“You have got to stop doing that,” Six replies, setting down her coffee.
Eight is dressed in workout clothes, his curly hair shoved underneath a fuzzy sweatband. He nods to me, then aims his most disarming smile at Six.
“Come on,” Eight says, “you can take it out on me in the Lecture Hall.”
Six stands up, pleased by the idea. “I’m going to pummel you.”
“What’re you guys working on?” I ask.
“Hand to hand,” answers Eight. “I figured since Six pretty much murdered me back in New Mexico—”
“For the last time, that was not me,” Six interrupts, annoyed.
“—the least she could do is show me some new moves so I can defend myself the next time she attacks.”
Six tries to punch Eight in the arm, but he quickly teleports behind the couch.
“See?” Eight grins. “I’m already too quick for you!”
Six bounds over the couch after him and Eight sprints off towards the Lecture Hall. Before giving chase, Six looks back at me.
“Maybe you should try talking to Ella,” Six says.
“Me?”
“Yeah,” she replies. “Maybe you can decide if her visions mean something or if she’s just traumatized.”
As soon as Six leaves the room, there’s a heavy thud on the floor behind me. I turn around to find Nine grinning at me, shirtless just like Sarah said he’d be, gripping a sketchpad in his meaty hands. I glance up at the ceiling.
“How long were you standing up there?”
Nine shrugs. “I do my best thinking upside down, dude.”
“I didn’t realize you did any thinking.”
“Okay, fair point, you usually do enough thinking for all of us.” He thrusts the sketchpad at me. “But check this out.”
I take the sketchpad and start thumbing through the pages. They’re covered with floor plans drawn in Nine’s precise hand. It’s like the architecture of some military base, yet it looks strangely familiar.
“Is this—?”
“West Virginia,” Nine declares, proudly. “Every detail I could remember. This should come in handy when we make our assault on the place. I’m sure it’s where that fat jerk-off Setrákus is hiding out.”
I sit down on the couch, tossing the sketchpad on the cushion next to me. “When I wanted to attack the cave, you were totally against it.”
“That was after you’d run into a force field like a dummy,” he replies. “I said we needed numbers. We’ve got numbers.”
“Speaking of which, did you check the tablet this morning?”
Nine nods. “Five’s staying put for now.” We’ve been keeping an eye on our locater tablet since returning to Chicago. Five—the one Garde we haven’t made contact with—has been on an island off the coast of Florida for the last few days. Before we left for New Mexico, he was in Jamaica. His moving around is standard Loric on-the-run protocol. Finding him, even with the tablet to point us in the right direction, might not be easy.
“Now that we’ve had a chance to rest up, I think we should make it a priority. The more of us the better, right?”
“And maybe while we’re searching for Five, Setrákus Ra mounts a full-scale invasion of Earth.” Nine slaps the front of his sketchpad for emphasis. “We’ve got him on the run. We should finish it off now.”
“On the run?” I ask, staring at Nine. “That’s not exactly how I remember it.”
“What? He did retreat, didn’t he?”
I shake my head. “You think you’re ready for a rematch?”
“You tell me.” Nine curls one of his arms behind him and juts the other out overhead, a bodybuilder pose. I can’t help but laugh.
“I’m sure he’ll be intimidated by flexing.”
“It’s more intimidating than sitting around, anyway,” counters Nine as he flops down on the couch next to me.
“You really think we should go storming West Virginia? After the beating we took at Dulce?”
Nine looks down at his fists, clenching and unclenching them, probably remembering how close he came to being finished off by Setrákus. How close we all came.
“I don’t know,” he says after a pause. “I just wanted to give this to you so you know it’s an option, all right? You might not think I’m, like, capable of learning my limitations and shit like that—but, back in New Mexico? I was maybe, just slightly, over my head trying to fight Setrákus alone. Six went off on her own too, Eight got wrecked, and everyone else was getting shot up. But you kept it together, man. You kept us together. Everyone knows it. I still don’t buy your bullshit about being Pittacus reincarnated or whatever, but you’ve got that team-captain vibe. So you do the leading and I’ll do the ass kicking. It’s what we’re best at.”
“Best? I don’t know—Six is pretty good at ass kicking, too.”
Nine snorts. “Yeah, she was super-badass in her freaking ceiling cocoon. That’s not the point, Johnny. The point is, I need you to tell me what to punch. And I need you to tell me soon or I’m gonna go stir crazy up in here.”
I take another look at Nine’s sketchpad. From the look of it, he probably got right to work on these drawings as soon as we returned from New Mexico. For all his bluster, at least he’s been trying his best to come up with a way to take the fight to the Mogadorians. Meanwhile, I’ve been stuck in this rut, unable to sleep, thinking myself in circles alone on the rooftop.
“I wish Henri was here,” I say, “or Sandor. Any of the Cêpans, really. Someone that could tell us what to do next.”
“Yeah, well, they’re dead,” replies Nine, bluntly. “It’s up to us now, and you’re always the one with the ideas. Hell, the last time I wouldn’t go along with your plan, I almost had to throw you off a roof.”
“I’m not a Cêpan.”
“No, but you’re a freaking know-it-all.” Nine pats me hard on the back, which I’ve come to realize is as close as he gets to real affection. “Quit whining, cut down on the snuggling with your little human girlfriend, and come up with some brilliant plan.”
A week ago I would’ve bristled at Nine calling me a whiner and needling me about Sarah. Now, I know he’s just trying to motivate me. This is his version of a pep talk and, embarrassing as it is, I sort of need to hear it.
“What if I just don’t have a plan?” I ask quietly.
“That, John-boy, is simply not an option.”
CHAPTER SIX
I’M BACK ON THE ROOF OF THE JOHN HANCOCK Center. This time, I’m not alone.
“We don’t have to talk about it, if you aren’t ready,” I say gently, looking at the huddled form sitting Indian style on the roof next to me.
Ella has a blanket wrapped around her shoulders even though it isn’t that cold on the roof. Somehow she looks smaller than usual, and I wonder if stress is causing her to revert back to a younger age. Beneath the blanket she’s wearing one of Nine’s old flannel shirts. It comes all the way down to her knees. Lately, it seems like the only time she’s able to sleep peacefully is in the afternoons. She probably wouldn’t have even gotten out of bed at all today if Marina hadn’t gently prodded her to come up here and talk with me.