The Drake Equation

by Bart King

  Rayla Rafferty: Was it the grunting that aroused your suspicions?

  Sharon Shuey: No, it was the hood that sent up a warning flag. It was pulled around his face—oh, and the color. It was the most hideous bright green you can imagine.

  Rayla Rafferty: Chilling! Who knows what this Green-Hooded Bandit was trying to conceal? Thank you, Sharon. And Jim, I’ll have more details on the police investigation into the Noyd Woods Mystery as the story unfolds. Now back to you in the studio.

  Tipper: Ah-oo-ga!

  Anchor Jim Bottoms: Thank you, Rayla, for those shocking developments from Santa Rosa’s very own backyard. But how about that Tipper? A beagle with a nose for crime. Speaking of which, an eight-year-old boy in Rincon Valley got a bean stuck up his nose today, and fire crews were called to the scene—

  *click*

  My heart pounded as I stared at the TV’s blank screen. Sure, I knew that what I’d done was “technically” wrong. I’d used the quincunx to break the law. But T’wirpo—or the quincunx?—had basically encouraged me!

  I know, I know. “The alien made me do it” is sort of a weak argument. After all, I’d chosen to do what I did. But stopping the construction sure seemed like the right thing to do. If only someone had done that in the wetlands years ago, wood ducks would still be around today.

  I mean, isn’t it okay to do something slightly bad for the much greater good?

  Besides, right now I had other things to worry about. Like, what kind of “project” had T’wirpo signed me up for without even asking me? And, in a more down-to-earth way, was I going to get caught? Was there any evidence that could link me to Cataract Grove?

  I glanced around my room and spotted Jason’s lime-green hoodie folded on my desk. Hide the evidence! I stuffed the hoodie under my bed.

  Standing up, I saw my reflection in the darkened bedroom window. I looked worried. I looked guilty. But what were the odds the police could find me? After all, there was only one witness (two, counting Tipper), and all she’d seen was a grunting kid with a green hoodie.

  Plus, it wasn’t like a high-tech NCIS team was investigating the case. I mean, our police chief’s last name was Castleberry. How good could he be?

  “There’s no way the police know it’s me,” I repeated to myself. And just like that, I felt a little better.

  There was a knock on my bedroom door.

  “Come in,” I said.

  The door swung open. “Noah?” Mom said shakily. “The police are here. They would like to speak with you.”

  “HI, NOAH. I’M DETECTIVE MARLOWE.”

  The woman stood up from the living room couch. She was tall, almost as tall as Dad, and dressed in jeans and a black turtleneck. Her police badge hung around her neck on a silver chain.

  I could see that another police officer—a man in uniform—was in the kitchen talking to Dad. My father looked pale under the lights.

  “—but we’re as surprised as you are, Officer!” Dad protested, waving his arms around. The police officer watched him warily.

  Mom turned to me and put her hand on my shoulder. “Noah, I’ll be right over there in the kitchen. Excuse me for a moment, Detective.” As Mom left, Detective Marlowe fastened her gaze on me. Her eyes were like black buttons, dark with almost no white.

  Through the front window, I saw the lights of three police cars parked in front of our house. I could also see people moving around in the darkness.

  Huh? What’s going on here?

  Detective Marlowe was still watching me. “First, let me apologize,” she said. “I’m so sorry to wake you.”

  I tried to answer, but the words caught in my throat and I coughed instead. My hand crept to my scar.

  “Do you need a glass of water?” she asked.

  “No,” I managed to say. “I’m okay. And I wasn’t asleep.”

  “Oh.” The detective cocked her head. “Did I interrupt your homework?”

  Not trusting myself to speak, I shook my head.

  “Good.” She sat down on the couch. “You probably finished it all at school, a smart student like you. Except your school’s shut this week, isn’t it? With the earthquake and all.”

  “Right,” I agreed. Was she trying to catch me in a lie already? “The earthquake. And all.”

  Stop being paranoid. This might not have anything to do with what happened at Noyd Falls.

  “The reason I’m here is because of what happened at Noyd Falls.”

  I started coughing again, and thought back to a few hours before.

