The very thought of it made Max shiver—there was no fun in peace.
Now, the Dark Ages had been a party. In the Dark Ages man was scattered and ignorant—helpless against the elements and one another. No one communicated, no one knew what was going on from one village to the next, empowering Max to roam freely and find, or create when necessary, adventure as he saw fit. If only those sweet Dark Ages could return again.…
The water purifier crackled, bursts of electrical sparks popping out and pulling Max’s thoughts back to the task at hand. He wielded the purifier like a magic wand, feeling its motion through the air. Slipping his free hand into his pocket, Max removed a small orange worm that he thumbed onto the wood of the purifier. Upon contact, the worm dug into the grain of the wood, burrowing inside like the hungry parasite it was. When it had disappeared from sight the purifier shivered and shook and the blue light grew dim, flickering out. A moment later an orange glow erupted inside the wand and it emitted a high whistle, like that of a siren.
Wouldn’t Conrad be surprised when Max showed him this! Of course, Conrad had no experience with the Antipode worm. Time was when the worm could be found on every continent on the globe causing havoc of every delicious nature. But as always happened, the Outsiders got wigged out and hunted down the Antipodes until they had eradicated every single last one of them. The fact that the worm was the cause of death and destruction anywhere and everywhere that it was found probably had something to do with the Outsiders’ violent feelings toward it and its eventual extinction. Outsiders hated death and destruction and thus hated the worm.
Fortunately Max had the foresight to save a few of them for his own personal use. What the Outsiders didn’t understand was that the worm wasn’t destructive, but brilliant, not to mention the fact that the little wriggler had a great sense of humor. The creature naturally and organically played the “opposite” game, and what could be more fun than that? Children liked the opposite game—the opposite of “up” is “down”; “in” for “out”; “hard” for “soft.” The worm played the same game on a grand scale and in the most creative ways. If you were a kind, helpful person and the worm got into you it would turn you into a killer. The worm would turn a hot fire into ice, a fish into a bird, and now, thanks to Max’s foresight, the worm had turned the purifier from something that could transform sand into clean drinking water into a machine that changed cleaning drinking water into sand. Ha!
It was all so fabulous and amazing that the only thing that saddened Max was that no one else was around to witness his genius. He wanted credit where credit was due; he wanted to be appreciated and admired, and more than anything he wanted a round of applause.
At the edge of the river Max hesitated only a moment before wading in up to his waist. The water was cold and ran around him quickly. Fish darted away from his feet and a water snake retreated to the reeds.
He didn’t want to rush things: he wanted the moment to linger. Max held the wand up in his arms and turned around slowly, taking in the delicate balance of nature.
The water was pure and sparkling: basic but essential. It was easy to take water for granted until you didn’t have it anymore. Max remembered the time he was stuck in a settlers’ outpost surrounded on all sides by bloodthirsty natives—he couldn’t really remember which natives; frankly, after a while they all sort of blended. Anyway, it was okay fun: unexpected things were popping up, skirmishes and attacks followed by counterattacks and the usual man-trying-to-survive-against-a-ruthless-environment sort of scenario. It was on the point of becoming ho-hum when the clean water ran out and suddenly things amped up to a whole new fun-level. The settlers started fighting among themselves over what was left of the water. Desperation was so deliciously dramatic—Max had never felt so young or so vibrant.
Then there was that time on the Viking ship when Sventlek the Red had poisoned the water and the crew went blinking mad and burned the ship from underneath themselves and drowned like rats. What a riot!
It had only occurred to Max recently that since the world was so globalized, the only way to really achieve the fun-charge he was looking for was to “encourage” global problems. And nothing said global catastrophe like a good old-school water shortage. The Colorado River would be first but others would follow: the Yangtze, the Nile, the Danube. Then Max would sit back and just watch the fun, soaking in all that delicious hysteria.
With Conrad’s intelligence at his disposal Max was back in business again; water shortages would be only the beginning. Maybe it could be a one-two punch: first the water, and then he’d get Conrad to engineer a really bad virus. The Black Plague was a great thing when it happened; Max remembered those days well and fondly.
Yes sir, with genius on your side the possibilities are endless.
Max turned around and around in the water and when the anticipation overtook him he tapped the top of the water with the wand like an orchestra conductor. Upon contact the cold water instantly turned to sand. The effect rippled outward as more water came into contact with the wand and a wave of sand began to travel up and down the river.
Max was now buried up to his waist in golden granules. A two-foot-long trout came thrusting upward out of the sand in confusion, gasping and flailing. Max watched it wiggling in panic and then placed his hand lovingly on top of its head as it flipped and flopped, its gills opening and shutting more and more slowly.
Max listened to the frogs chirping at a hysterical pitch and the birds going frenzied. In the distance a black bear began howling. He could feel his energy rising and his body growing younger by the second.
And then Max gave himself, because no one else would, a long, loud round of applause.
“Hooray for Max,” he cheered like he was a fan in the stands. “Max is amazing! What an achievement!”
He continued to clap for quite a while because, frankly, this was the sort of thing that deserved a long round of applause. Finally he stopped and bowed. It felt good. Not as good as if someone else had been there, but still it was better than nothing.
