The Raven Gang (Noble Animals Book 1)

  The Raven Gang

  Brendan Walsh

  The Raven Gang

  Copyright © 2017 Brendan Walsh

  All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations em- bodied in critical articles or reviews.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

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  ISBN:

  First Edition: Feb 2017

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  The Man in the Clouds

  “Hey! Watch where you’re going!” remarked the snobby man in a rain coat as he sprinted down the crowded avenue. Why are some people so defensive? If there was an answer, Patrick Buchanan did not have it. Perhaps it had to do with the fact that it wasn’t far gone past six in the morning. As a proud night person, he could sympathize with the man’s frustration. He had no idea what he was doing sprinting down the bustling avenue, and barely even remembered waking up or skipping a much needed morning coffee. All he knew was he needed to be somewhere, and soon.

  Up ahead of him, a young couple were holding hands. The man was holding some ice blended drink topped with whipped cream. The two were standing side by side, sharing the drink and uncaringly blocking most of Patrick’s running space. It would be difficult to get around them at his speed and proximity to them, so he decided it wasn’t worth all the extra effort.

  The iced mocha crashed on the concrete with a miniature explosion as he breezed past them. Twenty-year-old Patrick did not have enough time to veer out of the way, but he was moving too fast to care. He was in a hurry and didn’t even turn around to see the young woman yell behind him.

  “Hey Jerk, come buy us another coffee! Hey! HEY!” she screamed at the top of her barely breathing lungs. Her strained voice didn’t even attract a passing eye. Everybody was lost in their own little trance, only minding their own business. He continued his sprint as he prepared to steer for the bend.

  Looking up, he noticed he was almost late. Dark, gloomy clouds loomed lowly overhead. Odd. He’d heard it was not supposed to look so low for another while. The clouds seemed to suck all the happiness and joy right out of him like a vacuum. He had to rid himself of the blackening clouds’ authority. The parking meter right up ahead marked the turn of the corner, and he was now speeding down faster than a mad bicyclist. Mastering the turn at such unsafe speeds was difficult among the pedestrians, but he did it.

  “Hey! Watch where you’re going!” said the same offensive figure with the coat. It was the same street! What was going on? Still feeling that he was being ganged up against, he dashed onward.

  Looking around, he saw that everything was exactly the same: the pattern of gum running evenly along the edge of the curb, the same young couple up ahead with the iced drink, and the same vintage stores and the poor looking departmental store on the other side of the street. However, it had a different effect on him this time.

  “There! Aha!” he exclaimed loud enough to startle the whole block. That departmental store seemed to have some kind of gravitational pull on him. He knew that’s where he had to be. He stepped on the edge of the gum-cluttered curb and waited for a couple of cars to pass before darting as fast as his legs would carry him across the street. Cars honked violently at him and he was pretty sure he heard an old man curse out at him. But he wasn’t paying attention. Like everyone else, he was getting lost in his own head.

  Upon fast approach he realized that it was not the strange store that had captured his interest. It was the thin alleyway on its side. On the corner of the old red-bricked exterior of the store was a rotting wooden ladder, which appeared to climb higher than the height of the moderately tall store. Even as the ladder looked a bit sketchy, damaged by years of neglect, he placed a firm grasp on the splintered wood and started to summit the building. He proceeded upward with his grip unchanging. Patrick was surprised, the ladder became more stable the further he climbed. He felt there had to be some kind of external force guiding him, making sure that he made it up in one piece. It dawned on him much too late that he had climbed past the roof of the building, which may have been a good thing. Fear could have gotten the best of him if he had noticed any sooner.

  Patrick’s heart was almost coming out of his chest. Every pulse through his veins was hurting throughout his body. The fear was stimulating, almost addicting. It was a fear unlike one he had ever known. It was both the fear of the known and of the unknown. With both forces at war, he climbed even quicker, nearly slipping off on a slippery step above seventy feet high.

  The next stage was traversing the low hanging clouds. This proved a much more difficult task. The darkness of the clouds blurred his vision. Small storms were swirling about inside the fog. Electricity, heat, ice, were all brewing around him. He had climbed up about fifty more feet before the darkness showed him some mercy. Just a little more, he promised himself even though he did not know when it would actually end.

  He was in luck. Curious Patrick was now high above the clouds. Looking down below he still saw storms raging on, but that part was over. He did it. A look of triumph was smeared across his face. He did not let his moment of victory run too lengthy, though; he still needed to proceed upward. After an immeasurable amount of distance, he reached his destination.

  It was a grey platform, which gave a greatly similar appearance of a pavement, or a runway used by some kind of airliner. There was something feint and silhouetted in the distance. A lone figure was observing the coming dawn. With both his feet now on a solid floor, he began to sprint once again. The man ahead became much clearer than he first appeared. Patrick could now easily make out his features. He was a well-dressed man in an all gray suit with black shoes. His jet black hair was neatly combed back, which made it appear much longer than it really was. He visually searched him for anything he could possibly be carrying, in his pockets, his hands, or in a briefcase off to the side, but his hands were just cupped in front of him. He had a medium pitched voice as Patrick soon found out.

