by DM Fike
“A Child? I thought you said there was only one.”
“There have been more.” Nobody paced the room. “We’re in uncharted territory here. Bedwyr’s trying to recreate the Child of the Statue via unnatural means. A human has never wielded any magic before, much less two elements like wind and lightning, and I have never heard of any dark or light magic connected with the statue. Yet you used dark magic last night as if you’d been doing it all your life. Who knows how this is going to manifest itself?”
“You think this other Child of the Statue is in my mind?”
Nobody nodded, then shook his head, then slapped his cheeks in frustration, the bottoms of his eyelids sagging. “I don’t know what to think.”
Avalon stroked Vimp’s fur, trying to untighten the knot that had formed in her stomach. Her recent Miasmis symptoms and new magical abilities couldn’t be coincidence. The cloaked girl had clearly been Aossi. The vans last night proved Saluzyme was involved. James. She didn’t want to believe he knew but didn’t know how he couldn’t, given his position inside the company.
But if she felt nauseated about James, complete terror threatened to break her when she thought of her father’s work on the Entelegen. Her father had been the pillar on which her family stood. He had stayed by his mother’s bedside whenever he wasn’t building the machine that might save her life. She had never seen him as happy as when James’s controversial therapy had cured her, his only child. The fact that Avalon had lived while he died testing a Miasmis machine had always seemed like such a cruel twist of fate. But once again, fate found a way to up the ante by suggesting maybe her father had aided in this awful web Avalon was uncovering.
She shoved her hand in her pocket, feeling the familiar storage key. She stood, Vimp squealing as he slid off her lap onto the floor.
“Where are you going?” Nobody asked as she headed for the door.
“Someplace that may have answers.”
Avalon raced down the steps, into the parking lot and back behind the hotel, occupying the spot where Kay had left last night. Maybe she could find him before they left. She cupped her hands around her mouth.
“KAY!”
The sound echoed across the silent dawn hours.
Nobody trotted behind her as she inhaled another deep breath.
“Are you sure you should be doing that?” Nobody asked.
She ignored him. “KAY!”
A window opened on the second story of the hotel. “Shut up!” a guttural voice yelled, a man’s blocky frame outlined in the threadbare curtains.
A weird bubbling sensation stirred in Avalon’s gut. She turned toward the open window, hand outstretched.
Nobody squeaked and pulled her back. “You’re the one screaming dirty murder at oh-no-you-didn’t o’clock in the morning. This does not call for divine retribution.”
“But I need to leave, and Kay’s out there.”
“Kay’s his own man. I mean fairy. Blah, whatever! He makes his own decisions.”
Avalon let the bubbling sensation in her gut fade. “Fine.” She jerked away from Nobody. “Fine!” she yelled, not sure whether she was addressing the man in the window or Kay.
They grabbed their things from the hotel room and packed into Digs’s hulk of a sedan. Nobody and Vimp respected Avalon’s foul mood by remaining blessedly silent in the passenger seat on the ride back toward the city. She was happy not to bear the brunt of bad jokes, trying to quench the awful feeling that she had abandoned Kay. As she exited the freeway, she found the university streets nearly empty in the early weekend hours.
Nobody raised an eyebrow as they passed a sign for the medical school. “So we’re going to Saluzyme?”
“No, my father’s prepaid storage unit. It has some work-related stuff of his I want to check out.”
“Oh yeah!” Vimp pressed his face to the glass, staring into the sky. He bolted from Nobody’s lap and plastered himself along the backseat window, neck craned upward.
Avalon glanced in the rearview mirror and caught a glimpse of the “U” on the Wasatch Mountains. She fought back tears, remembering her father’s promise. She couldn’t cry now.
“Look out!” Nobody screamed, pointing forward.
Avalon slammed on the brakes as a young man with a backpack jumped in front of the car, his cell phone pointed to the sky. Tires squealed as she swerved to miss him. She slid into the incoming lane, but thankfully, no one drove in the opposite direction.
Nobody rolled down his window. “You trying to die?” he yelled at the dazed student.
