The Annual Solstice Party was thrown by the faculty for the students a few days before Christmas. It was a wild, festive affair intended to let the young academics let off some steam before the midterm exams and mingle with their professors. There was a lot of alcohol involved, and things had a tendency to get exciting, if not wild.
It was held off-campus, in the residential area filled with small, tidy houses with white fences. Today, though, it had transformed into an epicenter of a small social tornado. There was loud music spilling out onto the street, and enough cars parked along the curb for Mickey's blue Pontiac to not draw any attention.
'Tell me how you got an invite, again?' Mickey said, turning off the ignition.
I shrugged.
'I'm friends with some dudes from the university.'
He looked at me with skepticism.
'How on Earth did you get mixed up with these folks? Like... they don't usually talk to people like us.'
He was technically right.
'I'm in a band with them.'
Mickey eyebrows flew up.
'You're in a band? With humans?'
'Yeah.'
He blinked.
'Do they know... like, who you are?'
'No. And they never will.'
Mickey sighed.
'So you're going to go party with glamorous college girls, and I'm supposed to sit here and what, just wait?'
'No. You're supposed to be on the lookout in case Zero shows up. And I'll be inside trying to find Tanya Duncan. If everything goes well, I'll persuade her to talk to us in a less crowded place.'
He frowned.
'How are you going to do that in the middle of all these people? You can't exactly announce who you are, and why you want to talk to her.'
He had a point.
'I'll think of something.'
'Great plan, Matthew.'
I touched my face, winced, and opened the door.
'It's the best one we've got. Wish me luck.'
There was a big inflatable Santa Claus on the lawn in front of the party house. It was swaying lightly in the wind, giving a distinct impression that he had a little too much eggnog. I heard a burst of laughter from the inside and took a deep breath.
It was going to be okay. I just had to find a girl at a party and convince her to talk to me in private. I could do that, right?
Of course, I had to do it without anyone, especially my friends, noticing. Despite the possibility of an insane, homicidal wraith showing up. And let's not forget about not one, but two high-ranking Protectors breathing down my neck, ready to make me disappear if even a whiff of all this reaches them.
No biggie.
I walked inside.
The noise of the party enveloped me. There was music, voices, laughter. Someone was trying to sing along to the pop hit blasting from the speakers, not completely hitting the notes. Plastic cups were overflowing with beer and wine. The house was filled with young people, energetic and attractive. They were celebrating with abandon, reveling in the blissful ignorance of their age. Some were dancing, others gathered in small groups for gossip and discussion. Here and there, a lone faculty member loomed in the sea of students, always in the epicenter of conversation, enjoying the rare moment of genuine connection with their pupils.
I had to remind myself that I'm on a mission. I looked at the crowd, searching for the girl from the photo Mickey showed me. Brown skin, curly hair. Green eyes that looked much older than they should have. Instead, I saw Claire.
She was wearing the same outfit from yesterday, but now her hair was gathered up, revealing the delicate neck and toned shoulders. She was talking to someone, her face was lit up with a brilliant smile. I stared at her, hungry for something I couldn't have. Would never have. For a second, everyone at the party, except for me and her, disappeared.
I wanted to stay in that moment forever. But I couldn't. Mickey was waiting outside, Zero was burning with unnatural fever somewhere in the snow, and the Protector... Amber? Andrea? Adele?... was after me, cunning and deadly. So I tore myself away from it, back into the real world.
Someone's hand landed on my shoulder.
'Matt! Welcome to the most fun party of the year!'
It was Ted, already a little bit drunk, very happy to see me. He hugged me with one hand and waved another in the direction of the crowd.
'You see this people? There's so much IQ gathered in this house that the countrywide average would drop twenty points if anything were to happen to us. Like a rogue meteorite, or a wraith. These, my friend, are the most pretentious assholes in the city!'
He laughed.
'Come one, let's find Claire. Dylan and Nelly decided to skip this feast of vanity.'
He led me to her, somehow pulling two cups of beer out of thin air.
'Here! Don't even try to survive this sober.'
I was scanning the crowd, trying to find Tanya. There were too many people, too much noise. She was here somewhere, but where?
Claire's smile broadened when she saw us.
'Hi, Matt.'
Looking at her, I felt my face throbbing with pain. My heart beating nervously.
'Hi.'
I was going to say something. Something genuine. Pay her a compliment. Tell her how incredible she looked. I even opened my mouth, but then her eyes widened.
'Matt. There's blood on your shirt.'
It took me a second to register what she was saying. I looked down, a piece of ice materializing in my chest.
Fucking stupid. Stupid piece of trash. I was so preoccupied with everything, I hadn't even noticed red smears on the collar of my t-shirt. I remembered Mitchel's fist throwing me on the floor, blood streaming down my chin. The Protector's handkerchief, initials sewn into a corner with elegant cursive, still resting in my pocket.
