Hunt for the Pyxis

by Zoë Ferraris

  Emma’s heart leapt into her throat. Laine seized Mom. Her nose was bleeding profusely now, her head lolling forward.

  “What about Mad Jack?” Laine asked.

  “Bring him,” Rastall intoned. “We’ll need him later.”

  The burned man bent over and hauled Dad onto his shoulders.

  Emma and Herbie listened as the kidnappers thundered through the kitchen and out the back door. They heard snatches of conversation—about a car parked in the alley and whether they should go back to look for Emma. They heard their own hearts racing, blood pounding in their heads, their breath magnificently loud in the confined space. Emma was crying silently, too stunned to speak.

  It was Herbie who began feeling the walls around him, looking for a way to open the hidey-hole. “Don’t worry, Emma,” he said breathlessly. “We’ll get out of here and call the police. They’ll find them. We know exactly what they look like.”

  When his fingers finally struck the latch, the door sprang open and they both tumbled out.

  Emma hit the carpet and lay there facedown, struck dumb with shock. Herbie sat up and rubbed his foot. Something had fallen out of the hidey-hole behind them—a wooden box about the size of a backpack had knocked into him. He pushed it aside and knelt over Emma.

  “Just stay here. I’m gonna call the police.”

  For the next hour, officers swarmed through the house. There were beat cops in uniform, plainclothes police, and even forensic techs in white bubble suits. Emma sat numbly at the kitchen table while Herbie hovered around her, bringing root beer and cookies because he thought she was in shock. She hadn’t said much since they fell out of the hidey-hole.

  Emma was desperately grappling with what she’d seen. Despite Herbie’s many suspicions over the years, she’d never truly believed that her parents were involved in anything illegal or dangerous—or even that they could be. They were honest people, and they expected her to be honest too.

  But they had recognized Rastall and Laine—and Laine had recognized Dad, calling him “Mad Jack.” It was bad enough that her father might actually have a criminal past, but now to discover that her mother did too—and that she wasn’t afraid of a small punk like Rastall! She had stared that gun straight in the barrel and told Rastall she’d kill him if he didn’t give her necklace back. Emma couldn’t think of a single time when her mother had shown such bravado before. In fact, all she could think of were the times when a little courage would have been welcome. Like when their car had gotten a flat tire on the freeway, and Mom had waited two hours for the tow truck to come. (“It’s not safe to change your own tire,” she’d said. “You could get hit by a car!” ) Or the time in McDonald’s when a distracted clerk had tried to charge them ten bucks for a hamburger, and Emma was the one who had to point out his mistake—Mom being too shy to correct him.

  Emma simply couldn’t believe that her parents were criminals. They hadn’t done any kidnapping or shooting. They had been victims, actually—forced at gunpoint to cooperate with criminals. For all she knew, they were heroes, working undercover for the CIA. It would certainly explain why they hadn’t told her anything.

  But she had a horrible feeling that Herbie was right and her dad was involved in something shady.

  Herbie sat down beside her. “You want more root beer?” he asked.

  Emma shook her head. She noticed that the police were watching them. “I can’t believe this is happening,” she whispered.

  Herbie seemed relieved that she was finally talking, and he leaned closer to whisper back. “Have you ever seen those kidnappers before?”

  “No,” Emma said. “It’s totally weird that they were after my mom’s necklace. They called it the Pyxis.”

  Herbie nodded. They had both heard the word before—they had even drawn a picture of it for their sailing chart. It was a small constellation in the southern sky. The Pyxis was supposed to be a compass and was part of the bigger constellation Argo Navis, which was a ship.

  “They were also talking about Draco,” he said. “Like it was a place. Like they’d been there.”

  “I don’t get it,” Emma said. “If this necklace is so important, then why did my mom leave it lying around?”

  “Did she ever wear it?”

  “Yeah, when they went out for fancy dinners. The rest of the time she just left it in the jewelry box on her dresser. But it was obviously really important to her; otherwise she wouldn’t have threatened to kill Rastall just to keep it safe.”

