Chapter 68 – Calistan Canyon
Sunday, August 2, 2308
Ashley flew down the paths, making her way toward the far side of the neighborhood. In her excitement, she overshot the street leading to the security house and drifted too far down into the canyon. She needed to go uphill.
The kite wasn't helping anymore. The fall had drained the charge and she wasn't able push it up the steep canyon walls. It was shredded. While it would be fine for riding downhill, that wasn't helping now, she needed to cross the canyon and go up the other side.
Ash knelt and disconnected the kite from the board. She collapsed the whip and folded up the sail. The kite had saved her life, but it was worthless to her now. Ash wrapped the sail around the mast, and tied it with a bit of guideline. She buried the whole mess in some brush at the base of a big tree.
Returning to her board, in the middle of the path, Ashley had the intense feeling of being watched. She knelt to tie her shoe, scanning the trees and paths around her. She saw no one, and discovered that her shoe did indeed, need to be tied.
When Ashley looked up, she saw Oscar, the Dunkirk's cat. What was he doing out here?
Ashley turned to grab her board, and found Bobby Dunkirk standing just down the path from her. She couldn't understand how he'd gotten behind her, but there he was, dressed in all white, and he was staring at her. Oscar had come with him.
Ash noted how much Bobby had changed since she'd last seen him, weeks ago. His hair was slicked down close to the scalp, and his clothes were white, clean and pressed. He looked as if he were ready for picture day at school. Bobby's expression was also quite formal, no smile, his hands folded behind his back. This was not the same boy she had known. This Bobby was different. He seemed more adult than most adults did.
"What happened to Jack?" Bobby asked, without any sort of greeting.
"He died," Ash answered.
"It was the very next day, wasn't it?" There was something eerie about Bobby, from his dead-white suit to his ultra-smooth demeanor. He didn't seem drugged. In fact, he seemed wide-awake.
Ashley found herself strangely calm. "Yes, it was the next day."
"Do you miss him?" Bobby asked.
"Very much," she answered.
"I need your help," Bobby said, without a pause.
"My help?"
"You were there that day, in the canyon. That's when it all started. It touched you, I can tell. You're the only one who can help me."
"What are you talking about?" Ashley asked. She knew he was talking about the Micronix, the prototype in her pocket. The same way she'd known her father was involved when Jack died.
Oscar seemed oblivious to all of it. He sniffed the grass and weeds, watching everything and nothing.
"He's after me. He killed them and now he's after me." Bobby looked up the hill toward their street. He sounded a little more normal, but the words he was saying were disturbing.
"Who's after you?" Ash asked.
"My dad, he killed them. He’s killed so many."
"Your dad?" Ashley asked, pulling out Ross's phone. "Do you want me to call the police?"
"No. They can't help me. He kills the police. That night you were running, he killed lots of them. You're the only one who can help me."
"I'm just a girl. What am I going to do against your dad?"
"You have the power. You can stop him. You have to stop him," Bobby was growing more impatient.
"You sound crazy, you know that?"
"Please just come with me, I'm begging you." Bobby had gone from weird monotone creep to panicked and terrified little boy.
Ash almost laughed but caught herself.
"Please, Ash," Bobby was almost in tears now. "He's going to kill my Mom! Please, you have to help me. He's gonna kill them." Bobby paused and composed himself. "Please, just talk to him, Ash. He'll listen to you."
"Why do you think he'll listen to me?"
"I can feel it. You're different. When the man fell you found something. You found something, and it's in your pocket right now. That's why he'll listen. You have all the power. You can cure him."
Bobby seemed more normal now than Ash had seen him so far. He sounded okay. He was a little keyed up, but he wasn't doing his weird zombie monotone and he wasn't panicking. "What do you mean cure him?"
"Like you cured me," Bobby said.
"When?" Ash asked.
"Just right now," Bobby answered.
Ashley looked at him. He certainly seemed less uptight.
"Everything will be all right, I'm sure of it. If you just come with me. Evan and Anne and my Mom will all be okay. If you talk to him, he won't hurt them."
Ash walked forward and put a hand on his shoulder. She looked Bobby in the eye. "It's going to be okay, I'll help you."
Bobby seemed to calm down. "I have to show you, then you'll understand," Bobby said.
As Bobby walked through the forest, Ashley followed on her board. Her hand found the hard metal rectangle nestled in her pocket. Somehow she was not reassured by its flat texture under her fingertips.
Ashley stood with Bobby atop a small rise, past where the old asphalt street stopped. They stood, looking at the side of the modern-art fiasco Bobby called home. Ash could see her own house, just down the road.
Ash looked over at Bobby, he was terrified. She felt awful for having left him in the forest, that night a few weeks ago. It would be difficult to say that Bobby was okay. Ash didn't think he'd ever been normal, but he seemed better at the moment than when she had run into him ten minutes ago.
Bobby lived in one of the most expensive homes for miles. The white structure stretched out into the canyon, vast and angled. The rooms intersected in odd arrangements, walls and ceilings set together in disturbing ways, resulting in massive amounts of wasted space. For a prosperous slumlord and art connoisseur, Ashley felt Mr. Dunkirk had exhibited zero taste in choosing the family domicile.
Ash hadn't seen Bobby's older brother, Evan, since the Pierce incident, and she rarely saw Anne outside of family barbeques. This summer, the Dunkirk’s' hadn't thrown any of their trademark parties. Mrs. Dunkirk loved to host giant events, inviting hundreds of people. Shirley worked as a professional coordinator, served as head of the PTA, and was a member of the neighborhood homeowners' association. She planned school field trips, coordinated weekend outings to amusement parks, and organized multiple-family gatherings at local restaurants.
The Dunkirk’s also had a habit of slipping away for fancy trips. Upon their return, the neighborhood kids would be tortured with story after story about how they went tiger hunting in India, or fishing for giant carp off the Sea of Japan. "And did you know that, in Japan, they have red dragonflies?" Bobby would go on and on, repeating the same trivial facts day-after-day.
Ash found their familial enthusiasm nauseating. Her family never took vacations. Ashley's father rarely took breaks of any kind from his work. As a result, Ashley hardly knew him, but as her mother put it, he made the sun shine and the grass grow. "If your father stopped going to work, the world would fall apart." Small comfort, even when the she believed it.
Now her world had come crashing down. Her parents no longer existed. She had lost her brother. This was a new world she was living in. Here, the rules were different.
Bobby reached into his back pocket, produced a key card and handed it to Ash.
"Is there a code," Ashley asked.
"No code, just swipe it. Go in through the back."
"Look Bobby, I'll go in there. I'll check on your family, but I want you to understand, it might already be too late. If your Mom is in there, if she's hurt, I'm calling the cops, okay. If anyone is hurt, it's nine-one-one, images attached."
"Please, just check, okay?"
Ashley rode her hoverboard right up to the back door and leaned it against the house. She used the key Bobby gave her and entered the kitchen.