The Power of Six - Chapter 13

Chapter 13


SIX DRIVES OUR CHARCOAL-COLORED SUV, WHICH we saw for sale in
a yard two miles down the road for fifteen hundred dollars, into town to buy
groceries. While she’s gone, Sam and I spar together in the backyard. The
three of us have spent a week training, and I’m amazed at how good
Sam’s gotten in the short amount of time. Despite his small size, he’s a
natural; and what he lacks in strength, he makes up for in technique, which
is much better than my own.
At the end of each day as Six and I retreat to the corners
of the living room or to our empty rooms, Sam stays up
studying fighting techniques on the internet. What Six
learned from Katarina and I learned from Henri is a method
of combat that loosely resembles a blend of jujitsu, Tae
Kwon Do, karate and Bojuka here on Earth, a system
designed to be committed to muscle memory, including
grappling, blocks, fluid body movements, joint manipulation
and strikes to vital points of a person’s central nervous
system. For Six and me, having the benefit of telekinesis,
it’s a matter of sensing the subtlest of motions in a radius
around us and then reacting to them. Sam, however, needs
to keep his enemies in front of him.
While Six ends each session without a mark, Sam and I
both finish with new scrapes and bruises. But despite them,
Sam never loses passion or drive. Today is no different. He
comes at me, chin tucked and eyes alert. He throws a right
cross that I block, then a left side kick that I counter by
sweeping his right leg out from under him, sending him
crashing to the ground. He stands, then charges me again.
Though he connects often, with my strength, his shots aren’t
very effective. But sometimes I feign pain to boost his
confidence.
Six gets home an hour later. She changes into shorts and
a T-shirt and joins us. We drill for a while, slowly doing the
same block-counterkick over and over until it becomes
second nature. But while I take it somewhat easy against
Sam, Six goes all out against me, thrusting me backwards
with such force that the wind is knocked out of me.
Sometimes I get irritated, but I can still tell I’m getting better.
She’s no longer able to deflect my telekinesis with a casual
flick of the wrist. Now she’s required to throw her whole
body into it.
Sam takes a break and watches from the side with
Bernie Kosar.
“You’re better than that, Johnny. Show me the good stuff
already,” she says after she upends me when I threw a
sloppy roundhouse kick.
I charge her, closing the gap between us in a tenth of a
second. I throw a left hook but Six blocks it, taking hold of
my bicep and using my momentum to toss me over her
head. I brace myself for a painful landing, but she doesn’t
let go of my arm, instead twisting me back over her
shoulder so my feet hit the ground.
She wraps her arms around my arms; my back is
smashed against her chest. She sticks her face against
mine and playfully kisses me on the cheek. Before I can
react she kicks the back of my knees and my butt hits the
grass. My arms are swept out from under me and I’m flat on
my back. Six easily pins me, and she’s so close I can count
the hairs on her brow. Butterflies flood my stomach.
“Okay,” Sam finally interrupts. “I think you got him pretty
good. You can let him up now.”
Six’s smile widens, and mine does, too. We stay that
way for a second longer before she leans back and hefts
me up by my shoulders.
“My turn with Six,” Sam says.
I take a deep breath, then shake my arms to rid them of
their jitters.
“She’s all yours,” I say, making a beeline towards the
house.
“John?” Six says just as I reach the back door.
I turn, trying to tamp down a strange fluttery sensation at
the sight of her. “Yeah?”
“We’ve been in this house for a week now. I think it’s time
to lose whatever sentimentality or fear you’ve been holding
on to.”
For a second, after what just happened I think she’s
talking about Sarah.
“The Chest,” she says.
“I know,” I say, and I enter the house, sliding the door
behind me.
I go to my room and pace, taking deep breaths, trying to
figure out what just happened out in the yard.
I go to the bathroom and splash cold water on my face. I
stare into the mirror. Sarah would kill me if she caught me
looking at Six like that. I tell myself again that I have nothing
to worry about because Loriens love one person for life. If
Sarah is my one love, then Six is simply a crush.
Back in my room I lie on my back, fold my hands across
my stomach, and close my eyes. I take deep breaths,
holding each one in for a five-count before exhaling out my
nose.
Thirty minutes later I open the door and creep down the
hall, hearing Sam and Six milling about in the living room.
The only place I could find to hide my Chest in the house
was in the utility closet, on top of the hot water heater. I
struggle getting it out, making as little noise as possible.
Then I tiptoe back to my room, gently closing and locking
the door behind me.
Six is right. It’s time. No more waiting. I grab hold of the
lock. It quickly warms, then squirms against the palm of my
hand, taking on an almost liquid form, and snaps open. The
inside glows brightly. It’s never done that before. I reach in
and remove the coffee can containing Henri’s ashes and
his letter, still in its sealed envelope. I close the lid and
relock it. I know it’s stupid, but I feel like I’m somehow
keeping Henri alive by not reading the letter he left behind.
Once the Chest is open, and once the letter is read, he’ll
have nothing left to tell me, nothing left to teach—and then
he’ll become nothing more than a memory. I’m not ready for
it yet.
I open the closet where my clothes sit in a pile, and I bury
the coffee can and letter under them. Then I grab the Chest
and leave the room, hovering in the hallway to listen to Sam
and Six streaming a show online called Ancient Aliens.
Sam is asking Six about all the alien theories he knows and
Six quickly confirms or denies them based on the teachings
of Katarina. Sam furiously scribbles answers on his legal
pad, which then breeds more questions that Six patiently
answers or shrugs her shoulders at. Sam eats it up,
drawing parallels to what he already knows.
“The pyramids of Giza? They were built by the Loric?”
“Partly us, but mostly the Mogadorians.”
“What about the Great Wall of China?”
“Humans.”
“Roswell, New Mexico?”
“You know, I’ve asked Katarina that once and she had no
idea. So I don’t know either.”
“Wait, how long have the Mogadorians been coming
here?”
“Almost as long as we have,” she says.
“So, like, this war between you two, is it new?”
“Not necessarily. What I know is that both sides have
traveled to Earth for thousands of years; sometimes we
were here at the same time, and from what I understand,
much of it was spent on friendly terms. But then something
happened that ruined the relationship, and the
Mogadorians left for a very long time. Beyond that I don’t
know much, and I have no idea when they started coming
back.”
I cross the living room and plop the Chest in the middle of
the dining-room floor. Sam and Six glance up. Six grins,
again giving me strange flutters. I smile back, but it feels
insincere.
“I figure we might as well open this thing together.”
Sam begins rubbing his hands with a crazy look in his
eyes.
“Jeez, Sam,” I say. “You look like you’re about to murder
somebody.”
“Oh, come on,” he says. “You’ve been teasing me with
this Chest for almost a month now and I’ve been patient
and I’ve kept my mouth shut out of respect for Henri and
everything, but how often do I get to see the treasures from
an alien planet? I just think about how the guys at NASA
would die to be sitting where I am right now. You can’t
blame me for being so into this.”
“Would you be mad if this whole time it’s been full of
nothing but dirty laundry?”
“Alien dirty laundry?” Sam asks sarcastically.
I laugh, then reach down and grab hold of the lock. My
hand instantly glows when touching the cold metal, and the
lock again warms, shaking and twisting in my grip,
protesting the ancient powers that keep it closed. When it
clicks open I remove the lock, set it aside, and place my
hand on the Chest’s top. Six and Sam both lean forward in
anticipation.
I lift the lid. The Chest is yet again ablaze with light that
hurts my eyes. The first thing I do is remove the velvet bag
holding the seven orbs that make up Lorien’s solar system.
I think of Henri and how we watched the light glow and
pulsate at Lorien’s core, showing that the planet is still
alive, albeit hibernating. I place the bag in Sam’s hand. All
three of us peer down into the Chest. Something else is lit
up.
“What is that glowing?” Six asks.
“No idea. It never did that before.”
She reaches down and plucks a rock from the bottom of
the Chest. It’s a perfectly round crystal no bigger than a
Ping-Pong ball, and when she touches it, the light brightens
even more. And then it fades, and begins to slowly pulse.
We watch the crystal, transfixed by the glow. Then,
suddenly, Six lets it drop to the floor. The crystal ceases to
pulse and resumes its steady glow. Sam reaches down to
pick it up.
“Don’t!” Six yells.
He looks up, confused.
“Something doesn’t feel right about it,” she says.
“What do you mean?” I ask.
“It felt like pinpricks against my palm. When I grabbed
hold of it I got a really bad feeling.”
“This stuff is my Inheritance,” I say. “Maybe I’m the only
one allowed to touch it?”
I bend down and carefully pick up the glowing crystal.
Within seconds it feels as if I’m holding a radioactive
cactus; my stomach compresses and acid climbs up my
throat, and I instantly toss the crystal onto a blanket. I
swallow. “Maybe I’m doing it wrong.”
“Maybe we don’t know how to use it. I mean, you said
Henri kept you from seeing inside because you weren’t
ready. Maybe you’re still not ready?”
“Well, that would be pretty lame,” I say.
“This sucks,” Sam says.
Six walks into the kitchen and returns with two towels and
a plastic bag. She carefully grabs the glowing crystal with a
towel and drops both into the bag, which she then wraps in
a second towel.
“You really think that’s necessary?” I ask. My stomach
continues to gurgle.
She shrugs. “I don’t know about you, but the feeling I got
when I touched it was bad news. Better safe than sorry.”
What’s left in the Chest is everything comprising my
Inheritance, and I’m not really sure where to start. I reach in
and grab an object I’ve seen before, the oblong crystal
Henri used to spread the Lumen from my hands to the rest
of my body. It comes alive and bathes the dining room in its
bright light. The crystal’s center begins swirling with what
looks like smoke, twisting and turning back on itself, as I
have seen it do before.
“Now we’re talking,” Sam says.
“Here,” I say, giving it to him. The crystal falls inert when it
transfers hands. “I’ve already seen it.”
Also inside the Chest are a few smaller crystals, a black
diamond, a collection of brittle leaves bound with twine, and
a star-shaped talisman the same pale blue as the pendant
around my neck, which tells me it’s Loralite, the rarest gem
found only at Lorien’s core. There’s also a bright red oval
bracelet and an amber-colored stone in the shape of a
raindrop.
“What do you think that is?” Sam asks, pointing to a flat,
circular stone the same milky white color as a pearl that’s
stuck in the corner.
“Don’t know,” I say.
“How about that?” he asks, this time pointing to a small
dagger that looks to have a blade made of diamond.
I lift it from the Chest. The handle fits snug in my hand as
though it was made for it, and I suppose it was. The blade
isn’t more than four inches long, and just by seeing the way
the light glints along its edge, I can tell it’s far sharper than
any razor one might find on Earth.
“What about that thing?” Sam asks again, pointing to
something else, and I have no doubt he’ll ask the same
question over and over until he’s inquired about every
object inside.
“Here,” I say, setting the dagger down and removing the
seven orbs in an effort to keep him occupied. “Check this
out.”
I blow on them, and tiny lights flicker across their
surfaces. Then I toss them up in the air, and they instantly
spring to life, spinning in orbit around the orange-sized sun
in the center.
“It’s Lorien’s solar system,” I say. “Six planets, one sun.
And this one here,” I add, pointing to the fourth orb, which
remains the same various shades of ashen gray as the last
time I’d seen it, “is Lorien as it looks today, at this very
moment. The glow at its center is what’s left.”
“Wow,” Sam says. “NASA dudes would be crapping
themselves right now looking at this.”
“And watch this,” I say, illuminating my right hand. I sweep
the light over the orb, and all at once the surface changes
from its depressing gray tones to vibrant blues and greens
of the forests and oceans. “This is the planet as it was the
day before the attack.”
“Wow,” Sam says again, staring in awe with his mouth
hanging open; and while the rotating planets have him
transfixed, I look back in the Chest.
“Do you know what any of this is? Or what it does?” I ask
Six, who doesn’t respond. I turn and see she’s just as
amazed as Sam by the solar system spinning two feet
above the floor. Since Henri had told me they weren’t part
of my Legacy, which means they weren’t locked in the
Chest, I had wrongly assumed she’d seen them before. But
it makes sense she hasn’t; they can only be activated after
the first Legacy develops.
“Six,” I say again. She comes back to reality, turns to me
and I find myself looking away once we make eye contact.
“Do you know what any of this stuff is?”
“Not really,” she murmurs, running her hands over the
stones’ surfaces. “This is the healing stone Henri and I used
at the school,” she says, pointing out a flat, black rock I’ve
seen before. Then she freezes, a faint gasp escaping her
lips. Sam and I exchange confused expressions. She lifts a
pale yellow stone, its surface waxy and smooth, from the
Chest and holds it up to the light. “Oh my God,” she
marvels, flipping it over.
“Tell me,” I prod. She looks me right in the eyes.
“Xitharis,” she says. “It comes from our first moon.”
She brings the small stone to her forehead, squeezing
her eyes shut. The faint yellow shade of the stone darkens
slightly. She opens her eyes and hands the stone to me. I
frown and take it from her, my fingertips grazing the palm of
her hand. Sam inhales sharply.
“What the …” He looks terrified, groping for me like he’s
blind.
“What’s going on?” I ask, slapping Sam’s hands away
from my face.
“You’re invisible,” Six says quietly. I look down at my lap,
and it’s true: I’ve completely vanished. I drop the Xitharis on
the floor like a hot potato, and instantly become visible.
“The Xitharis,” Six explains, “allows one Garde to transfer
a Legacy to another, but only for a short period of time. An
hour, I think, maybe two. I can’t say for sure. All you have to
do is charge it by focusing your energy on the stone. Put it
to your forehead, and bam, it’s ready to go.”
“Charge it, like a battery?” Sam asks.
“Exactly, and it won’t start using the Legacy until it’s
touched again.”
I look at the stone. “Sweet. Looks like somebody other
than you is taking a trip into town.”
“And somebody other than you is going to be resistant to
fire,” she says playfully.
“If you’re nice to me, then it’s definitely a possibility,” I
say.
Sam picks the stone up and clenches his entire body in
deep concentration. Nothing happens. “Oh come on,” he
says to the stone. “I promise to use it for the power of good.
No girls’ locker rooms, I swear.”
“Sorry, Sam,” Six says. “I’m pretty sure this stuff only
works on us.”
He sets the Xitharis down and we dig through the rest of
the Chest to see if anything else is activated by touch; but
after an hour of studying and holding all seventeen artifacts,
blowing hot air on them, squeezing them tightly, nothing
else engages aside from the glowing crystal wrapped in the
towel, the larger oblong crystal with the smoky center, and
the solar system still rotating above us. The healing stone,
however, does cure the cuts and bruises Six has been
stamping my body with.
“Man, I’ve waited most of my life to open this thing; and
now that I have, a lot of it seems useless to me,” I say.
“I’m sure their uses will reveal themselves in time,” Six
assures me. “Things like this need to be slept on. It’s
usually when they’ve left your mind completely that answers
finally come.”
I nod, looking back at everything lying around the Chest.
Six is right; forcing an answer only guarantees that no
answer will come.
“Yeah, maybe some of it only activates with further
Legacies. Who knows,” I say with a shrug. I put everything
back inside, feeling compelled to keep the glowing crystal
covered with the towel. I leave the solar system out, which
continues its circular march. I close and lock the Chest and
carry it down the hall.
“Don’t be discouraged, John,” Six says behind me. “As
Henri said, you’re probably not ready to see it all yet.”

