The Paladin Prophecy

  “I’m supposed to check with an operator, isn’t that right?” asked Will.

  “Use my phone,” said Robbins. “Hit zero. An operator will put you through.”

  “I did have one question for you guys,” said Will as he moved to the phone.

  “What’s that, Will?” asked McBride.

  #59: SOMETIMES YOU FIND OUT MORE WHEN YOU ASK QUESTIONS TO WHICH YOU ALREADY KNOW THE ANSWER.

  “My roommates mentioned something about a kid named Ronnie Murso?”

  He could tell by their expressions that he’d caught them off guard. Will picked up the phone and dialed. The operator came on immediately:

  “How may I connect your call?” said another flat, happy midwestern voice.

  “This is Will West. I got a page?”

  “One moment, please.”

  A clipped male voice came on: “Mr. West, this is Dr. Kujawa, over at the medical clinic?”

  “Did you page me, sir?”

  “I did. We met yesterday, but you were unconscious at the time. I put those stitches in your head. How are you feeling?”

  “Much better, thanks.”

  “Glad to hear that. Mr. West, I’ve got some test results here that I need to go over with you. Could you come by my office right away?”

  “Why, is something wrong?” asked Will.

  “We’ll discuss it when you get here. Please ask Dr. Robbins to come with you. I’d like her to see this as well.”

  Will hung up. “Dr. Kujawa wants to see us both,” he said.

  “We’ll talk on the way,” said Robbins. “And I’ll tell you about Ronnie Murso.”

  THE MEDICAL CENTER

  Will had to work to keep pace with Dr. Robbins as they crossed campus. A breeze had kicked up and the frigid air slapped at his face. Dr. Robbins hardly seemed to notice.

  “Ronnie Murso came in as a freshman last year,” said Robbins. “He had trouble adjusting to life away from home. A lot of new students do. He also had serious family issues; his parents had just divorced. When school ended, Ronnie was scheduled to split time with them over the summer. He took a vacation with his father first, at the end of the term. A fishing trip in a remote part of Canada. When their scout plane went back to pick them up, they weren’t at the rendezvous point. Searches were organized. Police got involved. To make a long story short, they never found them. Ronnie and his father disappeared.”

  #92: IF YOU WANT PEOPLE TO TELL YOU MORE, SAY LESS. OPEN YOUR EYES AND EARS, AND CLOSE YOUR MOUTH.

  “There are theories,” said Robbins. “Ronnie was their only child, and his mother is convinced Ronnie’s father kidnapped him to deny her custody. That he ran off with Ronnie to start a new life somewhere. If that is the case, no one’s found them yet.”

  “What do you think?”

  “It’s possible, but I think it’s more likely they got lost, or ran into trouble, and something tragic happened. But until someone finds them, we’ll never know.”

  “Is that why you waited before putting anyone else into his room?”

  “In part. For people involved in something like this, it’s often harder not knowing what’s happened than it is being told for sure.”

  “So why did you put me in there?”

  She stopped, looked at him searchingly. “Why is this so important to you?”

  “I guess I’m a little sensitive,” said Will. “I just spent the freakiest twenty-four hours of my life getting here, only to find out I’m living in the room of a kid who mysteriously disappeared six months ago.”

  Robbins put a hand on his shoulder. “I understand your concern, Will. It’s perfectly natural. But what happened to Ronnie doesn’t in any way involve you.”

  There’s something she’s not telling me. Will didn’t know how he knew it—instinct, intuition, whatever. But now wasn’t the time to push her about it.

  #60: IF YOU DON’T LIKE THE ANSWER YOU GET, YOU SHOULDN’T HAVE ASKED THE QUESTION.

  They arrived at the medical center without another word. Set apart from the quad, it was the most modern building on campus—a six-story tower of blue-tinted glass and steel. Some donor had written a large check to put their name here: Large brushed silver letters identified it as the Haxley Medical Center.

