Well, that explained why he hadn’t answered when I called.
“Then, since I wasn’t responding to her calls, she started dropping by the house unexpectedly,” he continued. “My family would do as I asked and tell her I wasn’t home, but they like Sarah and didn’t care for lying to her, and I hated putting them in that position.”
“So you basically moved out.”
Smokey shrugged. “I told my family that I had to check into HQ for some training, which isn’t exactly a lie since I’m going to be homeschooled by Mouse. And if Sarah asks, the League isn’t going to tell her anything about who’s in residence at the moment.”
“Speaking of Sarah,” I said, “full disclosure: I spoke with her today.”
Smokey dropped his spoon into the oatmeal, then pushed the entire bowl away before leaning back, looking annoyed. “I suppose she asked you to talk to me.”
“Something like that.”
“And I take it that’s why you’re here.”
“Not the complete reason, but yeah,” I confirmed. “Obviously it’s none of my business, but for what it’s worth, I think you should at least hear her out.”
Smokey looked away for a moment, shaking his head in a woebegone manner before turning back to me. “Did she tell you about our arrangement – the concessions we had to make to her family in order to date?”
“She told me.”
“I guess you think it’s weird.”
I held up my hands in a hands-off fashion. “Hey man, you’re talking to a guy who had to get engaged to someone in order to get home to see his girlfriend. I’m not in a position to judge anyone.”
“True,” Smokey acknowledged with a chuckle.
“So is that why you started missing school, too?” I asked. “Trying to duck Sarah?”
“No,” he stated, shaking his head. “I skipped school because of Atalanta.”
I frowned. Needless to say, his statement bothered me. Playing hooky – even for a pretty girl – was well out of character for my friend.
“Wait a minute,” I said. “You skipped school to hang out with her?”
“Not exactly,” Smokey stated. “She had a problem that she needed some assistance with. Helping her caused me to miss some class time.”
I took a moment to let his statement soak in, not saying anything. Based on what I was picking up from him emotionally, there was more to the story, but I probably needed to get it another time.
“Anyway,” I said, “my talking to Sarah about you was really sidebar to another conversation and segues into the real reason why I’m here.”
I then reached out telepathically to explain about my evil twin – and much to my surprise, hit pay dirt.
Chapter 42
“So Smokey actually interacted with this guy?” Mouse asked.
I nodded. “Yeah, but in a very limited fashion. As far as he was concerned, though, it was me.”
We were in Mouse’s lab. After getting the story from Smokey, I had immediately called my mentor. At that juncture, Mouse was onsite at HQ, so I’d simply teleported and here we were.
“So let me see if I have this right,” Mouse said. “The fake Jim shows up in the teen lounge, sees Smokey, and approaches him. Smokey thinks it’s you, and immediately asks about the mission. Your evil twin says he has to leave, but states he’ll be back in a few minutes and asks Smokey to grab him a soda in the meantime. He then teleports.”
“And about thirty seconds later, I walk in,” I added. “The real me, that is.”
Thinking back on it, it certainly explained why the initial part of the conversation with Smokey seemed odd – as if he were following up on something that had been said before. (And from his point of view, that had been the case.)
“So,” Mouse concluded, “while he seemed to have fooled Smokey, this fraudster didn’t appear to get any useful info.”
“True,” I agreed. “Of course, Smokey’s embarrassed about it. He feels like he’s less of a friend for not being able to tell the difference between me and the fake Jim.”
“Tell him he shouldn’t feel like that at all,” Mouse assured me. “In fact, it was him being a good friend and knowing you that probably made your lookalike skedaddle.”
I gave him a bewildered look. “I’m not sure what you mean.”
“Think about it. Smokey had just asked him about the mission. Presumably, your double didn’t know anything about it. He wouldn’t be able to discuss it without blowing his cover.”
“Or at the very least making Smokey suspicious,” I added.
“Right,” Mouse stated with a nod.
“It’s too bad the League doesn’t have cameras in the teen lounge,” I lamented. “We might have been able to figure some more things out if we caught this guy on tape again.”
“You super teens are under enough pressure,” Mouse explained. “You need to have at least one place you can go and relax without feeling you’re being scrutinized. So, no cameras in the lounge.”
Unexpectedly, my cell phone vibrated, indicating a text message had been received. I pulled it out and glanced at it as Mouse continued talking.
“Anyway, your evil twin didn’t learn anything,” my mentor stated, “even though he got close to someone in your inner circle.”
“Make that two people in my inner circle,” I corrected, frowning.
I handed Mouse my phone, showing him the text that I’d just received, which had come from BT and confirmed my earlier suspicion about who the fake Jim had definitely made contact with. It stated:
Logs show you visiting Paramount twice this weekend.
Chapter 43
“You think you need to go talk to Paramount?” Mouse asked after viewing BT’s text. “Maybe peek inside his head and see what happened?”
I shook my head. “Paramount’s brain is still a block of Swiss cheese to a large extent. It’s still regrowing, healing. Even if I did go and take a cursory glance at what’s in his mind, between the seizures, the memory lapses, and everything else, I wouldn’t know what
