Psion Beta (17 page)

“
It’s not your business, Kobe,” Sammy said without giving Kobe the courtesy of even a look, “so leave me alone.”

“
I’ve heard stuff,” Kobe continued. “Like Li told me about the moves you could do in your very first Game. Like a perfect landing blast. You were the first one in your group to pass the primary units. You lied to me . . . and everyone else.” His eyes flickered to Jeffie.

Now Sammy’s face turned red.

“
But I also know that someone has been rising quickly through the ranks since then. So I’ll ask you again, what’s your rank?”

The cafeteria became deathly quiet as everyone waited for Sammy to answer. Furious and embarrassed at being put in the spotlight, he was tempted to show Kobe two of his fingers (the middle and the thumb), but instead answered, “Twenty,” and returned to his meal.

Brickert burst out in laughter, then stopped at a look from Kobe. It was Brickert, not Sammy, who held the number twenty ranking, but Sammy knew Brickert didn’t mind.

“
Liar,” Kobe spat, reaching over the table at Sammy, trying to grab Sammy’s com. Sammy jumped up from his seat and leaned away from Kobe’s reach. “What have you got to hide?”

“
Get away from me!” Sammy got up and shoved Kobe backwards.

“
Keep your dirty hands off me!” Kobe shouted back, now in Sammy’s face.

Everyone now was either yelling or rushing toward them to stop a fight. Brickert got in the middle first simply by standing up—unfortunately it was just as Kobe aimed a blow at Sammy—and got punched right in the eye. When Brickert fell backwards holding his face, Sammy tried to knock Kobe down with a quick sweep, but Kobe jumped over it and aimed another punch at Sammy, connecting with the side of his head.

Suddenly, Sammy wasn’t at headquarters anymore, he was back at the Grinder where fights started every day if a bigger kid wanted someone else’s dinner roll. He blasted Kobe in the chest, propelling Kobe toward the wall. Kobe neatly stopped himself using a backward blast off the wall, then blast-jumped over Sammy, grabbed the com off Sammy’s head, and landed on the other side of the room. Sammy would have gone after him, but Martin Trector and Li Cheng Zheng tried to stop the fight by grabbing Sammy.

Before Sammy could get free, Kobe manually accessed his per-stats. With a grim face, he threw the com back at Sammy. “I knew it.”

“
Kobe, you are way out of line!” Kaden stood in the doorway of the room with Al, both breathing like they’d heard the news and come running.

“
I’m out of line?” Kobe asked. “Why is he lying to everyone? I bust my butt in that room everyday so I can be the best, and he just sits back and wins everything! How is that fair? He’s top in almost everything. It’s a bunch of bullsh—”

“
Shut your mouth!” Kaden interrupted. “It’s not your business. Al just told me he’s dropped a ranking, too, but he’s not mad about it. You don’t know how hard he works. You don’t know anything.”

“
That’s crap—”

“
All you care about is winning. You’ve never taken time to get to know Sammy. Just get out.”

Kobe opened his mouth to argue.

“
I said GET OUT!”

If anyone else had said that, Kobe would have either laughed or gotten angrier. Kaden, however, possessed a certain influence over his brother. When Kaden spoke, people listened—even his twin. Kobe gestured rudely to Sammy and stomped out of the room.

Kaden awkwardly muttered something that Sammy didn’t hear, then followed his brother. Sammy appreciated Kaden’s interjection, but he was concerned now with the looks everyone else was giving him. Some stared at him curiously, others jealously, and Brickert with a swollen eye full of pity. It was Jeffie’s hard glare that made his heart sink. She had the distinct look of someone who felt betrayed, and—as he began to notice— so did Kawai. Natalia just seemed fascinated by the whole event.

“
Jeffie—Kawai—I—” he started to say, wanting to explain why he had kept up the act for so long, but not able to grab the words.

With one last look of disgust, Jeffie shook her head and walked out with Kawai in step. Sammy stared stupidly at the door.

“
It’s so stupid!” he vented to Brickert as they hurried down the stairs. “Man, I hate Kobe. I freaking hate him. Why can’t he just grow up?”

