And then something did.
Suddenly I had a plan.
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
Penny waited in the grass at the top of the small hill. Everybody else was in place, standing in front of her. She was the queen chess piece, and we were the, uh, other chess pieces.
I crouched in the middle of the crowd to stay hidden.
A hole opened in the wall of lava, and Angel walked through.
She looked worse than before. Much of her armour was missing, revealing the glowing silhouette of her body underneath.
The students in front stepped aside, allowing her to walk onto our chessboard.
‘I know what you’re all thinking,’ Angel said to everyone. ‘But this isn’t actually my worst day ever.’
I started crawling towards her.
Angel’s suit dripped with energy, leaving a glowing path of white splatters and footprints.
‘I used to be one of you,’ she continued. ‘A student taught to hide my power. Brock was the same, and look at us now. He’s a lifeless statue, and I’m a monster without a body.
‘Fear is what did this to me! I was taught to fear myself, but I will not let that happen to you! With my help, we will become a beacon for humanity! We will keep them safe, but we need to keep ourselves safe first!’
Angel stopped when she got to Penny.
‘I’m sorry about this,’ Angel said. ‘If Donald had listened, everything would be different. Nobody would’ve gotten hurt.’
Penny blinked, staring past Angel.
‘Aren’t you going to try to stop me?’ asked Angel. ‘I thought you’d put up more of a fight.’
Penny remained silent.
Angel looked over her shoulder, suspiciously eyeing the rest of the unflinching students. ‘Why aren’t any of you trying to stop me?’
Angel slowly reached for Penny’s face, and then her fingers went right through it.
The hologram flickered.
Duncan’s holopods had come in handy.
I made a dash for it, jumping on Angel’s back while she was still confused. She spun, but I held tight, reaching for the key on her breastplate.
Angel grasped my neck and pulled me away.
‘Ben! You’re alive!’ she said, genuinely happy. ‘But where’s your precious headmaster?’
‘Gone,’ I gasped. ‘And he’s never coming back!’
‘Eh,’ she shrugged. ‘I doubt that.’
She squeezed tighter. I could barely breathe.
‘This was a clever plan, really,’ she said, ‘but time’s running short. I know you only want to protect your friend, but if you don’t tell me where Penny is, then she’ll die anyway, along with everyone here and in Lost Nation. It’s either one person – or thousands.’
I tried to talk, but my voice was strangled by her grip.
Angel looked at me curiously, then loosened up. ‘What did you say?’
As soon as my lungs filled with air, I shouted, ‘NOW!’
The real students of Kepler Academy stormed through the holographic wall that had kept them hidden.
Angel went down like a Jenga game as kids piled on top, her energy splashing all of us like tingly drops of water.
I finally had the key in my hands. All I had to do was twist and pull. The ‘twist’ part worked fine, but the ‘pull’ gave me trouble. It was stuck.
Angel tried pushing me off, but students surrounded her, holding her arms back, giving me space to work.
I planted my feet and pulled as hard as I could, but the key wouldn’t budge.
And then Millie put her hands around my waist.
A line formed behind her, each kid pulling the one in front of them.
The same happened on the other side of Angel, pulling her in the opposite direction.
It was a giant game of tug-of-war where the losers all die in an atomic blast.
Fun!
I felt the key give a little, and then it popped loose, sending everyone tumbling to the grass.
The lava wall fell. Noah’s head rolled back, and he passed out in the street. Arnold, too. Everyone’s powers came back.
We did it! We got the key out!
But when I looked at Angel, I realised it didn’t work. Her armour didn’t cinch up the way Kepler said it would.
I looked at the piece of metal in my hand.
It was still attached to her breastplate.
We didn’t just remove the key; we’d removed the entire lock.
Angel was going to blow, and there was nothing we could do about it.
CHAPTER FIFTY
‘Everyone to the portal!’ Duncan commanded.
Students ran for Joel’s open portal, leaving me alone with Angel in the grass.
Nearly all her armour was gone. She twitched like a broken toy with dying batteries. All that remained of her was a glow that boiled massive bubbles of energy. The only skin she had left burned away as her power overtook her.
My plan didn’t work.
It only made things worse.
This all happened because I wanted a superpower. And now thousands would die because I stole a stupid, small chunk of metal.
‘Don’t crowd!’ Duncan shouted. ‘Form a line and stay calm! Trust me, we’re all getting out of here alive tonight!’
I dropped the key and ran for the portal, but Penny passed me going the opposite direction, back towards Angel.
‘Penny, no!’ I said, pulling a 180.
By the time I made it back, Angel’s hand was around Penny’s neck. But it was Penny who was holding it there.
‘It’s not working!’ Penny said.
‘Stop!’ I said.
‘It’s the only way to save the city, but it’s not working! She’s not doing anything!’
‘I can’t control it anymore …’ Angel said. ‘I can’t stop it …’
Energy bubbled wildly around us, growing more unstable and noisy, making it hard to hear anything.
