Ninja Girl: The Nine Wiles

by Steven W. White

"Yes, sir."

  "Now, get out of here, or you'll be late for class."

  A few seconds later, Spencer heard the angry slam of the principal's office door and felt its vibration through the walls. After that, silence.

  #

  After school, Ash met Mule for tutoring at the school library. They dropped their book bags at a table, and Mule opened his math book and homework folder.

  The cameras watched their every move.

  Ash's body felt like a train wreck. The morning's ibuprofen had worn off, and every muscle sang its own song of pain. She couldn't forget the band-aid on the skin between her right thumb and index finger, on the cut that, ironically, hurt less than the rest of her. Her fingers curled around it, picking absently at the band-aid's corner.

  "Hold on, Mule," Ash said. "I want to look something up first."

  "Oh, right. Standing long jump."

  "Not this time."

  "Hundred yard dash?"

  Ash hesitated. She didn't want to talk out in the open like this. "Come on." They climbed the steps to the split-level, where a bank of old desktop computers sat in a long row against the windows. Of eight computers, five were unoccupied. There was a single camera at the far side of the floor. Ash hoped that she and Mule would look really small.

  "I want to look up..." She tried to remember how Elsbeth had pronounced it. "The Mutus Liber," she whispered. She sat at a terminal as far as possible from the other students and wiggled the mouse to wake the computer up.

  "You always surprise me," Mule said. "I didn't think you went for German techno."

  She slapped his shoulder, and pain shot up her arm. "It's not a band, you weirdo. Ow. You're just being funny."

  Mule shrugged. "I'm just being funny. But what is it?"

  "It's a book," Ash whispered. "The Silent Book. I thought it was top secret, but..." She typed Mutus Liber in the search engine's field.

  About 127,000 results (0.22 seconds).

  Obviously not top secret. What in the world was Elsbeth doing, guarding a hidden page from a book that everybody knew about?

  A Wikipedia entry was the second hit down. Ash clicked on it.

  "Wow." Ash scanned the rest of the article. There wasn't much here. "It's really real. And it really is a formula, like Elsbeth said."

  Mule hunched in his chair, squinting thoughtfully at the screen, his chin propped on his massive fist. "This is an Elsbeth thing?"

  "Yeah. But what the heck is the Philosopher's Stone?"

  "Well," Mule said. "They were very big in 1677. Every philosopher had to have one."

  Ash shook her head. "You just make stuff up."

  "Sometimes."

  "Whatever the Philosopher's Stone is, it's bad news. Like, end-of-the-world bad."

  Mule looked impressed. "That bad?"

  "I shouldn't even be showing you this." Why hadn't she looked this up when she was alone? She had promised herself to keep Mule out of all this.

  "What?" he asked. "It's just the Internet. You've got to let me meet your aunt. She sounds completely awesome."

  "Awesome?"

  "She's definitely into cool old stuff."

  "Ugh."

  "Well?"

  "Well, what?"

  "Philosopher's Stone. You going to click the link?"

  She might as well. She couldn't protect Mule from common knowledge. And she hated the thought of hiding things from him, because then... he couldn't be on her side. And all this was too much for her to handle alone. She clicked.

  The article ran on and on, and didn't make much sense. Lots more Latin, and plenty of other languages, too. Magnum Opus, and al-iksir, and Cintamani. Ash could tell that the Philosopher's Stone was something that obsessed weirdos had tried to create for centuries and centuries. It was supposed to be beautiful, and heavenly, and wonderful. But what did it do?

  Three English words appeared repeatedly, and locked in Ash's mind.

  Lead into gold.

  Was that what scared Elsbeth so much? Why? If people could use the Philosopher's Stone to turn lead into gold, well... wouldn't everybody be rich? What was so bad about that?

  And if the formula was so secret, why was it right here on the internet?

  She clicked back the the Mutus Liber article.

  A series of mystical illustrations.

  She clicked back once more, to the page of search results, and clicked the first hit.

  It was a homemade-looking website about alchemy, and pictures of the fifteen pages of the Mutus Liber were right there, for the whole world to look at. She clicked on them, and they expanded.

