Chapter 7
My week at home passed quickly. They always do. I didn't mention Grandmaster Park's ultimatum to my parents, and they didn't nag me (much) about going to college. I hoped that wasn't a sign that they were giving up on me. I mean, I still hope to thrill the heck out of them someday by announcing that I'm going to settle down and go to school somewhere. Of course, that can't happen until I'm done with the Primes for good, and that won't be for years yet.
I played "Gladiolus Rag" for my mom, and she had to admit that I had been keeping up well with my piano practicing. And she checked my hands for any obvious signs of scarring; despite what I had told Trina, she does worry that martial arts will permanently damage my fingers.
Have I mentioned that my mother is a piano teacher? No? Well, she is, and she has insisted on teaching all of us kids to play. She still gives me lessons whenever I come home to visit, in fact, which I think is pretty cool of her. She presented me with a copy of Gershwin's "Three Preludes", with instructions to learn as much of the middle prelude as I could by the time I came back for another visit.
I also spent a few afternoons with my dad, running errands, brushing up on the various non-English languages he's taught me, and just generally hanging out. And I spent one back-breaking day helping my Aunt Min with her worm farm.
In all, it was a fun visit, except that Angela pestered me with questions about the Primes every time we were alone. Was Prime Green the only girl? Were any of the guy Primes really cute, and in particular, was Prime Red dating anyone?
I had to suppress a laugh at the last question. A few years ago, Shelley had been dubbed "Eric the Red" by a few of the London dailies because she's tall and her favored weapon is a broadsword. From there, the name had spread world-wide, and based on what I read on the Internet, the mysterious "Eric" has developed quite the female fanbase. I swear, if Shelley ever gets unmasked in public, there are millions of teenage girls and young women all across the globe who are going to spontaneously die of broken hearts.
Regardless, my week's vacation ended at last. As I was puttering around my room, packing up my stuff, I kept noticing Angie hanging around. Nothing too obvious, but somehow I was never out of her sight for very long. Finally, I sighed and demanded, "What is it?"
"What do you mean?" she asked innocently, coming in and sitting down on my bed. "Am I bothering you?"
"No," I replied, "but don't you have anywhere you have to be? Some band thing? I thought you guys were taking a trip to Cleveland tomorrow. Don't you have to pack?"
"Nope," she replied smugly. "I'm all set. In fact, I thought I might walk you down to the bus station."
Ah, so that was it. See, when I leave, I normally just go out to some deserted field or other just outside of town, and Wizzit teleports me home from there. Obviously, I can't tell people that's what I do, so my story is that I walk to the local bus station, catch a ride down to Columbus, and fly out to meet my team.
"You, uh, want to see me off, is that it?" I said cautiously.
"Well, yeah. I think that would be pretty neat." She suddenly looked concerned. "It won't get you into any trouble if I do, will it?"
I shrugged. "I don't know. I don't think so, not any more trouble than I'm already in. I'm going to have to tell them about you eventually, you know, and they probably won't be too happy about it." Wizzit, in fact, was the one I was worried about; when you came right down to it, it didn't really matter what anybody else thought. "I'll tell you what: Give me about five minutes alone, and I'll see. And I mean really alone -- no listening at the door or anything."
"Well . . . okay." Angela looked dubious. "Promise you won't leave without saying goodbye?"
"I can't really promise that. If they decide to yank me, then they'll yank me. But I promise that I'm not planning to sneak out of here."
"You mean, they'd just teleport you back, just like that?" she exclaimed.
"Not so loud!" I hissed. "Of course they'd teleport me back. How else do you think I would leave?"
"I . . . didn't know," she said softly. "Okay, I'll give you five minutes, and I promise, no eavesdropping."
After she had closed the door firmly behind her, I went to the farthest corner of my room and faced the wall. "Wizzit, are you there?" I said quietly.
"And where else would I be?" Wizzit's voice emanating from my belt buckle was so loud that I jumped. "Relax, she's too far away to hear me, your mother is in her studio, and your father is outside in the garden. So, can you trust her not to tell anyone you're a Prime?"
For a second, I was nonplussed. How had he known? "Y-you mean Angie?"
"No, I mean the Queen of Norway! Of course I mean Angie, assuming that's the name of the alien life form you call your sister."
I was about to make an irritated retort when I realized that, to Wizzit, we were all alien life forms. "Yeah, I trust her," I replied. "She promised me she wouldn't tell anyone, and I believe her."
