“Shh!” Billy
interrupted. And, with that, they were back standing under the naked cherry
trees in front of the house.
“Is there
someone there?” Rebecca asked. Billy nodded. “Costumes, please. Oh, Hi, Doctor Dawson.”
“Um, hi,
Miss…?
“This is
Rebecca Hirsch, Aunt Sandy. You’ve seen her at the Golden Dynasty. And this is
Billy Tatum. He’s the guy with keen, animalistic senses.”
“Is that
Green Tea, by Elizabeth Arden?” Billy asked.
“Why, yes,
Billy. Thank you for noticing,” Aunt Sandy said. “It’s a gift. Is there
something wrong, Chris?"
“Billy says
that there’s someone out there. We think they might be looking for Uncle
Springett,” Chris explained.
“Who has
been dead for almost 70 years. Tell me. Are stupid supervillains more dangerous
than smart ones?”
“Don’t
worry, Ma’am,” Rebecca said, pulling out her phone to text maniacally for a
moment, both thumbs flying. “If you can just go inside and sit well away from
any windows for a minute or two, we’ll have this sorted out. Now get into your
costumes, boys, and let’s go check out the back yard again.”
“Because
we..are…the…Backyardigans!” Chris sang.
“Hunh?”
Billy asked.
“Here’s an
idea. Next time the community day care has to go off site, let’s have it at the
Institute instead of the Yurt,” Chris half-answered. Then he relented. “It’s a
kid’s show. About the wild, imaginative adventures you can have in your own
backyard.”
“Throw in a
time machine, a spaceship, and a dimensional portal, and you’ve got our lives," Billy pointed out. "And a daycare would liven the Institute right up. More experimental subjects.”
“Yeah. Now come
on.” Chris gestured his friends forward
as he led the way around the side of the house.
The back
yard was still empty. Chris stood still, straining to look out over the lake.
Where were they? Beside him, Billy asked, casually, “How can this be the same
address that a World War II vet lived at? All the houses look newer than that.”
“The beach
house was renovated in the early Sixties, same time as the property was
subdivided and the new houses put up.” Chris went quiet, too tense with
anticipation to keep up the conversation, but Billy gestured for him to keep
talking.
“They had to
do some pretty massive work anyway, what with the town sewer line coming in.”
“They didn’t
have plumbing here in the 1950s? Like, Leave
it to Beaver time?” Rebecca asked.
“Oh, no,
they had plumbing. It was just a septic field system.”
“A what?”
Rebecca asked.
“The pipes
led to an underground gravel pit. The fluid and …stuff just drained away into
the ground.”
Rebecca
wrinkled her nose. “Gross! Didn’t everyone get sick?”
Chris shook
his head. “Apparently, by the time sewage has percolated very far underground,
it’s basically all filtered out. Amoeba may be small, but they’re a lot bigger
than water molecules.”
“Hunh,”
Rebecca said, doubtfully. “So. What about what your Aunt Sandy said? Do you
really think that Professor Paradigm is likely to get two Springett Dawsons
confused when they were born 40 years apart?”
“Well, think
about it,” Chris replied, shading his eyes with his hand as he desperately
tried to make out small details on the beaches of houses fronting the lake to
the north of the Point, past the border. A car went by, flahing into sight
through the willows as the road came out directly over the beach, down towards the
lookout at the tip of the little peninsula. There was nothing out there.
Protest
rally noises continued to float down from Canada. He continued. “The whole
point of giving him a codename in the first place was to protect his secret
identity. So it stands to reason that if he
survived the war, and he was done being Achilles, he could take off his mask, go
back to his hometown and live a regular life. That’s why we have costumes and
codenames. So we can retire. There’s lots of World War vets in Oroville, and,
anyway, maybe super soldier serums make you live longer.”
“So Babs is
going to look like that forever? Lucky Tyrell!” Rebecca said.
“Are they
actually dating?” Billy asked. “And do you like Babs?”
