I slapped my palms together and then pulled them apart. The doors opened. Zoe, Doug, and I jumped into a glitter shower that would take us to who-knows-where.
* * *
The inside of the elevator was cool, like on our trip to the zoo. But this time it was a smooth ride. And dead quiet. I started humming to break the silence—and the tension—in the air.
“This is eerie.” Zoe walked slowly around the elevator, smoothing her hands against the walls. “I can hear my heart pounding.”
“I sure hope we’re not going up,” Doug whimpered.
Doug’s been with me on a couple really high adventures, once to the top of an Egyptian pyramid, and then to the year 1935, to the middle of the Golden Gate Bridge before it was completed on both sides. That one was the scariest of all. We escaped into the elevator just as the Badger brothers, the two guys who will do anything to get my token, flew off the edge of the bridge and into the fog.
“Doug, I think I can hear your heart pounding too,” Zoe said.
Finally, after another few minutes of deafening silence, the doors opened.
* * *
We’re in some kind of tall office building, like the Empire State Building. A sign in front of us says that we’ve landed on the twenty-third floor. Another sign stands next to it. It looks like a kid painted it with gold glitter. It says Tested and True Gold Refinery with an arrow pointing right.
“Well, this is better than being stuck on an unfinished bridge in the fog!” Doug steps out of the elevator. “You think they have a snack bar anywhere?”
Zoe goes out next, but I lag for just a second. I have a funny feeling about this place, and for the first time since I started these adventures, I don’t want to go.
Zoe turns back to me. “What’s wrong?”
I stay in place. “What do you think would happen if I don’t leave this elevator?” My hands are shaking as I grab my empty gold chain.
Zoe comes back in and stands by me for a minute. She puts her hand on my shoulder. “Well . . . let’s see . . . what do you think would happen if you never opened another library book?”
I shudder. “I guess I would stop learning new things.”
“Would you say that these elevator doors are taking us places where we’re learning new things?”
I take a deep breath. “Yeah. And each place we’ve been, I’ve been able to help another person with what I learned.”
“So why won’t you step out today?”
My legs feel weak. “Because I think this lesson is for me.”
Zoe turns to me and crosses her arms. “Well, then don’t you think this is the most important one?”
I look down at the ground. I can’t answer. I see Zoe extend her hand.
“C’mon. I got your back.”
Chapter 9
Pure Gold
There are gold arrows on the floor that I guess we’re supposed to follow. No one is in the hallways. Just me, Zoe, and Doug. I search for clues about what city we’re in. Or state. Or country. But there are just those golden arrows. Finally, after walking in circles through hallways that seem to go nowhere, we come to a door. It says TEST ROOM.
“What do you want to do, Arcade?” Zoe grabs my hand again. Doug is behind me, close. I can feel his breath on my neck.
I stand there for a minute to think.
What do I want to do? I want to run back to the elevator.
I look at Zoe, then Doug, then back at Zoe. They’re waiting for my decision.
Trust the tester . . .
“Let’s go in.” I reach for the door handle but, as I do, the door opens by itself.
“Arcade, what is this place?” Doug whispers as we look inside.
“It’s a warehouse, I guess.”
I really don’t know for sure what we’re looking at. Adults wearing white coats stand beside huge, steaming vats. I watch the guy closest to us pull a flaming orange container out of his vat and carry it over to a large work table. He pours glowing liquid into a dark metal container. When he is finished, he looks up, right at us! But then he goes back to his vat.
“Dude, do you think we’re invisible?” Doug is examining his outstretched arms.
“Either that, or the guy is very nearsighted. Like me.” I adjust my glasses on my face.
“Or he’s ignoring us for some reason,” Zoe says. “C’mon.”
Another guy brings his flaming container over to the same work table. “Not much here. Just a few flakes. A lot of scrap.” He pours a small amount of liquid into the dark container.
“That’s too bad,” a woman standing next to him says. “I had high hopes for that one.”
Wait a minute . . .
I take a few steps closer. I can barely believe my eyes.
Is that the woman who gave me the token?
