Justice (3 page)
Authors: Jeffrey Salane
‘I said,
squashed
, Zoso!’ demanded Ben. ‘Now get out of here before you earn a demerit.’
‘Gladly,’ said Devon as her eyes stayed glued on M. She was testing M’s nerves, but M stared right back at her until she turned and left the room. Then M bent over her friend.
‘Jules, can you hear me?’ she asked.
‘M,’ mumbled the usually exuberant Jules. ‘Is that you?’
‘It’s me,’ answered M. ‘Just relax.’ She cleared the finished tray from the table and helped her friend lie down. ‘They gave you a shot. It’s going to hurt like crazy for a while, but you’ll be okay, and then we’ll figure all this out together.’
Jules smiled. ‘Same old M, huh?’
‘Yeah, some things never change, do they?’ M whispered. The pain from the shot had been agonizing, but watching Jules have to go through the same thing was ten times worse. ‘Why isn’t she better yet?’
‘The serum works differently on different people,’ said Ben. ‘And Miss Byrd seems to have a more … robust physiology than most.’
‘Sure. Her muscles have muscles,’ said M. ‘So?’
‘So our special concoction has more to work with. Byrd’s actually in such good shape that her body might even be fighting the serum, which wouldn’t be the smartest thing to do.’
‘I can still hear you,’ said Jules from her prone position on the table. ‘And I’m not fighting anything. Look, here’s my white flag. Just call off the chemistry, Captain.’
‘If I could, I would, Byrd,’ said Ben. ‘But you are part of a
bigger picture now, so these steps are a necessary evil.’
There was a knock at the door, and another kid stood in the entryway. He was skinny and awkward, unlike the other Fulbrights, and wearing a lab coat instead of the standard suit. His dark eyes matched his deep brown skin, which stood out dramatically against the stark whiteness of the Fulbright Academy’s environment. ‘Direct, I have the new recruit ready. Should I bring him in?’
‘Of course, Noles,’ said Ben. ‘Mr Eaves, I presume?’
And in walked Merlyn, but M almost didn’t recognize him. He was not the same geek she had met in the back of a limo on their way to the Lawless School. He wasn’t even the same geek who had gabbed nonstop to the curator in the Black Museum a few days ago. Like Jules, he looked entirely different, but unlike Jules, these changes were for the better. His glasses were gone and his mop of hair had been trimmed high and tight, accenting his strong jawline and chiseled cheeks, which M had never noticed before. With his posture straightened, he appeared taller and more confident. Add in his new Fulbright uniform and Merlyn looked right at home here.
‘M!’ said Merlyn, running over to give her a hug. ‘I thought … well, I didn’t know what to think.’
M was scooped into his arms and felt a new strength in Merlyn that had never been there before. ‘What happened to you?’ she asked. ‘You look so different.’
‘Oh yeah,’ he said bashfully. ‘Um, this is all Keyshawn’s doing.’
The kid in the lab coat extended his hand. ‘M Freeman, I’ve heard a lot about you. I’m Keyshawn Noles. I’m Merlyn’s
roommate, but I’ve also been assigned to help train your team.’
‘He’s great, M,’ Merlyn interjected, like an excited, hyperactive child. ‘He gave me this shot and I just didn’t need glasses anymore. Then he set me up with this crazy suit. And wait till you see his laboratory, it’s … Hey, why is Jules lying on the table?’
‘Don’t mind me, you idiot,’ muttered Jules. ‘It’s good to see the new you, too.’
Keyshawn passed M and ran a small scanner over Jules. ‘She’s not taking to the serum. Who’s her roommate? I should have been notified about this immediately.’
‘She’s with Zoso,’ said Ben. ‘I’ll talk to her about it.’
‘Please do, Direct,’ said Keyshawn as he pulled out a syringe and plunged it into a bottle of violet fluid. Then, looking at Jules, he said, ‘This will help. Is it okay if I give you this shot?’
Jules gave a subtle nod and Keyshawn prepped her arm before gently inserting the needle. Instantly a wave of relief washed over Jules’s face and her body relaxed.
‘She’ll be loopy for a few minutes,’ Keyshawn told M and Merlyn. ‘Stay with her, and when she’s feeling better, I’ll see you in the lab. We’ll get you set up with your uniforms so you can get out of those robes.’
‘Thanks,’ said M, ‘for helping Jules and Merlyn.’
‘That’s what I’m here for,’ Keyshawn said with a smile.
‘So the reunion’s complete,’ interrupted Ben. ‘Noles, get back to your station and await further instructions.’
As Keyshawn left the room, Ben kept his eyes trained on M and Merlyn. ‘Sit, please, Miss Freeman, Mr Eaves. I’d like to
bring you up to speed.’
