Henry Rider: Clown Hunter

Chapter Three

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Chapter Three

I raced out the door with Ethan in tow, one hand clamped around his wrist while the other was poised to draw Splatsy at a moment's notice. My eyes swung back and forth with every step, trying to look everywhere at once. It was quiet out here. Maybe too quiet? It was one forty five in the morning, and Ethan's neighborhood was at the edge of a big woods, but shouldn't there have been, like, crickets? Owls?

Cut it out, I thought. You're just being paranoid.

"If I'm coming with you," Ethan finally gasped, struggling to keep pace with me, "then I want to know what's going on."

I snorted. "If I tried to tell you even the first tenth of what was happening here, your brain would melt."

"Is that supposed to make me feel better?"

I turned, and the look in his eyes told me he was one wrong word away from yanking his hand out of mine and bolting. Exhausted as I was, would I be able to chase him down and stop him? I didn't want to take the chance.

We came to the end of his neighborhood, where the road cut a line straight through the heart of the forest, and I finally stopped. Trees walled us in on both sides, the shadows too thick to see more than a couple feet in any direction. Patting Splatsy reassuringly, I began to make my way more slowly. There was a Corner leading to an IW station somewhere nearby. McGus had shown it to me on a map before I'd left. Thank chocolate turnips I'd actually paid attention this time.

"You're not human, are you?" Ethan asked quietly.

I glanced at him. "You're not going to try and run, are you?"

He shook his head, but still had that look in his eyes. I sighed.

"That thing that attacked your house is called a maiam," I said. "They feed on laughter, and it's my job to hunt them down."

I paused, wondering if I should tell him that I fed on laughter too. I decided against it. No need to freak him out more than he already was.

"Anyway, you've got so much laughter inside you right now that you're practically an all you can eat maiam buffet. Happy?"

"Not in the slightest."

"Good."

I paused, looking around. If I remembered McGus' map right, we were getting close. I held out my free hand and walked more slowly, moving it to the left and right like I was in a dark room and fumbling for the light switch.

"Now what are you doing?" Ethan demanded.

"Looking for the Corner," I mumbled in reply.

"The...what?" He looked at the road that stretched out in front of us in a perfectly straight line for miles. "I don't think you're going to find any corners out here."

"Not a corner," I snapped, patience wearing thin again. "Corner. Uppercase C. A gateway to an alternate — aha!"

In front of me, my hand vanished from the end of my arm. I'd found the Corner. Now for the hard part: getting Ethan through it.

"You humans live in three dimensions," I said, pulling my hand back out before he could see. "Height, width, and depth. But there are more dimensions out there than you could possibly imagine."

Letting go of his hand, ready to chase him if he ran, I stepped backwards so we were standing side by side.

"These dimensions are all around you, all the time. Places where they branch off from your reality are called Corners. Just like a corner in your world keeps you from seeing what's around it, dimensional Corners keep you from seeing what's in those other dimensions."