Shimmer

by Matthew Keith

  Chapter 11

  Alex spent the rest of the day half-heartedly rummaging through files and reading reports that no longer mattered. There was no reason for him to be at EMIT, not any more. He knew where his father had gone. He didn’t know what it was, but he knew it existed and he knew how to get there.

  And although he was terrified, he knew he had to go back. There was no way he could just leave his father in a place like that.

  Had Dad known about the Under before he used the suit? Had he been trying to reach it all these years, believing it was where Mom went?

  Alex’s heart skipped a beat. What if it really was where she’d gone? Could she have survived in a place like that? Who were those people, those pale, crazed, growling people that had attacked the first group?

  The Under was obviously a dangerous place. To go back was practically suicide. Maybe there was some record of it, some obscure reference in his father’s notes that might help when he returned. Now that he knew what he was looking for, maybe he would find something he’d previously overlooked. If he was going to find something, it would be in his dad’s lab under the house. That was where he needed to be. Being at EMIT was a waste of his time. His dad would never have bothered to go to such elaborate measures and create a secret lab if he had any intention of keeping even a scrap of his research at EMIT. Every minute that ticked by added to Alex’s frustration, knowing he was only playing out a charade for Silas’s benefit.

  He kept trying to come up with a reason to duck out of the building, an excuse to leave, but he knew there was nothing he could say that Silas would believe. Silas already suspected him of something, he was sure of it.

  Silas kept stopping by the office to check in on him, over and over through the remainder of the day. It was always under the pretense of making sure Alex was okay, tonelessly asking if he needed anything or if he’d found anything, but to Alex there was something sinister in the way Silas did it. Something else was lurking behind that pale freak’s “good” intentions, and Alex knew it. But if he could get his dad back it wouldn’t matter. Things would go back to normal and Silas could stay as creepy as he wanted. It wouldn’t be Alex’s concern anymore.

  But first he had to figure out how he was going to go back to the Under without being snatched by Jonathan’s people, who seemed to have been laying in wait right outside the room with the red glow. And then, of course, if he managed to evade them he still had to figure out how to avoid being ambushed by one of those pale, silent demon-men.

  By the end of the day, Silas had been in and out of his father’s office so many times Alex’s nerves were frazzled. Not only did the implications of Silas’s behavior make Alex worry—did Silas have something to do with his father’s disappearance?—but he was also very aware of the fact that he’d mentioned Leeann’s name to Silas, and she had the suit.

  He couldn’t stand the idea that he may have put her in danger. If Silas had been the one he’d seen just before sinking into the shimmer, then Silas knew Alex had found the suit and would be looking for it.

  The office grew progressively quieter as the afternoon drug on and the staff left to go home. Silas popped in twice after five o’clock, but he didn’t suggest they go home until almost seven. By then Alex was so tense he was ready to explode.

  Alex ate dinner with Silas looking on. Silas didn’t eat, nor did he speak. He spent the time in an expectant hush, as if he were waiting for Alex to say something. When that didn’t happen and Alex finished his meal, they both rose.

  Instead of heading straight to his room, Alex told Silas, “I’d like to go back and see Leeann again. I promised her I would.”

  Silas’s lips made a thin line of disapproval. “I would prefer that you stay here. You need your rest. I feel as if you’ve made excellent progress today.”

  Alex grew angry. He’d made no progress, and Silas knew it. “What about you, Silas? You haven’t even eaten. Aren’t you hungry? Don’t you need your rest too?”

  “There is too much to do,” Silas told him. “My needs are secondary. My responsibility, first and foremost, is to watch over you and the company until your father returns.” His face was like a marble mask. “My fate is sealed,” he said. “Yours is yet to be determined. I would like you to remain here this evening.”

  What was that supposed to mean? Alex had no idea what to say to it. He just growled and turned in frustrated anger. He stomped up to his room, slamming the door behind him. It was childish and stupid, but he didn’t care. It made him feel better. This whole arrangement with Silas was not going to last, no matter what happened with Dad. Alex would make sure of that.

  It only took a few minutes of pacing before Alex decided there was no way he was just going to wait for something to happen. He was too keyed up and Silas was acting too strange. His father had already been gone a month. He couldn’t keep waiting and just hope that one day Dad would miraculously appear.

  Dad must have transported himself into the same cavern Alex had gone to. If those people had taken him captive, Alex had to get him back. He could tell someone else and try to enlist their help—but who? His father had said to keep it a secret. As much as Alex wanted help, there was no way he was going to ask Silas, and he didn’t know anyone else at EMIT well enough to know if they could be trusted.

