Two Schools Out - Forever

121

"Okay, Iggy, your turn," I said, pressing a small bottle of shampoo into his hand. "And just because you can't see is no excuse to not get all the grime off."

Iggy took the shampoo, and Gazzy directed him toward the bathroom door.

My hair was still wet, dampening my T-shirt at the shoulders. We were ensconced in the lack of luxury of the Twilight Inn, which was the kind of place that had shady deals going on in all the rooms. We hadn't had baths since we'd left Anne's, and the Twilight Inn had the bonus of its own pay laundry room. I'd just gotten back with the last load of warm, dry, clean clothes, which I dumped on one of the double beds.

I felt almost human.

That was a joke-get it?

Nudge, Gazzy, Angel, and Total were on the other bed, watching TV. The kids all had their wings out, letting them dry. I sat down and shoved some laundry at Fang.

"So, Itex," he said, starting to fold and pack.

"Yep. Guess who made the laundry detergent? Guess what gas station we stopped at? Guess who made the soda you're drinking?" Now that I was looking for it, I saw the Itex logo everywhere. It was unbelievable-the company seemed to touch every aspect of our lives. But we'd never thought about it before, never noticed it.

Wordlessly Fang held up a pair of Gazzy's jeans. The back label said Itex.

"This is bad," I said, keeping my voice down.

"You idiot!" Total shouted at the TV. "It's the red one! The red one!"

"They're everywhere, all right," I said. "What's worse is, the more I think about it, the more I remember them being everywhere our whole lives. I remember Angel drinking Itex formula from an Itex bottle, and wearing Itex diapers. It's like they've been taking over the world without anyone noticing it."

"Someone noticed it," Fang said slowly, folding a shirt of Iggy's. "Someone at the School noticed it at least fourteen years ago. And built you to try to stop them."

There was my destiny again, slapping me in the face. "Built us."

"Mostly you. I'm pretty sure the rest of us are redundant." Fang sounded matter-of-fact, but the idea bothered me.

"You're not redundant to me," I said, stuffing a pair of shorts into a backpack.

Fang gave me one of his rare, quick smiles.

We turned the lights out early. I lay awake for a long time on the floor, thinking about Itex, the company that might blow up the world. My mission was to save the world. So I had to deal with Itex somehow, do something, find out something, stop them from doing something.

As a destiny, it was pretty fuzzy. It was like being told to climb Everest without a map and with no supplies. Plus be responsible for five other people. I felt overwhelmed and weirdly alone, though I was surrounded by my flock. I fell asleep hoping that maybe tomorrow I would be able to come up with something.

As it turned out, my "tomorrow" started in the pitch-darkness, with my hands and feet bound, and a strip of duct tape over my mouth.