“Hey, chill out,” he said.
“Sorry. It’s not you. I’m just angry at everything right now. You have no idea how bad this is about to get.”
I clamped my mouth shut as my eyes focused and I realized there was another cell in the corner opposite ours. Someone was sleeping on a cot. An adult. His back was turned to us. There’s an old saying Cheater had taught me: The enemy of my enemy is my friend. I was still too dizzy to stand. I crawled to the door of my cell and shouted at the guy, “Hey! Wake up!” He didn’t move. I tried a couple more times, then gave up and went back to the corner.
A moment later, Bowdler came down a flight of steps to the right of the cells. He didn’t have anything in his hand. Maybe he thought I was still too dizzy to be a threat. I waited until he unlocked the door and stepped in. Then I lashed out with my power. I wanted to crack his skull against the bars.
Nothing happened. No satisfying smack of bone against metal. No flying bits of brain.
I scanned the room, looking for the disrupter. Bowdler gave me a thin smile. “Oh, we’re not lugging around clunky prototypes anymore. You’d be surprised how small a device we can make. But I’m not here to discuss technology.” He glanced toward Martin. “I have the feeling you also have psychic powers.”
I remembered the sarcastic words I’d shouted a moment ago. And you know that with your psychic powers, Martin? Bowdler had probably heard me all the way upstairs. “That was a joke,” I told him.
“I think not. I think it was the truth. The name ‘Martin’ does seem to ring a bell. You cried it out the day you escaped.” Bowdler crossed the cell and put his foot on top of Martin’s hand where it rested on the floor. “The truth?”
Martin shrugged. “You heard him. It was a joke.”
Bowdler rocked forward slightly, putting more weight on Martin’s fingers. “I don’t like playing ‘truth or dare.’ I much prefer ‘truth or pain.’ Pain builds character. Something that your generation sorely lacks.”
Martin hated bullies. I expected him to spit out an insult or to grit his teeth and refuse to make a sound. I never expected him to talk.
“If I tell you what I know, will you leave the fourth kid alone?” he asked.
Bowdler slid his foot off Martin’s fingers, then leaned over and grabbed him by the front of his shirt. “What fourth kid?”
“Nothing,” Martin said. “There’s no other kid.”
“There’s nobody else,” I said. What was Martin thinking? If Bowdler got his hands on Torchie, it would be like tossing a puppy to a python. I wanted to jump on Bowdler’s back and pound him, but I wasn’t even sure I could stand up without help.
Bowdler ignored me and pulled Martin closer to him. “Do you know how easily I can make you talk? Do you know how quickly I can have you crying like a baby, just begging me to let you tell everything? Do you have any idea how much of the human body can be sliced off or peeled away without killing someone?”
“You can’t…” Martin said. “We’re just kids.”
“Can’t what? Look around? Do you see anyone who can stop me? Your little friend, that telekinetic freak of nature, has been tamed. You don’t have any way to hurt me, or you would have tried by now. I’m getting bored. So talk.”
Don’t do it, I thought. You can’t mention Torchie.
“His name’s Dennis Woo,” Martin said. “He’s in Philly, at the hospital.”
“No!” I leaped to my feet, then fell back to my knees as a wave of dizziness washed over me. How could Martin betray Cheater?
“What’s his power?” Bowdler asked. “Is he a telekinetic, too?”
Martin shook his head and whispered something to Bowdler. It was too faint for me to hear. Bowdler let go of Martin and strode toward the cell door.
Martin grabbed the bars on the side of the cage and pulled himself to his feet. Grunting with the effort, he dove at Bowdler. Bowdler glanced over his shoulder, then threw back a kick that caught Martin in the gut and dropped him to the ground.
“Looks like I can see the future, too,” Bowdler said.
See the future? I had no idea why he mentioned that. Precognition wasn’t Cheater’s talent.
It didn’t matter. Even if he’d mentioned the wrong talent, Martin had broken our vow. Bowdler went out and locked the cell door behind him.
Martin was curled up, but I didn’t feel any sympathy for him. “Why’d you do that?”
After all we’d been through, I couldn’t believe he’d rat out Cheater that quickly. I know I’d have kept my mouth shut, no matter what sort of things Bowdler threatened to do to me. No matter how many fingers he crushed. I held my hand up, with my palm facing him. “Doesn’t this mean anything to you?”