The Paladin Prophecy (44 page)

“Talking? Absolutely,” said Will. “Could you hear me?”

“Not clearly enough to know what you were saying.”

“You were right,” said Will. “That tube put the zap on my head, so I just kept blabbing, ‘You’re fine; you’re okay; don’t think about where you are.’ ”

“Were any voices … talking back to you?” she asked.

Will waited a beat before responding. “Did
you
hear any?”

“I didn’t
hear
anything.” She frowned and held his eyes. “We
saw
profound levels of activity in an area of your brain often identified with visual, aural, and sometimes even olfactory hallucinations.”

“So you heard me yakking nonstop,” said Will, trying to defuse her inquiry with a joke, “and thought I was helping a leprechaun look for his Lucky Charms.”

Robbins’s patience frayed. “Will, we have real cause for concern because you’ve been under such extraordinary stress. I’m told you’ve also had conflicts with some other students—”

Hearing that, Will realized how he could tell part of the story in a way she might be able to understand and respond to. “And I’m the new kid, so they think I’ll keep my mouth shut. I should just be happy to be here, right? Well, I won’t keep quiet about it any longer.”

“About what?”

Careful how you frame this
.

“There’s a group of students here,” said Will. “Seniors. They belong to a kind of club, or secret society, and they goof it up with rituals and masks that make the whole thing seem harmless. They’re called the Knights of Charlemagne.”

He thought by her reaction that she might have heard the name before.

“But it’s
not
harmless,” said Will. “It’s a cover for abusing younger kids. New kids or weaker kids or ones who don’t fit in, and this goes way beyond bullying. They single these kids out and terrorize them.”

“If this is true,” asked Robbins, “why haven’t I heard about it before?”

“Because they’re smart about who they target,” said Will. “Because they shut them up with threats. The kids they go after are petrified. And I know for a fact one of them was Ronnie Murso. They might even have something to do with his disappearance.”

That lit an angry fire in Robbins’s eyes, but she worked to keep a handle on it. “I’ll take this straight to the headmaster. Do you have any names of the people responsible?”

“Lyle Ogilvy,” said Will.

“Anyone else?”

“Not that I’m sure about. But you can definitely start with him.”

Robbins kept quiet, calculating. “Do your roommates know about this?”

#45: COOPERATE WITH THE AUTHORITIES. BUT DON’T NAME FRIENDS.

Will heard voices in the hallway. It sounded like it might be Ajay and Nick. “I don’t want to get anybody else involved.”

“Dude, check out the freakin’ pole in the lab! That’s awesome!”

Yep, Nick
.

“I’ll accept that answer on one condition,” said Robbins coldly. “Your parents will be staying as Mr. Rourke’s guests at Stone House. Take the rest of the day to collect your thoughts about what you’ve just told me. You’re going to give me every last detail you know about this by tonight. A complete and thorough account—”

“But—”

“Or I’ll have no choice but to immediately expel you from the Center. You’ll leave tomorrow. With your parents. For good.”

She stared straight at him, her violet eyes hard and unwavering. She wasn’t bluffing.

INSTANT MESSAGE

Robbins left the ward and moments later Nick and Ajay trundled in, regarding Will with more than a little awe.

“So are the rumors true, Will?” asked Ajay. “They’re saying you nearly got hit by that flying telephone pole!”

“Well, let’s just say I was in the room at the time,” said Will.

“Dude, no way, that had to be
ill
,” said Nick, giving Will a fist bump.

“I’ll tell you later,” said Will quietly, leading them out the door. “I told Robbins we’d meet her in the lobby. I want to look for something first.”

Will led them through the lab where the rescue crews were working and snuck out the door that led to the back stairs. They went down the empty, echoing stairwell to the second floor.

“What are we looking for?” asked Ajay.

“Evidence,” said Will.

“Of what?” asked Nick.

Will opened a utility closet, flicked on a light, and started searching. There were brooms, mops, and cleaning supplies on shelves. Stashed in a recycling bin, Will found what he was looking for: a long black mesh metal box the size of a baguette.

“Lyle tried to kill me,” said Will. He used a rag to lift out the box. “With what was in
this
.”

“Dude, oh my God … Lyle sicced his
ferrets
on you?!”

“Not ferrets,” said Will. “Worms, crossed with centipedes as long as this box, that bled acid. They crawled up my body when I was in the MRI machine.”