‘We need to get outta here!’ I shouted.
‘Please …’ Angel said. ‘Don’t leave me …’
Penny set Angel’s hand down.
And then she placed her hand on Angel’s head.
Penny was staying.
‘What’re you doing?’ I said.
‘I can’t just leave her! I have to try something!’
‘We don’t have time to try something! Don’t make me pull you out of here!’
She wanted Angel to take over her body.
She wanted to save the city even if it meant she’d be gone.
This was her choice.
Her battle.
I sat next to my friend and took her other hand.
She looked at me, slightly confused.
‘Side by side,’ I said, repeating her words from the beginning of the year. ‘I got your back.’
She smiled through tears. ‘You’re such a dork.’
She tried again, concentrating on using her power in a way she hadn’t before, but it still wasn’t working.
Penny let go of my hand and wrapped her arms around me. I squeezed her back, trying to tell her I was sorry, but she couldn’t hear me through the whirlwind of terror swirling around us.
I had made a mistake. Miscalculated. Messed up.
And it was going to cost us our lives.
CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE
‘Angel!’ a boy shouted.
Penny and I watched his silhouette grow larger as he approached. He slowed when he saw us.
A smile appeared on Angel’s face. ‘Brock …?’
I perked up, excited that Brock was alive and talking and everything! He must’ve been set free by Arnold’s power absorption.
‘Hey, man!’ I said, like we were old pals.
He looked at me. ‘Who’re you?’
‘Uh, nobody,’ I said. ‘I’m nobody. Never mind.’
Penny and I gave Brock room to sit by his sister.
He squinted as if he were trying to recognise her, and then he smiled. ‘You got old without
me.’
‘You’ve been frozen for thirty-two years …’ Angel said.
Angel rested her head against Brock’s chest. Even though he was only twelve years old, he was still her big brother.
‘Your body … What happened?’ Brock said.
‘I lost control. All I wanted was to save you … If I knew how easy it was … but it’s too late. I never wanted to hurt anyone … I made a mistake.’
Brock chuckled. ‘Your mistakes always got us into so much trouble.’
‘You always found a way to fix things, though …’
Brock’s face twisted as his sister twitched in his arms.
‘… Fix this,’ Angel said.
‘But your body’s gone,’ he said. ‘I need you to pull yourself together, okay?’
Angel shook her head. ‘… I can’t.’
‘Hey,’ he said. ‘Remember when you were, like, six? You used to come into my room in the middle of the night after a bad dream? You’d lie in my arms, and we’d read Garfield comics until you fell asleep?’
Angel nodded.
Energy continued to boil and swirl.
‘Give me your cape,’ Brock said to me.
For the record, I didn’t mind giving him the cape – I just wasn’t thinking straight.
I untied the fabric from my neck and handed it to Brock. He wrapped it around his sister and held her close.
‘Remember that one where Garfield brings a hose into the house?’
‘… And then he drenches the recliner with water?’
Brock chuckled. ‘Right! But then he uses a blow-dryer to dry it off!’
‘… And the chair shrank down to his size!’ Angel said.
She let out a laugh, glowing brighter than before.
Her power was peaking.
‘… You know that was the last one we read together?’ Angel said. ‘You left for the academy the next day …’
‘I know,’ Brock said, his face twisting as he nodded. ‘It’s time to sleep, all right?’
Angel smiled softly.
The air around us became unbearably hot.
This was it.
This was the end.
I hugged Penny close and tried to find the North Star to say goodbye to my parents.
There was a flash of light, and then …
Nothing.
The sky was dark, and the air was quiet.
It took my eyes a second to adjust. When I could see again, Brock was holding his sister.
Both had turned to stone.
My cape wrapped around Angel like a blanket, but the figure wasn’t the Angel we knew. It was the Angel that Brock read Garfield with – the one who fell asleep in his arms.
It was Angel at six years old.
Penny and I looked back and forth between each other and the statue.
It took us a moment to accept that it was over.
The bomb didn’t go off.
And everyone was safe.
Penny flopped back onto the grass, exhausted. ‘All right, good game, Braver. You got some orange slices or something?’
I reached into my back pocket and pulled out the package of peanut butter cups that Coach gave me from Jennifer.
Penny took one.
I took the other.
She laid her head on my shoulder, and I rested against her. We sat in silence, eating our treat after a hard day’s work.
It was melted and all smooshed up, but it was the best peanut butter cup I’d ever had in my life.
CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO
The aftermath.
Everything changed after that night.
Donald Kepler was gone. I explained what happened to Headmaster Archer and Professor Duncan, and they understood right away. I think they even expected it. Maybe Kepler told them it was going to happen since he knew the future.
They announced that Donald Kepler had died in Angel’s attack – not that he was stuck outside of the universe.
A statue of him was even put up right behind Brock and Angel.