The guy gave an apologetic wave and ran back to the sidewalk, sheepish but fixated with whatever picture he’d taken with his phone.
“Idiot!” Nobody rolled his window back up. “I hate that little wave they make. It’s like they’re saying, ‘Sorry I almost killed you, but I waved, so that makes it A-OK.’”
“Oh yeah!” Vimp yelled again, face still plastered to the rear window as Avalon shakily pushed the accelerator.
Avalon glared at the demon. “Vimp, get down before someone sees you!” He protested but leaped down to the floor mats.
Avalon made her way off campus toward their old neighborhood. Small storefronts faded behind duplexes, which gave way to smaller houses. They passed the condominium complex where her father last lived. Avalon recognized the park that she and Kay had slept in the first night he had come to life. She clenched her jaw.
The bright orange storage company occupied the better part of a side street, unmanned with a keypad at the entrance. Avalon punched in the four-digit code—the last four digits of her childhood phone number—trying to keep her face out of view of the entrance camera. Once the gate opened, she maneuvered the monstrous car around narrow corners toward the back of the property.
Avalon had just killed the engine when something crashed onto the car roof, causing a visible bow.
“Sadus!” Nobody yelled.
They both shrieked as a hand slapped down, palming the windshield from above.
Avalon reacted instinctively, gathering energy in her gut, feeling the ebb and flow of wind. Nobody’s hands became drenched in black goo.
Kay’s face peeked down into the windshield.
“Oh yeah!” Vimp clapped his paws.
The shock of Kay’s sudden appearance shook the magical wind loose from Avalon’s body, a wild animal released from its cage. It rocked the car wildly from side to side, hit Kay squarely in the chest, and sent him flying across the hood of her car. He slid out of sight beyond the front grill.
“Kay!” Avalon jumped out of the car to check on him. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.” He winced, rolling to his feet.
“That’s two people with a death wish.” Nobody played with the goo in his hands, fidgeting and rolling it until it disappeared into nothing. “Are you going to give us a little wave too?”
“I was trying to keep up,” Kay said accusingly. “You were traveling at an amazingly quick pace. When I thought I might reach you, you only stopped in well populated areas, like when you almost murdered that fellow with your carriage.”
“You followed us from the hotel?” Avalon asked incredulously.
“How could I not?” Kay retorted. “I need to keep you close.”
Avalon knew Kay referred to the fact that she might have created him and thus he had to remain in her vicinity, but Nobody completely misinterpreted his intent. “How very romantic of you. About as romantic as flying off in a huff last night.”
Kay glowered, his hand hovering over his sword.
Avalon got in between the two of them. “Oh no. Round two will not happen here. I came here for answers, and neither of you are getting in the way of that.” She turned to Kay. “Let go of your sword.”
He begrudgingly relaxed his stance.
She then wagged a finger in Nobody’s face. “And don’t you say a single word.” The gremlin pouted as he smacked his lips shut.
Despite the intensity of the situation, Avalon c
ould not help but feel a burden lift as she approached her father’s storage unit.
Kay had returned.
Avalon unlocked the garage door and used her full weight to push it upward. Metal screeched but eventually revealed a small storage space with boxes filled over her head, labeled both in her handwriting and her father’s.
Avalon grabbed a few empty boxes near the entrance. “I’m going to look for my father’s work files. You can help me by taking my stuff out of the trunk and putting them in these boxes. I might as well pack it away while I can.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Nobody gave a mock salute as Kay hauled a box to the car.
As Kay and Nobody got to work, Avalon shuffled things around inside the unit, searching. She found a cardboard box labeled “Jewelry.” Riffling through the contents, she found one of her mother’s cheap chain bracelets. She threaded the storage key’s head through the bracelet, the key becoming a charm. She attached the bracelet to her ankle and pulled her sock over it. She hoped that would prevent her from losing it again.
Avalon placed the lid back on the “Jewelry” box and dug deeper into the storage shed. It did not take her long to find her target, a banker’s box labeled “Saluzyme.”
