I can't believe... that I just saw... Robin get... kidnapped... and freaking... shot!
She had looked so awesome fighting the bad guy until he shot her. All she had wanted was to save Mark and keep him safe with the rest of us, and now she was in the worst danger of all of us.
When she used her only chance of escape to save me, I thought that I was going to cry.
But I didn't, mostly because I was being blown away by hurricane-power winds.
When I had gotten back to the campsite, everyone was on the ground. Apparently, no more Robin meant no more floating blanket.
They'd asked me what had happened, and I had explained everything. Now I lie on the blanket, staring up at the ceiling of a stolen tent, with a sobbing Jamal next to me.
"Dude," I tell him when I've had enough, "you need to chill. Yeah, they're both gone, but crying isn't gonna solve anything."
Jamal sniffles. "I know," he says, and his crying ceases, "but he's my cousin...and Robin saved us..." He lets out a sob. "But she couldn't save him!"
I moan. "Dude, she tried, okay? Now we have to try to save both of them, okay?" Jamal nods, sniffling. Gosh, right now he seems like a five-year-old! "Now get some rest, and you can help us look in the morning," I assure him.
"Okay," he says, curling up in the sleeping bag, "I will get some rest. I will sleep. I will find my friends in the morning. I will—"
"Dude, shut up and go to sleep now," I half-yell. Jamal's eyelids immediately close, and he starts snoring. "Great," I mumble to myself, "I got a crier and a snorer!"
I can't stay mad at Jamal, though—he's too pitiful right now. I decide that I'll kick his butt over this later, when he's regained his self-esteem.
"I'm going to find Robin!" I yell at no one at all. I unzip the tent flap and step outside, but John pulls me back inside.
"Are you crazy?" he says. "The police are probably looking for Emma and Jamal! And we're supposed to be at school taking our final exams! We can't just go walking around!"
"It's a half-day today," I point out. "We'll only be walking around illegally until noon. Then all of the other kids will be screaming in joy that school's finally over."
"Peter," John growls, "you're nuts. I'm going with you."
I laugh. "You call me crazy, and then say that you're coming with me?" I reply. "That makes perfect sense!" I step outside of the tent once more, and John follows me. "Listen, if you're coming, you better not get captured. 'Cause that would suck."
"I won't," John promises, "because I can do this!"
He points his palm toward the lake, and—very slowly—raises it upward. A stream of water snakes up and into the air, as if it's reaching for the sky. I probably should be a little freaked out, but so much has happened today that even seeing water defy gravity doesn't seem abnormal to me.
"Stop bragging and come on," I hiss. "We have to check at the school, first, so we can see if the van is still there."
John nods. He looks over at the lake, then asks me, "The lake is on one side of the school, right?" I nod. John gives an evil grin and says, "I bet that I can get us there faster!"
"What do you...," I begin, but John has already grabbed my arm and is pulling me toward the lake. He freezes a section of the water and shoves me onto it. I'm uncomfortable standing on a square of six-foot-long ice, but John just hops right on, unbothered.
"Hold on tight!" he yells.
"Hold on to what?" I say, but John just points his palms to the back of the ice sheet and we're speeding along the lake. I almost fly off of the ice sheet, but John has somehow frozen my shoes inside of the ice. I'm screaming and trying not to fall, cursing John with every cuss word that I know. "You suck, John!" I yell as we crash into a confused water skier. "You suck!"
John beams. "Thank you," he yells over the sound of splashing water, "I do rock!"
With a loud ka-crash, we hit the shore at full-speed. My feet are suddenly no longer frozen in the ice, and I'm flying across the schoolyard, a good ten feet above the ground.
I don't even have time to think; I just act.
I point my palms toward the ground, and then I yank them upward into fists. Chunks of earth, rock, and clouds of dust coalesce into one giant earth hovercraft and rise up to catch me. I land on the floating hunk of earth, now only seven feet off of the ground.
"Whoa!" John cries. "That was freaking awesome! Do it again!"
"John," I say, "I'm going to kill you!"
John laughs, and my earth-hovercraft-thing floats back down to the ground. I sigh in relief that I didn't go splat, 'because I don't really feel like dying today, thank you. I hop on the ground right next to John, and then take a quick look around the schoolyard.
"What might you be looking for?" I hear a voice behind me hiss. I turn around and find that I'm face-to-face with Agent Blake.