Brock took my place as ultimate hero of the academy, which I was totally cool with. He was, in fact, the one who saved everyone’s lives by turning back to stone. His sacrifice touched the lives of all of us.
Angel’s attack affected students differently. Half were more hard-core about honing their powers to defend themselves, while the other half just wanted to protect themselves from, well, themselves.
The attack messed up Penny the most. She said nothing was wrong, but it was obvious that she was afraid of becoming Angel. She even cut off all the strings on her ukulele.
Arnold and Noah were fine.
Sort of.
Arnold got his teeth fixed by the nurse with her healing power. But something was different about him. He was quieter. More of a loner. He hasn’t bothered me once since then.
And then there’s Noah.
No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t snuff out the fire on top of his head. Looks awesome – not so practical.
The worst part? He won’t be allowed to go home over the summer.
He was all, ‘No big deal,’ to everyone else, but I’m the only one who saw him cry because of it.
All in all, we were lucky.
Nobody was killed by the explosion in Lost Nation. Angel’s blast was strongest where she stood, so everything within half a block of her was crumbs while everything past that was just rattled like a small earthquake.
A few people were injured, but nothing a short hospital visit couldn’t fix.
The Lost Nation Police Department reported the explosion as accidental. No foul play suspected.
Coach Lindsay disappeared.
TBH, I hope he got away.
He was the kind of villain who wasn’t really a villain. He just made poor decisions because of his love for his sister.
The more I thought about it, the more I realised that heroes and villains aren’t as night and day as I thought.
Kepler’s decision to change history gave a sad ending to a lot of people, but he did it to save the world.
Abigail only wanted to help humanity with her power.
Even Angel just wanted her brother and her body back.
The only one acting selfish and stupid this year … was me.
Was I the bad guy in my sequel?
I took all my stat cards, scribbled out the weaknesses section, and then hand-delivered them to their owners along with a short ‘I’m sorry for being a wad’ speech.
It didn’t erase my mistake, but it was a start.
Millie forgave me, so that was cool.
She wasn’t a fan anymore.
She was a friend.
The biggest bummer was that I was done at the academy. Headmaster Archer told me I wouldn’t be attending eighth grade there. It was my consequence for stealing Project Blackwood and giving it to Angel. And also, like, the million other rules I broke while I was a student.
But the good news? My mind wasn’t going to be wiped. I’d remember everything. The school. My friends. My adventures.
Headmaster Archer said he hated the idea of wiping minds. He considered it a policy of the old leadership and felt it was time for change.
One thing was for sure.
Kepler Academy was never going to be the same.
CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE
My last day of school.
My last day at the academy.
My last day with my best friends.
Forever.
The graduation ceremony was scheduled after Donald Kepler’s memorial service, with both taking place in front of the school. A giant portrait of him watched students from the stage.
Several teachers shared memories they had of the old man, but none of them shed a single tear. Funerals are supposed to be sad and awkward. It was almost like people couldn’t wait for this one to end.
My friends and I sat in the last row.
‘Can’t believe they’re saying he’s dead,’ Penny said. ‘Not after what you told us.’
&nb
sp; ‘They thought it was better this way,’ I said.
‘Just more adults pretending something didn’t happen,’ Noah said, head crackling like a campfire.
‘What did it look like out there?’ Jordan asked. ‘Outside?’
‘Like I was standing on top of the universe,’ I said. ‘Because I think I was.’
‘I bet if we took the nurse out there, she could heal him,’ Noah said.
‘Maybe, but I think he’s the only one with the power to go out there. It’s not like there’s a lift with a button for the outside of the universe.’
Another teacher took the mic and started in with a boring story about the old headmaster, but she was interrupted by a loud crash on the stage.
Students stood on their chairs, making it impossible to see what was happening from the back row, but I could hear it over the speakers.
We ran down the aisle to get a better look.
A kid was writhing around on stage, frantically attacking his own head, looking exactly like I did when I was Outside – when that thing suction-cupped my head.
And then he stopped.
I got a good look at the boy’s face.
Actually, I got a good look at his mask.
It was Elvis Presley.
The boy tore off the mask and tousled his black hair. A Polaroid camera hung from his neck.
When he saw Headmaster Kepler’s giant portrait, he blew a raspberry and pouted. ‘I’m at my funeral?’ he said, his face turning from disappointment to glee. He raised a fist. ‘That means I wiiiin! Hide-and-seek champion of the universe!’
Headmaster Archer approached slowly. ‘Young man, are you … lost?’
‘Nope,’ the boy said.
‘Do you know where you are?’
The boy didn’t answer. Instead, he jumped from the stage and strolled back to the school like he owned the place.
‘That statue’s boss!’ he shouted over his shoulder as he passed Brock and Angel. ‘The one of the old skuzz is a little on the nose, though.’
Students mumbled, trying to figure out what was happening, but my friends and I already knew.
Ben Braver and the Incredible Exploding Kid Page 14
