Chapter 43

"Hey, can I ask you something?" Richie said.

Melinda flinched and almost bumped into him as they walked up Green Avenue. "What?"

"Why the hell do you keep looking at me like that?"

Melinda frowned. "Looking at you like what?"

"Like I'm gonna drag you into some dark alley and fuckin' rape you or something."

"Oh, I have not! Anyway, there's hardly any dark alleys in this part of town."

"That ain't the point," Richie said. "Stop sounding like your nerd boyfriend."

Melinda sighed. "Look, I'm not thinking that about you, okay? I mean..." Her eyes flicked over his body. "It's ... it's not like I don't want to do it again with you."

"Yeah, but I made you want that."

Melinda stared, her eyes wide. "You did? And you're admitting it?"

Richie shrugged. "Yeah, so? What's the big freakin' deal?"

"And what if I told you to stop it?"

Richie smirked. "I'm not in your head now. It just sorta got planted in there."

"So what if I told you to unplant it?"

"You want me to?"

Melinda pouted and folded her arms. "That's not a fair question."

"Why the fuck not?"

"Because if I try to answer that, I don't know if it's what I really want! See, this is what I hate about all this mind control stuff. It gets to where I don't know what's me anymore."

Richie failed to suppress a grin. "So if I did make you answer it, you'd tell me you don't want me to get rid of it?"

"Okay, fine, I probably wouldn't tell you to remove it. Satisfied?"

"Yep."

"God, you're impossible."

"Nope. I'm just gettin' sick of being a phony, that's all."

Melinda gave him a questioning look.

"Look, I don't want to make girls into slaves anymore, okay?" Richie said, speaking a half-truth at best. "And I want to send this Darkness shit packing. But guess what? I like to fuck."

"So you plant stuff in my head just to get it?"

"Crying out loud, it wasn't even me that started it. I don't understand any of this supernatural crap. I just know that we had to do this, just like Jason and Cassie had to do it. I don't think I coulda done it that easily without that going on."

Melinda paused, her eyes shimmering for a moment. She let out a windy sigh when no suitable reply would come to her. She looked down the street as her house came into view around the curve of the road.

"I never tried to get into your head before today, Melinda," Richie said. "Not fucking once since the House."

"You wanted to, though, right?" Melinda asked, her voice not quite as sharp as before.

"Yeah, maybe I did," Richie said. "Okay, yeah, I really did. You may be whiny sometimes, but when you're naked you look hot."

Melinda came to a dead stop. Richie took another step ahead of her before he stopped and turned towards her. "You think I'm hot?" Melinda asked in a softer voice.

"Yeah."

Melinda turned her gaze from Richie, perplexed.

"What, you thought you're not?"

Melinda shook her head. "I just never had anyone say that about me before. It's always Heather that's the hot one, and I'm just her baby sister."

Richie smirked. "Well, mebbe hotness runs in your family or something."

Melinda rolled her eyes but could not suppress a weak grin.

"I mean, c'mon, you got your sister and her big boobs, and I've seen your mother."

"Oh, eww, don't bring her into--"

"And you're starting to sport a pair yourself."

"News flash, Richie! There's more to a girl than her boobs."

Richie grinned. "Yeah, there's her pussy, too."

Melinda shook her head. "Why do I bother?"

Richie grabbed her arm when she tried to turn away. Her hair slapped his shoulder as she spun around. "Hey, I'm jokin', okay? Lighten the fuck up."

The cross look on Melinda's face was automatic and did not last long. "Everybody seems to be telling me that now."

"Mebbe you should start listening."

"I'm trying."

"Yeah, I know. Sorry I'm such an asshole about things," Richie drawled. He glanced up the street. "We better call it quits here. Dunno if your mother would think anything of me walking with you."

Melinda nodded. "Hey, maybe you can answer me something before you go."

Richie paused, then nodded once. "Fire away."

"What's with all this insight suddenly? I don't mean just now, I mean like the past two days or so. You never sounded this smart before."

"What, I sounded like a retard before?"

"No, I didn't mean that!" Melinda snapped. "I mean ... well you never said anything that would really help. Shit, that didn't come out right, either."

Richie waved his hand and managed to avoid a frown. He could have claimed he was far from dumb for hours and it would not make any difference to her or the other Harbingers, except maybe Jason. He shrugged again. "I dunno. Mebbe I just didn't have anything to say before and now I do."

