Oh.My.Gods. 02 - Goddess Boot Camp

  "Be­ca­use Da­mi­an re­ad­mit­ted you af­ter yo­ur ex­pul­si­on?"

  I slap a hand over my mo­uth. The qu­es­ti­on slip­ped out be­fo­re I knew it was co­ming. I to­tal­ly want to know, of co­ur­se, but I to­tal­ly don't want to get zap­ped to Si­be­ria. Xan­der de­fi­ni­tely gi­ves off a cross-me-and-you'll-ne­ver-be-he­ard-from-aga­in vi­be.

  I bra­ce myself for su­barc­tic tem­pe­ra­tu­res.

  "Not exactly," he says as we re­ach a wi­de spot in the tra­il-if the ba­rely vi­sib­le, less den­se path is a tra­il. Pic­king up his pa­ce, he pas­ses me. "And I didn't say which Pet­ro­las."

  I'm left watc­hing his back as he catc­hes up with my te­am. He has de­fi­ni­tely cor­ne­red the mar­ket on enig­ma. I ho­pe Stel­la go­es for the de­eply la­ye­red type.

  "I fo­und one!"

  The pi­er­cing lit­tle-girl shri­ek ec­ho­es thro­ugh the wo­ods. I fol­low the so­und of yelps and gig­gles to whe­re my te­am and Xan­der ha­ve gat­he­red. They're po­in­ting at a whi­te flag han­ging from a low tree branch.

  "This is one of ours," Tansy in­sists. "I'm su­re of it."

  "Re­mem­ber," Xan­der says, "if you cho­ose the wrong flag, then you'll lo­se a po­int and gi­ve the right­ful te­am a two-po­int bo­nus."

  No­te that re­bel boy sa­id "you," not "we." And he thinks I don't un­ders­tand the te­am con­cept.

  Tho­ugh no one ap­pe­ars in­te­res­ted in my opi­ni­on, I eva­lu­ate the flag.

  Accor­ding to Xan­der's inst­ruc­ti­ons, all the flags on the co­ur­se to­ok iden­ti­cal. Whi­te. We can't trust ap­pe­aran­ces to know which one is ours. As so­on as we to­uch the flag, it will chan­ge co­lors-to black if it be­longs to us, to red, blue, or yel­low if it be­longs to Stel­la, Ada­ra, or Miss Ori­vas. But we can't know for su­re un­til we to­uch it.

  "You ha­ve to fe­el the flag." Xan­der le­ans ca­su­al­ly aga­inst a tree. "See be­yond the sur­fa­ce." He lo­oks at me. "If you can."

  I scowl at him. In a per­fect world, the tree wo­uld be swar­ming with ants.

  May­be if I con­cent­ra­te, I can-

  "I think we sho­uld grab it," Gil­li­an says, ta­king a step to­ward the tree.

  Out of the cor­ner of my eye I see her re­ac­hing… for a red flag.

  "Wa­it!" I di­ve in front of her, pus­hing her hand out of the way inc­hes be­fo­re she co­uld to­uch the still-whi­te flag.

  "What are you do­ing?" Gil­li­an cri­es.

  Mu­ri­el cros­ses her arms over her chest and gla­res at me.

  "What, Pho­ebe?" Tansy asks, se­eming truly in­te­res­ted in my opi­ni­on. From the mur­de­ro­us lo­oks on Gil­li­an and Mu­ri­els fa­ces and the to­tal di­sin­te­rest on Xan­der's, she's the only one who wants to he­ar what I ha­ve to say. "Don't you think this is our flag?"

  I glan­ce at the flag aga­in. It's still whi­te. I ha­ve no re­ason to think Gil­li­an's wrong-espe­ci­al­ly sin­ce I'm the one with the de­fec­ti­ve po­wers. She's pro­bably de­ca­des ahe­ad of me in the who­le po­wers-cont­rol thing. But for that ins­tant I was so su­re it-

  Red. For anot­her split se­cond the flag was red.

  "No," I sha­ke my he­ad. "This isn't ours. This flag is red."

  "Wha­te­ver," Gil­li­an says, re­ac­hing for the flag aga­in.

  Tansy gasps. "I see it, too."

  Gil­li­an and Mu­ri­el sta­re at her li­ke she's bet­ra­yed them.

  She po­ints at the flag. "Lo­ok."

