The Stelter City Saga: Ultranatural (8 page)

“
C
laro
,” she grumbled, “but trust me you
don’t want to know because I guarantee you would hate
me.”

“
I can’t hate you
Larissa.”

“
Don’t lie to me, Ammon,”
she snapped, “You’ve hated everyone and everything since your dad
died and I know I’m not an exception!”

Her words nailed him in the chest. She
was right. He had been bitter for a long time now. To everyone;
even to his mother. “I didn’t realize this was hurting you so
much.”

Larissa rolled her auburn
eyes.
“Now you know.”

He stared down at her, but
her
g
aze
w
asn’t
meeting his. Slowly he lifted a finger to her chin and pulled
her face up to meet his. “I’m sorry.” He said and she could see
the
s
incere
truth of it in his eyes. “I’ve been so
stupid.”

Larissa beamed, “Yes, yes you have. Are
you going to be happy now?”

Ammon made a sound between a sigh and a
growl. “For you, I will try. But promise me something.”

Promise- the two syllable P word that
was so much more than a scramble of letters. Larissa swallowed then
nodded. “What?”

Ammon leaned in and pressed his
forehead to hers. “I’ll go back to myself if you tell me what your
secret is. I swear it, only if you keep your end of the
deal.”

“
Ammon…” Larissa grumbled,
“I’m keeping this a secret to protect you.”

The boy scoffed, “No,
Larissa, you’re keeping secrets to protect
you.”

She glowered up at him and kept her
tongue tied to keep from saying anything else. “I only wish you
knew.”

“
Then tell me!”

Larissa growled and shoved him aside
with a little too much force than she meant to. “Trust me Ammon;
you’ll hate me if you knew.”

“
I might be disappointed,
but I don’t think I’d hate you.” He retorted rubbing his
on
-
coming bruise.
“Ouch Larissa, you’ve got an arm.”

Not just an arm. She could probably
pick up a car with her pinky if she tried. Those were just things
that came with being a supernatural.

~“I just need to stop by the studio for
a moment.” Michael said from the other end of Lotus’s phone as she
slid into her blue Stelter Hailstorm convertible.

“
Okay, well I’m on my way to
the beach right now.” She replied shutting her door. “See you
there.”

Michael Caster could tell by the tone
in her voice that the billion dollar heiress was about to hang up.
“Hold on,” he cut in and Lotus nibbled on her nude lips.

“
Yes, Caster, what is
it?”

“
I’m sorry about putting you
on the spot like that.” He said hesitantly. There was a long pause
from his end of the phone before he continued. “I need to talk to
you. Face to face. I think if you knew the real me…” Michael’s
voice faded once more.

Lotus sat back in the
luxurious cushion of her sports car. With the top down, she could
feel the late winter breeze seeping to her hair from between the
Heleow skyscrapers. Her head rolled back and her sky colored eyes
scaled the towering hotel building she had just emerged from. Even
from
f
ifty
floors below, she could see the orange beach towel
still draped over the railing of her penthouse balcony.

“
Caster…” she moaned. She
already knew the ‘real’ him. She had known him for years, what more
could he possibly explain to her.

“
But I need to talk to
you…”

Lotus sighed and her inch long lashes
panned down the glass and iron hotel tower until she saw a cute
curly haired tourist tugging on her mother’s pant leg and pointing
at her. “We can talk when we get to the beach, alright?” She hung
up before he could respond and swallowed a big breath of
air.

It was sad to think that Michael was
one of her very best friends yet right at the moment, she didn’t
want to talk to him- she didn’t want to talk to anyone. It had only
been an hour since he had pulled the stunt on the Dylan Dade Show
and she was still trying to recover.

Lotus left a tire mark on the hotel’s
stone entrance as she sped onto the main street. There wasn’t a
single cloud in the sky which meant she was going to get some
awesome sun with her surfing time. As she blazed down the stretch
of road with thoughts of Caster fresh in her mind, she couldn’t
help but adore the way the uniquely shaped glass scrapers seemed to
reflect every beam of sunlight with a brilliant crisp light. Heleow
was much smaller than Tarrillian City, much, much smaller. But this
was her favorite of the Stelter cities.

The city of Heleow literally grew out
of the ocean. What was once a tiny flat sandy island just seven
miles south of Oahu was now a towering city full of glass and
power. Once she had driven to the island of Oahu through the
magnificent subway tunnel. After arriving in Honolulu, she had sat
on the beach to watch the sun set over the towers of glass and the
endless purple horizon. The sight had been so stunning she almost
decided to move to the Hawaiian capital just so she could have that
sight every day.

She loved life in Heleow. The
technology here made living in Tarrillian like living in New York
City. There were all sorts of glistening silver robots that sailed
in perfect lines around the perimeter of the towers as if they had
their own invisible floating highway. They came in all shapes and
sizes: ovals, cubes, Frisbees… some even glittered with lights. She
wasn’t sure what they did, but she knew that some kept an eye on
the city for security, others carried mail, and several were
weather detecting gizmos. Honestly, Lotus only cared was that the
robots made her city look futuristic, even though life was entirely
modern.

As Lotus drove across a flat
bridge, she was reminded of another one of her favorite things the
metropolis had to offer. Heleow, in only one way, was like Venice.
Channels of ocean water flooded every other street and gorgeous
steel bridges elevated the cars over. Traditional Hawaiian canoes
drifted through them sometimes hauling a load of fruits, but other
times they hauled crates full of DiAchi Tech. Lotus wasn’t sure
what it was about the channels. Maybe it was the fact that they
turned the water to such an electric blue- or it was the fact that
every single one of them was made of
a
clear metal,
giving the city another
futuristic vibe. Whatever it was, it was unique. No other place on
the planet could even compare to Heleow.

