This choice: A quick conference with Caleb -- then rush home • Go Back...Chapter #37A Minion of Your Own by: Seuzz   You don't like being grounded, but you doubt you'd like playing Joshua Call any better. Being safe from him is good enough. Having him as a minion is an unexpected bonus—though one that makes you feel more than a little guilty.
"I can only stay out for ten minutes," you tell Caleb. "What happened?"
"It was like making the first minion, but a lot faster. I took Call's clothes off him—ychh—and poured the shit over him."
"With my hair in it, right?"
"Yeah," Caleb says wearily. "I couldn't forget that, not the way you were shitting yourself over it. I set the mess on fire and there was another big flash, but this time the fire burned for only a few seconds. Which left me crapping myself, but it didn't relight when I tried. Then I saw what it made."
He quivers a little. "It was like it turned him into stone. It was Call, but he was grayish-white all over, and hard like he'd been encased in concrete. That was creepy enough, but I kept expecting his eyes to pop open, like in a horror movie. Finally I worked up the nerve to put a mask on him. I didn't want him coming back in any kind of body I couldn't handle, so I took off Eva's mask and put it on him, and—" He points to Eva.
The girl has been huddling up against a wall, listening intently to all this, and looking like she's about to cry. "Eva?" you say to her gently. "Are you okay?"
"I don't think so," she says in a half-sob, and her lower lip trembles even harder.
"Joshua Call," you say. "You know who he is, right?"
A look of distaste comes over her face, and she nods.
"Do you know where he is?"
Distaste turns to a kind of despairing confusion. "I don't know," she wails. "I don't know what's going on! I was here, wherever here is—" She looks fearfully around the basement "—all day, and then you came in and Joshua came in, and Caleb came in and there was a fight, and I was—" She falters. "I was saying and doing stuff I really don't understand, and then it was like I passed out and when I woke up—" Tears well up in her eyes. "I really want to go home, Will," she wails. "I don't like whatever this is!"
"It's alright, Eva," you say soothingly. "You trust me, right?" She looks doubtful. "You trust me," you say more firmly, "and you'll let me help you."
Tears pour down her cheeks, but she visibly relaxes and doesn't fight you when you reach for her face. She just closes her eyes as your fingers close over her temple.
You chant some arcane syllables and pull. There's an obscure flurry of motion beneath your fingertips, and you stagger back a step as Eva transforms into a perfectly executed statue of Joshua Call.
It's just like Caleb had said. He is the color of concrete, and so minutely detailed that you'd think it was the asshole himself wearing some kind of makeup: you can see the very fine folds of skin when you peer closely, and minute acne eruptions. But when you touch and press him, his flesh is cold and unyielding, like rock. Even his hair has the texture of stone that has been carved.
"I really have to get home now," you say when you've recovered your voice. You snatch the grimoire up from the floor, where it had been laying open under Call. "I'll take a look at the spell, see what else it has to tell us."
"What do I do about ... him?"
"Leave him here. I'll come out tomorrow morning and—" You shiver. "And if it looks like it's okay I'll put Call's mask on him and send him out. But hide him, okay, in case Connor or Justin come out."
Your knees are knocking as you run up the stairs and outside. You feel horror and trepidation, but also a little excitement as you race home, which you reach without incident and beating your dad by almost twenty minutes.
The spell Caleb used on Call seems to have executed correctly, for you are able to turn the page over and read the rest of it. It confirms the deductions your quartet had made: it turned Call into the same kind of minion that you had made earlier, and it appears that it will work the same way. You're more cheerful—though still guilt-stricken over what you've done—as you go to bed, for tomorrow when you put Call's mask onto the minion, you will have an obedient Joshua Call at school with you.
Except that you've forgotten about that head wound.
* * * * *
"We were just horsing around and I tackled him, and we fell onto the ground together. We were on a patch of concrete, and I don't know what he hit, exactly, but—" You trail off.
The doctor's face is grave. "It looks like he hit the corner of something."
"There was some furniture around. Um, is it really serious?"
"I don't know. It might just be a minor concussion. You're sure you don't have any contact information for his family or relatives?"
"No. Can I stay with him?"
"He could stand to see a friendly face when he wakes up." The doctor moves off abruptly.
You're in a kind of holding room off the emergency room at the hospital. It was the only thing you could think to do after you put Call's mask onto the minion and he fell to the floor, unconscious, with blood oozing from his forehead. At least you had the presence of mind to yank the mask back off him.
It was seven thirty in the morning—an early start to the day, as you had much to do before school—and your mind raced frantically and uselessly for several minutes before you began to settle on a course of action. You slapped the mask of yourself onto the minion, and after getting it to shut up—which only took as long as for you to say "Shut up"—you made it put on Call's clothes and ride with you in your truck to the hospital. There you swapped masks on the minion—your mask for Call's—and rushed him into the emergency room. Grimly, you reflected that a medical emergency was a good excuse for missing school.
You're now sitting next to a gurney on which Call is propped up with his head bandaged. Worry soon turns to boredom, compounded by the fidgetiness that comes from trying not to pay attention to all the other sick and wounded people in the room. The doctor wasn't concerned enough to put Call into a room.
A couple of hours pass. You surf the web on your phone and text Caleb with an update and with answers to his questions. He helps out by going around to your classrooms and telling your teachers that you're out helping a friend who has a medical emergency. You back it up on your end by getting a signed note from the physician who has been looking after the case.
A little before noon, Call's eyes flicker open, and you summon a nurse. She restrains Call, gives him a brief account of his hitting his head, and gives him an examination. She goes off to get some painkillers, leaving you alone with your erstwhile adversary/minion.
He is, at first, naturally very hostile to the sight of you, and his face shows alarm, anger, and fear when he discovers that you are able to shut him up and make him be still just by telling him to do so. After that, you quietly impress upon him the story that he is to tell people: that he met you at the old Acheson elementary school for an exchange of homework, and that some playful rough-housing turned very physical; and that he is not angry with you.
The latter directive, which you assumed would have just controlled his mouth, seems to change his entire attitude. All the hostility drains from him, and he looks at you with a much friendlier mien. Tentatively, you try building on it, telling him that he likes you, that he wants to protect you, and that he wants to beat the shit out of anyone who hassles you. He'll start attending classes again, and he'll watch out for you in the hallways. He'll also defend you if any of his own friends start criticizing you or the way he's watching out for you. By the end, you're exchanging firm handshakes and exclamations of mutual esteem.
The doctor comes in a little later, and Call tells him the story that you'd given him to tell, and tells it with all the conviction of someone who really believes it. He gives a phone number for an aunt he's living with, so that she can be contacted.
There is only one problematic note during the examination and interview, before you leave. The doctor changes the dressing on the head wound, and frowns over it, and frowns over the wound itself, which doesn't look as nasty as it had when it was covered in fresh blood but still looks unpleasant. With beating heart you ask him if there's a problem. He doesn't answer, and only replaces the dressing. You notice, however, that he takes the old bandage with him instead of chucking it into the trash.
But there's no further reason to stay at the hospital, and you part with Joshua by telling him to call you later tonight to talk.
It looks like you might have the rest of the day free, if you chose to take it. You ought to head back to the school. But maybe you ought to tell Justin and Connor what happened with Call, and how you had to use the forbidden spell. There is an hour coming up when they will both be at Starbucks, and you could tell them then.  indicates the next chapter needs to be written. |
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