“You hungry?”
Maia shrugged, but didn't open her eyes. “I could eat.”
“Dining Hall?”
The thought of going out again made her cringe, but she tried not to show it. “Ugh. Mystery meat? No thanks.”
Tessa hummed in thought. “Pizza?” she picked up her phone, waving it with a grin.
Maia sat up, eager to forget the day's events in a haze of cheese and pepperoni.
“Now you're talking.”
Maia didn't speak to Miranda for a couple days, but as Christmas break drew closer by the hour, she found herself wondering what she could do. She couldn't afford to fly home, and the letter from Housing said she had to vacate her dorm room by the time they closed for the holidays. She'd tried to plead her case with the University, but there was just no other on-campus housing available. They apologized and put her on a waiting list, but other than that, said there was nothing else that could be done.
The only people she knew in town were Tessa, who'd be leaving soon, and Miranda—and by extension, Miranda's crazy friends. She'd pulled out her phone countless times, wanting to text her cousin—or hoping Miranda would text her, but neither had happened. She didn't know if Miranda may have felt guilty for freaking her out—scaring her half to death, honestly—or maybe she wanted to give Maia some much needed space. In any case, Maia wouldn't be the one to break radio silence.
She made it through her last final and headed up the stairs to Professor Kennedy's office with a sigh. She was tired. Sleep eluded her lately, marred by strange dreams she couldn't remember when she awoke. Muffling a yawn, she knocked lightly on the professor's door frame, drawing his attention from a paper he was marking up with swift strokes of a ball point pen. Professor Joseph Kennedy was the fulfillment of every stereotype of the typical professor, from the graying temples and horn-rimmed glasses, to the suede elbow patches on the tweed blazer hanging off the back of his chair.
“Ms. Sheridan, this is a surprise,” he said, straightening the stack of papers and setting it aside. “I'd assumed all the students had already fled for the holidays.”
She smiled, despite the panic his words set aflutter in her stomach. “Soon. I was just hoping to catch you before you left. Do you have a moment?”
He motioned to the seat in front of the desk. “Of course. What can I do for you?”
Maia slid into the chair and dug in her backpack for her copy of The Order journal. “I was hoping you could help me with some translation,” she said, sliding the papers across the desk. “Or maybe direct me to someone who can? I don't really recognize some of the dialects in this document and I'd like to . . .” She paused when she realized he was eyeing the journal with something akin to surprise, his face several shades paler than the moment before, his posture rigid and tense. “Professor?” she prodded. “Is everything all right?”
He started, shaking his head slightly. “Of course,” he said, clearing his throat when it came out as a bit of a croak. He reached out tentatively and slid the stack of papers toward him, turning the pages slowly. “Where did you find this?”
“Microfiche,” she said, suddenly unsure of what she should say. “It seems to be a journal of some kind. I was thinking I might use it for my final paper. From what I've been able to make out, it seems like a pretty interesting resource.”
“Interesting,” he murmured. “Yes, that it is.”
She leaned forward a little bit, curiosity winning out over caution. “Can you tell me anything about it? Where it came from?”
He ran a finger over a line of text, silent for a moment.
“What led you to this document?” he asked quietly, his eyes lifting to scrutinize her carefully.
An odd choice of words, she thought, as an unexpected chill ran down her spine. “Led me to it?”
He simply waited, watching her, and for a moment she considered telling him about the whole thing—about her cousin asking her about a symbol on an old chest, about the bizarre story her friends told her . . . about super powers and quests and fights to save the world.
Ridiculous.
She could almost convince herself of that.
Maia swallowed and looked down at the journal, unable to meet his eyes for some reason. “Nothing led me to it,” she said with a shrug. “I was looking through some old microfiche, trying to figure out a subject for my final. You said we needed to focus on a person or group of people that had a significant influence on society through at least three generations.” She was babbling now, unable to stop. “And I came across the journal and got curious about this Order and who they were and what they did, and why this journal seemed to have been handed down for centuries. It seemed like it might be a good resource for my paper.”
She looked up at him finally, forcing a smile. “If I can figure out what it says.”
His eyes narrowed slightly and she had the strangest feeling that he didn't believe her. That he knew there was more to it than that. But instead of calling her on it, he nodded slowly.
“I actually am familiar with this,” he said, running a finger idly across the paper. “I'd be happy to help you with your research.” He tapped the paper once then flipped the stack closed and handed it to her before opening a drawer and withdrawing a business card. He turned it over and scribbled on the back.
“I will be checking my university email periodically over the break,” he said, “but it will be easier to reach me with my personal account. I'm giving you my cell number as well, but it will probably be easier to communicate via email. The cell service can be pretty spotty around my house.”
Maia reached for the card he held out to her. “I assumed you lived in town.”
He stood to put some files into a satchel. “About twenty miles north. We have a little place—a gentlemen's farm, I suppose you'd call it. My wife prefers country living.”
“Sounds nice.” Miranda tucked the card into her pocket.
He slipped on his jacket. “I'm afraid I have to leave,” he said. “But call or email me when you're ready and we can figure out a time to meet.”
