He was sitting in the living room, staring at the wall. He was thinking
about his dad, which is why it was an especially unpleasant surprise when
Mr. Eye appeared in the doorway. And, since his mother wasn't there, he
didn't see an reason to pretend that it was anything other than an
especially unpleasant surprise.
"You're back AGAIN?" He added 'Mr. Eye,' in his thoughts, but he couldn't quite get his mouth to make the sounds.
"Brandon! Where are your manners?" scolded his mother, walking into the room. So she had been in earshot after all.
"Sorry," he said, with just enough sincerity that she probably wouldn't make him repeat it.
She turned to Mr. Eye with a little smile. "Please, Mr. Summers, make yourself at home. Would you like something to drink?"
"Call me Scott, please," answered Mr. Eye with a chuckle.
"I can't sleep with you until you call me by my first name," muttered Brandon in a mockery of the man's voice.
"And I would like some water."
"You're sure?" pressed his mother, "We have coffee." She already went without sometimes and she was offering it to this calculating jerk.
"No, that's really not necessary." He took a deep breath and spoke before she could leave for the kitchen. "I'm afraid we have to talk business."
She stopped near the doorway, turned around, and nodded for him to continue.
"Well," he started, then indicated Brandon with a tilt of his head.
"He knows already. His father..." She stopped, aware that there was no need to continue the thought. "He can keep a secret."
Mr. Eye glanced Brandon up and down then began. "To be honest, Nora, we need your help. You know what we're trying to do, and you know we can't take two steps without them shutting us down. We desperately need any kind of power that will allow us to move around without drawing their attention. We need YOU."
His mom narrowed her eyes, considering him. At least she wasn't blindly agreeing just because it was Mr. Eye asking.
"You're a true morph, Nora; that's more than Mystique ever had and just look what she managed to accomplish."
She took a deep breath, looked at Brandon, and turned back to Mr. Eye. "I know what you're doing, and I know that I can help. And I want to help. But...Brandon." Isn't one parent enough, asshole? Not that she would have used that term even to someone she hadn't fallen under the spell of.
"What do you think, Brandon?"
The question caught him off guard, so he couldn't answer except with, "What?"
"What do you think? What do you think of what we're doing? What do you think of your mom's possible involvement in it? What do you think of your possible involvement in it?" He noticed the man didn't mention his dad's involvement in it.
"What do you mean, his involvement in it?" demanded his mother.
"Well," said Mr. Eye, looking from one to the other, "it wouldn't be the first time a boy had imagined revenge for his father."
Brandon was more shocked than he would have admitted. Not that the thought hadn't crossed his mind, but why was MR. EYE bringing it up? "How could I? I'm not even a mutant."
"Not yet. But you know as well as I do that you'll be a strong one once you do become one. With parents like these..." He trailed off, waiting for Brandon to speak.
He found he didn't have any idea what to say. His gut reaction was that he didn't want his mom to go because one parent was enough. Dad had died; he didn't want Mom to die also. But there was another reaction, that said that he did want her to go. Someone had to pay for killing Dad, and since he couldn't do it yet he felt like she should. She wouldn't be firing any guns, he knew, but she could at least figure out who had killed Dad and tell the guys who did to kill them. Besides, he couldn't show his fear to this man. Possibly some other man, but not this one. "I don't know," he said defiantly, "Are you just sending her off to die?"
The man looked shocked that an eleven-year-old would be saying something like that. Brandon considered telling him having a father die can sometimes be a reality check even to a kid, but he decided against it.
His mother spoke quietly. "Brandon, you mustn't talk like that. You know they're doing everything they can to help us."
Mr. Eye knelt down in front of him and looked him in the face, emphasizing that he was the adult and Brandon was not. "I know you don't like me, and I think I know why. But put that aside for a moment, and tell me straight: would it be too much for you to have your mother away with us a lot of the time?"
"No. It would be too much for you to send her out to be killed, though." Mr. Eye blinked under his stare, and he declared a small victory. "I'll be fine. It's her decision."