"But she wants to watch you teleport out?"
"You've been listening in on what we were saying?"
"Of course. I always listen in when you've got your belt on. I just don't always pay attention."
Interesting, I thought, filing that bit of information away for future reference. I had thought that was the case, but I had never been quite sure. "Then, yeah, she wants to watch me teleport out."
"Okay, here's the plan: She follows you out to the usual place. When I say 'Now!', you grab her wrist. I'll teleport the pair of you out over the Pacific Ocean. You let go of her, and then I'll teleport you back to HQ. Problem solved."
"Wizzit, I am not going to drop my sister into the middle of the Pacific Ocean," I said, annoyed.
"The Sahara Desert, then? The Nansen Ice Sheet? The Australian Outback?"
"No, no, and no. Not funny, Wizzit!"
He sniffed. "Well, I thought it was. Fine, then. If it will keep her quiet, then she can watch me teleport you out."
"I don't think she's demanding it as some sort of bribe," I told him. "I think she's just curious."
"I see. Very well, she can still watch you teleport." He paused. "Do you think she will need bribing at some point?"
I thought it over. "I doubt it. What did you have in mind?"
"Would she like, say, to become a Junior Prime?" he suggested, sounding just a little too casual about it.
"A what?"
"A Junior Prime. Like the pins they give out to your fledglings when they visit the place where they put out fires."
He wanted to bribe her with a made-over Junior Firefighter badge? I couldn't help laughing. "That might work if she were six years old." Then, because he might not know, I added, "She's actually seventeen. Much more mature. If you offered her a bribe, she'd probably ask for, I don't know, a date with Prime Red or something."
There was a pause. "She wants to go out with Shelley? Does she . . . like women, then?"
"No! She just . . ." I fumbled for how to best explain this to Wizzit. "She believes that Prime Red is an attractive male."
"I see. So, if need be, we could bribe her with a date with Mike?"
Mike, the self-proclaimed lady-killer? Good Lord, I hoped it never came to that! To Wizzit, I said mildly, "I suppose that might work, if it became necessary."
I heard a rapping at my door. "Trevor?" Angie said. "It's been five minutes."
"Don't offer her anything," I said softly. Then, "All right, Angie, you can come in."
She opened the door slightly and peeked in, obviously expecting to see more than just me packing my suitcase. "Nothing, huh?" she said, disappointed, as she stepped inside and closed the door behind her.
"No, I talked with them, and I got you permission to watch me leave."
"Hi, Angie," came the voice from my belt.
She jumped back about three feet, which was too bad, because the door was only two feet behind
her. "Ouch!" she said, rubbing the back of her head. "Is that . . .?"
"I'm the one who will teleport your brother back to headquarters. You can call me Wizzit. Tell me, Angie, would you like to see the Pacific Ocean up close?"
"No, she doesn't want to see the Pacific Ocean up close!" I interjected before she could reply. "Or the Sahara Desert, or the Nansen Ice Sheet, or the Australian Outback!"
"Actually," Angela started to say, "the Outback might be . . ." She trailed off as I shook my head furiously at her. I didn't really think Wizzit would abandon her out there, but there was no point in taking chances. "On the other hand, never mind. No, thank you, er, Wizzit."
"Would you like to become a Junior Prime, instead?" Boy, he just wasn't giving up! His voice sounded overly bright, as if he were trying to get a young child excited about eating Brussels sprouts.
"Uh . . . sure?" My sister was looking all kinds of questions at me, but all I could do was to shrug helplessly. "What does that mean, exactly?"
"I'll show you in a minute. Trevor, would you please retrieve the Junior Prime badge for me?" This request was accompanied by the familiar everything-going-hazy sensation, and suddenly I was standing in Prime Commander's office. "It's there on the corner of the desk."
Completely confused, I picked up the badge, which read "Official Junior Prime -- Pink". It definitely wasn't some cheap bit of plastic with a chintzy decal stuck on it. It was made of something metallic, yet flexible, with the words etched into it in golden letters somehow, and to judge by the heft of the thing, it had some of our tech was embedded in it as well. What in the world . . .? I had never seen anything like this before.
