Chapter 13
No matter how steadily Ann stroked Snowdrop's fur, the Vulpix wouldn't settle. Ann had cuddled close to Snowdrop in the pickup cab, but still she hadn't stopped whining and whimpering since Edgar and the others had disappeared into the pizzeria. Snowdrop's mouth was frothed with drool, and her whole body was quivering. It was making Ann nervous, primarily because Snowdrop's anxiety was contagious. And Ann didn't need the Vulpix's apprehension added to her own. She was plenty agitated already.
For maybe the twentieth, or fiftieth time, Ann pushed up the cuff of the Team Star uniform she'd worn for this stupid, ill-conceived venture. She frowned at the digital numbers on her black sports watch.
Where the hell are they? She asked herself.
Enough was enough. Ann couldn't sit there waiting any longer. She couldn't imagine what was taking them so long. They were supposed to have made a quick mess, grabbed anything valuable, and come back out. That shouldn't have taken this much time.
Huffing, Ann reached for the driver's-side door handle, and flung the door open.
Before she could move a muscle to leave the pickup, Snowdrop leaped across her. In a fraction of a second, the Vulpix was out of the truck and bolting away.
"Snowdrop, wait!" Ann scrambled out of the truck and started after her white Vulpix.
"Snowdrop!" she shouted again.
Snowdrop didn't break stride. She crossed the broken asphalt in a flash of white fur. Ann ran, but before she'd made it even ten feet, Snowdrop had disappeared into the trees at the edge of the pizzeria's lot.
Ann stopped. Her heart was a jackhammer in her chest. Her mind immediately filled with images of Snowdrop getting lost. Or stolen. Or hit by a car. Or mauled by another Pokémon.
Ann hugged herself. Reluctantly, she turned back to the pickup. She couldn't outrun her Vulpix. Her best bet was to go after her in the truck.
But she didn't have the keys. Her brother did.
Ann had no choice. She had to go inside the building and get Edgar so they could go after Snowdrop.
She looked up at the open loading dock door. What lay beyond it looked like the yawning opening of a Wailord's mouth. "Not smart," Ann muttered as she took a step forward.
But she didn't have a better idea. So, she kept going.
Picking her way across the dirty, disintegrating concrete of the loading dock, she went slowly, allowing her eyes time to adjust to the insufficient light. Once she had more night vision, she was able to spot a flattened door. That must have been the battering sound she'd heard right after Edgar and the others had disappeared from her sight.
She crept forward, reaching the open doorway and leaned through it. She peered left and right, and saw that she was on the threshold of the pizzeria's stainless-steel-filled industrial kitchen.
"Edgar?" she called softly.
Nothing but silence answered her.
She gingerly stepped into the kitchen. She looked around.
"Chuck?" she tried.
This time, she got a response. Of sorts.
The trill of a child's laughter came from behind Ann. The sound felt like a light touch, a tickle between her shoulder blades.
She twirled around. Immediately, she saw the source of the laughter.
Standing in a muted golden luminance emanating from a door on the opposite side of the kitchen, a little black-haired boy stared at Ann coolly. No smile. No expression at all. The child's expression was blank.
He must be lost, Ann thought. And traumatized.
Ann opened her mouth to say hello, but the boy turned and dashed away before she could even begin her greeting. He flashed through the open doorway and disappeared into the dapples of gray outside of the kitchen.
"Follow me!" he called out.
"Hey, wait!" Ann shouted.
No longer thinking about her brother or Snowdrop, she strode forward, following the boy. A lost little kid was more important than everything now. She had to help him out.
Exiting the kitchen, she found herself in a long hallway that was as dark and unnerving as an abandoned tunnel in a coal mine. She looked left and right down the black-and-white-checkerboard-floored hall. It was empty.
"Hello?" Ann called out. The word danced down the hall, spun around, and came back. A pervasive hush chased it. Ann tried again, more loudly. "Hello!" Once again, the word twirled away from her and came flying back. Once again, utter stillness followed it. Ann frowned, gazing down the hall again, both ways. Which direction should she go?
She shrugged and turned to her left.
"Cold!" The word came out in two syllables: "Co…old." It was a child's voice. From the pitch, it sounded like the same little boy who had giggled.
The sound came from the right end of the hallway. Ann reversed her direction. She took a step forward.
"Warmer!" The same little boy's voice. Playful.
Ann made a face. "You've gotta be kidding me," she muttered. The kid wasn't as traumatized as she'd thought he was. Maybe he wasn't even lost. Still, she should probably find him in case he was. And she still needed to find Edgar, too.
She took a half-step forward. Her head swiveled left and right. All of her nerve endings were on alert.
For the next few minutes, she pushed deeper into the bowels of the tomb-like building. Pausing to listen at closed doors (but lacking the courage to open them), she followed the hallway until it went around a corner.
