The Curse of the King

“No!” I said. “It’s the shell of a Loculus that’s existed for thousands of years, right? What if it absorbed some of that healing power? Maybe that’s what’s keeping you and me from having episodes.”

Cass’s eyes were as wide as baseballs. Dad was staring at the shard, too, from the copilot’s seat. Together we looked at Captain Nied.

He yanked back the throttle, and the jet began to dive. “Fasten your seat belts, gents. And welcome to LA.”

* * *

It is amazing what $200 will do to a Los Angeles cabdriver.

As we twisted and turned through the city streets, palm trees and white stucco houses zoomed by in a blur. We could see the freeway in the distance, the cars at a total standstill. “Freeway is not free!” the cabdriver said in an accent I couldn’t quite figure out. “Is prison for cars!”

No one laughed. We were too busy keeping our stomachs from jumping through our mouths. Dad was on his cell phone with the hospital the whole way.

According to Dr. Karl, Aly was alive, but it wasn’t looking good.

As the taxi screeched to a stop in the hospital parking lot, we pushed our way out. I hooked my backpack around my shoulders and sprinted after Dad. He flashed his ID left and right, fast-talking his way past guards. In a moment we were on the fifth floor, barging into the intensive care unit. It was a massive room, echoing with beeps and shouts and lined with curtained-off areas.

A dark-haired woman with huge eyes peered out from behind one of the curtains. “How is she, Cindy?” Dad asked, marching across the room as if he were a regular.

“Breathing,” Dr. Karl said, “but unresponsive. Her fever is spiking around a hundred four.”

I pulled the shard out of my pocket and held tight. I almost didn’t recognize Aly. Her skin was ashen, her eyes were only half-open, and her hair was pulled back into a green hospital cap. A breathing tube snaked from her mouth to a machine against the wall, and a tangle of tubes connected her arm to an IV stand with three different fluids.

Over her head was a screen that showed her heartbeat on a graph.

Aly’s mom was holding her daughter’s hand. Her face was streaked with tears, and her narrow glasses had slipped down her nose. She looked startled to see us. “Doctor …?”

“Sorry,” Dr. Karl said, “I’m going to have to ask the kids to stay in the waiting room. Standard procedure for intensive care.”

“I have to speak to her,” I insisted.

“She won’t hear you,” Aly’s mom said. “She’s completely unresponsive.”

“Can I just touch her?” I said.

“Touch her?” Mrs. Black looked at me as if I were crazy.

“This is way beyond ICU protocol,” Dr. Karl said. “If you don’t leave now, I will have to call security—”

BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!

Cass and I jumped back. “Are they coming to get us?” Cass asked.

“It’s not a security alarm. It’s something to do with Aly!” I said. Aly’s monitors were flashing red. Her eyes sprang open and then rolled upward into her head. She let out a choking sound, and her body began to twitch. As three nurses came running from the center of the room, Dr. Karl strapped Aly’s arms down.

“What’s happening?” I demanded.

“Febrile seizure!” Dr. Karl said. “Clear the area!”

“But—” I said.

A nurse with a barrel chest and a trim beard pulled me back, and I nearly collided with Cass. As the hospital staff closed in around Aly’s bed, we both stumbled back toward the entrance.

“They’re killing her, Jack!” Cass said. “Do something!”

I dropped my pack. “I’m going invisible. It’s the only way I can get to her.”

“There’s no room for you,” Cass said. “If you barge in, they will feel you, Jack. It’ll freak everybody out. Total chaos, and it won’t be good for her.”

“Any other ideas?” I said.

Cass nodded. “Yeah. I’ll distract them. Give me three seconds.”

“What?”

But Cass was already running away, heading toward the table that contained the medical equipment and monitors.

One …

I reached into the pack and lifted out the Loculus of Invisibility.

Two …

As I stepped forward, the loud beeps stopped. I looked toward the monitors. They were dark. Aly’s equipment had shut down completely. Cass was scampering away from the wall socket, where he had pulled out the plugs.

Three!

I heard a shout. Two nurses broke away from Aly, scrambling toward the equipment, leaving her right side wide open. I raced toward her, clutching the Loculus of Invisibility with one hand and the shard with the other. Dr. Karl was injecting something into her left arm, concentrating hard.

Aly’s chest was still. She wasn’t breathing. I placed the shard on her stomach, just below her ribs.

“The pads—now!” Dr. Karl shouted. “We’re losing her!”

“Come on …” I said under my breath. “Come on, Aly. You have to live.” Aly’s eyes stared upward, green and bright, dancing in the light even in her unconsciousness. I felt like I could talk to her, like she’d answer me back with some kind of geeky joke. I wanted to see her smile.

But there was no reaction. Not a fraction of an inch of movement.

A doctor was racing toward Aly with two pads strapped to his hands. They were going to try to shock her alive. I pressed the shard harder into her abdomen. I guess I was crying, because tears were falling onto her face.

Aly’s mom bumped into me and screamed. It wouldn’t be much longer before my invisible presence was going to be a big deal.

“We have power!” a voice barked. With a soft whoosh, the monitors fired up and the lights blinked on. The heartbeat graph showed a long, horizontal, flat line.

Dead. A flat line meant dead.

The doctor placed the pads on either side of Aly’s chest but I did not take my hand away—not even when they shot electricity through her, and her body flopped like a rag doll.

It wasn’t working.