The Omega Children - The Return of the Marauders (A young adult fiction best seller): An Action Adventure Mystery

by Shane Mason

  She picked up the brush again, paused, and imagined ancient ruins and herself as an archaeologist exploring them. The doors stood out once again as the place to start, and without realising it she clambered up to them, and became aware she had lost control. She whipped the bracelet off.

  I wonder.

  With no bracelet on, she flicked the brush over the door. Dirt fell away, revealing deep grooves, though what it was she could not tell; maybe a hinge of some sort. Shutting her eyes, she put the bracelet on again, imagined an archaeological dig and then opened them. The deep grooves appeared as a door handle of sorts. Excited, she whipped out her trowel, digging the dirt out, until an enormous door handle, recessed into the door sat before her.

  A dozen images of Greek, Roman, Egyptian, Minoan and even Sumerian door handles flooded her mind; none of which matched the design in front of her. Grabbing it, she tried pulling and twisting but it would not budge.

  Excited, she took the bracelet off again, to see what she recalled. She could remember that it was possibly older than anything known, but none of the ancient designs. Back on went the bracelet, and the ancient designs swirled through her mind.

  More details stood out. The shimmering, shape changing nature came from intricate stonework. Whoever had made the statues had, millimetre-by-millimetre, chiselled tiny dents in many directions, and as Lexington moved around they formed different images.

  Amazing.

  Once again the knowledge from the archaeologist’s costume filled her mind with past images, comparing all sorts of ancient structures, concluding that nothing like this had ever been seen.

  But this almost suggests a civilisation more ancient and older than whoever settled here before the British and even older than known history.

  ***

  Melaleuca hung back, watching Quixote for a time. He had found clown suits, juggler’s outfits, a trapeze artist costume, a pickpocket, a chimney sweep, a Morris dancer, and a ringside announcer at a circus. By the time he came back wearing an executioner’s outfit Melaleuca was ready to try some costumes of her own on.

  ‘Be careful with that one, eh?’ Melaleuca said. ‘See if you can find...’ What would be useful but fun? ‘…I know. Find a costume that will distract people should we ever need to create a diversion.’

  ‘Okay,’ he said excited at the prospect.

  Quixote headed back into the costumes and Melaleuca started looking as well. As she looked and pondered which she would try, another thought hit her. Why not just use her power of staring into people?

  ‘Mel?’ Quixote asked. ‘Can I try on something from the weird corner?’

  ‘Sure…ah..hang on. What? Weird corner?’

  ‘The ones that Lexington said made no sense.’

  Melaleuca eyed him up and down. ‘You’re not just doing it to rile her?’

  ‘I only want to see what they do,’ and then said in his most harmless tone, ‘You said I am in charge of fun. They look fun.’

  Melaleuca’s feelings told her to be cautious about them; however Quixote’s keenness needed directing as well.

  ‘Stay up here. If you find anything, write it up or I will when I get back.’

  ‘Fantastic. What are you going to do?’

  ‘There are a few people that I need to look at,’ Melaleuca said and watched, making sure Quixote went where he said.

  She climbed down the secret passageway and snuck out through the chapel. She waited and waited and waited and waited, but no one came by. Thinking Pembrooke might be in the garden, she strolled along the empty, sapping corridor, past the photos. Still no sound of anyone. She turned into the large entrance hall with the Grand Ascension Stairs and headed past it toward the kitchens.

  Pemily appeared, startled to see her.

  ‘Well, what are you doing here?’ she asked, flapping her podgy arms. ‘TUT! Don’t speak. Best you head up to your room.’

  Melaleuca blocked Pemily’s path, trying to catch her eyes. A little shocked, Pemily stepped backwards and gushed.

  ‘What is it girl?’

  Finally Pemily looked at Melaleuca, and instantly, like sharp daggers, Melaleuca’s hawk-eyes bore deep into Pemily.

