“What?” Andy’s eyes widened. “How do you know?”
“Remember how I lost my phone and I had to come back upstairs?”
“Yeah . . .”
“It was on the table under a napkin,” Mika said, her voice growing louder. “And I’m absolutely positive I left it in my purse all night. He took it! He took it out of my purse, and then he left it on that table.”
“But that was days ago,” Andy said. “How did he get into your account this morning when we won the Gold?”
“I bet I know.” Mika was already opening her email app. “Remember how OlympiFan kept saying I was entering the wrong password this morning? I had to log out and tell it I forgot my password to reset it. Kaito could’ve done the same thing . . . he did, look!”
She showed Andy and Emma her screen. In the trash was a deleted email sent from OlympiFan a week ago notifying her that she’d successfully changed her password. Mika felt a chill race up her spine. Kaito had been logged in to her account for a whole week, and she hadn’t even known!
Emma shook her head. “Whoa. You’re totally right. He didn’t need to know your password to change it, because you were already logged in. Then he gave you a new password and logged in as you from his own phone.”
“And at the shrine,” Mika went on, navigating back to her photos. “See, Gavin’s looking at the spot where Emma left the note because Kaito was trying to tell him about it! He must have pointed to the note right before I took the photo. He saw Emma leave it, and he followed her to the souvenir shop and took her phone, too!”
“But he didn’t know I was on Team Cryptic,” Emma said, chewing her lip. “Why’d he take my phone?”
“Because he thought you were cheating,” Mika pointed out. “Maybe he was trying to figure out exactly what you were doing with those notes. Once Kaito had your phone and realized you were on Team Cryptic, he saw the Bronze medal and left a message saying he stole your hints.”
“And then as soon as Andy found the Gold medal, he saw our hints and left that message.” Mika blinked as another thought occurred to her. “And then he logged into his account with Team SuperFan and entered the wrong guess—that’s why his teammates were freaking out! They probably didn’t realize he was still playing!”
“I’m going to tell Sabine,” Andy said, already opening OlympiFan on his phone.
Emma’s frown deepened. “It’s weird . . . Kaito had five hints about the Masked Medalist’s identity, and he still guessed wrong! Who do you think he guessed?”
Mika crossed her arms. “Maybe we should go ask him.”
From: SabineTheGreat
To: AndyK
Thanks for letting me know about Kaito. The thing is, I already knew he was the one who guessed.
I’m SO sorry for lying to you and your sister. My teammates have no idea it was Kaito, and I didn’t want them to find out. Kaito’s pretty new to our school—he enrolled right after winter break so he didn’t have a lot of friends. None of us knew him very well before OlympiFan and he got very intense about winning.
When we were all at the Meiji Shrine, Kaito saw your friend Emma leaving notes with fake clues. He showed me and said he thought our team needed a strategy like that. I disagreed because I thought it was too sneaky. Kaito asked the team to vote—either stick to the way we were playing, or come up with a new strategy to throw off the other teams, like he wanted. Everyone voted against him. I think we hurt his feelings. We didn’t mean to! Then one night he called me and said he knew who the Masked Medalist was! He said he’d seen an Olympic athlete logged in to the Masked Medalist’s Instagram, typing a post. He wanted to enter the athlete’s name so that Team SuperFan would win the grand prize even if we didn’t find the Gold. I said no way! I didn’t want to win by cheating, and I knew my friends wouldn’t either. I made him promise not to tell our teammates who the athlete was. Kaito got really upset and quit. When we all saw the message on OlympiFan saying our team had taken our guess, I knew it was him. But I didn’t tell anyone because I felt bad for Kaito. I really think he was just doing all of this because he thought we would like him better if he helped us win.
I’m really sorry.
Sabine
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
ANDY
“WAIT.”
Andy put a hand on his sister’s arm. Mika looked ready to storm over to the busboy and demand he confess everything—and Andy had to admit, it was a tempting thought.
But Sabine had responded so quickly. Andy scanned her message, then read it again, his mind reeling.
