Provex City Read online

  Sasha paced around my crumpled body. “Get up, Boy!”

  My eyes cleared and some strength returned to my legs. There were cheers coming from all around—there must have been dozens of students surrounding us now. I heard the cries of Desiree from somewhere behind me, as she tried to break into the circle. But the front ring of guys held her back.

  I stood up, tried to forget about the humiliation, and looked at my attacker with a fury I had never felt before. I clenched my fists together and took a wild swing, scraping only air. Sasha kicked at my knees and they buckled, dropping me to the ground again. I grabbed his leg and tried to yank him down, but he broke free and kicked me in the stomach while I was still knelt over. Again, I fought through a fit of coughing and wheezing. Desiree yelled from the background, desperately trying to stop the fight. I was losing strength fast. I probably wouldn’t even be able to stand. I was weak and losing. Sasha was bigger, stronger, and obviously more experienced.

  I stood up again, a little dizzy and nauseous, swaying on my feet. Desiree continued to yell for help, but no one seemed to be coming. I was scared; my whole body hurt and throbbed. All I had was myself. I had to do something.

  And I did.

  Sasha stood in front of me with a confident grin. I threw him off guard by suddenly lunging at him, taking us both to the ground and breaking open the circle. Due to some screaming and swearing, I think we knocked down a few other students, but I couldn’t make out what was happening. I had my hands locked around his body and accidentally head-butted him in the face as we hit the ground. Sasha tried to grapple me into a headlock with one arm and threw punches with the other. I released my hold to defend myself and threw some punches of my own. We rolled around as a mass of flailing limbs. I felt pain from the punches I received and the punches I threw, some finding him and others finding the ground. There was no restraint or strategy at this point, just feral attacks by any means necessary.

  The crowd cheered and chanted, now sounding muffled and distant. I was fighting for my life and had no idea whether I was winning or losing.

  Suddenly, a hand grabbed the handle of my backpack and pulled me off Sasha with inexplicable force. I was practically yanked off the ground and landed on unstable feet, with my arms still flailing out in front of me. Tears and blood ran down my face and my eyes were shut tight.

  “Break it up!” a familiar voice yelled.

  As I opened my eyes, I noticed I wasn’t fighting Sasha anymore. He was still on the ground with rips in his shirt and blood on his arms and face, propped up on his elbows. He looked furious, but didn’t move.

  “Everyone, get out of here! Go back to your lunches!”

  I turned to see who was still grasping my backpack and saw the welcoming face of Mr. Gordon. I couldn’t have been more relieved. My knees shook, and I probably couldn’t stand on my own.

  Another teacher came and helped Sasha up. Sasha vehemently tried to shake the teacher off and insisted he stand under his own power.

  “Please take him to the office,” Mr. Gordon said to the other teacher.

  Sasha barred his teeth at me as he was forced to leave. “This isn’t over!”

  “Oh, yes it is,” the teacher said, and they were gone.

  Desiree finally broke through the dispersing students and threw herself into me. “Are you all right?” she asked, and quickly released me from her concerned embrace.

  “I think so.”

  “We need to get you to the nurse’s office,” Mr. Gordon said, carefully letting go of my backpack.

  “I don’t want to go to the nurse.”

  “But we need to get you checked out,” Mr. Gordon insisted.

  “I’m okay. Really. I don’t need to go to the nurse,” I said again.

  Mr. Gordon insisted I at least rest up in his classroom for the remainder of the lunch period. Many of the students had cleared the vicinity of the fight, but were still looking on from afar to get a glimpse of my condition. There was no cheering anymore, and no one was making fun of me. The group with the two remaining bullies quietly took a seat on the sideline, like jackals waiting for scraps of food as they watched us leave.

  Mr. Gordon helped me into his classroom, and Desiree followed. There were a few students already sitting by the door to the classroom, but they were asked to wait outside.

  I took a seat in the first desk I could fall into, placing my backpack on the floor beside me. I took a deep breath and sighed and sank into the seat. Desiree took the next seat over. She reached forward and placed her hand on my arm. I kept still so she wouldn’t take it away.

