Page 10 of The Fall of Five (Lorien Legacies 4)

I clear my throat, trying to sound casual. “Hey, what’s going on?”

Both girls turn around to look at me. Sarah smiles big and waves with the hand not holding the gun.

“Hey, babe,” she says. “Six was just helping me learn to shoot. ”

“Yeah, cool. I didn’t realize that’s something you wanted to do. ”

Six gives me a strange look, like who wouldn’t want to learn to shoot? An awkward moment passes between us, where I’m feeling almost mad at her for giving Sarah this lesson without my permission. Not that Sarah needs my permission to do anything. The whole situation has me feeling flustered, and I must look it, because Six eases the gun out of Sarah’s hand. She clicks the safety on and holsters it.

“I think that’s good for now,” Six says. “Let’s do some more tomorrow. ”

“Oh,” replies Sarah, sounding disappointed. “All right. ”

Six pats Sarah on the arm. “Good shooting. ” Then, she fixes me with a tight smile that I’m not at all sure what to make of. “Later, guys,” she says, and breezes past me out the door.

Sarah and I stand in silence for a moment, the lights of the Lecture Hall buzzing overhead.

“So,” I begin, awkwardly.

“You’re being weird,” she says, eyeing me, her head tilted to the side.

I pick up the paper Mogadorian, examining Sarah’s handiwork while I figure out what to say. “I know. Sorry. I just never took you for the armed and dangerous type. ”

Sarah frowns at me. “If I’m going to be with you, I don’t want to be a damsel in distress. ”

“You’re not. ”

“Come on,” she snorts. “Who knows how long I would’ve rotted in New Mexico if you hadn’t shown up? And then, I mean, John, you pretty much brought me back to life. ”

I slide my arm around her, not wanting to think about Sarah at my feet, nearly dead. “I’d never let anything happen to you. ”

She shrugs me off. “You can’t say that for sure. You can’t do everything, John. ”

“Yeah,” I say, “I’m starting to realize that. ”

Sarah looks up at me. “You know, I thought about calling my parents today. It’s been weeks. I wanted to tell them I’m all right. ”

“That’s not really a good idea. The Mogadorians or the government could be monitoring your house for phone calls. They could be tracking us. ”

The words sound so cold and I regret them almost right away, how quickly I’m slipping into paranoid-and-practical-leader mode. But Sarah doesn’t seem offended. In fact, it looks like it’s exactly what she expected me to say.

“I know,” she says, nodding. “That’s exactly what I thought, and it’s why I didn’t actually go through with it. I don’t want to go home. I want to stay here with you guys and fight. But I don’t have any Loric superpowers. I’m just dead weight. I want to practice shooting so I can be more than that. ”

I grab Sarah’s hand. “You are more than that. I need you here with me. You’re pretty much the only thing keeping me from completely melting down. ”

“I get it,” she says. “You’re going to save the freaking world and I’m going to help you. That whole saying about behind every great man there is a great woman? I can be that for you. I just want to be a great woman with excellent aim. ”

I can’t help but laugh, the tension between us breaking. I lift Sarah’s hand and kiss it. She wraps her arms around my waist and we hug. I don’t know what I was so tied up in knots about; having Sarah here just makes everything seem easier. Coming up with a battle plan to take down the Mogadorians? No problem. And as for that one kiss with Six, it just doesn’t seem to matter anymore.

Eight teleports into the room with a puff of displaced air. He’s wide-eyed and excited, but turns sheepish when he sees us.

“Whoa,” Eight says. “Sorry, I didn’t expect canoodling. ”

Sarah snickers, and I glare jokingly at Eight. “This better be good. ”

“You should go to the workshop and see for yourself. I’ve gotta go get the others. ”

With that cryptic message, Eight teleports away. Sarah and I exchange a look, then rush out of the Lecture Hall and into Sandor’s old workshop.

Nine is already there, his arms crossed as he watches the bank of television screens on the wall. They’re all tuned to the same image, a newscast from some local station in South Carolina. Nine pauses the broadcast when we enter, freezing a still image of the gray-haired anchor.

“I turned on some of Sandor’s old programs the other day,” Nine explains. “They scan news feeds for weird shit that might be Loric related. ”

“Yeah, Henri had the same thing set up. ”

“Uh-huh, typical boring Cêpan stuff, right? Except this popped up tonight. ”

Nine restarts the broadcast, the anchor resuming his teleprompter reading.

“Authorities are at a loss to explain the vandalism of a local farmer’s crops early yesterday morning. The prevailing theory is high-school prank, but others have suggested . . . ”

I tune out the anchor’s theories as the image switches to an overhead shot of a twisting, mazelike emblem burned into the cornfield. It might look like a juvenile prank to the newscaster, but we recognize it immediately. Burned into those crops with jagged precision is the Loric symbol for Five.

CHAPTER SEVEN

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