CHAPTER 17

I drop Ethan off at his house and ride back home. If I’d wanted answers by pushing myself to touch the town sign, I hadn’t got any. All I’d come home with was a headache and the news that (surprise!) I wouldn’t be leaving Peregrination anytime soon, which I think I’d already worked out years ago.

After I ride around into the backyard, wave at Mum and Dad in the kitchen, and ditch my bike, I see Molly down by the back fence doing her weird hand-waving thing once more. She turns around and looks at me as soon as I see her.

Not the Ecens again? I say, those tails still way too clear in my mind.

You’re wasting your time with the town sign. She doesn’t answer my question.

I stand there and stare at her from across the yard for a moment or two, mostly wondering what her problem is. She’s sent here to look after me and this is what I get? Seriously, she’s not held together with cells, she’s held together with attitude. Well, universe, thanks for that. Thanks for nothing. I kick a bit of dirt around with the toe of one sneaker, thinking about all of this. When I look up once more, Molly is still waiting for some sort of response. Without thinking about it another second, I decide to give her one. I stalk across the wide, flat, dry (oh, and let’s not forget ‘green’ – she couldn’t pause for a moment to give us a bit of decent grass?) backyard to her.

When I get right up to her, lush, green grass springing up under my feet as I go, she simply shrugs. ‘So, you’re angry because you can’t leave, but, as you said yourself, you already knew that.’

I know it doesn’t make sense, but I don’t care.

Molly stares at me evenly. ‘Don’t you think I did it for a reason?’

I shake my head at the unfairness of it. ‘But all those years. All those trips we planned and then couldn’t take. Especially Mum. They really meant something to her, those trips. Plus, I think she remembers stuff. Places she wanted to see, to go to. You know, stuff from … before me.’

This makes Molly pause slightly. ‘You’re right. She does.’ She hesitates before asking her next question. ‘Do you think that’s wrong? That it would have been better to forget everything before? And everything that’s happening now? Do you think it would be better if, after all this, I placed you all on Earth and you never remembered what’s happened here. Or … me?’

‘Like there’s going to be an after!’ I say, then regret my words and groan slightly. Now I just sound like Molly. ‘I don’t know.’ But, in a way, I do know. I know that I’d be angrier than I already am if she’d taken everything away from Mum. That I wouldn’t want to be living a lie. And as much as Molly annoys me, I can’t really imagine a life without her. Ugh, she just heard me think that. I’m sure of it.

‘I don’t always know what to do, you know, Cooper,’ she tells me, turning her back on me.

I watch as she goes back to her web-weaving, that sticky stuff coming out of her palms. So disgusting. ‘Anyway, what do you mean by that?’ I say to her back. ‘Don’t you have, like, a boss to ask, or something?’

She turns to me once more, her mouth twisted slightly. ‘A boss? No. It’s just me. Well, it was meant to be me and Hale, but …’

‘But what?’

‘He left, like I told you.’ She doesn’t look away, but her face hardens.

I think about this. ‘And that’s why Dad got Jack just out of the blue that day?’

‘Yes.’

I look around me. ‘Where is Jack, anyway? He hasn’t come out to say hello.’ Which is strange. Jack always greets me as soon as I get home.

Molly freezes. ‘I thought he was with you?’ she says quickly. ‘He went out to find you.’

‘I didn’t see him.’

She starts to look slightly panicked. ‘What did you see?’

‘There’s not much to see, is there?’ I start, but then I remember something. ‘Wait. There was this weird slug.’ Now I think about it, that slug was kind of odd, because Molly isn’t into creating bugs and wildlife. I was introduced to a whole lot of them when she threw all that information at me about Earth. And while I’m thankful we don’t have some of them around here (snakes and spiders – yikes), would it really have been so bad to throw a fly or two into the mix? ‘Yeah, there was this one small, black slug. I haven’t seen one of them before around here.’

‘A slug? What do you mean? Define “slug”.’ Her attention focuses right in on me. It’s suddenly so intense that I can almost feel it surrounding me.

‘A slug,’ I tell her. ‘You know, black, about this long,’ I hold up two fingers about 15 centimetres apart. ‘It was on the road. I almost ran it over with my bike.’

‘You almost touched it?’ Molly pales. And, somehow, I’m guessing this isn’t just a ‘Molly hates bugs’ thing, but a bigger, Ecen-like, end-of-the-universe thing.

‘Um, yeah?’

‘But you didn’t touch it in any way, did you? You didn’t run over it on your bike, either?’

‘No. I’m not an animal killer, thanks very much. I saw it and swerved.’ I frown as I realise that Molly is really freaking out. Looking up, looking down, closing her eyes, opening her eyes.

‘Right. Okay. Good. And just one? You’re sure of that? Near the town sign.’

‘Yes,’ I nod slowly.

Molly is incredibly still. ‘And you never saw Jack?’

‘Um, no,’ I say, slowly.

‘Cooper?’ Mum calls out from the back deck, distracting us. We both swivel to see her standing outside, one hand shading her eyes from the two setting suns. ‘There’s someone here to see you.’

Mum looks absolutely chuffed as she sends this ‘someone’ down the back steps. A new boy at school! And he’s come to visit on his first day. She’s always desperate for someone who might make friends with Molly. Molly flashes me a look when I think this and I shrug as Hale crosses the yard towards us. ‘It’s true, isn’t it?’

‘I’ll make some sushi rolls!’ Mum calls out and scurries away into the kitchen. There’s a pause and then she sticks her head out again. ‘Is Ethan coming? If so, I’ll make more.’

Ethan’s eating skills are legendary. ‘No,’ I tell her, and she hurries away again.

Before Hale has even reached us, Molly speaks up. ‘Did you do this? Are you working for them?’

‘I don’t work for anybody,’ Hale tells her, calm as ever.

I cough slightly. ‘Um, hello? Want to fill me in here?’

They both ignore me.

‘Just tell me they don’t have Jack.’

‘Who?’

Molly shakes her head. ‘Like you don’t know who. Cooper saw a Rewlut. Now, how did that get in here? With your help, no doubt.’

Hale bites his lip. ‘Ah,’ he finally says. ‘Unfortunate. I did wonder if I was being tracked.’

Molly snorts. ‘I can’t believe you’re working for them. You’re even worse than I thought. We were supposed to be different. To have different … views on things. Perspectives. But all you can see is your own point of view. Now, where is he?’

Hale laughs at this. ‘If that’s the way you want to see it, dear sister. As for Jack, why, we’ve merged, of course. Now that I’m here, I thought it was a far better option for him. Couldn’t you tell?’

‘No!’ Molly says, in disbelief. ‘I couldn’t! You know I couldn’t! You’re ruining everything. Everything! I can’t concentrate. I can’t control everything. I can’t hear everything. And you can’t … you can’t just merge with Jack.’

Hale raises his eyebrows slightly. ‘You think he enjoyed eating from a bowl on the floor all these years? Sleeping on a mat on the floor? Living the inane existence of a lower life form? Lower even than a human? I sincerely doubt it.’

I’m trying to follow all this and failing miserably. ‘Hang on, you mean my dog’s inside you?’

‘Well, not literally,’ Hale tells me. ‘But if you’d like to think of it that way, yes.’

‘Right, okay then,’ I reply. The truth is, I’d believe anything these days. If somebody walked up to me and told me I’d soon grow an extra two arms I’d seriously ask Mum to get sewing so I’d have clothes when it finally happened. ‘Anyway, back to this “situation” you speak of.’

‘Ah, yes, that. Good thinking there, Cooper.’ He takes a step towards me, which makes Molly flinch. ‘You see, it’s all to do with that “slug” as you call it. The one that Molly missed …’ he grins at her now, as if he’s teasing her. ‘We call them Rewluts.’

‘I missed it because of you! Because of your interference!’ Molly huffs.

‘You see, very soon, there’ll be more than one of those creatures with us. The place will, in fact, be covered with them.’