“I wouldn’t
turn her away, if you know what I mean. Are they dating? I don’t know,” Rebecca
said. “Probably not, actually. I think we could tell if they were. Jealous?”
“Of Tyrell?
No,” Billy said. “Not my type. Jameel, on the other hand…”
Rebecca
sounded secretly amused by something. “Really?”
“Are you
saying you have a thing for Rose or my sister?” Chris said.
“Your sister
is hot,” Billy said.
“Gross! You’re
a hundred years older than she is!”
“For dating
purposes, I prefer to think of myself as a retarded Senior,” Billy pointed out.
“Maybe the
retards could go for Rose, instead?” said Chris. “Speaking as Charlotte’s
brother. So. Okay, so she’s in Grade 8, and you’re in Grade 12. That’s not that
much better.”
“Not so much
with the “r” word, Seventies Boy,” Rebecca said.
And it was
at that exact moment that Decurion and Big Ninja from the water just past the
dropoff where the good swimming started. “I was wondering how long they were just
going to lie there, holding their breaths, while we talked teen soap opera
stuff,” Billy said, grinning.
“You’re a
mean one,.Wolverine Boy,” Chris answered.
“Right back
at you, KFB,” Billy replied.
Rebecca took
in the scene. “Okay, I’m backup. I don’t like us engaging without being able to
pull out of the fight when Paradigm or Tesseract shows up. “Billy, you take the big guy. Chris, you
handle Decurion.”
Chris ran
down to the beach, flexing his right hand, but the blue sword didn’t appear in
it. Weren’t you supposed to get swords out of a lake? That was right. A girl’s
hand reached out of the water and handed it to you. But not today, because, as
Chris set his legs in Crow Stance, Decurion came lunging out of the water,
leading with shield and spatha out, point thrust low and scooping.
Chris
sidestepped. Crow was a good stance for sand, because it kept your weight over
the feet and planted them on short strides. The step shifted his centre of
gravity just enough to miss the point of the blade. Now he was inside the
weapon, and he shifted out of Crow to Crane, drawing his outside, right knee up
and launching a snap kick. Knowing that Decurion was fast enough to interpose,
Chris put his qi power into the blow.
As he expected, Decurion took a long step back to absorb the momentum, and slipped
going down into the water.
Beside
Chris, the massive, black-clad, black masked brick charged by, trying to get a
bead on a fast-dodging Billy. Then he disappeared. “Heads up, Chris,” Rebecca
called. So a big chunk of brick was about to come crashing down on the beach in
a second. Never fight a teleporter, Chris noted, if you’re allergic to gravity.
Chris moved
into the water, following Decurion. The fall didn’t seem to have dented the
villain’s arrogance, because even as he scuttled back, trying to get room to
stand up, he caught Chris’s eyes and sneered. “You hit me so much harder than
you do my …colleague. I wonder how hard you’d hit if you knew I was stabbing
her, too.”
Chris
flushed with anger, considering Bear stance for a moment. It was good for water
fighting, but he didn’t need to be fussy. Decurion was down, and it was time to
put him out.
Then, just
behind Chris, came the massive thump of the ninja-brick hitting the ground. It
shouldn’t have distracted Chris, but it did. Chris flicked his eyes back to
catch the big guy bounce off the ground and back into action, booming a roar as
he ran after Billy. Not that allergic to gravity, then, Chris thought, looking
back to Decurion, who had used the moment’s distraction to get back to his
feet. The pseudo-Roman flashed his blade through a couple of moves, ending with
a hammering blow to his own shield with the flat of the sword.
This was
bad. Now they were both in the water. Chris’s main advantage, his fast
footwork, was neutralised. He scrambled back towards the beach, splashing in
the water, while Decurion pressed his advantage, thrusting and slashing with
his long sword. Chris couldn’t use his qi
to enhance speed and strength at the same time, so he was left on hair
trigger speed, fast enough to slap the sword aside each time it came in, but
not strong enough to touch Decurion through his armour and shield on
counterpunch.
