Night School - Endgame (3 page)

Allie wanted to argue, but when she put it like that, it made worryingly good sense. An easy out. An end to the fighting. A fresh start. But there were flaws in the plan.

‘Wouldn’t Nathaniel just follow us?’

The headmistress shrugged. ‘Possibly. But perhaps not. You see, if we left Orion and Cimmeria voluntarily, he’d have no reason to pursue us.’

‘Then he’s won,’ Allie said flatly.

‘That’s what we’d want him to think.’ Isabelle gave her a meaningful look. ‘Once we’re out of his reach we will find a way to undermine him. To destroy everything he builds. To defeat him.’

Allie let out a breath she hadn’t known she’d been holding. She felt suddenly numb.

‘So the same fight would continue.’

Isabelle shook her head emphatically.

‘No, Allie,’ she said. ‘A new fight would begin. For the soul of everything. With us in the drivers’ seat.’ She leaned forward. ‘This is what I mean when I talk about losing cleverly. To come back and win another day.’

Allie hated how plausible it sounded. The idea that this war with Nathaniel could go on, even after they’d lost Cimmeria, was more than she could bear right now. With Lucinda still to be buried, and Carter…

She straightened. ‘What about Carter? You’re not giving up on him are you? Because I won’t go anywhere without him.’

Isabelle held up her hands. ‘No,’ she said. ‘No one is going anywhere without Carter. We need to get him back first and then we leave. That’s what I’m focusing on now. Please believe me. I would never do anything that would hurt Carter.’

It was a good plan. Or rather, it was the least-worst plan.

Even so, Allie hated it. You can have all kinds of fancy words for losing, but whatever you call it, you’ve still lost.

On the other hand, getting away – starting over. That was enticing. Leaving Nathaniel behind, at least for a while. Escaping. Being safe.

The thought was almost inconceivable. And she wanted it as much as Isabelle did.

However, she couldn’t imagine how this could be explained to the other students. They seemed so defeated. So exhausted. If she told them Isabelle’s big plan was to lose really, really well…

They’d give up. The way she kind of wanted to give up now.

They had to find a way to make everyone believe losing really was victory.

She could hear no sound at all coming from the corridor. The school was quiet as a church. So her voice seemed startlingly loud when she spoke again.

‘We have to get Night School going again.’

Isabelle’s head jerked up. ‘I’m sorry?’

Now that she’d said it, Allie knew this was the answer. ‘You’ve cancelled training, and classes,’ she said, urgency strengthening her voice. ‘Bring them back. Get everyone back to work. Right now.’

The headmistress looked taken aback. ‘Allie, after what happened to Lucinda, I really believe we need a few days to mourn.’

But the more she thought about it, the more Allie was certain she was right. Having nothing to do was making everyone feel hopeless.

‘Don’t you see? We don’t need time to cry. Crying is losing. We need to get to work. When we work – when we train in Night School – we feel powerful. We are powerful.’ She took a breath. ‘Besides. If we’re going to get Carter back we don’t have days to wait. We have to get started right now.’

Isabelle still appeared doubtful. ‘But the teachers are exhausted. The students are demoralised…’

Allie didn’t waver. ‘Then let the teachers sleep tonight. Tomorrow, they should teach. The students are depressed because they think we’ve lost. Worse,’ she said, ‘they think we’re giving up. We need to make them understand we’re still fighting. We still have a chance… Because we do.’

T
he next morning
, when Allie walked down for breakfast, a hand-written notice was posted on the door of the dining hall.

‘
W
hat’s this
?’

Katie leaned over Allie’s shoulder to read the letter.

‘All students at Cimmeria Academy are to…’ She read the words aloud, dismay growing with every word.

‘Not me, of course.’ She looked at Allie, her face a perfect mask of disbelief. ‘She can’t mean me?’

Allie knew they were friends now, and she should be sympathetic, but she grinned at her and turned into the dining hall.

Suddenly she was ravenous.

Katie followed on her heels, panic making her voice rise. ‘You volunteer for Night School. That’s the way it’s always been. They can’t forcibly enlist you. This isn’t the army. I am not a conscript.’

Rachel and Nicole were already at their usual table as the two of them walked up, Katie in mid-complaint.

Seeing Allie’s pleased expression and Katie’s outrage, Rachel’s eyebrows winged up.

‘Ah. You’ve seen the notice.’