Categories: The Power of Six

The Power of Six - Chapter 12

Chapter 12


THEY’RE HERE! I THINK. AFTER ALL THESE YEARS, THE
Mogadorians are finally here!
I turn so fast I slip and fall into the snow. I quickly crawl
backwards away from the cave’s mouth, my shoes tangled
in the blanket. Tears well up in my eyes. My heart races. I
manage to right myself and sprint as hard and as fast as
my legs will carry me. I don’t even look behind me to see if
I’m being followed, sweeping across the same snowy
terrain I’d just hiked through, moving so fast I hardly take
note of where my feet are falling. The trees below me begin
to blur, as do the clouds above. I can feel the blanket
hovering behind my shoulders, flapping in the wind like a
superhero’s cape. I trip once and slide across the ground,
but immediately scramble to my feet and sprint onward,
jumping straight over the camel’s back, again crashing
when I land. And then I finally dash past the birch trees and
make it back to the convent; the hike there took nearly
twenty-five minutes; the sprint back took less than five. Like
the ability to breathe underwater, the Legacy of superspeed
presents itself when I need it to.
I untie the blanket from around my neck, burst through the
double doors, and hear the lunchtime clatter coming from
the dining room. I hurry up the winding staircase and down
the narrow hall, knowing it’s Adelina’s turn to take Sunday
off. I enter the open room where the Sisters sleep. Adelina
sits regally in one of the two high-back chairs, Bible in her
lap. She closes it when she sees me coming.
“Why aren’t you at lunch?” she asks.
“I think they’re here,” I say, out of breath, my hands
violently shaking. I bend over and rest them on my knees.
“Who?”
“You know who!” I yell. Then, between my closed teeth:
“Mogadorians.”
Her eyes narrow in disbelief. “Where?”
“I went to the cave—”
“What cave?” she interrupts.
“Who cares what cave! There was a set of boot prints
outside of it, huge boot prints—”
“Slow down, Marina. Boot prints outside of a cave?”
“Yes,” I say.
She smirks, and I instantly realize coming to her was a
mistake. I should have known she wouldn’t believe me, and
I can’t help feeling foolish and vulnerable standing in front of
her. I straighten. I don’t know what to do with my hands.
“I want to know where my Chest is,” I say, not exactly in a
confident voice, but not in a timid one either.
“What Chest?”
“You know exactly what Chest!”
“What makes you think I held on to that old thing?” she
asks calmly.
“Because you would be turning against your own people
if you didn’t,” I say.
She reopens her Bible and pretends to read. I think of
leaving, but then my mind returns to the boot prints in the
snow.
“Where is it?” I ask.
She continues to ignore me, so I reach out with my mind
and feel the contours of the book, its thin, dusty pages, its
rough-hewn cover. I snap the book shut. Adelina jumps.
“Tell me where it is.”
“How dare you! Who do you think you are?”
“I’m a member of the Garde, and the fate of the entire
race of Loriens depends on my survival, Adelina! How
could you turn your back on them? How could you turn your
back on the humans, too? John Smith, who I believe is a
member of the Garde, is on the run in the United States;
and when he was pulled over recently he was able to move
the officer without touching him. Just like I can do. Like I just
did with your book. Don’t you see what’s happening,
Adelina? If we don’t start helping, not only will Lorien be lost
forever, but so will Earth and this stupid orphanage and
stupid town!”
“How dare you call this place stupid!” Adelina steps
towards me with clenched fists. “This is the only place that
let us in, Marina. It’s the only reason we’re still alive. What
did the Loric do for us? They pushed us onto a ship for a
year, and then they pushed us out onto a cruel planet
without any kind of plan or any instructions other than to stay
hidden and train. Train for what?”
“To defeat the Mogadorians. To take back Lorien.” I
shake my head. “The others are probably out there right
now, battling, figuring out how to come together and how to
get us home, while we’re stuck in this prison doing nothing.”
“I’m living my life with purpose, helping the human race
with my prayers and service. And you should be, too.”
“Your sole purpose on Earth was to help me.”
“You’re alive, aren’t you?”
“Only in the literal sense of the word, Adelina.”
She sits back in her chair and opens the Bible on her lap.
“Lorien is dead and buried, Marina. What does it matter?”
“Lorien isn’t dead; it’s hibernating. You said so yourself.
And the point is, we’re not dead.”
She swallows hard. “A death sentence has been handed
down to us all,” she says, and her voice slightly cracks.
Then, in a much softer tone, she says, “Our lives were
doomed from the beginning. We should do good while
we’re here, so we may have a good afterlife.”
“How can you say that?”
“Because that’s the reality. We’re the last of a dying race,
and soon we’ll be gone, too. And may God help us when
that time comes.”
I shake my head at her. I have no interest in talking about
God.
“Where is my Chest? In this room?” I walk around the
room, casting my gaze along the ceiling’s edges, and then I
crouch and peer beneath a few of the beds.
“Even if you had it, you can’t open it without me,” she
says. “You know that.”
She’s right. If I’m to believe what she’d told me years
before, when I could still trust the things she said, then I
can’t open it without her. The futility of it hits me all at once.
The boot prints in the snow; John Smith on the run; the
sheer and utter claustrophobia of Santa Teresa; and
Adelina, my Cepan, meant to help and assist in developing
my Legacies, who has given up on our mission. She
doesn’t even know what Legacies of mine have developed.
I have the ability to see in the dark, breathe underwater, to
run at superspeeds; to move things with my mind; and the
means to bring plants back from the brink of death. Anxiety
sweeps over me, and at the worst possible moment, Sister
Dora enters the room. She props her fists on her hips.
“Why aren’t you in the kitchen?”
I look at her and mirror the same scowl she’s giving me.
“Oh, shut up,” I say, and march out of the room before she
responds. I run down the hall, down the stairs, grab my coat
again and push through the double doors.
I look wildly around as I move within the shadows lining
the side of the road. Though I still feel as though I’m being
watched, outside nothing seems amiss. I race down the hill
without letting my guard down, and when I reach the cafe, I
enter because it’s the only place open. About half of its
twenty tables are occupied, which I’m thankful for; I have the
urge to be surrounded by people. I’m about to sit when I
notice Hector, alone in the corner, drinking wine.
“Why aren’t you at El Festin?”
He glances up. He’s clean shaven, and his eyes appear
clear and sharp. He seems well rested; he’s even well
dressed. I haven’t seen him this way in quite a while. I
wonder how long it will last.
“I thought you didn’t drink on Sunday,” I say, and
immediately wish I hadn’t. Hector and Ella are my only
friends at the moment, and one has already disappeared
today. I don’t want to upset Hector as well.
“I thought so, too,” he says, not taking offense. “If you ever
know a man who tries to drown his sorrows, kindly inform
him his sorrows know how to swim. Here, sit down, sit
down,” he says, kicking out the chair across from him. I plop
down in it. “How are you?”
“I hate this place, Hector. I hate it with everything inside of
me.”
“Bad day?”
“Every day is a bad day here.”
“Eh, this place isn’t so terrible.”
“How are you always so cheerful?”
“Alcohol,” he says with a sideways grin. He pours himself
what looks to be his first glass from the bottle. “I wouldn’t
recommend it to others. But it seems to work for me.”
“Oh, Hector,” I say. “I wish you wouldn’t drink so much.”
He chuckles. Takes a sip. “You know what I wish?”
“What?”
“That you didn’t look so sad all the time, Marina of the
sea.”
“I didn’t know that I did.”
He shrugs. “It’s something I’ve noticed, but Hector is a
very perceptive man.”
I look to my left and to my right, pausing to focus on each
person here. Then I take the napkin off the table and put it
on my lap. I put it back on the table. Then I put it back on my
lap.
“Tell me what is troubling you,” Hector says, then takes a
larger sip.
“Absolutely everything.”
“Everything? Even me?”
I shake my head. “Okay, not everything.”
His eyebrows rise and then furrow. “Now tell me.”
I have a deep urge to tell him my secret, the reason I’m
here and where it is I really come from. I want to tell him
about Adelina and what her role was supposed to be, and
what it has instead become. I want him to know about the
