Chapter 41

[The following chapter contains strong language. Reader caution is advised.]

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Wednesday 26th May 1999

 

 

I know, I know.

 

I do know what you’re thinking. Not in a telepathic way or anything, but I know.

 

Why don’t I just go back to my friends, my family and my real life now? I’d stopped running around in the guise of a monster. There was nothing else for me to do.

 

Even Kitty, someone who I’d known both for almost two weeks and for barely a night at the same time, felt it made sense.

 

“You should go back to your normal life…” she’d insisted while helping me scour the abandoned warehouse for any hidden money the morning after that fateful evening. “There’s no point hanging around with me…”

 

“And what will you do?” I asked her, rummaging behind a set of dusty office drawers all the while. Her talking about herself like that riled me somewhat, and I wanted to prioritise her wellbeing over mine. Besides which, moving the focus onto her next step kept it off of mine.

 

“The same, I guess…”

Glum and uncomfortable.

 

“Kitty… what those girls said, about your parents…”

 

She merely shrugged.

 

“Do you want to go back?” I asked her gently. This time, her response (after a brief pause) was a shake of the head. Her default mood and expression seemed to be “withdrawn”.

 

“That’s convenient!” Harmony spoke up abruptly; Kitty and I turned to find her spinning in an office chair. “I know just where to send you both!”

 

“I… I forgot you,” Kitty remarked at the sight of the construct. “How did I forget you…?”

 

“She has a habit of messing with people’s heads…” I explained in brief, making it clear to her that I disapproved.

 

“Why d’you think you never saw his face in the news reports about the Painters?” Harmony pointed out while revolving around and around.

 

“Anyway, what’s your big idea?” I grimaced at her; she stopped propelling herself, slowing to a halt, and only then did she reply.

 

“Go to Adam Montgomery. He was the first person to discover my existence and he’d love to meet you.”

 

Which was an intriguing prospect.

 

“It shouldn’t take you too long to get to his place!”

 

It took us two whole days.

 

“It’s really easy to find!”

 

The last three hours of which were spent wandering around the middle of nowhere looking for it.

 

“And hey, I’ll keep you fuelled so you don’t have to worry about eating!”

 

She seemed to forget about that by midday, because our stomachs wouldn’t shut up for most of the journey.

 

But finally, with aching legs being driven by nothing more than determination, we made it to a secluded country house. I couldn’t describe it in any way that would make it sound unique from any other country house; it was as normal a country house as one could possibly imagine. I wasn’t entirely convinced this was even the right place.

 

“We made it…” Kitty commented, wobbling to-and-fro a little as she walked sluggishly onwards.

 

“If they don’t have a full-on medieval banquet waiting for us, I’m gonna… … cry.”

Yeah, that was about all I had the energy for should that eventuality transpire.

“I’m gonna cry…”

 

Our approach must have been spotted by someone inside – or maybe we’d tripped some kind of security system – as the double doors that served as the entrance were swung open ahead of us. A red-headed man became visible, straightening out his shirt as we drew steadily closer.

 

“Welcome, welcome!” he greeted us when we came within earshot. “We’ve been waiting for you! I’m Dominic, you can call me Dom, I work here with Mr Montgomery.”

 

“Nice to meet you, Dom,” I smiled and nodded. “I’m Alex.”

 

“Hi…” Kitty muttered next to me.

 

“This is Kitty…”

Since she seemed too reserved – maybe too tired – to even introduce herself.

 

“It’s a pleasure!” Dom cheered while taking and shaking my hand. “If you’re ready, I’ll take you straight through to see Mr Montgomery.”

He released my hand, and then ushered us inside, letting us see the large hall with its fancy décor and its mirrored winding staircases that awaited us beyond the doors.

 

“Sure,” I confirmed, never wanting to disappoint if I could help it, “but could you get us some food for afterwards if it’s not too much trouble?”

