by Dawn Dagger
“I, um, I have a question,” I said, raising a hand and feeling my face flush with embarrassment.
“Yes?” She tilted her head, tapping her fingers to start a new search.
“Um, what’s an Aztec? And… a jaguar?”
She looked confused, then very sad. “Oh. Um, way back before America was made, before Great Britain or anything like that before World War I even--”
“Before the Great Fall?” I clarified.
“Absolutely. Before the Great Fall, way before. At the very beginning of time, almost. Aztecs were one of the indigenous tribes that lived in South America. Jaguars, well…” She pulled up a new window and typed in the name.
A gorgeous, silky cat appeared on the screen. It had big paws and small ears and a beautiful, spotted coat. It looked like a rather large cheetah. If that was the right animal I was thinking of. There were only two cheetahs left, as far as I knew.
“This is a jaguar. They were big cats that roamed Africa… They were very pretty, and ferocious. Are they not around anymore?”
I peered at her wondering what she was all about. I could not understand, she understood how some things worked, but not others. How could she not know jaguars were gone, and that Aztecs weren’t a thing anyone remembered?
“No, not anymore…” I said cautiously.
“Well,” she frowned, her eyes dark blue with sadness. “That sucks. Anyways, time to find these other artifacts, yeah?”
I nodded and leaned back in my chair, crossing my arms. Jaguar. The word itself was pretty. I was sad that they weren’t around anymore. They deserved to live. I loved their paws. That sucked.
Bang.
I sat up straight, startled.
“Did you hear something?” I asked at the same time as Diedre asked, “Did you say something?”
I shook my head and she did as well. “I didn’t hear anything. I thought you said something, though?”
“Not at all.” I stood up and began towards the back edges of the room, which were out of sight of the glass windows and very dark.
“Where are you going?” Diedre asked.
“Just, uh, just…” I saw a shadowy figure hiding beside a desk. Goosebumps rose along my arms as I walked closer, keeping my face toward the windows, watching from the corner of my eyes. “I’m, um, looking out the window. Nice view, ya know?”
Was I just imagining things? I might have been going crazy… I probably was going crazy. This whole adventure was insanity. No, I saw it! The shadows moved! They twitched. There was someone hiding in the shadows. I knew it.
“So, we can find the rattlesnake at the River’s Bend Museum!”
“Mhm.” I responded.
I turned away from the window. Tact or aggression? I wondered briefly. Should I engage the intruder, or see if they left peacefully. I was suddenly worried it was one of those people we had to save the world from.
The figure was gone. My heart thumped in my chest. Where had it gone?
“Diedre--” A figure suddenly rose behind her, but she was already moving. She whirled around in her chair and kicked, kicking the figure square in the stomach. The shadow fell back with a gasp and I ran over.
Dierdre was standing over the figure of a boy who seemed to be a little older than both of us. He glared from the floor, panting heavily. “Who are you?” Dierdre demanded. “Why are you following us?!”
“Stop trying!” The boy hissed. “You won’t ever win! Just accept that we are the chosen ones, and that everyone else does not deserve to exist! All others are streams of consciousness in one large thought! We are artwork, and everyone else is nothing but paint dissolved in water! Just let it happen!”
Diedre’s eyes flashed with so much anger I was afraid she was going to shoot lasers into the boy. “You are insignificant.” She growled. “Now, get out. Do not make me threaten you.”
The boy stood slowly to his feet, and gave her a slow, lazy smile, his amber eyes sparkling. “Tell me where the owl is.”
“I told you to leave.” Her voice was cold. I felt goosebumps raise on my arms. She was terrifying.
The boy stepped closer to her, holding out his hand. “C’mon, Claire. Give me the owl. You know you want to. You know I’m your friend. That I’m right. Give me the figurine, and tell me where the turtle is.”
She leaned closer to him, until their noses were touching. She was taller than he was too. “This is the last time I’ll tell you,” she whispered. “My name is not Claire, and you need to get out. Now.”