others, out there on the run or fighting, maybe sitting idly
like me, collecting dust. If there’s one person I’m certain
would be my ally, who would help me in any way he could,
then surely it’s Hector. He is, after all, a defender who’s
meant to hold fast and who was born into power and
bravery by such simple means as the name he was given.
“You ever feel like you don’t belong here, Hector?”
“Sure. Some days.”
“Why do you stay, then? You could go anywhere.”
He shrugs. “Several reasons.” He pours more wine into
his glass. “For one, there’s no one else to take care of my
mother. Plus, this place is my home, and I’m not convinced
there’s much better out there. My experiences have taught
me that things rarely improve with a simple change of
scenery.”
“Maybe so, but I still can’t wait to leave. I only have a little
over four months left at the orphanage, you know? And you
can’t tell anyone this, but I think that I’m going to leave
sooner than that.”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea, Marina. You’re very
young to be on your own. Where will you go?”
“America,” I say without hesitation.
“America?”
“There’s somebody there I need to find.”
“If you’re so determined, then why haven’t you already
left?”
“Fear,” I say. “Mostly fear.”
“You’re not the first,” he says, taking a moment to empty
his entire glass. His eyes have lost their sharpness. “The
key to change is letting go of fear.”
“I know.”
The door to the cafe opens, and a tall man wearing a
long coat and carrying an old book enters. He moves past
us and takes a table in the far corner. He has dark hair and
bushy brows. A thick mustache covers his upper lip. I’ve
never seen him before; but when he lifts his head and
meets my gaze, there’s something I immediately don’t like
about him and I quickly look away. From the corner of my
eye, I can see he’s still staring at me. I try ignoring it. I
resume talking to Hector, or rather I babble, hardly making
sense, watching him refill his glass with red wine; and I hear
next to nothing of what he says in reply.
Five minutes later the man’s still staring, and I’m so
bothered by it that the cafe seems to spin. I lean across the
table and whisper to Hector, “Do you know who the person
in the far corner is?”
He shakes his head. “No, but I’ve noticed him watching
us, too. He was in here on Friday, sitting in the same seat
and reading the same book.”
“There’s something about him I don’t like, but I don’t know
what it is.”
“Don’t worry, you have me here,” he says.
“I really should leave,” I say. An odd desperation to get
away has come over me. I try not to look at the man, but I do
anyway. He’s reading the book now, the cover of which is
angled toward me as though he wants me to see it. It’s
brittle and worn, a dusty shade of gray.
PITTACUS OF MYTILENE
AND THE
ATHENIAN WAR
Pittacus? Pittacus? The man is watching me again, and
though I can’t see the bottom half of his face, his eyes
suggest a knowing grin on his lips. All at once I feel as
though I’ve been struck by a train. Could this be my first
Mogadorian?
I jump up, smacking my knee against the bottom of the
table and nearly knocking over Hector’s wine bottle. My
chair falls backwards, crashing to the ground. Everybody in
the cafe turns.
“I gotta go, Hector,” I say. “I gotta go.”
I stumble through the doorway and make a mad dash for
home, running faster than a speeding car, not caring if
anyone sees. I’m back at Santa Teresa in seconds. I crash
through the double doors and quickly slam them shut. I put
my back against them and close my eyes. I try to slow my
breathing, the twitching in my arms and legs, my quivering
bottom lip. Sweat runs down the side of my face.
I open my eyes. Adelina stands in front of me, and I fall
headlong into her arms, not caring about the tension from
an hour before. She tentatively hugs me back, probably
confused by my sudden display of affection, which I haven’t
shown her in years. She pulls away and I open my mouth to
tell her what I’ve just seen, but she brings a finger to her lips
the same way I did to Ella at Mass. Then she turns and
walks away.
That night, after dinner and before prayers, I stand at the
bedroom window gazing out as darkness falls, scanning
the landscape for anything suspicious.
“Marina? What are you doing?”
I turn around. Ella stands behind me; I hadn’t heard her
approach. She moves through these halls like a shadow.
“There you are,” I say, relieved. “Are you okay?”
She nods, but her big brown eyes tell me otherwise.
“What are you doing?” she repeats.
“Just looking outside, that’s all.”
“What for? You’re always looking out the windows at
bedtime.”
She’s right; every night since she arrived, since I saw the
man watching me in the nave window, I’ve been looking
outside at bedtime for any signs of him. I’m now certain
he’s the same man I saw in the cafe today.
“I’m looking for bad men, Ella. There are bad men out
there sometimes.”
“Really? What do they look like?”
“It’s hard to say,” I reply. “I think they’re very tall, and
they’re usually very dark and mean looking. And some
might even be muscular, like this,” I add, doing my best
bodybuilder pose.
Ella giggles, going to the window. She stands on her
tippy toes and pulls herself up to see out.
It’s been several hours since I was in the cafe, and I’ve
managed to calm down a bit.
I place my index finger on the foggy window and trace a
figure onto it with two quick squeaks.
“That’s the number three,” Ella says.
“That’s right, kiddo. I bet you can do better than that,
huh?”
She smiles, sticks her finger onto the bottom of the
window, and soon there is the beginning of a beautiful
farmhouse and backyard barn. I watch as my number three
is absorbed by Ella’s perfect silo.
Three is the only reason I was allowed to leave that cafe
today, it’s the distance from John Smith to myself. I’m now
absolutely convinced that he is Number Four by the way he
is being hunted; just as I’m convinced the man at the cafe
was a Mogadorian. This town is so small I rarely see
someone I don’t recognize, and his book—Pittacus of
Mytilene and the Athenian War—plus his constant stare,
are no coincidence. The name “Pittacus” is one I’ve heard
since childhood, since long before we made it to Santa
Teresa.
My number: Seven. It’s my only refuge now, my greatest
defense. As unfair as it might be, I’m separated from death
by the three others who all must die before me. So long as
the charm holds, which, I assume, is why I was left alone
and not attacked right at the cafe table. But one thing is
certain: if he is a Mogadorian, they know where I am and
they could take me any time they choose and hold me until
they kill Four through Six. I wish I knew what’s keeping them
at bay and why I’m allowed to sleep in my bed again
tonight. I know the charm ensures that we can’t be killed out
of order, but perhaps there’s more to it than that.
“You and I, we’re a team now,” I say. Ella puts the
finishing touches on her window drawing, curling her
fingernails over the heads of a few cows to give them
horns.
“You want to be a team with me?” she asks in a tone of
disbelief.
“You bet,” I say, and hold out my pinky. “Let’s pinky-swear
on it.”
She smiles widely and hooks her pinky around mine. I
shake it once.
“There, that settles it,” I say.
We turn back to the window, and Ella wipes her picture
away with the heel of her palm. “I don’t like it here.”
“I don’t like it here either, believe me. But don’t worry,
we’ll both be out of here soon enough.”
“You think so? We’ll leave together?”
I turn and look at her. That wasn’t what I had meant at all,
but without thinking twice I nod in agreement. I hope it isn’t
something I’ll regret promising. “If you’re still here when I
leave, then we’ll leave together. Deal?”
“Deal! And I won’t let them hurt you.”
“Who?” I ask.
“The bad men.”
I smile. “I would appreciate that very much.”
She leaves the window and walks to another, again
pulling herself up to look out. As always, she moves like a
ghost, making no sound. I still have no idea where she
might have hidden today, but wherever it was, it was clearly
a place no one would think to look. And then an idea occurs
to me.
“Hey, Ella? I need your help,” I say. Ella drops from the
window and looks at me expectantly. “I’m trying to find
something here, but it’s hidden.”
“What is it?” she asks, leaning forward in excitement.
“It’s a chest. It’s wooden and looks very old, like you
might expect to see on a pirate ship.”
“And it’s here?”
I nod. “It’s here somewhere, but I have no idea where.
Somebody did a very good job of hiding it. You’re just
about the most clever girl I know. I bet you can find it in no
time.”
She beams, rapidly nodding her head. “I’ll find it for you,
Marina! We’re a team!”
“That’s right,” I agree. “We are a team.”