“What?” Mika asked, frowning at Andy. “Come on, he’s right over there!”
She fell silent when Andy held his phone out. Emma leaned across the table, and Andy waited while they read Sabine’s message.
“Whoa . . .” Emma said finally.
Mika looked as stunned as Andy felt. “No wonder Sabine was acting so weird at Tokyo Tower. She didn’t want us to know that one of her teammates did try to cheat. She probably realized it was Kaito who’d made the guess, and she didn’t want her friends to find out.”
“One thing doesn’t make sense,” Emma said, looking at Andy. “If Kaito actually saw this athlete’s phone and they were logged in to the Masked Medalist’s Instagram, then why was his guess wrong?”
Mika chewed her lip. “Sabotage? Kaito wanted Team SuperFan to lose?”
“But Sabine said he thought the other team members would like him if he won the game for them,” Emma pointed out. “And that was Kaito’s only chance to win!”
“That’s true,” Mika agreed. “I wonder which athlete he thought it was?”
“I think I know.”
Both girls turned to Andy. He gazed thoughtfully at his phone, allowing his mind to put the pieces together in a different way. At last, they were starting to fit.
“Kaito told Sabine he knew who the Masked Medalist was because he saw the athlete logged in to the Instagram account. But when he looked at the hints, they didn’t make sense—remember how Gavin said Kaito thought the game was rigged? He was angry because he thought the Masked Medalist had made the game impossible to solve. I’ll bet that’s when he deleted the Masked Medalist’s Instagram posts.” Andy looked up at his sister. “He took your phone during the soft opening, Mika—but you weren’t the only person who lost their phone that night.”
Mika wrinkled her nose. “I wasn’t? Who—oh!” she exclaimed, her eyes widening. “Wesley did, too!”
“Wesley?” Emma asked. “You mean Wesley Brooks?”
“Yes! He told us he lost his phone that night, too,” Mika said excitedly. “Then Emi found it in the kitchen. And Kaito was the busboy that night . . . wait. So this means . . .”
“Wesley Brooks is the Masked Medalist,” Emma whispered. “Right?”
Andy’s pulse was racing, but he forced himself to think through it one more time. “That’s what Kaito thought. But when Kaito entered Wesley’s name, the app said his guess was wrong.”
“Well, good,” Mika said, hands on her hips. “I mean, he cheated. He doesn’t deserve to win.”
“That’s true, but telling him that we know what he did won’t fix anything.” Andy said. “We can’t prove he did it.”
Mika let out a strained laugh. “So we just let him get away with it?”
“No.” Emma placed her hands flat on the table and leaned closer, her dark eyes sparkling. “We need to get him to admit it.”
“How?”
Andy thought carefully, his gaze wandering over the crowd until he spotted Gavin again. “I have an idea. Let’s find our parents—Gavin needs their permission to interview us. And I think we should do it tonight.”
Over an hour later, Andy finished off a bowl of okayu—rice porridge, according to the translation on the menu—topped with salmon roe. His nervousness over what they were about to do hadn�
�t stopped him from digging in to seven courses so far. Tonight, Chef Abe’s dishes were even better than at the soft opening, and judging from everyone’s reactions this evening, his restaurant was going to be a huge success.
“There he is,” Mika said in a low voice, pushing her empty bowl back and picking up her soda. A few tables away, Andy spotted Kaito serving a pair of women tall, thin glasses filled with something pink and bubbly. “He’s right next to Gavin—should we do it now?”
“Yeah.” Andy set his napkin down, glancing around until he spotted Emma. He nodded at her, and she nodded back, then pulled her phone out. Andy and Mika headed for Gavin’s table, and Emma edged toward them.
“Hi again!” Mika said cheerfully, plopping her soda down on the table. “We were wondering if we could do that interview about OlympiFan now.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Andy saw Kaito glance over at them. “We think we figured out who the Masked Medalist is.” Andy made sure to say it loudly, and sure enough, Kaito froze, still clutching his tray.
Gavin’s eyebrows shot up, and he pushed back his plate of spicy crab legs. “Did you now? I’d love to hear about it.”