They fought
silently for a long, slogging moment, exchanging grunts with thrusts and
parries until Chris’s feet hit dry land. “Heh,” Decurion said. “Where’s that
wuxia elegance? I thought you’d just jump backwards out of the water.”
Chris didn’t
respond. He’d noticed that Decurion dipped his point when returning to garde
from a thrust. Chris slipped into a traditional Monkey stance and focussing his
qi on the power of his Eight Spirit
punch. This time his dodge would go left, across the blade while it dipped.
That would put him on his foe’s
shieldless side. Even if his punch didn’t knock the villain out, it would
surely knock his helm clear.
Too late, as
Chris unweighted his following, right foot to come into stance, he saw Decurion
reverse his sword’s motion out of the dip below garde. He’d been decoyed, and
his body was in motion. Desperately Chris hunched to the left, dissipating his
blow into a chop at Decurion’s wrist. In almost the same moment, the keen edge
of the Roman sword bit into Chris right arm above the elbow while his left
slapped Decurion’s arm greave.
The sword
went arcing through the winter sky in a red spray of arterial blood. Chris was
in trouble.
Again the
disorienting flicker as Chris was teleported and, without the transitions that
made the world make sense, he was standing on the porch of the beach house.
Decurion’s sword clattered to the ground beside him as he clenched his left
hand over his wound, putting pressure on the cut to stop the bleeding. The
worst part, Chris realised, was that Decurion was right. He could have just
done a cricket leap backwards out of the water, but he hadn’t wanted to seem to
run away from Decurion, and he wasn’t even sure he knew why. What was it that
had made him so angry? Chris knew that Morning Glory would never go for a creep
like Decurion.
“He won’t be
much trouble now that we’ve got his sword,” Rebecca said from the side. “Uhm,
how bad’s the cut?”
“It’s pretty
deep,” Chris admitted. “I need a moment to tourniquet it before I go back in.”
“Okay,”
Rebecca said, doubtfully. “Billy’s going to have his hands’ full, dealing with
the two of them. Oh, crap.”
Rebecca was
responding to the sight of Professor Paradigm, sliding towards them like some
particularly smooth skateboarder, only six feet above the surface of the lake.
The weird lights of the lamp-like things bathed his face in mixes of colours
belonged in out-takes from Yellow
Submarine. Behind Chris, the slide door of the porch opened. His Aunt Sandy
came out, placing a white triangle bandage lightly over Chris’s left hand, now
red with blood.
Chris gratefully
took his hand off his wound as his aunt applied the sure pressure of over forty
years’ experience to a pad directly on the wound. She then tied off the
bandage, quickly, and so easily, that she didn’t even sound distracted as she
spoke to the newly arrived combatant. “Professor Paradigm, I presume?”
“Indeed.
Mrs. Dawson?”
“Doctor Dawson,” Aunt Sandy replied,
firmly.
“Ah. Doctor
Dawson, to be sure. We are looking, I am informed by my Internet-savvy
employees, for a relative of yours, one Springett Dawson.”
“My son, Springett, and my grandson both
live here. Would you, perhaps, be so kind as to explain why you are looking for
them, Professor? And why one of your employees took it upon himself to stab my
guest?”
And then,
Chris found his eyes drawn back to the road down to the point, just barely
visible from a standing position from this corner of the porch. A man on a
moped was coming up from the lake, an open-faced white helmet towering above a
long face from which a cigarette dangled dangerously over an ample stomach protruding
in a blue denim workshirt, below which the rider for some reason wore a white
towel over his lap. Big green gumboots in lieu of proper motorcycle boots
complete the bizarre ensemble.
