Bounders (10 page)

I squeeze my eyes shut and drift in the thrill of the speed and the steady current of air against my skin.

We slide into an awkward pile in the chute trough. Cole on top of me on top of Lucy.

“Get off!” she shouts. Or at least, that's what it sounds like. Her voice is pretty muffled beneath Cole and me.

“What are you clowns doing?” Marco asks.

“Now, now, everybody off. Clear the chute. Quickly now. There are others in the queue.” A squat man with messy hair pulls at my shirt with one hand and has Cole's collar in the other.

“Didn't I say quickly? Yes, quickly now. There, there. Don't be alarmed. You'll get the hang of the chutes with time. Just get out of the trough quickly.”

I stumble out behind Cole. The strange man is wearing a long white lab coat and small wire-rimmed glasses. Glasses? Who wears glasses anymore? As the man leans down to help Lucy, I whisper in Cole's ear. “Who is that guy?”

Cole shakes his head. “I have no idea.”

A gust of air from the chute announces the next arrival. Lucy had just lifted her foot from the trough when—
whoosh!
—Waters and Mira sail in.

“Good. We all made it.” Waters climbs out of the trough and helps Mira out after him. He nods at the strange man. “Kids, this is Gedney. He'll be helping us along.” Waters swings the cube door open and twirls his arm around in a circle. “Let's go. Everybody out.”

“Yes, yes,” Gedney mumbles. “Everybody out. Not a second to waste. Not a single second. Very important we keep moving.”

Lucy turns to me, her eyebrows raised. I shrug. No, I have no clue who he is. But I'm getting surer by the second we got bum luck with our pod assignment.

Waters takes off down the hall. All the officers at the space station stand straight and walk with confidence—it is Earth Force, after all—but Waters's walk is different. He has a bounce to his step that gives him an air of independence. It's like he knows a secret joke, and if you're lucky, he might share it with you.

We hurry to catch Waters. Gedney takes up the rear and herds us along. He keeps up his muttering—“Hurry, now! Keep moving! Quickly!”—and every time I turn around to look at him, he's glancing nervously over his shoulder. His posture is horrible. Worse than a Tunneler's. He hunches so far forward, I worry he'll lose his balance and fall on his face.

Waters stops at a door locked by a bio screen. “Here we are. The pod hall.” He leans in so the sensor can scan his right eye, and the door buzzes open.

The hall overflows with Bounders. I recognize most of them from the ship or the dormitory. Some of the cadets say hello, but most keep to their pods. So this is how it's going to be. All pods for themselves. It's probably Earth Force's way of drumming up competition in the Academy. Florine even said there'd be a contest.

We pass several open pod rooms. Most of them are set up like small classrooms: two rows of student desks facing a teacher's table at the front, and a huge tech screen pulled down on the rear wall.

Lucy halts in front of one of the rooms. I glance inside. No surprise, it's Sheek's pod. Ryan knocks my shoulder as he brushes past me into the room.

“Sorry,” he says.

“No worries,” I say. “Is this your pod room?'

He stands too close, right in my personal space. “Sure is,” he says. “I heard you're with our resident freak. Bummer.”

That makes me mad. Who is he to call Mira a freak? I ball my hands into fists. Wait a minute. . . . Why am I jumping to defend Mira? Don't I think she's kind of a freak, too? Ryan stares at me with an odd, questioning look on his face. I just turn and stomp away. Better to be rude than start a fight, I guess.

I catch a glimpse of Han's pod room as we pass. One wall is lined with photographs he's taken in space. A pang of envy twists in my gut. When I see Regis and Han talking by the instructor's desk, it twists even more.

“Okay, here we are.” Waters stops in front of the last door in the hall.

The very last pod room. Yet another sign we're the rejects.

Waters opens the door and stands aside for us to enter. The room doesn't look a thing like any of the other pod rooms we passed. Instead of desks, beanbag chairs are scattered around the room. A shag carpet the color of grass covers the floor. The walls are painted a sky-blue that gradually shades to a midnight ceiling twinkling with thousands of pinpricks of light.

Whoa. Weird.

“Dude,” Marco says. “You really let loose with the decorating. Where'd you even find this stuff?”

