I SANK TO the floor. My knees hit the concrete with a sharp crack, my eyes began to water, and I felt as if someone had crawled into my throat with a set of knives.
Torquin was struggling with his rifle, looking toward the back of the room. There, a lab room door was swinging open to reveal a figure wearing a white coat and a gas mask. As the person came closer, Torquin took aim.
I could see a black-and-gray ponytail protruding out from under the mask. As Torquin sneezed, the person bolted to the left.
Aly was wheezing, convulsed into a ball. Cass looked dead. I tried to keep my eyes open, breathing directly into the fabric. I crawled around, following the masked figure, who was grabbing at the wall as if looking for something. I managed to close my fingers around an ankle and pulled. As the person fell to the floor, I reached up and yanked off the mask.
“No!” screamed a voice. “Don’t!”
I was face-to-face with Dr. Bradley, Professor Bhegad’s personal physician.
And traitor.
“You’re”—I gasped—“one of them, too?”
I thought my lungs would ball up and burst. As I fell back, Dr. Bradley sank beside me, red-faced and choking, grasping desperately for her mask.
With a grunt, she yanked it from my fingers. Climbing to her feet, she slipped the mask back on and steadied herself by grabbing the wall.
I blinked like crazy but I was too weak to stand. Dr. Bradley was pulling open a metal panel on the wall, flipping a switch.
She swung around toward me. My eyes were fluttering shut. Tear gas? I didn’t think so. This was some other poison. I was drifting into unconsciousness, fighting to stay alert.
The last thing I saw before blacking out was Dr. Bradley looming over me like a colossus, reaching down toward my head.
I awoke next to a corpse.
Or at least that’s what I assumed it was—a body draped under a white sheet on a slablike table. I was lying on the floor. Rows of fluorescent lights beamed overhead, buzzing softly. As I tried to sit up, my head pounded.
“Easy, Jack,” Dr. Bradley’s voice said. “We’re not quite done with Cass.”
Blinking, I turned. Her back was facing me as she leaned over another table. Her ponytail spilled over the back of her lab coat. I could see Cass’s shoes sticking out from one side.
“What happened?” I said.
“Dr. Bradley thought we were Massa,” Aly’s voice replied. I got to my feet to see her, and my head throbbed with pain. She was sitting with Torquin against the wall near the door. Both of them were red in the face. I figured I was, too, from the aftereffects of the poison gas. “That’s why she activated the gas. When she realized who we were, she turned off the jets.”
“I meant Cass,” I said. “What happened to Cass?”
“Treatment,” Torquin replied.
“But—but he’s not scheduled to need one yet,” I said.
“He’s early,” Dr. Bradley spoke up. “One possibility is that the poison gas brought it on. That’s what I’m hoping.”
“Hoping?” I asked.
Aly sighed. “Remember what Professor Bhegad told us way back when we first got here? As we get closer to age fourteen, the effects of G7W start to accelerate. The episodes are more frequent, and the effects are stronger.”
“When is Cass’s birthday?” I asked.
“He doesn’t know,” Dr. Bradley said softly. “Even the KI, with all their resources, couldn’t get hold of his birth records. They were misfiled in some city hospital and possibly destroyed.”
“So he may have less time than we do,” Aly said.
Dr. Bradley shrugged. “The good news is that the treatment worked. For now, at least, he will be functional.”
“Excellent . . . work,” said the corpse.
The voice startled me. It was unmistakably Professor Bhegad’s. As I took a closer look at the figure under the sheet, I saw that its head and face weren’t covered. But even so, I might not have known the old professor. He was almost unrecognizable, his face chalk white, his eyes watery and small, his hair like a tangled mass of straw. “Good to see all of you,” he said, a line of drool dribbling from his mouth as he spoke. “I don’t know . . . how this happened.”
As his eyes flickered and he drifted off, Dr. Bradley turned away from Cass. “Your friend should be fine for now. As for Professor Bhegad . . .” She took a washcloth from a nearby sink and placed it on the professor’s head. “He was thrown to the floor after an explosion. His lung collapsed, and it’s quite possible he has some internal injuries; I haven’t been able to do a full examination.”
“We have access to Slippy on the other side of the island,” I said. “Fiddle can help you get there with the professor and Cass, while Torquin, Aly, and I rescue the Loculi.”
“Professor Bhegad needs hospital care,” Dr. Bradley said.
“Can you bring what he needs—some kind of portable hospital?” I said. “We can’t risk keeping him here. If the Massa find him, they’ll torture him for information. I can give you a walkie-talkie if you need one.”
“I have my own,” Dr. Bradley said wearily. “I can reach Fiddle. I suppose this is our only choice.”
“Professor Bhegad,” Aly said, gently brushing a strand of wispy white hair from his forehead, “Dr. Bradley is going to take you away from here. Have the Massa taken the Loculi?”
“N . . . no . . .” Professor Bhegad shook his head and turned shakily toward Torquin. “They are in . . . location D . . . Go now . . . keep them safe.”
“Is that the same as Building D, the control center?” Aly asked.
“Not Building D,” Torquin said. “Location D.”
“Which is . . . ?” I prodded.
“Dump,” Torquin replied.
The smell and the Song hit me at the same time.
We were in a Jeep that Torquin had stolen at the edge of the compound. Well, stolen isn’t really the right word. It belonged to the KI, but two Massa guys were in it until Torquin pulled them out and threw them against a tree. Now we were careening across the airfield toward the Karai Institute landfill, aka dump. My head felt light, as if something had crawled into my brain. Not a sound, exactly, but a vibration that began in my ears and spread throughout my body. “I’m feeling it,” I said. “The Song of the Heptakiklos. That means the Loculi are nearby.”
“It sbells like subthigg died here.” Aly was holding her nose. The stench was acrid, foul, and growing fast as the Jeep pulled up to a smoking hill. “I’ll stay in the car.”
“Big help,” I replied, climbing out the backseat.
I held the end of my too-long sleeve over my nose, but Torquin was breathing normally. “Nice place,” he mumbled. “Come here to meditate.” We stopped in front of an enormous compost pile, which he carefully examined with his flashlight. Then, barehanded, he began digging out blackened banana peels, hairy mango pits, and globs of wilted vegetables.
The Loculi, it seemed, were buried in a pile of garbage.
Behind us, distant shouts resounded from the jungle. I squinted but all I could see was a small area around me, lit by moonlight and an old, dim streetlamp. Torquin turned, quickly handing me the flashlight. “Pah. Massa. I distract. You continue. Find door. Code is FLUFFY AND FIERCE.”
“But—” He stalked away before I could say another word.
I stared at the mound of rotten food and nearly puked. But the voices were getting closer, and they did not sound happy.
There was one spot that looked as if the garbage had been stirred around recently. I hoped it was the right spot, and not just some jungle animal’s favorite snack location. Holding my breath, I thrust my hand into the goop. It was clammy and cold. My fingers slipped. I felt a rodent scampering out from underneath, nearly running across my shoes.
Keep going . . .
My wrists were covered now. Liquid dribbled down my arm. Each movement brought a fresh whiff of horribleness.
There.
My knuckles knocked on something hard. Guided by my flashlight in one hand, I used the other hand to fling away big gobs until I could see a kind of hatch within:
