Ben Braver and the Vortex of Doom Read online

Richard pointed at Penny. ‘Because it dampens powers. It basically shuts them off.’

  ‘We noticed,’ Noah said, playing with his newly normal hair.

  ‘Funny thing about this weapon, though,’ Richard said. ‘It only works on people with powers. If your hair was on fire because you were wearing a special helmet, say, then it wouldn’t have worked on you.’

  ‘But it did work,’ Noah said.

  ‘But it did work,’ Richard repeated, nodding slowly. ‘And that’s something of a mystery. There are only fifteen children on the planet with superpowers, and those fifteen are the offspring of seven specific people. We know who those seven are, and who their children are. But we don’t know who you are, so the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question is … who are you?’

  Nobody answered.

  ‘Why were you chasing my son?’ Mary asked from the kitchen.

  Again, nobody answered.

  We couldn’t.

  It was too risky.

  Anything we said could screw up the future.

  Richard turned to Donnie. ‘Why were you in the forest, son?’

  That time, it was Donnie who said nothing.

  And then I understood. Richard and Mary really had no clue what was happening. Donnie might’ve got us caught, but he hadn’t explained any of it to his parents.

  He was afraid of getting in trouble.

  ‘That does it!’ Richard shouted suddenly, spit flying. ‘Who are you? What are you doing here? What’s your mission? Why were you chasing after my son, and how did you know about the ski lodge? Tell me the truth! We have ways of making you talk!’

  Penny absolutely snapped.

  Richard sat back, speechless, clearly shocked at getting roasted by a twelve-year-old. He stared daggers at my friend, his eye twitching and everything. Everyone else waited for him to blow. He was a stick of dynamite, and Penny had just lit the fuse.

  But that’s when Mary roared with laughter. ‘I like you,’ she said to Penny. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone talk to my husband like that before!’ Richard groaned.

  ‘We weren’t trying to hurt your son,’ I blurted out.

  ‘Yes,’ Mary said softly. ‘I realised that once I got a better look at the three of you. You’ll have to forgive me for being rather aggressive. In the dark, you looked menacing, and the way Donnie begged for help, my goodness, I was expecting werewolves to run out of the forest.’

  Richard folded his arms and huffed loudly like he wanted his wife to side with him.

  ‘They’re children,’ Mary protested.

  At that, Richard sighed, finally letting up, like, ‘Fine, you win.’

  Mary came around the couch and sat on the armrest. ‘Now,’ she said. ‘What are your names?’

  ‘Noah Nichols.’

  ‘Penny Plum.’

  ‘Ben Braver.’

  Mary tapped the top of Noah’s head. ‘You clearly have a superpower—’

  ‘But you’re not a student,’ Richard interrupted.

  ‘Is it possible one of the seven had a child we don’t know about?’ Mary asked her husband.

  ‘Improbable,’ Richard said. ‘But not impossible.’

  I finally caved. It would’ve been a waste of time to listen to them try to figure out what our deal was, so I straight up told them. ‘We’re from the future.’

  ‘Ah-ha,’ Mary said. ‘Our son brought you here.’

  Donnie shut his eyes and waited for the scolding of a lifetime.

  ‘What’s the punishment for bringing guests from the future?’ Richard asked. ‘Should that be one or two spanks?’

  Donnie’s eyes shot open, and he stared into space like a deer caught in headlights.

  ‘You know I’m joking!’ Richard said heartily, slapping his son’s knee.

  Donnie slumped back, relieved.

  Mary clapped her hands and strolled into the kitchen. ‘Enough of this,’ she said. ‘Everybody follow me.’

  ‘…Why?’ I asked cautiously.

  Richard stood from his chair and loomed over the three of us on the couch. His eyes narrowed as a smile stretched out under his nose.

  ‘Because,’ he said.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Dinner was out of this world.

  On the menu was chicken à la king – diced chicken mixed with vegetables in a creamy sauce like gravy, and then poured over some scones – just like my mum makes.

  Richard poured everybody a glass of milk and took a seat at the end of the table, across from Mary at the other end.

  As Donnie told the story of what happened to him, we all filled our plates. Penny’s a vegetarian but didn’t want to be rude, so she scooped only vegetables onto hers.

  ‘… and then I woke up in some kind of mad scientist’s laboratory,’ Donnie said. ‘That’s when I wigged out and came back here.’

  I shoved a forkful of food into my mouth. ‘Yeah, I grabbed his shirt right when he used his power. That’s how we followed him.’

  ‘That was my favourite shirt,’ Donnie pouted.

  ‘Sorry,’ I said.

  ‘Fascinating,’ Richard said. ‘I didn’t realise you could take people with you out there.’

  ‘Ditto,’ Donnie said.

  ‘But why did you panic?’ Mary asked.

  ‘What?’ Donnie said.

  Mary dabbed the corners of her mouth with a napkin. ‘You said you … wigged out.’

  ‘Oh, right, yeah, because of the giant lizard monster in the room,’ Donnie said. ‘I forgot to mention that.’

  ‘Uh, no,’ I said. ‘There’s only one. At least I think there’s only one. And he’s not exactly a monster, he’s actually a descendant. The school was attacked—’

  ‘Kepler Academy was attacked?’ Richard said.

  ‘Yeah, by some bad guys called the Abandoned Children,’ I said. ‘They wanted Donnie.’

  ‘How did they know he was there?’ Richard asked.

  ‘Well, he showed up during …’ I stopped, not wanting to say that he showed up to his own funeral because that’s kinda messed up. ‘Uh, Donnie made a pretty big scene.’

  ‘But why would they want our son?’ Mary asked.

  Richard was on the same page as me. ‘A time traveller would be helpful to any organisation,’ he said.

  ‘Right?’ I said. ‘So we need to get back and stop them.’

  ‘Their attack on the school is nothing to worry about anymore,’ Richard stated bluntly.

  ‘What?’ I asked. ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because Donnie’s safe with us here in 1963,’ Richard said.

  ‘But they’ll still attack,’ Noah said.

  ‘They’ll lose interest when they realise he’s gone,’ Richard said firmly.

  I think he was only worried about his son, and since the Abandoned Children had no way to travel back in time, Donnie was safe, and that was that.

  Hopefully, they would lose interest after realising Donnie was gone, but I seriously doubted it.

  Mary set her fork down next to her plate. She looked at her son, perplexed. ‘What were you doing in a laboratory?’

  Donnie shrugged. ‘I dunno. I just woke up in it. I don’t even know how I got there.’

  Mary turned to me. She didn’t say anything, but it was obvious she was waiting for me to answer her question.

  I didn’t know what to say, because saying, ‘The school was going to keep your kid prisoner inside a laboratory for the rest of his life so he couldn’t use his power ever again,’ would’ve been kinda rude.

  That, and I was legit afraid of that woman.

  Noah had that look in his eye, like he didn’t want me to say something stupid. And Penny had that look in her eye like she was just waiting for me to say something stupid.

  Lucky for me, I was saved by a knock at the door.

  It wasn’t my house, but I was the one who jumped up from the table to answer it. I didn’t care – I just needed to get away from Mary’s question.

  I ran across the living room and twisted th
e doorknob on the heavy wooden door, swinging it wide open.

  Penny and Noah gasped. Pretty sure I would’ve, too, but I could hardly breathe as I stared at the face of the man on the other side.

  The man who started the academy.

  The same man who saved my life.

  It was Headmaster Kepler.

  And he’d brought pie.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  I’m not sure how long I was staring at the headmaster, but it was long enough that it got awkward. He was younger, with short hair and normal eyebrows – the headmaster in 1963. He had travelled back in time to save the world, but never returned to his timeline. That’s how he was there.

  I let him in even though it wasn’t my house.

  There he was – the man who was gonna die someday to save my life. I needed to warn him, right? To tell him what was gonna happen to him so that it didn’t happen.

  But I could barely talk.

  ‘I’d be lying if I said I was pleased to meet you, after what I’ve already been told,’ Headmaster Kepler said, ‘but I’m also not one to be rude, so …’

  He held out his hand to me.

  ‘Donald Kepler,’ he said as we shook. ‘And who might you be?’

  ‘I, uh, my name?’ I gulped. ‘Ben Braver.’

  Kepler nodded, blew right past me, set his pie on the kitchen counter, and then went straight for the dinner table, where Noah and Penny introduced themselves, too. ‘How exciting,’ he said, eyeballing Donnie. Then with the most sarcastic tone I’ve ever heard, he said …

  Donnie looked away.

  The headmaster clearly wasn’t in a fabulous mood.

  Kepler scooped food onto his plate, then he pointed his fork at Noah. ‘Mother tells me your head was on fire.’

  Donnie and Headmaster Kepler were the same person, but different ages. I had to remind myself of that or else Headmaster Kepler calling Mary his mother was gonna get weird.

  ‘Technically, it was my hair,’ Noah said. ‘I haven’t been able to put it out for a really long time.’

  ‘Your Power Dampener worked!’ Kepler said to Richard, then he turned back to Noah. ‘We’ve been testing that weapon on pig carcasses for six months now. Every carcass was completely vaporised by the net’s dampening field being too strong.’

  ‘Wait, so how’d you know it wouldn’t vaporise me?’ Noah asked Mary.

  ‘I didn’t,’ she said, unruffled.

  Whoa.

  Mama bear was protective of her cub.

  The headmaster reached his long arm across the table and grabbed a scone. ‘And what’s your power?’ he asked me.

  ‘I don’t have one, but I—’

  He moved right along like I wasn’t even there anymore. ‘And you, young miss?’

  ‘I can make the energy in my body do things,’ Penny said.

  ‘Curious,’ Kepler said. ‘What kinds of things?’

  ‘Control animals. Or explode like an atom bomb.’

  ‘That’s quite a wide range,’ Kepler said. ‘And what happens when you explode like an atom bomb?’

  ‘Uh, I die?’ she answered sarcastically.

  Kepler paused in the middle of buttering his scone and raised an eyebrow. ‘How do you know you have that ability if you die?’

  ‘Oh, it happened to a lady we knew,’ I said.

  Mary gasped.

  ‘No, I mean, it almost happened. Her brother turned her to stone to stop it, sooo …’

  Richard and Kepler shared a look.

  ‘Yup,’ I added.

  ‘My power’s too dangerous,’ Penny said, ‘so I swore I’d never use it again.’

  ‘At least not on purpose,’ I added quietly.

  Penny glared at me, her skin radiating slightly. ‘What’s that mean?’ she snipped.

  ‘C’mon, it’s obvious!’ I said. ‘Every time you freak out, your skin glows! And what the heck even happened in that hallway with the lizard monster?’

  Headmaster Kepler dropped his fork. ‘There are lizard monsters in the future? When do they attack?’

  ‘It’s not what you think,’ Richard said, disappointed.

  Penny folded her arms. ‘Worry about yourself, Ben.’

  ‘It’s for the best,’ Kepler said bluntly. ‘Powers aren’t a blessing; they’re a curse.’

  ‘Preach, preacher!’ Penny exclaimed, closing her eyes and raising her hands.

  ‘You can’t be afraid of your powers forever,’ I said.

  ‘Wanna bet?’ Penny said.

  ‘Ben’s right,’ Richard said. ‘Fear cannot control you.’

  ‘And why not?’ Kepler asked. ‘The child said she’s a walking atom bomb!’

  ‘Only if she’s taught to fear herself,’ Mary said. ‘Anybody, powers or not, is at risk of exploding if they’re taught nothing but fear their entire lives!’

  ‘Fear teaches control,’ Kepler said.

  ‘No,’ Richard said, leaning towards Penny. ‘You’ll only learn to control your power when you let go of your fear, darling.’

  ‘Yeah, right!’ Penny said super sarcastically. ‘I’m not ready to die yet, so forget that.’

  ‘All we’re saying is that there’s hope if you focus on the right thing,’ Richard said.

  ‘Pfft! And what’s the right thing?’ Penny asked.

  ‘Love,’ Mary said.

  Penny and Kepler both laughed at that answer.

  ‘Love versus fear!’ Kepler said. ‘The endless debate.’

  ‘The academy will fail if we teach fear,’ Mary said like it was her millionth time.

  ‘And the world will end if we don’t,’ Kepler said like it was his millionth time. ‘I’ve seen it happen. And I stopped it from happening again!’

  The room was so awkwardly silent that I could hear Kepler’s teeth grind.

