chapter 3 of The Token

Chapter 3.1415926535897932384626433832795028841...

Even during the afternoon the next day, they were still discussing what had happened. Each

claimed it was the others fault. A typical teenage argument. This was the gist of what happened.

Simon had planned to try to get his dad to stay as far away as possible from the homework room,

while Edmund did the homework. Then, the next day on the bus, Simon would copy what Edmund

had done (cheating was one of their least worries). Sadly, the plan completely failed—they were

worse off than they would have been if they had confessed—as that’s how it usually works. When

Simon had opened the door, he’d thought that his dad was going to be at the door, since there were

loud, slow footsteps outside that sounded like his dads. Also, he usually came up to check on them

at bedtime. But what Simon hadn't known was that his dad was working in his office, grading papers,

so therefore was not able to come over. He’d asked Edmund’s dad to go up, as he was walking by.

Now, if you think that Edmund’s dad wasn’t nice, you would be wrong; but he was the

strictest adult in the house. He had to deal with his boss all day, fixing this and that. Sadly, whatever

he did, his boss never thought he was doing anything right. Also, the machinery was old, so it was

a struggle to do anything, let alone deal with a fat boss breathing down your neck. Consequently,

Edmund’s dad was strict, and always tired. And he could get snappy.

When Simon opened the door, he was prepared to ask his dad’s trophies [21], which he was

proud of. If the chance was given, he would describe in real time what’d happened during the latest

competition, and the win-loss record of the people they’d went against. By the time he was done,

Simon felt like he had been at the competition.

Anyways, when Simon didn’t see his dad standing in the doorway, he was very alarmed.

The two men were very different. His dad was tall and thin, with his brown hair in his face, and a

haphazardly inside-out shirt covered in many digits of pi. His shirts usually had math scribbled on

them, (when he couldn’t find paper or a liteskreen). What Simon saw was had short hair stained

with machinery grease, and a grubby shirt slick with repair oil. However, it was mostly his eyes that

made the big difference between them. When Simon's dad was laughing, his eyes had a sparkle in

them. But Mr. Starr’s smile never reached his eyes. He was the kind who was always studying the

government and such, making his view of life not the most hopeful.

When he saw Simon, he immediately asked “Is your homework done?” Simon, too startled

to think, said “yes, the trophies are—no, um, I mean the homework is—not—it isn’t not done—

um, I mean...” then trailed off, still wondering what had happened. Mr. Starr could instantly tell that

Simon was trying to conceal something—probably the homework—and wasn’t doing it very well. He

decided to play along, to try to make them confess; then he would deal out the punishment. How ...

From Simon's point of view, it was going badly. He weighed the idea of starting a false alarm,

to distract everyone while they finished the homework—somewhere far away from Mr. Starr. With

a sinking feeling, he realized that it wouldn’t give them enough time. On top of it, they probably

would get in trouble for making the false alarm on top of not finishing their homework. Finally, he

decided to lie. Facing Mr. Starr, he said again, in a calmer voice, “Hi Mr. Starr. Where’s dad? Where

you coming up to check on our homework? I can show it to you; all done.” He hoped he sounded

convincing. He didn’t. Mr. Starr, in a very sly voice, said “Okay, let’s see this homework of yours,

mind if I do?” Without more ado, he slipped past Simon into the room. Panicking, Simon half

yelled “Wait, no! That’s, um... private!” He turned the Latin homework papers upside down and

quickly scooped them up, folded them in half, and stuck them in his pockets. Mr. Starr raised his

Simons powers, and the stopped attack

16

eyebrows. He had decided what to do with them. He had decided to let them go, for a while, and

when they weren’t ready, he would act. He would play it cool, so he would act cool.

“Okay, I’m fine with that. If it’s a secret, then I won’t try to find out” He said, shrugged his

shoulders, and slowly walking towards the door. Although Simon was very relieved, the look that Mr.

Starr gave him made him think that it was not completely over. Edmund didn’t notice, even though it

was his dad. He was distracted by how badly Simon was handling the situation, and was thinking of

what he would have said. Now, if he had opened the door, he would have said something intelligent,

something smooth, like, let’s see...