  Herbie blew air out of his cheeks. “That was a shock.”

  “She was fighting,” Emma said.

  “Totally not your mom.”

  “I know.”

  “Look, you have to tell this to the police,” Herbie said. “The sooner they start looking for your parents, the better chance they have of finding them.”

  “I don’t think they’re going to help us.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “They’re not going to believe any of this.”

  Herbie was about to protest, but the investigator in charge came into the room. He was an enormously tall, soft-jowled man. Although the kitchen entryway was high enough for a giant to pass through, he ducked anyway as he entered. A petite woman hovered near his shoulder and gazed warily around the room.

  “Hello there.” The man spoke to them as if he were talking to a four-year-old. “I’m Lieutenant William Sweetser. I’m in charge of this case. This is my assistant, Sergeant Penelope Wantling.”

  Emma stared at them doubtfully.

  “I’m sure the other officers have already told you that we’ll be taking you to social services until we can find your parents,” he said. “But first, I’d like to ask you some questions.” He took a seat beside Emma. The chair gave an unhappy groan. “We’re going to make this as easy as possible, all right?”

  Emma glanced at Herbie. He was wearing his look of polite neutrality. It meant he thought the officer was an idiot.

  Sweetser explained that he had heard their story from the other officers, but he wanted to go over the facts again. “There were three kidnappers,” he said. “Two men and a woman?”

  Emma nodded.

  “They broke in through your front door, held your parents at gunpoint, and then took them away?”

  “Um…they shot my dad and beat my mom bloody, then dragged them out of the house.”

  Sweetser cleared his throat uncomfortably. “And you two survived by hiding in a closet?”

  “My dad shoved us in there,” Emma said.

  “That was resourceful,” Sweetser said. “Now, at any point, did these kidnappers say what they wanted?”

  “They took a necklace from my mom’s jewelry box,” Emma replied. “They called it the Pyxis.”

  Sweetser blinked. “The Pyxis?”

  Emma stared at him. “That’s what they said.”

  “And did they say what it was?”

  “They wanted to activate it,” Emma said darkly, “to make sure it worked, but they didn’t, because it was going to send a signal that would alert everyone else to its location.”

  Behind him, Sergeant Wantling scribbled furiously in her notebook.

  “Let me get this straight,” Sweetser said. “They wanted to activate a necklace?”

  “That’s what they said.”

  Sweetser motioned to Wantling to stop writing. They exchanged a look, and she seemed to understand that Sweetser thought the story was ridiculous. A bit embarrassed, she lowered her pencil.

  “Well,” Sweetser said, “sometimes it’s hard to remember things clearly when you’ve had a shock. Maybe we’d better talk to you again in the morning.”

  Emma gave him a deadly look. “I have to go to the bathroom,” she said.

  Sweetser nodded. Emma stood up, giving Herbie a meaningful stare on her way out.

  She didn’t go to the bathroom. She went straight to Dad’s study. When she opened the door, a faint whiff of his cologne brought a choke to her throat, but she went insi
de anyway and locked the door. Peeking through the window, she saw that the police were loading up their vans, so she shut the blinds as well, all the while trying not to look at the bloodstain on the carpet.

  Emma pulled a chair over to the special bookshelf, stood on the seat, and began sliding books off the shelf, each time looking to see if the compartment came open. Herbie had shut it again, and they had lied to the police and said they’d hidden in a closet. But something had fallen out of the hidey-hole with them. It was a box about as big as a dictionary, and it was made of a bright reddish wood. There had been a design on the front. She’d only caught a glimpse of it, but she thought it was a horse. Whatever it was, Herbie had noticed something about it that had made him hide it again. And it was obviously important, or her dad wouldn’t have hidden it in the first place.

  Finally, she grabbed the right book (The Call of the Wild). There was a crunk behind the wall, and the hidey-hole popped open.