Categories: The Power of Six

The Power of Six - Chapter 11

Chapter 11


THE THINGS I REMEMBER ABOUT COMING TO SANTA Teresa are
mostly just snippets of a long journey I thought would never
end. I remember an empty stomach and sore feet and
being impossibly tired most of the time. I remember
Adelina begging for change, for food; remember the
seasickness and the vomiting it caused. I remember
disgusted looks from passersby. I remember every time we
changed names. And I remember the Chest, as
cumbersome as it was, that Adelina refused to part ways
with no matter how dire our situation became. On the day
we finally knocked at the door Sister Lucia answered, I
remember it being on the ground tucked snug between
Adelina’s feet. I know she stowed it away in the shadows of
some obscure corner of the orphanage. My days of
searching have turned up nothing, but I still keep looking.
On Sunday, one week after Ella arrived, we sit together
in the back pew during Mass. It’s her first, and it holds her
attention about as well as it holds mine: not at all. Aside
from class, she’s pretty much been by my side since the
morning I helped her make her bed. We walk to and from
school together, eat breakfast and dinner together, say our
nightly prayers together. I’ve grown very attached to her,
and by the way she follows me around, I can tell she’s
grown attached to me as well.
Father Marco has droned on for a good forty-five
minutes, and finally I close my eyes, thinking of the cave
and debating whether I should bring Ella along with me
today. There are several problems with it. First, there’s zero
light inside, and there’s no way Ella will be able to see
through the dark in the way that I can. Second, the snow has
yet to melt, and I’m not sure she’d be able to make the trek
through it. But most of all, I worry that bringing her would be
putting her in harm’s way. The Mogadorians could arrive at
any moment, and Ella would be defenseless. But even with
these obstacles and concerns, I’m eager to take her along
anyway. I want to show her my paintings.
On Tuesday, minutes before we were to depart for
school, I had found Ella hunched over on her bed. Still
chewing on a breakfast biscuit, I looked over her shoulder
to see her furiously shading a perfect drawing of our
sleeping quarters. The details, the technical accuracy of
each crack in the wall, her ability to capture the faintest of
squares of sunrays that dropped through the windows in the
morning, was astounding. It was as if I was looking at a
black-and-white photograph.
“Ella!” I had blurted.
She had flipped the paper over, trapping it against her
schoolbook with her tiny smudged hands. She knew it was
me but didn’t turn around.
“Where did you learn how to do that?” I’d whispered.
“How did you learn to draw so well?”
“My father,” she whispered back, keeping the drawing
turned over. “He was an artist. So was my mother.”
I’d sat down on her bed. “And here I thought I was a pretty
good painter.”
“My father was an incredible painter,” she’d said plainly.
Before I could ask her more questions, we had been
interrupted and then ushered out of the room by Sister
Carmela. That night I’d found Ella’s drawing under my
pillow. It’s the best present I’ve ever received.
Sitting in Mass, I think that maybe she can help me with
my cave paintings. Surely I can find a flashlight or lantern
somewhere here to take with us. And then my thoughts are
interrupted by a fit of giggles beside me.
I open my eyes and look over. Ella’s found a red-andblack
furry caterpillar that’s in the process of crawling up
her arm. I bring my finger to my lips in a sign of silence. It
stops her for a brief moment, but then the caterpillar climbs
higher and she begins giggling again. Her face turns red
while trying not to laugh, but the fact that she’s trying to stifle
it only makes it that much harder. And then she can’t help
herself and a string of laughs escape. Every head snaps
around to see what’s happening, and Father Marco stops
his sermon in midsentence. I snatch the caterpillar from
Ella’s arm and sit upright, staring back at those staring at
us. Ella stops laughing. Slowly the heads turn back around
and Father Marco, clearly flustered at having lost his spot,
resumes his sermon.
I sit with my hand around the caterpillar. It tries wriggling
free. After a minute I open my fist, and the sudden
movement causes the furry little thing to curl into a ball. Ella
raises her eyebrows and cups her hands together, and I
place the caterpillar in them. She sits there smiling down at
it.
I scan the front row. I’m not at all surprised to see Sister
Dora glaring sternly in my direction. She shakes her head
before turning back to Father Marco.
I lean over to Ella.
“When prayer ends,” I whisper into her ear, “we have to
get out of here as fast as we can. And keep away from
Sister Dora.”
Before Mass I’d fixed Ella’s hair into a tight braid; and
now, gazing up at me with her big, brown eyes, it looks as
though the heavy braid is weighing her head back.
“Am I in trouble?”
“We should be okay,” I tell her. “But just in case, we’ll rush
out of here before Sister Dora can catch up to us. Got it?”
“Got it,” she says.
But we don’t get the chance. When there are just a few
minutes left, Sister Dora stands and casually strolls to the
back, and then stands waiting at the door a few steps
away. When my eyes reopen as the final prayer ends with
the sign of the cross, Sister Dora places a hand on my left
shoulder.
“Come with me, please,” she says to Ella, reaching
across me to grab her by the wrist.
“What are you doing?” I say.
Sister Dora pulls Ella past me. “It’s none of your
business, Marina.”
“Marina,” Ella pleads. As she’s being dragged away, Ella
looks back at me with scared eyes. I panic and rush to the
front of the church where Adelina is standing, talking with a
lady from town.
“Sister Dora just grabbed Ella and pulled her away,” I
quickly say, interrupting her. “You have to make her stop,
Adelina!”
She looks incredulously at me. “I will do no such thing.
And it’s Sister Adelina. If you’ll excuse me, Marina, I was in
the middle of a conversation,” she says.
I shake my head at her. Tears form in my eyes. Adelina
doesn’t remember what it feels like to ask for help and not
receive it.
I turn and run from the room and up the winding staircase
to the church offices. To the left, at the end of the hall, the
only door closed is the one leading to Sister Lucia’s office. I
race towards it, trying to decide what I should do. Should I
knock? Should I kick straight through it? But I don’t get the
chance to do either. When I’m within reaching distance of
the knob, I hear the crack of the paddle, followed instantly
by a scream. I’m frozen in shock. Ella cries on the other
side of the door and a second later the door is opened by
Sister Dora.
“What are you doing here?” she snaps at me.
“I came to see Sister Lucia,” I lie.
“She’s not here, and you’re due in the kitchen. Go on,”
she says, shooing me the way I came. “I’m headed there
myself.”
“Is she okay?”
“Marina, it’s none of your concern,” she says, and then
grabs me by the bicep, spins me around, and gives me a
shove.
“Go!” she orders.
I move away from the office, hating the fear that runs
through me every time confrontation stares me in the face.
It’s always been that way—with the Sisters, with Gabriela
Garcia, with Bonita on the dock—I get the same feeling, the
same nervousness that quickly segues to dread, that
always causes me to walk away.
“Walk faster!” Sister Dora barks, following me down the
staircase and towards the kitchen where El Festin duties
await.
“I have to use the restroom,” I say before we reach the
kitchen, which is a lie; I want to make sure Ella’s okay.
“Fine. But you better make it fast. I’m timing you.”
“I will.”
I duck around the corner and wait thirty seconds to make
sure she’s gone. Then I rush back the way we came, up the
staircase, down the hall. The office door is slightly ajar and I
walk through it. The interior is dark, somber. A layer of dust
covers the shelves that line the walls, upon which sit ancient
books. The only light enters through a dirty stained glass
window.
“Ella?” I say, for some reason thinking she might be
hiding. No answer. I walk away and poke my head in the
rooms situated off the main hallway, all of which are empty. I
call her name as I go. At the hall’s opposite end is the
Sisters’ sleeping quarters. There’s no sign of her in there
either. I go back down the stairs. The crowd has made its
way to the cafeteria. I walk to the nave looking around for
Ella. She’s not in there, nor is she in either of the two
sleeping rooms, nor the computer room, nor any of the
storage rooms. By the time I’ve looked in most places I can
think to check, a half hour has passed and I know I’ll be in
trouble if I go to the cafeteria.
Instead I hurry out of my Sunday clothes, pull my coat off
its hook, swipe the blanket from my bed, and dash outside.
I trudge through the snow away from town, unable to push
the sound of the paddle’s crack and Ella’s scream from my
mind. I’m also unable to forgive Adelina’s scorn towards
me. My whole body tense, I focus my energy on some of the
large rocks I pass, using telekinesis to lift and hurl them
against the mountainside. It’s a great way to blow off
steam. The snow’s surface has hardened, creating a thin
layer of ice that crunches underfoot, but it doesn’t keep the
rocks from skidding downhill. I’m so mad I could let them
go, careening towards town. But I stop them in their tracks.
My gripe isn’t with the town but rather its namesake, and
those who live within it.
I pass the camel’s back—half a kilometer to go. The sun
is warm on my face, situated high in the sky and slanted
towards the east, which means I have at least five hours
before I’m due back. I haven’t had this much free time in a
great while; and with the bright sun and crisp, fresh wind
pulling me from my dismal mood, I hardly care that I’ll be in
trouble when I get back. I turn to see how effective my
blanket cape is at hiding my prints in the hardened snow,
and I’m afraid to see that it hasn’t worked at all today.
Nevertheless, I push forward until I spot the rounded
shrub sticking up over the snow, then I race towards it, at
first not noticing the very thing my eyes should be attuned
to: that the snow at the base of the cave is tossed up and
pushed around. But as soon as I reach the cave’s entrance,
I know immediately that something is horribly off.
Approaching from the south, a single set of boot prints,
double the size of my own, dot the mountainside, a perfect
straight line cut into the snow leading from town to the cave.
They seem to tromp around its opening, as though circling
it. I’m flustered, certain there’s something else here I’m
missing. And then it dawns on me. The prints—they lead
into the cave, but they don’t lead back out.
Whoever they belong to is still inside.

Categories: The Power of Six

The Power of Six - Chapter 10

Chapter 10


I NO LONGER SLEEP WITHOUT NIGHTMARES. Every night I’m stricken by
Sarah’s face, there for only a second before it’s swallowed by darkness,
followed by her calling out for help. No matter how furiously I search, she’s
nowhere to be found. She keeps calling, a scared voice, bleak and alone,
but I can never find her.
And then there’s Henri, his body twisted and smoking as
he looks at me, knowing our end together has finally come.
It’s never fear I see in his eyes, or regret, or sadness, but
rather pride, relief, and love. He seems to tell me to go on,
to fight, to win. Then, right at the end, his eyes widen in a
plea for more time. “Coming here, to Paradise, it wasn’t by
chance,” he says again, and I still have no idea what he
means. Then, “I wouldn’t have missed a second of it, kiddo.
Not for all of Lorien. Not for the whole damn world.” This is
my curse, that every time I dream of Henri I’m forced to
watch him die. Over and over again.
I see Lorien, the days before the war, the jungles and
oceans I’ve dreamed of a hundred times. Myself as a kid,
running wild through the tall grass while those around me
smile and laugh, unaware of the horrors to come. Then I
see the war, the destruction, the killing, and the blood.
Sometimes, on nights like tonight, I have distinct visions of
what I believe is the future.
My eyes aren’t closed for long before I’m whisked away.
And even as it begins, I feel myself entering a landscape I
know I’ve never seen before, but still find familiar.
I run down a pathway lined with litter and debris. Broken
glass. Burned plastic. Twisted, rusted steel. Acrid mist fills
my nose and causes my eyes to water. Decaying buildings
stand tall against the gray sky. A dark, stagnant river lurks
to my right. There’s commotion up ahead. The sounds of
yelling and metallic clattering swell in the thick air. I come to
an angry mob surrounding a tarmac where a large airship
prepares for takeoff. I go through a barbed-wire gate and
enter the airstrip fenced off from the crowd.
The tarmac is marked with small rivulets the color of
magma. Mogadorian soldiers keep the crowd at bay while
swarms of scouts ready the ship, an onyx orb hovering in
midair.
The crowd roars against the fence as soldiers knock
them back. They’re smaller than the soldiers, but have the
same ashy skin tone. A low rumble grows from somewhere
beyond the ship. The crowd hushes, taking panicked steps
backwards, while those on the tarmac file into orderly lines.
Then something drops from the hazy sky. A dark vortex
absorbs the surrounding clouds, leaving a thick, black
discharge in its wake. I cover my ears before the object
crashes to the ground, shooting vibrations through the soil
that nearly knock me off my feet. Everything falls silent as
the dust clears, revealing a perfectly spherical ship, milky
white like a pearl. A round door slides open, and a
monstrous creature steps out. The same creature that tried
to behead me in the rock castle.
A brawl breaks out along the fence, with everyone
scrambling to get away from this monster. He’s even more
enormous than I remember, with muscular, chiseled
features and short, cropped hair. Tattoos crawl up his arms,
scars are branded into his ankles, the largest of which
stands out on his neck, grotesque and purple. A soldier
retrieves a golden cane from the ship, its head curved like
a hammer, a black eye painted on its side. When the
creature holds it in his hand, the eye comes alive, rolling left
and then right, taking in its surroundings, until it finds me.
The Mogadorian scans the crowd, sensing me nearby.
His eyes narrow. He takes a giant step towards me, lifting
the golden cane. Its eye pulses.
Just then an onlooker shouts at the Mogadorian, furiously
rattling the fence. The Mogadorian turns towards the
protester, thrusting the rod in his direction. The rod’s eye
glows red and the man is instantly ripped to shreds, torn
through the barbed-wired fence. Pandemonium erupts as
everyone fights to get away.
The Mogadorian returns his attention to me, pointing the
rod at my head. I’m hit with the sensation of falling.
Weightlessness rises in my gut until I’m on the brink of
vomiting. What I see around his neck is so disturbing, so
haunting, that I’m jolted awake as though struck by a bolt of
blue lightning.
Early dawn breaks through the windows, bathing the small
room in the hard morning light. The shapes of things return.
I’m sweat covered and out of breath. And yet I’m here, the
ache and confusion in my heart telling me I’m still alive, no
longer in a dreadful place where a man can be ripped
through the small holes of a barbed-wired fence.
We found an abandoned house bordering a conservation
area a few miles from Lake George. The kind of house
Henri would have loved: isolated, small and quiet, offering
security without any personality. It’s one story, the exterior
painted lime green while the interior is various shades of
beige, with brown carpeting. We couldn’t be luckier that the
water hasn’t been turned off. By the heavy dust in the air, I
can only assume it’s been a while since anyone lived here.
I roll to my side and glance at the phone beside my head.
Having seen what I just did, the only thing that could take it
all away is Sarah. I remember the time in my room when
she’d just returned from Colorado—the way we’d held one
another. If I’m allowed to save a single moment with her
then I choose that one. I close my eyes and imagine what
she’s doing at this very moment, what she’s wearing, who
she’s talking to. The news reported that each of the six
school districts surrounding Paradise absorbed a portion
of the displaced students until a new building is built. I
wonder which of them Sarah’s attending, if she’s still taking
photographs.
I reach for my cell phone, the one prepaid and registered
under the name Julius Seazar. Henri’s sense of humor. I
turn it on for the first time in days. All I have to do is dial her
number to hear her voice. It’s that simple. I press the
familiar numbers one by one until reaching the last. I close
my eyes, take a deep breath, then turn the phone off and
flip it shut. I know I can’t punch the tenth number. Fear for
Sarah’s safety, for her life—and all of ours, too—stops me.
Out in the living room, Sam streams CNN with one of
Henri’s laptops on his thighs. Luckily Henri’s wireless
internet card, under whatever pseudonym he chose at the
time, still works. Sam furiously scribbles notes on a legal
pad. It’s been three days since the mess in Tennessee, and
we only arrived in Florida last night, having hopped aboard
three different semis—one of which carried us two hundred
miles in the wrong direction—before jumping a train that
brought us here. Without the use of our Legacies—our
speed, Six’s invisibility— we would have never made it. It’s
our intent to lie low for a bit and let the news dissipate. We’ll
regroup, start training, and avoid any further mishaps like
the one involving the helicopters at all costs. First order of
business, find a new car. Second order of business, figure
out what to do next. None of us really knows for sure. Again,
I feel the enormity of Henri’s absence.
“Where’s Six?” I ask, stumbling into the living room.
“Out back swimming laps or something,” Sam replies.
The one cool thing about the house is the pool in the
backyard, which Six immediately filled by directing a heavy
rainstorm overhead.
“I’d think you’d want to catch a glimpse of Six in her
bathing suit.” I nudge Sam.
His face reddens. “Shut up, dude. I wanted to check the
news. You know, be productive.”
“Anything?”
“Aside from now being considered an accomplice and
having the reward for me increased to a half million
dollars?” Sam asks.
“Oh come on, you know you love it.”
“Yeah, it’s pretty cool,” he says, grinning. “Anyway, no,
nothing new. I don’t see how Henri kept up with all this.
There’re literally thousands of stories every day.”
“Henri never slept.”
“Don’t you want to go check out Six in her bathing suit?”
Sam asks, turning back to the screen. I’m surprised by the
lack of sarcasm in his voice. He knows how I feel about
Sarah. And I know how he feels about Six.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I see the way you look at her,” Sam says. He clicks on a
link about a plane crash in Kenya. One survivor.
“And how do I look at her, Sam?”
“Never mind.” The survivor is an old woman. Definitely
not one of us.
“The Loric fall in love for life, man. And I love Sarah. You
know that.”
Sam looks over the screen of the laptop. “I know you do.
It’s just that, I don’t know. You’re the kind of guy she’d go
for, not some math nerd obsessed with aliens and outer
space. I just don’t see how Six could fall for someone like
me.”
“You kick ass, Sam. And don’t forget it.”
I walk out the rear sliding glass door leading to the pool.
Beyond the pool lies an overgrown yard enclosed by a
brick wall offering privacy from anyone who might wander
by. The nearest neighbor is a quarter mile away. The
nearest town is a ten-minute drive.
Six zips across the water, skimming the top like some
water-borne insect, and beside her, going twice as fast, is
a platypus-shaped mammal with long white hair and a
beard—I have no idea what animal Bernie Kosar’s
copying. Six senses me and stops at the edge, pulling
herself halfway out of the water and resting her arms on the
deck. Bernie Kosar jumps out and returns to his beagle
form, shaking himself dry and covering me with water. It’s
refreshing, and I can’t help but think how nice it is to be
down South again.
“You better not be killing my dog out here,” I say. I catch
myself staring at her perfect shoulders, her slender neck.
Maybe Sam is right. Maybe I am looking at Six the same
way he does. I want more than ever to run back inside, turn
on my phone, and hear Sarah’s voice.
“More like he’s killing me. The little guy swims like he’s
totally healed. Speaking of which, how’s your head?”
“Still hurts,” I say, running a hand over it. “But nothing I
can’t handle. I’m ready to start training today, if that’s why
you’re asking.”
“Good,” she says. “I’m getting antsy. It’s been a long time
since I’ve trained with somebody.”
“You’re sure you want to train with me? You know you’ll
probably end up hurt, right?”
She laughs, and then spits a mouthful of water at me.
“Oh, it’s on,” I say, visualizing the surface of the pool and
forcing a blast of air over it. Water rushes towards her face.
She dives beneath the surface to keep from being
splashed, and when she comes up she rides the crest of a
huge wave that nearly empties the pool, bringing her
towards me. Before I can react she moves away, but the
wave keeps coming, knocking me over and sending me
crashing into the back of the house. I hear her laughing. The
water recedes to the pool, and I stand and try pushing her
backwards into it. She deflects my telekinesis, and all at
once I’m upended and sailing through the air upside down
where I flail helplessly.
“What the hell are you guys doing out here?” Sam asks.
He’s standing at the sliding glass door.
“Um. Six was talking smack, so I decided to put her in
her place. Can’t you tell?”
I remain upside down, hovering four feet over the pool’s
center. I can feel Six’s grip around my right ankle, and the
sensation is the same as if she were literally holding me up
with one hand.
“Oh, totally. Got her right where you want her,” Sam
replies.
“I was about to make my move, you know. Biding my
time.”
“So what do you think, Sam?” Six asks. “Should I let him
have it?”
A smile breaks across Sam’s face. “Take it away.”
“Hey!” I say just before she lets go and I fall headfirst into
the water. When I resurface, Six and Sam are laughing
hysterically.
“That was only round one,” I say, climbing out. I peel off
my shirt and slap it to the concrete. “You caught me off
