FORT QUICKLY BACKED AWAY FROM both Time students, his hands up and ready to either punch or open a teleportation circle, whichever one was quicker. “What did you do with everyone?” he shouted, his voice cracking. “Where are they?”
“Oh, we just threw them all a quarter hour into the future,” the boy said, shrugging. “Calm down. We didn’t hurt them.”
“Well, except for the ones you hit with lightning,” the girl said, giving him an annoyed look. “Speaking of unnecessary.” As she spoke, Fort recognized her voice from the video. The boy, though, didn’t seem to be the other student who’d spoken in the message.
“Hey, they were shooting it at us,” the boy said. “It’s only fair. But they’ll all be fine.”
“We sent you a few minutes into the future as well,” the girl said to Fort. “See? It was completely painless, so there’s no need to worry about the soldiers. You probably didn’t even know it was happening. And this way you didn’t have to wait around while we cleaned things up.”
Cleaned things up? That was how she talked about sending all the soldiers into the future? Fort suddenly knew how the guards at the Oppenheimer School felt about the Destruction students. These Time kids were on a completely different level, and he had no way of fighting back.
“If we want to avoid some unpleasantness,” the boy said, nodding at Fort, “we need to be back at the school before our ‘mess’ returns, Ellora. Let’s get this moving. You know what we have to do.”
The girl sighed, then leaned in closer to Fort. “Do boys here like to pretend you know more than the girls too, or is that just a British thing?” She smiled but looked tired. “Now how about you bring your friends here? We don’t have too much time left, honestly.”
“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” Fort shouted, barely able to think from fear. They moved so fast and could freeze people in time, send them into the future! Would he even be able to open a teleportation circle before they stopped him?
The two Time students gave each other a look. “Yes, we would,” Ellora said to Fort. “Don’t worry. We’ll explain everything back at the Carmarthen Academy. Just bring Rachel and Jia along, and Simon and I will take you there.”
“We’re not going anywhere !” Fort said, now much more thankful that he and the others hadn’t disobeyed and just teleported over to the UK themselves. They would have been beaten instantly.
“Ugh, he’s been brainwashed by the adults here,” Simon said, shaking his head. “You knew this would be how it goes, Ellora. Let’s freeze him and quit wasting time.”
Fort’s eyes widened at the word “freeze,” and he stepped backward, ready to bolt. What did that even mean? They were going to freeze him in time?
“Whoa, it’s okay, Forsythe,” Ellora said, glaring at Simon. “We’re not going to freeze you!”
“We will if we don’t want to get caught!” Simon said.
“We want them to listen to us, don’t we?” Ellora said, turning to face her fellow Time student. “If we force them to come, they’ll just be looking for a chance to run!”
And just like that, Fort realized this was the perfect opportunity to do exactly what she said, to run. Now, while they were distracted.
But they’d freeze him if he tried to escape through a portal. No, what he needed was to get some distance first. So instead of opening a teleportation circle near him, he first silently opened a portal below them, leading to the cavern beneath the old Oppenheimer School.
“Cooperation is built on tru—whoop! ” the girl shouted as she and the boy dropped through the circle, and for a second, Fort thought he’d actually caught them by surprise. Maybe they didn’t see everything coming after all!
But then Ellora and Simon paused in midair, black light surrounding them. And then, as Fort watched in horror, time reversed itself: The two Time students floated back up out of the portal, and the teleportation circle closed below them.
“And you knew he’d try that,” Simon said to Ellora, completely calm as if nothing had just happened. “Can we finally do things my way, or do you still have to waste more time?”
“He just doesn’t understand!” she said, turning back to Fort. Her smile now was much more forced. “No one’s going to hurt you or your friends, Forsythe. We just want to talk. All you have to do is come with us, listen for a few minutes, and that’s it: You’ll be free to go.”
They’d be what now? Free to go? That couldn’t be right: These kids had put a dome up over half the UK just to get ahold of him and his friends. Who would go to that much trouble just to talk to someone? It had to be a trap.
And if that was the case, there was no way he was bringing Rachel and Jia here—
“Let me stop you right there,” Simon said, raising a glowing hand. “They’re coming too, whether you teleport them here or not, okay? So don’t even bother with all the tough talk.”
