by Lisa McMann
CHAPTER 39
A Strange Sight
By morning Charlie didn’t feel quite as worried about being discovered as she had felt the night before. Mac texted her early to report that the news outlets were still clueless about the identity of the mystery youth, so that made Charlie feel even better.
“I think Mystery Youth should be your superhero name,” Mac texted with a laughing emoji. “It’s the worst.”
“My costume would have MY on the front,” replied Charlie, and for some reason that sent her into a fit of giggles as she went into school to look for her friends.
The day opened with a steady rain that lasted until early afternoon, and even though the sun came out again around three o’clock, Coach Candy announced over the intercom that the game was canceled because the field looked like a small lake.
“It didn’t even rain very hard!” Charlie exclaimed when she met up with Maria after school at the outdoor lockers. “Back in Chicago we would have played through it.” She pulled out her phone to text her dad about the canceled game.
“Here in the desert,” Maria said, “the ground is rock and clay, so it can’t absorb the rainfall. Have you seen the washes?”
Charlie sent the text and looked up. “The what?”
“Washes. They’re like little dips in the road.”
“Oh yeah. They make your stomach feel weird if your car rides over one when you’re not paying attention.” She grabbed the books she needed and started organizing her backpack.
Maria nodded. “Those are put there on purpose so the water has a place to travel and cross the road when it comes off the mountains. So you don’t want to ride your bike over them when there’s standing water—they’re deep! And you never know what kinds of branches and rocks end up hidden under the surface.”
“How do you know all of that—about the washes and the rain coming off the mountains, I mean?”
“My mom used to work on a road crew back when it was just her and me,” said Maria. She popped a piece of gum into her mouth and offered one to Charlie as the two stopped in the office for Maria to drop off something. “Wanna come to my house for a while?” Maria asked. “Mac’s probably hanging out there until I get home.” She leaned in and whispered, “Maybe we can test out your new abilities.” She texted Mac that the game was canceled, and she and Charlie were on their way to her house.
“Can’t I have a day off?” Charlie complained. She checked her text messages.
“I suppose we could give you one day,” said Maria. She pointed at Charlie’s phone. “It’s amazing that thing still works. Your broken screen is getting worse.”
“I know.” There was no reply from her dad, but he wasn’t expecting her home until dinner anyway. Maybe he was cooking and not able to reply with his hands busy. She sent him a second text message about going to Maria’s house for a bit but assuring him she’d be home in time for their family dinner.
Maria looked closer. “And what’s that blob of plastic on the corner? Did your case melt?”
Charlie laughed. “Yeah, part of it melted in the fire.” She slid the phone carefully into her pocket. “I’m not quite sure how to explain that to my parents, so I’m just hiding it for now.”
They went outside, where the air was humid for the first time Charlie could remember. Puddles lined the sidewalks. As they stepped over them, Kelly rounded the corner of the building.
Maria glanced at her. “Hey, Kel. Heading our way?”
Charlie had forgotten that Maria and Kelly were neighbors.
“Yeah. I’m in a hurry though, so . . .” Kelly picked up her pace and started down the sidewalk in front of Charlie and Maria.
Maria kicked a rock into a puddle. “Catch you later, chica.”
Kelly waved halfheartedly over her shoulder and sped off ahead of them.
Charlie and Maria walked leisurely down the path toward Maria’s neighborhood. It had turned into a beautiful spring day and was warming up rapidly. “It’s so nice out,” Charlie said. “When it rains here, it’s like the clouds come in, get their raining over with, and then leave.” She took off her sweatshirt and tied it around her waist. “Chicago can be cloudy and rainy for days and days at a time.”
“You like this weather now—but just wait until summer,” Maria said. “A hundred and fifteen degrees is really stinking hot.”
Charlie grinned. She’d heard variations of this ominous warning from everybody she’d met since they’d moved here—it was like the Arizona theme song or something. “So what do you do in the summer?” she asked. “Stay inside all the time?” The idea sounded foreign to her. Summer in Chicago was hot, but it sure beat winter. She and Andy had gone to the pool at the community center a lot, and to the Y. They walked downtown, listened to the street performers, took Jessie to play Frisbee on the beach by Lake Michigan, visited the shops at Navy Pier, and sometimes rode the Ferris wheel if they had spending money.