The man stood back up and turned back toward Mom. "Can we talk alone?"
His mom nodded at him, and he nodded back. He went to his room and shut the door. He could have listened in on them even from there if he had wanted to, but he didn't want to. Mr. Eye would convince her to work for them. The only thing that bugged him about it was that she wouldn't agree because of him or Dad or anything like that; she would agree for Mr. Eye. The thing she refused to see was that he paid visits to many houses in which the man was dead, arrested, or out all the time. He even paid occasional visits to houses where the man still lived there and only happened to be out when he showed up.
He turned his thoughts away from sickening Mr. Eye and back to his dad. It had been five months now; he had been dead as long as he had worked with the rebels. He wouldn't have wanted Mom to join the rebellion, but he always did appreciate her power. She used to morph exotic birds for him; he had always had a thing for birds. There had been a whole lot of times he had come out of his room to find some strange animal in the living room and his dad laughing about how great her power was.
He had mostly forgotten about the visit by the time his mother opened his door, but he remembered as soon as she did so. He turned and looked at her face. She had agreed.
"You can come out now; he's gone."
He stood up without a word and followed her into the living room. He didn't really feel like listening to her try to explain her decision.
They stood, staring at each other for several seconds. She didn't know how to begin.
"Let's go over to the Ericksons'."
"What?" It was so unexpected that he assumed he misheard her.
"Come on. The Ericksons'."
"Why?"
"Because I'm not going to be able to be here every night and you need to have somewhere you can go. Mr. Summers says they're willing, so let's see how it works out."
He blinked two or three times, then followed her out the door. At least she wasn't going to make him sit through the conversation about why she was joining.
As they closed the door behind them and started down the street Brandon reflected on what it would be like with the Ericksons. It was obvious why he was going there; it was one of the few houses where two adults were always around. Mr. Erickson wasn't part of the rebellion because he was huge and bright red; if they were ever going to send him out they would just shoot him and get it over with. In any case Mr. and Mrs. Erickson were nice enough, from what he'd seen of them. They had two daughters, one of whom had reddish skin from her dad and both of whom were pretty. At least he would be near them. Not that they would notice his eleven-year-old self, but that could have advantages too.
He became aware all of a sudden that he wasn't following his mother anymore; she had stopped a few steps back. He turned around and found she was staring at something. It was the Heap.
"What's the matter?"
"That's why I decided to do it, you know, not because of Mr. Summers."
"What? Why?"
"I did it because I hate this place. Before, we could live in real houses. Our stores carried new, nice things. Our garbagemen really picked up the trash. Our theaters played movies."
Now that he looked at it, the Heap did look like it had been a theater once.
"This is no place to raise children. That's why by the time you're ready to have kids I want this place to be nothing but a memory." She started to walk again, and he went back to following her.
He found himself confused by her words. The barrow wasn't that great - it was dirty and cramped and there was never anything new happening except when soldiers arrested or shot someone - but he couldn't really understand the hatred in his mom's voice. It was just the way things were. Mutants were stuck in the barrow. No one liked it, but so far no one had been able to do a whole lot about it.
"That's why I'd like to get you in with the Ericksons; there's no way you're staying in the Heap."
"Mom..."
"I mean it; don't even go in there anymore. I feel bad for those kids, but the fact is that it's dangerous there. None of them know anything about their powers. Once you get your father's powers it may change, but right now you wouldn't have any way of defending yourself."
He knew it was better not to argue. He didn't particularly like anyone from the Heap, so it wouldn't be that hard to stay away from it. He had only ever spent any time there when Kin had had to stay there for a month when his father was detained for questioning. It had been right after Kin was brought to the barrow and Brandon's mother didn't know him or she would have allowed him to stay there, like she did later.
When they got there Chloe was sitting on the stoop. She was the fourteen- year-old, the girl Kin obviously had a crush on. "Hey," she called.
"You heard?" asked his mom.
"Yeah. Mr. Summers said Brandon was probably coming and probably so was somebody else."