  "Holy crap," said Mule.

  13

  Ash and Mule stared at the screen, trying to make sense of the pages.

  They saw two angels holding a tremendous drop of water with a man inside. Women in dresses, working at a table with pots and flasks, boiling, pouring, stirring. Black stones in a field, arranged in a triangular pattern, with cows and sheep standing around them and rays of blue sunlight streaming down. A woman giving a man a bath, pouring water on his head, beside another man sitting in a campfire, his body covered with flames.

  Mule rubbed the scar on his chin. "And I thought our chemistry book was confusing."

  "A book without words," Ash said. "But I think the formula is here, it's just... symbols. All this stuff must mean something. But nobody knows what." She closed the browser. "I've got to talk to Elsbeth."

  "Hey." Mule cleared his throat. "Speaking of confusing. Are we doing the tutoring thing today?"

  "Ah." Ash smiled sheepishly. "Sure."

  "Good. Because after yesterday, I was... you know. Wondering."

  Ash looked into Mule's inscrutable brown eyes. What did he mean? Then it hit her. "Yesterday!" She had missed their tutoring session. "Oh Mule, I'm sorry. I was..."

  Jumping into Drake's speeding convertible.

  Ash searched for words. "I... spaced. I've had a lot on my mind lately."

  Mule nodded. "I know." He sighed, inspecting his fingernails, overly casual. "It's fine."

  "Aw!" Ash shivered with rage. He was right, the big jerk. "Okay, okay." But what could Ash tell him? Where could she start? "I..." belong to an ancient sisterhood of cat burglars on speed. "I was... with Drake."

  Oh, that wasn't the right thing to say at all. What was wrong with her brain?

  Mule's face turned stony and grim. "Huh," he said quietly. "I thought you said he was a turd."

  "You said he was a turd."

  "Was I wrong? Did he deal with his neurological issue?"

  "He... I don't know." Ash didn't think this conversation was a good idea, but at least they weren't talking about ninjas. But Drake? Ugh. "He called me a kid."

  "Who cares what he called you?"

  "You've never called me a kid."

  "That's because you're not."

  "Is it because I'm small? Is that what he's saying?"

  Mule narrowed his eyes at her. "You're sort of obsessed with this guy."

  "I'm not obsessed!"

  "He ditches you and calls you names. Why don't you cut him loose?"

  Ash blinked. "Because... there's nothing to cut." Was there?

  "Want me to do it for you?"

  "Mule... no! Stop."

  Mule didn't stop. His voice was calm, almost cold. "I'm really not liking how he's treating you. I'm just saying. If you want him gone, he's gone. He'll never talk to you again. Just say the word."

  She knew from his tone that he wasn't joking. What did Mule mean?

  Only one possibility. Mule was offering to hurt Drake. To lie in wait for him, maybe. To put him in the hospital, maybe. Mule could do it – Drake would be no match for him.

  The thought of Mule hurting anyone that way was so repugnant, she couldn't stand it. She didn't even know if she could be friends with him after that. It made her feel sick.

  "Don't you dare hurt him," she whispered.

  "You sure?"

  "I mean it. And don't talk like that. It's not a pretty side
of you."

  #

  After that, they sat at a table on the library's main floor and reviewed for Mule's Algebra test. It was a cold hour, just equations and practice problems. All business. Ash knew that something was no longer right between them, but she couldn't say what.

  After a tepid goodbye, she walked across campus on the way home. It was almost four o'clock, and everybody had left. The sky was overcast and daylight was starting to fade. Gil the janitor methodically pushed a broom between the lunch tables, whistling faintly.

  Her mind was still chewing on her screw-up with Mule. She wanted to kick herself for even bringing up Drake's name. She got the sense that Mule just didn't like that guy, and it ran deeper than Mule wanting to protect her. She shouldn't have blabbed about a guy she liked in front of another guy. Not classy.

  She stopped. Could Mule possibly have a thing for her?

