Délon City: Book Two of the Oz Chronicles (2 page)

I surveyed my room. It was... normal. My Tennessee Titans pendant hung above my bed. My autographed Titans football was in its case on my desk. My Titans screensaver zoomed across my computer screen. Everything was as it should be. It was too perfect. I ran my hand across the top of my desk. A sticky almost invisible residue stuck to my fingertips. That wasn’t right. My Mom was the cleanest woman on the planet. She kept the house spotless. With the exception of Pop’s office, you couldn’t find a speck of dust with a microscope. Something was definitely wrong.

I thought about Pop’s purple rash and black fingernails. He was a contractor. He was prone to smashed fingers and various other injuries. He had had plenty of black thumbnails from accidentally pounding his thumbs with a hammer at work, but I had never seen all his fingernails turn black before. And the rash? I didn’t want to think what I thought, but I couldn’t help it. It was almost like he was turning into a Délon .

Suddenly, I wanted out of the house. I showered and dressed as quickly as I could. My heart was pounding the whole time. I rushed to the back door to make my escape, but Mom called out just as I was stepping outside.

“Don’t forget your cocoon, Oz.”

I stopped and looked back. My what?

She rounded the corner carrying a red, basketball-sized, pulsating blob that emitted a katydid-like chirping. “Your Pop picked it up after change therapy last night,” she said with a strange sense of pride.

I didn’t know how to react. “Change therapy?”

“It just came out of the incubation center a couple of days ago.” She reached behind the door and pulled my backpack off a hook.

“But...”

“I know. I know. It’s a little scary, but we got a notice last week that we weren’t complying fast enough with the general’s transformation orders.” She gently stuffed the cocoon in the backpack. “Turn around.” I did as she asked and she slipped the backpack on me. I could feel the cocoon gesticulating between my shoulder blades.

“It may take two or three days, but it should hatch soon. You need to keep it close by.” She kissed me on the cheek. “I’m hoping mine will hatch today.” She looked at the darkest corner of the room. A bigger cocoon expanded and contracted. It emitted the same katydid chirping. “Poor thing’s just too scared to come out.”

I was dumfounded. I had no idea what was in the cocoons, and I had no desire to find out. I was sickened that my Mom was so excited about having the disgusting blobs in the house.

“Oh, goodness, where’s my head today?” Mom said. “I almost forgot.” She sped back toward the kitchen and quickly reappeared carrying a small brown paper bag. “Your father’s transformation therapist suggested you eat some of these today at lunch. He said it will help your system prepare for the change. You might as well have a couple for breakfast since you didn’t get a chance to eat this morning.”

I reluctantly looked inside. Eight fat, juicy white insect larvae slowly wriggled inside the lunch bag. I gulped and nearly passed out from disgust. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” I muttered.

“Oz, please,” Mom said. “Don’t be such a baby.” She reached inside the bag and pulled one of the larva out. “They’re not that bad.” She popped the plump worm in her mouth and bit down. The ugly little maggot screamed. It actually screamed. Mom chewed it quickly and swallowed. “They don’t taste that bad, and once you get used to the screaming, you’re home free.”

I held the bag of maggots in my hand and stared at my mother while a big chirping cocoon squirmed in the backpack I was wearing. I definitely wasn’t home. The woman standing in front of me with larva remains on the corners of her mouth was most certainly not my mother, and the guy inside with a purple flaky rash and black fingernails was not my father.

I slowly descended the steps backwards, keeping a disbelieving eye on my mother as I went. Once I reached the ground I turned to run as fast and as far away as I could, but my Pop’s voice rang out.

“Oz, hold up!” He kissed my mom and bounded down the steps. “I’ll give you a ride.”

“That’s okay...”

“It wasn’t a question, son. It was a statement. Learn the difference.” That at least sounded like something my Pop would say.

“Yes, sir,” I said. I stood and watched as the man who may or may not have been my father walked by.

He was baffled when I didn’t follow him. “C’mon, get in the truck.”

The truck? The truck... that meant... gas was now usable. Cars ran. The Délons had changed that much. The Takers had somehow sabotaged the gasoline supply and rendered motorized transportation useless. The Délons returned that part of society back to normal. I could see that I was going to have to get used to a whole new set of rules.

