by Leito, Chad
Maybe something has changed. Maybe he’s different—or maybe her preferences have shifted.
He turned, feeling different emotions flood over him, and continued up to Viola’s dwelling. He opened the red door with a loud creak, and stepped inside. The fire was low and crackling over a layer of red embers. The air smelled like earth, and old tree roots were tangled in the black dirt ceiling. A hot teakettle sat on the stove, adding a lemony aroma to the room.
Jen sat at the long, wooden table, holding one of the rock grenades Mike Plode had made in her hands. Asa shut the door behind them and they were alone.
“Don’t play with that!” Asa said.
“Why is that?”
“It’ll blow up! It’s sensitive, if you disturb the flint inside, it could spark and kill you and probably everyone in the surrounding fifty dwellings!”
She stood quickly, leaving the grenade on the table, took his hands, and pressed against him. “What are you going to do about it?” She looked up through loose strands of blond hair at Asa. The fire was reflected in her blue eyes.
She’s flirting with me, Asa thought anxiously. He didn’t know how to flirt; he had never been able to talk to girls. His mouth felt like it was filled with glue, and he stood there awkwardly, not knowing how to respond.
He also didn’t know if he liked what was happening. Males in the Academy thought Jen was attractive; he had heard Mike Plode and Stan Nuby talk about her. Every time Asa and Jen entered the cafeteria, male and female eyes followed her. Not only was she fit and pretty, but she also had a cocky, feminine swagger about her that seemed magnetic. It was hard to take your eyes off her. Asa didn’t know how he felt about her, though. He loved her, as a friend. And she was attractive.
But she’s not Charlotte.
His mind flitted back to Charlotte, and he wondered if she was still okay, jogging through the forest alone.
“The dance is tomorrow,” she said. “Would you accompany me? I know the guy is supposed to ask the girl, but I got tired of waiting.”
“Tired of waiting?”
“Have you asked someone?”
“No. Am I supposed to?”
She shrugged. “Other people have.”
“Oh.”
“So?”
“Huh?”
“So will you take me?”
His mouth felt dry. “Yeah.”
She stood on her toes, kissed him, and then let go of his hands. “I would stay, but I need to go work with my Blood Canary. We have a week to move ours, and mine doesn’t seem to want to budge. But I’ll see you tonight, for practice at the Lab. I hear Bruce has been working hard on some intricate plays for the championship. It should be fun to see what he’s come up with.”
She opened the door, and Asa called—“See you,” and then she was gone.
Asa sat down. His heart was pounding, and for some reason, he felt dizzy. He stared at the fire, trying to calm himself.
“The dance,” he said out loud to himself, and then shook his head. Was I supposed to ask her? Has she been waiting for that? He was grateful that Jen was assertive enough to take the initiative and ask him. I hadn’t known I was supposed to go with anyone.
The dance was scheduled for the following night, after the Winggame Championship. It was a big topic of conversation amongst students in the cafeterias and in between classes. The Academy was providing each of the females with a dress and each of the males with a suit. Asa hadn’t worn a suit since his mother’s funeral.
Asa thought it would be fun to go with Jen. She was easy to talk to, outgoing, and he always had a good time when he was with her.
A knot began to twist in his stomach as he thought of the light-hearted way in which Charlotte had spoken to him. Asa felt rattled by her confidence. He had never enjoyed seeing her in emotional pain because of him, so why did our encounter today disturb me so much?
KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK
Asa looked over at the door and wondered who it could be. Jen? No, Jen wouldn’t knock; she would just enter. A new wave of anxiety rolled over him and he wondered if it could be Charlotte.
Asa stood and straightened his hair.
KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK
Or what if it is Derden, coming to interrogate me more on Teddy’s disappearance? Or another Multiplier?
Or what if it is Charlotte, and she was bitten by Joney, Michael, or Edna in the woods? An image of her with an infected black hole where her ear had been came to his mind.
KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK
Asa knew that his fears were unlikely.