Ben remained standing. The moment M and Merlyn took their seats, he spoke. ‘The past forty-eight hours have been quiet, due to the Lawless School’s destruction, but the lines are lighting up with chatter now and we have a feeling that something big is being planned in retaliation.’
‘You sank their school,’ said M. ‘What did you expect? That this would end the game?’
‘We expected a little more downtime, honestly,’ answered Ben. ‘The Lawless faction is not known for its ability to play together nicely, but it looks like they are getting the hang of it. There are a lot of conflicting reports coming in, but one thing is becoming clear: the Fulbrights will need you sooner than expected.’ He went on: ‘Your father felt that you would be the key to disrupting the next Lawless plan and I believe him. For that reason, we’d like to get your team on an accelerated track in preparation for immediate fieldwork. You’ve shown promise in your Lawless missions, but let’s face facts: you had dumb luck and older, more devious allies on your side.’
What Ben was saying was definitely true. The Masters, Zara, Ms Watts, Fox Lawless, Professor Bandit, Jones, even M’s mother, they had all helped M navigate the treacherous maze of the last few months.
‘So what do you want from us now?’ asked Merlyn.
‘I don’t want anything from
you
, Eaves,’ said Ben in a cold, even tone. ‘Let’s be perfectly clear about that. If it were up to me, you and Byrd would be at the bottom of whatever pit was left at the Lawless School. You are here at Freeman’s request. We will train you only so that you will be helpful to
her in any situation that may arise.’
‘Wow, tell us how you really feel, why don’t you?’ Merlyn said under his breath.
Ignoring Merlyn’s comment, Ben looked at his watch and continued. ‘Byrd will need to be better by nine hundred hours. After that you’ll report to Noles immediately. Do you understand?’
‘Yes, Direct,’ said M.
‘Good, then you have the room to yourselves,’ said Ben as he strode to the door. ‘I have a class to attend. And if you’re late to see Noles, that’s a demerit for each of you.’
After he left, Merlyn and M rolled their eyes almost in unison. ‘Wow, he’s a straight shooter, huh?’ said Merlyn.
‘Careful,’ said M. ‘It sounds like he’s got his eyes on you. What do you think a demerit means around here, anyway? Does it go on your permanent record?’
‘I don’t want to find out,’ said Merlyn. ‘I have a feeling that whatever it goes on, it’s going to be permanent … and it will probably sting like the dickens.’
‘Not worse than that shot, though,’ said M, rubbing the insertion point on her left wrist, which was still tender.
‘Yours hurt?’ asked Merlyn.
‘You’re kidding, right?’ asked M. ‘I felt like a fish being gutted while getting a chemical peel.’
‘Really?’ said Merlyn. ‘Keyshawn explained everything that was happening to me and gave me other stuff to stabilize the pain. It was over in no time.’
‘Looks like you won the roommate lottery, then,’ said M as she drifted back to the door to make sure the coast was clear. ‘Okay, let’s get real. This place is psycho. We’ve seen
what the Fulbrights are capable of and I don’t think we can trust them, but I don’t think we can trust anyone from the Lawless School, either.’
‘So what are we supposed to do?’ asked Merlyn. ‘I mean, we’re basically prisoners here, but out in the real world, Ms Watts would hunt us down.’
‘You’re right,’ said M, ‘so let’s use that to our advantage. We’re safe here and the Fulbrights think that we can be of use to them in the field.’
‘Why do they think that?’ moaned Jules, who was now covered in sweat. Her fever had finally broken, but she looked far from better. Anger at Devon rushed over M again, but now was the time to remain calm and stay focused.
‘My father. He left me a video,’ said M. ‘He seemed to think that I should stick with the Fulbrights, work with them toward some greater good. And he obviously convinced them that they should let me. Remember, he’s the one who left me with the keys to solving Wild’s
umbra mortis
mystery. What if there are other keys out there, waiting to be found?’
‘Oh sure, and you want to find them while under the watchful eyes of the Fulbrights,’ said Merlyn. ‘That makes a lot of sense.’
‘It does, if you think about it,’ said M. ‘Ultimately we want the same thing as the Fulbrights. We both want to stop Ms Watts from getting her hands on any more weapons.’
‘But that’s not all the Fulbrights want,’ argued Merlyn. ‘They want to destroy Lawless at the same time.’
‘Let them try,’ said M. ‘They can have their war if it means that we can tag along and keep innocent people safe.’
‘It may be the fever talking, but that does seem like a good idea,’ croaked Jules from the table.
‘Okay, you’ve got the invalid’s vote,’ said Merlyn. ‘As long as we’re talking about Ms Watts, though, I’ve got one more question that’s been bothering me. She really wants that second moon rock, right? But without Wild’s meteorite, it’s only a rock. She needs
both
if she’s planning to fire off another do-it-yourself black hole.’
Instantly M was taken back to her final showdown with Dr Lawless. He had given up the meteorite way too easily; he’d hardly even made M work for it. And that led her to an in-escapable conclusion. ‘Merlyn, you’re a genius. Lawless only gave me a
piece
of the meteorite. I’d bet anything Ms Watts still has the rest of it … We definitely need to get to that rock before she does.’
‘Where do we even begin?’ asked Jules.
‘We find my mother. That’s the best place to start,’ said M.
‘But she could be anywhere,’ complained Merlyn, ‘and we don’t even know where
we
are. No windows, white walls, we could be in a space station, for all we know!’
‘Wherever we are, she’s here with us,’ said M.
‘That’s why you didn’t ask the Fulbrights for her freedom,’ said Jules. ‘You’re not as clueless – or heartless – as Devon assumed.’
A bolt of confidence and determination shot through M, though it could have been the serum taking a stronger hold of her system. ‘No, Devon is the clueless, heartless one,’ she said. ‘Can you imagine if I had asked for my mother to be released? Then we’d have no idea where she’d run and hide.’
‘Or what would be waiting for her when she got there,’ added Merlyn.
‘It’s better to have her here, even if we don’t know where
here
is,’ said M. ‘This is our secret, guys. We can mount a search for my mother when the time is right. Apparently we’re good at finding things that people don’t want to be found. For now, though, we’ve got to work alongside the entire Fulbright Academy. And I’m sure we’re not the most popular cadets around here. Every Fulbright is training for one purpose and one purpose only: to capture and destroy Lawless students like us. They don’t trust us, they don’t like us, and they only see evil when they look at us. So get ready to become the unthinkable.’
‘What’s that?’ asked Merlyn.
‘A good guy,’ said M.
The endless turns of nondescript hallways made for the world’s most boring maze, but thank goodness Merlyn had apparently paid attention to where Keyshawn’s lab was located. Jules was up and about, with her almond complexion almost back in full. As the path splintered off into one long corridor after another, M became dizzy at the sprawling mental map of the school she was creating in her mind. And they were only seeing one floor! Who knew how high or how deep this place actually went. She was determined, though, to devote every inch to memory – she had to, if she had any hope of finding her mother. Every corner mawed into a new path, a new possible hiding place for something that wasn’t supposed to be found.
And the doors! There were hundreds of doors that they passed along the way. What could be waiting behind each one? Were they dorm rooms? Classrooms? Weapons rooms? Jail cells? With each door lacking a handle, the
unmarked entryways stood there like the ancient mysteries of Stonehenge, daring M to puzzle them out.
But time was not on their side, and M had enough mysteries to worry about. She hurried down the hallways, following Merlyn’s lead and looking over her shoulder regularly to make sure that Jules wasn’t going to pass out. Whatever Keyshawn Noles had given her really helped. Taking stock of the new people in her life, M realized she had already formed opinions on who she could trust and who she shouldn’t.
She trusted Ben, though the thought actually surprised her. He was not a fun guy, but he was at least honest. He didn’t like Merlyn or Jules, and he didn’t hide that fact from the world. M appreciated that. She also knew that Ben was following orders. He may be a direct, but he had a direct, too. That’s the way things worked around here. She didn’t need more than a few hours with the Fulbrights to put those pieces together.
The verdict was still out on Vivian. She was hard-pressed to keep a conversation going past a few cursory formalities, but that didn’t make her a bad person, just an awkward person. And true, she hadn’t helped M with the pain, but she had at least explained what was happening to the best of her ability. Still, M had laid her out pretty bad, and for a Fulbright, that had to be a hard pill to swallow. M put her in a mental maybe list of allies.
But Keyshawn, well, there was no question in her mind: she did not trust him at all. He was a plant so fake that she couldn’t even see the roots. Cozy up to Merlyn first, then heroically save Jules from a Devon attack? He might as well have been part of the Smooth Criminal clique at the Lawless
School – with his perfectly timed kindness and unassuming appearance. It was all a ploy to win M’s confidence, and an obvious ploy at that. Not only was he great with her friends, but he also just happened to be the nicest and most earnest of their Fulbright liaisons? No, if it seemed like it was too good to be true, it
was
too good to be true ninety-nine percent of the time. And Keyshawn was not a one percenter.
‘This is it,’ said Merlyn as he turned to a door, which looked like every door they had previously passed.
