A World of Trouble (29 page)

“What'd you tell him?” I yell once we're out of hearing range.

“That you all snuck bread and water to the adults! And Mother wanted me to escort you to Rock Bottom!”

“What's that?”

She glances at me. “You don't want to know. Trust me!”

I do. And it's a good thing, too. Because Dark Hollow Cavern lives up to its name. It's blacker than night inside. The Go Kart has headlights, but the dim yellow beams reach only two feet ahead. And it's definitely hollow, although the tunnel's height and width varies with every twist and turn. Glow-in-the-dark arrows indicate when to duck or move to one side, but you can't see them until the rock that's about to decapitate you is inches away. Despite these driving hazards, Elinor zips through the dark
labyrinth, making me feel like a marble in a pinball machine.

Eventually, we zoom through another opening. This one leads out of the crater and into the wide-open desert.

I look over my shoulder. Abe, Gabby, and Lemon are right behind us. I grin and wave, then swivel around and check my K-Pak. There are no messages, but GS George probably turned back toward Blackhole the second he got my note. And it's probably impossible to man the controls and e-mail at the same time.

“There's an abandoned tire factory not too far from here!” Elinor shouts over the sound of tires crunching across dirt. “We can hide there until our ride comes!”

“Great!” For the first time since climbing in her car, I relax my grip on the headrest. “That was way easier than I thought it'd be!”

Then, as if they were just waiting for our defenses to lower, the army of misfits appears. This time I hear them before I smell them. They're screaming. Barking. Pounding something that, when I turn around, I see is the resurrected brown school bus. They hang out the windows, hammering the sides of the bus with brooms, shovels, hockey sticks, and fists. Some wave brown IncrimiNation flags. A few ride on the roof, jumping up and down and banging their chests.

And leading the pack from the driver's seat . . . is Mr. Bull.

I turn to Elinor. “Where'd they come from?”

“No idea!” She tightens her fingers around the steering wheel. Punches the gas. “There must be another way out I don't know about!”

Something hits my left arm. I grab it, thinking I've been shot, but my hand comes away dusty—not bloody. I look up and see Lemon driving next to us. His speeding tires must've sent dirt flying.

“What do we do?” he yells. Or rather, asks loudly. Because he's Lemon.

“We can't outrun them!” Abe shouts, pulling up next to Elinor's side of the car. “The bus might be old, but it can move!”

“Maybe we should split up!” Gabby calls out behind us. “To confuse them!”

“No way!” I call back. “Capital T sticks together!”

“Well, we need a plan!” Abe insists. “Because they clearly have one!”

Best-case scenario, their plan is to rekidnap us. Worst-case, it's to kill us. Either way, it's happening soon. Because the screaming and pounding is growing louder.

“How far to the factory?” I ask Elinor.

She glances over her shoulder. “Too far!”

“But what if we get there even a second before they do? Could we run and hide inside?”

She shakes her head. “If I know about it, Shepherd Bull definitely knows about it. He probably has every room and hallway memorized! They'd find us in no time!”

“What about—?”

Our Go Kart lunges sharply forward. I slip from my seat and thrust my hands against the tiny dashboard to keep from flying out.

“You okay?” I ask Elinor.

She slides back in the seat. Brushes her hair from her face. Nods. Floors the gas.

“Sorry!” Gabby yells. “They just hit me! And I hit you!”

I look back—then up. The front of the bus is about a foot from Gabby's rear bumper. Through the broken windshield, I see Mr. Bull laughing.

“We have to fight back!” I yell.

“How?” Abe demands. “We don't have any weapons!”

We're quiet for a second. Then Gabby shouts, “Sure we do!”

After which, a strange thing happens. The way my body's
been switching to autopilot lately anytime it's engaged in conflict? That's exactly what Capital T does.

First Gabby motions for Abe to pull his Go Kart next to hers. When he does, she kisses her stuffed unicorn, lodges it between the steering wheel shaft and the gas pedal so that the motor revs nonstop, and hops out of her toy car and onto Abe's. Her unmanned Go Kart flies to the right, making Shepherd Bull ease up on the gas and a half-dozen IncrimiNators leap to the ground and run after it. Next she waits for the front of the bus to come close again, then climbs on top and crawls up the hood to the broken windshield.

“What's she doing?” Elinor yells.

Something completely crazy and definitely dangerous—that still makes me smile. Mostly because I know she's having fun doing it. “Staring him down!”

Gabby's blocking my view, so I can't see Mr. Bull's expression. But it must work because several seconds later, the bus slows. Gabby scrambles to the front of the hood, waits for Abe to draw closer, and drops onto the back of his Go Kart. Abe speeds up, leaving the bus in his dust. Once they're far enough away, he motions for Gabby to take the steering wheel and for Lemon
to drive next to him. Then, while the child giant shakes off his hypnosis, Abe pulls out his drawing pad, rips out page after page after page, and starts folding.

“What's he doing?” Elinor yells.

“Not sure!” I yell.

Abe says something to Lemon I don't quite catch. Lemon nods, reaches into his coat pocket, and removes his lighter. He holds it toward Abe. A flame appears. Abe holds a piece of paper over it. The paper catches.

Abe cups one hand around it and thrusts it at me.

I take it. When I do, I realize it's a paper airplane. One of dozens he's made in a matter of seconds.

I look at Elinor. “Can you drive parallel to the bus?”

I cup my hand around the flame to protect it from the wind. She swerves to the left and eases up on the gas until we're even with the back of the bus. Abe and Gabby drive next to us. Lemon drives on the other side of them.

