by Nick James
“No.” I sigh. “It’s not that. It was just… interesting.”
She turns around, leading me out into the curved hallway along the perimeter of the ship toward the staircase. “Sure. Interesting until it smashes into you.”
The last remnants of daylight stream up through the windows, creating a soft glow around Avery’s face. I can’t help but stare. Luckily she doesn’t notice, too busy chomping on the apple.
“So tell me where we’re going,” I say. “I can’t get in trouble again.”
She swings her arm around my shoulder. “You won’t get in trouble. Promise.” She bites into the apple. “I’ve made an amazing discovery and tonight’s the night to test it out.”
“Why tonight?”
She pulls her head closer to whisper. “Alkine’s having one of his closed-door staff meetings.”
“So? They always do that before Visitation.”
“We’re gonna bash those doors down.”
I look around to see if anyone’s listening. “That sounds dangerous.”
“Nah,” she says. “Not with my discovery.”
“Let me guess. You invented an invisibility potion.”
“Nope.” She bounds down the stairs and pushes me into a hallway leading back toward the center of the ship. We make our way past dozens of closed doors and two befuddled-looking agents before stopping outside Room 514.
“Isn’t this just a maintenance room?” I try the doorknob. “And it’s locked, anyways.”
She tosses the apple core into a nearby trash chute and digs in her pocket, pulling out a small pointed key. “Bam!” She shoves it in my face.
“Shh!” I look around the empty hallway. “Someone will hear you.”
“Yeah, right.” She crouches toward the door, sliding the key into the hole and turning. “Now spot me, Fisher! I’m going in.”
I keep my eyes on both sides of the hallway, waiting for someone to show up and drag me away to Mr. Wilson’s office. Or worse, Alkine’s.
Thankfully, nobody does.
Avery conquers the lock and grabs the back of my shirt, yanking me into the room with her and slamming the door behind us.
One thing she forgot to do was turn on the freaking light. It’s pitch black now. Like, beyond black.
She giggles. “Oops, where’s the switch?”
Panicked, I grope around the room looking for a button. Any button. A couple of minutes in here and I’ll go insane. Tight spaces are bad enough. Tight spaces in the dark are hell.
In my quest for the lights I trip over something-a broom, maybe-and land on the floor with an agonizing thud. Avery stops laughing and crawls over me, flipping a switch next to the door. Fluorescent light flickers on above us, casting a spotlight on me doing my best impression of a puddle.
I pull myself to a sitting position and rub my shoulder. The closet’s tiny. Stacks of buckets sit next to boxes of mechanical junk and dried-out, still-dirty mops. A row of brightly colored bottles line the shelf along the far wall. A wide metal tube in the corner stretches from the floor to the ceiling.
Avery rests her hands on her hips. “You like?”
I’d like it better if we were in here to do something other than snoop around, but things are never that simple with Avery.
“So we’re in a maintenance room.” I stand up. “This is really blowing my mind.”
Ignoring me, she heads over to the far wall and lifts herself onto a wooden crate.
I walk over to her. “What are you doing?”
She struggles with a square grate on the ceiling, yanking at the corners until they pop out from the panel and reveal an open air vent. “Think of this as our own little portal.” She bends down and leans the grate against the wall.
I stare at the dark hole in the ceiling. “A portal to where? The trash chutes?”
“Of course not.” She rubs her dirty hands on the front of her jeans. “This is how we’re gonna spy on Alkine.”
“Oh, no.” I take a few steps back. “I’m not going up there, if that’s what you’re thinking.”
“Relax.” She crouches to a sitting position, the heels of her feet kicking the crate. “I’ll go up first. All you’ve gotta do is follow. It’s safe, I promise. And you’ll kill yourself if you don’t go.”
I cross my arms. “Now why would I do that?”
“Because this meeting, Jesse Fisher, is about you.” She pauses. “They’re going to talk about you in there.”
“No they’re not.”
“Yeah. They are. And you wanna know how I know that?” She points to the hole in the ceiling. “Because I was up there in that vent a week ago when Alkine announced it.”