Wizzit instantly teleported me back to my room. "Give her the badge, Trevor," he said. I complied. "Now, Angie, hold up the badge in your right hand and repeat after me: I, Angela Chiao, do hereby solemnly promise to keep all the secrets of the Primes, and in particular, I promise never to reveal the identity of any Prime to anyone not authorized to receive such information. I also promise to assist any Prime when requested, without question, hesitation, or expectation of remuneration." After Angie had finished repeating the oath, he added helpfully, "Remuneration means payment. It means you shouldn't expect to get paid for helping us."
"Yes, I know what it means," she murmured, studying the badge in her hand. I think she was trying to figure out just how she felt about this whole thing. I could empathize. On the one hand, I had just teleported out to HQ and back, right in front of her eyes. On the other, Wizzit had just had me give her a Junior Prime badge and made her swear some silly oath of secrecy. "So . . . that's it?"
"That's it," Wizzit chirped. "Congratulations! You are the world's only official Junior Prime. Now you need to try out your badge."
"Try out my . . ."
"Say 'Junior Prime Pink, activate!'"
Angela's expression told me how lame she thought all this was, but she shrugged gamely and muttered, "Junior Prime Pink, activate!" An instant later, she was surrounded by swirling pink mist.
I think she must have been more surprised than I was, because she shrieked and I didn't. On the other hand, my heart stopped and I dropped dead right then and there. Well, not really, but it sure felt like it.
I heard the sounds of my father climbing the stairs and his voice saying in Mandarin, "Daughter, are you all right?" Even though he and my mother both speak excellent English, he prefers that we speak the mother tongue at home whenever possible.
"I-I am fine, Father," she called out in the same language. Geez, this thing even had the voice alteration! "Trevor!" she hissed in English. "How do I turn this off?"
"Junior Prime Pink, deactivate?" I guessed.
She repeated my words, and the pink haze faded away just as my father opened the door. "Son, are you -- oh, there you are, daughter. You are sure you're okay? I thought I heard you scream, and your voice sounded a bit odd just now."
"Yes, I am quite well," she said shakily. "I . . . tripped and . . . fell. But I am fine."
"Oh. All right then." He turned to me. "I just wanted to make sure you were going to stop and say goodbye before you left. Are you sure we can't persuade you to stay for dinner?"
I grinned. "I am afraid not, Father. I have to catch my flight. But Younger Sister said she would walk to the bus station with me."
"Oh. Well, that's good." He smiled. "I will tell your mother that you are going to leave soon."
"Thank you." After he had left, I said to Angie, "Sorry about that. He likes to surprise people."
"Dad? No he doesn't."
"No, I meant Wizzit. He has a weird sense of humor."
"I have an extraordinary sense of humor," came Wizzit's voice from my belt. "Some people just don't appreciate it."
Angie suddenly smiled. "Well, I appreciate it. Thank you for the badge, Wizzit. It's actually pretty cool."
"You're very welcome." I could tell that Wizzit was warming up to her. That's my baby sister for you; she could make friends with a rattlesnake. "Let me warn you: The badge makes you look and sound like a Prime, and it gives me your location in case I ever need to teleport you anywhere, but that's it. It doesn't give you any of our special powers. If you ever violate the Junior Prime oath, it will immediately stop working. Oh, and now that you have activated it, it will respond only to your voice."
"Got it. Thanks." She slipped the badge into the back pocket of her jeans. "Ready to go, Trev?"
"Just about." I stuffed a few more things into my suitcase and zipped it shut. Ten minutes and a couple of parental hugs later, we were walking down the street together.
"What's that for?" she asked me, indicating the bag I was carrying in my other hand.
"A friend of mine wants to learn to break boards," I explained. "I picked up some from the studio last night."
"You mean, he's never had to do that before?" she asked, incredulous. "I thought all you Primes were supposed to be good fighters."
"Well, first of all, I never said it was a Prime," I told her, "and second, board-breaking is kind of a Tae Kwon Do thing. Not all martial arts make you do that in order to advance."
"Oh," she said, then lapsed into a thoughtful silence. We turned off the street down a gravel road; it would eventually lead us to a farm owned by the family of one of my high school buddies. Angela asked, "So, what kinds of special powers don't I have?"
"You mean, from your Junior Prime badge?" I shrugged. "All kinds. You can't fly, you can't walk through walls, you can't leap over tall buildings in a single bound, you can't --"
"You mean, you can do all that stuff?" she asked, her eyes wide.
I grinned at her. "No, and neither can you. That's what you asked, isn't it?"