“Yeah,” Maria said. She kicked a stone into a puddle. “We stay inside a lot, or go to the movies if we can get a ride. We’d swim if we had a pool. We have lots of neighbors with pools, though— Hey, what the heck!” Maria stopped abruptly, staring ahead of them at something moving amid a grouping of saguaro cacti in front of a church. “Is it Comicon weekend or something?”
“What?” Charlie stopped too, and looked up to see three figures emerging from behind the cacti. They were dressed in black head-to-toe bodysuits, with big blackout goggles over their eyes. Charlie’s heart thudded. They were coming directly toward her and Maria.
CHAPTER 40
A Surprise Attack
Maria clenched her fists. “What the—” she muttered. “I don’t think they’re cosplayers.” She began looking around wildly for help, but their path was deserted. “Come on,” she said, grabbing Charlie’s arm and walking faster.
The strange-looking figures advanced quickly toward the girls, and Charlie had an uneasy feeling that whoever these people were, they weren’t here to play nice.
“Device located!” said the middle one. “It’s there on her arm!”
A gasp caught in Charlie’s throat—they were after the bracelet! And it was in plain sight since she’d taken off her sweatshirt. It was too late to hide it.
“Maria, run!” Charlie screamed. “Get out of here!” The bracelet was warm, but Charlie didn’t know what she was supposed to do—run? Or fight? She couldn’t tell without looking at it, and she didn’t dare take her eyes off the strange pursuers. She threw her backpack to the ground and raised her fists.
Maria grabbed the backpack and sprinted away as the three figures advanced and surrounded Charlie. The first one was tall and broad shouldered and extremely muscular. The second was slight and lithe and stood as if she was poised to jump, and the third was of average size and seemed to be constantly moving.
“Hand over the bracelet,” thundered the first one.
“I can’t,” Charlie said, raising her fists and trying not to panic. “It’s stuck on my arm. I’d take it off if I could.”
The three figures simultaneously lunged for her. Charlie flailed, swinging both elbows wide, and caught the two smaller ones in the chests and in the faces, sending them flying backward. She kicked wildly, slamming her foot under the big one’s chin. He reared back and fell to the ground with a thud.
“Cyke!” the small one hissed, but the man lay still. “Miko?” she called, but the other woman didn’t move either.
Charlie turned to face her. “Leave me alone,” she warned, but her voice betrayed her fear.
The woman sprang up in the air and pounced on Charlie, sinking sharp clawlike nails into the girl’s skin. Charlie yelled in pain and whirled around, trying to loosen the woman’s hold, and punched her in the face. The woman dropped like a stone at Charlie’s feet and didn’t move.
“Sheesh,” Charlie whispered as she pulled her wits together. She hadn’t expected to have to fight actual people like this. Pain pulsed through her, but she didn’t have time
to examine her wounds. By now it was clear that her strength power had activated. She hoped the healing would too. Quickly she turned as the third attacker, Miko, hopped to her feet and began bounding side to side like a monkey.
Miko sprang up and grabbed the street sign, swung on it to gain momentum, then did a flip in the air, kicking Charlie in the face on her way down. Charlie recoiled, her eyes watering from the shocking blow.
“OUCH, you little creep!” she cried.
Charlie grabbed the jumpy attacker by the foot before she could slide away, swung her around, and flung her into a bed of prickly pear cacti. Miko screeched and rolled, trying desperately to pull out the dozens of needles that had pierced her bodysuit. The big guy, Cyke, slowly rose to his feet, shook his head as if to clear it, and galloped toward Charlie, his muscles rippling under his suit.