"Warmer," the boy said again. His voice sounded both close and far away at the same time. Ann still couldn't figure out where the kid was. It almost seemed like he was in the walls, moving along with her. But that was impossible.
Ann looked down the stretch of corridor in front of her. And for the first time since she'd left the kitchen, she saw movement.
A set of double doors at the far end of the hall was swinging, as if someone had just pushed through them. Ann eyed the wagging doors.
Had the boy gone that way?
Or was it someone else?
Ann opened her mouth to call her brother's name, but some instinct closed her mouth again. Wrapping her arms around herself to ward off the chill that made it feel like her skin was inching its way along her bones, she walked slowly toward the doors. Each of her steps tickled a shy cadence on the cracked linoleum. Tap, tap, tap.
Ann, fighting the urge to run in the opposite direction, forced herself forward. She felt oddly disconcerted from herself, as if she wasn't so much moving as she was being moved. It felt like she was being compelled through a black hole by some magnetic force.
And then she was pushing through the double doors herself. But halfway through them, she paused.
Pencil-like lines of golden light, three of them, inched toward her. She looked ahead at them, and she realized she was seeing sunlight coming through dirty, narrow windows. The light was odd, almost sepia-toned.
Ann took another step and let go of the doors. A shush-shush and a tickle of air current told her the doors were falling closed behind her.
"Hello?" she called. "Are you in here?"
When she got no answer…again…she checked her surroundings. As soon as she did, her crawling skin picked up its pace. So did her heart rate.
What is this place?
Ann rotated to take in the metal shelving and stainless-steel worktables. Her gaze scanned piles of tools and what looked like robotic parts. Metal legs and arms and torsos and eyeless heads were…
Her gaze stopped scanning and locked in. It had gotten stuck on something she hadn't noticed at first. Beyond the worktables, a reclining metal chair with straps sat empty. Above the chair and spaced throughout the room, metal pendant lights hung low, dripping only the barest hint of illumination.
That's not good, Ann thought. She so wanted to run. Why wasn't she running?
Against her own will, she took another two steps into the room. She intended to look around to see if she could spot the little boy, but her gaze remained riveted on the chair. Even when she felt a shiver of warning skittering down her spine, the sensation of being watched strong and urgent, she kept her gaze fixed on the chair. For all she knew, a monster was behind her, but she couldn't seem to turn to find out.
"Psst." It was the little boy again. Close…and loud.
Ann yelped and finally spun around. She scrutinized the area behind her, but she couldn't see the kid. Where was he?
She was getting really, really tired of this game. It was beyond creepy in here. The robot parts she had first seen in the room were bad enough, but now her gaze had landed on a more complete robot. An animatronic. A big one. Ann had to tilt her head back to inspect the full height of it. The jitters that were still prodding her to run kicked up a notch, but she stayed where she was. She studied the massive thing guardedly.
What she was looking at appeared to be a decommissioned version of one of the Pokémon characters that had been part of the pizzeria's heyday. In fact, Ann thought, as she looked at the motley, broken-down Sprigatito more closely, this might have been Spriggy FazSprig himself.
Although the stiff, ragged-looking robotic Sprigatito had all its parts intact (unlike whatever critters had lost the pieces lying around the room), it had seen better days. Its green fur was matted, grungy, and smelling disgustingly of decay. In between the joints were visible ropey twines of wires and lengths of aging metal. The Sprigatito's face was the most intact part of the robot's structure. Its impossibly wide mouth was stuffed full of what looked like very sharp white teeth, and its round, white eyes were in pristine condition.
"You're as hot as a pancake!" It was the little boy again. His voice was muffled, and it was coming from…
Ann gave herself a mental shake. That can't be right, she thought.
But replaying the boy's words in her head, she realized she had heard what she'd thought she'd heard. The boy's voice was coming from inside the Sprigatito.
"How the hell did you get in there?" she asked. Her question was hushed, disbelieving.
Steeling herself, she took a step forward, keeping an eye unwaveringly on the robot as she stepped forward yet again. Hesitating an instant, she finally leaned in and put her ear against the grimy robotic Sprigatito's chest.
And then she jumped back and gawked when the robot started moving its arms up and down. Its mouth flapped open and shut, along with a glitched nasally voice emanating from within.
"HI! I-I'M SPRIGGY-Y FAZ-AZSPRIG! W-WHAT'S YOUR NAME-E?"
Ann, completely taken aback by the robot's sudden movements, but also unsure of how to respond to a machine, she barely croaked out, "Ann…"
"OH-H, THAT-AT'S A PRE-ETTY NAME! YOU-U WANN-N-A COME-E GIV-VE-E ME A BIG-G FAT HU-UG?" the Sprigatito replied, as if it were actually aware of Ann's presence.
Can you see me? Ann thought. Was it aware of her presence after all?
