somewhere else, but now he’s back, focusing on me. “Great doctors, Grandpa says. Isn’t that right, Mariko?”

  “Yes.” She puts her hand on my shoulder, and I can feel her shaking. “You’re safe.”

  The Celt relaxes his fists. Something changes because his eyes aren’t fierce anymore. They’re a warm, bright blue like two penny-sized chunks of sky stuck in a face as weathered as our redwood deck, and he looks like he wants to cry.

  The nurses swoop over to him as he buries his face in his hands. “I don’t want to get stuck here,” he says.

  And that’s when I know for sure that I’m right.

  Mariko hurries me out of the room and down the hallway back to the reception desk. “Mikey, I’m so sorry. You shouldn’t have seen that.” She runs her hands across her forehead and holds the top of her head for a moment. “Oh, what a mess. What am I going to tell—” but then she stops herself, takes a deep breath, looks straight into my eyes and says, “Oh my goodness, Mikey, are you all right? That was pretty scary back there.”

  It’s true, I’m shaking. With shock, I guess, but with excitement, too. I can’t believe this is happening. “Yeah,” I say. “I’m great. Just great.” And all the time I’m wondering why Mariko isn’t as totally astonished as I am.

  A door creaks. I crane my neck to see. The police officer who got kicked in the face comes out of the room rubbing his cheek.

  “Everything OK? Need me to take a look, Miguel?” Mariko asks.

  “I’m good. Just need some ice.” He shakes his head as if to say, “just another night at the VA.” “Good job quieting him down, kid! What grade are you in?”

  “Fourth,” Mariko answers. “With my son, Kyler.”

  “Cool.” Miguel makes for the break room, still rubbing his jaw. I can’t believe they’re all so calm about this, so un-amazed.

  “But will he be all right?” I ask.

  “Who? Miguel?” Mariko pulls the elastic from her ponytail, smoothes her long black hair, and ties it back again.

  “No! The warrior!” I say. “The Celt.”

  “What?” Mariko looks shocked. She puts her hand over her mouth and shakes her head. It takes her a while to recover. When she speaks again she’s kind of breathless. “Wow, you’re right! He did look like a Celt, didn’t he?” she says. “You nailed it, Mikey.” She hesitates, “But, you know…I think he’ll be just fine.”

  She’s so casual. “Fine?” I say. “Fine? How can he be fine? I mean, does he even know where he is, and what’s happening?”

  “Oh Mikey,” Mariko says. “You’re a sweet boy.” She puts her hand on my shoulder. “We’ll help him. We’ll work it out. Don’t you worry.” She pauses as if she has to be careful about what she says next and lowers herself down so we’re on the same level. Mom does this when she thinks she’s going to say something important, so I lean in. “You see, we’ve been dealing with this for years now,” Mariko whispers.

  “You have? You’ve seen more guys like him?”

  “Yes, and a few come back again and again. Especially on certain nights, when there’s a natural disaster or something. That’s when we see more activity.”

  “Activity? You do? But how come we don’t all know about it? I mean this is huge!”

  Mariko gives me a sad smile. “That’s one way to put it, Mikey. It is huge, and you know, I wish more people did know about it. Sometimes I think they don’t want to know. It’s like this…this…big secret!”

  I can hardly believe what she’s telling me. Maybe the shock shows on my face because she suddenly drops her voice and says, “Oh Mikey, I can’t tell you any more about this guy. It’s against the rules. But we’ll look after him. He’ll be OK. Really, he will. I mean, once you’ve experienced certain things they never quite go away. But people do get better. We’ll help him. Don’t let this worry you, OK?”

  Wow! What does she mean, worry me? This is the best night of my life!

  I look into Mariko’s face. She seems really concerned. I’m not sure what I should say or do, so in the end I just nod and agree that I’ll talk to her if I need to.

  I must have said the right thing because she smiles and straightens up. “Good. Come on, let’s go find Marty.”

  She acts as if our whole incredible time-traveling Celt conversation never happened. But I was there. I saw him. Awesome doesn’t get any bigger than this.

  I can’t wait to tell Kyler tomorrow!

  CHAPTER THREE

  Grandpa and I hardly get any sleep. Most of the night we spend in the ER. The rest I spend at home looking at time-travel videos online. How can I sleep when I’ve just seen a real live Celt?

  The more I watch, the more I play back that conversation with Mariko in my head. Was she trying to tell me that there’s a conspiracy, just like the videos say? That time travel is happening all the time, but it’s a big secret and somehow she’s involved? It gives me goose bumps just thinking about it. Can a secret that big stay a secret? I pull my military history book from the shelf by my bed. Wars are full of secrets, even our battles in Romanii: Northern Borders.

  The proof is there in black and white. During the Second World War, no one knew the Allies were making the atomic bomb, especially not the “general public,” even though whole “secret” towns were built where the bombs were made. And no one knew they had broken the Enigma code years before the war ended. Not even the Allied armies knew that the intelligence people had broken the code. Throughout history there have been secrets—massive secrets. This must be another one. Kyler’s gonna love this!