The boy gave her a simpering smile that made me feel sick. If he had looked at anyone less terrifying than Dierdre like that, I would have tried to knock out his teeth.
“Suit yourself.” And as if he were blinking out of existence, he was gone. I stared at the empty spot of air, feeling so crowded with questions I thought I might croak.
“Ass,” she mumbled, turning away from the empty air and sitting back down at the computer.
“Wh-what was that?” I asked. “Who was that?”
“No one. It doesn’t matter.” She sighed. She stood back up and turned off the computer. “Okay, I have a list of places the artifacts are.”
“Was he after the artifacts, Dierdre?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“Well, then he knows where they are!” I cried. “He was waiting here the whole time!”
Dierdre licked her lips, her eyes darting around. “Okay. Okay, we’re fine. Listen, we just need to… uh… No, that wouldn’t work! Why would you suggest that?” Her eyes widened. “How do you know about that, Clayton?”
“What are you talking about?!” I cried. “I didn’t say anything! Are you going insane, Diedre?!”
Her eyes widened so large I could see their whites all around. “Y-you… didn’t say anything? You haven’t said anything?”
“No.”
“You didn’t suggest we just teleport to the museum, because Gerard will be going there, if he heard where the museum is at?”
“No!” I cried. “I don’t even know what you’re talking about!”
Dierdre fell backwards and sat down hard on the ground. She held her head in her hands, looking sick. I knelt beside her, worried. “I keep hearing your voice, up in my head.” She mumbled. “You keep having great ideas that I don’t quite understand how you know enough information to be able to tell me. So I just go with it. You aren’t saying anything at all?”
I shook my head.
She groaned and flopped forward, so her head was pressed against the wood floor between her legs. “I don’t understand…”
“How long have you been hearing the voice?”
She shrugged weakly.
“Was it before you lost your memories? Or during?”
She shook her head.
“Well,” I sat down beside her. “I don’t know. I can’t remember exactly what changed. Maybe the seizure messed up your brain?” It sounded nastier than I expected once I spoke out loud. “Sorry, I didn’t--”
“Shush!” She gasped, suddenly sitting straight. She clutched the owl figurine in her hand. “Clayton, you, I think you, were right! He did hear! We have to go to the museum first!”
“What are we going to do? Break in?” I demanded. “We can’t do that!”
She pursed her lips. “Maybe… maybe we can… It’ll be tricky… and I need… I need to ask first… but, we don’t have time. Not if Gerard is going to-- Okay, Clayton. Hold my hand. I need you to listen to me.”
“All right?” I took her hand and she clutched mine tightly.
“Close your eyes.” I obeyed, and the floor dropped out from beneath us, dumping us into water.
4
We fell through the twisting darkness and hard onto a cold floor. I gasped as my shoulder hit hard against the ground, popping. Dierdre fell lightly on her feet beside me. I coughed and tried to push myself up, but she put a hand on my back firmly.
“Shhh…” she whispered, raising a finger to her lips.
My eyes slowly a
djusted to the dim light, and she gestured at something I couldn’t see. “Red tripwires,” she breathed. We were in a large, circular room, with nothing in the center save a small pedestal. On the pedestal stood the rattlesnake figurine, its body coiled and ready to strike.
“Wh-why are we here?” I whispered, my heart thumping urgently. “Dierdre, how did we get here?!”
She did not respond, twisting her body so that she could avoid invisible ties. She crept forward quietly, mumbling to herself. I felt dizzy and sick. It was teleportation. Or I really was going insane.
Everyone around me could teleport. What the hell was that? What the hell was going on?
Dierdre was at the figurine now, her hand hovering over its smooth back. She held her breath for a moment, cocking her head as if listening to someone. “You’re right.” She called to me. “You should come and hold this one. Just be careful, don’t touch the lines.”
“Dierdre I can’t see the lines!” I whispered. “I see nothing but open air!” Her brows furrowed, and she tilted her head, as if she couldn’t possibly believe I couldn’t see the lines.