  * * *

  A Few Hours Before

  EXPROPRIATE

  EXPROPRIATE

  EXPROPRIATE

  I made my selection, then stared at the silvery waterfall and waited in the darkness. As I waited, I began getting a familiar yet odd feeling in my hands. See, I already knew what it was like to suck a Coke through a straw…but now my palms were getting that “sucking” sensation!

  As I looked at the closest survey stake, I cautiously brought my arm up. Then I opened my fingers, and held my palm out at the red-ribboned stake.

  Here goes nothing, I thought, trying to channel EXPROPRIATE to my hand.

  But instead of a ray of power shooting from my hand to the survey stake, the opposite happened. The stake lifted up and out of the ground—and in a flash, it zipped right at me. I closed my hand and turned away, but it was too late. The stake somehow disappeared straight into my palm. It was gone.

  I examined my fist. It looked normal. Slowly and carefully, I opened my fingers. Everything seemed okay…but my hand still had that same sucking feeling. So I aimed it at another stake—

  Flash—zip. Now that stake was gone, too.

  If Jason had been there, he’d say, “I always knew you sucked.”

  So EXPROPRIATE means “subtract,” I thought, subtracting every survey stake I could find. I wonder if it works on bigger things—like bulldozers.

  * * *

  Detective Marlowe was still talking: “—your parents told us that you went to Noyd Woods this afternoon. Did you see anything unusual while you were there?”

  I shook my head innocently. “Sorry.”

  “So just to clarify, you didn’t see anything unusual?” Detective Marlowe leaned forward to peer a little more closely at me. Her badge dangled in the air. “Nothing at all?”

  She knows something’s not right. Maybe I should I mention the black swift? It is unusual….

  “Well, I did see my neighbor, Mrs. Shuey,” I confessed. “And Tipper, her beagle. But that was about it.”

  “Oh, so that was you.” Detective Marlowe pulled a notepad from her jeans and jotted down a few lines. Then she suddenly stood up. “Well, I guess that’s everything, then.” She held her hand out, and I shook it, painfully aware that my hand was cold and clammy. “Thank you for speaking with me, Noah.”

  I started to relax a bit as we walked to the front door.

  “Officer James,” she called into the kitchen. “I’ll be out front.” The policeman talking to my parents nodded, then went back to taking notes. From where I stood, I could see both Mom and Dad. They looked pale, as if it were a shock to have police officers in the house.

  Detective Marlowe’s hand closed on the doorknob. “Oh, there is one other thing, Noah,” she said, pausing. “Something that doesn’t quite dovetail. You never asked me about why I came to talk to your parents in the first place. Why is that?”

  It’s a trap!

  “I guess I’m a little punchy,” I said, laughing nervously. “Because I’m up so late and everything. Why did you come here?” Now I concentrated on not looking guilty. You’re going to be fine, I assured myself, thinking of the green hoodie. You already hid the evidence.

  Detective Marlowe turned the doorknob, but kept her eyes on me. “One of your neighbors reported something unusual.”

  As the door opened, I heard a deep rumble from outside. Behind Detective Marlowe, I spotted a giant flatbed truck backing slowly down the street. The massive
truck eased into our small driveway.

  “We’re ready to bring the crane!” someone shouted.

  Detective Marlowe gave me a keen look. “Come with me, Noah,” she said, walking out and turning briskly to the right. She popped the latch to the side gate, and waved me ahead into the narrow side yard.

  In front of me, I could see that our backyard was bathed in harsh artificial light—it was lit up like an outdoor stadium.

  Confused, I stopped.

  “Keep going,” Detective Marlowe said.

  I kept going. After a few more steps, I was at the corner of the house and could see our whole backyard. Bright lights running off extension cords were perched all along the fence, lighting up a scene that looked like a Hollywood set.

  There, stacked between my parents’ playground models, were giant piles of lumber. There were beams and boards and posts and trusses. There were heaps of planks and braces twice my height. There was enough wood in our backyard to build a whole neighborhood. And parked in the back corners of the yard, like two huge bookends—

  “One of your neighbors spotted the bulldozers.” Detective Marlowe had come up on my right. “They were the ones who called the police.”