He reached down and pulled his camera out from a bag underneath the table. A chorus of oohs and aahs rose up nearby, and the warm, sweet scent of chocolate filled the air as Chef Abe began his dessert presentation. Andy stepped closer to Mika, and Gavin began to record.
“Mika and Andy Kudo found the Gold medal at Tokyo Tower this morning,” Gavin said. “And now, they believe they’ve solved the mystery of the Masked Medalist’s identity!”
Kaito wasn’t the only person listening now. While most of the crowd was still captivated by Chef Abe and his dessert show, Andy noticed that the people at nearby tables had started to watch their interview with curiosity.
“Not just us,” Mika said as Emma joined them, holding her phone out. On her screen, Tyler waved at Gavin. “This is Emma Botha, and that’s Tyler Smith,” Mika explained. “They’re Team Cryptic—they found the Bronze medal and the first two hints to the Masked Medalist’s identity.”
“When someone hacked into my OlympiFan account and saw the two hints, we shared them with all of the other players,” Emma added loudly. “Because we think games are only fun when they’re fair for everyone.”
“The same person got into my account right after Andy found the Gold medal,” Mika added. “They saw our two hints, too.”
“Well, that’s a pretty sneaky thing to do,” Gavin said. “And what about the Silver medal? Do you think this person did the same thing to the team who found it?”
Andy shrugged. “Maybe. It doesn’t matter, because obviously the cheater still doesn’t know who the Masked Medalist is. But we do.”
He crossed his fingers behind his back, trying hard not to look at Kaito. Would he fall for their trap?
“Well?” Gavin asked eagerly. “Who is it?”
Andy took a deep breath, glancing at Mika, Emma, and Tyler. All four of them spoke at the same time.
“Wesley Brooks.”
The restaurant had grown quiet, and Andy glanced at the island kitchen. Several fondue pots sat on the bar as Chef Abe torched a tray lined with marshmallows. He was making a show of it, doing a little flourish with the torch before moving from one marshmallow to the next. But the attention wasn’t on him anymore, even when he increased the flames. Everyone was looking either at Gavin’s table, or at Wesley Brooks.
“Sorry, guys.”
Wesley stepped forward. He was smiling in an apologetic way, hands in his pockets.
Gavin swiveled around to get Wesley on camera. “So you’re not the Masked Medalist?”
Andy held his breath.
“Afraid not,” said Wesley, and from behind Gavin came a shout of anger.
“Yes you are!”
Kaito stalked over, hands curled into fists. Andy watched as the busboy walked right up to Wesley.
“Kaito!” Emi stepped through the crowd, her expression alarmed. “What’s going on?”
Wesley looked calm, although his smile was gone. “I’m sorry, but—”
“It’s you!” Kaito insisted. “You posted a picture on the Masked Medalist’s Instagram account before dinner here last week. I took your phone and saw it! But when I entered your name in the OlympiFan app, it said I was wrong! My team should have won the grand prize!”
“Whoa . . . You took my phone that night?” Wesley shook his head. “Man, I thought I was losing my mind. And buddy, I don’t think you deserve to win since you clearly cheated.”
Kaito scowled. “You cheated! You’re the Masked Medalist!”
Hana appeared behind Wesley, watching Kaito closely. Emi looked beside herself with embarrassment. Chef Abe began stirring a vat of chocolate vigorously, eyeing the busboy who now had the attention of the entire restaurant.
Wesley sighed. “I’m really sorry,” he said, sounding like he meant it. “But I’m afraid you’ve made a mistake. It’s true, I run the Masked Medalist’s Instagram, but I didn’t create the game. You guessed wrong. Didn’t you consider the hints?”
Andy inhaled sharply as he thought about the five hints again. The UK flag. A butterfly. 2012. 2. And that sound, that beezzt—a sound he’d heard just a few days ago at the swimming events. It was the starting buzzer that signaled the beginning of a race.
Swimmer. Butterfly. London. 2012. Two gold medals.
