by Jeff Sampson
Partial Transcript of the Interrogation of Branch B’s Vesper 1
Part 2—Recorded Oct. 31, 2010
F. Savage (FS): Hmm. Make a note: The nature of the—
Vesper 1 (V1): Make a note?
FS: Ah, sorry, I’m just making a statement aloud for the record. So I can refer back to the transcript when writing my full report.
V1: Got it. Sorry.
FS: Make a note: The nature and actions of these deviants—
V1: Deviants?
FS: Excuse me?
V1: You people call us deviants?
FS: I’m afraid that “deviants” is the slang term that we came up with in-house for those of you we haven’t . . . observed. I assure you it is not meant as a suggestion of your character.
V1: [laughs.] It’s actually quite appropriate, so, whatever.
FS: [clears throat.] As I was saying, the nature of these deviants, as suggested by the actions of Vesper 1—
V1: Wait, so which is it? Am I a vesper or a deviant?
FS: Emily, please. We’re on a schedule. [V1 begins to speak; FS talks over her.] The nature of these deviants, as suggested by Vesper 1’s actions during the events detailed in chapters three and four of her written account, would indicate that they develop heightened abilities based on some sort of time schedule. One that also alters their personalities before they—
V1: Turn into even more of a deviant.
FS: Excuse me? Uh, no, no, I meant before you—
[Distant, thumping noises echo; FS and V1 fall silent for several moments. Distant noises fall silent.]
V1: That normal around here?
FS: Ah, not particularly. Usually quite silent. I haven’t . . . I think we should continue on with your account.
V1: Aren’t you going to finish dictating your note to self?
FS: [sighs.] Forget it. Let’s just move on.
Chapter 5
The Bubonic Teutonics
The garage’s side door was unlocked, so I didn’t bother knocking. Megan’s older brother Lucas was there with a long white guitar hanging from his shoulder, a cord snaking from it to some sort of speaker sitting in the back of a truck parked on the other side of the garage. Lucas was basically a male version of his sister—tall and crazy skinny, with pasty skin and white-blond hair scooped up into some spiky anime-like ’do. Not usually my cup of soy chai latte, but I’m not gonna lie: a guy with a guitar? Pretty damn hot.
Behind Lucas, beneath shelves holding paint cans, and surrounded by drums and cymbals, sat the police deputy–slash–drum player. His short honey-blond hair was tousled and curly at the ends, his jaw shadowed with stubble darker than you’d expect a blond guy to have. His bare arms—shown off to great effect by an exceptionally clingy wifebeater—were tanned and so very, very defined.
Let me tell you, if I’d known how beautiful the deputy was, I’d have come to Lucas’s rehearsals a lot sooner. The deputy’s biceps were things of my late-night dreams. His pale blue eyes were too. And his broad shoulders. And his . . .
“Ready, Luke?” the deputy asked. Neither of them had noticed me.
“Yeah, I got it. Give me a four count.”
The deputy nodded and banged his drumsticks together four times before pounding on the drums, while Lucas flicked at his guitar and began to sing. The walls rattled as the sound reverberated through the garage.
I wasn’t in the mood for a concert and had things to do, so I took a step forward and gave two loud claps.
Lucas actually jumped. The deputy didn’t react much except to smile over at me. He had perfect, movie-star teeth.
“Uh, can I help you?” Lucas asked.
Grinning, I sauntered deeper into the garage. “Don’t recognize me?”
His cheeks flushed as I came close—very close. “Em-Emily?”
“Can’t believe you didn’t recognize me, dork,” I said, swatting at his arm. I looked over at the deputy and met his smile with one of my own. “Introduce me to your friend.”
Lucas took a step back. “Megan’s inside, Emily. We’re gonna be canvassing clubs this week to advertise our gig on Saturday, and I want to make sure we don’t suck before we do. So please—”
“Jared.” The deputy stood up from behind his drums and extended a hand.
I went and took Jared’s hand, shaking it and letting my fingers linger as he let go. His grip was strong.
“Ignore him,” Jared said as he gave me a once-over. “He doesn’t know how to behave when a pretty lady enters the room.”
