The Academy: Book 2 (9 page)

Asa remembered that scene in the rec room, and was surprised to recollect that he had been so forceful with Teddy. Now, as he watched his friend towel off his dead-looking pale-yellow face, Asa wondered if he would still feel comfortable telling Teddy that he was wrong.

I’m being paranoid again,
he thought.

The two of them discarded their towels between the bathtub and fire, so that they would dry, and were about to leave Asa’s dwelling when Teddy used his body to make a physical barrier between
Asa and the door.

“You’re lying to me, Asa.” He sneered down at Asa, the pupils in the center of his yellow-green eyes looked too big.

“Huh?” Asa’s heart was racing again.

“You act like you don’t love her, but I can tell you do.”

“Get off it,” Asa said, and shoved Teddy out of the way. To his relief, Teddy took a few steps away from the door (
he didn’t have to, he’s much too strong for me to move him like that
). Asa opened the door and stepped out. Teddy quickly followed.

The air was filled with the sounds of hundreds of great wings flapping in the air. All around the mountainside, second semester students were opening up their wings and taking off into the air.

Asa took a quick look back at the forest he had been in earlier that day. The tall timbers swayed with the wind, and somewhere in the distance the Multipliers were camping. He wondered what Joney and Michael and Edna were doing. And then he remembered something…

He and Jen were high up in the trees, while Joney tried to carefully read the lettering on the goggles. “Jul Conway.” And then Ed
na had begun to walk around, jittery and fearful.

“
Oh my! Joney! If this trapped up Jul Conway, I think that we are in very, very big trouble!” She began to pace, the goggles still in her hands. “Do you think it was him? What do we do?”

This memory didn’t make sense to Asa with Robert King’s death. Teddy had suggested that the video would help him make sense of what happened, but it only seemed to muddy the issue.

Why are they afraid of Conway? How does this fit in with the rest of it?

But now wasn’t the time to talk about it. Teddy had already expanded his wings out beside him and was running down the mountainside to gain momentum when Asa snapped out of his daydream.

Moments later, Asa was in the air, flapping his bat-like wings and gaining altitude.  The air was crisp and clear, with blue skies directly overhead. The wind pulled Asa towards Town, and the shadow beneath him slipped off the mountain and began to zoom over the canopy of the Arctic jungle.

When he was high over the water, he looked over and saw the Winggame courts bobbing in the gentle chop. He started his descent at this point, thinking,
if it weren’t for the violence, I would really like it here. This place is beautiful. Flying is wonderful, and if the Multipliers didn’t tamper with my team, I would actually like Winggame.
Asa exhaled, and was surprised at how much he desired to play the game fairly.

Asa glided down in between buildings and landed with a run on the cobblestone path. The road glistened with a thin layer of water, and radiated warmth up to Asa. As he had learned last semester, the streets were heated so that snow wouldn’t cake up and make walking difficult.

A line of Fishies was walking down the cobblestone, looking around, seeming to be trying to take everything in. All across the road, upper classmen were landing from the sky, sprinting faster upon impact than any natural human possibly could. On the steps leading up to a tall, stone, London-style clock tower stood a troop of raccoons, all of which had half-sized brooms in their hands as they swept the thin layer of snow away. Then there were the Multipliers, which could be identified by their black gums and the fact that they didn’t wear the utility suits that the graduates and students wore; Asa counted six in the vicinity, four of which he had never seen before.
Is that normal?
His eyes darted around quickly.
Are there more than usual? Or is it possible that I just have never noticed them before?

The Fishies were mesmerized, their faces wide-eyed, and Asa was struck by a sense that he had become desensitized to all the wonders of the Academy. He watched the way these normal humans walked, and noticed that compared to the mutated beings around them their strides looked labored. On some of them, their suits clung unflatteringly to rolls of fat and unhealthy bony hip protrusions.

Not for long,
Asa thought. He looked down at his own body and appreciated the drastic transformation he had made for a moment. There wasn’t an inch of skin on his body that didn’t seem to stretch over packed muscles as dense as lead.
Even my hands look different,
he thought, flexing them into fists.

Asa looked back to see a pack of five Fishie girls staring at him and giggling amongst each other. When he glared at them, they blushed red and pretended not to see him anymore.
Have they already been told I’m a murderer? They’ve only been here a day!

Conway strode in front of the line of Fishies, leading them into the center of Town. He was tall and lean, with
a sureness in his stride that was comforting. He was the man who the Academy had assigned as his “mentor” last semester, and he had been one of Asa’s father’s friends.

He might have sensed Asa staring at him, because he turned and looked at the second semester student. As usual, his face was serious and
stern-looking, with heavy, concerned lines above his eyebrows.
But there is something else in that look.
Asa felt that Conway was trying to communicate something to him, but he didn’t know what.

Conway turned back, and continued to walk forward. For some reason, the look that Conway had given him sped up his heart
rate. Asa tried to control his breathing as he walked. If Conway had tried to convey a message, there was no way that Asa could ask him about it. The man had risked his life last semester, and had made Asa more informed about the workings of the Academy than he had a right to be, by the Academy’s standards.

