The Somebodies Read online

  And so it was bad timing really when the bee stung Howard, and Howard-as-a-piggy-bank let out a small squeal. It wasn’t a true pig squeal—he was still ceramic—but it was a squeal nonetheless. The flying monkey flapped up and appeared above Fern, his talons on the back of the sofa, his wings beating to keep his balance. His foul scent pressed down on Fern. He lowered his head toward her. Howard’s piggy bank leg was swelling, the ceramic skin getting shinier and shinier. The flying monkey was so close now, she could feel his breath on her face.

  “He’s been stung. He needs ice,” Fern said. “He’s allergic. He’s swelling up.”

  The flying monkey didn’t seem to care. He flapped his wings angrily and screeched. The other monkey rushed over, the Brainkeeper running after him.

  “Don’t look!” the exploded-bun maid shouted.

  “I don’t see a thing!” the wrestler maid said.

  Fern was surrounded by beating wings and screeching.

  “They want your money,” the Brainkeeper said. “Give it to them!”

  “It’s not my money,” Fern said, letting go of the pony and holding Howard-as-a-piggy-bank as tightly as she could.

  The Brainkeeper ran to her and pulled on Howard. “Give them what they want!” he shouted.

  “No!” Fern said. She kicked the Brainkeeper in the shins. The bees were sailing off the Brainkeeper because of the gusty wind kicked up by the leathery, foul-smelling wings. The buzzing bee wings roared.

  “Don’t look!” the maids were shouting to each other. “Close your eyes!”

  Fern could barely see through the haze of bees, but the Brainkeeper had a good grip on the piggy bank.

  “There are things more important than money!” he said.

  “I know!” Fern shouted back.

  The Brainkeeper was wiry but strong and, with the wind and bees, Fern couldn’t help but lose her grip. One of the flying monkeys snatched Howard-as-a-piggy-bank, and the two flapped to the high factory windows. The one without Howard-as-a-piggy-bank crashed through first, glass raining down. The other monkey followed, gripping Howard-as-a-piggy-bank, and flapping out into the dark night.

  Fern turned to the Brainkeeper angrily. “That was my friend!” she said.

  “Money is no friend,” the Brainkeeper said. “I’d rather eat only honey and have one good friend than be stuck here alone!”

  “You are stuck here alone, day in and day out!”

  The Brainkeeper stared around. “Oh.”

  “And that piggy bank was Howard, a boy. A boy in the shape of a piggy bank. And if the Brain worked, you’d know that!”

  “Oh.”

  The maids opened their eyes. The exploded-bun maid looked at the broken glass. “That’s a mess.”

  “It sure is,” the wrestler maid said.

  “Is that all you two can worry about?” Fern looked at the clock. Four minutes to midnight. The Blue Queen’s powers would be hitting their stride. “I’m in a real dire emergency here! I’ve got to battle the Blue Queen! Ubuleen Heet is the Blue Queen! She isn’t Fattler’s counselor! She’s brainwashed him. He’s just lost his confidence. She’s got him believing he needs a Brain and a Brainkeeper! There are souls at stake! And, and, and…” Fern was breathless. “My friend has been carried away by flying monkeys who sniffed out the key that’s hidden inside him! The key that will help the Blue Queen take over again!”

  The two maids and the Brainkeeper stood in silence for a moment.

  “Why didn’t you say so from the get-go?” the Brainkeeper said.

  “Well, we’d have surely helped,” the wrestler woman said.

  “As best we could’ve,” the exploded-bun maid said.

  “Oh, well then,” Fern said.

  Just then there was a loud ding, and elevator doors opened.

  “I’m going to go try to fix things,” Fern said. “Do you want to help?”

  The Brainkeeper was suddenly distracted, calling his bees. “My little engines! Come to me! Come to me!” He had his arms held out. “I would, um. I certainly would, but…”

  “Oh,” the wrestler maid said, “we’re needed. I mean without us, who would clean up that glass on the floor over there?”

  The exploded-bun woman added, “And, well, we’ve punched in. You know, we’re on the clock. So we couldn’t possibly.”