  “Hello Mr. Buchanan,” he said smoothly without turning around. “I was beginning to think you would arrive too late.”

  Patrick felt his chest nearly sink to his knees. He was out of breath, but he gathered his lungs together enough to fire a question at the mystery man.

  “Why am I supposed to be here?” he urged confidently. “Who are you?”

  The lone man maintained his stillness, completely unnerved by Patrick’s hostile tone. “You know me Mr. Buchanan. You have always known me.” he replied, his shoulders sinking back down after a deep exhale. The man continued to gaze forward. There was almost something warm about the silence, an uncanny familiarity.

  He was about to speak again but the suited man beat him. “You know what the interesting thing about light is, Mr. Buchanan?”

  Patrick was unsure what kind of answer the man was hoping out of him. He felt his wits begin to fail him. He could hardly make a response.

  “I’m sure there are a lot of interesting things. I’ll ask one more time. Who are you?”

  The man ignored the latter question and proceeded with his initial one. “All light moves at the same exact speed. No matter how large the frequency or how small the wavelength may be, it maintains the same speed. Always. And it is the fastest known thing in the u
niverse.”

  He slowly proceeded a few steps forward, to get a view of the man’s face. Though he couldn’t even see his ears with his hair styled backwards.

  “Why are you telling me this?” he asked nodding questioningly to himself.

  “You need to be faster.” he declared sternly. “Everything from here till the end of your life will be trying to catch up to you, even light, and you have got to beat them all. We are all depending on it.” He spoke, emphasizing “all”.

  Patrick was struck with a sudden realization. The sun was shedding its first beam of light on the town. He was immediately frozen with fear. He had to get away from the approaching photons. Without speaking his goodbye to the mysterious man, he turned and ran faster than he ever had in his life. He had to do it. He had to beat the light. Far behind, at the edge of the solid ground, the man laughed.

  “Good luck, Mr. Buchanan!”

  Sudden feelings of ecstasy overcame him. He was going to do it. This light had nothing on him. He turned around, the speeding beams let him realize he was already too late. The light was quickly approaching him. Just a little more. The end of the pavement approached him rapidly. It’s going to be a close call. With all the courage he could forge, he jumped off the pavement, just as the light gave life to everything below.

  “Patrick. Hey Patrick wake up!” Johnny said shaking his friend. “I knew we shouldn’t have pulled that all-nighter last night.”

  His sight was now returning to him. The intense glare of the sun’s rays in his face didn’t help much. The actual events of the day in the real world began coming back to him. He and Johnny Mars had been staying up all night studying for a chemistry test the day before Thanksgiving Break. They had just been discussing their own opinions of the exam until he dozed off against the fountain that the whole campus seemed to revolve around. Patrick stretched out his arms freely until he realized Johnny was still forcing him awake.

  “I’m awake, you moron.” Patrick groaned. He brushed the floppy hair out of his eyes. He needed to get a trim.

  “Oh, sorry. I asked what you got as answer to the third question on the test. The one with the buffer added to the solution.”

  “The pH was 11.73. I’m pretty sure.” He clutched his aching neck. It was squished from napping in an awkward position.

  “Aww, I was off by like 2 numbers.”

  With a disgruntled grunt his friend returned to silence. Patrick didn’t know how Johnny was going to make it through the rest of their collegiate lives. Johnny Mars was a neuroscience major and often seemed to have trouble with basic chemistry. But it was nothing that couldn’t be solved with a little extra effort, on both their parts. Johnny got away with everything. He was a sweet talking kid with a noticeable New Yorker accent from a generous family in Manhattan, not that far from Time Square. Patrick had no idea why someone who lived in the greatest city on Earth would come to Weller College, a small Liberal Arts College 30 minutes outside of San Francisco. They did have a good neuroscience program, and it was within reasonable distance from another pretty cool city. Nothing could replace the Big Apple on his list of favorite places, however.

  “Don’t think about it too much. I mean we are on break for five days”. This was evident by the exodus of students passing by, mounting the bus that would take them to the airport. Patrick felt guilty he wasn’t escaping campus over break. At least he was going to have a little bit of company. Johnny wasn’t going anywhere either. He had a total of five other brothers and sisters and his family needed to have some financial stability. This unfortunately meant that Johnny wasn’t leaving for Thanksgiving or spring break.

  “I am going to really miss my family’s Thanksgiving dinner though.” Patrick unintentionally said out loud.

  “Me too. My family always makes something new every year.”

  “Oh well. It doesn’t make much of a difference anyway. I’m still going to have that big family Christmas party in a month.”

  “That reminds me! I forgot to tell you earlier. I got us something to do on Thanksgiving. You know that senior in our calculus class? Jessie Goldman? She invited me to some Thanksgiving party at a house in San Francisco. I asked her if I could bring a friend and she said yes. Apparently everyone will be there. It’ll be fun, man. What do you say?”

