“Because slides are fun?” Piper suggested. “If all it takes to get out of here is a big slide, I’m not complaining.”
“No, he’s right,” Dash said, thinking about it. This route reminded him of the tubing in the Cloud Leopard. Sure, you could go straight from point A to point B, but where was the fun in that? The Cloud Leopard was designed to let you take the long way around, if you wanted to. That had surprised Dash, and he’d asked Chris about it. Chris’s answer was simple: “Why build something boring when you can build something interesting?”
“Maybe this Lord Cain just likes playing games?” Dash suggested. The platform on the other side of the bridge led into another corridor. Its steel walls were so shiny they could see their reflection. Dash sighed and led his team inside. He unmuted his MTB. “Lord Garquin, how much farther do we have to go?”
There was no answer. Dash checked the Mobile Tech Band. Everything looked intact. “Garquin?”
There was a burst of static in his ear. Then it was drowned out by a flood of laughter—but that wasn’t coming from the radio. It was almost as if it was coming from…
“Are the walls laughing at us?” Piper asked.
They were. Also the floor, and the ceiling. The laughter was coming from all around them. And Dash was pretty sure the joke was on them.
“Did someone say something about games?” The voice surrounded them. Dash felt goose bumps rising on the back of his neck. The voice was almost like Garquin’s, but it was somehow off. It was too cold, too eager, almost joyously cruel. It giggled. “I do looooove games.”
“Lord Cain, I assume?” Dash said, trying not to panic.
“I know you can hear me, Garquin,” Lord Cain’s voice said. “No, don’t bother trying to answer. I’ve jammed your communications. I don’t think we need to hear from you anymore. I just wanted to thank you for sending me some friends to play with. Maybe you can have them back someday, if I ever get bored.” There was another giggle. It sent a chill down Dash’s spine. “But I’m very good at amusing myself.”
“You know what you were saying about finding our own way out?” Dash whispered to Gabriel. “Now may be the time.”
“In a hurry,” Gabriel agreed. They turned back toward the bridge.
A steel wall slammed down, inches from Dash’s face, blocking their way back.
“NOT SO FAST.”
At those words, another wall slammed down, blocking their way forward.
They were trapped in a steel box.
There was no way out.
“Lord Cain, we’re sorry for trespassing,” Dash said quickly. “We’re not trying to get involved in your war, we’re just here on a mission for our own planet, we—”
“Oh, I know all about your mission,” Lord Cain said. “I know more about why you’re here than you do. But now you’re here for only one reason. To entertain me.”
“So you think it’s funny to scare a bunch of kids?” Piper said defiantly.
“I think it’s very funny.” The evil laughter kicked in again.
“Well, I think that’s pathetic,” Piper spit out.
Gabriel tapped her on the shoulder. “Maybe don’t insult the guy who can crush us like bugs?” he suggested quietly.
“I’d listen to your friend if I were you,” Lord Cain boomed.
“And if I were you, I’d have better things to do than mess around with a bunch of kids who are just trying to help out their planet,” Piper said, her face pink with fury. Dash admired her…even as he kind of wished she would stop talking.
But Piper was too angry to stop. If some power-hungry alien wanted to squash her, then maybe she couldn’t stop him. But she could at least tell him exactly what she thought of him and his dumb planet. “We’re risking our lives to do something that matters,” Piper said. “We’ve come all the way here, millions of light-years from our home, and all we want to do is take a little bit of Magnus 7 from your river that you’ll never miss, and what happens? We get sucked into some ridiculous fight between you and some guy who’s probably exactly like you—and I bet you don’t know what you’re fighting about anymore either. So go ahead and laugh, because this is all just some stupid game to you. But you know what? I feel sorry for you. Because you don’t know what it’s like to actually care about something that matters. To care about more than winning some game. You probably never will.”
Even Piper was surprised by all the words that spilled out of her mouth. And in the long silence that followed, she wondered whether she had just made a terrible mistake. Would the others blame her for whatever Lord Cain did next?
Then Dash gave her a small smile. She’d spoken the truth. Whatever happened next, he was impressed by that.
“Ah, you think games don’t matter,” Lord Cain said finally. “Let’s see about that. We’ll play a little game, and if you win, you get your chance to accomplish your mission. If you lose…well…” His laughter echoed against the steel walls. “NO MORE CHANCES.”
The floor beneath them lit up with color. Rows and rows of glowing colored tiles, each one blue, red, green, or yellow. There was a flash of light, and then the walls each turned a color too. One was blue, one was red, the other two green and yellow.
“What kind of game is this?” Gabriel shouted.
“We can figure this out,” Dash said, his mind spinning furiously. All these colors, they reminded him of something…but what? “We just have to think.”
“Best think fast,” Lord Cain suggested. As he spoke, glowing red numerals lit up on the ceiling.
10:00
As Dash stared, the numbers changed.
9:59
9:58
It was a timer. And it was counting down.
There was a loud buzzing noise. Dash gaped at the wall in front of him, the one glowing red, thinking he was imagining things. Hoping he was imagining things.
