L.A. 2020
Caleb stared into his dressing room mirror, barely noticing his own impossibly handsome reflection. They weren't coming. They really weren't coming. He glanced at the wall clock telling him it was ten minutes to midnight. Ten minutes before Luke, Reggie, and Alex would vanish into oblivion, or more accurately vanish into him.
The energy he'd been collecting from them for the past few days had had quite the effect. He wasn't sure he'd ever given such an electrified performance as the one he'd given this evening. The surges were coming rapidly now. Wherever the boys were, they were not enjoying themselves.
He closed his eyes and concentrated on the link he'd forged so long ago. It had been an invaluable source of information thus far, alerting Caleb to all manner of fascinating tidbits. Perhaps even now the boys were regretting their decision and calling out for rescue. Naturally he'd provide one...though at this point he might demand some penance on their parts. A little groveling never hurt anyone. It was a bit demeaning the way he'd bent over backwards for a trio of children. Special children, he freely acknowledged, but still children all the same.
"-now! Go join Caleb's club! Please! It's better than not existing at all! Just go! Poof out! Do something! Please! Do it for me!" He knew that voice. Julie. Caleb grimaced. His...rival. How the mighty had fallen that he, Caleb Covington, found himself in competition with a teenage girl. At least she seemed to be conceding their little tug of war.
"We're not going back there." That was Reggie. Reggie, who'd been so enchanted with his club and all its delights. He'd chosen nothingness over Caleb. That was more than a little insulting.
"No music is worth making, Julie, if we're not making it with you. No regrets." Luke, who craved applause and an audience with a fervor matched only by Caleb's, had willingly surrendered both rather than join him. An unpleasant surprise to be sure. What of Alex? Was his silence implied solidarity or had he lost the ability to speak, choked with pain? Surely one of them had been moved by his performance?
Caleb shook his head. Pathetic, that's what it was. Of course Alex was in agreement. The boys were a package deal. He'd always know that. Convince two and the third would follow. Too bad he'd failed with all three. A swell of something unpleasant which he refused to name rose within him. Caleb pushed the feeling back down. Locked it tight in a box with all the rest the emotions he'd rather not confront.
"I love you guys." Julie's saccharine words were immediately followed by a curious sensation within his chest. Almost as if a rubber band were being pulled outward with the other end anchored inside his ribcage.
"How can I feel you?" Caleb paused in the middle of rubbing his chest. Feel him? Luke? Julie felt Luke? Luke was corporeal?
"I don't know." There was awe in the boy's voice. This was too much. Caleb needed to see what was happening. He focused on the doors outside of the garage the band called home. In a moment he was there, just out of sight. A voice drifted through the door.
"Alex, Reggie, come." He risked a peak through the window. All four figures within were far too distracted to glimpse him, immersed as they were in their group hug. A hug. It had taken Caleb decades and an enormous amount of soul links to achieve that feat. How had the boys managed in a few weeks? And...were they glowing? Not just in the "I'm a healthy teenager" way. In the "slap a halo on me, I'm an angel" kind of way. Caleb stepped back from the window. What was going on here?
"I don't feel as weak anymore." How marvelous for Reggie. Caleb, on the hand, was really starting to become uncomfortable. The sensation in his chest was only getting tighter.
"Me either. Not that I was ever that weak." Caleb felt a snap and three puffs of purple air rose from his shirt. His marks. Somehow Julie had overrode his marks. Yes, he'd been planning on removing them himself, but that wasn't the point. It was supposed to be Caleb's decision. The boys were supposed to know that it had been Caleb who'd shown them mercy despite their willfulness and general ingratitude. Julie had bested him, again. Would his humiliation know no bounds?
Caleb took a deep and calming breath. Yes, the urge to unleash some of his magic on the teens was great, but his self control was greater. He would need to regroup. He forced a smile and pictured the basement of his club. He came through in front of William's cell exactly as he'd intended.
"Hello William. Enjoying your timeout?" The skater immediately leapt up and ran over to the magically enforced bars.
"Is Alex alright? Did he cross over?" Caleb rolled his eyes, refusing to be moved by William's puppy dog like devotion. Sweet as the boy may seem, he had a short memory when it came to whom he owed allegiance.
"You do know that if the latter were true, I wouldn't be able to tell you the former." He examined his cuticles waiting for William's slow mind to process his words.
"Huh?" Precisely the response he'd anticipated. At least he'd been able to predict something accurately this evening.
