Authors: J. F. Jenkins
Decay (27 page)
“My name is Claire,” Potion said. Angela introduced herself as well, and a tension lifted from the room. It was nice for them all to be on a first name basis with one another.
“So what now?” JD asked.
Ophelia, Nia, leaned against a wall. “I don't know about you, but I still have another assignment to do. I've been given the lovely task of raising up that dead family again and finding a way to get them to talk. Hopefully it doesn't involve reconstruction because that's draining as all get out, and takes a lot of time. Plus, it's kind of gross. Not something I'm interested in doing.”
“What's so important about them?”
“Beats me.” She shrugged. “I'm pretty sure you guys are free to go. It's just us two who have to stick around.” She pointed at Potion.
He couldn't help but scowl as he thought.
Something tells me the dead people were the mission and not the artifact. Hopefully Alan knows something and can fill us in.
First, he had to find Alan so they could get back to the hotel and preferably in time for him to make use of the hot tub by the pool area. Nothing sounded better than unwinding under the hot jetted water and letting his muscles soak. They'd had a long, productive, and confusing day. A small reward had definitely been earned.
Â
Â
Dallas's wake had been the longest day of Orlando's life. It was five million times worse than the funeral, and he had acted as a pallbearer and everything. Something about spending several hours in a room with his best friend's corpse was unsettling. Even more so was the fact that hardly anyone came to pay their respects. Those who did kept asking him how he felt, or tried to make senseless small talk with him. He wanted to scream at them. How did they think he felt? His only real friend was gone â forever. His girlfriend, at the time, had stood by his side through most of it, which surprised him. He wouldn't have blamed her if she wanted to bail on him, but she also probably thought he'd reward her with a shiny and expensive treat for sticking through the ordeal. He hadn't, which was probably why she dumped him for Jesse Jordan roughly three days later. It wouldn't have surprised him if he had been cheated on.
The night of the wake, everything had become all too real. Before he had actually seen the body, the whole thing was just a joke in his mind. Dallas was playing a prank, skipping school to play video games, and he would pop back into Orlando's life at a random moment shouting “Boo!” For the first hour of the wake he thought the same thing. That it was all just a game. Dallas had always been into pulling bad, sick, jokes on him.
The body had looked too fake, too plastic, and yet all too real at the same time. The coloring was off, but if Orlando moved close enough he could see it was flesh and bone in the casket. When he dared to actually touch Dallas's hands, he cringed at how cold they were. The moment the casket was closed and he had to help march it to the hearse, his gut sank into a deep pit at the bottom of his stomach. Then it was placed in the mausoleum.
He took a week off from school. Naturally, his parents didn't stay for long to comfort or support him. Orlando needed more time in so many respects, but no one seemed to want to give it to him.
“It's bogus you're making me go to school again tomorrow,” he yelled at his sister. “I thought out of everyone, you'd understand the most, but you're taking Mom and Dad's side, again, even though all they do is ditch us anyway. Why live by their rules and let them boss you around?”
Lyssa hugged herself. “Because I agree with them. Going back to class is going to be hard, but you need to keep moving forward. Doing something besides staying here and absorbing yourself into some video game is so much healthier.”
“I don't feel anything when I play. Every time I feel, I just...”
Want to die too.
“I don't want to go back. I'm not ready,” he said.
“Please try it. We'll take it one step at a time. If it's absolutely horrible, we'll step back.”
“You can't make me.” He glared down at her.
She gazed back up at him coldly. “Watch me.”
Orlando threw up his hands and shook his head, storming away from her. “I can't believe you. I thought you were on my side!” He stomped his way up the stairs and into his bedroom, making sure to the slam the door behind him.
Looking around the room, he hated just about everything inside of it. The sports posters on the walls, his prep styled clothing that was splayed all over the floor, all of it, he suddenly loathed.
He ripped the posters off the walls and shoved them into a garbage can. Then he began to sift through all of his clothes. If the color wasn't black, or close to it, it went into his donation basket. There wasn't a lot left for him to wear, but he could easily do a shopping spree soon to make up for the loss. He owned too many colors. Colors he didn't feel worthy of wearing, and they were far too happy looking to fit his mood.
Why did you have to do this? How come you have to be so selfish?
