Edgewood Series: Books 1 - 3 (65 page)

As the woman had predicted, the door to Room 138 was closed. I raised my fist to knock and hesitated, clearing my throat in preparation. This was going to be momentous. Either I’d be meeting David Hofstetter, the formerly dead love of my sister’s life, the missing link to everything we’d encountered so far, or it was a trap. Going through this door might be the biggest mistake of my life. I wasn’t sure which, but we’d gone too far to go back now. I rapped my knuckles against the wood, and when I heard the buzz, I reached for the knob and opened the door.

Nadia

It was amazing to me that Russ knew exactly what to do. When I’d asked earlier in the car if he was nervous he said yes, but he didn’t seem nervous. When I had my breakdown in the tunnel, he picked me up like I weighed nothing and moved forward like it was all in the plan. Already today, he got us to the ruins, zapped his way into the tunnel, cured my claustrophobia, and knew to ask for David Hofstetter. Not bad for a high school student from Wisconsin on the run in South America.

And then he walked through the doorway of Room 138 like we had an appointment and David Hofstetter would be expecting us. He let go of my hand and stepped in front of me, which made me nervous until I realized the move was for my protection. Both of his hands flexed at his side. He was ready for anything.

But the man standing on the other side of the room didn’t look menacing. He looked a lot like the age-progressed picture we’d been given on the plane, in fact. Not identical, they’d gotten his hair wrong; it was darker and thicker in person, but the lopsided knowing smile, thin nose, and deep-set eyes were the same. He wore a white lab jacket embroidered with the name “Dr. David Hofstetter.” One of his pockets was held together with a safety pin. From the looks of the room, he’d been in the end stages of packing up his lab. “Russ Becker?” He said. “From Edgewood?” His voice was tinged with incredulity.

Russ said, “That’s me.”

Astonishment covered his face. “Did you two come alone? How did you get here?”

“It’s just the two of us,” Russ said. “We were traveling with a group but we left them behind and drove here on our own using a map I got from your grandfather.” He stepped closer to the man. They were eye to eye now, exactly the same height. “You’re the David Hofstetter who knew my sister? The one who supposedly died in a car accident?”

“That would be me.” He took a step back as if we’d hit him with too much information, but in an instant seemed to recover. A grin crossed his face, the same crooked grin as in the photo, almost a smirk. “I can’t believe Carly’s little brother is standing in my lab,” he said gesturing to his work space, a room the size of a classroom.

“Hi, I’m Nadia.” I stepped forward and extended my hand. I wanted to get a read on this guy and I needed to get closer.

As we shook hands, Russ apologized for leaving me out, but I waved away his concerns. I wanted to concentrate on David and see what I could find out about him. So far he’d told us the truth: he was David Hofstetter, Carly’s old boyfriend, the one assumed to be dead by everyone back home. His essence felt genuine to me. He was a good guy. There was nothing dark under the surface, at least not that I could see. Of course, I hadn’t detected anything negative about kindly Mr. Specter, so my meter wasn’t completely foolproof.

“You have questions for me, I’m sure,” David said to Russ. “And I have questions for you, but your timing is terrible. We’re evacuating and it’s down to the wire.” He lifted a box from the side counter to the table and rearranged the contents. “Right now I have,” he stopped to look at the digital clock on the wall, “seventy-two minutes to get everything packed up, compacted, deleted, or shredded, so that’s what I’ll be doing. Take it or leave it; that’s all I can give you.” He sat down in front of a computer monitor, his back to us. “Ask away. I’ll answer as best as I can.”

Russ and I circled around the desk so we could see David’s face. “First of all,” Russ said. “What happened to you sixteen years ago? Carly thought you died in that car accident. You broke her heart, you know.” He sounded angry and hurt on his sister’s behalf, which I thought was the sweetest thing ever.

David’s fingers flew over the keyboard; he didn’t take his eyes off the screen. “My heart was broken too. But it was unavoidable.”

“Unavoidable? Like you couldn’t have clued her in? She kept your secret for sixteen years!”

David glanced up. “Then how do you know about it?”

“Well, she told me,” Russ said, flustered. “But only after I saw the light particles too.”