“I may vomit,” said Ajay, leaning against a wall.

“Did anybody else see ’em?” asked Nick.

“No. Not a word to anybody,” said Will as he slipped the box into a plastic trash bag. Nick slung it over his shoulder as they hurried down to the lobby.

They found Robbins huddled near the front doors with Eloni and a woman who looked like his female twin. Eloni introduced her as his cousin Tika.

“Eloni will drive you back to Greenwood,” said Robbins. “I want you in your quarters for the rest of the day, Will. I’ll pick you up myself once your parents arrive. Call me immediately if anything else occurs to you.” She gave Will one last stern look.

The boys followed Eloni and Tika out to a dark blue Ford Flex, parked and idling outside. Snow was still falling heavily. They climbed in and Eloni took the wheel. No one spoke on the ride to Greenwood Hall. They parked in front; Eloni and Tika walked them inside.

Eloni stopped and knocked on Lyle’s door; Nick and Will exchanged an anxious look. When there was no answer, Eloni gave Tika an order in their native language. She went inside and opened the inner door. A moment later she came back and shook her head.

“Stay here,” said Eloni to her, and then to the boys, in a no-messing-around voice, he said, “Upstairs. Now.”

“You looking for Lyle, Eloni?” asked Nick.

“You could say that,” he said.

Once on the third floor, he followed them into the pod and checked each bedroom. Brooke’s and Elise’s rooms were empty.

“I’ll be just outside if you need me,” said Eloni, heading for the door. He closed the door, and his heavy footsteps padded into the hall.

“So the school’s put out an APB on Lyle?” asked Nick.

“I said just enough to get them interested,” said Will.

Ajay put an eye to the peephole and saw Eloni outside, arms folded, standing guard. “He’s planted,” said Ajay. “Like a potted palm.”

“We need to work fast,” said Will. “Have you seen Brooke or Elise?”

“Not since this morning,” said Nick.

“Robbins said she paged them when she called you guys, so they’re probably on their way. Try them again, Nick, just to be sure.”

Nick picked up the phone and asked the operator to page both girls.

“Ajay, is it safe to use our tablets?” asked Will.

“As safe as I can make them. I’ve got something else to show you as well.”

“Meet in your room,” said Will, heading for his. “Two minutes.”

As Will entered, his tablet turned on. His syn-app stood on-screen, waiting. He looked more lifelike now, fleshed out with detail, and even more unsettling.

“Is everything all right, Will?” asked his syn-app.

He even sounds more like me. He must be recording and sampling my voice
.

“Yes,” said Will. “I want you to look for photographs of ANZAC Special Forces helicopter units that served in Vietnam. Look for a chopper with the call letters Alpha Tango Delta three nine Zebra.”

“Are you looking for any person in particular?” asked “Will.”

“I’m trying to find out what happened to an old friend,” said Will. “His name was Dave Gunner.”

“I’m on it,” said the syn-app. “You have a video message from Nando.”

The syn-app opened a video of Nando in his taxi, speaking into the lens of his camera phone. “Wills. Had a badass nightmare about bugs last night, but aside from that I’m okay. Listen, we ran this down on that National Scholastic Whatever Program.” In his other hand, Nando held a BlackBerry. He read from it: “Corporate HQ in DC. Branch offices: LA, New York, Miami, Chi-Town, the ATL, and Denver. All in federal buildings, so it has some kind of relationship with government. But it’s a nonprofit, privately owned by something called the Greenwood Foundation. Catch you later. Peace.”

Will couldn’t move for a moment. “The Greenwood Foundation,” he repeated as it sank in.

“Yes, Will?” asked his syn-app.

“The Greenwood Foundation is the trust that runs the Center,” said Will.

“That’s correct,” said his syn-app.

Will picked up his tablet and hurried to Ajay’s room. Ajay was standing over something at his desk. Nick was on the phone.

“Brooke and Elise still haven’t checked in,” said Nick, hanging up. “Elise is on the equestrian team. She usually rides on Saturday afternoon.”

“In this weather?” asked Will.

“There’s an indoor ring near the stables,” said Nick.

“She probably isn’t wearing her pager,” said Ajay. “I had time for a closer look at your bird, Will.” The dismantled pieces were spread out on his desk. “Check out the eyes.” Ajay picked up the eyes, twin buttons connected by strands of gold wire to a silver box. He held the intricate apparatus underneath a framed magnifier.

