Jodi snapped her fingers. “The public library!” she said. “This morning, I saw Doc taking equipment over there. She must have relocated the computers.”
“Including the server we use to play Minecraft,” said Theo. “And the VR goggles—they’re gone, too.”
“We should go across the street and see for ourselves,” said Po. “We can go right now!”
Morgan felt a little better now that he knew where the computers had gone. He sometimes teased his sister when she acted like a spy, but she was good at noticing things that other people missed. “Jodi and I should call our parents first,” he said. “We need permission to leave school grounds.”
Harper took out her smartphone. She was the only one of them who had one. “We can all take turns calling our parents,” she said, handing the phone to Morgan first. “But hurry. I want answers as soon as possible!”
Morgan agreed with that, one hundred percent.
* * *
Excalibur County Library and Media Center was a large concrete building right across the street from Woodsword Middle School. Morgan had come here with his family almost every weekend when he was younger. They would go to story times and puppet shows and leave with stacks of picture books.
And no visit to the library was complete without a quick stop at the statue out front. It was Morgan’s favorite kind of statue—one you were allowed to touch! It was a model of a sword in a stone, just like the famous Excalibur of Arthurian legend. Because of the statue, and because Excalibur County Library and Media Center was such a mouthful, kids had always just called the place Stonesword Library.
Morgan touched the statue for good luck as he walked past.
As soon as they stepped inside, they saw two familiar figures standing in the lobby.
Ms. Minerva, their homeroom teacher, was talking with their science teacher, Dr. Culpepper. They were Morgan’s favorite teachers, but they didn’t always see eye to eye. In fact, Morgan quickly realized, they were having an argument right now.
“Absolutely not, Doc!” said Ms. Minerva. “Not here. The library is my happy place!”
“I only want to make it happier!” said Doc. “Don’t be so afraid of progress, Minerva.”
Morgan desperately wanted to run up and ask Doc what was going on with the computer lab. Ms. Minerva might know, too. She was the only adult who knew all about the Evoker King, and she had even helped them on some of their Minecraft adventures. For a grown-up, she was a whiz at gathering resources.
But Morgan knew better than to interrupt when adults were in the middle of whatever it was that adults found to get so upset about.
“You’ve already turned Woodsword into your own personal high-tech wonderland,” Ms. Minerva said to Doc. “The lockers are secured with biometric locks, the overhead lights are controlled by whistling, and the coffee maker chats about the weather while it brews.” Ms. Minerva rubbed her temples. “And the coffee isn’t even very good!”
“Those are all wonderful innovations,” Doc argued. “I refuse to apologize for making Woodsword the most technologically advanced school in the district. And I certainly won’t apologize about the coffee. Coffee always tastes terrible, and you drink too much of it. How many cups did you have today?” Doc leaned forward and sniffed loudly. “I smell at least five cups on your breath.”
Ms. Minerva gasped. “How dare you?!”
Beside Morgan, Theo chuckled. “Wow, this is entertaining,” he said. “I should have brought some popcorn.”
Morgan didn’t think it was funny, though. Watching the teachers argue made him feel anxious.
“You forgot to sign in,” said a voice. Morgan turned to see a man holding a clipboard. He was an adult, but obviously younger than the teachers. He wore colorful sneakers that matched his necktie.
For a moment, Morgan worried that they were in trouble. But the man smiled as he handed Morgan the clipboard. “You’re Woodsword students, right? Just sign in here, and then you’re free to explore.”
“Thanks,” Morgan said, signing his name to the sheet. “I’ve never been here without my parents.”
“And we haven’t been here at all in at least a year,” said Jodi. “We mostly use the school library these days.”
The man’s eyes went wide. “Then you’ll need the tour. A lot has changed here in the last year.” He took the clipboard back when they’d all signed it, and he shook it gently. “This will have to change next. I mean, a sign-in sheet for the computer room on a clipboard just feels so old-fashioned, don’t you agree? Hopefully Doc can help us with that.”