guard. Just wait.”
“What happened to being tough and rugged?” Sam asks.
“Isn’t that what you said when you buzzed your head?”
“Strategy,” I say. “I’m just giving Six a false sense of
security, then when she gets comfortable I’m going to pull
the rug out from under her.”
“Ha! Yeah, right,” Sam says, then adds, “God, I wish I had
Legacies.”
Six stands between us in her solid black one-piece
bathing suit. She’s still laughing, and water runs down her
arms and legs as she leans slightly forward and twists her
hair to ring it out. The scar on her leg is still discolored, but
it isn’t nearly as purple as it was the week before. She
whips her hair back over her head. Sam and I are both
mesmerized.
“So, training this afternoon then?” Six asks. “Or do you
still feel like I might get hurt?”
I puff my cheeks and release the air slowly. “Maybe I’ll
take it easy on you. I mean, that scar on your leg still looks
kinda nasty. But, yeah, we’re on.”
“Sam, is that a yes for you, too?”
“You guys want me to train? Seriously?”
“Of course. You’re one of us now,” Six says.
He nods, rubbing his hands together. “I’m in,” he says,
grinning like a kid on Christmas morning. “But if you just
want me for target practice, I’m going home.”
We start at two o’clock, but by the look of the gloomy sky I
don’t anticipate training for very long. Sam bounces on the
balls of his feet, wearing gym shorts and an oversized tee.
He’s all knees and elbows, but if heart and determination
could be counted, I think he’d be nearly the size of the
Mogadorian I’d seen aboard the ship.
To start, Six shows us what she’s learned of combat
techniques, which is far more than I know. Her body moves
fluidly and with the precision of a machine when she throws
a kick or punch, or when she does a back flip to evade an
attack. She shows us how to counterassault and the merits
of skill and coordination, and drills the same maneuvers
until they come instinctively. Sam eats it up, even when Six
pounds him backwards and he flips head over heels or has
the wind knocked out of him. She does the same to me,
and even though I try laughing it off like I’m playing around, I
work my hardest and she still kicks the crap out of me. I
can’t fathom how she learned all this on her own. After my
mouth is filled with grass and dirt for the second time, I
realize just how much she can teach me.
The rain begins a half hour later. A light drizzle at first, but
soon the skies open, sending us indoors for cover. Sam
paces through the house throwing kicks and punches at
phantom enemies. I sit in the chair, my fist around my blue
pendant, and stare out the front window for a very long time,
simply watching it all happen while remembering that the
last two storms I saw both raged because Six told them to.
When I turn back I see that she’s sound asleep in the
corner of the living room, curled around Bernie Kosar,
holding him in her arms like a pillow. It’s how she always
sleeps, wrapping herself into a ball on her side, her
features losing their sharp edges.
The white bottoms of her feet are aimed right at me, and I
use telekinesis to lightly tickle the bottom of her right foot.
She twitches it as though shooing a pesky fly. I tickle her
again. She twitches her foot a little harder. I wait a few
seconds and then, as softly as I can, I tickle the length of her
foot, from her heel up to her big toe. Six pulls her foot back
and kicks her leg straight out, the telekinetic force of which
sends me flying into the nearest wall, leaving a hole
revealing the interior wires and studs. Sam charges into the
room and jumps into the perfect fighting position.
“What happened? Who’s here?” he yells.
I stand, rubbing my elbow, which took the brunt of the hit.
“Jerk,” Six says, sitting up.
Sam looks from me to her.
“You guys are ridiculous,” he says, retreating back to the
kitchen. “Your flirting just scared the hell out of me.”
“Scared the hell out of me, too,” I say, ignoring the flirting
comment; but he’s already gone and doesn’t hear it. Am I
flirting? Would Sarah think that was flirting?
Six yawns, raising her arms to the ceiling. “Still raining?”
“Totally, but look on the bright side; the weather saved
you from any further bruises.”
She shakes her head. “The tough-guy routine is pretty
tired, Johnny. And don’t forget what I can do with the
weather.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” I say. I try to change the subject. I
hate myself for flirting with another girl. “Hey, I’ve been
meaning to ask you: who’s the face in the clouds? Every
time you whip up a storm I see this crazy, ominous face.”
She scratches the bottom of her right foot. “I’m not sure,
but ever since I’ve been able to mess with the weather, it’s
always the same face that appears. I assume it’s Loric.”
“Yeah, probably. And here I thought it might be a crazy
ex-boyfriend you’ve yet to get over.”
“Because obviously I have a weakness for ninety-yearold
men. You know me so well, John.”
I shrug. Both of us smile.
That night I cook dinner on a rusty but serviceable grill left
on the back patio. Or try to cook, I guess. Since I took home
economics with Sarah in Paradise, I’m the only one who
knows how to make anything remotely resembling a meal.
Tonight: chicken breasts, potatoes, and a frozen pepperoni
pizza.
We’re sitting on the living-room carpet in a triangle.
Under the blanket Six has draped over her head and body,
she wears a black tank top, and her pendant hangs in full
view. The sight of it returns my mind to the vision I had. I
long for a normal dinner around a table and a normal night’s
sleep where I’m not tortured by my Loric past. Was that
what it was like on Lorien before we left?
“Do you think about your parents a lot?” I ask Six. “Back
on Lorien, I mean?”
“Not that much anymore. I can’t even tell you what they
look like, really. I remember how it felt being near them,
though, if that makes any sense. I think about that feeling
quite a bit, I guess. What about you?”
I pick at a burned slice of pizza. I resolve never to cook
frozen pizza on the grill again. “I see them a lot in my
dreams. Which is really great, but at the same time it tears
me up inside. Reminds me that they’re dead.”
The blanket slides off the top of Six’s head and rests on
her shoulders. “What about you, Sam? Do you miss your
parents right now?”
Sam opens his mouth and closes it. I can tell he’s
considering telling Six that he thinks his dad was taken by
aliens, abducted when he went out for milk and bread.
Finally he says, “I miss them both, my mom and dad, but I
know that I’m better off here with you guys. Considering
what I know about everything, I don’t think I could be at
home.”
“You know too much,” I say. I feel guilty he’s eating my
terrible meal on the floor of an abandoned house instead of
feasting on his mother’s food at a dining-room table.
“Sam, I’m sorry you got caught up in this with us,” Six
says. “But it’s nice that you’re here.”
He blushes. “I don’t know what it is, but I feel a weird
connection to the whole situation. Can I ask you
something? How far away is Mogadore from Earth?”
I think back to when Henri blew on the seven glass orbs,
how they came to life. Soon we were looking at a floating
replica of our solar system. “It’s a lot closer than Lorien is,
why?”
Sam stands. “How long would it take to get there?”
“A few months maybe,” Six says. “Depends on what type
of ship you’re flying and what type of energy it uses.”
Walking in circles, Sam says, “I think the U.S.
government has to have a ship built somewhere that can
handle that distance. I’m sure it’s a prototype and top
secret and hidden under a mountain that’s hidden under
another mountain, but I was just thinking about what would
happen if we couldn’t find your ship and needed to take the
fight to them—go to Mogadore. We have to have a Plan B,
right?”
“Sure. What’s Plan A again?” I ask, biting my tongue. I
can’t fathom fighting the whole planet of Mogadore on their
own turf.
“Getting my Chest,” Six says. She pulls the blanket back
over her head.
“And then what?”
“Training?”
“And then what?” I ask.
“We go find the others, I guess.”
“It just sounds like a bunch of running and not much of
anything else. I think Henri or Katarina would have us doing
something more productive somehow. Like studying how to
kill certain enemies. Do you know what a piken is?”
“Those are those huge beasts that destroyed the school,”
Six says.
“What about a kraul?”
“Those are the smaller animal things that attacked us in
the gymnasium,” she answers. “Why?”
“In the dream that I had in North Carolina, when you and
Sam heard me speaking Mogadorian, those two names
were mentioned, but I’d never heard of them before. Henri
and I simply called them ‘the beasts.’” I pause. “I had
another dream earlier.”
“Maybe you aren’t having dreams,” she says. “Maybe
you’re having visions again.”
I nod. “It’s hard to tell the difference at this point. I mean,
these dreams felt the same as the visions I had of Lorien,
but I wasn’t on Lorien during these two,” I say. “Henri once
said that when I have visions it’s because they hold some
sort of personal significance to me. And that’s always been
true—the past visions were always of things that had
already happened. But I think what I witnessed in my dream
this morning … I don’t know. It’s like I was seeing it as it
was actually happening.”
“Wicked,” Sam says. “You’re like a TV.”
Six crumples her paper towel and tosses it up in the air
above her head. Without thinking I set it on fire, and it wilts
into nothing before landing on the carpet. Then Six says,
“It’s not impossible, John. Some of the Loric have been
known to do it. That’s what Katarina said, anyway.”
“But the thing is, I think I was on Mogadore, which, by the
way, is just as disgusting as I imagined it would be. The air
was so thick it made my eyes water. Everything was
desolate and gray. But, how did I get there? And how could
this one huge dude on Mogadore seem to sense when I
was there?”
“How huge?” Sam asks.
“Huge, like more than double the size of the soldiers I
saw, twenty feet tall, maybe more, far more intelligent and
powerful. I can tell just by looking at him. He was definitely a
leader of some sort. I’ve seen him twice now. The first time I
was overhearing information relayed to him by some little
peon, and it was all about us and what had happened at the
school. This second time I saw him as he was preparing to
board a ship; but before he was on it, one of the others ran
up and handed him something. I didn’t know what it was at
first, but just before the ship’s door closed, he turned
towards me to make sure I could see exactly what it was.”
“What was it?” Sam asks.
I shake my head, ball up my paper towel, and burn it on
the palm of my hand. I look out the back door at the setting
sun, a blaze of orange and hot pink like the Florida sunsets
Henri and I watched from our elevated porch. I wish he was
still here to help make sense of all this now.
“John? What was it? What did he have?” Six asks.
I lift my hand and grab my pendant.
“This. These. He had pendants. Three of them. The
Mogadorians must have taken them after each kill. And this
massive leader guy, or whoever he is, he put them around
his neck like Olympic medals, and then he stood there just
long enough so I could see. Each one was glowing bright
blue, and when I woke up, mine was too.”
“So are you saying it’s a premonition, like you just saw
your fate? Or could you have just had a weird dream
because of how stressed out you are?” Sam asks.
I shake my head. “I think Six is right and these are all
visions. And I think they’re all happening right now. But the
thing that scares me the most is that when that guy got on
that ship, there’s a good chance he was headed this way.
And, if Six is right about how fast a ship can travel, it won’t
be very long until he’s here.”