***

The truck barreled down Lincoln Street. Pop and I had not spoken since we left the house. I was scared of the man. I stared at his head waiting for the spider legs to jet out and reach for me.

Tullahoma looked like home. But, like my bedroom, it was too normal. November was creeping up on the small little southern town, and the foliage had turned brown. The cool crisp air of the season almost sparkled it was so pure. The happy faces of the townsfolk we passed seemed to be painted on. Nothing seemed real.

My backpack with the grotesque cocoon inside it was on the seat between Pop and me. It continued to chirp.

“Annoying little booger, isn’t it?” Pop said. He smiled. When he did, I could see that some of his teeth were missing. That unsettled me even more and Pop noticed. “What’s wrong, boy?”

I didn’t know what to say. There were so many things wrong. I didn’t know how to narrow it down into one brief, coherent sentence. What could I say that wouldn’t morph the man driving my Pop’s truck into a full-on Délon that would devour my brains before the next traffic light?

“Nothing,” I said.

“Look,” he said. “Don’t think I don’t know this is all scary to you. Hell, it scared me, too.”

“It did?”

“You bet. But it really isn’t that bad. It certainly isn’t like it used to be. The Délon’s are more careful now.”

“Careful?”

“Absolutely. They take it easy. They know transformation can be rough for us humans.” He patted the backpack. “This little fella will make sure you come out of this thing okay. He’s your best friend. My therapist says he comes from the best breeder in the country. He may even come from the General’s stock.”

“Really,” I said trying to sound excited.

“You could sound a little more enthused than that, Oz. Having one of the General’s solifipods is like having a blank check.”

“Solifipod?”

“Cocoon, whatever you want to call it. The point is somebody in high places likes you.” He pointed to the backpack. “That little shunter in there could be this family’s ticket to the Royal Council.”

Part of me wanted to ask him what a shunter was, but the other part of me wished I had never even heard the word. It sounded violent and painful. My instincts were to roll down my window and toss the backpack into the nearest ditch, but I knew Pop would throw a fit.

We turned into the Sergeant York Middle School parking lot. “Today’s the first day of the rest of your life, or I should say the best of your life,” Pop said. He pulled up to the curb and put the truck in park. He gave me a creepy half-toothed grin. “Today you get marked.”

“Marked?” I didn’t like the sound of it.

“I’m not going to lie to you, son. It’s going to hurt. A lot.” He opened his door and climbed out of the truck. “But it’s worth the pain, trust me.”

That was it. I had had enough quality time with freaky-turning purple-Pop. I opened my door and stepped onto the pavement with the intentions of bolting for the woods in the back of the school. But I only managed a half step before I ran into a seemingly immovable object and fell ass-first to the ground. I hit the pavement with a thud and looked up. There hovering over me was Coach Denton. I should say half of the thing standing over me was Coach Denton. The other half was a Délon with one dead eye and half its head outlined with flailing spider leg tentacles. The other eye was blue and the human half of the head was covered with a drooping comb over. The body was an impossible combination of sleek Délon design and the Coach’s doughboy build. Mandibles shot out of its mouth and snapped towards me.

“Going somewhere, Oz?” the Coach hissed.

Pop came around the truck. “They always try to run on their day of marking.”

Coach reached down and yanked me to my feet with his Délon hand. “Day of marking?” His dead eye bulged. “Well, congratulations, Oz.” He pulled me close. “It’s going to hurt like hell, but it will make a man out of you or, should I say, a Délon out of you.” He cackled or hacked some disturbing sound that rattled my bones. It made me regret killing the Taker Queen.

Pop reached in the truck and pulled out my backpack. “We brought his solifipod. It should be a couple of days before his shunter comes out, but we thought it best he keep it close by.”

Coach Denton sniffed the air. He held my arm tightly, and moved in closer to the backpack, breathing in deeply. “This is the general’s line.”

My Pop almost burst with excitement. “Really? We had been told that it was possible, but... Are you sure?”

Coach Denton breathed in even deeper. “Definitely. I’ve met General Roy on several occasions. This is his scent. I’d know it anywhere.”

General Roy? Was it possible? Was it the Roy I knew? The warrior I had betrayed? The one I had let fall victim to the Délons?