  She peered into the compartment. The wooden box was on the floor. She removed it and shut the hidey-hole again.

  Bringing the box to the desk, she set it down. There was a flying horse carved on the top. It was a large, beautiful white animal, its body inlaid with emeralds and mother-of-pearl. Beneath it, the word MARKAB was spelled out in black onyx stones. Dad had said he’d named the boat after his favorite star on Pegasus, but he’d never said why. It seemed obvious that the box belonged on the boat. It was made of the same reddish-brown wood as the boat’s desk and shelves.

  She began feeling around the edges. SNAP! The lid popped open. She lifted it gently.

  Inside she found a large book. Prying it free, she set it carefully on the desk. It was a thick, gleaming leather-bound book that crackled when she opened it. The pages were like onionskin. There was no title on the binding, but on the first page, she read:

  Puzzled, she turned back to the box, which was much larger than the book. It appeared to be empty, but when she touched the bottom, the wood flipped over in her hand, revealing another compartment beneath it. Inside that was a smaller box.

  It took a bit of prying before she could release this one. It was a wooden square the size of her fist. Once she removed it, she felt around the edges but couldn’t find a way to open it. When she turned it over, something inside of it went clunk.

  She heard a car door slam. Peeking out the front window, she saw Sergeant Wantling going down the stairs to welcome a new officer. Emma rushed to the closet, found one of Dad’s old backpacks, and shoved everything inside—the book, the large Pegasus box, and the smaller box that she’d found inside it.

  On her way out the door, she saw Herbie coming down the hallway. “You were right,” he said. “They don’t believe you. They thought you were totally making up your story.”

  “Come on,” she whispered.

  “Wait, what are you doing?” he asked, glancing at the backpack.

  She took his arm and began dragging him down the hallway toward the bathroom. “I got the box that was in the hidey-hole,” she whispered. “Let’s go before they catch us.”

  “What? Go where? You can’t just leave. They’re taking you to social serv—”

  “I’m going to the Markab,” she said. “I think there’s something important in the box, something my dad doesn’t want anyone to know about. If the police find out I have it, they’re going to take it away.”

  “Emma, you can’t live alone on a boat,” he said.

  “I won’t. I just need to see what’s inside this thing while there are no police around. And I need you to do me a favor.”

  “What?”

  They had reached the bathroom and she pulled him inside, shutting the door and locking it. “I need some tools,” she said. “A hammer and chisel.”

  “And you want me to get them.”

  “Doesn’t your dad have them?”

  “Yes, but if I go home, my parents will know I’m not sailing, and they’ll make me stay and finish my homework.”

  “Then don’t let them see you,” she said. Giving the window a hard yank, she got it open. “Get the tools and meet me on the Markab. It’ll look better if we split up anyway.”

  “Wait, what am I supposed to tell the police?”

  “Nothing. Just sneak away.” She lowered the backpack out the window. It landed on the grass with a gentle thud, and she crawled through the window frame, dropping silently into the yard.

  The Markab gave a creak as Herbie stepped onto the deck.

  Emma was nestled into the small sofa, the most comfortable spot on the boat. With shelves above and below her and desks on either side, she had spent the past hour inside her own private nook. She had piled a blanket onto her lap and was now curled into a warm ball, reading the Almagest, the book she’d found in the wooden box. It had a chapter for each of the constellations. At the very back of the book she’d found a pullout map of the night sky. She was just folding it up when Herbie stuck his head in the hatch.

  He climbed down the ladder, his backpack clunking loudly.

  “Did anyone see you?” she asked, climbing down from her nook.

  “No,” he said, scowling. He set the backpack on the floor with a metal clang. “You would NOT believe how ridiculous it was after you left—”

  “Did you bring the hammer and chisel?” she asked.

  He looked at her warily. “Ye-e-es,” he said. “Right after you left I had to—”

  “I found this.” Emma pulled the Almagest from the nook and handed it to him. “It was in the box that hit your leg.”

