The Very Killer Caterpillar

by Samantha Silver

  Cat nodded. “Agreed. I guess we’ll just have to do some more digging. Besides, I want to know what this whole Black Magic thing is about.”

  “Same, but we have to make it to the meeting for now. I guess that’s a problem for another day,” I said as we made our way back to the main entrance hall and followed the signs for the auditorium which was serving as the debate hall for the night.

  We settled into our seats; municipal politics were rarely enormously popular, but I had still expected there to be more than the hundred or so people in attendance. Everyone was scattered around, the auditorium, which could have easily held ten times the number of people in attendance. Cat and I took a couple of seats toward the back of the room, and sipped our coffees.

  “I kind of wish we’d brought popcorn,” she said, and I laughed.

  “Are we really going to need it?”

  “I hope so,” Cat replied. Boy, was she ever right.

  Chapter 4

  Ten minutes later the debate started, with the four candidates coming out along with the moderator for the debate. Frank looked quietly confident. He was in his early forties, and just starting to bald, but as he smiled over the crowd he exuded calm and confidence, what you wanted in a leader. Denise Williams, on the other hand, ran a hand through her salt-and-pepper hair, a smug look on her face, like she was already going to win this.

  I didn’t recognize either of the other two candidates. One looked like he’d just graduated from high school yesterday and was wearing his dad’s suit, the other was one of those men who could be anywhere from thirty to fifty, with a completely forgettable face and the same haircut that every politician in the world seemed to have.

  The moderator was one of the local journalists–I recognized his headshot from the article he wrote in the local paper every week–a man who looked to be in his early thirties, and definitely recognizable as a hipster, even though he didn’t have the token beard.

  “All right, ladies and gentlemen, if you can all have a seat, we’re going to get started,” he said. “For those who don’t know me, I’m Steven Jacobsen, I write for the local paper. I’ll be moderating the debate tonight, and I’d like to start by giving each of the candidates a minute to introduce themselves. We’ll go left to right, so if you could please get us started, Mr. Forbes.

  The young-looking kid coughed into his hand and then leaned forward into the microphone. “Hi, my name is Ed Forbes. Or, uh, Edward, if you prefer.” He paused for a minute, as if catching himself. “I’m running for mayor because I think it’s important that, uh, today’s youth have a say in the government, and uh, I think that I would be a good person to represent that segment, especially in a place like Sapphire Village, since we have so many more young people living here than uh, in other places.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Forbes,” Steven said. “Mr. Harding, your turn.”

  “Hello everyone, I’d like to thank you all for coming. My name, for those of you who don’t know me, is Frank Harding. I’ve lived in Sapphire Village my whole life. I work for the mountain, but that doesn’t mean I’m just a microphone for them. As many of you know, I’m opposed to the Renaissance development. As your mayor, I’d like to tackle the important issues that affect residents, like the lack of affordable housing, and work on ways to improve wages.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Harding,” the moderator continued. “Now, Mr. Vandenberg, please introduce yourself to the group.”

  “I thought we were going to keep my name out of this,” the man said. “After all, that’s how they get you,” he said into the microphone. “That’s right, the CIA,” he said to everyone else. “I’m running for Mayor of Sapphire Village because I know the government is trying to brainwash the citizens here, and I’m going to stop that from happening. They’ve created diseases meant to sterilize us. The zika virus? Created by the government and first tested in a Catholic country to bring down the birth rate. And don’t even get me started on chemtrails—”

  “All right, thank you Mr. Vandenberg,” Steven said, cutting him off. “That was a very… enlightening introduction. Mrs. Williams, the floor is yours.”

  Denise sniffed the air, like she was too good to introduce herself after people like that, and started her speech. “I’m sure you all know me, Denise Williams. After all, I’ve been a leader in this community for years. As your Mayor, I plan on taking this town into the twenty first century by Supporting Sapphire Mountain and their Renaissance plans. With me at the helm, Sapphire Village will experience an era of prosperity and wealth yet unknown to this community.”

  I could practically feel Cat rolling her eyes next to me, and I hid a smile. I definitely was not a fan of Denise either.

  The moderator thanked the four for their introductions and began asking the pre-selected questions. As we watched them answer, I realized two things: for one, either Denise or Frank was going to win this election. There was absolutely no doubt about that. Ed Forbes had no idea what half the issues in town were, and the answers he did give were vague and nervous-sounding. Vanderberg, whatever his first name was, just kept ranting about the government trying to poison the populace, and how he was going to protect the town from the secret government satellites watching our every move.

  By comparison, Frank’s answers to all the questions were reasoned, confident, and as time went on I noticed more and more people in the crowd nodding and murmuring assent to his answers. Denise obviously noticed this as well. She had begun to glare at people who were agreeing with Frank, and while her own answers definitely weren’t bad, especially when compared with the two other men who weren’t going to win the election, they didn’t carry the same conviction and confidence as Frank’s did.

  The longer the debate went on, the more unhinged I could see Denise getting. She clutched at her pen so hard I was fairly certain her hand was going to fall off, and if looks could kill I was pretty sure all of us in the auditorium would be dead before this debate ended.

