Tall people and short people, skinny people and muscled people. The clothing varied—everything from a large dude with a fancy robe containing every color possible to a slender woman with pale skin and red hair dressed head to toe in black. There was a guy with a turban, a woman with a baseball cap, another woman with a hat the size of a sombrero but decorated with tiny stuffed animals. Quite a few of the strangers wore what Paul considered normal clothes—jeans, flannel shirts, golf shirts, casual blouses, T-shirts—but the ones who didn’t stood out like huge chunks of coal in a bowl of vanilla ice cream.
A tall man with night-dark skin had eyes so blue they seemed to pulse and glow. He wore a one-piece suit with shreds of cloth hanging off like mummy wrappings. A woman sat three chairs down from him with bleached-blonde hair, her face painted in the fanciest makeup job Paul had ever seen—bright red lips, purple eye shadow, lines of blue streaking across her temple like colored wrinkles. She’d drawn a star on one cheek and a crescent moon on the other. Next to her was a man almost as short as Rutger but not nearly so fat, wearing a white shirt, white pants, and white socks and shoes.
“Who are these people?” Sofia whispered to Paul.
“Other Realitants, I guess,” he replied.
Sofia tapped the cast that covered his forearm from just below his elbow to his wrist. “How’s that broken bone of yours?”
“Feels great, actually.” He held up his arm and punched the air a couple of times. “Especially compared to how I felt yesterday. Can’t wait to whack Chu upside the head with this puppy.”
“You think Master George will let you go?”
Paul glared at her. “I’d like to see him stop me.”
Sofia rolled her eyes. “Ooh, you’re such a tough guy.”
“Tougher than you,” Paul muttered, but flinched backward when Sofia made a fist to punch him. “Calm it, girl! You’re the boss, you’re the boss.”
Sofia folded her arms and pouted. “We shouldn’t be acting like idiots. Tick’s in all kinds of trouble, I know it.”
Paul felt his heart sink to the floor. “Yeah,” was all he could get out. The room felt as if a dark cloud had formed on the ceiling, dimming everything to a dull gray.
“Can I sit next to ya knuckleheads?”
Paul looked up to see Sally. “Sure.”
He and Sofia scooted over, letting him have the aisle seat.
“Thank ya much,” Sally said with a grunt as he plopped down. “Gonna be one heckuva day, ain’t it?”
“Guess so,” Paul said.
“What’s the plan?” Sofia asked.
Before Sally could reply, a door opened and Master George came marching through, Mothball and Rutger close behind. Both of them carried wooden boxes.
Master George stepped up to the small podium while his two assistants set their boxes down. Mothball’s was the size of two coffins and looked like it weighed a thousand pounds. Rutger’s was as small as a shoebox, but sweat poured down his red face and he sucked in two dramatic breaths when he dropped his box on the floor with a loud clonk.
Master George gave him a stern look, then turned toward the audience. “Good morning to you all, and thank you so much for being here. Coming on such extreme short notice mustn’t have been easy, I’m sure. But a dreadful time has come upon us, and we must act quickly. We will need everyone in this room, without exception.”
He took a breath, then folded his hands together on top of the podium. “You were all briefed on the circumstances in our message to you, but I want to stress the most important issues of the day. The Dark Infinity plague is wreaking havoc among the Realities as we speak, but we’re very close to a solution. Realitant Second Class Atticus Higginbottom is armed with a powerful antidote that will shatter the source device and send out a cure through the quantum Chi’karda waves Chu has been using to control those he has infected. Thanks to Rutger’s tireless work, I have no doubt it will be a success.”
Several people in the room clapped, and Rutger did his best to bow, though it looked like a beach ball trying to bend in the middle.
“But unfortunately,” Master George continued, “we have an even bigger problem. Master Atticus has a power over Chi’karda that is extraordinary—far greater than we’d first thought and far more complex and difficult to grasp. It’s out of control, and the potential for disaster is extreme. It is vital that we find him, stop him, and bring him back here for a comprehensive study. I must say, as much as I admire the boy, he’s frightened the dickens out of me, and I don’t know what to think of it.”
The man in the colorful robe raised his hand, and Master George pointed to him. “So what ye thinking on the plan? How do we make sure we flash out the plague and save the boy from killing us all?”
Master George nodded. “Yes, Master Hallenhafer, how indeed? Though we haven’t had much time to prepare, we do have a plan. Rutger?”
The short fat man cleared his throat. “Tick’s ear transponder confirms what we’ve guessed—he’s been taken to the heart of Reginald Chu’s business palace in the Fourth Reality. No doubt the Dark Infinity device is located there in his research and development chamber underground. We’ve had spies in the Chu complex for many years, saving them for the day we’d need them most. Today is that day.”
“Sha people!” the dark-skinned man in the mummy suit shouted. “Sha to do such a linka?”