‘How on earth can you tell?’ asked Jules.
‘Oh, that’s right. You don’t have a suit yet,’ said Merlyn with a geektastic smile. ‘It’s so mind-blowing that I’m not going to spoil it for you.’
Then he placed his palm against the door and pressed gently until a sigh of air heaved from the frame and the door swung open. M took note of the lack of knobs and the pressurized, concealed hinges. The Fulbrights had not made this a criminal-friendly environment. In fact, breaking into any of these doors may be nearly impossible. Nearly.
The lab was the antithesis of everything cold and clean they had previously seen at the Fulbright Academy. Books with broken spines and well-worn covers were stacked in haphazard piles that stretched from floor to ceiling, and unfinished tech projects cluttered every remaining surface. Fulbright suits sprouted thin, stray wires like exposed arteries on an autopsy table, while open-faced motherboards of all sizes and complexities hung on a wall. It was like walking into a horror movie for robots that reveled in the gory side of artificial life, all guts and soldering irons ready for a modern-day Dr Frankenstein to build, destroy, and start again. Five
separate dry-erase boards were splattered with diagrams and messily written scientific formulas. Before the largest board, Keyshawn stood deep in thought.
‘You made it,’ he said, turning around with a smile. ‘I was slightly worried. This place can be, well, confusing, if you’re not used to it. I take it the suit works, Merlyn?’
‘Absolutely,’ said Merlyn, with a giddiness M hadn’t heard from him since their last class with Code, Lawless’s prodigious programming professor. ‘Guys, Keyshawn built this thing especially for me.’
‘Well, don’t get a big head,’ Keyshawn said while capping his pen. It was a subtle move that demanded attention. M had seen many different teachers use this exclamation mark to quiet their class. ‘I built one for each of you, coded to your strengths, your weaknesses, and made for only you to use.’
‘How?’ asked M, running her hand along one of the empty uniforms, hung up like a pelt to dry.
‘The suits react to the serum we administered,’ said Keyshawn with an obvious eagerness to explain the process.
Good
, thought M. The more Keyshawn bragged about Fulbright tech secrets, the more light he would shed on their situation here.
‘So there
is
a higher purpose for that insane roller coaster my body just went on,’ said Jules. ‘What was that amber stuff, anyway?’
‘The amber fluid …’ started Keyshawn, but then he paused to carefully choose his words. M knew that meant he was going to dumb it down for them. ‘It carries new chemicals through your body and deposits them along the way.’
‘And the chemicals bolster our health,’ finished M as she erased a stray mark on one of the dry-erase boards.
‘Yes, some do,’ Keyshawn said excitedly. ‘But some map out the physiological makeup of the cadet. Those chemicals have been designed to serve as wi-fi devices for the body. So let’s say you have an atrophied muscle – the chemical will send messages directly to your suit to ensure that when you use that muscle, the suit does the heavy lifting.’
‘Crazy, right?’ said Merlyn. ‘That’s how I remembered the way back here. It’s like muscle memory! And the interface between the suit and the user is so natural that I can’t tell where the suit ends and where I begin.’
Merlyn may have been in seventh heaven with Keyshawn, but all M heard was that the suit was in control of the user. Which meant if the Fulbrights so wanted, they could turn their cadets into a programmable drone army.
‘Why doesn’t Vivian Ware have a uniform like this, then?’ asked M. ‘She wears a knee brace, but your suit would fix her up, right?’
Keyshawn paused again at her question and M knew he was once again thinking carefully of the best way to phrase his answer. ‘Not everyone here chooses these suits.’
‘Because the suits are dangerous?’ asked M.
‘No, no, not at all,’ stammered Keyshawn. ‘The suits … well, some people think of them as a crutch. It’s a stoic and outdated way of thinking, if you ask me. The same people might as well use a typewriter and carrier pigeons instead of computers, but it’s hard to argue with that can-do mentality. For Vivian, though, the suit wouldn’t have corrected the issue permanently.’
‘Meaning she’d only be able to walk when wearing the suit,’ said M. ‘I’m not sold. Sounds so far like you’ve created a remote-controlled second skin. So tell me, why should I get into your suit?’
‘Because one day you’re going to need it,’ said Keyshawn. ‘And you won’t know you need it until the very second you do. But what better way to prove its worth than to attend your first drill? And trust me, you will want to have these on when you do.’
He gestured to the two dark suits behind him as if he were presenting them as a generous prize. ‘I’ll leave you to try these on while I prepare the Maze.’