"Ha ha, very funny." She stuck her tongue out at me. "You know what I mean. What kinds of powers do you have that I don't?"
"Oh, so that's what you were asking!" I said in mock surprise. "Do you want to take this one, Wizzit?" There was no reply. "Wizzit?"
"Maybe he's on a bathroom break."
"Nah, he doesn't take bathroom breaks. He probably just doesn't want to answer your question, and if he's going to take a pass, then I guess I'll have to, too."
"You mean, you won't tell me anything? That's not fair!"
I shrugged. "Sorry, little sis. I have to follow the rules."
She frowned, but a moment later she brightened again. "Could you tell me like this?" she asked, speaking in Mandarin.
Wizzit's voice, also speaking Mandarin, came from my belt. "The lovely young lotus flower will kindly refrain from attempting to circumvent the wishes of those who intend to keep their secrets."
Angela looked down, her cheeks reddening slightly. "Busted," she muttered, embarrassed. "Sorry, Wizzit." And then she added something I didn't understand. Wizzit gave her an equally unintelligible reply. She frowned and said, in English, "I see."
"
What language were you speaking just now?" I asked her, curious.
"Thai," she replied. "Dad started teaching me this past summer."
"He never taught me Thai!"
"Maybe you never asked. Besides, he taught you Japanese."
"Well, yeah, some, but --"
"And 'some' is all the Thai I know. Trevor, how many languages does Wizzit speak? That was what I asked him, and he said, 'All of them.'"
I considered her question. "I know he speaks every language I do, plus French, Russian, Polish, and a few Indian dialects."
"Indian as in native American, or as in from India?"
"Indian as in --"
Wizzit's voice interrupted me. "The lovely young lotus flower is cleverly attempting to discern the nationalities of some of your compatriots."
"No, I wasn't!" she protested. "I was just . . ." Angela's voice trailed off. Then she abruptly switched tacks. Giving me her sunniest smile, she said, "Never mind. I won't ask you any more questions, Trev, since you're obviously not allowed to answer them."
"Good," I said, relieved.
We walked in silence until we came to a small island of trees just on the edge of a corn field. "That misty stuff obviously make you stronger," she said thoughtfully when we stopped, "because I've seen the way that Prime Indigo manhandles those, er, those blobby things. I don't think you could do that in real life."
"Enclave calls the blobby things drones," I informed her. "We call them Zoinks. And the 'misty stuff' is my force shield. I can tell her all that, right, Wizzit? I didn't think that was any special secret."
There was no reply. Angie shrugged. "Your force shield, then. You look like you're faster, too, but not nearly as fast as that little red guy, because otherwise you would never have been hit by that arrow that time you were in Mongolia. That looked like it hurt a lot, by the way."
"It did," I agreed. "But how did you know about that? It wasn't covered on the news, was it?"
"No, I saw it on the Prime Channel," she said, sounding surprised at my ignorance. "You know, on the Internet? Someone puts up videos of all your battles. I thought you knew."
"Uh uh. Wizzit, do you know anything about this?"
"Naturally." Wizzit sounded pleased with himself. "Who do you think posts them?"
"You post vids of our battles?"
"Of course. The more people that see the good we do, the more support we get, and the easier it is to do our jobs."
I couldn't argue with that, although I had never thought of myself as an Internet video star. I hoped it wouldn't make me self-conscious. "So, Sherlock," I said to Angela, "what else have you deduced?"
"Nothing much," she said, nonchalantly. "I notice that Wizzit didn't give me one of those blasters you guys carry, which, you know, would be, like, really cool to have." She paused, obviously hoping Wizzit would pipe up with an offer. When he didn't, she went on, "And you weren't even limping from that arrow when you showed up here. How's your knee, by the way? Still sore?"
"It's fine," I said tersely. "Okay, so you figured out that we heal up fast. Think you're pretty clever, don't you?"
"Actually, I do," she replied smugly.
"Wizzit, do you still want me to drop her into the middle of the Pacific Ocean? 'Cause I think I'm ready to do it now."
"Why on earth would I ask you to do something so terrible to such a clever, lovely young lotus flower?" Wizzit did a good job of sounding shocked. He added, "Besides, I can do that myself, now that she's carrying the Junior Prime Badge."
Angela's eyes went wide with alarm. "Relax," I assured her. "If he were serious, he'd have done it by now . . . I think."