"Oh, yeah, right."

"Then mebbe Jason created a smart pill in his secret nerd lab under his basement and I'm his test subject. Look, who cares? I'm in with you guys and that's what matters. Hey, I gotta go. Catch you tomorrow, okay?"

"Okay, Richie," Melinda said in a more contrite voice. She lingered for a minute as Richie walked ahead of her before she sprinted the final distance to her house.

At first, Jason was sure that the earliest opportunity to examine the data would not come until well into the evening. His mother was intent on having another "family night" that was not likely to end before his parents went to bed. The data had finished downloading during the afternoon, and Jason had just enough time to start a script running to parse them before his mother called him to kitchen duty.

Audrey had not counted on Henry arriving home late without a phone call to inform her. When he finally walked in just as dinner ended and claimed he still had paperwork to do before retiring for the evening, Audrey exploded. Soon Jason was ordered to his room, which he obeyed with alacrity.

It was hard to concentrate when the argument became a shouting match that fell silent only in the wake of slamming doors. He found morbid comfort in his parents' feud. Perhaps if the time ever came to enlighten his mother about her husband, she might be more willing to listen.

Jason studied the results of the data mining. He wanted to know all the transfers, withdrawals, suspensions, and expulsions that had occurred between Halloween and the end of the semester for every year starting with 1985 to the present.

This left him with far more information than he had expected. Haven's population was largely static, and its demographics had not changed very much over the past few decades. Thus the amount of reshuffling he discovered surprised him. It forced him to dig deeper into the data. He found what he was looking for several hours later.

"The whole thing was only thinly disguised in the end, Cassie," Jason said into the phone as he looked at the tabulated results on his computer. "But this just proves how much of a fanatic he is about secrecy."

"Oh goodness! You mean he really has been doing this every year?" Cassie asked.

"Well, he did something, " Jason said. "Here, let me explain. Every year since at least 1985, there's been a rash of student shuffling going on at Haven High in the last months of the semester."

"Student shuffling? You mean moving them around to different classes or rotations?"

"No, I mean shuffling them out of the school entirely. Or bringing students in from another school, but that's just part of the cover. Other students are simply withdrawn for various reasons, usually a claim that the family is moving out of Haven, or they want to tutor the student privately."

"All right, I follow you so far," said Cassie. "What else?"

"Well, at first I was stymied because nothing stood out until I looked at who was taken out of the school. Every single year, without fail, the students that were either withdrawn or transferred out of the school included at least one sixteen year old girl."

"Oh no..."

"So then I started plugging their names into Google. Nothing. Or at least nothing relevant. Any hits I got were for people who coincidentally shared the same name, but their age was wrong, or their past was documented enough to show no relationship to Haven. These girls simply disappeared. That's the only explanation that makes sense. Not even someone like Victor can delete that much information from the entire internet."

A despondent sigh sounded in Jason's ear. "This is a nightmare," Cassie murmured. "This really is like some horror movie, isn't it? At least it feels that way to me."

Jason wanted to act more sympathetic, but the thrill of discovery was still running hot. "I think that's the only relevant data point," Jason continued, voice quavering with the effort to dampen his excitement. "The other student reassignments resulted in people not dropping off the Earth like these girls did. They were likely feints so the removal of exactly one sixteen year old girl every year was not so obvious."

"Why didn't he just falsify the records?" Cassie asked. "Maybe we're reading too much into--"

Jason understood what Cassie was doing, but he couldn't allow it. The sooner they all woke up to the reality, the better. "Because that's not how he operates. Falsified records could be discovered. They might pop up in an audit. Someone curious about why a classmate was mysteriously absent from school might push things far enough to find it. Instead, he made sure he had a nice, legal paper-trail, with no one the wiser."

Cassie was silent for a long moment. When she spoke again, her voice was measured. "I hate to keep trying to poke holes in your theory, Jason, but how did he arrange for all those other transfers?"

"Huh? What do you mean."

"Well, think about it. Why would other parents just remove their children from the school on a whim?"

"Mann could have used his power on them."

"That many people, though?"

Jason paused, his mind racing. "He had help," he blurted.

Cassie met his statement with dubious silence.

"He would have to, wouldn't he? I mean, his power has limitations. It has to, or there's no need for the secrecy. Look how Ms. Hollis has some of his power. Mann must have given it to her."