"My dear William, it is fortunate you are so handsome. If the boys crossed over then no one would have any way of knowing if they were 'alright.' Something perhaps you should have considered before leading them down that ill-advised path." At this he fixed the boy with his most baleful glare. The teenager winced slightly, proving Caleb hadn't completely lost his touch.
"So...did they cross over?" Caleb pursued his lip, slightly irked he failed to totally intimidate the boy into silence. He supposed it was true what people said about love making young men bold.
He contemplated ignoring the question. What right did William have to an answer, after all the withholding he'd done in the past few days? Still Caleb had always been fond of the skater, perhaps been too indulgent with him. In a way the boy's unruliness was Caleb's own fault. He'd given the boy far too long a leash.
"I'll tell you, but only because I am the soul of generosity. No, the boys did not cross over. They are well for the moment. Though goodness knows how long that will last." Perhaps he shouldn't have tossed that last bit, but he was feeling frustrated.
"If you do anything to them I'll-" Caleb apparated to close the ten feet between William and himself. The boy tripped backward in surprise and lay sprawled on the floor gazing up at him.
"You'll what, William? Run over me with your skateboard? Oh that's right, it's not in there with you is it?" The look on the boy's face turned from scared to mulish in less than three seconds.
"I'm not sorry." Caleb raised his eyebrow. William may be developing a bit of a backbone after all. What inconvenient timing.
"Why would you be? It's not as though you completely and utterly betrayed the man who took you in and gave you a home. Who taught you all manner of tricks and even let you grind down the rails of his club." William crossed his arms, but the hunch in his shoulders demonstrated the boy wasn't entirely without remorse. Perhaps there was hope for him yet.
"It wasn't like I was damaging them." Then again perhaps not. Lord spare him the antics of petulant teens.
"The point is after everything I've done for you, I deserved a little more loyalty than what you've shown me." William sprung to his feet as quickly as he'd fallen, something in Caleb's accusation striking a nerve.
"You cursed my new friends and my...Alex. And why? Because they didn't want to join your house band? Why couldn't you have just left them alone?!" Caleb felt his lips thin. He HAD already deigned to explain to William why he couldn't simply let the boys waste their talents as they saw fit.
"I already told you, they are too powerful." It may not have been the WHOLE truth, but it was part of the truth, which frankly was more than most people got from him.
"So because you're threatened by them-" Caleb cut William midstream with a snort.
"I am not threatened by them." It was simply too much to let stand. The idea that with all of Caleb's many abilities, he was intimidated by three teenagers was laughable. Yes, the boys could, if they worked at developing their talents, one day learn many of the tricks he'd mastered. However, they'd need to survive the next few decades first, and their stubbornness and recklessness all but ensured they would not. At least not without his help.
"Then why?" A more complicated question than the boy realized, touching on secrets Caleb did not care to reveal.
"You'll be in the cell for the rest of the week. After that you're confined to the club until further notice. No skateboard." A fairly lenient sentence as far as Caleb was concerned. He'd certainly been harsher to other spirits for less. William opened his mouth, either to protest or to restate his question, but Caleb quelled him with a single raised eyebrow. The boy's jaw snapped shut. That was more like it.
Caleb vanished and re-materialized his suite. He paused a moment before heading to his end table and decanting himself some brandy. Ordinarily wine was his preference, but tonight he needed something stronger.
When he finished pouring, Caleb lowered himself into his velvet armchair. He regarded the liquor in his glass a moment before taking a sip. Of all the many skills he'd acquired over the years, the ability to manifest food and drink that could be consumed by ghosts was one of his favorites.
With a sigh he turned his thoughts to more pressing matters. What to do about the children? They needed to be saved from themselves. That much was clear. First Youtube and now the Orpheum. In this day and age, with every lifer carrying a camera in their pocket, discretion was more necessary than ever.
Did it really not occur to the boys there were reasons ghosts, which had been around since the dawn of humanity, still were considered myths? Did it not dawn on them that someone kept things that way? Yes, they'd been passing themselves off as holograms, but how long until someone saw through that charade? He was frankly shocked it hadn't happened already. They were calling themselves "Julie and the Phantoms" for goodness sake!
Julie. Even thinking her name brought a sneer to his lips. How had she gotten the boys to choose her over him? He supposed Luke wasn't so surprising. The boy was besotted after all. Reggie, though, who found the scores young women and meatball subs so appealing? And Alex, whose infatuation with a certain young skater was so great? It was quite frankly unfathomable.
Still, Caleb had never been one to surrender without a fight. Short term he had but one goal: Break-up their band. Separate Julie from the Phantoms, preferably in a way that didn't implicate him. He settled in to consider his options. It was going to be a long night.