Felix, back pressed to the wall, legs spread, standing on two blocks of wood mounted about six feet above the floor.
And the tiger, roaring and jumping and snapping at Felix’s feet.
“Shoot again! Shoot again!” Felix screamed.
Henry lifted the rifle with one arm, but being upside down and rocking back and forth made it impossible for him to aim. “I can’t risk it. I might hit ya!” Henry responded.
“Drop the papers, you moron!” Felix pleaded. “This is serious business!”
The fire on the tiger’s tail had gone out, but the flames were quickly moving through the room, traveling from the strings to the blocks. Henry tossed the papers to the side and got two hands on the rifle. Now Martin could see exactly what Henry had been holding.
It was his book. And it was on fire.
Bam!
The rifle went off and the tiger withdrew. Plaster exploded and left a hole in the wall between Felix’s legs.
“Jiminy Christmas!” Felix howled.
“I told you!” Henry screamed back.
At that moment, Martin didn’t care about Felix or Henry or anything other than the book. As he raced over to grab it, he heard Darla yelp, “Gimme it,” but he paid her no mind. It was as if the chaos around him had melted away.
Pages from the book burned quickly, one after another taking to the air like black and red butterflies. Martin lifted his foot to kick the fire out and end the destruction. Before he could stomp, something walloped his shoe.
Bam! Bam!
Searing pain coursed through Martin’s foot as he fell to the ground. Had he been shot? He lifted his leg to see. His shoe had been torn open and blood was bubbling up through the holes. Only they didn’t look like bullet holes. They were long and thin, like claw marks.
Hot stale breath caressed his nose. Turning over, Martin was now face to face with the tiger. Its tongue was leaking from its mouth, but the beast was lying on its side, and nothing else in its body was moving, not even its eyes.
Bam! Bam!
Darla emptied the rifle into the tiger’s head as she straddled it. Blood splattered upon her blue tights and into Martin’s face.
“You got it!” Felix screamed gleefully.
Darla set the rifle down and paced over to Henry. “What are you doing here?”
“Just get me down!” Henry pleaded. “This place is burnin’ like crazy.”
It was true. The fire was spreading. Nearly every block in the house was now burning and the walls were starting to catch.
Felix jumped from his perch and offered Martin a hand. There was no hope left for the book. It was fully consumed. So he accepted Felix’s help. Hobbling his way onto one foot, Martin wiped the tiger blood from his face.
Darla untied the snare, and Henry crashed onto his back. It should have knocked the wind out of him, but adrenaline was more powerful. He was on his feet immediately, snatching the rifle and heading for the exit.
“I guess our trap worked,” Martin, coughing, said to Felix as they limped after Henry.
Darla joined them, propping Martin up on the other side. “What was that pile of paper you were so busy with?” she asked.
“Something important to me” was all Martin said.
She turned to Felix. “And what in the half-baked heck was going on at Nigel’s?”
“He’s a fraud, okay?” Felix said defensively. “Magic? No way, Jose. He’s a con man. Where do you think he gets his information? Spies. Which might explain that burglar we caught. And you know what Nigel was doing tonight? He was out there drawing pictures of the machine. Why would he do that? I was sitting in Kid Godzilla, minding my own business, and I saw him through the window. So I followed him back to his house and I told him I was on to him. And I’m gonna tell him again!”
It appeared as though he might have a chance to tell him again. Because when they stepped outside, there was Nigel, standing only a few feet in front of them. Henry was whimpering and fumbling through the snow, trying to escape into town. Nigel had commandeered his rifle.
“Get away, the whole place is about to go up,” Darla warned, raising a hand and waving Nigel back.
Nigel’s clothes were covered in black ash, and his eyes were ponds of swirling red. He clenched his lips, as if he were holding back a torrent of angry words. A tear slipped over his left cheekbone. He raised the rifle.
“That’s no way for them to die,” Nigel said.
“Nigel,” Felix replied, the iris of his lazy eye retreating to the edge. “Calm down.”
