Poser and Vlad cleared a path for the exiting trio, but not fast enough. One of Lucille’s escorts shoved Vlad hard enough that he lost his balance and fell backwards into a row of stools. Brendan went to help him.
“Who the hell was that?” Vlad asked.
“That’s Lucille. She’s in my geometry class.”
Poser chuckled. “So, that’s what I have to look forward to in a couple of years when I get to that level of math.”
“You okay?” Brendan asked Vlad.
Vlad straightened his shirt down over his belly. He wound one shoulder as if shaking off a cramp. “I’m okay. But what did she call us?”
“She thinks we’re some sort of A.V. club. I’m not even sure those exist anymore.”
“Yeah, they do, and we’re in it,” Poser said. “Or at least the next closest thing. I think she also called us nerds under her breath as she left.”
“She did not,” Brendan said.
“Did too. And she called Vlad a fat Mumbai cowboy. And you a bean-eating charity case.”
“Liar,” Vlad said.
“And what did she call you?” Brendan asked.
Poser grinned. “I’ll see what she calls me later. She left me her number because I’m awesome.”
They skipped dinner, and Brendan joined them as they headed off campus towards the Bean. He checked his phone for a voicemail, but none showed up. He saw that his phone was searching for a signal.
“You just don’t say no to a woman like that,” Poser said.
“Then what do you say, since you’re the expert?” Brendan asked.
“You say ‘Yes, I’ll do your homework’ and ‘You’re the most beautiful creature in this school and maybe even the whole world’ and ‘Let me do your laundry for you so I can see what color panties you wear.’”
“Then she has her bully boys steal your lunch money,” Vlad said.
“Do they take credit cards?” Poser asked.
“You know who those guys are?” Brendan asked. “They’re not in any of my classes.”
“Sophomores,” Poser said. “The one named Paul is in my pre-algebra class. A bit of a lunk, to say the least. But Lucille…in two weeks, she managed to rope in two upperclassmen. She’s got game, I’ll give her that.”
“Maybe some kind of superpower,” Vlad said. “Pheromone based. Affects men of a certain age.”
“At this rate, she’ll take over the school in a fortnight.”
Tina was already in the coffee shop with a couple of other students. She broke off from them when she saw Brendan. They ordered coffee, and Champ had them sample a square treat he said was mango barfi. They liked it and ordered some more. A table opened up soon enough, and they sat, ate, and sipped. Brendan still felt yesterday morning’s scalded burn in his mouth. The caffeine rush came quickly, and he wondered if he would ever feel sleepy again. Poser was embellishing on the showdown with Lucille and her giant minions for Tina.
Brendan leaned in close to Vlad. “How hard would it be to make a signal booster for my phone?”
“Not hard at all. Sounds like something you could just go and buy. But it won’t help you if the internet is down. The cyberattacks can’t be overcome by a boosted signal. It sucks, but we just have to weather the storm.”
“I just want to be able to connect to the phone network for voice calls. Would something like that work?”
“Maybe. The phone systems are so enmeshed with the internet, it might not make any difference. But then again, it might work.”
Vlad ate the last of his barfi and stared at the table in thought. The loud voices in the shop didn’t seem to faze his concentration.
“Will you help me?” Brendan asked.
“Sure,” he said. “Anything for a fellow brother of the A.V. Club.”
7. Strange Girl
That night the coffee worked its magic and Brendan couldn’t sleep, so he went down to the electronics lab to tinker. As he was about to enter the science building, he saw a figure approaching down one of the illuminated walkways. If he opened the door, it would take a moment to shut as the automated closer did its thing. Instead, he dove for the bushes.
One of the security guards approached the door and confirmed it was locked. Brendan held his breath, but the man never looked in his direction. The guard entered something into a phone, perhaps a security checklist, before walking away around the side of the science building.
Brendan tried the door. Locked. He followed in the shadows behind the guard and saw that each door in turn was checked. The guard then went off towards the humanities building.
Brendan shivered. He could see his own breath. He still had one possible way of getting into the lab before giving in to the temptation of his warm dorm: the windows. Climate control kept every room on campus at the perfect temperature, but windows still got opened for fresh air.
The ground-floor windows were all locked, but he spied one wide open on the second floor. He pushed through some of the thickest shrubs planted at the base of the building. Branches scratched at his arms, and he almost tripped. Looking up, the second floor suddenly looked higher than it had moments before.
He climbed. The stucco and exterior molding gave him plenty of shallow handholds and footholds. He had never been particularly athletic, but running, climbing, and jumping with a purpose energized him. He tried not to think about how exposed he was. The lights from the courtyards lit the side of the building quite well. Anyone looking up would see him. He paused but saw no one below. Only the last reach for the second-floor window gave him trouble, but the wide molding above the lower window provided the perfect ledge on which to rest. With a final stretch, he pulled himself up and slid inside.
He dropped down onto the tile floor of a classroom. The lights from outside had spoiled his night vision. He waited for his eyes to adjust and paused to listen, but he heard nothing. He was alone.
