Spotted

"The thing about quick in-and-out jobs is they're never quick, never clean, and something always follows you home."

The urgency to act propelled me forward, an uncommon anger surging through my veins. Waiting for nightfall—a tactic of patience and caution—now seemed like a luxury I couldn't afford. My haste had led me to retrieve Nial's personal laptop instead of his work laptop, a stupid mistake that could derail everything. The settlement's protection hinged on Paul and Nial ordering fencing materials as soon as possible, and I'd grabbed the wrong fucking computer.

Taking a gamble, I chose to enter the Triffett residence through the Portal location I'd activated in Nial's office. No need for another front door entry, no need to risk being seen approaching the house in daylight. A quick in and out—find the work laptop, grab it, disappear. Simple. Clean. The kind of operation I was getting disturbingly good at. When I wasn’t cocking things up.

Clambering through the side of the filing cabinet—the entry point from Clivilius into Nial's lost world—I navigated awkwardly into the office, my eyes immediately scanning for the prize. The room was quiet, undisturbed since my earlier visit. The office door remained closed, a small mercy.

I moved briskly toward Nial's large desk by the window, my hands already reaching for drawers, shuffling papers and notebooks in rapid succession. The work laptop had to be here somewhere—a second machine, probably newer, with all his business accounts and supplier contacts.

The act of sifting through Nial's belongings should have bothered me more than it did. A week ago, the violation of privacy would have made my skin crawl. Now it felt like nothing more than another task to complete, another obstacle to overcome. I'd already kidnapped the man and stranded him in another dimension. Rifling through his desk drawers seemed almost quaint by comparison.

In less than five minutes, I found it. The laptop was snugly ensconced in its bag along with the power cable, tucked into the bottom desk drawer. I pulled it free, feeling the satisfying weight of success in my hands.

A new problem surfaced immediately—how would we charge this in Clivilius? The settlement had no electricity. I added the task to my never-ending mental list: get power to the settlement. Solar panels, maybe. Or a generator. Something else to figure out, something else to arrange. The complexity of building a civilisation from scratch seemed to grow with each passing hour.

With a resigned sigh, I stuffed the power cord into the bag and turned back toward the Portal, still shimmering against the side of the filing cabinet. Almost done. Almost free.

The phone in my trouser pocket rang.

The sound shattered the silence like breaking glass. Panic seized me—swift, cold, unforgiving. I fumbled for the device, my movements clumsy with fear, nearly dropping the laptop bag in my haste to silence the noise before it betrayed my presence.

Phone in hand, ready to reject the call, I paused. The name on the screen stopped me cold.

Gladys' mum.

Wendy. Calls from Wendy were rare—an exception rather than the rule. She and her daughters had their complicated relationship, and I'd always existed on the periphery of it, tolerated more than embraced. For her to call me directly, unprompted, meant something was wrong.

My gaze flickered to the Portal, its silent swirl offering escape. I could ignore the call, disappear back to Clivilius, deal with whatever this was later. But the unexpectedness of it gnawed at me, a hook I couldn't quite shake free.

A quick call, I told myself. Just tell her I'll call back in a few minutes.

I answered the phone, pressing it to my ear. "Hello," I hissed, my voice barely above a whisper.

"Oh, Luke!" Wendy's words tumbled through at a frantic pace, a cascade of concern and urgency that made it impossible for me to find a moment to interject. She was upset—that much was clear from the first syllable—but the specifics were lost in the torrent of her distress.

I tried to interrupt several times, my planned reassurances swept away by her relentless stream of words. Then she mentioned Duke.

At the sound of my dog's name, tears welled unexpectedly in my eyes. Duke. Always the unsuspecting anchor of my emotions, even now, even dead. The grief I'd been holding at bay crashed against the walls I'd constructed, threatening to break through.

I need to take this call, I acknowledged internally, frustration creasing my forehead. But continuing the conversation here risked my voice alerting someone to my presence. Every second I stayed increased the danger.

I glanced at the Portal—going through would sever the phone connection. Then toward the office door. If I can sneak outside, I'll be free to talk without fear of discovery.

"Wendy," I hissed sharply, cutting through her rambling with enough desperation to finally cause a pause. "I've got bad reception in here. Just give me a couple of secs to get to a better spot."

"Okay," Wendy tentatively agreed, confusion evident in her voice.

I moved toward the office door, cringing as several floorboards creaked beneath my weight, betraying my movements. Opening the door slowly, I peered into the hallway with cautious eyes. The house seemed eerily quiet—holding its breath alongside me.

