25
ALPHA ACADEMY
THE DARK
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 8TH
8:28 P.M.
The night air smelled like a passing rainstorm even though it had been sunny all day.
“So how do you know so much about this place?” Allie scurried to keep up with Charlie as they darted across the dark campus. Charlie had somehow orchestrated a campus-wide blackout to keep the surveillance camera from seeing them. Even the moon was cooperating.
Charlie stopped and looked squarely into Allie’s green eyes. “Truth?”
Allie nodded earnestly, like truth was something she practiced every day. Ha!
“I invented a lot of this island.”
“Liar!” Allie blurted. “There’s no way! I assumed Shira brought in some inventors from the future.”
“Nope.” Heavy sadness fluttered over Charlie’s eyelids, forcing them downward. “More like someone from her past.” She swallowed. “But Shira can never know. She thinks it came from her research and development team. If she found out I used her lab…” Charlie finger-sliced her neck. “The people who need to know about my… abilities… do. And that’s enough for me.” She blinked like she was lying to herself. Of course she wanted Shira to know. Who wouldn’t?
Allie studied Charlie’s face for the first time. It was perfectly symmetrical. Her skin was clear. Her dark eyes were soothing. Her lips were full (enough). She was like that sketch of a woman’s face Allie had once gotten at the MAC counter. The makeup artist had brushed colors over the sketch’s eyelids, cheeks, and lips, demonstrating the proper way to apply the latest palates. Once she was done, the drawing’s bland features came to life. In Charlie’s case, it wasn’t makeup that had brightened her face—it was skill. And it upgraded her beauty to the kind people wanted to stare at.
Just like Trina with her art.
“Honest-leh,” Allie exclaimed. “This is amazing. You’re so… smart. I can’t believe Darwin broke up—” She stopped herself before her callused bare foot got stuck in her mouth. But it was too late.
Charlie smiled like someone about to cry, then picked up the pace.
“I didn’t mean that. Well, I did, but I didn’t mean to mention him.” Allie scampered behind like an eager puppy. “It’s not like he’s into me anyway,” she panted, immediately regretting her insensitivity. Charlie, of all people, should not be expected to stroke Allie’s ego. Not when it came to Darwin. But he was Allie’s hot stove and she couldn’t resist touching it. Even if it meant coming off as a self-absorbed lovesick desperado to her new friend who just so happened to be his ex.
Charlie unlocked the fence that protected the organic vegetable garden from salad-obsessed alphas. “Hurry, get in.”
Allie slipped in, almost gagging on the moist, muddy smell of earth—a smell often associated with slimy worms. Worms who were probably gearing up to wiggle over her bare feet and lay eggs under her toenails…
“So why do you think Darwin doesn’t like you anymore?” Charlie asked, closing the gate behind them. Allie considered asking where they were going but didn’t dare change the subject.
“He didn’t look at me in class the other day. Not once. And he never bothered to text after I bolted.”
Charlie led them through two rows of onions. “What happened to you?”
Allie shrugged. “Keifer hated what I wrote, and I was embarrassed. I’m, um, used to creating alone in the wilderness. And this feels like speed-dating, only with writing, and it’s not working for me. I’m blocked. So I ran off to reconnect with nature.”
The truth was, the muse from Oprah had found Allie sobbing under an a?aí palm, and she’d pretended she was lost. She’d been thinking about how happy Darwin and Charlie’s toes had looked when they found each other in the sand. And now, standing in the shadow of Charlie’s genius, Allie felt like running all over again. How could she possibly impress Darwin when he’d had Charlie first? It was like buying makeup at Bath & Body Works after a lifetime of Chanel.
“I don’t even know why I’m on this secret mission. It’s not like he wants to see me.” Tears came all over again. At least this time she could blame it on the onions.
Charlie crouched down by a bed of lettuce. “What are you talking about?”
“I was supposed to meet him the other night—but he never showed.” Allie sniffled.
“I wouldn’t worry about how Darwin was acting.” She snapped off a crisp leaf of romaine and used it to clear away a soil pile. “Shira’s been tracking her sons with cameras. The feed goes straight to digital picture frames in her office. Darwin knew he was being watched and didn’t want to get busted, that’s all.”
A cool breeze snaked by Allie’s cheek and her heart lifted in her chest. “So he might still like me?”
“He definitely does.” Charlie didn’t look at her as she cleared away another scoop of mud. Traces of silver glittered between the brown muck, and suddenly a hatch appeared. Charlie yanked the handle.
“Whoa,” Allie gasped, wishing she had a better vocabulary. But what else does one say when someone lifts up a hatch in an organic vegetable garden that leads to a seemingly endless, underground spiral staircase?