As they walked up the steps Brandon found himself hoping the other kid was Kin. Then a few seconds later he changed his mind as he realized that that would only happen if Kin's dad went out to work on the rebellion. The army was already watching out for him, so that would not be a good idea at all.
Brandon couldn't get excited about being shown around the Ericksons' house; it was exactly like their own except a little bigger. The girls would share a room and he would share a room with the other kid, if he or she showed up. He hoped it was a boy; it would be weird to sleep in the same room as a girl. When he mentioned this to his mom she told him he was spoiled as an only child, and that he had to have been the only kid in the whole barrow who had never shared a room with anyone.
When they left again after half an hour or so, they hadn't gotten six feet when Kin appeared and called to Brandon.
He called back, then looked at his mother meaningfully.
"I have a meeting in half an hour, so I'll see you in three or four hours."
"Okay." She turned for home and he turned toward Kin.
"How come you went to the Ericksons'?" asked Kin, once they were close enough.
"I'm going to be staying there while my mom's away."
"Really? Lucky. So you saw Chloe and Stephanie?"
"Yep."
"Was Chloe wearing a see-through shirt again this time?"
"Nope, sorry. Maybe next time."
Kin sighed. Brandon had only been joking when he said a couple of weeks before that she had been wearing a see-through shirt, but Kin had believed it so completely that he didn't feel like explaining that it wasn't true. It was fun to play with him.
"But anyway Steph is prettier, and you can usually see her skin through her shirt, unless she's wearing black or something."
"I think it's kind of creepy. She's red! Besides, she's only twelve."
"She's old enough to be a mutant already. I'm not. And it's not creepy; it's cool. If it were neon red like her dad's maybe not, but it's only brown-red."
"Whatever. You take Stephanie and I'll take Chloe."
"Don't say that too loud."
They walked in silence for a minute or two. They were good friends even though he was only eleven and Kin was thirteen. As his mother said, they were both at the level of 12-year-olds. They were in the same class and probably would have been even if actual teaching had gone on in the classes. Brandon may even have been ahead of Kin, since Kin hadn't been able to go to school regularly for his first two or three months in the barrow.
"How come your mom is leaving?" asked Kin finally.
"Same reason my dad left."
Kin's eyes shot open. "Is she going to...?"
"I hope not."
A little twister appeared at his feet and picked up little bits of trash and leaves, whirling them around. It was what always happened when Kin was nervous about something.
"Why?"
"Mr. Eye convinced her." She had said she was doing it so they could get out of the barrow, but he didn't feel like believing it at the moment.
"That guy is so old. How come all the women fall all over him?"
Brandon shrugged. "He doesn't look that old, I guess. Maybe the part of his face under the goggles is full of wrinkles." He liked the sound of that.
It hadn't made Kin feel any better, though, judging by the fact that the little twister was now big enough to throw trash at his legs hard enough to hurt.
"Ow! Cut that out!"
It sped up even more for a second or two, then died out suddenly.
"Bastard. You just wait until I have powers too."
"Oh yeah?"
"Yeah. Seismic AND true morph!"
"How do you know? You might only have one or the other, or something completely different."
"Huh?"
"Didn't you know? If you're the kid of two mutants the mutations screw each other up and you can get really weird stuff happening."
"Bullcrap. Just because your mom wasn't a mutant."
"No, really. Remember that Graham kid? You've seen his parents; which side did those little wings come from?"
He had a point. Graham had little batwings, and neither of his parents did. Even so... "No, you're just screwing with me."
"What about Stephanie?"
"Her skin is between her mom's and her dad's, just like everybody!"
"Fine. Believe what you want. I'm just saying, you might end up with some weird stuff."
They walked in silence for a block, while Brandon chewed on that. Then he realized something: Graham had had the wings since he was a baby. Steph had been red since she was a baby. Things like that didn't just hit you later, the way powers did. He smiled, but didn't bother to say anything to Kin.
