The Twin Powers (6 page)

I thought,
What tour?

I heard static, then Tom's voice in my head.

Grandpa and Ronnie are gone.

Where?

They just cut out, Eddie. Grandpa wasn't around last night and Ronnie wasn't in the wagon when I woke up this morning.

Ronnie likes to roam around.

Something's going on, Eddie.

I'm on stage, Tom.

At least look around. You're up high.

I scanned the crowd, looking for Ronnie and Grandpa and imagining where they might be, until I picked up a distant signal, like a blip on a submarine sonar screen in a war movie. The blip was moving away from me. Somehow I felt sure it was Ronnie.

A woman grabbed my arm. “We're moving down the steps now. TV interview.” She was talking into her wrist.

I pulled loose. “I've got something to do.”

“After the interview,” she said, grabbing me again. The agent called Brown rushed up to grab my other arm. I felt like a prisoner.

Tom? I'm picking up a blurry figure. Gray green.

That could be him!

Maybe I'm imagining it.

The powers, Eddie.

“Keep moving,” said Agent Brown.

Ronnie's heading into the sun, Tom. That's northwest this time of day.

Let me know if he changes direction. I'm on my way.

RONNIE

TRENTON, N.J.

2012

 

T
HE
only person I'd ever trusted was Eddie, the best guy in the world. That was before he started changing. We'd been on the road for only two days, but already Eddie seemed to think he was some kind of Elvis. He didn't seem like the guy who had protected me in school, shared his lunch, made me his sidekick. Eddie had never asked questions, never asked me why I wore old clothes that hung off me like tents or where my folks were. Or even where I'd been living before he invited me to live with him and his grandpa.

Once, I thought I'd follow Eddie anywhere, do anything he asked, but now I was on this strange planet where I couldn't be independent. I didn't know my way around or where to find food or a safe place to sleep. I was stuck on the wagon. That was what bugged me. I was used to being on my own, in charge of myself. I had needed to get out of that stupid wagon, away from Eddie's wise-guy twin brother. I had wanted to talk to Eddie before I split, but Eddie had been in the hotel room the night before. And now he was up on stage, surrounded by thousands of screaming people. Like Elvis.

It would just get harder and harder to be with Eddie as the tour went on, I thought. I'd be trapped in the wagon with Tom and his jerky friends, bossy Alessa and know-it-all Britzky. The last time all five of us were together, I'd thought we were almost like a family, but now I could tell that none of them liked me. And they didn't even know me. No one did.

I felt bad about leaving Buddy, but it would be too hard to take care of a dog on the run. Grandpa would be sure Buddy was fed and walked. Eddie wasn't paying any attention to him.

I pushed my way through the crowd, keeping my head deep in my Tech Off! hoodie. Soon as I got a chance, I'd turn it inside out. Grandpa had bought me jeans, T-shirts, and running shoes for the tour. They were stiff and tighter than the clothes I was used to.

“Hey, girly.”

A wall of varsity jackets rose up in front of me. Jock jerks. They closed around me, reached for me. I kicked the nearest one's shin, and when he bent over, I karate-chopped his neck. The jock staggered away, leaving an opening, and I slid through it. The crowd closed around the jocks and I turned a corner. When I felt safe enough to stop and look around, I realized I was even farther from Eddie and the stage. Now there would definitely be no chance to talk to him.

Maybe I should go back to the wagon,
I thought. No. I couldn't spend another minute with Tom. But I needed to find out what was going on.

All I had were questions.

Who is Hercules?

Is Dr. Traum behind this?

Why is the government involved? On both planets!

Who are friends and who are enemies?

I felt so small, weak, alone.

I felt like crying.

Toughen up, you little sissy,
I told myself.
You've been on your own for years; you've been alone since Mom died and Dad disappeared into a bottle and the foster family did bad things and you took off. You didn't need anybody then and you don't need anybody now. Nobody's even looking for you back home. If people were, they wouldn't find you because they're looking for a different person.

Why did Eddie bring you along to this planet? He felt sorry for you. All he ever cared about was himself, playing the jock star.

C'mon, Ronnie, he did make you feel good, made you feel protected. How much of a friend would Eddie be if he knew the truth about you?

Something warm and wet slapped against my face.

Buddy!

I threw my arms around him and buried my face in his soft, furry neck. He cried too.

A hand closed around my arm. “It's okay—I'm a friend,” a deep voice said. A big guy with a scraggly red beard and long yellow teeth, dressed in jeans and a New York Yankees warm-up jacket, had me in a grip that tightened as I struggled. I kicked him but he didn't seem to notice. “I'm on your side. Trust me.”

“Who are you?”

“My name's Keith. Tom ever mention me?”

“No.”

“Maybe he called me Lump.”

“Never heard of you,” I lied. Eddie had told me about the Lump, the guy who had lived in Tom's house. He was some kind of computer geek who might be working for the government. Eddie liked him because they were both sports fans. Tom hated him.

Keith, or the Lump, smelled bad.

Two men in dark suits with white wires coming out of their ears suddenly surrounded us.

“This one's been on the run from the wagon,” said Keith. “Find out what he knows. It's time to take these little punks down.”

TOM

ALL OVER NEW JERSEY

2012

 

I
TURNED
my hoodie inside out to hide the Tech Off! logo and walked northwest for almost two hours before I began to pick up two moving brain-wave blips that I thought could be Ronnie and a small non-human thing alive enough to be vicious little Buddy. That was all I needed.

They had stopped, probably to rest. I was tired, mostly from the energy I was expending to concentrate on staying on Ronnie's trail. I hoped it would get easier as I got better at it. You really have to work at your powers.