It looks like her, but she’s not wearing her regular white sweat suit and Triple T ball cap. She’s wearing a white coat, like all the other workers in the room, and her hair is tucked up into a gold bandana.
I elbow Zoe. “Zoe, what does the patch say on her coat?” Zoe’s farsighted, so she needs reading glasses, but she can see distances way better than me.
Zoe takes a half-step closer and cranes her neck forward. “It says Quality Control.”
“So she’s some kind of inspector, then?”
Zoe shrugs. “I guess so.”
“I’m gonna test my invisibility,” Doug proclaims, and he struts right up to a vat in the middle of the room.
DOUG!
Workers walk around him, and he grins back at us, waving his hands in the air.
“They can’t see us.” Zoe has to grab the sleeve of my T-shirt to move me forward. “Let’s follow the Quality Control woman.”
She is walking from vat to vat, staring into the steaming fires. Zoe and I stay a few feet behind her.
“This one is all scrap,” a man says, as he carries his container to pour the contents out at the work table.
The woman yells out to the workers, “Keep testing! One of these will come out pure.”
“Guys! Check it out!” Doug motions us over to a table at the far corner of the huge warehouse. We jog over, dodging workers along the way.
“We got gold bars, people!” Doug reaches over, pulls a gold bar off the table, and hands it to me. “Of course, I’d prefer a chocolate bar . . . or an ice cream bar. But gold is pretty awesome too.”
I take the bar from Doug and turn it over to examine it. It’s gold all right. It has words and numbers stamped into it. 100 grams. 999.9 Fine Gold.
“999.9? What’s that mean?”
Zoe takes the bar from me. “It means this gold is as pure as you can get it. It’s scientifically impossible to remove all the impurities.”
“That doesn’t make sense,” I say. “If they know how to get rid of all the other impurities, why not just finish the job and get that last speck out?”
Doug takes the bar back from Zoe. “Where do you think that last speck is hiding?”
A loud shout comes from one of the men in the room. “Boss! Come quick!”
The familiar woman with the Quality Control badge rushes over. We follow. “Have you found something?” She wrings her hands.
“We left this one in the fire a little longer. It’s registering one-hundred percent. Do you want to test it yourself?”
The woman nods, takes a stick out of her coat pocket, and dunks it in the fiery liquid. She waits, and appears to hold her breath, while something registers on the side of the stick. She gasps. “One-hundred percent. I KNEW it was possible!”
The man holding the handle of the container begins to shake.
The woman puts a calming hand on his arm. “Careful now, follow me to the mold.” She leads him to a side door of the big warehouse. She takes a key out of her other coat pocket, unlocks the door, and we all walk in.
“I’ve been waiting for this for a long time,” she says. “Go ahead and pour it in.”
The man approaches the small tab
le that holds a small, round mold, but stops short of pouring in the liquid. “Are you sure? I mean . . . you’re gonna waste the power of pure gold on some kid?”
The woman smiles. “It won’t go to waste. Not when it finds the right kid.”
The man hesitates a moment more. “Okay. You’re the boss. You sure it won’t spill over in this tiny mold?”
“It will all fit just fine. Pour away.”
The man does as he’s told. Zoe, Doug, and I watch as the red-hot liquid streams into the mold.
I poke Zoe with my elbow and whisper, “What were you saying about things being scientifically impossible?”
Zoe focuses in on the gold, now forming in the mold.
“Arcade . . .” Zoe’s mouth drops open.
“Because if it was scientifically impossible then—”
“Arcade!”
“Stop trying to change the subject, Zoe. When you’re wrong you’re—”
“ARCADE!” Zoe’s eyes are bugging out of her head. She just points at the table, the mold now filled to the top with gold.
“It’s . . .”
My heart leaps in my chest and goosebumps form on my arms. “Yeah. I know. It’s my Triple T Token.”
“And it’s looking for the right kid.”
* * *
Now it’ s my turn to stand there with my mouth hanging open. I push my glasses up on my nose. “The right kid? What does that mean?”
Zoe stares up at me. “One who best matches the token, I think.”
“But Zoe, I’m not one-hundred percent pure. I’ll never be. It’s not possible.”
“Ha! How well I know that! You’re right, no one is perfect. But the token is. So, what if the token is looking for someone it can trust to use its power perfectly? Maybe that’s you, Arcade.”
The woman and man leave the room, and we follow them out to the steaming warehouse. She dips her stick into a few more containers and shakes her head.
“Maybe it’s me? How will I know? How will the token know?”
Zoe begins to pace. Her hands are glued to both sides of her head. She closes her eyes, and her face contorts. Then she stops, shakes her head, and takes a deep breath. “Arcade, I don’t know how to tell you this.” She takes another deep breath.
“I know what you’re going to say.”
“This is totally out of the box for me.”
“I know.”
“And it wouldn’t make any sense, except that . . . we’re here, and that doesn’t make any sense either.”
Silence. Zoe gathers herself.
“Arcade, the only way the token will know if you’ll use it properly is to put you through the fire, just like it just went through the fire.”
Gulp.
“And now,” she says with a sympathetic smile, “I know why you were afraid to get out of the elevator.”
This whole time Doug has been standing there with his mouth hanging open. “Zoe, what are you saying?”
“The woman on top of the Empire State Building said that things were about to heat up, right? To test your metal?”
“Yeah,” I say. “That still doesn’t make sense.”
“Arcade, I don’t think she meant the word metal, m-e-t-a-l. I think she was referring to the word mettle, m-e-t-t-l-e. It means strength of character, courage, determination, the ability to cope in the midst of difficult circumstances.”
“Difficult circumstances?” The knot in my throat returns.
Zoe puts both hands on my shoulders. “Arcade, I think that Triple T Token hanging around your neck is a fiery ‘mettle’ tester—”
I look down. And there it is, back on the chain.
“. . . and it’s about to test you.”
* * *
The fiery metal tester pulses light.
“It’s time to go.” I pull the warehouse door open and we exit back into the hallway. The gold arrows have switched direction!
We follow them back to the elevator doors, where glitter is rising up and the golden coin slot is waiting.
I stall.
“Now what?” Zoe asks.
“Now I’m afraid to go back! What’s going to happen? What will the tests be? Will I pass, or will I turn out like the Badger brothers? What if I’m NOT the right kid?”
Zoe puts her hand on her hip. “You ask too many questions.”
“Hey, Arcade?” Doug rubs his belly. “Can we get some food?”
“Sure, Doug.” I chuckle and grasp the token between my palms. “We need food.” Then I pull it off the chain and drop it into the golden coin slot.
Chapter 10
Shrimp Break
When we stepped out of the elevator, I expected to see Flames splashing and squawking in Doug’s bathroom. But this time was different.
We were standing in a fish market.
“Yes! Arcade, you did it! Cha-ching! Early dinner time.”
Zoe’s jaw hung open. Mine too. Usually the token takes us right back where we started.
“Please tell me we’re in New York City.” I backed out of the market and checked the sign. Empire Fish Market. I recognized the familiar New York City skyscrapers with scaffolding surrounding them. “Whew!” I walked down to the corner to check for street signs. “OH, NO!” Zoe and Doug caught up to me, and they both looked up. Waaaaay up.
“Hey, isn’t that the Empire State Building?” Doug laughed.
“Right back where we started!” Zoe stomped her foot and pounded her legs with her fists.
“And now neither one of us has a backpack,” I said.
“Or money,” Zoe added.
“Money? You need money?” Doug was still gawking at the Empire State Building. “I got money.”
“You do?” Zoe blew out a breath. “Good. How much?”
Doug reached into his shorts pockets and pulled out three crumpled, one-dollar bills. “I keep subway money in all my pants, just to be safe. How much do you need?”
Zoe frowned. “Three times that much if we all want to ride the subway home.”
“What about food?” Doug gulped and patted his stomach.
“Maybe you should use that three bucks for a hot dog,” I said.
“LIVINGSTON AND BAKER! HOW NICE TO SEE YOU!”
The booming voice was unmistakable. I had listened to it every school day for the last six weeks of sixth grade. Mr. Dooley. He walked toward us, carrying an Empire Fish Market bag.