Chris
stared, vaguely aware that there was something more than normal of his
attention. He was reminded of the way that a ball on a trampoline rolls towards
something heavy. He was even more reminded of it when the moped left the road
and, somehow, just passed through the darkness of the willows and into the
light of the beach, not twelve feet from Professor Paradigm.
“I would
also be fascinated with your answer, Professor.”
Unlike his aunt, the newcomer’s pronunciation dripped with sarcasm.
“Who are
you?” Professor Paradigm asked, as the moped braked to a stop, complete with a
slight rise of the back tyre, even though it was six feet off the ground.
“Ah. I’m
sorry. I was just on my way back from campus when the text came in.” The
odd-looking man on the moped turned into a standing man in a tattered bathrobe
with strange symbols on the chest, sandals with straps that laced halfway up
his calf. His lean, ,cigarette-enhanced face suddenly wore a beard, and his
short hair turned into a wild, hippy mane held back by a headband with more
mysterious symbols.
“Eldritch!
You will pay for intrusion into my affairs. Your quaint and self-deluding
apprehensions through the mystic are as nothing compared to the
power that is unleashed science!”
“You need
therapy, Paradigm. Or at least a better connection. And a rather longer list of
hacked spells than you’ve ever used before if you think you can beat me.” Eldritch held up his hand, and
lights exactly like the ones that played across Paradigm’s face flickered
between them. He paused for a moment. “Seriously. About the drugs. Let me know.
We can set you up.”
“I am not
some addlepated druggie,” Paradigm protested, his voice rising a little. “And
even if you know counterspells to the Lights of Luathon, I still have my
Pirates!” Morning Glory and Displacer appeared on the beach behind Ninja and
Decurion. Chris’s face crimsoned. She was smart. She would realise in a second he’d
lost his fight with Decurion. This was turning into the worst day of his life.
“Oh, dear. I
think I see where you`ve gone wrong, Paradigm. Unlike yourself, I`m an actual
professor, and I have assistants for things like this.” Behind Eldritch, four figures
flickered in the air. Chris recognised the new costumes of his cousin Jenny,
her boyfriend, Brad, and Nita Guzman. A tall, slightly stooped, skeletally thin
figure in the ack was presumably Billy Washington, completing the new Bay Young
Guard. “I should caution you,” he continued, “That Berkeley students are the
best in the country. Although they tend to be disappointingly conservative these
days, I believe that there might be some class participation credits on the
table in consideration of a tidy resolution of this little confrontation.”
“No need for
that, Professor,” Billy Washington said. “No one calls you addlepated and gets away with it. Not at least when I’m pulling
a 4.0 in your class!”
“You do seem
to have a natural aptitude for macro, Black Titan. I also rather like the
way that you deal with supervillains.”
“The hippy
professor superhero teaches economics?”
Aunt Sandy asked the air.
“Chair of
the department, for my sins,” the familiar voice said, but originating in the
air over the porch, with no sign of Eldritch actually speaking.
Paradigm, on
the other hand, sounded defensive. “There will be no fight here. I apologise
for the intrusion, Doctor Dawson. We were apparently under a mistaken
impression about your family tree and your guests. There will be compensation once I rule this dimension. And rather sooner, if the young gentleman would consent to join my
Pirates.” Chris shook his head, looking at Morning Glory, trying to project
reluctance as he did so. He didn’t want to join the Pirates, but that didn’t
mean that he didn’t want to join Morning Glory! That, however, was probably a
more complicated message than you could send with a look.
Professor
Paradigm and the Pirates disappeared. After a long moment, so did the Young
Guard. Then Eldritch followed. A moment later, back in his commuting clothes/guise,
he was standing on the porch. He reached over to Chris and touched his wound.
Health flowed through his arm from the old professor’s touch. Chris let his
hand drop. The bloody gash was reduced to a dry, healing wound.
“I’m sure you
know some specialists who can finish up that working,” the old wizard set,
taking his cigarette from his mouth with his other hand. “Now. I gather that
Paradigm was here on a misconception, Miss Hirsch?”
