“What are you doing?” Tick asked.
Chu’s voice suddenly boomed through the air as if he were commanding an army through a loudspeaker. “It’s time, Benson! Bring them all in. Bring them all. The entire force. The Metaspides, the Ranters, the Denters. It’s time for war.”
Tick leaped into motion, running toward him, not fully understanding, but determined to stop whatever he was trying to do.
“I’ll be right back,” the man said with a last glance at Tick.
Reginald Chu disappeared.
Chapter 63
A Gift from Friends
As soon as Chu disappeared, Tick had only one thought consume his mind. Reuniting with the Realitants. But he’d barely taken a step when he felt a tingle shoot down his back, and suddenly he and Jane were on the far side of them, off the mountain and between his friends and the churning Void. Jane had winked them there.
The wind tore at their clothes, and the cracks of thunder coming from the lightning within the Void made the world seem as if it were about to split open. Which, Tick realized, was actually happening, in a way. Though there weren’t as many rips in Reality as he’d seen back at the Grand Canyon, glimpses to other worlds dotted the air.
“Why’d you do that?” he yelled at Jane.
She stepped up close to him. “No matter what you think, you have no choice but to help me now. Call it a trap if you’d like, but you are out of options. Help me, or the Void will kill everyone. Everyone!”
They stood on grassy fields that had seemed far away just a minute ago. The massive hurricane of the Void churned in a grand circle next to them. It was easily the most frightening thing Tick had ever set his eyes upon.
He knew she’d won. Only he had the power to stop such a horror. “How can I even trust you?” he yelled at her. “I’d be better off doing it alone!”
She leaned into the fierce wind, her gaze glued to the monstrosity in the near distance. She finally looked at him. “And if you succeeded, I’d still do whatever it takes to build my Utopia. Do you understand? You might as well join forces with me now.”
Tick glared back. He wanted to ask how she could still be thinking of her Utopia when so much was on the line. But he chose to let it go for the moment. He was going to turn the tables on her. Use her, for a change. He’d rely on his instincts, pool their powers just like when they broke out of the Nonex. And somehow he would destroy the Void and sever the link with the Fourth Dimension.
“Then let’s do it,” he finally said.
“It’s the right decision, Atticus!” she shouted. “Be prepared to use every ounce of our Chi’karda once the time is right! Stick together every step of the way!”
Tick nodded, refusing to give in to the fear that wanted to cripple him on the inside. “Then there’s only one thing to do.”
She nodded, pointing at the spinning mass of the Void. “Walk straight into it.”
“Tick!”
He looked back to see Sofia and Paul running straight toward him, sprinting at full speed. Part of him wanted to tell them to go back, to leave him, that it was too dangerous this close to the Void. But he wanted to see his friends. Desperately. He started off in their direction to close the gap.
“Atticus!” Jane shouted. “We don’t have time for this!”
“I’ll only be a second!”
He ran until they met, and then they were all hugging each other, fiercely, even laughing. Right then Paul and Sofia were his tie to everything that he cared about in life. Seeing them filled him up, something he’d needed so badly. He’d been running on empty for a long time.
“What’s going on?” Tick asked them. “How did you know I was here? Why are you guys here?”
“No time to explain,” Sofia responded, shouting into the wind, leaning close to his ear. “We finally connected with your nanolocator, and . . . we figured some things out. Karma, Tick. There’s a thing called Karma that’s going to help you. It’s made things happen so that we’d all end up here. Right here, right now.”
Tick squinted his eyes in confusion. “Karma?”
Sofia put a small bag with a hard, boxy thing inside it into his hands. Paul had tied a string to Tick’s wrist before he could even vocalize the questions in his mind. He felt a buzz inside of him, a surge of feeling that gave him goose bumps.
“There are things we don’t totally comprehend yet,” Sofia said, smiling. Actually smiling. “Take this with you for whatever it is you . . . and she have to do. It’s going to work out, Tick. Paul and I know it. Sato knows it. We all know it!”
“But . . .” Tick was speechless.
“We’ve trusted you a billion times,” Paul added. “Trust us now. See you when all this is over!”
He swatted Tick on the back, and then the two of them ran back toward the other Realitants and Sato’s army.
Chapter 64
The Magic Silver Cube