“That would be e-emotion, Lord Commander. Your subconscious l-longs to be close to Earth’s b-beauty, and the tightening f-feeling is a physiological reaction to that desire. It’s c-called ‘heartache.’ ”
“Heartache?” The Lord Commander massaged his chest tenderly with his claw. “It sounds repugnant. And I don’t mean in a good way.”
Snarlpustule poked his own chest curiously. “I’m not experiencing anything.”
The Lord Commander looked around at his crew and saw dozens of black eyes looking back at him with confusion.
“Neither am I!” the Lord Commander bellowed. “I was merely testing you lot, searching for weakness. I’ll accept no weakness when we’re hunting GGARL!” The Lord Commander thrust his fist into the air and spat a thick, steaming mucus glob onto the deck of the bridge.
“GGARL!” the crew shouted in unison, punctuating their cry with mucous globs of their own. The deck would need refinishing, and there would no doubt be several boots that needed resoling, but the Lord Commander didn’t care. He was making a statement here.
“Snarlpustule, begin readying the assault brigade! Full weaponry! And alert the ship’s cannon teams. After we’ve slaughtered this GGARL!—”
“GGARL!” Another round of waving fists and mucus globs.
“—and claimed its wretched cape, I want Earth blown to pieces. I’ll not allow its . . .”
“B-beauty, Lord Commander,” the servant offered.
“Beauty! I’ll not allow its beauty to taint my universe!”
“Right away, Lord Commander!” Snarlpustule saluted and ran from the bridge, his cry of “GGARL!” echoing after him.
The Lord Commander sat back and looked at Earth one final time. The sight of it really did fill him with a most peculiar feeling. Perhaps there was something there worth saving after all.
No. That sort of thinking wasn’t Unnd-natural.
There was no question: Earth must die.
CHAPTER
18
MILES WAS EXHAUSTED WHEN HE returned home from cleaning up the jackknifed semi. He fell into bed, listening to his dad and Dawn laugh through the wall. It was good to hear his dad sound happy.
Even though it was almost dinnertime and Miles was hungry, all he could think about was sleep. He hoped for a quiet night and closed his eyes.
• • •
The next day was anything but quiet.
Miles should’ve known he was in for a wild ride when he rolled out of bed that morning. The apartment was colder than it had any right to be, the result of northern Georgia experiencing its annual in-between season—the time of year when one day feels like summer, the next like fall, and you never know when you go to sleep if you’re supposed to have the air-conditioning or the heater on.
Then there was the rain. It ran down the windows in sheets, the wind whipping fat raindrops against the apartment building. No thunder or lightning, though, which meant Miles couldn’t use potential electrocution as an excuse to not walk down to the bus. At least the bus stop was covered, so Miles had a place to drip dry after he sloshed through the flooded parking lot to get there.
When he stepped off the bus at Chapman, the sky was dark with swollen clouds. Heavy as the rain was, the storm still had more to give. Miles followed the other kids from the bus and dashed under the overhang. He started to shake himself dry.
Henry was waiting for him, huddled against the building. “Some day, right? I think I took on an inch of rain just getting from my mom’s car to here.”
“Try waiting for the bus.” Miles wrung the bottom of his shirt, and water gushed out.
Henry opened the door to the school, and cold air blasted Miles in the face. Somebody had mistakenly concluded that air-conditioning, not heat, was the way to go. Pneumonia city.
“Look on the bright side,” Henry chimed. “Studies have shown that crime goes down twenty-three percent when it rains.”
“Maybe so, but I don’t need a study to tell me that traffic accidents go up.”
“Good point,” Henry conceded. “Which reminds me: Nice work with the semi last night. Lots of afternoon commuters tweeted that you helped get them home in time for dinner.”
“I’m thrilled they had a restful evening,” Miles griped.
Henry eyed Miles with concern. “You all right?”
