Initiates (The Book of Adam 3)

by Scott Gelowitz

  “Yeah, I would have put money on Kevin and Mark too before we left. And I would have agreed that I’d be the least likely to feel homesick at all, but now that we’re here, I definitely miss home a little,” said Adam.

  The others watched him, waiting for him to continue with that thought.

  “It’s not that I miss Mary all that much, but this is the first time I’ve left Grayson for any amount of time, and I’m really going to miss being there.”

  The others nodded back at him, agreeing and admitting that they felt the same way.

  “Well, at least we brought the best parts of Grayson along with us, so that should help…too bad we brought Mark though,” said Jimmy with a mischievous grin.

  Mark threw a bread crust at Jimmy, who laughed at the feeble gesture.

  “Don’t throw food or you won’t get anymore,” barked Betty from behind the counter.

  Mark was both startled and scared that she might be serious. “Sorry,” he called back to her, and he ran to pick up the crust before dropping it neatly in the garbage.

  Betty shook her spoon at Mark and then grinned.

  “Mind if I sit with you guys?” asked a voice from behind Adam.

  He turned to see Derek standing with a plate of food.

  “Not at all,” he replied, gesturing to the chair beside him.

  “How’s your morning going so far?” Derek asked generally once he had settled into the chair.

  “Alright. It doesn’t even feel like we’ve left home,” said Mark.

  “Yeah,” replied Derek, “I thought the same thing. If it weren’t for the different students in my class I’d swear it was just another classroom back home. You guys are the only ones in your grade, right?”

  They all nodded and Adam could tell that Kevin still didn’t trust Derek. Adam had known Kevin long enough to be able to tell when he was putting on a show for the others, and at that moment he definitely was.

  “Do you have a lot of people in your class?” asked Mark.

  “I think they said 27 including me. The strange thing about it is that I’m the only guy – not that I’m exactly complaining about it.” Derek grinned.

  “Kevin’s sister might be in your class. She’s in Grade 11 too,” said Mark.

  “Kassie, right?” asked Derek as he looked at Kevin. Kevin nodded back.

  “Yep, she’s in my class. She’s one smart girl,” said Derek. “I think she answered half of the questions this morning.”

  “That’s her,” said Kevin.

  “She’s dating your brother, Trevor, right?” Derek asked Jimmy.

  “How’d you know that?” asked Jimmy.

  Derek stammered a little. “Well, uh, you know, Killaly isn’t that far from Grayson. I’ve seen them at the ball games together.”

  Jimmy understood immediately.

  “You’ve got a little crush on her, don’t you?” he asked.

  Derek turned a deeper shade of pink. “Uh…no…she’s just…you know…she’s a good looking girl, that’s all.”

  Kevin’s face was changing and it seemed to Adam that he didn’t know if he should be angry or laughing.

  “Quit making Derek uncomfortable,” Adam said to Jimmy. “We all know Kassie is a babe.”

  The words were out of his mouth before he realized he had said them. The wide eyes of his friends stared at him as if he had just admitted to running naked through the school hallways.

  “Anyway,” said Adam, trying to move the conversation away from the subject, “how’s your teacher?”

  Derek shrugged. “Hard to tell yet. She seems alright. I think she’s as nervous as the rest of us. You guys have Horton, right?”

  “Yeah,” said Adam.

  “I’m jealous,” Derek admitted. “He seemed like he’d be a lot of fun.”

  “So far he is,” replied Mark, “But we’ll see. He’s still a teacher after all.”

  Everyone grinned at the observation.

  “All we’ve done so far is go through some of the classes we are going to take. Not sure what we’re going to do this afternoon. I’m hoping we get an idea why they had to send us all the way here for the year. It can’t be just to teach us the classes we’d have learned at home,” said Derek.

  “Horton told us a few things we’ll be learning, like self defense and surveillance,” said Adam. “And he hinted at a few other things too.”