A new sense of purpose filled Allie. She wasn’t just along for the ride, hoping for one last look at a boy with a fetching lip freckle. She was back in the driver’s seat, speeding toward a make-out session with a boy who made Fletcher look like Tofurky—a less appetizing substitute for the real thing.
But it wasn’t just Darwin-joy that made her want to jump down the spiral steps two at a time. It was Charlie-joy, too. They were becoming friends, and it had been a while since she’d had one of those.
“Follow me.” Charlie slipped inside. “Leave the hatch slightly open for Skye.”
Allie shimmied in after her. “Eeeeeeeeee,” she squealed. “It’s freezing in here.” Her breath puffed from her lips like cigar smoke. She stepped onto the cold cement step, wondering what kind of bacteria lay in waiting. But an itchy foot was a small price to pay for love.
“Press alpha-H on your aPod,” Charlie whispered. “Your uniform will heat up.”
“Ahhhhhh.” Allie sighed like she was finally peeing after driving from California to Oregon.
“Shira thinks the cold will keep her skin from aging.”
“In bed.” Allie giggled.
Charlie giggled back.
“So how do we let the boys know we’re here?”
Charlie kept winding down the steps, her brown hair swishing back and forth across the back of her champagne-colored blouse. “Whenever Darwin and I snuck out to meet each other, I sent him a song from a fake e-mail address with an untraceable IP address.”
Allie felt a flicker of jealousy despite Charlie’s assurances. Charlie and Darwin had secret codes. She and Fletch hadn’t even bothered to coordinate ringtones. The most romantic thing they’d ever done was get matching highlights.
“So what was your song?” Allie asked like someone who never got jealous.
“‘We Belong Together’ by Mariah Carey.” Charlie shrugged matter-of-factly. “We kind of had goofy songs for everything. ‘I Turn My Camera On’ by Spoon when Shira’s tattling assistant was lurking. ‘SOS’ by Rihanna for ‘meet me after Shira’s done torturing you.’ Weezer’s ‘Say It Ain’t So’ when Dingo was about to pull a prank. But Mariah was the default.”
Allie’s mind expanded with questions like a cooked bag of Jiffy Pop. The stove was burning hotter than ever and she had to touch it. “So what if Darwin gets your message and thinks you’re the one coming to meet him? Will he think you want to get back together? Will he be upset when he sees it’s me and not you?”
“Don’t worry,” Charlie said with certainty as she sent the message. But instead of Mariah, she sent him “Meet Me at Midnight” by Allie J. The subject line said VEGGIE TUNNEL. “Darwin’s smart,” she said. “He’ll figure it out.”
Charlie punched some numbers in the side of her skeleton key, then inserted the A-shaped end into a slot to the right of the door. The slot glowed bright neon blue, and the cement door immediately lifted open, revealing a large vestibule and a ski-lift chair waiting to whisk them toward the boys.
“This is serious-leh amazing,” Allie gushed.
They were who-knew-how-many feet underground. Dozens of tunnels branched out in all directions like tracks at a busy train station, only they were hewn from glass, not concrete. Eerie blue light waved all around them, making pale Charlie look like she was a member of the Blue Man Group. Allie realized with a jolt that the glow came from the walls—which were actually those of a giant aquarium. In the ceiling overhead, the walls next to her, and the chilly glass beneath her feet swam thousands of the most exotic, colorful fish Allie could possibly have imagined.
Charlie checked her aPod. “Skye’s really late. Do you think something happened?”
Allie couldn’t bring herself to respond. The splendor of her surroundings was too much to process. It was more romantic than Disneyland at night.
Just then a loud BAAAAMMMM echoed through the tunnels. Footsteps and whispers followed. Schools of fish scattered. Allie’s heart revved.
BAAAAMMM!
Charlie retrieved her skeleton key from her pocket. The door lowered and the lights shut off. They were trapped inside. “Hide!”
“Where?” Allie panicked.
“Shhhhhh,” Charlie hissed.
Allie pressed her back up against the nearest wall-slash-aquarium. Was the glass double-paned? Were the fish trying to break through? Was the water seeping out of the aquarium into the tunnels, where it would surely flood and drown her? The air was thick and sticky, and each breath felt like she was snorting a milk shake. She was no longer part of a beautiful seascape. She was encased in glass, trapped in Sleeping Beauty’s coffin.
Just like in the fairy tale, a kiss was inevitable. But would it be her true love’s—or the kiss of death?
Bam! Bam!
The footsteps were getting closer. She’d have her answer soon.