“No way.” I picture the faculty sitting around some fancy table arguing over reasons to throw me off the ship. “Why would they be talking about me?” I think back to my weird conversation with Captain Alkine the other night and suddenly it’s not so hard to believe.
“Trust me, Jesse. Have I ever lied to you?”
“I guess not.”
“And do you really think I’d drag you up into some vent for nothing?”
I take a moment to consider it. “Yes.”
She laughs. “Okay, maybe I would, but you’re still coming up with me.”
My arms drop to my sides and I give a defeated shrug. She’s impossible to argue with.
She beams. “Good enough for me.”
Without wasting another moment, she stands and grabs onto the ceiling panel. Her shirt rises, revealing an inch of midriff. If her words weren’t enough to get me up into the vent, that’ll sure do it.
Then she lifts herself into the hole. She’s definitely done this before. I bet she’s a pro.
Once she’s all the way through and has a second to turn herself around, I crawl onto the crate and grab her outstretched hands. She helps me up until I’m halfway in. I scoot toward her and turn to look back at the closet. I’m gonna regret this. I just know it.
13
With each room we pass over, grids of light stream through the metal grates below us. It’s never completely dark. Of course, it doesn’t change the fact that I’m wedged inside an air vent. I’m glad I’m skinny.
Avery doesn’t seem to mind. She crawls through the narrow spaces with ease, contorting around corners with lightning speed. I follow dutifully behind, convinced that the entire system’s going to give way and drop us right into the middle of a classroom. Or fill with hot air, or poisonous gas, or some equally unpleasant substance.
Again, Avery doesn’t seem to share my concerns.
“Shh!” She waves her arm behind her. I do my best to tread lightly, careful to stay as silent as possible.
Then I hear it. Alkine’s voice in the distance, coming from somewhere below us.
Avery slows her crawl, sliding along the thin sheet of metal without a sound. I copy her. The farther we slide, the more clearly Alkine’s voice flows up into the vent. I can’t believe I’m doing this. Sneaking around empty rooms is one thing. Spying on people from air vents is mass different. It feels wrong.
Avery intersects the bars of light shining up through the nearest grate and cautiously spins around so that she’s on one side of the opening and I’m on the other. We lean our heads down, peering through the empty slots.
Captain Alkine stands at the head of an oval table. Before him sit the head teachers for Year Seven and up-all six of them. Mr. Wilson reclines in a chair closest to us. His bald spot glints with the reflection of the overhead lights. It could be blinding at the right angle.
Each teacher jots notes on a circular memo-pad in front of them, but I’m too far away to read the writing. From the amount of scribbles on each, the meeting must have already been going for a while.
“Our stats this month are looking very good,” Alkine booms, his voice echoing through the vent. “Three Pearls taken from the Surface and transported to the Tribunal-two Fringe trades and one from Richard Harris’s team down in Boston. That makes a total of twenty-one collec
ted from all eight agent facilities.” He smiles. “The Tribunal is satiated.”
“Well, thank heavens for that,” Mrs. Higgins, head of Year Seven, replies. The teachers laugh.
“Richard Harris is Skandar’s dad,” I whisper to Avery. “Poor guy’s been on the Surface for months now.” Surface work is the worst, and the most dangerous. I can’t imagine being stationed down there for longer than a day. Skandar never talks about it, but I know it’s hard for him, not knowing what’s happening.
“Then there’s Visitation Day,” Alkine continues. “I know you all heard my spiel at assembly today, but I just want to give you one last heads up. It’s your job to secure everything that needs to be secured by eleven o’clock tomorrow morning. It’s a pain, but I’d like us to all be aware of our surroundings. I know I don’t need to remind you about what nearly happened in the level five training room two terms ago.” He pauses, taking a seat. “Now, if there’s no further housekeeping to take care of, I’d like us to focus on the boy.”
Avery tilts her head and meets my eyes. Neither of us says a word. Alkine doesn’t even have to say my name. Somehow I just know he’s talking about me. Avery was right.
Alkine sighs. “It’s no secret that I’d hoped he’d be in a better position right now. The good news is, we’ve still got time. He’s only just entered the program and I believe that if we focus our attention and work as a team there’s hope for him yet.”
I lean my face closer to the grate, forgetting that any of the teachers could look up at the ceiling and see me.
“I spoke with Fisher when he came back from the Surface,” Alkine continues. “Incoherently, I’m sure. You all know that I’m no good with kids. Anyways, I let him know what my expectations were, that he should come to me with any concerns.”
Mr. Wilson shifts in his seat. “Sending him down to the Surface without an escort was a big mistake. What if the Unified Party had found him and not just some punk kid?”
Alkine holds up a finger. “If we hadn’t sent him down, he would have wondered why he was the only one in his year without Surface training. And he did have an escort.”
Wilson slouches forward, resting his head on his hand. “Rodriguez doesn’t count.”
I glance at Avery. “Eva?”
Alkine sighs. “Doug, you of all people should be able to appreciate Rodriguez’s considerable skills. Plus, she has a direct line to me. If anything had happened, I’d have been down there myself. Syracuse is a deserted town, miles from the nearest Chosen City. We know what we’re doing. We’ve managed to keep him off the Tribunal’s radar well enough, haven’t we?”
Wilson shakes his head. “Another mistake, if you ask me. Sometimes I think it would have been better to turn him in the day we found him, spare us all this trouble.”
I bristle at the tone of Wilson’s voice. My fingers wrap around the grate.
Mrs. Dembo, head of Year Ten, sets down her pen and scratches the back of her dark, shaved head. “What trouble? He’s a normal boy.”
Alkine crosses his arms. “I’m afraid that may no longer be true.” He presses a button underneath the table and the door buzzes. My shoulder jerks. Avery grabs it, silencing me.
I watch as someone new enters the room. At first I don’t recognize her from above, but as she takes a seat beside Alkine I spot the uncomfortable scowl on Eva’s face. Suddenly this nightmare meeting turns into full reality.
“Evening, Rodriguez,” Alkine glances in her direction. “Tell everyone what happened two days ago.”
Eva nods, shifting nervously in her seat. “Okay. Well, I didn’t exactly see it myself, but piecing together what Jesse said it seems that he… I don’t really know how to say this… but he survived a twelve-story freefall. On pavement.”
Mr. Wilson snorts. “That’s impossible.”
“I know,” she replies, her eyes fixed on the table. “That’s what I told him. I thought maybe he was kidding around. You know, being stupid. But I know he was up there on that rooftop, and the only way to get down to the street as fast as he did was to go through the hotel lobby. Harris was there the whole time and he swears Fisher never came down the stairs. The only other explanation is that he fell. Unless they’re both pulling one over on me.”
I frown, wishing I hadn’t told her anything. Hearing her recite all this brings the memory flooding back. I’d been trying to repress it.
Mr. Kennewick, head of Year Twelve, clasps his hands. “You’re saying he became invincible?”
She nods, meeting the faculty’s eyes for the first time. “ Became , yes-but not for long. When I found him, there was a gang of Fringers beating up on him pretty bad. It doesn’t make any sense. Survive a fall like that only to be brought down by three teenagers?”
Mrs. Dembo jots something down on her memo-pad. “And he confided in you? About the fall and everything?”
“Yeah,” she replies. “I just told him he was being stupid. You said not to respond if anything weird came up.”
Alkine nods. “You did just as I asked.”
Her brows furrow. “But what’s going on? Why am I looking after someone who’s apparently invincible? Why isn’t he protecting me?”
A chill runs down my spine at the word invincible. That’s a superhero word, not a Jesse Fisher word. And the fact that Eva’s telling Alkine anything is enough to make me wanna drop down and punch her in the face. But I can’t even move.
“He’s not invincible,” Alkine says. “It must have been some sort of anomaly.” He turns his attention back to the teachers. “Has anybody noticed anything different lately?”
I peer around from teacher head to teacher head, fuming inside. It’s all I can do to keep from shouting through the grate. What right do they have to be talking about me like this?