“
I’m sorry, Sammy,” Brickert said, struggling not to say anything more. Sammy noticed his hesitation and turned on him.

“
What? What are you thinking?”

“
Let’s get in the room first.”

When the door had closed behind them, Sammy asked again. “All right, what?”

“
Listen, everyone knows there’s something different about you. You never lose in—in Star Racers. And everyone is beginning to see how good you are when we play the Game. If you don’t believe me, ask Natalia. She knows everyone’s opinion about everything, I’ll tell you.”

Sammy didn’t want to admit it, but Brickert’s words rang true. Ever since Marie told everyone about the impressive moves he performed and how he single-handedly held off four opponents in that room, he was much more involved in the Game. And for the last few weeks, the honcho whose team he played on consistently earned the victory.

“
But so what? Why do people even care?”

“
So what?” Brickert cried, throwing his head down into his hands. “No one understands you. You’re so . . . frustratingly secretive about everything. Everything, I tell you! It’s like you don’t trust anyone.”

“
I do—”

“
Including me. Don’t you realize you’ve never told me anything about your life before you came here? You know me like—like—I don’t know . . . but you know me really well.”

Sammy forced a laugh. “That’s because you talk so much.”

Brickert laughed, too. “When I’m around you, I do. But for all I know you could’ve been raised by Martians—plus, you’ve got to understand the way everyone else feels. You’re better than all of us in almost everything, or you will be soon. Why?”

“
I don’t know,” Sammy answered. Then, seeing the look of skepticism on Brickert’s face, he added, “I’m being serious! It comes easily to me. Things have for a while now. Ever since . . . .”

His voice trailed off as embarrassment overcame him.

“
See what I mean?” Brickert told him. “You’re doing it again.”

“
I’m sorry, but there are things in my past, things I’ve done, that I don’t want people to know. Everyone loves to tell the story of how they found out they were Psions. Not me. Mine wasn’t good.”

“
Like I said, you don’t trust anyone.”

“
I trust you. You’re my best friend. I just don’t want . . . people to know about the things I’ve done.”

“
Why?”

Sammy blasted a piece of paper hanging from the ceiling by a paper clip and made it twirl. The spinning cleared his thoughts. “Because they won’t like me. They’ll think I’m a freak. Or they’ll pity me.”

Brickert blasted the piece from his side and made the spinning stop. “Right. Trust issues. You don’t trust us to accept you or your past.”

Sammy was about to disagree, but didn’t. Brickert was right, even if Sammy wouldn’t admit it. He took off his clothes, hung up his com, and went to bed. He lay silent for a long while thinking about everything that had just happened. When he heard Brickert starting to snore, he said, “Hey, Brick, you’d better put ice on your eye.”

Saturday’s Game went well. Gregor was honcho again, but Kobe was also on the team, and only referred to Sammy as “hot shot.” After winning, Sammy repaid his debt to Gregor, who led the team to victory in four Games of five over Ludwig. He’d hoped that by following Gregor’s orders exactly he would be relieved of his guilt.

He wasn’t.

Jeffie was assigned to Ludwig’s team. After the Game, she congratulated Kobe with an unnecessarily long hug, then walked past Sammy with her hand outstretched to compliment Gregor. Natalia and Kawai spoke to him, but he could tell they still held a grudge. At lunch, the three girls sat at a separate table with their roommates. It made Sammy feel weird.

“
How long do they stay mad?” he asked.

“
It’s only been a day,” Brickert explained. “Girls need more time than guys.”

“
Well, then they’re stupid,” Sammy commented while trying to stab a tomato with his fork. “Salads are stupid, too. Why did I even order this?”

“
One time I mixed peroxide into my sisters’ shampoo—you know, as an April Fool’s prank. Only two of them used it before they realized what I did. I’ll tell you, I honestly thought they were going to kill me—all because of a stupid joke. I mean, it’s not like it’s so hard to just dye it back to the way it was. No sense of humor at all—worse than the time I hid their make-up . . . .”