"Wait, given it to her?"

"Yes, given. It fits, Cassie! She never exhibited anything close to this power before, has she? It started only after Mann arrived. And remember some of the stuff Melinda saw and heard from Heather, and what you felt from her. It all suggests to me that Ms. Hollis is inexperienced in using this power, or that she doesn't have as much as she wants. Hell, Cassie, the fact that we could push her out of Heather's mind in the first place--"

"Yes, I get it," Cassie said. The silence that followed was brief but heavy. "Jason, I don't like what you're implying. It means Victor could have a whole army of people in Haven to 'tweak' people's minds so they don't notice what he's doing."

"Or arrange for cover for his actions," Jason said, gesturing at his computer monitor. "Though not likely an army. It would have to be a more clandestine organization. That would fit with his style."

"But doesn't that mean Melinda could be in serious danger?"

Jason let out a long sigh. "I'm trying not to think about that."

"If Victor really has more people working for him, it won't be enough to have just Richie looking out for her."

"I know, I know." Jason ran a hand through his hair. "Maybe we can ... we can do this thing with the spell before that."

"I hate this, Jason," Cassie said, her voice quavering. "I hate being forced into something I don't really want to do!"

"Um, did you talk to Ned yet?"

"No. I've ... I've been avoiding him. I don't want him changing my mind for me, not yet. I want my head clear for what I'm going to be doing tonight with Gina."

"You have any idea how you're going to approach it?"

"All I know is that I'm not going to bother trying to change her conscious thoughts again. That just brings Victor's presence to me. That's the really creepy part, Jason. It's like he's got a piece of himself inside the people that he's trying to enslave. And, yes, it did feel like Ms. Hollis had something similar in Heather's head, just not as strong. So I guess you're right about her getting her power from Victor."

"Cassie, I'll try to find a way to get out of some of my chores tomorrow," Jason said. He was careful to hide the doubt from his voice. If his parents were as angry at each other as he suspected, it would not be defused by morning. The last thing his mother would tolerate would be any perception of slacking off.

"I'm going to have to come into town anyway." She sighed. "Melinda could never settle on what she wanted, so the costumer is going to have to go with what he has left that will fit her."

"So what does he have for her?"

"Melinda's not going to like it."

"What is it?"

Cassie told him.

Jason sucked in his lips and draped a hand over his mouth. He uttered a few awkward coughs, and his voice still quavered with amusement when he spoke. "Um, yeah, that's not really suited for her, is it?"

"She's going to want to kill me, isn't she?"

"Well, not if you have Blacknose the Pirate protecting you."

"Oh, this is not funny!"

Jason cleared his throat. "Um, sorry. It'll be okay, Cassie. I don't think any of us will have our mind on the party anyway."

"I know, I was just trying to find some way to make things a little brighter. Maybe I'll see what else the costumer has. Sometimes he gets an order canceled at the last minute. I better get going, Jason. I need to prepare myself for tonight."

"All right. Good luck. And please be careful."

"I'll try, Jason, but we're running out of time. I may have to start throwing caution to the wind."

Jason was about to comment how much she was starting to think like Ned, but thought better of it.

Heather slipped on her nightgown over lacy white underwear, trying to ignore her little sister. Melinda had emerged from the bathroom after brushing her teeth and was arranging her bed, moving about in unabashed nudity. Heather kept her gaze averted as she sat before her dresser, raising her eyes to the mirror only when she was sure she would see only her own reflection. She picked up the hair brush and eased it through her red locks.

Behind her, Melinda finished her task and dashed to the closet. She eyed her big sister as she slid hangers to one side, then cursed when she couldn't find her nightgown.

Heather's strokes with the hairbrush slackened. She stared at herself, her eyes sliding downward to her bra. Her breasts swelled hard against the cups, the flesh appearing about to spill over the tops with each intake of breath. As her arm moved, she was suddenly aware of the tightness of the bra and the tug of her panties in her folds.

The brush stopped. Her lips parted and allowed a soft, husky sigh to pass between them.

Melinda stomped back into the bathroom and found her nightgown behind the door, still hanging on the hook where she had left it that morning. She eyed Heather again as she returned. "At least your Aura is mostly gone."

Heather froze, then blinked rapidly. She turned her head. "Huh?"

