This choice: You want to train with Frank and Joe • Go Back...Chapter #59A Puzzling Job Offer by: Seuzz   "What are you talking about?" you ask.
"Yes or no, think fast," he says. "If I hit zero the answer is 'No'." He holds up his open palm. "Five. Four."
You blink rapidly. Go with Joe and Frank to train with them? How could that possibly do anyone any good?
"Three."
Joe and Frank said that they have "special aptitudes", and from your time in them you dimly remember how extraordinarily rare those aptitudes are.
"Two."
Joe can't be saying that you have those aptitudes. You've never been good at anything in your life.
"One."
But if you ever wanted anything in your life, you want what they have, and you'd work yourself to death to have it. Especially after what you told Frank last night and Joe this morning.
"Ze--"
"I'll do it!"
"Do what?" Joe's eyes are sharp.
"Go with you guys. Jesus, Joe, I don't know what you're talking about, but if you're really talking about training with you guys, and learning the kinds of things you know--"
"And doing the kinds of jobs we do?"
You gasp, and your eyes widen. Joe's eyebrows twitch.
"I want to be good at something, Joe," you say in a low, steady, measured voice, remembering what he'd said earlier. " I want something that is mine, that I worked for, that I can hold my head up proudly over. I want what you've got--"
His eyes sharpen, but you're already backing up, to get clear what you want.
"No, I don't want what you've got, not specifically. But I want it to be able to stand next to you, and have people see that I belong next to you."
His eyes brighten as he smiles. "Stand up, Prescott, straight and tall. I've got to talk to a bunch more people, but your 'Yes' was the most important answer to get."
"Yes to what?"
"Well, we'll see. That's the second most important answer to get."
* * * * *
He calls someone, and after a brief talk gives you the receiver. "One of our colleagues," he says. "She's going to give you the same kind of interview I gave you. Answer her questions the same as you answered mine." You sigh deeply, for they'd left you tired and vexed.
You're revived a little by the voice on the other end, an arch, Scottish-accented one. She introduces herself as Kali Valentine, and as Joe had warned you, she leads you through the same kind of cock-eyed interview. She's much brisker, though, and it only takes thirty minutes for her to finish. She has you give the phone back to Joe. His eyes dance merrily as he listens to her. "I was sure I'd messed up," he says. "It's a relief that-- No, I haven't told Dad. I wanted you to check my work. Well, we need to call him anyway, we're almost done out here. It'll be a nice dividend on the job, eh? Oh, he's a bit of a drip, but you'll like him." He winks at you. "I like him, even though-- Oh ha ha, Kali, you missed your calling, you shoulda been a stand-up comic. Thanks again, we'll talk later." He hangs up. "I said I liked you, and she said--" He breaks into a perfect mimicry of your interviewer. "You're saying he has big boobs? No, you just are one!" He grabs you about the neck and grinds his knuckles into your scalp.
"What is this all about, Joe?" you demand.
"Wait until I can tell Frank. He's supposed to call-- Shit!" He wheels to stare at the clock. "We're supposed to go check on Fat Eric's shop, see if he's there. Was gonna do that after breakfast, but I got caught up in the other stuff. Come on!" He drags you out the door.
* * * * *
King Kong Komics is closed up tight. After exploring that dead end, Joe calls Eastman High and tries to get them to summon Jonathan Straussler to the phone; report comes back that he is absent. You drive out to the Strausslers, and Joe does another remote recon. "Still empty, 'cept for some of those goons in suits," he says, gazing distantly through the windshield of the truck and sucking thoughtfully on a chocolate shake. "I'm leading them a nice chase around the house, though. Ah ha ha! Where'd I go, asshole?" He sighs and starts up the truck. "They cornered me and I had to turn it off. When you were in here--" He points to his forehead. "Did you remember the Halloween stunt I pulled on those guys in the dormitory?"
"Please don't remind me I was ever doing that stuff," you say.
