The Suburb Beyond the Stars Read online

  They crossed the Atlantic Ocean in their hovering coracles and galleons. In the mountains of what is now Vermont, they founded a fabled kingdom called Norumbega. Beneath the hills they built palaces and cathedrals and the City of Gargoyles, with stone streets and squares where they held their weird games and rituals for many centuries. They lived there happily — practicing falconry in the forests, holding sub-aquatic jousts in mountain lakes, playing golf with greens and holes in other worlds — until one day when another eldritch race, the Thusser, came to challenge them.

  The Thusser wanted to rule over the Empire of Norumbega. They could tell it was built upon an interdimensional rift of great power. They wanted that power for themselves. They felt they would use it more cleverly than the Norumbegans, who spent their days strapping themselves to kites and designing beautiful boots. The Thusser decided they would take the kingdom by force. They began a devastating war, a siege of the mountain.

  The Norumbegans plated their highest peaks in metal and sent out airborne warships and dragonauts in goggles to drop bombs on the Thusser Horde crowded below. The Thusser built huge guns and marched in inexorable waves toward the battlements, hurling shot as large as hills at the armored summit.

  The siege would have gone on for years and would have exhausted both parties if they hadn’t come to a curious stalemate. The Norumbegans were losing — being somewhat too frivolous for a sustained siege. They called a cease-fire and parleyed with the Thusser, complaining that they were finding warfare (as they said) “too too dreadfully human.” The idea of making vital political and economic decisions based on how much enemy flesh one could ravage reminded them too much of the animals they’d left behind in the muck of the Old World. It was absurd. They wanted, instead, to decide the conflict on the basis of a much more arbitrary and trivial system. They wanted to play a game.

  Each generation, two human pawns were chosen to enter into some kind of a labyrinth. One (without knowing it) represented the Norumbegans; the other (also without knowing it) represented the Thusser. Each round, one team or the other would claim victory — and whichever human won would devise the puzzles and traps for the next round. At the end of all the rounds, the fate of the kingdom would be decided. Either the Norumbegans would take possession again, or the Thusser would sweep in and make it their own.

  In the meantime, while the Game was played, Norumbega would remain unoccupied by either team. The Norumbegans themselves went into exile in another world. The Thusser watched jealously over the Game from their haunts.

  And now it was Brian Thatz’s turn to create a round of the Game. He had won a victory for the Norumbegans. It was up to him to build a world into which he would, in several years, have to lead some hapless pair of players.

  When Brian and Gregory had played the Game, the whole thing had been arranged by Gregory’s cousin Prudence. She was a fan of Gothic novels, so she had created a round full of menacing servants, monsters in the woods, and mansions with turrets.

  Brian, on the other hand, loved old detective novels — hard-boiled stories in which sad men in trench coats leaned against brick walls, coughing on phlegm and watching the silhouettes of lovers on the window shades above. So he had decided he would create a supernatural mystery story, a set of strange puzzles that would lead his players — whoever they turned out to be — through the mean streets of Boston, down darkened alleyways, and into an underworld populated by gangster minotaurs and blond dames with wings.

  His workshop for the Game was a series of rooms in an old, unused art deco office building. It had been rented for him by an agent of the Norumbegans, a bitter elfin mechanic named Wee Sniggleping. Wee Sniggleping was in charge of arranging things according to Brian’s specifications and the complicated Rules. In his mountaintop workshop, he was building gangsters and molls, toughs and stooges, so they could eventually populate Brian’s round. When completed and installed, they would swagger and growl like real people.

  Wee Sniggleping and Brian had not yet refinished the office building. Above the front door, the stucco shadow of old lettering still read WORLDWIDE INDUSTRIAL BATTER CO. Inside, the afternoon light shone through cracked windows into a ruin of fallen plaster, graffiti, and chipped marble facing. Upstairs, there were floors of metal filing cabinets with drawers torn out, hallways where the wooden paneling had been smashed, and wires yanked out of the walls.

