CHAPTER TEN
No Turning Back
Xavier braced himself, arms across his face, lips pursed, eyes closed, expecting to be deluged by flying sand as soon as he passed through the gate. It took him a moment to realize that nothing had happened. He opened his eyes and peeked through the opening in his crossed arms. When he finally put them down, he marveled at the fact that the ferocious wind did not touch him at all. The storm raged all around him, but he couldn’t feel it.
Xavier was in the storm but he wasn’t in the storm. Levi, he thought. He wished he could go back and tell him—tell him that this way had been the right way after all. But when he looked back, he saw that the gate was gone. He noticed that his breastplate was pulsing faintly, and the pulsing got faster depending on which way he faced. He turned in a circle until the pulsing became a steady beam of light, aimed at the ground just in front of his feet. He took a step that way. And another. The light continued to shine just a little bit ahead of him, pointing the way. He looked ahead—all he saw was wild, whirling sand. But as he took each step, making sure the light from his breastplate was steady and didn’t blink or flash, he was able to stay in the calm air.
How is Levi doing? Xavier thought as he navigated through the storm. He wondered if he should have been more forceful about preventing Levi from taking the other route. But maybe Levi was okay, sitting up there at that fancy castle waiting for them, eating ice cream, like he said. Xavier supposed he would find out when he got there, if he got there. There didn’t seem to be an end to this sand storm. He couldn’t even glimpse the beautiful castle that had appeared through the wide gate.
Had he made the right choice?
All he knew for sure was this: there was no turning back now.
He kept going, watching for the pulsing of the breastplate to correct his course now and then. After a while it got sort of boring. He could see the sun at times through breaks in the sandstorm, a fuzzy white circle in the sky. He wondered if it was the same sun they had back in their world. But this sun didn’t move at all, so it was impossible to know how much time had passed—or if time was even passing at all.
He thought of his parents—had they woken up yet? Did they know he and his brother were gone? He wondered how Evan was doing, in that gloomy town with the bossy girl with the big eyes—had they gotten to the castle yet? Were they eating ice cream too, waiting for him to show up?
Xavier couldn’t remember the last time he had been really alone like this. It wasn’t a great feeling. He wished they hadn’t had to split up in the first place. Why did they have to go through all this crazy stuff to get to that castle? What were they supposed to do when they got there? Was there going to be a battle then?
Xavier hoped Ruwach would suddenly appear to provide some answers. Then he remembered the last thing the little guide had said before he disappeared:
You already have everything you need.
Xavier had to trust that that was true.
He took his next step into the light, and his foot sank in soft sand up to his ankle. He tugged it out and then took another step, but that foot began to sink slowly as well. It suddenly got much harder to pull up his feet to take more steps—each time his boots sank deeper and deeper, until he almost couldn’t move at all. His heart raced, and his breath caught in his throat as he realized what he was walking in.
Quicksand.
* * *
Evan and Brianna walked silently along the dark street, which seemed to go on forever. Tall gloomy buildings rose up on both sides, their windows shuttered. They leaned inward, creaking eerily, as if about to pounce on whoever walked by. There was no moon in the sky, no stars either. The duo couldn’t see what lay ahead of them. The only illumination came from the street lamps, which winked on one by one as Evan and Brianna approached. Their breastplates glowed faintly, the steady beams of light shining in little pools in front of their feet.
“Do you think anyone lives here?” Brianna asked, gazing up at the run-down buildings. “Zombies maybe?”
“There’s no such thing as zombies,” said Evan.
“I read a book about zombies,” said Brianna. “They hide in abandoned old buildings like this, and then they jump out at you while you’re walking by, minding your own business—”
“There’s no such thing as zombies! You read too much.”
“How would you know? You probably don’t read at all, do you?”
“I do so!” Evan said, reddening. “Man, how did I end up in this awful place with a know-it-all girl? That Roach guy must hate me.”
“Ruwach!” Brianna said with a huff. “You can’t even pronounce his name!”
“Well, it’s a weird name,” Evan said sullenly. “I don’t get this. We’re supposed to be in a battle. This isn’t a battle! I mean, what’s the point?”
“What if there are zombies—”
“There aren’t any zombies already! And if there were, what would we fight them with? We don’t even have any weapons!”
“Ruwach said we have everything we need,” said Brianna, sounding as though she were trying to convince herself more than Evan. “If something jumps out at us—we’ll know what to do. Right?”
“Like what?”
“Like—I don’t know yet. Trust the armor. That’s what Ruwach said. And your brother—he said it too.”
“So you’re taking advice from Xavier now?”
“He seems smart,” said Brianna with a small shrug.
“So you’re saying I’m not smart?”
“No, I didn’t say that! He’s just older and he—probably knows more.”
Evan shook his head, disgusted. “You’re just like everyone else. You think that Xavier is so great. Well, believe me, if you had to live with him, you probably wouldn’t think that.”
Brianna sighed but didn’t answer. They walked in silence awhile.
“Do you think Levi is okay?” Brianna’s voice was softer, edged in worry.
“He’s probably doing better than we are right now,” Evan muttered.