“Yeah, I’m okay. Just beat. If I’m not crisscrossing the city, I’m wondering when you’re going to send me somewhere. Add to that something my dad said last night, which made me realize I’m supposed to be looking after the entire globe, not just my area code. If I’d ever traveled farther than the other side of the Georgia-Tennessee line, that probably would’ve dawned on me from the get-go.”
“You’re talking to a Gilded expert. It dawned on me. But if you read the earliest issues of Gilded Age, you’ll see your predecessor stayed close to home in the beginning, too. First, learn to take care of your city. Then comes the world.”
Miles combed his fingers through his rain-slicked hair. “This superhero needs a super-vacation.”
“I’ll do my best to lighten your workload today. I’ll only send you out if it’s absolutely necessary.”
“It’s more than that. All this sneaking around behind my dad’s back. It’s wearing me down. He found the cell phone, by the way.”
“What’d he say?”
“He wasn’t happy, I’ll tell you that. He got distracted by the neighbor before he could think up a punishment, but you’d better start brainstorming another way for us to keep in touch. If I had to guess, my phone isn’t long for this world.” Miles thought about mentioning that, on top of everything else, he’d soon be getting grilled by the United States Army, too. But why bother? It wasn’t as though Henry would be able to do anything about it.
“I’ll come up with something,” Henry said. “And before I forget, here.” He reached into his bag and pulled out a fresh pad of signed hall passes. “I swear I’ll try to take it easy on you, but keep this handy. Just in case.”
“Ready for anything,” Miles said, frowning. He slipped the pad into his back pocket and trudged off to class.
• • •
The wind and heavy rain persisted throughout the morning and into the afternoon. When last period rolled around, Miles found himself in the unfamiliar position of hoping Mrs. Euclid’s math lecture wouldn’t end, so much did he not relish the idea of going home in the downpour. The National Weather Service should rank the severity of storms according to how many extra minutes of prealgebra one would voluntarily endure to avoid venturing out into them. That’s a system that surely every man, woman, and child could relate to.
The patter of raindrops became the harsh clatter of hail, like the sound of Skittles spilling on a countertop. The lights flickered, and Mrs. Euclid gazed up uneasily. A gust of wind bellowed against the building and dragged a loose tree branch along one of the classroom’s windows.
“Children! Move away to the other side of the room!” Mrs. Euclid said urgently.
Then the school’s sirens began to wail, and Miles knew, one way or another, he was headed outdoors.
vrrrrrrr
Even before he looked, Miles guessed what Henry was texting about.
Tornado.
F-4. BAD.
Cape up. NOW.
Miles had no clue what made a tornado an F-4, but at the very least, he knew it was more dangerous than Fs 1–3. BAD with a capital B-A-D.
“Attention, all students and faculty,” Assistant Principal Harangue’s voice squelched over the intercom. “A tornado warning has been issued for Gwinnett County. Please proceed in a quick and orderly fashion to the gymnasium. This is not a drill. Repeat, we are under a tornado warning. This is not a drill.”
“Line up, class!” Mrs. Euclid ordered. Kids hurriedly gathered what they could of their belongings and rushed toward the door.
Miles snatched up his backpack and looked for an exit, but he was stuck. The class was bottlenecked in front of the door, wai
ting for Mrs. Euclid to lead them out. Even if he could somehow get the cape on without anyone seeing—which was doubtful—the only way he’d be able to leave the room was if he busted right through the wall. Not exactly the sort of thing that goes unnoticed.
In the distance a power transformer violently hummed its last breath, and the classroom’s lights went dead. The power company would be working overtime tonight.
“Quickly, class! Quickly!” Mrs. Euclid urged.
Miles looked out the window, and that’s when he saw it. In the distance, a thick, swirling mass of dark clouds reached down from the sky like a pointer finger of doom. It looked slow and lumbering, but Miles knew that was an illusion. The tornado’s winds would be fast enough to rip entire buildings off their foundations. And it was headed straight for the school.
Miles hurried to the back of the line, nervous energy building inside him. Every second that passed was another second the tornado was allowed to cut its path across the ground. Was it picking up cars? Houses? He needed to get outside and help people. He needed to do it now. If he could just make it out to the hallway, then things would be . . .