“The light particles? You mean the lux spiral?’

“I guess, if that’s what you call the meteor-shower thingy that lands like a spiral.”

David raised his eyebrows. “None of those Edgewood idiots told you it was a lux spiral?”

“What Edgewood idiots?” Russ asked, exasperated. “Do you mean Mr. Specter and his friends?”

I stepped forward. “Why don’t you start at the beginning and tell us what you know.” I looked him right in the eye, a fairly new thing for me. My hood was down and I realized it had been down most of today. I was literally coming out of my shell, and my worst fears weren’t coming true. The people who saw my face weren’t running in horror. Some didn’t even seem to notice. All this time I’d been so worried that I looked like some kind of monster, when really I just looked like me, a girl with a scarred face.

David nodded and turned back to the computer. “It sounds like you know the start of it. Carly and I would meet at the closed-up train station at night after our parents were asleep. We used that key to get in.” His head jerked in Russ’s direction and we both looked down to see the key dangling from a chain around his neck. “One night, Carly showed up with her baby brother in her arms.”

“Me?” Russ asked, resting his hands on my shoulders.

“Yeah, you. Her parents—
your
parents—had to drive unexpectedly to Fond du Lac that night because one of your grandparents had a stroke. Carly was babysitting, but she didn’t want to stand me up, so she just brought you along. Carried you all the way in the dark with a diaper bag slung over her shoulder.”

“How old was I?”

David shrugged. “Just a baby. Teeny. It was early September. When were you born?”

“Today,” Russ said, realization crossing his face. “Today is my birthday. I’m sixteen today.”

“Happy birthday,” I said, and he gave my shoulders a squeeze.

“So you were about three months then,” David said with a beleaguered sigh. “Carly and I spent our time together in the train station. I’m sad to say there was some making out and weed involved. We were young and stupid and in love. You slept right through it all and we dozed off too. And then, I woke up. It was the vibrations from the spiral lux hitting the ground. I tried to wake Carly, but she was pretty out of it. And then you started crying, so I picked you up and took you outside with me.”

“So Russ saw the light particles as a baby?” I asked.

“He didn’t just see them, he was directly exposed to them. I walked into the middle of the spiral with the baby in my arms. The light was mesmerizing. I couldn’t believe that the pieces were glowing but not hot. Later, I found a piece in the fold of your blanket and another one grasped in your little hand. Carly wasn’t too happy with me after she heard about it. She said you could have put it in your mouth and choked on it.”

It all made sense now. Russ wasn’t a second gen because he was the second generation to have powers; he was a second gen because he’d come into contact with the particles twice, sixteen years apart.

“And then you discovered you had powers…” Russ prompted.

David said, “Five of us discovered we had powers. I’d been exposed to the fall lux, the others had experienced it the year before during the spring lux. Having supernatural powers at that age—” He shook his head and smiled at the memory. “As you know, it’s all fun at first. But then things soured and we couldn’t agree on how to handle it. There was fighting among us. And then one by one, the Associates recruited the others. I held out as long as I could, but I knew it was only a matter of time.”

“So the Associates faked your death and got you to join them too,” Russ said.

“No!” David lifted his hands off the keyboard and looked up, eyes blazing. “I never would have worked for the Associates. Ever! Is that what you think?”

“Isn’t this an Associate research facility?” Russ asked.

David stood up. “I am a senior member of the scientific research division of the Praetorian Guard. This is a PG facility.”

Russ

Clearly I’d offended the guy, but honestly, I didn’t know what side he was on. And actually I still didn’t know what to believe. He could have told me anything. I squeezed Nadia’s shoulders and said, “So you’re telling me that you’re with the Praetorian Guard?”

“Of course,” he said adamantly. “I’d never have anything to do with the Associates; they’re power-mongering murderers. The bastards electrocuted my grandfather. You think I’d work for them?”

Nadia stepped forward and ran her hands the length of his body. “He’s telling the truth.”

This was getting more curious the whole time. “So why don’t the members of the Praetorian Guard in Edgewood know where you are?” I asked.

“Only one of the five is smart enough and loyal enough to be trusted with any information at all. Three of them are lovable numskulls playing spy games and one of them is working undercover for the Associates.”

“Mr. Specter,” I said.

“That’s right,” David said, nodding affirmatively. “Sam Specter. Science teacher and traitor. He was my teacher sophomore year. Terrible teacher. Made up the curriculum as he went along. He’s a loose cannon, thinks he’s playing both sides against each other, but everyone is on to him. Sad old guy’s got nothing going for him, but he has delusions that he’s James Bond. And now he’s managed to get hold of the plans for a device we’ve been developing that alters brain waves and memory. God only knows all the havoc that will cause if he ever gets it to work.”

“I think he already has,” Nadia said. “He has this goggle-thing he calls a Deleo. He used it on our friend Mallory to brainwash her. He tried to do it to Russ too, but it didn’t work because he resisted.”

“Great,” he said, sighing. “We can discuss that later. I’ll need to know as much as you can recall about the device.” He turned back to the computer and worked on the keyboard for a moment. Lines of text ran across the screen. “Just so you know, what Mr. Specter calls a Deleo was not intended to mess with people’s brains. It was designed to restore memories to people with dementia and calm people who suffer from anxiety and trauma, particularly those with post-traumatic stress disorder and people suffering from debilitating phobias.” He tapped on a few keys, and the screen cleared, then filled with lines of text again. He continued, “After my faked death, I joined the Guard. They educated me in my chosen field and I’ve been doing research at various locations ever since. I’ve been here for about five years, but our location has been compromised, so we’re evacuating today. This is all top secret, you understand.”

“We understand,” I said. “Believe me, we’re good at keeping secrets.”

David said, “So how is Carly doing? Does she ever talk about me?”

“I never heard her mention you until after I saw the light particles—I mean the lux spiral,” I said, correcting myself. A disappointed look washed over David’s face. Clearly he hoped Carly was still pining for him.

“What kind of research are you working on?” Nadia asked.

“The details are classified, but I can tell you that I’m working on a way for cells in the human body to utilize energy in the same way they do after they’re exposed to the lux spiral. If it works, we’ll see advances in healing and medicine, improvements in how we power cities and vehicles, and new forms of communication not reliant on devices that can break or be shut down. It’s very exciting to be part of all this. It’ll be a whole new age.”

“Yeah, it’s exciting, but to never see your family or friends again?” Nadia said. “That must have sucked.”

“It wasn’t easy, but it was for their own protection. The Associates have been known to kidnap or kill family members of the Praetorian Guard.”

“So you never saw your family again.” Nadia’s mouth turned down in sympathy.

“Not quite,” he said. “I’ve been to Edgewood half a dozen times or so. Incognito. Just to see my old house and a few familiar faces.”

“And no one knew who you were?” I said.

David blinked, his mouth set in a firm line. For a second I thought he wasn’t going to answer, but then he said. “I couldn’t help myself. I told my grandfather the truth. And he kept my secret until the end when his brain started to go. He got so confused he thought I’d been kidnapped or God knows what. I gave him the medallion as a keepsake, hoping if he had something to hold onto it would help him remember. I’m assuming he gave it to you?”

I nodded.

Nadia asked, “What about the first two locations on the map, the cat park and the convent? Why did you have that on the map?”

“What are you talking about?” David asked, puzzled.

I pulled the paper out of my pocket, unfolded it, and presented it to him. “This map of Peru. With the latitude and longitude listings for the cat park, the convent, and the ruins? Your grandfather gave it to me, and said it would help find you.”

David stared at the paper. “I don’t know what this is. I’ve never seen it before.”

“You didn’t give this to your grandfather?” Nadia asked.

He shook his head. “The numbers look like my grandfather’s handwriting.” He looked up at us. “I told him I was in Peru and he wanted to know about it, but I couldn’t disclose where I was working or what I was doing. So I told him about the cat park. And the convent and the ruins. Just making conversation,” he said. “Grandpa must have thought those places were the key to finding me.”

The mention of a key made me remember something. “When we first got here, I put the medallion in the slot, and when I typed in my name it let me in. How did it know to let me in?”