Chapter Text
In another life, he would have loved this trip, Sticky mourned. Silly things like vacations (let alone international ones) were an out-of-reach luxury for his family for many years. And as soon as it had become a within-reach luxury, there was no time. How could Sticky want a vacation? Across the ocean? Didn’t he know he had a competition on Tuesday, and a spelling bee the day after that?
It was new. He wasn’t used to sitting around, not studying, not competing, not risking his neck on some world-saving adventure. Curtain clearly had no use for him yet. Jackson and Jillson were an ever-constant thorn in their side. And yet Sticky was far from bored. They lounged inside and watched the waves on the chilly days, went onto the deck to soak up the sun on the warm ones. Sticky scanned the chop for the gleaming scales of fish, named the species of the birds that soared in their wake, tasted the scents on the wind, tried to identify each type of tree the driftwood once belonged to.
They were heading towards Europe, Sticky knew, just from watching his environment and absorbing every detail, fact-checking it against perfectly-remembered encyclopedia entries and articles he’d read years ago. But where they were in the journey, that was more uncertain. How fast was the vessel going? Kate could tell. When he’d asked Jillson when they were expected to arrive on land, she’d explained to him with a plastered-on smile that they were already on land, silly, it was just below the ocean. So Sticky had known not to ask again.
He rolled over and stuffed his face into his pillow, counting the seconds until the burning in his lungs grew too great and he had to pull back for air. It wasn’t long.
As much as the ocean voyage was proving to be an unexpected blessing, Sticky had to admit one thing.
He hated Curtain’s yacht.
For clearly it was his and not a borrowed or rented one. It looked as though a navy blue sea monster with a day job as an interior designer had thrown up all over the walls. And what was up with the shapes? Wavy shapes, pointed shapes, obscure shapes only Sticky could name. Half of the ceilings were slanted or uneven. The stairs were designed to give the illusion that they were floating. They just made Sticky trip. It could have passed for a slightly too-expensive hotel had Sticky not suffered under Curtain’s architecture and design choices for months. Now, it was just a reminder of whose boat he was on and whose prisoner he was, in everything but name.
More than once he’d wondered if Curtain had a Waiting Room on the vessel. More than once he’d pushed that thought aside.
Sticky rolled over on his bed and stared up at the ceiling—which was decorated with more shapes, in case that wasn’t apparent. He picked one abstract navy blue line and tried to follow it as it curved around his ceiling and onto his walls. It was making him nauseous. For real, this time, not as he’d pretended for the second time in two days. But Jillson had spent all last night emptying her stomach. Miraculously, she’d taken his excuse at face value and sent him off to his room, alone, while Reynie remained on deck under Jackson’s guard.
Which was good. Sticky needed time to think. Alone.
Now that he was alone, Sticky was doing everything but thinking. Or, he was concentrating really hard on not thinking about the problem, which in turn made him think of it, and so on and so on until his stomach tangled into knots.
It was no use. Sticky bundled the blankets over his face and released a muffled yell.
The unfairness of it all smothered him even more. How long was he going to spend atoning for one mistake? How long would his friends try to trust him, and say they did, but would wrestle down their internal doubt when the slightest thing seemed out of place or off about him? It wasn’t fair. Curtain had gotten his claws into him once, yes—but hadn’t he proved himself? Hadn’t he sealed his decision the moment he took his seat in the Whisperer and began to throw every answer at the Whisperer other than the one it wanted? When the man could have tore his memories away like paper with a single thought?
Stop that, another voice in his head piped up. Reynie knows you. He knows what you risked for them. He’s your friend! Clearly he wanted to believe everything but that you had betrayed them again. When you stood up and professed your new loyalty to Curtain without even talking it over, what on earth was he supposed to think?
Not the worst! Sticky yelled back. It should have been easier to believe that I had a plan!
The voice in his head had no answer for this.
Sticky lowered the blankets, heaved a long sigh, and opened his eyes unseeingly to the horrendous ceiling.
What were the facts?
Reynie was his friend. Reynie had come with him immediately, not knowing the road ahead. Reynie knew he had a plan now. The only way out was forward. The only way forward was together.
He couldn’t do this alone. He needed Reynie for this to work. That was why he’d insisted on him coming along. Kate had been out of reach, Constance had been slumped against the wall, but Reynie had been there. Reynie was here now, his only friend in this navy blue hell.
Sticky scrubbed his palms over his eyes and sat up. His stomach wasn’t perfectly calm, but it was better, and maybe that was enough. He needed to find Reynie.
There was a knock at the door.
“Reynie?” Sticky called out of instinct, wondering if he’d somehow summoned his friend just by thinking about him enough.
The door banged open. It was not Reynie.
“Good, you’re feeling better,” Jackson barked. “It wouldn’t make a good second-first-impression to throw up over Dr. Curtain’s shoes. Come. He wants to see you.”
Sticky jolted to his feet. “Now?”
“No rush, whenever you feel like it! So long as it’s within the next five minutes.”
Sticky gulped. He needed to see Reynie again to truly resolve the swirling in his stomach. But it would have to wait.
He dusted off his pants and smoothed the wrinkles out of his shirt. “I’m ready now.”
The doorbell rang five minutes after Milligan announced Ms. Perumal’s approach. Mr. Benedict let Rhonda open the door, hanging back with a cowed expression. Perhaps he needn’t have worried. Her approach was far less ferocious this time, as if she’d had some days to think and had decided she really wouldn’t have known what else to do in Mr. Benedict’s shoes, either. Perhaps she simply knew her Reynie, knew his big heart and knew he was perhaps their only hope. The world’s only hope.
And now she was his.
“I asked my sister to come stay with my mother,” Ms. Perumal explained, nodding in thanks to Number Two as she took her coat. “I didn’t want to worry about her falling or forgetting her pills or something. Would you mind if I took a short nap on the couch in between searching?”