  “Time will tell,” said Kevin. “I’ll bet that within a few days we’ll have a pretty good idea of what to expect. All I know is that it can’t be all that bad if Adam’s Dad didn’t want to leave here when he was done.”

  They all nodded as Derek shoveled down some more food. When Derek had finished eating it was time to head back to their classrooms.

  While they walked, Kevin looked over at Adam. “So you think my sister is a babe, hey?” He scowled for a fraction of a second and then burst out laughing. “Wait ‘til I tell her.”

  Adam was about to beg him not to say anything when Kevin said, “Just kidding.”

  Adam hung his head the rest of the way back to the classroom.

  After they arrived, they sat at their desks until Horton showed up a few minutes late.

  “So, where did we leave off?” he asked, but he wasn’t really looking for an answer from the boys, so he just continued speaking. “I forgot to tell you about the interviews we will do tomorrow.”

  “Interviews?” asked Mark.

  “Yes. We like to conduct interviews fairly often throughout the year. It helps the instructors get to know the students so we can help them decide what path they would like to take within the League. It’s really informal, so don’t worry about studying for it,” he said.

  “I wasn’t going to,” replied Mark without thinking.

  “I didn’t expect you would,” said Horton, smiling. “We will conduct them in the morning and then figure something out for the afternoon. All of the other classes should take all day because of the number of students, so that should give us extra time for things. For now, though, I thought we’d try something a little different. Did you guys manage to see the waterfall and the swimming area?”

  They all nodded but were confused, wondering where he was leading with that question.

  “We’re going to go there and learn a few things. Did you all bring swim trunks?”

  They all nodded again.

  “Go put them on and meet me at the door to the pool area as soon as you are ready. You won’t need to bring a towel, so go,” he said and he waved them toward the door.

  Excited that they weren’t going to be spending the afternoon inside the classroom, the boys jogged to the dorms and soon were heading to the pool.

  As soon as they turned the last corner they saw Horton waiting for them by the door. He opened it as they neared and in no time they were inside.

  “Pretty impressive, right?” he asked.

  All agreed.

  “Is that a natural waterfall?” asked Adam.

  Horton grinned. “Yes. It was found fairly soon after discovering the main cavern and it was the key to deciding if we would stay here.”

  “Why?” asked Kevin.

  “I’ll get to that in a moment. Right now, follow me,” said Horton and he led them to the edge of the large pool in front of the waterfall. He didn’t even take off his shoes and waded straight into the water. The boys were surprised because it looked to them that Horton hadn’t changed out of his clothes from earlier in the day, so they hadn’t expected him to walk in without changing into something else first.

  Adam was the last one to enter the water. The first thing he noticed was the temperature. It was much warmer than he had expected.

  Horton led the group to the right side of the huge swimming area where he stopped at a rope that stretched from the shore to the back wall. He was just deep enough that his shoulders were still visible.

  Once the group caught up to them he asked, “So, any ideas why this discovery is the key to us choosing this place?”
r />   “Drinking water?” asked Kevin.

  “That’s one thing, yes, how about another?”

  “Are there fish in here?” asked Jimmy.

  Mark looked frightened for a moment before regaining his composure.

  Horton noticed. “Yes. Large fish. Sometimes they will bite your legs because they like human flesh.”

  Mark yelped and began struggling toward the shore through the deep water.

  “I’m just kidding,” Horton yelled so that Mark could hear.

  Mark paused just long enough so that Horton could say, “There are no fish in this water. Come on back.”

  Mark looked uncertain if he should, but after a few taunts by the others he waded back toward them.

  “Any other guesses?” Horton asked again.

  After a few moments of no response, he continued.

  “This water is exactly 22 degrees Celsius, or about 72 degrees Fahrenheit, or 295 Kelvin and it has been since the day we discovered it. It gets warmed deep in the earth and is pushed up there where it comes out as the waterfall.” Horton pointed to the top.