  They both turn and squ­int. Gil­li­an's mo­uth drops. Mu­ri­el huffs and stomps away. "Let's go find our flags." She ducks un­der a pi­ne branch. "I am not lo­sing to Tres­sa Boyd."

  Gil­li­an hur­ri­es af­ter her. As Xan­der pas­ses me, he says, "Ni­ce catch, Cast­ro."

  I just ke­ep blin­king, not qu­ite be­li­eving what I just did. When I lo­oked at the flag, I saw the whi­te mask or wha­te­ver. When I was thin­king abo­ut so­met­hing el­se, tho­ugh, only catc­hing sight in my pe­rip­he­ral vi­si­on, I co­uld see the true co­lor.

  "That was ama­zing," Tansy says, her vo­ice la­ced with a sen­se of awe. "You didn't even ha­ve to con­cent­ra­te or anyt­hing."

  No. I didn't. In fact, con­cent­ra­ting ma­de it wor­se.

  Stel­la's exer­ci­se the ot­her night pro­ved that my po­wers co­me from my mind. But how am I sup­po­sed to cont­rol them if fo­cu­sing do­esn't help?

  "We'd bet­ter hurry up," Tansy says. "I bet Gil­li­an tri­es to grab the wrong flag aga­in. If you're not the­re to stop her, we'll lo­se for su­re."

  I let Tansy le­ad me up the path, but my mind is still thin­king abo­ut my po­wers. And how I only ha­ve less than two we­eks to fi­gu­re out how to cont­rol them when trying to cont­rol them sends them out of cont­rol.

  At this po­int, I re­al­ly sho­uldn't be surp­ri­sed by be­ing tos­sed in­to such a vi­ci­o­us circ­le. Try to cont­rol my po­wers, and they go ber­serk. Tra­in mo­re, cont­rol less. Stay on at the Aca­demy to le­arn how to use my po­wers, but be for­ced to pass a po­wers test first. La­tely, my who­le li­fe is one big exer­ci­se in cont­ra­dic­ti­on.

  * * *

  "Cong­ra­tu­la­ti­ons, Pho­ebe," Stel­la says when camp bre­aks up for the day. "Xan­der says you fo­und two of yo­ur te­am's flags, and sa­ved them from cho­osing three wrong ones."

  I shrug. It's not li­ke I ac­tu­al­ly did so­met­hing to suc­ce­ed. "No big."

  "It is a big," she in­sists. "Most ne­os are lucky to find one. They al­most ne­ver iden­tify enemy flags. You've ear­ned yo­ur se­cond me­rit bad­ge."

  She hands me anot­her ro­und patch. This one has a red outer ring, a black backg­ro­und, and the cen­ter pic­tu­re lo­oks li­ke a ma­gi­ci­an's wand with lit­tle sparks co­ming out the end. I gu­ess it has so­met­hing to do with mas­king ap­pe­aran­ces or ma­king so­met­hing in­vi­sib­le. Ma­king the co­lo­red flags lo­ok whi­te.

  Big who­op.

  I glan­ce aro­und to ma­ke su­re ever­yo­ne el­se is go­ne. I don't want to get ca­ught con­fes­sing to the evil step­sis­ter.

  "But what go­od do­es it do me?" I ask when I'm su­re we're alo­ne. "If I try to use my po­wers, they go wacky. It's only when I'm not thin­king abo­ut it that they co­me out right."

  "Hmm." Stel­la taps a french-ma­ni­cu­red fin­ger on her lips. "The­re has to be a way to re­ver­se that. Or at le­ast har­ness it."

  I can see the ge­ars tur­ning, her mind wor­king to fi­gu­re out the so­lu­ti­on.

  "May­be you're overt­hin­king, ove­ra­naly­zing." she sug­gests. The­re's an exer­ci­se de­sig­ned to-"

  "For­get it," I say, wal­king away. I'm so not up for Stel­la's full at­ten­ti­on right now. Af­ter six ho­urs of in­di­rect po­wers usa­ge in the com­pany of ten-ye­ar-olds-except-as I fo­und out, Tansy…she's twel­ve-my mind is fri­ed. "I can't think abo­ut this any­mo­re right now."

  "We can try that exer­ci­se to­night," she calls out.