He took a deep breath, and opened the door. Stan Nuby stood before him—his face was a sick shade of yellow. His eyes were puffy, like he had been crying; he glanced around the room and then spoke in his Southern accent. “I need to talk to you. Anyone else here?”
“No.”
Stan shoved himself inside, and Asa shut the door.
“Is everything okay, Stan?”
Stan was pacing around the room, tugging at his blond hair with his small, veiny hands. “Piggy, I done somethin’ bad. Real bad. And, I don’t know if you’ll ever forgive me. I feel sick. I done somethin’ bad, Piggy.”
“Have a seat,” Asa suggested, but Stan ignored him. He paced around the room, clearly restless. He kept on looking over at the door, as though expecting someone dangerous to come in.
His left wrist was still in a cast, and the two black eyes he had gotten last week had gone from purple to greenish yellow. “I done somethin’ real bad, Piggy.” His eyebrows were pulled together and he looked like he was about to cry. “Like, go to hell for it kind of bad.”
“What did you do?” Asa asked.
“It’s somethin’ that a student should never do to another student. We’re supposed to be brothers, of a sort. We’re teammates. Ohhhh. Ohhh!” He was groaning, tugging at his hair, and a slow trickle of tears ran down his cheeks. “It makes me feel terrible. Listen, when I tell you what I’m about to tell you, you’re going to want to kill me. I know it. I would want to kill me to, if I were in your shoes. But, it won’t do us any good for you to come over this table, tryin’ to fight me, you hear? Because this is my last stop on my way out, Asa. I’m leavin’ the Academy. Janice and I are. She’s waitin’ in the woods for me. So, just know, before I tell you this, that I’m sorry and that this is the last time you’ll see me.”
“You’re leaving the Academy?” Asa asked. Fear came to the back of his throat like acid, and he again thought about Carmen telling him to leave the mountains.
Stan shrugged. “I know that I probably won’t make it too far before they hunt me down. But if I stay here, they’re going to kill me anyways. You know that I needed to ace all my tests and win the Winggame Championship to get my thousand points, right?”
“Did you get a bad grade on something?”
“No, not officially. I haven’t got my grades back or nothin’. I think I got mostly B’s. I could’ve gotten all A’s, but it seems unlikely. And, we’ll probably lose the match tomorrow, let’s be honest.” His eyes moved over to the door, and again Asa got the feeling that Stan was scared of someone barging in the door and killing him. “But anyways, I got somethin’ that I want to tell you, cause I’m a good guy, and I want to help you out. Now, I know that you’re going to be furious, cause what I did…well…it’s going to put you in a bit of a pickle. But don’t go gettin’ mad, cause that’s not gonna solve nothing, you hear?”
“I’ll be calm,” Asa assured Stan. “Now, tell me.”
Stan shook his head for a moment longer, and then began to sob. His chest rose and fell with wheezing, fast breaths. “I’m a traitor, Piggy. I am. I—I—I…” but then he broke into such violent sobs that he wasn’t able to continue talking.
“Calm down. Just try to breath.”
Stan nodded, and tried to compose himself. What has he done to become this upset? Asa wondered. This is the same guy that murdered both his parents, and the police officer that came to investigate when he was only
a child. And here he is, in hysterics with guilt over something that he’s done to me.
“I’ve been a spy,” Stan was finally able to get out.
“A spy?”
Stan nodded, still braying with tears. “Giving information. But it was so that they wouldn’t kill me.” Stan’s chest was expanding and contracting at an alarming rate, and tears were flooding down his face.
“So who wouldn’t kill you?” Asa asked, but he had a cold certainty that he already knew.
Stan’s crying was only getting worse.
“Calm down, Stan, you’re going to make yourself sick!”
As if on cue, Stan threw open the bathroom door and vomited heavily into the Academy-issued toilet. When he was done, he spat what was left into the bowl and flushed the toilet.
“Jesus, Stan! You’re really scaring me! What’s going on?”
Stan stood up and wiped his mouth. He looked slightly more composed. “Don’t use the Lord’s name in vain.”
Asa was slightly annoyed at Stan’s call to morality, considering his history. But, he apologized anyway. “Sorry. I’m just nervous. What’s going on?”
Stan inhaled heavily through his nose. Tears continued to wash down his face, but he was now composed enough to talk. “It was two months ago, I think. Benny Hughs came up to me after one of our practices. He asked me if I hated you. I said yes. But you gotta understand, Asa, I thought you were killing other students at the time. Now I know better.
“Benny said that I could help bring you down. I says, ‘yeah, I’d like that.’ So, he brings me out into the wilderness, and I have to meet with this guy in the woods somewhere. He says that this guy is going to help me to bring Palmer down. Sounded good to me, Asa, but I didn’t know! I didn’t know you were innocent!
“Well, anyways, when the guy gets there, his name is Allen, and he’s not really a guy. He’s a Multiplier. And he wants to know all sorts of stuff about you.
“At first I was kinda startled, and didn’t know if I wanted to say nothin’ to him, but he had a gun, and shot into a tree right beside my head and said he would blow me to bits if I didn’t start talkin. So I did.”
Stan’s crying eyes flickered back over to the door. “I am scared they’re comin’ for me, Asa. They have ways of monitoring. I’ve got to make this fast, okay? I’m going to tell you the essentials, then I’m gettin’ my ass outta here.” He looked back over at the door. “If they saw me talkin’ to you, I’d be dead.”
Asa nodded. He had so many questions to ask, but decided it would be best to remain silent and let Stan finish. Did he come into contact with Multipliers from the Hive? Asa wondered. Or are these Multipliers that work for the Academy? And why is Benny Hughs involved?
Stan sniffled, then wiped his nose. “You gotta believe me on somethin’, though, Asa. I don’t know why, but there are Multipliers out there that want you dead. I never heard the reason. It doesn’t make sense to me. But they told me about how last semester they were the ones responsible for all your teammates dying. I thought it was you. I think that’s what they wanted—to make you look like a bad guy. And I called you a murderer, and, well, I’m sorry.” His eyes moved to the door again, and Asa couldn’t help wondering if Charlotte was still alive out there. “Anyways, me and this Multiplier, Allen is his name, have been meeting pretty frequently. And, tonight, when you and the rest of the Sharks have your team meeting in the Lab, they’re plannin’ on raiding the classroom. You can’t go tonight, Asa. They’re coming for you, tonight!”
Asa thought about what Stan had said about the Multipliers knowing things, and about how if they were watching, they would have seen Charlotte leaving to go on a run. “Have they said anything about any other students? Does it seem like they want to kill anyone else, or just me?”
“Just you, Piggy. And they’re going to git you if you go tonight.” Stan’s eyes moved over to the door. “I got to get goin’. I’m sorry about this.”
Asa looked into Stan’s green eyes and believed that he was truly sorry. “It’s okay. I forgive you Stan.”
Stan nodded solemnly, and walked over to the front door. He turned, looked at Asa, and said, “the two of us got a deadly road up ahead.”
“Take care, Stan.”
29
The Decision
After Stan left, Asa put his back against the closed door, and stood there, breathing. He could feel the cold weather through the wood. His mind was racing; it was hard to gather his thoughts.
He felt like he had just dodged a bullet. If Stan had just left, and hadn’t warned me, I would have been bitten tonight.
He was once again overcome with the odd premonition that a Multiplier would bite him. He knew it was only a feeling, but the sensation felt so real to him.
He inhaled slowly, trying to calm down. If he weren’t careful, he would hyperventilate.
“Calm down, Asa. Think about this. What is the first thing that I need to do?” he said to himself.
The first thing that I need to do? I need to get out of here! Multipliers are coming for me tonight!
“Calm down,” he said again.
For a moment he just stood there, breathing, trying to clear his mind.
“Charlotte,” he heard himself say. He opened the door just a crack, peaked through it, and did not see her returning. He closed the door.
He felt incredibly guilty for not warning her about the Multipliers, and considered going after her.
“No,” he whispered. “That wouldn’t make sense.”