“Does Doc work here?” asked Harper.
“Not officially,” said the librarian. “But she’s helping us upgrade some of our equipment.”
Morgan snuck a look at Doc. She and Ms. Minerva were still in the lobby, waving their arms in the air as they talked loudly.
“Someone should probably shush them,” said the man. “But I’m not that kind of librarian.” He smiled. “My name is Mr. Malory. I’m the new media specialist. Let me show you around.”
Mr. Malory took them on a brief tour. Morgan thought he knew what to expect—books, and a lot of them. But there were also vinyl records, DVDs, and even video games!
Harper ran ahead to look at a bulky electronic object. “Is this a 3D printer?” she asked.
“It is!” said Mr. Malory. “You’ll be using it for some of your STEM projects this year. And look over here.” He pointed through a large window, into a room where a teenager with a VR helmet sat at a computer with a steering wheel attached to it. “This is our driver’s education room. We only have one device so far, but I hope to expand it.”
Po made a high-pitched sound of pure joy. “VR can teach me how to drive? Sign me up!”
Mr. Malory chuckled. “Not until you’re older, I’m afraid. That room is strictly for teens.”
Jodi grinned at Po. “By the time we’re teenagers, they’ll probably be able to beam the driver’s manual directly into our brains.”
“You might be right,” said Mr. Malory. “Technology is changing at a rapid pace. And educators like me need to keep up with those changes.”
“I couldn’t have said it better myself,” said a familiar voice. Doc approached the group, grinning from ear to ear. “Mr. Malory and I are going to bring this building into the twenty-first century!”
“There’s nothing wrong with this place as it is,” said Ms. Minerva, who trailed behind Doc. “And there isn’t enough space to make all the changes you want to make.”
“There will be plenty of room if we digitize more of the books,” said Doc. She waved an electronic tablet under Ms. Minerva’s nose. “I have a whole library’s worth of books on this tiny device! There’s no reason to have shelves and shelves of books taking up space.”
“There is every reason in the world to make room for books,” said Ms. Minerva. “Especially in a library.” She closed her eyes and took a big, deep breath. “For one thing, a library should smell like books. I love that smell. Don’t you?”
Doc took a sniff of the air…and promptly sneezed into her sleeve. “I’m allergic to dust,” she said.
Mr. Malory stepped forward. “Don’t worry, Ms. Minerva,” he said. “The books aren’t going anywhere.”
Ms. Minerva nodded. “That’s all I wanted to hear. I know I can trust you to keep Stonesword special.” She turned to the kids. “Mr. Malory here was my student not too many years ago. I had a feeling he would grow up to be a librarian.”
Mr. Malory cleared his throat. “Technically, I’m a media specialist.”
Ms. Minerva grinned at the kids. “I’ve always preferred to be called a ‘librarian,’ personally.”
Morgan grinned back. When Ms. Minerva played Minecraft, she wore a modified villager skin and called herself the Librarian.
“That remi
nds me. I think I know which technological innovation these students are looking for,” said Ms. Minerva. And she pulled a familiar VR headset from her duffel bag.
Morgan felt a rush of relief. That VR headset wasn’t just an average piece of equipment. Doc had upgraded it with cutting-edge technology. There were only six of them in the entire world!
“I’m so glad to see this,” Morgan said, taking the headset as soon as Ms. Minerva offered it to him.
“I almost forgot in all the excitement,” said Jodi. “But what exactly happened to the computer lab?”
Ms. Minerva raised an eyebrow and looked at Doc. “Yes, Doc,” she said. “Why don’t you fill us in?”
“Okay, so, technically, that’s my fault,” said Doc. “I left the lid off a terrarium over the weekend.”
“Right,” said Po, tapping his chin. “The terrarium. It all makes sense now.” He leaned over to Harper and whispered, “What’s a terrarium?”