Melinda raised an eyebrow. "You okay?"

"What? Yeah, I'm fine, runt. What is it?"

"Why are you wearing that?"

Heather rolled her eyes. "I wear this same nightgown every night."

"Yeah, but you don't wear that bra. Or those panties. When you wear anything at all, that is. I thought you were sleeping in the nude now anyway."

"So maybe I just wanted to do something different, okay?" Heather snapped.

"But why those? You haven't worn them in years."

"And you keep track of this? Some new underwear fetish of yours?"

"Oh shut up, bubblehead!" Melinda said. She jumped onto her bed and bounced a few times on the mattress. "Your boobs are too big for that old one anyway."

Heather glanced at herself in the mirror again. "I just ... um..."

"Ms. Bendon made you do that, didn't she?" Melinda demanded.

Heather threw down her brush and bolted up. "She didn't make me do a fucking thing," she grumbled. She reached under her nightgown and removed the bra, tossing it aside. Through the sheer nightgown, Melinda noticed that the nipples were erect. Heather flushed as the nightgown brushed against them. She took a quick breath and turned towards her bed.

"You can't do it, Heather," Melinda said.

"Do what, runt?" Heather grunted as she pulled back the covers.

"You can't be Ms. Bendon's slave. She'll turn you into another Marcie."

Heather sighed. "I really don't want to talk about this now. One crisis at a time, okay? Anyway, maybe we can do something about that before I have to go do it." She climbed into bed and stretched out on her stomach, propping up her face with her hands.

Melinda sat up cross-legged on her bed. "What, you mean the spell?"

"Yeah. Maybe we can use that power to ... I don't know, do something."

"That's not what we were going to use it for."

"So who left you in charge?" Heather said with a humorless smirk.

"That's not what I meant. We might be able to do it only once and we'll need it against the counselor."

Heather shrugged. "Who said it has to be only once?"

Melinda frowned. "And we keep using Diane like that?"

"Why not? She's our slave."

Melinda shook her head. "Oh no she isn't. She's your slave. I'm not involved in your sick little game."

Heather smiled. "No, she belongs to you, too."

"I'm not doing this Heather!" Melinda cried. "You're not going to--"

"Melinda, hush," Heather said. "Just be quiet for a minute and let me talk, okay?"

Melinda wanted to protest. She knew she should protest, but something tugged at the back of her mind and prevented her from speaking. She nodded once.

"I've been thinking about this ever since I got home," Heather began. "It's real simple, baby sis. We don't do this, and something real bad is going to happen."

"We already know he wants to take the Book," Melinda said in a weak voice.

"I'm not talking about that. I've been seeing pieces of that vision in my head at night. I don't think we're really getting what's going on."

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"I mean, yeah, Victor takes the Book, but there's something weird about the final bit of my vision, like what he's trying to do with it."

"You said he was fighting someone for it."

"No, you all said that," said Heather. "But I can't see anyone else there. I think he's alone."

Melinda frowned. "Then what--?"

"Melinda, I really didn't want to go off on that. The point is, I feel there's one more vision waiting that will tell me what's really happening. I'm not going to get that if I don't get enough power. We have to use Diane to do it."

Melinda stared. "I can't believe you just said that!"

"You don't like it?"

"Of course I don't like it! What kind of stupid question is that?"

"Even if you think we'll have to do it?"

"Yes, even if ... no, wait, I don't--"

"Even if it feels like the right thing to do?"

"But I don't ... I-I mean ... it can't be right," Melinda sputtered.

Heather smiled.

Melinda glared. "You're doing something to me!"

Heather shook her head. "You don't believe that."

"But ... b-but you have to be."

"Melinda, you know what happened with Diane and Ned?" Heather asked.

Melinda's eyes widened. She knew but could not bring herself to give voice to it.

"Diane fucked him because Ned told her to do it."

Melinda clenched a hand into a fist on her thigh, then slowly relaxed.

"Diane did it because she's a slave. It's that simple. She's Ned's slave." Heather grinned. "I told Diane to go home and frig herself silly after her parents go to bed. She's going to do it because she's my slave, too."

Melinda's eyes flicked over her sister, staring at the lingering wisp of Heather's Aura as if expecting to see it rear up like a snake and slither towards her. It remained weak and quiescent, doing little more than waft in placid swirls about Heather's body.