by Ned Rust
“My phone, why?” said Mr. Griffin.
“I want to look up about this squid.”
“Not right now, Neil,” replied his father, sucking air through his lower teeth like he did whenever he was feeling impatient.
“The pressure only matters somewhat—it has more to do with the environment,” said Neil. “And there’s no way they’re going to get that right in an aquarium.”
“So what’s the big deal with this squid, kiddo?”
“It’s a giant squid, Dad.”
“Ah,” said Mr. Griffin, drumming his thumbs on the steering wheel and glancing over at his son. “Okay, so how giant is giant?”
“Well, this one’s a juvenile so it’s not humongous. They said fifteen feet, and that’s got to mean including the tentacles so, really, its body’s probably just five or six feet long.”
“That’s still pretty decent, I guess,” said Mr. Griffin, pausing to make his leaking-bicycle-tire noise again. “How big do the grownups get?”
“With tentacles extended, probably more than fifty feet.”
“That’s a lotta calamari!”
“Might as well be,” said Neil, frowning. “Those idiots are going to kill it.”
“That’s too bad, buddy,” said his father, his attention migrating back out the windshield.
“Can I go to Texas to see it?” asked Neil.
“Sure, whatever you want,” said his father, really not paying attention to his eldest son now as he stared up at the light, trying to see if it had turned yellow for the cross street. “If this bobo doesn’t get moving, I’m going to lay so much horn on him he’s going to think he’s been stomped by a moose.”
“Antlers, Dad.”
“What?”
“A moose has antlers; a bull has horns.”
“Right,” said his dad. “Stomped by a bull.”
“Anyhow, it’s probably not worth bothering,” said Neil. “I bet they don’t keep it alive more than a week.”
Neil sat back and tried to calculate his odds of being able to swipe the phone from its cradle without his dad noticing.
The light changed and the Range Rover’s left signal began to blink.
“Are you turning?!” yelled Neil’s dad. “You conspicuously consumptive piece of nouveau riche, resource-hogging, impractical, humanity-hating soulless yuppie garbage!?”
The car behind began to honk.
“You have got to be kidding me,” said Mr. Griffin, looking in the mirror. “A freaking Prius? Honking at me? Do you not see the mountain of waste ahead of us, my green little self-righteous, tailgating friend!?”
“Chill, Dad,” said Neil.
“Yeah, I’ll chill when people in this world stop being stark raving hypocritical entacks.”
“What are entacks, Dad?”
“Never mind—forget I said it, buddy.”
Neil shrugged and continued to obsess about his father’s phone.
“Holy frack! Would you look at this bonehead! Want to give me just half an inch to get around you maybe?”
Sensing his father’s distraction, Neil—with cobra-like quickness—snatched the phone from its cradle.
“What a donkey pit,” said Mr. Griffin as he accelerated out through the intersection onto Benedict.
Neil nodded absently and tried to enter search terms into the smartphone hidden in the crook of his arm.
“Neil!” yelled his father. “What the heck, buddy?!”
“Dad, I just need it a minute, seriously, it’s not like I’m going to blow out your plan by Googling a couple things, jeez.”
“And you know how I feel about you using jeez, you smart aleck—seriously, put it down.”
“What?” said Neil, hurriedly trying to finish swiping texas aquarium squid into the screen. “It’s not like I’m going to break it—” But just then his hand—seemingly of its own volition—shot out and whipped the phone against the windshield.
There was a screaming sound as Neil’s father stomped on the brakes and threw a protective arm across his son’s chest.
The truck came to a dead stop and everything was silent as if time itself had ceased. Neil looked out the windshield and saw a large animal bound across the other lane and through a hedge. They must have missed the thing by inches. There had been something very strange about it. It didn’t quite seem like a deer or a dog, and it had been carrying something in its front paws, almost like it was a person and—
There was a new squealing noise. “Sit back!” his father shouted, looking into the rearview mirror. He moved his foot from the brake pedal and pressed Neil firmly into his seat while he threw his own head back against the headrest.