“Really? Over break?” she asked, surprised.
Professor Kennedy slung his satchel over his shoulder and crossed the room to open the door for her. “We have a lot to cover,” he replied. “And in this case, I'd say time is of the essence.” He stared at her, unblinking for a moment, as if he were trying to send her a silent message.
Maia broke eye contact, the nerves and panic rearing their ugly heads once again. “Thank you,” she muttered as she left his office and all but ran down the stairs. Her instinct told her Professor Kennedy knew more—a lot more—than she had thought he might. And she wasn't all that sure she wanted to hear what he had to say.
The darkness seemed thick, somehow, reaching out and sliding over her skin. She couldn't see through it, and reached up to sweep a hand in front of her, almost expecting the gloom to swirl away before her eyes. It didn't, instead it clung to her, an almost physical presence.
Maia trudged forward, unable to see the mud beneath her feet, although she could hear and feel the squelching beneath her. She didn't know where she was going, only that she had to keep walking.
An unfamiliar voice shouted behind her and Maia whirled, jarred by the sudden change in her surroundings. She now stood in the middle of a clearing, surrounded by trees, with people stumbling and screaming around her.
Fighting. They were fighting.
“Run, Maia!”
Chloe tugged on her arm, dragging her forward as she watched something over Maia's shoulder with wide, frantic eyes.
Maia looked back to find a column of smoke whirling like a tornado behind them. It reached to the sky, fingers of blackness twisting out and streaming through lightning-laced clouds.
“What is that? Is there a fire?” she asked.
Chloe yanked her behind a tree. “You've got to do it,” she said. “Do it now, Maia!”
“Do what? I don't know what's going on.”
&n
bsp; “We're running out of time!” Chloe grabbed her shoulders, shaking them.
Maia pulled away. “I don't know what you want from me!” She turned to run, only to find the smoke pillar right behind her. She spun back around, but Chloe was nowhere to be found— there was only a barren landscape filled with smoke and flying debris.
“Help!” she shouted, her voice barely audible above the now raging wind. Bits of debris and dirt swirled around her, stinging her cheeks as her hair twisted and tangled across her eyes. She stumbled forward, unsure of where she was going, one step at a time.
There. She could see . . . something—a house, barely visible through the storm. She staggered forward, arm held up to shield her eyes as much as possible. The house loomed in the distance, blue with a peaked roof and white front porch—a refuge from the storm raging around her. She tripped over something in her path and fell to a knee, pain shooting up her leg and across her palm as she scraped it on a rock.
Or was it a rock?
Maia blinked and the storm was gone. No trees. No dirt or smoke. Just a quiet night on an unfamiliar street. She knelt on a sidewalk, apparently after tripping on the curb, her palm stinging, but not bleeding from catching her fall on the cement
“What the—”
She got to her feet, a chill seeping through her, and she realized she was barefoot, dressed only in the t-shirt and flannel pants she'd worn to bed—
Bed. A dream. Good lord, she'd been sleepwalking.
Rubbing her bare arms, she turned in a slow circle to try and figure out exactly where she was. It was an ordinary street in an ordinary neighborhood. In the distance to her right, she could hear multiple sirens, but where she was, everything was quiet, the streetlights casting a golden glow on the sidewalk. She shivered, still unsettled by her dream, and considered her next course of action. Maybe she could knock and ask to use a phone. It was the middle of the night, but maybe someone would take pity on a half-dressed, freaked out sleepwalker. She turned to focus on the house before her and froze.
A blue house with a peaked roof and a white front porch.
The house from her dream.
She stumbled back off the curb and bumped into a car. A police car, she realized when she turned around, still in shock.
Perfect.
The officer rolled down the window. “You all right, miss?”
“Umm . . .” She swept her hair back from her face, trying to calm her racing heart, and determinedly not looking back at the house. “I guess I've been sleepwalking,” she admitted, flexing her toes on the cold asphalt. “I don't suppose you could give me a ride back to campus?”
“Sure,” he said. “Get in.”
She sat huddled in the back of the squad car, only half-listening to the cop talking about some incident in town. Maia had never sleepwalked before. Never had trouble sleeping or even had such a vivid dream, to be honest. She couldn't understand what was wrong with her.
“—out by yourself at night. It’s not safe.” The cop caught her eye in the rearview mirror and she scrambled to try and make sense of what he was saying.
“I'm sorry?”
He shook his head as if to mourn the existence of young people in an otherwise sane world.
“I said, with all the trouble in town lately, it's really not safe for you to be out alone at night.”
Instead of arguing that she was perfectly capable of taking care of herself—which she had to admit might be hard to prove, given that she was walking around in her pajamas—her curiosity won out.
“What kind of trouble?” she asked.
“You haven't heard?”
“Guess I've been a little busy, you know, with finals and everything.”
“And you haven't heard about the problems we've been having?” He shook his head again, muttering almost to himself. “Media's falling down on the job again.” He glanced back at her. “It's been a weird couple months. It started out with stupid stuff—fist fights, minor property damage, more domestic disturbances than usual. But it's been escalating lately. We've had a few near riots this week and nobody can figure out why.”