The IncrimiNators are so busy screaming and beating their transportation they don't realize right away that we've moved. I take advantage of this head start and stand on my knees. Assess the situation. Eye potential targets. Just like I didn't want to hurt the
misfits with Skee-Balls, I don't want to hurt them with fire. . . . But I do want to get them off the bus.

“The flags!” Elinor yells.

My head snaps toward her, then to the row of broken windows lining the side of the bus. Five kids fling around brown IncrimiNator flags. Unlike everything else associated with this dirty, strange place, the flags are shiny. Clean. Pristine.

“They're the only things Mother insists we take care of!” Elinor adds. “If anything happens to them, we're thrown in the pit for a week!”

Point taken. As the heat of the burning paper airplane nears my pointer finger and thumb, I pull back my arm. Aim. And fire.

I get a direct hit. Abe holds another paper airplane toward Lemon, who lights it. Abe gives me the flaming flyer. Elinor hits the gas until we're even with the next flag. I get that one too. And the next one and the next one and the next one. When we run out of targets on this side, we loop around to the other side and start again.

The reactions are even better than I could've hoped. As soon as the kids see flames, they shriek. They wave the flags, smack them against the side of the bus, pull them inside, and beat them
against seats. The IncrimiNators who aren't holding flags drop their garden tools and sports equipment to help others extinguish. The material must be flammable, because the flames grow taller. The smoke thicker. Soon the IncrimiNators start giving up. Desperate for fresh air, some climb out of the windows and pull themselves up onto the roof. Others dangle from the windows until their arms grow tired. Then they let go, dropping to and rolling across the ground.

To his credit, Mr. Bull holds on a while. He keeps driving even when he starts coughing. But then his coughing turns to hacking. Then choking. Eventually he throws open the door and flings himself down the steps while the vehicle's still in motion. He lands face-first on the ground, flops over onto his back, and gasps for air. Any IncrimiNators still on board join him.

The bus rolls several more yards. Then it bumps into a cactus. And stops.

To
our
credit, we don't celebrate. Not right away. We wait until we've put about a mile between us and the fallen IncrimiNators. And the fire inside the bus reaches the gas tank, the bus explodes, and the black sky turns gold. And a loud whooshing starts in the distance, then comes closer.

We even wait until a scraped, dented, wobbly helicopter appears. And GS George sends down a chain ladder. And we scramble up and inside.

Only then, falling onto the couches, do we finally release a collective sigh.

“That's some flare,” our pilot calls from the cockpit as we swoop away from the burning bus.

“Go big or go home!” Abe calls back.

Completely exhausted yet somehow more awake than I've ever been, I smile at him. Lemon. Gabby.

Elinor.

“Let's go home,” I say. “To Kilter.”

DEMERITS: 2500

GOLD STARS: 300

Y
ou knock.”

“No, you knock.”

“I can't knock. I don't know what's behind that door. The second we step inside, everything could change. We might get expelled. As in kicked out. Then I'll have to go back to straight A-plusses and extra credit and giving out rice cakes on Halloween and—”

Lemon holds up one hand. Gabby stops rambling. Abe looks relieved. Lemon curls his fingers to his palm, presses his thumb
to his pointer finger, and reaches forward. He taps the door once, then turns the knob, and pushes.

“SURPRISE!”

Abe, Gabby, Elinor, and I jump. Lemon slides his hands into his coat pockets.

“If this is what getting expelled looks like,” Abe whispers, “we should do it more often.”

I know what he means. Instead of landing on the Kommissary roof when we got back to Kilter, we landed in Annika's backyard. GS George told us en route that while we were rescuing Elinor he e-mailed his boss and informed her of our whereabouts because there was no use trying to hide it. The helicopter still flew, but it was so banged up she'd know it had been somewhere it shouldn't have been. And since, until last night, she was the only one who used the chopper, that would mean it had been stolen. GS George thought coming clean was the only chance he had of saving his job.

Annika's response contained a single order: to bring us to the conference room in her house the second we got back. That was all she said, so I figured she was furious. I expected to find her waiting inside the conference room with our packed suitcases. And possibly our parents, come to bring us home.
Home
home. Not Kilter home.

As it turns out, Annika is waiting in the conference room. But she's not with our suitcases and parents. She's with Houdini. Wyatt. Fern. Samara. Lizzie. Devin. Mr. Tempest. Ike. With the exception of Mystery, who stands at the back of the group picking his teeth, they all clap and cheer after yelling their initial greeting. Silver streamers hang from the ceiling. Bunches of silver balloons bob throughout the room. The long table's sprinkled with silver glitter and covered in platters of fish sticks and my alliance-mates' favorite snacks. Champagne flutes surround big glass bowls filled with hot chocolate and sparkling apple cider.

It's a party. Though for what, I'm not sure.

“
Look
at them!” Annika sings, hurrying toward us with arms outstretched. “Back from the battlefield and cuter than ever!”

She gives each of us a quick, tight hug. Even Elinor, who catches my eye when it's her turn. Then Annika takes a champagne flute from the table, fills it with sparkling cider, and turns toward us.

“No one in Kilter Academy's illustrious history has ever done what you four did last night. There are too many achievements to recount them all now, but among the most notable are stealing a school helicopter in the middle of the night. Convincing a Good Samaritan to act as pilot. Traveling across the country.
Rescuing a classmate from a difficult, somewhat dangerous situation. Returning here safely—and before breakfast.” She pauses. Smiles. “After you successfully completed the Ultimate Troublemaking Task last semester, I knew you were talented. But I didn't realize until this morning that you were extraordinary.”

Abe and Gabby grin. Lemon lets one corner of his mouth lift. Elinor frowns. Still unsure of the situation, I shoot for a neutral expression.

Annika raises her glass. Our teachers quickly take theirs from the table, fill them, and join the toast.