Renesmee was a simpleton. She was the sort that rode to the market with two bushels of wheat, and to avoid damaging her horse, she would carry the wheat upon her own neck, still riding upon her horse till the end of her journey.
During the Autumn, Renesmee’s belly swelled up and she was blessed with twins. It was an overcast day when she went into labor.
She had long been enduring pain, when lightning flashed in the stormy sky. The midwife candle in hand, inspected the birthing area and cackled.
“Born will be a child of darkness & a child of light.
One dull & the other superbly bright.
One with intelligence that is rare.
The other with dangers, beware.”
In that moment,young Renesmee understood nothing except her agony.
***
To an outsider Amaya and Luca seemed identical, but beneath the surface they were as diverse as chalk and cheese.
One grew up frolicking with black cats and spent the nights chasing bats.
The other grew up hiding in little nooks and devouring giant books.
***
“Did you know Carrots were originally purple?
“Did you know an octopus has three hearts?
“Did you know there are more ways to arrange a deck of cards than there are atoms on earth?
“ Did you know that the hundred precise folds on a chefs hats represent the hundred ways to cook an egg?”
“Did you know know the odds of getting a royal flush are exactly 1 in 649,740.”
Luca was a fountain of knowledge, wherever he went facts and figures would pour out of his mouth delighting and astounding listeners.
Tales of his immense intellect reached far & wide and it wasn’t long before young Luca was recognized and recruited. He would drift in and out of the house like a shadow, barely there always working.
Renesmee was oft heard bragging to anybody that was willing to listen.
“My Luca is sooo smart that he works for the Super Secret Service. They only hire the brightest you know.”
She preferred not to talk of Amaya and his strange ways, whispering to snakes, Dracula orchids and what not.
***
Renesmee was baking her signature rhubarb and strawberry pie, when the doorbell rang with urgency. Before she could open the door, men in khaki broke the door down and streamed in, scattering in all directions shouting commands at one another.
“Where is he? Where is your rogue son?” billowed one khaki giant.
“He he’s he’s hiding in the greenhouse,” she stuttered, the pie splattering onto the floor.
They went to the greenhouse and found Amaya holding a pair of shears…
…tending to bromeliads and succulents, with a macaw perched on his shoulder.
***
The password you entered is incorrect.
Please try again.
The screen from Luca’s computer screen glowed a ghoulish green.
Amaya had been staring at it for hours along with the sharpest minds in intelligence, whilst his mother bustled around telling everyone, how this was a mistake and that Luca was a part of the Super Secret Service.
Ignoring the hag’s comments, techies and analysts studied the detailed board pinned to the wall. The board was scrawled with answers to Luca’s famous ‘Did you know questions,’ scraps of equations that he had been working on had been pinned up on boards, alongside other memorabilia.
Every few minutes one of the intellects would walk over to the computer punch in permutation combination of probable passwords and then walk off in frustration as the tenacious message would flash yet again.
The password you entered is incorrect.
Please try again.
The key to everything lay behind that screen.
****
“May I ?” mumbled Amaya
“And what rare intelligence do you possess that these gentlemen don’t Ama?” reprimanded an exasperated Renesmee with a tinge of indignation in her voice.
“The most uncommon form mumma, common sense,” came his gentle, chiding reply.
He scratched his head for a few seconds and then typed the password. The screen transitorily went dark and then flickered to life revealing the secrets of the most wanted terrorist handler in the country.
The room burst into a round of applause as Renesmee watched the prophecy unfold before her eyes in awe.
“Extraordinary! Simply marvelous!”
“Your other work conserving the environment and now this! Sir…you have truly served this country in more ways than one.”
“How did you crack the code, Sir?”
“Elementary, my dear,” chuckled Amaya.
The password is incorrect.
The password was incorrect.
[link] [comments]
from Short Stories
No comments:
Post a Comment