They rounded a corner and the Heap came in to view. It looked different this time than it had ever before. It looked uglier, dirtier. It looked like a dead theater, instead of the mysterious place with all the cool older kids it had been when he was younger. He noticed that the plastic of the old movie poster cases was all broken and that the old sign where the movie titles used to be posted had two big holes in it. The lamp post out front was extremely bent and the light that should have been on top was completely gone.
"What's up with you?"
"What was it like, before?"
"Huh?"
"What was it like when you lived with your mom?"
"Um, better than here, I guess. But we're mutants."
"But don't you wish you weren't a mutant? Your mom wasn't; you might not have been. Don't you miss living with your mom and your sister in a house and all?"
Kin shrugged. "They didn't even want me after they found out. I wouldn't go back to them if I could."
"Okay, so what if you and your dad could live in a house just like you did back when you lived with them?"
"That would be nice, I guess. I would miss my twisters, though."
"I mean you'd still be mutants and you'd live in a house outside the barrow."
"Oh. I guess."
He didn't know what to say to that. He had expected Kin to want really badly to get out of the barrow. Did that mean that his mom was just wrong? Was the house and the neighborhood his parents lived in when they got married better than the house and neighborhood Kin's mother and sister lived in?
"So?" asked Kin. "Are we going in, or what?"
"Into the Heap?"
"Yeah."
"I guess." It wasn't like his mom was going to find out. She had said something about safety, but he wasn't worried; Kin was there if there was anything he couldn't handle.
As they closed the distance to the Heap, Brandon wondered more about life outside the barrow. What was with Kin not caring, anyway?
The first thing they noticed when Kin cracked open the door to the Heap was an ominous kind of sanding noise and a lot of shouting. They walked to the end of the little hallway and looked out in the main area and saw bigger kids running in every direction. Brandon saw something flashing toward him really fast and ducked, just in time. It looked like a boomerang or something, but made of metal.
"They finally destroyed the lighting!" yelled Kin, just so Brandon would be able to hear him.
Suddenly Brandon realized that he was right. Pieces of lighting bars were flying around in every direction. It had been a small piece that had flown at his head.
"Get down!" yelled Kin. He held out his hands, and after a count of ten or eleven there was a huge wind tunnel of little swirling bits of metal pointed away from them. It grew and continued to grow.
"You're back AGAIN?" He added 'Mr. Eye,' in his thoughts, but he couldn't quite get his mouth to make the sounds.
"Brandon! Where are your manners?" scolded his mother, walking into the room. So she had been in earshot after all.
"Sorry," he said, with just enough sincerity that she probably wouldn't make him repeat it.
She turned to Mr. Eye with a little smile. "Please, Mr. Summers, make yourself at home. Would you like something to drink?"
"Call me Scott, please," answered Mr. Eye with a chuckle.
"I can't sleep with you until you call me by my first name," muttered Brandon in a mockery of the man's voice.
"And I would like some water."
"You're sure?" pressed his mother, "We have coffee." She already went without sometimes and she was offering it to this calculating jerk.
"No, that's really not necessary." He took a deep breath and spoke before she could leave for the kitchen. "I'm afraid we have to talk business."
She stopped near the doorway, turned around, and nodded for him to continue.
"Well," he started, then indicated Brandon with a tilt of his head.
"He knows already. His father..." She stopped, aware that there was no need to continue the thought. "He can keep a secret."
Mr. Eye glanced Brandon up and down then began. "To be honest, Nora, we need your help. You know what we're trying to do, and you know we can't take two steps without them shutting us down. We desperately need any kind of power that will allow us to move around without drawing their attention. We need YOU."
His mom narrowed her eyes, considering him. At least she wasn't blindly agreeing just because it was Mr. Eye asking.
"You're a true morph, Nora; that's more than Mystique ever had and just look what she managed to accomplish."
She took a deep breath, looked at Brandon, and turned back to Mr. Eye. "I know what you're doing, and I know that I can help. And I want to help. But...Brandon." Isn't one parent enough, asshole? Not that she would have used that term even to someone she hadn't fallen under the spell of.
"What do you think, Brandon?"
The question caught him off guard, so he couldn't answer except with, "What?"
