For this part and part 62, anything in italics is part of a projection. Regular text is real.
<center>~*~Part 61~*~
</center>
“Xan, are you sure you’re ready for this?” My mother asked. She was so nervous for me.
“I know I am, Mom. We all are.”
We’d watched the warehouse for 3 straight days. We knew there were 20 men working at the warehouse every day in 3 different shifts. We knew when those shifts ended. And we knew how bored several of the outside guards were, especially in the daytime, thanks to some dream-walking Isabel and I had done. Isabel had also connected to Alex each night to share our progress with him, and we knew he was ready. I’d practiced my projection. The plan was completely ready. All I had to do was puck up the phone and call Jeremy to put all our planning into action.
“Promise me one more time that you’re going to be careful.”
We’d been going back and forth like this for the past 20 minutes. I had already promised to be careful—and to avoid unnecessary risks—15 times. “Mom, I—“
“Alexandra Maria Isabella, humor me!”
I smiled a little. I always had to laugh when she called me by my full name. “Mother, I promise you that I will be careful and avoid any and all danger and do only that which Dad and Michael would approve of.”
She hugged me. “Thank you, Xan. Now you can call that evil bastard.”
I smiled.
“Don’t let on that you know what he is, Xan,” my father warned me for the 7th time. “Just tell him that you need his help.”
I nodded and dialed Matt’s cell phone.
“Hello?” His voice sounded so familiar. I could easily remember why I’d fallen for him so quickly just by speaking to him. “Hello?’
I turned on my scared, hurt voice. Oddly enough, it wasn’t that much of an act. “Matt?”
“Alex, is that you?” He suddenly sounded worried and interested.
“Matt?” I cried a little harder.
“It’s me.” He sounded so comforting. He shouldn’t work for the FBI; he should be an actor! “What are—where are you? What’s going on? No one has seen you in weeks. I mean, other than that note in my locker… Did you really run away, Alex? Where have you been?”
“Yes, I really ran away, Matt. I can’t tell you where I’ve been—I figure I’m going to be going back there soon.”
“Why are you calling then? I have been so worried about you, baby. I mean, one minute you’re saying we’ll be together forever. The next—you’ve left this note in my locker that answers nothing and is just a long goodbye, really. What is going on?”
“God, Matt, so much has happened lately. I don’t know how to explain it all. I never intended to.”
“Then why are you calling me?” He had just the right amount of anger in his voice to make it seem like he really did care.
“I need your help.” I sighed. “I’m sorry for doing this to you, Matt, but you’re the only person I could think of to call. You’re the only person I know who would actually help me.”
“With what?”
“I’m in California, at my uncle Alex’s.”
“Why?”
“I came here because I started to feel really guilty about my mother. I can’t believe I just left her without a goodbye or anything, you know. I wanted to call her and let her know I was okay, but I was afraid to. So I thought I’d come see Alex and have him help me. I don’t know what I was thinking. He would have tied me up until my mom got here and took me home—“
“Would have?”
“He’s not here, Matt. Alex is missing. No one has heard from him in weeks. And when I called my house, my mom wasn’t there either. I called her work and they said they haven’t seen her since the day I ran away, Matt. Something is going on here, and I am so confused.”
“Maybe he and your mom are together, looking for you, Alex.”
“I don’t know. It just seems so—I can’t believe that, Matt.”
“Why not?”
“Because I know Alex. He would never leave his email for so long without at least checking in. And he hasn’t checked since the day I ran away. Something is going on, Matt.”
“What do you want me to do? I can’t—“
“I need you to come help me find him. Please. I know I’ve hurt you, Matt, but you are the only one I can trust. Please help me.”
He sighed. “Give me an hour, okay, and I’ll meet you somewhere.”
“An hour? Matt, you’re hours from here.”
“Don’t worry about that. I’ll meet you in an hour—“
“Can we just meet at Starbucks? I need some coffee if I’m going to make it through this.”
“Sure,” he laughed a little. “I’ll see you soon, Alex.”
“Thank you, Matt.” I whispered and hung up. I looked at my family. “He’ll meet me in an hour.”
“Okay,” my father nodded decisively. “Let’s get going.”
Both my parents hugged me tightly. “Take care of yourself—“
“I will,” I said exasperated. “I promise.” I calmed down a little. “You guys need to promise you’ll be careful, too, all of you.” I looked at my family meaningfully.
“We are careful, Xan. We’ve had a lot of practice at this, remember?” Maria smiled.
I nodded. “Okay.”
