FWOOMP!
The night lit up. A rocket shot through the window and slithered into the sky. A zillion others chased after it. Firecrackers exploded and bottle rockets whistled.
“Put it out,” I yelled to Torchie.
A man came screaming through the door of the building, his clothes blazing. He rushed down the steps. Two more burning men followed right behind him. All three were wearing dark blue suits. They ran right past us, pushing between Cheater and Martin. One of them pulled a cell phone from his pocket, but then flung it away when the fire spread to his sleeve. As they turned and raced toward a van parked at the curb, howling and slapping at themselves, the fire on their clothes went out. Torchie must have doused it.
“We have to help them,” Torchie said.
“I don’t think so,” Cheater said.
“It might be better if we didn’t,” Martin said. “They’re the bad guys.”
The van squealed away from the curb, bounced off a couple cars parked across the street, and blew through a red light. Headed for the hospital, I guess. Torchie turned back to the building. The fire in the window dimmed and died.
I heard sirens in the distance. “We’d better go.”
“I feel awful,” Torchie said as we walked away.
“Don’t,” I said. “They probably did a lot worse to a lot of people.”
“It doesn’t matter what they did,” Torchie said. “It matters what I did. I’m a bad person.”
“Hey,” Martin said, “that just proves you’re a good person. A bad person wouldn’t feel anything.”
“You think so?” Torchie asked, wiping a smudge of soot from his nose.
“Absolutely,” Martin said.
“Besides,” Flinch said, “I think you just saved us from a very bad experience. Now let’s go give Bowdler a bad experience of his own.”
THREE TIMES ON the way to the school, Cheater stopped and looked over his shoulder.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“I think someone’s following us.”
“Yeah,” Flinch whispered to me. “It’s Livy. She wants her skirt back.”
I looked over my shoulder. There was nothing but shadows. I pointed at the school. “I’m more worried about what’s ahead of us.”
As we walked around the side of the school, I imagined coming face to face with a dozen guys in dark blue suits.
“I wish you could sense people from a distance,” I told Cheater.
“That would be nice,” Flinch said. “Bowdler could have fifty guys with him.”
“I don’t think so,” Martin said. “From what I’ve seen inside that twisted mind of his, I think he’s going to be by himself. He can’t imagine that he’d have any trouble with us. He has a disrupter. He probably has a gun or something. For all he knows, the bad guys back there caught us. He’s too full of himself to bring along help. He’s used to people following his orders. And there’s no way he’s going to let anyone see him negotiating with a bunch of kids.”
“Let’s hope so.” I turned to Torchie. “I guess you’re on.”
elsewhere …
BOWDLER KNEW THAT for most people, there might seem to be little point going to the schoolyard. Santee would have the five boys secured before they got this far. But Bowdler believed in covering every possible outcome. If, by some unthinkable circumstance, Santee failed, then this is where Bowdler would need to be. This sort of careful planning was why he was destined to succeed.
He definitely wanted Eddie back. And he wanted the Grieg kid. That would be useful. Fire from a distance. It wasn’t as universal as telekinesis, but it still had powerful potential. Dobbs didn’t seem to have much value. Unless he could be made to see farther into the future. It might be worth an experiment or two. Maybe try some extreme threats. But this one—Bowdler looked at him with disdain—he wasn’t worth anything.
The mind reader would be valuable. The Anderson kid might be useful, too. Though he looked like he’d be the toughest to break.
But that was all in the future. Right now, he had to stay focused on the present. They’d be here any moment. And then they’d be his.
“Sparkie!”
Bowdler spun to his right and reached automatically into his pocket. A girl was running across the field toward them.
“Sparkie! Here, boy!”
She ran right up to him. She was so close, he could almost count the freckles on her face.
“Have you seen my dog?”
“No.”
“You sure? His name’s ‘Sparkie.’ ”
“If he ran away, he’s probably dead by now.”