Orlando growled and sent the entire contents of his dresser top to his floor. Something broke in the process, but he didn't care much about the mess. When he looked up and saw himself in the mirror, he went to his desk to find the nearest pair of scissors. He hated the blond hair on his head, hated how in style and shaggy it was.
If I didn't care so much about being cool, none of this would have ever happened.
Taking the scissors to his hair, he began to clip it as close to his scalp as he could get. He nicked himself a few times in the process, but he welcomed the pain. He deserved it.
Just as he was finishing his spontaneous haircut, Lyssa knocked on his door. She didn't wait for him to answer and entered on her own.
“What did you do?” She gasped and stood in the doorway, her gaze wandering over the room before settling on him. “Put the scissors down.”
He glared at her and threw them at his mirror. The crunch it made as it cracked brought a smile to his face, if only a tiny one. “I need more time.”
Lyssa took a few hesitant steps toward him. Soon her arms were wrapped around him, and she pushed his face into her shoulder. Tears streamed down her face. “Okay.”
Crying as well, he clung to her. She was the closest thing to having a real mother that he'd ever known. A role neither of them had wanted her to play, but she took it on anyway. All he wanted was for his parents to be there and help him through the whole thing. Like usual, they had abandoned him as soon as possible.
* * * * *
Orlando hated that dream. Waking from it was always welcome no matter what time of day it was. He groaned and rolled over, surprised to find himself in
his
bed back home. What was even more surprising was that he wasn't alone. When he looked over and saw a middle aged woman with dark hair curled in toward his side, he pinched himself.
“Mom?” he somehow managed to choke out.
The sound of his voice must have startled her awake because she jumped and rolled away from him. She
was
his mother. There was no question about it. He didn't see the woman often, but he'd recognize her anywhere because she never seemed to change much physically. Outside of a different hairstyle every so often, she was an older version of his sister. They had the same dirty blonde hair and bright blue eyes as him.
She rubbed his arm gently. “Yeah sweetie, it's me.”
“What are you doing here?” He blinked a few times, wanting to be positive she was, in fact, real.
“We came home as soon as your sister told us you were missing,” she said.
Mixed emotions moved through him. It touched him that he was important enough to drop business over, but it also frustrated him that it took such an extreme circumstance to bring both of his parents home again.
He turned away from her, rubbing at his eyes to dislodge the sleep from them. “I'm fine. You can go back to whatever it was you were doing. I'm sure your slave driver of a boss is missing you both over at...wherever you are this time around.”
His parents moved about constantly. They'd traveled the globe. He didn't even know what they did, and neither his mother nor his father offered up that information freely. Getting them to say anything about what they did was difficult. He'd given up on trying a long time ago.
With a sigh, his mother ran a hand through his hair in slow, soothing, strokes. He hated how much he liked it.
“Honey, I'm not leaving again,” she said. “Not for a few months at least. Even then, it may just be your father who goes. With everything that has been going on in your life, we both feel like it's best for us to stay home for a while.”
Orlando rolled his eyes. “Right, I totally believe that.”
“I know we haven't given you much reason to trust us.”
“No, you haven't.” The words she was saying were ones he'd heard at least a hundred times before.
She gave a weak smile. “There's a lot we need to talk about, but we'll wait until you feel better. Just know, I'm here now, and I'm not going anywhere this time.”
You shouldn't have ever left in the first place.
He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to hold back all of his emotions. “Talking later would be best. Can't say I'm feeling too great right now. Kind of weak still, and tired. Oh, and hungry.”
“Let me make you something. I'm pretty sure you have a visitor or two anyway.” His mother leaned over him and kissed his forehead. That one action alone brought tears to his eyes. Thankfully, he was able to keep those back as well. He couldn't even remember the last time she'd kissed him. When they were home last summer, their goodbye had been rough and uncomfortable. Neither of his parents had expressed much emotion, and Orlando had been sure to do the same. To have her go from stiff and empty to compassionate was strange. Not to mention heartbreaking because he hated how much it took for his parents to notice either him or his sister were even alive.
He had guests, so there was no way he could have a breakdown. There was time for him to wallow in self-pity when he was alone later. Even then, it wouldn't be something he did for long. He'd gotten over his parents years ago. Outside of the fact that they created him, he had a hard time viewing them as more than two adults who came into the house sometimes and paid the bills.
