Chapter 10 – A Dangerous Discovery
I told my mom I was going over to Faedra’s. Next, I texted Chandler and asked him to meet me there before jumping on my bike and pedaling as fast as a super-not possibly could toward her house.
The whole way there, I was worried sick something might be seriously wrong – like the house was on fire or something. Then I remembered she was a super, and a fire would be so easy for her to handle, so that couldn’t possibly be it. Dang it! What was wrong!? Suddenly, the fact that Faedra had been hiding her superpowers from me wasn’t all that important. All I wanted right then was to get to her house and make sure she was safe.
When I arrived, everything looked totally normal to me at first. The house wasn’t on fire, and no ambulance with its lights flashing was in the front driveway or anything like that. Then I noticed that I couldn’t see any lights on inside the house. It was summer time, and there was still some daylight left, but even so... by this time of day, you could usually see lights turned on in most people’s houses.
I laid my bike over on the ground and sheepishly walked up to the front door and rang the doorbell. I half expected Faedra’s dad to open the door a few seconds later, but no one answered. I tried to peer through one of the glass panels that flanked either side of the door, but with no lights on inside, it was next to impossible to make anything out.
After several seconds, I decided to try the front door. I depressed the latch and pulled on the handle. To my surprise, it came open, so I went inside.
I hadn’t thought to bring a flashlight, but I didn’t want to start turning on lights all over the place. I wasn’t sure what was going on yet, and Faedra had said that she needed my help. What if a burglar was hiding around the corner or something? If that was the case, though, Faedra could easily overpower a burglar with her superpowers, right? It didn’t make any sense. Why would Faedra need my help? Something was definitely wrong here.
I crossed the foyer and placed my hand on the door-knob of the basement door. I took a deep breath, slowly turning the knob and then gently pulling the door open, hoping the hinges wouldn’t squeak. I never remembered the door squeaking before during the hundreds of times Faedra, Chandler, and I had gone down to her basement to play video games in the game room, but we’d never been concerned with being quiet before. When you’re trying to be totally silent, it’s amazing how every floorboard seems to creak, and every door hinge squawks to announce your presence.
Thankfully, the door opened silently. I looked down the stairs and saw that the landing at the bottom was barely illuminated by the light coming in from one of the basement windows. It was now or never. I reached my hand over to the light switch and turned it on. I listened for any sign that someone might be downstairs, but heard nothing.
“Faedra?” I whispered, waiting for a reply. Then, I heard something. It was faint, not nearly as loud as my whisper, but I thought someone had called my name. I slowly descended the steps and peered around the corner. There was Faedra, tied up to a chair.
I instinctively ran up to her and began untying the ropes. As I did so, I accidentally knocked the cell phone that had been resting on her leg onto the floor.
“What happened?” I asked as I continued to untie the ropes.
“Too weak... take me up... stairs,” she whispered.
For the first time, I noticed that she looked sick. Her skin was pale, and she looked like my mom had the last time she’d had the flu, right before she threw up. I finished untying the ropes and held out my hand to help her up. I immediately thought the gesture was stupid since Faedra was super-strong, but she seemed to struggle to lift her arm up and place her hand in mind. I realized she was too weak to stand on her own, so I bent down, draped one of her arms around my neck for support, put my arm around her waist, and hoisted her out of the chair.
“Hello? Anybody home?”
It was Chandler, calling from the front door.
“We’re down here, in the basement. Faedra’s sick,” I called out.
“No...” Faedra muttered as we made our way to the stairs.
I could hear Chandler hurrying across the foyer and beginning to pad down the stairs; then I heard a bump and a groan. As Faedra and I made it to the landing and turned to head up the stairs, I saw Chandler seated on the third step down, leaning against the wall and looking just as sick as Faedra.
“What’s wrong with you?” I asked. Chandler just stared back at me and moaned helplessly, but he didn’t move.
Faedra and I slowly made our way up the steps. As we got closer to where Chandler was sitting, it seemed that Faedra’s strength was returning. I wasn’t having to practically carry her anymore and she was moving more under her own power. I couldn’t walk past Chandler while supporting Faedra, too, so I sat her down two steps below where Chandler was.
“I’m going to set you down for a minute while I get Chandler upstairs, and then I’ll be right back for you, okay?”
“Okay,” she replied.
I helped Chandler stand to his feet and practically carried him up to the main floor, where I sat him down in a chair in the front den, and then I went back and helped Faedra. By the time Faedra and I reached the foyer, she was walking under her own power again.
“Thank you,” she said, her voice sounding much stronger. She began walking through the rooms on the ground floor, calling out for her mom and dad. “Mom! Dad! Is anybody here?!”
Taking my cue from her, I helped search some of the rooms, too. By the time we came back to the foyer after having searched the rest of the house, she seemed to be walking fine. Chandler was still sitting down in the chair where I had placed him.
“What’s going on?” Chandler asked.
Faedra didn’t reply, practically running out the back door – I assumed to check the garage and back yard for her parents. I followed her out just in time to see her duck into the garage. She came out a few seconds later, tears streaming down her face.
“They’re gone,” she said. “I can’t believe they’re gone.”
“What happened, Faedra?” I asked.
“Yeah, and why do I feel like I have lead shoes on my feet and I can’t think straight?” Chandler added.
I turned around to see him leaning against the back door frame for support, not looking quite as sick as he had earlier, but still pretty pale. Faedra was wiping the tears off of her face with the back of her hand.
“I’ll tell you everything soon, I promise,” she said, “but first I need your help to get something out of the basement. Chandler, you need to come out of the house. The farther away you are from the basement, the better you’ll feel.”
“I’m all for that,” Chandler responded, leaving the support of the door jamb and lumbering unsteadily across the yard towards the garage. With each step, he seemed to become more steady. By the time he was beside Faedra and me at the garage, he seemed fine.
“Okay, so I’m confused,” I began. “Why is it that you and Chandler got sick and I didn’t?”
“It’s a long story. For now, just know that there’s a meteor fragment in the basement that makes supers weak, and I need your help to get something from down there that will help us find my mom and dad.”
“What happened to your mom and dad?” Chandler asked.
“They were kidnapped, and we need to move now to help find them.”
Chandler and I exchanged a quick glance.
“Well, since I’m the only one who doesn’t get sick in the basement, tell me what you need and I’ll go get it,” I replied.
“You know that book shelf in the corner, the one to the left once you come off of the steps?”
“Yeah?”
“That little, stuffed elephant sitting on top of a barrel is what I need.”
“Got it,” I said, already turning back towards the house.
“Thanks, Dylan,” Faedra called from behind me.
“I’m guessing this isn’t just a stuffed elephant,” Chandler said.
“It has a USB drive inside that I need to get to one of Dad’s friends, and fast.”
I found the elephant downstairs and came back out a minute later, holding it in my hand. “Here you go,” I said as I handed it to Faedra.
Faedra opened the bottom of the little barrel that the elephant had been sitting on, and pulled out a USB drive not much bigger than a dime.
“What’s on the thumb drive?” Chandler asked.
“I’m not 100% sure. My dad just told me that if he or Mom were ever kidnapped, that I should take this to his friend and it would help them find them.”
“You mean your dad was expecting to get kidnapped?” I asked.
“Like I said, it’s a long story. Right now we need to get this to Mr. Franklin ASAP.”
“Mr. Franklin?” Chandler and I both asked in unison.
“Yeah... Mr. Franklin’s not just an Anglican priest, you guys...”