There was nobody in the backyard. At least not that they could see. They stared through the sliding glass door for ten minutes waiting for the mystery lady to show up, but she didn't appear. "Maybe she's waiting for you to go out first." Ruskin said, "She's probably hiding in the woods back there." The two of them squinted to peer past the fence into the trees beyond it. As kids, they had explored every inch of that small wood. Otto was certain he could find his way to the stream while blindfolded and probably even the log they used as a bridge to the other side. Beyond that was a community park where toddlers ran wild in the daytime and at night, teenagers drank beer and made out on the jungle gym.
If anything should go wrong tonight, Otto thought, I know how to run through there without stumbling and make it all the way to the convenience store on the far corner past the park before I have to stop and catch my breath in the back alleyway. "Listen, Ruskin," Otto said, "Remember what I told you. If we get caught or if anything happens, just blame it all on me. Tell them I told you I'd destroy the world if you didn't help me."
"Don't talk like that, man, you're scaring me."
"Yeah well, if I've learned anything in the past week, it's to be ready for anything," Otto said as he put his new nose casing on. "Stay in here," He said and opened the door to step outside.
As he walked towards the back fence, he saw a figure emerge from the woods. It was Nurse Vickers—with short, dark hair and no glasses. She was how he remembered, down to the scarf around her neck which matched her nose-button. She smiled as they approached each other.
"I wasn't sure it was really you," Otto said.
"I figured you'd be cautious," She said at the fence. "You've been through a lot." She held out her hand across the fence line for Otto to take hold.
"Both of you freeze and put your hands on your head!" Someone called from the neighbor's yard. Nurse Vickers grabbed Otto's hand in a flash and pushed her nose-button, but nothing happened. "Oh no," She said under her breath.
"What's wrong?" Otto asked.
"I said put your hands on your head!" The shadow called out again. There were more of them. Otto could see their forms moving in the darkness to surround him and Nurse Vickers.
"It's that man," Nurse Vickers said. "Otto, run!" And with that, she took off for the woods.
Otto jumped the fence and ran into the woods. Several shadowy forms followed after him, but he saw others branch off to follow Vickers. Running with a nose casing on his face was not as easy as running casing-free like he did the night he escaped HOME. Panting made his mouth dry out and exhaustion set in a lot faster. But his familiarity with the woods was an asset.
He heard Nurse Vickers trip nearby and immediately the law-enforcement were on top of her, telling her to stay still while they cuffed her. But Otto dodged trees and jumped the stream at the place he knew was easy to jump. Behind him, he heard the splashes of law-enforcement in the stream. Before they had managed to pull themselves up the stream bank, Otto was running across the park and towards the convenience store on the far corner, passing a group of teenagers on the playground. Maybe they'll slow law-enforcement down, he thought.
He made it to the alleyway and began zigzagging through the buildings. In the distance, he heard the sirens of the law-enforcement cars. They'd catch up to him soon. And it wouldn't take much to corner him. On his left, he heard music thumping in the walls and somewhere behind the music, there was talking and laughter. Otto changed directions as soon as he found a passage through to the main street and found a place that he had never seen before. It looked like a bar or a club with posters plastered all over its front windows, but outside, a group of people clad in heavy black clothing smoked cigarettes and talked loudly.
Otto stopped to catch his breath. He had a stitch in his side and his nose casing was making him feel like he was suffocating. When he thought he could talk, he motioned towards one of the smokers to get his attention. "What--" he gasped for air, "What is this place?"
"You ran all the way here just to ask what this place is?" A young man raised his pierced eyebrow at Otto.
"No, I..." Otto didn't know how to answer him. It was hard for him to talk, anyway. "I... Can I come in and get some water or something?" He felt in his back pockets to see if Ruskin left some money in there. There was none.
The group looked at each other and then shrugged their shoulders. "Are you under 18?" The same young man asked.
Otto nodded.
"Then here," he pointed towards a shadow at the door way, "He'll stamp your hand." The shadow moved towards Otto with an ink stamp in his hand.
Once inside, Otto found the bathroom and locked himself in it. The smokiness of the bar wasn't helping his breathing and he needed to take off the nose casing. The music, he found out, was coming from a live band playing in the back of the bar. They were awful. The off-key pounding hurt Otto's head. But he was too afraid to leave the bar. So he stood in his bathroom stall, leaning against the flimsy wall until the music stopped.
Tuesday
On Tuesday, it rained. It started out as a cold drizzle in the night that created a layer of tiny water droplets on Otto's clothes without sinking through the fabric. But as the gray light of a dreary day dawned, the rain drops grew. Before any of the shops opened up, Otto was soaking wet and numb from the cold.