  They took an elevator to the fifth floor. Dr. Kujawa welcomed them and led them to an adjacent exam room. He wore a white lab coat with DR. KEN KUJAWA embroidered on the upper left chest. Kujawa looked trim and fit—early forties, Will guessed—with a close-cropped salt-and-pepper brush cut and a brusque, no-nonsense manner.

  “Have a seat right there, Mr. West,” said Dr. Kujawa, nodding to a table. “How’s your head feeling?”

  “Right now it feels fine,” said Will.

  “Let’s have a look.”

  Kujawa bent over him, parted Will’s hair, and examined the wound. “That’s what I thought,” he said cryptically. He waved Robbins over to see it; then they looked at each other.

  “What’s the problem?” asked Will.

  “Come into my office,” said Dr. Kujawa.

  They followed him into his office, where Kujawa took a seat at his desk and punched up data on a sleek desktop version of a Center tablet.

  “Your transcript said you’re a runner. Is that right, Mr. West?” he asked.

  “Yes. Cross-country.”

  “Have you ever, to your knowledge, taken, used, or been given any performance-enhancing drugs?”

  “What?”

  “They would have been classified as an ESA, or erythropoiesis-stimulating agent. Pharmaceutical product. Administered by injection.”

  “No,” said Will, looking at Robbins with alarm. “Never. Absolutely not.”

  Kujawa continued matter-of-factly. “They stimulate the body’s production of a hormone called erythropoietin. EPO substantially increases production of red blood cells, which radically increases the amount of oxygen carried to your muscles. Enables athletes to perform at a premium in sports demanding high endurance, like biking, rowing, or running.”

  Will’s anger built steadily. “That’s called blood doping.”

  “Have you heard of HGH or human growth hormone? Because your blood levels are also nearly double the average for your age and size—”

  “If you’re accusing me of taking drugs, I swear to you that has never happened.”

  Kujawa didn’t react, just looked at him, neutral, appraising. Waiting.

  “It’s not that he doesn’t believe you, Will,” said Robbins calmly. “Go on, Ken.”

  “EPO and HGH also enhance the body’s ability to heal, from life-threatening wounds down to micro-tears in muscle fibers. The obvious value to athletes is it speeds recovery. Not just from injuries but also from routine training.”

  Kujawa pulled a mirror from the top drawer of his desk and a smaller hand mirror from his coat. He walked over to Will. “You suffered a gash in your scalp that was an inch long. I needed six stitches to close it. Roughly twenty-four hours ago. Take a look at it now.”

  Kujawa positioned one mirror above Will’s scalp and gave the other to Will to hold in front of his eyes. Then he moved Will’s hair to the side so he could see the site.

  The wound was gone. No scar, no scab, not even any stitches. Just a slight white discoloration.

  “Not only is the wound healed, but your body’s already assimilated the dissolving stitches, which normally takes more than a week. This, to put it mildly, is more than a little unusual.” Kujawa put the mirrors away, took some printed pages off his desk, and handed them to Dr. Robbins.

  “I ran a panel of routine tests with the blood I drew yesterday,” he said. “The oxygen-binding capacity of your blood is off the charts, over three times the high end of normal. You’d make Lance Armstrong in his prime look like an invalid.”

  “I don’t understand this,” said Will. “It’s not possible. This has to be some kind of crazy mistake.”

  Robbins was still staring at the results, pale, brow furrowed, deep in thought.
r />   “I don’t think so,” said Kujawa. “To that end I’d like to run more tests, to determine whether your body produced these levels on its own or if they were synthetically created and, maybe by some method unknown to you, introduced into your system. Have you ever been given any injections?”

  “No.”

  “What about any unusual vitamins or supplements?”

  “Not that I’m aware of,” said Will.

  “It would be helpful to see your medical records. Yearly physicals, vaccinations, that sort of thing. Could you ask your parents to send them to me?”

  “Of course,” said Will.

  The truth was a lot more awkward: He couldn’t remember ever visiting a doctor. His father kept a weathered black leather bag in their bedroom closet that contained a stethoscope; exam instruments for ears, nose, and throat; a blood pressure cuff; and syringes for drawing blood. He used them to give Will a comprehensive checkup twice a year. For the longest time, Will had assumed that’s what every family did. But there was another factor in this unusual routine: Will had never needed a doctor. Because as far back as he could remember—his entire life—he’d never been sick. Not once.

