It went as smoothly as planned. As I finished lunch, I told mom and dad that I was going to the Left manor to feed the cats, and that a friend from school was going to meet me outside to swap books. Swinging my backpack over my shoulder, I waited till I got out of sight of our house to start jogging. Wouldn’t get me back a lot of time, but it would get me some.

  I unlocked the back door and let myself in. I’d barely set my backpack down in the chair when there was a gentle rapping on the door. I jumped and squeaked. Only a little squeak, but I guess it was audible, because the fellows were grinning as I opened the door. All except Donny. I yanked the door open and they filed in. “Guys, you’re going to have to stay in the kitchen. You can’t go rambling about in this house. That will get me in trouble.”

  They started pulling out chairs. “Does anyone want tea?” They all turned to stare at me. “Ok, or not. That’s just what happens in this kitchen.”

  Chris Blue folded his arms and leaned his chair back slightly. “Never had it before.”

  I checked the clock. 12:55. There would be a little bit of time. “I’ll make it and you guys can have some or not.” I started the water and as I prepared the tea, I started telling them the whole story. From the first trip into town with Stenway and Sydney, to my sprint out into the rain, to the creepily identical to this house lair under the gazebo (“Oh, so that’s why we can’t get in!”), to waking up in the hallway of the Left house with a lump on my head.

  The fellows didn’t ask any questions as I poured out the tea into a random collection of mugs and cups. Placing the sugar and milk on the table, I pushed my hair back and wriggled my shoulders. 1:07. “I’m going to feed the cats. I have to leave by 1:35 and I will have to clean these dishes before then too. Think of your questions while I feed the cats. I’ll be back in 10 minutes.”

  I sped through that feeding. Poor cats. They didn’t get the normal amount of petting and chattering and playing. They also were not going to come into the kitchen with all those boys there. Not that I could blame them.

  I walked back into the kitchen. Some of the fellows (Peach and Chris Blue) had drunk a fair amount of their tea (gauging by the amount of milk in there, there was probably a fair bit of sugar as well.) Clive had drank about half an inch of his, straight black, and the others had left theirs untouched.

  “1:19. What questions do you have.”

  “Could you get back to the first location?”

  “No. I wasn’t paying enough attention. If I saw the same map that we looked at the in the place, I could maybe find the correct train station and MAYBE we could work back from there, but there’s no way we’re getting inside.”

  Chris Blue rapped out an order. “Dennis, track down some maps. T.J., write down everything you can remember about that map. Color, size, fonts, folds. At the end.” He ripped a sheet of paper out of a notebook and started writing on it. “Who had the next question?”

  The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

  “Just to confirm, the list of people who were at the head table at the Super place were the barrel shaped man with the loud voice, the pale see through woman, and the uniformed man with the ring?” They asked me for any other specifics I could give.

  “They quizzed you on Reckoning Blue. Any ideas why they haven’t come talk to us about how we found it?”

  “Not a clue. I guess they would try to go behind the scenes to figure it out first.”

  Chris nodded at Peach, who slid a small piece of paper across the table to me. “This is how we found it. Read it later. We’re getting short on time.”

  Chris downed the last of his tea and nodded to Peach to do the same. “If you’re done with the mugs, empty them. T. J., better start cleaning. We’ll come to you.”

  I glanced at the clock. 1:27. I headed to the sink and turned on the spout. “Ok shoot.”

  Dennis asked a very technical question about the contraption that I was strapped to, but I don’t think I answered him very well.

  “If Mr. Left and Mrs. H could be guaranteed to be away from their lair, could you get in?”

  “I think so. I didn’t think there was any kind of bio scanning or anything like that. Which seems like an oversight.”

  “I wonder why they aren’t concerned about you coming back.”

  Chris grunted. “That wasn’t on the approved list.”

  “It’s a good question though.” Donny rubbed his chin.

  “Who had the last question?” Chris glared at Donny. “Back on track people, we have three minutes and she still has to write things down.”

  “Last question.” Peach kneaded his hands together. “What do you think the point of that experiment was?”

  Chris grunted. “We agreed that was too theoretical to get through with the time allotted here.”

  “I don’t know, but it makes me nervous.” I flipped the dish towel over the mugs and put them up into a cabinet. “I wonder what happened to Mr. Left, and also if they want to stack powers, or if they just want to make regular people into villains. There’s probably more people that would sign up for that than there would be supers.”

  “That’s weirdly pessimistic of you.” Chris glanced over at me and shoved his paper over. “Write about that map.” I put my head down and jotted what I could remember. The fellows were chattering over my head about the potential uses of the technology. I handed the paper back to Chris and picked up my backpack. “1:35. We need to go.”

  The fellows filed out and I shut and locked the door behind me. All the fellows but Donny vanished back into the bushes. He grinned at me. “So we’re not all seen to be leaving at once. Less suspicious.” His smile drooped, then dropped off all together. “Be careful, T.J. Especially since you have that paper.”

  “You too.” I spoke a little louder than necessary, so all the fellows could hear. “They want to know how you got the info. And, I may be being followed. We don’t know. If I’m being followed, you’re being watched too.”

  Donny nodded once, sharply. “Get going.” He started to turn away, then turned back around. “T.J., call me later. About the book or whatever or don’t say anything. Just so we know you made it ok.”

  Somebody (Clive) made a raspberry noise from the bushes. I ignored it. “I will.”

  I started jogging back towards the house, slowing down to a brisk walk when I got in sight of the house. My goal was to get up to my room as quickly as possible. I had a lot of reading to do.