"What do you think? What do you think of what we're doing? What do you think of your mom's possible involvement in it? What do you think of your possible involvement in it?" He noticed the man didn't mention his dad's involvement in it.
"What do you mean, his involvement in it?" demanded his mother.
"Well," said Mr. Eye, looking from one to the other, "it wouldn't be the first time a boy had imagined revenge for his father."
Brandon was more shocked than he would have admitted. Not that the thought hadn't crossed his mind, but why was MR. EYE bringing it up? "How could I? I'm not even a mutant."
"Not yet. But you know as well as I do that you'll be a strong one once you do become one. With parents like these..." He trailed off, waiting for Brandon to speak.
He found he didn't have any idea what to say. His gut reaction was that he didn't want his mom to go because one parent was enough. Dad had died; he didn't want Mom to die also. But there was another reaction, that said that he did want her to go. Someone had to pay for killing Dad, and since he couldn't do it yet he felt like she should. She wouldn't be firing any guns, he knew, but she could at least figure out who had killed Dad and tell the guys who did to kill them. Besides, he couldn't show his fear to this man. Possibly some other man, but not this one. "I don't know," he said defiantly, "Are you just sending her off to die?"
The man looked shocked that an eleven-year-old would be saying something like that. Brandon considered telling him having a father die can sometimes be a reality check even to a kid, but he decided against it.
His mother spoke quietly. "Brandon, you mustn't talk like that. You know they're doing everything they can to help us."
Mr. Eye knelt down in front of him and looked him in the face, emphasizing that he was the adult and Brandon was not. "I know you don't like me, and I think I know why. But put that aside for a moment, and tell me straight: would it be too much for you to have your mother away with us a lot of the time?"
"No. It would be too much for you to send her out to be killed, though." Mr. Eye blinked under his stare, and he declared a small victory. "I'll be fine. It's her decision."
The man stood back up and turned back toward Mom. "Can we talk alone?"
His mom nodded at him, and he nodded back. He went to his room and shut the door. He could have listened in on them even from there if he had wanted to, but he didn't want to. Mr. Eye would convince her to work for them. The only thing that bugged him about it was that she wouldn't agree because of him or Dad or anything like that; she would agree for Mr. Eye. The thing she refused to see was that he paid visits to many houses in which the man was dead, arrested, or out all the time. He even paid occasional visits to houses where the man still lived there and only happened to be out when he showed up.
He turned his thoughts away from sickening Mr. Eye and back to his dad. It had been five months now; he had been dead as long as he had worked with the rebels. He wouldn't have wanted Mom to join the rebellion, but he always did appreciate her power. She used to morph exotic birds for him; he had always had a thing for birds. There had been a whole lot of times he had come out of his room to find some strange animal in the living room and his dad laughing about how great her power was.
He had mostly forgotten about the visit by the time his mother opened his door, but he remembered as soon as she did so. He turned and looked at her face. She had agreed.
"You can come out now; he's gone."
He stood up without a word and followed her into the living room. He didn't really feel like listening to her try to explain her decision.
They stood, staring at each other for several seconds. She didn't know how to begin.
"Let's go over to the Ericksons'."
"What?" It was so unexpected that he assumed he misheard her.
"Come on. The Ericksons'."
"Why?"
"Because I'm not going to be able to be here every night and you need to have somewhere you can go. Mr. Summers says they're willing, so let's see how it works out."
He blinked two or three times, then followed her out the door. At least she wasn't going to make him sit through the conversation about why she was joining.
As they closed the door behind them and started down the street Brandon reflected on what it would be like with the Ericksons. It was obvious why he was going there; it was one of the few houses where two adults were always around. Mr. Erickson wasn't part of the rebellion because he was huge and bright red; if they were ever going to send him out they would just shoot him and get it over with. In any case Mr. and Mrs. Erickson were nice enough, from what he'd seen of them. They had two daughters, one of whom had reddish skin from her dad and both of whom were pretty. At least he would be near them. Not that they would notice his eleven-year-old self, but that could have advantages too.
He became aware all of a sudden that he wasn't following his mother anymore; she had stopped a few steps back. He turned around and found she was staring at something. It was the Heap.
"What's the matter?"
"That's why I decided to do it, you know, not because of Mr. Summers."
"What? Why?"
"I did it because I hate this place. Before, we could live in real houses. Our stores carried new, nice things. Our garbagemen really picked up the trash. Our theaters played movies."
Now that he looked at it, the Heap did look like it had been a theater once.
"This is no place to raise children. That's why by the time you're ready to have kids I want this place to be nothing but a memory." She started to walk again, and he went back to following her.
He found himself confused by her words. The barrow wasn't that great - it was dirty and cramped and there was never anything new happening except when soldiers arrested or shot someone - but he couldn't really understand the hatred in his mom's voice. It was just the way things were. Mutants were stuck in the barrow. No one liked it, but so far no one had been able to do a whole lot about it.
"That's why I'd like to get you in with the Ericksons; there's no way you're staying in the Heap."
"Mom..."
"I mean it; don't even go in there anymore. I feel bad for those kids, but the fact is that it's dangerous there. None of them know anything about their powers. Once you get your father's powers it may change, but right now you wouldn't have any way of defending yourself."
He knew it was better not to argue. He didn't particularly like anyone from the Heap, so it wouldn't be that hard to stay away from it. He had only ever spent any time there when Kin had had to stay there for a month when his father was detained for questioning. It had been right after Kin was brought to the barrow and Brandon's mother didn't know him or she would have allowed him to stay there, like she did later.
When they got there Chloe was sitting on the stoop. She was the fourteen- year-old, the girl Kin obviously had a crush on. "Hey," she called.
"You heard?" asked his mom.
"Yeah. Mr. Summers said Brandon was probably coming and probably so was somebody else."
As they walked up the steps Brandon found himself hoping the other kid was Kin. Then a few seconds later he changed his mind as he realized that that would only happen if Kin's dad went out to work on the rebellion. The army was already watching out for him, so that would not be a good idea at all.
Brandon couldn't get excited about being shown around the Ericksons' house; it was exactly like their own except a little bigger. The girls would share a room and he would share a room with the other kid, if he or she showed up. He hoped it was a boy; it would be weird to sleep in the same room as a girl. When he mentioned this to his mom she told him he was spoiled as an only child, and that he had to have been the only kid in the whole barrow who had never shared a room with anyone.
When they left again after half an hour or so, they hadn't gotten six feet when Kin appeared and called to Brandon.
He called back, then looked at his mother meaningfully.
"I have a meeting in half an hour, so I'll see you in three or four hours."
"Okay." She turned for home and he turned toward Kin.
"How come you went to the Ericksons'?" asked Kin, once they were close enough.
"I'm going to be staying there while my mom's away."
"Really? Lucky. So you saw Chloe and Stephanie?"
"Yep."
"Was Chloe wearing a see-through shirt again this time?"
"Nope, sorry. Maybe next time."
Kin sighed. Brandon had only been joking when he said a couple of weeks before that she had been wearing a see-through shirt, but Kin had believed it so completely that he didn't feel like explaining that it wasn't true. It was fun to play with him.
"But anyway Steph is prettier, and you can usually see her skin through her shirt, unless she's wearing black or something."
"I think it's kind of creepy. She's red! Besides, she's only twelve."
"She's old enough to be a mutant already. I'm not. And it's not creepy; it's cool. If it were neon red like her dad's maybe not, but it's only brown-red."
"Whatever. You take Stephanie and I'll take Chloe."
"Don't say that too loud."
They walked in silence for a minute or two. They were good friends even though he was only eleven and Kin was thirteen. As his mother said, they were both at the level of 12-year-olds. They were in the same class and probably would have been even if actual teaching had gone on in the classes. Brandon may even have been ahead of Kin, since Kin hadn't been able to go to school regularly for his first two or three months in the barrow.
"How come your mom is leaving?" asked Kin finally.