While Edmund was thinking this, Simon had walked over, shakily took the homework out

from his pocket, and slumped down in his chair. He was still ready for anything, and was wondering

when it would come; the comeback. He knew Edmund’s dad well enough to see the patterns he

used. First, he would let them go for a while, and then, when he was completely prepared, he would

catch them unaware. This was way too much like a cat playing with a mouse for Simon too like. He

hadn’t done this many times in the past, but he made it very obvious when he did. He would do

something that the family would discuss for the rest of the week. This was what Simon dreaded,

more than the loss of the dessert; that was a mildly bad consequence. Edmund opened his mouth,

to comment, but Simon broke in before he could say anything. He wasn’t in the mood for criticism,

and they needed to talk.

Simon had another plan, but Edmund was willing to go along with it this time. It made more

sense, and they didn’t have any other ones that could work. This was the new plan: avoid Mr. Starr

as much as possible, and do their homework at midnight tonight. No one would be awake, and they

could take as long as they wanted.

After that, they got ready for bed, and also got some necessary things done, for

midnight. They both set their alarms for 11:45, got a couple flashlights, and hid them under their

beds. They also got some fun games to play, a couple of chocolate bars, soda, a hacky sack, and

some comic. They were all set to party all night.

When Simon looked at the alarm on his clock, after setting it, something didn’t look right. But

by that point he was so tired he told himself to forget it. In a few minutes, both friends were fast

asleep, and their clocks ticked away, waiting to buzz loudly at 11:45 the next morning.

At some point in the night, Simon awoke from a very deep sleep. It was so sudden he didn’t

realize he was awake until he had been lying in his bed for well over a minute. It was debated over

later what woke him up, but they never found out. some instinct in Simon’s brain made him wake

up; he knew something was amiss right away. He lay there for a while, wondering what was nagging

at the back of his mind. He rolled over onto his side, and looked at the clock, still ticking away. That’s

weird, he thought; its 4:37 and the alarm didn’t go off. Then the full meaning of that made him sit up

in bed. He had set the wrong time on his clock; both of them had! They had set their clocks for 11:45

AM, not PM! And he also had band that morning, so he would have to get up at 5:45. School started

at 7:45, but band started earlier. He jumped out of bed, and ran over to rouse Edmund. Edmund was

a deep sleeper, even more so than Simon. It took ten minutes before he was out of bed and semi

functional; but it was well over half an hour before he stopped yawning and got down to business.

It was almost 4:50; they only had 55 minutes left before people started getting up. “Come on!’ said

Simon,’ we’ve only got like 55 minutes left! Commme-ooon!”

But for some unknown reason, Edmund wouldn’t get to business. He claimed later

that, since he wasn’t even in the band, how was he supposed to know Simon had to get up by

5:45? Which was immediately followed by Simon painfully explaining to him he had told him,

17

specifically, when he had gotten him up. But all the same, Edmund claimed Simon hadn’t said that;

he was probably still too tired to understand or hear what Simon was saying.

When finally Edmund was awake enough to do homework, Simon tried to get down and

do it. But Edmund, still not getting the point of haste, had already gotten everything out, and was

setting up SANDY LAND[23], by the time Simon realized what he was doing.

“What are you doing?!’ Simon softly yelled at Edmund. “We have to get this homework

done!” Edmund slowly looked up from his game, and said in a sleepily, “since we went to all that

trouble to get it here without anyone seeing, why not use it?”

“ drop the game and come help me with this homework!” Simon said, pushing the game

away from Edmund. “Hey!’ yelled Edmund, ‘knock it off!” They tumbled on the ground for a minute;

in the end, Simon got the game away from Edmund and back in the box. Both of them were

breathing hard, and boy if looks could kill, I’d stay clear of that room. Edmund sat back on his legs

and crossed his arms. For a couple of seconds they stared at each other; then Simon remembered

the homework. He stood up, and said in a rough voice, “Okay, if you’re done being a fool, then let’s

do this homework!” Edmund finally consented; but by now it was 5:05, and they still had a good

amount of homework left. After that, with only a little more grumblings from Edmund, they went too

it. They were putting off the studying part; they hated studying, and it was one of the only things that

they agreed . They had a big test that day, first period. If they had known a little better, or a little

more, they would have probably studied first; but they didn't know any better.