He had spent the night curled up against a brick wall in an alleyway several blocks from the bar, but when his fingers and toes went numb, he started walking—any direction except back towards Ruskin's house. Poor Ruskin, Otto thought, I hope what I told him will work.
A woman ran across the street holding her silver nose-button down. She had no umbrella, but Otto could clearly see what looked like a glass bubble around her, keeping the rain at bay. I wonder if it's heated too, he thought. The woman ran to open the doors of a large, stone building, keeping one hand on her nose-button as she fiddled with the door lock. Otto looked up at the giant metal letters that ran down the side of the building: LIBRARY. Huh. I never knew this was here. He looked around to see if he even knew where "here" was. He didn't.
He followed the woman inside and stood dripping in the space between the glass doors. It was only slightly warmer in here, but at least it was dry. The woman eyed him suspiciously as she went to the front desk computer. Otto smiled and waved his fingers to prove his friendliness, but it only made her narrow her eyes at him in a look that was something between disgust and confusion. Luckily, she didn't throw him out—perhaps out of pity. Otto was allowed to stay in the space between the doors and watch the day pour down while he considered his new options for life.
Nurse Vickers's voice saying, "Oh, no!" and "Otto, run!" kept playing over and over in his head. He had never imagined her sounding so desperate. She was the one that always had a plan—was always in control. She had her "ear to the ground" and had contacts all over the city. How could she get caught? And now that she was, what was he supposed to do? He had nothing and no one left to turn to.
The sun broke through the clouds as the town came awake. Otto watched the cars go by on their way to work. A school bus passed and for the first time, Otto wished he was on it. At least it would be warm and familiar. Across the street, a tall, lanky man dragged himself down the sidewalk. He was as sopping wet as Otto and looked pale and sickly. That's how I'll be soon, Otto thought. In fact, the man looked oddly familiar. His dark hair dripped over his face like an oil spill, but underneath his curtain of bangs was a distinctly white nose-button. Pieter!
Otto put his hands on the floor to push himself up and prepare to run, but Pieter didn't see him. Pieter didn't seem to see much of anything. He leaned against the building on the opposite side of the street and slumped to the ground.
What if he's hurt? What if he really needs help? He thought about what it was like for him crawling out of the woods a few days ago. At least he had Ruskin to help him, give him shelter and food and water. Pieter had no one. He hadn't even been allowed out in who knows how long.
Under the urge of a humanitarian reflex, Otto forced himself off the floor and headed out the door. He crossed the street and sat down next to Pieter to find that Pieter had fallen asleep in the little bit of warmth that the sun was now giving off. His clothing was soaked through and coated in mud. He had sticks in his hair and dirt smeared on his face.
A man passing by them dropped a bill at Otto's feet. Otto looked up as the stranger in a business suit walked away. "Thank you!" Otto called after him. It wasn't much, but it might get something for Pieter to eat.
Otto got up without disturbing Pieter, who was starting to slump on his side, and walked to a coffee shop down the street. They gave him a pastry at a discount, a cup of tap water, and a look of pity. By the time Otto made it back to Pieter, Pieter was curled up in a fetal position on the sidewalk, loose change tossed on the ground in front of him.
"Pieter?" Otto sat down beside him again and put his hand on Pieter's shoulder. "Pieter, I got you some food and water."
Pieter didn't respond, so Otto put the food and cup down on the ground and settled in to wait. A black car pulled up on the curb across the street and four law-enforcement officers jumped out. None of them were wearing their uniforms, but they were easily recognizable by their nose-button color. Next to them, another car pulled up and four more got out. Otto's body stiffened. Oh no, he thought, they've come for me.
But the officers didn't look his way. They marched into the library and emerged soon afterward with the librarian in hand cuffs. Otto looked on, his mouth agape, as they guided her into the back of one of their black cars. Three of the law-enforcers got in the car with her and took off while the others regrouped on the sidewalk.
Otto pulled his knees up, rested his arms across them and hid his nose behind his arms. Running would draw too much attention. But perhaps if he stayed right where he was, they wouldn't notice him. There was no way for him to hide Pieter's nose, but at least it was less obvious since he didn't have a nose casing.
The officers pointed down the street and started walking in that direction, away from Otto. He took a deep breath and prepared to run as soon as they were far enough down the street. He tapped Pieter on the shoulder, but Pieter still didn't wake. Maybe that's a good thing, Otto thought. There was no telling what Pieter would do with Otto when he woke up, although, Otto was sure he could fight him off now if he tried to push his button. Pieter didn't look like he could take on much more than a tulip in a fight.