The hallway stretched in both directions. To the right, the living room. To the left, bedrooms and what I assumed was a back door. I chose right, toward escape, each step measured and deliberate.

Then I heard it—the soft grunt of someone dozing in the living room.

I froze, my heart skipping a beat. The living room doorway gaped open ahead of me, a gauntlet I'd have to pass to reach the front door. There was no way to slip by without being seen if whoever was sleeping happened to wake.

Pivoting on my heel, I moved in the opposite direction, mind racing through alternatives. The back of the house had to have an exit—a laundry, a mudroom, something.

A bedroom doorway loomed ahead, and I peered inside as I approached. The darkness within served as a veil, revealing only outlines—a small bed, a child-sized shape beneath the covers, the Dalmatian from my previous visit resting on the floor beside him.

Something tightened in my chest at the sight. The child couldn't have been more than three or four, innocent and unaware of the chaos his father had been pulled into. The dog lay curled protectively on the rug beside the bed, a guardian keeping watch while the household slept.

I thought of Henri, of Duke, of all the things I was doing to protect those I loved. This child would grow up without his father for weeks, maybe months, maybe longer. Nial's wife would lie awake wondering where her husband had gone, why he'd abandoned them without a word. All because of me.

The guilt flickered and died, smothered by necessity. I didn't have time for guilt. I had a settlement to protect.

Taking another step, the floor beneath me betrayed my presence with a creak that seemed impossibly loud in the quiet house. The Dalmatian's head snapped up, eyes sharp and assessing, a low growl rumbling in its throat.

I froze, motioning frantically for the dog to be quiet—a silent plea for discretion. Remarkably, it obeyed, lowering its head back to its paws. A small mercy.

Then the young boy's eyes opened wide.

He sat up halfway, staring directly at me, his young face a complex mix of fear and curiosity. A stranger in his house. A stranger in the dark doorway of his bedroom. For a terrible moment, I imagined him screaming, imagined the mother waking, imagined everything collapsing around me.

Without a word, I pressed my finger against my lips, signalling for silence.

The child stared at me for what felt like an eternity. Then, understanding something—or perhaps just too sleepy to process the strangeness of the situation—he rested his head back on his pillow, eyes still watching me but making no sound.

My heart thundered in my chest, a cacophony loud enough to betray me on its own. Time to move. Much faster.

I made haste toward the back door, praying the toddler would keep our secret. The kitchen materialised around me—countertops cluttered with the debris of family life, dishes in the sink, a child's drawings stuck to the refrigerator with colourful magnets. Beyond it all, I spotted the back door, my escape route.

With a small amount of luck, I quickly unlocked it, the mechanism turning with a soft click. Stepping out into the chilly afternoon air felt like breaking the surface after too long underwater. I closed the door softly behind me, a silent farewell to the scene of my latest violation.

Bringing the phone back to my ear as I walked into the backyard, I spoke, "Wendy, I can't talk for long. What's wrong?"

"Why the hell is Duke wrapped in a bloody towel in Beatrix's bathroom!?"

Wendy's voice—a mixture of screech and sob—pierced my eardrum.

My back stiffened. Every hair on the back of my neck stood on end. Duke. In Beatrix's bathroom. Wrapped in a bloody towel.

Beatrix had taken him. Had taken Duke's body from Clivilius and brought him back to Earth. And somehow Wendy had found him.

"I'll be right there," I promised, ending the call before she could respond.

With burning eyes, I turned on the spot in the backyard, desperately searching for a suitable place to activate the Portal. The garden stretched around me—thick with trees, enclosed by a wood-paling fence, cluttered with outdoor furniture and children's toys. Every surface was blocked, obscured, useless. The limitations of my surroundings, once an inconsequential detail of Nial's home, had become critical barriers.

The sudden opening of the back door gripped me with terror.

I spun around, my heart plummeting. The little boy stood in the doorway, the Dalmatian by his side. He must have followed me, curious about the stranger who'd appeared in his room and vanished into the house. His small face held no fear now—only the open curiosity of a child too young to understand danger.

The Dalmatian had no such innocence. It began to bark—sharp, warning sounds that shattered the quiet of the afternoon.

Each bark made me wince as though the sound physically penetrated my skin. My borrowed time was expiring with each passing second. Inside the house, the mother would be waking, would be coming to investigate the commotion. I had seconds at most.

The dog launched itself from the steps, barking furiously as it bounded toward me—a blur of spotted fur and bared teeth closing the distance with terrifying speed.

Panic seized control. I turned and ran.