  Images flashed fast. She saw Pemily doing her daily chores, hitting herself, going off into a strange looking town, and attending a meeting of people hurting themselves. Keeping eye contact, Melaleuca wanted to see deeper, and the images came faster, blurring as they went. Large people crushed houses, fires burnt, and animals of great ferocity ran rampant through crowds of people. Out of the murky images one of their mothers leapt into view, blood stained and tattered. Shocked, Melaleuca pulled back, breaking the connection with Pemily.

  Pemily tottered back and forth, giddy, grabbing for the wall.

  ‘Here...what...oh dear...I feel...’

  Footsteps approached, and not wanting to be caught, Melaleuca slipped out through the kitchen and in to the garden, finding a large asparagus patch to hide in. She thought about the visions, letting her feelings explore them. So much hidden for them to discover, she decided it best to run it by Lexington.

  Pembrooke appeared pushing a wheelbarrow and mumbling to himself. Melaleuca snuck behind him. Trying to take him by surprise she said, ‘Hello.’

  ‘Arrgggh!’ Pembrooke shrieked, dropping the wheelbarrow and turning. ‘Oh my words, tis only you.’ His leathered, old face wrinkled up. ‘Exploring, eh?’

  With little time to bandy words, she locked eyes on him, boring deep into him. Images of soldiers in smart red uniforms marching off a ship and being greeted by villagers and peasants flashed through her mind. Some guy with a loud voice announced he was Captain Wakefield of Her Majesty’s Service and that a golden age had arrived.

  Pembrooke yanked his head backwards.

  ‘Ohhh, you the sharp one, eh. Got some sort of powers, eh? Whassit? Vision eyes? Minds readers? Teleport-kinesis? Go on tells. I won’t say nufink.’

  ‘Tell me everything you know.’

  He chuckled in return.

  ‘An old fella like me. What do I know?’

  ‘You were there when Captain Wakefield arrived. I just saw it.’

  Pembrooke said nothing but scowled a little.

  ‘Who is this Captain Wakefield?’ Melaleuca asked.

  With eyes fixed fast on the upper story windows, Pembrooke said, ‘Better a pound earned than a pound given.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  Pembrooke turned away from her. ‘Shoo, I’ves work to do.’

  He ambled away.

  Maybe she could solve everything if she could make people freeze in one position and stare into them. It would help she thought, but then she would have to sift through a bewildering array of information, or at least, Lexington would.

  She decided to inspect the statue of Captain Wakefield once more, and then, perhaps find a costume to augment her new gift.

  ***

  After climbing up and down the statue and brushing all the dirt off it she could reach, Lexington became intrigued by the layers of dirt around it. They could tell her how long it had been buried, though how it became buried for so long was more intriguing.

  Focusing on the layers, she relaxed, trying to let the costume work. Some facts of the alluvial past and different dirt types wandered through her mind, but nothing like the flood of images before. She needed another costume for that, but which?

  Of course, a geologist’s costume.

  She pulled the bracelet off, and climbed down, packing her tools away to head back. She glanced in triumphant at the statue, smug she would solve it. Something about the head caught her eye.

  How did I miss that?

  One of the eyes had been removed. She snapped the bracelet back on and climbed up to it, her curiosity outdoing any fear of falling. She pushed her fingers into the eye socket. It felt empty. Unable to peer in, but desperate to look, she worked her way down, and started scrambling up the hill to get above it. On a steep edge above the statue, she peered over, realising she needed the hel
p of the others.

  But there on the top of both statues lay the unmistakable patterns from her lost medallion. Again she felt foolish for losing it, and now she would have to tell the others about it, but would they believe her, and more importantly, would they follow the words of her mother? Her mother’s instructions had been to return if she found…..what, she thought?

  How could her mother have known of this statue, which she had already surmised had been covered for thousands of years? She must have meant something else.

  With unanswered questions she headed back, dreading suggesting they return to Lone Valley to find their parents.

  ***

  Ari drifted in and out of sleep, finding it challenging to stay awake. He could feel the same force he had felt in the bracelet room, though each time he detected it, and focused on it, it disappeared.

  As the sun crawled across the fudgy sky, furtive questions nipped at his mind as he battled sleep. Why could he not see any clouds on this side of the mountain? Who were the men they saw going through the tunnel?

  He shut his eyes once again, trying to block the questions, and placed his hands on his crossed legs, determined to stay awake. Bird song chatted all around him and a distant wind tugged at the trees. And then another sound, a sound beneath sound that had no sound, thrummed around him. It seemed to be coming from inside his ear or from a source deep in the earth, which he could not tell. Excited and unsure, he started to think about it and the no-sound disappeared.

  He relaxed again and this time the costume tuned his ears to the variances in everyday sounds. The wind through the large trees on the front lawn chuffed as it passed through its leaves and branches, sounding like soft-muted cotton-wool rubbing together. Beyond them the wind charged through the tall thin trees guarding the fence-row sounding thinner, with a high pitch scream barely audible to it. The wind in the squat bushes blasted through them so quickly that it gave off a rattle sound, and the wind in the forest had an edge of largeness to it, like it swallowed it, channelled it and then ejected it with more gusto.

  Even the birdsong had differences. Some squawked, some chirped, some chatted and others seem to have a playful tune.

  Relaxing more he heard a rhythm between the wind and the birdsong. Losing himself deep in mediation, time began to slow down, and the wind and birdsong at last seemed to form the barest of a rudimentary syllable.

  ‘Ooooooooo.’

  He heard the wind and birdsong speak like it had actually spoken.

  ***

  Melaleuca inspected the statue of Captain Wakefield, though it yielded little clue as to who he was and more importantly why Pembrooke had him in his memory.

  How much simpler would it be if she could find someone that could just tell them the history of this land. But that was not going to happen.

  She looked again at the statue, wondering if Captain Wakefield had anything to do with the Marauders or worse - the bloody image of her mother?

  She searched her feelings, finding only a jumble of thoughts and images, nothing on which to make a decision. She knew though, that the information needed to be passed on to Lexington.

  She headed back to the attic, figuring Quixote needed checking as well.

  ***

  In the low grey light of the attic, a small figure darted in front of Melaleuca, running deep into the bowels of the attic.

  ‘Quixote?’ she shouted in a soft voice. ‘Is that you?’

  No one replied.

  She walked toward where she had seen it go.

  ‘Quixote?’

  Noises, as if someone searched fast through the costumes came from the attic, and the blue light from the costume room cast its light-stream out in the empty attic, making it very obvious that an open door sat in the smashed up brick wall.

  Melaleuca found Ari, standing in the middle of the costumes from the last thousand years, searching through them.

  ‘What are looking for?’

  ‘What! Oh it’s you. I heard it, I actually heard it,’ Ari said.

  ‘Heard what?’

  Lexington rushed through the door, flushed with excitement. ‘It’s older than anything known to history, and ─ ’

  ‘I heard the earth speak!’ Ari half shouted. ‘I need an Indian medicine man outfit. What do you call them?’

  ‘A shaman,’ Lexington said. ‘Did you really hear the earth? What did it say?’ Lexington looked puzzled. ‘And how?’

  As he started to tell them, something small exploded from a corner, sending billows of orange smoke into the room. Ari ducked and headed toward it, then stopped, stood and exchanged knowing glances with Melaleuca, both saying, ‘Quixote.’

  ‘Over here,’ Quixote said from the opposite corner.

  They turned, heard another small explosion, and more orange clouds billowed up to the roof.

  ‘No over here!’

  Two more orange smoke-bomb clouds erupted by the mirror at the other end of the costume rows.

  ‘Quixote. Very good,’ Melaleuca said. ‘Come and show us.’ She turned to Ari and Lexington.

  ‘I asked him to find a costume that would be good for causing distractions.’

  Quixote leapt out from behind a row of costumes.

  ‘Cool eh!’

  A snug fitting suit clung to Quixote’s body, mottled in different colours and hues. Small tubes appeared under the surface of the material and ran from the legs up over the torso and converged on his arms, ending at the cuffs.

  ‘What is it?’ Melaleuca asked.