  “What were you thinking?” Mr. Gordon finally asked, standing before me.

  “What?”

  “Fighting isn’t the answer. Children fight. Adults settle their disputes peacefully.”

  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Was he actually blaming me? I needed to justify myself. “They were making fun of me, and then Desiree. What was I supposed to do?”

  “Walk away.”

  “I tried. But if I had walked away, I would’ve been giving up. I couldn’t let them get away with making fun of me. I needed to stand up for myself. That’s what I did!”

  Mr. Gordon took a box of tissues from his desk and handed it to me to wipe off my hands and face. “You can’t be concerned with what other people think of you. Your need to be right and accepted will only cause you to meet more people with that challenge and focus in mind.”

  “You’re saying I should have done nothing? ’Cause I’m not gonna be bullied my whole life,” I said.

  “You’re getting defensive, which is exactly what I’m talking about. You won’t get everyone to agree with you. If that’s your fight, then it will be a losing one. What I’d like you to understand is, if you find some peace, then what others say won’t matter. Those challenging people will simply go away.”

  “Just like that.”

  “Just like that,” he said and snapped his fingers. “But not necessarily in the way you think. It’s not like you’ll see them disappear before your eyes, but the result will be the same. How’s your head?”

  The bell rang.

  “It’s pretty sore.” I felt my cheek with the back of my hand. It throbbed.

  “Looks like you’re gonna have some nice bruises, but you should clean up some of those cuts.” Mr. Gordon took one of the tissues and dabbed at the dried blood on my cheek. I flinched as he touched the bruises. “Why don’t you go wash up,” he said and went to open the door. “Oh, and by the way, I’ll talk to Vice Principal Adams and sort this whole mess out.”

  “I’m proud of you,” Desiree said and lightly squeezed my arm. She got up and went back to her usual desk. “Mr. Gordon?”

  “Yes, Miss Behring?”

  “I didn’t quite finish my homework. I was going to before class, but...”

  Mr. Gordon chuckled and said that she was excused this time.

  I left the room as everyone flooded in. I walked out the double doors and found the bathroom on the exterior of the building. I examined my face in the mirror while washing my hands. My cheeks and below my nose were covered in dried blood. I splashed some water on my face and carefully wiped the blood away. As I washed off, I noticed my cheek felt less sensitive. When all the blood was gone, I examined my face closer and felt my cheek again. It felt fine. I looked and looked and couldn’t even see a hint of a bruise. I had felt like I was going to have at least one black eye, but nothing. It was a strange relief. I felt my stomach and ribs. They were still sore.

  What a day.

  I left the bathroom with a slight sense of optimism and headed back to class. But sitting through class was not so easy. I repeatedly ran the argument and fight over in my mind. I heard the yells. I heard the hideous laughter. I felt the punches. By the end of class, I decided I wasn’t going to make it through art and told Desiree I’d see her tomorrow. I thanked Mr. Gordon for his help and advice and began the long, yet serene, walk home.

  The house was empty
except for Frolics, who greeted me with the utmost enthusiasm. I lackadaisically made myself a snack and sat down in the living room, in Richard’s recliner, to relax in front of the television.

  The side door opened and someone barged into the kitchen. I had only been home about a half hour. Once I heard the footsteps, I knew it was Jeremy.

  “What’s up?” he asked.

  “Did you see the fight today?”

  “No, when?” This piqued his curiosity.

  “At lunch.”

  “Oh my God, I can’t believe I missed it!”

  “It was right in the middle of the quad. How did you miss it?”

  “I always miss the good stuff.”

  “Yeah, especially since it was me!” I yelled. “Where were you?”

  “It was you? What happened?” His demeanor suddenly changed and he finally put on the air of a concerned older brother.

  I told him what had happened and got worked up again just thinking about it. “One of my teachers had to pull me off that Sasha guy. I couldn’t stop punching him.”

  “Wow,” Jeremy said, dumbfounded. “I can’t believe you did that. You look like you’re in pretty good shape, considering.”