“I don’t know. Levi’s instruction was pretty clear about the wide gate and all. I’m not sure it was such a good idea—”
“Well, we followed the instructions, and we aren’t doing so well, are we? I mean, look at this place!”
“Yeah, it’s pretty creepy,” Brianna said. “At least it’s not raining anymore.”
“Wouldn’t want to mess up your hair,” Evan muttered under his breath.
“What did you say?”
“I said, ‘It sure isn’t a day at the fair,’” Evan said aloud. “Are you sure we’re supposed to be going this way?”
“This is the way the armor is telling us to go,” Brianna replied. They had already figured out that their breastplates stopped blinking and remained steady when they were headed in the right direction.
“Do you see it yet?” Evan asked. “That castle? We’ve got to be getting close.”
“I can’t see it,” Brianna said. “I can hardly see anything. My feet hurt! I need to sit down for a minute.”
“Sit where?”
“There!” Brianna said, pointing to a street lamp that had just blinked on. “A bench!”
“I don’t think we should stop,” Evan said, looking suspiciously at the bench, as if it might be a trap.
“Just for a minute! I’m tired! The Book didn’t say anything about not taking breaks, did it?”
“No—but it didn’t say we could, either.”
“See?” Brianna flounced onto the bench. “Finally. Look, nothing happened. I’m fine.”
Evan hesitated, still unsure about the safety of the bench. But after a moment he sat down too.
“I miss my mom,” he said. “And my dad. You?”
“I don’t live with my mom and dad,” Brianna said.
“You don’t? How come?
Are they dead?”
“No, they aren’t dead. They just can’t take care of me. Me and my sisters live with my nana and Grandpa Tony.”
“Oh. Grandparents are cool,” Evan said. “My grandpa made me a sweet shield and sword once. I mean, when I was a kid,” he added. “He makes stuff like that. He built a tree house for my mom when she was little. When we go to their house we can still play in it.” He said it as if hoping Brianna would be impressed.
She wasn’t.
“Stellar,” she said with a hint of sarcasm.
“We moved to the country so we could be closer to them,” Evan added.
“Did you want to move?”
“Not really. I miss my friends. But it’s nice having a house and a yard. And I have my own room now too.”
Brianna sighed. “I wish I had my own room. I have to share with my sisters. They hardly give me any space since I’m the youngest.”
“Yeah, I know what that’s like. Being the youngest. No fun.”
“You got that right.”
They were silent a moment. Then Evan spoke again.
“I wonder what they’re doing.”
“Who?”
“My parents. Your sisters. Our—people. Do you think they’re looking for us?”
Brianna shrugged. “My sisters probably aren’t. They hardly know I’m alive. But Nana and Grandpa Tony . . .” She paused. “Maybe they don’t know we’re gone yet. I mean, how long have we been here?”
“I don’t know. I can’t tell.”
“Me neither.”
Evan looked up at the sky, suddenly nervous. They had to get to that castle, wherever it was. Soon. “We should go,” he said. He stood up.
“Ahhh!” Brianna cried, startling him. He whipped around and saw that the bench had tilted like a teeter-
totter, and Brianna’s end was literally sinking into the pavement, like a ship going down in the sea.
“Take my hand!” Evan yelled. Brianna reached for Evan’s hand, and he pulled her with all his might, making a growling sound with the effort. He thought he might pull her arm right out of the socket, but Brianna managed to push off and get free of the sinking bench. Together they watched it go down and disappear with a loud gurgle.
“What’s happening?” Brianna gasped.
“I don’t know. But I think we need to get out of here!”
They stumbled away as the hole in the ground widened, swallowing cobblestones and street lamps. It rumbled and groaned like a monster devouring a whole village. A building nearby began to shift, leaning in farther as the ground under it was eaten away.
“Run!” Evan said.
The two kids raced up the street, but the sinkhole followed them, widening so that whole buildings behind them began to crumble and crash into it. It was insatiable, gobbling up everything in its path. Evan and Brianna could barely keep ahead of it.
Suddenly their breastplates began to blink furiously. The kids stopped, turning in all directions until the blinking light became a steady beam—aimed straight at a tall building on the side of the street.
“It wants us to go that way!” Brianna shouted.
They ran to the building, but there was no door or even a window to climb through. Just a solid wall.
“Now what do we do?” Brianna asked, her voice as shaky as the ground under their feet. She covered her ears to block out the horrible, gurgling noises of buildings and roadways being sucked into the pit.
Evan leaned back to look up, searching for something to climb on or a window higher up. He noticed that the beam from his breastplate pointed up as well—straight up the wall.
Up the wall?
“We have to go up the wall,” he said to Brianna.
“Up the wall? Are you crazy?” Brianna gasped.
“Why not? Spider-Man can do it!”
“You are not Spider-Man!”
Evan lifted his foot, and as he did he felt his boot vibrate, sending out long tendrils that stuck to the wall like—like Spider-Man, he thought. Cool. He took a big breath and lifted the other foot off the ground, placing it on the wall, so that his body was now parallel with the ground. He thought he might fall upside down and crack his head on the sidewalk—but he didn’t. He was standing on the wall, looking straight ahead at the starless sky, his mouth dropping open in wonder.