Worse. The hallway was in chaos. Kids scrambled in every direction like blind bats who’d had their sonar disrupted. Teachers and student hall monitors did their best to herd everyone to safety, but the hallway was choked with people moving in such a disorganized hurry, they forced the entire crowd to move slowly. Only Trisha Brevard seemed oblivious to the danger. She bounced around like a pinball, her head down as she thumbed out a text—probably something along the lines of OMG! Tornado! LOL!
The twister was imminent. The building groaned, straining to hold on to its roof. There was no chance they’d all make it to the gym in time. Even if they did, who knew if the building was capable of withstanding an F-4 anyway? It wasn’t as if the gym had ever been tested in a wind tunnel.
“Miles!”
Miles spotted Henry getting swept past him by the crowd. He tried fighting his way to Miles, but it was no use.
“Tornados are rotating columns of air!” Henry yelled. “North of the equator, they spin counterclockwise! COUNTERCLOCKWISE!” And then Henry was gone, carried away by the current.
Counterclockwise? Miles didn’t have time for fun facts. He needed a place to put on the cape. He could go back inside the classroom, but then what? He couldn’t just dash down the hallway like he had during lunchtime. There were too many kids for him to avoid, and if he ran into any of them at supersonic speed, they’d splatter against his chest like lovebugs on a windshield. Miles needed to get clear.
He did the only thing he could think to do. He ran in the opposite direction.
Miles jostled his way against the tide of kids flowing toward the gym. For every step he took forward, he was pushed two steps back.
“Coming through!” he yelled desperately, but no one bothered to make way for him. They just scowled, annoyed by the idiot new kid who was going the wrong way. Miles imagined a bus full of retirees getting sucked up by an F-4 tornado during their outing to the public library, and pushed harder against the throng.
Just as Miles began to wonder if every middle schooler in the county had transferred to Chapman for the day’s tornado alarm, the crowd started to thin. The last few older kids shuffled by, snapping their gum and making jokes about how frazzled everyone else was. The coolest of the cool, they apparently felt it necessary to act blasé even in the face of impending natural disaster.
At last, Miles spied light at the end of the hallway—a double-door emergency exit on the west side of the school. He made a break for it. He’d duck into the band room just inside the exit, change, and be airborne without anyone noticing. He was home free.
“Stop!” A voice echoed in the emptying hallway. It was loud enough to be heard above the wailing tornado siren.
Reflexively, Miles stopped short. He recognized that voice. Whatever you do, don’t turn around, he thought. Don’t turn around!
Miles turned around. There was Josie, running toward him frantically.
“Oh. Hey, Josie. What’s up?” How was it possible for him to utter five simple words and yet sound like a complete dork?
“You’re going the wrong way! We’re all supposed to head to the gym!” Josie tucked her hair behind her ears, revealing tiny bluebird earrings.
Miles nodded. “Right. Well, I, uh . . .” He reached for something—anything—to say. “I didn’t know that. Who told you?”
Josie crossed her arms and pursed her lips, an incredibly gorgeous way of showing she was aggravated. “I’m a hall monitor this period. It’s my responsibility to know. And to make sure everyone gets where they’re supposed to be.”
Whoever decided Josie was the right person for that job, Miles had to commend them on their choice. He’d follow her into a tornado, let alone away from one.
Josie softened, and she offered Miles a soothing smile. “Come on, new kid. Follow me.”
Yep, right into the swirling, debris-filled heart of an F-one-million tornado.
Josie reached out and took Miles’s hand in hers, pulling him gently toward the gym.
Miles was in a trance. Josie Campobasso was holding his hand. Granted, it was because she believed he was too stupid to take adequate cover during a tornado, but still. Josie. Was. Holding. His. Hand. Heart working faster than his brain, it sent word to his feet to do what the prettiest girl in three counties asked. They complied.
He walked slowly at first, but as the worry in Josie’s voice grew, so did his speed.
“Hurry!” she urged.