Mr. Wilson sighs. “He conked out during a round of Bunker Ball the other morning, but that’s hardly different.”
“He does seem more unfocused than usual,” Mrs. Dembo adds. “I kept catching him daydreaming this morning in class.”
Mrs. Higgins rests her hand on her chin. “Could it be some sort of residual effect from the chemicals?”
Alkine shakes his head. “No, no. We’ve tested his chemical levels each year since the day we found him. It was amazing he was alive at all, down in Seattle so soon after the bombings. It’s barely safe now, and it’s been decades.”
Avery’s face darts up again and she flashes me a concerned frown. “Seattle?” she whispers.
I meet her eyes for half a second, but my mind’s spinning so fast that words don’t register at normal speed. My hand slips against the grate, squeaking. For a second I’m sure they’re going to notice us, but nobody at the table seems to hear.
“Well,” Eva starts, “personally, I think it’s time you told him everything you know. The poor guy’s gonna develop a complex.”
Alkine clears his throat and takes a sip of water from a glass beside him. “I’m beginning to think the same thing. I wanted to keep him safe, to give him as normal a childhood as we were capable of up here, but he’s growing up. He needs to know the truth about his past before the Tribunal, or worse yet, the Unified Party, finds out.”
I frown. The Tribunal and the Unified Party? Neither should have a reason to care about me. I keep waiting for everyone to look up and yell “gotcha” like in one of those stupid prank shows on the e-feed. But somehow I don’t thing that’s gonna happen.
“Bring him the key,” Mrs. Dembo starts. “Tell him it belonged to his parents.”
The word echoes through the vent. Parents. The teachers never talk about my parents.
“We don’t know that for sure,” Alkine responds. “And I’m hesitant to broach the subject with him until we know more. I’ve sent team after team down to Seattle but there’s got to be something we’re missing. There’s a connection here, with the bombings, with Fisher… I just can’t work my head around it.”
Eva straightens up in her chair. “You think Jesse had something to do wit
h the Scarlet Bombings? He wasn’t even born yet.”
Alkine nods. “Yes, but we found him in Seattle on the tenth anniversary of its destruction. He didn’t know who or where he was, but he was completely immune to the chemicals around him.” He pauses. “There we were, faces strapped up with gas masks. Meanwhile, this three-year-old child is wandering around in the middle of the apocalypse-dazed, but otherwise healthy.”
My mind flashes back to the dream, the mist-covered city and the key hanging around my neck. The shadow behind me. Alkine’s shadow.
Avery grips my wrist. “Maybe we should go.”
I shake my head, keeping my face down. There’s no way I’m leaving until I hear everything they have to say.
Eva leans forward, drumming her fingers nervously on the edge of the table. “Do you think he remembers any of it?”
“Doesn’t seem to,” Alkine replies. “He was so young. We’ve never given him a reason to trigger the memories.”
Suddenly everything falls into place. I slot Alkine’s words into the jigsaw puzzle that was my childhood. Orphan. Birth certificate destroyed. “Routine” medical tests. I guess when you grow up like that, you end up not even questioning it. Skyship Academy’s always been my home. It’s all I remember.
Alkine clears his throat. “Maybe I’ll head down to Seattle myself before talking with him. There’s got to be something we overlooked. Children don’t appear out of thin air, especially in the middle of a war zone.”
Mr. Kennewick crosses his arms. “Meanwhile what are we supposed to do if the kid starts flying around the room or shooting laser beams from his eyes?”
“He’s not some sort of mutant,” Mrs. Higgins responds. “He’s our student. We’ll take care of him.”
“Take care of him by telling him the truth,” Mr. Sorensen adds. “He has a right to know. What are you so worried about, Jeremiah?”
Alkine sighs, shifting in his chair. “I’m worried that if we tell him, that if he finds out we’ve been covering this for all these years, he’ll end up doing something stupid and wind up in the hands of the government. They have to know he was down in Seattle that day. Madame herself was there, remember? What if she knows something we don’t? She’s a very charismatic woman. If Fisher’s angry with us it will only weaken his judgment. He could go running right into her arms.”
