“Not herself,” Devin said. “But you noticed that.”
“Did Butler summon me again?” I asked, afraid of the answer.
“Not that we heard,” Maddy said. She walked over to my desk and put a tiny MP3 player down on the edge. “It’s that playlist.” She backed away, toward her own desk.
“Oh,” I said, snatching it up. “I can’t wait to listen to it.”
Maddy sat down and stared at her computer screen. Her shoulders were board-stiff.
Devin’s gaze ping-ponged between us. “Maddy is giving you music,” he said. “Maddy, whose taste is superior to all? You better hope you like it.”
“Shut up,” Maddy grumbled.
“I know I will. I asked her for it,” I said, and Maddy’s shoulders relaxed. “She always has the best band T-shirts. Never anyone I’ve heard of.”
“She does,” he said, before changing the subject. “Want to tell us where you really went when you cut?”
I did want to tell them—about the principal’s office, and the Warheads, and about the lab and the fact I was becoming more and more convinced the gamers’ odd behavior and their ability to get into Anavi’s head had something to do with whatever their independent study really was, whatever was happening in the afternoons at Advanced Research Laboratories.
But I wasn’t ready to spin out my still-developing crazy-mad-science theory for them. I liked having Maddy and Devin as partners in journalism, and I definitely wanted them to be my friends.
What I did not want was to drive them away before there was any way to prove something beyond the norm was going on. Even if I got something more solid, I’d have to think over the best way to share it. They didn’t know the true extent of what was happening to Anavi.
“I’ve been here,” I said. “I was ready to write my story. I got Butler on the record saying that bullying is no big thing.”
Devin whistled, low. “No one will ever call you a coward, that’s for sure.”
I took a half bow at my desk. “I’m glad people will know. For Anavi’s sake. She gave me permission to name her.”
Devin said, “I don’t know how to explain the way she’s acting. Stress, sure, but it’s weirder than that.”
He had no idea how right he was.
“If only you could give her a healing potion,” Maddy said. “A glowing orb of health or something.”
Devin opened his mouth to respond, but then shut it and went to his desk.
“What?” Maddy asked.
“There are no healing potions in Worlds, and only one glowing orb,” was all he said, slinging his bag onto his giant desk and himself into his seat in front of the enormous computer monitors. I was glad he’d been distracted from his line of thinking about Anavi, for now.
“So,” I said, “I figured even though I’m writing the story, we should all get credit. I want to put that you guys also contributed to the report at the end.”
They both attempted to play it casual, but their reactions were too happy.
“Ooh,” Maddy said.
“Perry will have to eat his words, hm?” I asked, before remembering their reactions when Perry had told them they should learn from me. I’d put my foot in my mouth. Again.
“Sort of,” Devin said, letting me off the hook. “But I’ll get started on designing a splashy layout for the piece.”
“The Scoop’s first scoop,” I said, grinning.
James came in at that moment.
“The Third,” I said, feeling my grin turn dark, “did you tell Butler anything you shouldn’t have?”
James ignored my question, striding to his desk with a holier-than-thou-mere-mortals air.
I cleared my throat.
“First off,” James said, “I don’t care enough about getting you in trouble to do that. But more importantly, I believe in protecting sources, and in journalistic integrity. Not that I’m sure breaking into the school’s backend system counts . . . ”
“For a minute, I almost liked you,” I joked.
“But, no, I did not say a word, even though Butler brought you up. He knows I work here. He’s convinced that Dad will one day get his political muscle back and those tiny donations that my father doesn’t even remember will buy him a seat at the big kids’ table.”
“Oh,” I said.
Maddy sighed. Then sat up straighter in her chair again, as if noticing she might have done it out loud.
I needed to mend the moment. I had been unfair in assuming James had sold us out. Devin and Maddy both liked him. I should give him more of a chance—even if his perfect teeth and hair and the family moneybags that went with them did make it hard for me to trust him.
“So, James,” I asked, “you want an ‘also contributed’ on this story? Or not?”
“No, because I haven’t,” he said.
Well, I had made an attempt. “Okay with me,” I said, and went back to typing, letting my fingers fly across the keys.
I couldn’t wait until the piece went live.