  He looked at the title page. “Uh…okay. Why did your dad hide this?”

  “I don’t know. And check this.” She flipped to the back of the book and unfolded the map for him. “Hand me the meteorites.”

  “They’re not meteorites.” Herbie collected the four stones from the shelf and put them at the edges of the chart Emma had placed on the kitchen table. An enormous map of the night sky sprawled before them—so big that one of them could have curled up on top of it and fit very nicely. But this chart was different from the ones they knew. Hand-drawn lines connected the stars of each constellation, but they also connected each constellation to its neighbors. The result was a vast network of lines stretching all across the galaxy.

  “All right,” Herbie said, looking baffled. “Why are all the stars connected?”

  “That’s what I can’t understand,” she said. “The book has a chapter for each constellation, but then there’s all this weird writing.” She flipped to a sample chapter to show him and landed on the page for the constellation Orion. A few pages gave a description of an ocean somewhere, followed by some strange symbols.

  min dec 42 deg. Whl. Plcn. 99 sk. ≈ S: gry.

  “What is that?” Herbie asked. “It looks like a code.”

  “I’ve been trying to figure it out, but it doesn’t make any sense. I just know this has something to do with my parents’ kidnapping. It has to. Why else would they hide the book?”

  “Emma,” he said gravely, “you know what this is?”

  She blinked.

  “It’s a game manual.”

  “No,” she scoffed. “What?”

  “Yes. I think it’s pretty obvious that your mom and dad were involved in an elaborate role-playing game.”

  “Ro—” Emma snapped up. “Herbie, this is not a game. They shot my dad! ”

  “People take these things seriously,” he said grimly. “I mean, look at this page. It’s describing an imaginary place. And those weird numbers and letters are probably some sort of technical specs. If you were playing the game long enough, you would know what it means.”

  “This is not a game. I can’t believe that you would be skeptical about that,” she shot back. “Do you remember when you said my dad was an alien?”

  “I didn’t mean he was actually an alien—”

  Angrily, she leaned over and grabbed his backpack, reaching for the hammer and chisel. But he stopped her.

  “Listen,” he said.
“The police are looking for you. They flipped out when you left, and a dozen more cops showed up at the house.”

  Emma’s hand dropped from the backpack. “Did they interrogate you?”

  “No. I was watching from the bushes in the side yard. And I guess one of the cops finally called my parents because then MY MOM showed up.”

  “Oh.”

  “Yeah. And she thought I’d been kidnapped too.” His face was getting red. “And I couldn’t let her think that. So I climbed back in through the bathroom window and went through the house and came outside and told everyone I was okay. The police were freaking out about you. I told them I’d been upstairs in the bathroom and I had no idea where you were.”

  “Did your mom say anything about the boat?”

  “No. But once the police were gone, she told me to search the boat, and if I didn’t bring you back, I’d be grounded for a month.”

  “Seriously? Your mom didn’t tell the police about the boat?”

  “No. Which is why you have to come with me. Like, NOW.”

  “I can’t.” She shut the book and stood up. Her body was trembling. “Look, this book has the answer—I’m sure of it! If I take it off the boat, the police will take it away from me. And they’re not going to find my parents!”

  Herbie was giving her a dubious look. She knew he wanted to disagree, but he had to admit the police seemed pretty lame.

  “If I go to the group home,” she said, “I’m not going to be able to find my parents. Some social worker’s probably just going to make me do my homework.”

  “It is your turn.”

  “I know,” she said, “but I think I should be given a hardship excuse.”

  He frowned at her. “What, just because your parents were kidnapped?”

  She looked at him seriously.

  “Fine,” he said, sitting in a chair and pulling his backpack onto the table. “But I’m only giving you the hammer and chisel if you promise me two things.”

  “Thank you,” she whispered.

  “First,” he said, “you have to come with me. My mom says we have to bring you to social services—or I’ll be grounded for a month. And you know she’s not kidding. Even though you’re in a group home, we’ll find a way to find your parents.”