Deep waist-high bookcases circle the room. On the top shelves are lots of unusual objects—lava lamps in shades of crimson and lime and aqua, squishy balls with rubber tendrils in different shapes and sizes, vases with prickly light sticks, and swaths of material of all sorts of textures.

Seriously. Where did he find this stuff?

Lucy creeps up beside me. “Is this a joke?”

I shrug. “You talked to Florine. Did she ever mention this guy?”

Lucy shakes her head. “Do you think they accept transfer requests?”

Waters closes the door and adjusts the lights. Or really, he just turns the lights off, so the room is entirely lit by the lava lamps and the night sky (or ceiling, whatever). He crosses to the middle of the room and plops down on a beanbag. Despite his being twice the size of a kid, he somehow has mastered the art of sitting on these things.

“What are you waiting for? We need to get started.” He pats the beanbag. The little foam balls inside swish with each pat. “Sit.”

I sink into a cobalt-blue beanbag. The beans mold around me, pulling me deeper into their foam. All sense of proper sitting or military form is lost to that bag.

The others claim bags, too—except Gedney. He buzzes around by the door, checking the readings on mounted screens. Marco and Lucy sprawl on their bags like me. Cole somehow manages to stay upright on his purple beanbag, but he can't last long. Mira lies on her belly on top of a lemon-yellow bag. She faces away from the group. Her fingers rhythmically stroke illuminated sticks in a cylindrical vase. The lights on the sticks dance in a pattern connected to her movements. Once I fix my gaze on the lights, I can't tear it away.

“Jasper,” Waters says, “we'll start with you.”

I SPACED OUT AGAIN. I HAVE
no idea what I'm supposed to be starting on.

“Sir?” I try to sound polite and enthusiastic. Maybe that will make up for not paying attention.

Waters smiles. It's one of those grown-up smiles that says both
You're a good kid
and
I've got something on you
. “I was just telling the group,” Waters says, “I think we should get to know one another better, say a few words about ourselves. And no ‘sirs,' remember?”

“Ummm . . . okay.” I haven't really prepared for that kind of question, which I guess is pretty stupid, since of course the teachers will want to get to know us. “Well, I'm from East. District Eight. I have a younger sister, Addy. She's a Bounder, too. So she'll be coming to the Academy next spring when we're here for our third tour.” I hoped that was enough, but they all still stare. “And I play the clarinet.” Why did I say that? That is the last thing I want them to know about me.

As soon as the word
clarinet
slips out of my mouth, Mira flips forward on her beanbag. She pulls her knees into her chest and wraps her arms around them. Her liquid brown eyes lock on mine, and I swallow my gasp. Her eyes hold the most boundless amount of space I've ever seen. I could latch on to those eyes and stay. I shake my head and turn away.

The other cadets look from me to Mira and back again. I feel my cheeks flush. Waters nods approvingly before turning to Marco. “You're next, hotshot.”

Marco jumps up and paces back and forth across the pod room. “Marco Romero. Amazonas. Older brother not a B-wad. Nothing else to say. Except I'm really curious why we're holed up in this love den while everyone else appears to be learning.”

Waters laughs, a deep, hearty sound that rises up from his belly and pushes out into the pod room. “Love den?” he says. “I've never heard that one. And how come you called yourself that—B-wad? It's not exactly the most flattering term. I won't tolerate it in this pod room.”

I wondered the same thing. On the passenger craft, Marco lectured the other cadets about using that word. Seems a little hypocritical to me.

“I didn't call myself a B-wad.” Marco crosses his arms against his chest. “I called my brother a B-wad.”

“You said your brother isn't a Bounder,” Waters says.

“He's not. But if he were, he'd deserve to be called a B-wad.”

Marco and Waters lock eyes in some sort of showdown. There's nothing the groovy lights or cushy seats can do to ease the tension. Waters lets several seconds pass before speaking. “Have a seat, Marco.”

Marco doesn't budge, and he doesn't break his stare. What will Waters do if Marco refuses to sit? Waters isn't flustered. He stretches out on his tangerine beanbag and clasps his hands behind his head. His long legs, crossed at the ankles, cover half the width of the green shag rug.

Marco shrugs and returns to his seat. Waters nods at Lucy. “Miss Dugan.”

