by Gwenda Bond
James the Third was coming up the hallway toward us, and I felt Maddy and Devin tense. He wore an honest-to-god sweater vest. I hardly expected him to even bother to greet us unless he planned to express his disapproval again.
But he slowed, waiting until we reached him, and gifted me with a grudging nod. “Good work.”
I put my hand over my heart and gave Maddy a light elbow in the ribs. “You might need to catch me. I may faint here.”
The Third rolled his eyes, but he held up his phone so we could see the screen. The browser was open to the Scoop—not my story, but a sidebar that had been Devin’s idea. The teaser encouraged people to post their own bullying stories to demonstrate how common an occurrence it was.
I leaned in to get a better look at the glowing screen, and my mouth dropped open when I saw the number. “Is that a one-zero-zero? Already?”
James angled the screen toward himself, tapped it. “That’s a one-zero-one, because someone just posted a new one. They teased your story on the Daily Planet homepage, so you got Perry’s seal of approval too. Almost all of these are stories are not so different from Anavi’s, thanking her for being willing to come forward. And the Scoop for running it.”
I stepped back, overwhelmed. “Are they all from East Metropolis?”
“Not most,” James said, “but more than I figured. There are even a few others who agree that Butler lets it happen by not doing anything.”
“Anything about the Warheads?” I asked.
“Shhh,” Maddy hissed, but it was too late. Because said Warheads were nearly on top of our small cluster of justice and truth and gutsy reporting. And they would not be mistaken for fans anytime soon.
Gone were the mocking leers and grins, replaced by stone-faces that were somehow worse. They radiated dislike, disapproval, discontent.
No discord, though. They remained too similar for that.
“Creepy,” Maddy whispered.
“Looks like I made myself some enemies.” I sniffed, to show it didn’t bother me. “Not the first time.”
Even though it was unsettling. They were unsettling.
I tried to exile the memories of that shove against my mind in the cafeteria, of the hot explosion in my shoulder in the game.
The Warheads’ synchronized movements slowed, and then stopped, so they were standing in a strange, strained half-circle around us Scoop staffers. But I realized that wasn’t it. There was something about how they positioned themselves. It was . . . tactical.
They were arrayed around all of us, sure, but if I wasn’t mistaken, they were focused on Devin.
The hall had gone silent as an abandoned tomb, people quieting in anticipation of seeing some kind of showdown. I was never one to disappoint. Except maybe my parents.
“You guys didn’t really strike me as big readers,” I said, shifting over toward Devin. “I’m so honored. But, then, it was about you, and you are egomaniacal jerks, so maybe I’m giving you too much credit. What do you think?”
Devin coughed beside me, and when I looked over, he shook his head. Then he did it again, a quick shake, back and forth. Like something was bothering him. I’d seen Anavi do the same thing.
Forget standing tall in front of our audience or the Warheads. The actual scope of Project Hydra, whatever it was, remained a mystery. And so the important thing was to get Devin away from these losers. My story was supposed to stop the madness of targeting Anavi, and push them into giving up more clues about what was going on at the lab in the process—not get someone else put in their jerkhead sights.
Speaking of . . . where was Anavi, anyway?
Lucky for me, Principal Butler decided to put in an appearance. The bell rang and the hall began to clear, and he got a few raised eyebrows as students rushed past him.
He was rumpled, even though it was barely past eight. His suit was wrinkled and tie loosened. Like he’d taken a dozen complaining phone calls already and needed not to feel like he was wearing a noose.
“School board read it too?” I asked before I could stop myself.
Butler directed a furious look my way, but he must have been too angry to speak to me. He said, “My office now,” to the gamers.
He’d be coming for me sooner or later. Probably when there weren’t so many people watching. Even he wasn’t bold enough to collar me here and now.
Though he did finally say, “I’ll be checking your facts, Ms. Lane. You’d better hope they were confirmed,” before herding the gamer Hydra back up the hall toward his office.
Their many heads swiveled to give me . . . and then Devin . . . one last round of unsettlingly similar hard looks.
Devin was still being quiet in a way that I didn’t care for.
“Dev, you in there? I’m out here stealing your dire wolves,” I said.
For a second, there was no hint of a response from him, and even James and Maddy seemed vaguely alarmed.
But he shook his head once more, and then said, “In your elf dreams.” If his voice was flatter than normal, the others pretended not to notice.
I wasn’t always as good at pretending as I wanted to be, not in front of people who mattered to me, and so I towed him in the opposite direction of the principal and the Warheads.
The hall was mostly empty, and I waved away Maddy and James.
“Go on to class, you two,” I said. “I want to ask Devin something.”
They left, but not so happily—until James distracted Maddy by speaking to her.
Maddy’s playlist. I couldn’t forget to listen to it. I wanted to be able to tell her genuinely how much I liked it. I could at least stick to one part of my plan, even if the rest was kaput. The part where I made a friend here.
But right now, there were more pressing matters.
I stared at Devin, knowing that rumors would be flying if anyone saw us, me peering up into his face with my hands on his arms.
“Dev,” I said, “did they do anything to you?”
He looked down at my hands, and then back up, probably noticing the same thing I had about the two of us standing so close. He struck me as in control of his faculties again.
Especially when a half smile crossed his face, and he said, “Why haven’t I asked you if you have a boyfriend? Lois, are you single?”
“Um,” I said. “I think I am.”
He mulled that over, considering me. “That sounds like there’s a guy in the picture already.”
There was a guy in the picture already. But it was complicated, like this whole situation.
Even so, at the thought of SmallvilleGuy, I dropped my hands from Devin’s arms.
“Stop trying to distract me,” I said, partly to change the subject and partly because I was afraid the Warheads had gone after him back there. “Did those guys do anything to you, before?”
“What do you mean?” he said. He made a mini-shrug. “I’m the king. What could they do?”
I didn’t believe him.
But cluing Devin in on my suspicions that the Warheads were involved in some sort of unsavory top-secret research and that he might be in danger of becoming the next target of their group consciousness—well, that would take a little more time than we had before first period. And a lot more evidence.
Unlike Anavi, he wasn’t volunteering any details beyond the ordinary. It was possible the Warheads were messing with me. Possible they hadn’t done anything to Devin to make him so subdued. I wanted him to open up, though.
“Why’d you make your character a fantasy guy, not a mercenary or a soldier or an alien?” I asked.
He ducked his head in—unless I was misreading him—embarrassment. The first time I’d ever seen him less than confident.
“Spill it,” I said, twisting the screws.
“I like reading that stuff, okay?” he said. “Big novels with elves and orcs and dragon
s . . . If you tell anyone, I’ll—”
“Sic your dragon on me? Noted. Promise I won’t tell a soul. But really, these days, isn’t it okay to just let your fantasy freak flag fly?” I stroked my chin. “Oh, wait, you already did. And you put your head on it.”
He laughed, and the remaining tension was broken, any embarrassment gone. But I stayed with him all the way to his first period study hall, only going to my own geometry class afterward.
I’d feel much better when I saw Anavi, and confirmed that she was doing all right. This time, my skill at conspiracy theorizing might be getting the best of me.
Come on, SmallvilleGuy, dig up something else on this company that I can use.
*
The morning was a long one, filled with geometry (teachers would seemingly never learn that hard-selling that we’d need a subject later in life only made it sound more like we wouldn’t) and AP lit (I considered appropriating SmallvilleGuy’s take on Macbeth, for I too liked the witches best). I got a few more thumbs-up and high fives, which I wanted to enjoy, but I hadn’t been able to find Anavi. It was possible her parents had kept her home, but the day before she’d seemed so certain that she wanted me to mention her by name.
That had been before. Before her lunchtime revelations of the desire to slaughter and lay waste to all the worlds in Worlds War Three.
Before the mid-day break, I waited by Anavi’s locker. But if she was here, then she’d gone straight to lunch, so I headed that way.
I had wanted to enter the cafeteria together, in case the Warheads tried anything. I was still in Anavi’s corner.
The Warheads might have been taken to pretentious-office-ville by Principal Rumpled Shark, but they were free now, ensconced at their usual table by the doors. Whatever wrist slapping had occurred, you’d never know it to watch them.
They wore their holosets. I figured there was no danger in crossing close by them on my search for Anavi, given that they were deep in the game.
But they began laughing as I passed, without even turning off the glowing scenes in front of them. A chill passed over me, and I felt that shove against my mind, pushing me away. But more insistent. The pressure lingered.
Not so long, but long enough to make me want to get away from them. And fast.
I sped up, almost careening through the cafeteria. I garnered some “what’s with her?” looks as I half-ran, but I ignored them and went for the back corner and Anavi’s usual table.
She was sitting there, alone, and I was surprised that Maddy and Devin weren’t with her. I’d expected them to be.
But then the two of them rose from a table along my route, and Maddy grabbed my arm. “Don’t,” she said.
“Don’t what?” I asked.
“Go over there,” Devin said.
He still seemed less energetic than normal. But maybe I was imagining it, seeing something that wasn’t there through the lens of my worry.
“She ran us off,” Maddy said. “She was rude about it. I even gave her a word to spell, thinking she was joking at first.”
“Let me try,” I said. “You guys stay here.”
“Your funeral,” Maddy said.
“But I was so young and full of life,” I deadpanned.
I knew the whole deal and they didn’t.
Anavi might not be up to talking to people yet. So I moved toward her slowly, concerned about full troll-slaying mode. Why would Anavi be nasty with Maddy and Devin?
It didn’t make sense. And it wasn’t like her.
I pulled out the chair next to Anavi, who kept staring straight ahead. Sitting down, I put my hand on her arm. “Everything all right?”
“You can’t sit here,” Anavi said, flat, toneless. “Go away.”
“Anavi, talk to me. Are they still bothering you?”
Anavi threw off my hand, kicking back her chair as she stood. “You are the one bothering me.”
She stalked away while I watched her go, gaping.
Devin and Maddy walked the rest of the way over. “Told you,” Maddy said, without a hint of smug.