  “All right, now I’d like to call up any members of the public who would like to ask questions, we have time for about ten or so,” Steven said, as some staff brought in microphones and set them up in the aisles. A few people got up and slowly meandered their ways toward them.

  “Hello, my question is for all four candidates,” the first person asked. “It seems there has been an increase in violent crimes in Sapphire Village lately, what will you be doing to address ?”

  After a mumbled answer about being tough on crime by Ed Forbes, Frank answered next.

  “While there has been a rash of murders in Sapphire Village recently, I am more prone to believe they are isolated incidents than the sparking of a trend. I would, as Mayor, offer Chief Griffin and his entire staff my support and work with the police in town to determine what we can do to prevent this sort of thing in the future.”

  “The CIA is bringing in secret operatives and murdering the people who come too close to discovering the truth,” Vanderberg replied. “They are then framing local citizens for the murders, and getting them to admit to it via brainwashing, therefore ridding themselves of even more enemies. I will put protections in place to ensure that the agencies that pretend to protect us can no longer silence the voices of the truth-tellers.”

  I raised my eyebrows at that answer. I had to give him points for creativity. Then, it was Denise’s turn.

  “Unlike Frank over here,” she started, spitting out his name with obvious disgust, “I think we need to be harder on crime, and harder on the criminals. And it starts with the police, who obviously aren’t doing their jobs. As Mayor, I’ll be getting rid of this ineffectual police chief who can’t even stop innocent members of this community from being murdered, and replace him with someone who does what’s needed to restore law and order to this community.”

  “What a sack of baloney,” Cat muttered. “Chief Griffin has done really well, and both murderers were caught. You can’t blame him for them happening in the first place.”

  “Agreed,” I said,
balling my hands into a fist. I was surprised at how outraged I was at the idea that Denise would fire Chief Griffin.

  “But Mrs. Williams,” Frank interrupted. “You cannot deny that Chief Griffin has gotten results. After all, both murderers so far have been caught.” There was a murmur of assent from the crowd at the statement, which I was pleased to see.

  “Well, he hasn’t caught the third murderer yet,” she replied.

  “The body was found less than twelve hours ago, and we don’t even have definite confirmation that it was a murder yet, you can’t expect an arrest to be made instantly. The police need to have time to investigate.”

  “As far as I’m concerned, I want murderers off the street as fast as possible. I don’t want them out there out there. What I’m hearing you say is you don’t mind having murderers on the street, killing our children,” Denise practically shouted, standing up from her chair and glaring down the long table toward Frank.

  The crowd murmured angrily, obviously not happy with the outburst from Denise, as Frank held up his hands. “Woah, I’m not saying that at all. All I’m saying is the police need to be given the time to conduct a proper investigation, rather than a rushed one with inferior results. No one wants to see an innocent person go to jail.”

  “I bet you I can get her to crack,” Cat whispered in my ear, and I watched with interest as she walked up to the nearest microphone, while Steven interrupted.

  “All right folks, I think we’re getting a little bit off topic here. Why don’t you all take a seat and we’ll take on the next question.” He looked around the auditorium and pointed at Cat. “How about you?”

  “Thank you, Steven,” Cat said sweetly. “My question is for Denise Williams: What makes you think you would be better at ensuring law and order when you falsely and publically accused me of killing Edith Chalmers a few weeks ago?”

  I bit my lip to hide a smile as I watched all the blood drain from Denise’s face, and then a second later had it turn red with anger.

  “How dare you, you devilish woman! You know very well that I never did anything of the sort.”

  “You did, in fact,” Steven said calmly into his microphone. “I just happened to be in Cat’s Cupcakes at the time and saw the entire thing.”

  Cat was grinning at Denise from her spot in front of the microphone. Denise stood up angrily. “So, I see you’re all in cahoots, trying to slander my good name. Well, I don’t have to stand here and take this. I will be the next Mayor of Sapphire Village, no matter how much you all do your best to try and stop me!”

  She had moved around the table at this point. Frank stood up. “Please, Denise, just sit down. We can talk this through, we can finish this debate. No one’s trying to slander you.”

  Denise had begun to storm off, but she turned around, walking backward as she turned to yell at Frank some more. “Don’t pretend to be on my side now,” she said, wagging her finger at him. At the last second, I realized that Denise had actually started going the wrong way, she was now moving toward the edge of the stage. I opened my mouth to point out what was happening, but it was far too late.

  With a single step backward too many, Denise plummeted off the stage and down the ten feet or so to the ground below with a giant shriek. There was a thud, and then a cry.

  “Isn’t anyone going to come down here and help me?” she shouted immediately. The remaining three mayoral candidates and Steven had already jumped out of their seats to help. “Get off me, I can do it myself,” she cried as soon as they arrived, and I shook my head.

  “Are you all right?” Frank asked.

  “Of course I’m all right,” Denise said. “Besides, I’m not finished stomping off. You can all go to hell! All of you!” And with that, Denise turned on her feel, glaring at Cat, who flashed her a huge smile and a wave, earning herself a one-finger salute back from Denise as she left the auditorium.

