Ari presses his hand to the glass above his head in case the walls are touch-sensitive. Nothing. Far past where we’re standing—flush against the portside wall of the engine room—some random timer is ticking up, reminding us of the seconds that are speeding by: 00:37:20. 00:37.21. 00:37.22.
“Jack,” Ari says, “maybe I was wrong. Maybe we shouldn’t have come here.”
“You think?”
“QUARANTINE IN TWO MINUTES.”
I stop pacing next to Ari. Tired and frustrated, I lean against the glass. As soon as my hand touches its surface, the voice of the AI booms, “WELCOME, JACKSONVILLE GRAHAM.”
At the sound of my name, we all freeze.
“WAIT. JACK GRAHAM? YOU’RE DEFINITELY NOT SUPPOSED TO BE HERE. OR YOU, ARIZONA. UGH, OR YOU, BECKENHAM.”
“Nice to speak to you too, Ship,” Becka says, as if she has one-on-one conversations with it all the time.
“AND YOU’RE CERTAINLY NOT SUPPOSED TO BE ABLE TO ACCESS MY INTERFACE, JACK. HOW DID YOU DO THAT?”
“Your guess is as good as mine,” I say, desperately trying to stay calm. My dad must have done this—must’ve given me this access.
“WELL, YOU CAN BET THAT LOCHNER IS GOING TO HEAR ABOUT—”
“Ship, we don’t have time for this!” I slap the glass with my other hand to emphasize my point.
“HUH,” says the ship. “DUAL AUTHENTICATION ACCEPTED. ADDITIONAL VOICE RECOGNITION REQUIRED FOR SIGNATURE PROTOCOL.” It pauses. “WHAT THE HECK AM I SAYING?”
And the room flickers to life.
Images and graphs appear all around us, some flat against the glass, others as 3D holograms floating between the inner chamber and the outer walls. Numbers made of light shoot out toward the engine room, tracing the outlines of unfamiliar machines. Across from Ari, a detailed diagram of the ship slowly spins, blinking yellow, orange, and red in places where the hull is damaged. A bar graph appears above Becka’s head, displaying the status of the ship’s fuel, water, and oxygen supplies. And, directly in front of me, a detailed and colorful map of the solar system pops up. Toward the middle of the map, close to the biggest planet, a tiny moving blip is moving fast into open space.
Just beneath the spec, a message reads, “Current Location: Jovian Sector 1151.”
“What the . . .” I mumble.
“ADDITIONAL VOICE ALGORITHM CONFIRMED,” the computer responds. “TOUCH AGAIN TO INITIATE SIGNATURE PROTOCOL.”
As quickly as the images appeared, they dissolve like fireworks falling back to the ground, leaving only a single flashing red button on the glass where I’d put my right hand.
My ring beeps with the receipt of a new message. It’s from my dad. “Touch the glass a couple times and then speak a few words.”
I roll my eyes. Perfect timing, as usual.
The ring chimes again.
“I don’t think I’ll be able to reach you after. But I’m sorry. It’s all my fault. I love you and am so proud of you. Be safe. Come home.”
I stare at the words floating in my palm, not even caring that Ari and Becka can see them too. It feels like my heart is going to pound out of my chest. What did you do, Dad? What’s going on?
“Touch it!” Becka urges, reminding me of the ship’s last instructions. “Touch the glass again!”
I move a finger close to the blinking red button. My mind is racing. My dad thinks what is all his fault? Getting fired? This weird attack? Why did it seem like he was saying good-bye to me? And why does he want me to press this button so badly? I feel dizzy.
And I still don’t know if doing what he tells me—trusting him—is actually a good idea.
“QUARANTINE IN ONE MINUTE.”
“Oh fine!” Becka shouts, impatient. She shoves me out of the way and presses the button herself. But nothing happens. She taps the screen again and again. But the button just continues flashing.
“I think it has to be Jack,” Ari tells her.
So before I can think clearly, before I can process everything that’s happening, Becka grabs my hand and slams it against the glass, pressing a finger down on the button.
“Hey!” I shout.
