In Aissaba’s ear, she heard the Master of Mind’s unhelpful warning: We’ve lost track of the Humvee. Keep an eye out.

It was parked just outside the distortion field, doors open, engine on – its former passengers huddled at the edge of the treeline not far away. Tassadu gaped at this state of affairs, mouth as wide as the vehicle’s doors. With a subtle movement of his eyebrow and jerk of the head, he suggested to Aissaba that it would be funny to jump in and drive away.

This brought Aissaba dangerously close to laughter, so she squeezed her eyes shut. (Blink: Cassandra watched Dad’s jaw as he watched the house. Her Geiger counter for parental stress was clicking like crazy. But then a chill on the back of her neck prompted her to look back over her shoulder, suddenly certain that the trees were watching.)

When Aissaba opened her eyes, Tassadu was eating an apple rather calmly – poking holes with his fangs and sucking the juices out. He could have been at a theater, completely at ease, in spite of the fact that Cassandra seemed to be looking right at them.

“So, is it robbers?” said Orion.

“Not robbers,” said Joanne, with what seemed to be excitement. Or insanity. Aissaba couldn’t tell. “It’s Fortress dwellers. Look!” She showed Orion and Cassandra something on her phone.

Aissaba’s stomach dropped. (Blink: It was a recording of Aissaba and Tassadu from the hidden camera in Mom’s office. Cassandra’s stomach dropped. “Those are the ones we saw!” exclaimed Orion. He was being overly helpful – trying to get out of being grounded.)

The apple froze on the way to Tassadu’s tongue.

“They may still be inside,” said Joanne, excitedly. “Nothing has tripped the door alarms yet.”

“What about the motion detectors?” said Cassandra, still looking in Aissaba’s direction.

“They’ve been off since last Christmas,” grumbled Cody Johnson. “Someone’s cat kept setting it off.”

This put the parents in a dark mood for several minutes, during which Joanne said something about the cat being “a registered therapy animal,” to which Cody responded that his dad’s hospital room had been “cluttered with crystals today,” which inspired a rebuttal about Cody being lucky to have Orion and Cassandra to take care of him on his future deathbed.

Aissaba couldn’t follow the logic, eyes on Joanne’s phone the whole time. If only they had a language pebble. Could probably delete the video data remotely.

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Tassadu was already moving to the edge of the distortion field farthest from the Johnsons. There, in the dirt, was one of the mind pebbles, and Aissaba could tell from the look on his face that he was weighing the idea of re-flashing it.

Aissaba put a hand on his arm and shook her head. Too risky. Not only would it weaken the distortion field at the worst possible moment – but also, there was no guarantee that the mind pebble would withstand the strain of being repurposed. Plus, Aissaba doubted the Master of Mind had given them pebbles that could be re-flashed as easily as Tassadu’s pebbles – which meant they would need to be wiped first.

To do that, Tassadu would need the pebbles sitting in the pockets of the two kids right in front of them. This had gone on long enough, Aissaba decided. Tassadu’s advocatus diaboli crap aside, it was time to get those pebbles out of the hands of the twelve year olds.

Taking a deep breath, she sat with her trunk to the apple tree and closed her eyes.

(Blink: Heart pounding, Cassandra asked her mother what she was planning to do with the video of the girl and the dragon snooping through the books in her office. “I need to ask your grandfather,” she said. “He was right about putting you on the bus, and I think he’ll know what to do now.” Cassandra said she needed to pee, and Dad gestured toward the depths of the forest, as if the solution were obvious. She began to wander in the general direction of a basin not too far away.)

***

Cassandra stood at the edge of the basin. Behind her, Orion was trying to sound excited about whatever Mom and Dad were excited about – which was always hard to determine. Were they happy that people from the Fortress had come? Mom certainly seemed to think it was significant. She hadn’t acted this giddy since her books had gotten accepted for publication.

(Blink: Aissaba sat with her back to a tree, looking up at the edge of the basin where Cassandra stood. Tassadu was right in front of the girl, his face seeming to say, Should I grab her? I could literally grab her right now.)

Cassandra took a step backward. Major goosebumps. She didn’t scream, though. Aissaba and Tassadu didn’t seem like the kidnapping type. Plus, they couldn’t exactly leave the basin without being seen. And Mom and Dad both had guns.

Cassandra closed her eyes. (Blink: Aissaba found herself realizing that Cassandra was realizing that Aissaba was realizing that they were caught in some kind of blink-loop. “Cassandra, we could really use those pebbles. Kinda in some trouble here…”)

And suddenly Cassandra realized that, for once in her life, she might be able to turn a situation to her advantage. Going to school sucked. Being grounded sucked. Having parents who were going crazy sucked. Having a grandpa who was already crazy, not to mention almost dead, sucked.

It had gone on long enough. Maybe, just maybe, the pebble in her pocket was the key to making everything not so sucky. I’ll think about it, Cassandra mouthed to the empty basin. But first, I have some requests.