Maybe he didn’t intend anything by the look. He could just be tired. He sure looks it.

Conway’s hair had turned even grayer in the past month. Asa thought that with Robert King dying, the graduates were surely going through an incredibly busy time.

But still, Asa had a suspicion that he couldn’t let go that Conway had been trying to tell him something. His speculations included the idea that Teddy had suggested—that the Multipliers were going to attack at the assembly. He also wondered if the rumors were true, and there was going to be a task this year that encompassed all students in one enormous, gladiator-style fight.

But it can’t be true. It wouldn’t be fair.

The last thing that Asa considered was the possibility that Conway had been trying to communicate a good thing. Perhaps with Robert King dead, the Academy was going to disassemble.

But then why did they bring in a new batch of Fishies? And, there are still four owners of Alfatrex, even with Robert King dead. Surely they’ll find some sick way to use us.

Asa felt less and less sure with each effort to rationalize what was going on. So, finally, he switched to a different subject. Up ahead, Charlotte was walking shoulder-to-shoulder with
Shashowt. Asa watched them as they moved forward into the stadium-style seating that had been put out.

He had mixed feelings about seeing them together; maybe they were just friends, but Asa thought that
Shashowt had other intentions. Asa knew that he had broken off their relationship, and that he had no right to dictate who she saw. But still, the sight of Shashowt beside her made Asa grit his teeth.

Teddy gave Asa a knowing look as they passed beneath stone archways into the Town Center.

They walked up a long row of stairs with the other students moving in the same direction. The layout looked different than it had just weeks ago when they had the end of semester meeting. Asa wondered if the stone structure could somehow change shapes, or if someone actually had to re-carve it.

As Asa crested the flight of stairs leading to the meeting place, he was floored. By the faces of the other students, Asa guessed that they felt the same way. The center was beautiful. The smooth stone bleachers had been obsessively cleaned so that the intricate carvings of vines, leaves, and acorns
gleamed. The marble was so white and shining that it resembled the surface of a pool of milk. The stage to which all the seats faced was covered in thick black and white striped carpet: Asa guessed that it was made entirely of artic tiger fur.

Sprinkled over every surface of the enormous Town Center were hundreds of thousand
s of red rose petals. They were strewn across the aisles, the seats, and the stage. At a distance, the pedals looked like large drops of blood.

             
Asa and Teddy made their way to the top of the steps, twenty rows above where anyone else was sitting. They had both gotten used to sitting alone: ever since Asa killed Shelby last semester, his reputation as a brute had only grown. People had also been sure to keep their distance from he and his only friend here, Teddy.

They watched as the students filled their seats. Asa noticed that the students all seemed m
ore stoic than usual; the pedal-strewn hall was filled with the sounds of footsteps and whispering, serious voices.

For the Fishies, the reason for their mood was obvious: They were in an entirely new environment, and just as Asa had done last semester, they would probably keep their mouth
s shut until they knew the Academy’s customs.

As for the older classmen, Asa thought that many of them were trying to portray themselves as tough. They puffed out their chests, flexed their jaws, and tried their best to concentrate on their footsteps to be sure they wouldn’t trip.
Tonight, the Winggame player draft was scheduled to begin. Because it was advantageous to be put on a good team, every interaction leading up to the draft was crucial for the players. Last semester, Asa had been selected first among the Fishies after an upper classmen noticed him flying along the mountainside. The rumor spread, and by the time the draft came, he was highly desired.

And, with the draft coming earlier this semester, the students were feeling added pressure to make every effort to impress. With lives relying on how well a team drafted, the students could be sure that someone was watching them, judging them, at all times.

Asa and Teddy sat on the pedal strewn bleachers, not talking. Asa couldn’t keep his mind from returning to the idea Teddy proposed in the dwelling.

What if now that Robert King is dead, the Multipliers want to kill you and Charlotte, and take over the Academy.
Maybe they’ll want to move it—to hell with what the crows might reveal.

He looked over at Charlotte, and watched as she bent her arm behind her in a most unnatural way to scratch her back; she was only able to do this because of the mutations she had attained at the King Mountain Task last semester, which made her unnaturally flexible.

Out of the corner of his eye, Asa saw a figure break the invisible social barrier that insured no student ventured within twenty rows of Asa and Teddy. It was Jen. She wore an enormous smile on her face, and her short hair bounced up and down as she moved up the stairs. “Asa!” she shouted, waving.

Why is she coming to sit by me?

With the serious tension that filled the room of students trying to attain a position on a good Winggame team, Jen’s shout was almost offensive. Heads turned to see who had broken the silence, and to know who had uttered the murderer’s name. People threw disgusted looks at Asa, and he felt the urge to bury his head. But, he had an image to keep up; if people weren’t afraid of him, they might attack like Shelby had last year.

Teddy seemed to feel the tension too, and neither of them said a word until Jen had plopped herself down right in between them.

“And you should be Teddy,” she said, putting her hand out to shake.

Teddy looked at Asa as though for help, and then glanced down at all the dirty looks people were throwing at them.
Why is she sitting with you? What are you up to?
the looks seemed to say.
Reluctantly, Teddy shook her hand and said, “yeah, how’d you know?”