“Whoa,” Josh cried, coming around the side of the container. “A dragon? I didn’t know there was a dragon in this game! Cool!”
“Why, thank you,” Yano replied. “I am pretty cool, aren’t I? I mean it’s not every day you see a dragon with three heads. Also, you should check out these claws.” He held out his paw for Josh to inspect. “Aren’t they just perfectly manicured?”
I rolled my eyes, swatting his paw away. “Yes, yes. You’re a ridiculously gorgeous beast, Yano. Everyone can see that. Now, where have you been? We’ve been flying blind! Or, not flying, that is. When we really needed to.”
“I’m sorry about that,” Yano replied. “It seems I glitched out of the game. And when I tried to get back in, I landed here again, trapped in the shipping container. Only this time you weren’t here to let me out. And it was locked from the outside.” He scowled. “Thanks for coming back for me, by the way.”
“We didn’t,” I admitted. “We glitched out, too. Ended up back here. Evidently that’s what happens if you try to play the unfinished levels. Even worse, you lose all your progress and experience points. Back to square one—literally.”
The dragon’s three heads frowned. “Well, that’s not great.”
“No kidding,” I agreed. “Which means we need to be really careful this time not to die or glitch.”
“Careful is my middle name!” Yano declared. “Well, actually it’s Clive, but I don’t like to admit that.” He furled his wings. “So what are we waiting for? Let’s get this show on the road!”
Josh slapped the dragon on his side. “Sounds good to me! What grand adventure shall we embark on now? Forbidden levels? More capture the orb? Want to see Grandpa’s Fortress of Solitude? That’s something to see!”
I grabbed Lilli by the arm. “Can I talk to you for a second?”
She nodded, though she didn’t look happy about the prospect. I dragged her away from Josh, around the side of the shipping container.
“What?” Lilli asked when we were out of earshot.
“You need to tell Josh to go away.”
She groaned. “Are we back to this again?”
“I’m serious. I know you like him. And you can play soccer with him in the real world all you want. But he can’t play with us in here.”
“Why not? He’s really good. And, let’s face it, we can use all the help we can get. Especially now that we don’t have Starr.”
I raked a hand through my hair, frustration rising. “What if he finds out what we’re really here for? What if he tells his grandfather? All of this will be for nothing.”
“I told you I don’t think he would.”
“Why? ’Cause you two are suddenly besties after ten minutes of game play? You do remember what happened the last time you trusted a guy online, don’t you?”
She recoiled as if she’d been struck, and I immediately felt bad throwing the Logan thing in her face. Logan, whom she’d met online and fallen for, only to find out he wasn’t real—he was just a joke made up by her friends. Lilli had given up video games—all things online, really—after that. Until Dragon Ops, when she rediscovered her love of gaming.
So yeah, a bit of a low blow. But I was desperate! Josh needed to go. Now.
Lilli said nothing for a moment. Her eyes seemed to cloud over as if she was thinking really hard about what she wanted to say next.
“What?” I demanded, an uncomfortable feeling worming through my stomach. Suddenly, I wasn’t sure I wanted to know what she was about to say.
“This isn’t like the Logan thing,” she admitted at last. “I actually know Josh really well. In real life, I mean.”
“What?”
“Yeah. From school. We kick the ball around sometimes at recess. And sometimes we… text and stuff.”
“You text?” I stared at her in disbelief.
Her expression tightened. “Yeah? So what?”
“Lilli, he’s a total jerk.”
“He’s not, Ian. He’s really not,” she insisted. “Look, I know he acts super intense when it comes to soccer. But it’s just ’cause he loves it so much. And he hates that half the team always acts like they don’t want to be there.” She wrung her hands. “Just like you act when someone isn’t all into video games.”
Ouch. I didn’t know what to say. Lilli clearly liked Josh a lot. She’d been hanging out with him. Texting. And I had no idea.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were friends?”
“Gee, I don’t know. Maybe because I knew you’d act just like you’re acting now?”
“And when did this start? This… friendship?” I demanded, though what I really wanted to know was how long she’d been keeping it from me.
She shrugged. “I guess it was right after we got back from Dragon Ops. I was still feeling all messed up at the time, and I didn’t know how to deal. Josh found me under the bleachers during gym class, crying. He sat down and talked to me. He’s a really good listener, Ian. He was there for me when I needed him.”
I stared at her, my heart plummeting. “Oh my gosh,” I whispered. “You told him, didn’t you? You told him about Dragon Ops?” A thread of hysteria wound through my voice, but I couldn’t help it. “How could you?” I whispered.
I couldn’t speak. Emotions ran through me, hard and fast. Lilli talked to Josh about Dragon Ops? She wouldn’t even talk to me about Dragon Ops!
My mind flashed back to all those terrible nights after we’d gotten back from the game. The nightmares waking me in a cold sweat. The way I’d lie in bed, panic burning through me like wildfire. Wanting so badly to talk about what had happened, to try to expel it from my brain. But instead, I’d suffered in silence.
Meanwhile my sister had been texting her new boyfriend in the next room.
“Look, I didn’t know he was Admiral Appleby’s grandson,” Lilli