Rounding the drum set, I sat on the stool he’d just vacated. “A gentleman and a drummer, huh? So does this band only have the two of you?”
“You got it. We’re the Bubonic Teutonics.”
“So, what, you’re like an albino White Stripes or something?”
Jared laughed, sending his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down on his long neck. I could see small beads of sweat forming there, could smell something enticing in his perspiration. Some part of me wondered, Is he the one?
The one what? I wondered again, but only briefly. Somehow, as nighttime me, the unusual thought almost seemed to make sense.
“Yeah,” he said. “Something like that. So, are you and Megan heading out somewhere?”
I needed to get closer to him to be sure. I decided to bat my eyes and tilt my head so that my hair brushed against my bare shoulders. From Jared’s expression, it seemed to work.
“Totally,” I said. “Wanna come? It’ll be fun.”
“I’m pretty sure I’m too old to be going places with sixteen-year-olds.”
“You are too old,” Lucas called. Having grown bored with the two of us, he’d gone to the truck and was fiddling with his guitar and the speakers. He strummed a cord, and a screeching sound echoed through the bare rafters above us.
Jared shrugged, the muscles on his broad, bare shoulders tensing tightly. “Sorry, guess you two are on your own. Just make sure it’s a crowded place and you drive there. Can’t be too careful after what happened to that poor girl last night.”
“Ooh, you really are a deputy, aren’t you?” I had to know if he was the one my brain was searching for. Leaning in slightly, I closed my eyes and inhaled.
I expected . . . I don’t quite know what I expected. But he smelled off. He smelled clean, artificial, like the mix of man-made chemicals that are soap and shampoo. And though usually I thought that would be a good way to smell, a strange disappointment washed over me.
I didn’t know how I knew, but he wasn’t right. At least not the right this new version of me wanted. Still, he was so pretty to look at.
“Lucas, Mom told you to keep it down and—what the hell?”
The door leading into the house slammed shut, and I spun on the stool to see Megan standing there. She was dressed in her clothes from that morning, her long hair pulled back into a ponytail. She stiffened in surprise at the sight of me.
“Emily? Is that you?”
I raised my eyebrows. “Hey, what’s up?”
“Hey, Meg,” Jared said. “Your friend was just saying hi.”
“Yes, she’s distracting Jared and keeping me from practicing,” Lucas said, still focused on tuning his guitar. “Get rid of her and then I’ll keep it down.”
Megan could only stare slack-jawed at me. “Emily?” she said again. “What are—Why are you dressed like that?”
“Come on, I look awesome,” I said. Regretfully leaving Jared behind, I rounded the truck and grabbed Megan’s arm. “I’m on a mission.”
Speechless, Megan let me lead her back through the door. I waved over my shoulder as I went inside. “Bye, Deputy.”
He winked at me. “Nice meeting you. And remember to be safe.”
“Always.”
I shut the door and could hear the boys begin their song again. Shoving Megan, I said, “Why didn’t you tell me that the deputy was basically a male model?”
Megan flinched away from me. “Is this some kind of joke? What are you talking abou
t? That guy is twenty-one years old, Emily, and you were hanging on him like a frickin’ groupie.”
“How could I not?”
With a disgusted sigh, Megan stormed down the hallway to her bedroom. I followed her in, went to the edge of her bed, and leaped on top of her messy comforter. I rested back on my arms and crossed my legs.
“I need you, Reedy,” I said. “Been to Emily Cooke’s blog today?”
Megan continued to gape. “What? No, I—,” she started.
I waved my hand. “Didn’t miss much, just a bunch of kids acting like they cared about the hot chick at school before she died. But you know Terrance? Down the street? He called me fat, so you and I are going to go to his house and verbally smack him down.” I wagged my eyebrows. “Maybe a little physical smackdown too.”
Megan gawked at me.
“Hello?” I gestured toward her shoes in the corner. “Chop-chop, girl, put your shoes on. We’ve got things to do, teenage boys to humiliate—”
“Okay, stop!” Megan threw her hands in the air. “Back up, Em, ’cause you are flirting with my brother’s friend, you’re dressed like a giant slut, and you’re acting like you’ve downed a cocktail of vodka and crack.”