  I looked just beyond the policewoman, at the back of our house. Starting at the corner, thick posts stood neatly propped up against it all the way to the screen door at the far side. And leaning against the posts were short survey stakes with bright-red ribbons. Hundreds of them.

  I guess EXPROPRIATE doesn’t mean “subtract” after all, I thought.

  Feeling dizzy, I reached out a hand to the closest post for support. But as soon as I touched it, the post slid away and hit the one next to it. That one quickly hit the next post, and there was a noisy chain reaction of toppling posts collapsing sideways into a big heap.

  The police officer and I stared at the mess.

  “Oops,” I said.

  “How strange,” said Detective Marlowe. “Those posts were balanced there quite carefully. But why? I can’t think of a reasonable explanation for any of this. But that’s a nice crowning touch, don’t you think?”

  She pointed at the Möbius Fun Climb playground model, the one I’d fallen off so many times. There, perched on top of it, was a big sign. On it, parents waved to their kids as they threw a football. The sign proclaimed:

  WELCOME TO THE FUTURE HOME OF CATARACT GROVE

  I COULDN’T SLEEP.

  Sure, the work crew was moving giant piles of lumber right outside my window. But even without the noise and bright lights, my mind was fluttering.

  See, I’d been trying to use my “five-finger” method on the quincunx to contact T’wirpo, but so far, no dice. I glanced at my clock: 2:17 A.M.? Great.

  I climbed out of bed and went in the kitchen to pour myself a glass of rice milk. Then I stepped out the back door and watched two forklifts lifting piles of lumber. Workmen swarmed everywhere. The closest one to me was a big bearded guy wearing a hard hat. He gave me a friendly smile as he lifted the last of the posts that I’d knocked over.

  “Hey, sorry about the noise.” He pointed a gloved hand at the bulldozers. “We’ll have to take out part of your neighbor’s fence to get those ’dozers out.” The man scratched his hard hat like he was scratching his head. “But how do you think they got in?”

  I quoted Detective Marlowe: “I have no reasonable explanation.”

  The man chuckled. “I’ll have to remember that when I get home. ‘Where have you been all night, dear?’ ‘I have no reasonable explanation.’” He went back to pulling a heavy strap around a big stack of boards.

  “So where’s all this stuff gonna go?” I asked.

  “Oh, right back where it came from,” the bearded man grunted, tightening the strap. “It’s a rush job, which is why we’re working all night. That way, they should be able to start construction just a day or so behind schedule.”

  “What?”

  Seeing my crestfallen expression, the man said, “Hey, cheer up, kid. Nothing was actually lost. And building houses out at Cataract Grove gives people jobs.”

  “Yeah, but how long do those jobs last?” I asked. “A few weeks? And then they’re gone. But Noyd Woods has been there for hundreds—thousands—of years!”

  The worker held up his hands in surrender. “Look, kid, everyone’s got an opinion. So if you think squirrels and pinecones are more important than people, that’s okay with me. But me, I’m sticking up for my own species.”

  I didn’t have anything to say to that, so I took another sip of rice milk.

  * * *

  The bulldozers were fired up with twin diesel roars. As they lumbered through the hole in the fence, a crane lifted lumber out of the backyard and into our driveway.

  I peeked around the side of the house and saw TV crews were filming out front. I even saw Rayla Rafferty (“I’m here LIVE!”) talking to our neighbors, Mr. and Mrs. Shuey. Luckily, the police had rolled out yellow crime scene tape across our front yard, so we were safe inside the house.

  I got back into bed, feeling hopeless, my mind racing. How did I mix Mom and Dad up in this? Are they going to be charged with Grand Theft Bulldozer? I was so full of adrenaline from everything that had happened, there was no way I was ever going to—

  I fell into a deep sleep.

  At sunrise, Mom and Dad woke me. They both had bags under their eyes, and I felt like I did, too. I managed to get dressed and drag myself to the kitchen. While Dad made me an egg-white scramble, Mom explained that the two of them needed to drive down to the police station to “clear up a few more details.”

