Planet Expo: Origins [Book One]

Chapter Seven

[A.K.A. Events of the Others]

   Laughing, Nathaniel pointed his finger at his friend, Bill, who was recording him and their other two friends. “Yo, here is Lover Boy Nate trying to show Jack and Sammy boy how to get mad girlies in Global Warcraft,” Bill narrated as he held his phone in front of him to ensure the nonsense actions would be captured and recorded. 

    “Gather ‘round lads and younglings, for I shall teach you the ways of online filtration,” Nate said while flapping his arms in such a way that could only indicate that they should come closer as he hunched over like some sort of goblin. “Yes! Yes,” Jack said, “show us the ways of online looveee.”

    The boys burst out laughing, and at that, Billie stopped recording as Sammy went to play the movie they all decided on. “You guys are such idiots,” Sammy said as he settled down on the sofa with chips and a cup of soda in hand. “Whatever man, you still looveee us,” Nate said while laughing at the end. “Hush it’s starting,” Bill said as he slumped, eager to watch this movie. “Nerd,” Jack said, which then caused Bill to throw some chips at him. Ares, resting on the carpet by the coffee table, see the fallen chips and let out a soft bark, almost as if he was thanking Bill for discarding food. Ares was quick to eat the fallen chips, much to Nate’s dismay since he was sure Lisa wouldn’t be too happy if she discovered the family dog ate some human junk food. “Well, it’s not like he ate the whole bag,” Nate thought to himself. With that reassuring thought, Nate went back to watching the movie and conversing with his friends. “Maybe we’ll play a racing game when the movie is over,” Nate thought as the movie finally showed the main characters after a few short minutes of opening credits.

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    “Bye, guys!” Nate shouted as his friends continued to walk down the driveway and into their parents’ car. When he back inside, he checked his phone to see if his twin finally responded to his text. “Wow, Lis left me on ‘read’ yet again. Would it kill her to spare 5 seconds away from her crush to reply?” he thought to himself as he walked upstairs to his room. 

    After a few minutes of playing video games, Mr. Archer came into his son’s room without knocking, his concern for his daughter seeping out of his body. “Have you heard from Lisa yet? It’s almost 11. And on a Saturday night no less. People act wild on weekend nights.” Nate shook his head as he paused the game. “The last text I got from her said that the movie was over. That was at 7:25.” Mr. Archer nodded his head; he remembered speaking to his daughter around that time, hearing his daughter’s voice over the phone saying the movie was over and that she’ll call again when James’ parents came to pick her and James up. “Alright. I’ll try to call James’ parents-”

“HONEY! NATE! GET DOWN HERE!”

    Both men felt dread seep to their core at Mrs. Archer’s shout. Nate was sure that he didn’t do anything to warrant such yelling. Well, he was absolutely positive that he hadn’t done anything in recent days that would warrant such yelling. They both went down the stairs as quickly as they could. Halfway down their descent, they were only able to see James’ parents. Feeling confused over his mother’s need to shout, Nate then saw the reason for concern. While both Mr. Archer and Nate entered the living room, it was then that they saw a pair of detectives that accompanied by James’ parents.

    “These detectives don’t dress like the televised ones do,” Nate thought to himself as the detectives greeted them. These detectives didn’t wear the traditional trench coat with nice-looking office shoes; instead, they both wore slacks with a black mating belt and a white button-up with a gray tie. The detective with red hair and freckles wore a light gray blazer while the other detective, who had dark brown hair and beautiful hazel eyes, wore a tan jacket with sneaker-like shoes. Due to his father being a local government official, Nate was relatively used to having law enforcement come over time to time since Mr. Archer was tasked with the duty to provide legal aid to governmental-related cases. Nate liked to describe his father as a glorified caseworker, although his father mainly serves as a defensive criminal justice lawyer.

    Mrs. Archer quickly introduced them, but it’s not like the detectives needed much of an introduction anyways. It was evident by the ornate matching wedding bands and the family resemblance that the taller gentleman was obviously the husband of Mrs. Archer and the father of the twins. While the teenage boy was obviously Lisa’s twin since they looked about the same age and had shared very similar features to what they had seen on the CCTV. 

    “I’m Detective Ryan, and this is my partner,” the freckled detective said while stopping so the other detective could announce her name. “Detective O’Hare,” she filled in as she stepped forward to shake the Archer family’s hands. “We will get straight to the point, as I’m sure you folks are naturally worried about your children. Ryan and I already briefed the Johnsons, son, Ryan, would you please?”

    Detective Ryan nodded and pressed the side of his watch, which caused a hologram of a huge pile of information to appear. Whispering, “organize” to this watch, the information took the form of a presentation, the title slide being “Archer-Johnson, Province Ameni: District 6, Case#: PA-D6-M14-2.” With a simple tap of the watch’s screen, it then projected previously recorded footage from the mall security cameras. “Lisa and James,” Natanthiel said under his breath as the clip showed his sister and one of his best friends, along with some other teens he didn’t recognize, get hit by some weird looking darts, and then passed out cold on the floor. The footage then showed Lisa and James being taken somewhere underground while the other teens were escorted out of the room by the other scary-looking adults.

“That woman-”

    “Yes, Mrs. Archer, we have confirmed that the woman who took your daughter and the Johnsons’ son was your twin sister,” Detective O’Hare said with a solemn look. “Twin… sister? Mom?” With wide eyes, Mrs. Archer looked at her son. “There’s a reason I never brought up my sister.” Turning to the Johnsons, with a pleading expression, “Jania, Richard, I had no idea my sister would do something like this. But if she is involved, then I know she wouldn’t physically hurt our kids,” Mrs. Archer said, sounding on the verge of breaking down.

“Oh, Lana,” Mrs. Jania Johnson said, “I’m just worried about our kids. I don’t blame any of this on you. You have nothing to do with it. It’s that sister of yours that-”

    Mr. Richard Johnson put his hand on his wife’s arm to lower it, her anger and concern for the missing teens overwhelming her. “Honey, there is a child present. I’m just as scared and worried, but let’s try to stay calm for the moment, ok?” Nodding her head in agreement, Jania took a deep breath as she and the others listen to the detectives’ every word.

    “So far, we don’t know much. We have other detectives and officers from nearby districts to keep a lookout as well. As of now, we don’t think they went to Province Charted. In my professional opinion, if they’re not in this province, they’re probably in Province Rey,” Dectrice Ryan said. “Another thing to note is that there is no attempt to communicate a ransom on their end, which is weird considering your financial background Mr. and Mrs. Johnson, as well as your legal pull in our local government Mr. Archer. From there, we think the k********g was to serve some greater purpose since Ms. Lavender Field is involved with the Earth Warriors.”

    “We have no reason to believe the children’s lives are in immediate danger, but we are working on getting them back home safe and sound as soon as humanly possible.” The parents in the room were quick to thank the detectives as they resumed giving all the details, facts, and everything else they knew so far. 

    Meanwhile, Nathaniel was gripping tightly on the stair railing behind him while his other hand gripped onto itself. The pressure and pain of his fingernails digging into his left palm made him realize that all of what was happening is real. He could barely focus on what was happening, he heard the voices and tried listening to the detectives, but his mind was elsewhere; too concerned for his sister, too concerned for his best friends. So much happened within the span of five minutes that he couldn’t process it.

    His sister and best friend were both kidn*pped. The other teens in the room had their memories wiped of the events that occurred within the room, but besides that, they left relatively unharmed, the only injury they all suffered was from the small puncture wound on their necks from the dart. He just discovered that he had an aunt on his mother’s side. Then he found that the same newly discovered aunt is working for people who want to undermine the current government on this planet in favor of having humanity returning to Earth. Due to their beliefs that Earth had enough time to heal, some people felt the Earth was ready for a new age of humanity, hence the birth of the Earth Warriors. 

    Closing his eyes and taking a breath, he tried calming down just a bit so he could focus. He didn’t understand how everyone was acting so calm and rational. In the end, his re-focusing technique was used too late, seeing as he heard the detectives bid goodbye, promising to do whatever it took to bring Lisa and James back safe and sound. The Johnsons left an hour after the detectives did, they needed each others’ support, they all wanted to be there for each other since they’re all currently sharing the same trauma of having their precious children temporarily taken away from them; with no means of contact and with no means of concrete reassurance that Lisa and James were unharmed. Of course, this also meant that the missing teenagers were also currently experiencing the trauma of being kidn*pped and taken away faraway.

    Neither the missing characters nor the family of said characters knew of what the villains of this story had in storied for the soon to be heroes of the told story. “But this isn’t a fictional story, it’s happening in my real life,” Nate muttered to himself as he walked upstairs to his room, he felt the concerned gaze of his parents, heard the soft cries of Mrs. Johnson as they walked out the front door and as he walked up and out of the living room. At that moment, he didn’t care. Nathaniel didn’t care about the teary-eyed look; his mother and father gave him as they watched him go up to his room. Didn’t care about the Johnsons being on the verge of a breakdown; after all, their only child was up and gone, and they didn’t have another child, another reason to stay strong. Didn’t have a reason to pretend to be alright for the sake of someone else.

    The Johnsons then left, needing to go home just to process everything and try to sleep for the night. Lana didn’t know what to do about her son, didn’t know how to bring reassure to him since she didn’t even know to reassure herself in this situation. Her little girl was temporarily taken from her by her rotten sister no less. She felt so many things, yet didn’t know how to adequately express them even though her career depended on expressing her emotions, her message, her thoughts on a canvas for the world to see.

“Oh, Theo, what are we going to do?”

    Her husband looked at her, trying to find the right words. Despite being a man of law, he very rarely got k********g cases. The first k********g case he ever received was when a father technically kidn*pped his daughter way from the mother. And that was about five years ago. It was a tricky case but managed to defend the father and reduce his punishment. With low crime, there was hardly a need for criminal defense lawyers. This is why he had to climb the ranks to get a government position even if it was a lowly local position, despite not being a politician, so he could help provide for his family. With a sigh, he silently let go of the wish that he wasn’t experiencing this situation right now; he knew it wouldn’t help. “I’ll go talk to Nate. It’s late. Maybe try to sleep, honey? I’ll join you soon.”

    With a small nod, Lana got up and started up the stairs but looked toward the kitchen, and thought of Lisa and how they would bake together, the 5-year-old twins throwing the leftover flour at each other as she decorated the cookies. Lisa’s laughs, Nate’s shrieks echoed in her mind, and before she knew it, she was at the fridge, pulling out the ingredients to bake the same cookies they made that day. Tears spilled into the mixture of eggs, butter, and cookie dough, sobs mixed into the air of silence and dread, negativity seeping into a house that held so many beloved memories. 

With his heart dropping at the sound of his wife’s cries, Mr. Archer headed up the stairs in tow of his son, his own tears falling behind him with every step.