The reason I broke up with her was so that we wouldn’t be as big of a target for Multipliers trying to kill us. The last thing I need to do is traipse off into the woods after her. And, even if Multipliers are out in the woods and are killing her right now, what am I going to do about it? They’re stronger than me, faster than me, and they outnumber me. If she is going to die, she is going to die.
He groaned.
He considered going and talking to Teddy. Teddy was a good person to talk to with problems like these, especially since he was locked up. He had all the time in the world to think about different problems in his cell.
Asa rubbed his temples. His head was pounding.
The door pressed open behind him, and Asa shrieked. He jumped away from the opening, and was crouched low, ready to defend himself when Roxanne walked in. She shut the door behind her, but kept her distance. “Asa? Is everything okay?”
“No. Everything is not okay,” he said. “We need to have a team meeting. Now.”
Roxanne instant messaged the team, and they all dropped what they were doing and flew to Viola’s dwelling. Last time Asa called a meeting he had been visited by a rogue Multiplier who warned of an attack on the Academy. The Sharks came in wearing faces of concern. They didn’t speak much as they took their seats, and Viola poured tea for anyone who wanted it. Asa just drank water. His hands were shaking enough as it was, and he didn’t need any extra caffeine.
“I guess that we can all fly together over to the Lab after this for our Winggame meeting,” Bruce said.
Mike Plode was still taking his seat, but everyone was present. The door was locked.
“We won’t be having a team meeting,” Asa said. “Multipliers are planning to attack us tonight at the Lab.”
Gabby spilled her tea at the news, and Viola promptly stood and began to wipe it up with a towel. Gabby wanted to help, but Viola insisted that she stay seated. It was probably best that Gabby didn’t try to hobble around on her one leg when she was so nervous.
As Viola poured Gabby some more tea, Asa told his teammates about Stan’s confession. Despite the heaviness of the situation, relaying the story made Asa feel revived. I love these people. Jen grabbed Asa’s hand under the table.
When Asa was done, Viola drummed on her lips with her metallic, explosive fingernails. “So that’s why Stan was always so beat up. It makes sense now—the black eyes, the broken wrist, all the different bruises.”
Asa nodded.
; “How do we know that Stan was telling the truth?” Jen asked. “He’s always hated Asa—maybe he just wants him to leave the Academy.”
“I don’t think so,” Asa responded. “He seemed pretty convincing. He really looked scared. His eyes kept moving towards the door. He seemed pretty paranoid, and he even threw up in the toilet. If he wanted to punish me in some way, he could have killed me while we were alone—he’s strong enough, at least.”
Asa wondered if Stan was still okay.
“So are we going to leave the Academy?” Viola asked.
“No!” Boom Boom said, his green eyes flashing. “Don’t you remember my point about standing our ground? If we leave, they’ll just have a better chance of taking over the Academy; and if the Multipliers take over the Academy, they’ll then take over the world. Best thing would be to stay where we are.”
Viola crossed her arms and shook her head.
“I think that Mike is right,” Bruce said. He ran one of his huge hands over his short black hair. “I mean, think about it, we don’t even know where Allen, this Multiplier that Stan has been meeting with, is from. What if he’s from the Academy? Think about it. The Multipliers in the Academy want Asa to leave so that the contract with his father is broken, but they can’t force him out, or the crows will do their thing and tell the news stations about the Academy. So what if some Academy Multipliers are using some kind of a scare tactic to get Asa to leave? It would make sense for Benny Hughs too, who you also said was involved. He’s taken on the role of unofficial coach of the Wolves, and so maybe he doesn’t want Asa playing in the Winggame Championship tomorrow. All Benny cares about is his legacy anyways, so I wouldn’t put it past him to work with the Multipliers in a scheme. Maybe he wanted to make Stan think that Multipliers are going to come and kill Asa so that he’d leave and not get to play in the championship tomorrow.”
Lilly Bloodroot stared down into her cup of tea with her large, glossy, purple eyes. She watched the cup of liquid like it was a television, and Asa wondered if she was hallucinating. She spoke so low that it was barely audible; “what about Carmen?”