“This was our world.” Nigel’s voice was both steely and sad. “And the only reason you’re still here is because we let you be here.”
He steadied the rifle.
He clenched his teeth.
Then Nigel shot Felix in the head.
Felix’s body crumpled, taking Martin and Darla down with it. And Nigel didn’t say a word. He simply turned around and walked back toward his house.
Shock left Martin frozen, until the sharp smell of smoke and burning animal flesh brought him to. Darla was sitting in the snow, Felix’s body resting in her lap. There was a hole in his forehead. It was small, dark, and perfectly round.
“He shot him,” Darla said, looking over at Martin in disbelief. “Just like that.”
By now, Nigel had reached the edge of his lawn. His house was completely engulfed. Flames screamed from the windows and ripped away at the slates. Black smoke hovered over it all as the animals inside continued their horrible racket. A few had escaped to the lawn. A goat, two cats, a massive snake.
Nigel climbed the hill and stopped when he reached the goat. He placed a hand on its back, and the animal’s legs shuddered. Nigel petted it and ducked over to whisper something into its ear. The goat unleashed a terrifying bleat and fell forward onto its chest. It rolled over and stopped moving.
Throwing the rifle strap over his shoulder, Nigel was possessed by a sudden jolt of energy. He burst into a run, headed straight to the front door of the house, ducked his head down, and disappeared through a wall of fire.
PART III
“Xibalba welcomes you.”
“Thank you. That’s mighty swell.”
“Mighty swell?”
“I say kooky things sometimes.”
“Well, I guess it’s understandable. Hard not to be ‘kooky’ these days, what with all we’ve gone through. You must be hungry. Hey, Chet! Why don’t you fetch our new pal an apple or something? And, Tiberia. Maybe some ointment for that cut on his leg?”
“Thank you, Calvin.”
“It’s Kelvin, actually. Common mistake. And we’ve already established that you’re Felix. So why don’t you tell us how you got here, Felix?”
“Balloons.”
“Like a hot-air balloon? Gotta be a first.”
“No. Regular birthday balloons. I had a sack of them. And I found a helium tank thingy. I’d fill up a balloon and let it fly. Then I’d follow it. Once I lost it, I’d fill up another and off it’d go and off I’d go.”
“An odd way to travel.”
“I don’t think so. People like balloons. I thought maybe someone would spot one and we’d meet up and have a chat. Ended up here instead.”
“Still have that helium tank?”
“Sure do.”
“Does it make your voice all squeaky and hilarious?”
“I suppose.”
“So you’ve made yourself useful already. We’re gonna have some fun here, Felix.”
—— 24 ——
The Trial
The smoke weaseled in through a window of Sigrid’s house and attacked her nostrils as she ran on her treadmill. When she pulled back the curtains and saw the flames, she grabbed her cymbals and took to the streets, running up and down, sounding the alarm. Before long, all of Xibalba was gathered around Felix.
There was nothing they could do. He was quite clearly dead.
The fire spread, marauding from building to building. When it reached Gina’s ca
ndy-colored home, the fireworks inside kicked things to another level, unleashing whistles and deafening thumps of rainbow explosions. It quickly came to a point where fighting the fire was impossible. Since everyone wanted his or her own house to be saved, no one’s could be saved. They could agree on only one thing: they would save the machine.
They surrounded it with walls of snow at least two feet thick. Then they gathered behind the walls with an arsenal of snowballs to pelt back the flames. When morning came, a fresh warm rain accompanied it. The fire had started to peter out on its own, but the rain finished the job. And it provided them with a chance to see the destruction. They went to Nigel’s house first.
In the pile of ash and blackened wood, there were too many animal bones to count. Whether Nigel’s bones were among them was impossible to say. All they knew was he was gone.
Most of the homes were destroyed or damaged beyond repair. The kids split up in an attempt to recover what they could while Martin stayed back. He said it was to clean his injured foot. It was really to think.
The realization entered him like a piping hot drink, scalded him at first and then overtook his core. Things had changed. Chet’s death, while tragic, had been accidental. Felix’s murder was something else entirely. In Nigel’s cold eyes, Martin had seen pain and rage and desperation. He had seen a human, doing a profoundly human and thoroughly awful thing, all because of events Martin had set in motion.
