REAP THE WHIRLWIND I FLYNN CARSEN

Hashtag Team Library

Hashtag Team Library

Hey now don't you runaway, don't you runaway
Hey now don't you be afraid, don't you be afraid
You're safe
You're safe...

"She could be anywhere in history!" Clara hissed, rounding on Eve.

"What the hell did that woman do to you, Hartley?" Jacob said worriedly, grabbing her shoulders, stooping down so he was eye-level with Clara. "Tell us, so we can help you," he said gently, holding Clara's wild gaze.

"Please don't leave me," Clara whispered.

"None of us are going anywhere," Ezekiel said, exchanging glances with Eve and Cassandra, "we're hashtag Team Library, remember? No matter what happens, we're here, stuck to you like wet on water."

Clara nodded, biting her lip, her eyes brimming with tears again.

"What's this about the feedback loop?" Jacob then said quietly.

Taking a deep breath, Clara recounted everything Morgan had boasted about the app, what it was capable of. As she glanced round at their pale faces, she suddenly felt like she was standing on solid ground again, that the world made its usual strange sense once more. They had been deceived as she had, lied to like she'd been. But most of all, she was still her, Clara Hartley. They made her what she was, nobody else.

"Morgan's still here," Cassandra said to Clara, "she's not done yet." With you, she silently added, thinking what they were all thinking.

"Never mind her," Jacob said, rolling up his sleeves, "we have to save these kids."

"What do you propose we do, then?" Ezekiel asked, brow furrowing.

"Set off the fire alarms," Jacob said quickly, "evacuate everyone" -

- "These twenty seven kids are linked by the rule of three," Clara said, shaking her head, "the magic will find them anywhere."

"So we have to protect them from here," Eve said, catching on.

"A Faraday cage," Clara said, looking dazed, clutching Jacob's sleeve, "we need to build a Faraday cage."

"A container that protects everything inside from an electrical charge," Cassandra hastily explained, catching sight of everyone else's confused faces.

"We don't have time to construct somethin' like that," Jacob snapped, losing his cool.

"We don't have to," Clara breathed, her gaze being drawn like magic to Amy's display. She rushed over to it, tipping the table over, knocking everything onto the floor, Amy's mother descending on her, practically breathing fire.

"What the hell are you doing!?" she screeched, flapping her hands at Clara.

"You were assigned this booth and table, weren't you?" Clara fired at a startled Amy as she dropped to the floor, peering under the table.

"Yeah, we were all assigned our booths by the McCabe Foundation," Amy said, looking at Clara like she was mad.

"Five legs on a round table," Clara said brokenly, getting to her feet.

"And a pentagram flung in for good measure," Cassandra said, observing the symbols painted on the table's underside.

"We need to take the legs off this table," Clara said quickly, "spread them out, and get everyone inside the radius" -

- "of the pentagram," Cassandra finished for her, grabbing Clara's arm, "but it won't be enough."

"What do you mean?" Eve said urgently.

"We need to supercharge the pentagram," Cassandra explained, "the app - it's a focusing spell. So if we plant stakes and then use it to focus all of our energy on creating a Faraday cage, it will protect the kids from the feedback loop."

"Do you think you can map out the pentagram?" Clara asked Jacob, her hands shaking.

"I was a surveyor for ten years, Clara," he said, ruffling up her hair, "I can do this blindfolded."