I rolled my eyes. “Oh, come on, we don’t have time for this, just—”
Megan stormed forward and put her finger in my face. “No, listen, Em: You don’t come barging into my house done up like this and get away without explaining yourself.” She caught sight of my mud-splattered shoes and gaped at me. “How did you even get here, anyway? Did you walk all the way here by yourself? After what happened last night?”
Again I rolled my eyes, then looked away at Megan’s walls. Her art. Scrawled paintings that showed no sense of depth or anatomy or, y’know, skill were tacked to the wall. Megan liked to pretend she was an artist, but I’d always known she was a straight-up poser. Instead of trying too hard to be one of the Cool Kids like in junior high, now Megan tried too hard to be one of the Mysterious Loners. She was always hiding herself, just like I did. Or used to do. After tonight I was never going back to the old me.
Megan grabbed my arm and pulled me toward her door. “No, Emily, I don’t know what’s going on, but you’re not yourself. Someone just got frickin’ killed a few streets up from you last night, and now you’re walking around dressed like this—”
I yanked my arm from Megan’s grasp. “I feel fine,” I said. “Better than fine. I feel amazing.” I got in Megan’s face and grabbed her shoulders. “Don’t worry about me, Reedy. Focus on the goal: Terrance Sedgwick down the street?”
Megan sighed again. “Em, I am not—”
I shook her, and she scowled. “Just answer the question. Seriously, you know Terrance, right?”
“He’s a fat jerk. What about him?”
“Let me show you.”
I pushed her around her bed toward the laptop on her desk. Shoving her down in her chair, I opened the laptop, clicked her browser, and got on to Emily Cooke’s blog. A few scrolls down the page and Terrizzle’s message was smack-dab in front of us.
I pointed, and Megan read what he wrote. “What a jerk! You are in no way fat.” She gestured at the screen. “Is that what this is about? What Terrance wrote? Overcompensation is unhealthy, Emily.”
I put out my arms and spun, modeling my outfit, knowing that every part of me looked amazing. “I’m working this top, though, aren’t I? This is to lure Terrance into a trap and mess with him. Luring other guys is just an added bonus.”
Megan slouched in her chair. After a moment, she said, “If I don’t go with you, you’re going over there by yourself? You’re really going to go wander over to some strange guy’s house, dressed like that?”
I nodded. “Well, yeah. It’s not like anything bad is gonna happen to me. If I can survive a drive-by drink throwing, I can survive anything.”
“What on earth are you talking about?” Megan asked.
I put on my best innocent face. “Nothing,” I said. “So, decision time. You coming?”
With another sigh, Megan pushed herself to her feet. “Fine, I’ll go with you. But we’re taking my car, not walking.”
“Wicked.”
“Whatever.” Megan slipped on her shoes before snagging her keys from a hook on the wall, and we headed into the cool night. I spread my arms and twirled down the wet concrete walkway toward the street, where Megan’s car sat waiting.
Megan didn’t say anything, just stomped past me. She unlocked the passenger door, banging it with her fist so that it popped open with a metallic creak. I ducked inside as she got into the driver’s seat. Punching the gas, she turned the key in the ignition and the car belched before sputtering and dying. Cursing, Megan turned the key again. This time the car coughed to life. Megan flicked on the pale headlights and pulled out into the road.
“Little Rusty’s on his last leg,” I said. I felt for the seat lever and then lowered the back so I could lie down. Propping my heels atop the dashboard, I watched Megan as she drove. She kept her eyes on the road, her brows drawn tight and her lips pursed. Orange light from the streetlamps briefly lit up her scowl as we passed beneath them.
I stretched and waved my hand in her face. “Hello, Reedy? I just called your car Little Rusty. You’re supposed to get all pissy and tell me not to call it that.”
Megan ignored me. She stomped on the brakes, hard, and I lurched forward. Before I could react she cranked the steering wheel to the left and headed down a side street.
Lowering my feet, I sat up and peered out the window. We were heading down Roosevelt Street—the exact opposite direction of where I wanted to go.