“So we’ll meet you outside city limits as soon as you call to let us know you have Alex,” Seth confirmed the final leg of the plan.
“Agreed,” Michael nodded. “Be sure to stay in motion. We won’t know how many people will be there to watch or follow. They might even call in some who aren’t working the warehouse.”
“Right.” Seth agreed.
We all took a long hard look at each other, as if confirming that each of us knew that we were going to bring Alex home today no matter what. Then we all took off. Seth and Michael went to get the cars ready. Maria and my parents started moving everything they’d need from the hotel rooms to the car. And Isabel walked me to my car.
“You’re ready for this, Xan. I know you are.” She hugged me.
“Thank you, Isabel.” I smiled and climbed into the car.
She shut the door for me and looked at Seth. “Now please be careful driving, Seth. We don’t need any accidents today.” She smiled.
Seth shook his head. “I’ll try.” He smiled and we drove off towards the Starbucks we had scouted out the day before.
We were both silent as we drove. I guess Seth thought I needed some time to concentrate or get mentally ready or something. I just didn’t know what to say to him. I was so afraid that anything I might say would lead us to a huge discussion on trust and who we were. I just wanted to be calm before I did the biggest thing I’ve ever done.
He pulled up across the street from the coffee shop. “You should definitely change your appearance, Xan. I mean, he might see you from wherever he parks.”
I nodded. I thought about what I’d like to look like and closed my eyes for a second. When I opened them, I was a redhead again with dark sunglasses and black clothes on. “What do you think?”
“You’re a goth’s dream.” He teased.
“Thank you.” I started looking to see if Jeremy and his people were here. The road looked perfectly fine. There were a bunch of empty cars, and the crowds seemed perfectly fine. “Do you think they’re here all ready?”
“Not yet. I think we’d know.”
“How?” I was confused as to what he was talking about.
“Intuition, I guess.” He shrugged. “I just know they’re not here yet. We’ll know when they are.”
We waited for a few minutes more. Then a black truck pulled into the parking lot beside the coffee shop.
“That’s one of them.” I looked at Seth. “I know it is.” He nodded.
We watched for a few more moments as a long black van pulled up right in front of Starbucks and then Matt’s old car pulled up, too.
“How many people are there? We need to let my Dad know.” I tried to count, but all the windows were black.
Seth concentrated for a few minutes. “As best I can tell there are 8 of them.”
“8? How can you tell?”
“I can just feel it, I guess. Being an alien isn’t exactly a hard science, Xan.”
I wanted to laugh at that, but I kept my mind on the focus at hand and watched the scene in front of me. “Okay. Matt just walked into Starbucks.”
“Start the projection walking out of another building or something. Don’t let them see you around this car.” Seth urged.
I nodded and looked at some of the closest buildings. I chose to walk out of the GAP, with a bag in my hand. I might as well get something cute out of this operation. I concentrated for a few moments.
I walked out of the GAP, carrying a bag with a red sweater in it. I pulled a black hat over my hair and looked around suspiciously as I made my way down the block to the Starbucks. I slid in, trying to look as inconspicuous as possible. I scanned the room and focused on Matt.
I walked over to him. “Matt?”
He jumped up. “Alex?” He wanted to hug me, but he just looked me over. “Are you okay?’
“I’m fine.” I sat down across from his chair. “How did you get here so fast?”
“Don’t worry about that, okay?”
“No, Matt, I’ve been suspicious of everything and everyone. I mean, I was even curious about the guy behind the counter at the GAP. I need to know the truth of what’s going on here. From everyone, even you. Until I find my family, I trust no one. So how are you here so quickly?”
He looked at his coffee. “Okay. I’ll tell you the truth. I’ve been trying to find you since the day you left. I knew at first I couldn’t talk to your mother about it, so I didn’t even try. I just tried looking on my own. But last weekend, I decided to ask your mom if she’d heard from you. When I couldn’t get in touch with her, I started to get really worried. So I decided to talk to the rest of your family, the people you’d be most likely to get in touch with. Maria wasn’t at her house, at least she never answered my calls. So I called Alex, and he wasn’t here either. So I decided to come down here this weekend to see if I could find him.”
“Why?” I couldn’t keep the suspicion from my voice.
“Alex, I was worried about you.” He said a little angrily. “I mean, that’s why I’m here. I was worried about you. I came down here to see if I could find Alex so I could find you.”
I nodded. “I’m sorry I’m so paranoid, Matt. I just don’t know what to do. Thank you for being here and willing to help me.”
“So what do you think we should do? Have you thought of a plan for this?”