"Aw, it's something we'll laugh about in our golden years," he says, punching you in the shoulder. "So, anyway, that twin of mine wears whatever it is that I'm wearing when I project it, see? So, this one October me and Frank are on a retreat with Father Ed--oh, you'll love him--and there's a bunch of these Catholic boys' school cocksuckers up there at the campgrounds with us, because it's a church retreat kind of thing that Father Ed badgered Dad into sending us along on, and these guys are hassling us, because, you know, Catholic boys' school cocksuckers will be Catholic boys' school cocksuckers. So I cut some holes in this sheet and put it on, and I got sunglasses underneath so my eye sockets are totally dark. Also, I got some old rusty chains me and Frank found, got them wrapped all around me like a belt, and dangling from my wrists, and--
"And when night comes I project myself in this rig and send it along to their wing of the dormitory, which is this falling-down crap pile up in the mountains. I'm a ghost, okay?" he shouts as you gaze blankly at him. "And I'm walking through walls--my twin is--and floating through furniture, and these guys absolutely freak, especially when one of them tries tackling me and sails right through. Then I start chasing them, going 'Waaauuuuggghhhhh!!!' and they stampede all over each other, and then--"
He throws his head back and howls. "And then Father Ed charges in because they're making this unholy racket! He takes one look and figures out exactly what's going on. 'Franz, you little shit!' he yells. I put my twin out bang like a candle. 'Frank, get me outta this thing,' I holler at him, but he's on the floor in stitches because I been telling him what I'm doin' to those assholes. I'm only halfway changed back into my PJs when Father Ed charges into our room. I try jumping out the window, but he grabs me by the ankle and drags me into the hall for a thrashing." He pounds a fist on his leg as he gasps with laughter. "Fuck, fuck, fuck! That was so awesome!" He recovers himself suddenly, though, and slouches with a burning frown. "Except for the latrines Father Ed had me cleaning for a week afterward." He shudders elaborately, then turns a sharp eye on you. "So, you and me are gonna hang out and figure ways to prank people after you're one of us, aren't you?"
You've been laughing along with him, though much more quietly, because his cheer is infectious. This question takes you aback, though. He still hasn't explained exactly what he means by all those hints he's been dropping. Practically everything you learned of them, during your time inside them, has vanished, even the name of their secret society. About the only thing that remains is the impression that there are so few of them you can almost count them using just your fingers and toes. And that's in the whole wide world.
And this assumption that you might join them seems particularly egregious, coming as it does not even a day after you'd been parading around inside their faces and using that book to do horrible things to other kids. Joe's expression is serious--if not particularly grave--as he looks at you.
"Joe," you find yourself asking with no little trepidation. "Have you really forgiven me for what I did to you and Frank?"
He presses his lips together and swirls what's left of his shake, and looks over your shoulder. "I want to," he says. "I'm trying to. Very slowly, I think I am. Gimme awhile, hang out with me, ask me again later." He sucks down some more shake, then looks away. "You did yourself a lot of credit, though not in an especially noble way, with that talk you had with Frank last night. He told me about it and we talked about it after you went to bed. There's something very flattering about your life, your being, your very self being the object of such envy. Makes you realize how good you got it." He again sucks thoughtfully on the straw. "And you wanted it even though you couldn't have our prodigies. Yeah, it really makes you appreciate your skin."
Your cheeks and forehead burn with embarrassment and shame. He doesn't mean to, he doesn't even know he's doing it, but he's running you down by sympathizing with how much you wanted to step up from your own being.
And then, as though he's reading your mind, he says: "And you know what it makes me want to do, Prescott, what it makes me want to do, knowing that you felt such envy of me and Frank?" He turns to you. "It makes me want to lift you up so high that I might start feeling envious of you."
* * * * *
Frank--still in your form--is chewing his lip hard when he gets back home. "Wish I could say you can go back home, Prescott," he says as he drops your bag on the floor. "But--"
"But he isn't, Frank," Joe says. "He's coming with us."
Your twin stops cold. "What do you mean?"
"I haven't talked to Dad about it yet, but I got Kali to confirm it." Joe pulls you to his side. "Prescott is a Stellae," he announces with a wide grin.
Frank stares at Joe, and he stares at you.
Then he punches you across the room.  You have the following choice: 1. Continue |
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