"Same reason my dad left."
Kin's eyes shot open. "Is she going to...?"
"I hope not."
A little twister appeared at his feet and picked up little bits of trash and leaves, whirling them around. It was what always happened when Kin was nervous about something.
"Why?"
"Mr. Eye convinced her." She had said she was doing it so they could get out of the barrow, but he didn't feel like believing it at the moment.
"That guy is so old. How come all the women fall all over him?"
Brandon shrugged. "He doesn't look that old, I guess. Maybe the part of his face under the goggles is full of wrinkles." He liked the sound of that.
It hadn't made Kin feel any better, though, judging by the fact that the little twister was now big enough to throw trash at his legs hard enough to hurt.
"Ow! Cut that out!"
It sped up even more for a second or two, then died out suddenly.
"Bastard. You just wait until I have powers too."
"Oh yeah?"
"Yeah. Seismic AND true morph!"
"How do you know? You might only have one or the other, or something completely different."
"Huh?"
"Didn't you know? If you're the kid of two mutants the mutations screw each other up and you can get really weird stuff happening."
"Bullcrap. Just because your mom wasn't a mutant."
"No, really. Remember that Graham kid? You've seen his parents; which side did those little wings come from?"
He had a point. Graham had little batwings, and neither of his parents did. Even so... "No, you're just screwing with me."
"What about Stephanie?"
"Her skin is between her mom's and her dad's, just like everybody!"
"Fine. Believe what you want. I'm just saying, you might end up with some weird stuff."
They walked in silence for a block, while Brandon chewed on that. Then he realized something: Graham had had the wings since he was a baby. Steph had been red since she was a baby. Things like that didn't just hit you later, the way powers did. He smiled, but didn't bother to say anything to Kin.
They rounded a corner and the Heap came in to view. It looked different this time than it had ever before. It looked uglier, dirtier. It looked like a dead theater, instead of the mysterious place with all the cool older kids it had been when he was younger. He noticed that the plastic of the old movie poster cases was all broken and that the old sign where the movie titles used to be posted had two big holes in it. The lamp post out front was extremely bent and the light that should have been on top was completely gone.
"What's up with you?"
"What was it like, before?"
"Huh?"
"What was it like when you lived with your mom?"
"Um, better than here, I guess. But we're mutants."
"But don't you wish you weren't a mutant? Your mom wasn't; you might not have been. Don't you miss living with your mom and your sister in a house and all?"
Kin shrugged. "They didn't even want me after they found out. I wouldn't go back to them if I could."
"Okay, so what if you and your dad could live in a house just like you did back when you lived with them?"
"That would be nice, I guess. I would miss my twisters, though."
"I mean you'd still be mutants and you'd live in a house outside the barrow."
"Oh. I guess."
He didn't know what to say to that. He had expected Kin to want really badly to get out of the barrow. Did that mean that his mom was just wrong? Was the house and the neighborhood his parents lived in when they got married better than the house and neighborhood Kin's mother and sister lived in?
"So?" asked Kin. "Are we going in, or what?"
"Into the Heap?"
"Yeah."
"I guess." It wasn't like his mom was going to find out. She had said something about safety, but he wasn't worried; Kin was there if there was anything he couldn't handle.
As they closed the distance to the Heap, Brandon wondered more about life outside the barrow. What was with Kin not caring, anyway?
The first thing they noticed when Kin cracked open the door to the Heap was an ominous kind of sanding noise and a lot of shouting. They walked to the end of the little hallway and looked out in the main area and saw bigger kids running in every direction. Brandon saw something flashing toward him really fast and ducked, just in time. It looked like a boomerang or something, but made of metal.
"They finally destroyed the lighting!" yelled Kin, just so Brandon would be able to hear him.
Suddenly Brandon realized that he was right. Pieces of lighting bars were flying around in every direction. It had been a small piece that had flown at his head.
"Get down!" yelled Kin. He held out his hands, and after a count of ten or eleven there was a huge wind tunnel of little swirling bits of metal pointed away from them. It grew and continued to grow.