  “Notice how this room isn’t filling up with water even though there’s quite a lot flowing in all the time? That’s because it travels out of here through a bunch of cracks and fissures that lead throughout the mountain. We use those fissures and warm water to keep the temperature in here the same all year long. It can be blazing hot or super cold outside and the temperature in all of Area 51 never changes. We’ve got an unlimited supply of temperature control. Pretty interesting, right?”

  Adam thought it was, but he could tell the others weren’t as interested as he was.

  “Do you have to re-direct the water flow whenever you build a new area?” asked Adam.

  “We have a few times. There’s more than enough water capacity that we could double the size and still be comfortable. Anyway, that’s all I wanted to show you. I didn’t really feel like teaching any more today, so if anyone asks, I taught you about our heating and cooling system. Now go have fun in the water for an hour or so. There are all sorts of beach balls and floating things in those baskets over there.” He pointed to some huge baskets behind the door they had entered from, but they had been so interested in Horton and the waterfall that they hadn’t noticed anything else.

  Horton started toward the shore and Adam followed, but as Horton emerged from the water, something seemed quite odd to Adam. Then he realized what seemed strange. The parts of Horton that were coming out of the water looked as if they had never been in the water.

  Adam watched in silence until they were completely out of the water.

  “How did you do that?” he asked as Horton sat down.

  “What?” asked Horton, pulling off his shoe and draining the water from inside and then shaking it.

  “Oh yeah, the clothes. I put a water-repellent on them. It sure helps to keep the stains off I tell you. The only part that sucks is you can’t help filling up your shoes.” He took off his other shoe and poured the water out.

  “Don’t you ever have to wash them?” asked Adam.

  Horton nodded his head. “Oooh yeah. They get a little funky after a few days of hard work or about a week of doing nothing.”

  “But if the water is repelled, how do you wash them?”

  “That’s easy. There’s a special ingredient that you add to the wash that deactivates the repellent. All you do then is spray them with the repellent when they are clean and dry. It doesn’t work if they are already wet. Don’t worry, you’ll learn about all of the interesting things these folks have dreamed up. Give it a little time.” Horton grinned and winked at him. “Now go have some fun.”

  Adam grinned back and ran to get a pool toy. If school was going to be like this, he understood why his dad didn’t want to leave.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  While they were swimming, Horton informed them that most days their classes would be from 9 a.m. until 4:30 p.m. but some evenings would be used for extra classes – usually self defense. Their first self defense class would start on their second day at seven in the evening, and the boys would probably be added in with one of the other classes.

  After a fun filled couple of hours swimming, Horton told the boys that they were free to go until the next morning.

  Once he had showered and cleaned himself up, Adam knocked on everyone’s doors and they all wandered back to the cafeteria. Derek was already there, so they asked if they could sit with him.

  He beamed as he replied, “Absolutely.”

  “How was the rest of your day?” he asked.

  Adam glanced at the others and they looked as if they felt the same way he did - a little guilty that all of the other students had to work while they played, but he answered truthfully.

  “No way!” exclaimed Derek. “I wish.”

  “Maybe you’ll get to go swimming tomorrow or the next day,” said Adam.

  Derek frowned. “I’m not looking forward to the next couple of days. Did you know that they’re going to tell everyone what happened to you guys?”

  Adam nodded.

  Derek looked sheepish. “I want to hear what happened to you, but I’m not looking forward to everyone finding out that my dad that tried to sell you to Larix.”

  Adam was conflicted but yet felt sorry for Derek. “Horton told us that the instructors won’t say anything that would impact you. They feel that you’re not your dad and need to be treated separate. Your dad hasn’t been convicted of anything either, so Horton says they can’t say anything about him yet.”

  “Did he really say that?” asked Derek, looking hopeful.

  Adam nodded. “He also told us that if anyone has questions about what happened we aren’t supposed to answer but send them to ask their instructor. I’m assuming the same applies to you.”