Fort’s eyes widened at this. Could the other boy have known what he was thinking? He didn’t seem to have Mind magic. But no, it had to be like when Cyrus did the same thing, seeing the conversation before it happened.
“We also don’t have time to explain how time visions work,” Simon said, rolling his eyes. “You know what? I’m tired of this. Come right now, or I’ll freeze everyone in this entire school, and cart you over in a wheelbarrow or something. Sound good?”
Ellora groaned. “Oh, brilliant, Simon. Why not just threaten to freeze his heart while we’re at it? You need to stop with all the threats!”
“What do you think we’re doing here?” Simon said to her. “That was the whole idea, threatening everyone !”
“Not them!” Ellora said, pointing at Fort. “We need their help!”
“Don’t tell him that!” Simon said, rolling his eyes again. “If they know we need them, they’ll never do what we say!”
Weirdly, the more they argued, the less intimidating they seemed. Sure, they could move faster than he could see and just mentioned freezing his heart, but other than that, they sounded like any other kids his age … just with amazing accents.
Maybe there was a way out of this, even without his magic. Granted, it all hinged on Ellora telling the truth, that they really did just want to talk, but at this point, it wasn’t like Fort had any other options.
“Promise me you’ll release everyone!” he shouted over their bickering. “I’ll bring Jia and Rachel here if you promise you’ll drop the dome and let everyone go. Including us.”
“Of course!” Ellora said. “Just come with us and talk, and you’re free to go.”
“After you help us,” Simon said, and Ellora sighed loudly.
“If we come and listen to what you have to say,” Fort said quickly, “how do I know you’ll actually release us all? How can I be sure that you won’t destroy London anyway?”
Simon and Ellora looked at each other again, and Simon snorted. “Destroy London?” he said.
“Forsythe, that’s why we’re here,” Ellora said, rubbing her forehead. “To save London. We need the help of you three to do that.”
Wait, what? They wanted to save London? But that wasn’t how it sounded from their video—
“The video? We said those exact words in it!” Simon said, this time annoying Fort more than scaring him. “ ‘If you do not do what we say, London will be destroyed.’ How did you not understand that?”
“I knew William would confuse them,” Ellora said. “He tried to be all tough, too, and look where it got us. He completely made it sound like we were going to burn London down if we didn’t get what we wanted, not that we needed them to stop it.”
“But London’s just the beginning,” Simon continued. “Just show him what’s coming if it gets destroyed, Ellora. We don’t have any more time to argue. If we’d done things my way, we’d have gotten away cleanly, but no, you had to waste all the time.”
Ellora winced. “It won’t take long. I’ll show him. You go get Jia and Rachel.”
“They’ll need to see too,” Simon said. “I’ll do that while I cart them back here. Don’t leave him in the future for too long.”
What? Leave him in the future? What did that mean? But before Fort could ask, Simon continued.
“Oh, and make sure you reverse time to reopen his portal back to the academy, or we won’t be going home.” He nodded at the nearby wall where Fort had opened his teleportation circle.
Uh, reverse time to what now? They could reopen his teleportation circles?!
She rolled her eyes. “Yes, I know. I’m the one who came up with that.”
Simon sighed loudly, then disappeared in a flash of shadow, leaving Fort alone with Ellora. Even with just one of the students, Fort didn’t feel any better, especially knowing that anywhere he teleported her, she could just reopen the circle and come right back.
“I really did want this to go differently,” Ellora said, frowning at him. “This is all William’s fault.” She shrugged. “But there’s only so much time, so …”
Her hands began to glow, and before Fort could move, the entire Deployment Room faded out around him, and then returned just as quickly. Only now it was utterly destroyed.
Half the walls had collapsed, with dirt and stone crumbling from various holes. The raised platform where Colonel Charles had stood was almost completely gone, just a foot or two at the side remaining.
All in all, it looked as if a bomb had gone off. And there was no indication that anyone was left, not even a lit emergency-exit sign or something.
And then a raindrop fell in front of Fort’s face, and he looked up in confusion.
Then his mouth dropped open in dread.
There was no ceiling on the room. In fact, there were no longer any floors above it either. Now Fort could see straight up to the stormy sky above. Where once had been an underground-facility-turned-school, now there was nothing but open air, with dirt and dust swirling in the wet wind.
The second Oppenheimer School, built in an underground bunker that could withstand a nuclear blast from thirty miles away, was just … gone.