  Quixote shrugged his shoulders.

  ‘Whatever it is,’ Ari said, ‘it distracted us. How does it work?’ He touched the fabric, feeling the tubes underneath.

  Quixote shook his arms.

  ‘Watch.’

  He lifted an arm, closed his hand and then threw it toward a corner.

  POOOOF! Another cloud appeared.

  Lexington narrowed her eyes on the suit with suspicion.

  ‘It’s obvious which section you got this from. How did you work it out?’

  ‘Just put it on and jumped about.’

  ‘I see. And what if cannon balls had shot out of the sleeves.’

  ‘Well it didn’t.’

  ‘If it did?’

  A sneaky smile crossed Quixote’s face.

  ‘What about your laws of physics?’

  ‘Oh really.’ Lexington flicked a dismissive hand at him. ‘That is so old. It’s obvious a new set of laws operate here. Anyway, I have discovered that the statue is older than known history.’

  ‘Boring!’

  ‘Enough,’ Melaleuca said to Quixote.

  Lexington turned to Melaleuca, saying, ‘I suggest once again that the mysterious costumes be treated with caution. They seem, well, different. If this costume does this, what might the others do? They need to be carefully investigated.’

  Melaleuca could see sense in Lexington’s words; however Quixote had discovered a costume that might prove useful.

  ‘We keep on doing what we are doing,’ Melaleuca said.

  Lexington started to protest, but was hushed by Melaleuca.

  ‘We keep on exploring. Stay out of people’s way. Have fun. Use your imagination. From now on Quixote, if you want to select a costume from that section then let’s make sure myself or Ari is with you. That goes for us all. Okay?’

  They all nodded.

  Lexington pulled Melaleuca to one side out of earshot of the others. Lexington tried to make her eyes as big and round as possible.

  ‘I have discovered something.’

  Melaleuca breathed in and out.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I found something that makes me think that our parents are needed to solve this mystery.’ She proceeded to tell her about the medallion and what she had found at the statue. ‘...so you see Mum said to come get her if I found it. I think I have found it.’

  ‘You should have told us way before this. It matters not anyway. My decision is we wait until we know what it is we have to fi
nd?’

  ‘Your instincts?’

  ‘Yes.’

  As Lexington started to protest, Ari yelled out, ‘I found it!’

  Ari held up a costume made of tanned yellow leather with faded paintings and bird feathers hanging off it.

  ‘A shaman outfit.’

  ‘Very good,’ Melaleuca said. ‘All of us write up what we found out today.’ With a serious tone she carried on talking. ‘We rely on no others, except ourselves. Even if someone told us all we need to know, it is ultimately us who must decide whether we believe them and what we do with the information.’

  As they wrote up their finds, Lexington ran her eye over it. Quixote’s costumes, plus Ari’s earth-speak she could not immediately fit into what she had found. But Melaleuca’s discovery gave rise to questions.

  ‘How did you find this out?’ Lexington asked. ‘What costume did you use?’

  Melaleuca explained her newly discovered powers, adding, ‘I think I have always had them but never a use for them until now.’

  ‘Perhaps we all have powers,’ Quixote said.

  Lexington felt heat pickles crawl over her skin. Was this the time to reveal her inner voice? She did not know why but she thought they might think less of her, and so coughed and said, ‘Perhaps…n.n.n.not all of us d…do.’

  The others looked at her strange, so she drew their focus to Melaleuca’s finds.

  ‘So one of our mothers was involved in a fight and the man in the statue has something to do with a discovery of this land.’

  ‘I guess,’ Melaleuca said.

  ‘Well, it is still not enough to go on.’

  ‘Lex, it’s only been one day,’ Ari said.

  ‘Then I’ll find a costume that speeds up time,’ Quixote said.

  ‘Ahem,’ Melaleuca said, prodding Lexington. ‘Isn’t there something more you should be writing?’

  With reluctance Lexington wrote up what she had found and then told the others of the medallion and what her mother had said.

  ‘You should have told us after you lost it, Lex,’ Ari said.