“What are we going to do about this?” Cass followed Eldon into the director’s quarters, literally fuming. “You can’t just let him go back. Tell me your plan.”
“My plan is to stay here at Valor. Get the SecDef off my ass and get this program reinstated.”
“That’s it?” Cass asked, “What about Wyatt’s mother? What’s she going to make of her son coming home unexpected from camp with another camper?”
“We have a cover story. They got concussions, decided to come home. Jalen’s parents will come get him when they’re back from a tennis tournament. Besides,” Eldon added, “Wyatt’s mom is not there.”
“Where is she?”
“A retreat in Florida.”
“Retreat?”
“Yoga, meditation. Just trying to get her life together.”
“Valor for moms,” Cass joked.
“Yeah and trust me it’s better she’s not there. Better for me, anyway. I can handle Narcy.” Eldon looked out a window, shaking his head. “My wife … I can’t figure it out.”
“You sure you don’t want to leave for a few weeks?” Cass asked.
“You know how this works. We can’t break the rules, for my son. Or for me.”
Cass sat down. “I know we have to follow a code. But Dolly’s gone, and the only other person who gave a shit about that is getting his memory wiped as we speak.”
“Don’t know why the hell he would just up and leave. And take Jalen with him.” Eldon rubbed his eyes and scratched the stubble growing on his neck. “Maybe he wanted to go home … maybe I didn’t know him like I thought.”
“No, he wanted the mission. That’s all he wanted.”
“Well, we don’t get to ask him now.” Eldon stepped toward the door, put his hand on the knob, and then stopped. “The thing Wyatt doesn’t understand is that he’ll forget everything. He’ll go from superhero back to average kid. All of his talent, all of his training—gone.”
The discharge of Wyatt J. Brewer—the only Top Camper in Valor history to blow the horn, aside from the illustrious John Darsie—was surprisingly quick and perfunctory.
“Now, I know it’s here somewhere…” Ken’s voice echoed and the three wandered down a dark corridor of the Cave Complex looking for the processing-out medical ward.
“Over here.” Wyatt rolled his eyes and opened a hatch to a bunker ten feet underground.
“Right,” Ken Carl huffed. “I would’ve found it.”
“Not likely. We had to move it when a camper last year—Hudson Decker—escaped before his memory could be wiped.”
“That sounds like a confidentiality breach,” Ken said, stepping down into the creepy hatch.
“Would be if he wasn’t dead,” Wyatt said blandly.
Wyatt and Jalen entered a small room, similar to a doctor’s office.
“Boys, please.” Dr. Choy wasted no time in greeting them, pointing to the couple of medical beds lined with white paper. “Please”—she motioned to Ken Carl—“cut the ties.”
Ken got out a pocket knife and cut the zip ties and then assisted Dr. Choy in clamping each teenager to a bed.
“Okay.” Dr. Choy smiled. “You don’t seem agitated, but we offer campers a sedative, if they so choose.” She offered Wyatt a small white pill.
“I’m good.” Wyatt turned his head and fixed his eyes on the panels in the acoustic ceiling.
Dr. Choy turned to Jalen.
“If he’s good, I’m good.” Jalen pressed his head against the crinkly white paper. “Let’s do this.”
“Suit yourself,” she said and slid the white pills across a metal tray. She then uncapped a bottle and shook out two bright blue pills into her cupped palm.
She dropped the first blue pill into Wyatt’s mouth while Ken looked on. She moved over to Jalen and repeated the procedure. “Now the injections.” The doctor picked up a hypodermic needle loaded with dark purple fluid. She flicked the needle and felt in Wyatt’s arm for a vein. “Wyatt will require more, as it’s harder to erase more years,” she explained to Ken Carl.
The serum burned through his arm, but Wyatt didn’t flinch; instead he closed his eyes, embracing the instant effects.
“Man, I hate needles,” Jalen said, extending his arm to Dr. Choy.
“Nice veins.” She felt the boy’s muscles in his forearm, and lifted a second needle. And in moments, Jalen, too, was instantly fluttering to sleep.
Dr. Choy readied an ECT machine, a device from the 1970s used for electroshock therapy that looked like a clunky stereo tuner.
“Wyatt,” Jalen said. “Make sure Dar … make sure he can find me … on the train … I need to find insights … and Vegas … I’ve never been to Las Vegas,” he mumbled incoherently.
“What’s he saying?” Ken Carl asked frantically. “Something’s off.” He leaned over Wyatt. “Stop it for a minute, doctor. I need to ask him something.”
“I’m sorry.” Dr. Choy dropped the needle into the orange sharps bin. “It’s already taken effect…”
“You can’t reverse it?”
“No.”
Ken turned to Wyatt. “You’re up to something.” He leaned down and looked into the boy’s liquefying blue eyes. “Tell me … can you hear me?” He grabbed Wyatt’s limp shoulders and shook them.
“Sir, hands off the patient,” Dr. Choy said. “It’s too late.”
Just before Wyatt slipped into a deep sleep, his lips curled into an up-yours smile.
“Dammit!” Ken stormed outside, pulling his cell from his pocket.
The SecDef answered on the second ring. “This is Elaine.”
“We have a problem.”
“I’m listening.”
“Wyatt Brewer—the son of the camp director here—well, he just quit the camp.”
“And this matters to me because…” the SecDef said, staring at her long nails.
“This kid is the best they’ve got. He’s not going to tap out unless he has an agenda. And it looks to me like he’s taken this new kid with him. They were saying something about a train and Las Vegas.”
“What kid?”
“Jalen Rose.”
Silence followed. “You mean the kid who was partly responsible for the attack in Austin? The kid who was Encyte’s pawn? He’s dropping out with the director’s son?”
“Yeah, I didn’t put it together until now, but yes, and they’re gone.”
Elaine sighed and muttered a curse. “I leave you there, and you let this happen. Incredible. Just incredible. So, what do you wanna do about it?” the SecDef said, lowering her voice to a whisper.
“Put Tui on him. Let him follow them for a while.”
Elaine sighed again.
“These boys are up to something,” Ken pressed. “And figuring out what that is might solve all your problems at once.”
“Okay, you got the green light. But, Ken—”
“Yes, ma’am?”
“I’m sure I don’t need to tell you, but our conversation never happened.”
“What conversation?” Ken ended the call with an exaggerated click.