  “Oh, I see,” Fern said, disappointed. She walked to the elevator. “Everyone should have faith in something, and I have faith in you all,” she said, wishing it were true. “I’m not sure why. But I do, even though you haven’t helped me and even though you’ve just said that you won’t.” She looked at each one. They stared at her. “I can’t explain it,” she said. “But I still have faith. It’s the stubborn kind.”

  She hoped this would make them charge forward, but they didn’t. They stood there somewhat ashamed of themselves and maybe a little indignant that Fern was asking for help, and feeling sorry for themselves too for being in such a position. All of this passed across their faces.

  Fern stepped into the elevator. The doors shut. She gave a frustrated sigh.

  “Floor, please!” a voice called out.

  Fern turned, expecting to see the same elevator operator who’d taken her and Howard to the city beneath the city, sitting there in his cap and vest, fiddling with his pressurized buttons. But it wasn’t the same operator. This one was young. His vest was loose and saggy around his spindly frame.

  “I don’t know what floor,” Fern said. “All I know is New York Foods.”

  He nodded his head. “That’s up above. It’s a secret line. I’ve never used it.”

  “Where does the secret line lead to?” Fern asked.

  “Inside the castle gazebo,” the elevator operator said. “On the royal grounds. I’ve been wanting to see it. Is that where you want to go?”

  Fern nodded. “As fast as you can,” she said.

  The elevator operator said, “Okay then!” He pushed a button, but the elevator didn’t move. “Darn you, Charlie Horse!” the kid said.

  “Hey,” Fern said. “Did this elevator used to belong to an operator who wore a very tight vest?”

  “That’s right!” the young elevator operator said, fiddling with some buttons. “He up and quit. Just like that. He went off to take engineering lessons. Always wanted to design things like this, I guess.”

  Fern smiled to herself. He’d listened to her advice. Imagine that!

  Just then a bell dinged again. The elevator operator opened the door. “More passengers,” he said.

  And there stood the Brainkeeper and the two maids, blurry in a cloud of bees.

  PART 5

  THE SECRET SOCIETY OF SOMEBODIES

  1

  THE GAZEBO

  THE ELEVATOR OPERATOR GOT CHARLIE HORSE up and running. He threw it into high gear. They chugged up, up, up and swerved to one side then the other. They bucked and flew. Fern, the Brainkeeper and the two maids sank to the floor and braced themselves. Fern gripped the miniature humpbacked pony.

  The elevator hoisted itself up to the surface of New York City, specifically into the chilly back room of New York Foods, to get on the right track. Through a thick pane of glass, Fern could see shoppers pushing carts, pawing tomatoes under fluorescent lights. On the top of the glass, she saw the etched words, which of course, when read by the shoppers on the other side of the glass, read NEW YORK FOODS. The elevator only hesitated here for a moment, just long enough to switch tracks, and then it plummeted back down to the city beneath the city. Fern’s stomach rose to her throat. The maids held hands. The Brainkeeper talked to his bees, which had calmed quickly and were now arranged like medals of honor covering the chest of his overalls. “It’s okay,” he said. “Don’t be frightened.” But by the quaver in his voice, it was plain that he was frightened. Fern was frightened for Howard. She imagined him in the flying monkey’s clutches, swooping through the open air. Fern wondered if she’d be able to save him.

  The elevator popped up and stopped. It let out a b
ing! The door opened.

  Fern and the others said good-bye to the young elevator operator and stepped out. They were inside the gazebo, near a quiet fishpond, the fishes’ orange and gold bodies swishing in the light. Through the lattice, across the front lawn, they could see the meeting of the Secret Society of Somebodies. Circling a grassy mound lit with two tall torches were the members—hundreds of them, maybe even thousands. Instead of the more businessy blazers, they were now wearing robes of varying colors, with the Triple S emblem stitched where their lapels would have been. They were poised with their hands above their heads, not as if they were under arrest, but more like they were holding down the shoulders of a much taller foe. They hummed prayerfully.

  Fern could see a hunkered form on the grassy mound. At first she wasn’t sure what it was, but as she stared, it took shape.

  “It’s Fattler,” the Brainkeeper said, his bees humming on his shirt.