I was hungry but I didn't have any money, so I opened my backpack and took out my violin. I was on a college campus. Last time I fiddled for money had been in a park near a college campus in New York. A college neighborhood is always a good place to play for pay. You get students, teachers, tourists, people who appreciate music and have a little dough. I pulled up my hoodie, opened the backpack in front of me, sat on a bench, and tuned up.

And then I felt sad. The violin was something that Dad and I shared. We played together. We'd warm up with something wild and crazy like the dueling violins from
Riverdance,
which made us laugh, and then we'd go on to Mozart or the Beatles or zydeco, whatever we felt like.

Dad was a famous violin teacher—he traveled constantly to coach big stars before a major concert. Or at least that was what my stepmom and I had thought. Maybe some of it was true. But it was also a cover story so he could do his alien-revolutionary thing. Eddie had a similar cover story for Dad, except he thought our dad was a famous basketball coach who worked privately with pro stars around the world. Eddie and Dad played ball when they hung out.

Sitting in the park with the violin in my hands brought back the old days, before Dad disappeared in what we were told had been a plane crash. We had had a great life, Stepmom and Dad and me, until that had happened. When he disappeared, nearly three years ago, everything had changed, almost overnight. This jerk I called the Lump moved in as a tenant to help pay the bills. I hated him. And I started fighting with everybody. Teachers called it “acting out.” I started getting expelled from schools. Then six months ago all the stuff with the aliens happened, and I found my twin brother. I saw Dad again, just for a minute before he got sucked up by the alien spaceship. The Lump moved out shortly after that, but I still haven't seen my dad since.

“You gonna play or what, kid?”

I almost snapped, “What's it to you, dirtbag,” before I realized where I was and what I was doing.

I made myself smile. “What would you like to hear, sir?”

“She likes Mozart.” It was a college guy with a girl next to him.

I checked the tuning, then swung into a melody from
The Magic Flute.
The girlfriend clapped and dropped a dollar into my backpack and suddenly I had a crowd. I stuck with Mozart for a while—he was one of Dad's favorites—then did a few Beatles tunes on request. When there was a lull, I did a Willie Nelson song. Old people go nuts when they hear “My Heroes Have Always Been Cowboys” on a violin. Dad used to call that
fiddlin
'.

I was so lost in the music that I was able to forget for a while how things were all messed up and that I was supposed to be chasing Ronnie.

My backpack soon had enough dollar bills for a meal. I scooped up the money and thanked everybody. They looked sorry to see me go. I was sorry to go too.

I found a diner nearby and ordered a hamburger and fries. There was a TV over the counter. Eddie filled the screen. He was being interviewed. I pulled my hoodie up around my face.

“Last question, Tom. Some people say you've got a political agenda. Some people say you're just trying to sell your sponsors' products. What do you say to all that?”

“I say groovy,” said Eddie, with his dopey smile. I could tell he was enjoying himself. “People are talking instead of planting their faces in their iThingies. Just what we want.”

Probably still talking about you on their iThingies, dummy.

The newswoman turned to the camera. “And just what America seems to want as the caravan following the Tech Off! tour grows on the road to Washington, D.C..”

Tour? Washington, D.C.? How'd all this happen so fast?

A commercial came on. The waitress said, “Some kid, that Tom. How old do you have to be to be president?”

A few people laughed. I wanted to say,
Forget about age
—
you have to be born in this America, not in some other planet's America.
I should have felt proud of my brother, but I was annoyed. Not jealous, I thought, just annoyed. Why? Because he seemed to be liking the attention so much. We were supposed to be trying to save the Earths, not having fun.

Do your own job,
I thought.
Concentrate on Ronnie.
He wasn't that far away. I finished my food and hit the road.

ALESSA

EN ROUTE TO WASHINGTON, D.C.

2012

 

B
RITZKY
and I sat on the driver's bench of the wagon as the caravan rolled slowly along a two-lane blacktop road. There were farms on both sides. Cows glanced up at us, lost interest, and chewed on. Behind us were dozens of cars, trucks, vans, buses, RVs. The caravan disappeared around bends of the road. How had this happened so fast?

We must have gone viral! But how would I know?

I missed my cell and tablet. Agent Brown let me use his cell while he watched. I wondered how many thousands of Twitter followers I could have by now. Once people knew I was in the wagon, they'd go wild to follow me and also on Facebook, Instagram, Tumblr
 . . .

“Check this out,” said Britzky. He handed me the binoculars. “About twenty cars back.”

Two kids our age were standing in the bed of a pickup truck waving a white bed sheet attached to two broomsticks. I focused and read:

Save Earth.

No Nukes.

No Extreme Weather.

“That's so cool. It's what this was supposed to be all about.”

“Enjoy it while it lasts,” said Britzky.

“Pessimist.”

He pointed up at two drones hovering above the pickup truck, their propeller blades making the banner flap. “You think the government's going to let this go on?”

“One banner?”

“One banner leads to another one,” said Britzky. “That's how revolutions happen.”

“Revolutions? Shut up. This is just going to be a week of no texting. That's it.”

Britzky lowered his voice. “How do you think the American Revolution started? Some people didn't want to pay a tax on tea.”

He looked serious. He was making me nervous.

“What do you mean?”

“This isn't some middle-school project, Lessi. Do you know the Russians have secret files on extraterrestrials?”

“How do you know that?”

“Everything's online if you know where to look.”

“So what does that have to do with us?” I said.

“Why do you think these federal agents are on our backs?”

“Why?”

“They're afraid if the Russians or the Chinese get to the aliens first, they'll team up and take over the world.”

“But what does that have to do with us?” I asked again.

“The federal agents seem to know the aliens already made contact with us. They think that if they stick with us, they'll find the aliens first.”

“Should we warn the aliens? Tell them we're being watched?”

“Are we on Dr. Traum's side?”

“Whose side
are
we on?”