‘Jinx?’ I call out tentatively.
There’s a light on in one of the houses a few metres away. There’s a red post box at the front with the letters CHAN written in gold along the side. A shiver runs down my spine. The house is the type almost no one can afford any more, unless you’re on Companioneers Crescent: wide-fronted, with two huge windows downstairs, and four on the upper level. It’s painted a warm, creamy white, with deep olive-green shutters.
Is this where Monica Chan lives?
On a fake street buried beneath Moncha HQ? Why would she choose to do that?
No. Something is not right. I need to go in and find out what’s going on, once and for all. A blinking red light catches my eye. I look up and I see cameras in the trees – and thick iron bars concealed amongst the greenery.
That’s when I realize: it’s not a home at all. It’s a prison.
I slowly walk down the path, treading on each flagstone carefully as if each one might be booby-trapped. Who knows in a place like this? But I peer through the front window and spy a flash of Jinx’s tail, giving me the push I need to enter the house. The door is unlocked. I knock on it once, unable to shake the politeness from my system, but go in without waiting for a response.
‘Hello?’ I say, tentatively.
The door swings open into a wide hallway, rich oriental carpets covering dark hardwood floors and vibrant paintings of countryside in oversized gilt frames on pale green walls. I feel like I’ve walked into a dream. None of it seems real. I wrap my arms around my waist, a deep sense of wrong pervading all my senses.
A giggle from the front room catches my attention. I walk in without hesitating any longer. Sitting cross-legged on the floor, stroking Jinx, is my idol and tech icon – Monica Chan – her signature jagged fringe grown out of shape. Jinx rolls on to his belly, allowing her to stroke him in his most vulnerable state, and a pang of jealousy spikes through my belly. Monica is talking to him, laughing – and, I realize as I get closer, crying too. Tears are rolling down her cheeks, dripping on to Jinx’s fur. ‘I thought I’d never see you again!’
She looks up as I walk in, and doesn’t even blink. It’s as if my presence is not a surprise to her. ‘Are you the one who did this? Are you the one who brought him back to life?’
‘His name is Jinx,’ I say, through my teeth.
‘Jinx. Oh, a perfect name. A perfect name for a perfect creature. My little trickster. He looks very different now, but I would recognize him anywhere.’
‘There wasn’t much to work with,’ I say, bristling at the implied insult at my handiwork. Then I soften. ‘You created him?’
‘Created him?’ She continues to brush Jinx’s fur with her fingers as she talks, as if she wants to touch every part of him. ‘I suppose you could say that. It would be more accurate to say that he created me. He showed me the light.’ At that, her eyes seem to glaze over. ‘I . . . can’t think like that. It’s too difficult. I am happy now.’ Her fingers lift from Jinx’s fur, hovering just above him. She wants to touch him but something is stopping her.
Jinx rolls over on to his paws now. He nuzzles up to her, then hops into her arms, climbing on to her shoulder. Absent-mindedly – more habit than purposeful movement – she runs her fingers around Jinx’s tail, holding it up to the leash around her ear. ‘Do you mind?’ she asks, her eyes suddenly bright as if she’s woken from a trance. It’s as if the artificial light from the basement prison she lives in is replaced with inner light that shines from her face like moonlight. This is the woman I recognize from all the videos I’ve watched. The woman I’ve idolized for so long.
I hold my breath as she connects Jinx’s tail to her leash. And yet . . . nothing seems to happen. I breathe a sigh of relief, despite myself.
Monica closes her eyes. When she opens them again, she deflates. ‘I suppose things have moved on for both of us. Come on, let’s drink some tea. We won’t have much time – and I don’t know how much longer I’m going to be this lucid – but I do know that a cup of green tea can fix anything. Something my mom said once.’
‘My dad used to say something similar,’ I say, my voice sounding small.
‘He must have been a smart man, your father.’
I don’t elaborate – because I don’t want memories of my dad to ruin this moment. But Monica continues. ‘Is that who gave you that ring?’
