Killer Spirit

by Jennifer Lynn Barnes

  It was the first time I’d ever seen Chloe issue a direct threat in Brooke’s direction, and for some reason, it made me smile. The two of them weren’t acting like part of some crazy hierarchy that I’d never really understood. They weren’t captain and cocaptain or commanding officer and second in command. They were friends who had a common ex, and Chloe wasn’t about to shut her mouth.

  “He’s over Brooke now,” Chloe said. “And he’s sure as hell over me. He’s all yours, and you’re actually stupid enough to think that he’s the one playing you.”

  “Chloe. Shut. Up.” Brooke was clearly on the verge of losing it.

  Chloe made good on her threat and turned the communicator off. Given the broader situation, that seemed a little bit shortsighted, but I was the one who’d banged Amelia’s rules into their heads over and over again: nothing could happen until three. We could watch, and we could wait, but we couldn’t make a move.

  “Is there anything else you want to know about Jack Peyton?” Chloe hissed.

  “Yes.” The simplicity and unexpectedness of my answer took the wind out of Chloe’s sails. “What do you know about his uncle?”

  “We’re not having this conversation,” Chloe said.

  “We should have had this conversation weeks ago,” I countered. “Now, the Squad’s cover is in danger, and my cover is pretty much on the critical list. I have no idea what’s going to happen next, and I want you to tell me the truth.”

  Chloe pressed her lips together, hard, but somehow, her expression looked more nervous than angry. “Jack’s uncle is one of the Big Guys,” she said finally. “So is Brooke’s mom.”

  She stopped speaking then, as if she’d told me something I hadn’t already known. “And Brooke doesn’t know about Jack’s uncle,” I said, hoping that would prod her into telling me something new.

  “I never told her,” Chloe said. “It happened our sophomore year, back when Jack and Brooke were going out. The two of us were in Brooke’s room, and I went downstairs to grab some cookies. There was a man there, and he and Brooke’s mom were talking. She called him Peyton. I knew it wasn’t Jack’s dad, and then I recognized his voice—how could I not?—but I didn’t really process what he was telling her.”

  “And what was that?” I asked.

  Chloe took a deep breath, like she couldn’t possibly have enough oxygen in her lungs to divulge this secret. “He said that history had a way of repeating itself, and that Brooke’s mom knew better than anyone how ugly these things could be. I had no idea what he was talking about.”

  That made two of us.

  “That was the night Brooke found out she had to break up with Jack.” Chloe shook her head, as if trying to shake off the fact that she’d mentioned any of this to me at all. “If you tell anyone I told you this, anyone, I will kill you, and I will make it look like an accident. Are we clear?”

  “Crystal,” I said, unsure whether to take Chloe’s threat literally or with a grain of high school drama salt. Since I didn’t plan on mentioning this to anyone ever, it didn’t really matter.

  Refusing to meet my eyes, Chloe leaned forward and flipped the communicator back on. “Sorry,” she said. “Technical malfunction.”

  “Connors-Wright still hasn’t made a move,” Zee said from the other side of the feed, “and there’s no sign of Amelia. I’m uploading my footage of the park so we can divide it up and decide the most likely angle of entries for our hostiles.”

  Chloe glanced at me, and I nodded. If they were talking entry angles, this afternoon really was going to happen, and since Chloe couldn’t exactly leave the audio feeds behind long enough to do a cameo upstairs, it was up to me to pass the message along.

  “I’m going back up now,” I said.

  Chloe huffed.

  I thought about thanking her for reading me the riot act about Jack and telling me a secret she’d kept from Brooke for years, but decided against it. This was Chloe, and she didn’t want to hear it from me.

  CHAPTER 33

  Code Word: Answers

  By the time I made my way back up to the cafeteria, my presence had definitely been missed. The other girls’ eyes registered my entrance the moment I walked into the room, and the decibel level of conversation in general went up a couple of notches when the rest of the school saw me.