As Keyshawn left the room through one of several doors, M and Jules turned their attention to the empty suits. They were sized perfectly. Their height, their measurements, it was if they were looking at shadowy outlines of themselves. M’s fingertips sizzled when she touched her suit for the first time. As she jerked her hand away, white sparks jumped between her skin and the fabric. She shot a wide-eyed look at Merlyn, who just smiled with excitement.
‘It’s electrifying, I know,’ he said. ‘But you’ll get used to it. That sensation is the chemicals recognizing the matching tech components for the first time. Compare it to the first time a QWERTY keyboard made sense to your hands, and instantly every key was in the right place to spell out your thoughts without you having to hunt and peck.’
‘You know we’re not computers, right?’ asked Jules, who seemed to be having second thoughts about the new dress code. ‘And can mine come in pink? This black is way too drab.’
‘Just try it on already and stop being so girlie,’ joked Merlyn, but the looks that the girls gave seared through him and he appeared instantly sorry for what he’d said. ‘I’m going to pay for that one, aren’t I?’
‘Oh yeah,’ they said together with conviction.
‘Now turn around while we slip into something more … technological,’ said Jules.
Brushing Merlyn’s idiocy aside, M took the suit down and puzzled over its open back. She didn’t see any Velcro or zippers. As she stepped in, though, the back of the suit closed around her automatically, like magnets locking into place. The effect was surprising, but nothing compared to what came next: a sudden light shock that danced over her entire body and gave her goose bumps, like millions of antennae were growing out of her skin. The suit was communicating with her body in a language that M’s mental self couldn’t understand but that her physical self did. ‘Whoa’ was all she could say.
‘I know!’ said Merlyn without turning around, but M could hear his wide smile. ‘This must be how a Jedi feels!’
‘Merlyn, I’m sure this is all incredibly exciting to you,’ she said quietly. ‘But you know we can’t trust Keyshawn, right? This suit, it’s great, but if it can do everything Keyshawn promises, it’s basically a skintight jail cell waiting to happen. Can you hack into these suits and put us back in charge?’
Merlyn turned around, his smile replaced with an expression of shock. ‘Oh wow, you’re right. I … I got too hung up on the next-level tech specs to think of the downsides of the design.’
‘Well, the suits apparently don’t make you any smarter,’
said Jules with a wink. ‘Come on, Merlyn. I’m sure you’ve got an answer up there in that big head of yours.’
‘I can’t believe I didn’t think it through,’ said Merlyn faintly to himself.
‘Are we ready?’ asked Keyshawn as he came back into the room.
‘You know that old saying,
The clothes make the man
?’ M answered. ‘I finally understand what it means.’
‘I’m glad you like it,’ said Keyshawn. ‘But this suit is slightly more complicated than a nice shirt that makes you feel like a million bucks. In fact, this uniform
costs
a million bucks.’
Keyshawn picked up a tablet and walked over between Jules and M, murmuring as he studied the small screen. ‘Yes, it looks like everything is responding beautifully. Better than I imagined, actually.’
‘What do you mean, better than you imagined?’ asked M, whose nervousness was building in the pit of her stomach. ‘You’ve done this, like, tons of times, right?’
‘A little less than that, if my math is correct,’ said Keyshawn distractedly.
‘Let’s assume you’re great at math,’ she continued, ‘because if you designed these suits and wrote those equations on the boards over there, then your math is probably pretty brilliant.’
M twisted and grabbed Keyshawn in a single, swift movement that caught them both off guard. Lifting the taller boy off the ground, she asked, ‘How many suits like this have you made?’
As Keyshawn’s toes dangled and reached for the ground,
he creaked out an answer in the tiniest voice M had ever heard. ‘Including yours? Four.’
‘Hold up,’ exclaimed Merlyn. ‘You’re saying that we’re the guinea pigs?’
‘I’m saying that I have been given orders to introduce a new tech on a trial basis with a small team,’ admitted Keyshawn calmly while still in M’s grasp. ‘I didn’t know in advance who would be chosen for the team. And I was under the impression you knew about the test.’
‘Did it look like I knew what was going on when I was paralyzed on the table?’ asked Jules.
‘He doesn’t care whether we’re willing subjects or not. Do you, Keyshawn?’ said M. ‘You only care about the suits and how they work.’ Then she tossed him heavily to the floor, where he landed hard.
Even though he lost his breath on impact, Keyshawn spoke through his windedness. ‘You have to understand. I’ve put so much time and thought into making sure these suits are in excellent working order. This is the future of the Fulbrights. With this, maybe, hopefully, we can end this conflict once and for all.’
‘Oh yeah, you care so much about ending the war that you created a supersoldier,’ answered M. ‘That makes you about as smart as the guy who invented the atomic bomb.’