They had been working for 10 minutes, when both of them jumped a foot in the air out of

their seats. Why, do you ask? Well, to better understand that, let’s go a little ways back. I’ll go back

to 9 o'clock last night, when Mr. Starr was having a good think, while reading the newspaper. He

was wondering whether or not he should wait until the weekend to fall upon Simon and Edmund

with the consequence or what. Sooner would be better, logically, he thought. If they didn’t do

their homework, there wouldn’t be anything to show if they turned in their uncompleted papers

in the morning; no, sooner was better. But how?—then he got an idea. Why not that soon, he

thought. They’ll be the least prepared. Content with his plan, he went back to reading the obituary

section of the newspaper.

Now we can come back to the board game fight. What had happened was this. Simon and

Edmund had made a lot more noise than they had thought. Not enough to wake anyone up, but

enough to, say, alert someone patrolling the hallways that something was up. And I bet that you can

probably guess who that someone was.

He had started walking around the halls, and kept on telling himself he should have got up

sooner, when he heard something. It sounded like “Thump, Thump, “-ay!’ Thumpity Thump ‘knock

it off—” Swish ‘Oof!” Thumpity-thumpity-thumpity-thumpity-Thump! Then silence. He silently and

quickly walked over to their room, and peeked in through the door. Because of the angle, he couldn’t

see Simon or Edmund; but he stayed for a while to listen for a while. Everything was pretty quiet for

a while. Mr. Starr was to walk away, when he heard the sound of paper rustling and low voices

saying something Latin conjugation. Then he knew that they were doing homework; or at least could

assume so. He opened the door, and said, loud enough to wake the sleepers farthest away in the

house, “Well now, what do we have here? I see some friends have decided to finish their homework

before everyone else wakes up, and tried to deceive me with lies the night before, eh. What do you

think of that?!?”

That was what startled Simon and Edmund so badly. They’d sat, gaping at Mr. Starr; but

only for a second. Then it happened. Mr. Starr had opened his mouth, and was to say something.

18

But he never got to say what he had been thinking; for at that instant there came a low humming

noise.

found. Mr. Starr muttered under his breath, “What in heaven's name could that be?” Then they all

jumped, and for the second time that day for Simon and Edmund. The noise appeared to be coming

from the ceiling, but there was nothing above them but a bedroom, and above that the observatory,

both of which were empty. The noise, although hardly noticeable at first, and hardly louder than

someone humming a tune, started to slowly grow. They stood transfixed, unable to move. It had

taken hold of their shoulders with a grip of iron, and held them fast. It continued to get louder. Simon

noticed that all the hair on his arms was standing straight up and down in the air. The air felt

electric. Edmund hair started to rise up from his head. He yelped in surprise. Simon realized that the

same was true for him. His long bangs were rising from his forehead. Even Mr. Starrs’ short hair was

pointed straight up and down. He self-consciously tried to smooth it down, but all in vain. The noise

continued to get louder. By now it was the same as a whole army of hummers humming as loud as

they could, at close range. And still it continued to get louder. All of a sudden, the lights started to

flicker. The walls were cast in a strange, dingy yellow glow from the lights. Simon felt like he was in

the middle of a thunder cloud. Little arches of electricity jumped from the walls, zapping them if they

came too close. Everyone by this point had covered their ears: Edmund tried to yell something to

them, but he might as well have saved his breath. Even without their ears covered, neither Simon

nor Mr. Starr would have been able to hear. In fact, even Edmund couldn’t hear himself yelling. And

still it continued to get louder. The noise was more like a taste, a smell, a picture; it pierced through

the mind and slipped into every sense. It was the smell of rotten eggs. It was the hue of slime coated

mold. It was the taste of charred toast. It felt like their heads would split open and their eardrums

would pop. But for the noise itself, it was all of these sensations mixed together. It was then that all

the light bulbs in the house shattered. Glass rained down on them from all sides. The air was livid

with electricity: all three of them felt like a live telephone wire was sparking all around them. Simon

and Edmund were rolling on the ground, like they were on fire. Mr. Starr was slumped against the

wall, his face in a gruesome expression. They wanted it to be over.