  But there was one office that had already been restored and prepared for the Game. On the pebbled glass window of the door was freshly painted NATE FLOCKTON — PRIVATE EYE. And inside was Brian’s headquarters.

  He and Gregory had turned it for the moment into a kind of clubhouse. There were huge ornate desks from a century before and some giant fake ferns. Gregory had hung plastic parrots and cockatoos on perches from the ceiling. The two found some horrible paintings in the garbage — Technicolor dogs with their tongues out and landscapes that looked like the surface of Venus after a neon storm — and hung them unevenly on the walls. Brian had brought over some boxes of his favorite books and an encyclopedia that he’d stuck in some church bookshelves.

  The upper half of a mechanical secretary — her lower half was just a set of metal struts — greeted them whenever they walked in. “Why, hi there, boys,” she would say. “Mr. Flockton ain’t in. You want I should take a message, or you okay just cooling your heels ‘til he gets back from whatever filthy joint he’s sunk in today?” There was no Mr. Flockton yet — Wee Sniggleping still had to build him, as well as twelve other assorted cops and crime lords. Even the secretary, Minnie, was still in her early stages and could say only a few things — but it was always exciting for Brian to see the world he had planned come together.

  Now, however, Brian was pacing around in the inner office while Gregory sat on the old couch, listening to his story.

  “You don’t think the Thusser were trying to find this place?” Gregory asked.

  “At first I thought that, but now I’m not sure,” said Brian. “I don’t think it makes sense. I know that they’re talking to Sniggleping and the Speculant about all the stuff we’re doing here. They must know where our headquarters are.”

  “Maybe they don’t.”

  “I don’t think it was just about tailing me.”

  “Yeah, the tail. You said he had blotchy cheeks?”

  “Like he’d had some kind of disease.”

  Brian looked down at Gregory. Gregory was smiling. Exasperated, Brian said, “What? What’s funny?”

  “Your tail has pimply cheeks. You have pimply cheeks on your tail.”

  “Gregory!” Brian protested. “I was almost killed.”

  “I’m sorry,” Gregory said. He tried to drop his smile.

  “Stop joking.”

  “I’ve stopped. Look. Here’s me serious.”

  Gregory took on the expression of an undertaker who’d once dreamed of dancing on Broadway.

  Brian frowned and absently knocked on one of the encyclopedias, trying to calm down. Sometimes he hated it that Gregory never took anything seriously. It made him feel like he was some dull boy in knee socks, some twerp bringing down a great party by complaining about almost being killed. He knew that if Gregory had been confronted with squalling evil on the T, there’d be a great story with lots of sly jokes, and it would sound like Gregory was a hero, calm and cool. And if it could be told to other people, kids would be gathered around Gregory like they always were, boys slapping his arms, girls touching their hair, smiling.

  And of course, Brian realized, he himself would be one of the people who’d laugh at Gregory’s jokes. Because that was what was great about Gregory: He never gave up. He never stopped laughing. He balanced Brian’s thoughtful frown. That’s what made the two of them a good team.

  Brian sighed and knocked again on the encyclopedias. He said, “I don’t think that they were just trying to follow me. I think their plan all along was to get me alone and kill me.”

  “Are you kidding? You really think they would have killed y
ou? Completely?”

  “Yes, Gregory! They tried! I’m telling you, this monster really was inches from tearing me apart!”

  “Wow.” Gregory nodded. “It’s great that you thought of that third rail trick.” He shook his head. He looked genuinely uneasy.

  Brian said, “I’m lucky I didn’t trip or something. I would’ve died, too. I can’t even think about it.”

  “I know. Dude.”

  “It’s so weird. I can’t tell my parents. They’d think the whole thing was crazy. Here I am being threatened, and I can’t tell anyone. Except you. And maybe Prudence. She’d understand.”

  “What are we going to do?”

  Brian was glad Gregory had said we. He replied, “We have to talk to Prudence.”

  “I haven’t heard from her in a week or so.”

  “I know,” said Brian. “I’ve tried on e-mail and the mirror. She doesn’t respond.” He sat down heavily on the couch. “Now I’m worried about her, too. Gregory, what if they got her?”

