Chapter 36 - It’s the dull thrill of the chase

­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­The sergeant is still focused on keeping time still, Nico has no orders from him other than to get us home - or at least to the mainland. He’s 8, and he’s flying 40 people over open water with no directions to go for other than “straightforward”. Even with an alternate route, Joseph would track us down easily.

“Who’s Joseph?” mother asks. Finally, there’s an upside to having a mother who reads minds.

“School police,” Brody answers uncertainly.

“Yes dear, I read minds. My husband controls time, but you’ve figured that out already.”

“And she has mind control,” he indicates towards Marie. “He can fly, obviously,” he nods towards Nico. “And he breathes fire,” he looks at Andy. “What about him?” Mother lets him speak out loud to be polite.

“Criss has super hearing,” she explains. I suppose that is the gift most difficult to guess based on observation. He looks around at all of us, taking in the Langdale family in all our prison breaking glory.

“Hale is at home, he’s telekinetic like Lizzy.”

“I can set the table without moving,” I bud in. “He can make the forks dance and the knives fight. But family trees are hardly the most important thing right now, who was the voice at the school?”

“Head Timer,” Howard answers. “Your father froze everyone’s sense of time in a single instant, but Timers have a different sense of time than the rest of us, she expanded that instant, made it longer so to speak. We couldn’t see her because she was too fast - she moved from her classroom on the 4th floor to the grounds in an instant. We could only hear her because your father didn’t actually stop time, just people’s sense of time, sound waves aren’t people, and she released her hold on time as soon as she’d spoken the words.Her voice sounded odd because it’d been slowed down and then sped up again to fit our sense of time.”

“And she’s coming after us,” mother reads.

“Not right away. I don’t think she could break the sergeant’s hold, even if she used every ounce of strength she has. Even if she could, there’s no way she could take on all of us, or that she’d even risk coming so close to 30 uncontained Unassigneds. She’ll wait till time starts moving on its own again, and then she’ll alert the others. They’ll come after us fully equipped and prepared for war.”

“And this Joseph guy can track us.”

“Easily.”

“How do you suggest we do that?” mother asks Brody.

“It takes some getting used to,” I tell him. “What were you thinking?”

“Nothing, it was just a thought.” His annoyance is rising. He’s out of the basement again, and bad as it might have been there, he wasn’t a freak there, it was his comfort zone.

“He was thinking about hiding. It’s a good idea, we can’t stand and fight with all these children here. You seem to have done it a lot before, how did you do it?” He studies his fingernails instead, clearly unhappy to have his thoughts shared against his will.

“He hid in plain sight,” I tell her. “At the school it was easy, just stay where there’s a crowd, and Joseph won’t be able to tell which student is which. I don’t see how we can do that here.”

“No, I suppose not. And regular people won’t do? Yes, yes I suppose that does complicate things. I suspect our best bet is the family, they can set up shelter for us. They won’t be happy though. This would have been a lot easier if we’d known we’d have extra passengers.”

“As if you’d have agreed to do it,” Brody remarks under his breath.

“They won’t stand for it, showing up with all these outsiders…” uncle Howard states instead.

“You always had a stricter view on them, Howard, they really aren’t as bad as you make them out to be, they will want to help.”

“I fell in love and got a lecture on secrecy and was cast out, you expect to bring 30 outsiders in front of the family heads and get away with it? You are fooling yourself, dear sister.”

“I can see that you think that. Perhaps bringing them to the family isn’t the best idea, but I don’t think the family would just turn them out, they’re just children after all.”

“We can’t wait, and we can’t just fly around aimlessly,” I bud in.

“We need somewhere big enough for all of us, and somewhere we can easily defend,” Brody sums up.

“That looks lovely dear, where is it?” Normally mother would never share like this without permission, it’s rude and cruel, but given the current situation…

“Nowhere we can use.” The look on her face changes, I can’t quite tell if it’s worry, or anger, or disgust… I look to Brody instead, trying to find a clue there. He refuses to look at me, he just talks to the waves beneath us instead. “My father has money,” he says in shame. “He likes to invest in real estate.” I look to mother, but there are no questions coming from her. She knows. She read it, the abuse, the neglect, the shame… She wasn’t worried or angry with Brody, she was worried about him and disgusted by his father. Uncle Howard retreats a little and keeps his head down. I can only imagine the emotional turmoil he’s reading in mother now, emotions he’s lived with for years, but now has to feel afresh again, not to mention the confused children.

“Anywhere we can use?” I ask Brody.

“I don’t know. He usually prefers high-end buildings, fancy beach houses, not somewhere you can house 30 runaways.” Usually. There is someplace on his mind. I keep my tongue, hoping he’ll go on on his own. “I don’t know if he still has it…” He hesitates.

“You have a place in mind,” Marie buds in. “We’ll just go ask him.” Or tell him, if he doesn’t see things her way.

