Chapter 13

Alan

       "Why are we here so early?" I asked as me and my siblings got to the HQ at eight in the morning. We had never gotten here at this time before, and while I wasn't one to sleep in, even eight was too early to be here.

       "You'll see," Grandpa said as he led us to the main area where Jerome and Mae were waiting.

       Lately, Jerome and Mae had been helping out us Protectors a lot, and I knew part of it was because they were each attracted to one of my siblings. I didn't care. Whatever the reason was, their help was what we needed recently.

       "So, I might have found a way we can beat Dirk," Jerome said. "And we need to get it done as soon as possible since he has a lot of vampires on his team, and they're unable to attack until the night."

       "Unless they portal to here again," Ryder pointed out.

       "Which will be quite improbable since I created a barrier that only lets me portal in to here," Jerome said. "Anyway, there's this really powerful spell book that no sorcerer knows the location of. It has a lot of spells that nobody has even attempted yet, which means if we find it before Dirk does, I'll have a lot more leverage over him."

       "Okay, but there's just one problem," I said. "You said no sorcerer knows the location of it. How can we find it if you don't know where it is?"

       "Because I don't know exactly where it is," Jerome said. "But we might be able to find it out. The last person to have it was a friend of Mae's great-grandmother, and he thought it would have been a lot safer if he hid it where no one can find it. The only person who knew the location was Mae's great-grandmother since she was a siren so she wouldn't have any use to it."

       "My great-grandmother wrote the location in her journal," Mae said, and I just noticed she was holding a leather journal. "Well, not the exact location. More of a puzzle to get to it. All we have to do is solve it and we'll know. I hope the six of us will be able to solve it."

        "Only one of us should work on it," Orchid said. "Just in case we have to flip through the journal, and it will be easier for one person to look at it thoroughly."

       "Okay, but who?" Mae asked.

       "I've got this," I said, taking the book out of Mae's hands before handing it to Nolan. "Here you go. I'm giving you five minutes."

       Nolan furrowed his eyebrows. "Five minutes? That's not enough time."

       "No, that's not the max time you're allowed to solve it," I said. "I'm saying that's how long it will take you to solve it."

       I was right. 

       Though it actually only took him three minutes before he said, "Got it.

       "Already?" Mae asked.

       "Told you," I said. "This guy is a puzzle genius."

       "How'd you solve it?" Mae asked. "It was literally just a bunch of random letters."

       "I know," Nolan said. "I thought that the key to the puzzle was going to be on another page, and it was. In the corner of the very last page was A with an arrow pointing to Q, so I guessed any A's would be a Q, which meant B's would be R and so on. So Q-B-J-U-H-D-Q-U K-D-Y-L-U-H-I-U spells A-L-T-E-R-N-A-T-E U-N-I-V-E-R-S-E."

       "It's in an alternate universe?" I asked. "Two things. One, how on earth do we get there? And two, where exactly would it be in the alternate universe?"

       "Maybe there's another clue in the journal?" Orchid suggested.

       "I'll check," Nolan said, flipping through the journal before landing on a page and looking at it. "Hold on....It's at the high school close by."

       "Now there's just one more thing we have to figure out," Mae said. "How do we get to the alternate universe, and who will be going?"

       "Well, I won't be able to go," Jerome said. "I can make a portal to go there, but I don't know if I'll have my magic in the alternate universe, so I have to stay back to open up the portal again."

       "I wanna go," I said. "I'm barely given a bit mission on my own."

       "And you'll continue not getting one on your own," Grandpa spoke up. "You can go, but I'm not letting you go alone. Pick someone to go with you."

       Normally, Ryder was my go-to mission partner but right now, I'd prefer going with Nolan. He had been spending a lot of time with Jerome recently, so he'd be the one most likely able to know a spell book when he sees one. 

       And while Ryder was the most intelligent one of the family, Nolan was honestly a bit better than Ryder when it came to puzzles. Ryder always thought logically, when Nolan was an outside of the box thinker.

       "I'll bring Nolan with me," I said.

       "What?" Ryder asked. "I'm always your partner."

       "The book is in a high school, Ryder," Orchid said. "Chances are, we're not home-schooled in the alternate universe, meaning the three of us will be going to that school. You graduated."

       "Yes, exactly why I picked Nolan," I said. I was just going to let Ryder think that.

       Thanks, Orchid, for thinking about that.

       "Alright, are you two ready to go now?" Jerome asked. "The quicker you find the book, the safer we'll be from Dirk."

       "Yeah, we can go now," I said.

       "Do you think two hours will be good enough?" Jerome asked. "I won't know if you've found it or not, so I'll have to just bring you back and hope you found it."

       "What if someone else sees the portal when you're bringing us back?" I asked.

       "Oh, I won't make a portal, per se," Jerome said. "It will kind of be like....teleportation. So, you ready?"

       Nolan and I both nodded.

       "Alright, here goes," Jerome said, turning to where no one else was. He created a portal, but unlike the normal blue colour that his wear, this one was purple. "Remember, it's an alternate universe. Everything will be different and chances are you won't even have your abilities."

       "That's gonna suck," Nolan said. "I like my invisibility." He looked at me. "You ready?"