His mother gave his hair one more ruffle before she stood up from the bed and left the room. Orlando took a moment to exhale slowly, preparing himself for whoever his mystery guest was. The moment Angela walked through the door, he relaxed. He didn't have to put up a front with her. Something about their relationship made it easy for him to bring down all of his walls. Tait had been good at doing the same thing until she betrayed his trust. Hopefully he wouldn't have to learn the hard way, again, that opening up was a bad idea. His teammates made him more secure. They'd gone through so much together. If anyone left, it'd probably be him and not them.
After shutting the door to his room, Angela pulled his desk chair up to the side of the bed, all smiles. “You have no idea how happy I am to see you're okay. What happened anyway? Cadence didn't say much over the phone.”
“I'm not sure how to explain it. There's a lot I'm still trying to piece together.” He sat up in bed and was startled by how heavy his body was. It took a lot of effort for him to move.
“Don't push yourself,” she said.
He shook his head. “I'm not. It's not like I'm in pain, just weak. Something she did to me...”
“She?”
“Nia,” he mumbled, then waved a hand. “She's a girl from my school. I'm not sure who tapped her, but she somehow has powers. Ones that can raise the dead.”
Angela's fists clenched. “I met her this weekend. She knows who I am, who JD is. We know who she is too, of course. Basically, we exchanged information. She works for the yellow tribe. If I'd known she was the one who did this to you, made you disappear, had us worrying so much, hurt you like this, I would have punched her in the face.”
He laughed. “That's a girl fight I would love to see. But honestly, she's not worth breaking your nails over. Let me continue though, because it's not all her fault. I agreed to let her do this to me.”
“Why?” Angela frowned so deeply, he didn't know what to make of it. No one had ever expressed so much concern for him before.
For a moment, he was quiet. Finding the right words to explain the entire situation was difficult. There was a lot to process still. “Sometime over the winter, she became buddy-buddy with my best friend.” He paused, licking his lips. “My best friend who died a couple of years ago.”
“Mildly creepy, but...whoa.”
“Tell me about it.” He closed his eyes. “They came up with this idea that she could bring him back to life for good. You know, make him more than just some kind of animated corpse. In order to do that, though, she needed to use the life force of another living being. Preferably a person because, well, we're sentient and have powerful energy or some kind of strange scientific thing I can't quite explain. They wanted to use me, and I agreed.”
“You volunteered your life to bring back your best friend?”
He nodded. “Because I felt like it was my fault he died in the first place. I understand better now why he did kill himself. He claims the actions rest on his shoulders alone, but I still sort of feel like they partly rest on mine too. We both could have done a lot of things differently.” She leaned forward but didn't say anything, and for that he was grateful. Side commentary was not welcome for the time being. “I don't know how much you know about Dallas, and I don't want to give you the whole story now of what happened.”
Angela raked her lower lip between her teeth for a few seconds. “The name rings a bell, but I wasn't in the high school then. Most of the gossip from that year never made it to my ears. Some of it still lingers. What I do know is there was a kid in your grade who committed suicide during your Freshman year, and that was the same year you 'flipped your lid' and became an outsider. I never put the two events together, but then, neither does anyone else.”
“Not many people do. Most are too shallow to make the connection.”
“Hey now!”
He laughed. “Present company not included.”
She sat back in the chair. “That's better.”
“Anyway, when the process was taking too long, not working, becoming too painful to me, Dallas decided he didn't want to be brought back anymore. We had our heartfelt gushy talk about life and death and everything in-between. I fell back asleep, and when I woke up, Cadence and Jaes were there. We teleported back here, and I passed out again.”
“That's quite the adventure,” she said.
Orlando nodded. “Tell me about it. My parents are here too. Feels kind of like I'm at some sort of dysfunctional life reunion.”
“Yeah, I saw your mom on my way up. I said about two words to your dad. He's kind of rough. Doesn't smile, and he gave me the impression that he wanted me to go away.”
“Don't take it personally. I get the same vibes. Only he doesn't want me to go away, I can just tell he has other places and other things to be doing whenever we hang out. According to my Mom they're going to be sticking around for a few months. I'm honestly not sure how I feel about that.” He picked at the lint on his bedspread.
Angela moved her hand closer to his. They didn't touch, not at first, because he could sense her hesitation as she rested it on his lap. After a few seconds had passed, she closed the gap and gave his hand a squeeze. “You're so used to not having them around, it's easier to have them gone. Is that it?”