“Marie!” mother tells her off in a stern, harsh voice. Marie shrinks a little in her air seat and looks at me for an explanation.

“Not now,” I evade.

“Well, we need somewhere to go.” And towards his dad is the last place Brody would go, anyone in their right minds at the school would assume tracking us there would be a trick, a diversion or something like that.

“I’m sorry dear, I truly am, but it seems like this is the best plan we have.” Brody refuses to look at her.

“We’re nearing the mainland now,” Nico calls back to us. “I need instructions soon.” Mother looks around at our extra passengers.

“Cloaking. We need cloaking. And transportation.” 30 children running around the city in dirty rags would cause attention, and even cloaked moving around this many people would be difficult. “I’ll call Victor and Selma. If we ask them to come to us they might be more willing to help.” I assume she’s talking to herself by now, since the only ones who might know who Victor and Selma are, are the general and Howard, neither of which seem inclined or capable of answering her right now.

“We’ll be in line of sight soon,” Nico warns.

“Brody, full on submarine?” I suggest. He looks quizzically at me for a second, but decides the idea isn’t half bad, and it will give him something to do. He nods. “Hold still Nico,” I request. I reach down and find the bottom of the sea and level myself according to that instead. This is like standing on one leg in the sea, not exactly easy. “Come over here, would you?” He obeys, and Brody parts the waves beneath us and I lower us down. A few of the children gasp as the waves crash together again five feet above our heads, but between Howard and mother, no one panics. I doubt any civilian will see us down here.

“If everyone could be completely quiet please,” mother requests. No one speaks - possibly because most of the children are all looking up at the waters above us in fear. “Requesting an audience with the Langdale Council,” mother says. She repeats it three times as if dialing a phone. I suppose someone like Criss, with enough study in familiarity and a feel for every single family member… it is possible such a person could hear a Langdale call from anywhere in the world. Quite useful. “We request the help of Victor and Selma.” She repeats this three times as well - I suppose reception is not always ideal with long distance calls. “Officials are in pursuit of us, we are about 30 people, most are scared children.” She hesitates, but there are no secrets in the Langdale family, it is too impractical. “They are from the school,” she explains. “There they are called Unassigneds, it means they don’t have control of their abilities yet.” She can barely keep her voice steady. “We could not leave them there, not like that. We need the family’s help, we have a plan, and we will not be bringing anyone in danger. Please. They’re children.” She stops her description for a second before saying “Lizzy and Howard are among us.” She falls silent, not repeating it. Uncle Howard looks at her with a sort of fear I can’t fully understand. Mother shows no sign of receiving a reply, and neither does Criss. We are left in uncertainty.

“He’s got it darling, you can let go,” mother says softly half an hour later. I hadn’t even noticed I’d been edging around the water trying to make sure Brody had it under control. Brody looks up at her, but she simply smiles and strokes the hair out of the sergeant’s face. He’s lying down next to her, exhausted and barely conscious. “Howard and I will keep guard,” she says though I have no idea what she means.

“I mean you just let Brody hold his part, and you let Lizzy keep the balance.Howard and I can keep watch on you, alert you if one is fading or slipping.”

“I suppose that could…”

“Yes dear, I’m not just a pretty face or a stern mother. I can do my part too.” Brody doesn’t even complain that I was checking, doesn’t mention anything about not trusting the Unassigned or thinking he’s useless. Criss smiles and shakes his head at me. Brody looks to me for guidance.

“It’s better than exhausting ourselves trying to double guard.” He accepts my word hesitantly, it always feels better to have your own hands on things, or at least familiar hands whose capability you know and trust. Another hour passes with nothing but balancing the bouble and watching my mother try to be polite and not read Brody too much or too obviously. She clearly finds him interesting though. At one point she lets out a clear gasp and looks directly at him before realizing how rude that was. Her eyes are wide and intense, curious, and alert. It’s not until I catch her sneak a peek at the triplets I realize it wasn’t Brody she was surprised with.

Time passes slowly, steadily. Maybe we should try to wake Trixie up, she might be able to tell us if anyone is coming at all. The longer we sit here, the greater the chances of getting caught are. We might be hidden from prying eyes down here, but Joseph couldn’t have an easier task of finding us if we’d put up a great, big, neon sign pointing straight at us.

“I think Marie’s ‘never’ stunt saved us,” Howard says. “They haven’t gotten past the barrier yet. If we can get help before they do, we have a chance.” A small splash makes me look up, and the surprise almost makes Brody lose his hold. A thin woman in her 30’s is falling through the water as if summoned by Howard's words.

“Selma,” mother says in joy. Selma clearly was not expecting the water or the sight of us. Her face is confused, wide-eyed, shocked - you name it. Brody drains the water from her clothes and hair. She looks around at all of us, submerged in our air bubble submarine.

“Brilliant,” she exclaims.