       I nodded before we both stepped into the portal. When I stepped out, I was in a bedroom that looked fairly similar to mine, though it was a bit bigger with a few toddler things as well.

       I felt bad for alternate universe me, having to share a room with William.

       I looked around but didn't see Nolan with me. I guessed he ended up in his own room.

       But why wouldn't Nolan and I share a room? We were triplets. Why make me share a room with William?

       My cell phone beeped with a message and I took it out of my phone to read it. It was from Nolan, and I immediately knew this mission was going to get a lot worse.

       "Alan!" Orchid called from downstairs. "Hurry up! We're going to be late for school!"

       I put my phone back in my pocket and looked around, seeing a backpack sitting by my bed. I picked it up and then left the bedroom before heading down the stairs to where Orchid was waiting impatiently by the door. I put on my shoes and almost immediately afterwards, she grabbed my arm and pulled me out the door. "Someone's in a hurry," I said.

       "Yes, because you always take forever," she said, closing the door behind her. "And just for that, I'm driving."

       "Aren't we going to wait for Nolan?" I asked.

       Orchid furrowed her eyebrows. "What are you talking about? Nolan always goes with Jerome."

       "Well, sorry for being stupid," I said.

       "I didn't....Never mind, let's just get to school," Orchid said.

       I just realized....I'd actually have to go inside a school. My family had always been homeschooled since we were Protectors, and we also had to train daily. Now, I was going to have to go to a public school and if I wasn't careful, I'd have to go inside a classroom.

       I shuddered at the thought.

       While Orchid was driving us to school, I texted Nolan to tell him that I would look for the book alone since he wasn't going to be able to do it, unfortunately. I brought him for a reason, and he ended up being in a wheelchair for whatever reason.

       What happened in this universe?

       As soon as we got to the school, Orchid walked over to Atticus, and I tried finding where the library was. It was the only place I could think of the book being in. It wouldn't be in a classroom with teachers coming and going, taking all their belongings with them.

       I was finally able to find the library, though it wasn't that hard to miss. I just hoped I would be able to find the book soon before I would be forced to go to class.

       I didn't even know where my class was.

       I walked in the library, thankful that not too many students were there. I went to the furthest bookcase to start looking, but I got another text from Nolan. This one, however, made me chuckle. Poor Nolan. Poor, little Nolan.

       At least he was getting somewhere with Jerome here.

       I put my phone on silent and put it in my pocket before I started looking at all the books for a possible book of spells.

       Would it even be in the library? Was that too obvious of a place to hide it?

       Oh well. I had no other choice. We needed to find it.

       I scanned the books, looking for one that seemed out of place. Since it belonged to Mae's great-grandmother's friend, it definitely would have looked years older than all these books.

       I wasn't finding anything, so I went to the historical section because I doubt many people went there unless they had to look something up for school.

       Then again, that was what the internet was for.

       When I got there, one book caught my attention. I pulled it off the shelf, seeing a very intricate symbol on the front. As soon as I opened the book, I knew it was the one I was looking for.

       That was easy. 

       I didn't have a barcode on it, so I wondered why it was able to stay on the bookshelf for so long without the librarian noticing it.

       I looked back and forth to make sure nobody was looking before sticking it in my backpack, then leaving the library.

       Since I didn't want to go to class, mainly because I had no idea what class I had, I went to hid in the washroom until Jerome brought me and Nolan back to our universe. I wondered how Nolan was doing right now....

       I flipped through the book, looking at a lot of the spells there. Jerome was right. Even though I didn't know much about sorcery, I knew this would give him a lot of leverage against Dirk.

       It felt like forever before Jerome finally brought me and Nolan back. I felt it coming since I was feeling a bit weird and everything was getting blurry, but then I was suddenly back in the HQ.

       "I'm never going back there again," I said.

       "Why? What happened?" Jerome asked.

       "Oh, nothing," I said. "I just didn't like being in a school."

       "Nothing?" Nolan asked. "I was paralyzed from my waist down."

       "How did that happen anyway?" I asked.

       "Car crash, apparently," Nolan said. "I was the only one severely injured."

       "Anyway," I said, holding the book out to Jerome. "I found it."

       "Really?" Jerome asked, taking the book from me and flipping through it. "Oh, wow, these spells are amazing. Thank you."

       "It was no problem," I said.

       "Again, it was," Nolan said. "I was in a wheelchair."

       "Oh, come on, think of the positive thing that happened there," I said, wiggling my eyebrows. Nolan just glared at me in reply.

       "Ooh, I want to know," Orchid said. "What was it?"

       "N-nothing," Nolan said. "Just....yeah, nothing. I'm gonna go train and shoot arrows and....yeah."

       When he walked off, Orchid grabbed my arm and pulled me to the side. "What's up with him?"

       "Oh, he's just flustered because Jerome was his boyfriend in the alternate universe," I said.

       "Aww, really?" Orchid asked. "Okay, that makes me feel more hopeful about them dating here. I really want to see him happy."

       "Yeah, me too," I said.

____________________

Let's all just appreciate Alan's text messages to Nolan. And the contact name. cx

I've still been updating this book every day lol. There are so many intense parts I want to get to.

( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡° )( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡° )