FORSYTHE,” COLONEL CHARLES SAID, SITTING down outside Fort’s cell in the disciplinary barracks, which apparently was just a nice name for a military jail. “I’m sorry for the accommodations, but I’m sure we won’t need to keep you here for very long. I just have some questions I need answered, and then we’ll try to replicate your experience with Sierra from a few hours back. But this time, we’ll ensure your safety and monitor the entire process.”
Fort nodded. He already expected this, given who’d won the argument between Colonel Charles and Dr. Opps earlier.
“First, an easy one,” Colonel Charles said, smiling in a friendly manner. “How exactly did you get into that room without being seen? Did someone help you?”
Fort paused before answering. No one else was going to get in trouble for this; that was the least he could do. “No, I got there all on my own.”
“That’s simply not possible.”
“You should talk to your guards,” Fort said with a shrug. “None of them were paying any attention, I guess. I just walked right in.”
Colonel Charles narrowed his eyes, his smile fading. “This isn’t the time for jokes, Forsythe. I can have you sent home with your memory wiped if I need to. But I know you want to serve your country just as much as I do. I remember your testing a couple of days ago; you’re a fighter, just like I am. So help me on this, and maybe we can keep you at the school, transferred to the Destruction classes. I just need to know how you got down there, and who helped you.”
Fort paused, taking that in. It was everything he’d wanted from the first time he’d even heard of the Oppenheimer School. And all he had to do was sell out his friends to get it. To abandon them, just like he’d abandoned his father.
That was never going to happen.
“Why do you want to wake up Damian?” Fort asked. “Everything that happened is because of him.”
Colonel Charles leaned back, then looked over Fort’s shoulder. “How much did you see in Sierra’s mind?”
“I saw him open a . . . a portal or something, to another dimension,” Fort said, staring at the colonel. “Whatever it was, it led somewhere dark and awful. And out of it came the same monsters that attacked Washington.”
“Then you also are aware that he wasn’t in control of himself?” the colonel asked, turning back to Fort.
“Maybe not, but I saw him try to let that same tentacle monster through before that, too,” Fort said, his heart racing at the thought of it. “That makes all of this his fault. And since that’s the case, I want to know how you think you can control him this time, if that thing comes back and takes him over again?”
“The blame lies with Oppenheimer,” Colonel Charles hissed, his face contorting with anger before he regained control of himself. “Dr. Oppenheimer was the one in charge of Damian’s education,” he said more calmly this time. “He allowed, even encouraged Damian to experiment with Summoning magic, as it’s called. And because of him, not only your father, but other people’s loved ones are now gone.”
Fort gritted his teeth at the mention of his dad. “That’s not true, though, is it?” he said quietly. “Only my father died in the attack.”
Colonel Charles narrowed his eyes, and Fort could see his anger building again. “On the National Mall, yes. But my own son Michael was killed at the National Security Agency headquarters, boy. Another student of Oppenheimer’s that he failed.”
Fort’s eyes widened, and suddenly a bunch of things began to fall into place. The Destruction student in Sierra’s memories was Colonel Charles’s son? And he had lost his life in the NSA attack?
“I’m . . . I’m sorry,” Fort said, knowing exactly how useless that was to hear from someone else. “But doesn’t that just mean we definitely shouldn’t bring Damian back?”
“I’m not here to answer to you—” Colonel Charles started to say, then sat back and rubbed his forehead. “Forget about Damian for the moment. I need to know how you made your way down to Sierra’s room. You bypassed our entire security operation. How did you do it? Who helped you?”
“I told you, no one did,” Fort said. “It was all me.”
“Using magic?”
“What, my Healing spells?” Fort said, forcing a smile. “Yeah, I cured a few diseases, and there I was.”
Colonel Charles’s lips curled in anger. “I’m going to give you one more chance to tell me how you reached that floor, Forsythe,” Colonel Charles said. “I won’t tolerate this another minute longer.”
“Or what?” Fort said. “You won’t send me home. You need me to awaken Sierra and Damian, so he can put the entire world in danger.”
Colonel Charles leaped to his feet, his chair crashing down behind him. “How about if I expel all your friends, then? Oppenheimer tells me you’ve been hanging out with our resident clairvoyant. Why don’t I arrange to have him sent home, without his magic?”
“Good luck with that,” Fort said. “He’ll see you coming a mile away.”
“Then how about Sebastian? Jia? The entire Healing class?” He sneered. “I’m happy to send them all home and start fresh if you’d like. Maybe just cancel the entire program?”
Fort dug his fingernails into his palms, trying to stay strong. Sebastian going home would be great news, but the rest of the healers hadn’t done anything wrong and didn’t deserve to lose their magic. And Jia . . . well, he still had a lot of questions for her, not to mention her spells were still in his head.
“Or how about your family?” Colonel Charles said, squeezing the bars with both hands. “Should I arrange for your aunt to lose her job? Her apartment? Whatever happens next, it’ll be on you, Forsythe.”
“Don’t you hurt her!” Fort roared, slamming his hand against the cell bars.
“Then tell me how you evaded our security!”
Fort growled in frustration, wanting to scream at the man, even attack him through the bars, but knowing he couldn’t risk anything that might set the colonel off. “Fine,” he said through clenched teeth. “I’ll tell you the truth.”
“It better be the truth!”
Fort cursed the man silently. “I heard Sierra in my head, commanding me to come to her. I couldn’t stop myself. I had to do what she said.”
There. That was the truth. Not the full story, no, but he hadn’t lied.
Colonel Charles slowly blinked. “She had no conscious brain activity at that time. She couldn’t have commanded you in such a way.”
“Then you tell me how I knew she was there,” Fort said, turning back to glare at the colonel. “I’m not a doctor, but I know what it’s like to have my body taken over. And this was the second time she’s done it to me.”
“Assuming that’s true, that only explains how you knew where to go. But how did you get in unseen?”
Well, Fort had tried being truthful, but that was all he could say without getting his friends in trouble. So now it was time to lie. “I don’t know. She must have used her magic on the guards and had me avoid the cameras. I barely knew where I was. Before the guards brought me here, I didn’t even know I was underground.”
Colonel Charles stared at him for a moment, and Fort began to sweat, wondering if the colonel could see how nervous he was. But then Colonel Charles smiled slightly. “If she’s that close to waking, we might not actually require your services any further, Forsythe.” He stood up and turned to go.
“Hey, wait!” Fort yelled, jumping to his feet. “Don’t do this. You can’t wake up Damian. You haven’t seen what happened, what he did!”
“Enjoy your time here, Forsythe,” Colonel Charles said. “It looks like you’ll be heading home after all today, with no memory of the school. Your country thanks you for your service, such as it was.”
And with that, he left, and a soldier closed another barred door behind him.
Fort screamed in frustration and punched the pillow on the cell’s bed a few times before calming down. That wasn’t helping. But what else could he do? He didn’t have the power to stop Colonel Charles from waking up Sierra, and no one else would believe him, other than maybe Dr. Opps, who wasn’t any better off than Fort was.
Except there was someone with the power to fix everything. Someone who could wipe people’s memories herself, or even take over their minds. Wipe the magic from Damian’s head before Colonel Charles could make the boy use it, even.
And all Fort would have to do was get to Sierra first—and hope that waking her up didn’t destroy his own mind in the process.
He watched the door for a moment and counted to one hundred, just to be sure Colonel Charles was gone.
Then he cast Ethereal Spirit on himself and left the disciplinary barracks through the wall behind him.