It was like Lane’s contraption, only instead of orbs racing along tracks, these were kids, pushed along by fear and emotion. Martin had started it, so it was his responsibility to end it. He fought the urge to cry. He needed to be decisive and convincing, win over the doubters. And those who couldn’t be won over—they would need to be dealt with in other ways. It was a tough stance, but he had to take control, or else they would all career into their doom.
A steel-handled broom played the role of a crutch, and he lifted himself up. He limped through the smoldering town until he reached his former house, where sizzling snow greeted him. Lane happened to be there too. She was walking circles around the foundation, poking at embers with a bent wire coat hanger.
“You already go to your house?” Martin asked.
“It’s a smoking pile,” Lane said. “Brown plastic icicles and rebar. But, you know, kind of pretty in its way. Like a black-sand beach. Ever seen one of those? The horns from the record players looked like silver seashells.”
“I’m sorry,” Martin said.
“What for? You didn’t do anything. You didn’t start the fire. You didn’t shoot Felix.”
It was true. He was as passive an observer as he could have been. He didn’t do a thing. Like so much of his past life, he had let it happen all around him.
“At your house, when you did your show for me, the …”
“The Rube?”
Martin nodded. “There was a record you were playing. I’ve been thinking about that. About what the words might have been.”
“I was playing it backwards,” Lane explained. “Heavy metal. Backwards messages. It’s a thing … people do.”
“And?”
“And yes, it was supposed to sound like a bunch of words.” Lane tapped the tip of her shoe against a rippled and broken beam.
“What words?”
Leaning in and pushing with a sole, Lane sent the beam toppling. A flurry of sparks danced through the damp air. She looked down and saw something.
“ ‘You are not our savior,’ ” she said breathlessly.
“Excuse me?”
“You. Are. Not. Our. Savior. Those were the words, or those were supposed to be the words. The atheist in me isn’t exactly a perfectionist.” She lowered herself to her knees and poked the hanger through the rubble. Then she grabbed a handful of snow and plunged it into the smoldering mess.
“I … could be … our savior,” Martin offered hesitantly.
“Oh boy,” Lane said. “Don’t even start with that.” With a sneer and a grunt, she pulled her hand back.
Why not? Martin thought. After all, there were far too many coincidences. He’d heard enough Arrival Stories to know that his eleventh birthday had happened at the same time as the Day. Exactly two years later, he arrived in Xibalba. Nigel had predicted someone would come and save them all. Martin had to be that person. There was no con here. This was fate. And the machine? It was more than a hunk of metal. It was, quite simply, all that was left of Martin’s father—his headaches, his sleepless nights, his pulsing green eyes staring out at the sea. It was an essential part in all this, and it had to be protected. Nothing could stand in the way of its completion.
“Think what you want about me,” Martin said, “but I’m going to make things right. It’s what I was destined to do.”
“Okay.” Lane shrugged, still grasping what she had rescued from the rubble. “Then tell me exactly how you’re gonna pull that off.”
Henry was out there somewhere, hiding. By breaking into the Internet, by stealing Martin’s book, by letting it burn, Henry had done something wrong and he knew it. But it was far worse than he might have imagined. Martin didn’t care what Henry’s motives were. He only knew that he was a danger and a liability, that he couldn’t be trusted. He only knew that this angry kid had destroyed one of Martin’s last links to his former life.
“I’ll start by finding Henry,” Martin said. “It’s because of him that this happened. He needs to be punished. And with him out of the way, and with everyone pitching in, we’ll finish the machine. Now more than ever we need the machine.”
As she brushed snow from her hand onto the ground, Lane revealed what she had found. It was one of the bottles from the dollhouse. “You know, Felix told me about the marble,” she said. “Does everyone else know Darla was hiding a marble? That a marble is supposed to complete the machine?”
“I don’t think so,” Martin admitted. “They don’t have to.”