  “I’m freakin’ sore,” I said, feeling my ribs. “Where were you?”

  “I went off campus with some friends. Did you get suspended or something?”

  I had forgotten off-campus lunch was an option for seniors. “No, my teacher took care of it. The other guy was sent to the office.”

  “That’s good. I’m sorry it happened.”

  “Yeah, well...”

  “Don’t worry about that Sasha guy anymore. I’ll take care of him,” Jeremy said and left me again.

  4

  Something Extraordinary

  I wandered the cavernous stone hallways that seemed to extend into eternity. The walls were lined with large glass windows and elegant oil paintings, depicting unfamiliar royal figures and sublime landscapes that seemed to come alive in their frames. No matter which hallway I explored, there were windows on either side overlooking dazzling lakes and dense forests. Sunlight poured in through each window and lit up sections of the floor, hiding the cathedral ceilings in shadows. Crystalline sparkles danced through the shadows, making the ceiling all the more spectacular. The hallways were chilly and smelled of pine. I appeared to be a young child, and the castle I wandered through practically swallowed me whole.

  I could hear Mom calling for me from a distance, her sweet voice reverberating off the stone walls. I continued heading away from her, in a game only I was playing. Her calls were stern and desperate, and gaining on me.

  “Oliver! Oliver, please stop hiding from me!” she pleaded from a nearby hallway. “Come back to me this instant!”

  I saw her shadow creeping ahead of her body at the end of the hallway. She was getting close. Running to a towering door to my left, I jumped for the doorknob and the door swung open. I quickly slammed it shut and turned to take in the room before me.

  I was sure I had never been in this room before. The room had one window with the same view as the hallway, bookshelves lining the walls, and two dark green couches facing each other in front of an empty fireplace. The room was musty and felt like it hadn’t been used in years.

  I snapped my fingers and a circular arrangement of soft glowing orbs appeared near the ceiling, floating in midair. The gesture felt natural, like I had created light with the snap of my fingers a thousand times. A globe on a small cherry table by the window lit up as well. It had three transparent layers built within one another, each with different territories outlined with unfamiliar names. I turned the knob on top of the globe, cranking the tiny gears in the apparatus’s center, and watched as each layer spun independently of the other two. When the layers slowed, the outer two layers landed on the expanse of different oceans, and the innermost layer on a territory called Greater Meric.

  Suddenly I heard muffled voices. They seemed to be coming from the room next door.

  I put my ear up to the wall. There were definitely two distinct voices, but I couldn’t make out what was being said. Mom still called from the hallway. Hopefully, I had locked the door. I couldn’t remember. I had an irresistible need to know who was next door, and a soft voice in my head told me to crawl into the fireplace. So I did.

  I could easily fit into the fireplace on my hands and knees. The bottom was covered in cold brittle coal, crunching under me. But I continued going further and deeper than I thought possible until there was light ahead of me and darkness behind. The voices grew louder and clearer. I crawled to the edge of the shadows and looked into a new room that seemed similar to the one I had just left. There were more bookcases, a desk, a door, and floating florescent orbs illuminating the room.

  The voices came from two men engaged in conversation, one of them being the man in the long black coat. But this time he wasn’t wearing a long coat like he usually did, just a black shirt.

  “My sincere condolences, Cornelius,” Kafka the bogeyman said. He had a porcelain complexion, which made him look youthful and almost wax-like. “We will all celebrate the life of your son.”

  “Thank you, sire. The last few days have been difficult, but I know he would want me to celebrate, not to grieve.”

  “Well spoken, my brother.”

  “On a more positive front, the tower in Provex City is nearly complete,” Cornelius said. “It is a sight to behold.”

  “Fantastic new—”

  The door violently flew open, and Mom rushed in, startling the two men. “I’m terribly sorry,” she said. “I’m looking for my son.”

  “Well, as you can clearly see, he’s not in here,” Kafka said. “Now leave and close the door behind you. Next time, remember to knock.”

  “Yes, sir. I’m so sorry,” she said and departed in a flash.