Otto pushed himself off the ground and started walking in the opposite direction from the officers. He turned the corner at the end of the block and was about to run, but saw another black car on the street. This one was headed away from him. Still, he didn't want to risk them seeing him in their rear-view mirror. He ducked in and out of alleyways, crossed streets and ran through areas of town he didn't recognize at all until he came to something that looked familiar—the back sports fields of his high school.
Further towards the center of campus, Otto heard the commotion of a large crowd. A bell rang for class, but the noise from campus didn't subside. Curiosity got the better of him and he picked his way, carefully towards the center courtyard, ducking behind outlying buildings and bushes. There was no way to get close enough to see the crowd, but crouching at the corner of the science building, he was able to hear them clearer.
"What are you doing here?"
Otto's heart sank. He turned around slowly to see Reinhardt standing over him.
"Ha! I knew it," Reinhardt said, eyeing Otto's nose-button. "I knew you were a rogue right after Detroy was taken away."
Otto said nothing.
Reinhardt sat down next to Otto. "So you break out of a government facility, hide for days, probably at Ruskin's house, and then you come back to school to watch the chaos of all the rogues being arrested? Or perhaps you're here to turn yourself in."
"Rogues being arrested?"
"Oh, you don't know?"
"What's going on back here?" Lancret appeared from the other side of the building. "Otto?"
Otto dropped his head into his hands. "I don't even know what I'm doing here," he said. "I was trying to get away from the law-enforcement. They're everywhere and I ended up in the back fields and there was all this commotion..."
"Were you hoping to blend in with the crowd?" Reinhardt suppressed a laugh.
"Of course not."
"So it's true!" Lancret squatted down to sit with the boys. "Otto, why?"
"Why what?" Otto said.
"What happened last night, would be a better question," Reinhardt said.
"Last night?" Lancret looked from one boy to the other trying to get a grasp on what was happening. "Is that why Ruskin isn't here?"
Otto looked up at her. "He's not here? Oh, no." Otto turned sick with regret. Everything was falling apart and now everyone he cared about was in law-enforcement custody.
"Is he a rogue, too?" Lancret looked like she was about to shatter.
"No," Otto and Reinhardt said together.
"How would you know?" Otto turned to Reinhardt.
"It's pretty obvious. That guy would never last as a rogue. He can barely keep it together as a frivolous."
"How did you two even find me back here?" Otto asked.
"I saw you in the field," Reinhardt said.
"I saw him go behind the building," Lancret said, pointing at Reinhardt.
"Fantastic," Otto said. "Are you going to turn me in?"
"No," Lancret said.
"Maybe," Reinhardt said.
"No!" Lancret said to Reinhardt.
"Keep it down," Otto said.
"They're not going to hear us," Reinhardt said. "Half of them are trapped in a time loop from some rogue's button and the other half think it's damn amusing."
"It is kind'a funny, but it gets old watching them do the same thing over and over," Lancret added. "I heard one of the teachers outside of the time loop say she was going to go call law-enforcement to get it cleared out, so you might want to get out of here, Otto."
"And go where?" Otto asked.
"Why are you helping him?" Reinhardt said to Lancret. "You don't know anything about how dangerous he is."
"Are you dangerous, Otto?" she asked with wide eyes.
Otto dropped his head and sighed.
"According to my sister," Reinhardt said, "He's one of the most dangerous. All of law-enforcement is freaking out that they lost him.
"I had to leave!" Otto said. "There's this guy that's trying to push my nose-button! He's crazy!"
"Why would anyone want to push your nose-button?" Reinhardt asked.
"He's crazy!"
The sound of sirens interrupted their conversation.
"You should get out of here," Lancret put her hand on Otto's arm.
"No, he needs to turn himself in. If anyone can protect him from this crazy person, it's law-enforcement. You just need to tell them what's going on. I'm sure they will take every precaution with you."
"Right, and I'll end up locked in a room and wrapped in a straitjacket for the rest of my life."
Reinhardt considered that option while Lancret looked at both of them in horror. "That's just terrible!" She said. "Get out of here, Otto!"
"Where am I supposed to go?" Otto said. "Everyone I know is either in custody or sitting right in front of me. I have no place left to turn. I have no money. I have nothing. I slept on the street last night."
The noise of the crowd began to drop its pitch as the law-enforcement officers entered the courtyard.
"Okay, fine," Reinhardt said in a hoarse whisper. "But we're not through with this conversation." He grabbed Otto by the arm and pulled him up. "Are you staying here to get interrogated by law-enforcement? Or are you coming?" he asked Lancret.
"Um..." Lancret darted her eyes to where the crowd was being surrounded. She sighed. "I'm going to regret this, aren't I."
"I already do," Reinhardt said. "Let's go."