“Hold up, Megan, you’re going the wrong way.”
She ignored me and kept driving.
Tugging her arm, I said, “Hey, don’t be lame, we’re supposed to go to Terrance’s!” When she didn’t stop, I popped the back of the seat up. “Okay, if this is about your brother and the deputy, don’t be a freak. I wasn’t going to do anything with them. The deputy was just cute and I wanted to say hi.”
Megan let out an exasperated sigh and glanced at me. The green dashboard lights gave her pupils an unearthly glow.
“Okay, ew. But no, this isn’t about my brother or his friend.” She yanked the wheel to the right and turned down another street. “Or maybe it is. It’s about the clothes, pawing at older guys, wanting to go after Terrance, all of it.” She flicked her hand up in annoyance. “It’s about you even telling me, ‘Don’t be a freak’! You don’t say things like that, Emily. Something is really wrong with you right now that you apparently can’t see, so I’m taking you home so you can go to bed and wake up and be yourself again.”
I opened my mouth to protest. Without even looking at me, Megan held up a finger in my face and said, “Don’t argue.”
Suddenly the car felt horribly cramped. It was a cage of rusted steel surrounding me, hemming me in and stinking of cracked pleather and exhaust and ancient nacho cheese crusted into the backseat carpet. It didn’t help that the warden of this little prison was Megan at her snippiest. I glared at the side of her pasty, long, giant-nosed face, and I hated her. I wanted to lunge at her and throw her to the ground, tower above her and make her realize that I wasn’t some mousy little girl she could boss around.
Instead, glaring out the window, I got an idea.
“That’s cool,” I said. “You’re right. This isn’t me.” I wrapped my fingers around the ancient window crank and forced the old gears to turn, lowering the window. Cool air rushed through the widening crack, catching my hair.
“Whatever,” Megan said. “Terrance is a jerk, but we’ll get him back some other way. Once you’re no longer tripping on glue fumes or whatever is going on here.”
“Oh, totally.” By now the window was completely open. I stuck my head out and parted my lips to suck in a breath of fresh air. I opened my mouth and let my tongue loll out.
And then, while Megan ignored me to glower out at the dark street, I swiftly unlatched my s
eat belt, reached out of the window, and grabbed onto the ancient bike rack bolted to the top of Little Rusty. I hefted myself outside so that my heels straddled the door, then slanted back as far as my arms would let me.
I clung to the bike rack as the car raced down the dark suburban street at thirty-five miles per hour. Parked cars and trees whizzed by me, and the wind felt like it was trying to toss me to the hard asphalt that zipped past beneath, but I had no fear. I was in control here. The night, the wind, the car—I was their master.
I tilted my head back and let out a loud, howling laugh.
Megan’s panicked voice screeched out of the car. “Emily! What are you doing?”
She never sounded panicked. She was scared out of her mind, and I loved it.
The car swerved as Megan momentarily lost control. I rode it like a surfer riding a wave and whooped in excitement. We were rushing by the forested park not far from my house. The car started to slow, so I tensed my legs, waited for the right moment—and leaped.
The car came to a sudden stop, brakes squealing like the poor little pig whose house wasn’t strong enough to keep the big bad wolf from blowing it down. The driver’s-side door creaked open and Megan jumped out, running back down the street, her terrified expression painted red by the car’s taillights. She screamed my name, “Emily! EMILY!”
Hanging from a tree branch fifteen feet off the ground, I laughed down at her.
“Scared you, didn’t I?”
Megan slowly came back to stand beneath me on the dark, empty road. Her car grunted and grumbled behind her like an addled old man. She gawked up at me, trying to say something.
Gazing down at her from the branch like it was nothing, I started to say something—about how much of a bitch she was for lying to me, and that she got what she deserved—when a sensation washed over me. A feeling that something I couldn’t see was hovering right in front of me, looking at me with eyes I couldn’t see. Just like in the darkened backyard I’d used as a shortcut.
And then, something inside me shifted. I very suddenly realized that I was freezing, that everything had gone blurry, and that I was hanging what felt like a million miles above the road after jumping out of a moving car.
