AnotherArchetype
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142. Smudge
🕑 Added 2025-04-23 10:04:31 +0000 UTCI was the first to reach the mansion kitchen backdoor, taking hold of it, but finding myself not turning the handle, because a sudden overpowering sense of dread had taken hold of me.
It was a feeling which had gripped me before back when Xandra and I were moments away from yanking open the back door to the Putsley Bay petrol station. Back then, we had agreed on a plan to go in through the back of the petrol station, to then steal what food and other supplies we could get our hands on before making a get away.
But a sense of dread had gripped me tight, and I had backed out of the plan. Instead, because of my stupidity, I had decided to try paying for food without changing my appearance, without having a Piper Pass, and the whole thing had gone terribly wrong. To the point where the people inside the petrol station had tried to capture me via a citizen’s arrest, and two police officers had used taser guns on me.
I let go of the kitchen door handle.
“Slip?” Clang’s voice rang, “What’re you doing?”
I raised a hand as if to silently ask Clang to give me time to think. Regina stood behind him, her large eyes narrowing with both suspicion and worry.
The feeling of dread eased up just a little as I focused my full attention onto it.
What is it? I thought, trying to discern anything from within the dread which gripped me, Is it trying to tell me something?
I moved back into the kitchen and raised my slip-gloved hands onto the kitchen island to support some of my weight.
“You felt like this before,” said Regina, “Back in Putsley Bay, remember?”
“Yeah,” I said, softly, my voice still carrying the extra resonance I used the power to add to disguise my real voice.
“Back then,” I said, “I thought the feeling was because I felt bad about breaking into the petrol station. I decided to listen to the feeling, and then everything went wrong, didn’t it?”
“Then maybe its nothing,” Clang’s voice rang.
“Maybe,” I said.
But I didn’t believe it. I put a hand to my slip-suit-covered chest, feeling the soft yet firm sinew-ridges there.
I decided then and there that I needed to know if there really was anything to this sense of dread, or if it was just me having yet another mood swing.
Power, I thought, I want to know what this feeling means. Examine it, reveal it, open it up to me.
It seemed Clang was about to say something, perhaps to urge me to give up whatever I was doing and to go with him and Regina out of the kitchen. But Regina placed a hand on his shoulder, and must have given him a look to deter him from saying anything more.
After several moments of waiting the power finally kicked in, and attempted to do as I asked.
The dread, though felt all over, also existed like a large, brown, mist-like smudge in my mind’s eye.
The power, just like I had asked it to, took hold of my awareness of this smudge.
At the periphery of my vision I could still see the kitchen island I was looking down at, but at the centre of my vision was the smudge. My view of it intensified, and it seemed to grow closer, and in turn my eyes strained to look at it and my head fiercely ached.
The power drew upon my willpower, draining it. The smudge, in turn, resisted the penetrating force brought upon it by the power and the scrutiny of my gaze.
My teeth were gritted from my effort to perceive what I could of the smudge.
Then, just as I reached my limit to train the power on the smudge in my mind’s eye any longer, the smudge broke apart, becoming two pieces, then three.
Very quickly the number of visible pieces erupted until there were dozens, in a myriad of shapes, like scattered pieces of a puzzle.
And the power, and my mind, in tandem, seeing the scattered pieces in their unique shapes, was able to piece them back together not as a smudge, but as one large piece able to be understood.
I absorbed the meaning of this large piece and, since the meaning had been imparted from it, the piece disappeared, the power relented, and I fell back onto the kitchen floor in a daze.
The pressure in my head lifted and I let out several ragged breaths before regaining control of myself.
Clang and Regina hadn’t moved, but both watched me intently. I threw up my right arm and Clang, in turn, hoisted me to my feet.
Despite myself, a smile reached my face.
“What?” Clang’s voice rang.
He set a heavy hand on my shoulder and shook me a little, “Say something!” his voice rang.
“I see it,” I said, “I know their next move. Come with me.”
I raced through the mansion, bounding ahead, leading the way. Clang and Regina followed; Clang thundering along and Regina springing ahead of him.
I reached the first floor, moved acrobatically along the hallway, then dove into the classroom where I had done so much of my thinking and planning through the night.
I had already begun wiping the whiteboard clean and had a board marker pen in my hand by the time both hurried into the classroom.
Regina sprang against the hallway wall, twirled through the air, then landed in a squat position. She stood up, hands at her hips, her voluminous curly hair bouncing once atop her shoulders.
“You wanna explain what the big idea is?” said Regina, in an unimpressed squeak.
CRACK! CRACK! CRACK! CRACK!
Clang thundered down the hallway and entered the classroom so roughly he tore off some of the wooden door frame upon entering.
“What are you doing?!” his voice rang, loudly, “Are we in danger?”
“Yes,” I said, with a smile on my face, “Yes, we are.”
“We were going to get the supplies,” Clang’s voice rang, “Where’s the danger?”
“What happened down n’ the kitchen just now?” Regina squeaked.
“Alright,” I said, throwing my hands up, “I’ll explain. But I have to be quick. If I’m right, we don’t have much time before the danger gets here. Everything else can wait until I’ve said what I’ve got to say.”
“What do you mean?” Clang’s voice rang.
“Dude,” I said, pointing to the floor, “Sit down and I’ll explain – both of you.”
Clang and Regina faced each other, and then decided they were eager enough to know what I had to say to do as I asked. Regina crouched, putting her arms around her knees. Clang sat back, putting his hooded head against the rear wall.
“Out with it,” Clang’s voice rang.
There was a sudden silence in the classroom as I thought about how I might explain what I knew. I quickly found however that explaining it in simple terms wasn’t going to be so easy.
“The danger,” I said, my resonant voice filling up the small classroom space, “Is from The Sub-Divisioners.”
“We know that,” Clang’s voice rang.
“I know they’re a threat,” I said, “But they’re an immediate threat. Right now.”
“How?” Clang’s voice rang.
“Robert Hoffman, Chellam, and The Pied Pipers as a whole,” I said, “We know they have a plan to take the MICE from the Wedder Gorge facility and to turn them into their enforcers later down the line. That’s what the likes of Tiffany, Blain, Mikayla, etc, signed up for. Are you following?”
Both Clang and Regina nodded.
“Right,” I said, “But it’s not going to start with them. It’s going to start with the Sub-Divisioners. They’re going to find out how well they can make MICE obey their commands with a test-group first. That’s going to be the Sub-Divisioners.”
“Why would the Sub-Divisioners help ‘em?” Regina squeaked.
“Because they have blackmail on them,” I said.
I started to draw on the whiteboard to help illustrate my point. I drew the names of Robert Hoffman, Chellam, and the Pied Pipers, bunching them together. Then made a separate group for The Sub-Divisioners. And then wrote in big bold letters: BLACKMAIL.
“The Sub-Divisioners are juveniles for the most part. Some would also be sentenced as adults with criminal records,” I said, “What’s important is that they were sent to the Sub-Division, like you said, Clang, and there Chellam would have all the information they’d need to blackmail them. The most important blackmail of which would be any loved ones they had. If I know one thing about Chellam, it’s that they’re willing to do anything to maintain their monopoly over the world. They see us MICE, such as they call us, as a threat. So they’re going to do whatever they can to control us too. And if they can’t control us, they intend to destroy us.”
Clang and Regina seemed to be following so far.
“So,” I said, “I think very soon we’re going to encounter some of these Sub-Divisioners. And they’re going to come to us pretending as if they escaped confinement. Maybe they’ll even try and tell us that they’ve found other MICE on the run, and they’ll invite us to go along with them to a safe place. Then, when they have us right where they want us, they’ll turn on us, and try to either capture or destroy us. Or maybe they’ll straight up offer us to join up with Chellam again, like they have.”
“Why would they wanna do that?” Regina squeaked.
“Because,” I said, “The blackmailed Sub-Divisioners would rather work against us, than lose their loved ones. They’ll be in an impossible situation, and I expect most will give into Chellam’s demands. And the three of us have shown the likes of Robert Hoffman that we can survive on our own, despite how much they’ve tried to hunt us down already. The more we demonstrate we can survive, the more they’re going to respect and fear us. They’ll try to offer us to work for them again, and when we say no they’ll try and destroy us – again.”
“So this is what you saw just now?” Regina squeaked, “You had a vision or some’thang?”
“It wasn’t a vision,” I said, “It’s more like – I guess you could call it ‘intuition’. But I don’t wanna get caught up on that right now. We need to talk about what we’re going to have to do.”
Again, I waited for an objection from either Clang or Regina, but none came.
“Okay,” I said, “I can’t get into the project I’ve been working on. I’m calling it The Archetype Project. But there is one core element we need to talk about.”
I wrote the next three words in bold on the white board at a frantic pace, which read: OUR SECRET IDENTITIES.
“Listen,” I said, “It might already be too late, but it’s still worth a try. The number one weakness we all share right now is that we have loved ones who Chellam will go after if they know they can use them to blackmail us.”
“Too late?” Regina squeaked.
“I messed up,” I said, “I called my brother, so he knows I’m alive. There’s a good chance Chellam would know through him that I’m alive. If not that, then there’s a chance the Pied Piper officers that attacked us at the factories got a look at our faces. I don’t know if any of them had body cams, but if they did then they’d know I made it out of the Wedder Gorge facility.”
“Don’t forget the security cameras at the Putsley Bay petrol station,” Regina squeaked.
“Right,” I said, “They’ve got plenty of ways to know we’re on the run. Clang, they’ll know your brother handed himself in. And there’s a good chance they’ll have you ID’d from the factory incident.”
“I get this is about us not wanting to be blackmailed,” Clang’s voice rang, “But why talk about it now?”
“It might already be too late,” I said, “But it only means we have to take even greater precautions moving forward to hide our identities. Right now we’ve already come a long way to hiding our identities. But when the Sub-Divisioners arrive soon we can’t let them know who we are. If we do, then they’ll use that against us to hurt our families sooner, rather than later.”
“But you dun’no this,” Clang’s voice rang, “You’re just guessin’.”
“It’s just intuition,” I said, “But I can see it so clearly. We need to decide now, together, if we’re willing to commit to our secret identities. Because there’s no other way we’re going to be able to survive into the future if we don’t.”
“What’s the other option then?” Clang’s voice rang.
“Ain’t it obvious?” Regina squeaked, “We either agree to keep each other’s secret identities, or we have’ta go our own ways.”
“Exactly,” I said.
The white vapours and gold and silver particles swirling around Clang’s head slowed, as if delayed by his sudden intense introspection.
“It’s good with me,” Clang’s voice rang, “I’ll use ‘Clang’ from now on. I can commit to that for now.”
“For now?” Regina squeaked.
“Yeah,” Clang’s voice rang, “One day I’ll be The World’s Greatest Hero, but for now, because I’m not ready, I’ll take on a secret identity. When I’m strong enough to protect my family from Chellam, and the Peepers, then I’ll drop the secret identity.”
Regina lifted her head, her eyes searching the children’s table in front of her as she considered everything.
“Okay,” she said, “Me too.”
“But you can’t use ‘Regina’,” I said, “That names not going to be enough to cover your identity.”
“Why’s that?” Regina squeaked.
“Because I’m betting – X – told her parents about Regina. As unlikely as it might be for the Piper’s to figure out your real identity, you can’t put it past them to go to her parents and learn what they can. The stronger we get, the more they’re going to do anything they can to find our weak spots. As soon as they make the connection between X’s imaginary friend, Regina, and you, both toon-raccoons – see where I’m going with this?”
“Okay,” Regina squeaked, with a nod, “I’ll need’a diff’rent name.”
She put a clawed fingertip to her bottom lip, and then snapped her fingers, and smiled.
“I know just tha’ one,” she squeaked, “Toontastic. Miss Toontastic. That’ll be my name.”
“And you’re sure that won’t give X away?” I said.
“Crystal,” Regina squeaked, making an ‘okay’ sign with her hand and a very Xandra-like wink.
“To be clear,” I said, “This means we’re going to have to maintain our secret identities for each other moving forward. Absolute secrecy. It’ll have to be this way until the Chellam threat passes, if it ever does.”
Clang stood up first.
“Okay,” his voice rang.
He raised a hand forward, and then his voice rang again, saying, “I swear to protect our secret identities with my life.”
I put my hand in next, and said, “I swear to protect our secret identities with my life.”
And lastly, Regina, AKA Miss Toontastic, placed her hand over mine and Clang’s, and said, “I swear to protect our secret identities with my life.”
And it was then Miss Toontastic’s ears pricked.
“Someone’s coming,” she said.
I nodded, “They’re right on time.”