“Why a marble? Why not anything? Why not a bottle, like this?”
“It was Kelvin Rice’s marble,” Martin said. “Without Kelvin, I would never have found Xibalba. The machine never would have been built.”
“You ever play spin the bottle?”
“No.”
“Neither have I,” Lane said. “It was Kelvin’s idea of romance. Messages in a bottle too. He loved those. Sometimes he’d place a tiny bottle on my doorstep with a note in it, inviting me to hang out with him in his basement. I never told him, but I thought it was the cheesiest thing in the world.”
“Are you upset that I was living in his house?”
Lane shook her head and tossed the bottle back into the blackened remains, and it knocked pollen-thin ash into the air. “It doesn’t matter now,” she sighed. “It was just a place and Kelvin was just a kid. He had marbles and bottles and model airplanes and stuff that kids have. Stuff, that’s all it is. It burns, or you lose it, or you forget about it. If you want to tie it in to some grand plan of fate and destiny, be my guest. But believing in that sort of thing means you have to believe in the good and the bad, the victories and the disasters. It’s all equally profound. It’s all equally meaningless.”
“I know that,” Martin said.
“Fair enough. So first we find Henry. Then punish him. How?” she asked.
There would be a trial. Outside, during the day, by the machine, where everyone could watch. Chairs and couches were to be planted in what remained of the snow, and a large oak table was to be positioned center stage. The search for Henry didn’t take long. He was found sleeping in the police station, of all places. He was given two days to prepare his defense.
A precedent had been set. Kelvin had been given a trial too.
“He called it a kangaroo court,” Darla told Martin.
“What’s that?” Martin asked.
“Beats me. Never been to Australia.”
Apparently, since the kids knew legal proceedings only from television, there never had been much actual law. Their courtroom had simply been a collecti
on of odd clichés. A croquet mallet served as a gavel, and even though no one was officially appointed judge, Ryan took it upon himself to bang it every once in a while and holler, “Objection! Overruled!” Riley fashioned a series of mops into ridiculous British court wigs, which a few kids donned to class up proceedings. Felix, of course, was the stenographer, jotting down notes on pieces of wood. There was almost nothing to write, however. Kelvin had been found guilty in a matter of minutes, and his defense had amounted to “Yes, I did it, but I thought it was the right thing to do.”
“What did he do?” Martin asked.
“He betrayed us” was Darla’s answer.
“Like Henry did?” Martin said.
“What’s Henry’s crime, really?” Darla asked. “He was caught up in the craziness with us. I hardly think he deserves a trial.”
“He was sabotaging our mission,” Martin explained. Then Martin did something he had never done in his life. He told a flat-out lie. “Those papers he had, the ones he burned. He stole them from my personal page. They contained important coordinates we need to enter into the machine.”
“Really?” Darla asked. “They looked a bit more like a novel or something, from a distance, at least.”
“Why would Henry break in to steal a novel?” Martin asked.
Darla shrugged. “The guy is loopy. You should go easy on him.”
Henry’s trial would be a more restrained affair than Kelvin’s. Light on pomp and circumstance, heavy on accusations. On the day of the trial, Henry arrived, escorted by Tiberia. Stern and muscular and proud of it, Tiberia was a girl, but she was the closest thing Xibalba had to a man. She was six foot one, and she shaved her scalp every day, to show off her head’s perfect roundness. Her contribution to their community was simple. Tiberia was the muscle. Need to move a rock, tighten a bolt, swing an ax? Call Tiberia. Her passion wasn’t manual labor, however. It was, in some ways, quite the opposite.
She spent most of her free time in the kitchen, mixing vitamins and powders she found at drugstores. She was trying to devise the perfect protein shake, one that, in her words, would make “gettin’ buff as easy as having breakfast.” In the process, she had acquired all the town’s narcotics and antibiotics, which she locked in a massive fireproof safe. “No one here has a PhD, so I’m the closest thing to a person who knows a thing or two about a thing or two. If you need some, you’ll get some, but only if you need some,” she told kids.
The Only Ones Page 13