"Uh..." I stutter. "Uhm... We're just looking for our mother. We can't seem to find her." I turn around and yell, "Mom! Oh, Mom! Where are you, Mom?"
"Nice try," Agent Blake says, "but school's already started. And I know that both of your parents are at work."
I give a half-hearted laugh. I forget that with my short blonde hair and John's chin-length brown hair, we look nothing alike. "Oh, yeah," I say, "did you hear that, John? We aren't related!"
"Pete," John sighs, "give it up."
I glare at him for not going along with it, and then turn to the agent. "Where is Robin?" I demand. "Where did you idiots take her?"
"She's long gone, boy," Agent Blake tells me. "And the boy—Mark, is it?—is as good as dead. We don't need him as long as we have her, you know."
I force down my horror. "Let them go!" I yell. "They didn't do anything!" Well, I know that Mark didn't, anyways. I have no idea about Robin...
"Not true," the agent replies. "The girl attacked us in Ireland when she was four; she escaped our prison after we attacked and successfully kidnapped her in Oklahoma. Now, we're not taking any chances. We won't let her escape again."
"She only attacked you because you were freaking kidnapping her!" I yell. "And Mark didn't do anything! You just attacked him! And what about us? You just took us away from school so you could kidnap us, didn't you? You guys are a bunch of phony idiots who kidnap innocent kids!"
Agent Blake glares at me. "Kid, you don't want to make me angry," he says menacingly. "You won't like me when I'm angry."
"I don't like you now," I tell him with a snarl. "Now leave us alone so we can find our friends." I grab John's arm and we begin to stomp away when the agent says something that I don't understand at first. "What?" I ask turning around.
That was a big mistake.
I cry out as a fist slams into my chin. I fall to the ground, swearing, and look over at a pissed-off John. Apparently, Agent Blake broke his Beatles keychain.
"I swear," John hisses, "I am going... to freaking... kill you!"
With a quick thrust of his hand, a spear of ice sails straight at Agent Blake, who throws himself to the ground just in time to avoid getting an unwanted chest-piercing.
"John, let's go!" I yell, taking advantage of the moment. "Come on!"
"My keychain...," John sobs, "...it's broken..."
"I'll buy you another one," I tell him as I grab his arm and drag him behind me as I run.
"It won't be the same," John sniffles. Then his face brightens, and he adds, "But I have another keychain just like this one, so it's all good!"
I open my mouth to ask why he made such a big scene over the keychain then, but he's beaming so brightly that I decide to let him be. I try to use the ground to help us move faster, but all I succeed in doing is making John trip and fall over an emerald.
He picks it up and says, "I'm keeping this," as he tucks the emerald into his pocket. Then we're both running at full speed towards the school building.
As we near it, though, I notice that there's no van in sight, and tears sting my eyes. All of my hope vanishes once I realize that the van is gone.
"They're headed to this place," John says, and I notice that he's picked up a yellowed piece of paper off of the ground. He holds it out to me and I realize that it's a map. My hope resurfaces and a smile forms on my face; there's a circle over Washington D.C., and written next to the circle is an address.
"This is probably a trap," I say, "but it's our only chance." John nods in agreement. "So we go?" I ask him.
"Yep," John says, "as soon as we figure out how the heck to get there."
I moan and bang my head against the map. "Stupid logic!"
John randomly blurts, "What were you and Cooper talking about back at the campsite? You know, when I was falling to my doom."
I blush. "Uhm, er, nothing," I lie.
John grins. "You have a thing for Robin, don't you?" he asks.
"No!" I lie again.
"Yeah you do," he says. "You totally do."
"Fine," I sigh, "I like Robin. So what?"
"Awh!" John says. "That's so adorable!"
"Shut up,"I mumble and help me figure out how to keep her from being murdered."
"Oh, right!" John says. He rips the map out of my hand and points to the circle, saying, "We need to get there."
"No duh," I say.
"Well, one of us has to have the gift of air," John continues, "and it's obviously not me, or you, or Mark. So that leaves Emma and Cooper. All we have to do is push both of them off of a tall building and see which one doesn't go crunch-splat." John beams.
I frown. "No," I tell him. "Besides, you're risking killing off your girlfriend."
His expression grows to one of pure horror. "No!" he yells. "I take that plan back! Veto! Veto! Veto!"
I laugh. "Come on, Mr. Congressman, let's go figure out which of those two can take us to Washington D.C."