She looked around the room, and spotted a folding chair tucked against the end of one of the long shelves. Not knowing what else to do, she trotted over and grabbed it. She brought the dirty, gray metal chair back to the animatronic and positioned it in front of its legs. She stepped up onto the chair's seat.
The chair let out a snapping ping, and it wobbled. But it held. Ann shifted her feet and leaned toward the animatronic Sprigatito.
It was amazing how someone could powerfully want to do one thing and do the exact opposite. Every fiber of Ann's being was yelling, "No!" as she leaned in closer and wrapped her arms around the robot's waist. As soon as she did, she felt the animatronic's arms wrap around her body, embracing her in a warm hug.
As she stood there, hugging the animatronic, she was surprised to feel how comfortable it was. It was a welcome feeling, considering the fact that she couldn't remember the last time Joshua had hugged her.
But then, she looked up, and saw that the Sprigatito was now looking down at her with its magenta eyes, and its mouth was hanging open.
As Ann continued to stare up at the robot's face, she saw something emerge from the open mouth. A small hand rose up into sight, reaching toward her face.
"There you…" she began.
But then her words, and her face, were snatched downward.
The little hand had seized her by the mouth, small fingers curled around her lower teeth and lip. It yanked and heaved a squealing Ann downward through a metal-filled tunnel wrapped in wires. Ann was on the skinny side, but she wasn't skinny enough to fit comfortably through the confines of an animatronic trachea. Metal scoring her skin, she screamed as her feet came off the chair. Vaguely aware of the sound of the chair clattering to the floor, she scissored her feet and pressed her hands against the Sprigatito's crusty shoulders. She pushed against the hard surface and kicked frantically.
She felt her foot graze against something, and she heard a ting. She'd hit one of the pendant lights.
Trying to twist one way and then the other to get free, she saw the pendant's light rays careen frenziedly back and forth.
Still being lowered inexorably into a seemingly bottomless, lightless well, she kept fighting, even as her skin was ravaged by serrated metal. She craned her neck, looking up toward freedom. On the ceiling, she caught a glimpse of a shadow play. Her churning legs and flapping arms created a tangle of light and dark entanglements that looked like the battle between a knight and a tail-whipping Dragonite. Watching her struggle this way almost made it seem impersonal, like Ann was outside of it, and caught within it.
Another powerful tug came from inside the Sprigatito, and Ann had to admit that this was happening to her, and it was very personal. She slipped even further into the darkness, and then…
A shocking, searing, jagged pressure sliced through her waist, and she screamed. Through her screams, she heard a wet thud.
Her brain had only seconds left, but in those seconds, she knew she'd just heard the sound of her lower body hitting the floor.
The Sprigatito had bitten her in half, and her other half lay on the floor, a part of her intestines exposed and leaking blood.
Joshua sat at his kitchen table. He wasn't doing much of anything, just sitting there. Actually, he was doing something. He held the plastic-and-tin fake security badge, and he was turning it over and over in his hand…staring at it, as if it were a crystal ball that could give him answers to his endless questions. Most of his questions were related to the odd happenings in his dreams, but those questions were so complex that he knew he had no hope of answering them.
Another set of questions were related to Celestine. What an odd woman. But odd in a good way. Joshua was powerfully drawn to her…but at the same time, she made him profoundly nervous. No way his brain could think him out of that tangle, either.
Of course, there were the usual questions about how he was going to clean up the trainwreck that was his life. But those questions were old and boring. And they, too, had no answers.
So, he settled on the most immediate puzzle. How could he make up with Ava? His sister was seriously angry with him for locking her in her room the night before. As a result, she was even more distant than usual.
Joshua wished he could explain to Ava that everything he did was part of his attempt to take care of her. His overriding goal was to protect her, keep her safe. But Ava didn't want to hear anything he had to say.
A few feet away from Joshua, high-pitched chatter and canned laughter came from the TV. Ava sat on the sofa, but she didn't seem to be paying attention to the cartoon on the screen. She was, as usual, bent over her Pokémon card collection. She went through each and every card meticulously, a furrow between her brows, her tongue clamped between her teeth and protruding from her lips.
Joshua sighed and stood. He walked over to the couch and sat down next to Ava.
"What are you working on?" he asked.
Ava stopped what she was doing. She got up and flounced into the kitchen, sitting down in the very chair that Joshua had just vacated. Joshua sighed.
"So, what's the plan here?" he asked Ava's back. She was wearing banana-yellow overalls today. The crisscross of the overall's back straps seemed to glare at Joshua. "You're never gonna speak to me again?" he pushed.
Ava said nothing. She centered her Pokémon cards in front of her on the table. She arranged a dozen or so of them and bent over, carefully observing each one.
Seems like it, Joshua thought.
He fingered the badge once more. He held it up, out in front of him. "I guess you don't want this, then," he said.