  What a thought. It was flattering and weird and terribly inconvenient. He was her best friend – she didn't want to lose him. Ash knew one thing: she would never mention Drake around him again. If Mule was actually driven by some kind of jealousy thing... well, it just made her think of the Incredible Hulk.

  That would be bad.

  She turned onto the path behind Building C, where the math and history classrooms were. She felt an inner sigh of relief – there were no cameras here. One set of second-floor windows were propped open – that was Mrs. Wilson's math room, where Mule would be squirming on the morning after next, as he tried to survive the Algebra test.

  Poor Mule. He had been so nice to her – for years – and now she barely thought of him. She wanted to turn things around. How could she make it up to him?

  She stopped directly under the windows.

  Oh.

  Everybody knew Mrs. Wilson went home at two forty-five each day. Everybody knew that she was as anal retentive as she was humorless, and copies of the Algebra test were printed and ready to go. Probably in her desk drawer. And Ash knew that a second-story window wasn't the obstacle it used to be.

  But wait. Breaking and entering? Stealing a test? Cheating? That's not who she was...

  Then again, Ash wouldn't cheat, technically. She didn't have to take that test herself (her math teacher was Mr. Goodwin), and she wouldn't show the test to Mule. She would just look it over and put it back, and give Mule a highly targeted and specific tutoring session. Mule would never know, and couldn't be blamed.

  And there would be no breaking. Just entering. She'd leave no trace. It was perfect.

  No, it was crazy. She couldn't. Could she?

  She thought of the first Wile.

  She had just been presented with those open windows. Now, how would she react to them? How would someone else react? Choose...

  Someone else might ignore them, leaving her best friend to fend for himself.

  Someone else might be too scared of getting in trouble to break the rules for the greater good.

  Someone else might not be totally clear on the concept that she was a freaking ninja.

  Ash scanned the wall. No handholds.

  No problem.

  She tossed her backpack on top of the lockers around the corner and came back, and as she gazed up at the windows, she breathed.

  In for six. Hold for ten. Out for twelve.

  She stepped backward, stopping at the edge of the grass, where a concrete curb marked the edge of the path.

  In for six. Hold for ten. Out for twelve.

  She set a foot on the curb and pushed on it, flexing the muscles in her legs, ready to use the curb as a starting block.

  In for six. Hold for ten... and the world went silent. A hundred unnoticed sounds became conspicuous in their absence. No breeze, no distant traffic. The crows at the lunch tables stopped their calls.

  Ash's gaze settled on a jetliner overhead, paused in the sky, its engine quiet.

  She waited, taking in the serenity of it all. So peaceful. She knew she could wait as long as she liked – time didn't hold her now. But she had made her decision, and was impatient to get the job done.

  She bolted across the path, and the air tried to rip her skin off. She winced and pushed herself through it. At the wall, she jumped, and her toes touched the bricks, stepping. In three steps up the wall, she reached the windows, but her momentum kept lifting her. Her feet skidded on the bricks, and she grabbed the rim of the nearest window to keep herself from ending up on the roof.

  It worked! She eased herself over the rim, past the bar propping up the pane, and into the classroom.

  The lights were off, the room lit only by light coming in the windows. Dark shadows lurked under the desks and chairs, and the math posters on the walls were vague and somehow ominous. Ash sat on the floor under the window, breathing.

  The enormous clock on the wall slowly, slowly, began to tick.

  The teacher's desk was covered with papers. Ash scanned for the math test, but it was too dark to read anything. She glanced a bit to the side – Elsbeth's trick – checking papers with her peripheral vision. That worked.

  She found the test in the top front drawer, and slipped out a copy. She sat in the teacher's chair and let her eyes rove, reading the left column by looking at the right, and the right column by looking at the left. Sixteen nasty problems.

  From the hallway came the sound of Gil's whistling. It sounded like he was working his way up the hall, emptying the wastebaskets or whatever. Not much time. Ash tried to commit each problem to memory.

  She heard Gil leave the neighboring classroom, lock the door, and whistle his way closer to her. She tucked the test back into its stack and closed the desk drawer.

  At the window, she peered at the concrete path far below. She suddenly remembered that she was not invulnerable, and that gravity was not her friend – and a crucial thought occurred to her.

  She had neglected the problem of down.

  14

  All Ash could do was fling herself to the path fifteen feet below. She swallowed.

  Maybe there was a better way.

  She could hear Gil the janitor just outside the door. Maybe she could appeal to him. I got lost, Gil. I was looking for the bathroom. Right.

  Or couldn't she just turn invisible? That would solve everything. She'd have to ask Elsbeth about that. She'd have plenty of time at home for that conversation, being suspended for invading a classroom and all.

  Hide? Under the desk was no good – Gil would empty the wastebasket right next to it. Ash raced to the file cabinet against the wall. On a hunch, she pulled out the bottom drawer.

  Empty. Nobody ever used the bottom drawer. But now, she would.

  But come on, could a person fit in there?

  Maybe a pint-sized person could.

  She set one foot in the drawer, and the metal bottom shifted with a popping sound. The cabinet threatened to tip forward. Ash turned and crouched, set her hands on the room’s industrial gray-brown carpet, and brought in her other leg. She folded up like a pillbug, scooted backward, and tucked her head. She was curled up in a duck-and-cover position, and by reaching back with one hand, she could feel the cabinet’s metal frame above her. She pulled, and slowly worked the drawer closed.

  Gil's key rattled clumsily in the doorlock.

  Ash's drawer latched shut with a clicking sound right by her ear. It was perfectly dark in the drawer, but only for a moment. Gil turned on the room lights, and they leaked through the cracks. Ash could see cream-painted steel two inches from her nose. She smelled metal and paper and eraser rubber. Her knees pressed hard on her collarbone, her thighs squeezing her lungs. She could only manage shallow breaths, and she tried to keep those quiet.

  Gil whistled.

  How had she gotten into this?

  Her neck started to ache. So did her ankles and knees, where they pressed on the metal bottom of the drawer. She heard the desk wastebasket's contents dumped into Gil's trash-can-on-wheels.

  Come on, Gil. Keep it moving.

  It was getting harder to breat
he. This had been a very bad idea.

  The lights clicked off, leaving her in beautiful, exquisite darkness. She heard the classroom door close, and Gil's whistling faded down the hall.

  Ash groaned in relief and probed blindly at the metal tabs until she got the drawer unlatched. She pulled at the frame, working the drawer open inch by inch. Unfolding her body was harder than she thought. Each movement came with its own unique jab of pain. She was one big cramp, head to toe.

  But she could breathe, and she savored the sweet air as she oozed one limb at a time onto the floor, pushing so the cabinet wouldn't tip over and flatten her. She lay on the musty carpet, stretched out, playing dead. As she stared at the ceiling panels, she realized she had no recollection whatsoever of the math test.

  Ugh. Ash opened the desk drawer, slipped out a copy of the test, folded it and put it in her pocket. Mrs. Wilson probably made extra copies and wouldn't miss it. Hopefully.

  She was still stuck in the room. She could walk out the building's front door if necessary, but she'd be caught on camera. At the window, Ash contemplated the path below, and how much it would hurt. She leaned out a little and craned her neck, looking up.

  The roof wasn't that far above her. Now, there was an idea.

  She crawled out and stood on the sill, clinging to the window pane. She stretched, and the edge was almost in reach. Ash took a deep breath, and with a nerve-wracking hop, caught the edge and pulled herself up.

  The roof of Building C was a vast, dazzling white plain, dotted with vents and pipes, with great humming metal boxes here and there. She jogged in a loop along the edge looking for a tree or a drainage pipe that could be her ticket down.

  Two boys sat at the roof's far side, watching her, about a hundred feet away. They lounged, sprawled against the short barrier at the building's edge, wearing oversized cotton zip-up jackets and matching baseball caps. An oak tree rose above them, framing them in a sage background.

  Ash stopped. She'd been caught – what now? She walked toward them.

  "It's a girl," said one.

  "A girl," repeated the other. "Or... a mirage."

  "A girl, I think. But... I can't tell how far away she is."