“It’s like an aquarium,” Harper said. “But without the water.”
“Right you are,” said Doc. “And this particular terrarium was full of caterpillars. The little things escaped and got everywhere.”
“Doc didn’t want to disturb the caterpillars—especially when they started spinning their cocoons,” said Mr. Malory. “So she asked if she could move the computers here. Now Woodsword has its very own butterfly sanctuary, and Stonesword will be hosting a few of Doc’s classes and after-school activities.”
“I hope you know what you’re in for,” said Ms. Minerva. “Doc is brilliant. But chaos follows wherever she goes.”
“That’s unkind, Minerva,” said Doc. “You shouldn’t say such things in front of Mr. Malory.”
“It’s the truth!” said Ms. Minerva. “Or did you miss the morning announcements today, when your AI newscaster gave advice on how to make bigger, wetter spitballs?”
“It’s news the kids care about!” Doc replied defensively.
“I can’t listen to any more of this,” said Ms. Minerva. She handed the duffel bag of headsets to Morgan and stormed out. “I need a real cup of coffee.”
“We’re not done…discussing!” said Doc, running after her.
Mr. Malory sighed.
“Maybe I should have shushed them after all,” he said with a mischievous grin.
“They disagree a lot,” said Jodi. “But that felt especially intense.”
Morgan gripped his headset to his chest. “Mr. Malory?” he asked. “Are we allowed to use the computers from the Woodsword computer lab?”
“Of course,” said the media specialist. “Doc has everything set up and ready to go.”
Morgan breathed a sigh of relief. It felt like everything around him was changing faster than he could handle.
But there was one place they could go where everything made sense: Minecraft!
Jodi always felt a thrill when she opened her eyes and saw Minecraft’s Overworld spread out before her in glorious 3D. It was a just as real as the real world—a virtual space that she could touch.
But there was a twinge of disappointment this time, too. Because she saw the rolling hills, blocky trees, swaying flowers, and shining square of sun…but she didn’t see her friend Ash.
Ash Kapoor was an important part of their Minecraft squad. She was a scout, a natural leader, and a good listener. Things hadn’t been quite the same since she’d moved away.
They kept in touch. Ash had even taken the sixth headset with her so she could join them in the game world from time to time. But they’d had a hard time making that happen. Ash was busy in her new home, and her school wasn’t on the same schedule as Woodsword.
Jodi missed her friend.
“What’s that over there?” Harper asked. “Is that a camel?”
“You’d better get your vision checked, Harper,” Po said, teasing. “I’m not a camel. I’m a butterfly!”
Po liked to change his avatar’s skin every few days. Today, in honor of the cocoons in the old computer lab, he was trying out a butterfly skin.
But Harper hadn’t been talking about Po. “Not you,” she said. “Up there, on the hill. Look!”
Jodi turned to see what Harper had spotted. It was a huge, animal-shaped concrete sculpture atop the nearest hill. A small stream of water fell from its mouth to form a river in the grass. Jodi recognized Ash’s handiwork immediately.
“It’s a llama,” Jodi said, smiling. “It’s even sort of spitting like a llama, see?”
“It looks more like it’s drooling,” said Po.
“Still, it’s pretty cool,” said Morgan. “Ash must have made that.” He turned to Jodi. “It’s her way of saying hi to you, Jodi. She knows how much you love llamas.”
Jodi’s heart swelled. It was the best sorry-I-missed-you present she could imagine.
Theo, on the other hand, was too occupied with Evoker King to even look at the statue. “I can’t believe it,” he said glumly. “The Evoker King is still solid stone.”
Jodi looked the Evoker King over from top to bottom. Theo was right. The King hadn’t changed at all. He hadn’t moved an inch since the day he’d turned to stone. They were no closer to understanding what had happened to him, or why.
“Well, He has to change back eventually,” said Po. “Doesn’t he?”
Harper shrugged her blocky shoulders. “It’s impossible to say. We just don’t have enough data.”