The Prius behind them, after braking too late, now plowed into the back of Mr. Griffin’s pickup, causing the airbags to deploy and sending the vehicle on a leftward-tilted twenty-foot skid down the rain-slick boulevard.
“Stupid mother-um…” said Neil’s dad, pushing down the airbags and reaching for his insurance card in the glove box. “What was that idiot doing!? Did I miss a memo? Is it Incompetent Driver Day out there!!!?”
“What was that thing?” asked Neil.
“Dog clearly not on its leash like it’s supposed to be by law,” said his father. “This is textbook no-fault.”
“Dad, are you sure that was a dog?”
“Of course it was a dog. You ever see a cat that big?”
“But wasn’t there something weird about it?”
“I dunno,” said Mr. Griffin. “I guess it was pretty chubby. Maybe it was one of those long-haired sheepdogs.”
“It didn’t have long hair, Dad.”
“So maybe it was a short-haired sheepdog,” said Mr. Griffin. “Look, stay in the truck and keep your seat belt on, kiddo. I’m going to go put flares out.”
“But, Dad,” said Neil, trying to think through the least insane way to describe what he knew he’d seen. “The dog—wasn’t it carrying something in its arms?”
“What are you talking about—it was a dog.”
“And didn’t it have something on its head?”
“On its head?”
“You know, like antlers?”
Mr. Griffin stepped down out of the truck and looked at his son, a degree of distance in his eyes. He really hadn’t gotten a good look but the animal had been too stocky to possibly have been a deer.
“Dogs have ears, you know,” he said, and slammed the door.
“That was no dog,” said Neil to himself. But he didn’t say what he thought it was. Giant antlered rabbit wearing a wristwatch and carrying a cross just wasn’t one of those things you said out loud, even when you were by yourself.
CHAPTER 23
Pain in the Grass
Breeden, the red-shirted twin, reached the ball first, scooping it up without breaking stride and—after scaring two boys out of his way with an aggressive lunge—broke out into the open field.
Patrick shook his head and started to jog after the pursuing pack. His new glove-like shoes felt pretty good. It was a strange sensation having his toes impact the ground separately, but they seemed to give his steps some extra spring. He quickly caught up with a thick-calved, blond boy at the back of the chase pack.
“So, how’s it work? Anything illegal?”
“Wha—?” asked the boy, slowing down and looking at Patrick with big-eyed apprehension.
“Yeah, you know, probably no punching or kicking, but it’s kill the carrier, right, so basically anything goes? Nothing around the neck or going for the face or the nuts, and no hair-pulling, right?”
“R-right,” said the boy. “But, umm, you know—” he replied as Patrick took off in a purposeful sprint to get to the front of the pack.
Breeden meantime had feinted left and sprinted right toward an opening along the boundary line. The scrum followed but the lead boys were stretching out now—not so much as part of a flanking strategy, but simply because the faster boys, including Patrick, were making better progress than the slower ones. But even the speediest
wasn’t quick enough and Breeden again broke free. Patrick groaned in frustration.
Safely in the clear, the red-shirted boy held the ball aloft, high-stepping like a touchdown-scoring NFL player.
Cheers went up from the sideline. Patrick was reminded of the popularity of the lacrosse-team jerks—the Lax Bros as they were commonly known—at his own school, and felt a degree of anger welling up inside him.
He had never much liked being the center of attention. The thought of lots of people thinking their own thoughts about what he was doing just kind of made him queasy. But in this particular moment—perhaps because it was a dream—what other people thought seemed suddenly a very silly thing. As long as he really knew what he was doing, what did the opinions of these dreamed-up kids even matter?
He lowered his head and sprinted for all he was worth—quickly breaking free from the chase-pack and earning himself a collective chorus of Oohs and Ohs.
Breeden noticed his effort, too, but rather than picking up his pace, dodging to one side, or betraying any annoyance, the big red-shirted jock—huge smile on his big-eyed, square-jawed face—stopped and faced Patrick.
