“Of course you can,” I said. “The database you can’t hack hasn’t been invented. What about calling the airport? Mr. Fuyijama said the admiral had to go announce more appointments.”
“I already did. IASA refused to authorize an in-flight emergency call, and the plane’s onboard number is just as protected as the admiral’s.”
My mom poked her head in the door. “Theodora? You need to come cut your cake.”
“I’m still packing,” I said, grabbing my duffel bag off my closet shelf and throwing some underwear into it.
“It’ll only take a minute,” she said firmly. “The governor’s here.”
Oh, frick. “Have you heard from Dad?”
“No, but he should be here any minute. Come on. Everyone’s waiting.”
“I’ll be right there,” I said, and called up Dad, but there was no answer. “I’ll only be a minute,” I said to Kimkim. “There has to be some kind of emergency number where we can talk to somebody. Keep trying!” and went out to the dining room.
Everyone in town was there, gathered around a sheet cake with a spaceship and silver stars spelling out “Blast off!” Mom handed me a huge piece, and I gulped it down, nodding while two dozen people I’d never seen before told me how lucky I was, and finally escaped on the pretext of taking Kimkim some cake. She waved it away, intent on her hacking, so I ate it.
“It’s no use,” she said. “I can’t get in anywhere. IASA, the Academy cadet roster, everything’s blocked.”
“But there has to be a number where the cadets can call them if they’ve got questions.”
“There is,” she said, her eyes on the screen. “It’s automated. Press ‘1’ for a list of forbidden kit items. Press ‘2’ for the Academy course schedule. Sixteen menu choices, but none for ‘If you wish to speak to an operator’ or ‘I think there’s been a mistake.’ You don’t remember the name of that recruiter, do you?”
“No. Did you check the name thing?”
“Yes. There’s no Theodore Baumgarten, or Ted, or Dora. Or Bauman or Bauer or Bommgren. The closest thing I found was a Theopholus Bami, and he lives in New Delhi. And is four years old.”
“Oh. I know—look up the Academy rules. Those can’t be encrypted, they’re public record, and there’s got to be something in there about turning down an appointment.”
My mom poked her head in again. “Your dad’s just pulled in,” she said.
Dad. Thank goodness. I waded through the crowd in the dining room again, which now seemed to contain everyone in the state of Colorado, all eating cake, and outside. “Dad, I have to talk to you. I didn’t apply to the Academy—”
“You didn’t?”
“No. I—”
“That’s wonderful! You did just what I always told you to do—follow your own path, be independent, don’t do what everybody else is doing, and look what it got you! An Academy appointment!”
“No, Dad, you don’t understand. I don’t want this appointment. I don’t want to go to the Academy!”
“That’s what you said your first day of school, remember? And do you remember what I told you?”
“The stink bomb story?”
He laughed. “No, I told you to try it for a week and then see how you felt. You’re just having cold feet. When does she leave?” he asked Mom, who’d come up carrying two pieces of cake.
She handed us each one. “In twenty minutes.”
“Twenty minutes?!” I said, looking at my digital. According to it, I still had over an hour.
“IASA called. They said they knew how eager cadets always are to go, so they’re sending the escort over early.”
“I have to pack,” I said, and shot back into my room. “You have to do something. Now,” I told Kimkim.
“I’m trying,” she said. “I looked up the Academy appointment regulations, but there’s nothing in them about turning an appointment down, and I still can’t get through to anybody. I’m afraid you’re going to have to go to the Academy to get this straightened out. It’s the only way you’re going to be able to talk to someone in person.”
“I am not going to the Academy,” I said, tossing clothes and shoes into the duffel bag she’d gotten out. “I’ll hide till the escort leaves. What about your basement?”
“That won’t work,” she said, coming over and taking out the clothes I was putting in. “They’ll think you’ve been kidnapped or something. Remember that cadet in Barcelona whose girlfriend tied him up so she could take his place? They’ll think Coriander killed you and send out an APB. Look,” she said, picking up the list and handing it to me, “you go with them and talk to whoever’s in charge of admissions. I’ll keep working from this end, and as soon as I’ve got something, I’ll message you. Do your mom and dad have a lawyer?”
Mom knocked. “Theodora, your escort’s here,” she said.
“Give me two minutes,” I shouted, frantically trying to find “3 pr. tube socks, white.”
“Here’s your toothbrush and toothpaste,” Kimkim said, “and your phone.”
“Come on, Cadet Baumgarten,” my dad said, opening the door. “You don’t want to keep the Academy waiting.”
“Dad, what’s our lawyer’s name?”
“Oh, for the admission papers and things, you mean? We’ll take care of all that. You just go on and have a good time.” He scooped up the half-packed duffel bag and led me out through the patting, handshaking crowd to the waiting hover. “It’s a good thing you didn’t do what I did in high school,” he said, handing me into the hover. “If you’d set off a stink bomb, they’d never have let you in.”
If only I’d known, I thought. The pilot leaned across me, shut the door, and took off. I took out my phone. “Help,” I messaged Kimkim.
I decided there was no point in trying to explain things to the pilot, especially after he said, “Boy, are you lucky! I’d sell my soul to get into the Academy!” I would just have to explain things again to the person in charge once I got there, and besides, in spite of what Kimkim had said, I was seriously considering making a run for it when he let me out at the gates, but he landed me inside the high, razor-wire-tipped walls and walked me into the main building past two heavily armed sentries and handed me over to a man in an IASA uniform.
“I want to talk to the person in charge of admissions,” I said to him.
“Name?”
“Theodora Baumgarten,” I said, hoping against hope it wasn’t on his list, but he found it immediately, handed me an ID badge, and weighed my bag.
“You’re two pounds over,” he said, opening it and taking out my phone. “You can get rid of this. It won’t work in the Academy.”
Oh, frick, I hadn’t considered that possibility. I’d have to message Kimkim and tell her—
“I have a sentimental attachment to it,” I said. “You can take my curling iron instead.”
The door behind us opened and two girls came in.
“Oh, look at this! I can’t believe we’re here!” one of them said, clutching her chest just like Coriander, and the other one kept repeating, “Ohmigod, ohmigod, ohmigod!” till I thought she was going to hyperventilate.
“You’re still overweight,” the IASA guy said. “You sure you don’t want to give up your phone?”
“I’m sure,” I said, pulling out my iPod and some DVDs.
He shrugged. “Suit yourself,” he said, handed me back the bag, and turned to the Hyperventilator. “Name?”
“Excuse me,” I said, moving back in front of her. “I asked to see the person in charge of admissions.”
“You’ll have to talk to your sector officer,” he said, looking at the list. “H-level. Second elevator on the right.”
I took it down to H, messaging Kimkim the news about the phone on the way down. “Working on it,” she answered immediately, so at least the phone worked in this part of the Academy. They must just jam the student areas, which meant till Kimkim found a way around it, I’d have to sneak off to an area where it did work.