  ‘Love versus fear?’ I asked just to make noise. ‘Shouldn’t it be love versus hate?’

  ‘Hate comes from fear,’ Richard said. ‘People often grow to hate the things they fear.’

  I thought for a moment and then ran my mouth without thinking. ‘That’s why you hate superpowers, isn’t it?’ I said to Kepler. ‘Because you’re afraid of them.’

  The headmaster studied me with his beady, narrow eyes.

  ‘Why are you even here?’ he finally asked. ‘Noah and Penny, I understand, but why you?’

  Ouch.

  ‘Because he’s a student at your school,’ Penny said, coming to my rescue. Good to know she had my back, even when we were fighting.

  ‘But you don’t have a power.’ Kepler continued to study me, deep in thought, probably wondering why he’d invite a normal dork to his school. ‘So there must be something special about you.’

  Double ouch.

  ‘Is saving the school special enough for you?’ Penny asked.

  ‘You did that?’ Kepler asked me.

  Triple ouch.

  ‘I mean, kind of, yeah,’ I said. ‘There was this woman named Abigail Cutter who went crazy and—’

  ‘Little Abigail?’ Mary said. ‘She’s a student here.’

  ‘She grows up to become a villain,’ I said. ‘She was the school security guard until she found Headmaster Kepler’s secret cave of secrets in the forest.’

  ‘That was Abigail?’ Donnie gasped. He tried to play it off, but his dad saw right through him.

  ‘What was Abigail?’ Richard asked his son.

  ‘Nothing,’ Donnie said. ‘I didn’t say anything.’

  ‘What did you do?’ the headmaster asked accusingly.

  Donnie paused. ‘I kinda ran into her … in the future.’ Richard rubbed his temples and groaned.

  ‘I didn’t mean to!’ Donnie said. ‘I dropped in next to the forest, and she saw me. She chased me, but then we fell into that weird secret cave Ben was talking about. I went back Outside before she saw that it was me, so it’s all good!’

  Oh, man. I remember that exact night.

  I couldn’t believe it.

  Neither could Penny.

&nb
sp; She dived for Donnie across the table. ‘This is all your fault!’ she screamed as Noah and I held her back.

  ‘Abigail didn’t even see me!’ Donnie said.

  ‘But she saw all those newspapers!’ I said. ‘That’s why she attacked the school! That’s why she teamed up with Angel and Lindsay! Every single thing that’s happened started because you showed up that night!’

  ‘Fine, I’ll just go back and fix it!’ Donnie barked.

  ‘NO!’ Kepler boomed. ‘The future has already been affected by you.’

  ‘Right? That’s why Donnie was in the lab,’ I said stupidly. ‘So he wouldn’t mess anything else up!’

  Noah and Penny froze.

  ‘What did you say?’ Mary asked softly.

  Whoops.

  ‘Nothing?’ I said, repeating Donnie’s words. ‘I didn’t say anything.’

  Mary leaned forward. ‘Why was my son in the lab?’

  I had already said it – no sense in dodging the question anymore. ‘Because he was a prisoner. I don’t think you were gonna let him come back here,’ I said to Kepler.

  ‘Why do you think that?’ Kepler asked.

  ‘Donnie went missing in 1963,’ I said. ‘If he was supposed to come back, then he’d be in the yearbooks, but … he’s not.’

  ‘That means he can’t stay,’ Richard whispered.

  ‘I’m not going anywhere!’ Donnie said, then he pointed a hard finger at Kepler. ‘You go Outside all the time! Why are the rules different for me?’

  ‘Because I never drop into the future!’ Kepler explained. ‘I simply observe it to keep it steady!’

  Mary’s face tightened, but tears welled in her eyes. She kicked her chair out and took her plate to the sink. ‘Well, it’s preposterous to think our Donnie won’t stay. He’s not going back to the future.’

  ‘Mary …’ Richard said with a shaky voice. ‘He has to go back.’

  Donnie sank in his seat but never argued.

  ‘No!’ Mary erupted. ‘He’s not going back. He’s staying even if we have to hide him for the rest of his life!’

  Nobody said anything because Richard was right. If Donnie disappeared in 1963, then he had to disappear in 1963 or else the future would change again.