Cyke may have been big, but his reflexes were slower than the other two. Unsure what to do, Charlie ran at him, awkwardly threw herself forward, and kneed him in the stomach. He didn’t even grunt, but Charlie’s knee exploded in pain. Cyke grabbed her around the waist and held her away from him as she tried to kick him. Failing, she grabbed his thumbs and bent them back as hard as she could, squirming to get out of his grasp. He yelled and dropped her, and she managed to cuff him in the ear on her way down.
Charlie scrambled out of his reach, dragging one leg. Her knee throbbed and began swelling. “Come on, starfish power,” she muttered. She couldn’t fight like this, and she certainly couldn’t run. What was she going to do? She hazarded a quick click and a glance at the bracelet, and saw that the climbing lizard was pulsing as well as the weight-lifting elephant.
Ah, she thought. She’d almost forgotten about her newest ability, and since she’d been focused on her knee pain, she hadn’t noticed the tingling. She moved farther away, limping, and spied a triple group of giant palms on the side of the church. Peering from between two of them was Maria.
Charlie limp-ran toward her. “They’ll be coming soon. Get on my back and hang on.” Maria didn’t hesitate—she leaped onto Charlie’s back as Cyke charged toward them. With no time to take off her shoes, Charlie began climbing the tree with her hands, remembering what Mac had said about geckos only needing a single finger to hang on to anything, and desperately hoping the bracelet’s lizard was a gecko, just in case. “I’ve got to start wearing flip-flops,” she said, grimacing as she climbed hand over hand, barely pulling herself and Maria out of Cyke’s reach.
“I’d take off your shoes if I could reach,” said Maria, dangling from Charlie’s shoulders as Charlie scrambled higher.
“Don’t worry about that—just hang on.”
Cyke jumped and grabbed onto the tree, attempting to come after them.
“Yikes!” squeaked Maria. “Look out!”
But apparently Cyke wasn’t a climber. He fell to the ground, snorted angrily, then reached around the trunk and began to shake it, trying to make Charlie lose her grip.
“Knock it off, you brute!” Charlie shouted, her lower half swinging wildly. She clenched her jaws and doggedly climbed a few feet higher. Maria’s fingers dug into Charlie’s shoulders as she tried to wrap her legs around her friend’s waist.
Charlie eyed the church roof. Lizards could climb, but could they jump, too? Her stomach twisted. “Don’t let go, Maria, whatever you do,” she said quietly. “The next time the big guy sways the tree toward the church, I’m going to jump to the roof.”
“¡Ay Dios mío!” cried Maria. “I can’t watch.” She buried her face in Charlie’s shirt.
“Just hang on. Ready?”
Maria gulped and tightened her grip. “Okay.”
The tree swayed. Charlie scrambled a couple of feet higher, her good leg helping to push them along. She gripped the trunk, and when the tree bent close to the building, she swung back and leaped with all her might, never taking her eyes off the rooftop. Maria stifled a scream.
Charlie’s injured leg hit the roof first and collapsed. She screeched and reeled backward, hindered by Maria’s weight. Their bodies slid down the tiled incline toward the edge. “Don’t let go!” screamed Charlie, slapping her palms down on the roof. They stuck fast as her lower half slid off.
Her feet dangled.
Maria’s legs lost their grip around Charlie’s waist and flailed precariously.
Charlie grimaced as Maria’s grip started to choke her. Slowly, gasping for breath, Charlie moved one hand at a time, pulling herself and her cargo up over the edge of the roof, until finally Maria could ease off Charlie’s back and sit on the roof herself.
The girls were shaking and covered in sweat. Charlie lay on her stomach for a long moment to catch her breath, then struggled to roll over and sit up. She untied her shoes and took them off, then tied the shoelaces together and strung them around her shoulders in case she needed her shoes later. They peered down at Cyke on the ground below as he stared up at them.
When Miko came bounding from the cactus bed toward Cyke, Charlie groaned and moved to her hands and one knee, letting the other leg drag behind. “Come on,” she said. “That one can climb and jump. We’ve got to get up and over this roof before she gets to us.”