“Take a bed. There are spare rooms. Anything you want. We need the extra pair of hands,” Milligan said solemnly.
“Then put me to work,” Ms. Perumal said without hesitation.
Kate Wetherall, meanwhile, was slinking up the bannister. She had taken note of the distraction and sniffed out an opportunity. As the adults chattered, setting Ms. Perumal up with her duties and filling her plate with snacks, Kate crept on tiptoe all the way up to the far corner of the highest floor, taking care to skip over the creaking floorboards she’d memorized in the days since she’d returned.
At last, she arrived in front of a nondescript wooden door. Kate glanced around one last time and then flung the door open with an almighty bang!
“A-ha!” she cried in triumph. “I’ve caught you! No escaping or feigning sleep this time!”
“Sngrghhhhh,” said the blankets.
Huh?
Kate flipped open her bucket and crept closer. She squinted; despite the mid-afternoon sunlight, it was difficult to see with the blinds pulled so tightly shut. She clicked the bedside lamp on. An arm emerged from the quilt.
“Waz … what time izzit?”
“Tuesday,” Kate said pointedly. She frowned. Constance’s head poked out from under the blankets. Her cheeks were red with the creases of her pillowcase, her hair mussed like a bird’s nest, her eyes dark and sunken. “What’s wrong with you? Are you sick?”
“What’s wrong with you? Can’t you open a door normally?”
“Were you actually still sleeping? Like, for real?” It couldn’t be true. And the more Kate looked, the more it seemed it actually was. The sheets were as tangled as though they’d been tossed about for three days straight. Pillows were strewn across the carpet. The whole room was cloaked in a hush, as if not even the dust had stirred. A plate teeming with food sat on the dresser, untouched.
“Of course I’m not sleeping. We’re talking, aren’t we? What do you want?”
For a moment, Kate felt ashamed. Mr. Benedict had warned her, but she hadn’t … she hadn’t quite grasped … but she pushed it aside. “I wanted to ask you something.”
“You’ve done nothing but pester me with questions since you walked in.” Constance scrubbed at her eyes and tugged a strand of hair out of her mouth.
Reconsidering her approach with this newfound discovery, Kate tilted her head to the side. Then she walked over and plopped onto the end of the little girl’s bed. Constance hissed at her.
“I wanted to ask you what happened.”
Constance looked at the ceiling. “I already told Mr. Benedict. I don’t see why I should have to repeat myself.”
“No, you told Mr. Benedict that Reynie and Sticky left of their own accord.”
“They did.”
“But that’s not the same as telling what happened,” Kate said, trying to make Constance understand. “Every detail, every word could be a clue, Constance. It might be our only shot.”
Constance scratched at a bug bite on her arm. “I don’t remember most of it. Their fumbling and indecision wasn’t worth taking up space in my memory.”
“Wasn’t worth—Constance, nothing, nothing, is worth more than this! How could you—”
“The failed MASTER was scrambling about the room, trying to salvage his infernal machine,” Constance interrupted, speaking with her eyes closed. Kate frowned. She’d meant to ask someone how the Whisperer had ended up in smithereens while she’d been battling the Executives. Perhaps Constance would explain … but the little girl barreled on, seemingly unable to stop now that she’d started.
“Then George piped up. He asked Curtain if his second chance was still open. He asked if he could come with Curtain. He demanded that Reynie come too. Reynie said yes.”
“And Curtain just allowed that?”
“Then they went into the elevator and they were gone. There, Kate. That is everything that happened. Are you happy now? Are you satisfied?”
“No,” Kate said, leaping to her feet to pace. “No, Constance, I’m not.”
Constance groaned and fell back against her pillows.
“It doesn’t add up,” Kate said, gesticulating wildly. “Why would Sticky give in when we’d won? Why would Reynie go without arguing? Why would Curtain take them back? More importantly, in what world would Sticky fall for his manipulation again?”
“In this world? Apparently?”
Kate rounded on Constance. “And I know you don’t believe it either. Deep down. You can’t accept that what you saw is true. You should listen to that instinct.”
“Now you’re suggesting I give in to delusion. So what?” Constance arranged her blankets loftily. “None of this helps us find them. If you’re looking for a big breakthrough, I don’t have it, Kate.”
Kate grinned. “We haven’t found them yet because the adults are the ones looking.”
“No. Absolutely not.”
“Absolutely yes.”
“If you’re suggesting what I think you’re suggesting …”
“Why not?” Kate exclaimed, throwing her hands up into the air. “What is there to lose? We have a better shot, Constance. We’ve spent more time together, survived the Institute as a team. We know them! And I know that Sticky has a plan. Or Reynie does. They both have plans. Personally I’d have about thirty seven of them.”
Constance didn’t look convinced. “What good is a plan if they fail at it?”
“Wow, encouraging, aren’t you? And the point is that searching for two helpless kidnappees is very different from searching for two undercover agents. I have a feeling Reynie and Sticky will try to get a message to us once they’ve got their bearings. We’re a team, remember? They’ll need us.”
“Team,” Constance sneered. “Some teammates they are. A really team-like thing to do, forgetting half of your team and leaving them behind.”
Kate bent over the side of the bed to look the girl directly in the eye. “Will you give me a chance to prove you wrong?”
Constance sighed. “I take pity on you. You’re going to end up in a ditch without me.” She threw the covers aside and swung her legs out. “This ‘plan’ is doomed to result in ruination and utter failure. Where do we start?”
As if awaiting that cue, the lamp cut out, plunging the room into darkness. The girls waited with bated breath. It was as if all of the air had been sucked out of the room along with the lights.
Then the alarm began to blare.
The red alert light bathed Kate’s grin in crimson. “We start right now.”