  Fattler was sitting in a chair. Ubuleen Heet stood beside him. She was in her motivational speaker mode—energetic but refined, her cocoon-and-moth brooch pinned to her white robe. The filigree clock on the spire was gonging midnight.

  “So, Willy, do you think we’re here to celebrate your ordinary nature? To celebrate your freedom from the shackles of genius?”

  Fattler sat back in the chair. “If that’s the case, well then, that is awfully kind of you! It’s unnecessary, though, because I’m really an ordinary guy now. Just me.” He knew it wasn’t why he was there. He’d been found out. The key. She must have tried it on the door to the castle, Fern thought. The Blue Queen looked angry—a pressured hatred that was boiling just below the surface. Fattler could feel it too—he had to. He was sweating. His eyes darted anxiously.

  Fern searched the crowd for the flying monkeys. Had she beaten them there? She looked up through the lattice to see if they were on their way, flying above. She could see the castle’s spire wedged into the dirty underside of New York City. She remembered how she’d pictured a family in Central Park having a picnic right above the castle’s spire, not even the least bit aware of what was pointing at them from below. That family would be asleep in their beds now, and the spot above the spire empty and dark.

  Behind the gazebo there were some food tables, picked over and abandoned. The exploded-bun woman pulled the tablecloth off each table like a magician. She threw one to each of them. “Robes,” she said.

  Fern caught hers and wrapped it around herself, making a knot near her shoulders.

  The Brainkeeper pulled a pen out of his pocket and wrote “SSS” on his makeshift robe and passed it on.

  The wrestler woman said, “We’ll sneak in and mingle.”

  Fern was scared. Her thoughts felt jumbled. She was relieved when the wrestler woman said, “Look there,” and pointed to a hedgerow. “You can hide behind that, follow it all the way to the front of the crowd.”

  “Good luck,” the exploded-bun woman said.

  The Brainkeeper smiled weakly. “I’ve never done anything like this before. I only know bees.”

  Fern had never done anything quite like this before either.

  The Brainkeeper and the maids walked down and joined the crowd.

  At this point Ubuleen was working up to her request. “For all that I have done for you, Willy Fattler, I asked only for one thing in return. Only one thing. And you gave me a fake!” She held the ivory key above her head. “What is it really, Fattler? Is it a—” She cupped the key in her hands and then opened them finger by finger to reveal a strand of pearls. The Blue Queen ripped the strand in half. The pearls went flying out, raining down on the heads of Somebodies, who didn’t flinch or move. They only kept up their humming.

  “Those belonged to my dear old auntie, who’s dead now!” Fattler said. “I wish you hadn’t done that.”

  “Oh, you’ll wish I hadn’t done a lot of things,” the Blue Queen said.

  “Wait,” Fattler said. “How did you do that? I mean, you aren’t supposed to have any powers, not after you were stripped of them after, you know, the past incident.”

  “Oh, stripped of my powers! The Great Realdo! And where is our Great Realdo now? Where is Dorathea? And her dear Mr. Bone?” The Blue Queen looked around as if truly mystified, and then she raised her finger in the air as if she just remembered something. “Lucess! Come here! Show them!”

  Lucess was holding the fishbowl. Her father was swimming in it, but he wasn’t alone. There were two other fish swimming in the bowl. One had enormous eyes that Fern recognized immediately—her grandmother. The other had blond eyelashes and ruddy cheeks—her father. Fern felt her whole body go cold. Dorathea and the Bone had been captured. They were stuck, like Merton Gretel, though they probably didn’t even know they were stuck with Merton Gretel. They were just fish, spinning around in a bowl. They weren’t coming to save Fern. Fern had to save them.

  The Blue Queen went on. “I’m not stupid, Fattler. I didn’t just get cast out and waste away! I had to get creative. Anybodies love books, you know. And why? Maybe because they transport us, transform us—and because we can make the imagined real. But also because those writers put their souls into those books they create, not even knowing it, probably—stupid writers! Imagine, we actually have access to their souls. And then Anybodies close the book and leave the soul there for the next reader, because it would be too evil to take it. Too evil? The writers left their souls behind. If they didn’t want them stolen, they should have guarded them more closely!” the Blue Queen said. “So I started getting souls and power from books—fresh, strong souls. The first one took a lot of effort. My daughter had to help—dear girl!”