The Coach scanned me with his dead eye. “This can only mean one thing. You are to sit on the general’s Royal Council.” He looked at my Pop. “We are not prepared for this kind of marking.”

Pop’s posture visibly sank. He had never been more disappointed. “But we got a letter. This is Oz’s day of marking.” He pulled an envelope out of his back pocket and handed it to Coach Denton.

The half-freak/half comb-over disaster let me go and read the letter with great interest. “But I don’t understand. The Minister of Regents must be present for such a marking.”

“He couldn’t make it,” a voice boomed. Three Délons approached on horses from the West. They galloped across the schoolyard. I immediately recognized the middle horse, Mr. Mobley. Roy’s horse.

Coach Denton and Pop collapsed to their knees.

The Délon who was once my friend and fellow warrior, Roy, dismounted Mr. Mobley. “I hope I will do.”

“General...” Coach Denton’s voice was quivering.

Pop tried to pull me to my knees but I shook him off.

General Roy was a commanding figure. The spider legs on his head did not flail like I had seen them do on every other Délon. They hugged his head as if they were hairs in a tightly woven pattern of cornrows. His milky eyes beamed confidence. He smiled and nodded. “Oz.”

“Roy,” I said. Pop and Coach Denton gasped at my insolence.

The other two Délons jumped off their horses. I don’t know how, but I could tell right away they were Miles and Devlin, two more of my former warriors.

Miles tilted his head. “Ozzie boy, how’s it hanging?”

“General, this is such an honor,” Pop said.

I looked at him and was disgusted by his groveling.

“The honor is mine, Mr. Griffin,” General Roy said. “Your son is a hero.”

Coach Denton giggled. “Oz, a hero?”

Devlin stepped forward and slapped the Coach. “Shut up, you filthy halfer.”

Pop swallowed hard. “I don’t understand.”

General Roy circled me as he spoke. “The legend of the Battle of Atlanta. The boy warrior. The Taker slayer. Surely you know your history, Mr. Griffin.”

“Yes, sir,” Pop said. “But... You mean...”

“I do indeed.” General Roy knelt before me. “Meet your new king.”

TWO

I sat in the principal’s office alone for a long time. King? Me? It was a laughable concept. Had I not just lived through the end of the world, I would have thought this whole turn of events was a bizarre dream.

I placed my hand on the principal’s desk and felt the same sticky substance that had been on my desk at home. I examined the rest of the room more closely. The walls, the filing cabinet, the clock, everything was covered in it. Even the chair I was sitting in. In fact, the substance seemed to be creeping up on my jeans and slowly covering me. I stood and wiped off as much of the goo as possible.

Roy entered, not the Roy I once knew and fought side-byside with, but General Roy, the leader of a purple army of monstrosities that had no business ruling the planet. And I was supposed to be their king? It was too twisted to even think about.

General Roy approached me and placed his hand on my shoulder. I got the same chilling sensation that I’d had when Pop put his hand on my shoulder earlier that morning. “Oz, my friend, it is so good to see you.”

I didn’t feel the same, but I didn’t have the guts to say it. I simply nodded.

“I know this is a lot to take in, and I wish I could give you some time to digest this new revelation, but time is something we don’t have.”

“What do you mean?”

He smiled. Délon smiles are not something to long for. They are wicked moments in time that are so visually disturbing they send little pricks of pain through the back of your head. “It will all be explained to you after your marking.”

There was that word again, marking. I was getting tired of hearing it. It didn’t exactly conjure up pleasant prospects.

Roy moved around the principal’s desk and sat in the ergonomic chair. “Unfortunately, the royal scarab has not emerged yet.”

“Scarab?” I couldn’t recall where but I had heard that word before. I repeated the word in my mind over and over again hoping it would spark a memory.

“They are skittish little things. A nuisance really, but we can’t have a marking without them. The royal scarab is particularly nasty. Has a mind of its own really.”

“I don’t understand...”

“Of course you don’t,” General Roy said. “You’re still human.”

“And I want to stay that way.” I said expecting a fierce rebuke. But Roy simply gave me a bigger, more disturbing Délon smile.

“You only think that because you’re human. Believe me, once you begin the transformation you will pray for Délon blood and Délon blood alone to run through your veins.”