~ { Shadow and Beauty } ~

Dirt Face

"One basketball to rule them all," Leo muttered. Kiara decided not to question anything Leo said from that moment on.

"Leo Valdez!" the spirit howled. "Open this gate or I will kill you!"

"A fair and generous offer!" Leo said, his eyes still on the sphere. "Just let me finish this. A last request, all right?"

That must have confused the spirits, because they momentarily stopped hacking at the bars. Leo's hands flew over the sphere, reassembling its missing pieces.

The eidolons started pounding on the gates again. Kiara readied her sword.

"Who is it?" Leo called.

"Valdez!" Wolf Head bellowed.

"Valdez who?" Leo asked.

Eventually the eidolons would realize they couldn't get in. Then, if Wolf Head truly knew Leo's mind, he would decide there were other ways to force his cooperation. Leo had to work faster. He connected the gears, got one wrong, and had to start again.

"Leo," Kiara warned.

"I know, I know!"

Finally he got the last spring in place. Leo pulled a set of watchmaker's tools from his belt and did some final calibrations. Archimedes was a genius—assuming this thing actually worked. He wound the starter coil. The gears began to turn. Leo closed the top of the sphere and studied its concentric circles—similar to the ones on the workshop door.

"Valdez!" Wolf Head pounded on the gate. "Our third comrade will kill your friends!"

Leo cursed under his breath.

Our third comrade. Kiara glanced down at the spindly-legged Taser ball that had knocked out Hazel and Frank. She had figured eidolon number three was hiding inside that thing. But Leo still hadn't finished whatever he was doing with the sphere.

"Yeah, okay," he called. "You got me. Just... just a sec."

"No more seconds!" Wolf Head shouted. "Open this gate now, or they die."

The possessed Taser ball lashed out with its tendrils and sent another shock through Hazel and Frank. Their unconscious bodies flinched. That kind of electricity might have stopped their hearts, and Kiara was too messed up to focus on sensing their life lines. She saw Leo hold back tears.

She put a hand on his shoulder. "You can do it, fire boy. Come on."

That seemed to motivate the boy a bit. He stared at the face of the sphere—seven rings, each one covered with tiny Greek letters, numbers, and zodiac signs. Leo put his hand on the sphere and hesitated momentarily. Then he thrust his hand in his tool belt and pulled out the fortune cookie Nemesis had given him.

"I need the access code for this sphere," he said and broke open the cookie.

Leo unfurled the little strip of paper. It read: That's your request? Seriously? (over)

On the back, the paper said: Your lucky numbers are: Twelve, Jupiter, Orion, Delta, Three, Theta, Omega. (Wreak vengeance upon Gaea, Leo Valdez.)

With trembling fingers, Leo turned the rings.

Outside the gates, Wolf Head growled in frustration. "If friends do not matter to you, perhaps you need more incentive. Perhaps I should destroy these scrolls instead—priceless works by Archimedes!"

The last ring clicked into place. The sphere hummed with power. Leo ran his hands along the surface. Magical and electrical pulses coursed via the Celestial bronze cables, and surged through the entire room.