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If there was one thing I was supposed to be able to do, it was break things! It was like a fundamental part of me was missing. Was this how Grandpa and the others felt? I’d been somewhat enjoying the loss of my Talent—it hadn’t been that long ago that I’d viewed it as a curse, rather than a super power.
I turned to look at the others, to beg for help getting the cabinet open, and I caught my reflection in a nearby glass case. It was watching me, and it didn’t move when I did.
“You’re it, aren’t you?” I asked the reflection. “The Talent?”
“Alcatraz?” my mother asked.
I ignored her, looking into my own eyes in the glass. The figure shook its head.
I jumped. I was expecting that, but I still jumped.
“What are you, then?” I demanded.
The figure mouthed something. I’m you.
“You broke things,” I said. “You broke everything. That wasn’t me. I didn’t want to.”
Didn’t you? the figure asked. You didn’t want to drive them away? You didn’t want to be alone?
“I…”
What am I to you? the figure mouthed. I could almost hear it. Something to be controlled, bottled in, used? Then ignored?
“Why did you do this?” I asked, stepping up to the glass. “Why did you let me save Mokia, then leave?”
Maybe, the figure mouthed, I was tired of being blamed for things that are not my fault.
I stared at the glass, and found tears leaking from the corners of my eyes. My mother stepped up to me, hesitant, as if she were approaching a wild animal. She touched me on the arm. “Alcatraz? Are you all right?”
“No,” I snapped, turning from her to the cabinet. I placed my hands on the metal and tried to summon the Talent. I reached for it, strained for it.
I was so close. Just another inch …
It refused.
But my robe did start talking to me again.
“I can’t believe I let my hood fall down right at the wrong moment!” it cried. “I ruined everything!”
And if this seems like too many talking inanimate objects for you, might I kindly remind you that you’re the one talking to a book.*
The Shamefiller’s Lens. I cursed, digging it out of my pocket, but the thing was brutally hot to the touch. It singed my fingers and I dropped it. It bounced to a rest on the floor and released a distinctive beam of light straight upward.
“Man, I’m a terrible ceiling.…”
I can’t believe that the last thing I said to Bastille was a complaint that she was supposed to protect me, a piece of me thought. I’m so ashamed.…
Uh-oh.
“Out!” I screamed at the others, then grabbed the screwdriver and ducked down, using it to tilt the Lens up toward the cabinet.
“Wow,” the cabinet said, “I can’t believe I slammed on that cute scientist’s fingers. It was absolutely the wrong moment too. There we were, the two of us, alone in here and, and, I can’t take it!”
No. I couldn’t destroy the cabinet. That would break the vials. Instead, I tipped the Lens toward the wall nearby. It was a long shot too, but I felt better about it.
“I’m the worst wall ever,” the wall said. “All I do is stare at the other walls. Do they see the dirty specks on me? Is that why they won’t speak to me? Oh!”
I failed her, I thought. I failed everyone.…
A section of the wall exploded as my screwdriver head melted. As I’d hoped, the wall ripping apart made the metal cabinet fall free. I managed to catch it, and the back was open. From within I grabbed a large bottle of liquid the same shade as the little vial the scientist had shown us.
“I’m the worst floor ever.”
“What an awful table I am!”
I ruined everything, I thought. I’m so terrible at all of this, I could just explode.…
I dove for the doorway, cradling the bottle as things inside the room began to burst in showers of sparks. The ceiling, the tables, the walls. Their blasts created a thundering cacophony.
But I survived.
Though a lingering sense of shame haunted me, I’d gotten far enough away. I was left with the image of a large column of light consuming everything in the room.
“What,” my mother said, “was that?”
“Lenses are acting kind of weird around me,” I said, struggling to my feet.
“That’s what you call ‘weird’?” she demanded as the entire room collapsed upon itself.
Dazed, I fished in my pocket. I’d dropped the Truthfinder’s Lens into the fans, so all I had left now were my standard Oculator’s Lenses and my Courier’s Lenses. Well, those and the Shaper’s Lens my grandfather had given me.