  Fol­lo­wing the path aro­und the qu­ad, I pass the girls' dorm. I'm thank­ful I don't ha­ve to li­ve the­re. Sha­ring my bath­ro­om with Stel­la is bad eno­ugh. I can't ima­gi­ne sha­ring with an en­ti­re flo­or full of girls. Li­ke Ada­ra. I fe­el sorry for Ni­co­le-she is so not the slum­ber-party type, but she's on the sa­me flo­or as the che­er qu­e­en and three of her che­er mi­ni­ons.

  As Ni­co­le puts it, she's trap­ped in che­er­land. This is her fo­urth sum­mer in the dorms. May­be she's bu­ilt up a de­fen­se aga­inst Aph­ro­di­te's des­cen­dants.

  Or, kno­wing Ni­co­le, may­be she's pla­ced so­me kind of cur­se on her do­or so they can't get in­to her ro­om.

  I'll ha­ve to ask her.

  De­to­uring from the path, I de­ci­de to see if she's ho­me. May­be she can shed so­me light on the anony?
?mo­us e-ma­il.

  Her ro­om is at the end of the first flo­or, with a gre­at vi­ew out over the qu­ad. Even if I didn't know which one was hers, I'd be ab­le to gu­ess-it's the only one with a sign that says KNOCK AT YO­UR OWN PE­RIL just be­low a skull and cros­sbo­nes. Bra­ving the war­ning-but ma­king su­re to knock on the do­or it­self, and not the sign-I rap my knuck­les on the smo­oth wo­od sur­fa­ce.

  No res­pon­se. If she we­re he­re, I'd at le­ast get a thre­ate­ning "Who is it?"

  I'm not re­ady to go ho­me and I don't want to be alo­ne. Clas­ses sho­uld be out for the day. May­be Troy is in his ro­om.

  I he­ad back out and to­ward the boys' dorm and climb the front steps and the two flights of sta­irs to his third-flo­or ro­om. My qu­ads cry out a lit­tle at the climb, re­min­ding me that re­co­very ti­me is a go­od thing. When I re­ach the ro­om with a gi­ant fo­am gu­itar on the do­or, I knock. Three se­conds la­ter, Troy pulls it open.

  "Pho­ebe," he says with hu­ge smi­le. "What are you do­ing he­re?"

  "Camp just en­ded," I say. "I was he­ading ho­me and tho­ught I'd stop by."

  "Get yo­ur butt in he­re, Cast­ro," Ni­co­le barks.

  Troy swings the do­or wi­de so I can see Nic lo­un­ging on the be­an-bag in the cor­ner. She's just sli­ding a big le­at­her bo­ok in­to her mes­sen­ger bag.

  She wa­ves me in. "We've be­en wa­iting for you to show up."

  "What's up?" I ask

  "I don't know what Nic's do­ing he­re," he te­ases. When she casts a scowl his way, he grabs the gu­itar off his bed and sets it on the stand next to his desk. "I was just abo­ut to play for so­me stress re­li­ef. My bra­in was not ma­de for or­ga­nic che­mistry."

  "I don't want to in­ter­rupt." I do, ac­tu­al­ly, but it se­ems way ru­de to say that. Even if I'm des­pe­ra­te for so­me rep­ri­eve from my own tro­ub­les.

  "No wor­ri­es." He drops in­to his dorm-issue desk cha­ir and mo­ti­ons me to the bed. "You're stress re­li­ef, too."

  "Thanks," I say, sin­king on­to his black-and-whi­te-chec­ke­red com­for­ter. "I don't fe­el much li­ke stress re­li­ef to­day."

  "Hard day at camp?" Ni­co­le asks, pul­ling a bag of but­ters­cotch can­di­es out of her bag. She thrusts the bag in my di­rec­ti­on.

  Troy growls a lit­tle and frowns at the candy.

  I le­an over and ta­ke one. "Yes. No. I don't know." I twist open the cel­lop­ha­ne wrap­per. "It's mo­re than camp, I gu­ess."

  Pop­ping the but­ters­cotch bet­we­en my lips, I let the smo­othly swe­et tas­te melt over my ton­gue.

  "Li­ke what?" Nic asks.

  Oh, everyt­hing. It's that I can only cont­rol my po­wers when I'm not trying to. It's that I'm af­ra­id my boyf­ri­end is get­ting back with his ex-or that I'm ha­ving an over­re­ac­ti­on of je­alo­usy. It's that I'm stuck at ho­me with Stel­la, with her ta­king me on as her pet pro­j­ect. It's that I'm sud­denly do­ub­ting what I le­ar­ned abo­ut my dad's de­ath, my boyf­ri­end's lo­yalty, and my own sa­nity. It's a mil­li­on things and not­hing.