  I must have fallen asleep because I wake up, what seems like five minutes later, with the book still open on my bed and my alarm blaring as loudly as a fire engine. I roll over groaning and hit the snooze. It’s only on the fourth burst of ringing that the memory of the Celt blows me clean out of bed like an electric shock.

  Grandpa’s already downstairs packing my lunch. He slides a bowl of cereal across the table as I sit down. Cereal without milk, just how I like it.

  “How are you, Grandpa?” I ask.

  “Sore. Pretty sore. But we had an adventure, Mikey Boy, didn’t we? Heh, heh, heh.”

  I nod and shovel cereal into my mouth as quickly as I can.

  “You’re running late this morning,” Grandpa says. “I was gonna let you sleep in. I already texted Dave to say you wouldn’t be walking with Kyler, but now that y
ou’re up…can you hustle?”

  “Sure! Maybe I can catch up with him.”

  I finish my cereal in record time, and I’m just putting my lunch box in my backpack by the door when Mom comes in from her shift. She makes me even later by doing what Grandpa calls one of her “Spanish Inquisitions.” This means she goes ballistic and asks lots of questions that neither Grandpa nor I get the chance to answer before she’s on to the next. You can bet Mariko’s already texted the details, but Mom insists on hearing them again from us.

  “Poker night, Dad? On Sunday night? When Mikey has school the next day?” Mom speaks really fast when she does the Spanish Inquisition.

  “It was the only night all the guys could make this month—”

  “And you go down unlit steps?”

  “There was dog poop in the—”

  “You could’ve broken your arm, or leg, or both.”

  “It’s just a strain, and a few stitches—”

  “Were you drinking?”

  “I had two or—”

  “You go down unlit steps when you’ve been drinking?” Mom slaps her forehead like she can’t believe what she’s hearing.

  “There was a plastic bag of dog—”

  “And you couldn’t leave it ‘til morning?”

  “Yeah I shoulda—”

  “And Mikey was still up? On a school night?”

  “He was in his bed—”

  “Who called the ambulance?”

  “Dave drove us—”

  “And you let Mikey stay in the emergency room?”

  “Dr. Curtis was—”

  “He couldn’t have stayed with Dave?”

  It goes on and on until she’s just shaking her head saying, “I don’t believe it, Dad. I just don’t believe it. I come home from work, and I’m still at work. What can I say? What am I going to do with you?”

  She slugs back black coffee even though she never drinks coffee after a shift. While her mouth is around the cup, I make a dash for the door. “Don’t forget your phone, Mikey,” she calls. Grandpa limps after me.

  “Don’t worry, Mikey. I’ll set her straight,” Grandpa says. “Mom’s not mad at you, but I’m in the dog house for sure. Throw me a bone next time you see me, heh, heh, heh.”

  I make it to school with half a minute until the bell. Probably because I’m late, Kyler’s playing with the “tetherball kids” in the yard. The tetherball kids are always out there right up to the bell.

  “Kyler!” I yell from the far side of the blacktop. “You’ll never guess what I saw last night!” I run to meet him, my tin lunch box clanking in my “mom-disapproved” camouflage backpack, but before I can reach him the bell rings.

  “Come on, you’ll be late,” he yells as he joins the last kids racing headlong for class.

  There’s no time to talk as we stuff our backpacks into our cubbies and sit down at our table for roll call, but the minute Miss O’Brien gets behind her computer to email our class numbers to the office, Kyler says, “What happened? You left the game!”

  “Oh man, did you put it on pause? Did I win? Did I miss my entire victory?” I can hardly believe myself. I have the most super-amazing news in the world, and this is the first thing that comes out of my mouth.

  “No,” Kyler says. “You didn’t miss anything. I put it on pause.” He shakes his head as if he knows he’s the best friend ever and kind of wishes he wasn’t right now.

  I try to thank him, but Miss O’Brien starts her Monday morning routine, announcing who’s paper collector, who’s librarian, all that stuff. There’s no way I can tell Kyler anything while she’s talking. It’s torture. I keep thinking she has to take a breath sometime, but no. It appears Miss O’Brien has given up breathing this week because the moment she’s done with the “helpers,” she says, “And now it’s your favorite Monday morning moment: what does Monday morning mean?”

  “Math!” the class shouts.

  “Yep, it’s quiz time!”

  Everyone cheers and then, remembering they’re supposed to be upset, they groan. Casey Rubens, sitting across from me, pretends to barf into her pencil case.

  “Oh, come on! You love it!” Miss O’Brien shakes the candy jar on her desk. “And today’s special question will be…” She takes two dice from her desk drawer and rolls them while everyone tries to guess the number. “Number nine,” she says, to a mixture of groans and cheers. In the “Monday Morning Means Math” quiz, Miss O’Brien randomly picks one math question before we start. If you get that question right you get a candy, even if you get all the other questions wrong. Everyone loves it.