  Derek smiled and sat back. “Thanks. You just made my day. I’ve been pretty worried about that since Ms. McFadden went over what we’d be reviewing in History of the Sentinel League.”

  At that moment, Kassie and Trevor walked up to their table. Kassie had a confused look on her face when she saw Derek sitting with the boys.

  Adam had seen her approach and watched her expression change.

  “It’s ok,” he told her, “He’s nothing like his dad.”

  Trevor looked confused and he set his food down once the others made room at the table.

  “This is Derek Gunderson from Killaly,” Adam continued. “He’s in Kassie’s class.”

  Trevor’s face turned suspicious as well. “You guys are cool with this?” he asked the other three.

  They all nodded and responded “Yes,” so his suspicious look faded, although not completely.

  “Derek, this is Jimmy’s brother Trevor and Kevin’s sister, Kassie,” said Adam.

  “Hi,” said Derek in a meek voice.

  Trevor nodded back at him.

  “We’re in the same class,” said Kassie. “You’ve been pretty quiet today.”

  “Yeah, it’s really intimidating being the only guy in a class full of smart girls,” said Derek.

  “You’re the only guy in the whole class?” asked Trevor looking from Derek to Kassie. His expression showed that he was truly interested in that information.

  Derek nodded.

  “You didn’t tell me that,” Trevor said to Kassie.

  “No, I didn’t tell you that yet,” she corrected him.

  The others felt strange listening to their short conversation, since it was obvious that Trevor had been worried about other boys in Kassie’s class, but since there was only one and it was Derek, he relaxed. Kassie would have liked to drive Trevor crazy with thought that there were other boys in her class chasing her, but that avenue had just been closed.

  “Well, this place is too full of awkward for me right now, so I think I’ll go do anything else,” said Jimmy as he stood to leave the table.

  Kevin, Mark, and Adam followed his lead.

  “Not sure what we’re doing yet, but you’re welcom
e to come along,” Kevin said to Derek.

  Derek looked surprised by the offer. He jumped to his feet to follow. “Thanks,” he said as he stuffed down the last bites of his food.

  “See ya,” Adam said to Trevor and Kassie, but neither one paid him any attention since Kassie was scowling at Trevor and he was smiling at her in return.

  “I think it’s time for another try at that mini-golf,” said Jimmy. “Who’s with me?”

  Derek, Adam, and Kevin said yes. Mark waffled.

  “I dunno. I kinda wanted to beat my high score on Ms. Pacman,” he replied.

  “You can do that anytime. I’ve seen you golf and you’re pretty good,” said Jimmy. The compliment was out of character for Jimmy.

  Mark looked at him suspiciously.

  “How are you going to make money off of me playing mini-golf?” Mark asked after some thought.

  Jimmy looked surprised and made a big show. “What? Me? No, you must be mistaken. I just want you to come play a game with us.”

  “Sorry, not buying it,” said Mark. “How are you going to make money off of that?”

  Jimmy looked as if he knew that he was busted, but still smiled with mischief.

  “I was going to bet the other guys which hole you would quit after.”

  Mark considered that for a moment.

  “OK. I’ll play. Which hole do you all think I’ll quit after?” asked Mark, looking at Kevin and Adam.

  “6,” said Kevin.

  “8,” said Adam.

  Derek held up his hands and said, “No idea. Maybe the end?”

  “And how much would you bet on that?” asked Mark.

  “No more than a dollar,” said Adam. “But I didn’t bring any money.”

  “None of us did. We weren’t supposed to,” said Jimmy. “I’ll just keep a total for when we get home.”

  “Are you guys in? Derek, you don’t have to,” said Mark.

  Adam and Kevin agreed.

  Derek said, “Sure, why not. It’s only a dollar.”

  Mark turned to Jimmy. “What’s your bet?”

  “Fifth hole,” said Jimmy.