My eyebrows raise in surprise, but then I realize that I’ve been playing with it again – it must have caught her eye.
‘I had one of those once,’ she says.
‘I know,’ I say, sheepishly. ‘It’s another one of the reasons why I wear it. You’re like – my hero,’ I splutter out, before I can stop myself.
Monica blushes and it covers both her cheeks, travelling down her neck – reminding me of how I react when I blush. The fact that someone so powerful and confident can still be reduced to redness like me endears her to me even more. Does she have to be perfect in every way?
‘If you put him back together after what he endured, you must be a pretty incredible companioneer. Has Eric tried to offer you a job yet?’
‘I don’t think that’s likely. I think Eric hates me. At least, his son does.’
‘And why is that?’
I shrug. ‘Because I beat him at everything?’
Monica chuckles, then beckons at something behind my head. I turn around to see a sloth baku walking into the room, two teacups balanced on its back.
‘Take one,’ she says to me.
I do as she says, but I can’t hold my questions in any longer. ‘What’s going on? Where are we? Why are you here?’
Monica sips her tea. Then, she frowns. ‘I did something . . . bad.’
I drop out of my chair, so that I’m almost sitting at her feet. ‘Do you know what Eric is doing to your company in your absence? He wants to destroy Jinx, you know. His son tried to steal him away from me.’
Her eyes darken. ‘Yes, well, the Smith family seems to have made a habit of trying to take things that don’t belong to them. I should have acted sooner.’ She levels her gaze at me. ‘If you’re a companioneer, then you know something about the magic of building. Of creating. I wanted to keep challenging myself. Keep pushing the envelope.
‘But I was so focused on my race to invent, that I forgot about my responsibility to the company that bears my own name. I’m not a natural CEO. I’m a creator. An inventor.’
‘A companioneer,’ I say, quietly.
‘Exactly. You understand that impulse to work. That’s when I was happiest. Jinx was my pet project. You must know that feeling, as an inventor . . . there’s the work you’re supposed to be doing, and then there’s that secret project that sets your heart on fire, the one you don’t share with anyone, the one that consumes you . . . that was this idea, for me – this question I wanted to answer. I’d created a perfect companion. But could I go a step further?
‘Could I create something that chose to be my friend? Not a slave – but a true friend? I spent every waking hour working on him, refining every component and aspect of his design, tinkering with his code, inching closer to perfection with every step.
‘The closer I got, the more protective I became. I didn’t want to share what I was working on with Eric. He begged and cajoled me, but nothing worked. I could tell he was getting frustrated, but also I knew he would wait. His frustration stemmed from the fact that he knew whatever I came up with would be a game changer for the company. So many of the updates I’d made – had they come to light – would have triggered a jump in Moncha’s shares. But I wasn’t ready to share him yet. I wasn’t ready for him to belong to anyone but me.’
‘And did it work?’ I ask.
Monica laughs, scratching between Jinx’s ears. ‘What do you think? No. I ended up with scratches up and down my arms, having to use the black marks to keep him powered down – every time I leashed him up, he would rebel and act like an out-of-control wildcat. Nothing I tried made him want to be leashed up to me, apart from
to use me as a power source. And with advances in piezoelectricity and solar energy, he didn’t even need me for that. You’ve noticed that, haven’t you? That he doesn’t need to be leashed to you to keep his charge?’
I nod, biting down on my lip.
‘That was just one of the breakthroughs I’d made creating Jinx. He is the culmination of all my hard work . . . I thought maybe my code was the only thing not up to scratch. That was always my biggest weakness, when it came to building the bakus. So I decided it was time to share with Eric what I had created.’
She pauses then, her eyes staring off into the middle distance.
‘What happened then?’ I prompt.
She sighs, her shoulders collapsing down. ‘He freaked out. He couldn’t understand what I was playing at – trying to create something that didn’t obey. It didn’t make any sense. He tried to alter the code I’d already written, but it backfired. The baku rejected the update – he wouldn’t accept Eric’s code! Even more than that, it started rewriting Eric’s code, infecting and dismantling it. We had to wipe the entire project to stop the baku from destroying everything on the Moncha cloud. It would have been chaos.