“If I lead you…”
“No, no, I can’t follow people well. Dierdre, just grab it and c’mon. Just don’t touch it!”
She nodded and turned to grab it, but something wrapped around the figurine. Dierdre gasped as a figure stepped forward, grinning. “Sorry, little girl. Told you to just quit.” She launched herself forward to grab the idiot from the library’s hands, bt she missed, slamming into the pedestal.
The pedestal rocked as the boy stepped back, gripping the rattlesnake tightly. He looked pained, but did not lose his horrific grin. I could do nothing, trapped behind invisible lines. Dierdre blinked out of existence and reappeared behind the boy, but he twisted around with such speed I didn’t even see him move.
In the next moment, Dierdre was slamming against the pedestal. She and the large marble pillar went rolling. Lights began flashing and an alarm blared, making it feel as if my head had exploded.
I ran toward Dierdre as the boy turned and went running out of the room so fast that he was not but a blur. Dierdre coughed and sat up and I helped to pull her to her feet. “We have to get out of here!” I shouted above the din.
“I know!” Her face was red, and I couldn’t tell if it was with anger or pain. Both, probably. She looked around and then reached for my wrist. She closed her eyes, but then opened them a second later. “Shit,” she muttered. “Shit! It didn’t work!”
“I guess not?” It felt as if ants were crawling all over my skin. We had to get out of the museum.
“I can’t teleport!” Dierdre cried.
I gripped her hand this time and began to run out of the nearest door, her in tow. We ran into a broad hallway full of doors and paintings, and I pointed to the nearest one. We ran to the door and tugged, but it would not open.
I cursed and tried the next one, but it was locked two. All of the other three doors proved to be the same. We could hear footsteps and shouts pounding in the hallways leading toward us. I pointed to a door titled ‘Personnel Only’.
Dierdre looked doubtful, but didn’t protest as I thrust open the door. We darted inside the dark room with a clatter, tripping and stumbling over various things, then we crouched in the back corner, panting.
My heart was thumping against my chest, and the burning smell of cleaning chemicals burned my lungs. Dierdre squeezed my hand. “Just breathe,” she whispered as footsteps ran past.
“I’m trying!” I hissed. Stupid asthma. I thought I might pass out. My chest was on fire.
Dierdre gently moved one hand to rub between my shoulder blades. It was a familiar gesture. Something my mother used to do when I panicked and could not breathe. It brought tears to my eyes, but my body instinctively relaxed in response to the touch.
The footsteps and shouting quieted, though the lights still flashed beneath the door and the alarms still blared. Dierdre began to creep out of the janitor’s closet, more carefully this time, and I followed.
We crept down the halls, casting long shadows that flickered like haunting ghosts in the raging light. We ran past glaring tribal masks and Nazi relics and all other sorts of things I had never seen before, looking for an exit.
“This many floors and no fire exit?” I panted as we stopped again at a dead end. “That’s got to be code violation.”
Dierdre cursed under her breath, trying again to do her teleporting thing. It didn’t work.
“Stop right there!” a voice boomed. We whirled around to see a man in a black uniform holding a gun up to us, his flashlight glaring in our eyes. “Hands in the air, museum thieves!”
Dierdre and I froze, then slowly rose our hands. “Listen, we didn’t--”
“I don’t know how you got in here, but you’re going to be locked up. I’m tired of crazies popping out of nowhere and screwing up our security cameras. I’m tired of stuff being stolen from this museum. Do you know how many people lost their jobs because of you idiots?” the man raved.
“We just wanna go home.” Dierdre said in a stilted voice. “We were just--”
“Save the lies! We caught you on camera this time. We’re not stupid. Now, c’mon, let’s go.” He gestured with the gun and I looked at Dierdre. She sighed softly, but began to tread forward. I followed reluctantly.
I watched her eyes, darting from the man who continued to rave to a nearby row of marble columns, all holding a large bust. Dierdre pitched forward suddenly, much to the startlement of us both.
She slammed her palms against the pillar, and like a row of heavy dominos, they all fell sideways with a heavy thud! Before the guard could jump out of the way, the last one few, pinning him beneath the marble.