 

“One step ahead of you, Alex,” Dom spoke warmly before closing the doors behind us. “We have other guests here, dinner will be ready by the time you’re done.”

 

My stomach grumbled loudly in gratitude before my voice could get a word in.

 

“Sorry about that…” I apologised on behalf of the empty chasm in my abdomen, though Dom simply laughed airily.

 

“It’s fine, you two must be starving,” he noted. “I’m sure he won’t keep you long. This way…”

 

As he led us through the building, more fancy paintings and attractive decorations sprung forth. Nothing seemed too stuffy or pompous; perhaps I’m not the best judge, but everything I saw was pretty cool. Instead of portraits, there were expressive paintings of storms and more abstract pieces.

 

Before long, we’d travelled across the landing, down a few hallways and up another flight of stairs, finally reaching the second of two doors in one particular corner of the building.

 

Dom knocked twice on the door.

 

“Come in,” invited the voice from the other side.

 

With that, Dom turned the handle, and opened the door for us to enter.

 

Sat behind a large desk covered with neatly-organised books, folders and papers was an older gentleman in a suit. As Kitty and I trod into the room with our aches and pains, he smiled at us in a manner which seemed not only to greet us, but to assure us that we were in safe, respectful hands. He rose to his feet, held his hand out for us.

 

“Welcome, both of you. My name is Adam Montgomery,” the man said as I took his hand.

 

“Alex Matthews,” I greeted him with the same tone and smile as I’d greeted Dom.

 

This time, Kitty did the same as soon as I finished my own handshake.

“Kitty Townsend,” she spoke up.

 

“Take a seat,” Adam implored us while returning to his own seat; then, he looked past us, at Dom. “Stay here with us, Dominic.”

 

“Okay!”

- and the sound of the door being shut.

 

Of the three chairs facing the desk, I took the one furthest to the right; as I settled down into it, I couldn’t help but let out a groan of relief. Kitty took the middle chair, keeping close.

 

“I’ll try not to keep you too long, I’m sure you could do with a rest,” Adam began. “Lokonessence did inform me that you’d be making the journey by foot.”

 

“She visits you too?” I asked, somehow surprised even if it did kind of made sense.

 

“Now and then. It’s still a little surreal being able to talk with it… I’ll try to keep this brief,” he reasoned, with himself as much as us. “I was a child evacuee in the Second World War, and I was sent here. I was a rambunctious sort of youth, and I wound up sneaking out one night… simply for the thrill of it, honestly. I went out to the gardens and I saw it… dancing like the northern lights. I was mesmerised. It was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. Of course, I couldn’t tell anybody about it. That would be incriminating when I wasn’t supposed to be outside.”

 

A twinkle in his eye with every sentence.

 

“Time passed, as it does, and I did my best to research what I’d seen. I knew it couldn’t be a natural aurora, what with those being a phenomenon concerning the thinner areas of the magnetosphere-”

 

“Sir, you wanted to be brief,” Dom reminded him; Adam chuckled softly.

 

“In any case, I managed to cotton on to what this strange spectacle was, and I dubbed it Lokonessence. By the 1980s, I’d established a research group, and then I foolishly chose to bring in a young man called Nick Riley…”

 

“Yeah, we’ve had the pleasure of meeting him a few times…” I grumbled.

 

“I must apologise for my part in that,” Adam replied as guilt shaded his face. “I saw a man who was squandering his potential, and I tried to bring out the best in him. He was too good to be running around the streets, getting into trouble. But he couldn’t escape that mindset.”

He put an elbow up on the table, his half-balled hand hanging in front of his mouth ruefully.

“All he saw was untapped power to use. And when he wasn’t allowed to use it, he forced out myself and anybody who was loyal to me. He went as far as to drive my family away from our home.”

 

“If it’s any consolation, last time I saw him, he was in a coma,” I told him. “He got a taste of raw Lokonessence and it overloaded him.”

 

I expected at least relief, if not cheer, from Adam… but instead, he momentarily closed his eyes and furrowed his brow.

