The Legend of the Rift (30 page)

NISSI, THE LOST WORLD,

WELCOMES YOU!

T
HE BANNER STARED
down at us as we finished up breakfast. It was like some cruel reminder of everything I'd just experienced—or thought I had.

I half expected to blink and see the black tower of Mount Onyx, the odd brick buildings of the Karai Institute. But we were in some big old tourist resort, vast, manicured, and flat, with towering palm trees set against blue skies. All around us were dads wearing Hawaiian shirts and moms loading up strollers with stolen supplies from the buffet table. And vice versa. Just outside the door was a gigantic
pool with a waterslide shaped vaguely like a green dinosaur. Mom and Dad spent the whole meal jabbering on about animals and exhibits. They both knew this scientist and that, and I was sure we'd spend many hours chuckling over tea and talking about genetics.

It all felt familiar. It all felt like I just woke up on Mars. So the two sensations canceled each other out, leaving me just plain numb.

Part of me wanted to run into the middle of the breakfast area and dance my butt off—because Mom was alive and Dad wasn't running away from home and we were together and nothing had ever been wrong.

But another part of me felt like my life was a great big PowerPoint presentation and a virus had just swept in and replaced all the slides.

Torquin . . . Marco, Cass, and Aly . . . the Seven Wonders . . . Professor Bhegad and Brother Dimitrios and Daria and Canavar and Crazy Farouk . . . they couldn't have just been thoughts and dreams.

Could they?

“Onward!” Dad trumpeted as he swigged his last bit of black coffee.

“Aren't you hungry, Jackie?” Mom asked, frowning at the untouched omelet on my plate.

“Tummy ache,” I said.

She handed me a banana from her tray. “Well, take this,”
she said. “Just in case you do get hungry. It'll be gentle on your stomach.”

I tucked the banana into my shirt pocket, which looked ridiculous, but in this crowd of tourists, no one would care. As we walked outside, the weather slammed me like a fist. Compared to the frigid AC of the hotel, the air was heavy and hot—and it was still morning.

We took a tram ride that raced along a lush tropical preserve. Our first stop was called Simian Surprises.

A canned voice spoke to us through the tram PA: “As on the island of Komodo, where the famed Komodo dragon survived to modern times, so, too, here in Nissi were found extraordinary examples of evolutionary anomalies not seen anywhere else in the world. At Lost World we preserve natural habitats, which necessitate sometimes dense tree covers, so walking visitors are urged to be patient. Do not under any circumstances attempt to feed the animals or even pretend to, and stay behind the Plexiglas barriers. . . .”

And blah, blah, blah.

I was tired and cranky before we even climbed down the stairs.

Our tour guide led us down a path between two extremely high Plexiglas walls. Kids had scraped words into the plastic, and by reading them I knew that Nick loved Jennie, and Taki “wuz hear,” and someone felt the need to write FIXX about a zillion times.

All I could see behind the scratched plastic was thick clumps of palm trees and an occasional bird. I slowed down so the grown-ups would go on ahead and let my eyes wander upward. I heard a monkeylike screech and imagined Qalani becoming the Omphalos while trapped inside jungle animals. “Hello, my queen,” I murmured.

The screech sounded again, this time a bit closer.

I looked left and right, and took the banana from my pocket. “Here, monkey, monkey, monkey!” I said. “Want some breakfast?”

“EEEEEEEEEE!”

A black figure dropped from the trees and slammed itself against the Plexiglas. I dropped the banana and fell to the ground as the creature spat a yellow glob that slimed the wall and dripped down.

The guide came running around the bend. He was trying to act all friendly, but I could see the anger in his face. “Oh dear, the black maimou must have smelled that banana, ha-ha!” he said with forced cheer. “This is exactly why we posted all the Do Not Feed the Animals signs!”

I bolted to my feet, staring into the yellow eyes of my assailant.

I knew that glare. I knew it very well. “It's not a maimou. . . .” I said.

“Excuse me?” the guide said.

The creature bared its teeth at me through the plastic and spat again.

“I'm not crazy. . . .” I turned to the guide and laughed. “I didn't dream it!”

“No, no, no, no,” the guide said, “these animals are nightmarish indeed but very real—”

“It's a vizzeet,” I said. “It's called a vizzeet and it spits poison.”

“Uh, ladies and gentlemen, the maimou's venom sac has been surgically neutralized so that any contact with its saliva is perfectly harmless”—he chuckled—“if a bit unsightly.”

As he walked onward with the group, Mom and Dad stayed behind. “Jack, are you all right?”

“I'm fine,” I said. “I'm fine and I'm not crazy. I'm not.
Where is this place?
”

They gave each other a look. “We've been talking about this for weeks, Jack,” Dad said.

“It's Nissi, the lost island in the tropics?” Mom added. “The place that somehow escaped being discovered until it was picked up by satellite a few years ago?
Ding, ding, ding
. . . ring any bells?”

“Right,” I said. “That's right. The island didn't sink. This is it. We went through the rift and the rift closed. Forever. The Loculi are gone! They're gone and there was never a Karai Institute or any Massa. I'm not the Tailor anymore. Or the Destroyer. I don't have to rule!
Do you know what this means?
Woo-HOO!”

A maniac. A raving lunatic. I knew I sounded like that, but I couldn't help it.