Katie turned her attention to her. ‘Rachel, I can’t be forced to join Night School, can I?’ she implored. ‘There must be a law. Freedom of… individuality. Some sort of protection. Human rights. I’m human, aren’t I?’

Allie snorted. Rachel’s lips twitched. ‘Well…’

‘Oh God.’ Katie sank into the seat next to Nicole, whose long, dark hair gleamed in the light like spilled ink.

Nicole patted her shoulder. ‘I think you’ll be very good at Night School.’

‘Of course I will.’ The redhead glared. ‘But I don’t want to. I’ll speak to Zelazny. He’ll put a stop to this.’ Jumping up from her seat, she sped across the room, copper-red ponytail streaming behind her.

‘Poor Zelazny,’ Rachel murmured, watching as she disappeared through the doorway.

‘He can handle her,’ Allie said.

Rachel’s cinnamon-coloured gaze scanned her face. ‘You look a lot better. Did you sleep?’

In fact, after her talk with Isabelle Allie had slept properly, in an actual bed, for the first time in days.

‘I had a talk with Isabelle,’ Allie said. ‘Cleared the air a little.’

‘Did you learn anything new? Any news on Carter?’

Allie filled Rachel in on what she knew. The other girl absorbed this with less joy than Allie’d expected.

‘But nothing concrete?’ Her brow creased. ‘They don’t know where he is?’

Her doubt was instantly deflating. Rachel was one of Allie’s smartest friends. If she didn’t believe Carter was fine…

Allie didn’t want to think about that.

‘Anyway,’ she continued firmly, ‘I told Isabelle we should get back to work…’

Nicole leaned over. ‘Are you responsible for lessons beginning again?’

‘Was it Allie?’ Zoe walked up to the table with Lucas. ‘Way to go, Allie!’

She emphasised her happiness with an air-kick that barely missed a nearby table of younger students. Allie hadn’t even noticed they were there until they ducked.

‘Don’t kill the little ones,’ Rachel chided Zoe mildly.

Zoe blinked at them, as if she, too, had failed to note their existence.

‘Hi Zoe,’ a boy at the table said shyly. He had glasses, olive skin and wavy dark hair and looked at Zoe with undisguised admiration.

She fixed him with a blank stare until his cheeks flushed and he turned back to his breakfast.

‘Whoever did it is a hero.’ Lucas pretended to punch Zoe who promptly punched him back for real.

Lucas clutched his arm. ‘Ow! Dammit, Shortie,’ he complained. ‘You have to work on your anger control.’

‘Don’t call me Shortie,’ Zoe replied, unrepentant.

‘So Night School starts tonight.’ Rachel raised her voice, in an attempt to restore order. ‘And this time every student left in the school’s going to be there. And every teacher. What’s that going to be like?’

A determined smile spread slowly across Allie’s face.

‘A start.’

Allie was hurrying to class when someone called her name. Turning, she saw a young woman with glasses and long dark hair twisted up on her head hurrying towards her.

‘Eloise!’ Allie ran to the librarian and hugged her. ‘You’re OK.’

Eloise was the youngest of the Night School instructors – the one closest to their age. She’d always been the one they would go to with their problems – the one most likely to still remember what it was like to be seventeen years old.

But the stress of the last year had changed her – she looked older. No one would mistake her for a student now.

‘I’m just fine.’ Her warm gaze swept Allie’s face, catching on the stitches barely visible at her hairline. ‘Mostly fine, anyway.’ Her smile faded. ‘I’m sorry about your grandmother.’

Allie took a step back. ‘Thanks.’ She mumbled the word. She still didn’t really know how to react to expressions of sympathy. What to say.

Seeing this, Eloise didn’t linger on the subject.

‘Dom’s looking for you,’ she said. ‘She wants you to come to her office right away.’

Allie’s heart leaped. ‘Is it Carter? Did she find him? Is he OK?’ Eagerness sent her words tumbling over each other.

Eloise held up a hand. ‘I don’t know. I was just told to find you.’

‘OK,’ Allie said, nearly hopping with excitement. ‘I better go.’

She spun on her heel and took off down the hall, class completely forgotten.

Maybe they’d found Carter. Maybe they were going to get him right now. 

The thought spurred her on, and she ran even faster. The only problem was, she didn’t actually know where the tech’s office was.

She searched the main school building without success before trying the classroom wing. Students were still in classes, and most of the doors were shut. She could hear the teachers talking, a faint drone in the background as she hurried upstairs to check the next level. It was much the same – there was no obvious place for Dom here.