Max would have lingered longer but he’d given Conrad ample time to figure things out in Xanthia and it was time for him to get back. He didn’t want to miss out on a drop of that drama.
Yes. Max sighed happily. The world is my oyster and life is good!
CHAPTER
42
Conrad took the steps two at a time. He was panting from the effort and sweat beaded his face and chest. Piper had to fly to keep up with him. Neither of them bothered with the torches as the thing they most feared was no longer below them but above them.
“Wait up!”
“There’s no time.” Conrad was panting. “We have to get to my father before Max gets back!”
They didn’t stop until they had gone all the way up the stairs and into the Knowledge Center, where they found the energy globe flashing like a red-hot siren.
“What the heck?” Piper reached out to touch it.
Conrad immediately identified the Colorado River as the focal point of a major shift in the planet’s energy. No doubt Max had done damage of some sort, and Conrad felt a sick foreboding in the pit of his stomach.
Conrad pulled Piper out of the Knowledge Center and into the sunlight, where the events of a normal afternoon were unfolding in Xanthia exactly as they always did. He had no time to consider this but craned his neck to look up to the top of the mountain. “I can’t see a cave.”
Piper rose into the air, cupped her hands over her eyes to block out the rays of the setting sun. “I see something near the top. Maybe that’s it.”
“You’ll have to fly me up there.” Conrad lifted his arms away from his sides so that Piper could grip him.
Piper swooped behind Conrad and grunted from the effort of picking him up. “Watch my shoulder,” Conrad warned. “It still hurts sometimes.”
Slowly they ascended, when AnnA spotted them and came racing their way, climbing up onto a balcony railing as though to catch them.
; “Piper!” AnnA reached up to Piper, out of breath, relieved to see her friend. “I’ve been looking for you everywhere.”
“AnnA!” Suddenly Piper remembered AnnA’s plight. Over the last week she and AnnA had spent every waking moment together and had become good friends. She had promised AnnA that she would help her, but the revelations of the last few hours had completely distracted her from that purpose.
“Piper, what do I do?” AnnA’s face was red and anxious. “Equilla has sent for me.”
“Come with us,” Piper said impulsively.
“Piper, no!” Conrad warned. “It’s too dangerous.”
“Not as dangerous as going to Equilla. C’mon, AnnA.”
AnnA hesitated, wrapping her fingers around the stone railing and looking up in confusion. “Where are you going?”
“We have to get to a cave at the top of the mountain. Do you know where it is?”
“Over there.” AnnA pointed in the opposite direction from where they had intended to go. “It’s behind the floating rocks.”
“I see it.” Conrad pointed to the rocks. “Go. Go.”
“But…” AnnA’s face furrowed with confusion and fear. “How do I get up there?” It was clear that Piper was only just able to manage Conrad’s weight and couldn’t handle AnnA, too. “And we are not allowed in the caves. The Guardian says that they’re not safe and we are not to go there.”
Conrad snorted. “I bet he does.”
Tears welled in AnnA’s eyes. “I … I cannot break the rules.” Her face was flushing a deep red. “I am … frightened. And I am not like you—you are Outsiders.”
Despite Conrad’s urgency, Piper slowed down and lowered herself until she was eye level with AnnA.
“We are frightened too, AnnA. You have to do it in spite of your fear.” Piper gazed with compassion into AnnA’s pale face. “And you are like us, AnnA. We are all the same, the Outsiders and the Chosen Ones; we all came from the same place but we were tricked into forgetting.”
“Piper,” Conrad urged, wary of the time.
Piper sighed, wishing she could do more for her friend. “AnnA, I can’t take you, you’ve gotta do it yourself—but you can. I know you can.” Piper tipped her head in salute and swooshed up.
AnnA watched Piper ascend. It caused a fluttering inside her chest that was entirely foreign to her, and she was only just able to place a name to the feeling: yearning. As she considered what she was to do with her yearning heart, Nuttle the squirrel leaped up on the railing next to her.
“AnnA, I am waiting for you,” Nuttle said in the voice of Equilla. “Please come to me at once.”
AnnA’s breath caught in her throat. She handed the squirrel a nut and then carefully climbed down from the railing. When her feet were back on Mother Mountain she looked from Nuttle to where Piper and Conrad had flown away, painfully aware that nothing she had ever learned in the Celebration Center or for that matter in all her years in Xanthia had adequately prepared her for a moment like this. Yet in the last seven short days with Piper McCloud, AnnA’s world had been turned upside down—Piper was a revelation on every level, opening AnnA to ideas she had never thought possible. AnnA considered, for the first time in her life, that somewhere, deep inside her, resided the same courage and spirit of Piper McCloud. And that maybe, just maybe, that was a good thing.
* * *
The floating rocks bobbed back and forth, bumping into one another with loud thuds, making it necessary for Piper to dodge through them like an obstacle course. At the mouth of the cave, Piper set Conrad on the ground and paused to take in the fact that the cave was not dark but had a blue glow emerging from deep inside it.