  It had to be him.

  Two hours later, Alex carefully opened his bedroom window and lowered down a makeshift rope made from every blanket and sheet that had been in his room. He’d carefully tied them together and knotted them around his bed frame. It didn’t reach the ground, but there was only about a six-foot drop at the end. If he hung from it, it would be an easy jump.

  He shimmied out the window and carefully pushed it closed in the hope that Silas wouldn’t hear noise and come in to investigate.

  He reached the ground without incident, landing softly in the grass below. He ran in a crouch across the lawn, only turning when he reached the sidewalk near the street.

  His heart skipped a beat when he looked back up at his window. Silhouetted in the glass was a person—Silas or Rosa, he couldn’t tell for sure. The form was black against the lighted background of his room.

  He ran as fast he could.

  Along the way he dialed Leeann, breathlessly explaining that he needed to come back over. He knew he was taking a risk using his cell phone—there were people at EMIT that could easily track and record his usage—but he needed the suit, and he needed to be quick.

  “It’s late, Alex!” she objected. “I’m in bed!”

  “I know and I’m sorry! But it’s an emergency and you have to keep it a secret! Please don’t tell your parents I’m coming! I’ll be in and out before they know I’m there.” He hit the ‘END’ button on his phone before she could object.

  When he got to Leeann’s back door, she was already there waiting. She let him in, shushing him the entire way up to her room. She grabbed a hot pink shopping bag from the top shelf of her closet and handed it down to him, earning a wry look from Alex.

  “Hey. You asked me to hold on to it,” she defended her choice of hiding places.

  She had a point.

  Once again, he stripped out of his clothes, making her turn around as he did.

  He’d gotten all the way down to his boxers when the doorbell chimed. At such a late hour, in the completely silent house, it was like an air horn going off. Leeann whipped around, eyes wide, then saw that he was only in his skivvies and whipped back around again.

  “Did someone come here for you?” she whispered with her head turned the other way.

  “I don’t know,” he responded tersely. He sat on the floor and hurriedly tugged the suit over his legs. It was so tight, like Spandex, it was slow going.

  Downstairs, the front door opened and Alex listened to the raised voices of Leeann’s parents.

  “Leeann?” her mother’s voice carried up to her room. They heard the sound of feet on the steps.

  “Hurry!” Leeann hissed.

>   Alex got to his feet and pulled the suit up over his waist. As he prepared to push an arm through the first sleeve, Leann’s door opened. Her mother poked her head in, eyes widening when she saw a half-naked Alex staring back at her.

  “What the hell is going on here?” she cried out. “The police are downstairs! What are you doing in my daughter’s bedroom, Alex—and why don’t you have any clothes on?”

  “I… it’s not what you think Mrs. Choi!” Instead of trying to come up with an excuse, Alex instead shoved his arms into the sleeves of the suit and hurriedly plugged the ports into his arms.

  Leeann and her mother had begun to argue, but as soon as the second port was plugged in and the suit powered up, they went silent. Leeann backed toward her door, closer to her Mom.

  “Please,” Alex urged Leeann’s mother. “Please, Mrs. Choi—stall them. It might be the police, I don’t know for sure, but I really don’t think it is.”

  “I will do no such thing!” Leeann’s mother replied indignantly.

  “Jang-mi!” Mr. Choi’s voice came from the main level. “Jang-mi? What’s going on up there? Hey!”

  The sound of multiple, heavy footsteps pounded up the stairs toward them.

  Alex gave Leeann a helpless look, one that was more apology than anything else, and ran to her window, thrusting it open. Warm air blew into the room.

  “What are you—you can’t jump!” Leeann shouted, taking a step toward him with one hand out.

  Alex activated the laser on the suit and pointed it out into yard. He gave Leeann a thin-lipped smile and closed his fist.

  From down in the yard where he appeared, he heard Leeann’s high-pitched shriek come from the second-story bedroom window. He looked back and saw a group of men push into the room. One of them rushed to the open window, immediately spotting Alex. He raised a walkie-talkie to his mouth and pointed.

  Lifting his right arm again, Alex pointed the laser down the street as far as he could see and closed his fist. And then he did it again. And again.

  And then he ran as fast as his legs would carry him, straight to his father’s house and the safety of the lab in the basement. He needed answers, and it was the only place he could ever hope to find them.

  When he reached the house he tore down into the storage room, hit the switch, and flung himself inside.

  He stood there, back against the wall, exhausted. He hadn’t realized how tired he was, but now that he was safe all he wanted to do was rest. He slid down the wall and sat on the floor.

  He was unconscious before he knew it.