The Afterlife Academy (24 page)

“W
hy isn't this working?” Wisdom mumbled as Charlie finished reading the passage.

At that moment, an immense, hairy demon dropped through the ceiling and squished a cluster of smaller demons. Looking bewildered, the new creature stood up, knocked Hoonga over, and stomped on Trutti.

“Trutti, wake up!” Hoonga smacked the bat-eared demon's cheeks until the creature revived, blinking and dizzy.

“What happened?” Trutti whimpered with a drunken voice.

“Yes, what
did
happen?” Wisdom pored over the pages Charlie had been assigned to read. “That wasn't the Gateway spell. What did you read?”

“What you told me to read!” Charlie fired back.

Wisdom's lips moved as he read silently and his eyes darted down the page. “Oh.” A look of slight embarrassment formed on his face. “Yep. Wrong one. Give me a second.”

The demons murmured disgruntledly.

“Settle down!” Wisdom flashed the Celestial stone again, and the demons shielded their eyes. Charlie could tell from their angered expressions that the creatures wanted to crush Wisdom as much as they did Charlie.

“Here we are.” Wisdom nodded with self-assurance. He jabbed a new page and passage with his index finger and smiled. “You can see why I'd make the mistake. They're almost identical in verbiage.” He laughed, and Charlie mimicked him. The smile slipped from Wisdom's face, and he shoved Charlie's head down until his nose pressed against the page.

“Don't get cute!” he hissed. “Just read!”

Charlie stared at the words. Something felt different about this passage. He knew it in his bones. Reading those words would open the Gateway. Would change the fate of the world. Hesitating, he looked pleadingly up at Wisdom. How could he offer himself up as a sacrifice and possibly become the catalyst for global terror? He was twelve years old! He hadn't fully grown up yet. He still needed braces. Why did he have to find that stupid book in that stupid hole at Victory Junction?

Wisdom snapped his fingers impatiently, and Noral and Pidge carried Charlie's parents and Melissa into the room. Their mouths were covered, and they looked both confused and terrified.

“Don't make me do something I don't want to, Charlie.” Wisdom's words flowed smooth with poison.

Charlie stared at his mom and dad. They struggled against the firm grip of their captors, voices muffled. As much as he hated the idea of dying, watching his parents suffer would be far worse, and he'd still have to give his soul to the book.

Charlie looked at Melissa. “I'm sorry.” It was all he could think to say.

Melissa was handling herself much better than the Dewdles, although even years of scouring SpiritSpy.org couldn't have prepared her for this.

Taking a deep breath, Charlie began to read. The stirring in the room ceased. Every demon held its tongue, and Wisdom's eyes twinkled with delight. The room grew intensely cold, and Charlie's breath crystallized in the air. He shivered but continued reading.

“Don't stop!” Wisdom shouted as a strong wind began to blow through the locker room. The lights dimmed as the temperature continued to drop. Charlie could sense something forming above him, a massive opening, a dark, cavernous hole, but he didn't dare look up from the pages of
The Summoner's Handbook.
He finished the first paragraph and clenched his jaw, trying not to throw up. Only a few sentences remained before the ceremony was complete. Couldn't he at least say goodbye to his parents?

Wisdom pressed a hand on Charlie's shoulder. “Almost there!”

As Charlie read, his mind pulled away from the moment. He recalled that first night when the shades had swarmed his bedroom. At that moment, his life, and the hundreds of hours he had spent investigating the world of the unexplained, the supernatural, had been validated. He had proof of something more—something outside of human beings and his normal, everyday life.

Charlie smiled as he replayed his first conversations with Walter. He couldn't believe it, but he missed that kid. If only Walter were there, Charlie knew they'd find a way out of this mess together.

“Uh, excuse me?” a voice called out.

Charlie stopped reading and looked up.

Walter Prairie was standing in the doorway.

At least thirty pairs of eyes flashed across the room.

“Have any of you seen a young boy, medium height, orange hair, freckles?” Walter continued. “A total dork.”

No one moved.

“What the heck are you doing here?” Charlie asked.

“I followed you. I couldn't let you mess up the world without me at least kicking a few butts!”

Wisdom stamped his feet up and down. “Don't just stand there like a bunch of idiots!” he shouted at the demons. “Grab him!”

All at once, the demons wailed and charged Walter. Hoonga reached him first, snatching him in his arms and roaring into his face. “Foolish move!”

“Yikes!” Walter said. “You need some mouthwash.”

Hoonga squeezed, and Walter gasped from the pressure. “Feel that? That's the pain of me crushing your soul. You will not survive this, boy! You will never come back from where I send you!”

Walter's lips moved, but no words escaped his mouth.

“No!” Charlie shouted.

“Don't stop reading!” Wisdom ordered. “Finish it!”

Charlie's eyes flashed from Wisdom to the book and then to Walter. “Let him go!” he demanded. “Let him go, or I'll close the book!” He nudged the book with his knees, and it threatened to fall.

“No!” Wisdom screamed. “Read it, or your parents die!”

“Let him go! Stop hurting him!” Charlie shouted.

Wisdom whirled and kicked a small scaly demon with his foot, sending it crashing into the lockers with a deafening bang.

“Argh! Let him go, Hoonga!” Wisdom commanded.

Hoonga continued to crush Walter with his arms.