But it’s too late. All of a sudden, the engines shut down. Completely. The room jolts and we all tumble down to the floor.
I don’t think I’ve ever been more terrified. I never should have let Becka come along. If the engines are stopped, then we’re stopped. Before, we were at least running away from whatever was happening near Jupiter. Now we’re sitting ducks. Because of me.
It’s dark all around us, except for a faint glow coming from where the red button had been, replaced now by text: A word and some numbers. It reads, “Protocol 061999.”
And the ship is speaking the same word over and over: “ENGAGE?”
“Great job, Becka!” I yell as we all scramble to our feet. “Now we’ve shut down the engines and destroyed our chances of getting away! Thanks so much for the help!”
“No, that can’t be it!” Becka shouts back. “The computer is still waiting for something.”
As if on cue, the sinister voice returns with its final countdown. “THIRTY. TWENTY-NINE. TWENTY-EIGHT . . .”
The voice continues, one second after the other, as the ship’s computer asks its question again and again: “ENGAGE? ENGAGE? ENGAGE?”
“What does the screen say?” Becka asks.
Ari reads the numbers out loud—“Zero. Six. One. Nine. Nine. Nine.”—as we just stand there. Three stupid kids, in way over our heads. Staring at a random string of numbers, glowing in the dark.
No—not random. “Six. Nineteen. Ninety-nine,” I say. “It’s—it’s my birthday.”
“FIFTEEN. FOURTEEN. THIRTEEN . . .”
If it wasn’t obvious before, it’s staring me in the face now: My dad created this whole secret protocol with me in mind. He was doing something for me. Thinking about me. For months, I’ve felt like all his covert experimenting was selfish. Like, if he really cared about me, he wouldn’t have taken such a ridiculous risk. But maybe it wasn’t all about him. Maybe some part of it was about me too.
“TEN.”
I don’t know what to do. This countdown feels dangerous, but following my dad’s instructions could make things worse instead of better. What if we need to be quarantined? Or, what if I press this button and it blows up the ship? What if, instead of saving us, I destroy us?
“FIVE.”
“ENGAGE?”
“FOUR.”
“ENGAGE?”
“Do something!” Becka screams.
“THREE.”
“ENGAGE?”
The words and voices swirling around me beat in my mind like fists punching me over and over.
“Engage!” Becka calls out desperately, spinning around. “Engage! Engage!”
But the computer won’t listen to Becka.
“TWO.”
“ENGAGE?”
“ONE.”
“ENGAGE?”
I have to make a choice. There’s no more time to think it through. So I lean in close to the glass, as if whispering the word instead of shouting it will somehow make my decision a little less real.
“Engage,” I say.
“ZERO.”
7
“Are we dead?”
Ari’s voice. I open one eye, then another, and watch as Becka tugs hard on Ari’s Einsteinish hair. He snaps his own eyes open and takes his hands off his ears. He looks dizzy, probably from some combination of whatever we just went through and Becka touching him.
“Nope, not dead,” Becka answers, bracing herself against the glass walls as if she’s woozy. “But not perfect either.”
“You guys feel weird too?” I ask, rubbing my temples. I have a massive headache. My vision’s a little blurry.
They nod and I’m glad I’m not the only one. It’s hard to describe, but it felt like, for a tiny moment, life itself went dark. And it was pretty nauseating.
“You ever been to Six Flags Io?” Ari asks Becka.
She glares at him. “Nah. I hate amusement parks.”
“Um, yeah,” Ari says back. “Me too. For sure.”
I shake my head in disapproval. Ari’s family has season passes to Six Flags Io. He had his bar mitzvah party there this year. Which Becka would know if she had bothered to read the invitation he gave her.
“But right now,” Ari adds, “I feel kind of like I do after riding some of the Mach-II coasters. I mean, if I’d ever ridden one.”
Becka’s barely even listening to him. “So what happened? Are we quarantined? Or did you . . . do something?”
I look around. The engines are back up and running and the displays around the room seem to have gone back to normal.
“I don’t know,” I say, pressing a hand to the glass. “Ship?” No answer. “Hello? Ship?”
Nothing.
“Hey,” Ari calls out. “Look at this.”
The hologram of the solar system is as bright as it was before. All of the planets and moons are perfectly positioned. Any kindergartener could label it.
“What?” I ask, leaning in.
But now I see that the map is different in two ways.
“We’re gone,” Ari says flatly. “The dot that shows where we are. It’s gone.”
The text underneath the map is also changed: “Current Location: Unknown.”
***
We’re all freaking out at this point, though none of us will admit it out loud. Becka wants to get back to the cafeteria to check on Diana, and since there’s nothing left for us to do in the engine room, we retrace our steps. We walk in silence, lost in our own heads. But as we step through the second hatch and round the last corner, Ari stops short.
“Shhh,” he snaps, putting a finger to his lips, even though no one said anything.
“What?” I ask. “We’re almost there.”
“You didn’t hear that?”
Ari’s eyes are scanning the floor near the edge of the wall.
“Hear what?” Becka and I ask at the same time.
“There!” Ari points. “No, there!” His head jolts back and forth, like he’s following something darting around in front of him.
“What are you looking at?” Becka yells.
But for the first time since Ari learned to crawl, he ignores her. Instead, grinning from ear to ear, he bolts down the hallway past the entrance to the cafeteria.
As Becka and I watch, Ari’s feet screech against the floor. He leaps into the air and, with hands stretched out in front of him, does a belly flop onto the ground, landing flat on his stomach.
“Oof,” he grunts, flipping over and holding up his hands in triumph. I see a tiny flapping creature wiggling between his closed fingers.
“You’re kidding me,” I say.
“It’s Doctor Shrew!” Ari yells.
He lifts a few fingers, just enough to show off a small furry head.
“Your hamster?” I ask. “I thought Principal Lochner took him away.”
Ari frowns. “No thanks to you.”
So here’s what happened: A few weeks after my dad got fired, I was in a bad place. I stopped studying and doing homework. And, for the first time in my life, I cheated on a test. I mean, it wasn’t a super important test or anything. Just some random pop quiz. But I guess the no-cheating policy pretty much applies across the board. I got caught copying off Diego. And while Principal Lochner was yelling at me in his office, I let slip that Ari had snuck a hamster onboard after Thanksgiving break. I’m not sure why I did it. Maybe I was just looking for a diversion. Maybe I thought that he’d get so mad about the unauthorized pet that he’d forget about my misbehavior.
No such luck. Instead, Doctor Shrew was taken away and kept in Principal Lochner’s office, and I had to retake the test.
“Like I’ve said a hundred times already, I’m sorry for ratting you out, okay?”
I really wanted to say, “I’m sorry for hamstering you out.” But I’ve used the joke before and Ari isn’t a fan.
“Whatever,” Ari says, peeking into his hands. “His cage must’ve gotten knocked over when we were attacked. And he bolted his way to freedom!”
Becka moves closer to Ari. “He’s so cute!” she says, petting the Doctor’s back. Ari’s in heaven.
Doctor Shrew jumps out of Ari’s hands, landing on Becka’s shoulder. “And I think he likes me!” she squeals.
Ari sighs like a balloon losing air.
“Why don’t we talk more about the hamster after we’ve figured out what’s going on?” I suggest.
“Right,” Ari says. “Good idea.” He grabs Doctor Shrew and tucks him into his front shirt pocket.
It’s no use trying to sneak back into the cafeteria unnoticed. We either saved the day somehow (which means that leaving without permission will probably be forgiven) or we didn’t save anything (which means that we’ve probably got bigger problems). So we just walk up to the doors, wait for them to slide open automatically, and step through.
Becka gasps.
Everyone’s gone. The students, the teachers. Everyone.
Ari’s eyes are wide. “They left us,” he says to me. “You were right. We never should have wandered off.”
Which doesn’t make me feel any better.
I try to be mad at Ari for not listening to me earlier, but I only end up feeling mad at myself. I didn’t have to let Ari convince me to go to the engine room.
So I try being mad at Becka for pressuring me into engaging the protocol, but that doesn’t work either. I made the call, in the end. And not even because I thought it would save us. Mainly because it had felt so good, for a split second, to believe my dad was looking out for me. Thinking about me. Protecting me.