“Is it gangs?”
He laughed. “In Gatesburg? No . . . nothing like that. That's what's so weird. The people getting in trouble are just normal people. PTA moms and businessmen and teenagers who we've never had problems with before. I don't get it.” He rubbed his jaw, thinking to himself, before he stopped at a red light.
“Anyway, nothing you need to worry about. We have everything under control.” He turned around, his arm across the back of the seat and his wristwatch clicked against the grate separating the front of the car from the back.
“I just want you to understand that you shouldn't be out at night. At least not until everything gets back to normal around here. Gatesburg is usually a nice, quiet town.”
“That's what they always say in the movies before everything goes to pieces,” Maia said dryly.
The cop laughed. “Yeah, well, luckily it's not that exciting around here. I'm sure this will all blow over soon.”
Maia directed him to her dorm, and he stopped at the rear entrance and rounded the car to open the back door for her.
“Well, thank you for the ride,” Maia said as she got out.
“No problem,” he replied with a salute. “You have a good night.”
“Thank you.” Maia hurried up the walk, and he watched to make sure she unlocked the front door before he drove away. She entered quietly, but the dorm was silent, and she tiptoed back to her room and dove under the covers, wrapping herself in the blankets as she tried to warm up. Whether it was the cold temperature outside, the disturbing nightmare, or the odd feeling she got as the police officer told her what was happening in Gatesburg, she wasn't sure.
It took a long time for her to fall back to sleep.
The next afternoon, Maia sat dejectedly on her bed, hugging her knees to her chest and staring unseeingly at Tessa's old bed across the room. The sheets and pillows were gone, only a few stray pieces of blue sticky tack on the wall marked the places where her numerous posters and photos had decorated the plain white walls. She'd left two hours ago to catch her flight and Maia had spent the time since scanning the Internet for a place to live, to no avail.
Her grumbling stomach and lack of anything edible in the mini-fridge finally forced her to put on shoes and head down to the dining hall for something to eat. The lines were short for the last meal before Christmas break, but she paused briefly to scan the bulletin board hanging by the door, hoping the perfect housing option would miraculously appear pinned to the corkboard.
Nothing.
She let out a huge, self-indulgent sigh and the papers fluttered a little in front of her. Maia was about to turn on her heel and head in for some food, but the corner of a flyer caught her eye. It had been hidden by another poster but she could just see the corner of a phone number peeking out. She moved the poster aside and found a flyer for a room for rent near campus. All of the phone number slips had been ripped off except one, which gave her pause. Most likely, it was an old flyer and all of the rooms were already rented. Still, she ripped off the last number with a tiny surge of hope, and took out her phone to call.
Then she froze, a chill running down her spine. With trembling fingers, she lifted the poster covering the flyer and pushed it aside, revealing the picture of the house with the room for rent.
A blue house with a peaked roof.
“No,” she whispered, ripping the flyer off the bulletin board, unable to believe what she was seeing.
But it was real. It was the house she'd dreamed of. The same house she'd sleepwalked to in the middle of the night.
She stood staring at the image printed on the paper, wishing she'd never seen it. Something strange—very strange—was going on. And Maia was quickly realizing that there was no escaping it.
She clenched her fist, crumpling the flyer in her hand, and walked out of the dining hall, her appetite gone. Wandering around campus in a daz
e, she eventually found herself in front of the library and sat on a bench out front, tugging her coat even tighter around her.
After a while, she took a deep breath and put the flyer on her lap, smoothing the creases out so she could see the house more clearly. There was no doubt in her mind that it was the same house. But what did it mean?
She swallowed, took out her phone, and dialed.
“And the kitchen's through here,” the landlord said, leading her through the house. Once Maia had made the decision to call, she pressed to view the house that same evening. When the landlord had given her the address, any doubts she'd had that the house was the one she'd sleepwalked to had vanished, not that there were many to begin with.
Remarkably, when she stood in front of the blue Victorian, instead of fear and anxiety, she'd felt only a sense of resolution—of inevitability. It was as if everything had been leading to that moment, and she only had to accept it.
Not that she had much choice, with the proof standing in front of her, all two stories and leaded glass windows and peaked roof of it.
Of course, the fact the house was cute was a bonus, and as soon as the landlord started the tour, Maia knew she wanted to live there. She could see evidence of the house's other occupants—an open textbook on the dining room table, a couple bowls drying in a rack next to the sink—but her potential roommates seemed to be out at the moment.
The landlord led her upstairs. “Two rooms are occupied, but you have your choice of the two down there—” he pointed over the handrail to the hall off the kitchen—”or this one.” He swung open a door and Maia's breath caught as soon as she walked through it. It wasn't anything special, not really. Just a small room with a single bed, a matching dresser, a small desk, and a tiny closet. But the view through the octagonal window over the bed drew her to it immediately. In the distance, the peak of Mt. Butler gleamed white against the blue sky, and she knew this room was hers.
“I'll take it,” she murmured.
Super Powers: The New Super Humans, Book Two Page 9