“Pain!” he snarled. “Feel it draining you of life. Feel it burning in your veins!”

“Did you hear me?” Wisdom shouted. “I said let him go!”

Hoonga still refused to acknowledge the order. Wisdom stomped across the room and shoved his Celestial stone directly in front of the demon's eye. Walter fell from Hoonga's arms and scampered across the floor, gasping for breath. Wisdom kept the stone next to Hoonga for several seconds, ignoring his pleas for mercy, then pulled it away, leaving Hoonga whimpering in the corner. “You do as you're told! That's my last warning!” He brandished the stone in the faces of the other demons. “All of you! Do you hear me? Is that clear? I will have order and control. Do not force me to make an example of one of you, because I will!”

With Wisdom's attention drawn toward scolding his minions, Walter crawled over to Charlie and started untying him. “What's up?” Walter asked.

Charlie kept his eyes on Wisdom, who was parading around with the brilliant orb pulsating in his hand. At any moment, order would be restored in the locker room, and when that happened, both he and Walter were as good as dead.

“Oh, not much.”

“So you can see me now, huh?”

“Uh, yeah.” Why was Walter making small talk? “Look, you shouldn't have come down here. They're going to kill all of us. Do you know you're glowing, by the way?”

“Really?” Walter stared down at his uniform. “Cool. I'm not supposed to. Teague sprayed me with some gunk to dim my aura.”

“That doesn't make any sense,” Charlie whispered. “And who's Teague?”

“You'll see in about twelve seconds.”

“See what?”

“I still have a few tricks up my sleeve.” Climbing to his feet, Walter cupped his hands around his mouth and yelled,
“Now!”

As Wisdom stood, scolding his Underworld servants, thirty-three Afterlife Academy Agents stormed the locker room from both entrances, charging the demons and zapping them with light.

The demons crashed into one another, roaring and squealing. They clawed strips of paint from the walls and smacked lockers and benches. The tight quarters of the locker room made it almost impossible for them to dodge the Agents' weapons.

“Holy cow! Are they with
you
?” Charlie's arms now free, he shoved
The Summoner's Handbook
off his knees, and the gaping hole in the ceiling vanished with a swirling pop.

Wisdom screamed in agony, but with all the demons and Agents scrambling around him, he couldn't make his way to collect the book. The Logan brothers circled one of the Jell-O demons and exploded it with bursts of light, spraying orange goo all over the room.

The other demons scattered. Some of them charged through the entryway, but they crashed backward into the room when they bounced into a pulsating shield the Agents had created. Noral and Pidge abandoned their post, dropping Mr. and Mrs. Dewdle and Melissa to the floor with a thud, and scampered away. The Dewdles rolled around, trying to free themselves from their bindings.

Charlie's mom's gag loosened. “The magic show has to end sometime!” she snapped. “This is not polite. You let my son go right now, Mr. Willows!”

The three of them still couldn't see any of the monsters or Agents, but they could see Charlie, who was now completely free of his bindings, and Wisdom flinching and shouting.

“Duck!” Charlie screamed. Walter dropped down just as a slime-covered snake demon, no bigger than a common raccoon, was hurled through the air by one of the Agents and skimmed across the top of Charlie's head. The demon left a trail of goop in its wake, and Charlie's hair stood on end as if doused in styling mousse.

Hoonga, already injured from his earlier fight with Walter and Wisdom's Celestial stone, took one look at the much stronger Agents, grabbed Trutti by the ears, and plowed through the middle of the chaos. Agents scattered away from his massive frame, and a sound of shattering glass rang out from the stairwell. The demon had created a gaping Hoonga-shaped hole in the shield.

Gorge fought his way out of a corner and collapsed upon Ronald, gnashing his teeth near the boy's throat. Walter reacted instinctively, and a long purple spear appeared in his hand. Charlie's mouth fell open in shock, but Walter didn't pause to admire his own creation. With an ear-piercing battle cry, he heaved the spear straight through Gorge's chest. The demon dissolved into nothing.

“Nice!” Charlie cheered.

“I know!” Walter nodded enthusiastically.

“Do you think we could untie my parents and Melissa?” Charlie asked.

“I think they're safer staying in one spot.”

The same slimy snake demon from earlier slithered toward them, snapping its fangs and hissing. The creature lunged for Walter's ankle.

“Look out!” Charlie kicked the demon, launching it across the room.

“Nice one!” Walter cheered. “Thanks!”

“No problem.”

As the demons began to thin out, those remaining scanned the locker room desperately searching for an escape. But three of the Agents had already set up another shield blocking the path to the rear exit. With nowhere to go, the creatures bristled, ready to take down as many Agents as they could with them.

“Stop!”
Wisdom's voice rose above the noise.

The room filled with a throbbing purple light from Wisdom's Celestial stone, and the fighting paused as Agents and Underworld creatures shielded their eyes from its magnificent brilliance.

“You are all intruding on a sanctioned ceremony! I have been given permission to conduct this from Darwin Pollock, Head Assigner of Agents for HLTA. I have a signed document. So stop interfering and leave at once!”

“Darwin's been fired and arrested, you pip-squeak!” Ronald said.

Wisdom wavered on his feet, his eyes homing in on Ronald. “Is that a fact? Well, no matter. The contract is still binding!”

“Darwin acted on his own accord. That contract has no power over our actions!” Teague said.