flung off their feet, and thrown against the wall and onto the floor. It was then that the windows

shattered. The whole house shuddered, and the floorboards rocked like ocean waves. From the

windows, there came a strange unearthly glow. It sounded like the house was being rammed by a

herd of elephants. Simon, in the back of his mind, could hear the force field alarm going crazy, and

that reminded him of something. But being thrown against a wall does not help good thinking, so he

put it aside. as he crumpled into a limp a heap on the floor, the noise started to change. It became

much louder, much closer: in fact, before, the noise now seemed to have been muffled, like it had

been on the other side of a wall. But still, the force behind it continued to grow. Simon felt the blood

dripping from his uncountable wounds, the little pieces of glass in his hair, and saw Edmund and Mr.

Starr lying on the ground. But he didn’t give up hope. This was nothing compared to when he had

picked up The Token. He stood up, and confronted to noise. It didn’t lower the volume of the noise,

but it made him feel better. Now it felt like he was on top of a tall pine tree, in the middle of a rain

storm, with the wind blowing his wet hair along with the top of the tree. And then, as the noise

became something more than painfully unbearable, (but not for Simon) there came a sudden

silence.

Glass tinkled all around them. The silence was like being brought up short from a high

fall, and finding yourself on your feet again. Edmund slowly dragged himself to their feet, and Mr.

Mr. Starr and the children stopped, and looked all around; but no source could be

Then, there came the explosion. It felt like they were swimming in energy. They were

19

Starr heaved himself up from the wall. They all slowly uncovered their ears; but then wished that

they hadn’t: the silence was almost as unbearable as the noise. The noise was still ringing in their

ears. The whole thing had only taken three minutes, and the explosion had only taken half a

minute. They stared at each other, unable to talk, or to even think of something to say, for what

seemed like a long time. In reality couldn’t have been more than fifteen seconds. Simon had no idea

what had happened. All he knew was he was bruised all over, his ears were ringing like crazy, and

he had a splitting headache. He also now knew what it felt like to be completely scared out of his

wits. As a matter of fact, he was to try to say that, when there came a dull thump from above. They

all jumped. The thumping was interrupted by a loud whirring noise, and a distinct burning smell.

Mr. Starr, who still remembered when his house burned down, nervously limped over to

Simon and Edmund. Still partially watching the ceiling, he panted to them, “what—cough cough—do

you think was going on, pant? It seems like, pant pant, someone was on the roof, pant cough cough-

and they’re trying to burn down the house! I’m going to- croak- tell Mother, Edmund, and your, your

parents, Sssimon. While I’m doing that, go back to your, pant, your room: we can talk later.” Simon,

however, was very reluctant to leave his spot; he felt, almost instinctively, that something much more

important than a robbery, or the house being burned, was underfoot. Mr. Starr gave them a look,

and then slowly limped away. Edmund gave Simon a questioning look, too: very similar to his dads,

Simon thought, with an uneasy feeling.

Edmund said, “We probably should be getting back to our room. I mean, what if someone

was trying to break into the house. And what in the world was that humming!?! I felt like my head

was going to explode!” He then promptly groaned, sank to the floor, and clutched his head in pain.

Bad headaches were starting.

Simon, who also had a bad headache, would have been glad to follow suit. But he decided

he was going to find out what in the world had happened. This was partially to find out what had

happened, and partially because he was a little uneasy with possibly someone on the roof. There

was the sound of feet on the roof- but that’s impossible, since the observatories up there, you

say. Well, that’s what the two of them were thinking; you will understand this later. They looked up,

and way above them, they could hear a curious sound; it was like the sound of a hole being cut

into thick cardboard, with a chainsaw. But it seemed as if the ceiling was being cut open, by some

unseen force; that’s when they all jumped back in surprise. A long, metal blade had pierced through

the ceiling, and was cutting a large hole in it! Dust rained down on them like snowflakes, and even

from their safe distance they were soon coated in the stuff.

Simon felt like something horrible was happening, and wished he could do something. He

was the least affected of the three: the encounter with The Token had changed how he thought

pain. You could say that his sense of pain was dulled, which, as you will see, will help him in many a

tight spot.

Aha! Thought Simon. I know what I can do! And without knowing what he was doing,

reached into his pocket and withdrew The Token.