‘I couldn’t tell if Eric was angry or amazed. He called my baku a monster. A virus. He wanted to destroy the baku then and there – he tried to! But I grabbed him and ran. This was my baby that Eric was trying to mess with. I triggered an old alarm that I’d set up a long time ago, in case something like this would ever happen. A mutual promise with an old university friend of mine who worked at BRIGHTSPRK to offer each other sanctuary, no questions asked. But Eric sent security after me. They took me down, and that’s when I lost the baku down into the ravine.
‘Next thing I knew, I woke up here. Leashed up to Pardem here. And curiously . . . happy.’ She gestures over to her sloth baku, who gives her a sleepy smile.
‘But Monica – how can you be happy knowing what Eric is still trying to do? That he’s taken over the running of your company. He’s told everyone you’re away on business! When you’ve been stuck down here all along.’
She doesn’t immediately reply, but she cocks her head to one side. ‘You have to get out of here,’ she says, softly. There’s no sense of urgency in her voice, even though her words quicken the beating of my heart. ‘If they find you . . . then he will arrest you.’
‘I can’t leave you here!’
‘You must.’
>>And what about me?
Well, Jinx? It’s up to you. You can come with me and I will promise to do anything I can to stop Eric getting to you.
Monica looks up at me. ‘You two . . . you’re communicating, aren’t you?’
I nod.
She smiles, her face lighting up with the wideness of her grin. ‘Don’t you see, Lacey? You’ve done what I couldn’t. You don’t need a leash to be attached to Jinx. To know what he’s thinking, to communicate with him. You’re not leashed to him right now. You’re leashed to that beetle.’
I stare down at my shoulder, where Slick is sitting. I can’t believe I didn’t realize it before. Jinx and I are communicating without officially being leashed.
‘Because you two choose each other. That’s what true friendship is. That’s what life is. Being presented with options and choosing your own path. Maybe not every choice makes you happier. Maybe not every decision will be the right one. But if you think carefully, I know you will know what to do.’
My eyes fill up with tears. ‘But Monica, I can’t just leave you . . .’
The sloth nudges Jinx out of the way, and Jinx steps backwards from her.
>>Lacey, she’s right. We have to leave.
‘I’m so sorry, Jinx,’ I whisper to him. Slick crawls up on to my shoulder and raises one of his small, beetle legs, in solidarity.
Pardem approaches Monica, climbing up on to her lap with his painstakingly deliberate movements, his arms wrapping around her neck in a slow, loving embrace. As he leashes to her, her demeanour changes again. The tension in her shoulders slips away and she sinks into the cushioned back of the armchair, her muscles relaxing. A small smile creeps on to her lips, and I can’t deny it – she looks peaceful. Serene. But the light is gone.
Jinx leaps up into my arms.
>>So that is my creator?
I squeeze his body tightly. She might have built your body, but Jinx . . . I think the point of all this is that you created you. Through your choices, your decisions.
Jinx rolls his spine and arches his back in my arms. I carry him out of the perfect house, down the perfect pathway, towards the Hollywood suburban dream that his creator is trapped in. He purrs softly, but I know that it’s not me who needs comforting, but him. I hold him close, stroking him.
I can’t just leave her here . . . it’s terrible. Moncha needs Monica Chan.
>>We won’t let Eric Smith take over. We’ll figure it out.
But how? I don’t know if I’m capable. I’m just a teenager. I’m not a superhero. I’m not special. I’m just me.
>>Lucky for you, I am special. We will do it together.
Suddenly, Slick beeps and flashes wildly. I look down at his carapace and see that he’s flagged Moncha security guards approaching.
We’d better move, Jinx.
He doesn’t reply, but he doesn’t wriggle out of my arms either – which I take to be a good sign. I run out of the creepy fake suburb, the movie-set ideal of perfect happiness.