“Well, we can’t stay here much longer,” said Morgan. “We’ve been in this spot for ages, hoping that whatever happened to E.K. is temporary.”
Po realized that Morgan was right. They’d been spawning in the same area for a while, afraid of leaving the Evoker King behind. Of course, they’d still had plenty of fun. Po got to try out new skins and role-play different characters. Jodi got to make sculptures. Harper was happy as long as they had materials to mine, and Morgan was happy as long as there were hostile mobs to fight.
The monstrous mobs were endless. They always appeared when the sun went down. But Po and his friends were having a harder time finding good materials in the caverns below their feet. They had mined most of the good stuff. All that was left in the area was stone and dirt.
“I think it’s time to go,” said Harper. “If we want to gather new resources, we need to move on.”
Jodi’s jaw dropped. “But we can’t leave him!” she said. “We had just convinced him to be our friend. How would he feel if he woke up and realized we had abandoned him?”
Harper rubbed her chin. “Okay. So what if we take him with us?” she suggested.
Po made a show of trying to push the Evoker King over. “He’s really heavy,” he said.
“Hm.” Theo squinted. “Stuff in Minecraft doesn’t really have weight, though. So how can he be heavy?” He poked the statue. “I think it’s more likely that he’s fixed in place. He’s part of the scenery now. But maybe we could move him…”
“With a Silk Touch tool!” said Morgan.
“What’s that?” asked Jodi.
“It’s an enchantment,” her brother answered in his geeking-out voice. “If you enchant a tool with Silk Touch, you can remove a fixed item without breaking it. You sort of just…knock it loose.” He turned to Harper and Po. “What do you two think?”
“I think it’s worth a try,” said Harper.
“The Evoker King should fly free,” Po said, dramatically fluttering his digital wings. “Like me!”
Morgan rolled his square eyes at Po’s butterfly voice, but Jodi giggled.
“So we’ll craft a Silk Touch pickaxe so we can move him,” said Theo. “Then we can put him on a mine cart, lay down some rails, and take him to our next base of operations.”
“I like it!” said Jodi. “Good plan, Theo.”
Theo smiled brightly. “Thanks.”
“We should hav
e everything we need for the enchantment,” said Harper. She ran into the small building where they kept their beds and their chests full of resources. They called it the Shack. When she came back, she set an enchanting table down on the grass and held out a shining blue rock. “I was hoping we’d find a good use for this lapis lazuli.”
“Ooh, pretty,” said Jodi.
“Pretty…and powerful,” said Harper. “Lapis lazuli can provide the energy needed for an enchantment.”
Morgan set a smelter next to the enchanting table. “We’ve mined a lot of iron ore lately,” he said. “We should smelt it all into ingots. We’ll need those for the mine cart and rails.”
“I’ll go get the ore,” Po said, fluttering into the Shack.
“And I’ll provide the pickaxe,” said Theo. He held out an iron tool. “Here you go, Harper. Go ahead and work your magic.”
It only took a moment. Harper fed the blue lapis to the enchanting table. There was a burst of light, and Theo’s pickaxe shone with the power of the enchantment.
“I guess I’ll do the honors,” Theo said. He approached the Evoker King. He gripped his pickaxe, lifted it above his head…and swung.
Where the pickaxe struck the stone, a crack appeared.
“Stop!” said Morgan.
“That doesn’t look good,” said Jodi.
Theo took a step back. His eyes were fixed on the Evoker King, and on the small crack in his stony skin.
As they watched, that crack began to grow. And glow…
Po stepped out of the Shack in time to see the Evoker King splitting apart.
Po was usually quick with a joke. He didn’t take many things seriously. Even when Minecraft got scary, he usually remembered that it was a game.
But this wasn’t funny. What if the Evoker King crumbled to dust before their very eyes? What if their new friend was just…shattered?
Crack in the Code! (Minecraft Stonesword Saga #1) Page 2