“Come on, Big Ears, let’s see what you’ve got!” he yelled, and began to run right at Patrick.
As will happen when two people—much less two reasonably fast young men—run at each other, they closed quickly. Neither boy slowed, flinched, or veered until they were maybe just a yard apart, at which point Patrick dove shoulder-first and a surprised Breeden—with split-second reflexes—leapt into the air.
But the leap wasn’t quick or high enough. Patrick somehow kept his eyes locked on the boy’s knees and managed to intercept his airborne opponent, receiving in reward something very hard—he wasn’t sure if it was shoe, shinbone, or kneecap—right in the nose. All he knew was it felt like a hammer blow. His vision went white and he felt his body flop backward with all the grace of a rag doll.
He seemed to hang in the air awhile—long enough to realize he was still airborne and to vaguely wish he weren’t—and then, suddenly, without feeling any impact, he was lying on the ground with his eyes closed. The pain was pretty intense but somehow he wasn’t any more preoccupied by it than he was by the grass tickling at the back of his neck.
He could hear people gasping, and this sound somehow energized him. He opened his eyes, rolled over, and got to his feet. An ashen-faced Kempton was staring at him from the sideline.
“Where’s the ball?!” yelled Patrick.
Kempton, his little jaw hanging open, limply pointed down the field. The shiny black object was sitting unattended by the far boundary line. Patrick noticed the other players on the field were standing just like Kempton: their lipsticked mouths wide and their outsized eyes staring in disbelief. A few appeared to be taking videos with their binkies.
Patrick noticed Breeden still sprawled in the grass.
“You okay, chief?” he asked.
Breeden grunted.
“Glad to hear it,” said Patrick, and, stooping down, added, “Jock-o.” Then he started jogging toward the ball.
But he didn’t get very far before the most appallingly loud siren he’d ever experienced—easily ten times more deafening than the starter’s signal, the class closing bell, or even Bostrel’s speech—dropped him to his knees.
He jammed his fingers in his ears but it was no use. His eyes watered, his teeth rattled, his T-shirt flagged under the force of the sonic blast. He felt like an ant trapped inside an air horn.
He tried to stand and run—he didn’t know how much more he could take. Tears welled up behind his eyes as he wished with all his might to wake up from this stupid dream already.
And then—for no obvious reason—the siren stopped.
A silence like crashing surf followed, and then a new sound began: a sound like thunder.
Patrick had never been crazy for science fiction, though he knew plenty of people who were—Stephen Westrum and Jeff Hookey from advanced math class, for instance, would go on and on about aliens and space weapons and were forever trying to get him to role-play in little games they’d set up. Lately they’d started calling him Rory, a character in the Doctor Who TV show. Not that he was hoping to be very popular at school anyhow, but those two sure didn’t help.
But watching the white sky-ambulance streak across the sky toward them now, Patrick almost second-guessed his science-fiction stance. Was it possible he’d been missing out? Setting aside the appalling noise of its engines—which wasn’t so easy to do—this was possibly the single coolest thing he’d seen in his entire life or, at least, that he’d ever dreamed.
The craft was white except for the big red cross on its belly, and was roughly Frisbee-shaped—maybe thirty feet across—with a series of jet or turbofan nozzles embedded in the outer portions of its fuselage.
It stopped, came to a perfect hover, gently descended to the grass, and shut off its engines. A ramp then telescoped out the back end of the craft and two men and a woman in red-and-white jumpsuits disembarked.
The woman and the taller man hurried to Breeden’s side while the shorter one began erecting an orange safety cordon.
Breeden began to push himself up—it was pretty clear to Patrick he was less than mortally wounded—but the two emergency medical technicians forced him back down and began to wave sensors along the length of his body.
The man with the safety cordon meantime had finished putting up signs that read “mōbƏL heLð yunit at wurk / 50m maxƏmum uprōc,” and was now strolling the perimeter, staring menacingly at the throngs of binky-holding students.