It was nice to think that
this was a Stelter City. She liked to imagine that the city was her
own considering that she hardly ever saw her parents and she had no
siblings. Though, she had the
g
hosts
of a
big brother named Lambert, and a little sister Haileigh
haunting her.
In fact, she
still had their birth certificates and
s
ome
family
photos stashed in a book under her bed. She would glance at them
occasionally, longing for someone to keep her company. But then
there was a fire, and just like that she became an only
child.

While most celebrities got a dog and
cried about family issues, Lotus preferred to hang out at the beach
alone. Surfing and singing were her two most irrevocable passions.
Singing because music made her feel something more than alive, and
water made her powerful…

The sandy beach was just a head of her
now. She vroomed under a bridge and glanced up at the slim metallic
bullet train as it sped overhead. There was only one set of tracks
that ran around the city and eventually dove under the ocean before
reappearing on Oahu. She had yet to board that revolutionary
contraption but for now she was content with just watching it speed
past. Or she was until she saw the array of blues and purples
sprayed into the last cart.

At the sight of graffiti, Lotus nearly
slammed on her breaks. Gang affiliated profanity was the utmost
despicable sight in her eyes, and she would have no part of it. Not
in her city. For a moment she thought Pele had invaded her city.
From what Lotus knew, Pele was a small gang and probably had no
more than fifty members. But every single one of them managed to
hide their identities better than a superhero. Small spontaneous
fires would erupt across the islands, and for anyone who didn’t
have direct ties with Stelter City Security wouldn’t know about
them.

Lotus hated the sight of
profanity in
her
city. Furiously, she dialed her manager.

“
Kasper!” she barked when
the man answered.

“
Princess?” came his
sarcastic response. Kasper was the tall curly blonde surfer boy who
looked funny in a suit and tie. He worked for her father and sat a
couple people down when ranked on the corporate scale, even though
he was only a quarter of a century old. Technically, it would be
Kasper who won her father’s legacy, not Lotus. But for now he was
assigned to be Lotus’s babysitter along with run some company thing
she didn’t care about.

“
There is graffiti on the
train!” she bellowed. “Get it out of my city!”

“
I find graffiti art
beautiful.” He pointed out with his calm collective
voice.

“
Kasper, it would mean the
world to me if you could help keep Heleow clean. Please do this one
thing for me.” Lotus insisted.

Kasper chuckled, “Well since you asked
so nicely, of course I will help you keep the city
clean!”

“
Thank you, Kasper.” was her
response. “Hey, why are you talking to me anyway? I thought you
would be in a meeting and I’d just have to leave you a
message.”

Lotus continued to drive.
The scrapers had disappeared behind her and now there was nothing
but sand and towering palm trees outlining either side of the road.
The road Lotus was currently traveling on was quite a stretch. But
by the time she reached the end, she would have ended up on the
jelly bean shaped beach; a manmade bay.
She
had once seen a satellite view of the island and it looked like a
shovel with a city on one end, a beach on the other, and a long
stretch of road separating the two.
Heleow
was still a growing city and the idea was that more buildings would
branch off from the long stretch
she was
driving on
.

“
Well I’m currently on the
phone with you, princess, because we just were just let out for a
lunch break,” Kasper replied. “I’m in Hong Kong right now. We just
finished buying out one of DiAchi Tech’s science labs. There’s
still a major manufacturer in Singapore, and I’ll be there next
week to sign the papers. But after that-”

“
Are you planning on
corporate domination?” Lotus guessed. Normally anything regarding
business sent her dozing. But not when Kasper was speaking. She
wondered if maybe it was because she still had feelings for the
guy. They never had anything but a babysitter-baby relationship. In
fact when she first found out Kasper was going to be her manager,
she had tried to put some moves on him. But he became utterly
disgusted as if the thought of dating her was like dating a
sibling.

“
It’s not a monopoly.” he
retorted.

“
But it sounds like it.” She
argued. The asphalt had finally spit her out onto the white sandy
beach. Manmade meant perfect waves that rolled in with swells
ranging from five to fifteen feet. “After you take over DiAchi
Tech, who’s going to stop Stelter Corperation from taking over the
world?” she asked as she parked her car on the practically vacant
beach.

There were only a couple vacationing
families exploring the new wonderland and some other famous people
she might recognize if they took off their big hats and
sunglasses.

“
I will,” said Kasper
responsibly. “That’s why your dad is making me heir.”

Lotus shuddered at that
title;
dad.
“Well
then why do you want to take over DiAchi Tech so badly?”

Kasper shook his head though Lotus
couldn’t see. “This is a whole lot bigger than you know, in case
you haven’t guessed that already.”

“
Nope, surely have not.” She
snapped, “But thanks for informing me.”

“
Ugh, you sound like you’re
in a bad mood.” Admitted Kasper. “What’s wrong?”

It was sweet that Kasper cared. He was
the only guy that had ever paid attention to her, besides Michael.
“Well a lot of things.” Lotus admitted. “My friend Mirage hasn’t
called me back in forever.” Lotus started, “But I guess what’s
really been on my mind is that… Promise me you won’t
laugh.”

Kasper laughed anyway. “Okay, I got all
of the laughter out of my system. You have my word I won’t laugh
after you tell me.”

Lotus sucked in a big breath of air.
She knew she could always count on Kasper for anything. “Okay…” she
started. “Michael asked me to marry him today.”

“
What!?” Kasper exclaimed,
“Congratulations-! Wait, I thought you were planning on breaking up
with him?”