Ava looked up.
Joshua smiled. Gotcha, he thought.
He tossed the badge to Ava. She lifted a hand and caught it.
"Pretty cool, right?" Joshua said.
Ava held the badge and glanced at it with apparent disinterest. Joshua knew her well enough, however, to recognize fake nonchalance when he saw it. Maybe he had cracked her armor. But no. Ava threw the badge back at him. He barely snatched it from the air before it hit him in the nose.
Ava picked up one of the cards…and started to sniffle.
Joshua looked up at the ceiling and exhaled loudly. "Forget it," he sighed.
He stood, striding back into the kitchen, he grabbed the knob of the junk drawer near the sink. He went to pull it open. It was jammed. He jiggled it, biting back a curse.
Finally, he got the drawer open, and he dropped the toy badge in with the other junk. He rammed the drawer back into place.
Turning toward his sister, he said, to the back of her head, "I'm trying my best, Ava. I really am."
Ava put her hands to her face.
I'm very sorry, Ava. Joshua thought.
He headed toward the hallway. At first, Ava didn't move, but then, out of the corner of Joshua's eye, he saw her lift her head just a little. Joshua pretended he didn't see Ava's gaze flit his way. He also pretended that he didn't see her expression, which looked every bit as remorseful as he felt himself.
Maybe she'll come around soon, he told himself as he headed to his bedroom.
There was nothing he could do if she didn't. And certainly, there was nothing more he could do right now.
On to other mysteries.
Joshua entered his bedroom. Leaving the door open so he could listen for Ava…in case she decided to call to him…or in case she got in some kind of trouble, he opened his closet and plucked his laptop from the single shelf above his pitifully sparse collection of clothes. Make that his sparse collection of his belongings, period.
He had no furniture in his room, other than a bed and a nightstand, not just because he couldn't afford anything more. He also had no need for other pieces of furniture. He had nothing to put on or in dressers or bureaus or desks. Besides his clothes and shoes, his laptop, and a few tools, all his closet held was a box of old photographs and a plastic container of wooden blocks. The blocks had been Joshua's favorite toy when he was a kid - he'd always loved building things. In spite of everything, he couldn't bring himself to throw the blocks out.
Taking his laptop to his bed, and feeling supremely sorry for himself, he fluffed his pillow and settled himself back against the headboard. He opened his laptop. After logging in, he clicked on his browser icon, and he started typing in a search box.
He began with "Spriggy FazSprig." He hit ENTER and looked at the screen. His search brought up not much more than a bunch of stock images of Spriggy and his weirdo cohorts. Joshua got up-close looks at the Fuecoco, that Quaxly, and the Eevee, as well as a few other Pokémon he didn't know about. But he didn't find anything interesting.
He backed out of the search. Then he tried again, typing, "Spriggy FazSprig missing children."
Now, we're talking, he thought as a slew of news headlines popped up on his screen. He scanned them, and he picked "SAD NIGHT AT SPRIGGY'S."
Clicking on that header, he skinned the article. Unfortunately, it didn't tell him much more than Celestine had.
But the article came with an embedded video.
Joshua clicked on the video and hit the PLAY icon. Watching the white circle spinning in the middle of his screen, he tapped his fingers on the side of his laptop as he waited for the video to load.
Finally, the image of a brunette, pert-nosed female reporter filled Joshua's screen. The woman's drop-shouldered top and leggings, as well as thee curly wildness of her big hair, screamed, 'VINTAGE.' Crazy-vintage, Joshua thought. The woman had a painted-on face typical for whatever time the news was reported. She had large eyes and a wide mouth, and at the moment both eyes and mouth were arranged in a theatrical expression of tragic regret.
The woman was precisely positioned in front of a bright, shiny version of Spriggy FazSprig's Pizza. It was the Spriggy's Joshua was guarding, but it was a blast-from-the-past variant of the place. The paint was fresh. The lighting was bright. And there were people milling around it - lots of people, and, as expected, some Pokémon accompanying them.
But there were also police cars. Several uniformed officers were corralling onlookers. Men in suits, obviously detectives, were strutting about importantly.
The puffy-haired woman wasn't the only reporter on scene, either. A bunch of news vans were parked just beyond a ribbon of yellow crime scene tape, which fluttered in a steady breeze. A few other men and women with microphones posed in front of cameramen who were holding heavy video cameras weighing down their shoulders.
The brunette reporter began speaking. "Tragedy struck tonight, "she began predictably, "at a local pizzeria. Spriggy FazSprig's has become renowned for family fun, a great place for kids. But tonight, it was anything but that. Instead, it was the heartbreaking setting of abduction and terror. Five children, who were attending a birthday event at the pizzeria, suddenly and mysteriously vanished into thin air."
Joshua was immediately caught up in the scene. He leaned in closer to the screen.