Categories: The Power of Six

The Power of Six - Chapter 9

Chapter 9


I’M THE FIRST ONE OUT OF BED WHEN THE MORNING bell rings. I
always am. It’s not necessarily because I’m a morning
person but because I prefer being in and out of the
bathroom before anyone else.
I rush through making my bed, which I’ve gotten very
good at over time. The key is getting the sheet, blanket,
and comforter tucked deeply in at the foot. From there it’s
just a matter of pulling the rest to the head, tucking the
sides, and adding pillows to give it that clean, a-quartercould-
be-bounced-off-it finish.
By the time I’m done, across the room in the bed nearest
to the door, Ella, the girl who arrived on Sunday, is the only
other one up. Like the previous two mornings, she’s trying
to emulate the way I make my bed, though she’s struggling
with it. Her problem is that she’s trying to work from the top
down instead of the bottom up. While Sister Katherine has
been lenient with Ella, her rotation ends today and Sister
Dora’s weeklong shift begins tonight. I know she won’t
allow Ella to skimp on perfection, regardless of how new
she is or what she’s going through.
“Would you like help?” I ask, crossing the room.
She looks at me with sad eyes. I can see she doesn’t
care about the bed. I imagine she doesn’t care about much
of anything right now, and I can’t blame her, given the death
of her parents. I’d like to tell her not to worry, that unlike
those of us who are “lifers,” she’ll be out of this place within
the month, two at the most. But what consolation can that
be to her now?
I bend down at the foot of the bed and pull the sheet and
blanket until there’s enough to tuck them both beneath the
mattress, then I stretch her comforter over them both.
“Want to grab that side?” I ask, nodding to the left of the
bed while I go to the right. Together we give the whole bed
the same tight, clean look as my own.
“Perfect,” I say.
“Thank you,” she replies in her soft, timid voice. I look
down into her big brown eyes and can’t help but like her
and feel some need to look after her.
“I’m sorry to hear about your parents,” I say.
Ella looks away. I think I’ve overstepped my boundaries,
but then she offers me a slight smile. “Thank you. I miss
them a lot.”
“I’m sure they miss you, too.”
We leave the room together, and I notice she walks on
the balls of her feet so as not to make a sound.
At the bathroom sink, Ella grips her toothbrush near the
top, almost touching the bristles with her small fingers,
making the toothbrush appear larger than it really is. When I
catch her staring at me in the mirror, I grin. She grins back,
showing two rows of tiny teeth. Toothpaste pours from her
mouth and runs down her arm, dripping from her elbow. I
watch it, thinking the S pattern it creates is familiar, and I let
my mind wander.
A hot summer day in June. Clouds drift in the blue sky.
Cool waters ripple in the sun. The fresh air carries hints of
pine. I breathe it in and let the stress of Santa Teresa melt
away into nothingness.
Though I believe my second Legacy developed shortly
after the first, I didn’t discover it until almost a full year later.
It was an accident I discovered it at all, which makes me
wonder if I have other Legacies waiting to be uncovered.
Every year when school lets out for summer, to reward
those of us who have been what the Sisters deem “good,” a
four-day trip to a nearby mountain camp is organized. I’ve
always loved the trip for the same reason I love the cave
that sits hidden in the opposite direction. It’s an escape—a
rare opportunity to spend four days swimming in the huge
lake nestled in the mountains, or a chance to hike, to sleep
beneath the stars, to smell the fresh air away from the
musty corridors of Santa Teresa. It is, in essence, a chance
to act our age. I’ve even caught some of the Sisters
laughing and smiling when they think nobody’s looking.
In the lake, there’s a floating dock. I’m a horrible
swimmer, and for many summers I just sat and watched
from shore while the others laughed and played and did
flips off the dock into the water. It took a couple summers of
practicing alone in the shallow water, but the summer of my
thirteenth year, I finally learned an imperfect and slow doggy
paddle that kept my head above water. It got me to the
dock, and that was enough for me.
At the dock, the game is to try to push each other off it.
Groups team up until they’re the only ones left, and then it’s
every girl for herself. As the biggest and strongest at Santa
Teresa, I used to think it’d be an effortless victory for La
Gorda, but it rarely is; she’s often outsmarted by the
smaller, more wily girls, and I don’t think anyone has won as
many times as a girl named Bonita.
I didn’t want to play La Reina del Muelle, Queen of the
Dock. I was content to sit on the side and let my feet dangle
in the water, but Bonita shoves me hard from behind
anyway, sending me headlong into the lake.
“Play the game or go back to shore,” Bonita says, flicking
her hair over her shoulder.
I climb back up and rush straight towards her. I shove her
as hard as I can, and she falls backwards and crashes into
the lake.
I don’t hear La Gorda behind me, and suddenly two
strong hands shove me hard from behind. My feet slip on
the wet wood, and the side of my head and shoulder smack
against the edge of the dock, clouding my vision with stars.
I’m knocked unconscious for a second, and when my eyes
open I’m underwater. I see nothing but darkness and
instinctively kick upward, flailing my arms to reach the
surface. But my head smacks against the bottom of the
dock, and I realize there are only a few inches of space
between the water and the wooden boards of the dock. I try
to tilt my head backwards to put my nose and mouth above
the surface, but water instantly laps into my nostrils. I panic,
my lungs already burning. I scramble to the left but there’s
nowhere to go; I’m trapped by the dock’s plastic barrels.
Water fills my lungs while the absurdity of death by
drowning pops into my head. I think of the others, how their
ankles are about to be seared. Will they believe that
Number Three has been killed, or will they somehow know
it’s me? Will it burn differently than if I’d died at the hands of
the Mogadorians instead of my own stupidity? My eyes
slowly close and I begin to sink. Just as I feel the last
stream of bubbles escape my lips, my eyes snap open, and
an odd sort of calm sweeps in. My lungs are no longer
burning.
I’m breathing.
The water tickles my lungs, but at the same time satisfies
every desperate need I have to breathe, and that’s when I
know I’ve discovered my second Legacy: the ability to
breathe underwater. I’ve found it only because I was pushed
to the brink of death.
I don’t want to be found just yet by the girls diving into the
water looking for me, so I let myself drift down to the deep
bottom, the world slowly fading to black until my feet finally
sink into the cold mud. I can see through the brown, murky
water once my eyes adjust. Ten minutes pass. Then twenty.
Finally the girls swim away from the dock. I assume the
lunch bell’s been rung. I wait until I’m absolutely sure they’ve
all left, then I walk slowly along on the lake’s bottom towards
shore, my feet sinking into the mud as I inch forward. After a
while the icy water begins to warm and brighten and the
mud segues to rocks and then to sand, and finally my head
emerges. I listen to the girls, La Gorda and Bonita included,
scream and splash towards me in relief. I take inventory of
myself on shore, noticing a gash on my shoulder is
bleeding, leaving a trail of blood down my arm in the shape
of a subtle S.
The Sisters make me sit the rest of the afternoon at a
picnic table under a tree, but I didn’t mind. I had another
Legacy.
In the bathroom, Ella catches me watching the toothpaste
run down her arm in the mirror. She looks embarrassed,
and as she tries to replicate the way I brush my teeth, even
more frothy toothpaste pours from her mouth.
“You’re like a bubble factory,” I say with a smile, grabbing
a towel to clean her up.
We leave the bathroom as the others are arriving, dress
quickly in the room and walk out of it as the others are
coming in, keeping just ahead of the group, as I prefer to
do. We grab our lunches from the cafeteria and head out
into the cold morning. I eat my apple on the walk to school.
Ella does the same. I’m about ten minutes early today,
which will give me a little time to get on the internet to see if
there’s anything new about John Smith. The thought of him
makes me smile.
“Why are you smiling? Do you like school?” Ella asks. I
look over at her. The half-eaten apple looks big in her small
hand.
“It’s a nice morning, I guess,” I say. “And I have good
company today.”
We walk through town as street vendors set up shop. The
snow hasn’t melted and is piled along both sides of Calle
Principal, but the road itself is clear. Up ahead on the right
Hector Ricardo’s front door opens, and out comes his
mother in a wheelchair, being pushed by Hector. She’s had
Parkinson’s disease for a very long time. She’s been in a
wheelchair for the last five years, and she’s been unable to
speak for the last three. He positions her in a sliver of
sunlight and applies her wheel brakes. While the sun
seems to bring her some comfort, Hector slinks away and
sits in the shade, dropping his head.
“Good morning, Hector,” I call out. He lifts his head and
squints one eye open. He waves with a shaky hand.
“Marina, as of the sea,” he croaks. “The only limits of
tomorrow are the doubts we have today.”
I stop and smile. Ella stops, too.
“That’s one of your better ones.”
“Don’t doubt Hector; he has a few nuggets left,” he says.
“Are you doing okay?”
“Strength, confidence, humility, love. Hector Ricardo’s
four tenets of a happy life,” he says, which makes no sense
whatsoever considering the question I asked, but it makes
me feel good anyway. He turns his gaze on Ella. “And
who’s this little angel?”
Ella grabs my hand and hides behind me.
“Her name is Ella,” I say, looking down at her. “This is
Hector. He’s my friend.”
“Hector is one of the good guys,” he says, though Ella
remains behind me.
He waves at us as we walk the rest of the way to school.
“Do you know where you’re going?” I ask her.
“I have Senora Lopez’s class,” she says, smiling.
“Ahh, you’re a lucky girl. I had her, too. She’s one of the
good ones in this town, like Hector,” I say.
I’m devastated; all three of the school computers are
occupied, a trio of younger girls from town are desperately
trying to finish a science assignment, their fingers flying
across the keyboards. I coast through the day, keeping to
myself as one thing runs through my mind. John Smith, on
the run in America, somehow staying ahead of the law, and
I’m stuck here, in Santa Teresa, an old, moldy town where
nothing happens. I’d always thought I’d leave when I turned
eighteen. But now that John Smith is out there, being
hunted, I know I have to leave as soon as I can, to join him.
The only question now is how to find him.
My last class is Spanish history. The teacher drones on
about General Francisco Franco and the Spanish Civil War
of the 1930s. I tune her out and instead write in my
notebook about John, what I know based on the most
recent article I read.
John Smith
Lived 4 months in Paradise, OH
Pulled over by an officer in Tennessee, driving
west in a
pickup truck. Middle of the night, with 2 other
people around
the same age.
Where were they driving?
One of the two people he was with is believed to
be Sam
Goode, also from Paradise, originally thought to
be a hostage,
now considered an accomplice.
Who is the third person? A girl with black hair.
Girl in my
dream had black hair.
Where is Henri?
How did they get away from 2 helicopters and 35
police officers? How did the 2 copters crash?
How can I contact him OR the others?
Post something on internet?
Too dangerous. Is there a way to do so that
eludes the Mogs?
If so, will any of the others even see it?
John is on the run. Ever checking internet?
Does Adelina know something that I don’t?
Can I bring it up to her without being obvious?
The pen hovers over the page. The internet and Adelina,
my only two ideas, neither of which seems promising. What
more can I do, though? Everything else seems as futile as
walking up the mountain and sending smoke signals into
the air. But I can’t help but feel like I’m missing something—
some crucial element that’s so obvious it’s staring me right
in the face.
The teacher drones on. I close my eyes and think it all
through. Nine Garde. Nine Cepan. An airship that brought
us to Earth, the same airship to take us back eventually,
hidden somewhere on Earth. All I remember about it is that
we landed in a remote place in the midst of a thunderstorm.
A charm was cast to protect us from the Mogadorians,
which went into effect only when we scattered, and that only
works if we stay away from each other. But why? A charm
that keeps us apart seems pretty counterintuitive in helping
us fight and defeat the Mogadorians. What’s the point in it?
While asking myself this question my mind stumbles on
something else. I close my eyes and let the logic carry me.
We were meant to hide, but for how long? Until our
Legacies developed and we had the tools to fight, to win.
What’s the one thing we’re able to do when that first Legacy
finally arrives?
The answer seems too obvious to be correct. With the
pen still in my hand, I write the only answer I can come up
with:
The Chest