“Am I crazy, or is that wall moving?” Gabriel asked.
Their steel box was shrinking. If they didn’t solve this puzzle quickly, they’d be crushed.
“Ticktock, ticktock.” Lord Cain chuckled. “Time’s running out.”
“Aren’t you done yet?” Anna asked, glaring at her second-in-command.
Siena bent over the slogger’s control panel, slowly picking through the tangled nest of wires. “Not yet,” she murmured, trying to focus. Colin had given her a complicated set of instructions for how to reprogram the slogger to obey their commands. This little robot was one of the most intricate pieces of machinery she’d ever seen, and she was determined to get it right.
“Well, hurry it up!” Anna snapped. They were deep in the heart of Lord Garquin’s domain. Colin had assured them that they’d be safe. “Garquin won’t hurt you,” he’d promised as he steered them through the maze of corridors toward the slogger they needed to find. “He doesn’t have the nerve.”
Anna didn’t like having to rely on Colin’s word. If he was wrong, if the sloggers turned on them, they were done for.
“For all we know, the Alpha twits have the element already,” she said impatiently. “They could be heading back to their ship.”
“Colin would tell us if that happened,” Niko said.
“Colin only tells us what he wants to tell us,” Anna countered, and no one could argue with that.
“Do you think maybe Dash had a point?” Siena said as she soldered two wires together. The slogger let out a long, unsettling beep. Hopefully that meant she was on the right track.
“Impossible,” Anna said. Then, “A point about what?”
Siena hesitated. She had a feeling Anna wouldn’t like what she was about to say. And she’d learned it was easier not to say things Anna didn’t like. Still, this had been bugging her all day. Siena only spoke when she had something important to say. But once she thought of that something important, she had to spit it out. No matter who it annoyed. “When he said we could work together to get the elements,” Siena said. “Don’t you think maybe he was right? The elements are what r
eally matter, and working together offers us better odds to accomplish our mission.”
“Says who?” Anna challenged her.
Siena looked up at the team leader, confused. “What do you mean?”
“Who says working together is better?” Anna said. “Do you have scientific evidence of that? Do you have statistics? Hard data? No? I didn’t think so.”
Siena and Niko were both looking at her now like she was a little bit nuts. But that only made Anna more certain of her point.
Niko cleared his throat. “I’m not saying we should team up with them or anything,” he said. “But you’ve got to admit that if we cooperated—”
“No!” Anna snapped. “I don’t have to admit anything.” She’d been hearing this kind of thing her whole life, and she was tired of it.
Two heads are better than one.
Cooperation is better than competition.
Work together and we’re all winners!
They were pretty slogans, but as far as Anna was concerned, that’s all they were. Slogans. Comforting sayings designed to make people feel better about being too weak to make it on their own. Because the people who didn’t believe in competition were almost always the people who knew they couldn’t win.
Anna knew she could.
Make that would.
Teachers at school always tried to pretend that everyone was equal, that everyone was special. That working as a group was better than working alone. But at home, Anna’s father had taught her that a group was only as strong as its weakest member. Which is why it was always safest to be a group of one.
He’d taught Anna to care about being the best—about winning. And winning meant relying on herself.
“Competition brings out the best in people,” Anna said. “Racing against the Alphas is going to make us a lot faster and better than teaming up with them ever would. Especially because if we did team up with them, they’d only bring us down. You remember what they were like back at Base Ten.”
“Always swapping secrets with each other. Sucking up to Commander Phillips,” Niko recalled, sullen at the thought of it. He still hated that he hadn’t been picked first for the mission.
“They did care a lot about getting people to like them,” Siena admitted. Talking to people, especially strangers, was hard for her. Making friends came naturally to people like Dash and Piper. They always seemed to know exactly what to say. Siena somehow always said the wrong thing. But so what? She was smarter than any of the kids on the Cloud Leopard. That wasn’t bragging; it was the simple truth. Just because they were more fun, more charming, more likable, did that mean they deserved to be on the mission any more than she did?
“Exactly,” Anna said. “That’s not how you get things done. It’s how you waste time. Let the Alphas do their thing, and we’ll do ours.”
“Done!” Siena said proudly. She peered down at the slogger, trying to decide where its face would be—if it had a face. “Ready to do what we say?”
The slogger beeped twice.
“Sounds like a yes to me.” Niko patted him on the head. “Guy’s kind of cute for a tin can, don’t you think?”
Anna shuddered. No one knew it, but she hated machines, especially the kind that could understand what she was saying—or talk back. This planet was a horror show of machinery, and she couldn’t wait to get back to the ship. “Let’s get this thing down to the river and get out of here.”
A troop of Garquin’s sloggers stomped past them as if they weren’t even there. Anna didn’t like the looks of them or the looks of the laser cannons sticking out of their chests.
Niko groaned. “Don’t know why you’re in such a hurry to get back. You miss him bossing you around?”