  “Why would they ‘get her’?” asked Gregory. “She’s no longer involved with the Game. She was in charge of the last round. And there’s no reason for them to attack you, either. You’re just the, I don’t know, referee or something.”

  Brian insisted, “We have to get through to her. She’s the only one who might know what to do. I’m terrified even to walk home.”

  “I’ll go with you … as long as I don’t have to carry the cello.”

  Brian bit his lip. “If we can’t get through to Prudence in a couple of days, we’re going to have to go up there and see what’s happened to her.”

  Gregory nodded.

  As Brian dialed Prudence, and listened to the phone ring and ring and go to the message, they looked around their office — the rubber plants, the glass-eyed cockatoos. Suddenly it didn’t look as cozy as it once had. They were aware of how much of the building was empty and how quickly evening was falling outside.

  Usually Brian and Prudence wrote notes to each other every few days. Brian was working his way through the huge tomes that explained the Game’s Rules. Though they had been translated into English at some point in the last century, they were not easy to read. Quite often, Brian sent Prudence e-mails like the following:

  From: [email protected]

  To: [email protected]

  Subject: The Manual of Fouls

  Hi, Prudence,

  Sorry to ask another question, but I’m really confused. On page 52 of the Manual of Fouls there’s a chart of “Powers Reserved to Tertiary Personae” and I don’t really get the restrictions on movement. How are those equations supposed to be used?

  I feel really stupid. I’m worried that I just can’t do this. I’ll never understand all this stuff.

  Brian

  And Prudence would write back things like:

  From: [email protected]

  To: [email protected]

  Subject: Re: The Manual of Fouls

  Hey, Squirt!

  Who in this world actually understands what they’re doing? I don’t. I just spent forty-five minutes trying to sort laundry. They tell you not to mix darks and lights, but WHAT DO YOU DO WITH TARTAN? It is mixed with itself.

  Even worse: The official Norumbegan tartan contains a stripe of some color invisible to the human eye. It’s a color called “dweomer-pale.” What does it look like? sez you. How the heck should I know? sez I. It’s invisible to the human eye. I just don’t want it to run and muck up my burgundy.

  The skirt’s wool. I guess I should probably wash it by itself anyway.

  Oh. Wait. You don’t care.

  What I’m trying to say, Scooter, is that we’re all confused, and you’re smarter than most of us. You won the Game for a reason — and your plan for the next round is amazing. I love the thought you’re putting into this mystery scenario. It’s going to be incredibly cool. I can tell that Gregory is green with envy. It shall rock. Don’t forget that a lot of the details you’re worried about will be taken care of by Snig and the Speculant and their cronies a few years from now. You’ll have plenty of time to read the manuals.

  So stop biting the rope. You will be fine.

  Okay. To answer your particular question about powers of movement, what I remember goes sumfin like this….

  And then she’d tell him what she knew.

  But Brian hadn’t heard from her in at least a week. She hadn’t responded to any of his recent questions. He’d assumed that she was just busy.

  Gregory occasionally had a little back-and-forth with her, teasing her about how boring she was, making jokes about how Brian was in love with her. Not for a while, though. There hadn’t been a peep from her.

  Brian was worried now. Very worried.

  He and Gregory didn’t laugh or joke as they locked up the office. (“Night, boys,” said the automaton at the desk. “I’ll tell Nate you were snooping in his donut drawer, soon as he gets back.”) They didn’t talk as they made their way through the dark interior of the Industrial Batter Co. Building, kicking their way through plaster trash.

  Gregory walked out the front door first. He looked around carefully before he stepped away and let Brian out into the light of the street. He walked with Brian to the Thatzes’ apartment building, and left Brian there. Throughout the evening, they exchanged nervous messages to check on each other.

  Even at home, Brian didn’t feel safe. His family’s apartment was always noisy. It was right over a main road, so all night, there were cars and the upshifting of trucks. The noise of the traffic meant that Brian’s parents always had to yell, which they would have done anyway, since they were those kind of people: friendly and loud.