  Fern spotted Lucess holding the fishbowl—her father swimming in it—standing near a trunk, filled with books, no doubt. She turned away and stared into the bowl. She was ashamed, Fern could tell. But her mother had made her do it, hadn’t she? Fern felt sorry for her. “After that one gave me some power, I had enough to get the next. And with each one, I grew stronger and stronger. I had to work the nonexistent muscles of my Anybody powers back. Like someone who has to learn to walk again after a car crash.”

  Willy looked at her blankly. “You found a loophole.”

  “I did. I certainly did. And now I need that key!” Ubuleen Heet almost lost her temper. Her arms shook at her sides, but then Lucess spoke up from beside her. Fern couldn’t hear what Lucess said, but the comment calmed her mother, for the moment. “All I want, Willy,” she said, “is a key to the castle, so that I can properly be restored to my rightful place.”

  “I don’t have the key,” Willy said, standing up as if just to stretch his legs.

  “You do!” Ubuleen Heet shouted.

  “I don’t know where it went,” he said. “I think it ran off!”

  “Ran off where, to whom?” Ubuleen asked.

  He paused a moment and then shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t remember,” he said. And then his mouth twisted—was it a smile? “My ordinary brain doesn’t hold facts all that well.”

  “Oh, it doesn’t, does it?” Ubuleen said. She held both her arms up in the air. Her face took on a bluish glint in the torchlight. “Tie him down!” she yelled.

  Two Somebodies charged up the mound and forced him back into the chair. He bent forward. His face in the torchlight was pinched and desperate. One of the Somebodies tied his hands tightly behind his back and rigged the rope to the chair.

  “Don’t try to break loose, Fattler. Or I will begin taking lives once again. And who knows who I’ll start with this time!” The Blue Queen shouted, “Send up the souls!”

  The crowd roared with shouts and applause.

  Lucess pushed the trunk up the mound in front of Fattler’s shiny black shoes. Lucess looked tired and weak. The trunk was heavy and, by the time she’d unlatched its lid and opened it up, she was breathless, but also wide-eyed and obviously scared.

  Fern wasn’t sure what to do. How could she possibly help? She didn’t trust herself. What if she confronted the Blue Queen and
couldn’t control her powers? What if she could only turn the Blue Queen’s hair into a pony—and not even know how she did it? What if her hands turned into books again, and this time she simply handed over her soul, bit by bit? Part of Fern wanted to turn back. What could she do with her measly powers?

  But then she thought of Howard. Where was Howard? She’d gotten him into this mess. She thought of Merton Gretel, her grandmother’s brother—his gills, his heart, his need for the rest of his soul. She thought of Lucess Brine. Poor Lucess. She deserved a good father after all she’d been through, a father who was able to really love her.

  The miniature humpbacked pony wriggled in Fern’s arms, restless as ever.

  “Stop it,” Fern said, frustrated. “Don’t you know anything? This isn’t the time for messing around.”

  But the pony seemed bent on something. He jumped from her arms. Fern watched him trot off toward the torchlight. She knew it was the right thing to do.

  2

  MORE SOULS

  THE TRUNK WAS FILLED WITH BOOKS.

  The Secret Society of Somebodies began to hum louder. Fern knew the tune quite well by now—the one from the invitation and the passageway. But now she could make out the words—“Hail the Blue Queen! Hail! Hail the Blue Queen.” It was an anthem that now was picking up steam. The air was windy. The Blue Queen, standing behind Fattler, raised her thick blue arms. The trunk began to glow with the dusky light of the authors’ souls that had been stitched into the books. Fern knew what was coming. She remembered it all, in terribly precise detail, from the time she’d looked on from underneath the bed: The Blue Queen was going to swallow pieces of souls.

  Fern glanced around the crowd’s feet for the miniature humpbacked pony, but she didn’t see him. The two maids and the Brainkeeper had mixed in perfectly. Fern couldn’t see them either. Although it made Fern feel weak in her knees, she inched through the hedges, closer and closer, until she could see Fattler’s moist eyes, shining in the light beaming up from the bits of souls in the trunk.