  “Well, um, with the injury of one of the candidates, I think we will leave everything at that,” Steven said into the microphone. “I thank all of you for coming, and to the candidates for, um, being here, and I hope you will all go out and vote on June twenty second.”

  The group of people all got up, the buzz in the room from people talking to one another making it obvious that the group of gossipers in Sapphire Village tomorrow were definitely going to have a field day.

  “I can’t believe that just happened,” I said to Cat as we left.

  “I know, wasn’t it amazing?” Cat replied with a grin. “I mean, I am legitimately glad she wasn’t hurt, but if Denise thinks she has even a chance at becoming Mayor now, she’s completely deluded.”

  “I just can’t believe she would throw Chase under the bus like that. To say that he was bad at his job because he hasn’t found a murderer after what like, eight hours? That’s ridiculous.”

  “Awwww, how cute, you’re defending your boyfriend,” Cat said, wrapping her arm around me.

  “Oh shut up, I am not,” I replied. “He’s not my boyfriend.”

  “Not yet, anyway,” Cat replied with a wink as we headed back out toward the car.

  Chapter 5

  By the time we got back outside there were far fewer students around on the campus; most of the classes had long since finished by now, so we decided to try and figure out what Black Magic was the following day.

  I went home and told Peaches everything that happened–she was practically in tears of laughter by the end of the story, reheated some leftovers, watched a bit of Netflix with Muffin kneading my stomach the whole time, and then went to bed.

  When I got down to the bookstore the next morning, I found Archibald, the store’s ghost, pacing–well, floating–around in circles, angrily.

  “Archibald, what’s wrong?” I asked him. I really hoped this had nothing to do with his “feud” with Lord Byron, which had now lasted hundreds of years, during most of which both men were dead.

  “I am outraged, Alice Calliope. Outraged!”

  “Ok,” I replied. Outrage wasn’t exactly a new emotion for Archibald. “What are you outraged about?”

  “The devil book you got me to listen to the other day.”

  “Ah,” I replied, nodding my understanding. Archibald had decided that nothing written after the year of his death was worth reading, an opinion my Aunt Francine who owned the store before me felt was fine. I, on the other hand, felt that Archibald was missing out, and was slowly managing to convince him to read more modern works. It turned out he was a huge Agatha Christie fan, but had sadly listened to all of her novels on audiobook now.

  Yesterday I had decided to see how he liked Harry Potter, and put him in the back room (where customers wouldn’t hear the iPad playing an audiobook) along with the iPad playing Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone.

  “Not a fan of Harry Potter then?” I asked.

  “The book is ridiculous,” Archibald complained. “So unrealistic.”

  “Well that’s the point, isn’t it? It’s supposed to be unrealistic, it’s a story about wizards and magic in a world where most people think that doesn’t exist.”

  “Oh no, it’s not the wizards I have a problem with. It’s the ghosts!”

  “Oh?”

  “For one thing, there’s no such thing as a poltergeist. If I had the power to move objects, I absolutely would be doing that constantly.”

  “So, the only reason you’re not haunting us all regularly is because you’re unable to, not because you don’t want to?” I asked, trying to hide a smile.

  “Exactly. The people of this century are far too soft, mentally. Back in my day only the strong survived. Between the high infant mortality rate and putting to children at work in factories to help their families earn a living, if you weren’t made of stern stuff, you never made it to adulthood.”

  “Well, that seems unnecessary,” I replied. “I don’t think you’ll find a lot of people agreeing with you that more dead children is what we should be striving for.”

  “Perhaps not,
but your generation does not know the fear of pandemic, or have the mental fortitude to deal with it. A little bit of haunting is exactly what is needed to toughen you all up.”

  “Ok, whatever you say,” I replied, happier than ever that Archibald wasn’t able to manipulate objects in his ghost form. “So, you don’t like that the portrayal of ghosts was unrealistic. Is that all?”

  “Of course that’s not all! It’s not simply that, it’s the portrayal of ghosts overall. Even the ghost who is supposed to be nice is known as Nearly Headless Nick. The book stereotypes ghosts as terrifying beings that one should avoid, rather than as former human beings themselves. If this book is marketed toward the youth of the world, they are learning that all ghosts are creatures who are either awful people or horribly disfigured, and that tars us all with a brush that I don’t want to be tarred with.”

  “Well, I don’t think J.K. Rowling is a witch, so she probably has never met a real ghost in her life.

  “Perhaps she should do her research better, then. Also, I take issue with the idea that a number of the top school professors could have concocted a supposedly unbreakable set of spells that three schoolchildren had very little problem with.”

  “It’s a book, Archibald. A book about magic, written for people in a world where magic doesn’t exist. It’s not supposed to be realistic.”

  “Well it’s ridiculous, and I don’t like it.”

  “Does that mean you don’t want me to put on The Chamber of Secrets today?”

  “Oh, I suppose I can struggle through it. How many of these Harry Potter books are there, anyway?”

  “Seven.”

  “Seven? My goodness. The greats of English literature should be glad they’re in the grave and do not have to lower themselves to reading this drivel.”

  “I really don’t need to put the second book on for you, I can always find you something else.”