The Hollow Boys

Chapter 6

THE LIMO EASED down the ramp to Will’s private underground garage beneath the Dream Rider building. As Jimmy placed his hand on the palm reader to raise the heavy security door, Will’s gaze ran to the giant artwork atop the white tower. There, the hooded head of the Rider watched over the city. Harry had been right. The Rider was everywhere.

wasWill was certain no other person on the planet would define “home” as he did. A seventy-five-floor skyscraper covering an entire city block might appear a tad excessive on the available living space spectrum. But when going out wasn’t an option, then staying in better be as good as it gets.

outinIn the garage, Jimmy drove past the cars of staff and building visitors. He stopped at the elevators. Adi and Will got out. “Won’t need you any more today, Jimmy,” Will said. “You can take off.”

Jimmy touched his chauffeur’s hat and grinned. “Thanks, Mr. Dreycott.” He drove away.

“Why does no one call me Will?”

Adi pressed the up button on the elevator. “You are aware we pay him full-time?”

upWill shrugged. “Am I running out of money?”

“Hardly. Between your parents’ fortune, the Dream Rider franchise, and your stock tips from Dream, you have nothing to fear…” She stopped.

Nothing to fear. Except going outside.

Nothing to fear. Except going outside.“Sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean…”

He shook his head. “It’s okay. Glad I still have money.”

“I should say you are running out. Perhaps then you’d take more interest in the business. It is yours.”

are“Not till I’m eighteen. That’s why I have you. And that Board thingy with all those old guys.”

Sighing, Adi shook her head. “How do you know I’m not robbing you blind? Your parents would want you more involved.”

Putting an arm around her, he gave her a hug. “Look, my parents trusted you…” He swallowed. His parents were in too many conversations this morning. “…and so do I. If you’re robbing me blind, well, I’m just going to let you. At least until I need glasses. Much like my current romantic life.”

She gave a small smile. “I thought you were seeing that young lady you met at our New Year’s staff party. The daughter of our controller?”

He grimaced. “Siobhan? She got tired of staying in for date night after we ran out of new floors to visit.” He didn’t tell Adi the real reason—that Siobhan was more interested in his money than in him. Another problem not likely to disappear anytime soon. “Speaking of romance, how are things with you and Laura?” he asked, wanting to change the subject.

“On-again, off-again. Currently on.” She bit her lip. “I think.”

“Good. I like Laura.”

An elevator arrived. Its doors opened on dark wood paneling, and they got on. Each floor button displayed words instead of numbers. Musée d’Orsay. The Louvre. Tibet. AGO. Egypt. Restaurants. Concert Hall. And many more. Each button glowed red.

Musée d’Orsay. The Louvre. Tibet. AGO. Egypt. Restaurants. Concert Hall.Will placed his palm on the glass plate of a hand scanner beside the array of floor buttons. Every floor light switched to green. His finger hovered over the button marked Egypt. “Are the latest sculptures in yet?”

EgyptAdi tapped her phone screen. “Due tonight. But they installed a new van Gogh yesterday.”

“Paris it is, then.” He pressed the button labeled Musée d’Orsay. The elevator accelerated upwards. Seconds later, they stepped out into the Musée d’Orsay in Paris. Or at least, what his art curator assured Will was a faithful recreation of the famous museum.

Musée d’OrsayéThe ceiling above had been removed, allowing the replica Musée to better simulate the two-story original. He walked through the central sculpture hall, Adi at his side, towards the van Gogh gallery at the far end. “Do I own this one?”

é“On loan. Although, you could afford to buy it.” She nodded at the array of painting and sculpture reproductions. “You could replace several of these with originals.”

“Kind of surprised you told me that.”

“Fine art is a smart investment—unlike your manga collection.”

“Manga is art.”

isThey entered a smaller room. On its walls hung reproductions of paintings by Vincent van Gogh. Adi checked her phone again. “The new one is—”

“The Church at Auvers,” he said softly, walking to that painting.

The Church at AuversIn it, a small stone church seemed a thing alive. Its stone walls writhed upwards to a blue sky so dark, it was almost black. Its windows framed that same deep blue, as if the church, too, contained the darkness haunting the sky.

Darkness inside. A darkness that haunted.

Adi came to stand beside him. “Why is Vincent your favorite?”

Because he was as lonely as I am. Lonely and haunted. But he just shrugged. “Because his paintings are beautiful. And he was my dad’s—” He caught himself. “He is my dad’s favorite.”