He met her gaze with his own. “Something along those lines. I'm taking it with a grain of salt anyway.”
“You're okay, though? Nia didn't hurt you too much, did she? It's sweet, what you wanted to do, but don't do it again. Okay? Maybe you feel like it's worth the sacrifice, but a lot of people were worried sick about you. I've never been more scared in my life. And that's saying a lot because I met some weird people and saw some weird stuff too,” she said.
“I didn't realize...”
“Well now you do. I've grown very attached to you, so think about that next time before you decide to be all heroic.”
He rolled his eyes. “Yeah, yeah, yeah...”
She gave his hand one more squeeze before letting go. It amazed him how much he missed the touch the instant that it was gone. Her hands were soft and warm, comforting. There was something else going on too, but he couldn't quite put his finger on it. Regardless, he didn't want her to stop.
“Does she know who you are? I mean, that you're a part of our team and stuff?”
Orlando shook his head. “No, but I'm pretty sure Dallas does. He has the knowledge of the other realm, though, and mentioned something about stalking me in his free time when he was ghost. I don't know if he said anything to her, but if she does know, she acted oblivious to it. Then again, she didn't have issues with talking about having powers and all that stuff in front of me, so who knows?”
“I'm still going to punch her, I think.”
He chuckled. “Why don't you tell me about what I missed? You said you saw some weird stuff, like what?”
Angela played with her long, dark, hair, twirling it around her index finger. “Where to begin... I saw a guy get shot and heal himself. I should mention he's a cyborg, and I think he's also a traitor. That was fun. JD rescued some corpses and brought back a shiny gold box that's apparently important. That's what we went into the mission to retrieve from the beginning. It's some kind of Alturan artifact.
“I met a snotty girl named Gabriel, got hit on by the cybornetic guy, was shot at by a girl who makes bullets from her body and fires them without a gun, and purposefully threw up so I didn't get JD and I busted. Like, everyone was doing the grand identity reveal thing at the end of the mission. If I hadn't gotten us out of there when I did, they'd all know. And I don't think that'd be a good thing either. Not with my suspicions about the cyborg, who goes by the name of Drone I should add. Overall it was a good time, let me tell you.”
“Sounds like it,” Orlando said. “I miss all of the fun. I spent the whole time sleeping, yet I'm still tired.”
“I'll make it up to you when you feel stronger,” she said. “Oh, I got you something!”
Orlando raised an eyebrow. “You did? Why?”
He could have sworn she blushed, but it didn't last long. She got up from her chair and went over to his dresser. When she faced him again, he saw a small square box about the size of a volleyball in height, but thin in width, in her hands. Covering it were heart stickers and smiling faces. Without a word, she handed it to him. Curious, he opened the box and pulled out a dream catcher. It was unlike any other he'd seen before. Woven into the design was an image of a horse head. Long blue and white strings dangled off of the bottom, ending in black tipped white feathers.
Angela was still standing, and she fidgeted with her hands in front of her. “It made me think of that galaxy you like so much. And I know you'll probably never admit to it, but you seem like you could use some good dreams. Just a vibe I get. Anyway, it made me think of you.”
“Thank you. I honestly, don't know what else to say. I can't remember the last time I got a gift just because someone saw something and thought of me,” he said and traced the outsides of the circle with a few fingers.
She shrugged. “It's what friends do. I'll hang it up for you, and then you think about resting again. You need to get better, fast. Something tells me we're going to be having another hard mission coming up, and we're definitely going to want your help. Having you around for this past one would have made a lot of things easier. Plus, I just miss hanging out.”
“I have that effect on people.” He smirked. “Go ahead and put it over by the window.”
Smiling, she walked over to the large window across the room and found a place to hang the dream catcher in the center. “I'll stop by tomorrow to check up on you.”
“Thanks,” he said, settling back into his covers and laying back down. He watched her go, saddened. It was necessary, unfortunately. After he ate whatever his mother brought back to him, he'd want to go right back to bed. He'd apparently missed a lot while he was gone. There were so many questions running through his mind. What big plans did Alan's people have for this artifact? Who was this supposed traitorous cyborg who was hitting on Angela? Why did that even bother him so much? And finally, what was in it for Nia?