Mom and Dad gave each other a look and burst out
laughing. “Another short story, yes!” Dad shouted. “I love the way your mind works, Jack. Everything a springboard for an idea. You will do this for a living someday. I know it. An author of a children's adventure series!”

“Make sure you include a little romance,” Mom said with a wink. “Now come on. Let's do some more exploring.”

As we walked on, all I could think about was Aly. And that made my collar feel about three hundred degrees hotter.

I had to find out about her. About Marco and Cass and Eloise. I had to know if they existed. But to do this, I would need some time alone.

We nearly ran into another family, a couple and three kids, heading into an enormous, high-roofed building that echoed with screeches. The eldest brother was maybe a year or so older than me, taking a zillion photos with his phone. Just inside the door, I could see a bright red dot in the middle of his image. I followed his line of sight to a branch on a tree way up by the opposite wall. The entire wall was constructed of caves, and at the very top one I saw a flurry of red.

To a hushed chorus of oohs and ahhs, a griffin flew out and perched on a branch. As it glowered down, it seemed to fix its icy yellow gaze on me.

CAAAAAAAAAWWWW!

At the sound of its screech I gasped and instinctively dropped to the ground.

“What on earth is going on?” the guide said. “Shall I call nine one one?”

I jumped to my feet, staring warily up at the griffin. “Sorry,” I said. “Sorry . . .”

The big red bird turned lazily on its perch and flew back into the cave.

Mom put a protective arm around me and smiled at the guide. “He hasn't seen one of those before, that's all.”

The older kid was still clutching his phone. With his free hand he dusted the dirt off the side of my shirt. “It's okay,” he said. “I was scared my first time, too.”

“Thanks . . .” I said.

“Randy,” he said with a smile. “You?”

“Jack.”

As he turned to walk with his family, I caught a look at his backpack:

I let out a laugh so loud, even the griffin looked.

“He didn't die. . . .” I murmured. “This kid. Randall. He didn't die in the bowling alley—he's alive. He's over fourteen and he's alive. And he's here!”

“Hmm?” Dad said absentmindedly, tapping away at his phone. “Just a sec, Jack.”

I watched Randall Cromarty walk away. His hair was cut short, and as he walked around the bend to the cafeteria, the sunlight reflected against the back of his head.

I could make out the vague outline of a lambda.

Mom saw me staring. She smiled. “I noticed that. He's got it, too. Your birthmark.”

“My birthmark?” I said. “But . . .”

“I saw you looking at your head this morning,” she said. “It's not unattractive, you know. Just white hair. Some kids think it's cool. And hair dye does have chemicals . . .”

“Don't dye it!” I said. “I mean, please. Let's stop dyeing it, okay? I don't mind anymore.”

She shrugged. “Sure, Jackie. No problem either way.”

“Honey,” Dad said. “We're late for that lecture.”

Mom rolled her eyes. “The numerologist? Tamasi?”

“Archaeologist,” Dad said. “He just loves analyzing finds based on numerical theories. Anyway, I like him. Hurry.”

We raced out of the exhibit and back onto the tram. I could barely think straight. As the tram passed over the
preserve, I heard screeches and snorts. I think I caught a glimpse of a hose-beaked vromaski, but I wasn't sure. It was a vast place, and I could not see far enough to any beach, but still . . .

This was the island. It had to be.

We had destroyed the Loculi with the kopadi. Which meant the Heptakiklos imploded, burying the great Atlantean power, the Telion. We had made it through the rift in time. Somehow.

If I was right, Karai's genetic engineering—the G7W death curse—never happened. And no Loculi were ever taken away to be hidden and protected.

“Penny for your thoughts, Jack,” Mom said, as the tram stopped at the exhibition hall.

“Can we visit the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World someday?” I asked.

“The Lighthouse of Alexandria, the Great Pyramid of Giza, the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus, the Colossus of Rhodes, the Temple of Artemis, the Statue of Zeus at Olympia, and . . .” Dad squinched his eyes shut. “I always forget one. . . .”

“The Great Wall?” Mom guessed.

“The Hanging Gardens of Babylon,” I said.

“Good one, Jack!” Dad said.

“So . . . they existed?” I said. “They were all built anyway?”

Dad snuck a look at Mom, as the tram came to a stop. “He's really in his own world today, isn't he? Come on.”

We climbed down and ran up the stairs to an old building, past a sign that said,
Today! 9:00
A.M.
Hear Professor Radamanthus Tamasi Discuss the Numerological Basis of Nissi's Archaeological Past!

This was crazy. But . . .

“Tamasi?”
I looked closely at the image—a craggy-faced guy with thick glasses, wispy gray hair, and a distracted look. “Isn't this guy named—?”

“Tamasi is his real name,” Dad said. “But you're right, he never goes by it. Has this thing about the number seven. It repeats itself in nature and archaeology in all kinds of odd ways.”

“One, four, two, eight, five, seven . . .” I said. “Every seventh is a combination of those digits in that order.”

“Good for you, Jack!” Dad said. “So this guy decides to create a kind of stage name for himself—”

“Bhegad?” I blurted out.

“How did you know that?” Mom asked.

BHEGAD. Of course. It wasn't a real name. I couldn't believe I hadn't seen this before.

“Check this out.” I grabbed a brochure from my pocket and scribbled on it: