Into the Church
Caden did a double take. How could Dom, the potato-shaped bully, be one of the Holy Police? He looked again, just to be sure, but it was really him. Dom may have been completely covered in the white uniform from head to toe, but Caden would recognize that freckled face anywhere. The puffs of curly red hair sticking out from the top of the hood were even more of a dead giveaway.
“Is that Dom?” Annika asked in disbelief.
“Yep,” Caden said, doing his best to stifle a laugh.
“He kind of looks like an egg riding a horse,” Annika snickered. “And I think he’s alone down there too.”
“Well then,” Caden said. “I guess we’d better go say hello.”
The two of them climbed over the rocky hill and made their way down the other side to the small beach. As they walked, tiny pebbles dislodged from the path and clinked down the slope, getting Dom’s attention.
“Who goes there?” he demanded. He tugged the horse’s reins and held his lantern out toward Caden and Annika, looking just as shocked to see them as they had been to see him.
“Hello, Dom,” Caden said calmly.
“Stop right there!” Dom said. He reached behind his back with his free hand and pulled out a crossbow. “I’ll … I’ll shoot if I have to.”
Seeing the crossbow made Caden and Annika stop, but only for a moment. Caden put out his palm, visualized the crossbow sliding right out of Dom’s hands onto the sandy ground, and it complied right away. It landed with a soft bump; it wasn’t even loaded. Suddenly Dom was empty-handed and looking quite scared.
“Run, Milchama!” he yelled, snapping the horse’s reins. Caden was one step ahead of him. He imagined Dom stuck in the air while the horse galloped away, and that’s exactly what happened. Milchama sped off like he’d been stung by a bee, but Dom remained hovering in the air, still in saddled position.
Until Caden released him to collapse on the sandy ground.
He fell on his rear with a thud. Caden and Annika ran over, magnet-gun and palms out, standing above him as he lay on the ground, hands up in surrender. It was hard to imagine that this was the same person who had threatened Caden with a sledgehammer just two days ago. If only he’d known how to use his angel weapon then.
Annika let out a laugh. “The Holy Police must be pretty hard up for help if they’re letting you join them.”
“I’m … I’m not even supposed to be here,” Dom said, sweat dripping down his reddened face.
“Then why are you here?” Caden asked.
“Everyone else is out looking for you,” he said. “The whole Church is trying to find you. And anyone left over is doing crowd control to prevent a riot in town. They just threw a suit on me and gave me a fake crossbow and told me to guard over here. I’m not an official Holy Police yet. I … I barely even know how to ride a horse!”
This was getting pathetic. Caden and Annika exchanged glances.
“What do we do?” Caden asked.
“Toss him in the ocean with your power,” she suggested. “Then let’s get going.”
“No!” Dom cried. “You’d better not do anything to me. Or else I’ll tell my brother and he’ll get you good! He isn’t afraid of your stupid weapons or anything.”
“Your brother?” Caden asked. This was the first he’d heard of Dom having a brother.
“Yeah, my brother Freid,” Dom said. “He’s inside the church. I just found out today that’s where they’ve been keeping him. You’d better get away from me before he comes after you!”
“Your brother isn’t a prisoner?” Annika asked.
“He works for the Church,” Dom said. “I mean, he has to stay there as punishment for using Iltech, but he’s super smart. They use him for lots of stuff.”
Caden’s heart leaped with excitement. If Dom’s brother was there, then his dad had to be there too.
“Can you help us get in?” Caden asked. “I need to find my dad.”
“No way!” Dom yelled. “You’re a criminal! You’re the most-wanted sinner right now. I don’t care what kind of weird powers you have, you’d have to kill me before I’d help you.”
Frustration burned through Caden. They were so close. He didn’t have time to explain everything to Dom that he’d learned about how the Church was wrong and Gotama wasn’t real. He just needed to get through Dom’s thick head with something quick.
“Listen, Dom,” Caden said. “You see Metl up there?”
Dom quickly glanced up at the shining gray ball and red X filling the sky.
“Yeah.”
“Metl is going to hit us. It’s going to kill everyone. You. Me. Your brother. Anyone you’ve ever cared about will be dead. The only way to stop it is if I meet my dad. I don’t know why, but I have the power to put an end to this. You’ve seen what I can do. I just need my dad to tell me how to do it.”
Caden could see the gears turning in Dom’s head. The idea of helping Caden was causing him extreme mental anguish, but the idea of being smashed to pieces was probably worse.
“You can really stop Metl?” he asked.
“Yes,” Caden said. “If you help me find my dad.”
“And my mom too,” Annika added. “Please help us, Dom.”
Dom turned to Annika and his face softened. He stood, brushed off his white uniform, and picked up the lantern from the sand.
“All right,” he said. “Follow me.”
He hopped into the tunnel carved into the cliff and started walking down the dark, damp corridor. After a quick exchange of surprised glances, Caden and Annika followed. Annika kept her eyes narrowed in suspicion and followed behind with her magnetizer drawn. Caden wasn’t prepared to trust Dom either. He kept his glowing red palms ready to go at any moment.
The journey through the tunnel was disgusting. The circular pathway was just low enough that they had to walk crouched, careful not to scrape their heads along the gooey ceiling. The floor was even worse. The stone pathway was coated in a thick layer of slime, and liquids of every gross color imaginable flowed by. Caden did his best to avoid the larger pieces of garbage that came floating past, but he did step on a few of them. They were disturbingly squishy.
And yet, Caden felt the same internal tug as before when they’d walked through the tunnel to the Basement. He had to be sensing electrical signals. But this was the church, the last place on Earth that should have any Iltech. It didn’t make sense.
“Just what is that power of yours anyway?” Dom asked, his voice echoing through the cramped stone passageway.
“It’s kind of a long story,” Caden said.
“Try me.”
“Well, it’s called an angel weapon. It—”
“Yeah yeah, great. Were you born with it or did you steal it?”
“Uh, well, I was born with it. But I’ve met others who had them installed later.”
“Huh,” Dom said. “I wonder if after you stop Metl from hitting us, my brother could rip that angel thing out of you and put it inside me instead.”
Caden didn’t say anything. The thought of Dom, or anyone like Dom, with an angel weapon was horrifying. He was glad he’d made Annika promise to destroy him when they were done.
“Are your parents inside the church too?” Annika asked.
“Even if they were, I wouldn’t know,” Dom said. “It was always just me and Freid. He’d work all day at the stonesmith, then tinker with his Iltech inventions at night to sell underground and make a little money. It worked well … until the Police found his workshop.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” Caden said, feeling sympathy for Dom for the first time ever. Dom just grunted.
“Whatever. Anyway, we’re here.”
They had reached a dead end. There was nothing except a stone wall illuminated by Dom’s lantern. It was wet with putrid-smelling liquids like the rest of the tunnel.
“Where are we?” Caden asked.
“Hey, relax will ya?” Dom said. He grabbed hold of one of the stones in the wall and shoved it to the side. As if by magic, it slid across like the lid to a wooden box, revealing a large red light with numbered buttons. Dom pressed one of the buttons and the light turned yellow.
“What is this?” Caden asked.
“The way inside, duh,” Dom said. “Now be quiet, I have to put in the password.”
Caden and Annika were silent as they watched Dom’s thick fingers press button after button. Again. And again. And again. Dom must’ve pressed them over one-hundred times before he finally stopped.
“It’s a … it’s a really long password,” he said. “Now wait a second.”
The yellow light turned green and the wall started shaking, as if there was a mini earthquake.
“What’s going on?” Caden asked.
“Can you go five seconds without asking a stupid question?” Dom groaned. He grabbed another stone in the wall and pulled. The wall swung open like a door. Inside was a small white room, so small in fact that it wasn’t a room at all.
“Is this an elevator?” Caden asked, remembering the lift in the Basement.
“I don’t know what it’s called,” Dom admitted with a shrug. “But I know what it does; it goes up. Get in.”
The three of them filed inside. The cramped elevator was barely big enough to hold them. Dom closed the stone wall from the inside, sealing them in the four white walls.
“Are we moving yet?” Annika asked anxiously.
“Trust me,” Dom said, “you’ll know when we’re—”
The elevator lurched upward with a jolt. Caden lost his footing and fell to the floor, and Annika accidentally grabbed onto Dom.
“I gotcha,” he said to her. Then he turned to Caden. “You lose your balance? Huh. Would’ve thought an Iltech sinner like you would be right at home in this thing.”
Caden didn’t say anything as he stood back up and the bumpy ride continued upward. This elevator must’ve been what he’d been sensing in the tunnel. But why did the church have an Iltech elevator? And how high were they going in the statue-church? Up to Gotama’s beard? The human-ant’s antennae?
He didn’t have to wait long to find out. The elevator convulsed to a stop and there was a pleasant “bing” sound, like Jadice’s tea maker.
“Oh, by the way,” Dom said with a smirk, “I’m sorry.”
The elevator doors opened, and Dom ducked down as Caden and Annika were suddenly face to face with a dozen Holy Police all pointing crossbows at them.
“Down on your knees!” they yelled in unison.
Caden reacted instinctively. He thrust out his palms and Annika reached for her magnetizer, but they were too late.
bzzt!
One of the Holy Police fired, but there was no sound of arrows piercing the air. It was a blast of something worse—magnets.
The weapon shot out a magnetic field, sucking Annika’s weapon right out of her hands and into the Holy Police’s possession. Caden felt the full impact of the weapon ripple through his body, as if he was a puddle someone had splashed into. He collapsed to the elevator floor on his knees, suddenly losing the energy to even stand.
“Excellent work, Dominic,” came a voice. The group of Holy Police parted and a tall, slender man in a blood-red Holy Police uniform strolled up to the elevator. He had the same freckles and curly ginger hair as Dom, and he was carrying a magnet-bow—the weapon that had sucked away Annika’s magnetizer and disabled Caden.
“Thanks, Freid,” Dom said. “It took a while to input that message to you guys. But it was worth it, huh?”
“I would expect no less from my genius little brother,” Freid said. He handed the magnet-bow to a nearby Holy Police, helped Dom up, and led him away with an arm behind his back.
“Mr. Freidric, sir,” said one of the Holy Police. “What do we do with these two?”
“Put them in the cell,” Freid said.
Dom turned to his brother. “Hey, remember it’s only the boy that’s the sinner. The girl didn’t do anything wrong. She was kidnapped.”
“No worries, Dominic,” Freid said. “We’ll let Father Yohan deal with them when he gets back. Until then, we’ll keep them safe.”
Caden still felt weak, as if the magnet-bow had ripped out his will to live. He couldn’t even stand. Two Holy Police lifted him under his arms and carried him into the room. Right behind him Annika was kicking and screaming, requiring four Police to subdue her.
Despite feeling dizzy and hopeless, Caden forced himself to look at his surroundings. This was where his dad was. It had to be. He knew it from the tugging sensation inside of his stomach, now stronger than ever. Tooby had told him to follow the electrical signals, and Caden felt like the electricity in the room was gripping right on his insides. He’d come so far to find his dad. He couldn’t give up now.
The room was big, at least the size of the Home, and it was filled with Iltech. But unlike the Basement where junk Iltech was piled up randomly, the Iltech here was in pristine condition and organized beautifully. Bright white rectangle lights lit up the ceiling, and there were screens and panels lining the walls, constantly displaying information. In front of each one was a person in a red uniform like Dom’s brother, furiously taking notes on paper or a handheld device.
Caden was nearly brought out of his stupor by seeing what was in the center of the room. There were at least twenty people lying unconscious on elevated tables, their heads and limbs attached to metallic sensors. They only wore white sheets, and they were immobile aside from twitching when one of the red-clad researchers came over and adjusted a knob attached to their heads.
Caden wondered what was going on. Who were these people? Were they—
“Mom!” Annika screamed. She somehow managed to yank herself free from the four Holy Police and ran over to one of the unconscious women. She looked nothing like Annika—pale skin, round face—but she had to be Annika’s mother.
Annika shook her, trying to wake her from whatever sleep she was in, but after just a few shakes, Annika was pulled away by Holy Police. Caden swallowed down his nausea and garnered enough strength to look over the unconscious group of parents, trying to find his dad. He looked for anything that he could remember from the photo—blond hair, tan skin, lanky frame—but he couldn’t find any that matched.
The Holy Police brought Caden and Annika to a jail cell built into the wall on other side of the room. With the touch of a button, the metal bars slid open, and Caden and Annika were thrown inside. Like the rest of the room, the inside of the jail was white and sterile. Another push of the button and the bars closed, locking the two of them in. The Holy Police turned their backs to Caden and Annika, keeping guard over them inside.
Caden felt dizzy and weak. Annika was crying into her hands. Agonizing, breathless sobs poured out of her.
“I couldn’t save her!” she cried. “I’m right here, right next to her, and I can’t do anything!”
The world around Caden was still spinning, but he tried to think of a way out. Annika’s magnetizer was currently confiscated by the Holy Police outside their cell, so that wasn’t an option. Caden tried to summon his angel weapon to open the bars, but he couldn’t concentrate on anything for more than a second before it made him sick to his stomach.
“It’s … it’s okay, Annika,” Caden said. “Don’t worry. We’ll … we’ll find a way.”
Annika shook her head with her face still covered in her palms. “You don’t get it. You just don’t get it. This is all my fault, Caden. She shouldn’t even be here!”
“What do you mean?” Caden asked. Annika sniffed and lifted her beet-red face out of her hands. Tears were still streaming down her cheeks.
“Not all Homes are as nice as Mother Mildred’s,” she said, wiping her face on her sleeve. “Both my parents died when I was little, and I was sent to a Home. I was like you, Caden. I lived at a Home, but I wasn’t a Nobody. For years no one adopted me, and the Mothers saw me as just a useless leech. So I did them a favor and ran away.
“I lived on my own for two years, bouncing from farm to farm doing little jobs. But once I was ten I came to Salem and I found something I was good at: stealing. Salem was the first big town I’d been to, with shops and stores and everything. It was so easy to just walk beside someone, pretend to be their kid, and then tuck away a few apples, bread rolls, or whatever else I wanted when no one was looking. I made a killing. It was great.
“I really thought I had it all. But then, during Ant Day, I saw a girl my age walking to the center of town to watch the fireworks with her parents. She walked between them, holding both their hands, and she was wearing this bright green dress. The way the three of them were laughing and smiling and just … being a family, it made something click inside my head. I knew I could never have parents like her, but there was one thing I could have: I could steal the same dress.
“I found one just like it at a seamstress’s shop. It was just my size; I had to have it. I don’t know if I was getting overconfident and sloppy, or if I was blinded by desire, but I just picked up the dress and walked out of the store. The owner saw me. I ran, but she caught me. I figured my life was over, but the woman didn’t turn me in. She dragged me back to her store, sat me down at a table covered in fabric, bone needles, and thread, and told me I was going to learn how much blood and sweat went into making that dress, so maybe I’d think twice before stealing again.
“I laughed, but she was serious. Her husband was Holy Police, and she was going to turn me in if I didn’t do as she said. I obeyed. I cut the fabric all frayed, accidentally stuck myself with the needle a hundred times, and barely put together a single sleeve after hours and hours of work.
“When we were done, she told me to come back again tomorrow, or else she’d turn me in. I had absolutely no intention of coming back, I’d just make a break for the next town. But then she did something I didn’t expect. She smiled and said if I came back tomorrow, she’d give me a snack while I worked. I mean, I didn’t mind stealing food, but getting something guaranteed to eat without any danger of being arrested? Now she was speaking my language.
“I came back the next day. She walked me through making the dress collar and we ate oatmeal raisin cookies together that she’d made herself. She told me that whenever she made them for her husband to take to work, she had to make ten times the usual amount, so he could share, or else all the other Holy Police would be jealous. I laughed out loud when she told me, imagining the super-serious Holy Police being jealous of cookies. I think that was the first time I’d laughed in years. That was when the woman told me her name: Sandie.
“I went back to Sandie’s house every day, laughing and sewing and eating cookies. I even stayed for dinner with her and her husband Wilhelm, and he’d tell me stories about all the mundane stuff Holy Police had to do sometimes, like investigate cat disappearances, or use their crossbows to help farmers shoo away crows. One night, when I was about to leave after helping clean up, they invited me to stay the night. It was the first night I’d spent in a bed in years.
“Sandie and I finished my dress a few days later. It was nowhere near as nice as the one I’d tried to steal, but she said it was beautiful. She said she liked it so much she’d trade the green dress I’d tried to steal for it. Before I could refuse, she gave it to me and said I was free to go.
“But I didn’t want to go. I threw the dress on the table and wrapped my arms around Sandie and begged her to let me stay if I made another dress with her. She told me I didn’t need to make a dress to stay with her. I could just stay.
“Sandie and Wilhelm took me in. They couldn’t officially adopt me since I didn’t have any records, but Wilhelm promised to pull some strings. And once I started living with them, they showed me the hidden parts of their lives: the Iltech. Sandie had a camera and a box full of photos, and Wilhelm had old Iltech weapons stashed away in the cupboard. We’d spend our nights together playing with the Iltech, making up stories about the strangers in the photos, and Wilhelm would explain all about the old weapons and how they worked.
“A wonderful year went by like that, all the way up to the day I was officially adopted. Wilhelm had made it possible, and to celebrate I wanted to get them something special to show how thankful I was. I couldn’t steal anything anymore, and I couldn’t afford anything either, so I decided to do something Sandie had never dared to try: taking a picture with her camera.
“I wanted to take a picture of myself, so we could add it to the box and I could be a part of the stories we made up. I snuck the camera outside at night when Sandie was asleep and Wilhelm was at work. I went into an alleyway next to the house. I had no idea how the camera worked, or even if it would work, but I had to at least try.
“But when I pressed the button to take a picture, a bright flash burst out of the camera, illuminating the alleyway like morning. The camera made a loud clicking and whirring sound, but all I heard was the sound of Holy Police horses suddenly coming in my direction. I ran back inside the house, threw the camera under the rug, and not a second later there was a banging fist on the door.
“I was paralyzed with fear. Sandie woke up and answered the door. When I saw who it was, relief rushed through me. There were two Holy Police, but one of them was Wilhelm, my dad. The other Police demanded to know what had caused the flash of white light. Sandie denied everything. I just stood there, glancing nervously down at the rug where the camera was hidden.
“At first it looked like everything was going to be okay. Wilhelm tried to laugh it off and persuade the other Police that nothing had happened. But he wasn’t convinced. He said something unnatural had made that light, and according to protocol, he had to search through every inch of the house until he found the Iltech that caused it.
“I saw the panic in Wilhelm’s face. He knew what a search meant: his Iltech weapons were going to be found. If that happened, we were done for.
“Just as the Holy Police took his first step inside the house, his foot hit the bump under the rug. He leaned down and dragged out the camera and freshly-printed photograph from underneath. My stomach sank. I knew what this meant—we were all going to be arrested.
“But then … something worse happened. Wilhelm started screaming at Sandie, yelling about how she’d betrayed him and betrayed Gotama by using Iltech. I was horrified. This was his chance to help his wife, to stand up for her, or to knock out the other Police so we could escape together as a family. But instead he was just blaming her like … like a monster.
“Before I could say anything, Sandie confessed. She lied and said she’d taken the photo of me with the camera, and that she’d forced me to pose for it. She said that Wilhelm and I were innocent, and that she had a stash of Iltech photographs and weapons too.
“My happy life was being destroyed before my eyes. My mother was being arrested, my father was betraying us. The life that I’d thought would be mine forever was slipping away like water through my fingers. I didn’t want to go back to another Home. I wouldn’t go!
“I ran. I made it about twenty feet before a crossbow arrow shot through my arm and brought me to the ground. It was my dad who shot me. He walked up to me and I honestly expected him to shoot me again, right through the head. But he grabbed me by the elbow and dragged me back to where the other Police was arresting my mother. The only thing he said was a whispered, ‘Sorry, kiddo.’”
Annika took a deep breath. As Caden had been listening, his vision stopped spinning, and he could feel his strength returning. He glanced at the satchel holding their wet clothes and saw Annika’s lime-green dress peeking out. All this time, Annika had been carrying around a reminder of her mother, just like Caden had with the photo of his dad, and he’d had no idea.
Caden didn’t know what else he could do for Annika besides talking to distract them from their predicament.
“What happened to Wilhelm?” he asked. “Was he arrested too?”
“I don’t know,” Annika said. “Maybe he was. Or maybe he’s still in Salem. I bet he was transferred to some other town though. Having a prisoner and her jailer as husband and wife seems like a bad idea. But I don’t care where he is. I’m going to find him. And I’m going to blast him and see how he likes it. It’s his fault my mom is here, being experimented on or whatever. I’ll never forgive him.”
The elevator door on the other side of the room opened. A figure in gray robes escorted by two Holy Police walked across the room to Caden and Annika, eliciting bows from everyone as he passed. Once he was standing in front of the cell, Caden recognized him. Even though he’d been far away when he saw him last, there was no mistaking that mane of white-fire hair.
“Hello there, Caden. Nice to meet you,” said Father Yohan with a smile. “Well then, enough chit-chat. Now tell me. Are you ready to save the world?”