“AND YOU ARE ZOE, CORRECT?” Mr. Dooley tipped his newsboy cap toward Zoe.
Zoe smiled. “Yes, we met the day of the career expo. How are you enjoying your summer, Mr. Dooley?”
“OH, SUMMERS ARE GLORIOUS! THIS ONE IS HOT, BUT AT LEAST I’M NOT HAVING TO PUT UP WITH THE SMELL OF SWEATY SIXTH GRADERS IN THE CLASSROOM.”
Seriously, I think his voice had gotten louder during the summer!
“AND WHAT BRINGS YOU YOUNG PEOPLE DOWN TO MIDTOWN THIS WARM AUGUST DAY? DID I JUST SEE YOU RUN OUT OF MY BROTHER’S FISH MARKET?”
“Your brother’s fish market?”
Mr. Dooley nodded. “Yes, Arcade. Patrick Dooley, owner of Empire Fish Market. Come with me. I’ll introduce you.”
* * *
“PATRICK, THIS IS ZOE, DOUG, AND ARCADE. DOUG AND ARCADE ARE MY STUDENTS.”
Mr. Dooley pulled a fifty-dollar bill out of his pocket and placed it on the counter. “HOOK THEM UP WITH SOME OF YOUR BEST FISH.”
Patrick, a sunny, smiling guy, yelled from behind the fish counter. “Anything for my favorite brother!”
“Wow, thanks Mr. Dooley,” I said.
“You are welcome, Arcade. Now you all better get in line. This place will be hopping soon. I have an appointment, so I have to run. BUT I’LL SEE YOU TWO BOYS AT SCHOOL IN ONE WEEK!”
And with that, Mr. Dooley opened the door to the fish market. The little bell jingled, and he was gone.
Chapter 11
Boyfriend on Broadway
“Did Mr. Dooley say he’d see us at school? Did he forget that we’re going to middle school
?” I picked up the pace to try to catch Zoe, who was speed walking north, away from the fish market.
Doug put a hand to his forehead and squeezed. “I don’t know, Arcade. Maybe we didn’t pass the sixth grade and they forgot to tell us.”
“Nah, I’m sure we passed.”
Zoe stopped and turned to yell back at us. “Pick it up, boys! At this rate, we won’t make it home for dinner!”
Doug and I did our best to catch up, but it wasn’t quite fair. After all, we were the ones carrying the heavy bags of shrimp.
“You think Mr. Dooley’s brother bought our story about why we needed so much shrimp?” Doug lifted the bag up and took a huge whiff.
“Why wouldn’t he believe us? We have a friend visiting from out of town who lives for shrimp and we want to surprise him. That’s the truth!”
“But who’s the friend?” Doug asked.
“Who’s the friend?”
“Yeah, who’s the friend?”
“Who’s splashing around in your bathroom right now?”
“Who’s splashing around in my bathroom right now?”
Zoe stopped and threw her hands up in the air. “BROADWAY! Why can’t we get off Broadway?”
Doug and I stopped, and I pointed to the street signs at the crossing. “It’s 54th and Broadway. We’re making progress! We’ve gone twenty blocks so far.”
Zoe gave me the crazy eyes. “We are NOT making progress! Your token is taking us in circles! We were lost on Broadway two hours ago, remember?”
“Zoe?”
A young man’s voice came from behind me and Doug. Zoe glanced over our shoulders. Her tense face softened immediately.
“Hi, Michael.” Zoe smoothed her hair and straightened her ruffled T-shirt.
Michael Tolley.
Michael Tolley is the older brother of bullies Kevin and Casey Tolley, and they happen to live on our street. And though she’s never admitted it, Zoe has a huge crush on him.
Michael held a small bouquet of yellow roses. “Hey, you guys.” He wiped a drip of sweat from the side of his face, and transferred the roses to the other hand, which he then whipped behind his back.
“Aww, you brought flowers? What a guy!” Leave it to Doug to create more awkwardness than there already was.
Arcade and the Fiery Metal Tester Page 5