The top floor of the classroom wing was dedicated mostly to seminars for senior students, so the classrooms were smaller and more numerous. All were empty at this hour – the corridor was gloomy and too quiet. Allie found herself tiptoeing – as if not to disturb the silence. That was when she first heard the faint tapping sound.

She paused to listen. The noise was arrhythmic but constant.

She traced it – going from door to door until she reached one where the sound was louder. This close she could hear something else as well.

Music.

She knocked.

‘Enter.’ Dom’s American accent flattened her vowels and elongated the ‘r’.

Allie burst in, already talking. ‘What’s happening? Is it Carter? Have you found him?’

Her words poured out in a breathless race.

‘Sort of.’ Dom stood up from a desk at one end of the room. Allie’s hope began to dissipate instantly – she looked too serious for this to be good news.

Allie’s chest tightened. ‘What do you mean, sort of?’

‘I’ve heard his voice.’ Dom’s tone was calm. ‘He’s definitely alive. I just… can’t exactly find him.’

Like Eloise, Dom was young, twenty-one according to gossip, but she was a technical genius. She had started a software company while still at Harvard, and sold it for millions of dollars.

A former Cimmeria student, she’d returned to the school to help them deal with Nathaniel, but her distinctive, androgynous style always set her apart from the school’s conservative teachers. Today she wore a button-down shirt of a heavy creamy material, with baggy trousers cinched tight around her narrow waist. Her burgundy brogues had been polished until they gleamed. With her dark skin and short-cropped hair, she was so sophisticated, Allie was usually a little in awe her.

But today all she cared about was Carter.

‘You’ve heard his voice?’ Allie wanted to shake the news out of her. ‘How? When?’

Dom stepped back. ‘You better come in, and close the door.’

Allie did as she was told. The room had once been a classroom, but it had been transformed into a spacious office. The desks had all been removed, leaving only an oak teacher’s desk, which Dom had accessorised with a sleek, black office chair. Three laptops sat side by side on the desktop. A widescreen monitor was mounted on the wall. Four leather chairs Allie thought she recognised from the common room surrounded a round wooden table that might have been harvested from the dining hall. A red Persian rug with a design of gold stars covered the floor.

Allie could hear the faint sound of jazz – the discordant kind, rather than the jolly World War II kind – swirling from hidden speakers.

‘Have a seat.’ Dom pointed at the chairs by the table, but Allie shook her head. She didn’t want to sit down. She wasn’t here for a chat.

‘Please, Dom. If you know something, just tell me.’ She couldn’t keep a pleading note out of her voice. ‘Where is he?’

Behind her glasses, Dom’s eyes were sympathetic. ‘That’s the one thing I don’t know.’

Allie wanted to scream in frustration. It took all her determination to keep her voice steady. ‘What do you know? Is he hurt? Where did you hear him?’

‘I hacked into Nathaniel’s comms system. I’ve been listening to them all night.’ Dom hurried back to her desk and began typing rapidly on one of the laptops. This was the sound Allie had heard from the hallway. ‘His system is well-protected. His people are very good, but…’ She paused to glance at the monitor. ‘I’m better.’

The jazz disappeared, replaced by a cold voice. ‘Item secured. Team Eight en route. Over.’

The sound crackled but Allie recognised it instantly: Gabe.

Her hands clenched and unclenched at her sides. The last time she saw Gabe he killed Lucinda. It turned her stomach to hear his voice.

It was hard to be here. Hard to know he lived on, while her grandmother’s life was over. But she made herself focus on small things. In the background, she could hear an engine rumbling – a vehicle of some sort – and other voices talking.

Then a second voice replied to Gabe. ‘Copy Team Eight. Gold Command requests verification of condition of item. Over.’

Gabe responded a moment later. ‘Item is conscious and aware. Condition good.’

Time passed. Then the second voice spoke again. ‘Gold Command requests verbal verification from item.’

Allie couldn’t put her finger on it, but something in that voice – a cool, undertone of distaste – told her the person didn’t like Gabe.

There was another long silence, broken suddenly by harsh breathing, and the clunking sound of a microphone being fumbled with.

Gabe spoke from a slight distance. ‘Verify your condition.’

A new voice replied, sardonic; unafraid. ‘How the hell do I do that?’

Allie’s heart leaped. It was Carter. She’d know that voice anywhere.