  Usually the grinding wash of the graveyard-shift commute put Brian to sleep as if it were some familiar river. The shouting of his parents from room to room (“Hey! Have you read this article on greens? Why don’t we eat more greens?”) was usually reassuring.

  But now Brian heard only the sounds masked by the traffic. He heard things creak and tick. He heard what might be footsteps in the early hours of the morning. He was sure that something was out to get him.

  He thought of the monsters he’d encountered in the Vermont woods — the Basement Lurker, like a childhood nightmare, hardly glimpsed save for the red jaws, the claws that snatched; the blind ogre Snarth, who fumbled through subterranean depths; and, most horrifying of all, Gelt the Winnower (haunter of Brian’s dreams for almost a year now), some production of the Thusser, a body like a man’s with spikes driven through it and, where each spike hit flesh, a long, silver cord that snaked out, sentient. Gelt felt through those cords — and could use them to snare, strangle, and dismember.

  The little ticks of the building settling … the trickle of water through pipes as neighbors flushed … the grunt of flexing floorboards … all of these sounded to Brian like Gelt or one of his awful brethren feeling his way through the dark apartment, lips moving, eyes blank. The clock glowed. It shifted from 3:31 to 3:32.

  Brian lay on his back and stared at the ceiling. He did not have the courage to turn onto his side.

  Gregory walked the rest of the way home, peering anxiously into bushes. He hoped he wasn’t monster bait. Brian had won the Game, after all — Gregory hadn’t.

  At home, he couldn’t concentrate on his homework. He kept texting Brian to make sure nothing had happened — nothing had kicked through a window or clambered up the fire escape.

  Gregory cycled through Prudence’s recent e-mails. No hint of a trip. No mention that she was shipping out to Turkey for a few weeks of sunshine and döner kebab. Nothing but bright, cheery reports of cooking triumphs and plumbing disasters. A few rude barbs about Gregory hitting puberty “like a stinkbug on a windshield.”

  Gregory tried her again on the phone. No answer. He talked to his parents. They hadn’t heard anything from her.

  If something had happened to her, he realized with a sinking heart, it had happened without her seeing that it was coming.
>
  He sank down onto his desk chair and crossed his arms. Prudence was Gregory’s favorite family member. Most of the fam came from Connecticut; they spent their Thanksgivings comparing the first-class cabins of international airlines and trading tips about where to buy swordfish steaks or boar butter in “the City,” by which they meant New York. Prudence was the only one with a sense of humor. Well, she was the only one who’d laughed when Gregory rigged the roast turkey to scream.

  When Gregory pictured himself older — an old man — sitting at the head of the table with his own children and grandchildren cowering in front of his own screaming turkey, he pictured their Auntie Prude at the same table, after a lifetime of ribbing each other at weddings and irritating the cousins. They’d have jokes, passwords, stories they could tell.

  Weeks often went by without her calling. So maybe nothing was wrong. Maybe she just wasn’t answering her phone. But maybe something awful had happened, and it had fallen upon her so quickly and so savagely she didn’t have time to call for help.

  Gregory sat at his desk and played with pennies. The night outside his windows got thicker.

  Brian was exhausted the next day. He’d hardly slept. At Newbury Comics, where kids tended to gather, Brian watched as Gregory held court like usual, surrounded by friends. Crowds were Gregory’s natural element. When some new bud made a crack about Brian Thatz looking like he was about to nod off, Brian just stood blinking and feeling ashamed and not knowing what to say. Gregory came to his rescue. “Cut Bri-Bri some slack. He had a rough day yesterday.”

  “Playing his cello?”

  “No,” said Gregory. “Fighting off a two-headed monster in the subway. It’s a tough neighborhood.”

  “He’s chubby for a master of the martial arts.”

  “He used his cunning wiles,” said Gregory, tapping his forehead. “He electrocuted the monster on the third rail. Three rails, two heads, one winner.” He yanked up Brian’s hand in victory.

  And everyone grinned. They thought Gregory was a card.