Zack, Perry, Blake and Rachel stood over Zack’s tiny kitchen table, pouring over Rachel’s laptop. They had pulled up whatever specs they could find about the old Alpha House, but there wasn’t a ton to go on.

“Aren’t there secret passages?” Rachel said. “Couldn’t we just get in that way?”

Zack crossed his arms and sighed. “From what Scott tells me, the staircases disappear at odd times. And as for the secret passages, they are there…but I don’t know where.”

“I could read his mind?” Rachel offered.

“Whose?” Zack said with a hint of impatience.

“I don’t know…the advisor guy…Max you something??” Rachel shrugged.

“Good luck with that. He’s usually three sheets to the wind,” Zack said with a dismissive flick of his hand. “And he lies through his teeth when he’s sober.”

Blake immediately sprang up. “I don’t hear you offering up any plans here!”

Perry immediately raised his hands. “We’re getting too hot on this. We need to calm down.”

Zack wanted to apologize. He looked at Rachel, only for her eyes to dart away. She avoided his gaze. She hadn’t met his eyes all night.

“Can’t we just…I don’t know…talk Kane down?” Perry said. “I mean what does he gain if the whole college collapses?”

Zack sighed. “Max isn’t the college’s biggest fan to begin with, and I’m betting Kaine’s no better.”

“Yeah, but Perry is right. What’s his game here?” Blake said. Rachel continued to plug away on the laptop.

Zack realized they were right. What was Kaine’s game?

“Last time I talked to him, he’d clearly taken the crazy juice,” Zack replied.

“I’m not reading a crazy person,” Rachel said. “Been there, done that. I didn’t like it the first time.”

Zack looked at Rachel. Once again, she didn’t look back. Instead she clicked through several scenic pictures of the landscapes around campus on the Innshadow website. One caught Zack’s eye when he saw the nearby rivers and lakes which bordered Innshadow’s property.

“Underground springs,” Zack said. “That’s what Kaine is after.”

Everyone stared at him with a blank expression. An uncomfortable silence hung over the room.

“Come again?” Perry finally said.

Zack sighed, wondering how exactly to parse this information.

“It’s a long story…Max wants to be young forever,” Zack said.

“Wait wait, how old is this guy?” Blake asked.

“Like seventy going on thirty,” Zack replied.

“I’m going to pretend that makes sense,” Blake said, but Zack continued.

“He thinks the underground springs will keep him young. He wants Innshadow to help him, but they haven’t, mostly because his aging clearly isn’t their top priority,” Zack said.

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

“I can see his point,” Blake said, flicking back her blonde locks. “I’m getting gray hairs just thinking about it.”

Perry nodded. “So Kaine cut out the middle man.”

“Exactly. He’s getting the spring water using the Magnometer,” Zack said.

Perry took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. “So how is he causing earthquakes?”

Blake cleared her throat. “I read up on Amber Shaw. Her time as Miss Magnitude was intense. She was one of the top ten most powerful heroines of her time. She didn’t just start earthquakes. She controlled the earth itself.”

Perry fixed a serious look to Zack. “And if he was off the slightest fraction, he could disrupt the faultline…or worse.”

“Why is there always a ‘worse’?” Blake sighed.

Rachel finally spoke up. “Great. So we know the motivation . . . and the stakes . . . but we still are no closer to finding a solution.”

A dense silence once again filled the room. However, once again, Rachel spoke up, and this time, she met Zack’s eyes.

Rachel looked up. “It’s really just Kaine we have to deal with.”

Perry looked up at him. “Aren’t you forgetting about the dozen or so frat boys?”

“Yeah, I fought them head-on,” Zack said, feeling the bumps and bruises from his bout with the freshman. “It did not go great.”

“Yeah, but they’re still boys,” Blake said with a smirk.

Perry gave her an odd look. “Yes, as we’ve established, they are boys who belong to a frat.”

Blake’s smirk grew into an outright grin.

“Why am I suddenly afraid?” Perry said. Rachel looked at her.

“That…just might work,” she said. Blake immediately turned to her.

“Hey no fair reading minds!” Blake said with a flick of annoyance.

“Sorry, force of habit,” Rachel smirked. Zack leaned on her chair.

“Do I get to know the plan?” Zack asked. Rachel spun around to face her.

“A diversion. One to lure the Alphas away,” Rachel looked up at him.

Zack thought about it for a second. He really didn’t want to take on the entire Alpha frat by himself, not when it had already gone poorly to begin with. He frankly wasn’t sure the Knightbrand armor could handle all of them at once either.

“Okay,” Zack said. “What kind of diversion?”

Blake pursed her lips. “You just leave that to me . . . and Perry.”

“Yep, I’m terrified,” Perry said. Blake gave him a mischievous look.

“Oh you should be,” Blake said.

This could work.

“So I’ll sneak back into the Alpha House, confront Kaine, and then grab the Magnometer,” Zack said.

“Could we just call Scott and have him take it?” Perry spoke up.

Zack almost kicked himself for not thinking of that sooner. With the rest of the Alphas distracted, Scott could feasibly just run in and grab it..

The only problem was that he and Scott were not on the greatest terms. And Zack couldn’t really blame him, the way he had treated him.

“Scott’s really tied into Alpha House. He’s trying to get a scholarship,” Zack said. “I don’t want to jeopardize that.”

The silence returned once more. Zack broke it before the quiet could linger.

“So we’re back to the original plan,” Zack said. “I’ll grab-”

Rachel stood up. “No, we will grab it.”

Zack started to say something but Rachel hushed him.

“You’ll need my help to locate any secret passages, remember?” Rachel said. “I can read anyone who might know where they are.”

“It could be dangerous,” Zack said. “Especially if we find Kaine.”

“Let him,” Rachel stood up and put her hands on her hips. “You think Dirk Saber hired me as his TA because, what, I’m just a pretty face.”

Zack started to say something.

“Dude…” Perry said.

“Don’t answer that,” Blake chimed in.

Zack knew there was no point in arguing. So he simply sighed.

“I guess it’s settled,” he said. “Either way, this ends tonight.”

Zack only hoped it was true.