  We grab our pencils and math books. I try to catch Kyler’s eye before Miss O’Brien gets started, but Kyler is a serious quiz-taker. His head is already down. Miss O’Brien launches straight into the questions. Now I’m going to have to tell him without making her nose quiver. This is not easy. Miss O’Brien’s a great teacher, and she’s really fun, but she can be strict too. She doesn’t like anything messing up her Monday Morning Means Math quiz, that’s for sure. The warning sign: she repeats herself for a second time, and then her nose begins to quiver.

  As she turns to write on the board, I nudge Kyler. He shakes his head as if I’m a gnat buzzing around his ear.

  “Kyler,” I whisper. He swats me away. Five questions later, I finally get his attention. He’s ahead on the quiz and looking around to see how he’s doing compared to everyone else. “I saw a Celtic warrior last night. A real Celt in the VA,” I whisper.

  Miss O’Brien looks around. Kyler makes a face. It’s an “I don’t believe you, and why don’t you shut up before Miss O’Brien moves our behavior pegs to orange” kind of face.

  “Mikey,” Miss O’Brien points to my math book then returns to writing on the board.

  I whisper again.

  Miss O’Brien turns back to me. “Mikey, eyes on your work, please.”

  I try to tell Kyler one more time and Miss O’Brien twitches her nose. I shouldn’t ignore the sign, but if I don’t tell him now I’m going to burst. And then it’s like some Celtic god has sent a thunderbolt from the sky. The classroom phone rings, and Miss O’Brien is distracted by someone in the office wanting to know whether Naomi Huang has gone to the dentist.

  “He was up on one of those wheelie beds,” I whisper. “Red hair, red mustache, torc, tattoos, ripping off his hospital gown, and yelling, ‘Cuckoolaaand!’” I must have said that one word louder than I intended because all of a sudden Casey Rubens is singing, “Cuckooland, Cuckooland, Mikey’s in cloud Cuckooland,” in her chipmunk voice, and everyone’s giggling and making whacko expressions at me.

  Miss O’Brien puts the phone down. “What is going on? This is the Monday Morning Means Math quiz, and I should be able to talk on the telephone without pandemonium breaking loose. Pandemonium means lots of noise and goofing off.”

  She puts Casey’s and my peg down to orange. Casey points at me as if it is my fault. I make a “too bad” face and shrug. I’m not worried. I’ll get my peg back up again before the end of the day. She won’t be so lucky. She never shuts up.

  Kyler seems to get back to his math, but a few seconds later he nudges me and shows me the side of his scratch paper. Red hair? Tattoos? he writes. I nod crazily. Ripped off his shirt? War cries?? He’s really thinking it over now. TORC???? I nod again.

  No way, he writes.

  Yes way, I write back. I grab a crayon from my pencil box and add some blood splatters and a puddle of red underneath to show I’m serious.

  He thinks for a moment. I can tell he is thinking because his mouth hangs open, which is the way Kyler always thinks. Then he grins.

  AWESOME!!!!!!!!!! He writes exclamation marks across the page until his pencil lead breaks.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  At recess, I sit him down at one of the lunch tables, as far as we can get from other kids, and tell him everything while he pulls out his snacks. Kyler’s the smallest, skinniest guy in our grade, but he’s big on snacks.

&nbs
p; “You should have seen him, Kyler. He was up on the bed, yelling, fierce as anything, and the look he had in his eyes…”

  Kyler groans as if he’s in pain and interrupts with stuff like, “I can’t believe it. Why didn’t Dad take me to the ER with you? This is killing me, Mikey, killing me!” But he doesn’t doubt me, not once.

  That’s the great thing about Kyler. He’s seen every time-travel documentary he can find, and he loves books where people are called “Zethos” and “Mildar” and live on planets where you can fall off the edge and every animal has two heads and six rows of teeth. So, a real live Celt in California doesn’t come as too much of a shock.

  I’m just getting to the truly amazing part, when Kyler interrupts. “So, he wore a torc and was covered in tattoos?”

  “Yep,” I say.

  “And he freaked out, like he’d never seen modern stuff before—”

  “That’s it! So I took a picture to show you—”

  “You got a picture?”

  “No, but I tried, and that’s when he pointed right at me. He spoke in a foreign language, and then he said, ‘Not this time!’ He knew he was in the wrong time, Kyler!”

  “Wow!” Kyler throws his arms back and splays his legs out, as if he’s just collapsed. “Wow,” he says again.

  “I know!” I feel myself break into an emoticon grin. Life doesn’t get any better than this. “So, I guess he’d just traveled here, or got transported or whatever, which is why he was freaking out—”

  “But he spoke English,” Kyler says, pulling a chocolate milk from his bag.

  “And another language, too.”

  “Yeah, but he spoke English and the Celts didn’t.”

  I can’t believe Kyler’s worrying about this right now. “So, the guy was speaking English. So what?”

  “So…if he’s learned some English…then he must have been here for a long time or maybe it’s not the first time he’s traveled here?”

  “Oh man, you’re right, that’s kind of what your mom said.”

  “Mom?” Kyler sits bolt upright. “My mom was there? In the room?”