“That describes four of us,” said Elise. “But not Brooke.”
“We’re all incredibly good-looking,” said Nick. “Except Ajay.”
“Don’t get me started, birdbrain,” said Ajay.
“Something else,” said Will.
“We’re the same age,” said Brooke. “We’re all fifteen.”
“Correct,” said Will. “Good. Keep going.”
“We all appear to have rather … unusual abilities,” said Ajay.
“Really?” asked Nick. “What can you do?”
Ajay glanced at Will, who encouraged him to answer. “Perhaps you haven’t noticed, but I possess extraordinary eyesight and a photographic memory.”
“That’s awesome. Dude, you are so helping me with my homework.”
“What about you, Brooke? Any unusual abilities?” asked Ajay.
“Like what?”
Ajay pointed at Will, Nick, himself, and then Elise. “Stamina, agility, memory, sonic booms, that sort of thing.”
“None that I’m aware of,” said Brooke, disappointed. “I’m feeling completely left out.”
“Don’t worry,” said Will. “They can activate at different times. We know that Lyle had powers, too, but we don’t know when they started. For us they came on gradually over time.”
“Except my sonic thing hit just yesterday,” said Elise. “Boom.”
“Yeah, don’t bum about it, Brooke,” said Nick, sincerely trying to help. “Tomorrow you could wake up and be able to eat a hundred hot dogs or something.”
“The woman of your dreams,” said Elise.
Will brought them back on task. “Something else we have in common: None of us have brothers or sisters. Including Ronnie and Lyle. All of us are only children.”
“Is that really so unusual?” asked Ajay. “American families have been trending smaller in recent decades. In fact, demographics from all of the industrialized Western societies suggest that the rate of birth—”
Elise rapped his knuckles. “Ajay: It’s unusual. Keep going, Will.”
“How did we get to the Center?” asked Will, still pacing. “What brought us here?”
“Test scores,” said Ajay. “At our old schools.”
“Tests given to us and every other kid in the country,” said Will. “By an organization called the National Scholastic Evaluation Agency. Sounds harmless and neutral, right? Vaguely governmental.”
“So why is that a concern?” asked Brooke.
“It’s not a government agency, although it has some kind of federal affiliation,” said Will. “The NSEA is a private company, owned by the Greenwood Foundation. The same Greenwood Foundation that owns and operates the Center.”
The others exchanged worried looks.
“That’s more than a little unsettling,” said Ajay.
“So the NSEA conducts evaluation tests,” said Elise, thinking it through. “Trying to identify the best and brightest students in the country. And the Center invites them to come here. I don’t necessarily see anything sinister.”
“And my friend Nando saw Black Caps at their LA office,” said Will.
“Oh, dear,” said Brooke.
“Where were you born, Nick?” asked Will.
“Boston.”
“Elise?”
“Seattle.”
“Ajay?”
“In Atlanta, although my parents lived in Raleigh at the time. Something to do with where our obstetrician worked, I believe.”
“Dallas,” said Brooke.
“Lyle was born in Boston,” said Will. “What about Ronnie?”
“Chicago,” said Elise.
“The NSEA has six offices,” said Will. “All in federal buildings around the country: Boston, Seattle, Atlanta, Dallas, Los Angeles, and Chicago.”
“All big cities,” said Ajay. “That could easily be a coincidence.”
“Where were you born, Will?” asked Elise.
“Albuquerque, New Mexico,” said Will. “That’s what my parents told me.”
“Albuquerque’s not on the list,” said Nick.
“Just because they told me that doesn’t mean it’s true,” said Will. “Ajay, would you mind pulling up Ronnie’s video? I want your isolated image of that silver box. This part came to me in a dream I had this morning. A dream about an egg.”
On his tablet, Ajay quickly retrieved an image of the metallic case with THE PALADIN PROPHECY engraved on its cover above the Roman numerals.
“Look at the Roman numerals,” said Will. “I think this means that the Prophecy started in 1990. Lyle told me that if I wanted to know about the Prophecy, I needed to start with the clinics.”
“What kind of clinics?” asked Elise.
“Look at the second number,” said Will, pointing to the IV after the numbers for 1990.
“Roman numeral four,” said Nick.
“But we were wrong about that,” said Will. “There’s no line across the top or bottom like the other figures. It’s not the number 4 because this isn’t a numeral. These are the letters IV.”
“Okay, so what?” asked Nick.
“It’s a common abbreviation,” said Will. “Used in medicine.”
“Intravenous?” asked Brooke.
“In vitro,” said Will.
“Which means ‘in the glass,’ or test tube,” said Ajay, accessing his prodigious memory. “A medical procedure often conducted in fertility clinics to help couples who can’t get pregnant. Couples who often end up with only one child. A procedure that entered the medical mainstream about 1990.”
No one spoke. A log popped loudly in the fire and everyone jumped.
“Dude … what does this have to do with an egg?” asked Nick.
“You’re not seriously suggesting we might all have been …,” said Brooke.
“I am so way beyond grossed out,” said Elise, frozen.
“Lyle said we were all the Prophecy,” said Will.
“Okay, I have no idea what we’re talking about,” said Nick.
“In vitro fertilization,” said Ajay impatiently. “Wherein an egg is extracted from a woman’s ovaries and fertilized by sperm from her spouse or a donor. Two or three days later, after replicating into a zygote of six to eight cells, the growing embryo is reintroduced to the woman’s womb. Leading, in approximately thirty-five percent of cases, to successful pregnancy. In vitro fertilization.”
“If Will’s right,” said Elise, explaining softly to Nick, “it means we’re test-tube babies.”
Nick’s face scrunched up. “Eww,” he said.
“And maybe more than that,” said Will. “Lyle said one other thing. Four letters: ATCG. Do any of you know what that means?”
“Adenine. Cytosine. Guanine. Thymine,” said Ajay. “The four basic nucleotides, the building blocks of DNA.”
“Genetic—in vitro—manipulation,” said Elise, turning pale.
Ajay fell back into the cushions. Nick fanned himself with a pillow.
“Special abilities,” said Brooke.
“I think it happened secretly,” said Will. “Your parents probably weren’t aware of it, although I think mine may have been. Whoever was in charge tracked us over time, then used these ‘random’ tests to see if whatever changes they’d manipulated were … awake. Then they brought us here.”
“We’re the Paladins,” whispered Ajay, looking stunned.
“I know how crazy this sounds,” said Will, pacing again. “I’m not claiming it’s true; I’m just laying it out there. A theory, that’s all. A theory I’m more than happy to see disproved. And if it isn’t true—if it’s completely, totally insane—it won’t take long to find out.”
“So where did this all start?” asked Brooke. “Who’s responsible for the Prophecy?”
“I don’t know where it started,” said Will. “The Caps, the Knights, and the Never-Was are involved somehow … but it sure seems to be ending up here.”
“But if they wanted you at the Center, why were the Caps trying to kill you?” asked Elise.
“I don’t know that either,” said Will. Unless it’s because, like Dave said, I’m an Initiate.