The hallway just outside the classroom was lit. Brendan slowly opened the door, grateful it could be opened from the inside. When he exited, the door locked behind him. He went down the hall to the stairs. Just as he was about to step out into the first-floor hallway, the front door snapped open. He hugged the wall.
A figure walked hurriedly past, someone short, bundled in a hooded sweatshirt and sweatpants. A fellow student, no doubt. Probably female, judging by the build. But how did she get the front door open? She went down the hall and stopped at the electronics lab. Had she been the one who had spotted him before and told the headmaster?
A petty anger rose. Brendan headed her direction, not caring how she might react if she saw him sneaking up on her in the abandoned hallway. She did something with the door and went into the classroom. Brendan caught the door just as it was closing. He got down into a crouch and slipped inside.
Only a few of the workbench lights were on, casting the room in shadows. The girl went to one of the workbenches. Brendan stayed in the dark and eased towards the back of the classroom to watch.
The girl pushed her hood back. She had olive skin and unusually light green eyes. Her movements were deliberate. She removed a tablet from a small backpack and propped it up on the table. She opened drawers and pulled out an assortment of tools. From the top shelf and hidden behind a stack of plastic trays she produced a small bundle, which she placed on the bench and unwrapped. It looked like random spare parts, but it must have been mostly assembled because she snapped it all together in moments. The final product looked like a metal glove. She switched it on, and a sole green LED confirmed power.
Brendan had seen a device like this before on a YouTube science show. It looked like a remote that might be used for a robotic arm and hand like what some of the other students were working on. But she was missing the robot part of the equation. What could her device control? Perhaps she was part of the advanced electronics class.
She fiddled with something. Her hand hovered over the workbench. Snap! A screwdriver was now in her hand. Some sort of electromagnet? She switched off the po
wer and placed the screwdriver on the bench, studying it as if it were some unknown alien object. Brendan craned his head. It looked like a screwdriver to him. She began taking notes on her tablet with her free hand. If that was all it did, what was the point of it being a glove? Deep in thought, Brendan leaned on a stool. It shifted with a squeak.
“Hello?” she said, spinning towards him.
Brendan stood up. The door was only a few paces away.
“Who are you?”
A brilliant light shined in Brendan’s eyes, blinding him.
“I’m Brendan. I was coming here when I saw you break in. I didn’t mean to scare you.”
“I’m not scared. You’re not supposed to be here. You should leave.”
“You’re not supposed to be here either.” He shielded his eyes and moved closer so he wasn’t standing in the shadows. “Do you mind?”
She turned off the small flashlight but kept it at her side like a weapon.
“Are you in Ms. Hayes’s electronics class?” he asked.
She studied Brendan up and down and apparently concluded he was no threat. She pocketed the flashlight. “No. Are you?”
“I am now. Were you the one who reported me to security the other night?”
“We can’t have just anyone getting in here, breaking things.”
“I never broke anything or took anything. What do you have there?”
She gestured with her mechanical-gloved hand. “Just a hobby of mine.”
“May I?”
“No. I don’t know you, Brendan. This is a personal project that I don’t feel like sharing.”
He put his hands up. “I was just curious. It’s always interesting what others are working on in the middle of the night.” He moved to another workbench and began taking out tools.
“What are you doing?”
“This is what I came here for before you interrupted me,” he said. After classes the following afternoon, he and Vlad could start in earnest on his signal booster. He proceeded to collect the materials he needed for his battery.
She stood there waiting. “I thought you were going to leave.”
He kept working. “Nope.”
She crossed her arms. “I could call security. Even if you’re in the class, you’re not supposed to be here alone this late.”
“You could do that. But if you’re supposed to be here, why is your project hidden up on that shelf?” He considered his own project. Maybe it was the caffeine or because he was tired, but his eyes had trouble focusing. He took a set of magnification glasses off a stand and put them on. “I guess you could even turn on the overhead lights if security knows you’re here. That would make this easier.”
“You’re rude.”
“Maybe.”
She watched him for a minute. “So what is that? Some kind of power unit?”
He felt a measure of relief when she stepped closer to get a better look. She wouldn’t call security. “Yes. I’m putting together a signal booster for my phone.”
“Because of the outages. You know that won’t help with internet.”
“That’s what everyone keeps telling me. But I might be able to place phone calls.”
“You could just use a landline.”
“You could just pick up your tools with your hand. That’s a lot of tooling for a magnet.”
“You’re irritating.” She put her project away. “What nights do you plan to be here?”
“I haven’t planned it out. Why? How about you?”
“I’m hoping to be here on a night where you’re not around so I can work in peace. Be sure to lock up when you leave.”
***
Brendan slept like a log. The next morning, he decided that he would return to the lab that night whether his project needed more work or not.
He had signal for a few hours that day around noon and he talked to his mother briefly. Then he resumed the search for news of his father.