  I was going to go out on a limb and guess that my…errrr…tumultuous relationship with Jack and my…creative display of “affection” that morning was the reason why. Luckily, people didn’t get a chance to stare at me for long. One guess as to why.

  “Four score and seven years ago, our forefathers brought forth on this nation the sacred tradition of homecoming.”

  First the homecoming pirates, and now this? Where was Noah coming up with this stuff?

  “That one girl might be named queen.” Noah paused for just a moment, and it occurred to me that he hadn’t prepared a speech and that perhaps he was having more difficulty with his Abraham Lincoln persona than he had foreseen. Unsure exactly what to say, he continued babbling on, his voice getting louder by the moment. “You! You there!” he yelled, pointing to a random guy who’d just gotten up to throw his trash away. The guy in question couldn’t decide whether or not everyone thought Noah’s outbursts were secretly funny, or whether they were just weird, but when Noah called on him again, he answered.

  “Uhhh…yeah?”

  “Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?”

  “Uhhhh…God?” the kid asked.

  “Answer the question!” Noah boomed, sounding for all the world like a courtroom lawyer.

  “I guess so,” the kid said finally.

  “Who are you voting for?” Noah asked.

  “Uhhhhhh…” The kid clearly wasn’t sure how to answer the question, but none of Noah’s freshman friends suffered from any such doubt.

  “To-by! To-by! To-by!”

  For the love of all things good and coffeelike, I thought. The chant was catching on.

  “For truth! For justice! For the American way! Vote Toby Klein!”

  “Actually,” I said, speaking up for the first time during one of Noah’s little performances. “Please don’t.” I tried to phrase this in terms that wouldn’t compromise whatever cover I still had left after the last couple of days, which meant I couldn’t tell the entire student body that I would prefer to eat my own tongue than wear a tiara at that stupid dance.

  “I’m just a sophomore,” I said. “And there are four seniors nominated, even though none of them are here today, because they’re…posing for Seventeen magazine….” The lie seemed like the kind of thing everyone would buy, and by the time the magazine actually came out, another rumor would have jumped to the forefront of the gossip mill. “Even though the seniors aren’t here right now,” I said, “I know that it would mean a lot to them if you voted for someone who’d been at and loved this school for four years. So don’t vote for me. Vote for one of them.”

  Done with my speech, I walked to our table and sat down, mentally daring any of the others to comment on anything I’d just said. The girls knew me well enough to keep quiet. Chip didn’t know anything or anyone well enough to do the same.

  “That was kind of cool,” he said. “You’re a really strange girl.”

  All things considered, it was probably the nicest thing Chip had ever said to me. For the first time since I’d met him, I didn’t feel even slightly compelled to castrate him with a butter knife.

  “Where’d you go?” Bubbles asked me.

  “I had to check on the banner paint,” I said. “I thought we left it in Brooke’s car, but we didn’t.”

  “Banner paint?” Jack asked. “Really.”

  “Yes,” I deadpanned. Then I turned to the other girls. “About the thing. The thingy-thing after school?” The other girls nodded.

  “Yeah huh?” Lucy asked.

  “It’s like thinging,” I said. I probably could have thought of a better word to tell th
em that our plan this afternoon was still on, but a better word might have actually made sense to someone other than the five of us, so I didn’t bother.

  “And FYI, Chip,” I added. “If you don’t stop trying to look down my shirt, I’m going to castrate you with a butter knife.”

  This time, Jack’s grin was sincere. The others just laughed off my threat, though Chip’s laughter definitely fell under the heading of nervous.

  Sometimes, in the midst of all of this, it felt good to be me.

  The rest of the period flew by in a blur, and I managed to make it through the rest of the day without causing a single scene, which was impressive given my track record. The closer seventh period got, the quieter and more withdrawn I got, and the less I thought about Jack and the more my mind played over every piece of data I’d encountered during my hacking spree the night before.

  If things had gone differently, I’d have been getting ready to go out into the world and fight the good fight. I’d have been the one taking Amelia Juarez down, the one making sure that Anthony Connors-Wright didn’t unleash the bots. If we hadn’t been taken off this case to begin with, I might have been tracking down the person who’d stolen the bots in the first place, the person who had tagged me.

  If I’d been part of our last line of defense against biotechnological warfare and the dangerous precedent that Ross’s invention could set, my adrenaline would already be pumping. I would have barely been able to sit still in my seat. As it was, I felt drained. Empty.

  Uneasy.

  What if I’d been wrong about Amelia? What if I was missing something? What if the other girls went and something happened to one of them? What if Amelia won?

  Under the influence of the what-if game, I didn’t even register the occasional barb that Mr. Corkin threw my way during history, and during computer science, I just stared at my screen. By the time seventh period came around, all I could think about was the fact that despite all of the what-ifs and everything that had happened in the last few days, the one feeling that I couldn’t shake was that I hated being left out.

  It was a strange thing for me to realize. I’d never been part of a group before, let alone a team. I’d always been a loner. I’d never liked sitting on the sidelines, but that wasn’t what was getting to me about this. It was the fact that all of the others were part of something, and I wasn’t.

  For the first time, I considered what it would really mean if we couldn’t figure out who had tagged me. If there was a person out there who knew my identity, and we didn’t catch them, I wouldn’t be able to go on any more missions. I wondered briefly if they’d replace me and thought about what it would be like to go back to being the old me. I wouldn’t have to worry about wearing the right clothes or saying the right things. I could see if Jack really liked me for me, or if part of the draw was who and what I appeared to be, even though he knew better than to believe a word of it. I wouldn’t have to feel guilty about using the only guy who’d ever kissed me.

  I would never have to go to a pep rally again.

  The twins would stop fussing over my makeup, and I could go back to using regular soap, and I wouldn’t have to take any more crap from Chloe or deal with the fact that Lucy was way, way too perky before noon. Zee would stop psychoanalyzing me, and Brooke’s totalitarian tendencies would be none of my concern. I’d never fully figure out what the deal was with Jack’s family.

  Tara wouldn’t be my partner.

  I wouldn’t have a partner.

  I wouldn’t have a team.

  Life would suck.

  In my head, the whole thing wasn’t laid out sequentially. The thoughts hit me all at once, and I couldn’t sort them apart enough to really analyze the fact that my entire stomach dropped at the idea of not being a part of something bigger than just me. The Squad had ruined me for being a loner. As much as I wanted to insist that I hadn’t, I had changed, and if all of a sudden I wasn’t a cheerleader anymore, there was a distinct chance that I would miss it. Not just the missions and the training and the overall purpose in life, but the other girls and the games and maybe even the actual cheering.

  On the tail end of this realization, it occurred to me that if they did replace me, I seriously hoped that they transferred somebody in. If they brought one of the JV cheerleaders up to varsity, I was not going to be a happy camper.

  I thought of Hayley’s words to me the day before. “If you’re still a part of the God Squad,” she’d sniffed. “I wouldn’t want to be.”

  It was official. If Hayley Hoffman got my spot on the Squad, I was going rogue. I had some secret-agent skills now, and I’d use them to do something drastic.

  That cheerful thought in my mind, I resigned myself to the fact that while the others were out determining whether or not I even had a future, I was stuck here painting banners. I thought about painting them down in the Quad, where I could at least keep tabs on how the mission was going, but thought of the way Chloe had reamed me that afternoon and decided against it.

  I might have been going down, but strangely enough, the last thing I wanted was to bring the rest of the girls with me.

  The practice gym was eerily quiet as I unrolled the banner paper and filled two tins with paint. Blue and gold, the colors of Bayport. Unsure what to do next, I stared at the blank paper. Zee had been pretty explicit about what not to write, but no one had actually versed me on the finer points of making banners. I vaguely remembered holding one up for the boys to run through at our last game, but the task of actually making it had fallen to one of the girls whose bubble letters were far superior to my own.

  Needless to say, girly script was not my forte.

  “Oh, well,” I muttered. “Here goes nothing.”