“Stupid man…” he shook his head lightly.

 

“I was actually with him too, for a while,” Dom remarked behind us; Kitty and I turned to look at him. “I was young and dumb, and I bought into his talk of power. Well, I grew up, left him and changed my ways. Reconciled with Mr Montgomery. We’ve been keeping half an eye on Nick, but we hadn’t heard what had happened to him.”

 

“It was about a month ago,” I explained. “Nick had his daughter get friendly with us- uhm, estranged daughter, she relocated from up north and we didn’t know she was anything to do with him… Basically he stole the weapons from us…”

I looked back to Adam.

“I assume you know we have the weapons? And that there are weapons…?”

 

“Very much aware, yes,” the older man smiled lightly. “Lokonessence told us your identities and we did a little background tracing…”

With that, he reached for a deep red folder at his right, bringing it forward and thumbing through it.

“Alex Matthews… 17 today, in fact. Happy birthday,” he added with that same smile.

 

I saw Kitty turn to look at me in the corner of my vision.

 

“Thank you…” I tried to reply with as much cheer as someone who had spent most of their birthday walking around starving hungry without any family and friends around to celebrate could.

 

“19 Pewter Drive, attending Grandoak Senior School… tied to the blue weapon, a sword…”

He looked up at Kitty.

“I’m afraid I’m not familiar with you, however, Miss Townsend.”

 

“Harmony… I mean… Lokonessence… met me and turned me into a monster. Then I met Alex,” Kitty explained succinctly.

 

“No weapon to bond through…?”

 

She shook her head.

 

“Interesting…” Adam mused. “As much as I’m opposed to the idea of weaponizing Lokonessence, I can’t say I’m not intrigued. Would it be possible for me to see yours, Alex?”

 

“Of course!”

I held my hand out, making sure I wasn’t about to knock anything over, and with its characteristic displacement of air, the Lokon sword teleported from where I’d hidden it amongst the abandoned warehouses the previous morning and into my grasp.

 

Adam’s eyes widened in almost childlike fascination. I delicately laid the weapon down on his desk to allow him a better look at it. He, in turn, gently picked it up, looking over it with a scrutinising and discerning eye.

“Extraordinary… it still boggles the mind that he managed to contain Lokonessence like this…”

 

“And the clothes I’m wearing are made by Lokonessence, too,” I added, pulling the sides of the coat back to show off the t-shirt a little more.

 

“I understand you’ve been fighting monsters it’s created?” he enquired.

 

“We didn’t know they were Lokon-made until recently, but yeah, pretty much. She- it-”

 

“You’re more familiar with the human guise, it’s okay,” Adam insisted.

 

“She’s using us… she’s fascinated by us and she’s making monsters from our minds for us to fight against because she finds it fun…”

I skirted around the part about the five of us all supposedly having mental issues. That wasn’t really something I wanted to confess to a stranger.

 

“I understand how that might frustrate you… but you’re experiencing something no one else ever has. You’re engaging with Lokonessence in a way even I haven’t. It’s flowing through you right now. That’s something you should cherish.”

 

Part of me wished he’d offered to take the weapons from us: to resolve our dilemma over whether to keep them or let them go. But the way he spoke of the situation romanticised it enough that I willingly accepted it.

 

“For full disclosure,” he continued, “I’ve been gathering up teenagers from the area and testing them for possible Lokonessence compatibility. Not through weapons, of course… we’re looking at other forms of technology. Considering the unique circumstances by which it’s bound itself to you, it seemed ideal to use subjects with similar… characteristics to you and your friends.”

 

Which surely meant more than just age…

 

“I guess they’re the missing teens on the news reports, then…?” I asked instead as the thought struck me.

 

What I didn’t expect was the confusion on Adam’s face.

“There haven’t been any reports like that. Everything we’ve done has been above-board.”

 

“Huh…”

Not what I’d anticipated, either.