Like AnnA, Conrad was afraid: afraid his father was dead, afraid of finding his father, and afraid of not finding him. He was strangely aware of his breathing all of a sudden, as though the cave had absorbed all sound and only the noise within could remain; the thud of his heart beating, the wheeze of his lungs pulling air in and pushing it out.
“Look! There’s snow,” said Piper, but she sounded impossibly far away, like she was in a distant land and calling out to him.
Conrad saw that his feet were in white powder. Along the walls of the cave ice was forming, and around the bend it was possible to see that the snow got deeper. The cold air now stung his lungs and his breath formed little clouds as it came out of his mouth.
His father’s hands had often felt cold; Conrad remembered how on his second birthday his father had carried him around his party and his hands had felt icy against his arms. There had been a lot of people at the party and they had all wanted to touch Conrad and talk to him and hold him and he didn’t like it. He was glad when his father had taken him back to his nursery and sat with him. They were dressed in the same outfit, a costume of some sort. As he thought on it Conrad’s memory sharpened and he remembered that the costume had been a Superman outfit: his mother’s idea, no doubt.
His father had looked like he truly was Superman to Conrad, though: strong, wise, powerful. He was his hero, and just being near him made Conrad glow inside and filled him with the urgent need to please him—and be like him.
For several months Conrad had been disassembling his electronic toys and reforming them in better ways. This was something his mother had reprimanded him for, thinking that he was ruining the toys, not making them smarter. Conrad hoped his father would celebrate and maybe even participate in this thing he felt compelled to do.
While his father watched, Conrad pulled apart his toy, reprogrammed it, and set it out for him to see.
“Call South America,” Conrad told the toy.
“Hola,” a voice in South America said soon after.
Conrad was delighted with the result and looked to his father with hope and anticipation. But the reaction he saw on his father’s face terrified him. His father’s eyes became small, his pupils dilated and strange. His hands shook and he spoke in a voice that was not his own before savaging the toy, hitting it until there was nothing but small parts scattered across the floor.
Even as Conrad thought about it now he felt the same sharp pain in the spot between his ribs. For years afterward in one form or another Conrad had attempted to please his father over and over again, hoping that at last his father would understand. Without fail his father treated his endeavors with revulsion and horror. It was more than confusing and disheartening to Conrad—it was dangerous. The satellite incident had been the final straw, pushing his father to throw Conrad at the mercy of Dr. Hellion and abandon him completely.
What would Conrad give to know then what he knew now? How much easier would it have been for his two-year-old self if he had understood that his father was under a powerful spell and suffering under his own wounds? In the file that J. had given to Conrad there were police reports on his father, and Conrad read about the day he had been discovered on the side of the road. An Officer Gonzalez had picked him up while wandering on a deserted Nevada highway, a scrawny eleven-year-old alone for an indeterminate amount of time without food or water and suffering severe burns from the punishingly hot sun. Child Services had questioned his father at length but he’d been robbed of all memory and knew nothing of his home or family. They held him, and the boy waited patiently for a loving family to claim him.
It was a futile and painful hope because, of course, no one ever came for him and he never had a home again. In foster care he was beaten and bullied by the other boys, enduring years of loneliness and mistreatment. When he was sixteen years old, the abuse had become too much and he’d run away to make it on his own in a cold and lonely world. For several years, he lived on the streets begging for change, when out of the blue one day, a mysterious benefactor took an interest in him. Suddenly unheard of opportunities were handed to him, and all the benefactor asked in exchange was a simple pledge of loyalty, which Harrington was all too happy to give. Years later, when that benefactor revealed himself as Max and his diabolical plans were laid bare, Harrington found himself caught in a web s
o deep and tangled, he was unable to free himself. And in this web he had remained, trapped and desperate.
What was it like, Conrad wondered, to have a feeling deep inside that could not be remembered or reasoned with, a longing for the peace of his home and justice for his mother? How had his father endured it?
Now that there were no longer secrets between them, would he be able to save his father from his past? No question; Conrad’s fears mounted.
The cave walls were coated in thick ice now; the snow was several inches deep and the blue light was growing brighter. As they rounded the bend the light was so blinding that Conrad was forced to raise his arm to shield his eyes.
As his vision refocused from a bright blur, Conrad’s heart skipped a beat.
In the middle of a cavern layered with ice was a frozen upright slab, and in the center of that slab was his father. Peter Harrington’s face was contorted with pain and his hand reached to the wound in his chest. He was frozen in place with the thick coldness, his skin tinted blue.
“Oh no!” Piper breathed, floating up and down behind Conrad’s shoulder.
Conrad took the last few steps and finally reached his father. He placed his hands on the ice above where his father’s hands were and willed with a raging ferocity to melt the cold and free him. The ice cared nothing for Conrad’s feelings and remained, burning his skin and firmly holding Harrington in frozen isolation.
Was it irony, Conrad wondered, or just some sort of nasty piece of destiny that was seeing to it that even though at long last he was physically with his father, he was still unable to reach him? The unfairness of it all erupted out of him and, using both fists, Conrad began pounding against the ice block.
“Ahhhhhh!” There was a raging scream and Conrad was surprised to hear that it sounded like his voice.