Andy had been so focused on getting Kaito to confess, he’d forgotten to put the last puzzle piece into place! His gaze moved from Wesley to Hana Takahashi as everything finally clicked. When she noticed him staring at her, she smiled and stepped forward.
“You have to type it into the app to win,” she said quietly.
Swallowing hard, Andy looked from Mika to Emma and Tyler. He was sorely tempted to pull out his phone, but he didn’t.
“No,” he said at last. “I only figured it out because Wesley said he runs the Masked Medalist’s Instagram. And since I know you’re friends, that’s a really big hint the other players didn’t have. I don’t want to win this way—it’s not fair to the other teams.”
“And the game was totally fair until someone started stealing phones and changing passwords,” Mika added, glaring pointedly at Kaito.
The busboy looked shell-shocked as all eyes turned to him. Even Chef Abe was staring, his mouth a round O of surprise at this turn of events. Kaito blinked, looking from Hana to Wesley to Gavin—and at the sight of Gavin’s camera, he seemed to realize what had just happened.
With a frightened cry, he pushed past Gavin, who stepped out of the way too quickly and began to lose his balance. His giant camera knocked against Kaito’s shoulder, and the busboy stumbled toward the kitchen—heading right for the beautiful chocolate fountain.
“No!” Chef Abe lunged forward to protect the chocolate fountain, throwing his arms wide, and slamming into a large mixing bowl filled with fluffy whipped cream. The bowl soared high into the air and turned over. Chef Abe looked up as it began to fall—straight toward his head.
There was a collective gasp from the crowd, and Andy heard Emi let out a shriek of dismay. Kaito shoved the chef out of the way, and the bowl landed squarely on top of his head instead.
“Kaito!” Emi hurried forward. “Oh, goodness. Are you okay?”
The busboy gingerly lifted the bowl. His hair, his face, and his neck were completely covered in whipped cream. Andy heard a few giggles, which were quickly stifled. He felt bad for Kaito, but he couldn’t help feeling relieved that Chef Abe hadn’t been humiliated on his opening night.
Apparently, Chef Abe felt the same way. Regaining his composure, he stepped forward and gave Kaito a little bow. Then he clapped the busboy on the back and smiled widely at the rapt audience. “My desserts are delicious, but please resist the urge to swim in them,” he joked.
The tension in the room
broke, and everyone laughed. Andy could have sworn he even saw Kaito crack a small smile beneath all the whipped cream.
Emi was clearly relieved. “Ladies and gentlemen, I’m so sorry for this, but—”
“But the show must go on,” Chef Abe finished grandly. Then he struck a match and tossed it into the vat of cherries, sending streaks of flame into the air.
Applause broke out, and Emi put her arm around Kaito and led him out of the room. Andy let out a long sigh of relief and then turned to Mika and Emma. On the screen, Tyler was grinning.
“I can’t believe that worked!”
Andy was about to reply, but the words caught in his throat when Wesley and Hana joined them.
“I think we have a lot to talk about,” Hana said with a wide smile.
“And a lot of dessert to eat,” Wesley added. “Although I think they might be out of whipped cream . . .”
OLYMPIFAN UPDATE!
Special message from the Masked Medalist
Hello, OlympiFans! The Closing Ceremony is tonight—and our game has come to an end as well.
But wait, what about the grand prize? No one has guessed who the Masked Medalist is!
Well, that’s not entirely true. You might have seen rumors swirling around on social media last night that the Masked Medalist had been unmasked. And it’s true!
I, Hana Takahashi, created OlympiFan.
So, who guessed my identity? Who won the grand prize? Well, that’s a little bit more complicated.
I designed OlympiFan to be both fun and fair. And while it was definitely fun (for me, and I hope for all of you, too!), it didn’t turn out to be totally fair. While it’s true that a player was attempting to cheat, I’m taking responsibility for this. I have lots of other games in the works, and I want to make sure they’re designed to be as fair as possible to all players. To do this, I need beta testers—players who play to win while still showing respect
Kudo Kids--The Mystery of the Masked Medalist Page 17