  “But you didn’t have anything to do with this!” I protested.

  Mom nodded. “The police can’t prove we stole anything—because we didn’t. But all those construction supplies were found in our backyard.” She paused and looked at Dad. “It’s all very strange.”

  My conscience twinged. “But shouldn’t I come with you?”

  My parents smiled at me—never suspecting that I was the real criminal.

  “That’s thoughtful, Noah,” said Dad. “But you didn’t have anything to do with this. As for your mother and me, we have a little history with the police, and that doesn’t help. In fact, you could almost say we’re jailbirds.”

  “Never mind that,” said Mom, giving Dad a warning glance. “Anyway, we’ve asked Mr. Bright if you can hang out with the twins this morning.”

  And so, an hour later the three of us were dressed, ready to go, and standing at the front door. Of course, I had the quincunx with me. And then it was time for what Dad called “running the gauntlet.”

  “Ready?” asked Mom.

  Dad and I nodded.

  Mom swung the door open and waved us forward. “Go, go, go!”

  Instantly, cameras swung our way. Packs of reporters on the sidewalk broke up as they ran for microphones and started sprinting toward us.

  “This is Rayla Rafferty LIVE from the suspects’ home—”

  “What can you tell us about the playgrounds you built in Russia, Mr. Grow—”

  “Noah, what do you know about—”

  After a quick blur of motion, three car doors slammed shut a moment later.

  “Whew,” said Mom, turning the key and driving quickly past the parked news vans. “If this is what reporters do to innocent people, I feel sorry for the guilty ones.”

  “Me too,” I said, feeling sorry for myself.

  A few moments later, I got out of the station wagon and stood by the gleaming new fire hydrant in front of the Brights’ house. Dad rolled down his window, and Mom leaned forward from the driver’s seat. “Remember honey, we’re not under arrest. The police are as confused as we are.”

  Dad gave me a thumbs-up. “For now, let’s think of this as an interesting mystery. It’s like that thing J. R. R. Tolkien said.”

  Mom smiled. “He said a lot of things, honey.”

  “Wait, I’ve got it.” Dad leaned forward. “An adventure is just a hardship looked at the right way.
So what we’re having is an adventure. Don’t worry, Noah, and we’ll see you soon.”

  I didn’t want to ruin their positive attitude. So as the car pulled away, I waved and cheerily called out, “Have fun at the police station!”

  I watched them drive off, passing a boy by the side of the road. He was sitting on his bike—his orange bike—and holding something in his hands.

  There’s that kid again! I started to walk toward him, half-expecting him to pedal off. As I approached, the boy slipped whatever he’d been holding into the side pocket of his backpack. Then he let his arms hang down at his sides, like a robot whose power had been switched off.

  “Hey,” I said.

  “Hi! Do you remember me?” He spoke fast, in a surprisingly deep, raspy voice. “I was in the bathroom that day with Coby.”

  “Yeah, I remember—sorry about that. So what’s up? What’re you doing here?”

  His words tumbled out quickly. “I’m Sanjay. And I’m here looking for you.”

  SANJAY (Dux survivors)

  APPEARANCE: A roundish boy with an intense gaze, and hair like an artichoke that’s gone to seed. Looks startled and excited at the same time.

  VOICE: Deep and hoarse, like a substitute teacher who’s been yelling.

  PLUMAGE: Dressed like a cartoon character. Currently wearing skater sneakers, bright-green shorts, and an orange T-shirt that says LET THE KIDS IN FOR FREE.

  RANGE: Unknown.

  SOCIAL BEHAVIOR: Almost always seen with three other kids his age.

  STATUS: Additional observation needed.

  “Um, how old are you?” I asked.

  Sanjay looked around warily. “Me? I’m nine and five-sixths years,” he said. “But that’s not important right now. There’s something you have to know—”

  “NOAH!” called Jason from behind me. “Let’s go—we’ve got stuff to do!”

  Sanjay raised his robot arms up to the handlebars. “Okay, you really need to talk to me and my friends.” Sanjay glanced at his wristwatch. “Seven hours from…now…it will be three o’clock. Meet us up by the waterfall then, okay?”