An irritating video blogger with a voice beginning to descend out of puberty claimed to have the first post-fight interview with Drone King. The blogger spent a full five minutes on the buildup before sneaking into the hospital. A police officer stopped him right before he went into the room his father was supposedly in. The blogger shouted, “Drone King! Your fans love you!” in a cracking voice while getting dragged away, all of it captured on a camera attached to his head.
At least Brendan knew where his father was, and he didn’t bother with any more emails. He wanted to fly to New York but would have no way of getting in to see him. The phone signal cut out before his final class.
That evening Brendan spent an hour with the group in the lounge watching the news. Tina and Poser both asked him if he was feeling okay.
“Just tired. Going to skip on the Bean tonight.”
He slept for two hours before getting up to go to the electronics lab. A fruitful session with Vlad after classes had been spent split between their independent projects, but they had finished his power supply and phone connection. All he needed now was an antenna. Plus, he wanted to see the mystery girl again.
He waited first for the guard. The man appeared on time, checked all the doors, and went on his way. When he saw the windows around the entire building were closed, Brendan realized he should have tried the doors first. He went to the window of the electronics lab and saw the usual warm low workbench lights were on. He saw her at the workbench. He tapped the glass. She ignored him. He tapped louder, with fingernails first and then a soft pounding with the heel of his hand.
She went to the window. “Go. Away.”
“Let me in.”
“No.”
Brendan took off his belt and started tapping with the buckle. The sound was surprisingly loud. He continued when she gestured for him to stop. She made a throat-cutting motion and then balled her hands into fists. Tap-tap-tap.
The window opened. He climbed inside.
“What is wrong with you?”
“I’m not done with my project.”
“Do it at another time. I need the lab.”
“Well, so do I.”
“What I’m doing is important.”
Brendan laughed. “Your project is important. Mine isn’t. Is that it?”
“My project is none of your business. How long will you be here?”
“A while,” he said, although he figured he might actually just need another hour. He could probably even find the material he needed and take it all up to his room.
He walked to her work table. She had wired a fine copper mesh that attached to the bottom of her glove’s fingers. When he tried to lean close, she body blocked him.
“I was just checking to see if you’ve made any progress with your cyborg magnet. I wasn’t going to touch anything.”
She looked over his shoulder. Her eyes went wide, and she grabbed him and pulled him down to the floor.
“The guard,” she hissed.
A flashlight played across the window Brendan climbed through. It was still open. The flashlight beam vanished.
“He’s leaving,” Brendan said.
“No, he’s heading towards the front door.”
She began to put her project away with deliberate care. He tugged on her arm, but she shrugged him off.
“It won’t take him a minute to be at that door,” he said. “Leave it.”
She considered all the scattered components of her project as if the cobbled-together electronic parts were beloved possessions. She picked up the metal glove and wrapped it in her jacket. A silhouette stepped up to the hallway door, a hazy shape in a white shirt holding a flashlight. The girl began to head towards the office, but Brendan pointed her to the window and had her slide through first. The security guard entered and shouted, “Hey! Stop!” as Brendan pushed himself through and tumbled onto the bushes below.
They ran.
***
He watched as she placed her project on a game table in the lounge of one of the girls’ dorms.
“No,
no, no, no,” she kept saying as she surveyed the glove and its wiring.
“It looks like it survived.”
“You don’t get it. I had to leave some components on the workbench that took a long time to make.”
“I had to leave my entire project behind, and you don’t hear me complaining. Just relax. We can rebuild yours, we can rebuild mine. Besides, it will all probably be there in the morning.”
“Don’t tell me to relax. And I don’t want your help. If you hadn’t shown up, this wouldn’t have happened.”
Brendan thought for a moment. “Wait a sec. What gives you exclusive rights to the lab? Neither of us is supposed to be there this late. My project is just as important as yours. I told you I’ll help you fix it.”
She straightened, sighed, and in a low voice repeated, “I don’t want your help.”
He raised his hands. “Fine. Offer withdrawn.” Then his tablet pinged. It was a school network text from Mr. Childes: “Please come by my office tomorrow before class.”
Brendan sighed. He showed her the phone. “I guess the guard got a good look at me.”
“The security is pretty well trained, and they have body cameras. But I wouldn’t worry about it. We didn’t take or break anything.”
“That’s hardly comforting. I have too much riding on doing well here. I can’t get expelled.”
“You won’t,” she said, putting a hand on his. “Look, I’m sorry I got mad. I…have a lot going on. My project is important, but I understand yours is, too. Meet me at dinner tomorrow in the restaurant, and we’ll talk about how we can avoid another night like this.”
“Okay. I’m Brendan,” he said, offering his hand.
She took it, gave it a pump. “Charlotte. And it might be best if we don’t talk about this with anyone.”
***
Mr. Childes cleared his throat. “If you examine your student handbook, which you downloaded and signed, you’ll see the facility curfew is ten p.m. Accessing any school building after that time is not allowed. And students are requested to be inside their rooms by eleven.”
Supervillain High Page 5