He had a point. Anna had spent her whole life letting her father tell her what to do. Now she was millions of light-years away from home—and, thanks to Colin, still stuck doing whatever she was told. But as the leader, Anna felt like it was her duty to enforce some kind of discipline and respect on her team. (Also, if she let them talk about Colin behind his back, who knew what they’d say behind hers.) “Colin just wants what’s best for the mission,” she snapped, “and if you feel the same way, you’ll get going.”
“Bossed around up there, bossed around down here,” Niko murmured. Siena swallowed a laugh.
Anna gave them both a sharp look. “What was that?”
“Nothing,” they said in unison. The slogger beeped.
The three Omegas made their way back toward the edge of the complex, edging across catwalks and crawling along narrow girders. It was slow going, but Lord Garquin could have made it much slower, if he’d wanted to. Anna didn’t understand why he wasn’t trying harder to stop them. She knew Lord Cain was throwing everything he had at Team Alpha to slow them down. It didn’t make sense that Lord Garquin wouldn’t do the same. And Anna hated things that didn’t make sense.
“Report your status,” Colin ordered through their earpieces.
His face glared up at them from the small view screens attached like claws to the back of their hands.
“We’ve found the slogger you told us about and we’re heading back down to the river,” Anna reported, pretty sure he already knew that. He could monitor their progress step by step, through their MTBs. “Should have the element in hand within the hour.”
“It’s seven thousand degrees Fahrenheit,” Colin said. “I suggest you keep it out of your hand.”
“It’s a figure of speech,” Anna said. “You know about those, right?”
There was a disapproving silence. Anna swallowed hard. She was officially in charge of the mission, but if Colin ever wanted to demote her, he could. He was the only one who knew everything about their ship and the elements they needed—he could do pretty much anything he wanted.
“Sorry,” she said, hating the taste of it.
“Hey, what’s happening with the Alpha team?” Niko asked, trying to change the subject. It was weird to see Anna, of all people, trying to suck up to someone. She was really bad at it, and you could tell it was killing her. Maybe she was human after all?
Anna gave him a grateful smile, then quickly wiped it off her face. Gratitude was just another way of showing weakness. Her father had taught her that too.
“No need to worry about the other extraction team,” Colin said. “They’re otherwise occupied.”
Siena frowned at Niko. Otherwise occupied? What was that supposed to mean?
“Is it really possible they don’t know what’s really going on down here?” Siena asked Colin.
“Not everyone’s as generous with information as I am,” Colin said. “You should thank me for being so open and honest with you. Because unlike some people, I trust you.”
“Yeah, trusts us not to get in his way,” Niko muttered.
“What was that?” Colin snapped.
“Nothing,” Niko said quickly, promising himself to stop muttering things that could get him in trouble.
“Uh, Colin?” Siena said hesitantly. “The Alpha team…they’re not in any danger down here, are they? Slowing them down, that’s fine. But they’re not actually going to get hurt, right?”
“Would you care if they did?” Colin asked. He sounded genuinely curious. “They’re your opponents. Anything that happens to them is good for you.”
Siena was shocked. She knew Colin wasn’t like other people—to say the least. But Dash, Piper, and Gabriel were just trying to do the right thing.
“I wouldn’t want anything to happen to them,” Siena said firmly. “None of us would, right?” She looked pointedly at her teammates.
“Obviously,” Niko said. It hadn’t even occurred to him to worry for the Alphas. Until now.
The two of them turned to Anna, waiting.
She rolled her eyes again. But she’d figured out that being a team leader sometimes meant sticking with her team. “Agreed, Colin. We don’t want anything bad to happen to Team Alpha.” As if anything bad was going to happen to Team Twit. They were the fo
ur luckiest kids on Earth. Luckier than Anna, at least—how else could they have beaten her out for a spot on the official mission? Certainly it wasn’t because they were better.
“Hmm.” He sounded like he was considering it. Then, “Understood.”
The signal went dead.
Siena frowned. “Do you believe him?”
“What? About not hurting the baby Leopards?” Niko said. “Yeah. Of course. Well…probably?”
“Not just that,” Siena said. “Everything. He knows so much we don’t, about the ship, about the mission—our whole lives are in his hands. Can we trust him?”
Many nights on board the Light Blade, lying awake, Anna asked herself the same thing. And night after night, she came to the same conclusion. “It’s like you said, our lives are in his hands,” she pointed out. “So we don’t have much of a choice.”
“Dude, the walls are closing in!” Gabriel shouted.
“I noticed!” Dash shouted back. “Why are we shouting?”
“I thought it might make me feel better!” Gabriel shouted, louder this time.
“Did it?”
Gabriel sighed. “No. I still feel like a juice box about to get squished.”
“There must be a way out,” Piper said. “We just need to think.”
They thought.
The walls and floors glowed with color.
The timer ticked down.
They thought harder.
“Fifteen tiles across,” Gabriel murmured. His lips were pursed, his tongue poking out just slightly. It was his thinking face. “Eighteen tiles long.”
“Better make that seventeen,” Dash corrected him as the room buzzed and the walls chomped up another foot of space. Something about these colors was familiar to him. The buzzing too. It was scratching at the back of his mind, just out of reach.