Approaching the small shed at the back of the yard, I spotted it—a flat wooden surface, clear enough to activate a Portal. Behind me, the Dalmatian's barking grew louder, closer. I could hear its paws pounding the grass, could almost feel its breath on my heels.

I activated the Portal on the shed wall, the swirling colours erupting into existence. A glance over my shoulder showed the Dalmatian almost upon me, teeth bared, and the toddler not far behind, his small legs carrying him across the yard in pursuit of his dog.

No choice. No time.

I threw myself through the Portal, commanding it closed even as I fell—but not fast enough. The collision of human flesh and dog fur came mid-transit, a tangle of limbs and spotted coat tumbling through the dimensional threshold together. Sharp yips of pain filled the air as we both crashed into the Clivilian dust on the other side.

"Fuck!"

The exclamation tore from my throat, an embodiment of frustration and self-condemnation echoing across the landscape. I pushed myself up from the ground, dust coating my clothes, my palms scraped raw from the fall.

The Dalmatian scrambled away from me, limping now, one leg held gingerly off the ground. She sat a few metres away, licking the injured limb with a mixture of pain and resentment, a final growl directed my way making clear exactly what she thought of me. The sight of her injury—a consequence of my desperate escape, of my carelessness—added another weight to my already burdened conscience.

Another dog hurt because of me. Another innocent creature caught in the chaos I created.

"Buffy!" A surprised voice called from a distance.

I looked up to see Nial hurrying toward us from the direction of the Drop Zone, Paul close behind him. Nial's face was a mask of confusion and concern—recognising his own dog, clearly, but unable to process how she'd come to be here.

I took several deep breaths, trying to rein in the storm of emotions threatening to overwhelm me. Duke's body in Beatrix's bathroom. The injured Dalmatian. The child who'd seen my face. Everything spiralling further out of control.

"What the hell!?" Paul exclaimed as they reached me, exasperation littering his tone. His eyes moved from me to the limping dog and back again, putting pieces together. "Duke hasn't even been dead for a day, and you're already bringing another dog here!?"

The words hit like a slap.

"How dare you bring Duke into this!" I yelled, my anger manifesting in a hard shove against Paul's chest. He stumbled back a step, surprise flashing across his face before his expression hardened.

"Let me guess, it was another 'accident'," Paul slurred the word like an insult, his arms coming up to prevent a second assault.

"As a matter of fact—" I began, voice tight with fury, ready to defend myself before cutting short. Trying to justify anything to Paul right now would get me nowhere. I changed tack, turning the accusation back on him. "Where is Duke?"

The question landed like a blow. Paul's face dropped, his mouth working in silent overtime, searching for words that seemed to elude him.

"Was there an 'accident'?" I sneered, unable to hide the bitterness that laced my voice.

Paul's shoulders slumped in defeat. "Beatrix took him."

"I know," I replied, my voice flat.

Something like hope flickered in Paul's eyes. "Oh. So you've spoken to Beatrix?"

"No."

"Then how—?"

"It would seem that Wendy has found him." The words came out clipped, each one carrying the weight of the crisis that awaited me.

Paul's brow furrowed. "Who's Wendy?"

"Beatrix's mother."

"Oh." Paul's face shifted as the implications began to dawn on him. "That might be a little awkward."

"You don't say." I sighed heavily, exhaustion beginning to creep through the anger. "Anyway," I continued quickly, gesturing toward Nial who had crouched beside Buffy, examining her injured leg with gentle hands. "That really was an accident. I'll tell you about it later."

"We've got time now," Paul remarked, his tone suggesting he wasn't ready to let this go.

My lips pursed with frustration. "You might have time, but I don't," I snapped, more harshly than intended. Wendy was waiting. Duke's body was lying in Beatrix's bathroom. And I had no idea how I was going to explain any of it.

Paul's head tilted, and he sighed—a sound that carried disappointment and resignation in equal measure. "Guess I'll talk to you later, then."

For a long moment, we stood in silence, our gazes locked in a wordless exchange. The distance between us felt wider than the physical space—a gulf of misunderstanding, of secrets kept and accusations made. With my eyes, I tried to convey something like hope, a silent promise that things would get better.

For my own sake, it has to.

"I guess," I echoed, handing Paul Nial's laptop bag. He took it without comment, the weight of it transferring from my hands to his like the passing of responsibility.

With a heavy heart and a mind already racing ahead to the confrontation that awaited me at Beatrix's house, I walked away. Behind me, I could hear Nial murmuring to Buffy, comforting words in a gentle tone that made my chest ache. Another person's life disrupted. Another innocent creature hurt.

The list of my sins grew longer.

And I knew I wasn't done yet.