  I dipped my foam brush into the blue paint, and set about writing GO LIONS! on one banner and GO BIG GOLD! on the other. The whole process was strangely soothing, though I wouldn’t have admitted my lack of enmity for it under threat of death.

  “Toby?”

  I jumped at Mr. J’s voice. Something about thinking the phrase threat of death and then having someone call out my name when I’d thought I was alone put me a little on edge.

  “Oh, hey, Mr. J,” I said.

  “Why aren’t you at the Spirit Lunch?” he asked.

  “The whatsit?”

  “The Spirit Lunch, honoring the state’s most esteemed cheerleaders,” Mr. J said. “I believe that’s where Brooke said she and the seniors were going this afternoon, and the rest of the girls appear to have gone as well.”

  Personally, I thought my Seventeen magazine excuse had more oomph, but I wasn’t going to quibble with the vice-principal.

  “Someone had to stay and paint the banners,” I said simply.

  “Oh,” he replied. “Good girl.” Then he paused and turned back over his shoulder. “She’s in here, Joanne,” he called. “I’ll let you tell her the exciting news yourself.”

  Joanne. My mind took in the name and recognized the reference. Joanne McCall. The PTA president. The nauseatingly reminiscent mom.

  “Exciting news?” I asked.

  Mrs. McCall came into the room, her smile proving that as Botox-ed as her face was, she still had control over at least a few of her facial muscles. “The homecoming game is going to be televised,” she said. “Including your halftime routine and the coronation ceremony. Isn’t that wonderful news?”

  Wonderful wasn’t the word I would have chosen myself, even with my newfound insight into my feelings about my cheer identity. Cheerdentity. Whatever.

  “If you girls will excuse me,” Mr. J said, “I have a student in my office. Something about Abraham Lincoln and streaking.”

  Mr. J left, and I looked down at the banner, hoping the NRM would get the hint and leave, but she didn’t. Instead, she came further into the gym, blathering on about the “excitement” as she did.

  “It’s the Game of the Week, you know,” she said. “For the entire state. There’s a chance that the feed may even be picked up nationwide
. It’s such an exciting opportunity for you girls!”

  Blah, blah, blah…

  “It’s so unfortunate that you won’t be there to enjoy it.”

  The tone of her voice never changed, but my body reacted as if it had. Even before my mind processed her words, a chill ran up my spine, and I made my way to my feet.

  “What did you just say?” I asked her.

  She pursed her lips. “I said it’s unfortunate that you won’t be there,” she repeated. “These are such precious and wonderful times. It really is a shame that I have to do this. I didn’t want to, you know, but you girls make these things so difficult.”

  I stared at her, and comprehension dawned on me. “You?” asked. “Seriously?”

  Mrs. McCall came closer. “I know, I know,” she said. “Nobody ever suspects the soccer mom.”

  It was when she said the word mom that my brain connected the dots and I thought about Kiki McCall and the fact that more than anything, she wanted to make varsity. There was something else, too. Something from my dream the night before, or maybe something from my first day on the Squad. Or maybe both.

  “When you went to see Karen, I thought you’d figure it out,” Mrs. McCall continued.

  “Karen?”

  “Karen Madden. Oh, I suppose her last name is Camden now. It’s so hard to keep these things straight.”

  The PTA president was planning to take me out, and here she was talking about Brooke’s mom? And then I remembered the last piece of information about Kiki. She wasn’t a very good cheerleader, and she clearly wasn’t cut out for espionage, but the reason she’d been strongly considered for the Squad was that she, like Brooke, was a legacy.

  And that meant that once upon a time, her mother had been on a Squad.

  That morning, I’d tried to convince the others that a rogue agent had tagged me, that the very same rogue agent had planted the bomb in Kann’s car and stolen the biotechnological weapon right out from underneath us at Ross’s office.

  “You’re the rogue operative,” I said. “You’re the one who planted the chip on me.” I’d always thought that this woman had no respect for personal space, but really, she’d had ulterior motives. “You stole the nanobots and blew up the car.”