Because he was as lonely as I am. Lonely and haunted.isHe felt her eyes on him, but she stayed silent. They stood staring at the picture.

“William…”

“What?”

“There’s a new bloom in the greenhouse.”

A surge of hope. And fear. Speaking of haunted. “Is it segregated?”

Speaking of haunted“Yes.”

“Where’d they find it? Bolivia again?”

She hesitated. “Peru. Arequipa.”

His heart jumped. “Arequipa? That’s the closest in over two years. I thought we’d found all the species in Peru.”

She didn’t look at him. “Apparently not.”

“This is great. I gotta check it out.” He turned to leave.

“Aren’t you going to read Mr. Lyle’s notes? To get ready for tonight?”

“I have time. This won’t take long.”

“Don’t you think…?” Her voice trailed off. She still didn’t look at him.

He knew where this was going. “I won’t stop looking, Adi. I won’t give up.”

“It’s been eight years,” she said quietly. “You’ve found no trace of them. Not even in Dream.”

eight“They’re my parents. I have one clue, one link to what happened to them and…” He stopped. And to me. He shook his head. “I won’t give up.”

And to meShe pursed her lips but didn’t reply. They walked to the elevators in silence. Adi pushed down while he pushed up, symbolic of their respective attitudes on his pet project.

downup“I miss them, too,” she said. She stared straight ahead, but her eyes glistened.

He swallowed. “I know.”

“Your parents were my best friends. They…” She hesitated. “They did a lot for me. More than you know. Much more.”

lot“And look what that got you. Stuck with raising their screwed-up little kid.”

She hugged him, an uncharacteristic show of affection. “Well, that kid has exceeded my expectations.” A down elevator arrived. She got in.

“Are you saying you’re proud of me?”

She smiled. “Or maybe my expectations were low.” The doors closed.

“Hey, no fair,” he called. “No chance for a comeback.” His elevator came. Inside, he scanned his hand and punched the top button: “Roof / Jungle.”

As the car accelerated upwards, he leaned against the wall and closed his eyes. Maybe this would be the one. Maybe he could finally stop searching.

WILL STEPPED FROM the elevator into a green sunlit world.

The roof was both his most and least favorite floor in his high-rise home. Here, under a retractable glass dome, he could stroll through a grassy park or lie in a wild meadow. He could wander a small forest or tour tended gardens of plants from around the world. Here he could see clouds swimming across the sky. Hear birds singing and squirrels chattering. Feel the heat of the sun, the breath of the wind, the cool sting of rain.

Here, he could go outside. Or, rather, pretend he could.

But the roof also held the Jungle. And the Jungle held both his greatest hope and darkest fear. He wondered which it would feed today.

He took a yellow-bricked path through a park of trimmed lawns. His target was a sprawling greenhouse in the northwest corner of the park.

The Jungle.

Reaching the greenhouse, he hesitated at the double doors. Maybe Adi was right. Maybe it was time to let go. To admit his parents were dead. Admit he’d never find them, never learn what had happened to them.

Or to him.

A corkboard hung to the left of the doors, protected by glass. A collage of yellowed newspaper clippings covered its surface.

It had been years since he’d even glanced at those clippings. He’d first put them there to remind his younger self why he kept coming here whenever a new flower arrived.

He walked over to the corkboard display. Time to quit? Or time to remind himself again?

In the center of the display, a headline blared from the largest clipping:

Controversial Art “Collectors” Vanish in Peruvian Jungle

Controversial Art “Collectors” Vanish in Peruvian JungleBelow, his parents’ faces smiled at him, cropped from publicity photos for their last lecture tour. He could never figure out which one he resembled.

His dad, Jonathan “Jon” Dreycott. Handsome, angular features. Neat van Dyke beard. Blond hair combed straight back from a high forehead. His mom, Dr Theresa “Terri” Yurikami. She’d been a medical doctor. Will never knew why she gave it up. The dark to his dad’s light, with her black eyes and long black hair and mischievous smile. They looked more like movie stars than the affluent dealers in rare antiquities and art that they were.

Or the thieves that they were, depending on what stories you believed. Smugglers who’d built a financial empire on cultural grave robbing.

He preferred art dealers to thieves and smugglers. The hardest part of his search for answers had been discovering, at nine years old, the rumors about his parents.

He scanned the articles on the board, hoping for a puzzle piece to at last jump out at him. Something he’d missed. Something the Peruvian police—and Adi’s team of investigators—had missed as well.

Nothing. No “aha!” moment. No bolt of mental lightning. The mystery remained a mystery.