Avalon hauled her prize onto the pavement so she could better examine its contents. Old pay stubs littered the top. Moving those aside, she found a series of small empty vials, each stamped with a Saluzyme logo, a cap sealing off the air within. She lifted the vials to the light, noting some hazy residue stains. The numbers written in permanent marker on the outside didn’t give her any clue as to what they had once held.
Avalon put the vials aside and kept digging through the box, most of the bottom filled with folders full of design specs and notes full of scientific jargon she did not understand. She despaired of finding anything useful until she uncovered a white envelope at the bottom. Her father had written the word “Private” across the strip of tape sealing it shut.
Avalon ripped the envelope open. A thumb drive landed into her palm. She whooped in triumph.
“Did you find something useful?” Nobody called after her.
“‘Marjorie and Avalon Benton medical files,’” she read the thumb drive’s label. “My dad made copies of my mother’s and my treatments at Saluzyme.”
“A clue, Sheer Luck,” Nobody said.
Avalon rushed back into the storage shed, opening the lid of an old plastic crate. She found her mother’s laptop, its power cord still attached. Avalon brought it out of the unit, found an electrical outlet at the end of the row of storage units, and plugged in the machine.
“This will take some time to charge,” she said. Kay, Vimp, and Nobody had packed most of her belongings. She kept some spare clothes and blankets for herself, directing everything else into the shed.
It took several minutes for the computer to have enough of a charge to boot up. Nobody grew impatient, sifting through the Saluzyme papers himself. “What does any of this mean?” he cried, as Avalon sat on the ground, laptop warming on her lap.
“My father built a special brain scanner called the Entelegen. Those are engineering specs. It makes as much sense to me as it does to you.”
Kay tentatively lifted a few pieces of paper that Nobody had strewn on the ground. He examined it. “These are the writings of a mad man.”
Avalon turned her attention to the screen as the computer finished loading. “Here goes nothing.” She shoved the thumb drive into a USB port.
She anticipated a folder popping up with files she could click on. She did not expect a gray dialog box with an error to fill the screen. “Cannot connect to /Saluzyme/Benton/Files?” she read aloud with a groan.
Kay jerked his head. “Are you trying to summon some sort of demon?”
“No.” Avalon ejected the thumb drive from the computer. She flipped the little stick in her hand. “It means we have to be on the Saluzyme network to access these files.”
“Saluzyme?” Kay repeated. “Isn’t that the people who pursued us last night?”
Avalon nodded, thrusting the thumb drive into her pocket. “If we can get to a company computer, we could probably read what happened to my mother.”
“And find out more about Subject #1 and Subject #2.” Nobody flashed his pointed teeth in excitement. “I smell a break in coming on!”
“You cannot go,” Kay protested as she shoved the rest of her things into the storage unit and locked it. “Those people will harm you.”
“I don’t think anywhere is safe for me anymore.” Avalon shivered at the thought of the TV report last night. “And it doesn’t matter either way. I have to know what happened to me at Saluzyme.” And clear my father of any involvement, she added silently to herself.
Kay shifted uncertainly from foot to foot, running his hand through his hair.
Avalon stood in front of him, his face slightly above hers. “You don’t have to come. Saluzyme is next to the Wasatch mountains. You could stay there and be safe.”
“Oooo,” Nobody whispered loudly to Vimp. “Lover’s dilemma. Do you think they’ll kiss?”
“Oh yeah!”
“You know I won’t let you go alone,” Kay said in frustration, ignoring their heckling.
Avalon stared deep into his worried eyes. “Let me make you a promise,” she said softly. “After we break into Saluzyme and get the info we need, Nobody will take us back to Llenwald.”
“Say what now?” Nobody’s grin morphed into a scowl of confusion.
“I’ve made up my mind,” Avalon told him. “I will only go to Saluzyme with my dad’s thumb drive if you promise to take us to Llenwald afterward. Kay must find out who he is.”
“Don’t you think if you really loved Winged Wonder, you’d accept him the way he is now?” Nobody asked.
