Colin rolled his eyes and sighed. "Look, the big meeting is over and we missed it. The weather is turning colder again. We all got sick, but we're all better now, so… so what is all this? My favorite color is Irish green. Why don't we all just relax?"
Victor leaned over and pointed to what he had previously written in the notebook: Never knocked us out for days at a time.
Colin turned to the rest of us. "What's that you've got in your hand?" (Let's see a show of hands.) This comment was also hard for Amelia to translate because, at that moment, she had pulled the lump of fabric out from her skirt pocket. She was staring at it in confusion, utterly confounded.
It was a knot. A knot with no beginning and no end. It looked like it was made out of an apron sash.
Amelia looked up to see that everyone else was voting.
Vanity was usually impatient with Yellow Alert restrictions. She held out her mittened fist, thumbs-down.
Colin said, "Caesar says, 'Kill the Christians!'" and showed his thumbs-down.
Quentin and Victor both gave a thumbs-up. Quentin said softly, "Spare the gladiator, who fought well, and the plebes will thank you next games, despite that they presently howl and yell."
A tie. Everyone turned and looked at Amelia.
She was staring at the impossible knot of fabric in her hands. She looked up, tears in her eyes. She raised her hand, thumb up. She whispered, "Vanity, what's your favorite color?"
Vanity raised an uncertain hand to stroke her red hair.
Colin made an impatient noise. "Oh, you are kidding. If things are that bad, what about plan C?"
(Plan C was "Call the cops")
Amelia shook her head. "The sun has come out." (It was getting a lot warmer; danger was growing.) Colin said, "Plan C is a great plan."
Victor said, "What do we say? That they overmedicate us here? I understand that happens in a lot of schools."
Colin snorted. "We'll think of something. We'll say Vanity is being sexually molested by the teachers.
Heck,
I'll sexually molest her my own self. At least I'll get put in a nice prison colony, and I won't be here any longer!"
Vanity smirked at him, saying, "Why don't you go sexually molest yourself, Colin? Oh, wait! You might catch a social disease from yourself! You don't know where you've been. Bleh!"
Vanity stuck out her tongue, and Colin smiled and pantomimed pulling down his zipper, with exaggerated welcoming gestures toward her tongue.
Amelia looked back and forth at this. Childish. So childish. But we are not children anymore. We cannot afford to be.
Quentin said to Amelia, "How hot do you think the weather will turn? Like spring?"
Amelia shook her head.
"Like summer? Tropic summer?"
Amelia shook her head.
"How hot?"
She whispered, "Do you remember the myth of Phaethon?"
Victor passed the notebook to her.
I wrote quickly:
They erased our brains, all of us. Me, they slipped. There is a creature in my bloodstream.
Sympathetic. This knot reminded me that I had amnesia. I tried to remember. Creature felt, wants to help. The creature is an amnesia-inducing drug. Knows how brain works. Helped. Starting to open brain block.
I know who we are. I know who they are. They can hear whatever we say; listen on the wind. No talking!
Victor leaned over and pointed to the sentence, "I know who they are." I wrote: Boggin=Boreas, North Wind; Fell=Telemus, a Cyclopes; Wren=Erichtho, witch; Glum=Grendel, sea monster; Daw=Thelxiepia, siren. Drinkwater from Atlantis.
Vanity, giving Victor a look of impatience, leaned in with her pink pen, and circled one sentence over and over. "I know who we are." She started sketching big question marks and exclamation points. I wrote: I am a Greek goddess from hyperspace. Quentin from underworld; Colin from dreamland; Victor from outer space; Vanity is from Homer We all have magic powers.
Names: Phaethusa; Eidotheia; Phobetor;
Damnameneus; Nausicaa
And, because I did not know whether I would have the chance, I wrote the secret out quickly: Victor has power over Wren; Quentin over Glum; me, Fell; Colin, Daw.
Boggin unkn ???? V Dangerous! Flies! Bends space! Curses! Spanks!
Also reverse. Watch out!!! Glum stops me; Wren stops C; Daw stops Vic; Fell stops Q. Boggin (?) stops Vanity?
If catch us, erase memory for good, no slip-ups.
Victor looked around at the others. He said, "Vanity's favorite color."
No one doubted me. No one called me crazy. It was the proudest moment of my life. All my friends trusted me.
All four of them held out their hands, thumbs-up. Unanimous. Red Alert.
Red Alert was the code for maximum security and greatest care.
It was the code for the escape attempt.
Colin leaned over the note. "Half a mo'. What's that word there?" He was pointing at "Spanks!"
But by then, the ten minutes were up, and the bell was ringing. I had the excuse of gathering books. We all hurried off to next period.
* * *
Less than six hours, I was the girl I used to be less than ten days ago. One would think there could not be much difference.
Now as I walked to the library with Victor, all the cliches that you hear about in old songs, but which never appear in real life, applied to me. There was a spring in my step and a song in my heart. I stood straight and proud and tall, and my face almost hurt from how wide and bright my smile was.
I could not figure it out, and I did not really know why. There is nothing to show it in anything I did that morning, during those six hours when I was just Amelia, but take my word for it: My life was tepid. The girl from ten days ago felt dull, harassed, and joyless, all the time, and she never noticed it, any more than a fish notices being wet.
But before ten days ago, I had never matched wits with Grendel and, to save my soul, outsmarted him. I had not talked Thelxiepia into standing aside silently while I undid Dr. Fell's foul potion. Ten days ago, I did not have two gods, Trismegistus and Mulciber, both vying for my favor. Ten days ago, I had not been the one brighter than the others. Ten days ago, I had not been the dangerous one.
Even if I failed and ditched now—and the chances of failure were higher than the chances of success—at least it would be my hands on the controls of the crashing airplane.
I resolved, as I walked, to be the most dangerous one I could be. And in my mind, that meant one thing: thought. Think things through; then act. First be patient; then be brave.
My smile faltered and my footstep got heavy.
"What is it?" said Victor.
I shook my head. I could not answer aloud, not while the wind might be listening, but a poignant thought had pierced my heart like a needle.
They had stolen Quentin's first kiss.
Again.
1.
Headmaster Boggin and Lord Mulciber were standing on the steps of the library, talking in low tones.
There was no way to avoid walking past them without being tardy for our study period.
I now wished I had taken my Dramatics lessons more seriously two years ago, when Miss Daw had insisted we attempt to put on a Shakespeare play with just five students to play all the roles.
I tried to recall what my first impression had been upon seeing Lord Mulciber, who now to me seemed kindly and funny, if gruff. I remembered he had looked like Quasimodo from Notre Dame, all humpback and twisted leg and crooked shoulders broader than a yard across. I tried to get a look of pity or disgust or something on my face, but I was not doing it. In the end, I just decided it was cold enough to allow me to put my scarf over my mouth and nose.