The Cypher Read online

  A task his dad used to do.

  Like Morgan, Thomas’s dad had been an accountant. He’d always worked for city-based companies until his maternal grandmother passed away. He’d moved to Fullton, Ohio to help with the house and other legal issues, and fell in love with the easy-going and slower pace of the small town. Fullton was Thomas’s mother’s hometown, and it made it easy for Thomas’s father to move his newly-formed family over to Fullton. Thomas had been born in Carlsbad, but he was raised in Ohio.

  His dad used to say that news from the world came from T.V. and the Internet. But the local news and business opportunities were always in the newspaper.

  Being their only child, Thomas’s parents decided that Thomas should be close to his grandfather. Grandpa spent at least a month every summer in Ohio with them; they in turn visited Carlsbad during Christmas, and, they took trips together at every opportunity they could during the year.

  Ever since Thomas’s parents had disappeared, Morgan had been searching for a job. Between his retirement fund, his savings and the rent he was cashing for Thomas’s house in Ohio they had more than enough to make ends meet. Thomas’s parents had life insurance, but since they had disappeared without a trace, the insurance could defer payment for up to seven years until they were presumed dead by law. Neither Morgan nor Thomas had pressed the issue; they wanted to believe they were still alive, somewhere.

  Grandpa entered the kitchen “Good morning.” he said ready to job hunt. Suited and clean-shaven, he carried a manila envelope with his resume in one hand, and a fresh musky odor seemed to follow his every movement.

  “Morning,” Thomas poured more milk in the bowl while his grandpa mixed egg whites, oatmeal, butter and heated it up in the microwave. “That smells horrible, Gramps.”

  “It’s good for the heart, and low on sugar. You better start taking care now, diabetes is hereditary.”

  “Come on Gramps!” Thomas blurted with a mouthful of cereal. “Thanks for ruining breakfast!”

  “I’m just saying.” He sat opposite of Thomas and dug into his oatmeal.

  Thomas was tired of seeing his grandfather go out every day on two or three interviews. They didn’t need the money, but grandpa insisted that it was to secure a better education for Thomas. “Any news?” he asked.

  Grandpa sighed before taking another spoonful of oatmeal.

  “So?” Thomas asked again. He wasn’t going to let Grandpa linger too much on self pity. But he also hated seeing him get hit in the face again and again. And since grandpa wasn’t going to concede, Thomas tried to get him to use the Internet, but he got tired of the job-hunting websites very quickly. He preferred the old-fashioned way, so every weekend he would buy newspapers and follow printed leads.

  “Same old…” Morgan replied. “Everything’s fine on the phone, but when they meet me and see that I’m a little older, they smile and say that they’ll call if a position opens.”

  “You’re a little more than older, Gramps,” Thomas teased. They had been living together for more than eight months and teasing Gramps about his age had always been his dad’s favorite pastime, so now Thomas had taken the task for himself.

  “It keeps the old man sharp. Makes the blood run a little hotter. Promise you’ll do the same to me when it’s my time,” his dad joked with him one night.

  He was now honoring that promise with his grandpa.

  “And you should respect your elders more,” Morgan teased back, pointing with the spoon. “Age brings wisdom.”

  “Then they would pick you immediately because you’re ultra-super-duper wise.” Thomas snorted and spurt milk out of his mouth. His grandfather always seemed to set himself up for that one.

  “Yeah. Yeah. Laugh! I see you as I saw myself once. You see me as you will be seen,” Morgan said seriously.

  Thomas stopped laughing for a second. “That doesn’t make any sense.”

  Morgan bit his lip. “I said it wrong. Your grandmother used to say that all the time.”

  Thomas had never met his Grandmother. There were plenty of pictures and stories about her and his Dad always said that Thomas had inherited her dark hair and eyes. Of her native Spanish, Thomas only knew a couple of words, mostly curse words.

  “Anyway…” Morgan took another bite of his breakfast. Thomas stopped laughing. He’d learned that a couple of jokes about age were okay, but when his grandfather said “anyway” it meant that they were done.

  “So where are you going today?” Thomas changed the subject.

  “Let’s find out, can you give me a hand?” Morgan tossed a couple of papers toward Thomas and they circled the accounting and management jobs offered on the paper.

  There weren’t that many.

  Halfway through the third paper Thomas found an ad that only had symbols. The logo was cool so he circled it for grandpa to see. It was surely one of those ads for secret parties or a practical joke.

  “Check this one out, Gramps. This could be the one.”

  He handed it to Grandpa expecting to get a smile, but instead his grandfather read through the ad.

  “You really think I’d be a good librarian?” his grandfather asked, his brow furrowed.

  “A what?”

  “A librarian,” he handed Thomas back the ad. “Do I look like a librarian?”

  Thomas took another look at the ad, ready to share a laugh with grandpa, but instead, he saw that the ad had somehow changed.

  “How much do you think an assistant librarian can make?” grandpa asked. “It might be worth looking into.”

  “This isn’t the same page I gave you, is it?” Thomas searched for the ad with the symbols – he flipped the page around, but it wasn’t there. The ad he had circled was the one he was reading, except it was in English now.

  “Getting late. See you later,” Morgan said as he scurried through the kitchen and left the house. “Clean up your room,” he screamed before he slammed the front door.

  “Sure, Gramps.” Thomas mumbled. He stared for a long time at the ad. Maybe his grandfather had set him up and was now having a laugh at his expense. After a few minutes, he crumpled the page and threw it in the trash.

  He went upstairs and picked up his room, and then went outside to their small yard to read in the lawn chair.

  He would have loved to go to the beach, which was only three blocks away, but if a police officer asked him what he was doing out of school he could get in even more trouble than he was already in. Instead, he resigned himself to spending the week at home either reading or playing on the computer.

  After some time, he went into the kitchen for a glass of water and glanced at the trashcan, the crumpled newspaper still at the top of the heap. What if he had read it wrong the first time? Or what if there was a duplicate logo on another page with symbols instead of letters?

  Suddenly his cell phone beeped. Another text message.

  He knew that Killjoy had done him a favor. He’d gotten text after text from people he didn’t know existed after she had suspended him. His visit with Killjoy had turned him into something like a celebrity in school, one of those few survivors that had faced Killjoy and remained in school, and everyone wanted to know the story.

  He’d only given his number to two people, Christina, a blonde girl who somehow needed to have all his information: Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and other more obscure Internet social media that he didn’t have and some he didn’t even know existed. The other person he gave his number to was Trevor, a kid that the science teacher had assigned him as project partner. He guessed that Christina had probably become his popularity manager somehow.

  Thomas didn’t like texting that much, but he had to send something back or his newfound popularity would go sour. He sent a mass text with just “tell u ltr,” and he sat down to figure out a story about his interview with Killjoy that would be a little more edgy and defiant than what it had been. Something that would uphold Killjoy’s reputation too.

  The thought of the crumpled newspaper wa
s replaced by T.V., videogames, and the usual chores around the house that grandpa had assigned. Without being in school, the day seemed to crawl and Thomas was about to fall sleep while watching a show when Grandpa called.

  “So how’d it go?” Thomas yawned through the phone.

  “The same,” Grandpa sighed dejectedly. “Whatever you do Thomas, don’t grow old.”

  “We’ll have better luck tomorrow.”

  “I know, see you in twenty. You need anything from the store?”

  “I’m okay, Gramps.”

  His grandfather sounded so depressed. Finding a job had become a crusade, almost as if his grandfather was making up for his parents’ disappearance. It had been Gramps who’d given his parents the trip of a lifetime. A two-month private cruise trip from New Zealand to China making port calls along the way. It had been his Grandmother’s dream to take that trip. But with her gone, grandpa had decided to give it to Thomas’s parents as an anniversary present.

  The videos, photos and calls had come in since the first day of the cruise, and grandpa was incredibly happy that someone was making the trip grandma always wanted, plus, he got to stay with Thomas in Ohio for the two months it would take them to return.

  Thomas kept the last picture they sent in his room. They were in the bow of the tri-masted Schooner; his father was hugging his mother by the waist and she was glowing. They were sharing a laugh as the wind blew away his mother’s hat, a sliver of the hat could still be seen in the edge of the picture.

  The next day a representative of the cruise called. The ship had vanished with all hands on board. There was no S.O.S. No warning or distress call, and no debris were ever found. There was no trace of the thirty-five passengers or the nine crewmen. It had simply vanished.

  It was no help at all that it had happened in a stretch of ocean the Japanese called the “Devil’s Sea” the Eastern version of the Bermuda triangle.

  Thomas didn’t want his grandfather to be hurt. He had taken care of Thomas since his parent’s disappearance. He had to help him find a job, any job that would take him.

  A faint crackling sound came from the wastebasket. The newspaper he had crumpled into a ball unfolded a little bit.

  He grabbed the newspaper page and found the ad. Somehow it seemed different than the one he’d read this morning. More urgent.

  Odd phone number.

  Thomas dialed; it couldn’t hurt. It only rang once before a girl with a sweet voice answered. “Guardians Incorporated. How can I help you?”

  “Hello, I read your ad in the newspaper.”

  “Which one?”

  “The Assistant Librarian.”

  “You have a nice voice.” The girl on the other side seemed to be really interested in him, even flirting through the phone.

  “Thank you, uhm, you too.”

  A long pause.

  “Do you want to apply?”

  “It’s still available?”

  “Yes, it is.”

  “Can I set up an interview for tomorrow?”

  A longer pause. “I shouldn’t say this but if you really want the job you should come in today. There’re a couple of people already scheduled tomorrow.”

  “Well, uh, sure, where’s your office?”

  “I can give you directions. Where are you?”

  “At home,” Thomas blurted and the girl giggled.

  “I mean what street?”

  “Mulberry Tree Lane. On Carlsbad.”

  “That’s great, you’re just two blocks away.”

  “You’re on Sycamore?”

  “Well, two and a half. Just drive left from your house and two and a half blocks away and you’ll see two brick columns and the private road on your left. The street name is Pervagus Road. Just follow it until you reach the mansion. Got it?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Great, what’s your name so I can put you on the list.”

  “My name is Morgan Byrne,” he lied. “I’m seventy two years old,” he added.

  He expected another pause but the girl answered immediately, “You don’t sound seventy two.”

  He heard Grandpa’s car pulling up the driveway. “But I am,” he said. “Does it matter?”

  “For the job? No. You can be ninety eight or say… fifteen and you’ll still get it.”

  Grandpa opened the front door. “I’m home,” he yelled.

  “At what time should I come in for the interview?”

  “It’s five and a quarter, let’s say in fifteen minutes?” the girl said.

  “Great, thank you very much.” Thomas hung up the phone just as his grandfather entered the kitchen.

  “I brought some hummus,” Grandpa said as he lifted a bag from the supermarket. “And popcorn.”

  “That’s great Gramps, but we’ve got to go.” Thomas grabbed the grocery bag and placed the hummus in the fridge.

  “Go? Where to?”

  “Your interview,” Thomas said pushing his grandfather out the door.

  Pervagus Mansion

  Finding the two columns wasn’t hard at all. They both wondered how they had missed them before. They were right there — two brick columns between two houses marking the entrance to Pervagus Road. The brick wall extended to where the road opened up after the properties in front.

  The wall was topped with black cast iron, and small stone gargoyles sat on top of each column. The road ended at a large iron fence and they could see a huge brick mansion beyond.

  Thomas felt like he was in front of a postcard taken from an old European castle. The stone gargoyles sitting on the columns by the fence were huge and looked ready to pounce down from their posts should the need arise.

  The mansion looked like those Thomas had seen on T.V. or in movies. It belonged in old countries like England or France, not in Carlsbad, California, and especially not just two blocks away from his house, on streets he skateboarded through almost every day.

  “Ready?” His grandfather lowered the window and extended a hand toward the ringer. A sign read, “Welcome to Pervagus Mansion,” and an Egyptian eye symbol was etched in a metal plate – the same eye that was on the ad.

  Thomas felt like the gargoyles perched on each side of the gate were analyzing them. A chill ran down his spine.

  “Wait,” Thomas said. He swallowed a lump in his throat. “What do you think about this place?”

  “What do you mean?” Grandpa said fixing his glasses.

  “It’s two streets away from the house,” Thomas said. “How come we’ve never seen it?”

  “Don’t ask me. You lost the remote for three days under the couch.”

  “That’s different.” Thomas peeked at the gargoyles. They seemed to be waiting for an excuse to move. “Just look at this place…” he said, his voice trailing off as he leaned forward, taking a peek at the side of the mansion. The buildings were surrounded by trails and fountains, and then opened to a forest beyond. The mansion felt out of place and Thomas tried to remember how far the rows of houses extended to the sides and back of the mansion. From this angle, he was completely sure that the mansion grounds reached at least as far as his backyard. Even beyond. “Do you think it goes all the way to the beach?”

  “So? Wealthy people love the beach, and these guys are definitely wealthy. It’s just a big house.”

  “Big? This thing is huge.”

  “It’s just an interview, Tom, and you set it up. I can take you home if you want.”

  “Do you want me to go?”

  “Do you?” Grandpa asked tilting his head in a way that made Thomas feel like a little kid.

  “No.”

  “Then let’s do it.” Morgan checked his watch. They didn’t have time to spare.

  “I don’t know, gramps,” Thomas stopped him again. “I don’t like it.”

  “Why? Morgan seemed amused. “Because of these guys?”

  He glimpsed at the gargoyles above them. The statues resembled a bat and a devil, their wings extended, covering their bodies, but their c
laws dug deep into the bricks and their tails curled around the column. They were different though, the one on the right was a little fatter than the other and its horns were more bull-like.

  “I just don’t like it. Can we try somewhere else, please?” The ad in the paper had seemed a little strange, and now that he thought about it, the girl on the phone had also been too eager to get him in for an interview.

  He didn’t feel threatened, just anxious, like when his mother taught him how to ride a bike, or the first time he jumped on top of a skateboard. She’d always encouraged him to try new things, but she’d always been big on safety too. “You don’t just rush into something because everyone does it or it looks nice, Tom!” She drilled him every time she could. “Stop, if only for a second and think, what could happen?”

  This definitely felt like one of those times.

  Morgan sighed. This might be the best chance so far to get a job, but he couldn’t just dismiss Thomas’s opinion. Especially since Thomas had set up the appointment.

  “I guess there are other opportunities elsewhere,” Grandpa said as he put the car in reverse.

  “Morgan Byrne.” A grainy voice startled them.

  The voice was coming from the gargoyle, its eyes glimmering. Surely from a hidden intercom and camera inside.

  “You’re almost late,” the voice continued. “Park right at the entrance. You’re expected.”

  Suddenly, the wrought iron gates opened. A large fountain sat in the middle of the patio, and more gargoyles on every corner of the roof and by all the chimneys. A circular stained glass window of the Egyptian eye took up the entire front of the mansion.

  Morgan patted Thomas on the shoulder. “We can’t just leave now, can we? We are expected,” he whispered mockingly.

  The moment to wait and think was gone.

  “Maybe we can reschedule,” Thomas whispered back but grandpa dismissed him with a little nod.