Unseen to her, my face twitched.
'What, that?' I said. 'That's just tomato juice. Some asshole spilled his Bloody Mary all over the place, down at the bar.'
Ted laughed.
'I thought you smelled like vodka! I just figured you had an early start before the party.'
I tried to smile.
'Who said I didn't?'
Claire shook her head, worry leaking away from her eyes.
'Good to know. Anyway, you know Sam. Sam, this is Matt, you've met him yesterday. And that's Ted.'
It was only then that I noticed the man she was talking to before we showed up. It was Sam the Handsome Assistant Professor. Today he seemed even taller, with more shine in his white-toothed smile. The pain in the left side of my face intensified.
'Ah, yes. Nice to meet you again. Ted... you're in Comparative Anthropology, right?'
Ted lit up, pleased that Sam remembered him.
'Yeah! You gave us a series of lectures on hate speech extinction. It was awesome!'
'Why, thank you.'
Ted looked at me, a devilish spark in his eyes.
'Actually, I was just telling Matt about your theory just last night...'
What was he up to?
'Really?'
'A-huh. He didn't find it convincing, though. His exact words were, if I remember correctly, 'complete bullshit.'
That bastard.
Sam's expression didn't change, but I could see a shadow of irritation in his eyes. Claire froze and then looked down. Was she embarrassed by me?
'Did you now, Matt.'
Sam smiled.
'I'm sorry, what do you study?'
I had no time for this bullshit. I needed to find Tanya Duncan, get her, and get out of here.
'Nothing. I'm not enrolled in the university.'
'Oh. College, then?'
I clenched my teeth, wishing that Claire would look at me.
'No, not really.'
Sam raised an eyebrow.
'A working-class man, then? How refreshing, now that every young person seems to be possessed by unfounded ambition. So, Matt, tell me, what exactly in my theory seems to be the problem, from your unusual perspective?'
The question was innocent enough, but the tone wasn't. Ted sensed the tension in the air. He looked at me, then at Sam, then at Claire.
I sighed. So, the bastard decided to teach me a lesson in humility. Fuck that. I've already received that lesson from Mitchel today.
'The whole of it.'
Sam laughed, amused.
'Really? Do you deny that we live in the safest, most peaceful, most ample era in human history? The best minds of our time, from Ernst to Liwei-Korshun, seem to disagree.'
I looked over his shoulder, hoping to see Tanya dancing, or drinking beer, or talking with some university people. But she was nowhere to be seen.
I had no argument against him, even if I knew who the hell he was talking about. Not unless I wanted to tell him how painful, terrifying and hopeless his utopia was to people like me. The wraiths. But then, he said human history, didn't he? And we weren't really human.
Claire finally looked at me, waiting. I sighed. Even If I could tell them the truth, they would never understand. And why would they? Their lives were perfect. Still...
'Have you ever been to the top of CN Tower?'
Sam blinked, surprised by my question.
'What does it have to do with anything?'
'It's an amazing view from up there. Especially in winter. There's light everywhere, the whole city is shining. The light reflecting from the water, from the ice. It's like magic.'
I remembered it in every little detail, the rivers of light that were really roads, the cold crispness of the air, the feeling of vertigo from being so high above the ground. The long, dark distance below.
'But it's not the first thing you see when you get up to the observation deck. The first thing you see, when you step out from the lift, is the suicide barrier. It's this thick metal ring that runs around the deck. Because, you know, there were too many people offing themselves by jumping from the Tower, and they had to build a special barrier against that.'
I looked at him, nursing my beer.
'In fact, there's one at every publicly available structure that's high above the ground. Now, if what you say is true and we live in such an amazing time... why the fuck do we need so many suicide barriers?'
Claire was smiling now, trying to hide it from Sam. I was losing time on this conversation, time I should have been spending on finding Tanya Duncan.
I remembered the dark alley where Mickey jumped over the fence of the railroad museum. Feeling the push of his Ability reverberating through my bones.
Sam gave me a condescending look.
'That's completely beside the point.'
I shrugged, partitioning my mind into dozen pieces. One piece of my mind replied to him. All the others got hold of the beer in my cup and pulled. Slowing it down.
Making it stop.
'Whatever, man. I'm not really a scientist. I guess you'd know better.'
I felt the cold bite my fingers as the beer froze solid. The quiet crackle it made was swollen by the music. Many wraiths were able to decrease the temperature of an object to zero. But doing it in an instance, like I just did, required a lot of Ability. Enough to send an invisible aftershock, like the one I had felt near Mickey.
Somewhere in the house, Tanya Duncan had felt that.
She was surprised now. She was raising her head now, looking. All senses focused on one intent. Find the source.
I felt her watching me.