  “I think I’m going to have to pass. Remember the last party you took me to?”

  “How was I supposed to know the host was actually a cop? This is completely different.” Johnny said, without any further convincing.

  “I’ll tell you what. I’ll think about it.” he compromised, knowing very well he actually wouldn’t. Patrick never got the appeal of parties. He would have way more fun playing Risk on the floor of the lounge in his dorm building.

  “I’m holding you to it. I got some things to do right now. If I don’t see you before, I’ll be the guy probably standing by the outside window of the house.” As if he ever needed any help recognizing Johnny. He had become notorious for wearing the same leather jacket every day. All light seemed to be powerfully reflected from the fabric. Even in the dark, Patrick new it he would not be difficult to locate.

  They said their goodbyes, and Johnny strode away from the fountain. Patrick watched his friend disappear into the seemingly lifted horizon with his plaid messenger bag. Johnny had a habit of mysteriously disappearing every now and then. It was like he disappeared off the face of the Earth. Search parties, phone calls, witnesses, no one could ever find him after he solitarily set off. Patrick never thought twice about it though, he wasn’t one to intrude on other’s privacy. Finding nothing left for him at the fountain, besides maybe tossing in another wishful penny, he gathered his supplies, and headed back to his dorm. Yeah haha. I’d have so much fun at that party, he thought, mentally grinning. Little did he know that this Thanksgiving night would change the course of his life, forever.

  The rest of his midday went by quickly and quietly. Patrick spent a good amount of it reading a portion of a full length copy of The Count of Monte Cristo. It was by far his favorite book he read in high school, so he figured he would go beyond reading just the abridged copy. His reading streak was suddenly cut short by the first jingle of the six o’clock bells. With nothing better to do, he grabbed his backpack and headed out to the Weller Coffee Lounge, which was the place on campus to get coffee or caffeinated drinks. He had no idea what special ingredient they put in their coffee or baked goods, but whatever it was made him an evening regular.

  On his walk he constantly swatted the front tufts of his hair out of his eyes. In high school Patrick preferred longer hair, relishing in the subtle rebellion against the school’s dress policy. Now it was no longer fun, even though everyone said it made him look like one of the Beatles. However, his almost Anglo-Saxon appearance did that enough as it was.

  The chime on the door signaled his entry. The place was vacant, with most people having gone for the break. Looking around at the nearly empty shop, Patrick felt that he should have felt lonely, but he did not. To him there was nothing quite like a cup of hot coffee in the cold weather-at least what passed for cold in middle California- and being joined only by his thoughts, seeing where they ended up wandering when he let them off the leash.

  Nevertheless, that time never lasted too long.

  “Good evening, Patrick. I had a feeling you would show up tonight.”

  The sudden greeting shook him up, though looking over, he realized he shouldn’t have been surprised. Sitting in the far corner underneath the small chandelier that overlooked the campus theater were two of his closest friends, Slate Kilroy and his girlfriend Lindsey Hunter. The two were regulars just like him at this hour. What did catch him off guard was seeing them still on campus. From what he had heard about each of their parents, they seemed like they wouldn’t tolerate a holiday without their kids.

  “Hey, you guys.” Patrick awkwardly dragged his feet in their direction. H
e tried not to make it too obvious that he was disappointed he wouldn’t be alone.

  “Come join us once you order your coffee.” Lindsey gleamed with an unnecessary wave. “We could stay here another hour if you want!”

  “Great.”

  He ordered his medium coffee with hazelnut creamer and gave the appropriate amount of money to the international student from Uruguay working the register named ‘Pablo’. The coffee took just 10 seconds as Pablo had just brewed a completely new batch. After Patrick received his slightly overflowing mug of joe, he found his way back to his company.

  “What are you two still doing on campus?”

  “We have the art show tomorrow.” they both answered routinely.

  “On Thanksgiving? Why would the school do that?” Patrick finally sat down, getting settled beside Slate.

  “At least they’ll have pumpkin pie.” Slate smiled.

  If someone took every perceivable color on the spectrum that was visible to the human eye and morphed it into a well-functioning primate, the result would probably be Slate Kilroy. His tie-dye personality made him someone who was easy to get along with, so much so that his Facebook friends numbered over two thousand. Not to mention he had a terrible knack for being impeccably well dressed, as evident by his current plaid scarf tucked neatly into his wool blend coat. To Patrick’s knowledge he had never done anything wrong in his life, and if he had so much as accidentally stepped on a lady bug, he would surely have wept.

  “So because of that show you can’t leave?” Patrick asked.

  Lindsey took a quick swig from her mug. “The show is a requirement for a minor, such as I, and for the major like Slate.”

  If there was something that the two of them could talk about for hours, it was art. It was something they reveled in during their free time and it made them a tight couple. However, to their misfortune, they would need to talk about it in front of many clueless, wandering faces that wouldn’t know Van Gogh from Dali. It was a requirement for both their classes, and Thanksgiving was the only day the school could hire professional art critics to view the students’ pieces. As if Weller weren’t pretentious enough already.