Eight years ago, his parents had mounted an expedition into the Peruvian high jungle in the Andes. Normally, Adi had said, such trips had clear goals. Retrieve a specific artifact. Investigate legends of a lost city. Confirm rumored ruins.

But this time, wherever they were going for whatever purpose, they’d shared it with no one. Not their regular outfitter. Not the Peruvian authorities. Not even Adi, their closest advisor and friend.

And certainly not their nine-year-old son.

Or maybe they had, and he couldn’t remember. Just as he couldn’t remember anything of the expedition. Not one memory from before he’d left home to when the Peruvian army had found him alone, dazed, and half-dead in the jungle.

A different jungle. Hundreds of kilometers and a journey of several weeks on foot from where they’d supposedly started.

Yeah, they’d taken him along.

He always came back to that. He’d had a fairly normal childhood until then. Public school, friends, and loving parents. Parents with the typical look-both-ways-before-crossing-the-street-and-don’t-talk-to-strangers care and concern for him. Sure, he’d gone on expeditions before, starting when he was seven. But he also remembered disappointments of being left behind with Adi whenever his parents decided a trip was “too dangerous for the boy.”

Which meant, he reasoned, they hadn’t expected the Peru trip to be dangerous.

So what had happened?

No clue had ever been found of them. Or any guides or bearers they might have used. Nothing. The entire expedition vanished without a trace.

Except for him. And he’d returned with only two things, apart from a sudden inability to go outside.

One was a ragged scar on his chest below the hollow of his throat. A scar in the shape of the twelve-pointed star known in South America as the Incan Cross. A scar that became his inspiration for the Rider’s jewel.

His other souvenir was a memory. His only memory from that trip. And one he would not give up. Just as he would not stop using it to search for answers.

onlyHis resolve renewed, he turned away from the yellowed clippings and pushed open the doors to the greenhouse, humming “Welcome to the Jungle.” Heat, humidity, and the thick, cloying scent of flowers hit him as he entered. The greenhouse’s climate control simulated high-altitude Peruvian jungles. He hadn’t gone ten steps before his t-shirt and jeans clung to him, wet and clammy.

He passed rows of wooden tables covered in explosions of plants in soil-filled trays. Plants from the jungles where his parents may have disappeared and from where he was found. And growing in their native soil.

Flowering plants. Different colors, different species. But all plants with flowers.

All with a scent.

scentBut—for eight years—not the right scent.

rightHe stopped outside a smaller, self-contained, glass room, a greenhouse within the larger greenhouse. A sign labeled “Isolation” hung over the door.

Lately, the plants had been coming from points farther and farther away from where he’d been found. But Adi said this newest bloom came from near Arequipa, where the expedition had supposedly started.

Maybe this time.

Opening the door, he stepped into the sealed entrance to the isolation room. The air here was cooler and dry, devoid of any scent. The door behind him closed with a click. A soft hiss sounded as the compressors started. Jets lining the airlock blew warm air at him from all sides, drying his damp clothes and removing scents of flowers from the greenhouse.

The jets died. A click sounded, and the inner door swung open. Taking a deep breath and holding it, he stepped inside.

The isolation room was empty except for a wooden table with a ceramic flowerpot. In the pot, under the overhead bulbs that simulated sunlight, a plant grew with broad, thick, dark green leaves. From its leafy center rose a single white orchid, brilliant in the light, its petals tinged with yellow.

Walking to the table, he let out the breath he’d been holding. He leaned over the flower and breathed in through his nose. Slow and deep.

He straightened. He stared at the orchid, fighting an impulse to fling the plant and its pot against the wall. Slumping to the floor, he hugged his knees to his chest.

No. Not the one. Again.

Eight years ago, after being found in the jungle, he awoke with one clear memory. And only one.

A smell.

A sickly sweet scent that could only be a flower.

When he returned home, he’d begun his search. A search that grew as his resources grew. Those resources included this facility and a team of botanists who scoured the sss jungles for new flowers to send to him.

Flowers like this one. Flowers that were never the right one.

rightWould he ever find the right one?

everAnd if he did, would it lead him to his parents? Adi wasn’t wrong. He’d never found a trace of them in Dream in eight years. Did they never dream? Had he just not found them yet?

Were they dead?

He wouldn’t think about that today. He had work to do, reading Harry Lyle’s notes on the missing street kids before tonight’s Dream Ride.

As he left the Jungle, his eyes fell on the faded newspaper clippings again.

Missing street kids. Missing parents.

Sometimes, the world just sucked.