  “Rather than have you worry, I want a more complete picture,” said Kujawa. “Run more tests, cover all the angles, and see what they tell us.”

  “We’d need your consent, of course,” said Robbins. “And your parents’ as well. Would you ask them to okay this?”

  “I’ll call them today,” said Will.

  “The sooner the better,” said Dr. Kujawa. “Use my phone if you like.”

  “They wouldn’t be reachable now. I’ll try later,” said Will. “Does this mean it’s okay for me to work with the cross-country team?”

  “Mr. West, based on what I’ve seen, you could run from here to the border of Canada without even breathing hard.”

  PROFESSOR SANGREN

  For the second day in a row, for different reasons, Will walked out of the medical center with his mind reeling. This time he hardly noticed the glacial air.

  This explains the running, at least, but how on earth did it happen? Am I some kind of freak? No wonder my parents didn’t want me on a cross-country team; I’d end up on Ripley’s Believe It or Not. And once they start poking around in my insides, what else will they find?

  As he walked toward the quad, bells rang nearby. Will tracked them to a tower atop Royster Hall, near the middle of the commons. Visible from anywhere on campus, the large clock on the tower’s four sides read 11:00. Sounding the hour.

  Will pulled out the schedule McBride had given him. The first of his five classes started at eleven. Right now. Room 207, Bledsoe Hall. He summoned the campus map in his mind and located Bledsoe Hall. He calculated direction and distance—over a quarter of a mile—and started running.

  He reached Bledsoe before the bells stopped ringing. Will hurried in, dashed upstairs, and found room 207. He saw shapes through the door’s rippled glass window and heard a male voice. Will took a deep breath and stepped inside.

  Six rows of curved mahogany desks on low risers ascended in a terraced half-circle amphitheater. A wall of windows was covered with louvered wooden blinds. Twenty-five students filled the desks, their tablets propped in front of them.

  Every student looked attractive, poised, and physically fit. A diverse group of races and ethnic groups, all, without exception, put together and self-assured. If this sample was any indication of the Center’s student body, Rourke was right; these kids were way above average. If they weren’t already rich and famous, it was only a matter of time. Will felt like a skunk at the opera.

  The instructor—a boyish, energetic man with a shock of long sandy hair—stood before a square blue screen that took up most of that wall. On a lectern in front of him sat some sort of built-in computerized control panel. The man stopped speaking as Will entered.

  “And you are?” asked the teacher.

  “Late,” said Will.

  “Only by … two months,” said the instructor in a deep, resonant voice.

  The class laughed.

  Will glanced at his schedule: CIVICS: PROFILES IN POWER AND REALPOLITIK. Professor Lawrence Sangren. “Really sorry, Professor Sangren,” said Will.

  #72: WHEN IN A NEW PLACE, ACT LIKE YOU’VE BEEN THERE BEFORE.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, welcome if you would the late Will West,” said Sangren, holding a hand toward Will like a talk-show host introducing a guest. “And did we bring our book with us today, Mr. West?”

  “I was hoping I’d get the textbook once I got here.”

  For some reason the class laughed at that as well. Will’s cheeks burned hot.

  “Like primordial life emerging from the sea, learn to crawl before you walk,” said Sangren. “And take a seat.”

  Will swallowed his anger and climbed the risers. He spotted Brooke in the middle of the third row. She winked at him, then nodded at an empty desk to her right. He slid in gratefully beside her, then noticed Elise sitting behind him, isolated, chin propped on her palm, staring at him. Shaking her head.

  “Miss Springer,” said Sangren. “Please explain to Mr. West why he should bring his notebook to class.”

  “Current text, study guide, and notes are uploaded wirelessly onto your tablet during every class,” said Brooke, then whispered, “That’s why we bring them everywhere.”

  He hadn’t brought anything with him: not even a pencil. Woeful.

  #40: NEVER MAKE EXCUSES.

  “How big a loser am I?” he whispered.

  “We don’t have units of measurement that size,” Brooke whispered back.

  “I am so doomed with this guy.”

  “Probably so.”

  “Thanks, I feel better now,” said Will.

  “Are we finding the accommodations satisfactory, Mr. West?” asked Sangren.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Good. Now please refrain from speaking unless you’re struck by either an original thought or a meteorite. The odds of which I would estimate are about even.”

  An even bigger laugh. Even Elise gave a little smirk at that smack-down.

  God. Just. Kill. Me. Now.

  Sangren ran his fingers over the console on his lectern. Overhead lights in the room dimmed; the louvers on the windows closed automatically. The blue screen behind Sangren transformed into a map of Europe that took up the entire wall.

  No, much more than a map, Will realized. Some kind of hybrid satellite image: intensely photo-real, with precise topographic three-dimensional contours. Engraved borders defined countries. Names of important places and geographic features conformed to the shapes of the ground below. Mountains jutted straight out of the surface toward them: The line of the Alps plowed south toward Italy.

  Every detail looked startlingly vivid. Large cities—Rome, Vienna, Paris, London—appeared as broad flickering pockets of light, teeming with life. Currents and tides animated oceans, rippling and swelling around ports and shorelines. No map he’d ever seen more plainly showed the influence of geography on the creation of societies. Clouds drifted overhead, and sunlight and shadows played across the entire continent in a way that only an astronaut, or maybe God, could have seen them.

  Will glanced around; the same map appeared on the tablets of all the other students. Astonishing.

  “The name of the class, Mr. West, is Civics: Profiles in Power and Realpolitik,” said Sangren. “The point of this unit is to look back and grasp what’s relevant to us as Americans—at this moment in time—about the struggles of our human predecessors. Are you with me so far?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Sangren moved his hands on his console. Animated three-dimensional images blossomed all over the map; time came to life before their eyes. Roman legions advanced on barbarian camps. Napoleon’s Grand Army rode toward Moscow. Dust rose from ancient roads to the drumbeat of hooves on paving stones, the clang of weapons, gunfire, and artillery. Merchants loaded sailing ships in harbors. Armadas clashed on open sea
s.

  “We don’t teach history here; we let history teach us. The way it did the people who lived it: the way you experience the present, as a living field you can reach out and touch. The human story. A long compelling tale fueled by one common theme: the lust for power. Driven by men and women who understood the tools and the rules of the exercise of power. What might those be, Miss Moreau?”

  Elise glanced at Will as she answered. Biting off each word with a snap. “Brutality. Terror. Corruption. Greed. Bloodshed. Deception.”

  “Don’t forget obsession, madness, and seduction,” said Sangren.

  “Oh, I never do,” said Elise.

  The class chuckled.

  “In other words, we look for the truth behind the common assumptions,” said Sangren. “And the truth isn’t very pretty, is it, Miss Moreau?”

  “No, sir. But it sure is interesting.”

  The class laughed again. All except Brooke, who rolled her eyes.

  “Empty your mind, Mr. West. Forget those nice stories you’ve been told about history as ‘progress’ and the ‘goodness’ of humanity. Chock full of idealism, fairness, decency, the innate nobility of man, all that heartwarming flapdoodle. Nothing wrong with it, by the way. And if you’re interested, you can learn all about it in another class just down the hall. It’s called fiction.”

  The class laughed again. Will’s eyes felt stuck wide open. He’d never heard a teacher chomp into the neck of a subject like this before. In the schools Will had attended, Sangren would have been banished for opinions this outrageous.

  His floppy hair waving as he moved around, Sangren continued with the passion and energy of a conductor driving an orchestra to the end of a symphony.

  “This is the big con of the ruling classes. The one they’ve convinced the masses to buy since the dawn of time, that submitting to the will of those in charge is in their best interests. Even if it costs them their cash, their livelihood, or their happiness. Even if it kills them, which more often than not is exactly what happens.”