“Let me go!” I shout, then without thinking, I turn and punch him in the face. It’s hard as stone and my wrist shrieks in agony.
Suddenly, the door swings open and the soldiers pile into the room. “You heard what she said, son,” one of them barks.
Fathom releases me and takes a step back. He looks like he’s about to say something else, but I’m not waiting around to hear it.
Terrance’s face is grave when I step into the hall. “I will speak with him.”
Bonnie helps me down the two flights of steps. When we get to the bottom, the bell rings and she falls back as students empty out of the classrooms. She must know that it wouldn’t be good for us to be seen in the halls together, me a kid and her a member of the National Guard. She doesn’t vanish—she’s back there—but she successfully makes it look like we’re just walking through the same hall. No one gives me a second glance.
I make a beeline for my locker and spot Bex and Shadow hovering there. They’re busy trying to wipe something off the door with paper towels, and when they see me, Shadow curses. Bex runs toward me, trying to shield my view.
“It’s no big deal,” she says.
“What is it?”
“Just someone being stupid,” Shadow tells me.
I push past Bex and pull Shadow’s hand off the graffiti.
fish lover.
“Did you see who did this?” Bonnie asks when she catches up.
“We just got here,” Shadow says.
The custodian approaches with a bucket and a brush, but Bonnie won’t let him wash it off.
“It’s evidence,” she explains.
Bonnie reports it to someone on the other end of her radio, which only attracts more attention from those in the hall. Soon kids are gathering around us, mumbling and staring like I have been in a terrible accident, a twelve-car pileup with broken bodies and burning gas trucks, and everyone is slowing down to gawk at the horror. What’s worse is I know one of these bastards did it. If my hand didn’t hurt, I’d punch them all out until one of them confessed.
From there it’s like I’m watching a slideshow presentation: down a hall, past the library, into the cafeteria, at a table with a plate of french fries in front of me I don’t remember buying, Bex’s worried face, Shadow’s worried face.
“Doyle assigned Fathom to me,” I say.
“Assigned him?”
“He’s trying to assimilate the Alpha kids by having them hang out with humans,” I explain.
“That’s why Fathom is in all your classes?” Shadow says.
I nod. “I meet with him for an hour every day, too. I’m teaching him to read.”
Bex looks hurt. Her eyes have the same bewildered look they had when she went through my backpack.
“It’s just been a couple of days,” I say defensively.
She can’t even look at me.
“I was trying to protect you,” I plead.
“So here’s the fish lover,” someone says behind me. I turn and find a weasel-faced girl standing over me. Her name is Svetlana . . . something. I don’t know her as much as I know of her. Once, last year, she broke a girl’s nose with a sock full of D batteries. I later learned the injured girl was her cousin and the attack was over some boy who didn’t like either of them. Right now, Svetlana’s eyeballing me with watery, bloodshot eyes. She’s bouncing on her heels and unable to stand still. Her pupils are as wide as manholes.
“You’re famous,” Svetlana continues.
“Leave her alone,” Bex says, springing to her feet.
“Was I talking to you, bitch? I’m not here to mess with her. I thought someone should warn her that people who fool around with the fish heads get jacked up.”
“You think you know something you don’t,” Bex says.
“Damn, Lyric, your friend has got a smart mouth,” Svetlana says. “Friends of fish lovers get jacked too. Especially mouthy ones.”
“Back off, tweeker,” Shadow says.
Svetlana laughs. “I got a big surprise—”
Suddenly, the cafeteria doors open and the Alpha enter. Fathom and the beautiful Triton girl are first, then Ghost and Luna, followed by the tiny Ceto girl called Bumper and the hulking Selkie kid. Terrance Lir follows close behind. Svetlana whistles, and a group of students, maybe twenty of them, climb up on their seats. Svetlana yanks the free chair from our table and does the same. Once she’s up there, she pulls her shirt off and reveals a red Niners shirt underneath. The others have all done the same, and together they raise one fist in the air and pump them to a beat only they can hear.
“We are the Coney Island Nine,” Svetlana shouts to everyone. “We ain’t afraid of no monsters, and neither should you be. If you can’t stand to look at those freaky things, then join us and we will drive their hermit-crab butts back into the ocean.”