Brianna’s eyes were even wider than usual. “How did you do that?”
“The boots! Try them!” Evan shouted. The ground under Brianna’s feet began to tremble violently. “Come on! Step on the wall! Or you’ll fall in!”
She looked at him and nodded, breathing deeply. This is like jumping in the puddle of water, she thought. What have I got to lose? The breastplate lit up the wall in front of her as if to confirm that she was making the right decision. She jumped with both feet onto the wall, just as the ground under her fell away.
Her boots sprang to life, several tendrils shooting out and cementing her securely. She let out a half-laugh, half-gasp. Her boots gripped the wall like spider legs. She felt weightless, her own body defying gravity. Maybe this is how astronauts feel, she thought. She took a step—her boots released easily and then gripped the wall once more when she put her foot down. Evan began to run up the wall—he actually looked like an astronaut, his feet lifting and falling almost in slow motion. Brianna began to run after him, enjoying the sensation of the boots gripping and releasing.
“Stellar!” Brianna said under her breath. “Wait till I tell my sisters—”
“Uh oh . . .”
The building they were walking on started to shake and wobble.
“It’s gonna go down!” shouted Evan. “Hurry!”
They raced up the wall as fast as their boots would carry them, rounding the corner to the roof, just as the whole building began to collapse under them with a terrifying roar.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
A Helping Hand
Levi was buried up to his waist in the thick soupy ground that was slowly hardening like concrete. His sinking had slowed, but he was now so far in that he had no hope of escape.
“Help!” he yelled as loud as he could. But his voice just bounced back to him, as if it had hit a wall. That didn’t seem possible, unless there actually were walls around him, walls he couldn’t even see. “Help me!” He shouted over and over, hoping against hope that someone—Ruwach perhaps—would come to rescue him. His screams ricocheted back to him, unanswered.
Wide is the gate that leads to destruction . . .
He’d taken the wrong path. He knew that now. But surely Ruwach wouldn’t just leave him here. Surely he would come and save him . . .
“Ruwach! Over here! Help me!” He paused, but there was still no answer but his own echoing voice. “I’m sorry, okay? I made a mistake! Please help!”
Levi heard nothing but the fluttering wings of the butterflies. More and more of them were landing on the flowers, lining the road on either side of him, watching calmly as he tried to get free. Butterflies—they didn’t look much like butterflies anymore, with their dark, angular wings that looked like they’d been cut from pieces of metal . . .
Maribuntas.
His heartbeat quickened. Brianna’s story about the horrible black bugs with the huge stingers came back to him suddenly. Maybe these things really were Maribuntas—maybe they really existed.
“Someone help me!” Levi called out with fresh determination.
“Hello?”
Levi looked around, certain he had heard a voice. It had been very faint . . . perhaps he was imagining it. But then he saw something coming through the trees, someone, walking toward him. A kid.
“Xavier? Evan? Is that you?” he called out. He couldn’t see the boy well at first, but there was something familiar about the way he moved, the way he was dressed. As he got closer, Levi could make out a Tony Hawk design o
n his T-shirt. It was the same as his own shirt—the one he’d been wearing at the Rec before grabbing the Crest and being sucked into this world. Maybe there was another kid from the Rec here, someone who’d come through after him—and he was here in this plastic dome with him. Or maybe Ruwach had sent someone here—to rescue him!
Hope welled up in Levi’s heart as the kid came toward him, strolling along as if he had all the time in the world. The kid was carrying a skateboard. Awesome! They could take turns riding it, maybe find a way out of this place.
But as the other kid came into focus, Levi began to get confused. He blinked several times—the image he was seeing couldn’t be right. He balled up his fists and rubbed his eyes, then looked again. Something was wrong with his vision, certainly. It must be a dream, or maybe he was just seeing things after being stuck here in this crazy world for so long. Because what he was seeing was simply impossible.
This kid looked exactly like Levi himself.
Levi stared, unbelieving, at this other Levi. His face, his clothes, his cool Vans, everything about him was the same. Even the birthmark on the left side of his neck—his birthmark! He opened his mouth to speak, but nothing came out. It couldn’t. It wouldn’t. He was looking at a mirror image of . . . himself.
Other Levi stopped and was looking at him curiously. “Hey, man, you in a jam?”
It even sounded like him! Levi’s mouth opened and closed like a fish. Other Levi walked over to him and set the skateboard down.
“Can you talk?” asked Other Levi, a half-smile curving his face. Levi’s smile, chipped tooth and all.
“Yeah,” Levi said finally, swallowing. His mouth was very dry. The shock of seeing himself—or a clone of himself—had made him momentarily forget that he was still stuck in the ground. “But who are—how did you—?”
Other Levi crouched down, examining the situation. “Whoa. You need to get out of there, man. Can I give you a hand?” Other Levi stretched out his hand. “Here, grab on. I’ll pull you out.”
Levi stared at the outstretched arm—his arm—with the same scar on his forearm he had gotten in a skateboard accident when he was seven. But it couldn’t be him, could it? He was convinced that he was hallucinating.
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