He recognized the nervousness in her tone. It was the fear that creeps in during the final moments before you’ve reached safety. The fear that fate can’t be trusted to bring you the rest of the way home.
How many others were just as scared right now, huddled in their basements or bathtubs, listening to the howling storm outside? Parents clutching their children close. Little kids whose worst nightmares, played against the soundtrack of thunderstorms in the night, seemed to be coming true. All of Chapman Middle, listening to the groan of the gym as it leaned into the wind.
Miles could make their fears go away.
His brain clamped both hands on the steering wheel and wrestled control away from his heart. His feet planted. Josie walked another step, then was pulled to a stop as well. She wheeled on Miles with eyes wide.
“Let’s go.” Her expression was desperate. She clutched his hand tighter.
“I can’t.”
“What do you mean, you can’t?” Josie barked angrily. She pointed down the hallway. “Move it, Taylor.”
Miles couldn’t help noticing that she remembered his last name. “You go ahead,” he said. “I just realized I, um, forgot something. I’ll catch up.”
Josie’s expression fell. “Please,” she whispered.
“I . . .” Josie’s eyes were cool, sparkling pools Miles wanted to cannonball into and swim in for days. If he didn’t leave her now, he knew he never would. “I’ll get to the gym. I promise. But there’s something I have to do first.”
Miles yanked his hand free from Josie’s and sprinted in the opposite direction. A twelve-year-old with zits running from the girl of his dreams—for the second time. Clearly, he was a raving lunatic.
Miles spied the Jammer strolling toward him. Dude the Teammate seemed nervous about taking so long to get to the gym, but not so nervous that he was going to abandon his post at the team captain’s side.
The Jammer stopped. He grinned cruelly, fists loaded and ready to do their worst. “Tornado coming, Taylor. Why don’t you go outside and play in it?”
Miles dashed past the Jammer without giving him so much as a glance. “Will do!”
Miles ducked into the open band room and slammed the door closed behind him. He made sure the doorknob was locked, then scanned the room for anything that even remotely resembled a changing area. If someone walked past the door, he didn’t want to get caught holding a glowing cape.
T
he drum kit would have to do. He crouched behind the kick drum and tossed his backpack to the floor. Separated from Josie, his mind was back on the task at hand.
The tornado siren pounded on his eardrums. Hail, larger and heavier now, ricocheted like stray golf balls off the windows. Wind buffeted the walls and carried thick tree limbs past. All nature was breaking loose outside. He hoped he hadn’t wasted too much time.
The cape hummed on his shoulders, as if to say, “What took you so long?” Miles touched the clasp halves together and felt the surge of power only he knew.
“—could you let me come away with a total win?”
At least the cape hadn’t blinked out completely. Miles had managed to get control of his thoughts just in time. Still, he had an urge to ball the cape up and toss it into the trees.
True, Miles had saved the school from getting reduced to matchsticks by an F-4 tornado. (A tornado, it was worth mentioning, he had literally flown apart. How cool was that?) But was it really necessary for him to drop his dream girl into a mud puddle just to stop the cape from going dead on him?
To be fair, he’d meant to drop Josie gingerly to the ground, and the mud bath was a result of his lousy aim. Would it have killed the cape to let him cruise around with her for a bit, though? It wasn’t like he’d rescued her from death-by-tornado solely to ask her out. How selfish did the cape think he was?
Wait.
Should he ask her out? Would that be cheating? Josie hadn’t known she was saying those things to Miles. She’d thought she was talking to a superhero. A grown not-quite-man-but-definitely-adult-something who, for reasons Miles understood all too well, gave new meaning to the phrase “strong, silent type.” There was no way Josie believed the things she’d said about Miles would ever find their way to his ears.
Surely there was some kind of rule that prevented Miles from capitalizing on the information, like the way you can say anything to your doctor or priest and not have to worry about it getting around.
Interesting. That was the word she’d used to describe him. Miles wasn’t exactly sure what that meant in girl-speak, but certainly it was better than being uninteresting. She’d said so herself. She liked it.