The Curse of the King. Peter Lerangis

Aly. Her skin was ashen, her eyes were only half-open, and her hair was pulled back into a green hospital cap. A breathing tube snaked from her mouth to a machine against the wall, and a tangle of tubes connected her arm to an IV stand with three different fluids.

      Over her head was a screen that showed her heartbeat on a graph.

      Aly’s mom was holding her daughter’s hand. Her face was streaked with tears, and her narrow glasses had slipped down her nose. She looked startled to see us. “Doctor …?”

      “Sorry,” Dr. Karl said, “I’m going to have to ask the kids to stay in the waiting room. Standard procedure for intensive care.”

      “I have to speak to her,” I insisted.

      “She won’t hear you,” Aly’s mom said. “She’s completely unresponsive.”

      “Can I just touch her?” I said.

      “Touch her?” Mrs. Black looked at me as if I were crazy.

      “This is way beyond ICU protocol,” Dr. Karl said. “If you don’t leave now, I will have to call security—”

       BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!

      Cass and I jumped back. “Are they coming to get us?” Cass asked.

      “It’s not a security alarm. It’s something to do with Aly!” I said. Aly’s monitors were flashing red. Her eyes sprang open and then rolled upward into her head. She let out a choking sound, and her body began to twitch. As three nurses came running from the center of the room, Dr. Karl strapped Aly’s arms down.

      “What’s happening?” I demanded.

      “Febrile seizure!” Dr. Karl said. “Clear the area!”

      “But—” I said.

      A nurse with a barrel chest and a trim beard pulled me back, and I nearly collided with Cass. As the hospital staff closed in around Aly’s bed, we both stumbled back toward the entrance.

      “They’re killing her, Jack!” Cass said. “Do something!”

      I dropped my pack. “I’m going invisible. It’s the only way I can get to her.”

      “There’s no room for you,” Cass said. “If you barge in, they will feel you, Jack. It’ll freak everybody out. Total chaos, and it won’t be good for her.”

      “Any other ideas?” I said.

      Cass nodded. “Yeah. I’ll distract them. Give me three seconds.”

       “What?”

      But Cass was already running away, heading toward the table that contained the medical equipment and monitors.

       One …

      I reached into the pack and lifted out the Loculus of Invisibility.

       Two …

      As I stepped forward, the loud beeps stopped. I looked toward the monitors. They were dark. Aly’s equipment had shut down completely. Cass was scampering away from the wall socket, where he had pulled out the plugs.

       Three!

      I heard a shout. Two nurses broke away from Aly, scrambling toward the equipment, leaving her right side wide open. I raced toward her, clutching the Loculus of Invisibility with one hand and the shard with the other. Dr. Karl was injecting something into her left arm, concentrating hard.

      Aly’s chest was still. She wasn’t breathing. I placed the shard on her stomach, just below her ribs.

      “The pads—now!” Dr. Karl shouted. “We’re losing her!”

      “Come on …” I said under my breath. “Come on, Aly. You have to live.” Aly’s eyes stared upward, green and bright, dancing in the light even in her unconsciousness. I felt like I could talk to her, like she’d answer me back with some kind of geeky joke. I wanted to see her smile.

      But there was no reaction. Not a fraction of an inch of movement.

      A doctor was racing toward Aly with two pads strapped to his hands. They were going to try to shock her alive. I pressed the shard harder into her abdomen. I guess I was crying, because tears were falling onto her face.

      Aly’s mom bumped into me and screamed. It wouldn’t be much longer before my invisible presence was going to be a big deal.

      “We have power!” a voice barked. With a soft whoosh, the monitors fired up and the lights blinked on. The heartbeat graph showed a long, horizontal, flat line.

      Dead. A flat line meant dead.

      The doctor placed the pads on either side of Aly’s chest but I did not take my hand away—not even when they shot electricity through her, and her body flopped like a rag doll.

      It wasn’t working.

      Aly was ghost white and still. Her chest wasn’t moving. As Dr. Karl finally called off the electric shocks, I pressed harder than ever, leaning toward her face.

      “I’m … I’m so, so sorry,” Dr. Karl said to Aly’s mom.

      I had failed.

      She was the first to die. One of us would be next, then the other. And then there would be none.

      I brushed my lips against her cool forehead. “Good-bye, Aly,” I whispered. “I—” The words clogged up in my brain, and I had to force them out. “I love you, dude. Yeah. Just saying.”

      I let go of her and walked away toward the center of the room. I felt numb. My eyes focused on nothing.

      “Jack?” Cass whispered, wandering toward me, looking all teary and confused. “Where are you?”

      I picked up the backpack and slipped the Loculus of Invisibility back inside. As I became visible, I noticed I was next to two doctors who must have seen me materialize out of thin air.

      But they hadn’t seemed to notice. They were both staring over my head toward Aly. Gaping.

      Cass turned. His jaw dropped. “What the—?”

      As I wiped away tears, the first thing I noticed was Aly’s mom. She was on the floor, fainted away.

      The second thing I noticed was Aly sitting up, staring straight at me.

      “You love me?” she said.

      

       SHE WAS ALIVE.

      Half of me wanted to jump with joy. The other half wanted to sink down and melt into the linoleum. Dad and Dr. Karl stood by the bed, gaping as if their mouths had been propped open by invisible pencils.

      “I heard you say it, Jack McKinley!” Aly laughed as if nothing bad had happened. “You said, ‘I love you’! I heard it!”

      My mouth flapped open and shut a couple of times. “The shard …” I finally squeaked. “It worked.”

      Aly’s smile abruptly vanished. She looked around the ICU. “Wait. Jack? Cass? What are you doing here? Why am I in a hospital? Why is Mom on the floor?”

      I rushed over. Dad and I both lifted Mrs. Black to her feet. Her eyes puddled with tears. As she hugged her daughter, the place was going nuts. Cass was screaming, pumping his fists. The hospital staff high-fived each other like middle school kids. Dr. Karl looked bewildered. I thought I could see some tears on her cheeks as Aly’s mom hugged her, too.

      “You are a miracle worker, doctor,” Mrs. Black said. “Thank you.”

      “I—I’m