She took off running and I sprinted after her, hoping the man was alright. We slid down the marble halls until we found the glass doors of the entrance. We broke through them and stormed out onto the cool street, panting and gasping.
Cop cars were pulling up now, their lights flashing. Dierdre and I darted into an alley and we watched, gasping for air, as people streamed in and out of the museum. We could hear the crackling of walkie talkies in the distance and shouting.
We waited in the alley for a very long time, watching as an ambulance pulled up and sped away, wailing. We hid behind one of the large recycle containers as a police man walked by, carrying his slim walkie talkie.
“Will he be all right?”
“The doctors don’t think so…”
“Crazy bastards. Pushed a marble pillar on him.”
The man walked away and I felt my heart drop into my stomach. I stumbled out from behind the silver bin, feeling dizzy. “D-Dierdre… was that…?”
“Was that what?” Her voice was hollow.
“D-Did we kill that man, Dierdre?!” I wheeled to face her, my voice pitching.
“I don’t… We can fix it! We’ll fix it, it’s all right!”
“No it’s not!” I whispered, my heart pounding. We had hurt someone. We might have killed them! All for some old artifact! I couldn’t breathe.
She grabbed my wrist. “Clayton, calm down! Calm down! It’s--”
And, before she could finish her sentence, the world blinked out of existence.
5
“What the hell did you do?”
“You’re telling me you did all that and you still don’t have the rattlesnake?”
“Listen--”
Voices filtered in and out of my ears, slowly breaking through the ringing in my skull. The world was blurry, but slowly clearing. I was lying on my back, staring up at something grey and metallic.
“Hey, hey, shut up. He’s awake.”
The voices went silent and I slowly sat up. I rubbed my head, my vision swirling. I was lying in a metal cylinder, but outside of the tube was a large room full of monitors, blinking buttons, and people in nice business clothes.
A man peeled away from the small crowd, coming towards me. He had a thin, black mustache and eyes that spa
rkled with intelligence. He approached me cautiously, as if I were a dangerous dog.
“How are you feeling?” He asked in a calm tone, one hand moving to scratch at the stubble on his chin.
“Horrible.” I coughed, rubbing at my blurry eye.
He extended a gloved hand and I took it, letting him help me to my feet. I glanced around the room and my eyes fell on Dierdre. She sat slumped in an office chair, looking absolutely miserable. The owl figurine teetered back and forth on her leg as she bounced it.
“We’ve got a lot to talk to Dierdre about,” the man said, placing a hand in the center of my back and beginning to lead me toward a door at the other end of the room. I didn’t like the way he touched me, but I was too disoriented to tell him off. I noticed a long line of red lights that pulsated urgently as we walked past. “Why don’t you go ahead toward the dining rooms and get a glass of water?”
He pushed me out of the room before I could protest and closed the door firmly, abandoning me in a very long hallway. I stood in front of the door for a very long time, stifled by silence, before decided to sit down.
I crossed to the other side of the hallway and sat down, hugging my knees. Where the hell am I?
My mind was a muddled mess of incoherent half thoughts. I couldn’t physically comprehend everything that was going on. Teleportation, the murder of a museum guard, stealing…
I hid my face in my knees, feeling tears burn my eyes. I hated this all. I wanted it all to go away. I just wanted my mom. I hugged my knees tighter, feeling my anguish churn my stomach. I would go back to being poor. I would struggle through school. I would use dirty soap happily.
I would suffer everything I had before, I just didn’t want to be left in the dark anymore. I wanted everything to be okay. I just wanted to go home. I sniffled.
“Who are you?” A deep voice asked.
My head jerked up and I dashed the tears out of my eyes. A pale white man stood above me, looking me over. He wore a simple suit and regarded me with a calm expression, but in his dark brown eyes swam some sort of emotion I couldn’t identify. It almost seemed to match the feeling in my chest; the feeling of being utterly lost. He looked like a very upset vampire.