“Okay. Hi, everyone. I'm Lucy Dugan. I'm super excited to be here. We've been waiting for this day for, like, our whole lives, right? Anyhow, I'm from West. Americana West. You probably knew that. I'm a web actress, just like Sheek. Or an aspiring actress, at least. I love to write. I've written thirteen full-length screenplays. So stereotypical, right? West, actress, screenplays? And all my friends . . .”

I try to listen to Lucy, but she just goes on and on. I tip my head back and close my eyes. How many times have I called someone a B-wad without really thinking about it? When have I actually understood what it means? That the
B
stands for
Bounder
? That the wad stands for—to be honest, I have no idea what the wad stands for—but it means freak, weirdo, loser. The word hurts. It's not a huge hurt like the way it feels when the kids at school tease me about my clumsiness or my clarinet. But each time I hear the word, or say the word, or even think about the word, a tiny dagger stabs me in the gut.

“And so what I'm really hoping to get from this is first, friends, lots of friends, and all of you are a great start. And knowledge—I know I'll learn a lot here, Mr. Waters. And of course, I'm really honored for this chance to serve my planet.” Lucy talks for so long, it feels like something is missing when she finally shuts up.

“Thanks, Lucy. Cole, the baton passes to you.”

“Thank you, Mr. Waters.” Cole sits up so straight, it's like he has a rod stuck through his spine. How on earth does he do that? I sink a little farther into my beanbag.

“My name is Cole Thompson. I'm from Americana East. District Seventeen. Grade Six. I have no siblings. I've read all publicly available information on Earth Force and the EarthBound Academy.”

Waters leans over his hunched knee and stands. “Thank you, Cole. I can tell you're very informed.”

Understatement.

Waters walks over to the corner where Gedney is still fiddling with the screens. “Now let me introduce you to my main man. Kids, this is Gedney.”

Wait a minute. What about Mira? How come she gets a free pass?

No one else seems to notice. They're all staring at Gedney. It's like Mira's not even here.

“Gedney is an important fellow,” Waters continues. “Probably the most important person you'll meet at the EarthBound Academy.”

You'd think Gedney would stand up straighter when all eyes were on him, but he actually hunches more. I really have no idea how he manages not to topple over.

“He's one of our key tech developers,” Waters says. “Some folks call him Einstein, but I like to call him the Gadget Guru.”

Gadget Guru Gedney. It has a certain ring to it.

Gedney inches away from Waters. “No, no, no. Don't make an asteroid out of a rock fragment. You kids are the important ones. No need to waste time on me.”

“Always the pinnacle of modesty, Gedney,” Waters says. “And cut it out with all the rush. They're here now. It
is
time.” Waters locks eyes with Gedney until Gedney nods.

I have no clue what they're talking about. Hurry. Don't hurry. I'm kind of with the Gadget Guru: let's just get on with it. Whatever
it
is.

“That's it for the meet and greet,” Waters says. “We have daily pod sessions, and after we cover the basics, we'll start the bounding protocol in a week or so. And now I'll let the Gadget Guru distribute the tablets.”

As Gedney digs through a crate in the corner of the pod room, my glance slips from one of my pod mates to the next. Marco with his fiery and impulsive personality. Lucy, friendly but never shuts up. Cole . . . What did Marco call him? Ahhh, yes. Wiki. The Fact Man. And then there's Mira. Mysterious Mira twirling on the tarmac to music only she can hear. What do they think of me? Me and my clarinet. At least I've managed to keep my klutzy ways out of the equation.

Gedney hands each of us a tablet. It doesn't look much different from the one I have back on Earth. The upside: it has a cool Earth Force insignia stamped on the back. The downside: I'm sure it has almost no connectivity. Media silence. No contact with parents, friends, anyone from the outside for six weeks. I bet the chance of our playing
Evolution
is zero.

“You're still with us, right, Jasper?” Waters asks. He stands by the door and waves his arm, shooing us out.

Heat floods my cheeks as I nod. I zoned out again? Geez, I have to work on the focus thing.

Everyone else is already on their feet. Well, everyone except Mira. When it's just the three of us left, Waters crosses to Mira's beanbag and takes her hand. He pulls her up and walks her to the door, his hand pressed firmly against her back.