Call Spirits in Your Past **Book Two**

Chapter 13 (Thursday)

"So...what'd I miss?" Ripple whispered, sliding into the desk. Next to her, Maro glanced up, then began scribbling in the corner of his journal. Ripple pulled out her own notebook, opening it quietly. Mr. Judington kept droning on.

Maro slid his notebook towards her, and she leaned over to read the words.

Not much. We've been talking about mission assignments.

Ripple froze. "We're already getting those?"

He wrote again. It is the second half of this class.

She peered around at the rest of their "team." Vizz was asleep on her desk, probably drooling. Treble was carefully writing down everything Mr. Judington said, barely glancing up. Her tongue stuck out. Ripple bit back a groan. They were not ready.

Someone tapped her on the shoulder, and she jolted around in surprise. "Um," Addeline said, clutching a blue book to her chest. "I think that's my desk," she paused. "Ri--" she cut off.

"I'm Ripple," she stood up, letting her roommate slide into the seat. Addeline plopped the book to the desk and swung her backpack off, but Ripple just stood there. Since when had their seating changed?

"Rimira," Mr. Judington cleared his throat.

Ripple flinched. "What?"

"Is there a reason you're getting up in the middle of class?"

In the corner of her eye, Addeline nervously finger-combed her hair.

"Ummm..."

Maro tapped her arm, and she glanced down. "I wasn't here on Tuesday," she read off his notebook, "so I didn't know our seats changed," she looked up at Mr. Judington.

He took off his glasses, rubbing his nose. "Right. Which one of you was here?"

Which one of her? There was only one of her. She read off Maro's notebook again. "Cory," she hid her surprise. Cory had been fronting recently? She scratched her arm. She hadn't noticed anyone else fronting on Tuesday. She'd come to mission training...

"You're just one seat over," Mr. Judington was saying. "On the other side of Addie."

"Oh," Ripple nodded, and grabbed her backpack from where it was still sitting under Addie's desk. She clambered over the empty desk behind Addie, meeting Maro's gaze. Sitting next to him was the only reason she'd been able to keep up in this class. Ribbon sometimes did their homework, but none of the others even tried.

She sat down and took out her notebook again. She flipped it open. Stared. "Wait," she rubbed her eyes. Someone else had been writing in her notebook. She glanced over at Maro, but he was busily writing. She stared back at her own journal. Her own loopy scrawl covered the first page and a half, vague doodles sparsely filling the margins. But large, neat words in clear sentences covered the end of the second page.

"Be sure to write this time down," Mr. Judington said forcefully, jolting her to attention. "Your group only gets one shot at this mission, and if you miss it, well..." he left the thought hanging. Ripple shivered slightly. There was no way she'd pass this class if she didn't show up to her team's assignment. She might not pass anyway, quite frankly.

Mr. Judington began listing off times. "Team Amalgamation: Friday night at four."

Ripple glanced around the classroom. Who'd come up with that name? It sounded complicated.

"Team Flutter: Friday at six. Team MVTR: Friday at eight."

Ripple dutifully wrote the time down, pretending her team was called something a whole lot more awesome. Maybe they could be MVATR now that they had Addie.

"Team El Mejor Saturday at ten--"

A group of students near the back of the room groaned.

"--and Team Teo Saturday at noon," Mr. Judington glanced up from his clipboard. "Did everyone get that? Or do I need to repeat anything?"

No one raised their hands. Ripple glanced toward Vizz, blessing the fact she'd sat up to take notes.

"Great. For the rest of class we'll be going over the scenario the judges have created for you. Edith, could you please pass these papers out?"

A tall girl near the front stood, nodding.

"The seventh grade inspectors have decided this year's mission will be catching a thief. Your role as a team will be to discover the thief, follow them to their hiding place, and apprehend them. Destroying evidence or making your presence known to the public will dock your grade. You can split up jobs between team members, or choose to work together throughout the entire course. You have no official time limit, but here's a tip: the longer you make the judges watch you, the more impatient they'll get. So be fast, be efficient, and don't get caught," Mr. Judington went back to his desk. "Good luck, everybody. That's all I can tell you about the scenario you will face. But," he held up a finger, "remember everything you've been taught so far this semester. You'll realize you know more than you think."

Ripple blinked wordlessly at her notebook. She filled maybe four pages, in probably twice that many weeks. Know more than she thought? She gulped. She barely knew the basics.

Addeline handed her a paper, and she quickly skimmed the paragraph at the top. It said basically what Mr. Judington had just told them. Below that was a rubric, with different boxes describing an "excellent" performance, versus an "unsatisfactory" one. She bit down her panic. This didn't tell her what she was supposed to do. What if one of her alters popped out in the middle of it, and they had no idea what they were doing? Or where they were?

She folded the paper up, catching sight of her name at the top of the neatly written notes in her journal. "Dear Ripple?" she muttered, scanning the block of words again. Her gaze settled at the bottom. "You've got this! Love, Cory."

So Cory had been fronting on Tuesday. And he'd written these notes for her. Huh. She didn't know his handwriting looked like that.