Chris looked
at Billy, who had just come up from the beach, expecting him to be offended by
the way that Eldritch looked to Rebecca for leadership. But he wasn’t. Billy
was more the lone wolf type.
Rebecca,
after her own short delay, replied. “Yes. We’ve recently learned that Achilles,
the World War Two superhero, used to live at this house. So does a great-nephew
of the same name. Evidently, Paradigm got the idea that they were the same
person.”
“Ah. Ah.”
Eldritch said. “I see that a call to Philadelphia and . . .other places is long
overdue. I’m glad to hear that we won’t need to provide special protection to
this house, however. The forces of good in this world are overstretched,
underfunded, and not much appreciated these days.”
“What’s
going on, sir?” Chris asked. “There’s something…”
“Indeed
there is,” Eldritch replied. “But it is not my secret to share.”
“So we just
go on fighting evil in the dark?” Chris answered, his anger rising.
“Young man,
you are not fighting evil right now. You are learning to fight evil. Please, do focus on this precious opportunity
to learn before it passes you by. For all that you now wish it on, life will be
a stop past the one you wanted before you know it is moving. Now, if you will
pardon me, I have to feed my cats.”
“Are you sure
that you wouldn’t prefer to stay for tea, Professor Eldritch?” Aunt Sandy
asked. “In my experience, cats can wait a little longer for their dinner than
they’ll have you believe, and I have scones and some very nice marmalade.”
“Thank you,
but I’m afraid that I can’t, Doctor Dawson. Not to be all spooky, but you are about
to receive another academic visitor.” Eldritch vanished.
As Aunt
Sandy led them into the living room inside the screen doors, she explained. “A
scientist from the Osoyoos Botanical Station is coming down to visit about this.
A Doctor Konoye.” She reached down to the coffee table and carefully separated
a flimsy piece of copy paper from the pile of comics and video game covers.
Chris took
the page. It was a yellowed copy of the front page of the Osoyoos News with old-time advertisements down the side and a date
that blurred out after the numbers 194-. Chris
read it. “Boundary resident Ning Li Wang Wins Injunction Against Chinaman's Bar Lumber
Harvest.” Chris scowled. “They spelled Grampa’s name wrong. What is this about?”
“An
injunction is a legal order to stop doing something,” Aunt Sandy said. “In this
case, cutting the spruce grove in the bog behind Chinese Bar. If we could
just figure out why the injunction
was issued, Dr. Konoye might be able to get another one issued and save the
environment. And her job.”
“That’s
far-fetched,” Rebecca said. “Just because there was an injunction then, why should a judge issue one now?”
Aunt Sandy
shrugged. “The bog is sacred to the Okanagan Band. Maybe it’s a culturally
modified site. The thing is that Henry Wong would have had
to have evidence to convince the judge. We can’t find it at Cherry Grove or the
Dynasty, but some of his papers were stored down here. Not that I can find
anything. Dr. Konoye is going to be so disappointed. Think of losing your job
at her stage in life. And with a
daughter to support.”
The doorbell
rang. Chris started towards it. He really wanted to see Dr. Konoye again, and
convince her that he wasn’t some kind of nasty hoodlum. More importantly, he
wanted to be with his aunt. Somehow, he knew that with her warm competence,
everything would be all right. It was something that Chris realised, he had
forgotten how to feel some time in the years between when he’d last seen Aunt
Sandy and gone to live with Auntie Ma.
But Rebecca
took his shoulder, holding him back. Chris looked over at her. She was holding
her phone in one hand, and shaking her head. “I’m meeting someone at the mall
in five minutes, and she’s not going to be impressed if I’m late. Your aunt is
out of danger, you need to have a healer look at your arm, and Billy needs to
get at least some of his homework done.”
Disappointment,
humiliation, defeat. It would have been Chris’s worst day ever if they hadn’t
been able to save his Aunt Sandy.
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