As Anavi went through the cafeteria, people were pointing and noticing her. Maybe that was all it was. Maybe she hadn’t counted on so much attention.
But another thing I hated was trying to convince myself of something that I felt in my gut was a lie.
CHAPTER 14
I entered the Morgue alone after school, feeling like I’d swallowed the kind of giant boulder that might be used to landscape Devin’s castle. A giant boulder that remained stuck in my throat. I wasn’t in trouble, but I was troubled.
The rest of the day had been more of the same.
I hadn’t been able to return the smiles and high fives, and even the continued posting of testimonials and supportive comments on the Scoop site didn’t break the spell of the worry that weighed me down. I was proud of the story, and I stood behind it, but the point had been to help Anavi out of the dark place she’d been in. Not to isolate her further.
I wished Anavi would talk to me.
The others were already at the office, chattering away and gathered around one of Devin’s giant monitors.
The Scoop site was up on it and visible from all the way across the room.
“Listen to this one,” Devin said, and read aloud from the screen. “‘I could never tell anyone, until I read this story. I thought I was the only one who stopped playing because I was too weak to fight back.’”
He paused before adding his own commentary. “Dude, if I recruited this guy and all the others who mention gaming, I could have the biggest kingdom in Worlds.”
Maddy laughed. “You hide it well, but you are such a nerd.”
“I am not,” Devin countered. But as he spotted me, he amended, “I’m the coolest nerd you know.”
“That’s probably true,” James said, then turned his head in the same direction as Devin, catching sight of me too. “There she is, the girl of the hour.” He raised his voice and called, “Perry, Lois is finally here.”
I hadn’t even noticed that there was a door back in the most dismal corner of the office. But today it was propped open by an old cardboard box and darkened by the shadows around it like the entrance to some missile-toting dragon’s cave. Why did everything in real life suddenly feel as dangerous as in the war game?
“Get in here, Lane!” The shout rang loud and clear from the gaping black maw. Er, door.
The metaphorical boulder lodged in my throat, I didn’t say anything to the others. I answered the boss by walking past them, ready to get reamed.
Perry was a pro. He didn’t read our stories before we filed and posted them, but he did select which ones got linked to on the Daily Planet website. He must have believed the facts were good when he gave the go-ahead for my story to be featured. He might not have had Anavi blow him off, but I suspected that by now he’d sense something was wrong, that the entire story wasn’t known yet.
Or not. When I reached the threshold of the dungeon-like office where Perry waited for me, he was grinning—hardly scary dragon-esque or even intimidating editor-esque. His feet were propped up on a desk as ancient as the ones out front, contrasted by the lightweight laptop open on top of it.
“The newsroom gets noisy,” he said. “Sometimes I come down here, where I can hear myself think. When I’m figuring out a tough story, the quiet helps.”
Like we were equals. Like we were going to swap techniques or something.
Me? Oh, I use my friend from a fringe message board to help me out when I’m up against a tough problem . . . like mind control. Do you believe in mind control? Wait, silly me, I mean psychological coercion. Or it could be a hive mind thing, hard to say.
“Sit.” Perry’s well-shined shoes swung down to the floor, and he waved me forward.
“I’ve been waiting for the other shoe to drop,” I s
aid, relieved to discover my throat was functional.
I took a seat in an oversized wooden chair in front of the desk. The back and arms were coated with dust, but I wasn’t about to complain.
Perry’s grin slipped when he registered what I’d said. “Well, it’s not going to drop right now. I wanted to give you my ‘atta girl, way to go, cub reporter’ speech. You should be riding high on your first story. What’s wrong?”
I ran my index fingers through the film of dust on the chair arms, not meeting his eyes. If I couldn’t tell Devin and Maddy about my suspicions related to the Warheads—and the real reason for my continued worry about Anavi—then I definitely couldn’t tell Perry.
I settled on, “Just . . . today was a little overwhelming. That’s all.”
Perry’s eyes narrowed, and he leaned forward.
Great, I just lied to my editor, a man who’s been nominated for a Pulitzer. Smart.
“Get used to it,” he said. “Your story was solid work, but it’s only a start. You need more. We need more, if the Scoop’s going to prove viable.”
“Yes, sir.” I rubbed the dusty fingertips of each of my hands together.
“Sir? Now I know something’s wrong. But hey, I’m familiar with the type who doesn’t go in for praise. I don’t care that much for it myself. Go. Get back to work. That’s the only thing for reporters like us.”
Like us. I wanted to accept that as the truth, but I’d never been gladder to be dismissed from anyone’s presence. I practically jumped out of the chair.
When I reached the door, Perry said, “Good job, though, Lane. I knew my instincts about you were right.”
Uh-huh. And I’m pretty sure my instincts are also right.
The others had migrated back to their own desks. Devin appeared to be hard at work moderating the ever-lengthening comment thread, but he looked up when I reached him. “Don’t let Anavi’s reaction get you down. I’m sure she’ll be fine tomorrow.”
I grunted in response.
“And don’t worry that we’re feeling lazy,” James said. “Perry already told us we need to pull in another half-dozen stories like that in the next few weeks. No pressure.”