  “This castle has hundreds of rooms, yet we still can’t get any privacy,” Kafka said and held his arm out toward the door. The wall instantly swallowed it up. It was then that I saw something on him I had never noticed before—a tattoo of a wolf head on the inner side of his right hand, its neck trailing down the side of his wrist and ending in open jaws at his thumb and forefinger. “Now where were we, Cornelius? Oh yes, the tower.”

  “While I was in the city, I spoke with Lazarus...and he said you found them: The Guardians of the Great In-Between.”

  I noticed that Cornelius had the very same tattoo on the inside of his right hand.

  Kafka produced a fiendish smile. “Lazarus shouldn’t be spreading rumors.”

  “Is it true? How did you find them?”

  “I think you should continue telling me about the tower...my tower...and forget what Lazarus has told you.”

  “You have my allegiance,” Cornelius said. “It’s true that much of the family is skeptical right now. They are afraid of your motives, your ambitions, feeling you have gone too far with your search for The Guardians. But not me. Though I would like to know why, be in the inner circle, and help you, if you’d let me. No one was sure they actually existed and now you may have found them. Did you...did you actually find them?”

  “Just one so far,” Kafka said softly, almost humbly. “But I will find the others. They cannot hide from me forever.”

  “I want to go with you—see him for myself. What can I do to prove myself to you more than I already have? I am not with Nicholae.”

  “I wish I could believe you, Cornelius. We have been through so much, in so many lifetimes.”

  “And I am still here for you. You can trust me.” Cornelius paused and swallowed hard. “The Guardians of the Great In-Between. What I wouldn’t give to see them.”

  “Where is Zachariah?”

  “Zachariah? I don’t believe he’s come back yet. It was awful what happened to him, a terrible accident. I know we all eagerly await his return.”

  “Is that so? I know for a fact that Zachariah has returned, and Nicholae and his band of traitors are nursing him back to health as
we speak. Don’t play dumb with me.” Kafka studied the expression of growing tension on Cornelius’ face.

  “Sire—” Cornelius’ expression sank further.

  “It pains me to do this. After all this time, I still do consider you family,” Kafka said, “but this has to be done.”

  “Zachariah’s death was no accident, was it?”

  “Zachariah’s death—though tragic—was necessary. As will be yours.” Kafka inched forward, forcing Cornelius back. Cornelius looked desperately around the room, his eyes stopping at where the door had been. “I give you the opportunity to reunite with your son.”

  “No...no! This is madness! You can’t just kill me!”

  Kafka lifted his right arm, and Cornelius flew off the ground and into the wall, where he was pinned in midair by some unknown force.

  “You can’t win! You can’t take on the whole family!”

  “One by one. We have lived many lifetimes together. I’m sorry it has to end this way.”

  “I’ll see you in the next life. This isn’t over!” Cornelius yelled and then gave out a gut-wrenching scream.

  “Not this time.” Kafka waved his arm again and Cornelius suddenly flew across the room and disappeared out of my field of vision. It sounded like he hit the wall above the fireplace. Then he dropped to the ground, landing face down in front of the fireplace.

  I gave out a soft gasp and quickly covered my mouth.

  He painfully lifted his head and looked deep into the shadows and saw me hiding. He mouthed something that I couldn’t make out, and his head violently fell to the stone floor.

  I scurried deeper into the shadows in horror.

  Cornelius reached out. Kafka walked up behind him and stopped. Cornelius’ body rose up and rotated, balancing limply on his toes like a hanged man. He blocked Kafka’s arm movements, so I couldn’t see what was happening.

  With a loud pop the fireplace burst into flames and I frantically backed up further. Cornelius’ body fell into the fire and was quickly set ablaze. I heard footsteps walking away and a door creak open and close. I was far enough back to not get burned, but the heat and stench of burning flesh was overwhelming. And for some reason I couldn’t move. The dying man before me was a horrific, yet mesmerizing sight. I didn’t understand what had happened or what I would tell Mom later that day. I didn’t know if I was also in danger.