Jinx directs me to the quickest route outside, using an unmarked exit that means we don’t have to go through the main atrium. But instead of following his directions to Mr Baird’s car, where I know Tobias and my teammates are waiting, I turn and head in another direction, down a narrow alleyway running behind the building. Relying on my memory, I try and orient myself in the streets. Slick beeps in my ear, but this time – I ignore him.
>>Where are we going? asks Jinx.
Don’t you remember this place?
I turn the corner and we arrive at the park where Jinx and I saw the wild cats. I place him down gently on the floor. Then he hears the first meow, and his ears prick up to attention.
‘This is what you want, isn’t it, Jinx? To find your place in the world. You can live here and you don’t have to belong to anyone.’
It’s more than that. It wouldn’t be right to take Jinx to BRIGHTSPRK, to force him to help me save Monica, or even to bring him home with me. He’s my entire world, but that doesn’t give me the right to decide what’s best for him. He needs to make that decision all on his own.
I don’t want a friend I have to force to be with me. Friendship is about choice, not obligation.
I know that now.
My heart feels as if it is ripping in two, but I summon some courage. ‘Go,’ I say. ‘Be free.’
I don’t know if it’s the right decision. But it’s what feels right to me.
I’m not starting out a campaign for Monica’s freedom by keeping my baku on a leash against his will.
More than my baku. My friend.
>>I love you Lacey, he says.
Without a second pause, Jinx runs away from me and my heart lurches. Then he stops at the gate to the park, his head cocked to one side, ears perked up into triangles. My heart swells at the sight of him, his tail gently swaying from side to side in the breeze.
‘I love you too,’ I whisper. ‘Go. Be free . . .’
He lifts up on to his haunches then, pivoting around in the strange sinewy way that cats move. But before he disappears from view, he turns his head and looks back at me. I wonder what he is thinking. What funny quip he might say at that moment. But I don’t need to wonder whether he is happy.
I just know.
He’ll come back and find me. If he wants to.
But I’m not done with Moncha Corp. Not with my idol locked up in the basement of her own headquarters and Eric Smith taking over. I’m going to find a way to save her, and then save the company that I’ve admired for so long. I’ve got my teammates, and I’ve got Mr Baird and the
resources of BRIGHTSPRK. We can expose Eric and bring Monica back to the head of her own company.
‘Slick, take me to Mr Baird,’ I say, leashing the beetle to my ear.
Slick beeps, a series of tones I haven’t heard before.
>>I’m sorry, I can’t do that. His robotic voice is hard in my ear.
‘What?’ I frown. ‘What do you mean?’
>>I’m sorry, Lacey, he says again, this time more softly.
A jolt of electricity shocks me through the leash and I collapse to the ground.
As a once-upon-a-time science fair nerd (and proud of it!), my first thanks go out to the amazing teens innovating and creating in STEM fields: you guys are my inspiration, and I can’t wait to see what the future will look like in your capable hands.
Huge thanks as always to my wonderful editor, Lucy Rogers at S&S Children’s UK. You loved Jinx’s voice from the start and have been such a brilliant champion for me, and for this series. Thanks to the whole team at S&S for the hard work you do!
To my agent, Juliet Mushens at CaskieMushens – you are my rock, always willing to jump into the arena for me at a moment’s notice! What a journey this has been, and I’m so grateful to have you in my corner.
To Kim Curran – thank you for being with me on every step of this journey, and for your patience and guidance through multiple drafts! I have so many writing friends to thank who have supported me above and beyond over the past year: Amie, Laura, James, Juno, Will, Laure, Tom, Neil, Keith and Zoe. You are all superstars.
To Jessie (and Jinx-inspiration Margot), and Adam, Tania and Scarlett – you guys gave me the space and time to write when I needed it most, and I can’t thank you enough.
And finally, to all my family and friends who have boosted me up over this past year, you have no idea what your support means to me. I’m lucky to have you all.
Jinxed Page 23