Which was stupid. Kid stuff. And that’s on me.
We walk into the center of the quiet room. The lighting is back to normal, so we can see that everything’s still a mess, with tables and chairs and juice boxes scattered all over the floor.
“Relax,” says Becka in a shaky, anything-but-relaxed voice. She opens her palm and tries to use her ring to “Text Diana,” but the ring glows red. No service.
I try my ring too. Nothing.
“They probably evacuated before the countdown ran out,” Ari says. He’s panicking, talking faster and faster. “Who even knows where they are now? Who even knows where we are? With comms down? And they would’ve taken all the shuttles—we’re trapped here by ourselves . . .”
“We don’t know that for sure,” I say, trying to convince myself that everything’s going to be okay, even though it’s not. “Maybe they’re somewhere else on the ship.”
“Should we go check?” Becka asks hopefully. “Go see if the shuttles are still here?”
I nod. “Good idea. Maybe they only headed down to the hangar bay but haven’t actually left yet, and we can still catch them.”
Of course, if five minutes is enough time for us to go to the engine room and come back, it’s enough time for everyone else to have evacuated the ship. I may not want to believe it, but I’m not delusional. We’ve been left all alone.
“Don’t . . . move . . .”
Almost.
The unfamiliar voice is raspy, like an old man’s. It came from behind me. A red laser bolt—a warning shot, I think—darts past us, inches to the left of Ari’s sleeve. It strikes the wall on the opposite end of the room and burns a hole straight through to the other side.
“Put your finger-bunches in the air,” the stranger says, “or be fired upon.”
We do as we’re told despite the fact that this guy just called hands “finger-bunches.” But as Ari lifts up his arms, Doctor Shrew—who’s always had trouble staying in one place for long—starts clawing his way up and out of Ari’s pocket. Ari’s short, but for the tiny hamster, a four-foot jump would be like me diving off a four-story building. So—on an understandable but totally idiotic instinct—Ari jerks his hand down to push Doctor Shrew back into his pocket, violating the “don’t move” order.
An
d we hear what sounds like the charge-up of a gun echo around the room.
“Whoops,” is all Ari has time to say, before the gun fires three shots—one for Ari, the second for Becka, the third for me.
A sizzling pain hits me in the back, just underneath my shoulders. It spills outward, up my neck, down my legs, out to my fingers. My whole body goes numb as I slump down to the floor, twisted into a pretzel. And my vision explodes with bright colors—purple, pink—before fading to black.
The last thing I see is Doctor Shrew scampering off, bolting his way to freedom.
8
“Jack? Jaaaaack!”
“You’ll never wake him up like that.”
I can hear them. Sort of. It’s like I’m in a pool underwater and they’re yelling at me from the deck. Not that I’ve ever been in a real pool, except during swim competitions at St. Andrew’s.
“Maybe you’re right,” someone replies, shaking me a little. “But what else am I supposed to do? Jack! Hey, Jack! Hey—wait! Look, he’s getting up. See? His hands are moving!”
“His hands are twitching. Not the same.”
“Fair point.”
Ari? Yes! That’s Ari’s voice! Of course! It all makes sense now. I must be asleep! This whole thing has been a bad dream and I’m just lying in bed, having a hard time waking up. There’s no attack. No engine room. No laser guns. I probably blew through my alarm and Ari’s come back from class to get me. Or—even better—maybe it’s Sunday, and I’ve slept till noon, and Ari wants to play video games.
“My turn,” she says. Wait. No. That’s Becka’s voice. And the only way that Ari and Becka would be hanging out together is if we were in one of his dreams. “Pass me the water.”
I’m trying to open my eyes, trying to say something, but my body still won’t cooperate.
“Wake up!” Becka shouts, as I’m smacked in the face with a blast of ice-cold water, which—gotta hand it to her—works like a charm. The water is so freezing that I snap my eyes open and sit bolt upright.
Becka is standing over me, holding this weird, jagged, purply bucket. “Told you,” she says smugly to Ari.
Seventh Grade vs. the Galaxy Page 4