Both Avalon and Kay glared at Nobody.
“Bah. Fine then.” Nobody threw his hands in the air. “There always has to be some yarn attached to kill the mood.” He stalked off, Vimp hanging around his neck.
Avalon reached out to Kay. “We’ll find out who you are.”
Kay abruptly jerked away before she could touch him. “Let’s go. Before I change my mind.”
CHAPTER 23
“I IMAGINED BREAKING into Saluzyme would be more exciting,” Avalon said. She didn’t have a lot of room cramped next to Kay, Vimp, and Nobody as they huddled inside a small ring of shrubs on the edge of the empty Saluzyme parking lot. Although it was Saturday and the building was deserted, Nobody insisted they survey the place a few hours to be sure.
Avalon’s left foot grew numb, so she shifted her legs into a crisscross position. She said sorry when she bumped into Kay’s knees, but he didn’t acknowledge her apology.
“Look on the bright side,” Nobody said. “Desert Rose hasn’t shown her glamour mug here since we arrived.”
“That’s because only the daft would dare infiltrate their enemy’s lair.” Kay scrutinized the Saluzyme building, fingers never far from his sword.
“Daft is one of the nicest things you’ve ever called me.” Nobody wiped away a fake tear, then curled himself into a ball on the ground. He convulsed as feathers overcame his clothing and he molted into his raven form. Once finished, he let out a loud caw.
“I’ll make one last perimeter sweep before we go.” Nobody arched his feathery back so Vimp could climb on top. “I’ll give the signal to follow.” He flew toward the building, his wings wide as he curved around a corner.
Avalon rubbed the toe of one sneaker into the soft dirt between fallen leaves. She wanted to talk to Kay, but he’d remained distant since leaving the storage unit. “I’m nervous,” she finally admitted.
Kay gave a curt nod but barely glanced her way.
Avalon’s face flushed. “Will you please quit ignoring me? Even if I did create you, I didn’t mean to. I obviously don’t control you. You seem to do whatever you please.”
Kay tightened his grip on his sword, and Avalon thought he might bite back with more angry words. He surpris
ed her by letting go of his weapon completely and slumping forward on his haunches. “I apologize. I do not know how to act. I am lost.”
The heat rushed out of Avalon, replaced by a numbness. “I really am trying to do whatever I can to help.”
“I know.” Kay avoided her gaze. “It is about the only thing that keeps me going. And I don’t know if that’s a positive sign or not.”
Avalon wanted to tell him that everything would be fine, that she could not have created him, that he must have a past, but each argument fell flat. The truth was, she had no idea how her own life had gotten so turned upside down. Everything she knew about the world had changed in only a handful of days. She didn’t even know what was real inside her own head anymore, much less what was going on inside his.
She slowly placed one hand over his. Her fingers squeezed. She thought she felt a tiny pinch back in response.
“CAW! CAW!” Nobody’s voice echoed in the distance.
Their hands parted. It was time to go.
Avalon and Kay crawled out of the bushes. Nobody continued to call to them near the top floor, swinging his beak to indicate they needed to join him.
Kay and Avalon stared at each other, trying to figure out how to coordinate flying together. Kay extended his arms, then retracted. Avalon stepped forward and bumped her head on his shoulder. They performed this awkward dance until Avalon finally launched at Kay, latching onto his neck. He put his arms gently around her waist.
“Hang on,” Kay said in her ear. He crouched slightly down before leaping, his wings catching a breeze and jerking them into the air.
Nobody told them he had broken into the building previously using air ducts. A shaft on the top floor connected directly into James’s personal examination room, which Avalon knew had a functional computer. They would enter the building there.
Kay flew Avalon to where Nobody had already pulled the grate off and crawled inside the narrow metal corridor, Vimp close on his heels. Avalon tried not to look down as Kay maneuvered her shoulders into the shaft. With her head and torso inside, claustrophobia threatened to overtake her. She swallowed down her panic as Kay pushed and her whole body slid into the confined space.