I shook my head. “Not really. I’ve been so paranoid. I just want to find him.” I looked at him. “You’ve been here, what? All weekend? Do you have any ideas? Have you got any leads?”
I would make this completely easy on him; he could just take me right on in to the warehouse. But what a surprise he would have once he got there!
“Well, I do know of one place where he might be.”
“Where? What’s going on?”
“I found a building, a warehouse, really. Kind of like the ones back home that we used to dream of making into a club.”
“What’s he doing in there?”
“I don’t know. I’m not sure that he is in there, even. I just know that I saw his car in the parking lot of the place.”
“Maybe we should call the cops, Matt. I mean, have them go in and search.”
“No! I mean, it might really be nothing. Maybe Alex is just turning the place into an apartment or something. I don’t want to have the cops barging in on him for no reason or anything.”
“Matt, if he were doing something like renovating a warehouse, he’d tell us. I mean, Alex wouldn’t do that anyway. He’s not exactly what we’d call handy.” I smiled a little. “But if you saw his car there…”
“Do you want to go see if it’s his? See if we can find him there?” Matt offered.
“Seth, he’s offering to take me to the warehouse. He says Alex’s car is there. Are they ready? Have they gotten him out?”
Seth was already on the cell phone with Isabel. “Not yet. Max, Liz, Maria, and Michael are in the place though.”
“Does she know what’s going on?”
“No, not yet. Just buy them a few more minutes, okay?”
“Are you ready to go, Alex?”
I hesitated. “I don’t know if I can do this, Matt. What if there’s really something wrong with Alex? What if he’s been kidnapped or something?”
He laughed. “Alex, who is going to kidnap a grown man who makes his living in computer programming? What are the odds of that?”
“I don’t know. What if he discovered some awesome new program that no one else has ever seen yet and there are people out there who want to take that program before he can publish it? What if he could do all kinds of good with it and someone wants to take it away to do something bad?”
“Alex, I think you’re over-reacting here—“
“Over-reacting?” I silently thanked Maria DeLuca for everything I was about to say. “You think I’m over-reacting because I’m worried about my uncle? The man who raised me like he was my father? I don’t think that’s over-reacting. I think that’s what I like to call caring or loving someone.”
“Alex—“
“And you might think that that idea is a little out there but in my opinion so is the very concept that my uncle Alex who can fix the world’s computer problems would ever be doing something that would involve a hammer and nails. I mean, seriously, this is Alex. I don’t think I’ve ever even see him use a screwdriver that wasn’t involved in opening a hard drive or something.”
“Alex—“
“And that little event could have happened. Don’t you watch the news? There is all kind of espionage going on in the business world! People are becoming more and more underhanded to try to get the jump on other businesses. I mean, just last week, CNN—“
“Alex, don’t make such a scene!” He hissed.
“So now I’m making a scene? Oh, I see. I’m showing some emotion, aren’t I? Heaven forbid, I do that. Well, I’m sorry, Matthew, but I am a highly emotional person. I can’t help but react to situations involving the people I love and care about. Don’t you remember how I got when my mother forbade me from seeing you? For God’s sake, I ran away from home!” I knew my voice was getting kind of loud. I didn’t care. So what if people saw me yelling at him? It’s not like it was the real me…
“Alex, if you keep screaming like this, you’re going to draw a crowd. How do you think they’ll react to that phrase?”
“Don’t be like that, okay, Matt?” I sighed. “I can’t help how I’m feeling here, okay? I mean, my God, in the space of just a couple weeks, my entire life has turned upside down. I went from being best friends with my mother to not even being able to tell her anything. I went from having the possibility of a real relationship with my father to him being completely shut out of my life. I left you and Meg. Do you know what it’s like to just leave your best friend and know you can’t talk to her again, Matt? But I thought it was the only way, the only thing I could do.”
“I just don’t understand how the only thing you could do was run away, Alex. I don’t think I’ll ever understand that. I thought we had something.”
“Matt—I tried to explain that in the letter I wrote you. I’m sorry. I just didn’t see any other way—“
He stood up. “We shouldn’t talk about this right now. Let’s just go. Right now, we go or I don’t help you.”
I stood up. “Okay.”
“Seth, we need to move, now.”
“Xan, we’ve been moving since you said word one to him.”
I couldn’t believe it, but I didn’t open my eyes. “Tell Isabel Matt and the others are on their way to the warehouse. Have they gotten him out?”
“Just about, I think.”
“They need to get him out!” I exclaimed.
“Don’t worry, Xan. We’ll get him out. Max won’t fail.”
I prayed he was right.
<center>***</center>