“Come on,” I said, holding the large bottle of antidote. “Let’s move.”
I got no complaint from the others, and Dif gave me a thumbs-up. He apparently considered what I’d just done to be properly “kooky” and “unexpected.” I pulled out the Courier’s Lenses and put them on as we ran down the hallway. “Grandpa?” I said, activating them. I couldn’t worry about the fact that they’d make me glow; hopefully everyone would assume I was a Dark Oculator.
NO NEED TO YELL, LAD! Grandpa’s voice screamed back at me.
“I’m not yelling, you are.”
MUST BE THE WAY WE’RE SUDDENLY SUPERCHARGING LENSES.
“I suppose,” I said, lagging behind Shasta and Dif. That burst of shamefilling had really taken a lot out of me. “We found where they’re keeping the Forgotten Language texts, and are on our way there right now.”
ROUSING ROWLINGS! I’M ON MY WAY TOO! YOU FOUND AN AUTHENTICATOR?
“Both that and the antidote for the Mokians. I took our authenticator off a Dark Oculator. You?”
TRICKED IT OUT OF ONE OF THE LIBRARIANS WHO OPERATE THE VENTILATION SYSTEMS IN HERE. RIGHT BEFORE JAMMING THE THINGS ON FULL SPEED.
“That was you?” I asked.
FIGURED IT WOULD MESS EVERYTHING UP IN HERE. LIBRARIANS CAN NEVER THINK STRAIGHT IF THEIR BOOKS ARE OUT OF ORDER.
I decided not to mention how the fans had nearly messed me up as well. “So that’s your plan to destroy
the place? Wind tunnels?”
WELL, THAT, Grandpa said, AND ENGAGING THE HIGHBRARY’S SELF-DESTRUCT MECHANISM.
I stopped in place. “The what?”
DON’T SHOUT, PLEASE, LAD! Grandpa said, but chuckled. THE SELF-DESTRUCT MECHANISM. EVIL SOCIETIES CAN NEVER RESIST PUTTING THE SILLY THINGS IN THEIR BASES.
“But…” I said.
DON’T WORRY, Grandpa replied. THEY’LL GET IT DISARMED BEFORE IT GOES OFF. I’VE NEVER YET BEEN ABLE TO GET ONE OF THE BLASTED THINGS TO ACTUALLY BLOW UP, BUT IT WILL SEND THE HIGH-LEVEL LIBRARIANS INTO A PANIC, MAYBE KEEP THEM OFF OUR BACKS. I’LL MEET YOU AT THE FORGOTTEN LANGUAGE ARCHIVE.
I nodded. Ahead, my mother had stopped in the wide tunnel, looking back at me insistently. The wind was pretty strong here. Not “blow you over” strong, but maybe “blow over your baby brother” strong.
I continued forward, feeling drained. Perhaps it was the lingering effect of the Shamefiller’s Lens, but I had a sudden, almost overpowering feeling that this was all going to end like it had in Mokia. Maybe we’d stop my father, but what about saving my friends? What about Himalaya and Folsom, and all the people fighting in ships above the city? What good was it to “win” if everyone I cared about ended up dying for that victory?
I dug out the phone and dialed Kaz.
“Al!” he said, picking up the phone. I could hear explosions on the other end of the line. “Please tell me you’re almost done in there.”
“Battle’s going poorly?”
“You could say that,” Kaz said, then cursed. He didn’t speak for a few seconds. “That was close. We’re going to need to pull out soon. And Al, something strange is going on.”
“Glass is acting oddly around you?”
“Yeah! How’d you guess? When I push buttons on the glass control panel, it lights them all up. It’s nearly gotten me killed. I have to steer with the most delicate touch. I don’t know how long I can keep this up before something goes very wrong.”
“Okay,” I said, “I want you to pull out. But I need you to do something crazy first.”