Kempton stole up next to Patrick.
“Why on Ith did you do that?” he asked.
“Do what?”
“Hit him!”
“He had the ball.”
“He didn’t have the ball!”
“He got rid of it?”
“At least a full quint before you hit him.”
“Really?”
“You saw where it landed—he chucked it halfway across the field!”
“Oh. I thought it must have come out when I hit him.”
“He got rid of it on purpose. And now, thanks to you, he may be injured.”
“Aw, come on,” said Patrick. He was starting to worry that maybe Ith people were more delicate than Earth people, although, he reassured himself, if that were the case, there was no way kill the carrier would be a premiere sport.
“Did he have some special condition or something?” asked Patrick.
“What do you mean?” said Kempton.
A year ahead of Patrick at Hedgerow Heights Middle School there was this kid Dirk Nixon who had hemophilia. Every time Dirk got a scratch or a bruise they’d rush him off to the hospital. And the whole situation was especially complicated because Dirk—who was keenly aware nobody was supposed to hit him back—was always chucking things (pencils, juice boxes, baseballs, tape dispensers, books, shoes, rocks) at people and starting fights.
“Well, what’s the deal with the paramedics?” asked Patrick.
“What do you mean? There was a trauma. MHYs are always dispatched to assess and treat traumas.”
“Trauma? He got tackled,” said Patrick. “And how did they get here so fast? How could they have known so quickly?”
“POP.”
“Who?”
“They saw what you did and dispatched a unit.”
“But it’s only kids out here,” said Patrick.
“POP sees what happens at all times,” Kempton said, pointing up at the sky.
“What are you talking about? What’s POP?”
“The Public Operations Panel? Tell me you don’t have POP on Earth!?” Kempton dropped his jaw in horror. “To spot problems and dispatch assistance?”
“They spotted me decking that kid?”
“Of course.”
“But how?”
“Probably when everybody hit their Inform buttons, duh!”
Patrick looked at Kempton to see if he was kidding arou
nd. He didn’t seem to be.
“Okay, so if I’d tackled him and nobody had reported it, they wouldn’t have known?”
“Well, a video algorithm probably would have picked it up.” He pointed at a nearby security pole topped with a black plastic bubble.
“Security cameras,” said Patrick.
“And the drones, too,” Kempton said, nodding up at the sky.
“Drones?”
“You don’t have drones on Earth?”
“We do, but, like, not over our schools and stuff.”
“Why wouldn’t you have them over your schools? Don’t you care about the safety of children?”
“Well,” said Patrick, looking up. “So there are drones up there right now?”
“Why would the drones not be there!? You don’t have a PSN on Earth!?”
“What’s—”
“The Public Safety Network? You don’t have one?”
“They have drones flying all the time watching everything you guys do? So, you have, like, zero privacy when you’re outside?”
“What’s privacy got to do with it?”
“Well, I mean—you’re being watched all the time.”
“We’re not watched; we’re monitored—for emergency responses just like this. And POP’s data feeds also supply MA, whose algorithms and analytics suggest appropriate long-term development initiatives and organizational course corrections.”
“MA?”
“The Ministry of Awareness.”
“Oh,” said Patrick.
“Anyhow,” the boy continued, turning his attention back to the paramedics. “I’m frankly a little surprised MA only sent an MHY and didn’t send cops, too.”
Patrick shook his head. “The police?”
“O-M-S!” squealed Kempton, smacking his palm against his forehead. “What are you—from the dark ages? KOPs are Community Officers of the Peace. You know, to arrest you.”
“Arrest me!? For what?!”
“For physical assault.”
“What?”
“You attacked Breeden.”
“Attacked? I tackled him.”
“Which is a form of attack. Hello?”
“Look, I told you, I didn’t know he’d gotten rid of the ball. And what’s the big deal, anyhow? It’s kill the carrier!”
