Chapter 4 Taken

 That night, Lance lay curled under his thin blanket, the window cracked open to the warm Michigan air. The soft hiss of crickets drifted in, mixing with the distant hum of trucks on US-10.

His Alupent inhaler rested on the nightstand, white against the dark wood, ready if the tightness came.

Sometime past midnight, sleep pulled him under — heavy and thick. And then, in the dark, came the light.

It wasn’t the moon. It was too white, too sharp. It filled the room, pouring over notebooks and radios and baseball cards.

Hands — or something like hands — touched his shoulders, lifted him weightless. He tried to speak but his voice stayed stuck in his chest. He tried to breathe but the air felt wrong — sweet and cold, like cinnamon and metal.

Shapes moved above him. Soft voices, not English, not anything he knew. He felt warmth behind his ear, a sting like a whisper. Then he was drifting — through the window, into the night sky, the house falling away like a toy below him.

He woke before dawn tangled in sweaty sheets, chest tight, breath shallow. His Alupent was still there on the table. He reached for it, the medicine sharp and bitter on his tongue.

A floorboard creaked in the hall. Bobby’s sleepy voice drifted through the door. “You up, Lance?”

Lance stared at the ceiling. Maybe it was just a dream.

But he could still taste cinnamon.

Chapter 3 The Whisper from Above

Far above, the ship Alton One drifted silently in orbit, its hull gleaming white and smooth like the inside of a seashell. Inside its heart, Tsatso sat alone in the vast control room — his cage, his post, his only link to the planet spinning below.

One entire wall was a massive window, wider than any Earth house. Through it, Tsatso could see the curve of the blue Earth, cloud bands drifting slowly like breath over water. He sometimes wondered if the humans down there ever looked up and felt him watching back.

The air smelled faintly of cinnamon — a leftover trick of the Alton Guard’s old designs, meant to keep the mind calm on long shifts. Now it was just a ghost of warmth in this cold nest of screens and humming panels.

Rows of holographic monitors flickered all around him, each one displaying tiny moving lives — highways full of blinking cars, cities that glowed like circuits, quiet neighborhoods like Lance’s little street in Scottville. Lance’s feed was always near the center. Tsatso liked it that way. He had been tasked, long ago, to monitor thousands of people. But Lance Goodman — small, shy, lungs too tight for his age — was the one he watched closest.

He had met the boy many times, though Lance wouldn’t fully remember — not properly. The protocols required an amnesia injection after each contact, to keep the Alton Guard’s secret work hidden. Tsatso had done it. Mostly. But sometimes — when Lance’s tiny hand clutched his finger in the sterile craft, or when the boy’s eyes fluttered open too soon — Tsatso had hesitated. A half dose. A slip. A wish of his own.

Now he was trapped here — the last loyal Alton watcher locked in his control room, while the Sassa Guard stalked the ship’s outer corridors like wolves waiting for the door to fail. It hadn’t always been this way. Alton One was built for protection — a silent guardian drifting above a noisy world, meant to steer away threats before humans ever knew they were in danger. That was the Alton promise.

But the War of the Corridors had changed that. The Sassa Guard found the cracks, forced their way in, turned the outer decks into their hunting ground. Tsatso had sealed himself inside this nerve center — this single room of blinking consoles, memory needles, and the great window where Earth hovered close enough to touch.

He closed his pale eyes, shaped like slivers of glass. Through the chip behind Lance’s ear, he heard the boy’s thoughts like distant radio static. He heard the stifled coughs, the shaky breaths when Lance’s small white inhaler ran dry, the tiny dreams that slipped out when the boy forgot to guard them.

“You’re not alone,” Tsatso whispered to the cold humming dark. “I’m here. I will always be here.”

Below, Lance dreamed — or half-remembered — cold metal beds, bright lights, and the warm sting behind his ear. The sweet-bitter scent of cinnamon drifted between them both, like a secret promise the invaders hadn’t stolen yet.

The fight for Earth — and the boy — was far from over.

Chapter 2 Brothers and Baseball

“Hey, Lance, you coming outside?” Bobby called from the front porch, tossing a baseball in the air.

Lance looked up from his notebook, where he’d been sketching strange shapes and symbols. The warm summer air drifted in through the cracked window, carrying the smell of fresh-cut grass and faint exhaust from the highway.

“Not now,” Lance muttered, adjusting his glasses.

“Come on! David’s waiting.” Bobby was older by a year and more confident — he had the easy smile and the strong hands that made him a natural leader.

David appeared behind Bobby, grinning wide. “We need you, man. You’re our secret weapon.”

Lance sighed but stood, slipping his white Alupent inhaler into his pocket before following them out. The warm air made his chest tighten, but he didn’t say anything.

Outside, the sun warmed the cracked driveway. Bobby tossed the ball to David, who caught it easily. Lance felt the inhaler press against his leg — it made him feel safer, like a tiny shield no one could see.

“So, you believe in that radio stuff?” David teased, nudging Lance’s shoulder.

“I do,” Lance said, eyes serious. “I think there’s something out there listening. I just have to figure out how to talk to it right.”

“Sounds crazy,” David laughed, but there was no real mockery in his voice.

Bobby threw the ball to Lance. “Crazy or not, you’ve got heart. Let’s see what you can do.”

Lance caught the ball clumsily but smiled. For a moment, he forgot about the chip behind his ear, the whispers at night, and the dreams he couldn’t quite explain. 

📚 WISHED AWAY: THE ALTON ONE CHRONICLES Chapter 1: The Boy at the window

Manistee, Michigan.

Lance Goodman sat cross-legged on the thin carpet in the far left bedroom at the end of the hallway — his room. The house was old, creaking under the weight of wind off Lake Michigan. His room smelled like old socks and pencil shavings, but it was his place.

At ten years old, Lance was small for his age, with brown hair that stuck up in the back and glasses that always slid down his nose when he read. The room was crowded — not with toys, but with odd things: broken CB radios, a hand-built crystal radio set, coils of wire strung along the baseboards. Near the west window, facing the lake, a wooden desk held a battered ham radio console his dad bought at a yard sale. Next to it: spiral notebooks stacked crooked, each one jammed with messy notes — dates, times, dreams, words he couldn’t explain.

Sometimes, when he looked around, he thought his room felt like a little spaceship — wires and screens, notes and knobs, like a secret command center he’d never seen but somehow knew how to build. He didn’t know where he got the ideas for it all. He just did.

One wall was covered in baseball cards, thumbtacked in neat rows. His favorite was the rookie Alan Trammell. Lance looked at that card a lot — the young Tigers team was finally looking like something special.

But the real shrine was by the south window. There, taped to the glass, was a spiderweb of copper wire and aluminum foil, shaped like an antenna. It looked ridiculous. But Lance believed. He knew — somehow — that if he talked just right into his old mic, something up there would hear him.

He crawled to the desk, put on the big headphones that made his ears sweat, and flicked the console on. The soft green glow lit up his glasses. Beside the mic sat his small white Alupent inhaler — always within reach when his chest got tight.

He took a breath. “Tsatso. I know you’re there. It’s Lance. It’s me. I remember.”

Outside, the wind rustled the big maple tree by the driveway. Somewhere down the hall, his little brother Tony babbled in his sleep.

Lance pressed the transmit button. Static hissed. But in that static, if he closed his eyes… he could almost smell it. Cinnamon.