  Not that I say any of that. Don't ne­ed to ex­po­se my fri­ends to the in­sa­ne ramb­lings of my bra­in. They might ne­ver re­co­ver.

  "Li­ke this." I lift one hip and pull two pi­eces of pa­per from my back poc­ket.

  Ni­co­le snatc­hes them from my hand.

  After un­fol­ding them, she says, "They're blank."

  "I know," I sli­de the but­ters­cotch aga­inst my che­ek so I can talk. They're not sup­po­sed to be blank. They're sup­po­sed to be e-ma­il prin­to­uts. I slip the but­ters­cotch back on­to my ton­gue and mut­ter, "Thtu­pid, cur­t­hed e-ma­ils."

  "They wo­uldn't print?" Troy asks.

  I sha­ke my he­ad. When I re­ce­ived the se­cond e-ma­il last night, almost iden­ti­cal to the first, I wan­ted a prin­to­ut so I co­uld I analy­ze them. May­be find a clue to who sent them.

  Forty-se­ven at­tempts la­ter, all I had was blank pa­per.

  "Huh." Troy's brows scrunch to­get­her. "Who we­re they from?"

  "The sa­me per­son who sent the no­te," Ni­co­le sug­gests.

  "Pro­bably." Unab­le to re­sist, I crunch the but­ters­cotch. So­me­day my te­eth will be dust. "The sen­der's ad­dress was bloc­ked."

  "Bloc­ked?" Troy's eyes get all wi­de. This was to yo­ur Aca­demy e-ma­il?" When I nod., he sha­kes his he­ad. "The Aca­demy e-ma­il system do­esn't al­low bloc­ked sen­ders."

  I shrug. As if I can chan­ge what hap­pe­ned.

  "Show me." He le­aps up from his desk cha­ir and wa­ves me over. "Log on to yo­ur e-ma­il."

  With a he­avy sigh, I push off the bed. It's not that I don't want to find out who sent the mes­sa­ge, and how they ma­na­ged to block the sen­der and ke­ep it from prin­ting. I am just run­ning low on mo­ti­va­ti­on.

  When I'm slow to mo­ve, Troy ta­kes my sho­ul­ders, ur­ges me in­to the cha­ir, and sho­ves me clo­ser to the desk. Grab­bing the mo­use, I click the Aca­demy e-ma­il lo­go and en­ter my user na­me and pas­sword.

  "See." I po­int at the bloc­ked mes­sa­ges, still at the top of my in­box.

  Troy le­ans over my sho­ul­der, squ­in­ting at the scre­en. "I can't be­li­eve it. Aca­demy e-ma­il is im­pe­net­rab­le. No one can bypass the se­cu­rity system wit­ho­ut ma­j­or re­per­cus­si­ons."

  "What abo­ut last ye­ar," I ask. "when Grif­fin mes­sed with my e-ma­il? Every ti­me I de­le­ted his mes­sa­ge a new one pop­ped up."

  "That's dif­fe­rent." Troy rubs a hand back and forth over his short ha­ir. "Anyo­ne can cre­ate a simp­le hack on the­ir own com­pu­ter to auto­ma­ti­cal­ly re­send a mes­sa­ge. But this mes­ses with the Aca­demy ser­ver. It's im­pos­sib­le."

  "May­be," I say, thin­king. Cle­arly not. "But that do­esn't chan­ge the fact that-"

  "Let's ta­ke this to Uri­an," Nic says, "He'll fi­gu­re it out."

  "She's right. The kid's a ge­ni­us." Troy jerks the desk cha­ir back, with me in it. "Let's go."

  He hur­ri­es out in­to the hall. Ni­co­le shrugs, li­ke we both know he's over­re­ac­ting, but fol­lows him thro­ugh the do­or. When I get into the hall. I see Troy knoc­king on a do­or three ro­oms down. When the­re's no ans­wer, he rolls his eyes and knocks aga­in, this ti­me with a knock-knock… knock knock-knock-knock pat­tern.

  "Pas­sword?" a muf­fled vo­ice says thro­ugh the do­or.

  "Chi­me­ra."

  No ans­wer.

  "Sho­ot," Troy whis­pers. "That was yes­ter­day's pas­sword." To the do­or, he says. "Scylla's stra­it."