Categories: The Power of Six

The Power of Six - Chapter 8

Chapter 8


WE HOP A FREIGHT TRAIN IN TENNESSEE, AND once we are settled Six
tells us about her and Katarina being captured while they were in upstate
New York, just a month after narrowly escaping the Mogadorians in West
Texas. This second time around, after botching the first attempt, the
Mogadorians had planned well; and when they stormed the room, they
totaled more than thirty in number. Six and Katarina had been able to take
a few down, but they were quickly bound, gagged, and drugged. When Six
woke up—having no idea how much time had passed—she was alone in
a cell in a hollowed-out mountain. She didn’t discover she was in West
Virginia until some time later. Six learned the Mogadorians had been
trailing them the entire time, observing, hoping the two might lead them to
the others, because, in Six’s words, “Why kill one when the others might be
near?” I shift uneasily when she says this. Maybe she is still being
followed and they are waiting for the perfect time to kill us.
“They had bugged our car when we were eating in the
diner in Texas, and it never once occurred to either of us to
check,” she says, and then gives herself over to a long
silence.
Aside from an iron door containing a sliding hatch in its
center for food to be delivered through, her tiny cell was
made entirely of rock, measuring eight feet on each side.
She had no bed or toilet, and the cell was pitch-black. The
first two days passed in total darkness and silence, without
food or water (though she never felt hungry or thirsty, which,
she said she later learned, was due to the charm’s effect),
and she had started to believe she’d been forgotten. But
her luck hadn’t been that good, and on the third day they
came for her.
“When they opened the door I was huddled in the far
corner. They threw a bucket of cold water on me, picked
me up, blindfolded me, and pulled me away.”
After being dragged down a tunnel, they’d let her walk on
her own while surrounded by ten or so Mogs. She could
see nothing, but heard plenty—screams and cries from
other prisoners there for who knows what reasons (when he
heard this, Sam perked up and seemed about to interrupt
and ask questions, but said nothing), the roars of beasts
locked away in their own cells, and metallic clanking. And
then she had been thrust in a room, had her wrists chained
to a wall, and been gagged. They’d ripped off her blindfold,
and when her eyes finally adjusted, she saw Katarina on the
opposite wall, also chained and gagged and looking far
worse than Six felt.
“And then he finally entered, a Mogadorian who looked
no different from someone you’re likely to pass on the
street. He was small, had hairy arms and a thick mustache.
Almost all of them had mustaches, as though they had
learned to blend in by watching movies from the early
eighties. He wore a white shirt, and the top button was
undone; and for some reason my eyes focused on the thick
tuft of black hair poking out. I looked into his dark eyes, and
he smiled at me in a way that told me he was looking
forward to doing what he was about to do, and I started to
cry. I slid down the wall until I dangled from the shackles
around my wrists, watching through my tears as he pulled
razor blades, knives, pliers, and a drill from the desk they
had in the center of the room.”
When the Mogadorian had finished removing over twenty
instruments, he’d gone to Six and stood inches from her
face so that she could smell his sour breath.
“Do you see all of these?” he’d asked. She didn’t
respond. “I intend to use each and every one of them on you
and your Cepan, unless you truthfully answer every question
I ask. If you don’t, I assure you that both of you will wish you
were dead.”
He picked one up—a thin razor blade with a
rubbercoated handle—and caressed the side of Six’s face
with it.
“I’ve been hunting you kids for a very long time,” he’d
said. “We’ve killed two of you, and now we have one right
here, whatever number you are. As you might imagine, I
hope you are Number Three.”
Six had made no response, pushing herself against the
wall as though she might disappear into it. The Mogadorian
grinned, the flat end of the razor still touching her face. Then
he twisted it so the blade pressed against her cheek, and
while looking deep into her eyes, he jerked the razor down
and made a long, thin gash along her face. Or rather he
tried too, but it had been his own face that was slit open.
Blood instantly poured down his cheek and he screamed in
pain and anger, kicking the desk over, sending all of his
tools flying, and he stormed from the room. Six and
Katarina had been dragged back to their cells, kept in
darkness another two days before finding themselves
again gagged and chained to the walls of the room. Sitting
on the desk with his cheek bandaged sat the same Mog,
looking far less certain of himself than he had before.
He’d jumped from the desk and removed Six’s gag,
grabbed the same razor he had tried cutting her with, and
held it up in front of her face, twisting it so that the light
glimmered along the blade. “I don’t know what number you
are… .” For a second she’d thought he would try to cut her
again, but he turned and crossed the room to Katarina
instead. He stood at her side while looking at Six, and then
he touched the blade to Katarina’s arm. “But you’re going
to tell me right now.”
“No!” Six had screamed. And then very slowly the
Mogadorian made an incision down Katarina’s arm just to
be certain he could. His grin widened, and beside the
original cut he made another, this one deeper than the first.
Katarina groaned in pain while the blood ran down her arm.
“I can do this all day. Do you understand me? You’re
going to tell me everything I want to know, starting with what
number are you.”
Six had closed her eyes. When she reopened them he
was at the desk, turning over a dagger that changed colors
with movement. He’d held it up, wanting Six to see the
blade twist and glow as it came to life. Six could feel its
hunger, its desperation for blood.
“Now … your number. Four? Seven? Are you lucky
enough to be Number Nine?”
Katarina had shaken her head in an attempt to keep Six
quiet, and Six knew that no amount of torture would ever
cause her Cepan to talk. But she also knew she preferred
death to seeing Katarina maimed and mutilated.
The Mogadorian had gone to Katarina, lifted the dagger
so the tip was just over her heart. It jerked in his hand, as
though the heart was a magnet pulling it forward. He looked
into Six’s eyes.
“I have all the time in the galaxies for this,” he’d said
without emotion. “While you are in here with me, we are out
there with the rest of you. Don’t think anything has stopped
us from moving forward because we have you. We know
more than you think. But we want to know everything. If you
don’t want to see her sliced into little pieces, then you better
start talking, and fast. And every single word that comes out
better be true. I will know if you’re lying.”
Six had told him everything she remembered about
leaving Lorien and the trip here, the Chests, where they’d
been hiding. She talked so fast that most of it came out
jumbled. Six told him she was Number Eight—not wanting
to tell him the whole truth—and there was something about
the desperation in her voice that caused him to believe it.
“You really are weak, aren’t you? Your relatives on
Lorien, as easy as they fell, at least they were fighters. At
least they had some bravery and dignity. But you,” he’d
said, and shook his head as if disappointed. “You have
nothing, Number Eight.”
And then he’d jammed the knife forward, through
Katarina’s heart. All Six could do was scream. Their eyes
had met for a single second before Katarina drifted away,
her mouth still gagged, slowly sliding down the wall until the
chain had run out of slack and she hung limply by her wrists
as the light drained from her eyes.
“They were going to kill her anyway,” Six says softly.
“Telling them what I did, at least I spared her from horrible
torture, as if there’s any comfort in that.”
Six wraps her arms around her knees and stares at
some abstract point out the window of the train.
“Of course there’s comfort in that,” I offer, wishing I were
brave enough to stand and wrap my arms around her.
To my surprise, Sam is that brave. He stands, and
makes his way over to her. He doesn’t say a word when he
sits down next to her, instead opening his arms. Six buries
her face in Sam’s shoulder and cries.
She eventually pulls back and wipes her cheeks. “When
Katarina was dead, they tried everything, and I mean
everything, they could to kill me—electrocution, drowning,
explosives. They injected me with cyanide, which did
nothing—I didn’t even feel the needle going into my arm.
They threw me in a chamber filled with poisonous gas, and
it was like the air inside was the freshest I’d ever breathed.
The Mogadorian who pushed the button on the other side of
the door, though, he was dead within seconds.” Six takes
another swipe at her cheek with the back of her hand. “It’s
funny, you know, that I think I killed more Mogadorians when
I was captured than I did at the school in Ohio. They finally
threw me in another cell, and I think they’d planned on
keeping me there until they killed Three through Seven.”
“I love that you told them you were Number Eight,” Sam
says.
“I feel bad that I did it now. It’s like I tarnished Katarina’s
legacy, or the real Number Eight’s.”
Sam places his hands on both her shoulders. “No way,
Six.”
“How long were you in there?” I ask.
“One hundred and eighty-five days. I think.”
My mouth drops open. Over half a year locked away,
completely and utterly alone, waiting to be killed. “I’m so
sorry, Six.”
“I was just waiting and praying for my Legacies to finally
develop so I could get the hell out of there. And then one
day, the first one finally did. It was after breakfast. I looked
down and my left hand just wasn’t there. Of course, I
freaked out, but then I realized I could still feel my hand. I
tried to pick up my spoon, and sure enough, I could. And
that’s when I understood what was happening—and
invisibility was the thing I needed in order to escape.”
How it started for Six wasn’t all that different from how it
had started for me, when my hand began to glow in the
middle of my first class at Paradise High.
Two days later Six had been able to make herself
completely invisible, and when dinner rolled around that
day, and the slot on the door was slid open and her meal
pushed through, the Mogadorian guard saw an empty cell.
He’d looked wildly around and then hit an alarm that sent a
piercing wail through the cave. The iron door had been
flung open and four Mogs charged in. While they stood
there, dumbfounded as to how she’d escaped, she slid by
and rushed out the door and down the tunnel, seeing the
cave for the very first time.
It had been a massive labyrinthine network of long,
interconnected tunnels that were dark and drafty. There
were cameras everywhere. She’d passed thick glass
windows revealing chambers that looked like scientific
labs, clean and brightly lit. The Mogadorians inside had
worn white plastic suits and goggles, but she’d raced by so
swiftly she couldn’t tell what they were doing. A sprawling
room housed a thousand or so computer screens with a
Mogadorian sitting in front of each, and Six assumed they
were looking for signs of us. Just like Henri, I thought. One
tunnel was lined with heavy steel doors she had been sure
held other prisoners. But she sped on, knowing her Legacy
was far from developed and terrified she wouldn’t stay
invisible for very long. The siren had continued to wail. And
then she reached the heart of the mountain, a great,
cavernous hall a half mile wide and so dark and murky she
could hardly see to its other side.
The air had been stifling and Six was already sweating.
The walls and ceiling were lined with huge wooden trellises
to keep the cave from collapsing, and narrow ledges
chiseled into the rock face connected the tunnels dotting
the dark walls. Above her, several long arches had been
carved from the mountain itself to bridge the great divide
from one side to the other.
She had pressed herself against a rocky crag, her eyes
darting back and forth for a way out. The number of
passageways had been endless. She’d stood there
overwhelmed, her eyes sweeping across the hollow
darkness, seeing nothing at all that looked promising. But
then she did—far across the ravine, a pale pinprick of
natural light at the end of a wider tunnel. Just before she
climbed the wooden trellis to reach the stone bridge that
led to it, something else caught her eye: the Mogadorian
who had killed Katarina. She couldn’t let him get away. She
followed him.
He entered the room where he had killed Katarina.
“I went straight to his desk and took the sharpest razor I
saw, then grabbed him from behind and slit his throat. And
as I watched the blood gush and spread across the floor,
followed by him bursting into ash, I found myself wishing
that it would have been possible to kill him a little more
slowly. Or to kill him again.”
“What did you do when you finally got out?” I ask.
“I hiked up the opposite mountain, and when I got up
there I stared down at the cave for an hour, trying to
remember every little detail I could. Once I was satisfied
with that, I took note of everything I passed on the five-mile
run to the nearest road, and from there I jumped on the
back of a slow pickup truck. When it stopped a few miles
down the road to get gas, I stole his map, a notepad, and a
couple of pens from the cab. Oh, and a bag of potato
chips.”
“Niiiiice. What kind of chips?” Sam asks.
“Dude,” I say.
“What?”
“They were barbecue, Sam. I marked the cave’s location
on the map I showed you guys back at the motel, and in the
notepad I drew a diagram of everything I remembered, like
a chart that would lead whoever read it straight to its
entrance. I kind of panicked and hid the diagram not far
from the town but kept the map, then I stole a car and drove
straight to Arkansas; but of course by then my Chest had
long since been taken.”
“I’m so sorry, Six.”
“Me, too,” she says. “But they can’t open it without me
anyway. Maybe I’ll get it back someday.”
“At least we still have mine,” I reply.
“You should open it soon,” she says, and I know she’s
right. I should have opened it already. Whatever’s in that
Chest, whatever secrets it holds, Henri had wanted me to
know them. The secrets. The Chest. He had said as much
in his final breaths. I feel stupid for having put it off this long;
but whatever’s in the Chest, I have a feeling it’s going to set
the four of us on a long, uphill journey.
“I will,” I say. “Let’s just get off this train and find a safe
place first.”

Categories: The Power of Six