“Right behind you,” Maria said weakly. She followed Charlie up the pitch of the roof, then over the peak. She and Charlie got one last look at Cyke and Miko, and to Charlie’s surprise the two began walking away from the church toward the road as if they were giving up. Cyke had his hand by his ear and appeared to be talking to someone. Beyond them, the woman with the claws was just getting to her feet.
“I don’t know where they’re going,” said Charlie, “but let’s lose them now while we have a chance.”
They descended the other side of the church roof. After a quick look around, Charlie gave Maria a ride down the wall.
“Be right back,” Maria said, hopping to the ground. She ran to get their backpacks from behind the palm trees where she’d stashed them while Charlie put her shoes back on.
A moment later Maria returned. “Let’s keep off the streets and go behind the houses. And stay quiet—we don’t know if anybody else is out there.” She carried both backpacks, one slung over each shoulder, and helped her friend walk. They went as fast as Charlie’s injured knee would allow, following the walled backyards that were typical of newer neighborhoods. Charlie fought off the pain and tried to concentrate on getting to Maria’s house, but she couldn’t stop wondering who the strangers were, and what exactly was happening.
“That was insane,” Maria said finally as they sneaked through a common space a short distance from her house. “I’ve never been so scared in my entire life.”
“I thought I told you to run away,” Charlie said, trying to breathe through the throbbing pain.
“Like I’d leave you totally alone with those grunts,” Maria said. “Who were they? Why isn’t your knee healing? And where the heck is Mac? I texted him three times to come and help us.”
“All I know is, they were after the bracelet.”
“But how do they even know about it? And how did they know where to look for you?”
“No clue,” Charlie said as they reached the sidewalk and turned toward Maria’s house a short distance away. “I hope we lost them.” She looked cautiously up and down the street to see if Cyke and his team were anywhere in sight.
“Oh no!” Maria said with a gasp. “Look!” She pointed to her driveway. A white van with tinted windows idled there, belching occasional clouds of smoke from the tailpipe.
Charlie’s eyes nearly popped out of her head. “That’s the van that almost hit you!” Instantly her bracelet grew warmer. “And . . . is that—another one?” she asked, incredulous, as someone wearing the same weird bodysuit got into the driver’s seat. “That’s not Cyke or Miko or the claw woman.”
Maria grabbed Charlie’s arm. “Look!” she cried. “They’ve got Mac!”
A man and a woman, who were big and beefy like bodyguards, were carrying Mac out to the van. One of them handed s
omething to the driver through the window—it looked like Mac’s iPad and cell phone. They tossed Mac into the back of the van and slammed the door, then climbed in.
“What are they doing?” Maria whispered, horrified.
The vehicle backed out of the driveway and started down the road, away from them. “Mac!” Maria screamed. She ran out into the open and chased it. “Mac!”
“I’m going after them!” Charlie said. She took three steps before she remembered her knee, but it was feeling a little better, so she kept going at a fast limping gait. Maria followed her. A moment later the outline of a head popped up in the back window.
“Mac!” Charlie shouted. She waved her arms. She put on an extra burst of speed, trying to catch up to the van, but she was no match for it in her condition.
The back window angled open at the bottom, and Mac’s hand slid out through the narrow space, waving frantically. “Help!” he yelled through the opening.
“We’ll get you out of there!” Charlie called, hoping he could hear her.
The van swerved, knocking Mac off balance, and he disappeared from the window. A second later someone came running out of a house toward Charlie.
“Charlie, stop! Hold up!”
Charlie turned to look. It was Kelly.
“What?” Charlie slowed to a limp, anxious not to lose sight of the van but unable to catch it. She bent down and checked her knee as she moved along, and breathed a sigh of relief. The swelling was going down. It was definitely healing—and fast.
“Stop!” Kelly said. “I saw what happened—I’m calling the police!”
That halted Charlie in her tracks. “Kelly, no! You don’t understand what’s going on. Trust me, I can handle this.”
“Don’t be stupid,” Kelly said. “Somebody just kidnapped Mac!” Kelly held her phone, finger poised to dial.
“Kelly!” Charlie yelled, frustrated. She didn’t have time to explain. And for once she just needed Kelly to listen to her.