“Two sophisticated lenses,” said Ajay, pointing with a stylus, “that, properly synchronized, deliver three-dimensional optics to here.” Ajay pointed to the silver box. “A central processor equipped with advanced facial recognition software and a high-powered wireless transmitter. The real mystery is there’s no power source. I can’t figure out what was driving it, and I’ve never seen robotics this advanced.”

“Aphotic technology,” said Will softly.

“What’s that?” asked Ajay.

“The name for this, and that gear we saw in Ronnie’s video; the Carver and the glowing metal sheet,” said Will. “You’d better sit down for a second, guys.”

Looking apprehensive, Ajay and Nick sat down. Will took a deep breath.

Make it as simple as possible, and don’t mention Dave or the Hierarchy.…

“The Black Caps and Knights work for a race of beings called the Other Team,” Will said. “The Other Team is originally from here, but they’ve been trapped in the Never-Was since before humans were on the planet. And they want back in. They created all the monsters we’ve seen as part of their plan to break out.”

Ajay and Nick looked at each other. “Uh, okay,” said Nick.

“Speaking of which,” said Will, “did you check out the bug from my computer?”

Ajay blinked, then picked up the Altoids tin from his desk and opened it, revealing a thin layer of black goo inside. “I’m afraid it’s decomposed,” Ajay said. “I’ve examined what’s left and can’t find anything that resembles biological DNA.”

“That’s because these creatures from the Never-Was have a different biology,” said Will. “The Other Team needs help from people here, using technology that
they
gave them to bring them over.”

“That’s where the Caps and Knights come in,” said Nick.

“Yes,” said Will. “And the truth is, while we’ve uncovered a lot, in some ways we’re only at the beginning of what we need to know.”

Ajay’s eyes were wide. “So this Other Team wants to break out of the Never-Was … in order to do what?”

“To, uh, take over the world,” said Will, mumbling slightly. “And in so doing, capture, enslave, and destroy all of humanity.”

Ajay and Nick looked at each other again. “How do you know this, Will?” asked Ajay cautiously.

“I have a source on the inside,” said Will. “That I can’t talk about.”

“Although your end-of-the-world scenario strains credulity,” said Ajay, swallowing hard, “our faith in you to date has not been misplaced. So I think I speak for both of us—”

“Dude,” said Nick firmly, holding out his fist. “Whatever it takes.”

Feeling greatly relieved, Will gave them both a fist bump.

Will’s syn-app announced, “You have a message from Brooke, Will.”

“There she is,” said Will. “Ajay, put her on the big screen.”

Ajay merged their tablets to his wall screen, and Will told his syn-app to play the message. Brooke appeared in the library, whispering to her tablet camera. “Will, I ran a global search through school histories, yearbooks, and newspapers for anything on the Knights of Charlemagne. I got several hits.”

Brooke read from the articles as she browsed through them on her screen.

“The earliest mention of the Knights is in the 1928 yearbook. It was a newly formed social club limited to twelve members per year, all seniors. Their motto was ‘Making Better Men for the Benefit of Man.’ It doesn’t seem that they were involved in anything more sinister than croquet tournaments and amateur productions of Gilbert and Sullivan. In 1937, the Knights appear in a photo with a distinguished visitor, Henry Wallace, then secretary of agriculture under President Franklin Roosevelt. Take a look.”

A black-and-white photo came up on-screen, showing that year’s twelve-man Knights of Charlemagne group and their guest of honor, Henry Wallace, around a long table in an ornately decorated dining room, raising glasses in a toast to the camera.

“Pause,” said Will, and the image froze. Will pointed at one of the students. “I could swear I’ve seen that kid before.”

“How is that possible?” asked Nick. “It’s from over seventy years ago.”

“I don’t know,” said Will. “Maybe I saw his picture somewhere. Where was this taken?”

“It looks like the formal dining room,” said Ajay. “Strange. A big shot like the secretary of agriculture visits the Center, and no school officials, not even the headmaster, get invited to this dinner?”

“Continue,” said Will.

Brooke’s message resumed. “This event seems to have been the Knights’ high-water mark. There are only a few more mentions of them; by 1941, they disappear completely. It seems that they were disbanded, some kind of disciplinary action, but I can’t find any explanation.”