  Ni­co­le rolls her eyes.

  The do­or swings open si­lently.

  "Don't," Troy whis­pers thro­ugh clenc­hed te­eth, "la­ugh."

  We walk in­to a ro­om stra­ight out of Star Wars. Com­p­le­te with cros­sed light­sa­bers over the desk, black cur­ta­ins bloc­king out the win­dow, and a li­fe-si­ze Han So­lo cu­to­ut in the co­mer.

  A gig­gle bub­bles its way to the sur­fa­ce. Troy cuts me a harsh lo­ok and I stif­le my hu­mor. But se­ri­o­usly, a li­fe-si­ze Han So­lo?

  "Sta­te yo­ur pur­po­se?"

  Tur­ning to­ward the vo­ice, I see a short, dark-ha­ired buy pus­hing the do­or clo­sed. I can't tell for su­re-li­ke I sa­id, the win­dow is blac­ked out and the only light in the ro­om is co­ming from the glow of a com­pu­ter mo­ni­tor-but I don't think I know him.

  "Aca­demy e-ma­il," Troy says.

  "Fa­mi­li­ar," the dark-ha­ired boy says, le­aving his post at the do­or and sli­ding in­to the cha­ir in front of his com­pu­ter. "Si­tu­ati­on?"

  "Bloc­ked sen­der." Troy mo­ves fart­her in­to the ro­om and sits on the un­ma­de bed, on the ed­ge ne­arest the desk.

  "Impos­sib­le." Dark-ha­ired boy clicks ra­pidly on his key­bo­ard.

&nb
sp; "Not- im­pos­sib­le." 'Troy says, le­aning for­ward so he can see the mo­ni­tor. "I've se­en it."

  Ni­co­le le­ans clo­se to my ear and whis­pers, "Uri­an's a lit­tle psycho, but he knows com­pu­ters bet­ter than an­yo­ne."

  Dark-ha­ired boy stops typing. "Addi­ti­onal in­con­sis­ten­ci­es?"

  "The mes­sa­ge won't print."

  Dark-ha­ired boy grunts and starts typing fas­ter than ever. Ima­ges flash ac­ross the mo­ni­tor at warp spe­ed.

  I fe­el li­ke I've en­te­red nerd-vil­le.

  I stick to my spot just in­si­de the do­or. From what I can see in the flic­ke­ring light, the rest of the ro­om lo­oks li­ke a hur­ri­ca­ne, tor­na­do.,and tsu­na­mi to­ok turns mes­sing with the con­tents. I'm sud­denly very glad I had to we­ar pants and clo­sed-toe sho­es for camp to­day. Who knows what's li­ving in tho­se pi­les.

  "Access co­des?" dark-ha­ired boy fi­nal­ly asks.

  "Pho­ebe," Troy says, "tell Uri­an yo­ur user na­me and pas­sword."

  "No way," I say. I don't know this guy. I've re­ad abo­ut tho­se iden­tity thi­eves who hi­j­ack yo­ur e-ma­il and use it to send spam abo­ut dis­co­unt presc­rip­ti­on drugs and pi­ra­ted com­pu­ter prog­rams.

  "Uri­an's all right," Ni­co­le says.

  I stand my gro­und. "I don't know him."

  "Pho­ebe, this is Uri­an Na­cus." She nods at the dark-ha­ired boy. "Uri­an, Pho­ebe Cast­ro."

  Uri­an spins in his cha­ir fas­ter than an Olym­pic sprin­ter. "Cast­ro?" he asks, brows ra­ised. "The apo­ni­kos?"

  The what?" I as­ked, thin­king I might ne­ed to get of­fen­ded.

  "Des­cen­dant of Ni­ke," Troy says qu­ickly, as if he can sen­se I'm up­set.

  Uri­an le­aps to his fe­et and bows po­li­tely. "A ple­asu­re." Flas­hing me a smarmy smi­le, he ta­kes my hand-which I didn't of­fer-and kis­ses my knuck­les.

  "Uh, thanks," I say, ret­ri­eving my fin­gers.

  I gla­re at Troy over Uri­an's he­ad. What has he got­ten me in­to?

  "Ple­ase," Uri­an says, wa­ving at the flic­ke­ring com­pu­ter scre­en. "Key in yo­ur user na­me and pas­sword. Yo­ur ac­cess co­des shall re­ma­in yo­ur own."