 

“Perhaps Lokonessence has been making you see news reports that weren’t there?” Dom proposed.

 

“Or she’s been making the two of you not see the news reports…” I countered. The whole world became unnervingly subjective and suspicious when Lokonessence entered your life.

 

“We’ll look into this…” Adam claimed, and cleared his throat lightly. “In any case, you’re both welcome to stay here however long you’d like, though I’m sure you’d both like to return to your homes soon enough. If you have any questions, feel free to ask.”

 

“Could you…?”

Kitty spoke up only for her voice to die back down. Just when I thought she’d relinquished her question…

“Could you make me a Lokon weapon?”

 

Adam and Dom both seemed taken aback by that, which was convenient as it allowed me to take the lead: I turned to her, finding her with a look of conviction on her face like I’d not seen from her before.

“Kitty, do you realise what you’re asking…?”

 

“I can’t go back to my old life. And Lokonessence has already bound itself to me,” she told me with that same look. “I want to help you.”

 

“Help us what? We’re not superheroes, we’re fighting monsters made just for us. It’s all pointless. You’d be better off forgetting all about this-”

 

“Too late. This is what I’m meant to do. I just know it. I feel it. Even if it’s Harmony choosing it, I don’t care.”

Her eyes were locked to mine, so much determination suddenly manifesting itself.

“I’m meant to be with you and your friends.”

 

“You could stay here and help Adam…”

 

She shook her head lightly, maintaining eye-contact.

“I’m gonna be a Painter.”

And then, she looked to Adam, expression more sheepish.

“If you can make a weapon, I mean…”

 

“What do you say, Dominic?” the older man looked at his assistant; Kitty and I focused our attention on him at the same time.

 

“Might be challenging doing it on my own, but it is feasible…” he reasoned. “If you’re certain it’s what you want…”

 

“Please,” Kitty spoke, smiling ever-so-slightly.

 

“Alright!” Dom cheered. “Alex, if you don’t mind leaving the sword with me, it’ll help me freshen up my memory on how to make a Lokon weapon. You’ll have to stay here for a few days, of course.”

 

“That’s fine,” I insisted even though I knew full well I could teleport the sword back to myself whenever I wanted. I didn’t have to stay… but it felt like the less scary option.

 

“If that’s all, I let you go and have something to eat,” Adam concluded with yet another warm smile. “It’s been a pleasure meeting you, Alex, Kitty.”

 

…

 

A few minutes later, Dom had led us not to a fancy, formal dining room as I expected, but to a single open door with chatter pouring out.

 

“This is the common room,” he told us as we approached it. “The teens we’re working with right now are in here, and they’re digging in to pizza. There should be plenty, so don’t hold back!”

 

“Thanks and thank you!” I replied gratefully, practically bursting to get in there and fill my stomach.

 

“Go ahead, I’ll see the two of you later,” Dom chuckled, gesturing for Kitty and me to enter the room.

 

“Okay, thanks!”

Except the moment I made my way to the door, I realised that I was about to have who knows how many eyes focused on me. Thankfully, the near-constant pangs in my stomach drove me forward regardless, and I practically strolled in like I owned the room.

 

Half a dozen teens were lounging about, tucking into pizza and engaging in conversation; my entrance, and Kitty’s behind me, drew their attention as expected.

 

“Hi, I’m Alex-”

 

“The fuck?” spoke a familiar Bolton accent from a familiar face.

 

Kayleigh Parker, with Will Harris right next to her to boot.

 

“Let me guess. You guys are raiding the place?” Will teased.

 

“I’ll explain everything after I’ve eaten an entire pizza…” I said while making a beeline for the pizza boxes stacked up. Kitty followed, stuck to me like a shadow.

 

I won’t explain what followed. It’s the closest I’ve ever been to embracing my inner animal. It wasn’t pretty. That poor, delicious pizza…

 

“You two were starving, huh…?” a girl giggled, picking up a slice for herself from one of the remaining pizzas.

 

“‘Were’?” I repeated, taking another slice from the same pizza and biting off a third of it.

 

“I’m Rin,” she told me. “I… guess you already know Kayleigh and Will?”

 

“Same school,” Kayleigh clarified firmly.

 

“And you’re one of the Painters, aren’t you? Adam’s not told us much, but those clothes…”

She was eying me up and down, taking in my Painter gear.

 

“Don’t tell anyone,” I winked.

 

“I’d be careful,” a guy with ashy-brown hair leaned in with a playful smirk. “She doesn’t look it but she’s a master gossiper when she tries.”

 

“Nathan!” she laughed, pushing him away again. “It’s not true, I’m the most reliable person I know when it comes to secrets. Not that I’m boasting!”

 

“Hey, just don’t tell the press or something and we’re good,” I chuckled.

 

“Alex…”

Kayleigh’s voice hit me half a second before she dragged me off by the arm. Leading me into the corner of the room, she glared at me.

“Did you talk with Adam?”

 

“Yeah, a little…”

 

“Did you mention me?”

 

“Not by name… just that Nick’s daughter helped him get the weapons…” I told her truthfully. She relaxed, if only a little.

“Lemme guess… he doesn’t know you’re related to Nick?”

 

“And I plan on keeping it that way,” she added sharply. “Harmony led me and Will here after we left Nick’s hideout. Said it’d be of interest to us if we wanted to use Lokonessence. I figured it’d be a good idea to keep my family history hush.”

 

“Good luck making that last…”

Like, doesn’t that sound doomed to fail?

“I won’t say anything, though.”

 

“You better not,” she sneered. Clearly satisfied with that, she walked off, over to Will again. As I turned back to the others, I saw Kitty shyly conversing with Rin and Nathan. I felt a swell of pride in her emerge from my now mostly-full stomach.

 

…

 

Kitty and I had been offered a room each, and after a nice relaxing bath, I’d headed to bed in the hopes of getting as long a rest as was humanly possible. I’d only just settled down in bed when a light knock rapped on the door.

 

“Mhm…?” I called out lowly. The door opened and Kitty shuffled in, sporting pyjamas and slippers.

 

“Hi,” she greeted me, and then shut the door behind herself.

 

“Aren’t you tired…?” I asked as I sat upright.

 

“Yeah, but…”

She walked over to my bed, and handed me a folded sheet of paper.

“Happy birthday…”

 

Taken aback, I looked at the makeshift card and found… well…

 

A drawing of myself, in my Painter gear, looking heroic.

 

It was honestly incredible, and more than that, it was so surreal to see how she depicted me… like something out of a comic.

 

A simple “To Alex, Happy Birthday, from Kitty” inside. But nothing more was necessary.

 

“Wow… wow. Thank you…”

And now my eyes were welling up…

“This is… I love it.”

 

“You’re welcome. I wanted to do something for you and I didn’t have much else to do…”

 

“No, it’s so cool… you drew this?” I asked even though it was blindingly obvious that she did.

 

“Yeah… I like drawing,” she informed me, a little uncomfortably. “So… when they finish making my weapon… we’re going to go back to your friends, right…?”

 

I exhaled softly.

“Of course. It’s just… when I last saw them, I was really angry and upset… and I feel ashamed. I don’t feel ready to see them again. They must hate me by now…”

 

Kitty shifted uncomfortably, and didn’t speak at first.

“I dunno. I’m not good at making friends. … I don’t think real friends would hate you just because of that, though.”

And with that, she headed over to the other bed and pulled back the covers.

 

“… I thought you were staying in the room next door…?” I asked her as she discarded her slippers and clambered in.

 

“Changed my mind,” she told me plainly, settling down. Whether she wanted the company, or felt that I needed it, I wasn’t sure. I simply put my card down on the bedside cabinet and flicked the light switch off.

 

“Night, future Painter,” I whispered into the dark.

 

“Niiight…” Kitty replied softly.

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