This time, The Token awakened as if he had commanded it too come to life. Simon felt a

sudden jolt of adrenalin rush through his body, and his brain go into combat mode. Know he thought

over it, he hadn't even know he had a combat part of his brain. Either he had always had it, but

never had to use it, or The Token had developed it into Simons mind. Simon stood tall and straight,

with his hand raised in front of him, with The Token help forward like the great power that it was.

Edmund gaped at Simon: his face was in a gruesome expression, proud and stern, like an ageless

king going into battle. There was a silence, where the only noise was the sound of the cutting. And

20

then, at last, the cut fell upon the ground, a perfect circle. There came a clicking sound, like millions

of robotic spiders trying to force their way through the hole. A red light blazed forth, and a foul stench

blasted them in the face. And still Simon stood strong. The Token churned and swirled, and a golden

light sprang from within, in response. The hall was cast in evil looking shadows: Edmund crept back

against the wall, a look of terror mirrored in both of his widely opened eyes. And that was when the

unimaginable happened. Simon’s father walked into the hall, in time to see a long, robotic arm came

through a hole that it had cut in the ceiling.

He gasped, fainted, and fell with a cry upon the floor in a dead heap. You would have too, if

you had had a nightmare and was going to get a glass of water, and then saw a robotic arm coming

through your ceiling. Edmund was the only one to notice; Simon was preoccupied. From nowhere,

a string of complicated numbers and patterns swirled before his eyes. They swirled faster and

faster, until, with an explosion of light and sound, The Token blasted a ball of golden energy at the

arm. With lightning fast reflexes, it fired a smaller bolt of red energy directly into the golden ball. A

massive blast of heat flung Simon off his feet and against the wall. Edmund, already against the wall,

was flung sideways into the door frame. Dr. Photon, a limp but very much alive body, was thrown

through the doorway and against another wall a good thirty feet away. He collapsed on the ground in

a heap, again.

Simon was hardly conscious. He tried to rise to his feet, but in vain. He feebly lifted his

hand (he had not let go of The Token) and fired a curious looking, knotted rope of green gas. It

acted very much like a lasso, and rapped the robotic arm to the door handle of a nearby door. It

then proceeded to seep into every crack and crevice of the metal. A hissing sound could be heard,

like the sound of strong acid dissolving tinfoil. The arm flailed, and fired bright red balls of energy

in random directions: but it could not escape. It slowly stopped flailing, and then stopped moving

altogether, and hung still. Simon still struggled to remain awake, but slowly slipped into oblivion. He

felt that they had won. He was to find out that this was not so.

There came a loud grunting sound, and the noise of metal against metal. Simon feebly

looked up, and saw a massive man fall through the hole and fling the arm aside. He was tall, nearly

seven six, and seemed to be made of metal. His arms ended in flat, cannon like cylinders, and one

of his legs was a metal pole. His eyes were glass balls, tinted red, with fisheye lenses inside. He

was bald, and wore a black hat like a sailor captain’s hat. He walked with a limp, but was still very

menacing. He said something in a strange language, which sounded like gibberish: what he said

was this:

"Futurum, hic ar quid durum, quid opus spiritu humilitatis Force field vix satis firmus parum

temporis impetum potentia, et brachium prohibere poterat, nisi. Quis ego volo hominem invenire!

Ahh est."

I believe that was Latin, but I’m not completely sure: if it was, it was spoken in a very strong

accent. Anyway, even if it was Latin, what happened next was still as horrible as if he had, say,

spoken German or Spanish. He had been turning this way and that, and then finally, at the end of

his speech, (as if coming to a decision) walked over to Dr. Photon, and roughly grabbed him by the

arm. He dragged him toward the hole in the ceiling where, Simon realized, a latter was coming down

out of the hole. Simon tried to yell something, but all he could say was “no! Whaa...?” before he fell

back down upon the ground. Edmund, less wounded, struggled to his feet in the hope of somehow

helping: all that happened was he got shoved back down to the ground in a painful fashion. He gave

a cry, and was still. Now the giant was climbing the latter. Simon, in a last desperate attack, lifted up

The Token, and blasted a quivering arrow of light toward the giant. There was a blinding explosion,

and Simon lay still at last. Darkness engulfed him, and his vision went black.

21