Sammy was flabbergasted by Jeffie’s behavior. He assumed things would go like the last time she’d been mad at him: if he just stayed calm, remained friendly, and waited for her to come to her senses, things would turn out fine. However, rather than shooting him scathing looks like before, her behavior was dramatically different.

She had always been good friends with Kobe, especially since Kobe was considered one of the “older Betas.” And it wasn’t uncommon for them to flirt as they sparred in a game of Star Racers. But that Saturday she spent the whole day attached to Kobe’s side, laughing at everything he did and said. She giggled especially hard when Kobe used the term “hot shot” with his friends. Kobe clearly did not mind the extra attention.

This new behavior went on into Sunday. With the weather unseasonably warm, many of the Betas headed to a park for a game of Frisbee. In no mood for socializing, Sammy went to the library and chose a book. Very few books in the library were fiction, but he found a dusty old copy of
The Count of Monte Cristo
and decided to try it. While the others divided into teams, he parked himself under a nice big tree and started reading. Brickert and Kaden tried to get him to join, but they saw he had no interest. Brickert, of course, was chosen last. From where Sammy sat, Brickert didn’t mind. Sammy envied the way his friend didn’t let things bother him.

He left this train of thought as the tale of Edmond Dantès unfolded. A sailor with a promising future who falls in with a band of smugglers, an incredible transformation into a fabulously wealthy and mysterious count—Sammy saw parallels of his own life as he lost himself in the book.

The game lasted over two hours. During one of their breaks, Kaden jogged over to where Sammy sat in the shade.

“
Hey, you all right?” he puffed.

“
Yeah, fine,” Sammy said in an absent-minded, leave-me-alone tone. “I’d just rather read than play.”

“
When did you start that?” he asked.

“
Huh?” Sammy snapped out of his trance. “Oh, uh, just today. Why? Have you read it?”

“
Yeah. It’s awesome. Are you really already that far into it?”

Sammy looked at the book. He hadn’t realized it, but he had finished well over half the book. And the book was fourteen hundred pages.

“
No! Uh—no . . . I know it drives people crazy, but I just like to skip around.”

Why am I still lying?

“
Are you cool about yesterday?” Kaden asked him.

“
Don’t you think it’s funny how when Kobe does something stupid, you’re the one who apologizes?”

Kaden grinned and chuckled, but Sammy thought it sounded hollow. “Well, I’m not apologizing for him, but I do want to uphold the family honor. Look, dude, I don’t care if you’re number one or number ten in the rankings. We just do our best. I hope you don’t think everyone cares about all that stuff.”

You didn’t see the way everyone looked at me on Friday night,
he thought, but only said, “I don’t think that.”

“
Good—well, you know what they say, ‘never get between a man and a good book.’” With that, Kaden joined a group of Betas heading back to headquarters for lunch.

“
I thought it was ‘never get between a hungry man and a meal,’” Sammy called after him.

Kaden just grinned again and shrugged as he walked off.

Sammy went back to his book, but was immediately interrupted by a loud clearing of the throat. Brickert wanted his attention. When Sammy looked up, Brickert pointed to something in the distance. He tried to see what it was, but only saw a bunch of Betas. Brickert pointed again with a jerk.

Sammy finally saw it.

It was Jeffie. She was holding Kobe’s hand as they walked back into headquarters.

Brickert gave Sammy a helpless look and mouthed, “Sorry.”

Sammy wanted to act like it didn’t bother him, but he couldn’t. Something deep inside him smoldered powerfully and for a brief moment a feeling of terrible strength swept over him.
How can she be so stupid?
Hasn’t she seen the way Kobe treats me . . . or Brickert? The way he takes everything way too seriously?
Why
—
how could she like him?

Worst of all, Sammy hated that he still cared for her. He still wanted Jeffie. Why couldn’t the poisonous thoughts erase that? Despite everything negative and horrible he thought about her for taking the slightest interest in Kobe, he still liked the way her blonde hair bounced when she walked, the way the corners of her nose stretched when she smiled, and her fiercely competitive nature about everything from Star Racers to spinning her plate on her finger.